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INAUGURAL SEASON INTRODUCTION

Well, here we are and it’s just about that time for the first season of ozfortress highlander to get underway. With signups closed, we thought it would be a good idea to detail the experience you can expect from the new home of Highlander in the Australia / New Zealand region.

For the debut season of ozfortress Highlander, we are proud to announce that we will be running three divisions! These divisions are labelled Premier, Intermediate and Open descending from highest to lowest.

The regular season will take place over 5 weeks. Listed below are the three divisions with seedings of each listed in order, as well as the formats being used in each division. Finally, you can find player restrictions for Intermediate and Open on the Season Page linked at the bottom of the seedings, or here.

FINAL PLACEMENTS

PREMIER

Round Robin

¯_(ツ)_/¯
rasgals
monster energy
ECKES BOCKUS SERIES ECKES
MSG
NIGHTMARE BLUNT ROTATION 🛐⛪🧔🙏📿🔔👼

INTERMEDIATE

Round Robin

flamter
nukaleya ratsz
dragon
🐊🦦🦨🦒Super Auto Pets Enjoyer 🦢🦔🦏🐀
Ascension
muscle mercs

OPEN

Swiss System

Yesterday’s Leftovers
Ambatukammmmmmmmm
Salt Free Gaming.
Mega Chippy
Patent Pending
Productive Compromise
Morb Fortress 2 - Morbheads

SEASON OUTLINE

MAP POOL

For this season, we will not be changing much from the last season of RSL Highlander. We feel these maps are staples in the community, well known by both players new and old. The Map Pool is as follows:

koth_product_final
koth_ashville_rc2d
koth_warmtic_f10
koth_proside_v1
pl_upward_f8
pl_borneo_f2
pl_swiftwater_final1
pl_vigil_rc9
cp_steel_f10

After much deliberation, we have decided to bench Cascade temporarily and are opting to bring in a new version of Lakeside Pro made by community member xobile. The map will be receiving constant updates and changes prior to the season. All community feedback is appreciated and can be given here. In the unlikely event that Lakeside won’t be ready in time for this season, Cascade will be brought in to replace it. If you want to see the Map Schedule, see the link at the bottom of the page.

WEAPON RESTRICTIONS

With the new season comes a pair of weapon unbans. Both the Sydney Sleeper and Natascha. This is an experimental change which interest and thoughts on it will be gauged via the poll following this season.

SYDNEY SLEEPER

Following up on multiple nerfs and reworks of the weapon over the years, we’ve decided to open up the possibilities for sniper. With the functionality of the weapon changed for the better (no more ‘splash jarate’ effect on headshots) and community views shifting, we don’t believe this weapon will negatively impact games going forward and will open up different playstyles for snipers.

NATASCHA

This seems to be the more controversial change, but the admin team and community seem to be more open to testing than in the past. Originally banned due to being "unfun" and "not in the competitive spirit" to play against, it hasn’t been tried in Australasia highlander for many, many years. We’re interested to see if the meta shifts and changed community perspectives on the weapon will give this item some space within the competitive whitelist, transforming heavy into a bulky support class rather than a damage-dealing tank.

WEEKLY FIXTURES & LENGTH

In continuation of RSL Highlander and ozfortress Sixes, this season of Highlander will continue to feature two maps per week, with some maps repeating. The length of the season will be determined once signups have closed.

PLAYOFFS

For the first season of ozfortress Highlander, the staff team has decided to revert some of the playoffs changes seen in the most recent season. King of the Hill (KOTH) maps will be played as First to 3 / Best of 5 rounds instead of Best of 7, this is due to player feedback. Stopwatch is returning to ABBA only in Playoffs, and all Premier Playoffs matches will be run as an opt-out ABBA, with Main Grand Finals being the only Main Playoffs match to have ABBA by default, with opt-out the same as Premier. Opt-out will mean that captains from both teams can agree upon, and decide not to play ABBA for their match. This should be noted along with Picks/Bans in-match communications at least 24 hours prior to the official match taking place. These changes were made using poll data from previous RSL polls.

NEW CONFIGS & SERVER COMMANDS

The configs moving forward into this coming season will be virtually identical to that of the previous seasons of RSL Highlander with a few key differences. The configs will now allow the use of the newly unbanned weapons stated above (Natascha and Sydney Sleeper), along with updated TF2 Competitive Fixes (which can be seen on the season page). You can find the ozfortress Highlander configs here.

MORE TO COME!

We will continue to work on refining and improving Highlander as a whole, whether that is the rulesets, documentation, format, etc. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to bring them to us either via a League Support ticket or #highlander-support, both of which can be found in our Discord here.

Helpful Links

[Map Pool] [Key Dates] [Unlocks] [Administrators] [Player Restrictions]
[Transfers] [Transfer Windows][Server Configuration] [Highlander Ruleset] [Patreon]