Tournaments GSCPL V - Format Discussion

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Host Team: Murm Akai Zcarlett
Tournament Rules and General Guidelines
GSCPL V Commencement Thread (Coming Soon)
Spreadsheet (Coming Soon)​


How does GSCPL work?

There will be 6 or 8 teams, each with their own manager and assistant manager. Management duos will do a Snake Draft Auction on Pokemon Showdown!, where they will take turns nominating and bidding in an auction for players who signed up to assemble their teams with limited credits available. Then:
- teams will then play one another for 5 or 7 weeks, with a new opponent each week. This will culminate with a Playoffs week consisting of the Top 3 or 4 teams overall from the regular season season.
OR
- teams will play one another for 5 weeks, then the bottom 2 teams will be eliminated, and the remaining 4 teams will play each other for 3 more weeks, then the top 2 teams will play each other for finals. For more info, see: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/on-6-team-pls.3726578/

Note: Format is TBD

How does one signup as a player?

Player signups are projected to begin Sunday, September 24th and will be open until 24 hours before the auction (see below). You should include your name, timezone, metagames you are willing to play, and any expected inactivity. Do not sign up if you cannot commit to the entire tournament. GSCPL IV is expected to run from the beginning of October to the beginning of December.

How does one apply to be a manager / assistant manager?

Manager signups are projected to begin Monday, September 23rd and will be open until Sunday, September 29th at 11:59 PM GMT-4. The GSCPL hosting team will pick managers.

If I am selected as a captain, can I still play for my team?

Yes, managers and assistant managers will be given the option to draft themselves for a set price of 15k credits. You do not have to buy yourself if you don't want to. Double manager self-buy TBD.

When is the GSCPL Auction?

The auction date will occur during October 12th / October 13th, when at least one representative of each team will be available.

When does GSCPL Week 1 start?

Monday, October 14th.

The General Manager of a team is essentially the boss of a team. The GM is the final word in all decisions (barring the hosts) regarding their team. The GM decides which players play on the team, who plays in what slot, and even handles the team finances. Managers also make sure that the team keeps running on a day to day basis. If a team fails to complete their matches by the end of the allotted time, the onus is on the manager to inform the hosts as to what happened in order to make sure that proper activity calls are made.

Because of these responsibilities, The General Manager is probably the most important part of the team. As such, the position of GM is not one to be taken lightly.

• General Managers are chosen largely on a subjective opinion of the hosts as well as GSC Moderation Team as to who they believe would be fit for the position. Being fit for the position includes the knowledge of players in the community (for fielding a competent team), having above average activity on the forums, Pokémon Showdown and/or Discord (in order to ensure that you don’t abandon your team), as well as possessing a necessary amount of “gravitas” (If you can’t make a player do what you tell them to, such as play an undesirable metagame, you’re not going to make a good manager).

General Managers are required to acquire one Assistant Manager. The General Manager gets full sovereignty in choosing their assistant manager. The assistant manager is essentially the second in command for the team. They have all of the functions and roles as the General Manager does, the GM just trumps them in head-to-head decisions.

Lastly, the General Manager has the following duties:

• They shall choose one Assistant Manager.
• They shall make the hosts aware of any player retentions by the time player signups close.
• They shall be present at the live auction, or appoint someone (the Assistant Manager) to participate in the live auction in their stead.
• They shall send the hosts weekly rosters.
• They shall ensure to the best of their abilities that their battlers complete their matches on time.
• In the event that a match fails to be completed, they shall inform the hosts as to why the match failed to be completed, and what their battler did in order to finish the match.
• They shall communicate any grievances with the hosts.

Total money for teams is the minimum number of players x 10,000 credits.

In the weeks preceding the Live Auction, a time will be chosen where at least 1 Manager or Assistant Manager from each team can meet and perform a live auction in order to choose players. The Manager and/or Assistant Manager present will be expected to remain at the auction for the entire duration, which should take approximately 1-2 hours.

Once a time is set, all attending Managers + Hosts will enter the place where the auction will be held - most likely a group chat for the auction. Spectators are allowed to join in to watch the auction, but will not be able to speak. Discussion on the bidding should be relegated to the GSC Discord.

The hosts will first ask a team to nominate a player. The order by which teams will nominate players will go in a randomized snaking pattern from the first chosen team to the last chosen team, then the last chosen team to the first chosen team. Details of said player will be displayed and bidding will commence, starting at 3000 credits, with the nominating team automatically placing the first bid. The auction will then be in real time. Managers will simply put in their bids in the chat, raising a minimum of 500 credits. If after 15 seconds there are no new bids, the player is sold to the highest bid in the channel. Updated credit totals will be displayed and then the next manager in the rotation will be prompted to nominate a player.

