Only recently, the Global Esports Federatrion has announced some exciting details about the Global Esports Tour. Hallmarked as a globl event celebrating esports, it looks to be hosted in multiple countries with multiple esports. Read on as we discuss some of the details we know of.
Global Esports Tour Details – Fact Sheet
Credits: DreamHack
Here’s a quick look at some concise facts below:
Titles: Hearthstone, PUBG:Mobile and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Venues: Los Angeles, Riyadh and Dubai
Prize: $500,000 split across all three event
Organizer – Global Esports Federation partnered with FACEIT
Dates – September to November
This is everything really. Picking some of the top esports in the world, although Hearthstone isn’t as big as the other two, we’re in for a ride.
However, the main highlight is definitley the fact that all events will be held in offline environments across the world. Combining the international organization with FACEIT could make this event a regular staple of the year.
Credits: Psyonix
Here’s what the Co-Founder and CBO of FACEIT had to say:
It’s fantastic to be a part of the Global Esports Federation and to help build the first Global Esports Tour.
FACEIT’s ambition is to build a better competitive gaming ecosystem with more opportunities for players and the community.
We believe that hosting global competitions such as the GET is another step in the right direction.”
Credits: Michele Attisani, Co-Founder and CBO of FACEIT
Over the next few days, Grandmasters 2021 Season 2 should be continuing for multiple regions. Accordingly, at this time of year, we’re feeling somewhat reflective over the state of competitive Hearthstone. Let’s dive right into the past year of competitive Hearthstone 2020/21.
This Time Last Year – Hearthstone Stagnating?
Roughly this time 2 years ago, before the competitive season relaunched, a change hit competitive Hearthstone.
Credits: Blizzard
Indeed, at this time, Blizzard announced an exclusive esports viewership deal with YouTube. All of their assets, including competitive CoD and also Hearhtstone began broadcating exclusively here.
We’re mentioning this point as the community argues that it’s this point in time which resulted in a reduction of viewership. Supposedly, by moving to a different platform, the viewership was affected.
Let’s take a look ourselves by going through the past competitive year of events!
Fact Sheet – The Best Hearthstone Esports Events Over the Year – Competitive Hearthstone 2020/21
As always, we’d like to first thank Esports Charts for all of the viewership details which are made publically available for these events.
Although we can’t list every event, we’ll be sure to cover the entire calendar year.
Grandmasters 2020 Season 2 Asia-Pacific – August 2020
$90,500
Online
Peak Viewers – 18,600
Average Viewers – 9,382
Credits: Blizzard
Moving to one of the more notable events, the Grandmasters series is a seasonal event involving the highest tier competitors.
Lasting over a few months or two, the event takes place across multiple regions. Indeed, what we’d like to point out is that the APAC region quickly began climbing as the region with the most viewership overall.
Masters Tour 2020 Madrid – October 2020
$250,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 12,187
Average Viewers – 9,018
Skipping to October, the Masters Tour 2020 Madrid was the final event of the series last year. Involving both Grandmasters and random competitors, it keeps things very fresh and exciting.
However, viewership here is struggling majorly and was a main point of improvement for the competitive year 2021.
Hearthstone World Championship 2020 – December 2020
Credits: Blizzard
$500,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 89,246
Average Viewers – 23,286
Yet, this was all made up for with the Hearthstone World Championhip 2020in December.
Following an intense year of competition, like other esports,Blizzard puts it all on the line for the best competitors in the world.
However, viewership this year was quite abysmal compared to last. Although the 2019 event offered a peak viewership of 276,000, the viewership is seriously down at the largest event of the year.
Perhaps being online affected this outcome.
Masters Tour Ironforge – March 2021
Credits: Blizzard
$250,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 11,527
Average Viewers – 7,525
Starting off the 2021 season of the Masters Tour, Ironforge would try and switch things up.
However, the event failed to bring anything new to the table, and viewership for this type of event was typically at the same spot as the 2020 season.
Masters Tour Orgrimmar – April 2021
Credits: Blizzard
$250,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 20,656
Average Viewers – 14,833
Yet, in the next event, things looked much brighter as down in April, Blizzard managed to drive a small increase in viewership at the Masters Tour Orgrimmar in April.
