The third Masters Tour event this year took place last weekend with almost 350 hopeful players battling it out in an online tournament. In addition to a share of the prize money, the enticing prospect of getting invited to Hearthstone Grandmasters was on the line. You can re-live the action with our spoiler-free post below.
Top 8 Decklists
These were the players that survived the nine Swiss rounds and made it to the final day.
VoD
You can find the VoDs of the three days of competition below. Timestamps have been provided (by HSEsports) in a spoiler below the video if you're only interested in certain matches.
Day 1:
- 42:10 - xBlyzes vs Furyhunter - Swiss Round 1
- 1:29:01 - VKLiooon vs ChaboDennis - Swiss Round 1
- 1:57:43 - Fenomeno vs lnguagehackr - Swiss Round 1
- 2:37:39 - Alan870806 vs Pavel - Swiss Round 2
- 3:10:59 - TIZS vs Pinche - Swiss Round 2
- 3:32:48 - FroStee vs VKDiana - Swiss Round 2
- 4:24:13 - NoHandsGamer vs MegaGliscor - Swiss Round 3
- 5:30:48 - PNC vs T4COTASTIC - Swiss Round 3
- 6:04:51 - SCACC vs Fujitora - Swiss Round 4
- 6:44:49 - AyRoK vs Rami94 - Swiss Round 4
- 7:14:53 - Tansoku vs Zhym - Swiss Round 4
- 7:47:42 - noblord vs Alan870806 - Swiss Round 4
- 8:05:15 - Neirea vs justsaiyan - Swiss Round 5
- 8:48:03 - Surrender vs gle - Swiss Round 5
- 9:26:36 - VKLiooon vs azuuu - Swiss Round 5
Day 2:
- 34:49 - GivePLZ vs Felkeine - Swiss Round 6
- 1:13:08 - PNC vs Paradox - Swiss Round 6
- 1:39:31 - Hi3 vs RNGKylinS - Swiss Round 6
- 2:12:01 - SNBrox vs matff - Swiss Round 7
- 3:10:31 - BabyBear vs DikiyZver - Swiss Round 7
- 3:54:42 - Ostkaka vs Cosmo - Swiss Round 8
- 5:00:29 - WEStone vs Pignas - Swiss Round 8
- 5:21:20 - Swidz vs PNC - Swiss Round 8
- 5:54:14 - DeadDraw vs azuuu - Swiss Round 9
- 6:54:38 - Monsanto vs HSKeDaiBiao - Swiss Round 9
- 7:59:32 - pianolkiller vs Warma - Swiss Round 9
Day 3:
Results
You can find out how the Top 8 single-elimination bracket played out within the spoiler below. The preceding Swiss results can be found here in full.
Recap
Predictably, Warrior and Demon Hunter were the top 2 most popular classes brought by the players, and the aforementioned pair were also on top of the winrate list, only surpassed by Priest (according to Battlefy's stats). While Druid and Rogue were also popular, Shaman and Paladin were almost nowhere to be seen. The next event will take place before the new expansion comes; hopefully Blizzard will find a way to shake the meta a bit or we'll be looking at these same lineups for some time still.
As mentioned before, this tournament was the third and final event to count towards Grandmasters' promotion, and with its conclusion we have the names of the newest challengers in Hearthstone's elite competition.
In Asia-Pacific, the frontrunner trio were left with no other choice than hope that no other players could surpass them as their chances of making to top 8 had disappeared before the last round of Swiss. Three APAC players were on the verge of getting into top 8 before the last round but as they all were defeated, Alan870806, Bankyugi, and TIZS kept their places as the top 3.
For Europe, it wasn't over until it was over. With five Europeans reaching the top 8, only xBlyzes was able to be certain of his spot before the competition ended on Sunday. AyRoK had to fear for his place the entire time but was able to hold on to it as his compatriot Warma triumphed over Pignas in the final. This was another agonizing result for DeadDraw, for whom this was the third top 8 and second top 4 in last two years, as he narrowly missed GM promotion for the second time with Pignas beating him in the semifinal.
In Americas, PNC got close to redeeming himself but an agonizing 3-2 defeat to WEStone on the last round meant that the Chinese would get the top 8 spot. With PNC's loss, the frontrunners NoHandsGamer and brimful were allowed to keep their GM spots despite two other Americas players reaching the top 8 as Monsanto already had a place in the competition. As a minor consolation to PNC, it was another Argentinian Rami94 who took the remaining vacant spot.
The esports year will continue next month with Masters Tour Asia-Pacific.
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