I agree with most of Super's assessment.

-Blizt has some alts right now, but I think they haven't rebuilt much since their top players left few months ago.

-FCC has lost most of their strategic players (Smoove, Aura, Super, SFG, etc.) and the ones remaining in FCC seems to be more role-playing oriented. One thing is for sure, they stand no chance in Division B with their current line-up

-French clan I think might go inactive. I saw Boubou left for Lynx recently, it is not looking like they will participate again.

-LuFredd is losing some players for some reason lately, maybe they will return, maybe not. They have some nice players like Kalati, Nicat and Max. If they can recruit a few other players they could be fine.

-BIA has lost some players to other clans like 101st, their status is uncertain but less uncertain than some others.

-Olympus probably will play again and get a ton of boots like usual.

-Poon Squad lost matrixch to 101st, arguably their best player. They might play again, more than some other clans on this list.

-Dutch NL could come back I think.

-DWF lost their top player in fireice82. I have no clue if they will participate in CL considering the guys left seem to prefer other types of games than strategic ones or are alts for other top clans.

-VIW might still play. They are still recruiting new guys and there seems to have some sort of activity within the clan.

-German Warlords probably will play again.

-NWO is almost sure to participate.

-LEA no clue.

-Vipers would have some nice players to participate like Dar. I don't know how good and deep of a CL roster they could have excluding their alts but I feel they could probably put up a good fight in CL10.

-AOE seems to be quite inactive.

Edited 8/28/2017 23:15:07

Blitz is being held together by alts, if they were to be propped into clan league using them, it would be a disaster. This is a horrible idea.

French community is very inactive and I know that players within the clan are looking to other options at this point.

FCC has 1 player from this CL playing, and he is fairly inactive.

Lufredd is dead, they can't even fill a roster, and Max is playing for SNinja.

BIA is inactive, most of their active players have been picked up by 101st.

Olympus as far as I know will be barred from joining.

Poon Squad is inactive, as seen by players leaving and what they have told me.

Dutch NL suffered heavily with boots. I doubt they play.

DWF is inactive and no longer has stable leadership

VIW has a major inactivity problem, but still has enough players to fill a roster.

German Warlords got slaughtered, so it's just speculation.

As long as you continue to lead I'm sure nwo will play.

LEA is active, that's all I know.

Vipers is unlikely. They seem inactive and have been few players wanting to play.

AOE was trying to rebuild, but it's likely that it has failed.

Good assessment overall. It surely looks like 7th Heaven, TJC and maybe even Hydra could end up in Division B in CL10. Even Stats at 5th place could be in B at this point...

If French + Blizt drop-out, that leaves 2 places in division B + the 2 already assured first 2 positions of C. And considering the actual 3rd of C, FCC, is kind of dead in terms of strategic playing, we could see places 1 to 5 in B next season (except FCC).

What is concerning is that a lot of strategic clans seems to be dying but few that I am aware of are building for the next CL. Maybe Wizards could be such a clan if Bugs Bunny or whatever his name is now would be fully committed to his clan (meaning having his main in it). Idk.

It was nice to see FCC on the uprise while it lasted. It was nice to see a clan coming from almost nowhere and have great aspirations. I am hoping other clans will try to build-up to be competitive on the future CL.

Edited 8/29/2017 01:47:59

The reason why we don't see a lot of new clans coming up is there already are a lot of clan out there. All of them eat, breathe, grow or shrink, and recruit new members (well most of them).
Clans like BIA, Blitz, Viw (who will most likely still play, they have a lot of new recruits) Olympus were in a decline for years now. DwF was always known only for having ALE and another 65 level player in it. Turtles were always very volatile having so few players in them. FCC was unexpected, but could easily survive with better management decisions. Lu Fredd already collapsed once. Poon Squad is a casual clan, they could easily recruit a lot of people if managers weren't going inactive. :p German Warlords are a big and active clan (I think?).

But what about other clans? If WL was EU4, then 101st/Lynx would have a record for biggest coalition against them from Agressive Expansion modifier they just worked up for themself. They could field two or three strong CL lineups. MASTER, ONE!, Outlaws got stronger than ever. Sninja literally doubled up their firepower upon the merge with Vikinger (which mostly consisted of players not coming from other clans) and will actually be competitive in division B. VS gained some players. GG lost some, but also gained some. And many clans came through little to no change in size and strength.

Basically what we see is normalization. Hordes of weak, long declining clans collapse into fewer, but stronger clans. It really seems more drastic because it's all happening within one season of Clan League, but this season has been nearly double the length of previous divisions, so we see a bigger sum of movements.

