That's best case scenario tbh

Today and yesterday against BBL
We just looked horrible, flicker and beyn jeez
Mako can't be igling, fuck that

But tech pauses do ruin the experience of what competitive playing is all about.
Players aren't going to a tournament expecting they're gonna have technical issues mid game. That's why they also play practice right before the game starts.
Having tech pauses can make a team lose momentum (Example: XLG v SEN yesterday, where XLG won 4 or 5 rounds in a row, and SEN just calls for a tech pause): it makes players spend unnecessary time in the game they wanna play and win, considering they have to potentially go back there the next day to play against the team that are in the other bracket, so they'd have less prep time; it can calm a player and, effectively, affect their performance.
Sure, they can come up with extra strategies throughout that time, or not, because there might be nothing to talk about the game they're playing.
Point is, tech pauses can induce a player/team to perform better or worse overall, because it's a blueball of a move.
They're still gonna take it seriously, that's not the issue, but a tournament with so much money invested, can't even get a decent production setup? That's straight up wanting to be called a joke of a tournament.

already went with my goat cloud

nah im good, he could retire for all i care

Cloud

nah im good

go for trexx maybe

Sage cypher deadlock chamber vyse

Coach Chet

Man, cloud would be such a great addition to vitality tbh
But yeah VIT 2-1 GX

Guess so
He's very underrated
To me he's a top 5 igl oat

It won't take long, that's for sure

I'm not even talking about in terms of teams, cuz even this tournament has like 5 good teams. And don't tell me nrg and 100t are good teams, and that g2 are a contender without leaf.
I'm talking about in terms of hype, production and in general, a better tournament

it is an s-tier event, just doesnt look like one
at least lock-in looked better than this

tech pauses.

Games are good. 2 matches at the same time is not so good.
Production is horrible, they should step up a lot in that sense.

emea is mid, i only like a few teams from there
and the production is still terrible compared to emea
sure they had hour-long tech pauses and even had to re-schedule the last few games
but this is a world class tournament (supposedly) and it already has more tech pauses, replay system is bad, yesterday had a game with no sound (DRX was the only one as far as i know of), spectating players and showing cameras of other players

and this is only the second day.
safe to say that this is on its way of being the worst event in terms of production quality

this production is shit bruh, already more tech pauses than EMEA stage 1
all this money in their hands and cant even make a decent event

yes, cuz bbl and m8 are on the same level

ur team doesnt have a lot of life now does it
at least g2 are in the tournament, u lost to fucking GENTLE MATES

my humble goat sinatraa

Not with whack on their team, but tbh i really dont care, i just want xlg to win so we have a free pass to playoffs

And maybe BLG, since G2 are struggling without Leaf

https://www.vlr.gg/448600/drx-vs-sentinels-champions-tour-2025-masters-bangkok-r1/?game=202501&tab=overview
Our favorite rookie <3

But yeah, there's been quite a few

Saadhak

So FNC swept GEN-G and Boaster played very well this icebox. I'm glad for him.
GEN-G the moment they lost that bonus, it all went downhill for them. Unfortunate.
Still not over for them, so we'll see how they manage against either 100T or EDG.
APAC is getting dropped one by one now, compared to the American teams, where only NRG and PRX are standing tall at the moment.

I really don't know what it is, but this environment they're playing in looks like something straight out of a movie where they're experimenting with guinea pigs.

They're playing with a new guy that basically has no training with them.
Although flicker is good, they just don't have that chemistry yet.
That's what happens when you change players 50 times throughout a season.
Still not all lost tho, we can still qualify.

For people saying it's online, you're out of your damn mind, this is a LAN event. It even says on liquipedia. The lag you think you saw was the stream lagging. Production at its finest.

Fnatic are up as of right now, chronicle won them the map.
Great game ngl, hopefully it goes to a 3rd game.

At least they gotta qualify, like come on

Sen is gonna win against xlg
Drx is gonna qualify
Hyunmin and mako will go on a rampage

DRX was just god awful against BBL.
One more chance to qualify, so we'll see.

they looked very good against edg

First day of EWC:

Good games overall, players were having fun it seemed (especially PRX and BLG).

