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![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/shiroiusagi/2015/wcs/wcs2016.jpg) Source (eslgaming.com)Big changes are coming for the 2016 WCS Challenger! For the first time in StarCraft II history the WCS will utilize the in-game ladder to determine 2016 WCS Challenger qualifier slots for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. Not only that, but top finishers can also look forward to cash prizes from a US$10,000 prize pool, based on their performances. How it works The ladder competition will start today, February 1st, and will last until February 12th, 12:00 am PST for America and 12:00 am CET for Europe. Once concluded, the top sixteen EU and NA ladder players will be invited to a regional double elimination tournament run by ESL, where they will compete for the following prizes:
- 1st place - US$1,400 & direct qualification to the WCS Circuit Winter Championship
- 2nd place - US$1,200 & direct qualification to the WCS Circuit Winter Championship
- 3rd-4th place - US$800
- 5th-8th place - US$600
- 9th-16th place - US$400
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Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. A free character name change was provided to every account on January 29th.
Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees!
Die barcodes, die!!!
Damn, this is great news.
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Finally some announcement about WCS that I actually like. It's good they experiment with formats and encourage ladder play.
However, was leave league to get GM MMR bug fixed? If not this can get nasty and very salty.
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Uhh sounds cool, maybe this was why David mentioned anti hack was a huge focus for them. I think this can work, but they pretty much have to remove Bonus Pool in GM right? or else the top dogs will be guys with just about spent Bonus Pool? I'm not GM so if someone can state something on this.
Now I really wish you could spectate people online btw!
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Australia18228 Posts
On February 02 2016 01:20 Musicus wrote:Show nested quote +Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. A free character name change was provided to every account on January 29th. Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees! Die barcodes, die!!! Show nested quote +For the North American Challenger tournament, only residents and citizens of North America (Canada & U.S.) will be eligible qualify. Wow, that's not so fair imo :/. But damn, this is great news.
It is fair, every region has their own Regional Challenger tournaments
Those who could play in NA Server Qualis have China/Taiwan/Oceania&Japan tournaments to play in
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If you want to play under a barcode name you can still play as abrcode :D
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On February 02 2016 01:22 Inflicted wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:20 Musicus wrote:Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. A free character name change was provided to every account on January 29th. Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees! Die barcodes, die!!! For the North American Challenger tournament, only residents and citizens of North America (Canada & U.S.) will be eligible qualify. Wow, that's not so fair imo :/. But damn, this is great news. It is fair, every region has their own Regional Challenger tournaments
Yeah, just realised this lol. You caught me before I could edit my post :p.
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So just play ladder and get to top16 for money or do I have to do something on ESL site?
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I don't get it, this only provides four slots to the WCS championship unless I'm missing something huge?
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Australia18228 Posts
On February 02 2016 01:23 Nerchio wrote:
So just play ladder and get to top16 for money or do I have to do something on ESL site?
Players must have their Battle.net account registered to one of the eligible countries or submit other proof of citizenship or residency to esportsteam@blizzard.com. ESL and Blizzard will identify the top sixteen players in both regions at 12:00 am PST on February 12th.
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OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable.
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Katowice25012 Posts
Good move to see ladder events tie into WCS.
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This is cool. Hopefully they play around with it a bit more and implement something to improve this with the annonced ladder revamp.
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On February 02 2016 01:23 Nerchio wrote:
So just play ladder and get to top16 for money or do I have to do something on ESL site?
Just play ladder, do not use a barcode and your battle.net account has to say where you are from.
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That's pretty cool, hoping to see a special show for the last hours before the deadline to see the evolution of the ranking. I'm sure BaseTradeTV can do something fun.
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8748 Posts
On February 02 2016 01:23 Nerchio wrote:
So just play ladder and get to top16 for money or do I have to do something on ESL site?
the ladder is a qualifier to a tournament. tournament rewards money
edit: well, since everyone who qualifies to the tournament gets at least some money, yeah that's pretty much true what you said. but you do have to show up to the tournament
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On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable.
