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Hello AsiaFortress Community

As many of you are aware, Shounic left for Canada some time back and has passed on the role of Head Administrator to me. In light of these major changes, I'd like to give all of you an idea of what to expect, the changes I've already made, as well as formally introduce you to the revamped Administrator and Staff Team.

Whitelist Changes

First, I'd like to announce a new whitelist for our PUG servers and potentially future tournaments.

The following unlocks have been added to the PUG whitelist with immediate effect:

• Liberty Launcher
• Concheror
• Flare Gun
• Ali Baba's Wee Booties
• Jag
• L'Etranger
• Cloak and Dagger

On the other side of the coin, if the community is unable to use these weapons responsibly (e.g. offclass excessively causing grief and frustration within their PUG team) then they will be removed and future additions to the whitelist will be less likely.

Offclassing Rule Changes

On that note, there is a revision to the offclassing rules in PUGs to accompany these whitelist changes.

To put it simply: If at any point in time during an ongoing PUG while you are playing an offclass a teammate objects to you offclassing in team chat, then you must switch back to a standard cookie cutter class next life (after you die as your current class).

After you have been told to stop offclassing once, you are required to ask for any objections in team chat before proceeding to offclass again for the duration of the PUG. As long as there is a single objection to you offclassing you are not allowed to offclass for that life.

Please note that this rule only applies to teammates objecting. You are free to disregard complaints from the enemy team that you are headshotting them too much.

If you believe someone to have broken this rule, then alert an Administrator if they are in the server. If there are no Administrators in the server, then you may report it directly to me after the game through Steam chat or the Private Message function on these forums.

You must produce evidence by uploading a demo (on Dropbox, Google Drive, etc.) showing the player in question breaking this rule if you are reporting it after the match. Reports without proper evidence and documentation will not be accepted.

Those who have been found guilty will be dealt with following a three-strike system. First-time offenders will be served with a clear warning. A subsequent offense will result in a kick from the server. Repeated offenses will be dealt with by bans of increasing durations, eventually resulting in a permanent ban for the most severe cases.

After extensive discussion with my Administrator and Staff Team, we have agreed that this is the best compromise between freedom in offclassing, reducing administrator subjectivity and ensuring a reasonable quality in PUGs.

Of course, you are free to disagree - let us listen to your feedback in the posts below, both before and after you have played a PUG with this rule in place. These rules are subject to change and reiteration following feedback and observations in PUGs. If they don't work as well as they should, then rest assured they will be changed.

Medigun Pickup Changes

With immediate effect, all Medigun pickups are banned in both PUGs and official matches.

For AsiaFortress PUGs, the cvar tf_dropped_weapon_lifetime 0 will be used, which means that all weapon drops are disabled until a way to either disable only Medigun pickups or Ubercharge retainment is found.

For official matches, the same cvar will be used for official AsiaFortress servers to disable all weapon pickups. However, in the event the match is played on servers which do not have the cvar set (i.e. weapon drops are enabled), teams are still not allowed to pick up Mediguns. Doing so intentionally will cause the offending team to automatically forfeit the match.

Any team which suspects the other team has done so can submit a demo (preferably SourceTV) to request for a match overturn on the grounds of rulebreaking.

The Creation of the Cast Team

One of the things I’d like to focus on improving within our league is the casting. I have found the quality of our previous casts to be lacking, and have made plans to create an official Cast Team to handle coverage for our future events.

For this undertaking, I have requested for Sakiisa to take charge of the team which he has generously accepted. If you’d like to help, we’re always looking for more casters and assistants, so don’t hesitate to post your interest in this thread or contact me directly.

Saki is a great caster himself, as demonstrated in his excellent coverage of the AsiaFortress Cup 9 Grand Finals despite the tight time constraints, and I trust in his ability to lead our Cast Team into one comparable to our fellow leagues in North America, Europe and Australia.

Administrator and Staff Team Changes

Next, I'd like to introduce the new Administrator and Staff Team who will join me in managing and improving the League.

Administrators

These individuals  have been granted administrative powers in-game, but some can only use their powers in specific situations.

