So its altruistic to steal position of someone in Group A who fought hard for it just because your highness Eraserhead wants to.
I think I will write to internet dictionary that they need to change definition of altruism.

Did I say anything about stealing, my guy?

To be fair, I think that psykkoman is right here. If Rufus went directly into Division A, that means that someone who otherwise would have been in Division A would lose their place.

Whether this is stolen or given is semantics

Bodski, you are missing the point as well. This old format will never attract a top player who never or barely ever played the league. Now tell me if that’s fundamentally a problem or not?

Edited 2026-08-11 17:46:08

That is not fundamentally a problem from my perspective.

We just look at this differently.

You think that there is more value in having the best players than I do.

I think that there is more value in having a consistent approach for all players than you do.

Your perspective is not unusual (and nor is mine).

I'd have to agree that no one deserves special treatment, and if they did, it could not come at the expense of others (E.G. You can an extra spot in A instead of kicking someone to B).

I do think the format is rather problematic however, as I sort of implied before. The P/R format I've realized, is inherently not a bad format, it could work in faster paced events, where it fails is when you combine it with a long form event that takes months to years between seasons. If you are a new player just joining in, you'll be stuck at the bottom, and need at least 3 seasons to climb all the way to division A to even have a chance at winning the event. This is extremely demotivating for great players who are new to the event who will need to spend years fighting through divisions they don't belong in, and as a result many will be pushed away from the event. The P/R format could work better with a faster paced event or less divisions, but as it currently stands, with long 3+3d MD tournaments and 4 divisions, the path to top level games is a slow one.

Ironically Octane, that is something which I find attractive about it.

I think that it will break down as follows:

This trek from the bottom to the top would be 6 games (2 at a time) for a maximum of five promotions.

To require five promotions assumes 98 existing players wish to continue, which I suggest is ambitious, so it may be more accurate to consider four promotions, which I imagine would be less than a year.

So if you wanted to play, you would play 6 games against players lower than my level (E)

Then 6 games against players around as good as me (D)

Then 6 games against players who are better than me (C)

Then 6 games against top players who are not quite the eilte (B)

Then you compete against the very best (A) after 24 games. This is not a whole lot.

If I were organising this event I would want you to play from the bottom to make those divisions more interesting as you quickly progress. Many players won't get a chance to play against Octane or Rufus, so this gives a small number of us another opportunity to do so. There are multiple benefits to having an imperfect pyramid.

And another thing....

In principle I don't have an issues with events which are seeded. You could have some kind of event where seeded players or teams join after some preliminary rounds. I think that Nations Cup works with some of those principles.

Like I said, not planning to have months between seasons anymore, but yes, it does take some commitment if you've never played. I appreciate that having top level competition at the top is absolutely a plus for the level of competition, hence why I want to make more room for the returning players than there previously has been, but I don't think anyone should get special treatment in the sense that they should just get to skip the divisions altogether. It would indeed take a few seasons to get to A, and if people aren't motivated to do so, that's just really fair, not every event is for everyone.

I don't think there's a way for a P/R league format to keep integrity and appeal to people that aren't motivated to be a part of it. The way I'm trying to do it at least gives space for people to come back after being inactive for one or a couple seasons and not start fully from the bottom, but everyone should have to go through the ranks at least once. No hard feelings if people don't have the motivation to do so :)

Then you compete against the very best (A) after 24 games. This is not a whole lot.

It has less to do with the total number of games played, and more to do with how much time it takes for these games to finish, the problem is that there are too many stallers for a season to last any less than a few months, as everyone will be waiting on the slowest players to complete their games before we can advance to the next season. I don't view anything less than a few months between seasons as realistic, the only way to shorten the seasons would be to reduce division sizes (Leads to more divisions though so would lead to having to fight for longer anyway), or to reduce the boot timer from 3 days, which is a can of worms that probably shouldn't be opened.

Anyhow, Meld has a point that not every event is for everyone, some people just value different things. I value being able to win an event in your first season trying, like Titled Tuesday, Seasonal Ladder, or AWP. I think being locked out of being able to compete at the top for your first season takes a lot of the excitement away, and makes it feel like a grind akin to QM, but that is just my highly competitive side talking, so perhaps I am in the minority.

You should absolutely base big leagues around the best players. Otherwise you won’t get traction.
Have any of you remember the last time someone analysed a P/R game in the latest seasons? Or any game that everyone was hyped to see? As far as I know, the league was basically dead for many seasons before it finally shut down.