I get your point but I don't think expecting pro players to play a lot creates an unhealthy lifestyle, if they can't balance it and they play 12 hrs straight its their fault.
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On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable.
Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points.
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So people who don't make it into GM league before its full are out of the running automatically?
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8748 Posts
On February 02 2016 01:20 ejozl wrote:
Uhh sounds cool, maybe this was why David mentioned anti hack was a huge focus for them. I think this can work, but they pretty much have to remove Bonus Pool in GM right? or else the top dogs will be guys with just about spent Bonus Pool? I'm not GM so if someone can state something on this.
Now I really wish you could spectate people online btw!
I think the time period is too short for the "only play when you have bonus pool" strategy of topping the ladder to work. I think the strat also works better when there's less ladder activity in general, but this competition should be creating a ton of ladder activity. I'm pretty sure anyone who only plays enough to use their bonus pool, even if they have an extremely high win percentage, will get passed by people playing more games because of inflation. The inflation happens as more and more people play this season, creating more and more ladder points at the lower ranks, which filter up to the higher ranks.
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It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points.
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On February 02 2016 01:27 Dodgin wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. I get your point but I don't think expecting pro players to play a lot creates an unhealthy lifestyle, if they can't balance it and they play 12 hrs straight its their fault.
Well when someone who's not affected by a disease is having an unhealthy lifestyle is almost always his own fault, but you can encourage or discourage it with incentives. I guess that considering the lifestyle of most progamers that won't change much though.
On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points.
Yes, that's very true. MMR should be used to rank people, it's a much better indication than points.
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On February 02 2016 01:32 Dodgin wrote:Ok I had to do a bunch of searching to find the right page on liquipedia but this explains it a bit better: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/2016_WCS_Winter_Circuit_ChampionshipThis is in place of the " Regional Challengers " 2 slots for Europe, Africa and the Middle East, 2 slots for North America (USA and Canada) At least I think that's how it works.
Exactly!
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I'm generally excited about this, but as Firecake above me said there's a lot of problems with ladder right now and I'm a little worried this could end up being a bit of a shit show.
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On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points.
I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool?
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On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points.
I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think.
Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified.
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On February 02 2016 01:34 OtherWorld wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points. I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool?
It's not perfect but still more meaningful matches is better
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Very good news 
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That is a great news !
As a side effect I think it will help streamers get more viewers, thus more income. The last hours will be crazy exciting.
Seeing how the ladder works, MMR should be ultimately the decisive factor, not ladder points. But it is a good start.
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Australia18228 Posts
I count only $9800 for the prizepool, ESL pocketing that last $200 wow
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On February 02 2016 01:37 Nerchio wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:34 OtherWorld wrote:On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points. I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool? It's not perfect but still more meaningful matches is better
As you have already qualified, can you even play in this?
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On February 02 2016 01:53 Clonester wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:37 Nerchio wrote:On February 02 2016 01:34 OtherWorld wrote:On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points. I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool? It's not perfect but still more meaningful matches is better As you have already qualified, can you even play in this?
It says that he can, and if he takes top two, the player under him will get the invite.
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On February 02 2016 01:53 Clonester wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:37 Nerchio wrote:On February 02 2016 01:34 OtherWorld wrote:On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points. I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool? It's not perfect but still more meaningful matches is better As you have already qualified, can you even play in this?
Players already qualified for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice will be eligible to play in their Regional Challenger, and the next eligible player will be invited should they secure a first or second place.
Not sure why SGTK did not put the important parts in the OP  .
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your Country52797 Posts
Hey, this is cool. I wish blizzard would change GM slightly to accommodate though.
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On February 02 2016 01:41 Inflicted wrote:
I count only $9800 for the prizepool, ESL pocketing that last $200 wow
Free beer for the crew.
