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IEM Katowice 2021 to be held online, prize money redistrib…

Forum Index > SC2 General
63 CommentsPost a Reply
Prev 1 2 3 4 Next All
sneakyfox
Profile Joined January 2017
8216 Posts
January 21 2021 19:06 GMT
#21
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?
"I saw what sneakyfox wrote on TL.net and it made me furious" - PartinG
Chris_Havoc
Profile Joined August 2016
United States600 Posts
January 21 2021 19:19 GMT
#22
On January 22 2021 04:06 sneakyfox wrote:
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?


Why not? The situation requires it to be online then so be it. The players having been playing online in ESL events for a year. Yes time zones and late night fatigue suck but there is no other feasible way to do it at this point.

Crowds are not necessary to a World Championship either. Even hype is an optional luxury in a pandemic.
Owner of the SC2 Esports Anthology channel on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/SC2EsportsAnthology
NotSoHappy
Profile Joined November 2010
445 Posts
January 21 2021 20:02 GMT
#23
terrible, just terrible.
Warcloud
Profile Joined May 2010
United States97 Posts
January 21 2021 20:05 GMT
#24
If they want this online, they should have kept the original prize pool but divided up into regional finals. I know people want a world champion* but cross-region play makes the title less meaningful anyway.
Poopi
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
France12945 Posts
January 21 2021 20:34 GMT
#25
On January 22 2021 04:19 Chris_Havoc wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 04:06 sneakyfox wrote:
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?


Why not? The situation requires it to be online then so be it. The players having been playing online in ESL events for a year. Yes time zones and late night fatigue suck but there is no other feasible way to do it at this point.

Crowds are not necessary to a World Championship either. Even hype is an optional luxury in a pandemic.

Well time zones and late night fatigue suck but the worst is plain and simple cross server lag. Either way the world champion will have an asterisk next to his name
WriterMaru
AbouSV
Profile Joined October 2014
Germany1278 Posts
January 21 2021 20:34 GMT
#26
On January 22 2021 04:19 Chris_Havoc wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 04:06 sneakyfox wrote:
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?


Why not? The situation requires it to be online then so be it. The players having been playing online in ESL events for a year. Yes time zones and late night fatigue suck but there is no other feasible way to do it at this point.

Crowds are not necessary to a World Championship either. Even hype is an optional luxury in a pandemic.


True, but only to some extend.

Having a championship with at least three vastly different time zones and connection time makes it difficult for player to be in the best condition and show the most interesting matches.
So it's great that they get to keep doing their job and earn money for it (prizepool-wise), but this does not make much difference with another whichever tournament one can tune in at a random time on this sidebar >>>
Players just have more pressure about any random network or computer problem, since they might miss not 200 buck, but a hundred times more.
JJH777
Profile Joined January 2011
United States4418 Posts
January 21 2021 20:41 GMT
#27
Damn this really sucks. Hopefully Koreans dominate here to the extent they usually do at Katowice so that ping is less of an issue in the playoffs at least.
TentativePanda
Profile Joined August 2014
United States800 Posts
January 21 2021 21:16 GMT
#28
Sad but I think it was the right decision. As long as the other $250,00 actually makes it to future tournaments...
MajiN1
Profile Joined July 2017
113 Posts
January 21 2021 21:24 GMT
#29
It's better than having an offline tournament without half of players cause they cannot flight to come to Poland.
Online events doesn't prevent Koreans winning (TSL, Asus Rog or Last Chance)
vyzion
Profile Joined August 2016
308 Posts
January 21 2021 21:53 GMT
#30
Makes sense to me, hopefully we're doing offline events again within 2021!
Darkhorse
Profile Blog Joined December 2011
United States23455 Posts
January 21 2021 23:04 GMT
#31
On January 22 2021 05:34 Poopi wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 04:19 Chris_Havoc wrote:
On January 22 2021 04:06 sneakyfox wrote:
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?


Why not? The situation requires it to be online then so be it. The players having been playing online in ESL events for a year. Yes time zones and late night fatigue suck but there is no other feasible way to do it at this point.

Crowds are not necessary to a World Championship either. Even hype is an optional luxury in a pandemic.

