League Decisions

[Wyzaaad]

Fellas,

At last Thursday's practice, we decided as a group that we would like to participate in two leagues this year. We have the choice of 3 legitimate leagues: CEVO, ESEA, and ECO. We should agree as a team on what everyone wants to do (I've put a poll up for us to choose our options). I've given my input below.

Timing:
ESEA and CEVO play-offs are ending around the same time (end of July). I suspect that there will be a short break, (1 or 2 weeks) registration, pre-season, and regular season matches will start after that. CEVO started before ESEA this last season; however, the ending times of the seasons suggests that they'll start around the same time this go 'round.

ECO has not announced a start date yet for their league since they are still refining their ACS, but I expect them to start around the same time as CEVO and ESEA. They released a news update yesterday if you'd like to take a look: ECO League CS:S News Article.

Competition:
All three leagues seem to be sticking to one format as far as divisions: Open/Amateur, Main, and Invite. While I believe that last season's main+ teams in ESEA-O and CEVO-A (due to the disbanding of CAL last season) will be moved up, I expect there to be the same problem in ECO this season (especially since I don't see any teams placed in the main or invite divisions - if someone can pull up a main or an invite team list, please tell me how you did it). That could mean that everyone plays in open their first season or that ECO will do move-ups by application. It's tough to say at this point.

Organization:
I think of all the leagues ECO will be the least organized since it is their inaugural season (despite being mostly returning CAL staff), but all leagues I believe will be reasonable enough to have fun playing in them (as far as organization is concerned).

My Thoughts:
If I had my pick, I'd do ESEA and CEVO since they are the most well established. I'd also like to throw out there that we concentrate on one league (i.e., if it comes down to practicing one map or the other, let's practice the ESEA map). I believe ESEA is the most organized, has the most proven anti-cheat client, and provides a lot of cool extras as far as self-recording demos and match statistics. I will point out that one potential bad point about ESEA is that we do not get to use our own server - just something to consider.

What are everyone else's thoughts? I'll recap my questions:
1) Which leagues?
2) Go hardcore on both or concentrate on one?

ycfx

[Joe15555]

Well, participating in three leagues is definitely out of the question. As far as ECO goes, I haven't heard anything positive or negative, so we'll have to wait and see on that one. It would be nice to have one free league, and one paid league.

I also just noticed that the ECO league has de_cpl_fire on their rotation, which is very intriguing. I can almost assure you all that we will participate in the ECO league, as I don't think we can pass up on the idea of matching a team on fire.


We shall play it by ear, and by member opinion.



All the best,


Joe