Managers: it is necessary for you to field a roster of 6 to 8 starters and a minimum of (likely) 2 substitutes. Playing Managers and Assistant Managers are included in the roster number.

There is no midseason this year. Therefore, it is highly recommended that all teams spend all of their credits in the auction, as there is no use for them afterwards.

It is at this time that the tournament will commence. The league stages consist of a Round Robin tournament. Every team will face every other team once through the regular season. Each manager will submit to the hosts a roster no later than the deadline of the previous week. This roster will list the starting players and what metagames they will play.

When the week starts, teams' players will face off in their respective metagames / tiers. The GSC OU 1 from Team A will face the GSC OU 1 from team B, GSC OU 2 will face GSC OU 2, and so on. Whichever team wins the most battles will be declared the victor for the week. Rather than score based on how many individual battles a team wins, the primary thing that matters is who beat the most teams. As such, points are awarded based only on wins and losses versus teams as a whole, not individual players. Beating a team in a week’s matchups is worth two points, tying with a team is worth one point, and losing is worth none, simple as that. At the end of the round robin, the top three or four teams in the points proceed to the playoffs.

There are a few regulatory things during the league stages that need to be outlined.

1. Substitutes – At any point in time during the week, a team may make a substitution for a currently slotted player. In order to do this a manager must post in the thread, tagging the hosts, the opposing managers and the opposing player stating which player is substituting out, and which player is substituting in. A player that has substituted out for a week cannot be substituted back in. In addition, in order to catch any attempts at garnering favorable matchups in GSC OU (where the lineup you choose affects pairings), all substitutions are subject to veto by the hosts if the substitution is suspected to be attempting to “game” the system.

2. There will be no trades allowed at any point during GSCPL.

3. Activity decisions – There are inevitably times where two players simply fail to complete a match; however, the nature of the tournament system sometimes makes it advantageous to purposely fail to play (such as when a team is up 3-2 in a week). Because of this, it is necessary to make activity decisions on matches. Hosts are required to make thorough investigations regarding each and every potential failed match during a week. If both parties are deemed to be equally apathetic or enthusiastic about getting the match done, but just have not had the opportunity to make it happen, the match will result in a no contest. However, if it is deemed that one party made significantly more effort than the other in attempting to get the match done, then a win will be awarded to that player. Things that will make it very likely that you will lose via activity include: failing to VM your opponent immediately upon the week’s start, scheduling a match and being documented as missing the match time, failing to provide any concrete times for which you can be reached, failing to respond to an opponent’s VM at all. Note that this is a tournament that requires a very high level of activity and diligence, if you don’t think you can get your matches done, quite simply don’t sign up.

4. Rule Breaking – There is no excuse for breaking any of the predetermined rules. If you are caught breaking a rule, you will lose your match. There is no lenience with regards to this. Break a rule, you lose. Period.

5. Reversing Rulings - No ruling will be retroactively overturned once the week following the week that the ruling has been made has ended. This includes: activity rulings / rulings based on rule breaking / anything else under the sun. I'm not going back in time to reevaluate every single decision I've made throughout the tournament on Week 9 because you think you were robbed of 1-2 wins along the way and now they're the difference between you and a playoff spot. Any appeals to a ruling must be made during the week that the ruling is made; beyond that, all rulings are final once the week ends.

Sunday September 8th - Format Discussion Thread
Monday September 23rd - Manager Signups
Monday September 30th - Player Signups
Saturday October 12th / Sunday October 13th - Live Auction
Monday October 14th - Week 1


In this thread, feel free to discuss anything regarding GSCPL before it begins. This is meant to be a place for players to voice their opinions and help us decide some key things regarding GSCPL. The major point of discussion is the Format. Retain prices will be unchanged.

1. Teams and Slots
​
Last year's format was 8 teams with 6 slots. The GSC Moderation team is mandating 50% of slots be for OU.​
​
3 options:​
​
1. Revert to 6 teams and 6 slots.​
2. Keep 8 teams and 6 slots.​
3. Revert to 6 teams and expand to 8 slots. The 7th slot would be a 4th OU slot. This 4th OU slot could also be Bo3 OU. The 8th slot would be PU.​
​

2. Playoff Format (Only if 6 teams)

3 options:
  1. 3 team playoffs. Top seed gets a bye round to finals and 2 and 3 seed play semifinals to decide who goes to finals.
  2. 4 team playoffs. Top 4 seeds make playoffs, with 1 seed playing 4 seed and 2 seed playing 3 seed to decide who goes to finals.
  3. Amaranth's Proposal C for 6-team PLs

3. Self-Buy Pricing

Last year the prices for self-buys were 15k for a single buy and 45k total for a double buy. Some have expressed the price for a double buy is too much and constricts drafting unnecessarily much.

