Photo: Brian Kibler / Twitter
ThijsNL’s Paladin could not be answered as the Swedes went down 0-6.
A massacre ensued in the first match of the ESL Trinity Series, the $150,000 team league featuring the biggest and most accomplished orgs and players in Hearthstone. The seven-week journey to the finals began with a clean sweep by three-times GosuAwards winners G2 Esports, who ravaged Alliance in an unlikely sweep.
After banning Shaman and Rogue – decisions mirrored by Alliance themselves – G2 Esports led in with an Anyfin Paladin, ordinarily a niche pick used to counter heavy control decks and which often crumbles to heavy aggression. Luckily for the ATLC champions, heavy aggression was not at all forthcoming.
Alliance struggled to topple the murloc army game in and game out, with only their RenoMage and Dragon Warrior coming somewhat close and the rest of the games being won in a one-sided fashion. Only six games into match, deck pilot Thijs “ThijsNL” Molendijk recorded the league’s first all-kill.
RELATED: ESL Trinity Series event coverage hub
Tempo Storm upset Virtus.pro in the second match of the night. Considered underdogs not just in that particular series but in the league overall based purely off of past tournament results, Tempo Storm punished Virtus.pro’s questionable choice of Freeze Mage and threw a curve ball themselves, playing Aviana/C’Thun Druid in a meta which very much favors the Jade archetype instead.
In spite of not playing a game himself, Victor “VLPS” Lopez was instrumental to his team’s success. The youngest Tempo Storm member could be heard actively advising plays through the team’s communication channel, a unique feature of the Trinity Series.
The rest of the week one matches will be played tonight, January 19, starting at 19:00 CET. In game one, CompLexity takes on Cloud9, followed by Team Liquid’s bout with Luminosity Gaming right after.