• PRX v BLG - Best game of the day.
• G2 v KC - Nice to see KC doing good in a world class tournament; G2 however, Leaf's impact is very noticeable. They really need him.
• SEN v BBL - Nice back to back round trading game in the first half. Second half was alright, Zekken stepped up a bit, but BBL got the upper hand in the end - Lewn was probably the best -player of the day, in my opinion.
• DRX v XLG - First stomp of the day. XLG just couldn't stand a chance, to be honest. Flicker looked very good for his debut. XLG are really struggling with their players, unfortunately.
• NRG v TH - NRG looked very good, only American team to win a game today and looked dominant against the runner-ups of last year's Champions. Heretics seem to be struggling to find tactical plays and look like one of the worst teams of the tournament so far.
• RRQ v TEC - Another stomp. RRQ is just on a whole level above TEC. Looks like TEC needs to step up the game a bit in every sense of the game.
• -100T v FNC - Fnatic were dominating the first half, then 100T dominated the second half, although not enough for them to win the game. I think everyone looked good on that match, -especially Kaajak and Eeiu.
• -GEN-G v EDG - GEN-G just looked far superior than the reigining Champions. EDG look like they have been struggling to find a way to get into the meta ever since Stage 1. Being the best -team in China is now starting to be a bit questionable with everything that happened for the qualifiers for Masters, but, then again, it's been only 1 day for the EWC and they already have been playing on Stage 2, so we'll see where they go from here.

That's it about the games, now I'll talk about the rest of the event in general:

• Production quality looked outright terrible - Spectating someone and showing someone else on camera (Example: Spectating Mako and showing another player on camera, don't remember who); Tech issues; sound delayed on some of the games and NO SOUND for the DRX game (at least that I know of); Replay system was bad some of the times.
• The environment of the place where they played looked very dead, but I guess that's what happens when you play in an enclosed space where no one else is watching but the people that HAVE to be there. Hopefully that'll change when these qualifiers are over.
• Having 2 games playing at the same time is not good for attracting fans to see the games, since we need to choose between each stream we want to see and/or click between tabs to keep up with both games. I think one match at a time would've been enough, since it's only BO1s, so they would take about 40/50 minutes each. That'd give plenty of time to stream them all.
• Having BO3s happening on the same day is even worse, because, why would you put players playing against other teams in the same day without even resting? Sure, it was a BO1 first, but that is just mindboggling.

That's pretty much it.
So, in general, it was kind of a lackluster experience in terms of attraction, but, then again, it's the first time they do this, so maybe in the future it'll be better. Glad some of the games were good, though.

What are your thoughts about this event so far?

I'll keep on updating while the games are running their course.

marved

he looked really good, he even kept up with mako and hyunmin in terms of aim
i liked him this game

I just fucking love that the link to yt stream is DOTA stream
Thank you vlr!

They changed it now, thank you

song was so trash, it made them perform worse than the song

I think BO1s are good for the players but not good in terms of content and attraction.
Since this is just an opening stage, BO1s are great for them so they can start preparing for the real deal.
We just gotta hold on for it to happen, cuz it can't be just about what's best for the fans.

should've been that way a long time ago

0 emotion is crazy, i'm legit watching prx blg and they are just taunting each other almost all the time

Nrg is ass.
Ewc is NOT a major, if anything, it's a masters 2.0.
The worth is whatever, it's oil money. Saudi Arabia is well-known for it.

Yeah, first he gotta shoot at fade's eye.
Then, not leave mid event.
If he succeeds on both, then sure, we'll be good contenders for Champs

They can maintain form, if they learn a new gameplay basically.
Everyone's gonna be up their asses if they keep playing the way they did. For PRX, the best thing they have to focus on right now, is on slow paced rounds. If they learn to do that and change in-between rounds from slow pace to high pace, they'll be quite unstoppable.
They showed a little of that slow paced game against FNATIC, but it really looked flawed and they still manage to win based on how they interchanged between paces.
I want them to be top tier contestants for a long time.

He's mid

u must've watched reels from no name tiktokers

Derke

What you just said, described exactly why aspas is rated so high, not just amongst us the community, but also professional players. It's the first guy that comes to mind when you ask "who's the goat of Valorant".
His seasons on loud he was the most consistent. In champs 2022 he wasn't the best in terms of fragging, but the job of a duelist (in his case), isn't to necessarily frag, it's to create space for your team to play freely, and he does that naturally while also being an aiming monster. Why did he get his mvp? Not sure tbh.
But that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Not only after that did he consistently played like the best guy on team and the best player in the world, his move to LEV made everyone question his career choices and he STILL brought them to champs in 3rd place by practically himself. And now in MIBR, he is doing the same exact thing with them.
He might not be number 1 for some people, but he's definitely top 5 player in terms of gameplay.
-
With all this said, some people have bias, some don't, some people hate Aspas, some love him, but as I said in the beginning, think about who's the best player of all time and he pops up in your head 9 times outta 10. So, at the very least, he is in the discussion for that category.
-
That's my take on all this

2021.