The previous playoff schedules for Sixes and Highlander did not allow for the fourth map (for Sixes it was Logjam, and for Highlander it was Cornwater) in playoffs. Additionally, the previous match schedule for playoffs was not Page Playoffs, and sent teams instantly into Semi-Finals, and included a Bronze/Third place match alongside Grand Finals.
We feel as players are more used to Page Playoffs in their typical seasonal play, it would be best for us to revert to that system for playoffs.
What do these scheduling changes mean?
Where playoffs originally started at 7:00PM AEDT for Sixes and Highlander, both Sixes and Highlander will now start at 6:30PM AEDT on their respective days, with Semi-Finals and Grand Finals matches being moved forward 15 minutes (7:15PM & 9:15PM AEDT respectively). We typically don't like making any schedule changes after signups open but we feel most players will prefer these changes and the chance to play all of the maps in each day. You can see the full schedules for Day 2 of each weekend updated on each cup page linked below!
Sixes Cup | Highlander Cup
Signups periods
Yup, all at the same time! A Midsummer's Night Sixes and Highlander cups will be held before the signups of Sixes Season 36 signups and Highlander Season 3 signups close, giving teams more time to sign up for the main season (16 days for Sixes Season 36, 18 days for Highlander Season 3), whilst still having 10+ days to sign up for each cup.
A Midsummer's Night Sixes Cup 2023 signups
You can sign up for A Midsummer Night's Sixes Cup 2023 from Sunday 12th of February, up until Wednesday 22nd of February. We aim to have seeding out Friday the 24th before the cup starts, with the cup being split up into two days over a weekend, Saturday the 25th of February and Sunday the 26th of February.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP! | CUP PAGE
A Midsummer's Night Highlander Cup 2023 signups
You can sign up for A Midsummer Night's Highlander Cup 2023 from Sunday 12th of February, up until Monday 27th of February. We aim to have seeding out Friday the 24th before the cup starts, with the cup being split up into two days, Friday the 3rd of March and Saturday the 4th of March.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP! | CUP PAGE
Sixes Season 36 signups
You can sign up for Sixes Season 36 from Sunday the 12th of February, up until Monday the 27th of February. We aim to have seeding out by Thursday the 2nd of March at the latest before the season starts. The season starts Sunday the 5th of March.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP! | SEASON PAGE
Highlander Season 3 signups
You can sign up for Highlander Season 3 from Sunday the 12 of February, up until Wednesday the 1st of March. We aim to have seeding out by Saturday the 4th of March at the latest before the season starts. The season starts Tuesday the 7th of March.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP! | SEASON PAGE
It's here! au.serveme.tf has arrived, with a capacity of 12 servers. Please remember that we are still very much in the testing phase, and it will take some time to ensure everything is up to snuff. With the upcoming Summer Cups and seasons, we will be monitoring server performance very closely to ensure there are no glaring issues. Before we jump into how to use it, there are some things you need to know.
Using au.serveme.tf!
au.serveme.tf make use of Valve's SDR permanently, meaning there are some differences from how you used to use bookable servers. Valve SDR acts like a VPN of sorts for the server, preventing certain protocols like RCON from working typically. Because of this, servers using Valve's SDR need to come up with solutions, and in the case of bookable servers - a way to grant RCON control of some variety to the person booking the server.
Controlling your server
serveme.tf accomplishes this in two ways, kind of. When using an au.serveme.tf server, you can opt to either send commands in the game chat via !rcon command-goes-here, or use the Web RCON button found on your booking's reservation page. You'll notice earlier we said "kind of", but the two options we listed are full RCON control of the server, so what gives? When booking the server, you get the opportunity to set the map, config and whitelist. But these controls aren't limited to the booking period - they are also available whenever via the "Edit" button on your reservation page. You can change all of the aforementioned server options here as well!
Booking/reserving your server
"Ok, you've told us how to control our server, but not how to book one" is probably what you are wondering, or not, it is pretty simple. Navigate to au.serveme.tf home page, and you'll find two options. You can choose either "Get server" or "1-click server", but for now we recommend "Get server". Upon clicking the button, you'll be redirected to a page where you can configure the server as you like, with the same server options we discussed earlier, and some new ones. It's all easy enough, just follow through with the prompts!