First-in-line are Caldoran (me), Life and And. We are the Head Administrators of the SEA, Korean and Hong Kong communities respectively. We lead and handle major changes, as well as manage the League as a whole. All Administrators and Staff will report to us for the respective regions. We have all administrative powers such as kicking, banning, changing maps, etc.

Next are the Competition Administrators. Teejay and Gothmog will be holding this role. Teejay will be organizing and managing the Major Competitions (i.e. Merc Cup, AFC) while Gothmog will be organizing and managing the Minor Tournaments and Events (i.e. Mash Potatoes, Ultiduo and MGE tournaments). They have most administrative powers like kicking, banning, changing maps, RCON, and etc. but can only use these powers in official events they are managing. In other words, they cannot use these specific powers in PUGs or matches they are not in charge of.

As mentioned earlier, Sakiisa will be taking on the role of Casting Team Administrator. He will be in charge of leading and managing our Cast Team, and has the same powers as the Competition Administrators. Like them, he can only use these powers in official events where the Cast Team is involved.

For the General Administrators, I have appointed pttypwr, iridescentFUZZ, moosepi, Himari, oro and vetia. These are the Administrators in charge of enforcing the rules in the AsiaFortress PUG servers. They will also assist the Competition Administrators in the organizing and administrating of tournaments and events. They have the ability to kick, ban, change the map and execute different config files in the PUG servers.

Above the General Administrators are Senior Administrators. Hirasagi and Gothmog will be taking on this role. On top of taking on the responsibilities of a General Administrator, they are also in charge of keeping track of bans and player activity. They will also lead and manage the General Administrators to ensure proper procedures are being followed. Like General Administrators, they are able to kick, ban, change the map and execute config files in the PUG servers.

Staff

Staff have no administrative powers associated with them in-game, but are nonetheless a crucial part of our team.

Community Managers are a new role I have created for the purpose of understanding and interacting with the community better. Fwishy and vetia have been assigned this role. Their responsibilities involve gathering and responding to opinions and feedback from the community, and presenting them to the entire Administrator and Staff Team for further action and planning. If you have any feedback for the community, these two are who you should be looking for.

In the Design department, Cell has graciously lent her amazing artistic talent as our Official Designer. moosepi and vetia have also been hard at work creating official writeups as our Content Creators, as evidenced in the awesome AFC 9 writeups on our website and saloon.tf.

Of course, our team of Administrators and Staff welcomes anyone interested and qualified in helping us out. If you think there’s a role here you can assist in, or there are other ways you believe you can contribute, feel free to contact me directly on Steam or send me a PM on these forums to apply.

Moving Forward

In recent times, I have been made aware of several things community members are dissatisfied about, and I will be working on improving them.

To give a quick rundown, these are the goals I am aiming for, in no particular order:

• A more flexible and transparent administrative team open to feedback and suggestions
• Clearer and better defined rules
• A more inclusive unlock whitelist
• Higher quality PUGs
• More frequent tournaments and events
• LANs and cash prizes if and when feasible
• A PUG community more open and welcoming to newcomers
• A respectable Cast Team with strong production values

I am always open to feedback and suggestions. If you don’t like the rules that have been put in place, think one of the Administrators or Staff have crossed the line, or simply have an idea or concern that you wish to share, then feel free to post it in the Suggestions and Feedback board in our forums.

However, if for any reason you feel uncomfortable or hesitant to post it in public, then you are also welcome to add me to talk to me directly on Steam.

To the AsiaFortress community, let’s work together to revitalize our community and improve our league to new heights. I ask of you to put behind us all the past drama and grievances as we head forward into yet another year of Team Fortress 2.

I hope for and look forward to your support.

With regards,

Caldoran

SFM artwork by Blobinet, banner design by Cell, writeup by moosepi

AFC9 has ended, and what a ride it has been! Each division has seen some fantastic teams battle it out for the right to be called champions, and as a result we've seen some amazing TF2. Congratulations to all teams on their great gameplay, and to honour these players' efforts, let's go over the results of each division.

In Division 3, third seed Backcappers surprised everyone by not just holding their own against second seed Hemaera Cutie, but defeating them in a hard-fought best-of-3 semi-final match. They lost Badlands 3-4, falling short of victory by just a hair, but managed to pull themselves together to win Snakewater 4-2, and carried this momentum into a crushing 4-0 victory on Metalworks.

