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4 Posts
![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/esm734.jpg)
ESL has announced the format and schedule for the upcoming ESL Pro Tour.
As previously announced, the prior six regions have been merged into three: Europe, Asia, and Americas. The format for the regionals has changed, starting with a Swiss-style group stage before moving on to a more familiar single-elimiantion playoff format.
Regionals:
- Europe: 32 players, 2 Swiss groups of 16 players
- Asia: 16 players in a single Swiss group
- Americas: 16 players in a single Swiss group
ESL SC2 Masters: Summer 2023 - $200,000 USD
- Online Regionals - $125,000 USD
- Qualifiers: April 7th to 9th
- Week 1: May 2nd to 7th
- Week 2: May 9th to 14th
- Week 3: May 17th to 21st
- ESL SC2 Masters: Summer 2023 played in Jönköping - June 16th to 18th - $75,000 USD
ESL SC2 Masters: Winter 2023 - $200,000 USD
- Online Regionals - $125,000 USD
- Qualifiers: Oct 17th - 22
- Week 1: Oct 31st - Nov 19
- Week 2: November 7th to 12th
- Week 3: November 15th to 19th
ESL SC2 Masters: Winter 2023 played in Atlanta - December 15th to 17th - $75,000 USD
The offline ESL Masters events at DreamHack have changed in format as well. It has been scaled down into a 48-player competition (16 seeded players + 32 open qualifier players), and GSL-style groups have been removed in favor of multiple double-elimination brackets. Ultimately, it's trading out one complicated format for another, but it eventually culminates in an 8-player single elimination playoffs. [Detailed diagram will be posted later]
The breakdown of the 16 seeded players at the offline ESL Masters events is as follows:
- 6 Players from GSL Season 1
- 4 Players from the ESLM Europe Regional
- 2 Players from the ESLM Americas Regional
- 1 Player from the ESLM Asia Regional
- 3 Players from the Global Standings
ESL Open Cups will resume giving ESL Pro Tour points on April 4th. The points and prize money splits remain the same.
For more details on seeding and regional qualifiers, read the full announcement on ESL's official website.
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Yay!!
Are there that many more EU players for it to have 32 players and Asia to have 16? Or is this just a case of ESL favoring its home region (which is totally understandable). Just curious, not sure how they usually do it.
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So the Americas and Asia regions got the shaft compared to last year by having essentially 1 and 2 fewer guaranteed spots to the finals, respectively, especially for Asia since it's a lot harder for players in the Asian region to travel to the offline events in Sweden/US.
Also does anyone enjoy Swiss-style group format? (Aside from the Swiss, I suppose?)
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On March 22 2023 05:49 argonautdice wrote:Also does anyone enjoy Swiss-style group format? (Aside from the Swiss, I suppose?)
I do.
Played quite a few years of curling, and it is usual to have swiss rounds in the first part of an event.
Always wondered how it would look to have swiss rounds instead of the round robin groups in sc2.
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United States1901 Posts
Swiss doesn't really work unless you have way more people. Magic tournaments make good use of it because tournament size is massive in comparison. Swiss actually makes sense to have 200 people play 9 rounds since you get a cleaner cut, but when you only have 16 people playing a million rounds you're opening yourself up to some really awkward records/tiebreakers. Oh well.
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On March 22 2023 07:19 Mizenhauer wrote:
Swiss doesn't really work unless you have way more people. Magic tournaments make good use of it because tournament size is massive in comparison. Swiss actually makes sense to have 200 people play 9 rounds since you get a cleaner cut, but when you only have 16 people playing a million rounds you're opening yourself up to some really awkward records/tiebreakers. Oh well.
I assume ESL will do it like they do it in Counterstrike. With 16 players (or teams in CS) there are no awkward tiebreakers whatsoever. It is a a clean system. When you have 3 wins, you advance. If you have 3 losses, you are out. It really plays out nicely.
https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/Intel_Extreme_Masters/2022/Rio/Legends_Stage
For example, this was the Legend Stage in the last major. It guarantees every player has to play between three and five matches, depending on how good they perform.
This is a good scaled down ESL Tour overall, though I'm not convinced GSL really needs 6 slots. I'm also not sure how the Global Standings are supposed to work if they now qualify you to the events that usually give you the global standing points?
No word on the Championships yet?
