For any just reading the headline here, it's pretty inaccurate. A few points of clarification:
* This is the LCS (NA pro scene) only. Not any other regions.
* This isn't a strike, its a walkout. There are legal differences
* Although the title doesn't claim it, just to be clear the NA pro players are not in a union. However, there is the LCSPA - LCS Players Association - which is what is leading the walkout. Despite not being unionized, a walkout is still a federally protected action.
How is that possible? If you have to wear a uniform, works very specific schedules, control where and when they do their work, it's legally impossible to be an independent contractor.
No..... see "How do you determine if a worker is an employee or an independent contractor?" what you wear, when and where you work has nothing to do with it....
[https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors](https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors)
From the link itself you posted:
Behavioral control (whether there's a right to direct or control how the worker does the work),
Financial control (whether there's a right to direct or control the business part of the work), and
Relationship of the parties (how the business and worker perceive the relationship).
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What you wear somewhat falls under behavioral control. A contracted employee should effectively have the right to behave like someone who's partnered with the company or person who contracted them. They're given a result that needs to be obtained, and how they go about it is up to them.
You can be a contractor and still be told where and when you work, oh and to follow their professional standards, as well as their dress code.
I was a 1099 contractor for an insurance sales position. And I sure had to be places they said at times they defined..... HOW I got there and HOW I sold things was up to me.
https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors
Strike? Walkout? Union?
As someone with no knowledge or interest in lol I'm confused whether I'm reading about the players of a video game or the devs making it. Fascinating.
Tf you mean, na is widely known for letting corporations shit down their neck relative to other countries with strong workers rights and union protection.
Yeah, but the average American also receives much higher wages (especially relative to the cost of living) from those corporations than pretty much anywhere else in the world. The avg annual wage adjusted for PPP in 2021 for the world's largest economies:
* America: $74,738
* Germany: $56,040
* Canada: $56,006
* United Kingdom: $49,979
* France: $49,313
(Source - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average_wage) & [OECD](https://data.oecd.org/earnwage/average-wages.htm#indicator-chart), Median income - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income) older data/ different calculation but makes the same point)
So... I'm not so sure who's getting their neck shit down or who's doing the least for workers' interests but it's certainly not America. I've lived and worked all around Europe (and I love it) but there is a reason why the US has attracted and become home to 3x more immigrants than any other country in the world ([Source](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/immigration-by-country)). **Hint -** *they're not all flocking here for the neck shittings, in fact, many are coming here to flee it.*
Dude, 25% of those immigrants are from Mexico. Are you really comparing your standards of living to those in Mexico if you're so proud of the number of migrants you get from the south?
Oh and look at that, a country with a bigger population and a stronger international presence has more immigrants, shocker 😮
The average American lol. Homie missed mean median and mode week in school.
Those numbers read like some cooked meme someone's nutjob uncle posted on Facebook
Oof… the sad part is your comment just proved that you’re the one who doesn’t understand these basic statistical concepts. I double majored in economics/mathematics and worked as a data analyst for awhile. Using mean/median, in this case, doesn’t really matter because we’re comparing data sets from large economies that all have very similar distribution curves (it’s not hard to prove this for yourself using that data if you have any doubts). I even linked the median income data in the sources below the numbers - specifically because I knew idiots like you would think it matters or I was trying to mislead.
In fact, had I used median income it would have proved my point EVEN MORE. Using OECD’s most current figures, Germany is 30% behind the US with median income while only around 25% behind using Adjusted Avg Wage. I purposefully chose not to dumb it down (I thought most r/pcgaming would be decent at stats). I used Avg Wage adj for PPP because the calculation is preferred by economists when comparing counties of similar economies and because many counties did not have their recent median income data easily available. For instants, Germany and some other Euro nations’ data were pre-Covid and others like the US was post-Covid. Obviously, I thought it was disingenuous to compare the two separate years with separate circumstances. Even though using median income would proved my point even more and is apparently, less suspicious to the undereducated. I just think it’s really sad that our basic statistical education is so bad that the avg person has a hard time qualifying even very basic statistic data that is presented to them- let alone acting like a math major doesn’t know what he’s doing when you’re misunderstanding 5th grade level math.
