Hello everyone!
For almost 2 months the amazing guys from managrind have been running hearthstone beta tournaments (even before that on cockatrice). Every saturnday they run NA tournaments (actually this is Americas and not NA, so if you are brazilian like me you can particiate) and on sundays they host EU tournaments. So far 7 NA tournaments have been done, and I think it is a good time to review them. I'll make a really short review of each tournament and then in the end analize the overral results.
For almost 2 months the amazing guys from managrind have been running hearthstone beta tournaments (even before that on cockatrice). Every saturnday they run NA tournaments (actually this is Americas and not NA, so if you are brazilian like me you can particiate) and on sundays they host EU tournaments. So far 7 NA tournaments have been done, and I think it is a good time to review them. I'll make a really short review of each tournament and then in the end analize the overral results.
1st NA Tournament (08/24)
12 participants - 4 rounds of swiss + top 4
1st place - Knight
2nd place - Noxious
3rd place - Zoiaxas
4th place - Ezmod
Congrats to Knight on winning the first hearthstone beta tournament ever! I was lucky enough to participate in this tournament, and I want to point out that the organisers did a great job. The tournament went very smoothly, almost no delays, and everyone was having a good time. The small number of players did help out make everything work out. Since most participants were experienced managrind players with cockatrice tournament experience, I think it was a very hard to get wins. Also, I believe this was one week after the release of beta, so card availability was an issue to a lot of players, including me.
2nd NA Tournament (08/31)
26 participants - 5 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Spajj
2nd place - HearthstonePower
3rd place - Wynta
4th place - Rorix (=D)
Top 8 - Ezrabar, Holysnowva, Mand, Jotto
The second tournament was a huge success in my opinion. Double the amount of players allowed 5 rounds of swiss plus a top 8, crowning Spajj as the champion. The increase in participation was unexpected for me, since not many beta keys where available at that time. Great job managrind! My first and only top 8 playing a warlock aggro deck!
3rd NA Tournament (09/07)
35 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - ZenStyle
2nd place - SnakeBasket
3rd place - Chu8
4th place - Spajj
Top 8 - Knight, Reynad, Montanx, Bryansc
Third tournament and the players keep coming. Spajj and Knight make another top 8, which will be a trend. A problem with this tournament was that 8 players were tied at 4 - 2 records, and only 4 of them managed to make top 8. I would like to see more rounds in future tournaments, but the platform used to run them does not allow that.
4th NA Tournament (09/14)
43 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Sar
2nd place - Jotto
3rd place - Spajj
4th place - Bryansc
Top 8 - Magicmatz, Trolflcopter, Holysnowva, Credible
Once again the number of participants increases. At this time, a lot more beta keys were available, and i guess the tournaments became popular in the community. Spajj and Jotto make another top 8, and Bryansc makes his second top 8 in two tournaments played. Congrats to Sar on the win with a paladin deck!
5th NA Tournament (09/21)
42 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Spoh
2nd place - Jrax
3rd place - Aimlessgun
4th place - Eromezis
Top 8 - ColdandUgly, Souzek, Jotto, Drakonic_Rage
Tournament number 5 and the participants seems to have stabilised. 40 + players is a nice competitive field, even more so when the players improve their gameplay and collection. Jotto makes another top 8 and Spoh wins the whole thing!
6th NA Tournament (09/28)
26 participants - 5 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Knight
2nd place - Spajj
3rd place - Epictankz
4th place - Dienewb
Top 8 - Sorgaith, Moonstar, Spacewizard, Doomtop
This was a weird tournament since only 26 players showed up. I was not there so I'm not sure what might have caused that. Knight and Spajj make all the way to the finals!
7th NA Tournament (09/14)
39 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Moonstar
2nd place - Jotto
3rd place - Spoh
4th place - Hybris
Top 8 - DecisionMusic, Necrogen, Knight, Dirtysecrets
That was the first tournament after the wipe and patch. Card availability and the card changes were a factor, and I would like to say it was very fun! The field was very diverse, and so was the top 8, indicating that Blizzard did a great job balancing the classes. The number of participants return to it's peak. Again the number of rounds was a problem since there were 9 players at 4-2 record, and only 3 made top 8. Six players out of top 8 on tiebreakers is not desirable, even more so on a 39 players tournament. Jotto and Knight make another top 8, and Moonstar wins!
