Competitive Matchmaking Alternatives, External Service & Sites - eSport

A list of alternative competitive Matchmaking eSport Services & Sites for CS2, like the ESL & Faceit Leagues.
Also some statistic pages and others - related to Counter-Strike.

Legal:
The content of this page / guide is protected by § 2 of the Copyright Act. It is not allowed to copy the content in whole or in part used or distributed. A forwarding or linking to the site / guide, however, is allowed.

Changes and errors excepted. I assume no liability for the content of this guide, the information for this guide comes from different sources.

Whats this ? Why should i use this ?

Hey, welcome to my Guide i will show you this alternative Matchmaking Services, there you can play independent of your normal CS2 Ranks and your CS2 Rank won't get affected by this.


When you know another service please comment it, so i can approve it and add this to the Guide. Thank you =)

And i please you to don't judge too hard with my english grammar, i'm not a native english speaker, its my school english.

CS2 Stats Tracking

There are some sites with you can track your stats in multiple games for free.
The PROBLEM with all those is the same like in MM itself, they DO NOT recognize or care if you are playing with or against higher skilled player ELO. Only Win/Loose mainly counts and some non teamplay related stats.

CSStats - https://csstats.gg/
Tracker Network TRN - https://tracker.gg/
CSGORanKings - https://csgorankings.com - buged/not working
leetify - https://leetify.com/invite/39fd0ac5-27df-40e8-a1e2-54dd54451be0
scope.gg - https://app.scope.gg

Matchmaking with fitting opponents

* This services are under test ! And this Guide is not finished yet ! Please note this.
My Counter-Strike Global Offensive Skill was around DMG with ~2500H. In CS2 i am around 15K Skills of my Friends are DMG - LEM - Global

Very good with all this Services is that you can report Smurfs, they are not wanted and they get punished.


More than 23 Games and i have to say because the few amount of Players there is safe a Cheater in every single game, they do not do anything against cheaters, and also their Anti Cheat is NOT WORKING. They have no real MM System, K/D, Playtime isnt really recognized and games are NOT balanced. Also very questionable is the fact that some Admins/Mods have cheated themself in the past and they close tickets without a reply.



This Service does no longer exist.
Challengeme.gg after 130 matches there is no balance, enemy are far to strong or to weak may caused because there are to less players online and the service is still in Beta status.

1vs1 Mode definily to strong opponents, i had only a single opponent with same skill.



FaceIT after 200 matches there is no balance, enemy are far to strong or to weak.
And there a lot of trolling and toxic ppl.
FaceIT has no MM (Skill / Elo based onto Win/Lose) and FaceIT seems to be NOT interested in doing things better or improve their service.



This Service is merged with FaceIT
ESEA after 12 matches, i think there is no matchmaking balance but maybe the reason is that there only a few players in my skill range, and a few games are to less to get a correct skill leveling.
But also here is no real MM/Balance System and the overview and handling isnt the best.



This Service does no longer exist.
CEVO after 9 games a completly chaotic and not good handleable service for Free Users, opponents are also here far to strong or to weak, Teams are mostly inbalanced. I didnt tested the Tournaments.



This Service is merged with FaceIT
ESL after 8 Tournaments and over 100 varied Matches/Games played, i can say this is really unbalanced, there is no Matchmaking via the Site/Service, completly randomly choosed opponents. And Tournament system is chaotic and poor organized, sometimes you have to wait 2 hours for an opponent because Staff/Support is not able to solve Problems.



This Service does no longer exist.
Over 80 MM Games and a few Tournaments, i can say this is the most balanced service this time but also not perfect, its better to play with premates. In my opinion they do not do enough against cheaters and use poor anti cheat systems.

Client Software & Website

Swedish Company
Worldwide e-Sport Service
Anit-Cheat & MM Client


German Website, Company & Service
Europe e-Sport Service
Website Languages: English
Anti-Cheat Client, required for Ranked.



North America/Russian Company (corporated with a Russian Company)
Worldwide e-Sport Service
Website Languages: English, Spanish, Polish, Portuguese, Russian
Anti-Cheat Client & Client equal to the website, required for Ranked.



Turtle Entertainment (2015 owned by the ESL), American/German Company
Worldwide e-Sport Service
Website Languages: English
Client required. Download via Steam or Retail



Unsafe website with the old HTTP instead of HTTPS
Client for MM


Turtle Entertainment, German Company
Worldwide e-Sport Service
Website Languages: English, Bulgarian, Chinese, Czech, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, Turkish
Anit-Cheat & MM Client




P*P*O LTD
Worldwide Service
Website Languages: English
No Client

Cheaters, Lags & Performance

Cheaters

Dont say it is useless to report suspect players ! A report doesnt hurt and doesnt take much time !
When you think a report is useless you are one of the reasons there are so many cheaters ! Think of this ! When no one report suspect players they don´t get banned !