3 options:
  1. Keep self-buys at the same price.
  2. Lower the second self-buy from 30k to 25k for a total of 40k for a double buy.
  3. Remove the option to double buy.
 
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Personal opinion:

- No super strong preference for teams and slots but I suppose 6x8 > 6x6 > 8x6. Fine with any of these though.

- 4 team playoffs is absolutely my preferred for 6 teams. 3 team playoffs kinda sucks and belgian felt like it dragged in RBYPL IV and I wasn't a big fan

- Remove double or lower to 40k
 
1. 6 teams with 6 slots - the quality for OU and NU, as well as captains, was suffering big time last year and it meant the tournament overall suffered. Keep the tournament smaller until the player base is healthier.
2. 4 team playoffs has the lowest downside in practice, from what I've heard the Proposal C hasn't worked out well in practice, although I would be OK with trying it myself.
3. Remove the ability to double self-buy (ideally remove selfbuys completely). Everything that undermines the auction is a danger to the health of the tournament, it should not be the case that top teams are formed at the manager selection. If it is deemed necessary to keep double self-buys, do NOT make the price tag cheaper, the two teams that went for the double self-buy last year won the tournament and the regular season respectively, so it is not prohibiting success (I would argue on the contrary). (edit: also a smaller tournament would mean a lower need to pad out the player pool with extra selfbuys)
 
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Personally I would prefer keeping 8 teams simply because it's the best possible playoff format. But I also can't ignore the fact that there were quite some problems filling the managerial slots last edition. Even though signups were fine on paper there was definetly a steep quality drop. At the same time I'd hate to remove all the additional slots we added last edition. Yeah the quality was lacking in some slots but in the end these kind of Premier Leagues are also the best opportunity for players with less experience to get their first team tournament experience and improve. And as a generation with fewer players we should always look for opportunities to grow the player base. Going back to 6x6 will definetly improve the overall quality but I honestly don't mind if a couple of slots drag down the quality a bit but in return we grow as generation because of that in the end.

Considering all these points I'd prefer the number of teams and slots in this order:
6x8 > 8x6 > 6x6

In case we decide for 6 teams I'm strongly in favour of the Proposal C that has already been tested in RBYPL last year and will most likely be used again this year. None of the three options are perfect but 3- and 4-team playoffs with 6 teams are awful. With 3 teams the bye week for the fist seed team just sucks and even more in case of a tiebreak. And 4 teams in playoffs makes the regular season almost meaningless unless all teams are equally strong. The biggest criticism on Proposal C was that it was dragging on a bit in the end but I honestly think that is the smallest problem of all possible formats. I'd rather play 2 more weeks in total than having a bye week or an almost meaningless regular season. In the end we are signing up for these tournaments to play the game after all.

Proposal C >>> 4/3-team playoffs

Double self-buys should be removed. Double self-buys were introduced to make managing more appealing but that barely worked and the double self-buys just ended up being too good like Isa said. But I also think we shouldn't remove them entirely and should just revert back to one singular self-buy. In case we change back to one self-buy the price should be changed back to 20k which is a good price.
 
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1. 6x6 > 6x8 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 8x6
There were issues with ou/nu slots last year, as well as managerial issues. 6x6 solves this imo and offers the highest quality. I don't see a reason to believe this year will have more signups for players/managers this year, and 6x6 offers the best of both worlds. If people are really keen on keeping 48 starters, I highly prefer 6x8 to 8x6. It seems evident to me that there was a larger managerial issue than player quality issue last year, although both existed. 6 teams keeps the manager selection tight. Please do not consider 8x6 lol it is strictly worse than 6x8.

2. Please do the belgian format. I loved it so much in RBYPL. They're running it back again this year with the format and it worked great imo. Absolutely the biggest reason why im okay with 6x6 is that this format works fantastic.

3. This is contingent on point one so im not sure how much there is to comment on rn. With my preference of 6x6, there should be no double buys. In a bigger tour (esp. 8x6), double buys should be considered. However, 6 teams no double buys is best. In the case we keep double buys (we shouldnt), price should be reduced. It was too high last year.
 
