- 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 HL S5 League Structure, Plans, and More (Part 1)

   exa   - 1/6/2020

Register Now For Season 5


Important Details


  • New Team Registration Ends & Invite Fees Due: February 4th (Invite registration ends January 27th @ 6 PM EST)
  • Invite Qualifiers: February 2nd – February 3rd
  • Placement of Teams: February 6th
  • Weekly roster join limit changes from unlimited to two per week: March 1st
  • Regular Season: February 10th – March 23rd (7 Weeks)
  • Roster Locks: March 16th
  • Playoffs: March 30th – April 20th* (3 Weeks)

* Invite/Adv will have GF an extra week if double-elimination is ran.


How to find a team to join



Finding a team is not hard, but it does require you to put in a little effort.

New Players to Competitive:

We encourage you to make a post in the websites Looking For Team (LFT) section and also post in our Discord #lft channel.

You should also contact leaders of teams who need a player. You can find them listed in the Teams Looking for Players (LFP) section and also the LFP section of our Discord #lfp channel.

Experienced Players to Competitive:

We particularly encourage you to make a thread on the RGL HL LFT forums section. This will allow you to advertise yourself to higher profile teams.

Browsing the LFP section of the forums will also present you with many teams that are looking to recruit players.


Survey Results



RGL HL S4 Postseason Survey Results

Here are the results for the Season 4 Postseason survey that we published weeks ago. Throughout this article, Season 5 changes that were made as directly as a result of community feedback are highlighted.


League Format


With Season 5 of RGL Highlander beginning, there are many changes that we wish to change or improve on that were either successful or were not very well received by players in the third season.

Invite

Regular Season

  • Team Fees will remain $130 per team. This is to maintain the $1,000 prize pool for Invite, as well as cover fees from PayPal.
  • We will push for an 8-team Invite for Season 5. If we do hit 8 teams, this means that Invite have a 7-week regular season.

Advanced


This was a question posed in the survey regarding the guidelines for Advanced. It seems that most players wish to continue our current system of class restrictions and approval for Invite players offclassing in Advanced. We will also have a public forum post detailing these restrictions.


All Divisions Structure


Map Pool (In no particular order)


  • koth_cascade_rc1a
  • koth_ashville_rc1
  • koth_product_rcx
  • pl_swiftwater_final1
  • pl_upward
  • pl_vigil_rc6 (rc7 will be played if it is released)
  • cp_steel

NOTE: The latest versions of each map will be played. The map order will be announced in a future article before match schedules are released.

Regular Season


  • Invite and Advanced will feature a round-robin format.
  • Main, Intermediate, and Open will feature a Swiss-format.

Playoffs


The number of playoff spots may grow/shrink depending on division size before Week 1.

  • Invite - double-elimination structure - top 4 teams
  • Advanced - double-elimination structure - top 4 teams
  • Main - single-elimination Swiss bracket - top 6 teams
  • Intermediate - single-elimination Swiss bracket - top 8 teams
  • Open division - single-elimination Swiss bracket - top 8 teams

Lower bracket final match will be played on Monday. Grand Finals (if it gets to a second match) must rescheduled to a day that works for both teams.

Please note that a team’s division is still subject to change as the week goes on or if a team leader can make a compelling case for being in a division. Players that leave and join new rosters during the season will also be monitored. If you believe that a team should be in a different division, you can contact us here on Discord.


Rule Changes


Ever since the introduction of RGL Highlander, we have continued to modify the rules to better address the issues that occur in the format. We are also introducing the Global RGL Ruleset which will apply to all the formats in RGL. In addition to this, we also have format specific rules.

We have spent a good amount of time this offseason to work on updating our rules. You can view the full updated rules here.




To prevent teams from further abusing the rules and rulebook, particularly during playoffs pick/ban stages, the above rules now apply to all teams.




The witch hunting section has been updated to include sections about withholding information and reporting the abuse system. This is part of the global rules that applies to every format in RGL.



The account sharing section has been updated. This will be in the global rules section.



The match communications are a place where all final agreements should be made by both team leaders. It is an area that administrators will check to ensure that there are no issues with a match and that the process is running smoothly. Team leaders that are posting spam, inappropriate messages, or content that does not contribute to the match negatively affect the volunteer work and time of staff members. As such, we will be updating the match communications rule to add the above:



The map pick/ban system will be updated. The higher seed during playoffs now has the option in whether they want to be the first or second team in the map pick/ban system.