Sadly i have to say that PvPr* ,Challengeme, FaceIT, ESEA, ESL, CEVO and also esportal do nothing against Cheaters on their Platform.
They ignore all informations or mails you send and only trust their automatic system.

Cheaters are everywhere, most used hacks are Wallhack or also known and called ESP - Visual Hacks with those you can see your opponent through walls and objects.

Another popular one is the Aimlock or Aim Assists, with aimlock your weapon automaticly moves & aim to the enemy, aim assists does what the name means, it assists you in different ways.

A professional cheater can use those hacks without being suspect to the opponent's.
You can't recognize those hacks, it feels like he's playing like a Global VS a Gold 3 player. But most cheaters arent good players or they stuck in between a rank and they are frustrated, you easily can recognize this cheaters.

• Servers located in Germany, Netherlands, France, Sweden, USA
  
• 128Tick Server
  
• Good & Stable Servers with less Lags and Pings
  
• A lot of cheaters, same as in standard MM. Because of the few amount of Players you have safe a cheater in every single game
  
• Surrender option

• BETA Status
  
• Anti Cheat System: EA - Easy Anti Cheat
  
• Servers located in Germany
  
• 128Tick Server
  
• A lot of cheaters, same as in standard CSGO MM, you have one in every 3rd game.
  
• VAC Banned players can still play via Challengeme also with players who have no ban.
  
• No high ping limit, latency check or high ping kick
  
• FPS drops
  
• Lags, mini Lags
  
• Report and Honor system in Lobby
  
• BOTs for leaving players
  
• Surrender option

• Servers located in Finland, France, Germany, Moscow, Netherlands, Sweden, UK, Kazakhstan
  
• 128Tick Server
  
• Average cheaters, same as in standard MM.But lot of Trolls/Toxic randoms.
  
• VAC Banned players can still play via FaceIT also with players who have no ban.
  
• No high ping limit, latency check or high ping kick
  
• Good & Stable Servers with less Lags and Pings
  
• Report and Honor system in Lobby
  
• BOTs for leaving players
  
• Surrender option

FaceIT Bann Policies
https://support.faceit.com/hc/en-us/articles/208282375-FACEIT-Banning-Policy



Servers located in: Africa, Europe, North America, Oceania, South America, South East Asia
More details: https://status.esea.net/

• BETA Status
  
• Anti Cheat System: Serverplugin / Sourcemod
  
• Servers located in: Unknown
  
• 128Tick Server (feature disabled, running at 64 Tick now)
  
• A lot of cheaters, same as in standard CSGO MM, you have one in every 3rd game.
  
• VAC Banned players can still play, also with players who have no ban.
  
• No high ping limit, latency check or high ping kick
  
• Report system in Lobby after Match.
  
• BOTs for leaving players (they get killed at the end of each round)
  
• No Surrender Option

Overwatch & Live Banns

Live Banns & Referee are really needed for all those services.



They have a Overwatch System and you can also call an Admin for different Issues.
But it seems in standard games there is no report or live ban for cheaters.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.



They do not overwatch and admins/mods doesnt bann live or take action.
But they bann you safe for 24H when you play against cheater and leave the game, because there is no surrender option.

Free User VS Payment - what do i get for ma money ?

Paid Features dont give you anything in compare to the costs. Its not worth.




At Pv*** at this time there is no reason or benefit to buy a Premium Membership. Unless you want to support the Pv*** Service.



Maybe with a Full Team (5 Players) its worth a try.

• Store Discount
  If you earned enough Coins you can buy Skins and other things and for some you get a 10% discount
  
  
• Item Limit on Store Sales
  
  
• 2x League Prizes
  There for you have to win in a League, thats really hard with random Mates.
  
  
• Access to Premium Competitions
  Also there you need good premates, you will become a little bit more Coins for a Win than in Standard
  
  
• Premium Support
  They said that your Tickets and other things have higher priority, but there is no proof for this
  
  
• Premium Emoticons/Chat Icons
  Yes you become acces to a few really cool emoticons for the chat
  
  
• Premium Badge
  Visible on your Pv*** Profile + Your Avatar is lighted by Flames
  
  
• Access to Discord Premium Channel
  Yes .... but what for ? There is no special thing in there

At FaceIT at this time there is no big reason or benefit to buy a Premium Membership.
The Store prices are way to high, and all other benefits are not needed or not worth.



Maybe with a Full Team (5 Players) with PREMIUM Only (AC required) its worth a try.

FACEIT Supporter
• Access FACEIT subscriber-only competitions
  Yeah .. not really worth the monay.
  
  
• Leagues & Ladders for subscribers
  Yeah .. not really worth the monay.
  
  
• Advanced statistics & Skill Level
  Maybe useful for ppl. who think statistic and status says smth. about a player. But don´t care about Smurfs dude...
  
  
• Supporter badge
  Uhh yeah ... not sexy.....visible on your Profile.
  
  FACEIT Premium
  
  
• All of the Supporter benefits
  What for benefits ?
  
