EPT
IEM Katowice 2024 - RO24 groups announced
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Waxangel
United States33388 Posts
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kennytennyson2
31 Posts
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dysenterymd
1237 Posts
Group B is a bit of a rough draw for Clem, even if I think his TvT has improved enough to be favored over Oliveira and Bunny. Clem and Cure should still easily advance though. Group C is an amazing draw for Serral, second place seems pretty clearly Byun favored, and I can see any of the remaining four players snagging the third spot. Hope Firefly shows up big offline, his playstyle is a lot of fun. Group D is ridiculous. Since Reynor is probably going to peak for Katowice and herO has been week offline I think Maru/Dark/Reynor are getting out. I think we'll have 1 toss in the playoffs from group C. Really wish Classic had qualified. | ||
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rwala
297 Posts
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tigera6
3397 Posts
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darklycid
3510 Posts
On January 18 2024 00:52 kennytennyson2 wrote: I think ShowTime getting group D is super tough, really unlucky to be getting the group of death Idk why but he always gets groups like this it feels like so he should be used to it by now  | ||
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Waxangel
United States33388 Posts
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MJG
United Kingdom1054 Posts
On January 18 2024 00:53 dysenterymd wrote: I think we'll have 1 toss in the playoffs from group C. Really wish Classic had qualified. The only Protoss that I can see making it out of their group is whoever gets the best of the mirror matches in Group C. In Groups A and B, Trigger and Stats are unlikely to finish anywhere other than bottom. In Group D, I'd definitely expect Dark, Maru and Reynor to progress. | ||
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Argonauta
Spain4948 Posts
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kennytennyson2
31 Posts
On January 18 2024 01:10 darklycid wrote: Idk why but he always gets groups like this it feels like so he should be used to it by now It's unfortunate cuz he would be an even stronger contender in group A and C rather than D | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 18 2024 00:54 rwala wrote: Group D...WOW! It's too bad they don't do these things like the old GSL-style group draws, those were highly entertaining and also introduced some interesting game theory and player selection intrigue. Feels like ESL doesn't like the concept of "group draws" at all, not only in SC2 but in general. Never understood why they don't make more of a spectacle out of it, if you compare it to LoL. The fact that this time we get to see how the seeding was done is probably the most upfront ESL ever was in these :D | ||
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tigera6
3397 Posts
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Xamo
Spain880 Posts
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Weavel
Finland9221 Posts
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Fango
United Kingdom8987 Posts
All the groups have a clear 3 favourites, except maybe D depending on how good herO looks. | ||
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Cricketer12
United States13974 Posts
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Kot-34rus
1 Post
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Kreuger
Sweden721 Posts
On January 18 2024 04:51 Cricketer12 wrote: How the hell did Group D happen... seeding and luck of the draw | ||
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argonautdice
Canada2719 Posts
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yezzir88
31 Posts
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Nakajin
Canada8989 Posts
Hoping for Showtime to shake things up a bit, he really has some awefull luck with draws. Also, I don't want to scare anyone, but the no-toss playoffs are quite possible. | ||
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Waxangel
United States33388 Posts
On January 18 2024 06:30 argonautdice wrote: This is the highest non-World championship prize pool tournament in the history of SC2 due to changes to the ESL circuit structure. "World championship" is a completely arbitrary distinction anyway. Plenty of tournaments that call themselves "world championships" or "world cups" or whatever but don't get treated as such (ESWC, GSL world/global championship, many of the IEM world championships in the past). This Katowice will be a "world championship" as far as fans and history is concerned. | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 18 2024 10:53 Waxangel wrote: "World championship" is a completely arbitrary distinction anyway. Plenty of tournaments that call themselves "world championships" or "world cups" or whatever but don't get treated as such (ESWC, GSL world/global championship, many of the IEM world championships in the past). This Katowice will be a "world championship" as far as fans and history is concerned. It depends what the term is supposed to mean. For me (and as I applied it in my HoF back then) the "World Championship" is the final event of the 'Year'/Circuit, the culmination of everything. Katowice is clearly not that, so I personally don't count it as a "World Championship". Still the second highest rated tournament of course, but not quite on the same level as the EPT Championship, whatever it will be in the end. | ||