12 participants - 4 rounds of swiss + top 4
1st place - Knight
2nd place - Noxious
3rd place - Zoiaxas
4th place - Ezmod
Congrats to Knight on winning the first hearthstone beta tournament ever! I was lucky enough to participate in this tournament, and I want to point out that the organisers did a great job. The tournament went very smoothly, almost no delays, and everyone was having a good time. The small number of players did help out make everything work out. Since most participants were experienced managrind players with cockatrice tournament experience, I think it was a very hard to get wins. Also, I believe this was one week after the release of beta, so card availability was an issue to a lot of players, including me.
2nd NA Tournament (08/31)
26 participants - 5 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Spajj
2nd place - HearthstonePower
3rd place - Wynta
4th place - Rorix (=D)
Top 8 - Ezrabar, Holysnowva, Mand, Jotto
The second tournament was a huge success in my opinion. Double the amount of players allowed 5 rounds of swiss plus a top 8, crowning Spajj as the champion. The increase in participation was unexpected for me, since not many beta keys where available at that time. Great job managrind! My first and only top 8 playing a warlock aggro deck!
3rd NA Tournament (09/07)
35 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - ZenStyle
2nd place - SnakeBasket
3rd place - Chu8
4th place - Spajj
Top 8 - Knight, Reynad, Montanx, Bryansc
Third tournament and the players keep coming. Spajj and Knight make another top 8, which will be a trend. A problem with this tournament was that 8 players were tied at 4 - 2 records, and only 4 of them managed to make top 8. I would like to see more rounds in future tournaments, but the platform used to run them does not allow that.
4th NA Tournament (09/14)
43 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Sar
2nd place - Jotto
3rd place - Spajj
4th place - Bryansc
Top 8 - Magicmatz, Trolflcopter, Holysnowva, Credible
Once again the number of participants increases. At this time, a lot more beta keys were available, and i guess the tournaments became popular in the community. Spajj and Jotto make another top 8, and Bryansc makes his second top 8 in two tournaments played. Congrats to Sar on the win with a paladin deck!
5th NA Tournament (09/21)
42 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Spoh
2nd place - Jrax
3rd place - Aimlessgun
4th place - Eromezis
Top 8 - ColdandUgly, Souzek, Jotto, Drakonic_Rage
Tournament number 5 and the participants seems to have stabilised. 40 + players is a nice competitive field, even more so when the players improve their gameplay and collection. Jotto makes another top 8 and Spoh wins the whole thing!
6th NA Tournament (09/28)
26 participants - 5 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Knight
2nd place - Spajj
3rd place - Epictankz
4th place - Dienewb
Top 8 - Sorgaith, Moonstar, Spacewizard, Doomtop
This was a weird tournament since only 26 players showed up. I was not there so I'm not sure what might have caused that. Knight and Spajj make all the way to the finals!
7th NA Tournament (09/14)
39 participants - 6 rounds of swiss + top 8
1st place - Moonstar
2nd place - Jotto
3rd place - Spoh
4th place - Hybris
Top 8 - DecisionMusic, Necrogen, Knight, Dirtysecrets
That was the first tournament after the wipe and patch. Card availability and the card changes were a factor, and I would like to say it was very fun! The field was very diverse, and so was the top 8, indicating that Blizzard did a great job balancing the classes. The number of participants return to it's peak. Again the number of rounds was a problem since there were 9 players at 4-2 record, and only 3 made top 8. Six players out of top 8 on tiebreakers is not desirable, even more so on a 39 players tournament. Jotto and Knight make another top 8, and Moonstar wins!
Participation
On average, the NA tournaments host 31.7 players. So far 118 different players have joined one or more managrind tournaments. On average each player participated in 1.9 tournaments, which indicates a great rotation of players. I don't know for sure why most people have joined only one or two tournaments, but I can say that for me the schedule is not the best. Saturnday afternoons are usually busy for me, so in order to participate in the tournaments I have to skip or rearrange some other activities. I also had to miss two tournaments due to a conflict of schedule, and would not be able to play on top 8 on others for the same reason.
