Everyone making tier lists with NA/EMEA/VS all top 8, not even considering the other regions, are you all just clouded by Iceland results, or just simply not watch these other regions play? Don't get me wrong, these 8 teams are indeed most probable to do very well, I don't think any of them get swept out of groups, but I also don't think that all 8 of them make playoffs.

Are these tier lists being made simply with the thought of "if this doesn't happen it's just an upset" ? I am genuinely curious.

8/8

Nothing, I just don't see them getting out of groups. They're really good, don't get me wrong, but they feel like another team who needs a pop off player to succeed.

G2 fans can keep downvoting but we'll see if they can do anything in a couple weeks :)

S SEN GMB Acend VS
A SMB NV BREN
B 100T F4Q Havan Zeta
C G2 PRex ViVo KRU
D CR

Likely the weekend before it starts, Berlin starts of the 10th, so maybe the 4th/5th. I assume there's a full team of analysts looking at every minor detail of a team instead of just saying "na number 1 so heres your bracket."

The first list is who are in the groups, then he predicted 100T and VS to get out of the group, Acend to be eliminated along with Paper Rex

Sentinels from NA, realistically this was my c9 brain when Tenz moved over to SEN - I've been a c9/TL supporter since early 2015 really (as an org in general).

Gambit from EMEA, there's a lot of doubters who don't see them going far for some reason and yes, now they do because they won EMEA but they absolutely own their region AND nearly qualified to Iceland, losing to the eventual 2nd place finisher.

I also would LOVE to see Vision Strikers succeed, and I'll definitely be hoping for a few upsets against i think everyone knows some teams.

Great groups. I still don't understand why there's people who believe 100T/Acend won't be in the same group as VS - even if this isn't the case, then NV/SMB will be instead, either way I don't really see all 5 teams moving to playoffs.

This was a long winded way of saying NA + EMEA + VS top 8, but gold 2 choke out and here's some random team instead. Cliché.

Some are troll predictions since they don't want to see their favourite team in a "group of death", so they just stick teams that are less likely to play playoffs with two favourites and call it a day.

I like the idea of listing it as top seeds with each region rather than "this is what group A might be."

So top seeds: NA#1 EMEA#1 KR#1 BR#1
second seeds: EMEA#2 LATAM SEA#1 JP#1
third seeds: NA#2 EMEA#3 SEA#2 KR#2
fourth seeds: NA#3 EMEA#4 BR#2 JP#2

justified top seeds with how regions placed in Iceland, NA/EMEA/KR top 3, and outside of those 3 was VKS in the 5th/6th spot, so Brazil gets the 4th top seed.

LATAM as a regional winner gets grouped with the second seeds as that's where I've put the rest of the regional winners - NA#2 and LATAM could easily be swapped, however.

Interesting, can't wait to see SEN get double swept out of the tournament then!

Best individual player gets bodied in Berlin qualifier

Can I use this as clickbait?

I didn't watch too many of the games - no English stream, or at least that I could find. But, heat OP

Vivo 3-0 HL last night, although for seeding, there's really no excuse to troll in some of these seeding matches for a main event like this. Vivo also beat the top 4 considered teams in BR to qual in the first place - good team, I think.

SEN
VS
GMB/SMB
Acend
NV
Bren
Zeta Division
100T
Vivo Keyd
G2
KRU
Havan Liberty
PRex
F4Q
Crazy Raccoon

The top 4 are a fairly clear top 4 and top 8, depending on groups are who I see going through to the single-elim bracket.

This is... not a good idea. The whole point of a tac fps like this is to consider both sides before choosing your comp, there are upsides to choosing a super aggressive comp (attack sided) or the opposite, giving you a clear advantage on one side compared to the other.

This is certainly a "fan-favourite" seeding for groups. Every group would need a clear upset to kick EMEA, NA and VS out of the top 8.

Group B also has EMEA 2 then KR, SEA and JP regional winners. Interesting.

