You have no reason to apologize Hive account@davemccoy, to me or anyone. We individually invested time and/or money into SM for our own reasons. You were excited, I was excited, we all were excited at this cool opportunity to be an early adopter. You are not to blame and you did not let anyone down.

As like you, I was surprised when I saw that Steem Monsters had entry fees for tournaments. I had the impression from the start that tourneys offered by SM would be free to play, and only tourneys created by communities would charge as they deemed appropriate. I know the "small" fee is nominal, but there has to be other ways of creating a "barrier of entry". As you already suggested, associating entry with league ranking is one way of doing so. Just like card values go up and down, we've seen game rules also ever-changing. The rules made today will change as the game itself changes. Let's see if this one will change.

You are still my best.partner.ever. I am going to think of you as taking a well-deserved vacation yourself, not of you saying goodbye to this game. Let the game take its course, make mistakes, correct their trajectory, and come back stronger. We've been on this journey from the start, seen ups and downs, and no way am I letting you give up this easily.