|
|
On February 07 2013 03:30 Klonere wrote:
riot subsidizes their entire pro scene essentially. valve already kinda does with TI but i dont really want it to become standard for a developer to have to pay pro-players in order to have a healthy scene, a very dangerous practice imo :-/
If you take a player like Dan Dinh (lol player who is the brother of a player in one of the most popular NA teams). and watch his story you can see just how much they rely on Riot. Dan and his brother got disowned by their parents and dan would always tell his stream he was eating mcdonalds because he couldn't afford anything else, and would complain about having to skip meals for food and stuff like that. Riot started their paying teams thing, Dan starts eating healthy food talks about a gym membership his brother moves into a huge house and dan joins. ect ect.
|
On February 07 2013 03:30 Klonere wrote:
riot subsidizes their entire pro scene essentially. valve already kinda does with TI but i dont really want it to become standard for a developer to have to pay pro-players in order to have a healthy scene, a very dangerous practice imo :-/
If riot didn't provide salary for anyone,the top teams and the teams with the most popular streamers would still be fine because of how popular the game is.
What riot is doing is hugely important to the people that have no other income apart from what they win in a tournament and that's what's keeping them afloat in season 3.I don't see how that is dangerous,they are getting paid for a single season,it's not like riot is giving them a life long contract.
|
But a shitload of teams that didn't qualify disbanded
|
On February 07 2013 03:42 Qbek wrote:
But a shitload of teams that didn't qualify disbanded
so what?
It really wanted too they could have continued on competing,there are just as much tournaments for league as there are for dota out there right now.Fact is a lot of teams were formed to just try and qualify for season 3 and if they failed they disbanded.
|
On February 07 2013 03:30 Klonere wrote:
riot subsidizes their entire pro scene essentially. valve already kinda does with TI but i dont really want it to become standard for a developer to have to pay pro-players in order to have a healthy scene, a very dangerous practice imo :-/
Dangerous? Not that pro-sport comparisons are fair, but that's how many sports DO work. Especially team ones. What's wrong with pumping money into a scene that you're profiting off of?
|
On February 07 2013 03:39 Sn0_Man wrote:
I wonder what riot's response would be to a team that wanted to sell, say, a CJ Entus Teemo skin and split the profits 50/50.
They will do this as soon as dota2 does this.
|
On February 07 2013 03:35 Comeh wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:31 hfglgg wrote:
most sports are not sustainable. how many professionals participare in the olympic games? and keep in mind that traditional sports are often heavily supported with public funds or that there are ways to sustain yourself without getting the money from sponsors. i.e. in germany a lot of athletes are "sport soldiers". this means that they can focus on their sport while getting payed by the government.
well these sports still exist and they are doing just fine with competitions and lots of newcomers every year. I guess the analogy would be that Riot is to the government or the NFL, and the proplayer is the athlete. As of right now, we are organized on a team basis (like...Uh baseball maybe?) where each individual team is self funded for the most part, but the players are also self funded / not really being paid (per se) by the team they are playing for. It works in sports, because of the wide audiences, the ticket prices (and concessions or whatever), and the advertising you can sell. As of now, we don't really have that in our scene, and to some extent its difficult to grow these things naturally unless some big investor decides to come into the scene and establish it.
what esport (dota2) needs is a larger viewerbase. keep in mind, that league of legends had 200k viewer in their first streamed and advertised tournament two years ago (and the production quality was beyond garbage, i muted the sound of every lol tournament ever since) and the userbase has rapidly grown since then.
riot did a nice job in holding this viewercount over the years, but it wasnt that no one cared for lol and then suddenly riot moneyz and ~1mio viewer in their season championship and full professional players.
first there was a massive userbase and on this userbase lol could grow as the esport it is right now.
|
Netherlands45349 Posts
On February 07 2013 03:42 Qbek wrote:
But a shitload of teams that didn't qualify disbanded
And a shit ton in Dota will probably too around the time of TI3.
|
On February 07 2013 03:44 Yoshi- wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:39 Sn0_Man wrote:
I wonder what riot's response would be to a team that wanted to sell, say, a CJ Entus Teemo skin and split the profits 50/50. They will do this as soon as dota2 does this.