Well time zones and late night fatigue suck but the worst is plain and simple cross server lag. Either way the world champion will have an asterisk next to his name

Fair enough but tis the world we’re in right now unfortunately.

Plenty of traditional sports have had champions crowned with varying degrees of asterisks attached over the last year or so. Seems to me that people attach that asterisk as firmly as they want depending on who wins haha
WriterRecently Necro'd (?)
Asunanas
Profile Joined April 2011
53 Posts
January 22 2021 00:09 GMT
#32
Really unfortunate but I really respect the decision. Having a huge tournament with tons of people coming from all over the world would have been a big mistake.

Stay safe and healthy everyone!
RKC
Profile Joined June 2012
2848 Posts
January 22 2021 00:30 GMT
#33
Postponement wasn't possible? I know the calendar may have been set, especially for GSL. But I'm sure a 2-week window can be found in summer/fall?
gg no re thx
EoxVqXXEOa47PtT
Profile Joined January 2021
2 Posts
January 22 2021 03:50 GMT
#34
--- Nuked ---
Karis Vas Ryaar
Profile Blog Joined July 2011
United States4396 Posts
Last Edited: 2021-01-22 04:56:39
January 22 2021 04:45 GMT
#35
On January 22 2021 09:30 RKC wrote:
Postponement wasn't possible? I know the calendar may have been set, especially for GSL. But I'm sure a 2-week window can be found in summer/fall?


my guess is still a ton of uncertainty. and it would mess up the rest of the their calendar. they want to do a finals and have some semblance of a off-season. if they delay to to the summer then what do they do til then? Have a new season and then have the previous years finals in the middle of the season? I'm sure theirs also a lot of other deals and things locked in so you just can't rearrange a years worth of events and planning. The best thing to do is probably just get it over with then hit the offseason and hopefully when events show up again things are better. With the general amount of impossibility to accurately know where things are going to be and having exact dates you can end up delaying it to where it has no meaning. It also might hurt viewership having it at a weird date.

also for a bunch of players I'm sure it factors into their expense planning and some of them might struggle if their pay is getting delayed 2-3 months.
"I'm not agreeing with a lot of Virus's decisions but they are working" Tasteless. Ipl4 Losers Bracket Virus 2-1 Maru
blooblooblahblah
Profile Joined February 2011
Australia4163 Posts
January 22 2021 05:40 GMT
#36
On January 22 2021 13:45 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 09:30 RKC wrote:
Postponement wasn't possible? I know the calendar may have been set, especially for GSL. But I'm sure a 2-week window can be found in summer/fall?


my guess is still a ton of uncertainty. and it would mess up the rest of the their calendar. they want to do a finals and have some semblance of a off-season. if they delay to to the summer then what do they do til then? Have a new season and then have the previous years finals in the middle of the season? I'm sure theirs also a lot of other deals and things locked in so you just can't rearrange a years worth of events and planning. The best thing to do is probably just get it over with then hit the offseason and hopefully when events show up again things are better. With the general amount of impossibility to accurately know where things are going to be and having exact dates you can end up delaying it to where it has no meaning. It also might hurt viewership having it at a weird date.

also for a bunch of players I'm sure it factors into their expense planning and some of them might struggle if their pay is getting delayed 2-3 months.


You're talking best case scenario too. The reality is a postponement until ideal conditions would be a huge shot in the dark. We still don't even have good reason to think things will be possible in 9-12 months, let alone a few. The scene needs major tournaments and the players need some sort of season structure to work towards.

This is the new norm for now, and I think it's better if we don't get our hopes up too much for that to change any time soon. I'd prefer to focus our efforts into improving the equality of the online conditions as much as possible, with better scheduling and the like.
Ganzi beat me without stim. Ostojiy beat me with a nydus. Siphonn beat me with probes. Revival beat my sentry-immortal all-in.
RKC
Profile Joined June 2012
2848 Posts
January 22 2021 06:54 GMT
#37
On January 22 2021 14:40 blooblooblahblah wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 13:45 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:
On January 22 2021 09:30 RKC wrote:
Postponement wasn't possible? I know the calendar may have been set, especially for GSL. But I'm sure a 2-week window can be found in summer/fall?


my guess is still a ton of uncertainty. and it would mess up the rest of the their calendar. they want to do a finals and have some semblance of a off-season. if they delay to to the summer then what do they do til then? Have a new season and then have the previous years finals in the middle of the season? I'm sure theirs also a lot of other deals and things locked in so you just can't rearrange a years worth of events and planning. The best thing to do is probably just get it over with then hit the offseason and hopefully when events show up again things are better. With the general amount of impossibility to accurately know where things are going to be and having exact dates you can end up delaying it to where it has no meaning. It also might hurt viewership having it at a weird date.

also for a bunch of players I'm sure it factors into their expense planning and some of them might struggle if their pay is getting delayed 2-3 months.


