Note: I had written this article over the last few weeks and hadn’t released it yet. Since huehue’s announcement, I will be helping with that event too. These are my general thoughts and feelings around a potential Nations Cup with any potential larger funding. These are simply ideas on how things could be implemented. If you have any thoughts/feedback about the event just announced, or want more details then please join the discord here - https://discord.gg/PEAJ7bwdSB
This article should not be treated as part of the 2023 Nations Cup hosted by hue.
This article should not be treated as part of the 2023 Nations Cup hosted by hue.
Nations Cup in 2023
Nations Cup may sound like an unfamiliar name to many members of the community now in 2022. It’s certainly something that’s remembered fondly by many of the veterans of the community as one of the holy grails of tournaments within the competitive scene, but the reality is so many of the current community has not gotten to experience one. ‘Nations Cup’ has been absent from the Age of Empires scene since 2017, (to the dismay of many), where Brazil B (dogao, Miguel, FeAge and St4rk) took home the crown in front of Finland A aka Suomi. It’s fair to say lots has changed since 2017 in the world of Age of Empires. We now play on the Definitive Edition. Improved graphics and quality of life features with it. Voobly looks to be largely a relic of the past. Please Microsoft, don’t turn off the servers. That being said, I’m sure many of those that are reminiscent of Voobly will attest that the path finding was better back then. T90 is now on Facebook. Zero Empires doesn’t even create content anymore and works for Relic on AoE IV. Wait, there’s an Age of Empires IV? The Indians as a civilisation existed and no longer do. Regenerating villagers exist in the game. Some units even have charge attacks. I think we will agree that the game itself is almost unrecognisable in comparison to the 2017 version, especially if you look at it from a visual standpoint. Just go and watch an old video on YouTube, my god that stuff is ghastly! Also very difficult to watch in comparison to present day AoE. All in all, it’s still the same game we fell in love with though, whether that was the Age of Kings, Age of Conquerors or most recently with DE.
The love for Age of Empires II is almost stronger than ever. A global pandemic helped rekindle this love for many which brought viewers and players back to memories of their childhood. This has been a story I’ve heard countless times from community members since I have integrated with the online community of AoE. Age of Empires II does an amazing job at exploiting feelings of nostalgia. The memories of playing on your old PC with no idea what a build order even was, creating cities, playing the William Wallace campaign. Many AoE2 fans look back on those childhood days as ‘simpler times’ and moments of pure happiness. Age of Empires has definitely benefited greatly from this and it’s quite evident in the demographic of the fan base. Nearly most of its fans/players appear to be mature adults (>25 years) which could certainly be considered odd for most video games and it’s always a big surprise to community members “that came back after many years” to find a thriving community.
For those like myself who weren’t active pre-2017 and need some more background information, Nations Cup was a 4v4, 16 team national team tournament with a mixed map format (we’re talking easily 30+ maps in the tournament). It was actually first hosted by the AoCGroup in 2005 and 2009 with relatively small prizes of $880 and $1000 which were actually rather considerably large at that time. How times have changed when prize pools around 1k USD barely make a viewer bat an eyelid. For full disclosure, I was not active in the AOE2 scene in 2017, so I don’t have any of the specific nostalgic emotions surrounding the last Nations Cup which last appeared then sponsored by SY. Nor do I have complete knowledge of how the event unraveled, but I have asked for some input from some community members that were active then, done some research and mainly extracted information from Liquipedia (thank you to the volunteers). SY are no longer explicitly involved in the Age of Empires community (at least under that name) so it seems unlikely that they would be the host of the next event. SY hosted and sponsored the last three editions of the tournament with the most recent featuring a prize pool of ¥200,000 CNY (≃ $30,309 USD) with the finals being played in China. The prize pool certainly wouldn’t look that out of place today in the current state of competitive AoE, but it’s fair to say that prize pools have moved on to bigger and better, certainly in the 1v1 side of things. The 2015 Nations Cup actually featured an even larger prize pool ($47,400 USD)) and 2014 was somewhat similar to 2017 ($29,000). If you type in SY Nations Cup 2017 to YouTube, it’s quite something to see how the landscape of ‘content’ has changed. Not a lot of videos and certainly a small amount of views in comparison to the present day.