Other booking features
There are a few more things you should be aware of. For instance, instances! As a free user, your bookings last two hours and can be extended if needed, but as a premium user, they last five hours! Premium users also get the benefit of reserving servers more than three hours ahead of when they intend to use it, unlike free users. Free users are limited to only one server at a time, with premium users being able to use more. Why are we telling you this? Well it leads into our next topic.
Patreon, increased costs, premium and more
Yeah, the bit no one likes to talk about. How much? Well, not a whole lot more than what we were already paying per month, but an increase. We'll detail this further at a later date, and we'll be sure to update our Patreon members. What it means for now, and for you, is there is an opportunity. Any new or existing Patreon members on every tier except our Soldier tier will receive au.serveme.tf premium membership. For a full list of benefits, see our Patreon.
Got questions or feedback? Need help?
Feel free to reach out to us via our Discord's #ticket-support channel, you'll notice a Server Ticket. For anything else, please feel free to reach out to core directly. As with many things this year, there will be more to come, and this is no exception. We're excited to be working with au.serveme.tf, and will work to bring more to our servers!
Well, it's been a bit. You're all probably wondering when it's all dropping, when you'll see our teased Summer Cup, and when the following seasons will be. We'll answer that below, but there are a few housekeeping items that provide some context as to why things have taken so long to progress.
The Server Situation
There's a bit to unpack here. As you may have noticed, there is some stuff happening with our servers. In early October, our current server provider Qixalite, whom we work very closely with, announced that they were pausing all of their Team Fortress 2 services. Initially, the plan was to use our own hardware, with their booking software, but this changed. For one reason or another, we needed to find another solution. Enter serveme.tf, a name some of the "boomers" amongst us will recognize. With a name synonymous with quality, serveme.tf provides bookable game servers globally, so we've partnered with them to bring au.serveme.tf to life!
So what does this mean for you?
With the swap in providers, comes a few changes to how you use bookable servers. There will no longer be a Discord bot, but instead, a full web interface for booking and controlling your server. We have an updated booking guide ready for au.serveme.tf's full release, which we'll give its own post.
With the transition away from Qixalite services, however, comes further cost. Sadly that is the nature of renting server hardware. We'll update our Patreon goal to reflect that once everything is finalised, and let everyone know. We do however have some planned additions to our Patreon Tiers, namely au.serveme.tf Premium will be included in our tiers. More details on exactly what is included will come in a follow-up post, so keep an eye out for that.
Please hang with us while we resolve any potential teething issues with the new setup, and as always you can reach out for help with the new system when it arrives!
o7 Qixalite, we'll meet again!
We would like to thank Qixalite, especially their server team, for everything they have done for the ozfortress community. They were the invaluable lifeblood of our community for many years, and whilst their contributions may have not been fully recognized by many, we hope to see them again. One final o7 for Qixalite!
Plugin changes & additions for future seasons
Many of you who have completed our Sixes and/or Highlander polls will have seen a question related to a plugin aimed at reducing, limiting or removing interpolation abuse, most prominently seen in Highlander with Spy melee. Whilst we may not implement anything for our upcoming seasons or cups, it is still planned, but we want to ensure there are no unintended side effects of its usage.
Sixes and Highlander seasonal league changes
The post-season polls for Sixes and Highlander contained a lot of potential changes depending on player feedback, and we have some of our own changes to implement as well, so below you will find three, mostly-complete lists of changes for our upcoming seasons.
General changes
General changes, not limited to one or affecting both Sixes and Highlander:
- Clarification/changes for "Inappropriate or unrelated posting in Match Threads, specifically Match Communications." infraction:
- Posts in Match Communications/Threads that do not fit our Post Guidelines prior to the conclusion of a match, from scheduling the match day/time to posting scores, logs and other final match details will be infractable.
- Posts in Match Communications/Threads that do not fit our Post Guidelines after the conclusion of that match will not be infractable. Please note, this does not include content that breaches our Community Guidelines or Infractions Ruleset, this content will always be actionable and infractable.