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On March 22 2023 07:25 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 07:19 Mizenhauer wrote:
Swiss doesn't really work unless you have way more people. Magic tournaments make good use of it because tournament size is massive in comparison. Swiss actually makes sense to have 200 people play 9 rounds since you get a cleaner cut, but when you only have 16 people playing a million rounds you're opening yourself up to some really awkward records/tiebreakers. Oh well. I assume ESL will do it like they do it in Counterstrike. With 16 players (or teams in CS) there are no awkward tiebreakers whatsoever. It is a a clean system. When you have 3 wins, you advance. If you have 3 losses, you are out. It really plays out nicely. https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/Intel_Extreme_Masters/2022/Rio/Legends_StageFor example, this was the Legend Stage in the last major. It guarantees every player has to play between three and five matches, depending on how good they perform. This is a good scaled down ESL Tour overall, though I'm not convinced GSL really needs 6 slots. I'm also not sure how the Global Standings are supposed to work if they now qualify you to the events that usually give you the global standing points? No word on the Championships yet?
Considering there are still 10ish Koreans who are better than all but the very best foreigners, 6 spots is justified. Granted, some of those might not be able to travel due to impending military service.
I really don't like 3 spots coming through the global standings, I'd much rather an extra spot be given to Korea, Europe, and one of Asia/Americas.
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Like what you do to judge the global standing, when you dont have enough tournaments to earn them. Like the first ESL Summer Global, there would only be result from GSL, ESL Regionals and a bunch of Open Cups who being dominated by the same group of top players? That means top 3 in global points would probably be those who made into to Ro8 GSL and/or Ro6/8 in EU, maybe one more slot for AM regional depending on the distribution of the points.
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In its current format the non-korean Asia region with its 1 spot is just going to make the Asia regional a giant exp pool for Oliveria, who at this point is miles above his none KR regional competitors.
I would prefer the competition for 2nd place to be more meaningful but I don't think the strength of rest of the region fully justify a second spot. Its hard to balance
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On March 22 2023 13:28 mintyminmus wrote:
In its current format the non-korean Asia region with its 1 spot is just going to make the Asia regional a giant exp pool for Oliveria, who at this point is miles above his none KR regional competitors.
I would prefer the competition for 2nd place to be more meaningful but I don't think the strength of rest of the region fully justify a second spot. Its hard to balance
this is a big lol, while oliveria has to be the favorite in his region, i dont think he is head over heels above everyone else. with only 1 spot it is entirely possible he doesn't even make it.
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On March 22 2023 11:12 tigera6 wrote:
Like what you do to judge the global standing, when you dont have enough tournaments to earn them. Like the first ESL Summer Global, there would only be result from GSL, ESL Regionals and a bunch of Open Cups who being dominated by the same group of top players? That means top 3 in global points would probably be those who made into to Ro8 GSL and/or Ro6/8 in EU, maybe one more slot for AM regional depending on the distribution of the points.
Also GSL is 3 seasons, while the online regionals are only 2.
So depending on the Timing (if 2nd GSL season is allready done before ESL Summer) the Koreans will have way more points, because 2/3 of their Regional is done allready. If the 2nd GSL season is not accounted for, they ll be at an disadvantage, because they only got 1/3 of their regional points allready earned, while everyone else got 1/2.
It just doesn t make sense if you re in the middle of the year.
They should have just given the 3 slots away to specific reasons and be done with it
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On March 22 2023 14:45 dbRic1203 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 11:12 tigera6 wrote:
Like what you do to judge the global standing, when you dont have enough tournaments to earn them. Like the first ESL Summer Global, there would only be result from GSL, ESL Regionals and a bunch of Open Cups who being dominated by the same group of top players? That means top 3 in global points would probably be those who made into to Ro8 GSL and/or Ro6/8 in EU, maybe one more slot for AM regional depending on the distribution of the points.
Also GSL is 3 seasons, while the online regionals are only 2. So depending on the Timing (if 2nd GSL season is allready done before ESL Summer) the Koreans will have way more points, because 2/3 of their Regional is done allready. If the 2nd GSL season is not accounted for, they ll be at an disadvantage, because they only got 1/3 of their regional points allready earned, while everyone else got 1/2. It just doesn t make sense if you re in the middle of the year. They should have just given the 3 slots away to specific reasons and be done with it
I'm sure they'll find a way to make it fair 
I like Swiss-Style. Works really well in CSGO
I'm just happy to get another year of awesome Starcrafts
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On March 22 2023 14:34 CicadaSC wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 13:28 mintyminmus wrote:
In its current format the non-korean Asia region with its 1 spot is just going to make the Asia regional a giant exp pool for Oliveria, who at this point is miles above his none KR regional competitors.
I would prefer the competition for 2nd place to be more meaningful but I don't think the strength of rest of the region fully justify a second spot. Its hard to balance
this is a big lol, while oliveria has to be the favorite in his region, i dont think he is head over heels above everyone else. with only 1 spot it is entirely possible he doesn't even make it.