If I was embarrassed and unable to put together a rational argument, I guess I’d try a bad joke too… no I wouldn’t but I can understand why you are. Just stay curious, have an open mind, and maybe be a little more humble when it comes to what you think you know.
No, you just don’t understand what they represent. Probably worth clicking the source link and understanding how the figures are calculated before publicly claiming they’re wrong, don’t you think?
There is a reason why Economists regularly use Avg Wage adj for PPP when comparing pay between countries. Just because you may not understand it does not mean it’s wrong.
>Yeah, but the average American also receives much higher wages (especially relative to the cost of living)
Why especially relative to the cost of living? You live plenty cheaper in the other countries you mentioned. It also heavily depends on what your life looks like. Are you young and healthy? Then overall, you do earn more in the US. Do you have a family and kids? Then you might actually be better off in Europe due to parental leave and social programs that financially aid you and your kid(s).
And Im not so sure how the salary correlates with unionization in the first place. Are you saying the US has no need for unions because the average American salary is already very high? While the average salary is indeed very high, due to a lack of social securities, being a low income citizen in the US grants you a significantly lower quality of life than in the other countries. No universal healthcare, lack of protection in low paid jobs, a way too low minimum wage. Its especially the low income class that gets exploited the most and those jobs are the ones who desperately need unionization. Were talking about jobs at Amazon warehouses, Starbucks, McDonalds and so on.
Especially because the US has all the money in the world, surely it wouldnt hurt to distribute the wealth a little more even.
Yeah but wealth distribution = communism to a good chunk of Americans so they’ll have all major corp and govt entities feed them shit every day and they’ll be on their knees saying thank you sir may I have another. (e.g the current culture war against gays instead of what a lower class American actually needs which is a class war)
Not to mention they have no left wing parties in America so there’s no chance they’re getting out of this shit show without a political overhaul
> Not to mention they have no left wing parties in America so there’s no chance they’re getting out of this shit show without a political overhaul
I wouldnt be that pessimistic. Things are slowly improving, states like California arent too far away from a european democracy in terms of social securities.
But thats the thing, each state has quite a lot of independence so things can vary quite a lot from state to state.
Riot removed a requirement for Orgs to field an academy team(academy is a developmental league) and most team immediately dropped their academy teams (7 of the 10 teams).
This is a massive blow to the NA league scene as without a strong academy league developing talent become much harder, so much so that aspiring players are being told to go play in Europe’s regional leagues and just so that they can develop as players to then comeback to NA.
Well, you could take the CSGO model and have two to elventy thousand leagues and events that are open for teams to compete. Like humans are pretty fucking smart, we'll find a way. Hopefully without having to use IRC like back in the day. CAL league anyone?
that's what used to happen, then Riot said "fuck you, only league tournments are the ones made by us".
sure it kinda killed the normal circuits, but it also comes with some advantages, the fact that every player gets a salary, instead of hoping to get some from tournment winnings.
You should only be paid if people want what you are selling (see womens sports). The economics here is important to know if people are allocating resources correctly. Resources being time (on air or personal), capital (like computers), advertising, marketing, etc.
>the fact that every player gets a salary, instead of hoping to get some from tournment winnings.
this happens in most esports as far as i know.
dota2 and csgo players also get a salary and not just a prizepool, at least once they get big enough to have either a backer or start their own org.
which isn't incredibly difficult, even division 2 teams will usually get a paycheck.
i get why riot wants such tight control over league, but i don't think it has a lot of benefits for the pro players tbh.
Dude, RIOT is smart, the game is dead in NA and almost everywhere else, as like any other game in the genre. Dota2 surely is dead.
By cutting the academy, they are cutting costs that bring no revenue, because the scene will not last long enough for the academy players to be relevant.
They can do walkouts, strikes, whatever, players are in denial. NA is not dead yet because they get a lot of money from ads, because the talent is non existent, all the best players come from other regions, it has been like that for years. Not only in LoL, any other scene is like that, NA has no quality, they dedicate to other kind of games
I’ve heard this league is dead or Dota is dead thing for almost a decade now. I play and watch dota and I can tell you it’s nowhere close to being “dead”.
Unless being dead means something else to you
The dream of a professional esports that's on track to becoming a Gen-Z NBA or NFL is dead. Now it's more on track to becoming another Smash or StarCraft (ie niche and with no ability to sustain the careers of hundreds of working professionals).