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tigera6
3397 Posts
On January 18 2024 12:55 Balnazza wrote: It depends what the term is supposed to mean. For me (and as I applied it in my HoF back then) the "World Championship" is the final event of the 'Year'/Circuit, the culmination of everything. Katowice is clearly not that, so I personally don't count it as a "World Championship". Still the second highest rated tournament of course, but not quite on the same level as the EPT Championship, whatever it will be in the end. So IEM only counted as World Championship-tier when it was announced as such during the EPT run, but it doesnt before and after that run? Meanwhile the prizepool and format of the tournament staying pretty much the same the whole time? | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 18 2024 14:11 tigera6 wrote: So IEM only counted as World Championship-tier when it was announced as such during the EPT run, but it doesnt before and after that run? Meanwhile the prizepool and format of the tournament staying pretty much the same the whole time? Yes. That is atleast how I always thought about it. Doesn't mean Katowice is "just another tournament", it has its own flair and as I said, it probably is always the 2nd most important tournament of the year. But most iterations, including the next one, are just not "THE" World Championship. But again, when I did this a while back I catched huge flak for that kind of distinction, so I'm probably in the minority on that. (It also immediately turned into "you just don't count them so Rogue is not on top!!1", which was kind of funny, though completly wrong) | ||
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Philippe
351 Posts
On January 18 2024 15:30 Balnazza wrote: Yes. That is atleast how I always thought about it. Doesn't mean Katowice is "just another tournament", it has its own flair and as I said, it probably is always the 2nd most important tournament of the year. But most iterations, including the next one, are just not "THE" World Championship. But again, when I did this a while back I catched huge flak for that kind of distinction, so I'm probably in the minority on that. (It also immediately turned into "you just don't count them so Rogue is not on top!!1", which was kind of funny, though completly wrong) Ultimately for me, the status of the event is what ESL ultimately decides when it starts, not how viewers/users personally feel about it. Whether it changed from when it was initially announced is not relevant there. | ||
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WombaT
Northern Ireland25321 Posts
Pleasantly surprised to see Stats in the mixup given he hasn’t really got going since returning, hopefully he can pull something out of the bag! | ||
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watchlulu
Germany474 Posts
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Akio
Finland1838 Posts
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Poopi
France12880 Posts
On January 18 2024 12:55 Balnazza wrote: It depends what the term is supposed to mean. For me (and as I applied it in my HoF back then) the "World Championship" is the final event of the 'Year'/Circuit, the culmination of everything. Katowice is clearly not that, so I personally don't count it as a "World Championship". Still the second highest rated tournament of course, but not quite on the same level as the EPT Championship, whatever it will be in the end. I mean both this Katowice and the "real" World Championship are Saudi money now that ESL is owned by it anyways, right? For me it will still be a World Championship the same way there were two World Championships when BlizzCon was still on: Katowice early in the year, and BlizzCon at the end of the year. | ||
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Edpayasugo
United Kingdom2215 Posts
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Haighstrom
United Kingdom199 Posts
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conormcgregor156
22 Posts
On January 18 2024 19:33 Haighstrom wrote: How did Stats get more points than Classic? That is insane to me To play this tournament, regional qualifiers were made. I suppose that the points will be taken into account in the other World Cup that will be played in a few months. | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 18 2024 19:33 Haighstrom wrote: How did Stats get more points than Classic? That is insane to me The EPT standing was just used for seeding, players had to qualify for this event. And Classic managed to bump out in three qualifiers somehow. But it is funny how every qualified player is in the Top 30 and then there is Stats just chilling out | ||
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Argonauta
Spain4948 Posts
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Durnuu
13320 Posts
On January 19 2024 16:56 Argonauta wrote: Why does winning ESL Summer Europe is 1000 EPT points and winning a GSL is 800? I assume it's because there are only 2 tournaments (Winter / Summer), vs 3 GSLs. | ||
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Argonauta
Spain4948 Posts
On January 19 2024 17:04 Durnuu wrote: I assume it's because there are only 2 tournaments (Winter / Summer), vs 3 GSLs. if that was the case then winning Americas or Asia would also be 1000 | ||
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Harris1st
