I appreciate the responses guys. Really, I do. Coop's posts especially have got me thinking, and I feel that my original reasons for the boycott have been overshadowed a bit by many quick "gut reaction" type posts and votes. People heard that we're losing maps and understandably are immediately upset and fully against any change whatsoever. Couple this with the fact that many players are not satisfied with Operation Health and SP holders especially feel a bit jibbed by the release of the full season 3 patch on the TTS a week before they were supposed to get their exclusive access, and my boycott proposal tapped into a vein of anger and frustration that I for one had no idea was so strong, and quite frankly I was not ready for it.
So let's take a step back here. Let me try to summarize what my vision for this boycott is.
To start off with, I fully plan to return to this game full-force once this boycott is over, regardless of whether any of Ubisoft's decisions are reversed or not. This has never been a "give me what I want or I'm taking my ball and going home" type of ultimatum. I would definitely say that this is much more of a protest than a threat to quit entirely. Maybe I just gave the thing a whole lot less weight with that statement, but it's the truth. I don't want to leave, and these changes alone are not enough to make me consider it.
So what exactly am I protesting? I am protesting the idea that Ranked is some kind of ESL practice mode. I am protesting the fact that Ubisoft made the decision to attempt to turn it into one with no input from the community, and with barely any warning. There was no "hey guys, what do you think about reducing Ranked to the 9 most well-balanced maps?" followed by a couple weeks for them to listen to our feedback and make a final decision. That final decision would still ultimately be Ubi's, but I would have a lot more faith that they know what they're doing if they actually ask us first. They could make the exact same decision they would have made anyway, but I would be more accepting of it because they clearly strongly feel it's the right move if they still make it despite our being against it. But just making the decision out of the blue like they did makes me wonder where their head is at.
Now, I'm not entirely against the rotation/removal of maps. First, let's talk about the removal of Yacht and Favela from Casual. I don't really buy the idea that they are being removed for the sake of new players. I think it has more to do with these data limits we are approaching and Ubisoft is trying to get us used to the idea of not having every single map available all the time. Like Coop said, we've only really been promised to get a new map every season. We were never really promised that Ubisoft would be able to support, maintain or balance operators around a constantly-growing pool of maps. So while I am disappointed by the loss of these maps, again I am more disappointed by the lack of open communication between Ubi and the community. If this is to be a thing going forward then we need to have some say in which maps are removed and which ones stay.
But Ranked is where my real gripes are. I understand the idea of limiting the competitive playlist to the most competitive maps, but I feel the ESL pool is just a few maps too small. I think Kanal and Hereford would be good choices to keep in the pool, but again, I feel like the whole community should get to provide some input both on how big the Ranked pool is and which maps stay in it. I don't think it should just come down to what the pro players feel are good maps. Because if it does I don't really think we'll see any of the maps that aren't currently in the pool back in Ranked ever again. And that would be a shame.
And now for the elephant in the room: Theme Park. We have waited an extra 3+ months for this map and now it's not going to be available in the competitive playlist for at least another 3? That to me is completely unacceptable and is the primary reason I will be boycotting. It is bad for both playlists for this map to only be available in casual. Ranked players will not be able to learn how the map functions in a competitive setting, and Casual players who don't want to play that seriously are likely to be "pub-stomped" by full squads of Platinum-ranked players who are only in Casual to get a chance to play the new map. It's bad for both sides, and like I said, I would boycott just for this decision.
Now that I've talked about why I'm boycotting, let me talk about what I want to get out of it. First and most importantly, I want to let Ubisoft to know just how strongly I feel about these decisions. What I'd like for them to do about it for the immediate future is to put Theme Park in Ranked for the entirety of Season 3. And for the future map rotations they need to let us, as the players, have a say in what maps will be in both playlists. I personally would really like there to be more than 10 maps total in Ranked but again, I want the whole community to get to voice their opinion on which maps are balanced enough for Ranked.
One more thing. I never wanted to divide the playerbase between those who are and those who aren't boycotting. This isn't a "with us or against us" thing. I don't even want to create a divide between the players and the developers. We both want what's best for the game. There have just been some major lapses in communication about what each group feels is best and that's what has led to this entire situation. And I feel like if we don't speak up now the next situation could be even worse.
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