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On February 02 2016 01:58 RHoudini wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:41 Inflicted wrote:
I count only $9800 for the prizepool, ESL pocketing that last $200 wow Free beer for the crew.
I'm okay with that.
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On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified.
How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier.
Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ?
In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat...
There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ...
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On February 02 2016 01:55 Dodgin wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:53 Clonester wrote:On February 02 2016 01:37 Nerchio wrote:On February 02 2016 01:34 OtherWorld wrote:On February 02 2016 01:29 ZAiNs wrote:On February 02 2016 01:25 OtherWorld wrote:
OK the idea of using the ladder for something meaningful is cool. The only thing that tickles me if that it means that you have more chances to get more ladder points (thus a better ladder ranking) if you play a fuckton of matches, meaning unhealthy lifestyles and all-ins more viable. Actually the best way to be at the top of the ladder is to just use up your bonus pool and not play extra matches, when at the top you lose a lot of points for a loss to almost anyone and don't gain that many points. I thought GM players can't accumulate bonus pool? It's not perfect but still more meaningful matches is better As you have already qualified, can you even play in this? It says that he can, and if he takes top two, the player under him will get the invite.
Thanks for the info. But I dislike this option to the greatest. Not because I dont want people to earn money, but because of the slot system:
Each Region gets 16 slots, it is one less chance per already qualified player who get in this. On the top of that, it will be extremely annoying for someone getting kicked out by a qualified player in Ro16 or Ro8 (and the loser bracket parts), while another guy meets a qualified player in the consolidation final and thus gets the ticked because he could dodge him earlier. I dont know Blizzard..
On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ...
Hacking isnt a big thing anymore, after the latest patch broke the best Hack and the creator of the hack doesnt update the hack anymore. In this very phase of today till 12th of february, hacking shouldnt be such a thing.
Wintrading on the other hand, better have 2 gm accounts and trade wins with yourself...
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All matches bo5 in the tournament round. w00t.
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This is awesome news. Its what so many people wanted. Although it may not be perfect, this seems like an amazing way to improve the NA ladder in particular. All we need now is that ladder revamp ;P
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rip Nerchio always in high master
have to agree with FireCake here, this doesn't look very good from the competitive stand point
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8748 Posts
Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship.
This means you can play under any name, right? And they gave a free name change so you can change it on February 11 11:59pm to whatever you want (your main ID)? Or when is the last opportunity to change it? The competition period has already started, but by mentioning the free name change it seems to imply that we're allowed to change it now, which is during the competition. If you don't change it, the worse thing that happens is you have to use your ladder name for the tournament?
I'm thinking about playing in this but would like to know at the start if we're allowed to play anonymously and at what point we need to have our final name change in if we want to change it.
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I wonder if this will affect the streaming patterns of some top players. Certainly you'd be careful to minimize the risk of being stream-cheated / stream-sniped if $$ is on the line.
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On February 02 2016 02:27 ClysmiC wrote:
I wonder if this will affect the streaming patterns of some top players. Certainly you'd be careful to minimize the risk of being stream-cheated / stream-sniped if $$ is on the line.
I guess they will just turn on 3mins delay or sth like that 
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On February 02 2016 02:23 NonY wrote:Show nested quote +Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. This means you can play under any name, right? And they gave a free name change so you can change it on February 11 11:59pm to whatever you want (your main ID)? Or when is the last opportunity to change it? The competition period has already started, but by mentioning the free name change it seems to imply that we're allowed to change it now, which is during the competition. If you don't change it, the worse thing that happens is you have to use your ladder name for the tournament? I'm thinking about playing in this but would like to know at the start if we're allowed to play anonymously and at what point we need to have our final name change in if we want to change it.
From what I understand you can change your name but you'll have to bear it for the rest of the Winter Championship. Basically if you enter this qualifier under the name "SickRabbit", and you go to the finals of the WtrC, well you'll play there under the name "SickRabbit".
