Last year the European Nexus Contest took the place of the 2017 Nexus Games as the Heroes of the Storm nation-based competition in Europe. The 2018 format was inherited from Blizzard’s tournament, which chose a couple of captains from the highest-ranking players from each country who would form a team with three more eligible players. The chosen countries were also the same as those that Blizzard designated for the Nexus Games.

However, Blizzard’s decisions haven’t always been the best for the competitive Heroes scene. In the 2018 Nexus Contest, Portugal forfeited its games due to not being able to submit a complete roster. On the other hand, players from countries without a spot in the tournament showed their interest and willingness to compete. With this feedback, Nexus Contest organizers changed the format for the 2019 edition.

First, teams wouldn’t be drafted by two captains. This change was forced by the merge of “Team League” and “Hero League” into “Storm League”, which does not evaluate the individual skill of players as well anymore. Instead, the Nexus Contest allowed any national team to join the competition and hosted qualifiers for the countries with more than one applicant. The nationality restrictions were also softened to allow people living in a country to represent that team even if it wasn’t their birth place.





With this new format ready, the Nexus Contest helped players look for teammates through their Discord server. Though not all the countries made it to the qualifiers, the community response was impressive. Besides the original 16 Nexus Games countries, 11 more appeared: Slovakia, Turkey, Serbia, Norway, Latvia, Greece, Bulgaria, Belarus, Austria, Romania, and Ireland.

In the end, 27 teams representing 17 different countries joined the qualifiers. Both Portugal and Hungary fell out of the tournament early to Slovakia, Norway, and Turkey. Unfortunately, Slovakia lost its spot due to team members' failure to prove their nationality. A total of eight qualifiers were hosted—with up to four teams, in the case of France—fighting to represent their country.

Team Turkey

Turkey hasn’t been shy coming into the Nexus Contest. Their country channel in the Nexus Contest Discord server has become one of the most populated along with Germany and France. But where does all this excitement come from?

The Turkish community is not a big one, but it looks like a family. They have a couple of Facebook groups that have served as a conduit over the years. Valadran is at the heart of this community. He started the project of making a Turkish player database, and not long ago he expanded this initiative to players from all over the world. According to him, this active community has about 5,000 players. Former HGC Turkish caster, Akfon, agrees: “The community is nice and most of them know the game very well. But the numbers are not too big.” He also tells us about his experience in the competitive scene: “As far as I remember the top viewer number was about 300 or so in HGC Finals, but there were lots of people watching it in English too. After Blizzard announced HGC had ended, the numbers obviously decreased.”





Despite this active community, there aren’t any local tournaments, and this lack of challenge has driven Turkish teams to look for some action in European amateur competitions. This is the case of Nexus Contest Team Turkey, a team forged in the Heroes Lounge divisions. The team core has been together for a while now, as Valadran points: “Melandio, Beregond, and V2Akriloth have been playing together for a long time. Vigi and Todleise are new players.” According to Akfor, they’re clearly the best team Turkey could have at Nexus Contest, and if we look at the qualifier, that’s correct: they secured a quick 3-0 victory.

Team Norway

The other new country in this edition is Norway, its case completely different from Turkey. The Norwegians are no strangers at all. We’ve already witnessed what they’re capable of. Back in the HGC days, Cursen played for Team expert, later Method Gaming, and made it to the 2017 Grand Finals and 2018 Mid-Season Brawl. Roskmeg has also had a taste of the HGC, and even if it only lasted a single Phase, he had made his way back through the Crucible just before cancellation.

QopenHagen, currently playing for aLbeus'r fnaculb (formerly Granit Gaming), the reigning European champions. However, he’s both Norwegian and Danish, and will be representing Denmark at the Nexus Contest. Segutten, Derlino, ImKirby, Impala, and Shalltear will be the ones to represent Norway as its national team.

A Community Effort

These teams represent themselves and their entire communities. They may not be the best in the tournament, not even close—in fact, after the first weekend they both lost their chances of advancing into playoffs)—but they carry the hopes of many Heroes of the Storm local players. And that’s the special thing about these nation-based tournaments. Whatever team is your favorite, cheer these underdogs on too, win or lose. That way we all can recognize these local communities, which are, all in all, the roots of our player base.