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Rob Zacny

Esports Today 10/27/2015: The Blizzcon Banquet

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Esports Today October 28, 2015:

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The Blizzcon Banquet
On the eve of Blizzcon, Taylor Cocke steps in for Andrew Groen to talk with Rob about the Korea vs. Korea League of Legends final, a new generation of Hearthstone stars, the final act of Heart of the Swarm StarCraft, and DreamHack Counter-Strike.

StarCraft, Hearthstone, League of Legends

Start - League of Legends

20 - Blizzcon

 

Crib Sheet

 

SK vs Origen

Fnatic vs. KOO Tigers

Fnatic head coach on why they lost

 

An admittedly odd episode this week. A family emergency required this one to be put together at the last minute, and we were kind of winging it. Taylor did a great job filling in on a show where we didn't have a chance to do as much prep as usual. Normal service will hopefully resume next week.

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Although I'm not really a Hearthstone fan (couldn't get into it when I tried to play it) I think I totally get the appeal of watching a competitive card game. In a lot of ways, I think played at the highest level a card game is just as satisfying to watch as a perfectly executed teamfight in DOTA or League. It's the "oh shit!" factor when someone drops the perfect, unanticipated ability or card at the right moment to completely turn the tides of the game. That sort of play is always going to be intrinsically exciting to watch I think. It's what makes a board game like Cosmic Encounter so much fun to play, and although I haven't followed competitive Hearthstone at all I think the game has to have a lot of those moments if it is as popular as it is.

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I was wondering if Rob might be able to throw some light on something for me.

 

One of the teams in the Hots tournament Team Dk is supposedly made of ex Starcraft pro's i was wondering if any of them were actually any good at starcraft >_<

Their names are:

JaeHyunSniper, Noblesse,sCsC &CrazyMoving 

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If that's the same sC, then 4 of them were Code A or better. Sniper won a GSL back in 2012. None of them have made any real waves in a couple years.

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Ok so if i understand this correctly

The GSL is an elaborate tournament which is separated into two tiers:

Code S contains the top tier players who are competing against each other to win the GSL.

Code A contains players who are competing against each other to enter Code S.

So they were in general talented players but apart from sniper they were never really in contention for the top honours?

That seems about right all in all Hots just doesn't have a huge prize pool to bring in a-listers atm but i can 100% see why a well organised team of people who have strong mechanical gameplay could be seen as a low risk shot at getting what is still a very nice payday.

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Yes, that's exactly correct with regard to the different tournaments. The closest sporting analogue is the English football (soccer) system of promotion and relegation between the different tiers of leagues. Code A are professional players fighting to win their way into the Code S tournament, and Code S is the pinnacle of 1v1 starcraftery.

 

Perennial Code A players are the guys who are just below the waterline of star talent. In global terms they are world class players. Basically all Grandmaster (if that's still the highest SC ladder rank), but in terms of professional talent they are the back end of your team lineup. Looking at when they were competing, they also could have been players who found a particular thing that worked well, but patches, game releases, and general talent swell means they might have been passed by. I don't really know much about them other than I'd heard of Sniper and SC.

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