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Current GM top16 have an advantage?! Current Master players dont have any chances into GM top16 within 12 days.
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Is this the death of barcodes?!
E: aw it's not ):
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i dont understand why people are hyped about no barcode. im pretty sure the barcodes are gonna ladder to top 16 gm and change their name on the last day of this qualifier
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this is pretty cool
I wish they used mmr and not ranks, but heh, not gonna complain about a potential really neat idea !
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Will the non-top-16 get other opportunities to qualify for WCS?
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On February 02 2016 02:58 Dingodile wrote:
Current GM top16 have an advantage?! Current Master players dont have any chances into GM top16 within 12 days.
The season ended recently, GM isn't open yet.
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On February 02 2016 03:20 IntoTheheart wrote:
Will the non-top-16 get other opportunities to qualify for WCS?
Most people qualify through the server qualifiers, 8 from EU and 6 from NA.
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pretty cool. i just wish every toujrnament organizer would stop call it NA if they wont include mexico just call it us - canada cuz it aint NA, NA include more than just canada / us
good luck to all :D
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SHOUTcraft America made ladder a lot more competitive at the top for a while. Hopefully this will have the same effect.
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i was hyped until i saw firegod's contribution
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On February 02 2016 03:40 Makro wrote:
i was hyped until i saw firegod's contribution
Haha I am sorry :D
At least, This tournament might show to everybody how bad the ladder is right now (and thus maybe Blizzard will do something to fix this).
It is a big issue because it prevents new people who don't have many contacts among pro players to practice.
Many people talk about the problem to find new talents in korea but it is the same problem in Europe because new talents can't get practice and thus become strong players.
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So will blizzard open gm today so this competition will start for the pros xD
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If we are worried about ladder and matchmaking maybe this is a good thing Blizzard is doing this. It will help expose any of the glaring issues and Blizzard will be forced to fix them if they want to keep up the quality of the competition.
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Interesting, I wonder how this change will playout.
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On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ...
iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1
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I think this is a major step forward. This gives amateur players an extremely clear and defined path towards going pro. No longer it is "be good at ladder and ... I guess show up and be good at tournaments." This makes it so your actual practice (you can argue how good ladder is for practice but lets pretend here for a sec) is closely intertwined with how you can go pro in the game. I love it.
Two notes though: They really, really need Ladder 2.0 for this to work. As it stands you can miss getting in GM and now suddenly you can't qualify because no matter how well you play if GM is full you're not qualifying. That isn't right. When they release Ladder 2.0 that has GM as GM + Masters that should solve this problem, though.
Next is they simply have to be more aggressive and more proactive about hacking. No more "Oh yeah that guy who is #8 on GM is an obvious maphacker" shit. Ideally prevent it outright but since we don't live in a perfect world they'll need some people who's main focus of their job is to monitor hacking reports and react swiftly.
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Like him or not, Catz makes a difference.
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Oh
Totalbiscuit should be pleased and given credit for this : P
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us.battle.net
Now this post actually makes sense and you can call Grand Master: Pro and Master: Semi Pro
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On February 02 2016 04:08 ivancype wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ... iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1
They were not very careful, there are other players that have been hiding their win trades a lot better.
It is really not difficult to chat somewhere else than the bnet client to ask for win trades.
But I think the worst thing in this qualifier is that people are always sharing their accounts on ladder and thus the MMR of many top players on the ladder is not calculated by the wins of the owner of the account.
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On February 02 2016 04:46 FireCake wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 04:08 ivancype wrote:On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ... iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1 They were not very careful, there are other players that have been hiding their win trades a lot better. It is really not difficult to chat somewhere else than the bnet client to ask for win trades. But I think the worst thing in this qualifier is that people are always sharing their accounts on ladder and thus the MMR of many top players on the ladder is not calculated by the wins of the owner of the account.