WTB No tidehunter T shirt for kunkka.
|
On February 07 2013 03:44 Yoshi- wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:39 Sn0_Man wrote:
I wonder what riot's response would be to a team that wanted to sell, say, a CJ Entus Teemo skin and split the profits 50/50. They will do this as soon as dota2 does this.
*as soon as DotA 2 does it and is successful with it. That's neither a stupid nor an uncommon practice. Riot is most likely the most successful company with their F2P model, Valves version of F2P that they basically introduced without any major risk (TF2) still doesn't do it.
I'm genuinely not even sure why it is more successful (beyond "bigger playerbase") because on paper I find Valves system much fairer and customer friendly.
|
On February 07 2013 03:44 Yoshi- wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:39 Sn0_Man wrote:
I wonder what riot's response would be to a team that wanted to sell, say, a CJ Entus Teemo skin and split the profits 50/50. They will do this as soon as dota2 does this.
Na'Vi weaselcrow courier?
|
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower/mid end teams by giving everyone salary.HotshotGG doesn't give a single fuck about the salary as he's already richer than god,but the new talent will have something to work and improve for,which is a big + imo.
|
On February 07 2013 03:53 TheKefka wrote:
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower end teams by giving everyone salary.
Technically "providing" for teams on a lower level than the very top means increased competition in the future. Increased competition turns into more viewers and more ad revenue for organizers which in return provides for teams via prize pools.
It's not a bad idea at all.
|
On February 07 2013 03:53 TheKefka wrote:
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower end teams by giving everyone salary.
You shouldn't need to be #1 to be sustainable though. There are teams in the NFL for instance that have been utter garbage for years and they still exist. If they were a progaming team they'd have disbanded at the first sign of trouble, but they don't need to win the super bowl to sustain their team.
|
On February 07 2013 03:53 r.Evo wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:44 Yoshi- wrote:On February 07 2013 03:39 Sn0_Man wrote:
I wonder what riot's response would be to a team that wanted to sell, say, a CJ Entus Teemo skin and split the profits 50/50. They will do this as soon as dota2 does this. *as soon as DotA 2 does it and is successful with it. That's neither a stupid nor an uncommon practice. Riot is most likely the most successful company with their F2P model, Valves version of F2P that they basically introduced without any major risk (TF2) still doesn't do it. I'm genuinely not even sure why it is more successful (beyond "bigger playerbase") because on paper I find Valves system much fairer and customer friendly.
TF2 doesn't sell team-branded merchandise because nowhere near enough people who play TF2 care for pro-play, and the pro teams just aren't the same kind of big organizations that could make something like this happen. The individual hats themselves are wildly successful/profitable. Moreso for TF2 than for Dota 2 because the items are more obvious, more customizable, and are useable more often than dota 2 items (something for scout is good for over 1/10 of the classes. Something for tidehutner is good for like 1/100 of the heroes).
|
On February 07 2013 03:56 r.Evo wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:53 TheKefka wrote:
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower end teams by giving everyone salary. Technically "providing" for teams on a lower level than the very top means increased competition in the future. Increased competition turns into more viewers and more ad revenue for organizers which in return provides for teams via prize pools. It's not a bad idea at all.
Exactly,it's actually genius and a pretty good investment.
On February 07 2013 03:57 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:53 TheKefka wrote:
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower end teams by giving everyone salary. You shouldn't need to be #1 to be sustainable though. There are teams in the NFL for instance that have been utter garbage for years and they still exist. If they were a progaming team they'd have disbanded at the first sign of trouble, but they don't need to win the super bowl to sustain their team.
But that's the whole problem with esports.People at the top are fine but they need other people to compete against and if they aren't much of a competition because of financial reasons than your whole scene is kinda fucked.
