WCS 2023 and the Upcoming Infected Challenge

@EE_kalyn and @ee_skyfyre8 

WCS 2019 may have been before you joined the game's developer team, but many players remember the major controversy that occurred when EA suddenly chose to do an Infected Challenge on that WCS. It cast a permanent dark cloud over the server results, because the Infected Challenge's timing meant it disproportionately benefited the team that eventually won. Afterwards, a lot of players left the game for good, due to the perception that EA was trying to help one side win and any competition would not be done on a level playing field. At the time, the developers acknowledged in the forum that they should not have done the Infected Challenge on WCS.

For this WCS, players were told from the start that they could not buy Repair Time on WCS. They rightly and fairly assumed that there would be no way to get extra RT on WCS. If EA wanted to do an Infected Challenge on WCS, then it should have been announced back in October when WCS was announced, so all alliances could plan accordingly. To spring the news on everyone now, after WCS has started -- and when alliances have already spent the last three weeks following different Repair Time management strategies -- is grossly unfair and wrong. 

Another real issue of concern is who knew about the Infected Challenge ahead of time, and whether this information was leaked to one side before being officially announced. Because the unfortunate fact of the matter is that one of the german forum moderators who has very close ties to the developers, @leo7044, is participating in WCS -- and is the CiC of a wing supporting one of the two major teams competing on WCS.

Every WCS in the past has been mired in controversy. We are hopeful that this time, with the new developers who joined, that this WCS will be different. Players who are competing on WCS, and many other players watching the competition from afar, would like EA to be fair and not make any sudden changes that could affect the results of the server. If players were told at the start that they cannot buy RT, then they should not be able to suddenly get it for free either. 

For all the reasons above, EA should not get involved or make changes to WCS now that it's started. Don't cast a dark cloud over the server. Let the teams there compete according to the rules that were announced in October. Thank you!

I don't play this server so not benefitting either way but that sounds like really controversial move to have an infected challenge on WCS where RT cannot be purchased. Better think twice about that before the integrity of another WCS is ruined.

Agree, we cannot go thorough WCS 2019 again.  I joked about something like this happening a few days ago and to see it appear as a real possibility is laughable.  The infected challenge does not belong on the WCS unless it was announced beforehand.  RT management is one of the single most critical aspects to a malus server.  To have this appear randomly throws multiple teams into disarray, especially those that explicitly planned to not have surprise events due to the debacle in 2019 (that EA apologized for).  Please do not enable this event on WCS.

Signed. Don't add this event to WCS.

@EE_kalyn Please can you exclude wcs from this, it was never mentioned at  the server annoucement  and it does mess around with rt strategy.

Just have regular servers monthly in wcs mode no fa, no malus, no uprising, level cap of 95.

That actually sounds like a good format for regular servers too.

Just do all that non vanilla stuff somewhere else for people who actually want to play those rules.

I have long thought wrath servers could be for non vanilla rulesets.

Second that. WCS deserves a clean matchup, not an infected one.

Completely agree with everyone's sentiments here. I have been playing this game over 10 years, my original account is BlueHere and what EA are doing is very unfair. How can you contradict the rules of WCS? If no RT can be bought then why then come up with a sly way of giving RT away so easily with the infected challenge? So many alliances including myself have spent a lot of time trying to save RT while farming. Instead i could have grown faster sooner with the knowledge that the infected challenge would help me gain back my repair time.

This decision of yours creates heavy doubt about the fairness of the game.

Have you got any negative comments from the alliance Schaffa? I know and so do you that there is a very good reason for that, because they have spent more RT than the competition. Do you play favourites? May the odds be with Schaffa forever? Something like that?

Hey! We heard and considered your feedback and decided that the present and past WCS will not be part of the upcoming Infected Challenge.

crazy how one whine can change your mind... they were all from the same alliance ^^ but well if they lose this time there will be another excuse again