Out of the new clans, NWO, Wizards, Huns IMO could be a solid addition to Clan League for sure, I will be surprised if at least one of them will not join. Maybe Cats, The Lost Wolves and/or the Italian clan will participate as well.

I think this debate over "are warlight clans growing or not" is coloured by your view of your own clan. If you are in a healthy clan right now, a minority of clans, you are wondering what the hell people are talking about? If you are in a clan that has collapsed recently, or a clan that has seen recruitment decrease you likely understand the argument I am making. So if you are say, Lynx, then you might think things are fine but if you are in Icelandic Turtles you might be more inclined to see problems.

And I do agree with Onoma's point that this CL is longer then normal, and we are witnessing history more. As well I personally have finished one 3v3 game, two games are nearing their end, and I still need to start my two remaining games. At this rate, we are looking at late Fall before Division C is done. I hope Division A enjoys the months of boredom and literally nothing to do as its a first for those clans.

Edited 8/29/2017 13:08:47

Normally the lower divisions didn't play as slow as A or B. This seems to have changed. 2d20h seems to be the norm now for teamgames.

I think the main difference between now and earlier in WL's history is that the strategic players and clans take it far more seriously. This has many consequences, one of which is increased recruiting, which you see manifested as poaching. You can also see that the "elite" clans are almost all much larger than comparably "elite" clans were only two years ago, probably due to a greater willingness to teach as well as recognition of potential instead of only recruiting fully formed players. On the whole, I don't think it is debatable that the overall pool of strategic talent has increased - it's only that instead of enriching the lower division clans as it had seemed it might, the talent is still flowing to the top clans.

If clan as a whole is revolving around CL play mainly, it is no wonder that clan collapse as result of bad performance, having hardly anything more to offer. Mismatching that natural process for "dying of Warlight" is huge overstatement. GG's example prove that CL relegation does not mean end of the clan automatically, but you need stable and enjoyable environment in the clan itself in the first place.

"Normally the lower divisions didn't play as slow as A or B. This seems to have changed. 2d20h seems to be the norm now for teamgames."

I think it has more to do with the qualifiers and then division C rather than anything else. Having to go through 2 steps takes more time. No new games can be made for division C before we finished totally qualifiers, meaning 1 guy or 1 team in qualifiers can delay the happening of division C and hence delay the ending of a whole season.

Edited 8/29/2017 16:48:51

Yes it's definitely the fault of that process. However a few seasons before the lower divisions played their games so quick, that this longer procedure wouldn't have mattered

Actually the difference wasn't ever this big. IIRC Clan League 7 had: started in october 2015, D1/D2 finish in january 2016, division A in february 2016. In those lowest divisions it partly was clans like DARKLORDS or HAWKS making it go faster with how many boots and nonjoins they had. Clan League 9 stage 2 div C has none of that even with two clans winning/losing their games considerably fast, and summer vacations are a factor not to be ignored.

Wow october 2015 to february 2016 to finish A? I highly doubt it. Would have to check. One thing is for sure, I feel 1 Clan League season is so long. It started in like February of this year and we might not see the end of it before like November.

Edited 8/29/2017 20:28:48

These reasons are part of why next CL is going to be based on a schedule (when games start) - so in theory it should greatly reduce the time of CL.

Those clans dying are mainly due to all good players going to a few of the Elite or very good clans and clan drama; not to mention very few like Ben goes to a new/not top 10 clans trying to train players there. I agree that many of the Elite or Very good clans are becoming more inclusive compared to earlier and not to mention Master/App, Lynx/101, GG/GGr are good models for a player to get good at game, which is very difficult if one has to learn everything on own(not impossible, just more time consuming).

There are few exceptions like MH or ONE, who are stable even after losing good players;for MH, it is advantageous having a larger clan with so much of depth and recruiting newbies while for ONE, it is mostly efforts of the active members.

The chances of Wizards participating in CL10 are not that high, since I am less active and not highly motivated as I was few months ago and it totally depends on the members' decision as a whole; but I would try max to make Wizards give CL10 a try :)

Lastly, Congrats to all of the promoting clans :)

Clans like BIA, Blitz, Viw (who will most likely still play, they have a lot of new recruits)

I've actually looked at what Blitz would have to offer right now and we only have like 4 new recruits since CL9 start and 2 of them were from the Stupid thread from which i think 1 is at least an alt. From all of the other players left in blitz it would even be hard to make a lineup if you take away the old lead of the clan basically. If Blitz would put a lineup now it would be like Rubens, ESPANA, pip, storm spirit, porian, pioneer, prisoner and there is no such thing as. So counting all of thsoe i get 8 players and yes the one i assume to be an alt is in that list as well since i put all 4 new guys in.