However, a greater increase in viewership is expected.
Grandmasters 2021 Season 1 EMEA – March/June 2021
Credits: Blizzard
$11,500
Online
Peak Viewers – 19,405
Average Viewers – 9,578
Kicking off the Grandmasters season once again for 2021, this time around viewership shifted to the European region in terms of a peak.
Lasting two months, the event once again failed to achieve major improvements from last year.
Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran – June 2021
Credits: Blizzard
$250,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 12,207
Average Viewers – 8,764
Back to the Masters Tour event, there isn’t much to discuss here. Once again, no surprising numbers here – is Hearthstone at a standstill?
Masters Tour Silvermoon – August 2021 – Competitive Hearthstone 2020/21
Credits: Blizzard
$250,000
Online
Peak Viewers – 15,278
Average Viewers – 11,779
The last event on the calendar so far, Silvermoon was the last event to try and impress us. However, once again, the Masters Tour events fail to break 20,000 peak viewers.
A Rough Season – Improvement Needed
As you can see, this past season of competitive Hearthstone has hardly been impressive.
With numbers much lower than last year, Hearthstone is lagging behind – especially since no offline events have been held in the process.
This past weekend, the Masters Tour 2021 Silvermoon took place. With $250,000 on the line and 399 players in the mix, the event was awesome. Indeed, we’re here to offer a short recap of how the event went in general.
Masters Tour 2021 Silvermoon Recap – An Exciting Event
They are far beyond anyone else! Last two standing… I can feel it! The blood, the power, the mightiness. Relentless may taste victory!
In just 2 days, we went from almost 400 competitors to a top 10. Indeed, before proceeding, taking a look at how the placements concluded for the event:
jiuquanyu
AyRoK
judgement
Leaoh
digo
Wolder
Cx
Brox
Fr0zen
Orange
Overall, it was an incredible run for the Chinese contender of ‘jiuquanyu’. Across each stage of the Round of 16 Playoffs, the young gun took on many renowned names – winning each one in a long 3-2 scoreline.
Further on, as the fourth season of 2021 Masters Tour, Silvermoon marks a halfway point in the season for Grandmasters 2021.
And then there were four excellent warriors:@AyRoK_HS 🆚 Judgement jiuquanyu 🆚 RNGLeaoh
After a short break, competitive Hearthstone is back in business. Following a month of downtime, the fourth season of the Masters Tour is back and ready to proceed. With $250,000 on the line for 400 players, we’ve got an event on our hands. Read on to learn How to Watch Masters Tour Silvermoon!
Event Background
Credits: Blizzard Activision
As I’ll reiterate, the Masters Tour 2021 Silvermoon is the fourth season of the 2021 season of Masters Tour events which fall under the grand scheme of Grandmasters 2021.
Like other events in the series, another $250,000 will be up for grabs at this online event. Also a recurring feature is the Open format – now with 400 players registered for this upcoming event.
Accordingly, the event will run from 27th to 29th August. Usually, we take this opportunity to list the competitors – this isn’t very possible with 400 contenders although a full list is available here.
Are you ready for Masters Tour Silvermoon? The fourth stop of the year begins Friday at 9:00 a.m. PDT / 6:00 p.m. CEST / 1:00 a.m. KST.
Check out the viewer's guide for all you need to know to enjoy the action and earn Year of the Phoenix drops!
In summary, competitors are either qualified as Grandmasters, through the in-game ladder, Masters Tour Qualifiers, China Gold Series, other third party events and previous contenders at Masters Tour Dalaran.
Format
In terms of format, multiple stages are always a feature of large Hearthstone events such as this one.
As usual, it kicks off with the first round – Conquest. Here, with all games BO5, players must submit ‘decklists’ consisting of chosen cards.
To advance a player must win a game with each of this three decks (Sets of cards) to win, making sure that all cards are separate. Meanwhile, a losing player can use whatever cards he wishes until even.
This style of play combined with Swiss Rounds (8) will quickly shorten the competition from 400 to 16 players across 2 days of competition – very impressive.
Credits: Blizzard Activision
At the end of the swiss format, we’ll have the top 16 players surviving. Accordingly, this players have earned their spot int he final stage – Playoffs. Here, a simple single elimination bracket will serve as the final determiner.
