cs is much more reliant on trashtalk to be interesting due to the game having a much lower strategic depth
| Flag: | United Kingdom |
| Registered: | January 19, 2022 |
| Last post: | November 10, 2024 at 12:44 PM |
| Posts: | 1782 |
cs is much more reliant on trashtalk to be interesting due to the game having a much lower strategic depth
In the streets of ukriane
A ghostly sight
ANGE1 roams the night
Now tremble at the face of his midround tricks
After you kill him with operator flicks
To where he goes to where he hides
No one knows where he truly resides
Sorry for the essay but i see this a lot and I think it warrants a further breakdown of the entire picture. Valorant esports does not stand on its own - it is part of a much larger valorant ecosystem.
People are quick to blame orgs for stupid contracts, but it's important to follow the money.
There are only 5 places money comes into the valorant ecosystem:
VC investment into orgs
Orgs selling merch/subscriptions (e.g. C9)
Advertisers/sponsors on org streamers
Advertisers on esports events
Skin sales
#1 is actually a lie. It is not an income stream, it is a cost. Yes it's huge dollars, but it is a trap. It is basically a loan that requires repayment (+ interest!). The VC that gives this money expects to get their money back and more. Therefore, this money is actually a NEGATIVE ASSET TO VALORANT if the org is successful because more money LEAVES the ecosystem than came in. It's only a positive asset (TO VALORANT) if the org folds and the VC eats the loss. That doesn't make it inherently bad - loans are useful to grow a business. But THIS IS NOT INCOME.
#2 is a tiny, tiny, tiny baby business, and has not yet been sufficient to cover the cost of VC investment. Even SEN can't sell enough t-shirts to keep up with costs, let alone repaying their investors.
#3 is also a tiny, baby business. Not only does it not pay back the VC - it doesn't even cover the cost of the content creators + staff that went into securing this sponsorship in the first place. With better sales and support this could be profitable - other media niches have profitable-but-not-huge media companies (think linus media group, mythical studios, dude perfect, etc). Solid companies making sustainable money, but 3 orders of magnitude smaller than riot games. Also, somehow these orgs haven't unlocked the sustainability yet - probably because the cost of content is too high without the benefit of direct profit (the youtube/twitch revenue goes to the streamer, not the org). Also notice that none of those media companies took on outside investors in order to grow. Outside investment is a COST, not revenue.
#4 is miniscule, and goes directly to riot.
#5 is where almost all of the Actual Money is. This is the cash cow, and Riot remains in complete control of it.
It's all about the skins.
eSports is nothing more than a means to sell more skins. It is a marketing product. It is a cost center, NOT a profit center. Maybe in 10, 20, 30 years that will be different and we'll have multi-billion dollar esports teams that are profitable in their own regard. That's what the VC's are hoping for - it's a lottery ticket for billionaires in order to become more-billionaire-ey. But it is NOT a reliable projection to build a sustainable business around.
Riot's Valorant team does not care about the 30 year outlook of esports. They are focused on making real, actual money - not speculation.
That means that riot views the orgs ONLY as expenses that they must support. They'll tell you it's a partnership, but realistically they care only whether a team can help them sell skins at a reasonable ROI. It is a marketing arrangement. They are the 2023 equivalent of madison avenue.
Riot does not care if SEN goes bankrupt, just as long as it doesn't effect the quality of the esports product.... if the product is compelling, there will be another team that people will support. Therefore Riot will put just enough money into the partnered orgs so that it doesn't effect the fan experience too badly... i.e. it's better long term to have consistent team names for fans to root for instead of just players. But Riot will try to pay those orgs as little as possible.
The question is not "Should player salaries come down?"
The question is "What can the players charge for providing their marketing services?"
The orgs will always be nothing more than middle men in this arrangement, skimming whatever tiny fractional percentage they can from the giant pool of riot's money. Orgs are the marketing agency, Players are the marketing product.
