My experience as a tournament admin in Katowice

Intel Extreme Masters World Championship Katowice 2017

note: this blog entry was originally written in italian and since I'm arguably a better writer in italian than I am in english, if you have the chance you can read the original here.

February 26, 2017, just arrived in Katowice, Poland: industrial center, home to coal and steel mines (as indeed a large part of Silesia), this city has in recent years also become one of the most important destinations for all eSports fans, becoming one of the major stops for the Intel Extreme Masters. And, fortunately, this year I was chosen as an admin for the StarCraft II tournament at the event.

Arrived when it was already evening in the hotel, me and Maria Laura (the other Italian admin who has had the misfortune to share the journey with me) decide to call a taxi for the ESL studio after hurriedly put down our things in our rooms : at the studio we find the casters who are already doing their tests, the admins who arrived before us that are already setting up all the stuff (including my old acquaintance MMY) and some players who are already warming up for the next day (the first of two days of the 64 players open bracket).

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The studio, the day before the storm

Monday 27 then begins the open bracket: the ESL studio is quite afar from the center of Katowice and we don't even have audience on site, however, find themselves managing sixty-four players is a great feat nonetheless, and I think we managed to do it fairly well. The catering at the studio is not bad, and a recreation room allows us to recharge our batteries during the lunch and dinner breaks.

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Couch and tv and we can relax during a lunch break

So, we get pampered during these two frantic days, so it's not really too hard to handle a double elimination ro64 bracket!

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Hi mom, I'm on tv!

Obviously, in addition to having to control the players, their scores and their replays to be uploaded at the end of each match, I also have to check for the messages that I receive on Whatsapp and notifications from Facebook every time I end up being framed on stream. I'm famous!
The first two days go quite smoothly, and on the first day we see Harstem, Snute and Stats (impressive run, if we consider that lasted from day 1 until the very end of the event) go through, then uThermal, HeRoMaRiNE and Pilipili (who takes by surprise the poor Elazer, considered by everybody the favorite in his bracket) ; then on the second day GuMiho, jjakji, Nerchio, Patience, Ryung, and MaNa advance from the ro64, so we got our fair share of koreans and two polish crowd favorites.

We get to March 1, media day, aka admin rest day for us mere mortals. We decide to go around Katowice and we end up walking through the entire city, and we discover that the city was founded the Prussians with the German name of Kattowitz: in the city the difference between the most recent buildings, built during the Polish era, and the older ones, German era, is quite obvious. But I'm not an architect nor an art historian, so I will not bore you further on this matter.

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Katowice's city center

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Even though perhaps this was a better view

March 2, the moment for the ro24 finally comes, the group stage: it's a different format than the usual GSL style we are used to for quite some time, with a brush up to the round robin format with 4 groups of six players each, where the winner of each group directly qualifies for the quarterfinals and the second and third go to the ro12.

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The players area for the group stage

And the admins workstation

For the final stage of the tournament we move from the studio to the Spodek, the sports arena that houses the entire Intel Extreme Masters (also with tournaments of Crossfire, CounterStrike and Heroes of the Storm). For the first day a the Spodek everything goes smoothly again, apart from a small problem with Bnet in the latter stages of the day that has us a bit slowed down towards the end, but still allows us to finish quite on time. From the player area, we admin coordinate the players and make sure that they play their matches and we collect their replays, we also prepare those who will be followed by the main stream in the auditorium.
In Group A, it appeared that HeRoMaRiNE could advance, but a defeat in the last round against an already eliminated herO makes him lose any chance to advance. Byun goes directly to the quarterfinals by winning the group (and thanking Snute for defeating Ryung in the last round), while the same Ryung and Solar advance the ro12.

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ByuN is a nice guy

Group B sees the domination of aLive, which somehow manages to avoid the main stream. Behind him are placed Stats and TY, but it is curious to note that all three will reach the semifinals of the tournament; nothing to do for jjakji, Harstem and Neeb, virtually eliminated even before the last round of this group.

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Ryung being spied

My vetoes for the day

We therefore arrive to March 3, perhaps the longest day of the tournament: started right away with a long bo3 between Zest and Nerchio on stage, then we have some technical issues on INnoVation's computer and finally the four-games series between ShoWTimE and GuMiho...
But first things first: in the end Zest arrives on time in Katowice, after losing his first flight because he forgot his passport: someone could say that this could affect his tournament, but his first series against Nerchio shows us really impressive matches. At the end, Zest actually wins this series, yet the Group C seems to be the right one for the foreigners: Serral places himself in first place in this group, already reaching the quarterfinals, while Nerchio still manages to go through, under the cheers of the polish crowd in the auditorium. Zest also advances, leaving Patience, TRUE and PiLiPiLi behind.
I would like to spend a few more words about the Kazakh player: having already said that he already surprised us in the open bracket, he played brilliant games in the ro24 too, maybe a bit too crazy games (six minutes carriers?!) , and perhaps he lacked a bit of lucidity and experience against Patience when he left prematurely a game that was far from lost. Along with Serral, he is definitely the "surprise" of this IEM and, as for the Finnish player, age seems to be on his side.