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I generally agree with vani's post, in that there is little reason in my opinion to reduce the amount of OU slots in the tour when one of the biggest draws of the tour is to get more people involved in GSC OU. This isn't the GSC Super All Star Hall of Fame Olympic Super Bowl PL and having 6x6 is incredibly elitist. Of course the "quality" will be lower with more slots and more people playing - that's common sense, nobody is going to argue that. But the upside is that, well, more people are playing and getting involved with GSC. If we think we can't really field a competitive lower tier pool based on 8 teams, that is a fair criticism. But any argument about a "lower" quality of OU games I think has no merit because the entire point of having the extra OU games is to get more people involved that may not usually get that opportunity.

Last year we had like $2 to spend on all of our players because of the stupid double buy rules that made no sense. Having to waste half of your credits on a double buy is just stupid - you need to either lower the price for the second buy to something more reasonable (look around at what other PLs do for double buys and use that - it works for them), or simply get rid of the double buys altogether if you are going to continue to make it a stupidly high price that only maniacs (me + soup) or super top elites (vani + Isa) would ever consider doing. It's unfair because A) the price was too high and unforgiving to the point you aren't really drafting a real team during the auction you're just praying for the best, and B) having a double buy when there's only 6 starter slots also just basically buys 33% of your starters as managers before auction which is equally silly. It might make more sense with 8 slots, but in that scenario you need to lower the price if you're going to allow it. The mathematical basis for coming up with the double self buy price last year was incredibly flawed logic that didn't even take into account the possibility that you may buy a sub for more than 3k - the entire premise for that double buy price already made no sense from the start and in practice it was more evident. It should have been 15k for first buy, 25k for second buy, end of story. If that's not acceptable, then don't offer it at all, it compromises the tournament by putting a stranglehold on a team's funds during the auction to the point they aren't really participating. We got really lucky last year that were able to get incredible production out of our 3k players - that's very rarely going to be the situation (in fact it definitely won't be the situation if you make it 6x6 this year because then only the elite players can participate lol!)

We should be about inclusion, not exclusion, and we can save the elitism for SPL. GSC PL should be as inclusive as possible with respect to player slots, and also with respect to tier inclusion. There's little reason to not include GSC PU in the tournament this year for example - it has established itself as a real meta with solid development and an actual player base over the past year. To me, this means that the most optimal configuration would be 6 teams, 8 slots, 4 OU, Ubers/UU/NU/PU. This retains all of the OU slots from last year so as to not cut those down (cutting the total OU slots shouldn't be considered), adds PU which is much deserved, and allows for a smaller manager pool so as to keep a high quality of managers for a better overall tour experience. I personally think that, if we get some amazing manager signups, we should consider 8x8. There's going to be enough player signups for it regardless of what happens. We will always be able to fill the pools, but the bigger problem with 8x8 is not having the right managers for it which hampers the overall competition and experience, for all teams and specifically for the players on the teams with bad managers. Nonetheless, the worst option is 6x6 - that's a recipe for elitism and shrinking the overall GSC Playerbase and gatekeeping new talent from blossoming in the community.
 
Hi! Very exciting that GSC PL is coming right up! I don't have a lot to share/add to this discussion, but having been involved in all of this tournament's iterations, including one with the three-team playoffs model, I strongly urge that we use a four-team playoffs system. I've long thought having one team get a bye into the finals is asinine. Why not have more teams qualify and more matches as a result? It's a better experience for all and should be a no-brainer.

Honestly, I don't have strongly-felt opinions elsewhere. I'd prefer the 8 team, 6 slot model for teams simply because it's interesting to have more teams compete and to have more matches/a longer season.

Thanks, and looking forward to GSC PL again this year!
 
I believe that despite a few conflicting opinions in terms of layout, that there are some really good individual points that a lot of people touched on.

As someone who has flirted with both GSC OU and GSC Ubers a bit in the last month, here's my take(will provide a TL;DR at the end):

- I'm glad to see that most people agree that 3 team playoffs is just not a good idea. I don't agree with it and believe 4 teams making it is much healthier; if it's true that one team had a bye into the finals... that just doesn't seem proper in the spirit of competition.

- For the most part, the player base for any oldgen is going to veer toward OU. GSC OU is certainly no different and it makes no sense to me to cut down on slots for what will inevitably be the most attractive tier to most users. UItimately we have to face facts and acknowledge that OU deserves that extra spot because it's what most people are going to want to play.