- The above changes have been made as a step back from our initial implementation of the rule, whilst still protecting the match organisation process. We've stated it before, but if it is in our rulesets, we will act on it to the fullest extent of the rule.
- We're raising the penalty/punishment for the usage of Alternate Accounts within ozfortress from 12 months to 24 months.
- The usage of Alternate Accounts has increased from when the rule was first implemented, so we feel it is a well-overdue increase.
- Account Sharing penalties/punishments will remain at 12 months as of now.
- We're making the following changes to our mercenary rules across the board:
- Lifted the overall season mercenary limit from "Teams can only make use of mercenaries within four matches per season" to unlimited, but teams can only make use of an individual player as a mercenary twice within a season. In essence, this means if your team was to merc LordShidden for two matches, they could not be used as a mercenary again within that season.
- We've made this change to no longer limit teams' mercenary usage within a season, but also to prevent teams from making use of the same mercenary for an extended period of time.
- A Sixes team can only make use of two mercenaries per match, and a Highlander team can only make use of three per match.
- Mercenary class denials and/or class locking needs to be stated along with the approval of the mercenary in Match Communications.
- This is so we as administrators know, but also to cover your team on either end of the mercenary equation in the event of a dispute.
- Not really a change, but we wanted to reaffirm our position on mercenary denials/disputes:
- We expect that teams seeking to use mercenaries within their match should be asking for at least three mercenaries before contacting an administrator. We've found that in many cases if a team had sought out a third option, the opposing team typically allows that mercenary. You are still free to dispute mercenary denials, but do not be surprised when we ask if you have requested three mercenaries already. This is the expectation we've set internally when handling these disputes, so we wanted to inform players of how we approach these.
- Out-of-Region player limits have been lifted in favour of a general Out-of-Region Ping Limit.
- We've opted for a ping limit to allow reasonable inclusion of players outside of our supported region. We've set this limit at 150 ping for now, and are open to feedback on this limit. During the seedings process, we will be doing general ping checks on those who are not from Australia or New Zealand to ensure they are on average at or below that limit.
Sixes changes
- We're looking to make changes to the Round Timer value used in our configs, which we'll be trying in the Summer Cup.
- We're also looking to make changes to the Round Win Limit, or removing it in favour of our traditional Win Difference, AKA the mercy rule.
- We are intending to make poll results public, but do so in a way that is sustainable for administration and respectful to our typical pre-season time constraints.
Highlander changes
- Highlander's Playable Match Days have now officially been changed from Monday - Friday to Tuesday - Saturday.
- Over half of the poll submissions wanted the change, with a quarter being indifferent.
- We are intending to make poll results public, but do so in a way that is sustainable for administration and respectful to our typical pre-season time constraints.
Staff; who's gone, who's new!
We're losing two champs. Chimes and Thyme have served as a League Administrator for over a year now, and both were invaluable members of our administration. Chimes joined us during our transition period from catfish to core as Head Administrator, and Thyme came over from RSL to get Highlander in ozfortress up off the ground. Whilst we can't hope to replace them, we know a guy. It's big shoes to fill, so brace yourself, community legend frydog has stepped up to take this mantle, and we have full confidence that they will become an integral part of our administration, as long as he stops simping on Twitter.
Approved Casting organisation addition: BearCasts!
BearCasts has been on the job for a while now, providing coverage of Highlander initially, but later expanding to cover interesting Sixes games. It's not often we get to see a group of vocally inclined gamers get together and build something unique, without the lack of professionalism you typically see. BearCasts are nothing short of top-tier, and we feel it's time for them to be recognized as such. From Sixes Season 36/Highlander Season 3 onward, BearCasts will be joining KritzKast and CappingTV officially as an Approved Casting organisation.
Head over to their Twitch channel, and make sure to click through their socials and follow them for more TF2 action!
Summer Cups & Upcoming Seasons
Yup, plural - Summer Cups. You'll find out more soon, but we'll leave you with this; Summer Cup will be two separate, two-night cups - one for Sixes and one for Highlander. The structure of which will be a map test cup. When it comes to signups time, we will be doing something a little different. Both Summer Cups and Sixes/Highlander seasons will have their signups open close to, if not at the same time, and it'll be soon. Sixes and Highlander seasonal league signups will be open for longer than their typical signups periods, and will close after their respective Summer Cups!