I think many of your concerns could be solved via some big data processing assuming they're collecting it. If someone is suspected of sharing accounts it should be fairly easy to tell based upon hotkeys, APM, IP address, MAC address(? doubt they would collect that) and easily solved that this is clearly two separate people playing the game.
For the win trading I feel they could generate trends as well. Where these two players have about a 50% winrate when playing each other, their match time is below the average across the ladder so these players get flagged. Then human intervention could determine if these two are in fact win trading.
I highly doubt any of this infrastructure is in place, though.
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Where are all the people who always complain that the TL community is too negative? You see? This is an update that people actually like and you see almost exlusively positive responses. (or at least not negative ones)
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using ladder is so stupid. There are maphackers, people using bonus pool, etc. They can find a better method.
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Weren't they discussing getting rid of bonus pool in the ladder revamp?
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On February 02 2016 04:50 Tenks wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 04:46 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 04:08 ivancype wrote:On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ... iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1 They were not very careful, there are other players that have been hiding their win trades a lot better. It is really not difficult to chat somewhere else than the bnet client to ask for win trades. But I think the worst thing in this qualifier is that people are always sharing their accounts on ladder and thus the MMR of many top players on the ladder is not calculated by the wins of the owner of the account. I think many of your concerns could be solved via some big data processing assuming they're collecting it. If someone is suspected of sharing accounts it should be fairly easy to tell based upon hotkeys, APM, IP address, MAC address(? doubt they would collect that) and easily solved that this is clearly two separate people playing the game. For the win trading I feel they could generate trends as well. Where these two players have about a 50% winrate when playing each other, their match time is below the average across the ladder so these players get flagged. Then human intervention could determine if these two are in fact win trading. I highly doubt any of this infrastructure is in place, though.
I agree, this is why I would prefer a new ladder system then to promote it they could do this qualifier.
This qualifier will show all the issues of the ladder instead of promoting the benefit of the future ladder
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If they don't fix the "leave league" bug the ladder is pretty much useless at the top level
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On February 02 2016 05:12 FireCake wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 04:50 Tenks wrote:On February 02 2016 04:46 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 04:08 ivancype wrote:On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ... iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1 They were not very careful, there are other players that have been hiding their win trades a lot better. It is really not difficult to chat somewhere else than the bnet client to ask for win trades. But I think the worst thing in this qualifier is that people are always sharing their accounts on ladder and thus the MMR of many top players on the ladder is not calculated by the wins of the owner of the account. I think many of your concerns could be solved via some big data processing assuming they're collecting it. If someone is suspected of sharing accounts it should be fairly easy to tell based upon hotkeys, APM, IP address, MAC address(? doubt they would collect that) and easily solved that this is clearly two separate people playing the game. For the win trading I feel they could generate trends as well. Where these two players have about a 50% winrate when playing each other, their match time is below the average across the ladder so these players get flagged. Then human intervention could determine if these two are in fact win trading. I highly doubt any of this infrastructure is in place, though. I agree, this is why I would prefer a new ladder system then to promote it they could do this qualifier. This qualifier will show all the issues of the ladder instead of promoting the benefit of the future ladder
There may be some kinks in the system to iron out not 100% associated with the ladder. I do agree this system seems to put the cart in front of the horse since it feels like it would work out better with their revamped ladder in place. But since it sounded like that won't be out until Spring/Summer they probably just wanted to try out this system and refine it to have a better system in place for when the new ladder actually launches.
For all we know Blizzard has been hard at work on some of this automated detection and they're ready to really test it out which is why it has started now. Blizzard would be wise to be secret about how they are addressing or plan on addressing the extremely valid concerns you're bringing up. So I wouldn't take silence as an absence of a plan until we see inaction against known offenders.
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On February 02 2016 01:20 Musicus wrote:Show nested quote +Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. A free character name change was provided to every account on January 29th. Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees! Die barcodes, die!!! Damn, this is great news.
