Guess I'm just a trailblazer, what can I say.

• I like to melt my shredded cheese in the microwave, and eat it on it's own.

• Toronto could finish in the top 6

• Philly won't do as well as last year

• Shanghai won't disappoint as much as some think they will.

I mean, if they invest into Contenders people won't be able to use Path to Poverty anymore, and that's a really catchy name that Blizz just doesn't seem to want to give up!

Shrug, it being boring is pretty irrelevant. Teams just need to beat them when it counts.

Can't even argue with you on this one.

When having players of your region just isn't enough.

Shrug.

WELP.

The only way I'll be surprised is if one team steam rolls the other tbh.

Shrug, can't save em all...your brain cell, of course.

Slasher actually investigated and clarified a lot of it:
https://twitter.com/Slasher/status/1081302874167173120

Flowervin meta too stronk.

I changed the rosters for the maps.

Bio = Duzi afaik.

Edit: Nope, yikes.

Actually, IF nV win 4-0, a loss by either of the 2-2 teams should put them in the playoffs due to having a better map record. This is absolutely doable, a win is the minimum requirement, but their competition is playing the top 2 teams of the group so unless we're looking at upsets, their destinies are in their own hands.

We'll have to see how the new rules affects FU, since I heard exceptions might be made for players who's contracts were signed before a certain date.

So I don't know what that means for the 5 non NA players, depending on who they would choose to keep, if they had to move them.

I really hope Academy teams will have the best possible rosters they can successfully build together, whether that's with or w/o 3 non region players is unimportant to me tbh.

NA is relatively weak when it comes to region exclusive talent so obviously there will be Academy teams with 3 KR/EU/AU/SA/PAC/CN players.

Is it likely that most, if not a majority, of those will be Korean? I think so. Do I think that's an issue? No, I actually don't. If NA players aren't skilled enough to take one of those 3 foreign-accessible spots then they shouldn't get them, imo.

I want the best that the region has to offer, because they're the ones that might get a shot at the league.

Now we just need to wait another 6 years to see him in OWL!

NRG is playing against Second Wind, nV has a very solid chance of making it in. They just need to win while NRG loses, it's definitely doable.

The road to poverty is paved with HotS money

Zeal with the omega 9000IQ play. He actually snuck into the house when his team had to reset and no one ever came for him.

Easiest back cap of his life.

Not sure, but Japan doesn't allow for dual citizenship past the age of 20 so he'll have to chose.

Don't worry about it fam. If this isn't the team you' re going root for, if this isn't the team you'd be willing to go see, then you don't have a horse in this race, and the nationalities of the players within should be of no concern to you.

If you are all of the above then who would you have wanted to see and why? Because regardless of where the players come from, this is MY team, they represent MY region, MY town.

Technically Jaru was also on loan from TO Esports to EnVision, though he did end up being transferred later on. I assume it was the same type of loan and they opted into the buyout option.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say OGE's overrated. No one seems rates him that high and he actually did a really good job coming into Dallas. So while I think your placement of him is somewhat fair, I'm not hot on the use of the word "overrated" to describe a tank that did decently considering the circumstances.

GM extraordinaire Flowervin got dis.

Was he not already in the rumored DC team? This is a team reveal, unless he's a new addition that wasn't expected - I may have missed that.

I can see where you're coming from but if we're going to use the time off argument we can also look at Leave for an example of a player that came back looking pretty good.

As for SK vs CN you can use the same argument for the former in that they don't exist as a team outside of OWWC. Had that team been in OWL proper it could well have won the whole thing, who knows right?

I will say though that I do somewhat agree in that I am a bit worried regardless. I think Guxue and Eileen would have gone a long way in making this team "look" stronger on paper. all that's left now is to see how they measure up to the rest of the league and the pressures that come with their roster choice.

Krystal and Guxue are on Hangzhou, and I think(?) Lateyoung, Leave, Shy and Sky are still available, either on Contenders teams or just free agents but I kinda want to see if this ends up being the full Chinese team or if they'll decide to diversify as well.

Absolutely top tier jebait. Disgusting even!

OP mentioned that, it's the same for other melee swing effects, but this one is a bit different in that it's also a charge mechanic of some sort. I also assume he still take wall dmg if he gets knocked into one.

Hm, was that change confirmed? As a Genji lover I'm happy but it raises some questions for me about other deflect interactions like with Lucio boop or Rein charge.

Maybe this is them deciding to apply interaction rules on an ability v ability basis instead of ability "classes"?

ʕ ͡·ᴥ ͡· ʔ You've been visited by Trill Smasher of goodults. Clap your paws and copy paste this message 5 times without getting banned by mods and good smashes will be with you for the next year ʕ ͡·ᴥ ͡· ʔ

GOATs/1st Gen looking hella different from just a couple of seasons ago, but we got an other all western clash on our hands. My recency vs experience makes me think 1st Gen looks "stronger" on paper but who knows at this point right?

Should be fun to watch in any case.

All western match-up! Will be interesting to see how these teams change in 2019, assuming they want to keep a core at all.

MA looks like the stronger team on paper to me but that's not saying much. Looking forward to seeing what the current season looks like.

Still wondering where that leaves WhoRU. Too good not to be on a team of some sort as we wait another 15 seasons for him to be eligible...

hm, I suspect a possible pattern...

Interesting...

No. It wouldn't.

This case is pretty black and white. TO Esports had a brand name and were told by Blizzardthey had to change it it remain in Overwatch.

The Toronto Defiant isn't in the wrong here, they'd of course want to be the only "Toronto team" in Overwatch but it'd not hard to understand why TO Esports wouldn't want to do that and would instead just drop out even if it's not a good look.

I think this is a pretty simple case to assess and given the state of the T2 scene it's not hard to think that people would be upset at Blizzard for "forcing out" another team even though the latter was given "a choice", imo.

You mean actually counter comping the other team and coming up with a backup plan? Can't say I see it like you do then.

If they're smart enough to be ready to adjust and come out with something more appropriate then power to them. Playing smart shouldn't be considered a bad thing, imo.

This might turn out to be an unpopular opinion, but I feel like the UK DPS got carried by the tanks/supports for the most part.

Don't get me wrong, they did clutch some fights and help set up big plays, but they weren't the main reason UK was so successful, imo.

So because of that I'm not ready to say that MikeyA or Kyb necessarily need/deserve to be in OWL. Fusion has absolutely convinced me and I think Smex could make a case for himself though not to the same degree.

I'm not one to identify as a region, I'm Canadian and feel no..."pride?"...in the NA thing. But if we're gonna go there NA vs EU is 2-1 because of Canada.

That doesn't mean anything but I guess the only thing that was overrated was team USA in this case.

Responding to a 10 month old comment...monkaS dude.

Just so happens that the meta was arguably in favor of France, with GOATs being strong in many situations. Canada just played around it extremely well.

I didn't lie, my prediction was indeed in bold. Also, it was all part of my plan, curse successfully activated. LONG LIVE THE QUEEN.

I'm really not sure about this one. China looks so good but Finland really seemed to have showed up during groups. I say this with very little confidence but, 3-2 for China

Bold prediction, 3-0 for USA.

Bold prediction, 3-0 for SK.

I want my boys to win, and I think they can pull through, but my gut feeling is a close match, either 3-1 or 3-2 in favor of France.

That being said, I expect to be proven wrong!