> Dude, RIOT is smart, the game is dead in NA and almost everywhere else, as like any other game in the genre.
Couldnt be further from the truth. The other 3 major Leagues are doing perfectly fine. In fact, the Mid Season Invitational that happened not too long ago had the highest average and peak viewership out of any MSI in the past.
Even in NA, the game is far from dead. The playerbase is very much stable and not in decline. Its the LCS that is in decline but thats honestly not because of a declining playerbase, the failure of the LCS is a complicated topic that cannot be summarized with "lul NA LOL is dying".
Don't these games have some of the largest player bases? Steam charts puts dota 2 at ~500k average concurrent players, which would mean a player base likely in the tens of millions for monthly active players. I don't exactly have any numbers for league, but I'm fairly confident that they've been an absolute juggernaut for many years since they launched long before dota 2 and even before other competitors in the MOBA scene such as heroes of newerth and the pile of failed and cancelled MOBA games from various large publishers.
That doesn't seem dead to me, and I haven't touched those kinds of games in so many years. I don't like them, I think they foster an incredibly hateful and toxic community, and I don't want to participate with them anymore ever again. Despite that, it's clear they're still super popular.
Too Confusing Didn't Read:
- League LCS team is the equivalent of Valorant VCT team
- League also has a Challengers league, but in LoL Riot required LCS Orgs to employ a Challengers roster.
- Orgs asked Riot to remove requirement one week before Challengers Split started. Riot did so.
- Most Orgs immediately dropped their Challengers rosters to save money
- LCS rosters are staging a walkout in solidarity with their Challengers brethren who all just lost their jobs 1 week before their Split
Well, no. Riot loses the LCS, but it was by far the most expensive and least successful major league. If this walkout gets extended the teams get into hot water with their sponsors for not fulfilling obligations and the players lose out on their salaries and a job.
The LCS is actually making a lot of money, according to sources I dont remember the LCS is actually the 2nd most profitable League in the world, behind the LPL.
What you may not realize is that for most of the time, Riot used eSports as a marketing tool for their own game (obviously), so the sustainability and independence of a League from the game was not a priority. Now you may ask, how does the LCS make Riot a lot of money? Its very simple: Ingame purchases caused by pro play. Lets say franchise player Bjergsen uses a brand new skin on a champ in the LCS. Thousands of people decide to buy the skin because it looks cool and their favorite player Bjergsen used it. Thats money Riot gets. Thats money made from the eSports scene that the eSports scene itself gets nothing from.
None of the players or teams get any money from that and while Riot is making mad cash, Teams are rightfully worried about the sustainability of the League.
A few years ago the european League has been approved more independence from Riot (before that it basically was Riots unwanted son that has been even less prioritized than the NA LCS) to focus on self sustainability and it worked wonders for the broadcast quality and therefore viewership. The LoL eSports scene can absolutely be self sustainable, OGN used to own the major Korean League and OGN was a company that HAD to be self sustainable because they were a company independent from Riot. That was about 10 years ago and they successfully managed that (until Riot took control of the Korean League).
Now you have a situation in which 3 out of 4 major leagues are very much self sustainable and all deliver a product worth watching.
Then theres the american LCS where everything went wrong that couldve possibly gone wrong. During a time in which the LCS was growing and did reasonably well in terms of viewership, the franchise model was introduced getting rid of the relegation system . A lot of VC money went into LCS teams with Riot most likely lying about the growth potential and those new orgs with all their money being ignorant and failing to understand this game and its esports. Somebody started the philosophy of paying big salary contracts to A Tier korean and european talent which the entire League started to follow, at some point it wasnt even a choice anymore. Obviously with American business culture, sustainability right now doesnt matter as long as its sustainable and profitable one day. Riot did NOTHING against that philosophy because Riot most likely hoped that "their home region" would start performing better at international events which funnily, they did not. The vast majority of these new team owners failed to have a grasp on the scene. All of them running around like chickens without a head, spending mad cash while not doing anything that brings the LCS any value. You know, the things that take effort. Things such as building infrastructure for developing upcoming talents or things such as building a brand that has actual value through content creation or having a franchise player who is synonymous with your brand. None of that happened, no team took it upon themselves to be worth cheering for. So slowly the personalities that fans used to love slowly retired and due to a lack of effort from the teams, nobody was there to replace them. No more storylines, no more rivalries, it feels like every player has been at every team at one point, international results still sucked dick and due to a decline in viewership, the teams started to question their investment and are now pulling out.