Germany6929 Posts
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Harris1st
Germany6929 Posts
On January 18 2024 07:19 yezzir88 wrote: Serral gets another hilariously easy group (for him). What a surprise. Call me when he gets into a group like group D (where he would most likely not make it out) lol nice bait To the World Championship discussion: We dont't know anything about this summer tournament in Riyadh yet. Gamers8 '23 was invite only and definitely did not count as a WC title. It was more like the WESG tournaments. So for me this IEM Kato '24 will crown the WC of the year 2023 (since that is the year the points accumulate). What happens next remains to be seen. | ||
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Philippe
351 Posts
On January 19 2024 17:07 Argonauta wrote: if that was the case then winning Americas or Asia would also be 1000 How regions are viewed inside the EPT circuit also play a factor into it. Look at how Astrea dominates the NA region, and he still barely has more points than a MaxPax who skips offline (but catches up because of the open cups) In any case unequal point distribution has been the case since 2020. | ||
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Yoshi Kirishima
United States10343 Posts
On January 18 2024 07:19 yezzir88 wrote: Serral gets another hilariously easy group (for him). What a surprise. Call me when he gets into a group like group D (where he would most likely not make it out) Because he's got the #1 seed. So that means the next best player in his group is going to be the weakest 2nd best player of the group out of all the groups. That's what he's rewarded for getting #1. | ||
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Argonauta
Spain4948 Posts
On January 19 2024 19:12 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: Because he's got the #1 seed. So that means the next best player in his group is going to be the weakest 2nd best player of the group out of all the groups. That's what he's rewarded for getting #1. Yes, but ByuN and Astrea also get incredibly easy groups and are lower seeds than #2 and #3. I would say that #3 seed (Dark) got the worst "reward" for being a high seed. Clearly a different pairing system would have been fairer. | ||
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TossHeroes
281 Posts
Anyone who thinks group D is needs to have their head shaked herO has been playing absolutely trash for a year now Maru dark Reynor will get out quite comfortably and easily | ||
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TossHeroes
281 Posts
On January 18 2024 08:57 Nakajin wrote: Wow group D... Hoping for Showtime to shake things up a bit, he really has some awefull luck with draws. Also, I don't want to scare anyone, but the no-toss playoffs are quite possible. Get that negatively out of here Our boy stats and skillious will make it out of the groups | ||
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Yoshi Kirishima
United States10343 Posts
On January 19 2024 20:11 Argonauta wrote: Yes, but ByuN and Astrea also get incredibly easy groups and are lower seeds than #2 and #3. I would say that #3 seed (Dark) got the worst "reward" for being a high seed. Clearly a different pairing system would have been fairer. The concept of this way of seeding makes sense, the only thing is that it depends on how players ended up being ranked and how many EPT points they got. So in terms of the EPT points, these are the players who performed the strongest at EPT points and thus, whether we think seed #4 is weaker than say seed #10 might be true, but in an objective sense they didn't perform as well in the EPT tournaments and thus it would be reasonable to predict how they might perform in this EPT tournament. I'm not sure what other pairing system you could use that would make it fairer, unless you were to do something like GSL group picks, but then players wouldn't pick based on EPT points. Or if the TOs organized it based on who they thought was strongest or would perform the best, but then there'd be much less incentive/reason to trying to perform well in the EPT circuit. In the end, IMO it's still better than completely random. Though i honestly wouldn't mind completely random either for tournaments (just not for a circuit finale). Seeding will never be perfectly fair, but just like how in GSL groups it would be very risky to try to strategically lose a match in the winners side to try to face an easier opponent and advance through losers, you similarly have a better chance at having an easy group if you try hard to get a high EPT rank than if you don't care as much. In this case Serral had a much more likely chance of having a weak 2nd player, and lower seeds have a chance of still being lucky but less so. | ||
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JJH777
United States4407 Posts
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Waxangel
United States33388 Posts
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rwala
297 Posts
