Chapter 194: Group Matches
The S10 World Series will officially start on December 10.
December 8th to 9th is the reporting time stipulated by the league. The 4 teams from Huaguo District went to the officially designated hotel to check in together on the afternoon of the 9th. This competition is still held at the Seoul E-sports Center, which welcomes players from all over the world. The hotel is the same as the last World Individual.
Players from Huaguo District are arranged on the 22nd floor of Building A.
Ye Shaoyang and Chi Shuo's room was just on the other side of the corner. The teammates swiped their cards to enter the door. The two of them carried their luggage and walked forward. Chi Shuo stopped at the door of room 2219, checked the door card, and said, "I'm here."
Ye Shaoyang looked at the familiar house number and said in surprise, "Isn't this the room I stayed in last time?"
Remembering what happened in this room, the two looked at each other and laughed at the same time.
During the last individual match, Ye Shaoyang discussed tactics with Chi Shuo in this room, and also kissed Chi Shuo intimately here, helping Chi Shuo through the susceptible period.
It was the first kiss between the two of them, which is still fresh in my memory.
Ye Shaoyang's ears became hot when he thought of the scene where Chi Shuo pressed him against the wall for a kiss. It's all because I don't know enough about Alpha's susceptibility period, I thought it would be enough to bite the neck like a temporary mark before, but I didn't expect to be kissed.
He didn't even expect that Chi Shuo would confess after the kiss.
Ye Shaoyang didn't hate it anyway, so he simply agreed.
Now revisiting the same place as a couple, Ye Shaoyang found that his original choice was right.
After agreeing to be Chi Shuo's boyfriend, there is no more rift between the two, and they are more tacit than before. They have a common goal to achieve with their loved ones.
Chi Shuo looked at Ye Shaoyang with gentle eyes. He lightly held Ye Shaoyang's hand on the back of the suitcase and said, "Last time you lived here, this time it's me. It's also a kind of fate."
Ye Shaoyang said: "Perhaps, this room will bring us good luck again?"
The two smiled at each other and squeezed each other's fingers intimately. Take out the door card and swipe the card to enter the house.
As soon as I entered the room, I saw Tang Can sending a message in the Tianhuan group: "The alliance has notified that there will be a buffet from 7:00 am to 12:00 pm during the game; 1-2 pm is the official lunch time, and 5-7 pm is the official lunch time. Dinner time. Due to the different schedules of players from different countries, everyone should bring their key cards and go to the restaurant to eat according to their own schedules."
Coach Lin reminded: "Pay attention to discipline during outings, and you cannot leave the team without permission. After the grouping situation comes out, I will inform you of the next training arrangements as soon as possible."
Everyone swiped the screen: "Received."
There are a total of 16 qualifying places in the World Championship of Gods of War. Because South Korea won the world championship last year, 3 teams have qualified for the promotion. Huaguo originally had 2 teams, but Yueying and Jingzhe qualified from the wild card division. The team of this year's Huaguo District delegation is very spectacular, and Qiu Heng, the chairman of the alliance, also went out with the team in person.
But the domestic black fans are right, e-sports is not an event that can be won by a large number of people. Four teams go to the World Championship. If they don't win the championship in the end, they will suffer more infamy than any season in the past. Be intense.
Yueying and Jingzhe came from the wild card division. Even if they can't win the championship, domestic fans will not say that they are "participating", and they have worked very hard. But Tianhuan is different. As the champion of the Huaguo Professional League, Tianhuan carries the hopes of too many people, and the pressure is also the greatest.
Coach Lin was worried that the players were nervous, so he launched a red envelope in the group: "I will send 66 small red envelopes, everyone will grab it by hand, I hope the next game will be smooth!"
66 red envelopes popped up in a row, it rained red envelopes in the Tianhuan group, and everyone rushed to grab the red envelopes, which diluted the tension before the game.
That afternoon, the game schedule was down, and Coach Lin posted a screenshot of it in the Tianhuan group.
Group A, Huaguo BM, American FNO, South Korean TOC, African ZZC;
Group B, China JZ, USA FLD, Europe AMT, Korea TIP;
Group C, China TH, Japan GOW, Africa YNF, Mexico GXC;
Group D, China YY, South Korea ATB, European HER, Japan MOK;
Cheng Xing's eyes were dizzy when he saw these letters, and he posted a headache emoji in the group.
