Reading through all this I can't help but wonder if it would make sense to have a pro level version of FAF. Kind of like we have FAF develop, Nomads and xtreme wars could we not have a pro level game type that used the preferred settings of all the 2K plus ranked players? FAF Pro? This game mode would still be ranked and would allow a suitable place for people who hit a certain level where they actually notice the difference between an early engineer dying or not or the difference between manually reclaiming and attack moving or patrolling. It would also allow lower ranked players to play that game mode if they so chose or to join in on a Semi-Pro level game such as 1400+ plus lobbies or something like that considering top level players tend to host such lobbies regularly. I personally would love to try a version of FAF that is more indicative of the way the game was played 5 to 10 years ago or whatever the Holy Grail of FAF is that the pro level group tends to reminisce about and would not have a problem if my rank was affected if I lost such a match similar to how I will play nomads or Extreme wars from time to time knowing my rank will be affected.
I personally can't imagine the game without advanced Target priorities, auto overcharge and even some of the implemented eco tools such as auto ringing/upgrading mexes and radars because my APM just won't allow for me to play the way it used to be and still enjoy myself but I do think that perhaps it's not ideal to have one standard set of rules that apply to pro-level and to the regular folk.
I'm sure all of these high-ranked players who keep speaking up about how everything is going to crap around here would have no problem being part of a committee to come up with the optimal set of rules for pro-level players and then it would just take some development time to create that game type.
How hard would it be to make another game type such as nomads or FAF develop?