- Interested in helping out RGL and being a part of the staff team? Open staff positions and applications for SUMMER 2024 can be viewed here.

- Click here to complete S17 Post-Season Survey #1! Survey closes in on Apr 9th @ 11:59PM EDT!

- Click here to complete RGL LAN 2024 Survey! Survey closes in Apr 7th @ 11:59PM EDT!

RGL Conduct Survey #3, New RGL Pages, Feedback, October Bans, and More

   exa   - 11/20/2020
Past monthly articles: January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September


RGL Conduct Survey #3


We want to continue to improve and refine our ruleset by ensuring edge cases are addressed appropriately and our rules take community sentiment into account. As such, we want to listen to our community's opinions as to what they believe is appropriate. In the above survey, there are questions about conduct that we want feedback on.


Addition of new RGL pages / Reorganization


We have added new pages under the league navbar. The goal is to include accessible information about the latest map pool for each season, a list of staff and division admins for contact, and any other frequently asked questions that a player may have.


Also, we have moved the individual format rules to different rules documents for easier accessibility. This means that the 6s, Highlander, and Prolander now have their own page, which can be viewed on the rules navbar on the RGL site.


General RGL.gg Feedback (Site, Forum, League, etc.)


On September 14th, we released a survey to help give us feedback on how to improve the league, our various platforms, and possible projects that we are interested in pursuing. We also had a field that allowed players to send in feedback to the league. This section will be to address common feedback.


"A lot of the newer players who answered the polls thought that while they had fun playing RGL, it could be hard for some to find teams or players."

This is an important topic. While advertising for a particular season or format is important, it is equally important if not more important to have the proper resources to help guide a newer player understand how to properly get set up inside of the league. This refers to also understanding the competitive lingo, understanding how and where to look for a team or players, knowing what the whitelist restrictions are, what the rules are for the format, and more. RGL now has a video and guides department team. With the help of these new staffing teams inside of our league, we aim to create resources specifically to help newer players. Coinciding with the development of the upcomingRGL site UI overhaul, this should help with making the site more intuitive and user-friendly to direct players to important resources in an easy matter.

“A lot of newer players were having trouble making the difference between Amateur and Newcomer, especially skill-wise and admin wise.”

Newcomer is a division that was first introduced in our No Restriction Sixes format in the spring of 2019, Traditional Sixes and Prolander in autumn of the same year, and Highlander in the summer of 2020. This is a division that is specifically geared towards players that are new to the competitive TF2 scene (hence its name). Amateur is the division above Newcomer, which are for players that have a couple of beginner seasons under their belt, yet are still a new player.


We have a table in our global rules that can be used for players to have a basic understanding of the skill range of each division that RGL has in its formats. Making this more visible either on a registration page or under the league table would help. This will be looked into. If you ever have a question regarding a player that you feel is too experienced for your division, we request that you message your division admin so this can be dealt with appropriately.

Regarding the structure with admins, each division for RGL Traditional Sixes and RGL Highlander functions with a separate division admin for each division. This helps split the workload among the volunteer staff members, rather than having one league admin oversee multiple divisions. There are also division moderators for our divisions that are there to help with answering questions, being available on match days to deal with match disputes, and assist their division admin. It should be noted that we do have the list of division staff found under the league table of our formats, in our admin Steam group, our #information channel in the RGL Discord, and now on the staff list article on RGL. Staff members will do their best to reply to messages as soon as they can, but will not always be immediately available. We recommend also using the support ticket system in our Discord server to get into contact with the appropriate admins, which can get a faster response in time-sensitive cases . Ultimately, it must be reiterated that staff are all volunteers and are doing their best with their limited time to assist players in an appropriate time and manner.

“Certain people found the names for Div-1 and Div-2 to be confusing or not good.”