Coach Lin marked the three teams in red and explained: "The North American champion FNO, the Korean champion ATB, the European champion AMT and the Chinese champion Tianhuan are in four groups respectively, and will not meet strong enemies in the group stage. Moreover, The teams in Group C, except for Japan's GOW, are relatively strong, and the rest of the African and Mexican teams are very weak, so the result of the draw is very beneficial to us."
Qu Jiang asked: "After the group stage, 8 will enter the 4th stage, which group are we playing?"
Coach Lin sent out a match schedule: "The first in Group C plays the second in Group D, and the second in Group C plays the first in Group D."
Everyone carefully studied the table, and they didn't have any clues after studying for a long time. After all, no one knows which teams will remain after the 16 teams go through the group round robin.
Ye Shaoyang said: "No matter what else, we will try our best to take the first place in Group C."
Coach Lin said with a smile: "Yangyang summed it up right. At 6 o'clock tonight, go to the restaurant downstairs on time for dinner. Starting at 7 o'clock, our four teams in Huaguo District will practice tactics in wheel battles."
Everyone acted quickly, simply packed the luggage they brought, and went downstairs to eat.
At 7 p.m., in order to avoid tactical leaks, everyone logged into the game with their laptops. After all, if you are unfamiliar with your life abroad, if you go to an Internet cafe or other place, if the content of their training is photographed by the built-in surveillance of the other party's computer, it will be troublesome.
In foreign countries, the heart of guarding against others is indispensable.
The operator of Huaguo "God War" opened a separate server for them for training. The players turned on their own computers on time in their respective rooms and logged in to the domestic server.
In the first round, Tianhuan fights Yueying, Beimu fights Jingzhe; in the second round, Tianhuan fights Jingzhe and Beimu fights Yueying... Such a frequent rotation of wheel battles will test the psychological quality of the players.
What's more, they are facing the top experts in the country.
In normal times, I can't imagine that Tianhuan can play against so many strong teams on the same day?
But by Worlds, it's become commonplace.
The training continued until 12 o'clock in the evening, and each of the 4 teams had their own winners and losers.
Even if Tianhuan is the champion of the domestic league, they can't guarantee that they will win Beimu, Jingzhe, and Yueying in every game. They have played 3 games and lost 1 game. The winning rate is about 70%, which is very good.
The coaches of each team began to review the game, and the review did not let everyone sleep until 2:00 in the morning.
The next morning, Ye Shaoyang and Chi Shuo got up early to eat. Except for the European and American players who suffered from jet lag, the Asian players were still sleeping at this time. Ye Shaoyang and Chi Shuo seemed out of place among a group of European and American players.
The two looked at each other and sat calmly by the window with their plates.
They were eating when suddenly a handsome young man with short hair and blue eyes walked towards them and greeted Ye Shaoyang in broken Chinese: "Lie Yang, long time no see."
Ye Shaoyang raised his head, held back a smile and said, "Mitchell, why did you cut your hair?"
Mitchell scratched his head: "Zhou Zhou said that my hair looks like a teddy dog."
Ye Shaoyang: "..."
Team Zhou is too direct, right? Although Ye Shaoyang thought so too.
Mitchell asked eagerly: "After cutting it off, is it more handsome?"
Ye Shaoyang said: "Cough, I have more energy."
Mitchell was obviously very happy, and looked at Ye Shaoyang with a smile: "I will definitely kill you this time."
Ye Shaoyang reminded friendly: "We are not in the same group."
Mitchell said seriously: "Then I will kill you when we meet in the knockout round!"
Ye Shaoyang looked down at the breakfast on his plate and said helplessly, "Let's eat first."
This guy has been thinking about killing Ye Shaoyang for a year, and has yet to achieve his goal. According to Team Zhou, in the international server, after Team Zhou single-killed Mitchell once, Mitchell chased him for several months and finally stopped until he killed Zhou Jiawen three times in a row.
What a persistent little lunatic.
