After weeks of qualifiers, high-intensity preparation and shifts in the meta, the WCS Winter Championship at IEM Katowice is finally upon us. The tournament represents the culmination of Blizzard’s new approach to StarCraft eSports, with fewer, more important and hyped tournaments. It is also the second test of how the strict region-locking of WCS, which has extended now to WCS Circuit events like DreamHack and IEM, will affect participation and interest from the foreign scene.
The Winter Championship will complement the long build-up with an unforgiving format. Thirty best-of-five series and one best-of-seven final will be played over three days, all single elimination. And in a WCS environment where it seems like anybody can beat anybody, the potential for surprise is never absent.
The stakes
Along with the terrifying possibility of an early exit comes the tantalizing prospect of the Winter Championship’s enormous prize pool, not to mention its payout of precious WCS Circuit Points. At $150,000, the tournament features the highest prize pool of any single event tournament outside of BlizzCon.
The winning player will walk away with not just the $35,000 first prize, but also a direct seed to the WCS Global Playoffs in November. This alone is a prize worth fighting for. The 31 other players who won’t be earning that spot will have to fight it out for the remaining 8,000 WCS Circuit Points, which are used to determine seeding and invites for upcoming events as well as further seeds to the Global Playoffs. The stakes, in brief, are high, and players will need to bring their very best.
Who to watch out for
With so many players in the running for the title at this tournament, it's impossible to go over all of them, but here are a few of the key players to watch in the coming days:
Nerchio:
Pegged by many as the strongest Zerg in the foreign scene right now, Nerchio is riding a wave of impressive results that have marked a strong comeback to the scene. Once one of the best European players, Nerchio faded from competitive play during Heart of the Swarm, but with the advent of Legacy of the Void he has proven that he has lost little of his skill. The Polish Zerg is considered by pros and fans alike to be one of the best all-around players – with a firm understanding of the meta – in the tournament. He has a tough first match against ShoWTimE, but the hometown hero is looking for a deep run at this event.
PtitDrogo:
The winner of DreamHack: Leipzig, the French Protoss struggled to build off his victory, instead stringing together a series of poor results. He failed to gain a seed through the regular EU qualifiers, having instead to compete in the Regional Challenger tournament, where he only barely squeaked through due to a series of tiebreaker matches. PtitDrogo clearly has the skills to face down the best of the best outside of Korea, but he’ll have to bring better than he has been if he wants to move past his veteran compatriot, Dayshi, in the first round.
Polt:
The godfather of the WCS, Polt will be looking to fulfill his destiny of winning five or more WCS titles. Well on his way with three victories so far, Polt should be going into his first match against the German Zerg, Lambo, full of confidence. When well-practiced, the Korean transplant has shown that he has some of the very best execution outside of Korea, and that gives him an edge against most of his opponents. Polt, along with viOLet and Hydra, have certainly looked beatable in the past few months, but they remain a tough match for even the best Circuit competitors.
MarineLorD:
MarineLorD set the foreign scene alight when he all-killed Team South Korea in Nations Wars III (beating INnoVation and PartinG twice each) to cap off a 21-2 record with four all-kills in that tournament. This astounding victory made up for lacklustre performances at both HomeStory Cup XII and DreamHack: Leipzig. Based on his current form, MarineLorD is widely considered to be among the best Terrans in the WCS system right now, and a deep run could cement his reputation.
Neeb
Neeb’s story is the perhaps the most inspiring of the whole group in the past few months. Once a player that drifted in and out of premier league through 2013-4, Neeb has become one of the most dangerous players in the scene: a ladder hero who finally performs when it counts. Having already qualified to the Winter Championship through the regular qualifiers, Neeb went on to win the Regional Challenger tournament by beating both Polt and Hydra to claim his first tournament title. Neeb has been proclaimed as the redeemer of NA, but will have to get past another surging Americas champion, Kelazhur, to truly make his mark in this event.
TLO:
Doctor Dario has been in his element over the past few months, as the uncertainty of Legacy of the Void's meta gives his creative playstyle some extra staying power. TLO has performed well so far with a solid quarterfinal finish at DreamHack: Leipzig, but will be looking for a top finish here to prove that he is once again amongst the best Europe has to offer. TLO benefits from playing the same matchup (his historically strong ZvZ) in both his first match and the Round of 16, should he beat his Chinese opponent iAsonu.
After weeks of feverish preparation, the players are finally ready to put it all on the line. With so much to gain, and with the margin for error so small, creativity, adaptability and near-perfect execution will be required to gain a victory in the crowded, uncertain hierarchy of the Winter Championship.
Christian Paas-Lang is an eSports journalist from Toronto looking forward to the BlizzCon finals featuring Neeb vs. Hitman. You can follow him on Twitter.
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