Regional winners will be favoured over 2nd place finishers, or even lower (EMEA and NA case with 4 and 3 teams respectively), take Iceland for example, Fnatic, KRU, CR and V1 were the bottom 4 seeds going in, with both BR seeds, X10 and Nuturn being seeded above them, as well as TL and SEN with byes in the first round as the top 2 seeds of 10.

I agree, I think Riot will seed the groups not necessarily to piss people off, but to give as many quality matches and "hype" matches as possible. A match like 100T vs Acend would do exactly this, especially if it's for a spot in playoffs.

This is true against Fnatic - in their first match. They later beat Sharks in a convincing 2-0 and took several rounds off TL even being bested 2-0 in this series. They're certainly not a bad team and good easily make top 8 here beating the likes of 100T, G2, NV and plenty of teams from the other regions.

Having said that, I don't think they'll make it passed the top 8, should they make it this far. And they likely won't beat the top seeds from each region, they're sitting somewhere in the middle.

I see, fair enough! In which case, I assume Gambit and G2 would be put in the same group on opposite ends, now for the two teams that fill that group up, that would a whole mess that I might have a little fun with later on.

Thanks for linking :)

Do you have a link to this? Unless it was from today then I'm not sure what source this is from.

no, that would be boring.

I'm flattered that you made a separate thread to talk about this potential group. This would certainly be the group of death.

Ok, now while I understand the argument of NA EMEA and KR being the 3 best regions at Iceland, this is not Iceland, and anything can happen; I can only recommend looking at other eSports and seeing that regional seeding at international events are not influenced by previous events as much as it may seem.

Having said that, yes, it is obvious that SEN, GMB and VS will have the top 3 seeds, but after that, every team, especially regional champions, deserve a fair shot and fair seeding rather than seeds 10-16. I don't think it's at all a good idea to be ranking F4Q above all of Vivo, Bren, Zeta and KRU; all regional champions, while F4Q are not. In terms of seeding, the top 6 should technically all be regional champions, however, I don't believe Riot will do this as EMEA have double the teams representing as BR, KR, etc. do, and so they should have more teams in that top 6 (or 8, in this case).

If we were to purely look at Iceland results, then we can simply say:

NA top seed
EMEA bottom seed
KR top seed
EMEA top seed
BR top seed & NA bottom seed
LATAM top seed & SEA top seed
Japan top seed & BR bottom seed

Those are the regional (with seeds) finishes of Iceland; and so, now let's effectively convert that to Berlin, we'd have in some order

SEN, G2, VS, GMB, Vivo, NV, KRU, Bren, Zeta, Havan

and outsite of those 10, we'd have Acend, 100T, CR, F4Q, PRex and SMB.

As an addition:
100T, Acend and VS is only my own prediction of how the groups will work out, if you look at it from afar you have KR#1, NA#2 and EMEA#3; now while I see this is a lot of people's 3 favourite teams, simply put, this is why seeding matches matter. There are people out there who say Acend didn't try against GMB in the match to bounce into the finals, whereas if they had, they could potentially be in an "easier" group. Same thing goes with 100T.

Update: This post is after Havan lost the top seed in BR to Vivo, changing some seeding :)

Instead of an edit, I figured a comment would do the same job; I put a bit more effort into avoiding issues with multiple regional winners being in the same group and focusing more on a 16-team double elim bracket setup with seeding. I focused on the top 8 and bottom 8 seeds to begin with, and how I split it up was:

Top 8: NA 1/2 ... EMEA 1/2 ... BR/KR/SEA/JP winners --> This is in no particular order

I also took Group A to play Group C in the 8-team single elim tourney as such:
^ this is to avoid regional teams playing each other early on, especially those regions with only 2 seeds, you'll see teams like this in Group A & D for example (vivo & havan) where they cannot meet until semi finals, or grand finals, should they both make it this far.

A1 C2
D1 B2

B1 D2
C1 A2

Where teams from the same group could rematch only in the grand finals.

