I just have a few questions:<br /><br />1 - Why is there even such a thing as &quot;The Board&quot;? The league was doing just fine without it, although it&#039;s also not such a great thing to have a bald nazi deciding things on a whim either. I believe there&#039;s a way to have a player-run league that everyone can enjoy if people know their roles and stay on the same page. If the rules have been or can be refined to the point where people just know how things work, there really won&#039;t be a need for arguing about everything. Should there be a reason to tweak or improve certain things, put it to a vote amongst the active/signed up players. Better yet, make it a REQUIREMENT for IDL participation to take part in votes throughout the season (if they come up). Say, at least 50% of a 4-man team has to vote on any given modification or rule tweak, or perhaps if there is any such thing as a &quot;board,&quot; it should be comprised of the 8 captains for that particular season, not some asshats who come out of nowhere (Mass) or don&#039;t even play. If captains are guaranteed a say, I&#039;m sure that would also encourage people to man up and BE captains.<br /><br />2 - Better maps that most people enjoy can be attained in a few different ways. First off, whoever has executive powers or anything of the sort should perhaps ASK the player base first? Then, when people who attempt to bring some fresh maps into the fold ask people to playtest, maybe those same people who bitch about maps not being &quot;good&quot; can actually get off their asses and help test and refine new maps. I mean, you&#039;re all the experts right? How about sharing some of that amazing knowledge so that perhaps future seasons for you or others are enjoyable?<br /><br />When I was doing the bulk of the testing for SCTF, I got a variety of opinions and great help from a good chunk of people. Blair&#039;s &quot;Monstrous&quot; SCTF01 was &quot;the perfect map&quot; according to LB. Dew was/is a fan as well. Saber liked the map but only if I got rid of the Rocket Launcher. The list goes on in terms of positives and negatives. At least those with an actual opinion other than &quot;you can get spawn camped and I want my ssg spawns&quot; (hello, this is Doom) took the time to playtest the mapset. So when you say that the Board should listen to everything you say, maybe you can practice what you preach and help mappers when they ask for non-gay/troll feedback.<br /><br />As for that PROCTF map, the &quot;official&quot; statement regarding that map (IIRC from Mass himself, or someone from the board) was, and I quote, &quot;We playtested it in Skulltag.&quot; Really? Like that matters dick in a ZDaemon league. Also, if you&#039;re gonna structurally alter a map that wasn&#039;t even designed for ZD, it shouldn&#039;t be used in the first place. Just ask Jkist and the folks at ZDDL--those same fags who swore by MAP01&#039;s &quot;purity&quot; (and other nuthugger/bandwagon hopper statements) basically admitted to the map&#039;s shitty nature by altering it. Don&#039;t be like them, and don&#039;t be in denial if a map you really THINK will work really won&#039;t.<br /><br />3 - Totally agree on the smug, arrogant, and all-around skullfag attitude some people (especially those &quot;in power&quot;) display around here. Competitive Doom used to be fun in the early years of the IDL, but now everyone seems to just enjoy being &quot;lil bitches hidin&#039; behind your lil&#039; keyboards.&quot; Let me break it down for you: no one in this league is impervious to being humbled. Everyone can beat everyone for the most part, so talking shit or being a troll will only make your eventual humbling all that more juicy. The way people treat each other around here is sometimes worse than Skulltag&#039;s most terrible drama-filled days of their lives. Both players and administration are at fault here (i.e. dew&#039;s rapid and trolling response in this very thread). In short, all of you Naut wannabes are killing the league. Stop it.<br /><br />4 - The number people who have actually put effort and money into hosting/supporting the IDL (since its inception) long-term can be counted with one hand. Everyone else has no clue what goes on or how many resources and time is required to do such a thing. Yes, that doesn&#039;t mean whoever hosts or keeps the IDL alive on the back end is beyond criticism or can&#039;t be called out, but a server host who provides a RELIABLE (not &quot;great,&quot; not &quot;perfect,&quot; not &quot;0 ping&quot;) service for others doesn&#039;t need to hear the kind of bullshit a lot of you people from point #3 throw around. If you&#039;re truly interested in the quality of the servers, do some research and maybe offer alternatives to the people paying. Maybe if you find a better datacenter, provider, or whatever, you can fly it by the hosts. Better yet, maybe you can fork your own ~$100/month and walk the talk. A lot of the attitude regarding this particular issue is similar to a spoiled brat berating his mom because he wants a 5mpg Ferrari instead of their trusty 35mpg Honda that has gotten them around their entire lives. Is the kid really in the position to bitch? No, and neither are most of you. On the other side of the equation, just because you host servers it doesn&#039;t mean you get to abuse your own power. If someone is being detrimental to a particular game, match, or you personally--by all means teach them a lesson, but handing out bans like dildos at Jenova&#039;s birthday isn&#039;t a good solution for your reputation and the integrity of your service.<br /><br />5 - I think Bones has done a great job with what he was given. Just because some trolls like to (like dew said) rape the wording of everything they see to find loopholes, it doesn&#039;t mean Bones can&#039;t make good decisions or that he has made terrible ones. Give the guy a break--I sure as hell don&#039;t miss the days when people picked ReakuCTF just because they &quot;thought&quot; it was a good map. At least Bones&#039; non-receding hairline would lead him to think about it beforehand.<br /><br />6 - Speaking of receding hairlines, one good thing Ralphis has done lately is actually compile a non-shitty version of the IDL WAD. Stuff like this is no easy task just in terms of keeping textures from menstruating, let alone ensuring the maps work as intended (splash damage, nodes, etc). Board, get over yourselves, and just accept that if someone in the player base does a better job or offers a better alternative, suck it up and roll with it (after thorough vetting/testing of course).<br /><br />7 - Have fun. For TAI&#039;s sake, you don&#039;t have to actively seek to one-up someone else with the shitty comments or ways to screw someone (interrupting practices, kick/banning, general attitude). Doom will never get old in my eyes, but some of you are really killing the last refuge for any worthwhile Doom activity.<br /><br />PS. Sorry for pulling a Jamie and posting an essay, but in this case it was necessary :o