The default ringer rule has been a rule that has been implemented in the first season of RGL Highlander and seen in Prolander and ETF2L. The intention of this rule is to encourage sportsmanship, while also preventing team leaders from denying the request of all ringers. It is understandable that the availability of players may fluctuate and often a substitute cannot make it either -- which leads to the last resort of ringing a player to replace the starting player for the match. The issue lies when teams are intentionally abusing the default ringer rule by doing the following:

  • Replacing their starting player who is readily available and intentionally using a default ringer to “upgrade” their roster
  • Default ringing a player who is eliminated from playoffs and intentionally using them as a starting player to “upgrade” their roster

It also begs the question of: what is the point of having a roster of 18 player slots if teams are ringing more players for matches than substitution players? It has become abundantly clear that defined roles of a substitution player have become less prevalent and meaningful overtime as a result of the teams being able to default ring a player.


As such, we will be updating the default ringer rule for Invite and Advanced as shown above.



Home/away side advantages, particularly on stopwatch maps, favors the home team that can pick their side for the first and third halves. This is further displayed with the ability of teams being able to maintain home status throughout the regular season as a direct result of the Swiss system. We will be implementing a rule that has been ran in ETF2L for many years with having teams opt for a melee fight to decide choice of color, if neither side can decide.


Other


Staffing Changes


We are moving our division admins around for Season 5.

The following reflects the updated positions of each admin in RGL HL:


The following reflects the updated positions of each division moderator in RGL HL



Registration


While in admin placement, there is now an option to indicate your preferred division.


Roster Transactions



Inside of our divisions, this proposition had a 82% approval rating. Given the overwhelming response, we have decided to implement a system with the goal of monitoring roster transactions after division placement and registration. Effective for the regular season, when a player join request is approved by team leaders the joining player will enter a “pending administrative review” status on the roster. Administrators may deny a team join request if the skill level of the player is inappropriate for the division. Extra scrutiny towards roster transactions among teams already at the top of their divisions will be given. Class restrictions or locks may be given to players on approval and will be noted appropriately on a public forum thread. It is not expected that much oversight will be needed, but we hope to avoid cases seen during Season 4 where the top teams inside of divisions were able to roster inappropriately skilled players.

In addition to this, we have implemented a rule limiting roster transaction counts during the regular season as a preventative measure towards roster hijacking. During the first two weeks of the season, teams may make as many roster transactions as needed. Following this period, teams will be allowed two roster joins per week until rosters lock.

Roster transaction rules will not apply to the Invite division.

Player eligibility for matches as a non-ringer will be granted after the admin review status is removed, provided they have been on the roster for 18 hours (including time pending review). As a reminder, teams are still granted the ability to use a default ringer inside of RGL matches, if they follow the necessary criteria as specified in our rules. In the event of administrators taking longer than reasonable to review roster transactions, please alert staff so that your players may be cleared for matches in a timely manner.


Number of Non-NA players per roster



With most players opting to keep the current cap at 2, the rule will stay in affect.


Match points vs. Win/Loss Calculations



Under the match points system, teams are ranked in the league table based upon points they earn during regular season matches. Each match played inside of RGL is worth a maximum of 3 points. A winning team can earn between 2 and 3 match points; a losing team can win between 0 and 1 match point. Both teams earn points based on the number of rounds they win in the game. Based on large approval to keep this system, we will be continuing to use match points to rank teams during the regular season.


Prize Winnings


For RGL HL Season 5, our expected prize pool is looking to sustain the $1,000 prize pool for the Invite division. Payouts to the top 3 teams. Subject to increase as the season goes on.

1st Place
$520

2nd Place
$354

3rd Place
$126



Invite S4 Results


Congratulations to the winners of their respective categories:

– pablo
– rain
– eX.Hunter
– dog
– Chubbz
– exa_
– Toy
– lenny
– Micahlele
Caster of the Season – Kresnik
Debut of the Season – Rayman5000
Best Player of the Season – dog


Part 2 Article


More rule edits, details on anti-cheat, and other map pool details will be announced in a part 2 article.


Forum Post

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