Note that besides prize, the top 4 seeds also earn Grandmaster points too.
Schedule for the Masters Tour Silvermoon 2021
For this event, no official schedule has been revealed. It’s likely that initially only the most exciting games from the Conquest stage will be broadcasted, while the Playoffs will receive full attention.
Credits: Blizzard Activision
We recommend staying up to date with the official event page here.
Watch the Masters Tour Silvermoon 2021 on esportsguide
You can also watch the Masters Tour Silvermoon 2021 live stream via our very own website. Providing an extensive list of the biggest esports together with streams for each esports match live today or upcoming matches.
What we’ll do, though, is look at the past event – history is a good predictor of the future. Here’s how the top 13 for Masters Tour Dalaran a few months ago looked like:
ShuiMoo
OmegaZero
reqvam
Leaoh
SuperFake
Gaby
okasinnsuke
HSKeDaiBiao
Bunnyhoppor
StrikeReaper
Monsanto
MegaGliscor
Yueying
One thing is that the top 4 is primarily dominated by Chinese players. Perhaps this could be an indicator of future events.
Beyond competition, we know that this event needs to start pulling in more viewership for competitive Hearthstone. With the last few events struggling a little, it would be great to see at this point in time.
Just recently, Blizzard just announced some new changes. Accordingly, we have some news for the Hearthstone Grandmasters and Masters Tour series. As one of the biggest changes since 2019, this is some awesome news for the esport. Read on for some quick details.
Hearthstone Grandmasters and Masters Tour – Fact Sheet
We have some QoL and format changes coming to the remaining Qualifiers and Masters Tour events of the year! Check them out and get ready for the #MTStormwind Qualifiers, starting this week:
Qualification – the final two qualifiers will have more spots for individuals to compete
Requirements to qualify have been changed to focus on consistency, where now the top 50 highest win percentage players competing in the last 20 qualifiers without placing first can dive in
Indeed, this is up to 50 from 30 invites – an awesome improvement from the past
Earning a Masters Tour Spot is now a lot easier thanks to this, as prior competitors had to compete at 47 Qualifiers or more to win one
Indeed, the entire aim here is to make qualification for spots to be slightly more accessible for competitors.
Next in the line is our community deck craftsman, no other than @Nohandsgamer 🛠⚙
Beyond these changes to qualification, there are other small changes. Otherwise, other small moves have also been implemented:
Webcams will be mandatory for all matches
Masters Tours events will feature eight swiss rounds instead of nine
We’ll see these changes implemented at the upcoming Masters Tour Stormwind Qualifiers. Meanwhile, there’s also the Grandmasters 2021 Season 2 coming on August 13th.
Out of the many events this past weekend, the Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran was perhaps the most surprising. Accordingly, with a total of 388 players jumping into an incredible format and $250,000, some epic Hearthstone was in store. Indeed, read on for a quick recap of the outcome of the event, with the outcome of a new champion in ShuiMoo.
Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran – ShuiMoo Is New
Travelers, thank you for visiting Dalaran. 🧙♀️
Would you grant me a favor? I promise there will be no more after that.
I provide you with a survey – you submit your answers. Will ya?
Bearing in mind the intense number of competitors, find the top 5 below:
ShuiMoo
OmegaZero
reqvam
Leaoh
SuperFake
Gaby
The newcomer of ShuiMoo first fought to dive into the Round of 16. Here, the new kid on the block let everyone know what’s up, with multiple consecutive wins landing him into the Finals. Here, against the likes of OmegaZero, a statement was made in the form of a sweeping 3-0 finish.
Greatest of them all, it's time for ShuiMoo & OmegaZero to face the throne.
As of right now, viewership statistics aren’t yet available but we seem to be on the rise for competitive Hearthstone. Otherwise, the sight of a new victor in the scene is always incredible to see, as the Grandmasters are kept on their toes.
We’ll be keeping our eyes on further competition, such as the Grandmasters Season 2 which is soon.
We’re back at it again for competitive Hearthstone with another awesome Masters Tour event. Accordingly, the Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran event is on the horizon and promises to be an incredible open event. With 400 players competing for $250,000, read all the details below in another episode of ‘How to Watch’!