- HOWEVER, as someone who enjoys a fair number of lower tiers as well, I think it is vital to have them see representation too for a number of reasons. I know that personally the inclusion of GSC Ubers into UPL was what got me to take notice of it and eventually start playing it a little more, and I believe that something similar could happen with people who only pay attention to GSC OU as of now. Assuming an ideal situation where teams are actually social with one another, players might swap notes and test out other GSC tiers in order to support their teammates and better prep for their opponents. So someone who might have only signed for GSC OU might find themselves becoming more interested in something like GSC UU or PU for example, further enhancing the diversity of the playerbase and thus in turn getting more eyes, battles, and development kickstarted for those tiers.

- It should also come to zero surprise by that last sentence that I very very strongly believe GSC PU should be included. I really like and will back the suggestion of four OU, one Uber/UU/NU/PU each. These are not tiers that come around often other than on spotlight ladders, and those ladders are not exactly the most popular ones. If GSCPL is meant to be a celebration and showcase of what Gen 2 competitive Pokemon has to offer then I see no reason why a tier that has proven to have legitimate support and a playerbase should not be included.

- I have zero experience being a manager so I don't want to comment on anything related to self-buys or finances for fear of overstepping since my post is being written to offer perspective from a relative newbie into the idea of PLs.


TL;DR: 6x8 is the right choice because it shows off every aspect of GSC. Include one slot for every lower tier + 4 OU slots(as it is probably going to get the most attention) and that might just inspire people who only came for one tier(most likely OU) to dip their toes into lower tiers. I suggest having a 4 team playoff because that encourages greater competition and more games played without compromising on quality by adding two more teams unnecessarily. I have no opinion on the financials of PLs as I'm not very experienced with that side of things, but my other takes in full are what I believe would make for a fun, balanced, and competitive GSCPL from a rookie's perspective.
 
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Really I appreciate all that everyone else has to say on this and they are valid points.
As a previous host, player and manager in this team tournament, I wish to express my opinion on both the structure of the tour and on how to address improper tournament etiquette from players and managers alike. For clarity's sake I'm going to keep them separate and start with the first issue.


I wish to say that I am in a very strong agreement with 6 teams and with Amaranth's proposal C and that I would welcome the idea of 6 teams with a 4th OU slot.
I'll explain why.

  • High octane and no time to adapt: In the first two PLs the situation was filled with a lot of excitement but it felt very rushed in many aspects. I dont want to take away the legitimacy of the results of those tours but they ended very VERY abruptly, lasting no more than 5 weeks for the losing teams (3 weeks in the case of GSC PL I because they did a double week but that's beside point).

  • Long tours = Burnout: On the other hand, I'm a believer that long and drawn out tournaments can lead to burnout where an otherwise dominating team in the first half or even all the way up to playoffs can perform worse by the end.

  • End of Season Shenanigans (absentees, troll lineups):The other issue that's a risk in all team tournaments is how by the end of regular season there is a lot of absentee-ism. For multiple reasons managers and players of all levels may decide that it's favourable to not play out individual games or a week.
    • On one end you have situations along the lines of winning teams being too concerned with differential to play out their week if it means jeapordizing their seed position (like in the case with 3 way playoffs where the finalists get a week of rest). If it could lead to a loss all but the strongest players tend to be incentivised not to play their games resulting in many deadgames.
    • But what's also very frustrating, and this issue is neither addressed with a 6x6 or a 8x6 solution, is how certain teams already know that they have no chances of qualifying for playoffs. In a low-stakes tournament like GSC PL, what remains for a player on a losing team to aspire to is to perfect his/her record. It's understandable that there isn't really much incentive for players to continue their weeks, after my experience last year I have to say that this not only goes against what team tournaments should stand for, but it's a completely toxic etiquette that ruins the sense of sportsmanship. Last year we had at least 3 teams in the last premier league, GSC PL IV, with absentee managers by the end, and for 3 weeks in a row scheduling was an absolute nightmare.

Here's how Amaranth's solution seems favourable:
  1. High stakes all throughout the regular season: your performance in the early season is still valuable, but if your team isn't in the bottom 2, there's still a fighting chance for you to make it into POs.
  2. Incentive for rank 1 and rank 2 to keep competing: This solves the issue of troll lineups and with the above point also helps solve the absentee problem.
  3. Strikes a good balance for a team tour: it's not too short to say you couldn't adapt, and not too long for you to say you had enough of it by the end. I think going back to the standard 6*6 of the old days simply isn't the solution with a growth in up and coming players and also others looking to participate in teams. Our goal should be to welcome as many willing players as possible in the hopes to see the community grow. For now this is the most elegant solution as opposed to having 8 teams.
In summary I don't know if I'll be participating yet in GSC PL V, but until this tournament will be taken as seriously as much more prestigious team tours out there like ROAPL or something, I don't see a world where these issues are going to be resolved without Amaranth's C proposal.

