The VCT EMEA Challengers qualifiers are soon to start. Amidst massive reception for Challengers Qualifiers, Riot makes a disputable decision.
Since Valorant was released in 2020, it has received ever-growing acknowledgement. With its relatively positive success in 2021, everyone now seems to want a piece of the cake.
The VCT 2022 came up in question quite soon after the Champions 2021 ended. From what we have discovered, the number of teams since 2021 has increased by huge amounts.
Also read: How NaVi and S1mple winning a Major changed the entire CSGO market.
Such circumstances have created an unprecedented situation for Riot Games and the Valorant team. There were a lot of options to consider, but, the time constraint prevented a lot of alternatives.
But, the current format of the VCT EMEA Challengers Qualifiers has certainly raised some questions.
VCT EMEA took some excessive liberty for EU Challengers Qualifier 2 final 256 pool.
We recently made some changes to the second EU Challengers Qualifier, so we wanted to clarify and explain our thought process.
— VALORANT Champions Tour EMEA (@valesports_emea) January 14, 2022
Riot Games discussed the possibility of BO1. This allows the Valorant qualifiers pool to increase from 256 to 512. But, Valorant decided not to continue with B01 completely. It was solely done to push through Pandemic norms.
Bo3 is not a viable option for 512 within the time remaining till Challengers. And, to be honest, they never expected such reception under the Covi19 circumstances.
It’s kinda sad but yes they can.
Every tournament organization writes in there Rules that they can change any rule at any time without notificate anyone.
The Players/Teams/Orgs are in charge to check the rules for any changes.Not the way i would go but it can happen.
— MisterPhnx (@MisterPhnx) January 14, 2022
Let there be no doubt, there is no limitation of resources but, time. Due to that, a lot of teams that registered late were put on the waiting list. Except, there is a catch.
Teams that qualified higher in the last round but registered late, were moved from the waiting list to higher seeds. This created some controversy, as a lot of teams in the bottom seeds or registered late were not inducted at all.
Riot stated the competitiveness might get affected if BO1 were organised, which is logical.
This process was not ideal, we’ve reached out to impacted team to apologize and we’re exploring how we can improve for the next Qualifier. – Riot Competitive Operations Team
— VALORANT Champions Tour EMEA (@valesports_emea) January 14, 2022
Riot Games X Valorant gave the following explanation on Social Media, specifically Twitter.
“We made the decision that if a team signed up late to Qualifier 2 and was put on the waiting list but had previously reached at least Round 4 in Qualifier 1, the team’s position would be manually adjusted so that they would be among the 256 Round 1 team in Q2.
Because of this decision, some teams were moved to the waiting list. The signup situation is constantly changing and some teams decide not to compete after signing up. Currently, one team is on the waiting list of Qualifier 2 who was originally in the Round of 256.
This process was not ideal, we’ve reached out to the impacted team to apologize and we’re exploring how we can improve for the next Qualifier.
– Riot Competitive Operations Team
Also read: CSGO Roster Changes: Fallen, “THE PROFESSOR” now a free agent as Team Liquid release him.
Teams are having a hard time swallowing the fact that Riot moved up certain teams in the final pool from the waiting list, while others wait.
But i mean Team Big was allready signed up for the 2nd qualifier before they knew they gonna be in the 2 closed for Sure. So i dont understand your choice to move Teams when everybody could sign up before.
— Jason “yeah boyyyy” (@JSNyeet) January 15, 2022
What does not make sense is Riot giving a hard time to the teams who already registered and were not on the waiting list. Also, in the competitive scene, the bigger organisations are seemingly getting some help from Riot Games.
Even if there is no help given out, Riot’s actions certainly make it seem so. But, as Riot states, a competitive scene requires that most teams are skilled.
Though a skill gap exists, there is no way to balance it. Better teams and gamers are gonna increase the skill cap every day, as the meta shifts considerably. Hence, teams look to get every bit of advantage they can.
Here’s how you could’ve achieved what you set out to do without negatively impacting players who are trying to qualify like everyone else:
– Establish that teams who make it to R4 are auto-invited to the next qualifier.
– Reserve however many slots you need to for those teams— xctbl (@xctbl) January 14, 2022
So, what is the actual motive behind this? Business is one thing, but, what would the long term effect of this. Valve tried to pull one under everyone a few days back. The repercussions were massive.
Yet again, a big corporation stirs the news for a rash decision. Hopefully, this does not kill the Valorant scene in due time. Eventually, the VCT EMEA Challengers Qualifiers 2 provides answers.
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