Here's the vod link: https://go.twitch.tv/videos/184454495

Overall Team SK got dominated, mostly because EM were able to kill their MErcy relatively easily since neither Jehong or Tobi are skilled enough to be in positions of power long enough throughout fights.

Regardless of Team SK losing, this just wasn't fun to watch for me. I saw some awesome plays by both teams getting outright nullified by a rez and fight lasting forever. SBB/Fl0w3r where underwhelming when their picks often just got rezed and it was a race to try and kill the Mercy before she came in to rez. The main reason why she wasn't dying was good D.Va matrix use, since you only need to shield her for about 1 sec while she's coming in, and 1 sec while she's running and to GA away after the CD is down.

Utterly unfun for me.

Well, it happened boys. I just saw Element Mystic dunk on Team South Korea 3-0 in their show match. Most of the maps were relatively close, but neither Jehong or Tobi really had the impact they needed to have while forced to be on Mercy.

This actually gives a huge advantage to Team USA who have a god Mercy on their team along with a very solid flex support since Lucio is likely to be the one to sit out. I'm not liking this Mercy patch, insane picks and mistakes are erased at the press of a button and if she ults she can even allow you to recover from two picks, a situation that happened quite a few times in this match.

All of this is on top of seeing Jehong and Tobi being forced onto a hero that's 1. Boring to watch and 2. requires much much more skill to counter play. This leads to situations where teams with the better Mercy just win by attrition, and victory is almost solely based on who kills the enemy Mercy first...if she hasn't ulted already.

With this match as another great example, I already know I'm not going to enjoy watching the OWC if this isa the iteration of Mercy we get to watch them play with.

Can't say, and as far as his previous performances I can't argue that he had been mostly underwhelming. I think some of that was partly due to the team he was in and the environment it created.

The moment he got put in a team with an appropriate amount of support he showed off what he could potentially have done, kind of like what Fleta showed, but to a lesser extent, cause as we all know, Fleta had been training 1v11 for the past year so...

As for what teams would have him their I can't say I'd know which ones. but I'm guessing either Optic, Philly or LA#2, w/o having any evidence what so ever to back up my theories.

Not sure how the current "best team" in APEX can't be considered "consistently good" though. I'm not 100% sure about NY since the Libero rumors would create an odd situation with SBB, Libero, Hooreg and Profit but with a pool of players that talented to choose from it's hard to believe they wouldn't be able to compete.

NY need a proven flex support, flex DPS (if not counting Libero) and imo a proven flex tank since Mek0 had been struggling in the later stages of his last couple of APEX runs.

I'm not quite convinced they're going to NY but if they did I'm in the opinion that it would only make the team stronger.

He's a troll.

MedalOfHonor played DPS for them pretty much all season long so his role is correct. Though, with WhoRU coming into the fold it may very well change if he stays on the squad.

I think you want Linkzr front and center though, having him as a backup to Tviq is an option but you'd be wasting a lot of talent considering what he showed us at Contenders.

With his hero pool pretty much any team could make use of him, other than SF, they need a solid hitscan player, Kappa.

t's unfortunate, but with the game being so young and that way OWL was announced, followed by the great information and tournament drought, we might end up seeing many more current Pros call it quits in the coming months if Orgs decide to not take part in Contenders.

Hopefully Blizz can help alleviate that and make participating in their game worth it for both players ans Orgs so we can have a healthy OW ecosystem overall.

Good win by BLANK, they're through to the top 8, next up is trying to get top seed.

GC Busan, masters of baiting:
Let's break it down! GC Busan baits masterfully

This will more than likely be a fight for seeding. It's hard to tell how strong AF really is right now but my best guess is a 4-0, possibly 3-1 in their favour.

A win here guarantees BLANK a spot in the playoffs, so make it happen boys!

I knew it would eventually happen but it's unfortunate that there wasn't a way to make this work. I hope most if not all of them find their way to OWL teams after what they showed at Contenders S1.

TwoEasy retired for the time being so he's not in the pool of talent out of OWL per se.

1. xQc is..well xQc himself confirming it but not announced.
2. Boombox tweeted an OWL and Kruise also confirmed on his stream that Boombox was the only one from the eUnited roster that made it into the League.
3. Unkoe and Bischu I don't know
4. Dogman said himself that he would likely not be in and is re-evaluating is future.
5. Don't know about Emongg

Apparently only Boombox got into OWL.

