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Professional news/discussion

Darkglasses

I'll keep all professional scene news here in case anybody's interested.

UGC Niagara on right now, Complexity mysteriously lost to an amateur team and are now about to play Optic Gaming in the losers bracket. Get the feeling that only certain teams are up for it. Complexity definitely not too interested. Clayster's having a dreadful tournament for Optic. I'd say Envy or Faze Black will win the tournament, outside possibility of Optic Nation

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Mr. Manager

it's not all roses, I'm sweating my balls off

Darkglasses

I'm guessing they're just going to the jacks while they sort out who chooses side?

Mr. Manager

How do they decide on sides? Seems to be a lot of uncertainty about the whole thing

Darkglasses

Cereal Rapist wrote: »

How do they decide on sides? Seems to be a lot of uncertainty about the whole thing

Varies depending on the tournament, but I think whoever picks three maps only gets to pick their side twice. Since the maps are pre-decided in this tournament, the sides are probably pre-decided too

Darkglasses

I was cooking, did they say what the delay was for?

Mr. Manager

Just to pick sides. Joked about an arm wrestling comp

Mr. Manager

What a spanking!

x43r0

Delighted for Merk - always been a fan of his since his days in Optic

After seeing their first game against vitality yesterday I thought they'd be a force

Mr. Manager

Merk was phenomenal alright.

Simply Red

Good to see an irish player make it to the finals of this

PayBringer

There is a channel devoted to nothing but COD on PlutoTV.

Darkglasses

One of the last ever Ghosts Lan tournaments is on this weekend, UMG Dallas. EG are not taking part, all the other top pro teams are. I think it's fair to say winning this LAN will not be hugely discredited by EG's absence, although it would have been 3/4 months ago. Since X-Games and G3, it's fair to say EG aren't the team they used to be.

x43r0

Darkglasses wrote: »

One of the last ever Ghosts Lan tournaments is on this weekend, UMG Dallas. EG are not taking part, all the other top pro teams are. I think it's fair to say winning this LAN will not be hugely discredited by EG's absence, although it would have been 3/4 months ago. Since X-Games and G3, it's fair to say EG aren't the team they used to be.

Agreed - I would say that the gap between EG and the rest has definitely shortened this year. Some of the other top teams have really upped their performances

Darkglasses

Karma has left EG, cue a million roster changes.

All the talk is about him jumping to Optic Gaming, but I don't see it. It largely depends on who EG want to replace him with. Nameless or Formal would be the two stand outs for me, which leaves a berth for Karma at Envy. There is some talk of Ricky going to EG, but I don't think his communication would be good enough for them, although it would be the ideal transfer for Karma to move to Optic Nation.

Apathy to EG is another strong possibility, again not the best communicator but a sick, sick player.

Also talk of Dedo going, but I think that's far less likely.

Darkglasses

Just announced that EG are going to hold onto Karma and bench him for the remainder of the season, using Fears as their sub. Holding out for someone (Optic) to buy out his contract).

Darkglasses

Faze tweeted out that Dedo is being traded for Karma, but EG just denied it. Hard to know what's happening right now

Darkglasses

UMG Nashville starts tonight, second last LAN tournament of Ghosts.

Tonight's games (all times EDT)
4:30PM Curse vs Most Wanted
4:30PM EnVyus vs Noble Vanquish
6:30PM Evil Geniuses vs Rise Nation
6:30PM FaZe vs Salvo
8:00PM OpTic Nation vs Most Wanted
8:00PM Denial vs Noble Vanquish
9:30PM OpTic Gaming vs Rise Nation
9:30PM Team Kaliber vs Salvo

Darkglasses

Jurd and Swanney have left Epsilon and are looking for a North American team to join

Darkglasses

Hardly worth updating here, but the first MLG Columbus has gone extremely well. I personally don't think Uplink is a good competitive gametype, but the tournament has been so exciting and successful in terms of viewer numbers I don't think anything will change for the rest of 2015. Optic Gaming vs. Faze championship final, MLG's ideal final almost.

x43r0

Darkglasses wrote: »

Hardly worth updating here, but the first MLG Columbus has gone extremely well. I personally don't think Uplink is a good competitive gametype, but the tournament has been so exciting and successful in terms of viewer numbers I don't think anything will change for the rest of 2015. Optic Gaming vs. Faze championship final, MLG's ideal final almost.

