Hello,
I'm trying to make sense of the 4 league formats that Overwatch has and condense their structure into a list of bullet points so that I can follow the scene more easily. Below you can see what I have come up with. Please correct any mistakes, add if something important is missing and if possible provide answers for the questions that I have put into parentheses. Please also tell me if I'm being silly because there is an easier/better way to follow the scene already.
||| Overwatch Open Division |||
[The very first Season started Sat, 08 Jul 2017, 18:00 GMT]
[Regular Season]
- Anyone can participate if in a team and Master Rank or higher (skill rating 3500+)
- Sign up here:
https://www.faceit.com/en/blizzard - Teams play Best of 7 maps in each matchup
- Default match date & time: Every Saturday, 19:00 CEST
- Matches may be rescheduled to start between 17:00 - 21:00 CEST on Thursday-Saturday.
- Lasts for 6 Weekends in total
[Playoffs]
- Top 8-16 teams advance to playoffs
- Teams play Best of 5 maps, except for Finals, which is Best of 7
- Playoffs happen on the 7th Weekend of the Season
- Playoffs are played over the course of 2 days (Sat/Sun)
- Prize money is $50.00 Blizzard Balance for 1st Place
- No matches on 8th Weekend
- New Season starts on the 9th Weekend
||| Overwatch Contenders: |||
[The very first regular Season started Sat, August 19 2017]
[There was a test Season "zero" in the months before that]
[Regular Season]
- 8 best Overwatch teams in each region (how is this determined? are these the teams that competed in the Open Division?)
- Matches played every Weekend (Sat/Sun)
- 6 Weekends of matches
- 7th Weekend no matches
- Top 4 teams of each region advance to playoffs
[Playoffs]
- 8th Weekend
- Prize money of $100K per region
||| Overwatch World Cup: |||
- Average skill rating of top 100 players from each nation determines which countries qualify (is this based on the Skill Rating of the Competitive Ladder or/and related to the Open Divison and Contenders results?)
- 32 countries can qualify and then move on to Group Stages
- An elected committee in each nation crafts a roster to represent the nation (Who is this elected committee, who elects them?)
[Group Stages]
[Top 32]
- 8 groups of 4
- Compete at group stage events in various countries
- The top 2 of each group move on to Top 16
[Top 16 Playoffs]
- The top two nations of each group play against eachother
- The winners move on to the Finals
[Top 8 Finals @ BlizzCon]
- No prize money
- Claim title of best players in the world
||| Overwatch Leage: |||
[Preseason]
- Early December
- Played at Blizzard Arena Los Angeles
[Regular Season]
- Played at Blizzard Arena
- Every Wednesday through Saturday
- January till June
- 4 Stages of 5 Weeks with 1 Week Break between each Stage
- Sunday of Week 5 of each Stage is the Title Match for Bonus Prize Money
[Postseason]
- Best teams (how many??) advance to playoffs
- Playoffs happen in mid July
- The Grand Finals happen end of July
- Winner received OWL trophy + $1 Million bonus
[All-Star Weekend]
- Weekend in mid August
- Community's favourite players (how is this determined?)
- Funny game rules, unexpected challenges
[No matches until Preason time in December]
(Can we expect the format of the Open Division, Contenders, League and World Cup to remain like this? Or can we expect a drastic change in structure like the one from Contenders Season Zero to Season One?)
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