[Eddie]

It's been an extremely competitive year for all SEA SC2 players, who have eagerly battled their way through regular tournaments, slowly collecting victories and points towards the end of season SCS Finals. The seasons elite then played through the 2 day Grand Finale bracket this past weekend, so we can now crown the undisputed 2013 Champion of SEA!

Congratulations to x5PiG for winning the inaugural season of the SEA Championship Series!

It was a fantastic weekend of Starcraft 2 staring the best local talent and a few foreign stars. Featuring the top 32 players who qualified from tournaments run throughout the year, it is the biggest, and hardest tournament to date going around in this region of the world. Finals were run over two days, and at the end of it, it was the Australian superstar Zerg PiG up against the Korean Protoss Arthur. An amazing finals series was played between the two, going all the way down to the ace match. However, it was PiG who emerged victorious, doing what other regions could not, defeating the korean star, to claim his home regions crown title!

Results:

#1st x5PiG $700
#2nd Arthur $300
#3rd Av.KingKong $200
#4th iG.MacSed $150
#5/6th dTefel $125
#5/6th Fray'Petraeus $125
#7/8th Fray'iaguz $100
#7/8th Av.Myuu $100
#9/12th SLCN.ARze $50
#9/12th NvmOOnGLaDe $50
#9/12th Ninja $50
#9/12th EnDerr $50
#13/16th FlashBlysk $25
#13/16th Fray'Fenner $25
#13/16th SLCN.Pezz $25
#13/16th x5MegaFonzi $25

$2100

We also had a Saphira mouse + Knucker Keyboard giveaway to fans thanks to Tt eports
3 Xmashed Gear Shirt shirts were also given away to fans/players as well!

Complete bracket + maps from the weekend can be found here.
A massive thank you to eCKo`Zenabi for updating liquipedia all weekend.
Thanks also for Syf.tRoy for helping out prior to the end, and team Syf for assistance with tournament graphics.

Big shout-out to our sponsors Tt esports, Silicon Sports, eSports SG + Xmashed Gear. All have been supporting our community for quite some time now, and made SCS a lot bigger. They'll all be on board again for season 2014. If you haven't yet, give them a like on facebook, or leave a comment saying thanks for helping us out + supporting SEA esports.

+ [*] +

Xmas is coming up, check out http://shop.xmashed.com/ for some great gift ideas.

Thanks to all the community members who donated towards the prizepool as well. You're all legends!

Thanks also to Rifkin, Duckville, Rezyn8, Livibee, Kez, Zepph, Fenner and any other casters who helped out across the weekend.

And thanks to all the fans for watching!

We'll likely start season 2014 in early January, and are hoping to bring you an even bigger and better year of SC2. GG 2013

We are seeking/welcome feedback on 2013. Please let us know what we did right, and what we can look to improve on in 2014.

[|Erasmus|]

Congratulations PiG

[eCKo'Apoc]

Congratz Pig !

[ToRSpartaz]

Congrats Piggy

Thank you for all of the hard work you put in this year Eddie! You made every minute of the event all the more enjoyable through your hard work

Bring on 2014! (The year of NXZ )

[SLCN.ARze]

Grats Pig!

Well run tournament, good to see a nice viewer count on twitch as well!

In terms of feedback, I'd like to see some readjustment in the awarded SCS pts structure in the tournaments. At the moment it feels like a large tier of players don't have anything to play for in each weekly, as getting top 3/4 isn't very easy. I feel giving some points to a larger pool of players, would encourage more players to participate as it gives them more to play for.

Particularly in smaller but more regular weeklies, distribute the points a little bit more. Even if its just a few points to top 8 finishers, that would provide some incentive to play. This way more participation can be encouraged and hence exposure!

Of course there will need to be a balance - between reward good performing players & rewarding regular participants. Hope that makes some sense! Otherwise really good job and look forward to 2014

[Eddie]

Thanks ARze.

Some thoughts to consider regarding points towards the smaller tournaments:

pX + wT weekly are only $10 + $20 respectively, all to the winner. 50 SCS points are given out to top 4. 25/15/5/5

pX + wT weekly have several rounds of best of one series.

I believe both rarely attract more than 30 players, so giving out points to deeper placings (top 8), means points will be given out to a high % of players compared to other tournaments with more signups.

pX + wT weekly are open to all leagues.

pX + wT weekly aren't on at great times for most SEA countries. (cant be helped)

A lot of these decisions regarding format, $'s, times, etc are up to the individual tournament organisers. It's great we have these fun weekly tournaments, but compare all of this to the bigger $100, $200, $300+ Cups, where there is 80-100 signups, bigger prize-pool, league restrictions, non-sea players, harder formats, better times, etc. It's really hard to justify giving out more points. They already get far more than they should.

Perhaps we could look at increasing point distribution to all tournaments however.

If anyone has any more thoughts on this please share.

[mGGVersus]

Congrats to Pig and everyone else!

[SlapShoX]

I May Be New Here, But Then I See PiG And His Plays!

Congratulations PiG!
_________________________________________________
SlapShoX

Quick Comments

	syfSoundwave:	Welcome! :)
	eCKoa`ProzeR:	Welcome pare :D

[Malice]

I think the event ended up really showing what this year in SEA has all been like, in the case of online tournaments anyway, it's a shame Value didn't show up to compete, because this year has really been about the players from other regions coming and playing in our wT majors, masters cups, as well as Kingkong living here and competing. It really added to the story and gave me as a viewer a reason to watch.

In the end, it was Pig the WCS Australia champion taking yet another Australian (Kind of) title. Which is great to see. Congrats Pig!

In the future I'd like to see points distributed for local LAN results, perhaps small local LANS, not that many are run all too often can register with you Eddie to hand out points maybe equal or similar to the amount a master's cup would give?
Possibly points given out for ACL LAN results too would be good. Just some ideas.