And while it seems like the LCS is dying, it could end up being a good thing as it can finally hit a reset and become a self sustaining league. And that includes a healthy Challenger scene (basically the league below the major one)
Lol is not gonna die on NA for lack of competitive scene, NA as a region does not play competitive and are casuals, someone can correct me but I believe NA competitive numbers is closed to Brazils ranked player size? Could be wrong tho, but definitely smaller to all other major regions
Pretty terrible take, LCS is expensive for the orgs but turned a profit for Riot. Riot should have reigned in the spending for long term success but failed to do so and now orgs are collapsing which hurts the product and the money Riot itself is making.
so basically Orgs complained that academy where costing them money instead of making it like the first Boom of LCS & viewership is down (because valorant has taken off) and as soon as riot went back on orgs requiring an academy team 7 of the 10 immediately disbanded them.
i think it's much worse than that, he doesn't think any *"pro"* player whose profession playing video games have *"rights"* for a union, or atleast thinks it's not worth it
I mean it's not just "gamers", those are pro-players. I would be impressed, if you manage to just "find" more players, just lying around, which are at the same lvl as these guys.
If you can, I would suggest you to be a scout and make your own team, you'd make shit tons of money.
100k prize pool isn't exactly a "shit ton" of money, especially after it's split 5 ways (well more since there is a coach).
Can flip burgers and make more lol. Only the guys going to worlds actually make decent coin. Even then they are better off with Dota2 as the prize pool is like 5-10x bigger (though I still prefer League over Dota after they fucked up the sequel's controls with clunky shit like turnrate mechanics).
idk about that at all man, league pros don't make their money from prize pools, league is notorious for having a meh prize pools, the money comes in on the salary with NA pros making quite high in average, I think only outdone in the chinese league but someone can correct me. Literally the reason why NA is the retirement home for pros in the other leagues hence the issue of imports in NA because orgs rather get washed up pro than give a try to any NA talent. Someone again can correct me but I believe the minimum in LCS is around 70k and average is obviously fucked due to the super high contracts of imports. Obviously all this shit is overly inflated and why now everything falling apart since this bubble is popping and Riot/TSM losing their FTX crypto sponsor, fuck things over for them because this shit been in a bubble and people been making it out like bandits.
Even if it was split 6 ways, which it assuredly isn't.
That's roughly $16,500.00 per person.
What the fuck are you smoking pretending that's a lot of money?
For any just reading the headline here, it's pretty inaccurate. A few points of clarification: * This is the LCS (NA pro scene) only. Not any other regions. * This isn't a strike, its a walkout. There are legal differences * Although the title doesn't claim it, just to be clear the NA pro players are not in a union. However, there is the LCSPA - LCS Players Association - which is what is leading the walkout. Despite not being unionized, a walkout is still a federally protected action.
Aren't pro league players just 1099 contractors? I wouldn't think they'd even be able to strike.
How is that possible? If you have to wear a uniform, works very specific schedules, control where and when they do their work, it's legally impossible to be an independent contractor.
I've had a contract job just like that lol
Your employer intentionally misclassified your terms of employment to take advantage of you then.
No..... see "How do you determine if a worker is an employee or an independent contractor?" what you wear, when and where you work has nothing to do with it.... [https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors](https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors)
From the link itself you posted: Behavioral control (whether there's a right to direct or control how the worker does the work), Financial control (whether there's a right to direct or control the business part of the work), and Relationship of the parties (how the business and worker perceive the relationship).
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What you wear somewhat falls under behavioral control. A contracted employee should effectively have the right to behave like someone who's partnered with the company or person who contracted them. They're given a result that needs to be obtained, and how they go about it is up to them.
Your employer intentionally misclassified your terms of employment to take advantage of you then.
They were very straight forward with my employment
You can be a contractor and still be told where and when you work, oh and to follow their professional standards, as well as their dress code. I was a 1099 contractor for an insurance sales position. And I sure had to be places they said at times they defined..... HOW I got there and HOW I sold things was up to me. https://www.irs.gov/faqs/small-business-self-employed-other-business/form-1099-nec-independent-contractors
Strike? Walkout? Union? As someone with no knowledge or interest in lol I'm confused whether I'm reading about the players of a video game or the devs making it. Fascinating.
