[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />I think the main truth is I doubt the IDL will change, the board will argue and Ralph will resist everything like usual.&nbsp; I&#039;d rather we try some new things and fail than stick with the same old gig.&nbsp; Lots of people seem to accept the IDL as good enough, but it can be better.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />Change in what way?&nbsp; I&#039;d argue that IDL went through a major change in Season 5, mostly all of which was Ralphis&#039; idea.&nbsp; In fact, the only thing I can think of in recent memory he said he&#039;d veto was switching to 4v4.&nbsp; I would also rather avoid a big change that destroys the league as opposed to doing the same thing next season.&nbsp; IDL is good enough, and it can be better.&nbsp; That doesn&#039;t mean we have to overhaul everything every season, that&#039;s madness.&nbsp; <br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />Most people resist changes on grounds which often can be tough to argue against, but the fact is debating and winning arguments isn&#039;t what should decide how a league is run.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />What do you mean, &quot;the fact is debating and winning arguments isn&#039;t what should decide how a league is run&quot;?&nbsp; How else are we supposed to decide things?&nbsp; This is how humans operate.&nbsp; Either one person decides what will happen, or multiple people decide what happens.&nbsp; If multiple people are deciding, there are going to be arguments and debates.&nbsp; I don&#039;t see how this is complicated, and I don&#039;t see what you are advocating.&nbsp; Should the board disband and let Ralphis do whatever he wants?&nbsp; Or should we throw Ralphis out?<br /><br />Are you saying that good sense is being shut out by oblique arguments?&nbsp; OK, let&#039;s take the 3v2 issue.&nbsp; We talked about this a little, and we agree that it&#039;s stupid to have these games, but I think it&#039;s better than allowing teams to force 2v2.&nbsp; You think that it would be easy to figure out if teams are doing this, and to just forfeit them.&nbsp; How is it easy to do this?&nbsp; Here&#039;s the options as I see them:<br /><br />[list]<br />[li]Put a limit on number of 2v2 games[/li]<br />[li]Track down absent players and see if they&#039;re really absent[/li]<br />[li]Just guess[/li]<br />[/list]<br /><br />These options blow.&nbsp; No limit on 2v2 games will be fair, no one&#039;s going to volunteer to hunt down players who are skipping games (assuming this is even possible), and guessing is obviously retarded.&nbsp; Even worse, it sounds like you want the IDL Administration to arbitrarily forfeit teams by &quot;figuring out&quot; if their players are skipping.&nbsp; Why do you think we would open ourselves to more accusations of favoritism and politics?&nbsp; What we&#039;re actually going to do is require that teams have 3 players, or forfeit.&nbsp; This will cause more forfeits, but it seems like the community prefers that to lame games, and I feel that way also.<br /><br />Do you know why I want explicit, specific and clear rules?&nbsp; Why I want to stick to the rules as strictly as possible?&nbsp; It&#039;s because it is fair.&nbsp; Everyone in IDL knows basically how the league works, and when my friends are like, &quot;come on Ladna, I thought we were cool&quot;, I can say to them, &quot;yeah but rules are rules, and if we do this for you then we have to do it for everyone.&quot;&nbsp; So when we do things like let Cha0tix into the league to play for Shakal, it&#039;s because it didn&#039;t change anything.&nbsp; He wouldn&#039;t have joined the league to play for anyone else, and because he franchised, nobody had the opportunity to pick him from the draft anyway.&nbsp; We debated this up and down, because Chow&#039;s a big douchebag!&nbsp; But we decided that we should do it for the following reasons:<br /><br />[list]<br />[li]Shakal did us a favor and took over the team with... 6th pick after the franchise deadline[/li]<br />[li]It didn&#039;t change anything for other teams, their franchise decisions wouldn&#039;t have changed[/li]<br />[li]Cha0tix is a strong player, and besides the fact that he makes BSK a competitive team, IDL is where strong players belong - at least we like to think so[/li]<br />[/list]<br /><br />The situation with DMR was more of an emergency, and it definitely impacted the league.&nbsp; A strong DMR team has the potential to win against WDC teams and change the playoff picture there, thus changing the Masterbowl matchup.&nbsp; This isn&#039;t as clear cut, but I think that saving DMR and pulling LordBritish into the league was the right decision.<br /><br />Of course, the rules don&#039;t give us the license to do any of this.&nbsp; Cha0tix entered the league after the sign-up deadline and franchised after the franchise deadline.&nbsp; DMR should only have been given the option to fill their slots with available free agency players.&nbsp; Ralphis even brought up the point, &quot;don&#039;t you think that someone in free agency is going to feel like we screwed them?&quot;, and they probably do.&nbsp; These were all things we took into consideration before making this decision.&nbsp; In fact, if you look at the post I made, I didn&#039;t even mention LordBritish because we hadn&#039;t asked him yet, and I didn&#039;t want to put him in a position of looking like a big jerk not wanting to join a losing team that lost 2 players to the ice monster.