Props to Ez on being the only player to participate on all 7 tournaments. We can see that some of the best players have a very high participation rate, indicating that dedication to the competitive enviroment really pays off as improvement on gameplay. Also, the average win % of the players that joined 5 or more tournaments is above 56%.
On average, the NA tournaments host 31.7 players. So far 118 different players have joined one or more managrind tournaments. On average each player participated in 1.9 tournaments, which indicates a great rotation of players. I don't know for sure why most people have joined only one or two tournaments, but I can say that for me the schedule is not the best. Saturnday afternoons are usually busy for me, so in order to participate in the tournaments I have to skip or rearrange some other activities. I also had to miss two tournaments due to a conflict of schedule, and would not be able to play on top 8 on others for the same reason.
Props to Ez on being the only player to participate on all 7 tournaments. We can see that some of the best players have a very high participation rate, indicating that dedication to the competitive enviroment really pays off as improvement on gameplay. Also, the average win % of the players that joined 5 or more tournaments is above 56%.
Top Players
This table only shows players that participated on 3 or more tournaments, mostly because the tournaments are very short (6 or less rounds of swiss). A lot of players have good win % but only participated on one or two tournaments, and I believe this is not enough information to label those as "best players". Keep in mind that the tournament scene is still young so we don't have much data to analyse. This is only showing results for swiss rounds, and the first tournament does not count at the top 8 column, due to the small number of participants.
We can clearly see here a domination of three hardcore managrind players: Knight, Spajj and Jotto. They have about 70% win ratio so far and made 11 top 8 as a group. This shows how the months of preparation prior to beta really gave them an edge on the Hearthstone competitive scene. Congrats guys!
Two players that are not on this table deserve some attention here: Moonstar and Bryansc. They are not on the table because they only played on 2 tournaments so far, but they have amazing results on those tournaments. Moon made top 8 on his first tournament and won the second, with a record of 8-3 on swiss rounds. Bryansc also made two top 8s on two tournaments finishing with the amazing 11-1 record on swiss rounds. Keep an eye on them!
This table only shows players that participated on 3 or more tournaments, mostly because the tournaments are very short (6 or less rounds of swiss). A lot of players have good win % but only participated on one or two tournaments, and I believe this is not enough information to label those as "best players". Keep in mind that the tournament scene is still young so we don't have much data to analyse. This is only showing results for swiss rounds, and the first tournament does not count at the top 8 column, due to the small number of participants.
We can clearly see here a domination of three hardcore managrind players: Knight, Spajj and Jotto. They have about 70% win ratio so far and made 11 top 8 as a group. This shows how the months of preparation prior to beta really gave them an edge on the Hearthstone competitive scene. Congrats guys!
Two players that are not on this table deserve some attention here: Moonstar and Bryansc. They are not on the table because they only played on 2 tournaments so far, but they have amazing results on those tournaments. Moon made top 8 on his first tournament and won the second, with a record of 8-3 on swiss rounds. Bryansc also made two top 8s on two tournaments finishing with the amazing 11-1 record on swiss rounds. Keep an eye on them!
Final Thoughts
I would like to finish saying thanks to the managrind guys for making such a good job creating a competitive community. In my opinion Hearthstone Arena and ranked play is kind of boring right now, so it is good to have something else to do. Also, if you have a beta key I would suggest you join the tournaments. They are really fun, everyone in the community is super nice and it is a great way to really test your card game skills. Follow @managrind on twitter to know when they will host new tournaments!
Thanks for reading!
I would like to finish saying thanks to the managrind guys for making such a good job creating a competitive community. In my opinion Hearthstone Arena and ranked play is kind of boring right now, so it is good to have something else to do. Also, if you have a beta key I would suggest you join the tournaments. They are really fun, everyone in the community is super nice and it is a great way to really test your card game skills. Follow @managrind on twitter to know when they will host new tournaments!
Thanks for reading!
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