It's why NA stacraft is complete shit,Koreans come and take everything and the only ones that have money is EG because they are good at marketing and getting sponsors.Also there isn't much money outside of the big events.
|
United States47024 Posts
On February 07 2013 03:43 Zdrastochye wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:30 Klonere wrote:
riot subsidizes their entire pro scene essentially. valve already kinda does with TI but i dont really want it to become standard for a developer to have to pay pro-players in order to have a healthy scene, a very dangerous practice imo :-/ Dangerous? Not that pro-sport comparisons are fair, but that's how many sports DO work. Especially team ones. What's wrong with pumping money into a scene that you're profiting off of?
I think it's necessary in the short term, but it's potentially problematic for the scene to become overly reliant on it.
The thing that fundamentally makes Riot/Valve different from a private sponsor is: Riot or Valve are not invested in the individual success of any particular team. They are concerned with the overall health of the scene as a whole, but not the individual success of teams.
In the absence of private sponsors and in a young, unstable scene, this is an enormous benefit. But in an established scene with sponsors invested heavily into their teams, the potential for growth via those sponsors is far higher than what Valve or Riot can offer. Take, for example, the recent explosive growth among the top DotA 2 teams in China. Teams like LGD and IG have been getting better practice facilities, and getting second teams. The sponsor organizations are invested directly in the success of their individual teams, so they are willing to invest aggressively in growing those teams.
Riot or Valve couldn't do the same thing. They're not invested in a particular team--and what's more they're obligated to maintain a semblance of fairness as TOs/organizers. This means they can't offer the same improvements (practice facilities, etc.) that individual sponsors could because they're obligated to provide them to EVERY team. When the scene is small, their ability to offer benefits to every team is manageable, but as the scene grows, these demands will necessarily grow beyond what Riot or Valve are capable of offering to every team, and the burden must be shifted onto individual sponsors.
|
On February 07 2013 03:57 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 03:53 TheKefka wrote:
The fact is the money/skill disparity between the top teams and everyone under them in dota is so huge that it creates a really big problem for everyone.Sure IG and Navi are good to go but everyone else is kinda fucked and they can't just live and practice like everything is going to be fine,it's a big mental strain.You can only go so far with developing new talent when you are not even sure you will be able to eat from what you are doing.
Riot pretty much fixed that for the lower end teams by giving everyone salary. You shouldn't need to be #1 to be sustainable though. There are teams in the NFL for instance that have been utter garbage for years and they still exist. If they were a progaming team they'd have disbanded at the first sign of trouble, but they don't need to win the super bowl to sustain their team.
NFL teams are big enough to justify losses over years, esport teams are so small they will just go bankrupt then.
|
It's a genius business and marketting practice, which are the areas in which Riot and Tencent are perhaps superior to any other video game company atm due to their deeper understanding of the e-goods model and market. The main issue with a scene like that, however, is that it's not self-sustainable in the long term and likely to fall apart as soon riot pulls its own money out of the market.
Riot will subsidize the pro scene as long as it makes money, which will occur for the foreseeable future. It is also highly likely that this infusion might be a quick and easy way to boost the scene to a state of self-reliance (see korea) and as long as they keep the title of "biggest whatever" in esports without the costs becoming prohibitive it will always be worth it.
|
United States47024 Posts
On February 07 2013 04:03 Kupon3ss wrote:
Riot will subsidize the pro scene as long as it makes money, which will occur for the foreseeable future. It is also highly likely that this infusion might be a quick and easy way to boost the scene to a state of self-reliance (see korea) and as long as they keep the title of "biggest whatever" in esports without the costs becoming prohibitive it will always be worth it.
From what I'm aware, Riot provided the least help to Korea in growing it's competitive scene. OGN's tournaments haven't been Riot-managed from the very beginning, and I believe OGN is managing the Korean LCS equivalent (and not playing by Riot's rules no less, as single sponsors are allowed to have multiple teams).
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