So nice to see! Also this will spice up the ladder, i really like it.
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Fighting barcodes !
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On February 02 2016 05:12 FireCake wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 04:50 Tenks wrote:On February 02 2016 04:46 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 04:08 ivancype wrote:On February 02 2016 01:58 FireCake wrote:On February 02 2016 01:36 Musicus wrote:On February 02 2016 01:32 FireCake wrote:
It is a good idea because almost no pro players are playing on ladder right now (the matchmaking makes the ladder useless). We might have some funny ladder games and stream might be more interesting for viewers.
But...
The matchmaking has been broken for months and is still broken, you can abuse the system by saving your bonus pool and use it just before the end of the qualifier. Not to mention that people can trade win very easily, it has been done many time in the past when koreans players had to play hundreds games to participate in the WCS.
It would be a lot better to use MMR to rank people and not points. I still love the fact that they are putting this system in place. Sure there are problems with it for now, but since they are aiming at a ladder revamp anyway, it will be really cool in the long run I think. Win traders usually get caught in ladder qualifers like in Shoutcraft or Destiny I and get disqualified. How do you detect win traders ? Most of time nothing is done with cheaters so I am worried with this qualifier. Many people share their account, how do you deal with this ? In WCS it is forbidden to use skin units, on ladder it is allowed. So in this qualifier it is allowed to cheat... There are many many problems with this qualifier and it seems they are not ready for this or they simply don't care ... iAsonu and XY were suspend from WCS America 2014 because they win traded, so there is punishment for this http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/13423452444#1 They were not very careful, there are other players that have been hiding their win trades a lot better. It is really not difficult to chat somewhere else than the bnet client to ask for win trades. But I think the worst thing in this qualifier is that people are always sharing their accounts on ladder and thus the MMR of many top players on the ladder is not calculated by the wins of the owner of the account. I think many of your concerns could be solved via some big data processing assuming they're collecting it. If someone is suspected of sharing accounts it should be fairly easy to tell based upon hotkeys, APM, IP address, MAC address(? doubt they would collect that) and easily solved that this is clearly two separate people playing the game. For the win trading I feel they could generate trends as well. Where these two players have about a 50% winrate when playing each other, their match time is below the average across the ladder so these players get flagged. Then human intervention could determine if these two are in fact win trading. I highly doubt any of this infrastructure is in place, though. I agree, this is why I would prefer a new ladder system then to promote it they could do this qualifier. This qualifier will show all the issues of the ladder instead of promoting the benefit of the future ladder
Well if you release a new version without having ever tried this, you're taking the risk of discovering flaws after your ladder 2.0 is out.
If anything starting it now will be a good stress test to show what works and what doesn't in the current ladder, hopefully improving next one.
Sometimes, if you wait for the perfect software before starting things, you may just never start anything
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This part is not clear to me :
Players already qualified for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice will be eligible to play in their Regional Challenger, and the next eligible player will be invited should they secure a first or second place.
What I understand :
an already qualified player (through last week tournament) can compete (in his case, only for the money) and try to get into top 16 gm, and if they end up first or second of the 13th 14th feb tournament, the guy arriving third is qualified?
So the more already qualified people get into top 16 gm, the easier the qualification will be for the others?
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12th february is going to be crazy :D. I like it.
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On February 02 2016 04:24 Circumstance wrote:
Like him or not, Catz makes a difference.
thanks for the shoutout <3 I haven't been the good type of stressed in a long time, I have so much shit to do my head's about to explode but I am so happy about the last couple of days at the same time, lets keep moving forward
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On February 02 2016 02:23 NonY wrote:Show nested quote +Players will be required to play under the name that they wish to use during the WCS Circuit Winter Championship. This means you can play under any name, right? And they gave a free name change so you can change it on February 11 11:59pm to whatever you want (your main ID)? Or when is the last opportunity to change it? The competition period has already started, but by mentioning the free name change it seems to imply that we're allowed to change it now, which is during the competition. If you don't change it, the worse thing that happens is you have to use your ladder name for the tournament? I'm thinking about playing in this but would like to know at the start if we're allowed to play anonymously and at what point we need to have our final name change in if we want to change it.
