eXtv & evlTV in association with BlackOut TV present:

The Mapmakers’ Showcase #1

Teams: ETF2L’s Highpander© vs UGC’s Dunning-Kruger Effect

Sunday, December 27th, 2015 1:00pm EST / 19:00 CET

Casters: Mario and CeeJaey with Dashner on twitch.tv/evltv

Maps: Fubar’s cp_vanguard_rc5 and Fubar & BobbleBobbler’s pl_barnblitz_pro7 (maybe their koth_product_r8 too)

This is the first time these versions of Vanguard and Barnblitz have been played in Highlander. Fubar and lawn will be on hand in the chat to answer questions and receive feedback. Fubar will also be interviewed and taking questions on stream during the intermission.

Match format:

• Round 1: Vanguard EU server – 1st to 5 or most points at 30 min
• Round 2: Barnblitz EU server (EU RED, NA BLU then swap)
• 15 minute interview with Fubar while the teams swap
• Round 3: Barnblitz NA server (NA RED, EU BLU then swap)
• Round 4: Vanguard NA server – 1st to 5 or most points at 30 min
• Round 5: Product – server all players had the best average ping to – first to 3 (OPTIONAL: based on time & if the teams want to play it)
• Postmatch interviews and wrap-up

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*Edit* We changed around the matches a bit due to a initial miscalculation with the Sonneborn-Berger Score. The current ones are correct and will stay. If you have any questions feel free to contact us.

Welcome everyone to the conclusion of the 9th season of ETF2L Highlander.
We hope you enjoyed the matches, and for the teams that made it through, congratulations. Here is where the poor and Irish get separated from the Gentle Mannes.

All divisions will have playoffs, all playoff matches will be using the Map Elimination system. Note that all dates are estimates and teams are able to negotiate other days by scheduling with their opponents.

Starting off, we’ll have our top 4 teams in Premiership battle it out, here is how it goes:
Currently the ranking is as following:

1. Tourettes Chessclub
2. Strong Opinions
3. Highpander©
4. Feila finanzieren durch DROPS

The first day of playoffs is January 10th, where we have the quarter final match:
Feila finanzieren durch DROPS takes on  Highpander©.

Semi Final

The winner of that match will face Strong Opinions on January 17th.

The date for the grand finals is currently set to January 24th, where Tourettes Chessclub will defend their title.

High

High has four teams, where we will have not one, but two Team Colonslash squads making it to playoffs.

1. The Bureau
2. Team Colonslash: Express
3. Team Colonslash: Ambition
4. UKIP

Semi-Finals

January 10th – January 15th

Semi Final 1: UKIP vs  The Bureau
Semi Final 2:  Team Colonslash: Ambition vs  Team Colonslash: Express

Finals: January 17th – January 22nd  SF1 winner vs SF2 winner
The winner of this match will get an automatic seed to the Season 10 Premiership division.
The loser of this match will face Stacked on January 27th in the relegation match. Winner of that match gets a Season 10 Premiership seed as well.

Mid

The teams making it into Mid playoffs are:

1. Bad Lads
2. Team Niveous
3. Budget Toucans
4. Schnitzel e-sports
5. Lesk
6. Team Colonslash: Frosties
7. Latency Issues
8. Saukot

Quarter Finals

January 3rd – January 8th

Match A:   Bad Lads vs Saukot
Match B:   Team Niveous vs Latency Issues
Match C:   Budget Toucans vs Team Colonslash: Frosties
Match D: Schnitzel e-sports vs Lesk

Semi-Finals

January 10th – January 15th

Semi-Final 1:  [Winner A] vs [Winner D]
Semi-Final 2:  [Winner B] vs [Winner C]

Finals
January 17th – January 22nd Semi Final 1 winner vs Semi Final 2 winner

Open

Open looks rather interesting this season, having 4 teams tied for the first place. After calculations the teams are seeded in the following order:

1. Lead Lining Lineup
2. Hearts eSport
3. Brigshaw's English Club
4. TwisteD eSports
5. open_squad powered by ZfG
6. ★ Alle Neune
7. That's a Bingo!
8. Awesome Comrade Elite

Quarter Finals

January 3rd – January 8th

Match A:   Lead Lining Lineup vs Awesome Comrade Elite
Match B: Hearts eSport vs That's a Bingo!
Match C: Brigshaw's English Club vs ★ Alle Neune
Match D:   TwisteD eSports vs open_squad powered by ZfG