I mean Oliveria is currently somewhere between top 5 and top 20 depending on his form and how much to account his iem run, while his noticeable competitors (Nice, Cyan, Has, Firefly, Meomaika etc) are all solidly in the "decent players but not even top 30" range. He also reached deep playoff in premiem events a couple of times besides the last iem, while the rest of the region is mostly in the "not playoff relevant" zone. Aligulac is not to be trusted entirely but a 600-ish difference in its statistical rating is quite a large gap that would kind-of qualify for "head over heals above everyone else".
I acknowledge that it is entirely possible for any stronger player to vastly underperform (or become inactive) and not qualify for a main event that he/she "should" and of course the lesser players could theoretically greatly improve and beat the favorite (pulls a 80>96), but describing my statement as "a big lol" based on the current situation is simply an incorrect oversimplification.
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On March 22 2023 17:14 Harris1st wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 14:45 dbRic1203 wrote:On March 22 2023 11:12 tigera6 wrote:
Like what you do to judge the global standing, when you dont have enough tournaments to earn them. Like the first ESL Summer Global, there would only be result from GSL, ESL Regionals and a bunch of Open Cups who being dominated by the same group of top players? That means top 3 in global points would probably be those who made into to Ro8 GSL and/or Ro6/8 in EU, maybe one more slot for AM regional depending on the distribution of the points.
Also GSL is 3 seasons, while the online regionals are only 2. So depending on the Timing (if 2nd GSL season is allready done before ESL Summer) the Koreans will have way more points, because 2/3 of their Regional is done allready. If the 2nd GSL season is not accounted for, they ll be at an disadvantage, because they only got 1/3 of their regional points allready earned, while everyone else got 1/2. It just doesn t make sense if you re in the middle of the year. They should have just given the 3 slots away to specific reasons and be done with it I'm sure they'll find a way to make it fair I like Swiss-Style. Works really well in CSGO I'm just happy to get another year of awesome Starcrafts
TIME won all but one of the SC2 CN Regionals (losing the other one in the finals). And while Has and Nice are good, I don't think they are better than TIME. Pretty sure he will dominate the new Asia Region, but the rest of the tourney should be fun
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On March 22 2023 20:02 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 17:14 Harris1st wrote:On March 22 2023 14:45 dbRic1203 wrote:On March 22 2023 11:12 tigera6 wrote:
Like what you do to judge the global standing, when you dont have enough tournaments to earn them. Like the first ESL Summer Global, there would only be result from GSL, ESL Regionals and a bunch of Open Cups who being dominated by the same group of top players? That means top 3 in global points would probably be those who made into to Ro8 GSL and/or Ro6/8 in EU, maybe one more slot for AM regional depending on the distribution of the points.
Also GSL is 3 seasons, while the online regionals are only 2. So depending on the Timing (if 2nd GSL season is allready done before ESL Summer) the Koreans will have way more points, because 2/3 of their Regional is done allready. If the 2nd GSL season is not accounted for, they ll be at an disadvantage, because they only got 1/3 of their regional points allready earned, while everyone else got 1/2. It just doesn t make sense if you re in the middle of the year. They should have just given the 3 slots away to specific reasons and be done with it I'm sure they'll find a way to make it fair I like Swiss-Style. Works really well in CSGO I'm just happy to get another year of awesome Starcrafts TIME won all but one of the SC2 CN Regionals (losing the other one in the finals). And while Has and Nice are good, I don't think they are better than TIME. Pretty sure he will dominate the new Asia Region, but the rest of the tourney should be fun
Yeah the consolidation of the Asia region and Oliveira's recent rise will certainly attract more viewers to this regional which is cool.
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The last IEM Katowice champion comes from Asia region,but they have only one seed?That means the other Asian player needs to beat Oliveira if they want to play offline game.
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On March 22 2023 22:14 Sarieli wrote:
The last IEM Katowice champion comes from Asia region,but they have only one seed?That means the other Asian player needs to beat Oliveira if they want to play offline game.
No. They can just grab one of the three spots trough global standing. I highly doubt it but I also highly doubted Oliv winning IEM
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On March 23 2023 19:09 Harris1st wrote:Show nested quote +On March 22 2023 22:14 Sarieli wrote:
The last IEM Katowice champion comes from Asia region,but they have only one seed?That means the other Asian player needs to beat Oliveira if they want to play offline game. No. They can just grab one of the three spots trough global standing. I highly doubt it but I also highly doubted Oliv winning IEM
I don't know if there are enough Open Cups in the world for that. Usually the global spots go to EU players (sometimes KR) because their regional events are worth more points even without getting super far in them.
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The Swiss system is also used in the Pro Chess League. It has the advantage that winners play winners, and losers play losers, so that in theory there are fewer mismatches after the first round. It also takes some of the chance element away. The best players should qualify.
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EPT