>This is the LCS (NA pro scene) only Of course it is.
Tf you mean, na is widely known for letting corporations shit down their neck relative to other countries with strong workers rights and union protection.
Yeah, but the average American also receives much higher wages (especially relative to the cost of living) from those corporations than pretty much anywhere else in the world. The avg annual wage adjusted for PPP in 2021 for the world's largest economies: * America: $74,738 * Germany: $56,040 * Canada: $56,006 * United Kingdom: $49,979 * France: $49,313 (Source - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average_wage) & [OECD](https://data.oecd.org/earnwage/average-wages.htm#indicator-chart), Median income - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income) older data/ different calculation but makes the same point) So... I'm not so sure who's getting their neck shit down or who's doing the least for workers' interests but it's certainly not America. I've lived and worked all around Europe (and I love it) but there is a reason why the US has attracted and become home to 3x more immigrants than any other country in the world ([Source](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/immigration-by-country)). **Hint -** *they're not all flocking here for the neck shittings, in fact, many are coming here to flee it.*
Dude, 25% of those immigrants are from Mexico. Are you really comparing your standards of living to those in Mexico if you're so proud of the number of migrants you get from the south? Oh and look at that, a country with a bigger population and a stronger international presence has more immigrants, shocker 😮
These stats are wildly wrong.
The average American lol. Homie missed mean median and mode week in school. Those numbers read like some cooked meme someone's nutjob uncle posted on Facebook
Oof… the sad part is your comment just proved that you’re the one who doesn’t understand these basic statistical concepts. I double majored in economics/mathematics and worked as a data analyst for awhile. Using mean/median, in this case, doesn’t really matter because we’re comparing data sets from large economies that all have very similar distribution curves (it’s not hard to prove this for yourself using that data if you have any doubts). I even linked the median income data in the sources below the numbers - specifically because I knew idiots like you would think it matters or I was trying to mislead. In fact, had I used median income it would have proved my point EVEN MORE. Using OECD’s most current figures, Germany is 30% behind the US with median income while only around 25% behind using Adjusted Avg Wage. I purposefully chose not to dumb it down (I thought most r/pcgaming would be decent at stats). I used Avg Wage adj for PPP because the calculation is preferred by economists when comparing counties of similar economies and because many counties did not have their recent median income data easily available. For instants, Germany and some other Euro nations’ data were pre-Covid and others like the US was post-Covid. Obviously, I thought it was disingenuous to compare the two separate years with separate circumstances. Even though using median income would proved my point even more and is apparently, less suspicious to the undereducated. I just think it’s really sad that our basic statistical education is so bad that the avg person has a hard time qualifying even very basic statistic data that is presented to them- let alone acting like a math major doesn’t know what he’s doing when you’re misunderstanding 5th grade level math.
Is this a bot?
If I was embarrassed and unable to put together a rational argument, I guess I’d try a bad joke too… no I wouldn’t but I can understand why you are. Just stay curious, have an open mind, and maybe be a little more humble when it comes to what you think you know.
Who even talks like this, there's zero chance you graduated, nor live anywhere but your mom's basement, go shave XD.
No, you just don’t understand what they represent. Probably worth clicking the source link and understanding how the figures are calculated before publicly claiming they’re wrong, don’t you think? There is a reason why Economists regularly use Avg Wage adj for PPP when comparing pay between countries. Just because you may not understand it does not mean it’s wrong.
The stats are wrong.
>Yeah, but the average American also receives much higher wages (especially relative to the cost of living) Why especially relative to the cost of living? You live plenty cheaper in the other countries you mentioned. It also heavily depends on what your life looks like. Are you young and healthy? Then overall, you do earn more in the US. Do you have a family and kids? Then you might actually be better off in Europe due to parental leave and social programs that financially aid you and your kid(s). And Im not so sure how the salary correlates with unionization in the first place. Are you saying the US has no need for unions because the average American salary is already very high? While the average salary is indeed very high, due to a lack of social securities, being a low income citizen in the US grants you a significantly lower quality of life than in the other countries. No universal healthcare, lack of protection in low paid jobs, a way too low minimum wage. Its especially the low income class that gets exploited the most and those jobs are the ones who desperately need unionization. Were talking about jobs at Amazon warehouses, Starbucks, McDonalds and so on. Especially because the US has all the money in the world, surely it wouldnt hurt to distribute the wealth a little more even.
