Hey Vaaero,

This is a really cool piece you did on VLR! I always like reading about ethnography and this was a fun one for sure.

Here's just a few notes I had. Feel free to accept/discard any points you like.

• The tradition of replacing vowels with 0 (the "0" treatment, as you called it) originates in Counter Strike forums. My guess is HLTV.org, but I'm not an expert on the matter
• Off Topic is not a channel, but rather a category. Threads can be sorted into three categories: General Discussion (which is most threads), Site Discussion, and Off Topic. The idea of these categories is to allow users to sort between them and read through threads only related to the category they wish (you can filter threads by going to Forums and clicking on Forum Index)
• You mentioned that there are baiters who get confused for "intellectuals." From my perspective, they're mostly just "intellectuals" who like to bait engagement from time to time simply because they find it entertaining. That's not to say this applies in all cases, but it is more common than not. If you want a few users to look at for examples of this kind of bait, n1cf and CanadaMan are a good place to start
• This is pretty inconsequential but I just thought I'd correct you for the sake of accuracy... the capitalizations of these usernames are BulkyLettuce and CanadaMan

Also "there is no isolation on VLR because VLR itself is the isolation" is a fire line, I can't lie.

Oh yeah, just a final note... I think it might be in your best interests to reformat this if you want people here to read it, just for the sake of legibility. This might sound a bit lazy but it does take more effort to read big block paragraphs than it is to read something formatted more like what I'm writing here. 👍

This is a good point, but there are, in fact, instances of players who have gone to play for countries where their parents were born and/or have a citizenship of (Emilio Nsue is one example that comes to mind, but there are a lot more, likely hundreds). So it is possible by FIFA rules that reduxx could (hypothetically, of course) play for Morocco if either of his parents are personally Moroccan

Oh yeah it was, completely forgot about that. Ty

They probably wouldn't be able to afford kaajak's buyout of $100,007 (for legal reasons I'm making this number up)

Did I see carpe in the trailer?

https://www.vlr.gg/413306/nasr-ignite-vs-giantx-gc-vct-off-season-spotlight-series-2024-lf

It's not about what he's running from. It's about what he's running to. And he's on his way to a trophy rn

Source?

Huh. Their website says it's still happening

I've had 3 cheaters get banned and 2 were in spike rushes

Did you know VLR lists Less as Felipe de Loyola?

You do bait sometimes though

FYI there is a preview button in the top right corner of the text box

Hopefully

I'm actually going to simulate mine, run a full bracket tournament

Remove viewership rewards on Twitch, viewership outside of China goes down by >80%

UPDATE

We're at 32 teams, so I'm gonna run a Valorant Simulator tournament to see which team would win

Not gonna start for a while; I have to manually input every player for all 32 teams, which is super tedious since I have to calculate the stats for each player. I've done up to Hong Kong as of writing this

For those curious, I'm gonna follow the same format as Champions, only with 8 groups instead of 4

Liquid is taking form

No prob 👍

Will update, ty for input

This is heavily Americas biased but I agree with your opinion on the teams

https://www.vlr.gg/329914/paper-rex-vs-gen-g-champions-tour-2024-pacific-stage-1-gf/?game=167292&tab=overview

That is a helpful trick, true, but until this becomes second nature it's not very convenient in practice, I've found

What is a sticker

Here's a quick pros/cons list for you:

Sova
✅ Scan + drone to reveal enemies
✅ Shocks to break trips + deal damage
❌ Does need at least a few lineups to play effectively
❌ Doesn't have util to help you take fights

Fade
✅ Everything gives you info (info is key)
✅ You can chuck everything and it just kinda works
✅ The ult and seize deafen people (this is super fun to abuse)
❌ Eyes can be broken pretty easily

Gekko
✅ Util can be used very frequently
✅ Ult is great, especially if you farm it
✅ Planting/defusing spike is great as well
❌ His util can be pretty easy to break
❌ You can get killed picking your util back up

Skye
✅ Very simple kit, lets you focus on gunplay (the Brim of initiators imo)
✅ Flashes are very flexible
✅ Dog is always good to have
❌ Not much info once your flashes are gone
❌ You will get flamed for not healing your duelist who's at 97 hp on the other side of the map

Breach
✅ Util dumping people is fun
✅ Ult is great for execs/retakes
❌ It's really hard to play for yourself
❌ Util is pretty clunky
❌ Doesn't give you the info that other initiators do

KAY/O
✅ Suppression is great, especially in higher ranks
✅ Very well-rounded kit
❌ Left-click flashes are hard to use (unless you're proficient with KAY/O you need lineups)
❌ Has the worst winrate of any initiator in ranked

Money, probably (I'd elaborate but I don't feel like it ngl)

I like this a lot :)

You're a hater, FENNEL was one of the best T2 teams in APAC and would've easily made Ascension if there was an LCQ (them and MiTH)

Anything's catchy if you hear it enough times

I think it's just promotion/relegation

That reminds me of the one something clip actually https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-2F9YWtLZ0

One man stood in their way

something duelist
trexx initiator
Chronicle flex
Demon1 controller
nAts sentinel igl

Wait that's a sick roster

I'm gonna do this once we hit 32 teams actually (we're at 29)

I replaced BreaK (Sova from tier 2)

Wait I LOVE this team now

Edited
Also if you can find 4 other Jordanian pros I'll add you as the 5th

Nope

Yeah I don't think so. Wish there was

Team Vitality

He's 23

I'm considering switching to DuckDuckGo after that one

Thank you, I was in desperate need of clever responses to utilize against my search bar

Sure

in whatever the fuck u want in me

I think I've played with you before

No way, that's longer than Xeppaa (for now)

https://i.imgur.com/pn37D6u.png

I don't know what he once was, I started watching last year