Thanks for the update!

I always intend to watch the streams of these but never seem to get the timings right. Must try harder for the next one

KERSPLAT!

Yeah keep firing up times etc. I watch when I can

Darkglasses

The final was insane, probably the best series I've ever seen (only seen 1 or 2 others that have come close).

Faze beat Optic in 2 best of 5s to take the Championship.

I'll throw up some videos when they come online, it's absolutely well worth watching.

The big story of the night for me though is how well Aches played for Faze with his atrocious injury. He put his hand through some glass the night before the final day, here's his hand after coming out of hospital

B3uH6a5IQAE3FYo.jpg:large

And after the final:

B3v3GfrIYAAHfxr.jpg:large

So Faze taking the championship means that Aches is now the single most prolific COD player of all time with 19 tournament wins, having now passed Teepee on 18. Right now, it's basically undeniable that Aches is the single best player out there. Censor has also risen hugely in everyone's estimation, it was kind of a running joke that Censor had no thumbs, but he was possibly Faze's best player this weekend, certainly more consistent than Apathy or Slasher. Slasher was a very late pick-up by Faze, after Aches basically insisted that Neslo be dropped shortly after they picked him up. Turned out to be a great decision on Aches's part.

As for Optic, second place is not what they hoped for but it's a decent start. I couldn't pick out any one player who did badly for the team, some have their doubts about Formal but I would think it's unfair. The team is currently Nadeshot, Formal, Crimsix and Scump. Basically 3 out and out slayers and one objective. If Formal didn't try to fill-in as an objective, the team would be woefully unbalanced. It's not something he's a natural at yet, but it'll come to him over the course of this game I expect.

Outside of the final, Envy's performance must be somewhat of a disappointment. They finished 5th overall, being 3-0'd by both Optic Gaming and Team Kaliber (who finished 4th) on Sunday. Although it's not a bad result, it doesn't live up to their early promise that they showed in the first couple of weeks in this game. Prophecy (The EU org. with NA players) had a fantastic run, for a team put together at such short notice. They could well be described as the 'leftovers' from all the roster changes, with Ricky, Parasite, Legal and Fears filling their team. Interesting that every one of these dropped players out-placed the team they were dropped from.

Finally, my own personal 'I knew that would happen' moment - Moho's Team Fear achieved nothing of note, despite picking up Neslo and Dedo. They only played one match on-stream (vs. Elevate), in which Neslo carried the team. Moho did not look nearly good enough to be playing in the league this year, although I feel bad for how far Dedo has fallen in the space of a month. He's gone from winning the E-Sports World Cup in France with Evil Geniuses, to dropping out of MLG Columbus in the 2nd round of the Losers Bracket.

The next LAN is I believe UMG Orlando, just around New Year's.

MLG league starts I *think* on the 8th of this month, and the teams taking part will be -

Optic Gaming: Nadeshot, Scump, Crimsix, Formal
EnVyUs: Clayster, Merk, Jkap, Nameless
Denial: Zooma, Saints, Replays, Attach
Optic Nation: Proofy, Karma, Mboze, Teepee
Justus: Enable, Mochila, Classic, Slacked
Team Kaliber: Sharp, Loony, Goonjar, Theory
Faze: Censor, Aches, Apathy, Slasher
Prophecy: Parasite, Ricky, Fears, Legal
Noble Pro: Killa, Study, MiRx, Spacely
Rise: Diabolic, Pacman, Chino, Whea7s
Aware: Sender, Happy, Accuracy, Lawless
Automatic Reload: Burnsoff, Miyagi, FeLony, Blfire

Darkglasses

Here are links to all 9 matches of the final

http://www.reddit.com/r/CoDCompetitive/comments/2nxqjm/columbus_vods_grand_finals_optic_gaming_vs_faze/

[Deleted User]

Only really follow it when I notice somebody I used to play with is playing so didn't watch it this weekend, how did it look though? Ghosts was basically unwatchable but Bops 2 was very entertaining, thoughts on this?