National teams are an interesting prospect for a competitive high level tournament, and would provide a breath of fresh air into the team game scene which has been dominated by aM and GL/Secret in recent years which are largely composite squads of many different nationalities. Generally, it’s something we don’t see a whole lot of at the top level. We of course have White Wolf Palace (WWP) which houses most of the Chinese players in their clan with Yo and Lyx heading the way. The best of the rest, is arguably Suomi, which is Finnish for ‘Finland,’ for those that don’t know. Besides Suomi there haven't really been many other “national” teams active in recent years at top level team game tournaments, but you could make an argument for Brazil. However, outside of the World Cup and most recently in Nomad Wars 3, they don’t seem to have been all that active. Even for Battle of Africa 3, Los Machos was formed including Slam instead of opting for a full Brazil outfit. Some new teams have popped up, Combi are essentially a Mexican squad, Poland are regularly competing as PL, Turkiye have a capable stack of 2k2+ players and even the United Kingdom are on the up with the players of PUB. National teams also pose the questions of the unknown. What would an Austria squad look like for Liereyy, what would Hera and Canada be like? Would Dave aka Marauder make the cut? These questions remain unanswered. By estimation we could have close to 30 teams from different nations that could be relatively competitive and that’s not including the possibility of supposed B teams. With the rebirth of the Definitive Edition and the plethora of new players (and old players that have since then left the scene), I can’t help wondering how a Nations Cup would potentially look in 2023.
Team Format (3v3 vs 4v4)
One of the most important debates for a prospective Nations Cup in 2023, surrounds whether the event should be 3v3 or 4v4. Of course, each has their own merits and each setting would likely benefit some nations rather than others.
Naturally, 3v3 would benefit nations with a smaller player pool and that are therefore less likely to have top professional players. Take Norway for example, who have TheViper and MbL at their disposable, but who would be their third and fourth remains a question mark. On the other hand, take nations like Brazil or Argentina who have a number of players that could be used. In their case, it may prove difficult in trimming the fat down to the top A squad. Undoubtedly, you would rather have a deep pool of players to select from, but some players on the cusp of big results could be left out.
However, the main benefit of Nations Cup being a 4v4 event is simply that it continues the tradition of previous events. Is a Nations Cup that’s 3v3 likely going to allow some smaller nations cup to be more competitive? Absolutely. Would it feel the same as previous events? I would say probably not. 3v3 and 4v4 are very different settings with 3v3s generally being dictated by the pocket player looking to dictate terms with one of their flanks and traditionally a 4v4 generally splitting into two 2v2s with potential swings of army in later stages depending on the game situation, map and matchup. Personally, I’m all for making events more inclusive and feel like a 3v3 would allow this, but I still feel like 4v4 would be an acceptable decision due to the lack of 4v4 tournaments in recent years and maintaining the tradition of previous Nations Cup.
Unfortunately, AoE isn’t as big as other games such as League of Legends or CSGO, the player pool just pales in comparison and both of those games have events on an unimaginable scale in comparison to AoE, also while having a fully fleshed out professional eSports scene. The AoE player pool is much smaller than those games, which means that some players and nations are more likely to miss out completely. Even with a change to 3v3 which would clearly be done to accommodate certain nations like Norway, why should players like DauT, Heart, Modri and classicpro miss out? What will be done to accommodate their needs? These are tricky questions and my first thoughts are that there will need to be compromises or tough decisions be made which will force certain players to miss out.
Teams - Exclusion, A/B Teams, Composite, Draft
These next points I feel are going to be the most crucial and important talking points for players/viewers surrounding a potential Nations Cup. In my experience of talking about settings with the community already, these parts have been rather decisive. I understand that a Nations Cup should be purely of Nations, I truly get it. However, something just doesn’t sit right with me that some players are at a significant disadvantage given the settings. It just feels rather bad that some players would miss out on the potential biggest event of the year. I would feel even more uncomfortable if there was a large prize pool attached to the event that essentially made it extremely difficult borderline near impossible to qualify for such an event. Is it really fair to have a $100k event where many can’t properly compete? On the other hand, it would provide a platform and pathway for many developing players to invest more time and resources into the game. Many have said, “tough luck” that it should strictly be Nations squads only, but there are clearly a lot of factors that need to be considered before arriving at a decision.
