HLTV have changed the application of Prize pool in ESL events, increasing the value of wins at earlier stages of IEM Cologne, amongst others.
The HLTV page for the event now displays Stage 1 as having a $28,000 prize pool, allowing for VRS points from the stage to be calculated with that as the prize money basis for VRS’s ‘Event Weight’ metric.
This change has been reflected on all future ESL events on HLTV that have the same stage-based format, meaning Pro League 22, IEM Krakow, and Pro League 23 will all benefit from increased VRS weighting in their opening stages.
It is unclear whether the same change will be made regarding the PGL Bucharest Major. The Major will feature three Swiss group stages, prior to the playoffs, with only Stage 3 and the playoffs being regarded as the main event in HLTV’s BLAST.tv Austin Major event page.
IEM Cologne VRS change in detail
Previously, Stage 1 of Cologne was categorised as a qualifier for the main event, meaning the ‘prize’ was a spot in the main event, rather than a monetary value.
This meant that the prize money for the event was effectively zero, making it worth the minimum amount in the VRS curve for ‘Event Weight’, a metric which adjusts the value of victories based on the prize money given out at the event.
Effectively, the consequences were that the wins in Stage 1 of the event were hugely devalued due to having no prize money attached to them. Wins at Stage 1, previous to this change, were given an Event Weight of 0.143. By contrast, wins in the main stage are given the full 1.0 Event Weight due to the prize pool of over $1,000,000, the cap amount for Event Weight.
With the change, the Event Weight on wins in Stage 1 is now 0.391, making it more than twice as powerful in the model. This means that any win at Stage 1 of the event is now worth drastically more to the VRS model than it had previously been.
It is important to note that this is not a change to the VRS model or to IEM Cologne as an event; instead, it is a change to how HLTV displays the event information.
Instead of the total prize pool being attributed to the main event, the prize money is now split to show at the stage where the prize money is decided. As the eight teams eliminated from Stage 1 take home a combined $28,000, the stage’s prize pool is now $28,000, with the remaining $1,222,000 applied to the main event.
As the main event is already in excess of the $1,000,000 maximum for Event Weight, this does not change the Event Weight for a victory in the main stage.
Change may come from online VRS discourse
The change comes after a thread by Jesper ‘Udknud’ Larsen, a self-titled “VRS nerd” who has gained recent prominence amongst Counter-Strike enthusiasts due to his deep-dive explainers of VRS and how aspects of the system interact with the Counter-Strike ecosystem.
Jesper proposed the change as part of a recent post, with HLTV Editor in Chief, Milan ‘Striker’ Švejda, visible in the surrounding discourse about the proposed solution. Esports News UK understands that the change came as a result of the online discussion, with HLTV deciding to implement the change.
If you want a deep dive into VRS and its potential pitfalls, please see our interview with Graham ‘messioso’ Pitt, where we discussed the subject at length with the Complexity CS2 General Manager.
Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.
