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![[image loading]](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/583417889223344158/1020347383692922940/ACC_Promotion.jpg?width=1606&height=904)
Extremely excited to announce AfreecaTV’s first sponsorship of an EPT Tournament, the AfreecaTV Champions Cup! Awarding $15,000 and 1280 EPT points, we look forward to hosting hard-fought and nail bitingly entertaining matches! 1st: 250 points 2nd: 180 points 3rd-4th: 125 points 5th-8th: 75 points 9th-12th: 50 points 13th-16th: 25 points QualifiersThese qualifiers are server qualifiers, players from all regions may play in as many of them as they like. There is no region lock. Double-elimination, 3 spots awarded in each KR, EU qualifier, 4 spots in NA qualifier,16 qualifier spots total For double-elimination qualifiers with over 16 participants: the bracket will be single-elimination up to the Round of 16 (Ro16). From Round of 16 onward, the bracket will be double-elimination.Seeding rule: EPT Combined Standings from 2022/23 Season. KR Qualifier #1: Thursday, Oct 20 7:00am EDT (GMT-04:00) sign up here. KR Qualifier #2: Saturday, Oct 22 7:00am EDT (GMT-04:00) sign up here. EU Qualifier #1: Wednesday, Oct 19 1:00pm EDT (GMT-04:00) sign up here. EU Qualifier #2: Friday, Oct 21 1:00pm EDT (GMT-04:00) sign up here. NA Qualifier: Sunday, Oct 23 7:00pm EDT (GMT-04:00) sign up here. Group SelectionAfter the qualifiers are concluded and we have our 16 participants we will perform a GSL-style group selection where players nominate each other. Let’s see what happens here! Main eventThe main event will be held from Nov 3rd to Nov 6th. Exact times will be announced after the qualifiers conclude. 4 groups of 4 players each will lead into an 8 player single-elimination playoff bracket. You can find all infos on Liquipedia. SponsorsHuge thanks to AfreecaTV for supporting this event and frankly the SC2 scene for a long time! Do please give your support! RulebookrulesStreamhttp://play.afreecatv.com/alphaxsc2We will only be hosting an English stream due to our sponsor's wish to consolidate viewership on one channel. **edit : AfreecaTV has now opened this event to community/language streams - Pls message Mage#0596 or Sushi #7857 on discord if you are interested! Thank you. Do note that live-streams will be exclusively on the AfreecaTV platform. Head AdminsKashim LadyAzylis Migwel MatcherinoOur tournament will also be on Matcherino! Check it out and support it if you feel like it. Replay pack for the entire tournament (Main event and casted qualifier matches) available at $10. Proceeds go towards production costs. Alpha XFor all Alpha X news, notifications, VODs, etc., feel free to follow us @ Twitter - https://twitter.com/AlphaXsc2Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/alphaxsc2Discord server - http://discord.gg/alphaxsc2Website - http://www.alphax.ggWant to support Alpha X if you are a fan of our events focused style of developing SC2 talent? We frequently organize events of all kinds to support our talents like Astrea, Zoun & RagnaroK etc and showcase other premier players. Support and more information via Patreon
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Canada8989 Posts
Wow, nice!
Am I to understand that it will be online?
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On September 17 2022 05:57 Nakajin wrote:
Wow, nice!
Am I to understand that it will be online?
yes, online
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United States33432 Posts
Interesting to see AfreecaTV finally putting a high-level event exclusively on their platform. I wonder how viewership will be?
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Big Shoutouts and Thanks to AlphaX and AfreecaTV!
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On September 17 2022 06:57 Waxangel wrote:
Interesting to see AfreecaTV finally putting a high-level event exclusively on their platform. I wonder how viewership will be?
Obviously more events are great and they can decide on how they want to run stuff. I do believe that the community should stand against it though. This doesn't unite but split communities. Community streams / language streams have been around forever and is what keeps not only their local scenes but the scene in general healthy.
I won't ask our viewers to boycott it but I will for example not stand up for banning other languages.
- NarutO
Edit: I want to mention that this is EPT specific and I think this shouldnt be allowed for EPT tournaments
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I certainly don't mind competition for Twitch considering it's the worst streaming platform available (along with trovo which is just a copycat  ). Youtube still #1 by far
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France12891 Posts
On September 18 2022 02:27 Durnuu wrote:I certainly don't mind competition for Twitch considering it's the worst streaming platform available (along with trovo which is just a copycat ). Youtube still #1 by far
Afreeca is worse than twitch though, it takes like 5s to load up a stream.