On January 20 2024 00:29 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: The concept of this way of seeding makes sense, the only thing is that it depends on how players ended up being ranked and how many EPT points they got. So in terms of the EPT points, these are the players who performed the strongest at EPT points and thus, whether we think seed #4 is weaker than say seed #10 might be true, but in an objective sense they didn't perform as well in the EPT tournaments and thus it would be reasonable to predict how they might perform in this EPT tournament. I'm not sure what other pairing system you could use that would make it fairer, unless you were to do something like GSL group picks, but then players wouldn't pick based on EPT points. Or if the TOs organized it based on who they thought was strongest or would perform the best, but then there'd be much less incentive/reason to trying to perform well in the EPT circuit. In the end, IMO it's still better than completely random. Though i honestly wouldn't mind completely random either for tournaments (just not for a circuit finale). Seeding will never be perfectly fair, but just like how in GSL groups it would be very risky to try to strategically lose a match in the winners side to try to face an easier opponent and advance through losers, you similarly have a better chance at having an easy group if you try hard to get a high EPT rank than if you don't care as much. In this case Serral had a much more likely chance of having a weak 2nd player, and lower seeds have a chance of still being lucky but less so. I said it earlier, look at how GSL used to select groups, something like that would be essentially self-balancing and fair (maybe ditch the #1 seed swap though, that made things a little weird). | ||
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tigera6
3397 Posts
Group A: #4 - #2 - #4 - #3 - #2 - #2 Group B: #2- #1 - #3 - #2 - #4 - #4 Group C: #1 - #4 - #2 - #4 - #3 - #3 Group D: #3 - #3 - #1 - #1 - #1 - #1 If its seeded, then make it seeded balance all the way through. Edit: Btw, can somebody confirm if the last round of the group stage will be Bo3 like usual or it will be Bo5? | ||
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Captain Peabody
United States3110 Posts
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 20 2024 18:16 tigera6 wrote: There is just some weird randomness in term of the players grouping from each "tier", and this has been an ongoing issue from previous IEM tournament. Serral is #1 in his tier (also #1 overall), got matched with mostly #4 an #3 of the next tiers, while Dark and Maru got matched with all the #1 is just bizarre. Group A: #4 - #2 - #4 - #3 - #2 - #2 Group B: #2- #1 - #3 - #2 - #4 - #4 Group C: #1 - #4 - #2 - #4 - #3 - #3 Group D: #3 - #3 - #1 - #1 - #1 - #1 If its seeded, then make it seeded balance all the way through. Edit: Btw, can somebody confirm if the last round of the group stage will be Bo3 like usual or it will be Bo5? While I would highly encourage ESL to finally do a fcking Groupdraw-Show like Riot, it is also not something that *can*t happened. Have you ever tried to roll groups with a dice? It is baffling how often you get results in a row you thought couldn't happen. As for your question: Why would the last round of Group Stage be Bo5? This is Round-Robin, not Swiss or GSL | ||
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tigera6
3397 Posts
On January 21 2024 00:32 Balnazza wrote: While I would highly encourage ESL to finally do a fcking Groupdraw-Show like Riot, it is also not something that *can*t happened. Have you ever tried to roll groups with a dice? It is baffling how often you get results in a row you thought couldn't happen. As for your question: Why would the last round of Group Stage be Bo5? This is Round-Robin, not Swiss or GSL Not sure what you said have anything to do with my question, I fully realize its Round Robin, but its usually Bo3 in all rounds of the group. But I recently check the ESL webpage and its said Bo5 for Ro5 of the group stage. That could just be a typo but thats why I wanted to confirm. | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 21 2024 01:15 tigera6 wrote: Not sure what you said have anything to do with my question, I fully realize its Round Robin, but its usually Bo3 in all rounds of the group. But I recently check the ESL webpage and its said Bo5 for Ro5 of the group stage. That could just be a typo but thats why I wanted to confirm. That bit of information would have been helpful. You have to admit, without context asking "is the last round of Round-Robin Bo5?" seems a bit...random. | ||
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LostUsername100
92 Posts
Why not run swiss tournaments? Seems the Champion's league is doing it, would also fix issues with groups like group D. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss-system_tournament | ||
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Balnazza
Germany1177 Posts
On January 23 2024 02:20 LostUsername100 wrote: Group stages are almost worthless for helping the eventual winner, when you have single elimination for the rest of the tournament (all this chatter about group seedings is pretty pointless). Why not run swiss tournaments? Seems the Champion's league is doing it, would also fix issues with groups like group D. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss-system_tournament ESL already uses plenty of Swiss for their tournaments (yes yes, it isn't "true swiss"). Or are you proposing to hold the entire tournament in Swiss? That's super-anticlimatic and also probably more games than ESL is willing to do. And I don't think the Champions League is using a Swiss System? They are using some very weird variation of Round-Robin, that is basically an americanisation of the system, meaning not every team plays against each other team the same amount of time - which is utter bs tbh. | ||
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