By the way, I am not saying that the previous participants weren’t the top class of this game, but rather that you should definitely do everything to get the current most active best players to participate in this event for all good reasons. I will make a bold move and say that Octane, Tornado and I ideally (if all agree) should be the center of the return of this competition if you actually planning it to go distance.

Sticking to the same rules will kill the league again.

(Believe me, it’s not about pleasing me personally, but pointing out that getting most active and enthusiastic players of this game will do the competition a favour both short and long term)

How about a compromise.....

This may be completely at odds with Meldarion's idea and it is their call.

Everybody starts even (disregarding previous performance and launching as P/R 2.0o) and then use Season 1 and maybe Season 2 to enable the very top Players to secure their place at the very top ?

So, say 10 divisions of 7 then the top 14 split across 2 x Division A who then reduce to 1 Division A of 7 Players ? The exact number of Players may make this more or less difficult. The same principle would apply for the lower Divisions.

This would mean a maximum of 2 seasons (3-4 months ?) to get from the beginning to the very top.

All this talk is about Eraserhead wanting another trophy he did not won yet for his bloated ego with least effort possible. Everything else around it is nothing but word salad.
Mate if you want that trophy work for it from the down up like everyone else who won it. If you are not willing to do so, shut up. This competition lived for 37 seasons without you and will live again.

A 3 year gap effectively makes it a new competition

There is no such thing as P/R trophy, big man. If you are not in touch with competitive community, please stay in your lane and be respectful

It is you who lack respect. Respect to people who won this competition hard and proper way.

Oh no, the “no u” counter-argument. I am finished. You win. You win it all.

An idea.

As it has been such a long time since the P/R League last ran, why not make all groups equal for the restart, and simply seed the players who deserve the top rankings across the groups. So make 7 groups, with the winner of each group moving to A for next season, runner up to B, and so on.

Edit: I finished reading the comments and see that basically the same idea has already been put forward, which I agree with completely.

Edited 2026-08-11 22:49:46

I'm not saying I disagree with you that sticking with the exact same rules is bad. But I do think there needs to remain a concise ruleset that applies to everyone. I did play with the idea of having first places in E and second places in D do play-offs for potential superpromotion, and same for first places in D and second places in C to potentially quicken it up at the bottom, but as of right now, I'm not 100% on how that'd look yet. However, even with that, it'll take - depending on sign-ups for this season - about 3 seasons to get from bottom to top if you do those well. I do think something of the sort makes sense and should be implemented.

However that obviously doesn't address the current situation; I don't disagree that having elite players like you, tornado, Octane and so on active in the competition raises the level. The issue I have is that within the P/R concept, people being able to rise through the ranks, there is no room to place people ahead, especially where there is no space.

I don't see that doing so can in any way be turned into a rule that isn't just a subjective 'hey, I know these people are elite', but an active criteria that feels related to the event, is repeatable and makes sense to everyone involved.

Edit: To those suggesting one layer and go from there, if I randomize that, odds are there'll be groups that are better and groups that are worse and a next season would have the very elite at the top, but also have a winner from a weaker group that'd usually be a B or even C player in A. And below that, it just throws the balance off further unless you start seeding players before making the layers, making a very unexciting first season, at which point you are better off putting players that'd be high seeds in high divisions straight away. Aka that kinda defeats the point of doing it altogether. Not only that, but it's just a lot more work for me as an organizer, and it doesn't implement a rule that fixes anything longer term.

Edited 2026-08-11 22:59:06

Firstly, I appreciate you bringing this old running event from the past back to today, I imagine the appeal was for Nostalgic reasons.

Secondly, Vacations being turned on is problematic. One player decides to change 7 vacations, it's a delay of 2 months, what if we get unlucky and two players vacation for 70 days. This is a problem, It should be removed.

Thirdly, After a 3 year break, this preference system for players that participated in previous editions doesn't reflect the current player base, we'll now have new skilled players starting at the bottom, while previous players simply keep their priority based on outdated results. This is a exceptional circumstance considering it's a relaunch with the stated time period. The fairest solution is a once off-reset.

As the first edition did, spend the first season getting the placements correct. With a bit of innovation and thinking, you could achieve a updated reflection of standings within 2 seasons. I would offer my assistance in planning this to get the right result.

I'm basically asking you to go back to doing a placement season or two to properly shape up the groups correctly as it was done before. You'll get a higher participation rate, within elitists and common folk alike. But most importantly it reflects the current player base, 3 years is too long and outdated. I would ask the oldies to play, but under a refresh/relaunch.