  
• Access to beta features
  The whole service is a Beta ....
  
  
• Premium Badge
  Uhh yeah ... not sexy.....visible on your Profile.
  
  
• Priority voting over supporter users
  Ähm just not fair :D ?
  
  
• Gain FACEIT points through premium missions
  Hmm that must be a hidden feature i didn´t found such things. ....
  
  

Website & Client looking the same and have the same features.

Website:

Client:

Conclusion

All this services need improvements to become better.
Maybe you can give them feedback, and they will improve their service.
As more people give feedback they will faster recognize and improve things !
So dont be lazy and think another ones will do this for you ...

• The biggest point i think they have to improve is the thing with laggers.
  This services definily need a Ping Limit or HPK - High ping Kick and Latency Check to become more professionality.
  
  
• In a Tournament or Competitive MM you should not play with ppl. who have a ping above 50 or massive lags.
  
  
• VAC Banned people should not play together with not VAC banned players to prevent bad experiences in games with cheaters.
  
  
• Also a Overwatch service by trusted players should be added, with benefits for this people who pay their time.
  
  
• A region restriction would be also nice because every IT-Student knows that you cannot play properly from one end of the world with guy from the other end and it depends on the internet infrastructures between the countries. As example Germany can play good with USA Nord, Netherlands but NOT with USA East, West or France, Poland or Russia. This cause lags and other performance problems.
  
  
• Referee needed !
  Cheaters are everywhere and VAC, EAC and FF etc. are not able to recognize them !
  As example i played a game with 8 Cheaters in 4 VS 4 and EAC does nothing.
  So for all this Services its essentially that a referee is watching every single game in Tournament ! So Cheaters can get banned instantly within a running Tournament
  
  But this time none of the listed services doing this! And thats really annoying.

Leagues and Limited eSport Services

This Sites & Services are hosted by eSport Teams or represent a "League" and have internal Tournaments, but no open Ladders, Gather, or Clients. The focus are mostly Team Matches and Tournaments to a specific time & date.

International:
battlefy - https://battlefy.com

Germany:
99damage - https://www.99damage.de/

Spain & Brazil:
gamersclub https://csgo.gamersclub.gg

India & other Parts of Asia
https://www.sostronk.com/ Shutdown at 31.10.2024

Other:
toornament - https://www.toornament.com/
popflash - https://popflash.site/
No longer active dreamteam - https://dreamteam.gg/
gosugamers - https://www.gosugamers.net/
challengermode https://www.challengermode.com
challengermode referral (bonus): https://www.challengermode.com/r/731983630754
challonge https://challonge.com
AVGL https://avgl.org

Links, Downloads & more

Websites

https://esportal.com
https://play.esea.net
https://www.faceit.com
https://cevo.com
{LINK REMOVED}https://www.challengeme.gg
https://play.eslgaming.com

Social - Twitter

https://twitter.com/esportalcom
https://twitter.com/ESEA
https://twitter.com/FACEIT
https://twitter.com/cevo
https://twitter.com/CME_GG
https://twitter.com/ESL

FAQ´s & Support

https://esportal.com/en/faq
https://play.esea.net/index.php?s=support&d=faq
https://support.faceit.com/hc
http://support.cevo.com/support/home
{LINK REMOVED}https://www.challengeme.gg/faq
https://play.eslgaming.com/help

Anti Cheat Client Downloads

https://esportal.com/en/client
https://play.esea.net/client
https://www.faceit.com/en/anti-cheat
https://cevo.com/hub/csgo/downloads/
{LINK REMOVED}https://www.challengeme.gg/download-client
https://play.eslgaming.com/anticheat/


Legal:
The content of this page / guide is protected by the Copyright Act. It is not allowed to copy the content in whole or in part used or distributed. A forwarding or linking to the site / guide, however, is allowed.

Sources: user experience from me & my friends, wikipedia.org, faceit.com, challengeme.gg, teamliquid.net, cevo.com, esea.net, wikia.com, 4players.de, 99damage.de, steampowered.com, reddit.com, youtube.com

[a4k0san]

currently faceit and esportal only options if u dont want to encounter cheaters

[⍟ GraY [trading]]

Does everyone just play premier now? Faceit seems to be the last thing standing and theres hardly 100 people queueing

[BestNoob]

Guide Update for Esportal and Faceit 2.0 will follow soon

[BestNoob]

Updated and added leetify - https://leetify.com/invite/39fd0ac5-27df-40e8-a1e2-54dd54451be0
a new STATS page for CS2 and more games

[BestNoob]

Updated a few things - and more will change soon

*NEWS
- eSportal has become insolvent
- ESEA & ESL has been merged with FaceIT

[BestNoob]

Updated few Guide content for CS2

[BestNoob]

* Updated Guide content

[BestNoob]

Updated a few things

[BestNoob]

Updated a few things.

[BestNoob]

Guys this guide is old but just for an update there is a new site called esportal
https://esportal.com/home