I feel like this tournament has a special kind of atmosphere that makes it one of the best things we currently have in AoC. Let's try to find some reasons:
Juan (vs) F1Re -> winner against miguel
slam (vs) MbL (already played) -> winner against St4rk
Losers bracket pre-final: the winners of the two lines above
Losers bracket final: challenging TheViper
Grand Final: challenging (czech) Lojza
- The streamer: Memb's coverage is beyond. Not only in numbers. Since he focuses on his own channel, he can let his strong streamer personality fully flourish. His passion for the game is pretty contagious. He does also a great job in forwarding the streams immediately to YouTube.
- The history: Being the third edition, this tournament can look back and refer to past events of its own. The first two editions were successful, which is a good foundation.
- The settings: The tournament promotes the thought that 1v1 Arena is one of the most interesting settings. It's the chess of AoC. It's the place where you witness the AoC technologies in their diversity and vasteness, you see everything from early castle to post imperial wars. The density of 1v1 confrontation is showcased. Also the civ settings of this tournament make sure we see a good variation of civs and non-mirrored games. And last but not least: a full Double Elimination beginning from the first round may be a ******ation, but the big field of strong players in the losers bracket tells such a good story: all these fallen stars trying to escape the dust of war.
- The community: Also shown by the numer of sign-ups, the community shows big interest in the event, enthusiasts like Gary Internet contribute to its liveliness, Memb's stream chat is running hot every time. Also the prize pool is donated by members of the community.
- The admin: swissboy and Masters of Arena is a great love story, he purely focuses on "his" tournament, it gets his full attention and he does an impeccable job as admin.
- The special ingredient: MoA3 is a 1v1 tournament where TheViper has lost a match already. Imagine the possibilities.
- The players: It's stunning how many top players joined the party and seem to take it serious in the face of the comparatively small prize pool. Since weeks we see match-ups on the highest level of play and entertainment. It also seems like there are not much/big scheduling and game posting problems. Just look what we have before us:
Juan (vs) F1Re -> winner against miguel
slam (vs) MbL (already played) -> winner against St4rk
Losers bracket pre-final: the winners of the two lines above
Losers bracket final: challenging TheViper
Grand Final: challenging (czech) Lojza