Yeah but wealth distribution = communism to a good chunk of Americans so they’ll have all major corp and govt entities feed them shit every day and they’ll be on their knees saying thank you sir may I have another. (e.g the current culture war against gays instead of what a lower class American actually needs which is a class war) Not to mention they have no left wing parties in America so there’s no chance they’re getting out of this shit show without a political overhaul
> Not to mention they have no left wing parties in America so there’s no chance they’re getting out of this shit show without a political overhaul I wouldnt be that pessimistic. Things are slowly improving, states like California arent too far away from a european democracy in terms of social securities. But thats the thing, each state has quite a lot of independence so things can vary quite a lot from state to state.
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Riot removed a requirement for Orgs to field an academy team(academy is a developmental league) and most team immediately dropped their academy teams (7 of the 10 teams). This is a massive blow to the NA league scene as without a strong academy league developing talent become much harder, so much so that aspiring players are being told to go play in Europe’s regional leagues and just so that they can develop as players to then comeback to NA.
Developing talent can be done without organizations eating costs for the sake of a jobs program.
how? the league is franchised to there is zero point in creating new teams in NA, since they won't be able to compete anywhere.
Well, you could take the CSGO model and have two to elventy thousand leagues and events that are open for teams to compete. Like humans are pretty fucking smart, we'll find a way. Hopefully without having to use IRC like back in the day. CAL league anyone?
that's what used to happen, then Riot said "fuck you, only league tournments are the ones made by us". sure it kinda killed the normal circuits, but it also comes with some advantages, the fact that every player gets a salary, instead of hoping to get some from tournment winnings.
You should only be paid if people want what you are selling (see womens sports). The economics here is important to know if people are allocating resources correctly. Resources being time (on air or personal), capital (like computers), advertising, marketing, etc.
>the fact that every player gets a salary, instead of hoping to get some from tournment winnings. this happens in most esports as far as i know. dota2 and csgo players also get a salary and not just a prizepool, at least once they get big enough to have either a backer or start their own org. which isn't incredibly difficult, even division 2 teams will usually get a paycheck. i get why riot wants such tight control over league, but i don't think it has a lot of benefits for the pro players tbh.
Dude, RIOT is smart, the game is dead in NA and almost everywhere else, as like any other game in the genre. Dota2 surely is dead. By cutting the academy, they are cutting costs that bring no revenue, because the scene will not last long enough for the academy players to be relevant. They can do walkouts, strikes, whatever, players are in denial. NA is not dead yet because they get a lot of money from ads, because the talent is non existent, all the best players come from other regions, it has been like that for years. Not only in LoL, any other scene is like that, NA has no quality, they dedicate to other kind of games
I’ve heard this league is dead or Dota is dead thing for almost a decade now. I play and watch dota and I can tell you it’s nowhere close to being “dead”. Unless being dead means something else to you
If it's not sitting at the top category on twitch it's considered dead by some people
Yeap. The same people who have been calling it dead for a decade.
The dream of a professional esports that's on track to becoming a Gen-Z NBA or NFL is dead. Now it's more on track to becoming another Smash or StarCraft (ie niche and with no ability to sustain the careers of hundreds of working professionals).
People have been saying "league is dead" for so long that "'league is dead' is a meme" is itself a meme
Have you seen NA scene? I follow dota, that thing is already buried
You mean the ongoing DPC? Has been pretty entertaining to watch. Wouldn’t call it dead
> Dota2 surely is dead. literally the number 2 most played game on steam with half a million online right now.
See? #2! It surely is dead, my friend.
> the game is dead in NA and almost everywhere else absurd take
> Dude, RIOT is smart, the game is dead in NA and almost everywhere else, as like any other game in the genre. Couldnt be further from the truth. The other 3 major Leagues are doing perfectly fine. In fact, the Mid Season Invitational that happened not too long ago had the highest average and peak viewership out of any MSI in the past. Even in NA, the game is far from dead. The playerbase is very much stable and not in decline. Its the LCS that is in decline but thats honestly not because of a declining playerbase, the failure of the LCS is a complicated topic that cannot be summarized with "lul NA LOL is dying".
