Photo: Gold.163.com
The Gold Series grand finals called for 32 of the best Chinese players and they answered. For the next three weeks, they will vie for $48,900 in prizes in the first LAN event for the region.
The estern scene might be having a slow start of 2015 with barely any high profile tournaments, but that's not at all the case with China. The home country of renowned players like TiddlerCelestial, MagicWind, Nicolas and RunAndGun already has its eyes fixed on the Gold Series grand finals, one of the highest paying local tournaments.
Although broadcast exclusively in Chinese, this is a great opportunity for western fans to acquaint themselves with the post-GvG metagame in China. The region was long regarded as weaker compared to its European and North American counterparts but several 2014 tournaments proved that wrong. In October, the $195,000 World Cyber Arena - the tournament with the biggest prize pool bar the BlizzCon World Championship - was topped by LiBo and TiddlerCelestial, Chinese players both. A month later, TiddlerCelestial made another wave, finishing second in the world finals behind Firebat, becoming one of the highest earning players in Hearthstone.
The Gold Series finals feature all those names, and more. The player pool is a mix of champions and bannermen from the biggest teams like Vici Gaming, World Elite, Invictus Gaming, Newbee, Big 3 and Douyu as well as up-and-comers who are yet to make their names in the game.
One such newcomer already made an impression yesterday in the opening day of the tournament. Inmdlong topped a group with two-times CN vs KR Masters grand finalist MagicWind and Big3's Melody, leaving the former second and the latter out of the competition.
The entire competition will be covered on GosuGamers' matchticker and at any time you can catch the action. Standings and results will be provided in our coverage hub.
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