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Heroes Weekly Roundup
By: Phantom and Valiver
By: Phantom and Valiver
Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the news of Heroes of the Storm. As a new, blooming game, there’s a lot of stuff going on. Don’t worry, we got you covered.
News
- Even though Kharazim was released a week ago alongside the patch, Infernal Shrines was just released this week. It still seems pretty snowbally, but we still think it might just be that people don't know how to play on it yet. Either way, if the map keeps generating problems we don't doubt Blizzard will make changes to it as it have done so in the past for other battlegrounds.
- Diablo 3 season 4 is live. If you make a seasonal character and get it to level 70, you will also get the incredible Malthael's Charger Mount in Heroes of the Storm!
- It looks like Blizzard isn't happy about the way Kael'thas talent, Chain Bomb, is working at the moment. Dustin Browder confirmed they are looking to fix it. Yay!
- He also confirmed there is no StarCraft event planned for this year though. Nay! :/
Tournaments
- The highlight of the week was without a doubt the MSI Masters Gaming Arena. As the first real global tournament since the release of the game, the MGA was supposed to be one of the most exciting tournaments to date, and it did not disappoint.
There is only one way to describe the tournament: AMAZING! We finally got to see how the three regions fared against each other and the tournament wasn't void of surprises. We saw Cloud9 winning very convincingly against TeamLiquid, and MVP Black beating both Tempo Storm and Liquid to get crowned as the first international champions we have right now.
The way MVP Black played was very impressive. After their loss against TeamLiquid they proceed to comeback and win the series by neutralizing completely TeamLiquid's favorite hero, The Lost Vikings, and winning in the third game with a triple warrior composition. After that, they proceeded to show a level of skill and coordination not seen in the western scene until now.
While some followers of the korean scene expected MVP Black to win agaisn't Tempo Storm, very few expected them to win so convincingly. And while some of the players may try to downplay the korean skill, the games showed a pretty different story. I mean, just look at this video of the self proclaimed "Best Team in the World" getting stomped and laughed at in their face.
If you haven't already we highly suggest you check out the VODs, even if you already know the winner. The games are THAT exciting to see. Western teams will need to practice much harder if they want to have a chance to win the World Championship at BlizzCon. - Because of the regions' different metas, the stats of the tournament, such as pick and ban frequency, and hero win rates are very different from what we are accustomed to. We've compiled all the stats of the tournament so people can more easily analyze them. Are you surprised by Johanna's win rate?
- Not everything was good though, as http://wiki.teamliquid.net/heroes/EStar_Gaming, just as http://wiki.teamliquid.net/heroes/EDward_Gaming before them, was forced to forfeit because of Visa reasons, leaving the tournament without any chinesse team. A shame if you consider just how good the chinesse are suppoused to be. We'll have to wait until BlizzCon to see how they fare against the rest.
- This weekend, the European September Open began. TeamLiquid and Virtus.pro weren't able to participate as they were playing at the MGA, so this is a great opportunity for other strong european teams such as http://wiki.teamliquid.net/heroes/Fnatic to finally qualify to the European championship.
- The Heroes of the Storm Copa America finals also took place this weekend. The Brazilian team Brave Ozone, carrying an impressive 86% win rate in their tournament matches, managed to win the Latin American championship and secure a spot in this September's Americas Championship, in Las Vegas, Nevada.
TeamLiquid Spotlight
- Professional players are the best of the best on their games, and so, there's a lot we can learn from them. Join Xingua as he analyzes the lessons learned from the North American August Open.
Community:
- The end of Masters Gaming Arena also meant the end of our Liquipedia contest. Congratulations to user DelHospital. He will now be able to enjoy an incredible MSI Z97 Gaming PC!
- Murloc Geniuses, formerly known as Team Zeveron, qualified in the last North American August Open to the american championship. To celebrate, they held an Ask me Anything session over at reddit. We encourage you to check it out as it is a great way to know the professional team.
- coL.Blinks, team captain of compLexity gaming, released a new series of videos where he analyzes some of their competitive matches. Watching those videos is a great way to see the reasoning behind pro-gamers decisions and increase your knowledge of the game.
The Funnies:
- Heroes of the Gimmick. 'Nuff said.
- Would you like some Epic fails?
- Would you like one more? (Sorry, it had to be done).
That's everything for the week, see you next time!
