Netease has announced plans for its flagship Chinese domestic starleague, the Gold Series Pro League (GPL). In 2015 GPL will be merged into the World Championship Series system and become effectively WCS China. China is currently the only region to run a standalone tournament as its WCS infrastructure.
Format The structure of GPL 2015 Season 1/WCS China 2015 Season 2 is as follows:
Qualifier: 256 man open qualifier, registration runs from March 3rd to 7th, residency and/or appropriate visas as sanctioned in WCS handbook required, top 16 advance to main tournament.
Main tournament: Two dual tournament group stages, top 4 advances to playoffs and gain WCS Challenger status.
Playoffs: Top 4 from main tournament join the 4 Chinese 2015 WCS Season 1 Premier League players in a single elimination bracket, played offline in the NeoTV studio in Shanghai, China. The round of 8 matches are also served as WCS Challenger matches, winners advance to 2015 WCS Premier Season 2. The bracket will then continue as a normal playoffs bracket to determine the winner of GPL 2015 Season 1.
Prize Pool 1st place: 10,000 CNY ($1,600) + WCS Premier League spot (min. $4,500) 2nd place: 8,000 CNY ($1,274) + WCS Premier League spot (min. $4,500) 3rd and 4th: 5,000 CNY ($800) + WCS Premier League spot (min. $4,500) 5-8th: 3,000 CNY ($478) + $2,000 WCS Challenger payout
GPL main tournament 5-8th: 2,500 CNY ($400) GPL main tournament 9-16th: 2,000 CNY ($318)
Total prize money (excluding WCS payouts): 66,000 CNY ($10,517)
Schedule Open qualifier: March 8-10th (unstreamed) Ro16 Group A: March 20th Ro16 Group B: March 22nd Ro16 Group C: March 27th Ro16 Group D: March 28th Ro8 Group A: April 3rd Ro8 Group B: April 4th WCS Challenger/offline playoffs: TBA
The open qualifier will also serve as the first stage of the $21K Kung Fu Cup/2015/1 Chinese qualifier, which the top 16 will play in another separate qualifier bracket for 4 main event spots.
Streams GPL will continue to be broadcasted on major Chinese streaming platforms in Chinese as well as Twitch.tv in English.
On March 04 2015 02:52 Yhamm wrote: what happen if the WCS champion is either MacSed or iAsonu? ^_^
While China should probably lose its qualifier spots for next WCS global season, any individual player qualified for next season should be grandfathered in. They're not like Koreans, where they're liable to just end up requalifying season after season for the entire year and crowd out local competition. They tend to have very static playstyles that other foreigners can learn and counter.
On March 04 2015 03:00 Waxangel wrote: Wow, it would be awesome if we could get quals for other regions to get done in this format. Europe would be pretty cool in particular.
I'm hoping for a steady progress from the system of 2015 WCS towards 2012 WCS. Expanding the regional qualifiers as the local scenes are ready for it should be better than the chaos of 2012 WCS. I'm excited.
WCS CN?! YESSSSSSS!!!! Does this mean Chinese players will no longer have to compete with EU and NA? :DDDDDD -sorry too excited to read past the title-
EPT
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/i80hWXO.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/2a6zp2f.jpg)
Kung Fu Cup/2015/1 Chinese qualifier, which the top 16 will play in another separate qualifier bracket for 4 main event spots.
