Esports still on the rise

[Ganrich]

Polygon did an interview with Time Sweeney on their Newsworthy podcast if anyone is interested. It is a bit more detailed than his Op-Ed.

 

http://www.polygon.com/2016/3/4/11158992/tim-sweeney-and-windows-10-as-game-blocking-monopoly-newsworthy

[Darkpriest]

Well production did get better but the games in the last days made it for the bad start.

 

Now it seems that IEM in Poland got so big that it even got a few minutes on main news of mainstream media.

[Keyrock]

Now it seems that IEM in Poland got so big that it even got a few minutes on main news of mainstream media.

That's a CS:GO thing, right?

[Darkpriest]

CS:GO , SC2 and LoL

Edited March 6, 2016 by Darkpriest

[Calax]

 

Now it seems that IEM in Poland got so big that it even got a few minutes on main news of mainstream media.

That's a CS:GO thing, right?

 

Right now League and CS:Go are the two major draws. In League terms the Korean powerhouse of SKT managed to win it all this year. Fnatic got number two. Both teams are in a unique position right now because in their own regions they're not the best (SKT got in because they won the World Championship last year, They're currently Sixth in Korea, Fnatic for winning one of the qualifiers, this year they're third in Europe).

 

Right now among the leagues Europe is a bit of a dumpster fire. During the off season most of the teams fell apart, with 3/5 from Fnatic departing for NA (including their longest Tenured player, Yellowstar who played in Season 2 and won the world championship). H2K basically lost it's entire roster except for their midlaner, but managed to come out of the situation with the best roster, including Forg1ven, who's known for being INCREDIBLY toxic... and being so mechanically gifted her hard carried his old team (SKGaming) for almost the entirety of spring last year. There are a few other problems with roster changes that had mananged to crush a few teams (Origen, built out of old Fnatic players who managed to get to Worlds last year on their first split in the league). Hopefully summer looks better for them.

 

North America is... interesting. TSM basically fell apart completely and was rebuilt. In the off season this caused some friction because they made a promo announcing their new ADC (Doublelift) that was a bit hostile towards their long time Rival, Counter Logic Gaming. They also have enough money to get the best of the best from any region, and got the best Support in Europe (Fnatic's Yellowstar) to match Doublelift. Their team is a dream team overall, and yet they're parked in fourth because they can't seem to coordinate that well. Some blame this on Doublelift because he's got a reputation for being a passive aggressive git who doesn't play well with others. Really I think it's just because they have three guys trying to say "Do this" and nobody wants to follow orders.

 

At the Top of NA is the team Immortals.

The list of investors includes power players in the sports and technology industries. Peter Levin, the president or Lionsgate Interactive Venture and Games, who previously built the Nerdist into a geek empire; Allen Debevoise, a chairman at Machinima; Steve Kaplan, a co-owner of the pro basketball franchise Memphis Grizzlies; Brian Lee, famous for co-founding startups with celebrities like Kim Kardashian; Paul Rappoport, COO at the XPRIZE; and many more comprise the ownership group. A group called Machine Shop Ventures is also investing—it's better known as the business alter-alias of band Linkin Park. (That's right: Linkin Park, the band whose music was pretty much the soundtrack of mid-2000s frag videos, now co-owns an esports team.)

They have by far the most gifted roster, Their top laner and jungler were the reason Fnatic went undefeated in the summer, their midlaner was a mechanically gifted player who left CLG because they wanted to swap between him and a younger player who they thought had a higher celing. The ADC was removed from TSM because he was blamed for mechanical misplays that led to defeats, while the support was probably the second best overall in the region. Right now they're at 13-1 simply because they operate at one speed, and nobody can keep up with their relentless aggression.

 

CLG is currently in the number 2 slot, a long existing team that ended up rebuilding over the course of the past few years. They were known for never QUITE being good enough and trying odd things... and Doublelift. In 2015 they managed to do quite well, and finally made it to worlds after becoming the best team in North America. This season they're overall the best domestic squad, with a very clear strategy that few people have managed to match. They're the only team that beat Immortals.

 

And C9 rounds out the Top Four. Those who watch DotA have heard the name, but they're built around their League presence. They've had the most stable roster in the entire league... partly because their leader/former midlaner is literally the only thing keeping them on top. Not because he's mechanically gifted, but because he's a genius level micromanager who manages to command the team in a way that makes their macro gameplay very hard to counter. Last year he "retired" for half the summer split,  and his team went 1-10. They brought him back at the midpoint of the season and they proceeded to go nearly perfect for the end of the season. They had to win the gauntlet to go to worlds, and they managed to do it with two reverse sweeps and one 3-1 series (gauntlet is best of 5 games) managing to play as many games in three days as they had during the split. Now they're in 3rd and are looking very very good as they find their footing again.

 

 The big thing for Riot and league, is they're swapping to a Bo2 Bo3 format for Europe and NA in the next season (other companies run the other premier regions). So in the summer they're gonna have more than one stream for their days matches.

[Darkpriest]

The Major drama does not end with the Grand finals. Someone screwed up badly...

 

http://www.joindota.com/en/news/37024-marriott-hotel-release-official-apology-after-players-belongings-went-missing

 

Btw one of the items lost were car keyes to a Maserati...