Darkglasses

AdamD wrote: »

Only really follow it when I notice somebody I used to play with is playing so didn't watch it this weekend, how did it look though? Ghosts was basically unwatchable but Bops 2 was very entertaining, thoughts on this?

It's the fastest paced COD so far, and there's even more kills than Blops 2. 40 kills is pretty standard, 50's are impressive and 60's are possible too.

Hardpoint is terrific, it works extremely well with the boost jumping. What's interesting is that you really can't just L-trigger a doorway/hall anymore. Everybody boost jumps around corners and if you're trying to pre-aim without moving, you're dead. In competitive, it can either be great viewing or pretty crappy. It was great in the OG - Faze series, it was terrible in the ON - Prophecy series. Proph got a tonne of flukey caps on the first side, it wasn't competitive. Time will tell.

Uplink takes a lot of getting used to, but it's grown on a lot of people this weekend. There's a lot of talk about nerfing the passing element, but what I really want nerfed is how much extra health the person holding the ball gets. They practically become juggernauts. Also, the maps need to paired down, Comeback has to go really. After the next patch it'll probably be fine.

If I had to get rid of one game type, it would probably be CtF. It's hard to reconcile the slow, methodical nature of the gametype with the fast movement of gunfights. At the very least, the Ascend map should go.

SnD kind of has the same problem as CtF, but it's getting better as time goes on. It was hard to watch when the game first dropped, but the players are learning where to break cover and how to flank and such, it's getting better. I think the snipers really need a buff, that's all.

Overall I'm loving watching it (you can probably tell

), can't wait to see more tournaments. If Columbus was anything to go by, it'll be even better than Blops. MLG's production values are always on the up too, Rambo and Mr. X are excellent additions to the analysis and commentary teams. Pity about Benson though. The only long wait of note was during the finals when the hotel got DDos'd, but that was only 45 minutes, and after that they didn't do any adverts. I believe viewer numbers peaked during the finals at 205,000, not sure if that's a record or not but it's very good numbers for COD. Not quite as good as CS:GO (>400k) but it's promising.

Darkglasses

Tl;dr, it's good! You can have a look at the videos I linked to see for yourself

Darkglasses

In case you missed it - Optic Nation have basically tanked in the online league, their current record stands at 3 wins and 9 losses. Much to my own surprise, the captain Mboze was removed from the team. Mboze was widely regarded as being the weak-link, but being such close friends with Nadeshot, everyone assumed he had immunity basically. They played their last few league games with their first sub, Synfula (a good guy to follow on twitter btw). However, Synfula has just announced tonight that he will not be teaming with Nation for UMG Orlando. Mboze has stated that he'll be teaming with Methodz, TCM and Felony.

This means that Optic Nation is still without a fourth player for Orlando, and speculation is rife that it will be Swanny. Would be awesome news for EU COD fans to have a British player on Optic. Benson, an English commentator on COD who moved to the US, explained that it's basically no problem for an EU player to come over to the USA and play professionally short-term (for one LAN for example), but long-term it's extremely difficult.

Darkglasses

If anyone is in the mood for watching some top quality professional COD, Optic Gaming are playing Faze tonight online in League play, 1.30 in the morning. Should be a cracker.

Darkglasses

Swanny is now confirmed to be on Optic Nation. Probably the biggest achievement ever for EU Cod

Darkglasses

Anybody ever been to or is thinking of going to Gfinity? I'm 99% sure I'll make the trip. There's a few pros I'd really love to meet, and I'd like to meet some other fans too. Never actually been to London before though