Also I would like to cut out double buys or buys all together. I wouldn't mind even proposing to make the single self buy 20k should we cut the double buy.
 
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Although I am skeptical regarding the tournament's growth if we revert back to 6 teams, the vibes I'm getting from the community is that we need GSCPL to be an event with high quality even if it comes at an accessibility cost. Valid concerns were raised, especially regarding bad managers from last year and absentees in the later stages.

Therefore for this year's GSCPL format I am currently favoring:
  • 6 teams x 8 (tiers tbd, likely 4x OU 4x LowerTiers).
  • Manager self buys abolished / restricted to a single selfbuy at 20k (I'm indifferent to either solution, but opposed in having double manager self buys with 6 teams)
  • Amaranths proposal C for playoff format (extra rounds for the top teams, that culminate to the final instead of 4way team playoffs)
 
Quick post about recent self buy discussion in GSC cord.

For 6 slots, please please keep it at 15k for a single buy. 20k self buy for 6 slots is equivalent to 25k for 8 slots (1/4th of your total budget) which is frankly absurd in terms of drafting constraint.

For 8 slots though, I’m okay with either 15k or 20k. Course I would prefer 15k cause I’m managing but 20k is definitely acceptable and accountable for in the auction and I understand the arguments for it.
 
Single buys should be 15k regardless of slots. 20k is too much, and I have not yet seen a single argument anywhere on why GSC PL needs to be 20k for a self buy when all the other RoA oldmeta PLs are 15k and it works fine there. And before we get the "well we are GSC PL we aren't the other PLs!" argument, I'm not saying we need to follow what others are doing, I just find it odd that in 7 out of 8 oldgen PLs 15k is the standard and works fine and I would love to see an argument/reason why GSC PL would not work the same and why it is different. Not only that, but 15k was the standard price in GSC PL itself before last year's disastrous double self buy rules. And on top of all of that, the 15k pricetag last year for single self buys seemed to work fine for the teams that single bought. I have not seen any downside to 15k as a pricetag for a self buy here as opposed to 20k other than punitive reasons that don't hold up and don't accomplish the actual goals they want.

20k is way too much for a single buy and all it does is punish non-elite players who want to player manage, while further compromising the auction by unreasonably restricting that team's ability to bid for other players. There were less than 5 total players last year that even went for 20k or more in the auction. I'm not sure if people just don't remember/aren't sure of what prices people are going for, but the fairest way to do this is to have all teams have as much access to their own funds as possible during the auction, and 15k still maintains this. Meanwhile, 20k adds an unreasonable burden that compromises teams at auction, gatekeeps non "elite" players from player managing without disadvantaging them, which also has the effect of discouraging some players from managing altogether (some of which are very good managers).

There just seems to be no real reason to make it a 20k self buy for a single self buy - all of the arguments I hear relate more to getting rid of self buys altogether, which is fair. But increasing it to a 20k self buy does not solve any issues associated with having self buys in the first place - it only makes them more unfair, so unless you get rid of them, keep it at 15k. It seems to work just fine in other tours and in GSC PL itself the past few years. I do not see why change is needed on this front.
 
Want to bump that I’m also in favor of a 15k price for managers. I feel as if the last thing we need is to dissuade managers from signing up this year. 20k is a pretty extreme amount. If we really want to experiment with higher self buys, let’s try a mid ground, 17.5k or something. However with my preference of 6x6 I especially support 15k.
 
Thanks everyone for the discussion both in this thread and on Discord. After further deliberation the GSC staff decided on the final format for GSCPL V:
  • 6 teams
  • 8 slots (4x OU, 1x Ubers, 1x UU, 1x NU, 1xPU), a minimum of 2 substitutes, 100k starting credits
  • Belgian Pro League format
    • 5 weeks regular season, top 4 advance -> points from regular season carry over and get halved
    • 3 week round robin between top 4 -> top 2 advance to finals
    • 9 weeks total
  • No retains this edition because of the reduction of teams
  • Single self-buy for 20k, no double self-buys
Manager signups will go up later today. Have fun everyone!
 
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