Well, judging by the tone of the message, you can see how the person approaches playing Heroes. For them, it's something akin to a single-player game – an adventure, a challenge, entertainment. But sports aren't an adventure or a challenge. Or rather, they can be, but in general, they aren't. Sports are primarily about competing with others. It's about figuring out who plays better – you or them. A battle for supremacy. To ensure that this battle yields fair results, sports strive to level the playing field. They create a flat surface, use a round ball, switch goals each half/period/set, alternate home and away games, and impose restrictions on equipment, and so on. If sports officials thought like Soda players, the football field would be an asymmetrical, uneven terrain with ravines, barbed wire, sudden earthquakes or floods, mines that release tear gas, the ball would be egg-shaped, of varying size and density, and dogs of different sizes, weights, and bite strengths would chase the players. And why not? It's an adventure, a chance to show character, willpower, and ingenuity. And it's all like real life. But why don't they do it that way? Why have competitions, from ritualistic battles to modern sports, always been conducted under conditions of initial equality (as much as technically possible)? Because the main goal of a competition is to determine the winner, the strongest, the best. Winners are respected and admired because they have demonstrated their superiority over their rivals. But how can you talk about superiority if the outcome of the match is determined by N percent of random factors that are independent of the players? Did the person win because they were strong, or because they were given a good advantage? That's what the collective wisdom aims to reduce in various areas of competition. In particular, in Heroes. This is a natural process, and there's not much point in arguing against it. It can only reverse if the Heroes community begins to degrade intellectually and morally, and loses the desire for personal growth. In fact, the popularity of Soda here is a good indicator of the level of degradation, both within the community and within individual personalities. In a well-developed community (like the one that formed on Bay), the transition to Team Elimination (TE) happened quickly and almost painlessly. The same happened at the St. Petersburg championships. Because people understood what sports are and what they require. But in various backwaters with an abundance of stupid, weak people, with low vitality, with petty ambitions, and so on, TE/Variant Team (VT) doesn't take root well, simply because it stirs up this swamp and shows it what the true pulse of life should be. Nagan likes to fondly remember old Soda players. Forgetting that modern Soda players, with rare exceptions, are a pathetic imitation of the old ones, simply a different psychological type. In many ways, modern VT players resemble the old guard. This is even noticeable in real-life communication. Very telling in this regard are the rules that people propose for playing for money or to settle disputes. In the past, they would suggest playing TE-8mm6, best of 3 wins. But the latest episodes have revealed a new favorite – the h3dm1 mirror match, and they are even willing to play to just one win.