Twitch is decent when you are watching live, but watching past vods on it is painful, takes lots of time to go back / fast forward and stuff.
YouTube seems very good indeed, and you have vod already included. It’s actually perfect for GSL, you can directly watch past matches if you were late
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On September 18 2022 01:04 TaKeTV wrote:Show nested quote +On September 17 2022 06:57 Waxangel wrote:
Interesting to see AfreecaTV finally putting a high-level event exclusively on their platform. I wonder how viewership will be? Obviously more events are great and they can decide on how they want to run stuff. I do believe that the community should stand against it though. This doesn't unite but split communities. Community streams / language streams have been around forever and is what keeps not only their local scenes but the scene in general healthy. I won't ask our viewers to boycott it but I will for example not stand up for banning other languages. - NarutO Edit: I want to mention that this is EPT specific and I think this shouldnt be allowed for EPT tournaments
I don't think Afreeca fancies viewership going to competing platforms, the powers that be might see that more than think about the community at large.
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Germany339 Posts
On September 18 2022 01:04 TaKeTV wrote:Show nested quote +On September 17 2022 06:57 Waxangel wrote:
Interesting to see AfreecaTV finally putting a high-level event exclusively on their platform. I wonder how viewership will be? Obviously more events are great and they can decide on how they want to run stuff. I do believe that the community should stand against it though. This doesn't unite but split communities. Community streams / language streams have been around forever and is what keeps not only their local scenes but the scene in general healthy. I won't ask our viewers to boycott it but I will for example not stand up for banning other languages. - NarutO Edit: I want to mention that this is EPT specific and I think this shouldnt be allowed for EPT tournaments
my opinion on it:
i am not a super fan of it being only on afreecatv either
afreecatv is laggy and loads forever
and yeah community/language streams are kinda essential for the scene
and with several of them having exclusive stuff with twitch or not being able to stream on afreeca for other reasons this makes the platform decision even worse
on the other hand form an organizer point of view it is totally understandable that afreeca (apparently a sponsor of the event) will want to show stuff only on their platform
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I mean, isnt GSL English cast is Afreeca-youtube exclusive? And they are also part of the EPT.
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No region lock? Count me in.
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you guys not supporting afreeca is just killing sc2 even faster, you know. as soon as blizz stops dumping huge money in....
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Thanks to Afreeca & AlphaX for organizing more StarCraft II for us!
We will only be hosting an English stream due to our sponsor's wish to consolidate viewership on one channel.
Does this mean no community streams on afreecatv.com either? What about the qualifiers?
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United States337 Posts
On September 18 2022 01:04 TaKeTV wrote:Show nested quote +On September 17 2022 06:57 Waxangel wrote:
Interesting to see AfreecaTV finally putting a high-level event exclusively on their platform. I wonder how viewership will be? Obviously more events are great and they can decide on how they want to run stuff. I do believe that the community should stand against it though. This doesn't unite but split communities. Community streams / language streams have been around forever and is what keeps not only their local scenes but the scene in general healthy. I won't ask our viewers to boycott it but I will for example not stand up for banning other languages. - NarutO Edit: I want to mention that this is EPT specific and I think this shouldnt be allowed for EPT tournaments
I think you are 100% right, and it was our mistake in making this guideline. Sometimes we get caught up in our own internal goals and metrics that we miss out on what's really important. It took a very long time to get approval for this event, especially as we get more pressure to reallocate resources to other games with larger communities. However, we never could have made it here without the Starcraft community's support.
With that being said, we will be opening this up to community streams and other languages. Please work with Alpha X to get coordinated, and feel free to reach out to me directly if you run into any problems. For Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese, Thai, Vietnamese, and Japanese casters, please express your interests, but understand that we will be discussing with our respective regional teams that may want to produce their own coverage first.
Please note that live streams will have to be exclusively on AfreecaTV. I understand that this may be frustrating for some, but I hope you can at least understand our own position as a live-streaming platform. However, I think allowing YouTube VOD uploads after the live-stream is a very fair compromise.