Event Background
In terms of background, this event is the third season of the 2021 Masters Tour. Once again, it’s an awesome opportunity for some Tier 1 competition between unknown names and up and rising stars fighting to be heard. Specifically, the event will kick off on 18th June and last up to the 20th June – running across an exciting evening.
Ready for the third Masters Tour of the year? #MTDalaran begins this weekend, and here are all the details you need to know, including how to earn YouTube Drops, to enjoy another thrilling @PlayHearthstone tournament!
Usually, we’d list all of the competitors/competing teams to offer our readers some context. However, with 400 competitors that’s rather difficult. All you need to know is that the Current Grandmasters will be challenged by Open Bracket contenders.
Format
When it comes to format, it’s rather simple. In general, each game will be a best-of-five series following the Conquest format utilized in previous Blizzard events. Specifically, it’ll kick off with a Swiss stage, which will help determine a total of 16 contenders for the Playoffs from the total of 400 competitors.
While you are watching Masters Tour Dalaran, don’t forget Qualifiers are running for Silvermoon. Congrats to @okasinnsuke_hs, who has been doing great, winning a #MastersTourSilvermoon invite on his 1st attempt 🙌
Indeed, once the top 16 are determined, they’ll be thrown into a Single Elimination Playoff format. Out of all the competitors, it’s these 16 teams that will enjoy the majority of the prize pool together with a greater chance of making it to the next Masters Tour event.
Schedule for the Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran
With regards to schedule, across the three days the stream is expected to kick off at the same time. However, as of right now, there are no available details for the schedule as of right now.
Credits: Hearthstone
Watch the Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran on esportsguide
You can also watch the Masters Tour 2021 Dalaran live stream via our very own website. Providing an extensive list of the biggest esports together with streams for each esports match live today or upcoming matches.
Heading into this event, it’s best to base our predictions on the previous Masters Tour event – that of Orgrimmar Masters Tour. Bearing this in mind, find the top 5 competitors finishing at the previous event:
Gaby
Viper
xBlyzes
Floki
Monsanto
Credits: Blizzard
It’s always exciting heading into these types of events – due to the open format there’s always an awesome opportunity for a new name to leave an impact. Notably, this is easily seen in how Gaby conquered the last event without anyone expected. Regardless, the veteran Grandmasters such as Viper and Monsanto are primed to have a chance to step up to the plate.
For those unaware, competitive Hearthstone can be a highly on-the-day competition, due to the element of lack involved – it’s all about playing your cards right.
Besides the prize, there’s also seeding to the next event on the line. Moreso as an esport, we’d like to see more viewership heading the way of competitive Hearthstone, improving on previous events and helping the esport in general. Do note that such an event will be taking place beside the Grandmasters 2021 events. We’re excited to see how this event does and who comes out on top.
1st – $2,500 + Seed to Hearthstone World Championship 2021 – Frenetic – FC Barcelona
2nd – $2,000 – xBlyzes – Grizi Esport
3rd-4th – $1,500 – Jarla – Nordavind
3rd-4th – $1,500 – Romania Rdu – G2 Esports
5th-6th – $1,000 – Bozzzton
5th-6th – $1,000 – Viper
7th-8th – $1,000 – Warma – Team Oplon
7th-8th – $1,000 – Thijs – G2 Esports
Frenetic taking the win at Grandmasters 2021 Season 1 EMEA – How did he do it?
Frenetic kicked off the event with the initial week play, from week 1 through 8. Fortunately he managed to advance with the bare minimum amount of 12 points. This put him ahead of players like Bunnyhoppor, Casie, as well as Felkeine.
Group Stage
After qualifying, he went onto Group A during the group stage, matching up against Jarla, Bozzzton, and Warma. He lost the initial match against Czech player Jarla, but won the matches against Warma and Bozzzton. This placed him 2nd in the group, just enough for him to qualify to the playoffs stage.