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Zest and Patience doing vetoes

We finally conclude the day and with it the group stage with the Group D: this group reaches the last round with qualified players already defined, in a kind of anticlimactic finals for the entire ro24. At least there's the first place in the group at stake, which is conquered by GuMiho after INnoVation fall against the already eliminated uThermal (although then he can steal the Dutch's build for the following TvT against Ryung in the playoffs). Dark and INno are ranked second and third in the group, while uThermal, ShoWTimE and MaNa leave the tournament. I've already anticipated that ShoWTimE has played a four-game series against GuMiho: the game 2 of the series, with the German leading 1-0, ends in a draw that the protoss could have avoided if he had just 10 minerals more (and he was quite ahead in army supply). So, rematch: this time the Korean terran wins the match easily, as well as then the third game of the set, taking home the series and practically eliminating the German protoss. As soon as this series ended, it was my turn to go to ShoWTimE to ask him to play as soon as possible against uThermal (since we were terribly late on the schedule, as mentioned before), but I think that in that moment he just wanted to kill me (well yeah, he needed a few minutes to digest that bitter defeat and I wasn't very delicate, lol). With this image in my mind, the day is finally over and so is my actual job: the next day I would be free!

Saturday, March 4: the playoffs! From now on only one match at a time is played, all in the auditorium, so there is no need for all these admin: I am free to enjoy the show as a spectator show.

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First match in the playoffs!

Ryung is the last (only?) "Italian" hope in this tournament, but few people consider him a favorite against INnoVation, who in fact wins 3-0. Zest also falls, against TY: it is doubtful if he could have done more had he had an extra day to adjust to the jet lag, but TY is definitely in very good shape anyway. Then I have to admit I missed the entire series between Solar and Dark and much of the series between Stats and Nerchio, but I went to eat at that point and to walking around the fair in liberty, now that I could. However I can attest that the Polish crowd supported Nerchio even after 3-0, tho, and it did not go away after his exit from the tournament: the auditorium remained totally full throughout the whole day, to the point that there was a considerable line of people waiting outside (a row that I could jump at any time thanks to my badge, thanks ESL ♥).

Then in the quarterfinals every series was very exciting (perhaps with the exception of Dark-Serral, pretty much one-sided): aLive and INnoVation gave an absolute show to the crowd, with aLive winning 3-2, the same score by which then TY rules GuMiho. On Dark and Serral: Serral had deservedly won his group, same way as he deservedly qualified for the tournament without having to go through the open bracket, but in the quarterfinals he has melted like snow in the sun against Dark: perhaps the emotion and lack of experience on certain stages have played their part, but Dark ... fuck, it's Dark! Finally the day ends with the series between Stats and ByuN, won by the protoss 3-1 leaving the terran in tears for the lost opportunity: maybe the kid begins to feel too much pressure, but I'm sure that soon he will add some other cup to his trophy case. Furthermore, going out in the quarterfinals in a tournament so stacked, it's not even an achievement to be ashamed so much after all, so ... go ByuN! (:

We finally arrive at the last day of IEM.

For the semifinals and the final, the stadium is all ours!

For the last day of IEM we move from the auditorium at the Spodek Arena: it starts with the semifinal between aLive and TY, both not quite so used to get so deep into a tournament and both determined not to miss this opportunity. This TvT is very hard fought, so much so that the series gets to the fifth game: and in the end, TY is the winner.
The other semifinal doesn't disappoint too, and Stats and Dark put on a great show. It is, however, the protoss to take home the series, 3-1, and so to earn the final against TY.

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TY vs Stats!

And the Arena is now full

The ending does not disappoint and the BO7 is played on all scheduled maps: TY brings home the cup after defeating Stats 4-3.

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The view from the big screen

TY the champion

And so we come to the goodbyes. All in all, it was a fantastic experience for me: I enjoyed working, and this is a privilege that few can boast about in this world. I also met great people, like the other admins of the tournament whom I spent most of the days with (in addition to the aforementioned Maria Laura, there were of course Loren - my spanish room mate - and Raner - directly from Estonia!). You also don't ever get bored when there is MMY around, and a guy like Pacyfikator... but the biggest thanks can only be for people like Carsten and Ana (as uThermal said on Twitter, every tournament needs people like them), Apollo and, above all, Jin: called from Korea just over a year ago with the difficult task of replacing Messioso, Jin has done an amazing and phenomenal job, and if there is one person of the "behind the scenes" to infinitely thank for the great success of the event, this is without doubt him: a head admin always able to motivate his subordinates, that even when we deserved a reprimand instead he was apologizing (him to us!), always helpful and very much, maybe too much !, caring.
Thank you very, very, much.

The whole admin team
from left to right, first row: Loren, Raner, Pacyfikator.
second row: Marialauraaa, Titich, Jin, MMY.

I will leave you now, then, hoping this was only my first international live event, but for now... back to the Go4SC2 cups! ;D see you all online.

ps. since we're here, I remind you about these wonderful links.
Liquipedia: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/IEM_Season_XI_-_World_Championship
VOD for the whole tournament: LINK
Replay pack: LINK 1 - LINK 2
TeamLiquid Recaps: Day 1 - Day 2 - Day 3 - Day 4 - Day 5 - Day 6
Blizzard Recaps on YT: Video 1 - Video 2 - Video 3
SC2HighLights: Top 5 Plays

My experience as a tournament admin in Katowice

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