Group A:
Sentinels vs G2
Zeta Division vs Havan Liberty

Group B:
Vision Strikers vs Paper Rex
100T vs Acend

Group C:
Gambit vs F4Q
BREN vs KRU

Group D:
Vivo Keyd vs NV
SupMass Blaze vs Crazy Raccoon

Top seeds in each group play the bottom, middle seeds play each other in the first round. Some CRAZY matchups if this is at all even close to correct, I do believe the NA/EMEA/LATAM seeds are mostly in the correct place, and it really seems like we all get a treat with that 100T vs Acend game early on in the tourney :)

edit: spelling

I could see a sova, skye, kayo comp working out... TL tried the breach/skye/kayo, but imo there's not enough info there for a pro squad.

I don't think it's new meta though.

I can get behind this seeding - but I think it favours NA and EMEA far too much. I can see Riot giving an advantage to region winners - but you also put SEA and JP top seeds in the bottom 8 teams seeding wise - I agree with the top seeds you put, however I would swap NA and EMEA 3rd place finishers with JP and SEA 1st place finishers.

EMEA 4th will also be a bottom seed in a group - makes the most sense. The rest, fair enough.

this aged well.

hahaha fair enough. If I'm honest, I doubt they get out of even a group with Haven and like SMB/GMB for example. Other regions looking really scary tbh

I believe Riot will seed it as such:

seeds 1-8 (in no particular order):
NA 1/2, EMEA 1/2, BR1, SEA1, JP1, KR1 --> Nice and easy.

I do have VS (KR1) being fairly high in seeding in that top 8, somewhere in the top 4 I think, whereas F4Q would be somewhere around the 13/14 mark of 16 seeds.

Groups would (should) be seeded similar to a normal double elim bracket:
1 8 9 16
2 7 10 15
3 6 11 14
4 5 12 13

I didn't necessarily follow that ^ with groups A-D (group A might be 3 6 11 14) - it is awkward to say that Acend would be seeded in the bottom half - but can't really place them much higher being 3rd of 4 in EMEA.

no, probably not. But I was feeling like a nerd so nerded out; as some might say.

Yeah I mean, Vivo and Havan are both looking quite good but in terms of VKS not making champions auto qual, it's highly unlikely. Vivo 2nd and Havan 3rd; without the semi final match being between these two teams (riot wouldn't have groups mixing like that, I don't think...)

Not for a while, they'll work a lot and kept a close series against the eventual top or 2nd seed of EMEA.

If they were to replace anyone, I can't see them removing Scream, Jamppi or Soulcas; and I feel Jamppi and L1nk work so well together. But good sentinels are very hard to find in EU it seems (hi kryptix)

So as everyone should assume, NA will mix with LATAM to make 4 seeds across the 4 groups, LATAM is the only region with a single team moving on, every other region (other than EMEA) has 2.

SEA, BR, JP and KR will be split across the 4 groups in some mixed up way, no two groups will be similar, as such:

SEA matched with BR/JP or BR/KR or JP/KR
Two groups will not have NA, EMEA, SEA, BR for example, this should not happen; if it does, then well, rito pls

Predictions:
I believe Riot will use Iceland results to assist in the seeding, although many teams are not attending from each region, SEN KRU CR are the only 3 teams that will have made both events.

However, teams like Nuturn would previously be seeded high, therefore, one can assume VS will be as well. VS will most likely be in neither EMEA seed 1 or NA seed 1 groups; so probably Acend's group (EMEA 3); This gives effectively Acend the 3rd seed in that group, with VS being top seed and 100T being second seed - this followed by 4th seed team from BR (loser of finals, probably vivo; havan too good)

Going along with the 3 teams that placed in Iceland, SEN will obviously be the top seed in the event, meaning their group should have only one other strong team, potentially the top SEA seed. This paired with G2, EMEA's 4th seed in a group with NA's top seed. This assumes Riot seed LATAM as the "4th" NA seed. Finally, a weak team, similar to the likes of Vivo in group A, every group will need that one wildcard, this group having the bottom JP seed, CR.... if anyone reads this whole post i love u.

