Author: thesupremecommander

Community Announcements Featured 

The Future No More

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , ,

To all stakeholders of the SPUFserver: It is with solemn regret that I must announce the indefinite suspension of operations for the SPUFserver, effective May 18th, 2014. For a while now, it has been apparent that the SPUFserver has not been receiving any significant traffic outside of specially organized events, and even that traffic has been minimal with waning community participation. Even with the cost optimizations that we have performed, server administration is still not a cheap venture, and there is no justification for keeping up a server which is not seeing any use. Thus, I have come to the… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

ESEA-Invite Season 16 Week 8 Standings and Playoff Scenarios

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , , , ,

At the conclusion of Week 6, we only had one team eliminated from the playoff race. Week 7 brought crazy games, including the close upset of Exertus eSports over Classic Mixup on Sunshine. When the dust cleared, Classic Mixup had clinched their spot and three other teams were sent packing their bags. In the penultimate week of the season, we may see the final two LAN spots decided, with two teams comfortably in control of their own destiny and one needing a lot of help to get in. [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

ESEA-Invite Season 16 Week 7 Standings and Playoff Scenarios

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , , , ,

We’re almost two-thirds of the way through ESEA Season 16 with only one last Invite game remaining in Week 6 on Granary, so it’s time to look ahead at Week 7 and the current standings in Invite. At this point, we’ve finally got teams clinching their spots and booking their tickets to LAN, while others are on the brink of seeing the dream disappear. [Continue Reading]

Read more
Community Announcements 

Help Wanted – Determining the Future of the SPUFserver

thesupremecommander 0 Comments

This announcement was made by me on the SPUFserver group recently and will probably be also made on SPUF at some point. It’s being posted here as well to get the word out. I appreciate your cooperation. I’ll just start by saying that it’s no secret that we haven’t been performing as well as we would like. We are fairly certain that the current operation of the SPUFserver is unsustainable. If we do not make changes to make the server more successful, it will have to die due to lack of funding or low traffic. This is not a desirable… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

World Champions – The Cream of the Crop

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Perhaps one of the more prestigious accomplishments that a person may be able to claim is being able to compete directly against the best of the best with the world’s eyes locked upon you. In the new world of e-sports, it somehow becomes more prestigious when you’re sitting right next to them as opposed to not even in the same city. In any case, we call those who emerge victorious champions of the world. Team Fortress 2 is a curious case among e-sports of the modern day – it doesn’t have a recognized worldwide competition of its own which can… [Continue Reading]

Read more
Featured 

First Look at Recent Changes to QuickPlay

thesupremecommander 0 Comments

Perhaps one of the smallest and yet most influential changes that Valve has made to the game was not too recently ago, summed up by one small note at the top of the patch notes: – Add quickplay option to only connect to official Valve servers This change was subject to much heated controversy, spawning several rapid threads about the topic on SPUF, Reddit, the HLDS mailing list, and other such communities. It also reflected growing divisions between important parts of the community, as server owners protested a change that would deprive them of a major source of traffic and… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

Sandbagging – A Problem?

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

TeamFortress.TV is known to many (and to some proudly) as a ripe source of drama within the competitive community. Whether it’s the newest revelations about the ESEA scandal, players getting VAC banned, or a top player leaving a team, TF.TV will gulp it all up. This week has brought renewed attention upon a certain phenomenon – sandbagging. To recap, the ESEA Main grand finals took place on Wednesday night between Street Hoops eSports and AG Rinkuing with Rinku. AG Rinkuing with Rinku, which had been a roster moved down from Invite that had recently picked up several Invite players to… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

A New Year

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , ,

Well, it’s been much too long since I last posted here about competitive, but here we are, with too much happening while I was away. Thus, let’s go over the finer points of what exactly happened. Of course, we can’t forget the biggest event of competitive (well, at least in North America and 6v6) – the ESEA Invite LAN! Four teams traveled to Dallas, Texas to compete for the serious money on the line: WELOVEANIME, lost in translation, Classic Mixup, and iT. From the beginning, the fight was expected to be mainly between iT and Classic Mixup. iT, the team… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

Fall Recap and Look Ahead

thesupremecommander 1 Comment , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Well, as I said in my column last week, it is the end of the season for most… or is it? Apparently not, as ETF2L Highlander will wrap up their regular season next week, and ESEA has decided to give us all a wonderful winter break and decided to start playoffs the first week of January. But enough of that. It’s time to cover our latest results. First of all is the TeamFortress.TV ZOWIE Invitational conducted this past Sunday. The first tournament conducted of its kind by TeamFortress.TV, it comprised top teams of North American 6v6 in a competition for… [Continue Reading]

Read more
The Competitive Corner 

The End is Here

thesupremecommander 0 Comments , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s that time of year again… most leagues are finishing up recording another winter season into the record books. Currently ESEA is in its final week of the regular season, UGC is nearly finished with playoffs, ETF2L 6v6 is proceeding with its Premiership playoffs, and ETF2L HL is in the second half of the season. So near the end, I think most can agree… this season has perhaps not been as exciting as it has been. For the ESEA Invite division, the LAN situation has pretty much stabilized… and it’s much less contentious than in previous seasons, with each seed… [Continue Reading]

Read more