I would say both of those are legitimate issues. The problem of ensuring ET maps play well is certainly legitimate. There is a limited number of players capable of actually playing ET maps, and out of those players only some of them actually understand what makes a good map. This is true at every skill level. Some players simply do not understand mapping. The numbers get even worse when you're looking for someone who not only understands mapping and can play an ET level map well enough to mod it and is actually willing to spend the time it takes to mod something. It's relatively easy to find someone who can mod the standard ENHI range of difficulties, but finding the required amount of mods for maps that go beyond the Insane difficulty becomes increasingly difficult.
I would say another dimension of the problem is motivation and how mappers feel about the system. ET players and mappers here seem to feel discriminated against by the rules and the ranking system at large. Whether or not this is intended doesn't matter, since it's about how these mappers and players perceive things. I know that if I was capable of making decent ET level maps I would not be trying to get them ranked right now, because I feel that the effort required to try to rank something of that difficulty is simply not worth it.
Personally, I don't feel that issues such as difficulty spikes or overmapping should disqualify ET level maps from being ranked the way they would on easier maps. As the difficulty of maps increase, mappers should be more free to create patterns that would be otherwise considered unrankable, because ET maps are targeted at the elite players who should be expected to be able to deal with essentially any pattern a mapper can think up, regardless of difficulty.
I would say another dimension of the problem is motivation and how mappers feel about the system. ET players and mappers here seem to feel discriminated against by the rules and the ranking system at large. Whether or not this is intended doesn't matter, since it's about how these mappers and players perceive things. I know that if I was capable of making decent ET level maps I would not be trying to get them ranked right now, because I feel that the effort required to try to rank something of that difficulty is simply not worth it.
Personally, I don't feel that issues such as difficulty spikes or overmapping should disqualify ET level maps from being ranked the way they would on easier maps. As the difficulty of maps increase, mappers should be more free to create patterns that would be otherwise considered unrankable, because ET maps are targeted at the elite players who should be expected to be able to deal with essentially any pattern a mapper can think up, regardless of difficulty.