Major problems

Since the first $250,000 major took place a year ago at DreamHack Winter, the entire scene has revolved around the community funded events taking place roughly every four months.

With major number four around the corner, we take a look at some of the biggest issues still surrounding these great events, and offer solutions on how to improve on them.

It's important we don't let these issues overshadow what's coming, but we also cannot afford to simply shrug them off as we have so far - improvements must be made by the next go-around.

Certain problems still persist at the majors 

Online qualifiers

After the most recent scandals regarding first Joel "⁠emilio⁠" Mako getting caught cheating by VAC, and then ALTERNATE's Robert "⁠sMN⁠" Fredriksson being busted by ESEA's anti-cheat, it's more obvious than ever that cheating is a massive issue in competitive Counter-Strike.

Former Planetkey Dynamics player Anil "⁠cLy⁠" Gülec was VAC banned and not permitted to take part in the majors, but due to FACEIT admins' mistakes was allowed to play in two pre-qualifiers and secure his team a spot in the closed qualifier.

Looking at sMN's statistics, it's likely he's been cheating for a while, as he had a great game in the DreamHack Stockholm qualifier to clinch a spot for ALTERNATE at the event, and then continued to perform well above his career averages in the DreamHack Winter qualifier.

Luckily his team came up short against HellRaisers in two 14-16 losses, but it's possible - if not likely - that he was also cheating then, and with a few rounds altered could have scored his team $50,000.

Following PENTA's surprising qualification to the major, thanks to a narrow victory over HellRaisers, multiple people familiar with the situation suggested someone on the team cheated to ensure their great reads in the match.

Yet another suspect is ESC Gaming's Ralf "⁠rallen⁠" Zarych, whom many assumed was cheating - and according to HLTV.org's sources that included a few admins - against Copenhagen Wolves.

Not only did his team close out two 16-14 wins versus the Danes, both times putting up huge terrorist halves on very defense favored maps, but his team also knocked out sMN's ALTERNATE, ironically.

To further add to that, there's been rumours that a friend of ESC member Jacek "⁠MINISE⁠" Jeziak is behind another huge issue that specifically bothers the Polish Counter-Strike scene - DDoSsing.

After tying the game at 10-10, Copenhagen Wolves were constantly under DDoS attacks until the Poles finally won the map 16-14 to advance in the qualifier towards a spot in Jönköping.

The match wasn't on CSGOLounge, further suggesting someone with something to gain was behind the attack. Last night, a similar thing happened in ESL Pro Series Poland matches, when finals spots were determined.

It's obvious the $50,000 in sticker money - paid out to teams in the ESL One Cologne Challengers capsule - is enough to incentivize many to cheat, when there is no anti cheat preventing them from doing so.

Fixing it isn't easy, but until someone does, there is a good work around. LAN qualifications.

It's time we stop relying on an honor system when there is no honor around. $50,000 winners can't be decided online, not with DDoS and cheating issues like they are today.

Valve must realize this is a real problem, and start hosting LAN qualifiers. Some will say it's too costly, but knowing the sticker money up for grabs, can a few thousand euros for travel be too much? I say no.

At the very least, the number of spots given out via online qualifiers must greatly be reduced, and Valve should find another way to allocate these spots at the major events.

Until a good solution to protect players from DDoS exists, and anti-cheats can catch all the private cheats, spots at the majors should be determined at LAN. Opportunity might not make a thief, but why risk it?

Did gla1ve's Copenhagen Wolves get cheated out of a major? 

Questionable format

Considering the scene now revolves around the majors and you can realistically make over $50,000 a year - per player - in sticker money alone, why should best-of-ones decide who gets invited back?

It's ludicrous to think the group stages at majors should be similar to group stages at every significantly smaller event held around the year. Two map wins should not guarantee a spot in the Legends capsule.

Now that Valve and DreamHack have decided - in a great move, by the way - to host a six day bootcamp at Inferno Online for all participants, we know it's not impossible for them to extend these tournaments.

I understand that as long as they are held at exhibitions, you are fairly limited when it comes to the number of days you can use per tournament. However, not the entire tournament has to be played there.

What if instead of a six day bootcamp, Valve gave teams three days to practice at a location similar to Inferno Online, and then used the next three days to host a big group stage?

Group stage could be two groups of eight teams where everyone plays everyone once in a best-of-three, with the top four finishers in each qualifying for the playoffs, to be held at the actual event.

Plus, this would guarantee each participant at least 14 maps of CS to learn from, as opposed to potentially traveling thousands of miles to play just two maps.

Playoffs then could reasonably be played out in best-of-five mode, truly determining who the best team in the world is - which should be the end of all goal of majors, to begin with.

Valve's The International events use a similar format for DotA 2, so it's not out of the question. Hopefully enough people push for the idea, and we can, in the future, see majors where the best team really does win.

Inferno Online could play host to a major's group stage 

In the end, this is yet another problem that only Valve can realistically tackle. It's up to the game's creators to set the rules for the organizations hosting their $250,000 majors.

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