Historically, A and B teams have been allowed to compete in the same Nations Cup from the same country. Take China for example, who had 3 teams qualify for the 2017 event (SY, Frantic and EMA). Of course, Brazil B won the whole event despite being the lower rated team than Brazil A, and still to this day they compete in some team game tournaments under that name (Nomad Wars 3 for example). Looking at it from a sporting perspective, it feels odd that multiple teams would be allowed to compete from the same nation vs having a more varied competition with different nations. This is not something you would see in the regular sporting world when it comes to team events. Yes, you could even argue that there are many more National teams that could be competitive in the current state. On the other hand, there could simply be an argument that the best teams should be allowed to compete at the main event regardless if there is overlap from the same nation. In my opinion, it does seem odd that accommodations would be made for nations to have multiple teams in the tournament, while smaller nations can be left to struggle to form competitive teams.
I’m sure we all remember the “May I team with DauT” thread by Modri which was completely speculative and not a formal application for a Yugoslavia team, but it did raise some concerns for a national team format and was another option that had been talked about and was brought up in the discussion of 2v2 World Cup. If players had a lack of top players from their nation, could they form a composite team of bordering nations? Please keep in mind this occurred in a 2v2 event, let alone a 3v3 or 4v4. I think the main concern is, to what parameters do you set so that this is not exploited to the point where a “super team” could be formed. Also, the other main consideration is whether it’s in the spirit of the event. If I team with people from my nation, then why should someone else be allowed to do something different? Why should certain players miss out on the top events simply because they don’t have a lot of top players to team with? I did mention there’s likely to be compromises with this event. No matter what, we either compromise to find settings that can be included or we settle and decide that some will simply not be involved.
That being said, another option I would like to propose is a draft style system where certain players from underdeveloped AoE nations could apply to enter. Now the exact details on who would be able to apply, I’m not 100% set on, but it certainly sounds doable. Much like Rage Forest, there could be nominated team captains who would then take turns picking from tiers of players which should ensure that no super teams occur. It may present some language complications and may not entirely be in the spirit of “Nations” Cup forming some ‘Rest of The World’ teams, but I would like to ask, is it fair for some of the best players to miss out on likely the biggest event of the year simply because of the place they’re born? It’s a very hard decision to make, that’s bound to upset many no matter the call, but I can’t help but feel there is a semi-fair solution out there. B teams are hardly the norm in competitive sports, why not ‘Rest of the World’ teams? I would like to find a mechanism to get these players involved. Another suggestion is the ROW teams could play show matches against teams that have competed/competing in the main event.
Ultimately, when the next Nations Cup rolls around, in my opinion the fairest option is not to provide any accommodations and pathways for some nations to have greater participation in the event because they have a larger and deeper player pool vs some players from smaller nations not being able to truly compete at the highest level. We should, though, take it upon ourselves to ensure that the event engages everyone in the community.
League/Qualifier Settings
Hopefully that is a nice segue into the next point of the league settings. The last edition of Nations Cup operated with Gold and Silver leagues which I assume was in order to accommodate different levels of players and greater participation. In fact, Liereyy competed in NC17 Silver League for Austria and Sitaux for France. Both players have gone on to bigger and better things, especially Liereyy, but I feel it’s important that we continue to have pathways and platforms for developing players to play in settings that will be unfamiliar to them. Arguably a Nations Cup in 2023 could populate multiple leagues in sign ups (provided there admins willing to work on it) and a Gold, Silver and maybe further into a Bronze league would provide greater competition than ever.
Qualifiers have used different formats, the most recent NC in 2017 used a single elimination bracket which is undoubtedly the easiest for administrators and arguable players to schedule, but previous editions do appear to have utilised regional qualifiers. For people that aren’t familiar with the behind the scenes of administering tournaments, scheduling is not easy. Also, I mean this for 1v1s. Now imagine team game tournaments, with 4v4 rosters, everyone with different schedules and time zones, some sets can be near impossible if appropriate time is not given and without some serious prodding to get sets scheduled. Of course, having 2-3 substitute players can help considerably with some of these issues. However, part of me does believe that a large amount of the player base needs a bit of a wake up call if they are going to be given a chance to compete in such a tournament and whether they deserve something on this scale. From the organisation standpoint, it would be amazing to run double elimination brackets for qualification, or use regional qualifiers (like in NC 1 and 2). It would be amazing to run national qualifiers where teams could fight for the right to be the A team that would battle out in the main event. Even then, I don’t believe AoE is able to effectively organise a tournament on that scale effectively as we do lack a central governing body and there is not one in sight, or development as far I know. Simply put though, I don’t believe the community is ready for something on that size and scale yet, which is a shame. Now, I don’t mean to place blame on anyone, improvements could be made, but the reality is the community is in a strange place where we have highly prestigious prize pools, but the competitive community is still developing. Most players work full time and it would be extremely important that it is taken into consideration when planning an event that would likely go quite deep in the player pool.