Now, KRU, another team from Iceland, likely seeded quite low in comparison to the likes of VS, all of NA & EMEA and even Havan Liberty; I think anyone is competent enough to see where I'm going with this one. The 4th team for this group being either F4Q, Zeta or the bottom SEA team; yes, I used a random number generator to choose this one.

And then for Group D, the leftovers.

Group A: VS, 100T, Acend, Vivo Keyd

Group B: SEN, BREN, G2, Crazy Raccoon

Group C: Gambit, Havan, Kru, Paper Rex

Group D: SMB, NV, Zeta, F4Q

I tried my best to come up with as fair seeding as I could here, and I can only assume that Riot will have a solid dozen analysts choosing some of these teams out, and as stated at the start of this very long post, (sorry) SEA, JP, KR & BR could be swapped in any way, but I tried to play off regional strengths the best I could.

The order of teams in each group is also seed order, I kind of had to put NA and EMEA at the top of most (b,c,d) groups as Iceland had SEN & TL topping the 10 teams in seeding at Iceland, however, I suppose group D could have say Havan Liberty or Zeta Division as its top seed.

If anyone agrees with these groups, I'd love to know who you think would move on from each, assume that in the single-elim bracket Winner A vs Loser C, Winner C vs Loser A (opposite sides of the bracket) and so on.

If you disagree, fair enough if you just downvote, it'll hurt a bit (not really) but if you feel like commenting how you think the groups will actually look, give it a go :)

EDIT: Filled in gaps in groups with EMEA, SEA seeded teams

I think too many games. Typically teams with 3 wins move on in 16-team swiss...
Rounds 1-3 = 24 matches
Round 4 = 6 matches
Round 5 = 3 matches

8 teams move on = 7 matches single elim

40 matches is way too many for 9 days with only 1 stream. Maybe they do it for Champions if they want to use 2 streams

probably pre determined
Group A vs Group C winner
Group B vs Group D winner

nats is nuts but ACE 3-2

Most likely.
SEN, G2, Havan Liberty (BR1), SEA seed #2
100T, EU #3, F4Q, Crazy Raccoon
NV, EU #2, BR2, VS
Acend, SEA #1, LATAM, Zeta Division

Some seeds like the LATAM, BR2, SEA #2 & JP #2 seeds could obviously be swapped around to have more "even" strength across groups, but I see something like this making the most sense.

Then seeding would mean nothing from regions. I mean, it currently doesn't really mean that much anyway, other than the likes of SEN avoiding Acend until Semi finals should they both win their groups.

This would be very nice, but Riot are not fond of 2 streams during S-tier events, as shown with all of LCS.

I'd upvote this 80 times if I could. I still much rather the format of maybe a round robin since Riot are getting too acclimated to this double elimination bracket style, it gets old. They need to try different formats at some point, I suppose Berlin isn't the place to do it, however.

they're a bit reckless, but they've had a few extra weeks to prepare under an org name now, so extra talent coaching could be all a team needs.
Lots of people will say Gambit 5-0'd them which makes them shit, but I just think Gambit is one of the top contenders for EMEA after falling just short (to fnatic, the 2nd place finisher) last playoffs. I don't think NAVI qual by any means, but they won't get double swept, or at least, shouldn't.

https://www.vlr.gg/pickem/0e5805d5

with the NV yay acquisition, not much changed from my previous pick'em, but now i just have sen nv xset qual instead of sen 100t xset (written in seed order)

SEN 2-0 RIse
NV 2-0 TSM (close game on TSMs map pick, maybe the classic long OT that TSM loves so much)
100T 2-1 FaZe
XSET 2-0 LG

NV 2-1 SEN
XSET 2-1 100T

TSM 2-1 Rise
FaZe 2-0 LG

100T 2-0 TSM
SEN 2-0 FaZe

SEN 2-0 100T

NV 2-1 XSET

SEN 2-1 XSET (i really hope with this being on it's own day it's a b05 like EU, in which case, 3-1)

SEN 3-1 NV