Ye Shaoyang looked at his back as he turned away and couldn't help laughing: "Mitchell's character is indeed like a teddy dog in battle mode. Does he really not consider changing to a warrior?"
Chi Shuo said lightly: "Battle Mage, it's also his personal style."
After a while, someone else came towards them, a big blonde beauty.
Ye Shaoyang remembered her, Vanessa, the female A player she had seen in the World Individual Championship, the jungler of the European champion team AMT, and the winner of this year's NovelFireP award in the European region, a very talented newcomer.
She won the MVP in the first year of her debut. Her legendary experience is the same as that of Miss Zhao Xinping of the Beimu team.
Vanessa stopped in front of the two and said with a smile, "SUN, Moon, how are you?"
Ye Shaoyang said politely, "Hello."
Vanessa said: "It's a pity not to be in the same group, I wish you good luck and advance to the next round."
She speaks English. Ye Shaoyang often participated in world competitions in his previous life. He could understand daily English conversations. He nodded to her and said, "Thank you, and good luck to you."
After Vanessa left, Chi Shuo leaned into Ye Shaoyang's ear and said, "You are the world individual champion, you will become the focus wherever you go. In the next games, Tian Huan will also be the focus of the coaches of the major teams. The goal, we have practiced a lot of tricks in private, there is no need to expose it too early."
Ye Shaoyang nodded in agreement: "Well, the group stage is played normally, let's talk about it in the knockout stage."
On December 10, the group stage officially started.
Each group will conduct round-robin matches within the group, BO3 format, global BP, and the top two in points will advance to the quarter-finals of the world championship, and then compete with the teams that have qualified from other groups in an eight-to-four knockout match until the champion is determined.
When it comes to the world stage, the teams that can come to this arena are the top-level teams in each major region, so the official will not ignore the group stage, and each game will be staggered and broadcast live around the world.
On the first day, the game of the most promising Korean ATB team in this World Championship was scheduled for the prime time, 7:00 pm. The other teams' game times are staggered from each other, with Tianhuan vs. Mexico's GXC scheduled for 2pm.
The ratings during this time period are not high, and there are not many spectators at the game site.
On the contrary, domestic netizens have set up the alarm clock to open the live broadcast room to watch the first game of the Tianhuan World Championship.
Mexico's GXC team is a team that qualified from the Latin American division. The e-sports strength of the entire division is not strong, and the tactical ideas are not so novel. Tianhuan played GXC smoothly, and won the first game in less than 20 minutes.
In the second game, GXC changed the lineup and frantically targeted Tianhuan's jungler. But I didn't expect Chi Shuo to choose a tool person to protect Ye Shaoyang's development, and let Ye Shaoyang take the rhythm to directly blow up the opposite middle lane, pushing down the middle tower at the fastest speed.
Tianhuan still won the game in 20 minutes.
Domestic audiences were stunned.
When I watched Tianhuan's game before, I often dragged it to 30 minutes in one round. Today, after two rounds of the game were played in 40 minutes, no one reacted.
【It's a bit easy to win, isn't it? 】
[It feels like the big devil is beating Xiaomengxin? 】
[After all, the league in the Latin American division has only been launched in recent years, and the players and coaching staff are not our professionals. We won the weakest team in Group C, so there is no need to be too happy.]
[They don't seem to know much about Tianhuan either]
[This grouping is more favorable to Tianhuan, the opponents in the group stage are not very strong, and there is no champion team in other divisions, Tianhuan will definitely have no problem qualifying! 】
The grouping is divided by computer lottery under the supervision of a notary by the World Alliance of "God War", and there is no possibility of black box operation. It's just that teams from the same country will be divided into different groups first, and then a random draw will be conducted using the exclusion method. The rules are the same every year.
Luck will naturally also affect the fate of a team. Tianhuan had good luck in the group stage, and Ye Shaoyang could already guess what the Korean media said - qualifying by luck.
But what about after the group is out?
8 into 4, 4 into 2, every game is a knockout, can you always win by luck?
The team that finally wins the championship is definitely the strongest.
On the first day of the game, the team that won Mexico 2:0 neatly was just an appetizer for Tianhuan. They will use the follow-up games to prove their strength and shut up the media who question them.