The staff agrees that the names for Div-1 and Div-2 in Traditional Sixes should be renamed, as it does not match the rest of the naming scheme of the divisions in our league. Furthermore, with Highlander looking to add more divisions, this would mean that any new division names would have to be consistent between formats in RGL. We have come up with new possible names for future seasons to remedy this. This will be addressed in the upcoming season articles.

“Make guidelines of what HL = in 6s clearer.”

The experience guidelines of a Highlander player seeking to play in the Traditional Sixes format are not exactly 1:1. What this means is that a player that participates in Invite Highlander may not be an Invite 6s player. This is due to the varying classes a player may play in Highlander (spy, pyro, etc.), the difference in DM abilities, and experience drop-off when transitioning to a new format. As such, this is why higher experienced Highlander players are often participating in the lower divisions of Sixes. This is due to the case-by-case nature that each player brings as mentioned above. Having some examples of common causes of a Highlander player being restricted in a publicly visible page is an area that will be looked into (e.g. An Invite HL sniper would be class restricted from Intermediate 6s).

“Visibility of the rules, as well as understanding them is too difficult.”

The sheer length of the RGL rules document at 54 pages made it hard to search through and find relevant details. This is due to all the format rules (HL, 6s, PL, NR 6s, etc.) being in the same document as the global rules at the top of the document. We have split the format rules into separate documents (one for HL, one for 6s, one for PL). Additionally, this will be done for our forum rules as well. Having the rules be on the navbar of the RGL site instead of under the league tab should also help with the visibility.

“Some people in Amateur were requesting that admins review teams earlier in the preseason.”

For the upcoming Traditional Sixes season, registration will end a full week before the first match of the regular season (a week earlier than it has in the past). Payment registration deadlines will be moved to 2-3 days before the season starts. A benefit of this will be to give teams more time to deal with the payment for the division that they will be playing in. Appropriate class restrictions for particular teams would be able to be issued earlier in advance, rather than a short notice before the match. This is in contrast to the prior seasons of RGL SIxes where the timeframe from registration ending to the first match of the season was very short, which led to short notice about their match schedules, payment, and possible class restrictions. If players are concerned about class restrictions in particular, they should feel free to reach out to the admin of the division they are wanting to be placed in to get an early understanding of possible class restrictions (though nothing is guaranteed until registration closes for placements).

“Cap of 2 non-NA players per roster should be revised.”

For those that may be unaware, RGL has a region rule where there is a maximum capacity of two players who are not from the league’s respective region. This rule serves the purpose of addressing high ping players, as well as the unfamiliarity of the league equivalencies that exist from a SA league to a NA league. We have plans to update this rule in the future to specifically address non-NA players (in regions like Colombia and Peru) that receive around 110 ping to Chicago servers. In these particular cases, players are pinging better to NA than they are to Brazil and may have no better option than RGL for competitive TF2 play. The exact details of this rule will be better defined in an offseason article.


“A lot of people said admins were hard to reach during match times because those admins are also playing a match.”

This is valid feedback. The issue with our current and past division admins is that many of them do participate in the league’s formats. In a grassroots competitive scene, RGL has a staff team that is made up of players that participate in the scene, which allows them to make decisions that have an impact on the community and scene at large. Since RGL is a non-profit organization (which has been losing money every year and just recently broke even in 2020), the staff members that make up the league consist of volunteers that dedicate their free time to support the league out of their own energy and willpower. It can be increasingly difficult to find a staffing team that meets the expectations that RGL seeks, and often players that no longer play in our leagues may not necessarily want to volunteer to help the league. Although RGL has routinely opened up staff application forms for their formats, this does not necessarily translate to many applicants -- specifically members that have a good reputation in the community and hold the standards and workload that we are looking for. It must be stated that being a league admin does require an individual to devote time outside of the game, which not everyone may want to do. With this being said, we will look for ways to improve communication times during match days for our division admins that are also playing in matches. Potential solutions include having division moderators that are not playing in our league (recruitment can be an obstacle) or having division admins fill in for a particular staff member that may be playing in a match and are unable to handle requests. We also want to encourage players to start using our Discord support ticket system, since this will contact all the staff members for that particular department to be able to help you if your particular division admin is not readily available to assist you.


