This is a tournament organised by AliSports ( Alibaba.com, aka the "amazon/ebay" of China ). The totoal prize pool for Starcraft 2 is $400,000 (and $1,500,000, $1,500,000, $300,000, for DOTA2, CS:GO, Hearthstone, respectively). Each region has 2-4(?TBC) qualifiers. The global finals will be held in December 2016, in Shanghai, China.
Prize Pool Distribution - SC2 :
Global Finals Total : $400,000 1. Place : $200,000 2. Place : $100,000 3. Place : $50,000 4-. Place : TBD
Asian Finals 1. Place : $10,000 2. Place : $5,000 3. Place : $2500
On May 17 2016 06:14 bearhug wrote: Here is the story: Upon planning the event, Alibaba asked a popular Chinese SC2 commentator XiaoSe, "what's is the largest prize money so far for SC2 in the world ?" Xiaose replied "ahh, $200k... ( total prize pool ) ." Alibaba "Got it. Let's match that. $200k for 1st place. "
On May 17 2016 02:55 Nerchio wrote: Somebody said this is pretty shady though, right?
I'm sure you'll be able to play your games and everything will be fine, but I could very well imagine that you won't see your prizemoney (if you win any) at all. Not sure if my memory is wrong, though, but there have been similar sounding tournaments in China for WC3 back in the days were no money was paid.
Maybe today this thing doesn't happen anymore tho, idk. Given their huge sponsor I wouldn't be thinking it could happen.
On May 17 2016 02:55 Nerchio wrote: Somebody said this is pretty shady though, right?
I'm sure you'll be able to play your games and everything will be fine, but I could very well imagine that you won't see your prizemoney (if you win any) at all. Not sure if my memory is wrong, though, but there have been similar sounding tournaments in China for WC3 back in the days were no money was paid.
Maybe today this thing doesn't happen anymore tho, idk. Given their huge sponsor I wouldn't be thinking it could happen.
You might be talking about WCA, they have not paid out all the prize money afaik.
On May 17 2016 03:36 Inflicted wrote: Not a Global Event
Well it is kind of normal, Alibaba is dumping a huge amount of money into esport they don't want anybody else to get exposure or to impose rules on them.
I wonder if they will try to expend outside of china in the next years or if they just want to take control of esport in China. I can't see them just financing this one thing. (Assuming all their tournaments don't bomb and they just decide to stop right there)
Alibaba is one of the largest companies in the world, often refered as the amazon of china. They are trying to get a foothold in the west, made one of the largest stock listening ever at New Yorks Stock Exchange a short while ago (2-3 years I think) and a generally extremly far away from being shady.
The risk that you will not see your money should be really small.
But the risk when it comes to production and accomodation... they are there, as always. Depends with whom they will work togeather. There are strong production crews like the people arround the golden champions league and there are lesser ones who put you in unfinished 5 star hotels and have a event full of lags and so on. Depends all on their partners. If they can grab netease and the guys arround the golden leagues, they should be a strong event without large problems.
The event will not be a WCS event because it cant be one at the moment. It is after Blizzcon and would count for WCS 2017... but there is no WCS 2017 at the moment. From the first time of the WCS; Blizzard changed it every year. How shall this event be related to WCS when even Blizzard doesnt know the rules for the WCS 2017 at the moment?
On May 16 2016 23:51 Hughgrant wrote: Woot! 200K! $$$$$
Here is the story: Upon planning the event, Alibaba asked a popular Chinese SC2 commentator XiaoSe, "what's is the largest prize money so far for SC2 in the world ?" Xiaose replied "ahh, $200k... ( total prize pool ) ." Alibaba "Got it. Let's match that. $200k for 1st place. "
Zero way they would have a tournament without Koreans.
Also that prizepool is ridiculous. They better have some really fucking legit qualifiers, if the 3rd place is already one of the highest prizepools for FIRST place.
until Blizzard comments on these guys i would not hold my breath.
EA took 2 years to pay the money owed to the final C&C Ladder season winner. It took so long some thought it might never happen and they'd come up with some elaborate legal reason why they did not have to pay.
Remember all of IPL's big plans. Then it all got cancelled. Just because there is some big company involved doesn't mean you'll get paid or the event will even take place. That final IPL event just got outright cancelled.
On May 17 2016 15:17 JimmyJRaynor wrote: until Blizzard comments on these guys i would not hold my breath.
EA took 2 years to pay the money owed to the final C&C Ladder season winner. It took so long some thought it might never happen and they'd come up with some elaborate legal reason why they did not have to pay.
Remember all of IPL's big plans. Then it all got cancelled. Just because there is some big company involved doesn't mean you'll get paid or the event will even take place. That final IPL event just got outright cancelled.
Of course you can't be sure. But a company as big as Alibaba, especially considering that they are involved in all kinds of sports, would ruin their reputation if this isn't legit.
Which doesn't mean that it has to be legit; but if you don't trust this tournament you're gonna have a hard time trusting any tournament where Blizzard (or Valve) isn't involved.
On May 17 2016 15:17 JimmyJRaynor wrote: until Blizzard comments on these guys i would not hold my breath.
EA took 2 years to pay the money owed to the final C&C Ladder season winner. It took so long some thought it might never happen and they'd come up with some elaborate legal reason why they did not have to pay.
Remember all of IPL's big plans. Then it all got cancelled. Just because there is some big company involved doesn't mean you'll get paid or the event will even take place. That final IPL event just got outright cancelled.
Of course you can't be sure. But a company as big as Alibaba, especially considering that they are involved in all kinds of sports, would ruin their reputation if this isn't legit.
Which doesn't mean that it has to be legit; but if you don't trust this tournament you're gonna have a hard time trusting any tournament where Blizzard (or Valve) isn't involved.
J2 Global is a publicly traded company on NASDAQ. That didn't stop them from burying the IPL6 faster than a zergling rush. How bad did it harm their reputation? No one cares. They didn't ever comment and they even sat on the information for a while knowing IPL6 was not happening.
Running IPL6 was a "drop in the bucket" for J2 Global. It got buried fast with not a whisper.
"What if I want to run a tournament over the Maximum Prize Value?
That’s awesome! We’d love to work more closely with you to ensure the success of your tournament. For larger tournaments like this, we can often help promote your event in the appropriate region, or offer other assistance. That process starts with obtaining a tournament license from Blizzard...."
so again UNTIL BLIZZARD SAYS SOMETHING this is meaningless.
pretty much guaranteed that the top management people from teams like Liquid will be going straight to Kim Phan and other Blizz execs to find out what they think is going on. or do you think Liquid just randomly flies guys all over the planet with zero diligence? lol
Jimmy is right. I have every faith that this will come about because of the sponsor but untill Blizz approves it it should be taken as a maybe happening instead of a certainly happening.
Well the JonSnow 10k giveaway on male was also Blizzard "approved"... WCA was and is also Blizzard approved, as it has 3 games of them (Hearthstone, Heroes, Warcraft III).
I dont think you can judge this from that point of view.
Alibaba is a rock solid company and the money will be there.
Went to talk about people at Ali and pretty sure they are serious and actually have people from their sports department running this so I'm not THAT concerned. Of course as a first timer expect hiccups.
On May 17 2016 15:17 JimmyJRaynor wrote: until Blizzard comments on these guys i would not hold my breath.
EA took 2 years to pay the money owed to the final C&C Ladder season winner. It took so long some thought it might never happen and they'd come up with some elaborate legal reason why they did not have to pay.
Remember all of IPL's big plans. Then it all got cancelled. Just because there is some big company involved doesn't mean you'll get paid or the event will even take place. That final IPL event just got outright cancelled.
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