The only LAN tournament that features global competition in the TF2 calendar is in Europe. Despite the record not showing it, this skews the tournament in favour of European teams, and puts the financial burden consistently on the North American and Australian scene. There are some good reasons for this, but equally it seems like a trend that can’t be continued as TF2 expands. TF2 needs an NA Major.
An esports ‘Major’ in other competitive games could be broadly defined as a LAN tournament that brings together a majority of the highest level global teams, and has them competing for a large prizepool. Both the amount of top-tier teams and the prizepot can vary, depending heavily on the context of the scene itself, but in general this definition applies. CS:GO has 3 Majors per year, and Valve has recently increased the prizepool to one million dollars, while Dota 2 has 3 Majors per year with three million dollar prizepools each (as well as The International). TF2 has one Major by these definitions, the UK summer i-series.
The summer i-series occurs each year on the Bank Holiday weekend in August, and plays host to a range of tournaments. The biggest for its scene, and the biggest in terms of viewership, is the TF2 tournament. It functions as the world championship for TF2, simply because it’s the only LAN tournament that global competition attends. Since 2012 we have had at least Europe and North America represented, always with at least two teams from outside Europe attending. However, since the event is always held in the UK, three non-EU teams has always been stretching the community finances to the limit.
ONE EVENT TO BRING THEM ALL
This has created a complete wasteland in TF2 from September to April. Every year, a top team has looked forward across the barren desert towards a shimmering LAN on the horizon, and judged it nothing more than a mirage. The mere thought of holding out through another year of tedium killed top teams that would otherwise have become true superpowers: i49 Epsilon; i52 Mix^ and iM; i55 TLR, nerdRage, Reason, and froyotech. Another Major would certainly have provided the motivation they needed to stick together, halving the downtime between global competition.
Not only would this keep the top talent far more interested, but holding a second Major in North America would boost motivation for European talent to compete for the right to attend, whilst also allowing mid-Invite NA teams to rank themselves against global talent for the first time. The lack of ESEA LAN for North America has had a negative effect on competition, albeit less so than I would have thought, and having a large LAN there would be a great positive for the scene. It would also make the competition for the world championships more even, as NA teams don’t have to deal with jet lag, lack of home support, travel problems, and rental PCs. Not that NA teams appear to need the help.
The more I dig into this idea, the better it seems. So what’s the problem? Why haven’t we got an NA i-series, with top teams flying over from Europe and even Australia to compete every spring? The biggest issue, of course, is money. That perennial thorn in the side of TF2.
AND IN THE DARKNESS, ROB THEM BLIND
The money that teams NA and AU teams required to attend iseries has almost entirely been fundraised. Players have paid a significant amount out of pocket, some more than others, but each year it weighs heavily on the wallets of your average Joe TF2 fan. Fundraising a team from outside Europe requires around 6000 USD to cover flights, accommodation, and rental equipment. This would presumably double the drag on Pugstar McJoe’s wallet, should we wish to run two global events per year. Fundraising 24,000 USD per year, enough to send two global teams per event, could be viable with enough of a gap between the Majors. Is this money well spent?
I’m of the opinion that is would be a wise investment for the TF2 community. Fundraising small projects is never as popular, so the simplistic argument that the money could be pumped into countless smaller online events does not hold water. For the extra money, we would have a scene that kept talent around, bolstered both the NA and EU scenes with regular global competition, and was more likely to grow in terms of viewership. The global iseries events have been a driving force for change, growth, and elevation of skill in this game.
There is also new money entering the scene with the announcement of Valve supporting matchmaking. Larger organisations and companies within esports had their attention taken momentarily by this, before filing it away under ‘potential for investment’. We’ve seen increasing (and perhaps more telling, new) sponsorships from companies over the last year, which appears to correlate with that announcement. It’s put ex-Ascent in a great position with financial backing from Ronin, while nerdRage, Perilous, and Publiclir all have extra cash in their back pockets to attend events from their eponymous sponsors. Perhaps we’re beginning to enter a new era for the community, one where the majority of the financial burden is not on players and fans.
ESEA has always been a huge help in this regard. Top teams from North America (especially with the death of ESEA LAN and associated travel costs) can use ESEA winnings to help them travel across the Atlantic and compete in the UK. Their counterparts in Europe and Australia have no such league with prizepools that large, and would struggle to raise the travel costs. This could be a problem with running two global events per year, as it may increase the yearly cost to around 30,000 USD. In two bursts this may be manageable annually (and Australian competition would also find it considerably cheaper to attend an NA event), but in order to make this a reliable financial reality we either need organisations to invest more heavily in TF2, in a similar vein to Ronin, or for teams to rake in more money from online competitions that are beginning to surface.
WE HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY
One also has to consider the issue of organising a tournament of this scale. While the summer i-series makes it more difficult than necessary with its open tournament and group stage structure, running any global tournament requires exceptional organisation and an existing LAN on which to piggy-back. Attempting to run one from scratch would involve too great a cost, both in terms of money and effort, for the volunteers of the TF2 community to handle. There is a lot to be said for the help and infrastructure than insomnia provides every summer.
Previous attempts at large NA community LANs, like theGXL, have been popular but lacked a large prizepool and suffered from organisational problems. People within TF2 production have had bad experiences with those running GXL in previous years, and have had to stump up a large amount of their personal money to fund the tournament. Finding an existing LAN that can house 8 top teams, is situated in a good location, has potential for sponsorship, and has staff with an amiable working style is a hard task.
In order to minimise the work required, the focus should be on making a closed global LAN, located in North America. Reducing the LAN to eight teams, with two from outside North America and the rest from within, allows the focus to be completely on the global competition whilst still allowing all of the viable NA talent to take part. There are, doubtless, LANs that would be interested in playing host to this event, but it would require time and effort to create these connections and find a venue and sponsor.
THE FUTURE OF GLOBAL COMPETITION
At some point as TF2 grows, we have to improve on our current model of global competition. Our system at the moment requires every top-tier team to be able to make the trip to the UK on one weekend in August, favours European teams at this event, has a large and sudden drain on the community funds (as every team wants to attend this single event), and creates a lull in the rest of the year that kills competition. Creating a Major in North America would be a huge asset for the TF2 community, and should be a focus for 2016/2017 as further sponsors become involved and TF2 grows.
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