Master League 3: Chaoskrieg Recap and onto the WC 2020

It’s been about a month since Master League 3: Chaos Krieg ended. Featuring 250 VPs and random maps, the format was designed, as the name implies, to introduce maximum chaos while still keeping things fair and balanced in a tournament format.

With only half the number of VPs available many games were nasty, brutish, and short. Any mistake was compounded by the lack of time and a triple VP cap was enough to panic all but the most experienced players.

All in all, it was another success for the Master League. Community members like Imperial Dane and Greyshot were able to cast some exciting, high-level matches and we all got to see our favourite players duking it out for some prize money provided by the community!


If you forgot how things went or you want to spoil the ending, check out the brackets.




GBPirate has spent some time combing through the replays to come up with the numbers of games played, factions chosen, and win rates. (Thank you to Janne252 for making the coh2 replay analyzer bot in Discord!) To see what I’m talking about, click here!

There are a lot of changes in Chaos Krieg compared to previous ML events. Of course, this is most likely due to the 250 VP change, putting a greater focus on the early game and reducing the chances of a drawn-out game slim-to-none. This is most clearly reflected in faction selection which biased USF and Ostheer over the others. The Soviets were chosen the least, with only 13 of 111 games featuring them. USF had the highest win rate at 57.1 percent while the OKW had the worst at 38.1 percent. The UKF weren’t far behind, though, with a success rate of just 39.4 percent.

To me, there were two pieces of data that stood out the most. First, is the lack of ace games. In Man lebt nur Zweimal, there were a plethora of ace games in all rounds of the tournament. Three of the four upper bracket quarter finals matches were split 2-1 and all of the upper bracket semi-finals, too. In the lower bracket, half of the matches on day two were split 2-1. In Commander Terminator, there were a healthy amount of ace games, too. In Chaos Krieg, only two matches were played out to their final round.

The second piece of data is the lack of seed upsets. In Man lebt nur Zweimal there were many upsets throughout, despite the fact that Luvnest, seeded first, came out on top in the end. In Commander Terminator it was much the same, with Luvnest being knocked out in the second round. With Chaos Krieg, we saw all eight seeds make it to the final eight spots and the upsets only came in the quarter finals.

Interestingly, we’ve seen every second place player come back and win the next tournament. By that metric, VonIvan is already on his way to win the next ML event or, perhaps, the World Championship 2020!




Official ML stream playlist

Olvadi casting Seeking vs JibberJabber Job here.

Imperial Dane casting PFC vs. happycat and others.

Greyshot Productions: VonIvan vs. Kobal + later rounds videos 24-28.

SiberianGT casting various players Show Spoiler

The Angry Dutchman: Quiritz vs. Borobadger It’s a series to watch!

The Mad Hatter casting Elpern vs. Sormaple

And, as always, check out the official Master League Korean language Twitch stream.




The Company of Heroes Master League is a community-driven project that showcases CoH’s competitive scene. It features tournaments every two months and is broadcast live on Twitch. The prize pool is funded by members of the community chipping in small dollar amounts every month. By becoming a Patron, anyone can have the chance to vote on a variety of things that affect future tournaments and events via the exclusive Discord channel that brings together fans, players, and the organizers. In addition to the regular tournaments, the Master League is a living history of Company of Heroes. Detailed statistics of past tournaments are documented and results from the twenty most recent events are used to seed players in upcoming tournaments. This is to ensure that the Master League stays as competitive as possible while providing an archive of past achievements. The best part about this is that the data is free to access and available to the public! Check it out in the Master League spreadsheet. For more information about the CoH Master League, read the announcement post and, if you’re interested in getting involved, visit the CoH Master League Patreon page.




Despite how awful 2020 has been, it’s been an exciting time to be a player and fan of Company of Heroes. Apart from a large number of competitive events such as the Master League, Stormless’ cash show matches, and others, there’s the potential for CoH-related news to come out in mid-November as part of SEGA’s 60th anniversary celebrations! Relic will have the spotlight starting next week, from 18-24 November. But that’s not all, folks. We've got the World Championships 2020!

2020’s World Championship will feature a double elimination format. It’ll be a two-weekend event starting this weekend at 14:00 GMT on the 14th of November. The winner will emerge, battle-tested or, perhaps, battle-scarred, on the 22nd of November. Be sure to tune in on Relic's Twitch channel. See the stream schedule below for more details.

Seeding for this official Relic tournament will come directly from the Master League’s ranking system. Nearly two dozen players have signed up and qualified, but there’s no telling who could end up being 2020’s world champion! They've got not only the chance to win cold, hard cash, but bragging rights and prestige!

• Become a patron at the CoH Master League Patreon page!
  
• Catch the best action of the Master League tournaments via Twitch.
  
• Check out A_E's YouTube channel here.
  
• For a history of competitive CoH tournaments, and to see how seeds for the Master League are calculated, click here
  
• Chaos Krieg brackets.
  
• Company of Heroes 2 World Championships 2020 brackets
  
• CoH2 WC2020 official announcement