Global Rule Edits



[1002.4.1] - Using a banned player in a scrimmage has been updated to only apply to permanently banned players. The previous rule iteration included players serving a minimum sentence of 6-months or longer. RGL Conduct Survey #3 polls the community on whether or not they think this rule should apply to non-perma'd players (specifically 6-months to less than a perma).

has been updated to:


We have also updated the skill range for our division guidelines for players to better understand the divisions before registration. We plan to make this table more visible either on the registration page or on our FAQ page.


Bans


These bans were enacted before the release of this article. If you would like to file a report, you can do so on our site here. This form will be for appealing indefinite bans in RGL.gg and this form will be for appealing all other bans in RGL.

NOTE: We only look at user-submitted reports. If you do not file a report, then there is a good chance that we have not seen it and are unable to deal with the situation.


Sexual harassment and inappropriate/lewd behavior


The following players have received permanent suspensions from RGL:

  • Kalvyn' - Breaking RGL's player conduct stance through improper interactions with a minor(s) in sexually suggestive ways.
  • Colonel Sanders - Breaking RGL's player conduct stance through improper interactions with a minor(s) in sexually suggestive ways.



Cheating


The following players have been caught cheating by the RGL Anti-cheat team and will be banned:

  • tired - 1-Year / Cheating - First cheating offense
  • Devil Krudz - 1-Year / Cheating - First cheating offense

NOTE; There will be an anti-cheat article coming out by the end of the month to address several topics surrounding AC.


Account sharing / Ban Evasion / Alting


The following player evaded their ban by playing matches on an alternate account.


The following account will be banned for being an alternate account to dope:


The following player knowingly supported the above alt account in evading their ban and playing in multiple matches during the season and will be banned for 6-months:




Alting


The following alternate accounts have been caught connected to existing accounts in RGL by the RGL Anti-cheat team and will be banned:




Probation


The following players have been banned and placed on probation:

  • rev - Minimum 4-months - Use of a transphobic slur, intentionally leaking match connect and STV information leading to a disruption of the match, as well as throwing in an Invite casted match.
  • Gabino - Minimum 3-months - Using a racial slur during a scrim, targeted harassment of another RGL player, and inclusion of a banned player who used a racial slur during a scrim.

After the minimum period has been served, the players can appeal to have the ban lifted if they can show that they've improved themselves and how they interact within the community.


League


  • XON MantiCoreGames - Doxxing and harassing players in the community. - 6-Months
  • gibus - Intentionally disrupting and interfering by connecting to an ongoing RGL match. - 1-Month



Sportsmanship and Spirit


The following players have/had been suspended for 1-6 weeks for their usage of racist slurs, homophobic or transphobic language, excessive toxicity and flaming, or derogatory language on our platforms. Repeat offenders will get longer ban lengths.

  • narwool - Use of a racial slur during a match. - 2-weeks / First Offense
  • ash - Use of homophobic slurs in a scrim. An increased sentence for Invite players.. - 3-weeks / First Offense
  • Silence - Use of a transphobic slur during a scrim while actively banned. - 5-weeks / First Offense



Demos


The following players have failed to provide a requested demo. The first offense during the regular season will be a warning. A second offence during the regular season or a first offence during playoffs will lead to suspensions.

  • shogaaa - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • jupit - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • syath - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • skip - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • pmn06 - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • Shoutzo - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • skip - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • Cutlery Box - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • Daffodil - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • owen chungus - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • mxr - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • elijah - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • mkz - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • pro gamer with a giant mousepad - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense
  • dino - Failure to Submit Demos: 1st Offense



VAC Ban


The following account has been banned for having VAC bans that may be affecting TF2. If you have a VAC ban for a game that is not TF2, please contact an admin to get the ban removed.



You can read further details and context about each of the player's bans by viewing their discipline history on their RGL profile.