You're talking best case scenario too. The reality is a postponement until ideal conditions would be a huge shot in the dark. We still don't even have good reason to think things will be possible in 9-12 months, let alone a few. The scene needs major tournaments and the players need some sort of season structure to work towards.

This is the new norm for now, and I think it's better if we don't get our hopes up too much for that to change any time soon. I'd prefer to focus our efforts into improving the equality of the online conditions as much as possible, with better scheduling and the like.


Yes, I totally get this. My work involves a lot of annual events and competitions. Since summer of 2020, the major ones already decided to go online for events in early 2021, come what may. So the organisers had a lot of time to make adjustments.

Katowice was determined to go offline. That's fine. But since they have committed to this path, the proper response would be postponement, I feel. Rather than making a late transition to online, with little time to prepare.

This is not meant to be super critical of them. I suppose there's pressure to be ambitious and aim for offline, but things just turn to the worst unexpectedly (such as the variant). Just an observation, that's all.
gg no re thx
Harris1st
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Germany7254 Posts
January 22 2021 08:32 GMT
#38
hmmm.. dunno Kev

I feel like this would have been the prefect opportunity to change the schedule completely and make the world championship at the end of the year (somewhat like it was with blizzcon).
It always felt wrong to me to make like a 3 week christmas break and then do WC as the first thing in the year.

I would do like 4 seasons (grand slams) and then the big bang at the beginning of december or sth to close out the year
Go Serral! GG EZ for Ence. Flashbang dance FTW
Ziggy
Profile Blog Joined June 2013
South Korea2106 Posts
Last Edited: 2021-01-22 08:40:02
January 22 2021 08:39 GMT
#39
The year is 2047, Mars has been hit with an outbreak of Covid-19.2: electric boogaloo and the Martian representatives can't make it to Earth for IEM Katowice so the tour goes online. The admins, teary-eyed, look back at how easy figuring out preferred server rules used to be.
WriterDefeating a sandwich only makes it tastier. @imjustziggy
deacon.frost
Profile Joined February 2013
Czech Republic12129 Posts
Last Edited: 2021-01-22 10:55:01
January 22 2021 10:53 GMT
#40
On January 22 2021 08:04 Darkhorse wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 22 2021 05:34 Poopi wrote:
On January 22 2021 04:19 Chris_Havoc wrote:
On January 22 2021 04:06 sneakyfox wrote:
So are we still calling this the world championship or will we have both 2020 and 2021 without one?

Can't really have an online WC, can we?


Why not? The situation requires it to be online then so be it. The players having been playing online in ESL events for a year. Yes time zones and late night fatigue suck but there is no other feasible way to do it at this point.

Crowds are not necessary to a World Championship either. Even hype is an optional luxury in a pandemic.

Well time zones and late night fatigue suck but the worst is plain and simple cross server lag. Either way the world champion will have an asterisk next to his name

Fair enough but tis the world we’re in right now unfortunately.

Plenty of traditional sports have had champions crowned with varying degrees of asterisks attached over the last year or so. Seems to me that people attach that asterisk as firmly as they want depending on who wins haha

I mean you can pretend that that LA OG were fine and all medals are at their full value. Similarily all the medals awarded at Moscow were not devaluated. But realistically in many sports the best didn't win as they weren't there.

Similarily here, the best may suffer from ping and some especially from the time zone fatigue.

I agree, it's the world we're living in. But let's not pretend this is equal to playing offline... (i'm not saying you said that, but Katowice really deserve the asterisk)
I imagine France should be able to take this unless Lilbow is busy practicing for Starcraft III. | KadaverBB is my fairy ban mother.
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