But make no mistake - it is RIOT's money. All 5 of those income streams are all eventually going to John Riot's pocket and nowhere else... even the money that's going to the orgs directly just means that riot has to pay them less skin money.
So let's ask teh question again: How much money does riot make off of skin sales? What percentage of that money is driven from the esports division?
Now, of that money, what percentage are the players entitled to?
Being the liberal commie scum that I am, I believe that the vast majority of that money should go to the Labor. In this case, the labor is: The players, the casters/talent, the production team, the programmers, the designers, the salespeople, etc.
In reality a much too high percentage goes to John Riot's pocket.
Don't blame the players for charging the most they can for their services.
Blame the billionaires for milking the system dry before moving on to the next shiny investment.
i stole this all from reddit lol
edit/addendum: This is why i suspect orgs like Mogul, DSG, etc will be the actual sustainable orgs in the end. They are being built by people who are trying to build a media company not a pro sports team. Not that all creator-owned orgs will be successful, but I think the long-term successful ones will be from creators who know how to make media/marketing businesses.
when eg starts being bad again, you will miss it
giants have 4 world class players and a mid igl, they definitely can
she said that 5 is good for defense side and so fut getting seven was great, you guys need to get your ears checked
edg most overrated team at champs, had easy schedule of teams and still didnt even get top 4
sure i would say 50 50 but i can see the argument for t1 being favoured
favourite is valid given the tape but heavy favourite is just ???
definitely, but heavy favourites is such a crazy takeway for two people of the broadcast to openly say (1 a pro player)
nrg always sandbags in groups games that arent elimination
they legit placed the same at tokyo what is this narrative
least delusional kr flair
prx and giants
t1 and eg
fnc and nrg
navi and liquid
fut is turkey so they dont have the europe always gets out of groups buff
source: https://www.vlr.gg/pickem/87d3d06c
sling shit into eat shit true combo
he wasnt allowed to cheat? ok sure
who is trernt
bronze is high rank for qwerty
Who flopped the hardest in their tournament debuts?
1) GUARD Trent during Masters Iceland 2022.
Lil bro was supposed to save NA but didn't have that dawg in him. One of the biggest choke jobs we've seen from a rising star, was unstoppable on wifi but the lights were too bright IRL. I think he's redeemed himself with this Ascension win though. Now that he's back in tier one he can start to change the narrative and get back to a VCT LAN. Either way the gold standard for the term 'onliner'.
2) EG Demon1 in Masters Tokyo 2023.
Technically not an onliner because Americas was on LAN, but 'spiritually' an onliner if that makes sense. Still hit some crazy shots in Tokyo but wasn't who America needed him to be. I guess we'll never know what could have been if he was even half as good as his league play. Hope he finds his form in Champs.
3) SEN Zekken at LOCK IN 2023.
I know he played in Champions 2022 but tbh I didn't watch the second half of 2022 Val because SEN wasn't in those tournaments. Anyway this was a pretty big flop because of how hyped he was as a young prodigy coming to SEN. I don't want to flame him but as a SEN fan I was let down really hard during that cursed FNATIC bo3. The good news is that he's quickly reestablished himself as the best young player in NA and makes a fearsome duo with TenZ. I trust and believe he will take us to champs under jimmy and kaplans guidance. Expecting him to pop off hard on 100T tomorrow.
If you have any other suggestions let me know! I don't follow EU and Pacific as much so I don't have the necessary background on those players.
guild lost to the same 2 teams as optic in that event but placed lower bcs optic got a mickey draw
are emea players, emea also includes Asian countries
there's no way the guard sells after winning ascension, that's like winning the lottery and refunding the ticket
who cares, 1 team only qualifies anyways
he just is probably bad at english, indian is very simmilar to indonesian word structure wise.
blg 3-1 trace
you can fuse turkey and mena and found ssa region
you will see the same thing with every other team vs fnatic
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