Thanks A_E and the rest of the team!

With GCS3 and therefore probably CoH2's last major tournament being concluded, I just wanted to get a big thank you out to especially A_E and all the tournament organizers of GCS3 and previous tournaments.

GCS3 was a pleasure to watch (actually, I am still catching up on youtube), and I can only imagine how many weekends, how much time and effort in general you guys have put into planning to make this event happen in person. This is not normal, especially not for a small/middle sized community as CoH2.
My first big CoH2 tournament that I watched was GCS2, which has already been a long time ago. You've been leading the CoH2 tournament scene for the better half of a decade and taken it to a level that probably no one would expect from a community of this size, while keeping it still very personal and "casual".
By now, the community probably already takes it as a given that you're organizing tournaments regularly and there will be an A_E tournament every couple of months. It's being taken as a given probably a bit too much than it should. Especially on this forum tournaments are barely discussed outside of balance issues, which might come off as ungrateful, so let this thread be a small counter point to that.

In essence: Thanks for all the effort you've put into CoH2 and its fanbase. I hope you'll stick around for CoH3, but I can obviously understand if at some point you decide that organizing tournaments consumes too much time and you have to or want to focus elsewhere, although I of course hope you and everyone else involved will still be up for tournaments in CoH3.

well written

I echo Hannibals sentiments. GCS3 was outstanding.

Thanks for the kind words chaps!

"It's being taken as a given probably a bit too much than it should." Yeah I could tell that with the viewer figures for ML, glad that GCS3 saw a return to public interest.


" I hope you'll stick around for CoH3, but I can obviously understand if at some point you decide that organizing tournaments consumes too much time and you have to or want to focus elsewhere, although I of course hope you and everyone else involved will still be up for tournaments in CoH3."

Let's hope we don't have to organise our own tournaments at launch at the very least!

In essence: Thanks for all the effort you've put into CoH2 and its fanbase. I hope you'll stick around for CoH3, but I can obviously understand if at some point you decide that organizing tournaments consumes too much time and you have to or want to focus elsewhere, although I of course hope you and everyone else involved will still be up for tournaments in CoH3.

The silent majority is the "casual" crowd, which makes most of the RTS money, that's just a fact.
If CoH3 can retain this crowd and with good monetization schemes then Relic/Sega has the money for investing in tournaments.

Thanks for the kind words chaps!

"It's being taken as a given probably a bit too much than it should." Yeah I could tell that with the viewer figures for ML, glad that GCS3 saw a return to public interest.

I think the issue with that was less that people were taking it for granted or that there was less interest in competitive play, and more that Coh2 in its current state has become somewhat stale at the competitive level. There's only so many variations of Soviets vs. Wehrmacht with the same selection of doctrines you can watch before it becomes less exciting. And I know there's the one-off game where someone picks a surprise doctrine or one of the other three factions, but typically, games were Soviets vs. Wehrmacht. Which as it happens, are the factions least likely (not impossible, of course, there were some great games) to create wow games in a way that an exciting USF player can for example.

I'm not criticizing or blaming anyone here, for the record. Neither the players for picking the safe option, nor the balance team and certainly not the tourney organizers. Nor am I saying the tourneys themselves were stale, but simply that the current way in which both Soviets and Wehrmacht are played to their maximum potential does not leave a viewer with the wow factor it did in previous tourneys.

That said, I personally thoroughly enjoyed GCS3 and can only thank the players, organizers and casters for putting their hearts and soul into this. It's very obvious a lot of hard work was put into GCS3, and I would say the result was spectacular (What a final!). For those of us that weren't there, it was great to see some of the people we interact with on a regular basis.

Here's to more in Coh3

Great job AE and team, very nice to see community for a game we loved.

I think the issue with that was less that people were taking it for granted or that there was less interest in competitive play, and more that Coh2 in its current state has become somewhat stale at the competitive level. There's only so many variations of Soviets vs. Wehrmacht with the same selection of doctrines you can watch before it becomes less exciting. And I know there's the one-off game where someone picks a surprise doctrine or one of the other three factions, but typically, games were Soviets vs. Wehrmacht. Which as it happens, are the factions least likely (not impossible, of course, there were some great games) to create wow games in a way that an exciting USF player can for example.

I'm not criticizing or blaming anyone here, for the record. Neither the players for picking the safe option, nor the balance team and certainly not the tourney organizers. Nor am I saying the tourneys themselves were stale, but simply that the current way in which both Soviets and Wehrmacht are played to their maximum potential does not leave a viewer with the wow factor it did in previous tourneys.

That said, I personally thoroughly enjoyed GCS3 and can only thank the players, organizers and casters for putting their hearts and soul into this. It's very obvious a lot of hard work was put into GCS3, and I would say the result was spectacular (What a final!). For those of us that weren't there, it was great to see some of the people we interact with on a regular basis.

Here's to more in Coh3

I share same thoughts too. Not criticising, just a pov.

Pick allies = insta win.
7 man cons need a nerf.

I am thinking for future format, how about game 1&2, allows choice of faction.
game 3 onwards, coin toss and winner picks their faction.

I also like to see RNG back, abandoned, plane crashes etc. I believe many RNG was disabled for such competitions, which i never agree. Stop citing diving with med tank > abandoned > amcry.

Thanks for the kind words chaps!

"It's being taken as a given probably a bit too much than it should." Yeah I could tell that with the viewer figures for ML, glad that GCS3 saw a return to public interest.


" I hope you'll stick around for CoH3, but I can obviously understand if at some point you decide that organizing tournaments consumes too much time and you have to or want to focus elsewhere, although I of course hope you and everyone else involved will still be up for tournaments in CoH3."

Let's hope we don't have to organise our own tournaments at launch at the very least!

I wasn't playing CoH2 yet when Relic created tournaments back in the days. When they do for CoH3, I hope they match the more casual style of your organizations.
The main appeal of your tournaments for me has always been that you could see a lot of improvisation around every corner. Just some real fans having fun with the game and casting it, not some super polished "product". Relic wants to promote their game, they need to make it look good even if it were not, while you had the freedom to just cast whatever you want. It's always been a tourney, not an advertisement, and that's the important part.
If Relic-organized CoH3 tournaments can't match that, I'm gonna stop watching.

Keep that up. Your tournaments have their rough edges, but they're bloody good anyways.

After looking at Elden Ring success, coh3 has a good shot at success, at mp success too. But please keep the coh RNG/asymmetry flavor.

I think there is room for new gen of PC gamers embracing a more mechanical and in depth games rather than just twitch shooters or twitch mobas.

Same here, big thank you A_E!
Well written Hannibal, well written.

Indeed a well-written OP, wholeheartedly agree. Though other things have taken priority over CoH for me during the last months and I haven't followed the most recent tourneys, including GCS3, I also want to thank A_E and everyone else involved for making these events happen! Was always a blast watching those matches either live or on YT. And even if Relic decides to run tournaments for CoH3 on a regular basis in the future, such community events would be sorely missed if A_E stepped down from his role as a host/organizer.
Anyway, hope to see more tourneys for either CoH2 or 3... and I kind of feel the urge to start binge-watching GCS3 now, haha!