Great event, thanks to everyone involved with running it, I enjoyed watching.

[SLCN.Kez]

Definitely wtb scs points at ACL (maybe they rejected the idea i dunno) But i know i never played in any of the weeklies cauz i wasn't really free or had the time, and would have been nice being rewarded and being able to play due to my total and complete domination of ACL

[nirvAnA]

yay! awesome morale booster going into IEM. gogogo pig!

[Eddie]

Unfortunately Malice and Kez, lans will likely never be included in SCS, as they can't be ranked fairly, especially in SEA.

Few reasons for this:

-Most lans are only open or accessible to a very small part of the SEA community

-Travelling to lans in SEA is very difficult and expensive, which really limits who can attend.

-Some lans are invite only, or qualifiers only open to certain countries.

-The player pool isn't as deep/tough as online events. If you take ACL Sydney 2013 for example, one of the bigger and harder lans, i think quickly going over the numbers there was only 10/32 of the top 32 -SCS players involved. It's a very small player pool compared to online.

-The frequency of lans is also an issue, and would favour players from certain regions.

For a tournament to be included in SCS it must:

-Be open to all SEA/the highest leagues
-There must be a cash prizepool

[Drinksarlot]

Congrats Pig! I only caught some of the final day but it seemed like a great tournament

[x5_dot]

Eddie makes some really good points regarding the points distribution. The SEA Championship Series needs to be inclusive of all SEA countries, not just Oceania. As it is, we already have our own internal circuit with ACL and their points system.

I find I have very little criticism of the SCS format or how it was run... which is a nice change. (Bigger points distribution for all tournaments might be the only thing that could give more incentive to players, maybe??)

Props to Eddie! Do you have any plans for 2014 that may be different or do you aim to run things pretty much like they are now?

Also, I just posted PiG's vlog on his SCS win for anyone interested http://www.sc2sea.com/blogs/showentry.php?e=1423

[Eddie]

Originally Posted by dot89

(Bigger points distribution for all tournaments might be the only thing that could give more incentive to players, maybe??)

I think more points towards the smaller tournaments could be done easier, eg extending wT to top 8, however doing similar for bigger ones, eg top 32+, is giving out a lot of points, to a lot of players. Could also be done though. Will look into some options.

An idea I've been thinking about coming from thoughts in this thread, is perhaps giving out bonus points to players outside of the top 16 or 32 season rankings who defeat players in the top 16/32 in a bo3+ in any tournament. Something small like 5 points, so even if they are knocked out before which ever round points are given out, eg R.16, R.8, they'd get some reward for a good 'scalp'. Bit like a mini ELO rankings type thing. There would be no penalty to the top 16/32 player, other than of course potential elimination from that tournament.

Originally Posted by dot89

Props to Eddie! Do you have any plans for 2014 that may be different or do you aim to run things pretty much like they are now?

Thanks. 2014 is going to be a very big and busy year in real life for me , so i don't know how much time i'll personally be able to dedicate to doing things differently. Will still try and pump out as many masters cups as i can, and I expect we'll follow a very similar structure for SCS, hopefully with a few improvements, bigger finals, etc.

Originally Posted by DM.MCZ.ProAnnn

However, for the 'bounty' showmatches, i feel that there are lack of people playing in those. Maybe we could reassess those showmatches?

Like they could earn 'bonus' points from playing.
Example: Both player bets 100 points each. Winner gets 200 while loser gets 10% of that? 20 points? Just an idea to encourage more people to play

Yes, SCS Challange/showmatches were quite under used. I think they are a great idea, and worth trying to improve.

[Mayo]

Congrats mate!

[ProAnnn]

Personally i think its a very well done event and the SCS points distribution are good. Rewards people for consistent placing high in tournaments.

However, for the 'bounty' showmatches, i feel that there are lack of people playing in those. Maybe we could reassess those showmatches?

Like they could earn 'bonus' points from playing.
Example: Both player bets 100 points each. Winner gets 200 while loser gets 10% of that? 20 points? Just an idea to encourage more people to play

[fur]

Eddie you are a ******* legend.

P.S. grats pig.

Quick Comments

ToRSpartaz:

+1

[SLCN.ARze]

Just to clarify my suggestions a little more - it was regarding the distribution of points! Even if say ro8 got like 1 or 2 points each, it still means something and DOES add up! I feel its a little too top heavy at the moment so scraping off some the top would be great

Quick Comments

NvRossi:

mmm i dunno, i think eddies reasoning is pretty solid

[rezyn8]

Congratulations Jared! Great to see a local defeat a Korean which in turn highlights the talent we have in our own backyard.

Massive thanks to Eddie for organising his events. His hard work MAKES the SEA scene!

Looking forward to 2014, its going to be an amazing year for eSports.

[ZizLah]

PiG's the only foreigner to win a tournament against korean opponents this year.

[Eddie]

Some good feedback so far, thanks guys.

I've been giving it a lot of thought, and have a few new ideas to increase point distribution and competition within tournaments, that we'll look to bring in for 2014. Also looking into encouraging more show matches.

Originally Posted by ZizLah

PiG's the only foreigner to win a tournament against korean opponents this year.

Regional final perhaps, not tournament.

Iaguz won ACL Melbourne and AVCON Lan.
Petraeus has won several Masters Cup this year against Koreans. Mafia won one as well.

And that's just in SEA.

[PiG]

I just wanted to poke my head in to say thanks for continuing these Eddie. If you ever find yourself stretched too far and need a hand please reach out to us in the sc2sea community, you have huge goodwill in this community for all the efforts you've put in over the last 3 years.

Keep up the good work and thanks for your efforts mate!