However, to speculate further, I believe the league and qualification settings will be almost completely dependent on the involvement of A/B teams and how many potential teams are allowed to compete per nation. If you look at a Nations Cup, you can pretty much say that this is the World Cup of AoE2. Generally, world cup competitions don’t allow multiple teams from one nation. I don’t know specifically the solution to this problem, but it would seem unusual for a Nations Cup in present day AoE to allow multiple squads from the same nation to compete, especially when the player pool is so deep. Yes, there are definitely some B squads that are likely going to be more competitive and just straight up better than A squads from other nations. There is definitely an argument that the competitive aspect of the tournament could suffer. However, for an international tournament in competitive settings it would just feel rather odd, and I do believe that AoE currently has enough diversity to support an A squad format. Imagine the thought of national qualifiers and teams having to battle out for the right to be considered the A squad for Nations Cup. Theoretically speaking, it shouldn’t be super hard to organise internal tournaments and should be easier than something regional/international, but would require some global manpower. Would the B teams be allowed to enter the silver league? It’s a good question which many are wondering of course and something I am not too sure about myself. We definitely don’t want to be in a situation where a Silver league would just be dominated by some of the B teams from countries like Brazil or Argentina. Honestly, I feel like there may be enough of a trickle down that you could allow B, C or whatever letter you want teams into Silver, Bronze and Copper league if needed. It’s certainly something that will require a great amount of thought put into it for a potential main event and not just hobbled together as an afterthought to the main event.
I’m not sure what the exact solution is here, but ultimately I do feel that it’s not very fair for certain nations to enter multiple teams because they have lots of players capable of playing at that level. I understand the argument that the best players should be able to compete at the best event. However, if some of the best players in the world from smaller nations are not even able to put a competitive squad together for the top league. The solution for both is that you need to try and put together the best squad you can for your nation and fight for the right to compete at one of the biggest team game events in the community. That is exactly what Nations Cup should be about, bringing people together, but we need to be cautious that we don’t favour certain teams.
Map Settings
There is always a large amount of debate when it comes to maps and their settings with every S tier tournament. Some questions are simple, what maps are we using, how many are there? But, some are a little less obvious. What changes have been made to the map vs the normal script in DE? I think most of us at some point have been watching a streamer and laughed in their look of confusion of “this is not what I was expecting.” Please don’t take that personally if you are that person. The point I am trying to get across is, preparation is key when it comes to maps and there needs to be certain considerations that allow the conditions for players to prepare the best across a certain number of maps. When it comes to Nations Cup, I think the next host should shoulder certain responsibility in keeping the legacy of the event, with some similar settings to what have come before it. Nevertheless, there are definitely improvements that could be made when it comes to the map pool part of the event.
SY Nations Cup 2017 for example had a very interesting map pool, including 33, yes that’s right, thirty three maps in total. In fairness, there was a mix of map modes, open, land, closed, nomad start, but many of the maps look unfamiliar in the modern day scene of Age of Empires. It begs the question, what’s the benefit of having a huge map pool like this? An argument could be made that a larger map pool leaves more opportunities for upsets provided lower rated teams could pick some of the less played maps that may have more of an unclear meta or that have certain gimmicks attached which may only be noticeable through some dedicated preparation. In theory, there could also be a greater variety of maps throughout the tournament depending on the implementation of the maps. We’ve seen some cases where map pools can change depending on the round (Terra Nova Duos) or where maps have been categorised where one player picks the category of the map then the opponent picks the map (Warlords). I think both of these systems have their merit and I am not trying to say these are bad systems at all. Generally though, I think variety in the competitive scene is incredibly healthy. It’s also great as a viewer to watch different strategies on a certain map type, and even watch the meta develop during a tournament as more and more games get played. Typically speaking, this is something that’s more likely to happen on custom maps with unclear or perhaps even an undefined meta. I would definitely be in favour of using new custom maps, perhaps through the medium of a map scripter competition (which has worked well in RMS Cup), but there would definitely be a need for a robust testing method which could be achieved through play testing and feedback. Nations Cup deserves to have the settings that make it the most competitive and I believe most players would agree that a less is more approach is the best way to ensure this.
