Organizations urge Valve to adjust the new ecosystem before they shut down

Twenty-two organizations have sent an open letter to Valve, urging the developer to tweak the new ecosystem in place for CS2 esports before it "kills" organizations. The news was first reported by HLTV this morning.

M80, FURIA, MOUZ, Falcons, and Ninjas in Pyjamas are some organizations that signed the open letter, which points out "significant flaws" in the Valve Regional Standings (VRS). The letter comes after several pros had already criticized how hard climbing the ranking is at the moment.

The organizations said that they can only enter the VRS through open qualifiers for tier-one events, but not every tier-one event is hosting open qualifiers. They also mentioned that the smaller tournament operators run invite-only events as they don't have the resources to organize open qualifiers.

"This creates a layered ecosystem: the biggest tournaments offer a small chance at a dream OQ run that catapults teams to relevance, while the tier below runs on invites only," the open letter reads.

"Below that tier is a dead zone, where teams slowly run out of oxygen while waiting for the next tier 1 open qualifier. As a result, any new up-and-coming team can only enter the ranking, paradoxically, through Tier 1 events, and these are few and far between. Unless the ranking system changes, there must be stronger incentives for smaller TOs to run open qualifiers."

Another issue brought on by the organizations is the fact that many tournaments had their VRS status revoked mid-event, while some other tournaments had the VRS status added mid-event. This issue, which has been extensively reported by HLTV, leaves teams hanging up in the air as they can't plan properly.

"This uncertainty has major implications for teams and players — due to how precarious the situation is in tier 2, committing to the wrong tournament could result in a long stint in the dead zone," the open letter reads.

The organizations stressed that players don't understand the steps to climb the ranking and asked Valve to create a centralized forum/platform so they can get their questions answered promptly.

"We understand that there is a cost to building and maintaining such a platform, and are open to working with a third party to do so. Currently, the scene is coping with the lack of clarity by sharing information in what has become a global game of telephone where, at times, teams are educating TOs on the current interpretation of the rules, mostly operating completely in the dark."

At last, the organizations asked Valve to bring back the open qualifiers for the Major, which have been scrapped for 2025 with the introduction of the Major Regional Qualifiers (MRQ).

The letter ends with the organizations criticizing the new ecosystem for not being a "level playing field", which Valve aimed to build by ruling out partnership leagues this year. The orgs told Valve to "finish what they started" before they shut down.

"From your perspective this might just be a time period where you’re accepting flaws in the system until it irons itself out," the organizations said. "To us, the teams, this time period could kill our Counter-Strike organizations."

Here are all the teams that approved the open letter. AMKAL and PARIVISION weren't among the original signatories, but they contacted HLTV to say they agree with the document.