I don't know why, but this brought back tsl2 for me. Those were the days.
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Awesome.
too bad NA ladder counts as well, as the competition is kind of... bullshit.
are EU players eligable for the NA ladder? i might try my luck huehue.
Also: Double Elimination! YES
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On February 02 2016 11:36 KalWarkov wrote:
Awesome.
too bad NA ladder counts as well, as the competition is kind of... bullshit.
are EU players eligable for the NA ladder? i might try my luck huehue.
Also: Double Elimination! YES
They be trying to fix it through this!
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If a player qualifies, and someone submits a replay of them playing as a barcode sometime between February 1st and 12th, is that player then disqualified?
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This is awesome, now we only need something to help the Korean scene and everything will be amazing :D
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China6327 Posts
On February 02 2016 14:25 jalstar wrote:
If a player qualifies, and someone submits a replay of them playing as a barcode sometime between February 1st and 12th, is that player then disqualified?
I believe it only counts top 16 GM after Feb 12th, if someone is not up there he/she is not qualified, that rule means you can't use a barcode to try to qualify.
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On February 02 2016 03:34 Major wrote:
pretty cool. i just wish every toujrnament organizer would stop call it NA if they wont include mexico just call it us - canada cuz it aint NA, NA include more than just canada / us
good luck to all :D
I feel you.
But unfortunately I must wish you good luck with that (terms are even more misleading in French).
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Russian Federation262 Posts
This is a good way to improve!
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On February 02 2016 03:34 Major wrote:
pretty cool. i just wish every toujrnament organizer would stop call it NA if they wont include mexico just call it us - canada cuz it aint NA, NA include more than just canada / us
good luck to all :D
They even said NA when it was the Americas so yeah..
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Do we see any Challenger matches? Or its all that we know that they all player take this serious and showing us that they are able to play 1500 ladder games within 12days...
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Whats the best way to follow this? Like best way to see an updated list of the top GM ladder?
EDIT: I do realize GM doesnt start for another week anyway
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On February 02 2016 06:38 Gwavajuice wrote:This part is not clear to me : Show nested quote +Players already qualified for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice will be eligible to play in their Regional Challenger, and the next eligible player will be invited should they secure a first or second place. What I understand : an already qualified player (through last week tournament) can compete (in his case, only for the money) and try to get into top 16 gm, and if they end up first or second of the 13th 14th feb tournament, the guy arriving third is qualified? So the more already qualified people get into top 16 gm, the easier the qualification will be for the others?
Actually, it might be harder: When you see the qualified players as the top foreign players, with every one of them the luck of the bracket becomes more and more important as these already qualified players can also kick you into the lower bracket and then out before your reach the consolidation or loser bracket final.
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8748 Posts
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So blizzard is getting pros to care about the ladder for only one week?
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They made a few updates to their post 3 days ago.
The most imortant one:
"Player's account names have to be recognizable (no 'barcode' or otherwise unknown alias) once Grandmaster League opens. Any later namechanges will render that account ineligible for the respective top 16 final"
http://www.eslgaming.com/article/2016-wcs-challenger-coming-ladder-euna-2533
Seems to be working out really well so far. I'm just sad that it ends so soon.
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On February 09 2016 00:10 Musicus wrote:They made a few updates to their post 3 days ago. The most imortant one: "Player's account names have to be recognizable (no 'barcode' or otherwise unknown alias) once Grandmaster League opens. Any later namechanges will render that account ineligible for the respective top 16 final" http://www.eslgaming.com/article/2016-wcs-challenger-coming-ladder-euna-2533Seems to be working out really well so far. I'm just sad that it ends so soon.