&nbsp; I know such thoughtfulness comes as a surprise, but really, we&#039;re generally not assholes.<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />Gotta give the player base the benefit of the doubt and roll back some of the more anal rules which are super competitive.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />The IDL should be more flexible and understanding and not so competitive all the time.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />When are we not understanding?&nbsp; With demo violations?&nbsp; I can&#039;t remember the last demo violation we enforced, which actually puts us in an awkward position if we every try and enforce one.&nbsp; That player is just gonna be like, &quot;So it&#039;s OK if midian never uploads a demo, but my team has to 3v2 for a while?&nbsp; That&#039;s real gay.&quot;&nbsp; Again, this is why we have rules, so we can avoid accusations of favoritism.&nbsp; In fact, we&#039;ve screwed up here, and it&#039;s a perfect example of why being<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />more flexible and understanding and not so competitive all the time.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />opens us up to criticism such as:<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />This is where IDL politics come into play.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />and:<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />The IDL has made some fucking terrible decisions and most of them are driven by elitist and competitive interests.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />and:<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />There have been many unfair decisions season after season without justification.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />When we do go out on a limb, like helping DMR and BSK, we get criticized for not magically poofing another top-tier player for EBL.<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />A good example this season is DMR and BSK.&nbsp; Shak got Chow who is a top player all around and DMR got LB who is fairly good, both weren&#039;t even signed up for the league.&nbsp; Both decisions are great and I commend the IDL for flexibility and doing things it often has not dared to in the past to bring players in.&nbsp; Yet let us compare what happened on BSK and DMR to EBL&#039;s current situation.&nbsp; EBL could really use help to turn their season around yet the teams given the leg up are better than EBL.&nbsp; This is where IDL politics come into play.&nbsp; EBL didn&#039;t get special help and this is pretty unfair.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />What would you suggest?&nbsp; It sounds like you&#039;re saying we should&#039;ve just let Shakal have a shitty pick and no Cha0tix, and let DMR pick 2 players from free agency instead of letting LordBritish into the league.&nbsp; Hey that&#039;s fair!<br /><br />Do you really think that the IDL Board likes Shakal?&nbsp; After he&#039;s quit the league 7000 times (once with Cha0tix)?&nbsp; You think we like Jenova - a rookie ex-cheater?&nbsp; You think we like Killingblair, who&#039;s also quit 7000 times?&nbsp; This accusation of favoritism is fucking ridiculous.&nbsp; Why would I, captain of FLS, want a strong BSK in my conference?&nbsp; Why would Ralphis, as captain of SUC, want a strong DMR in his?&nbsp; You should think about what you write before you write it - it&#039;s really easy to accuse people of things, but it&#039;s much more difficult to be a reasonable, proactive person.<br /><br />How do you think these politics work?&nbsp; Ralphis PMs me and is like, &quot;Man I fuckin hate Xenaero so much.&nbsp; No matter what, I want his team to bomb.&nbsp; Fuck that faggot.&quot;&nbsp; Or are we bribed?&nbsp; Did Shakal send me a scarf and a lock of his hair?&nbsp; I mean, FLS barely even practices.&nbsp; For a guy who cares enough about IDL to rig the shit out of the league, I sure don&#039;t seem like I&#039;m concerned.&nbsp; In fact, if I didn&#039;t think that more people share your opinion, I&#039;d just laugh at you.&nbsp; On one hand the board is incompetent, on the other we&#039;re scheming like crazy for... what exactly?&nbsp; If you don&#039;t remember, Nostar&#039;s teams won the last two seasons.&nbsp; Maybe we&#039;re both scheming AND incompetent!&nbsp; Christ.&nbsp; Like I said, you should think about what you write before you write it.&nbsp; We&#039;re constantly trying to make the league fair, fun, and highly competitive.&nbsp; I think this is obvious.<br /><br />[quote author=Fastidious link=topic=178.msg1571#msg1571 date=1267179398]<br />Also we should use SmartCTF, the maps are badass, seriously.&nbsp; If you haven&#039;t played them 3v3 yet you are missing out.&nbsp; They are designed with a much different attitude in mind than most CTF maps.<br />[/quote]<br /><br />This is what I&#039;m looking for.&nbsp; I welcome suggestions about how we can make things better, or even times when we&#039;ve failed so we can avoid failing next time.&nbsp; But these insane accusations of playing politics and favorites are counterproductive, harmful, and baseless.&nbsp; I&#039;m actually offended, not for myself, but because the other board members and Ralphis all put forth a huge good faith effort, and to have someone who won&#039;t even captain reduce it down to a bunch of incompetent, scheming assholes is intolerable.&nbsp; Do something, or shaddap already.