Clipped from Kruise's stream:
https://clips.twitch.tv/SplendidSaltyCheddarBibleThump

FeelsBadMan

It doesn't get any better the higher you go. Work on your positioning and focus on not dying, then on how much work you can get done under those conditions and you will climb.

Focusing on your playing environment holds you back since it lets you look away from yourself and what you could be doing better. That hold true for most if not all ranks until you hit your mechanical and tactical skill ceiling. Even then, you could always go past it by becoming an even better player.

Or at least that's how I try to look at the game no matter how up or down my matches are.

Yeah, a short mid-season signing period could be a thing, though I'm not sure if it will since there's apparently supposed to be a sizable off-season.

His father posted about him on reddit a little while back asking for information on becoming part of an amateur team. And he posted again as they've done a nice lil' YT vid clipping his journey to top 500.

YT Vid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8Wm7w2EDo

New Reddit thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Competitiveoverwatch/comments/77t4wl/my_journey_from_bronze_to_top_500_as_a_1314_year/

Old Reddit thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Competitiveoverwatch/comments/6x0zmx/where_would_a_14yearold_42k_rated_player_look_to/

1. It's amazing how good at the game he got, which I assume was just him understanding the game to match his level of mechanical skill.

2. His father openly supports, and is proud of, him and I think that's a huge contributing fact to how quickly he was able to "get gud". It's obvious that it goes a long way in allowing him to flourish in an admittedly difficult environment for someone of his age.

He tweeted about it:
https://twitter.com/KruiseOW/status/921820091087548417

It does look like he's sticking around for Contender S2, so I'm hoping a few teams get added for S2 and that we see more of these pro guys that didn't get a spot have their chance.

I'm also assuming a crazy amount of turnover as teams that couldn't deliver restructure their squads. We could see some crazy things happening in 2018 if OWL and Overwatch are a relative success.

So close. GCB's defence just too strong. Ma heart breaks for Runaway.

Good to see KARMA is finding some success. Hopefully they can help the region grow and eventually compete with the other ones currently dominating the OW scene.

Like #2 mentioned, Junk is hard to deal with now as Genji so unless the team is focused around giving him all the resources kind of like FaZe is you might be better off going McCree or Soldier to deal with Mercy, Junk and the occasional Doomfist.

#3 - this " beyond imagination" part feels a little bit like an exaggeration ;) just a little though

Meh, even if it is, it's probably not meant to be taken literally anyways, at least not to us from the west. But the words ring very true for the fans in KR, specially for Runaway.

That being said...GCB looks stronger considering who they had to take down and how they did it, but nonetheless, I think Runaway win 4-3.

RUNAWAY FIGHTNING!!

Nepal what competitive and so was King's Row to a certain extend, but ahq got blown out of the water on the other two maps and have now been virtually, if not officially, eliminated from playoff contention. With them failing to make it past the group stage at OPC they're going to have to really work on fixing those problems that have become apparent since their relative success finishing in the top 3 of OPC S1.

I think a rebuild of some sort wouldn't be out of the ordinary here.

Blank looking good in this one. Effectively they only need a win against MT1 to guarantee a top two spot but hopefully they can challenge AF to show the rest of the teams that they're here to play. Will be interesting to see who they match up against in the playoffs if they do make it through.

Agreed, my only question now is how is his Rein? The trend of DPS players going Tank is interesting but I don't recall any of them having a high level Rectangle Guy to go with their impressive Wintons.

Aside from that Attune looked very good, not exactly Recry levels of good on the Soldier but he does add some level of flexibility to the team for when they do want to try out different comps.

Looking forward to seeing AF match up against teams in the playoffs since they are guaranteed a top two spot no matter what happens now.

Not sure ViCi is better than BLANK though.

A look at one of LH's plays:
Let's break it down! Lunatic-Hai pulls off the counter-dive

Completely agree. It's a game of cat and mouse and who can kill the Mercy first but since she's usually well protected each gets like two rezes off per fight. Hopefully Blizz can see the issue after it being in Pro play (other than APEX challengers).

