Another week, another episode of GosuGamers' Hearthstone competitive recap. Fasten your seatbelts for issue #5 which covers StarSeries finals, GosuAwards Summer and more.
The "Hearthstone competitive recap" is issued every Monday and goes over the major events in - and often outside - competitive Hearthstone. Blizzard's card game is in the middle of of its HCT campaign but there are also lots of other third party tournaments running in parallel, and this post will summarize everything for your convenience.
Enjoy!
Tournament news:
Xixo brings the StarSeries trophy back to Europe
The Na'Vi marquee cut down China's hopes for a repeat championship and hoisted the StarSeries Season 2 cup in Shanghai this Sunday. Xixo defeated local player XieShuai 4-2 in the finals and won himself his second LAN title after Esports Arena Invitational last year. Xixo is also very close to breaking the 1,400 GosuRankings threshold and joining Thijs "ThijsNL" Molendijk in the exclusive club.
SeatStory Cup V gets officially announced
The fifth edition of everyone's favorite house-hosted Hearthstone tournament is about to return at the end of the month. July 21-24 are the dates for SeatStory Cup V as $20,000 are once again on the line. Details about invites and qualifiers and yet to be announced.
Major news and content:
The Innervated podcast #50 acted as a teaser and mini-preview of a GosuGamers first: GosuAwards Summer. Much like the main ceremony at the end of the year, the Summer awards will celebrate the best in selected categories - Best player, Break-out player, Best team, Best new/returning caster and Best tournament - for the first half of the year. Official announcements and community polls are to be announced this week.
Manchester City and Sporting Lisbon move into esports
Although Hearthstone is not just yet on the radar of these two major sports team, it's interesting news nonetheless. The English giants have already signed FIFA pro Kieran "Kez" Brown, while Sporting are looking into picking up a League team. Who knows, maybe card-slingers will come on their radar next.
To watch/play next:
July 14-17 are the dates you need to mark for DreamHack's next stop. The tournament expanded its swiss slots to 280, meaning even more players will get the chance to competefor the $27,500. Viewers guide of the event will be provided on Thursday, so you have all information conveniently gathered in one place.
The 2016 ONOG Circuit has been bringing continuous open tournaments to the North American region with prize pools that are nothing to scoff at. This weekend, the fourth Feature Tournament will be held, with eight players brawling for $5,500 and a seed into the PAX Grand Finals. The dates for the tournament are July 15-17 at the starting time is 19:00 PDT.
The second half of the regular season of China's premier team league continues. Invictus Gaming are yet to take their first win and unless they pull a miracle, they won't be making the playoffs. World Elite, on the other hand, dropped its first loss to eStar last week and will try to not score another one against table runner-ups OMG on Wednesday. Here's the schedule for this week (all matches start 13:00 CEST / 07:00 EDT / 04:00 PDT):
July 11 - EDG vs TongFu
July 12 - Celestial vs eStar
July 13 - World Elite vs OMG
Matches are broadcast on twitch.tv/tempo_storm by DTwo and crew.
GosuGamers' own circuit of open events expanded in July and all 13 cups are open for registration now. Grab one of the limited 128 spots now and compete for 7 HCT points each Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Looking to compete in more events than our own? Check the link above for full list of open cups with HCT points available.
Decks and guides:
Sumadin's C'Thun Secret Paladin
Fr0zen's #1 Legend N'Zoth RenoLock
zGGLeoz's ingenious techs and decks from GsuCup SEA #6
Astrogation's GosuCup EU winning decks
Top 10 GosuRanked players:
Here are the top 10 ranked players as of July 11th:
1. 
Sebastian "Xixo" Bentert • Natus Vincere • +1
2. Jan "SuperJJ" Janssen • Complexity Gaming • -1
3. 
Pavel "Pavel" Beltukov • Team ANOX • +1
4. 
Frederik "Hoej" Nielsen • Natus Vincere • -1
5. 
Thijs "ThijsNL" Molendijk • G2 Esports • -
6. 
David "Dog" Caero • Complexity Gaming • +1
7. Keaton "Chakki" Gil • No Team • -1
8. 
Dima "Rdu" Radu • G2 Esports • +1
9. Frank "Fr0zen" Zhang • -1
10. 
Esteban "AKAWonder" Serrano • N/A