Semi-Finals

January 10th – January 15th

Semi-Final 1:  [Winner A] vs [Winner D]
Semi-Final 2:  [Winner B] vs [Winner C]

Finals:
January 17th – January 22nd Semi Final 1 winner vs Semi Final 2 winner

Tough Break changes

Introduction
Just as we were getting ready for the Christmas holiday break, the Tough Break Update hit. The admin team had been discussing the various weapon tweaks introduced by Valve. In this post, we will briefly discuss the reasons we have for making changes to our ruleset, in hopes of increasing transparency and granting our user base a greater understanding of the weapon banning process.

Highlander Season 9

We strongly believe in the idea of Competitive Consistency – for that reason, we aim to minimize the effect of balance changes on ongoing seasons.
Valve introduced a new feature, namely player outlines for respawning players, visible when using DirectX 9. As this feature was not available during the majority of Season 9, it will be disabled for the remainder of the competition. We will discuss how this feature affects the game at a later date and whether it is worth keeping in our league, but for now it will be disabled using the server cvar tf_spawn_glows_duration 0. We are also forcing tf_preround_push_from_damage_enable 1. For the same reason, we will not be changing the current HL whitelist, with the exception of The Phlogistinator. We feel the weapon will have a much bigger impact on games after its change, compared to before the update. As such, it will be banned with immediate effect from all our HL configs. It may or may not be banned in future seasons, and that will be put to further discussion as players have more of a chance to get accustomed to the changes.

We would love to hear your feedback about the usefulness of this type of news post as we head closer towards 6v6 Season 23.

BlackOut TV – Monday 21st 21 CET / 3PM EST  –  Fair Enough vs. Highpander©

The final match before playoffs of Highlander Season 9 is here! Join CeeJaey, sigafoo & Jon LIVE on BlackOut TV for Fair Enough vs. Highpander© in their Week 7 official! This match will determine who will take that 4th place spot heading into playoffs in January! Can Fair Enough clutch at least 1 point to take down Feila finanzieren durch DROPS from reaching playoffs or will Highpander© strike down and resign their enemy to 5th position? Tune in at 21 CET on Monday 21st to find out!

Match Overview
Fair Enough vs Highpander©
Week 7 (Premiership)
Monday, December 21st 21:00 CET

koth_product_rc8

2 - 3

cp_gullywash_final1

0 - 5

OVERALL
Fair Enough [0:6] Highpander©

BlackOut TV 1 – 21 CET / 3PM EST  –  Stacked vs. WASP

Double double! Week 7 is here and we’ve got 3 matches left before the playoffs, lets get going! On BlackOut TV 1, join Heavy Is GPS & CeeJaey for the biggest game of the week, Stacked against WASP. 6 points to WASP means no relegation and dropping Stacked right into a playoff game against 2nd place in High. On the other hand if Stacked take the 6 for themselves, they can potentially tie up with Feila finanzieren durch DROPS and Fair Enough in 4th place leaving WASP with egg on their vests.

BlackOut TV 2 – 21 CET / 3PM EST  –  Tourettes Chessclub vs. Feila finanzieren durch DROPS

On BlackOut TV 2, catch sigafoo, Bulow & Arjax with Tourettes Chessclub vs. Feila finanzieren durch DROPS. 6 points in the direction of Feila finanzieren durch DROPS won’t get them to playoffs at this point, but it will mean they move into a solid 4th place of their own (short of Fair Enough beating Highpander© on Sunday). As for Tourettes Chessclub, winning or losing this game is irrelevant in terms of their position but will this mean they won’t show The Experiment who are the potential three time champions of EU Highlander? Tune in at 21 CET for all the action!

Season 22 powered by saloon.tf – Wrap-up

Yet another post-insomnia season has been finished which brought us another splendid season with lots of surprising outcomes. All top 3 teams had strong and tight matches against each other but yet again however Se7en was able to put out a force with their refined roster from last season claiming the Season 22 title and securing themselves €500 in the process.

The winning squad is comprised of:

• Permzilla (Medic)
• kaidus (Demoman)
• kaptain (Soldier)
• Zebbosai (Soldier)
• Hafficool (Scout)
• Starkie (Scout)
• Rising

Epsilon eSports earned 2nd place, winning €300 and Full Tilt won 3rd place, securing €200

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