A detailed announcement of the $100,000 tournament being held in Cologne later this year should have sent ripples of pure ecstasy through the competitive community. Instead the unveiling of the ESL Atlantic Showdown ruleset prompted a backlash from the professional community, who were disappointed at the first Overwatch Major's format and the hint towards Blizzard's vision of the future. Nevertheless, as a spectator this promises to be a truly phenomenal event as every team in Overwatch plans to fight tooth and nail for the top spot.

Such a situation could only happen in Overwatch, where the scene has yet to go through its teething stages but is about to be thrown in with the big dogs competing for six-figure prizepots. The primary announcement a fortnight ago whipped the pro scene into activity, as the first major trophy in the title's early history took shape.

The ESL Atlantic Showdown will see eight teams go head-to-head in Cologne, Germany at Gamescom, as four teams from North America meet four teams from Europe in a LAN setting for $100,000. The qualifiers for the event have recently opened and run all throughout July. The Qualifier Finals will run in August, as 16 prospective teams are whittled down to 4 from each region. The entire event should be an amazing showcase of competitive Overwatch and will boost the game's professional potential onto the global scene.

However the professional players are far from singing the praises of ESL and Blizzard for this event, despite the dollar bills falling from the sky.

For the past few months, the pro scene has been using its feedback and leverage to argue for more classically competitive rulesets: tournaments have been asked to use Hero Limit 1, remove the most unbalanced maps from the pool, use map vetoes for the selection process, and determine scores using stopwatch. The vast majority of these settings are based on previous history in other competitive games and are designed to prioritise competitive integrity for the tournaments and players.

Ruleset

The rules, when they were announced recently for the ESL Atlantic Showdown, ran contrary to this trend. ESL has planned to base its rules heavily on the upcoming competitive mode from Blizzard, and the official rules stated:

For the qualifiers. we’re planning to base the format on the new Competitive Play mode being added to the game soon. The mode is currently being publicly tested—look for an official announcement from Blizzard shortly, but if you want to read up on the latest information from the PTR, check out Blizzard’s recent forum post.

We’ll be using the Competitive Play format for all map types, with the exception of the coin flip mechanic mentioned in the post above. To resolve ties, teams will instead go to a single point on a predetermined Control map and decide the winner of the round there.

One goal is to see the whole variety of maps and game modes Overwatch has to offer. To make this happen the map pool will consist of a weekly six map rotation featuring at least one of each game mode (Escort, Assault, Hybrid and Control). There will also be no map vetoes - all matches will rather have a predetermined first map and after that it will be the loser’s choice what map is being played next.

It’s important to note that teams will have the freedom to craft team compositions as they like with no hero restrictions or limits. Blizzard and ESL see the option to stack heroes as a core game concept and central to the strategy of Overwatch, as it gives teams the most room to be flexible and adaptable.

Professional players are most upset by the lack of map vetoes in the ruleset. Whilst Hero Limit 0 was always seen as a sticking point for Blizzard, the usage of random maps and loser's picks in the tournament is a huge detriment to competitive play. The argument made by ESL and Blizzard is that the tournament should showcase what the game has to offer, but by removing map vetoes from the equation and having the first map be random smacks of a blatant disregard for the competition itself.

This move by ESL (and Blizzard, whose competitive mode the ruleset is based on) goes in the opposite direction of the pro scene in a number of ways. While the players currently have no leverage in how large tournaments like this structure their competition, they have expressed their disappointment publicly at the current ruleset and what it says about the vision Blizzard have for competitive Overwatch.

Watch

If you’re a spectator though, is there any reason to be alarmed?

Blizzard don’t think so, and neither do I, as the competition is incredibly fierce and the tournament should still be enjoyable. The lack of Hero Limits is likely to turn the tide back towards unrestricted play as teams clamour for any opportunity to practise in smaller cups, and whether or not you think this is a good thing for the future of Overwatch it makes the short-term unpredictable.

The random map element will annoy teams and potentially create unfair situations, but as a pure spectator these situation often cause more drama and interest in the tournament. Perhaps we’ll even see teams deliberately practising and picking the wildcard Assault maps as a tactical ploy? The tournament’s map pick system seems to favour the underdog in many situations and should lead to tight games across a series.

The competition could not be more intense. In both North America and Europe the top 4 teams are constantly receiving challenges and having to adapt to avoid being usurped. Seeing them fight at the first major LAN tournament in the history of Overwatch will be truly momentous for the title as an esport.

All of the games, from Qualifiers to the Grand Final, will be broadcast on the ESL Overwatch Twitch channel and casted by Leigh “Deman” Smith, Jason Kaplan, and Mitch “Ubershouts” Leslie.