The beginning stages of the Challengers Cup are about to get under way on Thursday 24th September, so let's take a look at the teams fighting for that $1500 prize pot. In the form of video AND writing!
Maps
Before moving to checking out the rosters for my Top 10, let's take a look at the maps involved:
Maps for Open Series
Round of 32: badlands, granary, viaduct
Round of 16: gullywash, snakewater, sunshine
Quarterfinals: process, granary, gullywash
Semifinals: badlands, snakewater,viaduct
Finals: gullywash, badlands, process
Maps for Invite Series
Map Selection
Quarterfinals: gullywash, process, granary
Semifinals: badlands, sunshine, snakewater
Finals: gullywash, badlands, viaduct
Top 10 Teams
I've roughly drafted my idea of a Top 10 for this tournament by taking the invited teams, adding in a few lower Premiership teams, sprinkling a couple of Premiership Qualifier teams in, and adding a random 10th team because I have no idea about these guys. I also asked the teams to provide a 100% serious quality insight into their teams for people watching.
1: Reason
- Permzilla
- kaidus
- kaptain
- Rising
- Starkie
- Hafficool
Stark : "We're like well good innit. We got me and haffi on scout which is like bangin ye? Then we got kaido on demo and hes just the dogs bollocks. Rising on roamer whos a BEAST. Kapi on soldier whos a MONSTER. Permzilla also plays."
2: Epsilon
- KnOxXx
- numlocked
- Mike
- tek
- schocky
- Flippy
Mike : "We're an Overwatch team trying out TF2 to pass the time. Finding this F2P anime knockoff seems like a pretty good way to pass the time especially since there are teams and cups apparently"
3: TLR
- Serotone
- WARHURYEAH
- AMS
- Salmon
- HerrP
- kiler4funn:P
WAR : "Hey guys, We here at TLR e-sports ™ cannot wait for the Challengers Cup powered by Razer Arena ™, with our new improved lineup featuring the best players (currently looking for teams from mid+) I’m sure we can put on a good show with our gimmicky playstyle. I hope other teams will join me as I say that we are very appreciative of Razer ™ for supporting competitive Team Fortress 2 ™. Our brand spanking new Overwatch ™ team will be firing on all cylinders as we look to claim our stake as the best Overwatch ™ team in Team Fortress 2 ™. I’d like to thank our sponsors for getting us where we are today, TorGuard ™, KFA2 ™, Netgear ™, Iiyama ™, Multiplay ™, BattleTiger ™, Gunnar ™ and Ocaholic ™. Cheers, WARHURYEAH"
4: Full Tilt
- kos
- alle
- Silentes
- Sideshow
- Thalash
- Astt
kos : "Listen kid we are the [censored] team in the game ty, we will end u all. Epsi blow cos they don't play, [R]aisin like to choke because kaidus who the [censored] are russians and tlr have never been good. ty. selling zowie za"
5: Serpents
- shyyou
- Death
- Forsak3n
- lippy
- ShaDowBurn
- atomic
ShaDowBurn : "..."
6: Danger Dogs
- skeej
- kr4tos
- zoob
- kalho
- tonmas
- Tseini
kr4tos : "im happy we finally finalised our roster, after weeks of trialing... in the end we just picked up skeej on medic and switched me back to demo, which we didnt try once before. but we all know each other from teams in the past/ highlander, so im confident we can work well together as a team! we are all looking forward for the first challenge in the razer cup now!"
7: LEGO
- Condom
- DrPhil
- Josh
- dmoule
- sorex
- iZon
Josh : "This version of lego only has one dane in it due to real life commitments from the other danes, so iZon was playing dota with me one night and came up with the idea of making a different version of lego by making it just for friends mostly. This involved me iZon and dmoule who have known each other for a few years with the addition of doctor phil and sorex who we have known for almost a year now. All we needed was someone to fill the gap of a cool player in prem and that is when we picked up condom. We've tried out this lineup a fair few times and only got steamrolled really by top teams such as reason and the last resort, but compared to low prem/top high teams we were always able to do well against them mostly coming up with victories and that was shown when we slammed dogs in the zowie cup."
8: top5 rocket?
- Ombrack
- Kaiizo
- Medico
- Neo
- Opti
- Blitzo
Opti : "I would describe top5rocket as a group of friends before a team. Blitzo and I have been friends since season 10 or something. We've successively met Ombrack, and then Kaiizo, Medico and Néo (who had been playing together before). Top5rocket is also including all the people casually playing mixes with us and that leads to, as fraac said, difficulties to find 'serious' logs. We've done a few lans/IRL meetings together; that boosted up our friendship greatly. The support we had on the forum (I'm looking at you Ownage) is really incredible andwe'd really like to thank them all for that. Top5rocket is a community of nice people, and 6 of them appear to be teaming up to play at a decent level."_
9: Planet Express
- ScrewB
- iikq
- neo
- muuki
- sheepy
- tommi
sheepy : "So it pretty much started with me just wanting to make a team with friends (muuki tommi setlet screwb neo) and we were pretty awful in our first few pcws as people have been enjoying pointing out on etf2l. We then deicded that we wanting to actually win something so we got iikq on demoman and now we have really improved a lot and are a pretty good team now. We still have a whole lot to improve on but all 5 players although not the most experianced and have never really played at a prem level are really commited and willing to put the effort in. We have made prem playoffs and although prem would be nice and we want it I think that we need a season to get used to playing at the top level. Considering how keen everyone on the team is I think when season 23 comes along we will be challanging the top prem teams."
10: Ownage Squad
- Verse
- nuze
- Drackk
- T0m
- hpqoeu
- moursi
hpqoeu : "Ownage Squad sponsored by UberLoFF are a Top Notch ETf2l "High" Division Team Looking to Win This Season (22) PLaying For this Extraordinary Team We have Prem PLayers such as "T0m" and "drack". Neither of which can jump properly, yet both play with gunboats. Scouting For tHIs Team We have "Moursi Fanshawe" And "hhhpqeoqu". moursi gets damage through building and "hqwerrew" snipes. Last and Least (cause theyre bad classes and no1 cares) we have "Nuzeman" and "Turbonmonkey" on Demoman and Medic. Really solid players."
Quite.
Well I'm sure you learned nothing from that. I guess you'll simply have to listen to the analysts over on twitch.tv/teamfortresstv, on Thursday 24th September, Sunday 27th September, and Sunday 4th October.