Oh that's a very important distinction. There are 2 barcodes in top 16 GM who may have been planning to namechange on the 11th or 12th.
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On February 09 2016 00:35 InfCereal wrote:Show nested quote +On February 09 2016 00:10 Musicus wrote:They made a few updates to their post 3 days ago. The most imortant one: "Player's account names have to be recognizable (no 'barcode' or otherwise unknown alias) once Grandmaster League opens. Any later namechanges will render that account ineligible for the respective top 16 final" http://www.eslgaming.com/article/2016-wcs-challenger-coming-ladder-euna-2533Seems to be working out really well so far. I'm just sad that it ends so soon. Oh that's a very important distinction. There are 2 barcodes in top 16 GM who may have been planning to namechange on the 11th or 12th.
Yeah, if that was their plan, they done goofed.
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On February 02 2016 06:38 Gwavajuice wrote:This part is not clear to me : Show nested quote +Players already qualified for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice will be eligible to play in their Regional Challenger, and the next eligible player will be invited should they secure a first or second place. What I understand : an already qualified player (through last week tournament) can compete (in his case, only for the money) and try to get into top 16 gm, and if they end up first or second of the 13th 14th feb tournament, the guy arriving third is qualified? So the more already qualified people get into top 16 gm, the easier the qualification will be for the others?
Funny part is, I think there are 16 Europeans qualified already if I'm counting right. So theoretically you could have a situation where the top 16 are already qualified lol.
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On February 09 2016 00:40 jcairne wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2016 06:38 Gwavajuice wrote:This part is not clear to me : Players already qualified for the WCS Circuit Winter Championship at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice will be eligible to play in their Regional Challenger, and the next eligible player will be invited should they secure a first or second place. What I understand : an already qualified player (through last week tournament) can compete (in his case, only for the money) and try to get into top 16 gm, and if they end up first or second of the 13th 14th feb tournament, the guy arriving third is qualified? So the more already qualified people get into top 16 gm, the easier the qualification will be for the others? Funny part is, I think there are 16 Europeans qualified already if I'm counting right. So theoretically you could have a situation where the top 16 are already qualified lol.
That would be hilarious, would number 17 and 18 on the ladder get the spots?
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PtitDrogo only has 30 ladders games played so far? Seems odd that he wouldn't be laddering hard with this being his last shot to qualify.
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On February 09 2016 00:49 jcairne wrote:
PtitDrogo only has 30 ladders games played so far? Seems odd that he wouldn't be laddering hard with this being his last shot to qualify.
uthermal also just started climbing and I'm sure Ptitdrogo and him will be top16 really fast, Showtime is rank 1 with only 70 games.
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maybe they are letting their bonus pool grow to mass game on the last day
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On February 09 2016 01:54 oGoZenob wrote:
maybe they are letting their bonus pool grow to mass game on the last day
That's exactly what they're doing. Bonus pool makes this competition kind of silly :/
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On February 09 2016 01:55 InfCereal wrote:Show nested quote +On February 09 2016 01:54 oGoZenob wrote:
maybe they are letting their bonus pool grow to mass game on the last day That's exactly what they're doing. Bonus pool makes this competition kind of silly :/
well everybody has bonus pool growing at the same rate, so i'd say it comes down to having a winning streak at the right time
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Can someone clarify what exactly constitutes a "resident" of a country?
Citizens are obviously good to participate, but what about skilled immigrants holding permanent residence (green) cards?
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On February 09 2016 02:14 EngrishTeacher wrote:
Can someone clarify what exactly constitutes a "resident" of a country?
Citizens are obviously good to participate, but what about skilled immigrants holding permanent residence (green) cards?
Hm, players with a green card or permanent residency can play (Masa for example), but players on an P-1A (athlete) or student visa that reside in NA can not (Polt/Hydra/Violet I guess).
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EPT