With Twitch relaxing some of their exclusivity rules, I hope we can work with more members of the community. Not just for this event, but for the GSL as well.
I will not pretend that AfreecaTV is the best platform or provides the best service to everyone globally. We're still very clunky and outdated, but I think we've come a long way from where we were. I can at least say that they are working hard to build a more dedicated development team for the global service. Things will not improve over night, but they are planning some significant changes.
In the near term, it's important that our team gets feedback and data from those who currently have issues with the platform. Please connect with us and work with our support teams so that they can take critical information to our dev/network teams and provide a better service.
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Reminder that EU qualifiers start tomorrow! (19th Oct at 7pm CEST)
Do sign up!
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EU Qualifier live with 2 English streams!
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Showtime spent 30 minutes to fight Serral on equal footing and then A-move his entire army into Serral defense on creep for no real reason and died. This is exactly what happened in TSL9 and group stage of DH EU.
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In the losers bracket they are forfeiting left and right
Do they think it s not worth it to fight thru it because one of Reynor and Serral is going to end up down there?
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On October 20 2022 04:26 dbRic1203 wrote:
In the losers bracket they are forfeiting left and right
Do they think it s not worth it to fight thru it because one of Reynor and Serral is going to end up down there?
Yeah, thats probably it.
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and Reynor doing Protoss again.
Edit: and he smashed Serral with it.
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Perfect balance from EU Q1 ! :D
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TW SEA considered as KR hype
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Hmm, Maru intending to go speed banshee again into mech... is he experimenting with a new style or just a build that he uses against weaker players?
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Man, Game 4 between Maru vs Creator was absolutely mind-blowing... I have no idea how he pulled that off...
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France12891 Posts
Dark losing to Ryung and RagnaroK, without winning a single game? Maybe his GSL result was not a fluke? Hopefully he turns it up in the next qualifier or at least in Super Tournament. Maru qualifying comfortably, that's pretty cool 
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On October 20 2022 23:28 buzz_bender wrote:
Man, Game 4 between Maru vs Creator was absolutely mind-blowing... I have no idea how he pulled that off...
Yeah, Creator was so freaking ahead and somehow Maru won with a push on a couple tanks, medivac, a Raven and 16 Marines.
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Is there any way to watch VODs on AfreecaTV?
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On October 20 2022 15:41 Kashim wrote:
Perfect balance from EU Q1 ! :D
Yes i suspect Clem to give up on purpose, let the 3 top zerg been qualified
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Terran always push on that 2-base timing, and EU Protoss always take the early 3rd base right before that, and the end result is a dead Protoss.
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No matter if Showtime is going to qualify today or not, his run is absolutly impressive allready
How did Afreeca and AlphaX even manage to get permission to run Server qualifiers instead of region locked ones?
TakeTV was forced by ESL to run one for each region
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Look like we are going to have at most 3 Protoss qualified, the balanced has been restored.
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Glad to hear that AfreecaTV started the champions cup! Thanks for opening!
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I wonder why DRG didn't try for any qualifier past the first.
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On October 22 2022 22:49 dbRic1203 wrote:
How did Afreeca and AlphaX even manage to get permission to run Server qualifiers instead of region locked ones?
TakeTV was forced by ESL to run one for each region
It's beacuse we have fully online event, HSC was offline.
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Can we have live group nomination this time around?
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GROUPS:
The selection process was via a snake draft starting with Clem as the top seed. Clem then had a swap option at the end which he used, replacing Solar's choice Cure with HeRoMaRinE who was Maru's choice!
Group A - Thursday, Nov 03 3:00pm GMT (GMT+00:00)
Clem
Elazer
Solar
HeRoMaRinE
Group B - Thursday, Nov 03 11:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)
Maru
Cure
GuMiho
Bunny
Group C - Friday, Nov 04 3:00pm GMT (GMT+00:00)
Reynor
MaxPax
herO
Serral
Group D - Friday, Nov 04 11:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)
Dark
ShoWTimE
RagnaroK
ByuN
PLAYOFFS:
Quarterfinals - Saturday, Nov 05 11:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)
Semifinals and Finals - Sunday, Nov 06 11:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)
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Okay, base on the group roster, I assume that:
+Maru pick neither Ragnarok nor Solar, instead went for HM. And Clem "saved" HM by let him join his group instead of the 4-Terran group.