Playoffs
His first opponent was Romanian player Rdu, in which Frenetic won with a 3-1 scoreline. His next stage was his last, the Grand Finals against xBlyzes. The series was very close, concluding with a 3-2 scoreline. Here Frenetic won the first round with Hunter, xBlyzes replied with a Warrior and Demon Hunter win, but Ferenetic closed it out with Druid and Rogue. If you would like to watch the whole match of the Grand Finals, you can check it out here:
If you missed out on any of the card action, be sure to check out Barca esports’ highlights of Frenetic:
Accordingly, the Grandmasters events for Hearthstone are picking up the pace. Indeed, it’s currently live across three regions. Namely, these are Americas, EMEA and APAC. Bearing this in mind, we’ll be diving into the current standings for the Grandmasters 2021 Season 1 events below for all regions!
Grandmasters 2021 – The Top 5s
So, now we’ll go region by region and list the top 5 players so far according to the rankings.
Indeed, for all three regions 5 weeks have already passed. Accordingly, the first seven weeks are in fact the Group Stage. Also, week 8 onwards will move on to the Playoffs.
Right now, teams are fighting to be in the top 8 in order to make it to the Playoffs. Here at the Playoffs, a single elimination bracket will sort out the top players. It’s here that the prize pool will be earned and players will earn qualification to Grandmasters Season 2.
Yet, there are still 2 weeks left – it’s likely the standings will change before them.
In our recent esports tier list, there were a few changes. Accordingly, one of these changes was the demotion of Hearthstoneto a lower tier. As I explained in that article, the esport seems to be struggling at the moment – some might say that viewership is a factor. Read on to figure out whether Hearthstone Viewership is sinking or not.
Hearthstone Viewership – Moving to YouTube
Welcome to Day 3 of #HSGM! Who's ready to find out Week 3 specialists? 🧐 💥
This time last year, Blizzard Entertainment signed an exclusivity deal with YouTube gaming for esports coverage. This meant that all Overwatch, Call of Duty and Hearthstone, amongst others, would be broadcasted exclusively over other sites such as Twitch. As of right now, the former two shooters seem to be unaffected.
However, it seems that Hearthstone took a big hit moving to YouTube – here are some statistics for you to digest. Below, I’ll be presenting viewership details for two events prior to the Youtube deal, and two events after:
Credits: ESL
Pre-YouTube Deal
Masters Tour 2019 Las Vegas
Peak viewers – 76,944
Average viewers – 50,851
Masters Tour 2019 Seoul
Peak viewers – 86,035
Average viewers – 45,843
Post-YouTube Deal
Masters Tour 2020 Madrid
Peak viewers – 13,187
Average viewers – 9,018
Masters Tour 2021 Ironforge
Peak viewers – 11,527
Average viewers – 7,525
What I can confidently say, is that the numbers are nowhere near that of a couple years ago – and this is incredibly worrisome for the livelihood of the esport. Yet, I really don’t think it’s due to the exclusivity deal due to the success other esports have found – let’s dig deeper.
More To The Loss – Could it be Online?
Credits: Blizzard
The next possible reason is the fact that another change which occurred was the move to online events. Yet, once again, I believe this really isn’t the case. Overall, Hearthstone Viewership is not due to the insanity of a present crowd, but rather to enjoy a sophisticated game of card-dealing action.
While yes, some viewers may have been dissuaded by the lack of an arena, I don’t think it is the cause for such a drastic loss in viewership for these $250,000 events. When I say ‘$250,000’, I’m referring to the modern Masters Tour – noting that in the past, these events would support a prize pool of $500,000.
This leads me to what I believe is the problem.
Activision Blizzard – Not Providing Support?
Credits: Blizzard
Indeed, the only finger left to point is towards the developers. Hearthstone Viewership is definitely their responsibility and likely, their goal.
Yet, as we learnt earlier this year, Blizzard publicly cut off much of their esports staff. Bearing this in mind, the YouTube channels for the events have been suffering, where only one broadcast of one language (English) is being offered to viewers unlike previously.
This is a major problem. Officially, the CIS region is quite massive for the esport. According to a recent report by escharts, the last Hearthstone World Cup enjoyed the majority of viewers from this region. I believe this can easily be fixed by supporting this region with appropriate broadcasts.
Hearthstone Viewership – Only the Beginning of the Season
Credits: Blizzard
The basis of this event is on the back of how poorly viewership was for the first event of the year – the Ironforge event. However, I’ll be the first to admit that it’s still the beginning of the season. Perhaps as the season progresses and picks up steam, together with a new Russian stream – Hearthstone Viewership could be back where it left off.