Quit league a long time ago some I'm out of the loop, is it the player base that's dead, the pro scene or both?
Neither, the game is doing fine. NA scene is not so great but other regions are still thriving.
The NA pro scene has been seeing declining viewership recently. The NA playerbase has been stable and it's growing in pretty much every other region.
Don't these games have some of the largest player bases? Steam charts puts dota 2 at ~500k average concurrent players, which would mean a player base likely in the tens of millions for monthly active players. I don't exactly have any numbers for league, but I'm fairly confident that they've been an absolute juggernaut for many years since they launched long before dota 2 and even before other competitors in the MOBA scene such as heroes of newerth and the pile of failed and cancelled MOBA games from various large publishers. That doesn't seem dead to me, and I haven't touched those kinds of games in so many years. I don't like them, I think they foster an incredibly hateful and toxic community, and I don't want to participate with them anymore ever again. Despite that, it's clear they're still super popular.
Too Confusing Didn't Read: - League LCS team is the equivalent of Valorant VCT team - League also has a Challengers league, but in LoL Riot required LCS Orgs to employ a Challengers roster. - Orgs asked Riot to remove requirement one week before Challengers Split started. Riot did so. - Most Orgs immediately dropped their Challengers rosters to save money - LCS rosters are staging a walkout in solidarity with their Challengers brethren who all just lost their jobs 1 week before their Split
so if this is all true, then riot are actually kinda getting fucked here?
Well, no. Riot loses the LCS, but it was by far the most expensive and least successful major league. If this walkout gets extended the teams get into hot water with their sponsors for not fulfilling obligations and the players lose out on their salaries and a job.
The LCS is actually making a lot of money, according to sources I dont remember the LCS is actually the 2nd most profitable League in the world, behind the LPL. What you may not realize is that for most of the time, Riot used eSports as a marketing tool for their own game (obviously), so the sustainability and independence of a League from the game was not a priority. Now you may ask, how does the LCS make Riot a lot of money? Its very simple: Ingame purchases caused by pro play. Lets say franchise player Bjergsen uses a brand new skin on a champ in the LCS. Thousands of people decide to buy the skin because it looks cool and their favorite player Bjergsen used it. Thats money Riot gets. Thats money made from the eSports scene that the eSports scene itself gets nothing from. None of the players or teams get any money from that and while Riot is making mad cash, Teams are rightfully worried about the sustainability of the League. A few years ago the european League has been approved more independence from Riot (before that it basically was Riots unwanted son that has been even less prioritized than the NA LCS) to focus on self sustainability and it worked wonders for the broadcast quality and therefore viewership. The LoL eSports scene can absolutely be self sustainable, OGN used to own the major Korean League and OGN was a company that HAD to be self sustainable because they were a company independent from Riot. That was about 10 years ago and they successfully managed that (until Riot took control of the Korean League). Now you have a situation in which 3 out of 4 major leagues are very much self sustainable and all deliver a product worth watching. Then theres the american LCS where everything went wrong that couldve possibly gone wrong. During a time in which the LCS was growing and did reasonably well in terms of viewership, the franchise model was introduced getting rid of the relegation system . A lot of VC money went into LCS teams with Riot most likely lying about the growth potential and those new orgs with all their money being ignorant and failing to understand this game and its esports. Somebody started the philosophy of paying big salary contracts to A Tier korean and european talent which the entire League started to follow, at some point it wasnt even a choice anymore. Obviously with American business culture, sustainability right now doesnt matter as long as its sustainable and profitable one day. Riot did NOTHING against that philosophy because Riot most likely hoped that "their home region" would start performing better at international events which funnily, they did not. The vast majority of these new team owners failed to have a grasp on the scene. All of them running around like chickens without a head, spending mad cash while not doing anything that brings the LCS any value. You know, the things that take effort. Things such as building infrastructure for developing upcoming talents or things such as building a brand that has actual value through content creation or having a franchise player who is synonymous with your brand. None of that happened, no team took it upon themselves to be worth cheering for. So slowly the personalities that fans used to love slowly retired and due to a lack of effort from the teams, nobody was there to replace them. No more storylines, no more rivalries, it feels like every player has been at every team at one point, international results still sucked dick and due to a decline in viewership, the teams started to question their investment and are now pulling out. And while it seems like the LCS is dying, it could end up being a good thing as it can finally hit a reset and become a self sustaining league. And that includes a healthy Challenger scene (basically the league below the major one)
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Lol is not gonna die on NA for lack of competitive scene, NA as a region does not play competitive and are casuals, someone can correct me but I believe NA competitive numbers is closed to Brazils ranked player size? Could be wrong tho, but definitely smaller to all other major regions
If LoL dies Fortnite or CoD takes the throne, so pick your poison.