Meanwhile, Beyond Velocity, the undefeated first seed, displayed their dominance by taking out Morning Glory 6-1 on Badlands and 5-0 on Gullywash. In the finals, the Backcappers fought hard, but Beyond Velocity managed to eke out a 3-2 victory, and maintained their winning streak to take Process 8-3 to claim their title as undefeated champions.

In Division 2, fourth seed Color Gayming came out strong, almost taking Snakewater but ultimately letting victory slip out of their grasp, losing the map 2-3 to opponents Kuaga. Unfortunately, they fell apart after that, and Kuaga was able to take Gullywash with a convincing 5-0, bringing themselves into the sem-finals. In the other semi-final match, third seed Sweaty Tryhards was able to take the momentum early on both Badlands and Snakewater. While opponents Clinker Criminals managed to fight back in the later halves, it unfortunately proved to be insufficient, allowing Sweaty Tryhards to take the maps 4-3 and 6-4 respectively, bringing themselves into the Grand Finals.

There, they fought hard, but were ultimately unable to overcome Kuaga's solid play, losing Granary 1-4 and Process 2-4, and thus giving the Korean team the honour of first place.

In Division 1, Turbo 9000 shocked then-undefeated Mihaly's Flow by taking the first map of the semi-finals, Badlands, 3-2, making themselves the first team in the division to force the superteam to a map loss. They fought hard, but were ultimately unable to replicate this feat, as they lost the subsequent maps of Snakewater and Gullywash 1-3 each.

On the other hand, the match between Merc Cup 6 champions Cute Beast and seasoned veterans Emi Dizziness was insanely close, with each map going to a Golden Cap. After Cute Beast took the first on Badlands and Dizziness the second on Snakewater, the match came to Gullywash, and after a back-and-forth lasting fifteen minutes, Dizziness took the last point, finally ending the three-hour-long monster of a match and heading into the Grand Finals. There, Flow came out in force to take Granary in a convincing 5-1, but Dizziness didn't lose heart, and scraped themselves a win, taking Sunshine 5-4. Flow, however, ultimately proved the better team, and took Gullywash 4-2, proving themselves Grand Champions of AsiaFortress.

Congratulations once again to all teams, especially the champions! It's been an excellent season on all fronts, and we hope you've enjoyed it as much as we have.

Thanks for being with us, and we hope to see you again in our next competition!

...oh, and what's next, you ask?

Well, that remains something for us to announce in the future, but I can tell you how to be better prepared for what we have in store for Asia.  Heard of Razer Arena by any chance? It's pretty cool -  perhaps you should sign up for an account and maybe even register a team?

Better not reveal too much! Stay tuned for updates! 

Writeup by vetia and moosepi, edited by Caldoran
 
The AsiaFortress Cup 9 Grand Finals are right around the corner, and as the competition draws to a close, let's review the events that have transpired. It's been a fantastic season, with excellent TF2 from all competitors, and I'm sure the Grand Finals will be no exception.
 
After the Chinese team Cute Beast came out of nowhere to crush all the competition and win the Mercenaries' Cup 6 Grand Finals, the Korean scene decided they wanted revenge, and formed two strong contenders for Division 1 Champions, Emi Dizziness under Larky and Mihaly's Flow under Creep. Unfortunately, a resident South East Asian superteam disbanded due to the immense difficulty of finding a decent pocket — but this freed up Teejay and Patty to be picked up by Creep. These three teams, along with rising stars and AFC 8 Division 2 Champions Turbo 9000, proved through two months of strenuous midfights, surprising backcaps and heart-racing airshots in the group stages that they deserve to stand at the top of the league, and entered the playoffs.
 
Most notably, Mihaly's Flow stood proud at the top of the standings, not losing a single map, let alone a match, even against their fiercest rivals, Cute Beast — who themselves lost no matches except to Flow, although notably, they were forced to a tie by Turbo 9000 in the fifth round of the tournament, a result nobody expected from the weaker team.
 
In the Semi-Finals, Turbo 9000 surprised everyone again, taking the first map, Badlands, off Mihaly's Flow, and with it the honour of being the only team to take a map off them. Tragically, though, their victory was short-lived; Flow managed to pull their act together for the next two maps, and knocked T9K out of the tournament, advancing themselves to the Grand Finals.
 