Now, how many maps should be available in a 4v4 tournament composed of national teams? It’s a good question. Memb is someone that is still a champion of the BO9 final format, but it’s something that seems to be receding into the darkness in most S tier competitions. The main downside to BO9 is the length, and there’s no getting around it, it can be quite long. However, I’m sure we’ve all seen BO7 finals that have ended 4-0 and we are all left wondering; “is that it?” Personally, I don’t have a huge preference on whether it’s BO7 or BO9 finals, I think both have their merits. If it’s going to be BO7 have a 9 map-pool, and if it’s BO9 have a map pool size of 11. I don’t think any could argue that these amounts of maps would certainly not be healthy for players, viewers and casters. Not only do players have to do preparation on these maps and it can be confusing at times when there is a large amount of maps for viewers and also diluting casters knowledge.
However, If I was going to pick though, I would prefer a BO7 format. Arguably, a BO9 would really need either a break in the middle of the series or even multiple which is not great for retaining viewer numbers. There would also be the question of fatigue which was brought up in the previous Battle of Africa where Gamer Legion were leading, but in the end losing to aM 5-4 after being 4-2 up. For a Nations Cup we do want to ensure that the settings ensure the highest level of competition possible, and with 4v4 team games they can certainly go on for a while so the likely common sense would be to have a BO7 finals format. Of course, it’s important that players have stamina and are able to perform over multiple games, but having to play nine potential games in a series is a massive commitment which can be very mentally and physically taxing, especially with no structure when it comes to breaks. How many games would be played in the previous round of the tournament would also be an important consideration as even a BO5 in theory, could last a number of hours.
One thing that has been slowly evaporating from the competitive scene in Age of Empires is the use of a set map in map drafting. Still quite a new concept and still leaves many viewers confused in Twitch chat as to why player x has an extra home map when drafting on CaptainsMode. Arabia has historically been the set map of choice in tournaments going back many years, but this tradition does seem to be disappearing more and more. The Grand Melee has brought it back in the form of Sheepfold, which does just appear to be an Arabia clone, which in fairness, should suit most of the top players. It's at this point I’d like to explain why I think a set map is generally bad for the tournament community. More often than not, Arabia can be used by top players as a ‘banker’ and can rely on getting the win on the map as the meta which has largely been established. An Arabia set map does allow players to be lazy (or rely on gained knowledge depending on your perspective) and not prepare fully for tournaments. Full credit to The Baguettes though, who certainly upset the TG meta in recent memory and have shook things up considerably. I fully believe that if you want to play a certain map in a tournament, you should categorically have to draft it. Otherwise, it could be favourable to one team more than the other. The same could be said for drafting of course, depending on the settings, but it’s important to give teams to pick the home maps they want to pick. If someone wants to play Arabia, then pick it as a home map. The new fashion comes in the form of a neutral map for game one. After home maps are picked, the remaining maps are banned by both sides until one remains. Thus, leaving the game one map, and also something that’s mutually agreed by both to be played on, most likely not going to be a map that a team hates, or loves completely, but something in the middle. A compromise. Something that has delivered a massive breath of fresh air to the competitive scene in my opinion.
Conclusion
Some of you may be wondering why I am even writing this ‘article,’ well the truth is I have some spare time and recently I have missed writing more and more after leaving university a couple of years ago. Selfishly, I wanted to have some creative output and to me this was something that was creative. I am not hosting the next Nations Cup. I don’t know if anyone has any solid plans in place. I would love to work on it. It’s a massive project and finding the right spot for it may be difficult, but I do think the Age of Empires community deserves another Nations Cup. The players, greater than ever and more multinational than it’s ever been arguably. The viewers, team game tournaments are strongly lacking and there’s been next to zero 4v4 team game tournaments since the release of DE. One place we do lack is in organisational man power. There are not a lot of administrators that run tournaments. With such a multinational event, it would also definitely be beneficial to have individuals involved that are bilingual and can communicate to members in their own community. I’m hoping that this piece builds some hype and gives some impotence to its development. If we’re not going to get it in 2023, I sure as hell hope we get it in 2024.
I will be releasing a player and team preview in the next couple of weeks where I look at speculative teams, much like Tarsiz created many moons ago. I hope to have that released in the coming weeks. Most of the things in this piece are not meant to be the perfect solution, but simply to offer some ideas. If you have any of your own ideas about how a Nations Cup would look, I would love to hear, provided it’s constructive.
Thanks - paradox303
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