+Group C is straight up ILLEGAL, and herO picking Serral instead of Byun is mind-blowing.
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Or Group B with all Terran!
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Wth Group C. 2times blizzcon champ serral, 1 time blizzcon champ reynor, last gsl winner hero and best eu protoss maxpax.
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Don't like this seeding procedure, the groups seem very unbalanced. Group A (group of a top seeded player) once again is the weakest, while group C literally consists of the 2 absolute best zergs and 2 absolute best protoss players in the world. Also we end up with a full terran group B. The fact that Clem is the top seed doesn't help either. He doesn't look like a top seed among guys like Maru, Serral or herO. But he is due to enormous EPT point distribution to a winner of EU regional (1200 points - 1.5 times more than winning a GSL!). Heromarine should be very happy about that though cause EU solidarity saved him there.
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I get Hero picking serral instead of byun: you don’t want to prepare for three different matchups, besides Byun is tricky and Hero is pretty good against zergs.
Group a: clem and maybe solar?
Group b: Maru and anyone else, probably bunny
Group c is so dead that nobody advances from it, alas.
Group d: Byun and Dark, Byun’s really good right now. But I can see Rag making it as well
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On November 01 2022 21:21 Argonauta wrote:
I hope you guys like TvT
At least its the 1st group to be played so we can get it over with.
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France12891 Posts
On November 01 2022 22:14 TheWildShooter wrote:
Don't like this seeding procedure, the groups seem very unbalanced. Group A (group of a top seeded player) once again is the weakest, while group C literally consists of the 2 absolute best zergs and 2 absolute best protoss players in the world. Also we end up with a full terran group B. The fact that Clem is the top seed doesn't help either. He doesn't look like a top seed among guys like Maru, Serral or herO. But he is due to enormous EPT point distribution to a winner of EU regional (1200 points - 1.5 times more than winning a GSL!). Heromarine should be very happy about that though cause EU solidarity saved him there.
ShoWTimE is better than MaxPax, not only does he have the ability to play offline in the high stakes tournaments, he does better than MaxPax in the DH:EU competitions.
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ShoWTimE is better than MaxPax, not only does he have the ability to play offline in the high stakes tournaments, he does better than MaxPax in the DH:EU competitions.
MaxPax has proven himself to be even better than herO at some points recently. I honestly don't think people should care as much about results. Just watch his games, and play-by-play MaxPax is way better than ShoWTimE. What's even more impressive is that he is able to do it online, with ping.
In last DH:EU he the bracket seeding was strange, and he faced Clem (3rd best European) early on, and lost. And in the DreamHack before that he was able to beat ShoWTimE in a clean 3-0 in the playoffs.
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Absolutely brutal group for herO, I don't think he's favored against anyone in that group. With Maxpax there we might see a classic case of PvP dooming the real Protoss hope.
GSL group selection process is sort of dumb format but I think it's fun in a smaller tournament like this. A group of death every once in a while is fun.
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On November 02 2022 00:43 dysenterymd wrote:
Absolutely brutal group for herO, I don't think he's favored against anyone in that group. With Maxpax there we might see a classic case of PvP dooming the real Protoss hope.
GSL group selection process is sort of dumb format but I think it's fun in a smaller tournament like this. A group of death every once in a while is fun.
Hey, this is online we're talking about. MaxPax has been taking out Reynor, Dark, Clem, herO and ByuN recently, and has the potential to do the same.
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Group C,
Serral > Hero
Reynor > maxpax
Serral > Reynor
maxpax > hero
reynor > maxpax
I don't think it looks great for the protoss 
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I am curious as to why group B plays before group A and group D before group C. The group order is BADC instead of ABCD. Is it some request by players or something?
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On November 02 2022 15:44 Drfilip wrote:
I am curious as to why group B plays before group A and group D before group C. The group order is BADC instead of ABCD. Is it some request by players or something?
It's done so that the Koreans don't need to play past midnight
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Hype! That group C! Love it
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Everyone in this tournament is pretty strong, but Jesus Christ that group C...
My predictions:
Clem solar
Maru gumiho
Serral maxpax
Dark Ragnarok
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Group C is absolutly insane and its 100% Reynors fault, he should have known that there is no way MaxPax isn t drafting herO
If Reynor took Showtime instead, MaxPax and herO would have been Darks Problem
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EPT