In the match between Cute Beast and Emi Dizziness, a huge shock came for viewers as Fury, pocket for Cute Beast and backbone of the team's Über-fights, was unable to come online due to technical difficulties, and Cute Beast was forced to bring in Flow's pocket Shocky as a sub. Despite this, however, the match was incredibly close, with every single map coming to a golden cap, a feat unprecedented in Asian TF2 history. Eventually, after fifteen minutes into the final golden cap round, Emi Dizziness managed to scrape a win over Cute Beast, and secure their place in the Grand Finals.
 
And now that the battle has come to a head between these two Korean superteams, the question on everyone's lips is:

Who's going to win?

Mihaly's Flow, of course, looks like the favourites to win. Teejay and Pttypwr have been a fantastic Scout combo all season long, and looking at their history it's easy to see why — both have been on the same team since AFC7. They're insane individually, too, with Pttypwr's experience allowing him to wreak havoc on the flank with the aid of Genos' brilliant bombs, while Teejay's DM allows him to take a buff, go in, and destroy everyone in his sight. Creep may not have nearly as much experience on Demoman as he does Soldier, but he's been in the game for just about forever, and so his main-calling lends an element of expert coordination to the team. Janus, their Highlander-Spy-champion-turned-Medic, is relatively new to the 6's scene, but he showed us he can dodge with the best when he took second place in Mercenaries' Cup 6 with Unagi Park.
 
New Pocket Soldier Soap is replacing Shocky for the match, and while he may not be the best-known player on the South East Asian side of AsiaFortress, he's been hailed as one of the best players with many Korean tournaments under his belt. With a background in roaming, his experience could allow him to sniff out and anticipate Wekeed, the enemy Roamer's plays.

Overall, Mihaly's Flow have a very solid lineup behind their team, and if they play their cards right Soap may just be the tipping point for them to take home the title of AsiaFortress Division 1 Champions.

 
 
On the other hand, if anyone can exploit the weaknesses of Flow, it would be Dizziness. Flower is one of Dizziness' most outstanding players, as not only does he have amazing Scout DM, his sniping ranks him easily amongst the top of AsiaFortress, as he demonstrated in the Semi-Finals against Cute Beast. Larky, his Scout partner, is no slouch either. While he's not nearly as flashy as Flower, Larky's solid Scout play has shown that he's a reliable fallback whenever one of Flower's high-risk plays don't pan out. Babel brings a wealth of experience on pocket along with his brilliant DM, allowing his team to take a ton of ground while Wekeed distracts the enemy team with his roaming. Life, the Medic, is quite possibly the most experienced active player in Asiafortress, having played in nearly every season since the beginning, and his grasp of Medic mechanics makes him a seriously valuable asset. 
 
That said, while Flower's offclassing ability may potentially be the X-factor that gives Dizziness the edge they need over their rivals, his flashy plays might end up hurting his team more than they help. His inconsistent nature combined with his high-risk playstyle means that when he chokes, his entire team feels it, and against a consistent team like Flow, any small mistake is grounds for exploitation. Forcedge might be another weak link in the chain, as his impact on teamfights can be lacking at times. Of course, he's by no reasonable measure bad, and so if he keeps it together and Flower hits his shots, Dizziness could very well end up taking the title.
 
In conclusion?

Both teams are crazy strong, and while each have their weaknesses, there's no doubt that they'll put out some of the best TF2 gameplay Asia has ever seen. Mihaly's Flow have established themselves with a strong foothold at the peak of Division 1, but can Dizziness' dynamic play disrupt their streak?

Tell us what you think by voting with your wallet (backpack?) at Saloon.TF, and then find out if you were right by tuning into Sakiisa's Twitch on 5th September (Saturday), 8 PM GMT+8!

Hello nerds. so i'm leaving for Canada and it means I can't be as involved with the community. I will still be an Admin but Caldoran will be taking on the stuff I used to do from now on. I'll also take this moment to officially recognize the other helpers who are now official Admins too - Andrew, Vetia, and Himari. 

Regardless, remember what we're all here for: to have fun playing TF2 with each other, so don't lose sight of that