Edited March 8, 2016 by Darkpriest

[Keyrock]

The Major drama does not end with the Grand finals. Someone screwed up badly...

 

http://www.joindota.com/en/news/37024-marriott-hotel-release-official-apology-after-players-belongings-went-missing

 

Btw one of the items lost were car keyes to a Maserati...

They lost Ramszes' keyboard.  Again.  Dude's keyboard was lost twice during the event.  You can't make this stuff up.  

[Darkpriest]

Welp, DotA 2 beat again the record for the prize pool, the on going The International 6 managed to get nearly 20mil USD for the prize pool. that's some nice pocket money to win there... as first place gets 44% of the pool

[Leferd]

Excellent longform piece on MOBA by former baseball GM/sportswriter-extraordinaire, Ben Lindbergh.

 

https://theringer.com/the-wild-west-of-e-sports-1cc050f8100e#.l4px5b9fq

 

What I found fascinating is the discussion on how eSports analytics are still behind MLB and the NBA -despite the prevalence of data available. However, it can provide a huge competitive advantage for those teams that know how to use it. The analytics movement is there, but the adoption rates are still at the baseball equivalent of the 1980's. Also...Mark Cuban introduced an eSports betting service??

 

Grantland is dead. Long live The Ringer.

[Keyrock]

@Leferd - To be fair, eSports are still in their infancy toddler years.  In the 1980s, baseball had been around for over a century.  eSports have been around for less than 2 decades.  In that sense, they're ahead of the curve of popular conventional team sports in terms of stats analytics adoption.  Also, you and Nahaz would be good friends.

 

 

He's DotA 2's biggest stat analytics proponent.

[Leferd]

True. But the data in MOBAs is readily available. Which is rich for exploitation in the right hands. Potential gold mine opportunity before the rest of the field can catch up.

 

*edit* Nahaz is featured in the article.

Edited August 8, 2016 by Leferd

[Bartimaeus]

snip

 

Hmm, that doesn't seem right...

 

 

 

[Keyrock]

 

snip

 

Hmm, that doesn't seem right...

 

 

 

 

Edited August 8, 2016 by Keyrock

[Keyrock]

TECHIES!

 

Edited August 8, 2016 by Keyrock

[Keyrock]

LOL

 

[Darkpriest]

Anime makes yo bad at video games

[Keyrock]

Digital Chaos 

 

March 2016: Team Secret win the Shanghai Major with the lineup of Puppey, pieliedie, Misery, w33.haa, and EternalEnvy.

 

Shortly after that w33.haa and Misery get kicked from the team and replaced by Universe and Arteezy formerly of Evil Geniuses.

 

The original DC lineup disbands after coming up short repeatedly and then is reformed as Misery, w33.haa, Resolution, Saksa, and Moo.

 

EG and Secret do a bunch of nothing.  DC starts slowly but builds momentum.

 

EG and Secret shuffle rosters again.  Universe goes back to EG.

 

All 3 teams qualify for TI6.  EG plays well and is now in the final 4.  DC plays well and is now in the final 4.  Secret exits the tournament in last place.

 

Karma.

 

Also, the Arteezy Curse continues.

[Darkpriest]

RTZ has a problem of being a farming type of a player, you cant have in one team two similar core roles, you need to have space makers, like compare w33 invoker, wr etc with RTZ

 

EDIT: oh and PITLORD announced plus Monkey King

Edited August 13, 2016 by Darkpriest

[Keyrock]

RTZ has a problem of being a farming type of a player, you cant have in one team two similar core roles, you need to have space makers, like compare w33 invoker, wr etc with RTZ

This is why Arteezy and EternalEnvy on the same team is such a bad idea.  Even in a meta that is friendly toward greedy play, having 2 heavy farming cores tends to leave your offlaner and supports with nothing, not to mention making you predictable.  The current meta, however, does not generally reward greed and is much more geared toward constant fighting, making the RTZ and EE combo that much more troublesome.  They're both good players and they can work on a team, just not the same team.

Edited August 13, 2016 by Keyrock

[Darkpriest]

Finals day . lets see who will get to take 10mils home

[Keyrock]

Holy **** game 3 of the lower bracket finals!  That was ****ing amazing.  Moo's play in the final moments when EG were making their all-in throne push was phenomenal.  The Digital Chaos Cinderella story continues.  Wings vs DC is going to be crazy.  I'm sad both these teams can't win.

Edited August 13, 2016 by Keyrock

[Keyrock]

MID SKYWRATH!?  WHAT THE **** IS HAPPENING?

 

[Keyrock]

HOLY **** IT WORKED!  MID SKYWRATH MAGE WORKED!  NOT ONLY DID IT WORK, W33 ****ING CRUSHED!  WHAT AM I EVEN WATCHING!?  WHAT IS DOTA!?WHERE AM I?  AAA.. BBB..GHHHH>YHGHGHG&YUQWGKOASDBVAKL:bv

[Bartimaeus]

oh, so that's what we're talking about

[Keyrock]

Wings wins TI6 and over 10 million 3-1.  In the end, it was even year magic, it was pre-ordained.