HL Season 18 New Team Registration End Date

A Closer Look at the Product and Ashville Results

exa - 2/1/2020

Past articles: RGL HL S5 League Structure, Plans, and More (Part 1)
RGL HL S5 Updated Map List, Invite Qualifers, and More

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 with double-elimination.

In the article RGL HL S5 Updated Map List, Invite Qualifers, and More, we publish the survey results for the Ashville and Product surveys, as well as announced the map pool for the upcoming Highlander season. There were several updates made to the article shortly after that needs to be reiterated. It also seems that our communication of the reasoning and purpose of the Ashville update was not as clear as it should have been, so this article will aim to correct common misconceptions that have been floating around.

A Closer Look

Shortly after we initially released the edited map pool for RGL Highlander Season 5, it came to our attention of the mistake of having only one division play a different version of a map, separate from the rest of our league. Upon further review with our admins, it did not make sense from a logical standpoint to have divisions run different versions of the same map. Having consistency among all the divisions in their map pool, whitelist, and etc. is an important aspect that was overlooked. All the divisions will be running the nobuild version for the upcoming season.

Why run the nobuild version? The votes were close?

First, we must take a closer evaluation of the votes, where 38 Invite players (54%) voted for the nobuild version, 22 Invite players (31%) opting to play the regular Ashville version, and 10 Invite players (14%) voting to play a new map. It is clear that a majority of Invite players want to play the version with nobuild in shutter. An aspect that players brought up is why a decision was made to run the map, if the votes were so close. It should be noted the notion of running this map largely has the goal of being an experimental change. This was an aspect that was not stated in the previous article and is one that needs to be addressed. After the season concludes, we will be releasing a follow-up poll to gauge feedback and evaluate community opinions to decide how we want to advance.

We must also take a closer look at what the other divisions voted for.

In Advanced and Main, both of these divisions all voted for the nobuild version over the regular version of Ashville. We then see the Intermediate and Open divisions voting against such a procedure. With the top 3 divisions all voting for the nobuild version over the regular Ashville, it serves as a representation of what the top divisions want.

To what extent do Advanced/Main/IM/Open player results matter in the final decision-making?

It should be noted that in the survey, the premise of parsing and publish Invite player results was an important aspect. These are players that typically will have the most experience, knowledge, and understanding of the core issues of the format. Thus, their opinions will naturally carry more weight than a newer player in the Open division that is still learning the ropes of competitive Team Fortress 2. In the particular surveys for both Ashville and Product, we looked at the Invite player results first and then looked at what the other divisions voted on when coming to a final decision on the changes to be made.

It should be highlighted that players with no division experience also voted on the Surveys. In non-Invite divisions, 50 players voted for the nobuild version (14 non-division players), 69 players voted for the regular version of Ashville (26 non-division players), and 51 players (15 non-division players) voted to play a new or different map. Subtracting the non-division player results yield us with 36 players voting for the nobuild version, 43 players voting for the regular Ashville version, and 36 players voting for a different or new map. This effectively means that 70 Invite players voted, 115 players in other divisions voted, and 55 players with no division experience voted.

With only 117 players voting in the other divisions (includes players that are simply registered in RGL and voted), this offers a relatively small sample size of what the other divisions want. This is in retrospect, where we have 70 Invite players vote for the same Ashville survey. If this was due to a lack of turnout among players to vote on the survey, it is clear that more players need to be participating in these surveys to get a better representation of what the players want.

What about Product?

In these results, Both Advanced and Open voted against playing Product every season. It should be highlighted that only about 36% of players in Advanced want to play Product every season.

We will do the same with Product. In non-Invite divisions, 57 players voted to play Product every season (17 non-division players), 56 players voted to alternate or retire the map (12 non-division players. Subtracting the non-division player results yield us with 40 players voting to play Product every season and 44 players voting to alternate or retire the map. This effectively means that 56 Invite players voted, 84 players in other divisions voted, and 29 players with no division experience voted.