And personally I don't want to see amazing Ana/Zen or Lucio players forced onto Mercy since she's very boring to spectate and we won't see the clutch plays they would have otherwise gotten off.

I think the current meta just fits him much better. The slower pace and extended fights gives them more chances to execute their strats it would seem.

Just a reminder for anyone that wants to participate, feel free to upvote the Reddit post to help with visibility.

Like to replies seem to indicate I'm assuming MY + Eileen/Undead. Or MY + two more.

MY looking strong and a CN vs KR final is very likely imo. FW looks to be the strongest non CN or KR team and I don't think they have what it takes to take the teams from either region down.

Really Hard to tell but I think we'll see:

1. MY vs GCB finals
2. MY vs RUN finals
3. GCB vs RUN finals

Depending on who gets seeded where after the APEX finals. But hey, who knows, maybe 1246 or Mt1 will come up big and cause massive surprises.

Looking forward to seeing who can make this happen here.

Pretty hype for GCB and RUN awaiting their challengers in the playoffs, but I can also see both MVP and AF joining them there.

MVP effectively only needs one win to almost be a lock and AF's group looks like it's ripe for the taking if they've recovered from the stumble they had in this Season's APEX. Hopefully their tank play has massively improved and Arhan/Recry can once again get the space they need to dominate.

With what we saw from MY at the Seoul cup a MY vs RUN/GCB finals looks hella hype though.

EnVision looks like they're having a difficult time deciding how to approach these matches. Jaru hasn't been as impactful on the Tracer as he was on the Genji and while Tseini's Pharah is sick his other DPS heroes haven't been as effective either.

Really hoping they figure out a way to make this work in the next two matches or else they'll be going home early.

FW is the clear favorite out of the OPC teams and they've all but guaranteed their spot in the playoffs after their wins this morning (Thursday) but hopefully BLANK can find a way to win big matches here. Goes w/o saying that they have to take the match against ahq and probably MT1 since AF is hard to gauge right now.

Hoping BLANK can also make it through for a chance to show that they can also bring it to CN and KR.

The guy was obviously a master team builder, but good on him to secure his long term future instead of only focusing on the immediate.

I hope he finds professional success in whatever he chooses to do later on.

Good for him, unfortunate to see him go since I'm sure he could have found success on another squad but I can understand why he'd want to just move away from OW, specially after how he was treated by the team he gave so much to.

Best of luck to him and hopefully he's able to make it in PUBG!

The number of LAN events isn't the joke though.

Jaru looked a bit lost, feels like he hasn't seemed as confident as he was earlier in contenders when he was playing Genji. He's not a horrible Tracer but his impact definitely isn't as big as it once was.

Here's hoping they can find what works for them and stabilize, otherwise they might make an early exit from playoff contention.

Yeah and I think that's a very good thing. I've been watching APEX Challengers and seeing Mercy on every map is just not fun. The pace of the fights is off too. I feel like she's still a problem since rez is just so strong in its current form.

Hopefully the Pros can deal with her and not have her be present 100% of the time.

Someone on the Reddit post mentioned that he should be a judge, so he could keep the bench tradition going.

It's hard to see right now but if the game is successfull then 18 y/o kids could end up having a ~10 year career in OW then move on to other things or other roles in the game.

Right now though there isn't enough space for everyone at the top level so players in their mid to late 20s that aren't finding success need to evaluate the risk/rewards of staying in the scene.

He's obviously a smart guy, glad he's kept himself options for the "after Overwatch" period of his life after.

yeah, #TrueFeelsBadMan

The winner of this match moves on to Super Week so it has HUGE implications...NC FATCATS FIGHTING!!!

Edit: Welp, they came close, wasn't quite enough to make it through.

He posted a TwitLonger about it:
http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sq8s0h

Unfortunate to see him go, I was hoping they could get picked up for Contenders S2 and maybe get more OWL chances in the 2nd season...

Agreed, looked brutal but realistically this could bode well for the Foxe's future in a post LH/LWB/C9DK Apex world.

My head says GCB but my heart says RUN, so I think Runaway will win 4-3...RUNAWAY FIGHTING!!!

The logo reminds me of radioshack...I just can't bring myself to like it. So I have no choice, once again I must....50 DKP MINUS!!!