So in short, at this moment i don't think Blitz would participate in CL10.

Looking back at everything that has happened in Blitz in all my years being with them I feel like we already slowly started declining during CL6 when Jeff, QB and Gross all decided they would be moving over to Masters after that season had ended but the real hit was basically during season 8 to 9 with the breaks from both KKND and myself i feel like. We were probably the backbone of Blitz keeping everything active, nothing against all the work Lin and Pip put in up to this point, but we were just the main players keeping Blitz alive i feel like. Basically at this point Wini and AUN also joined the leaders group of Blitz but i think it was already too late at this point looking back at it.

I will personally most likely play for Hydra next season of CL unless something specific comes up which might change my mind but that is very unlikely to happen too be fair.

Nobody likes commitment, Commitment = time + energy , Giving commitment requires motivation. Motivation for 9 months is hard. 9 months is long and draining. People play games for fun and excitements.. 9 months of constant gaming and commiting is not fun and excitement. Players drop out of clans to play for better clans to make this more worth-while in A division or they quit.

If clan wants success on CL, Recruit, Make community of players with goal to improve. Your players won't be poached if your close and all are in a group goal.

Good Leader = Improvement and stability

Good leaders = Hard to find.

Some clans don't have ambition to be the very best so if they have player who does, expect them to leave.

Bad Leader = Not community known , Doesn't recruit , No ambition and lazy in general = to long-term stable decline.. Players will leave. No community goal/motivation leading to death. Sign of this = Alts being allowed.

The leader is the captain of ship, No leader = Sink sunk.

Want success on CL? Clan has to be orientated around it + Strategic improvement environment + Recruit (poaching is allowed and lets be fair it's recruiting to have a depth roster for CL now)

If your clan isn't orientated around CL you underperform like Hydra
If your clan doesn't have a active leadership with no ambition , players = bored , demotivated and leave like Blitz

Facts. Facts. Facts.

What else is a fact? A team full of players with right attitude will always get you points then a significantly more skilled team that are coasting through the games.

Look at dead clans means you know what to ensure is correct with your own clan.

The only clans that has been "New" and made a smash on A division has been Outlaws + ONE! and they are 2nd + 3rd *If last 2 games are won.

Survive. Grow. Profit.

Outlaws aren't really new considering they were Lynx's little brother for a while. I see that a lot changed in Outlaws since the schism of last year but I wouldn't put it as they are new. It would still be 101st if leaders of Lynx would have accepted to sell the clan to Platinum also.

Unless you meant new in A, which would make more sense. Few clans that I am aware of have climbed their way from the bottom to the top without the support of an other elite clan. Only MH, VS and 7th Heaven come to my mind right now as clans that have either come from nothing and got to the top or are on their possible way to get to the top.

Edited 8/30/2017 22:34:38

ONE isn't exactly a new clan. We competed back in CL4 as XS, so we're actually among the older clans still around.

Few clans that I am aware of have climbed their way from the bottom to the top without the support of an other elite clan

And what does this even mean? Every clan in A started from the bottom at some point.

Edited 8/30/2017 23:00:10

Clans have climbed their way to the top. WG did years ago. Masters after that. Turtles. ONE. None of those clans existed in the first couple CL. French may not have either, I don't remember off hand.


If you are saying few have climbed in the last 2-3 CLs, then sure.


I hate to see so many clans drop out, but it is what it is. As long as other clans can take up their spot, and it doesn't get totally diluted (too top heavy and bad competition below)...the league will be fine.

Yea exact I meant since like CL7. What I meant is that few clans are able to start from bottom to top and establish themselves as a new credible threat to the top clans.

In the same line of ideas, I am hoping divisions A and B become less predictable. ONE! was a surprise for me in A this year (which was nice to see), but we all knew Masters would win this. More parity would make the Clan League more exciting. Everyone pretty much knew GG would win B and everyone that plays often with 7th Heaven knew they would dominate in Qualifiers and C. But ofc hoping for more parity is like believing in Santa Claus.

One thing that could make things more exciting is limiting the number of tournaments per player to only 2, which would force each clan to have more players into their line-ups. I know it was like 4 tournaments per player in CL7, so 3 per player is already an improvement but 2 would force clans to have depth and not only rely on like 3-4 top players and some lesser good others.

Edited 8/30/2017 23:41:36