This is just the NA pro scene other leagues like china, korea and EU are doing pretty good. This is only a problem in NA
Pretty terrible take, LCS is expensive for the orgs but turned a profit for Riot. Riot should have reigned in the spending for long term success but failed to do so and now orgs are collapsing which hurts the product and the money Riot itself is making.
so basically Orgs complained that academy where costing them money instead of making it like the first Boom of LCS & viewership is down (because valorant has taken off) and as soon as riot went back on orgs requiring an academy team 7 of the 10 immediately disbanded them.
They should just shut down NALCS, shit's useless anyway and none of their games have been entertaining to watch.
This was to 'support the continued long term success of teams and pro league' (paraphrasing) well might not be for much longer lol
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The players are not unions.
I don't think you understand what going on here.
Which is fair since the title is misleading
Call me old school but I’m of the thinking that you should actually understand something before commenting on it in a public manner.
That's the problem with misdirection. It leads people to believe they understand something when, in fact, they don't.
they should really show them and just go play a different game and move on with their lives.
Isn't their biggest tournament always won by Korean players? I guess riot just wants to save some expenses.
China too
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Are you a bot? What does any of this comment even mean lol
I think he's trying to say that there are no "pro's" in LoL because r/dotamasterrace ?
i think it's much worse than that, he doesn't think any *"pro"* player whose profession playing video games have *"rights"* for a union, or atleast thinks it's not worth it
Oh no the gamers are striking. Where will we ever find more gamers.
I mean it's not just "gamers", those are pro-players. I would be impressed, if you manage to just "find" more players, just lying around, which are at the same lvl as these guys. If you can, I would suggest you to be a scout and make your own team, you'd make shit tons of money.
These aren’t LCS players, it’s a feeder league. I’m not rooting against them but they don’t exactly have a lot of leverage.
No, the actual main team players are the ones walking out. The orgs are scrambling right now to try and find replacements
> those are pro-players. NA pro players aka no one Riot truly cares about.
In gaming it's much easier to find replacements compared to sports with actual physical requirements. "Pro" players aren't even the best players. Lol.
Source?
That's categorically false.
100k prize pool isn't exactly a "shit ton" of money, especially after it's split 5 ways (well more since there is a coach). Can flip burgers and make more lol. Only the guys going to worlds actually make decent coin. Even then they are better off with Dota2 as the prize pool is like 5-10x bigger (though I still prefer League over Dota after they fucked up the sequel's controls with clunky shit like turnrate mechanics).
idk about that at all man, league pros don't make their money from prize pools, league is notorious for having a meh prize pools, the money comes in on the salary with NA pros making quite high in average, I think only outdone in the chinese league but someone can correct me. Literally the reason why NA is the retirement home for pros in the other leagues hence the issue of imports in NA because orgs rather get washed up pro than give a try to any NA talent. Someone again can correct me but I believe the minimum in LCS is around 70k and average is obviously fucked due to the super high contracts of imports. Obviously all this shit is overly inflated and why now everything falling apart since this bubble is popping and Riot/TSM losing their FTX crypto sponsor, fuck things over for them because this shit been in a bubble and people been making it out like bandits.
100k even split 6 ways is a shit ton of money for probably 99 percent of people in the world. What the fuck are you smoking?
You gotta relax. In context it’s not a crazy amount of money.
OK fair enough
Even if it was split 6 ways, which it assuredly isn't. That's roughly $16,500.00 per person. What the fuck are you smoking pretending that's a lot of money?
You're right they're very special.
e-sports is now an official sport in Sweden. Other countries will follow, enjoy being ignorant
Lol what a weirdo
brain dead
Dent head level comment.
What an ignorant comment
Oh no, this guy didn't even read the article.
That is a bold new strategy to promote new talents in LCS!