Stick with us, we have a YEAR ahead of us!
Whilst it has been a bit of a slow start to the year, we hope you can understand we've had a lot on our plates, volunteer-wise or personally, but we're looking to make strides in 2023, and we hope to see you there when we do.
Post-Season Polls!
We're looking for as much feedback as possible! If you are a team captain, please send the poll to your team and encourage them to fill it out! The poll only takes a few minutes to complete, providing us with feedback, insight, and concerns on potential changes, our future direction, and more. We've linked each poll below!
Next Seasons & Delays
There is a bit of a surprise below, but we wanted to give everyone some insight into why things are moving a bit slowly on our end. In late 2022, our main and only server provider Qixalite announced that they would be taking a step back, and slowly shutting down services. We have been working to have our own server solution ready, but this takes time and will undoubtedly have teething problems. If everything goes according to plan, you should see our new servers in action for our upcoming cups (yes, plural).
Something is returning!
We're excited to see you back for Season 36 of Sixes and Season 3 of Highlander, but first, we have some off-season action coming. Many of you have noticed that we're running a bit behind schedule, but we promise there are good reasons for our delays. In the meantime, here's a sneak peek, for some it'll be familiar:
Please note: This art is not final, merely a placeholder teaser!
Earlier tonight, teams participating in the Summer Brawl 2023 LAN event received an attendee guide which details what to bring, risk management, schedule, etc. An inclusion in the guide regarding behaviour management at this event states the following;
“Antisocial behaviour will not be tolerated and there will be no warnings. ozfortress infractions can and will be handed out for poor behaviour and may lead to being banned from future LAN events.”
We wanted to give some much needed insight into ozfortress’ working relationship with the Summer Brawl 2023’s team so those attending are aware of our own involvement. From Day 1, we remained adamant that we were providing the LAN team with a platform to host this event (the ozfortress website), and would help promote it through our discord server and social medias. We have taken issue in the past with internal planning surrounding certain event responsibilities, and would just like to reaffirm our position publicly regarding behaviour management at the Summer Brawl 2023. ozfortress will not make use of its infraction system for an event that is not ours, nor will we ever. The infraction system isn’t to be loaned out or used outside of ozfortress. In saying this, if any behaviour at the event warrants serious review or barring from ozfortress services, we will not be afraid to do so. We ask that everyone makes themselves aware of what the rules at this venue and event are, and hope everyone enjoys their time at the event in a way befitting functioning members of society.
We hope this clarifies some concerns attendees have regarding our position, as we share those concerns also.
Over the last quarter of 2022 our Infraction team in coordination with our league administration, has created a highly-requested ban review system. Whilst named “Ban Appeals”, the system will act more as an early “good behaviour” unban, where those whose appeal is accepted will still serve out the probation period assigned to them after their ban would typically expire.
This system is applicable only to Infraction threshold bans, and there are no plans to expand it to other ban types/conditions as of now. ozfortress has always ensured that we only issue bans we will stand behind, and are sure of beyond reasonable doubt. Due to the nature of Anti-Cheat bans, they will not be eligible for this appeal system, nor will any other ban type (for now). This system will undoubtedly see evolution throughout 2023 and beyond, and we are open to feedback on this process.
To be eligible for Ban Appeals, the following criteria should be observed:
- Banned user needs to have served 75% of their total ban duration.
- Banned users’ behaviour during their ban period should not conflict with our Infractions ruleset or our Community Guidelines.
As mentioned earlier, we are open to receiving feedback on this system, and will continue to refine and evolve the system going forward, but expect the typical new system teething issues and clarifications on how certain processes will work. The system is live and can be found under the Help dropdown found at the top of the website.
Most Valuable Player was missing from the awards, but has been added now.
Join our Discord
Follow us on Twitter
Support us on Patreon
Subscribe to us on YouTube
Join our Steam Group
Like us on Facebook