$10,000 EGCtv Stormgate Open Viewing Guide
This weekend marks the first time players will compete in a tournament with money on the line in Stormgate's history, and that means there's a ton of story lines going into the event. Lets get into them
Starcraft vs The Rest
One of the biggest questions going into tomorrow (and Saturday and Sunday) is just how good the Katowice qualifier players will be. Dark, Clem, SKillous, Kelazhur, Elazer, and Probe will all play in a Round Robin format to determine which four will move on to the true tournament - that means 15 Best-of-3's! Five players (Dark, Clem, SKillous, Kelazhur, and Elazer) are in the bracket because they were involved with IEM Katowice 2024, and Probe was included due to being left out of the qualifier bracket last week - lucky him!
Probe (likely playing Vanguard) is a well-known face in the playtest discord, offering build advice and play suggestions as he works to single-handedly drive the meta forward. Elazer's Infernal account is currently #4 on the Stormgate Leaderboard with a staggering record of 141-29 - but he doesn't have a significant number of matches against the likes of PartinG or LucifroN and he does have a losing record against Mixu (4-8). The other's are a bit of a mystery - Skillous appears to have played about 50 games as Infernals, but the rest of the group is a bit of a mystery. This begs the question - how much will Starcraft skill carry over into Stormgate with limited prep? Will players like Probe or Elazer with significant experience in the game dominate, or will Clem's raw skill carry him through? Even if they qualify in through the Katowice Qualifier, how will they fare against the 4 players that qualified through the ladder and the other 8 players from the qualifiers last weekend?
Can anyone stop PartinG?
From the leaderboard alone, it's clear that one player stands head and shoulders above the rest of the beta - and his name is PartinG. The Starcraft 2 legend known for his blink micro and the invention of the soul train has been grinding hard in Stormgate from the moment he got his hands on the game in the pre-alpha. Such was his dedication to the game, he scheduled internal tournament games around his military obligations, waking up early or staying up late to compete. This has born fruit - he sits #1 on the Stormgate Leaderboard with a lofty 343-14 winrate and stands 300 MMR above Lucifron.
PartinG has a target on his back, but no one really knows how he's going to play. While PartinG was a mainstay of the competitive circuit in the closed tests, he's played his cards incredibly close to the chest since the beta opened up. He hasn't streamed Stormgate, he hasn't played in any small tournaments, and the only replays that exist of him playing are in the hands of those who played him on the ladder - and I doubt they are sharing. I've heard rumors of groundbreaking strats in the works (he discovered 9 flaming imps killed a command post and immediately got them nerfed, for example). He is by far the impressive player of the beta, and that means he'll have a massive target on his back. Can he live up to expectations?
How will the Stormgate purists hold on?
PartinG and the Katowice players are probably the biggest story lines going into the championship weekend, but the 8 players who qualified through a grueling 512-player bracket deserve special mention as well. They're a mixture of SC2 up-and-comers (NightPhoenix, Exostriker, Erik, Highdra, Snoxtar), WC3 Professional players (Krolu), and a couple GM SC2 players (Kel and Bosse). Erik was the lone Vanguard player to survive the qualifier bracket, Highdra has a tendency to do very well in young RTS scenes (he's the best Gates of Pyre player!) - and the rest have a tremendous opportunity to make a name for themselves in a very new scene. How far will experience in Stormgate carry these hopefuls against players who have dedicated the last ten years of their life to playing RTS professionally? Only time will tell.
How much will the new patch affect things?
Only one Vanguard player qualified through the open bracket last weekend, but the games on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday will take place on a new patch meant to take away some of the strength Infernal players have in the early game and give them a couple more tools to deal with Vanguard late game. Will it work? It's unclear, but Infernal and Vanguard win rates have trended much closer to 50/50 since the patch dropped on Tuesday. There's still a lot to explore, but the game seems fairly balanced going into the games this weekend
How to Watch
Each broadcast day will start at 1500 GMT (10 AM ET, 7 AM PT, 16 CET) on EGCtv's twitch and youtube channels. Friday is the 6 player Round Robin for Katowice players, Saturday is the Ro16 and Ro8, and Sunday sees a champion crowned!
