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2019 Overwatch League season

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2019 Overwatch League season
LeagueOverwatch League
SportOverwatch
DurationFebruary 14 – August 25
September 5 – 29 (Playoffs)
Number of matches28
Number of teams20
TV partner(s)
Regular season
Top seedVancouver Titans
Season MVPJay "sinatraa" Won
Stage Champions
Stage 1Vancouver Titans
Stage 2San Francisco Shock
Stage 3Shanghai Dragons
Grand Finals
VenueWells Fargo Center,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
ChampionsSan Francisco Shock
  Runners-upVancouver Titans
Finals MVPChoi "ChoiHyoBin" Hyo-Bin
Overwatch League seasons

The 2019 Overwatch League season was the second season of the Overwatch League (OWL), an esport based on the video game Overwatch. The league expanded from 12 teams from the inaugural season to 20 teams. Of the eight new teams, two were from the United States, two were from Canada, one was from France, and three were from China.

The season began on February 14, 2019 and ended on August 25. Postseason play began in late August. The San Francisco Shock won the Grand Finals over the Vancouver Titans to become the league champions.

League changes

Expansion

See also: Overwatch League § Teams

The Overwatch League initially launched with twelve teams in the 2018 season. During this season, Blizzard stated it planned to expand out the league to add six teams, ideally gaining more teams in European and Asian regions, and started meeting with potential owners in March 2018.[1] By September 2018, Blizzard confirmed it had signed eight additional teams based in Atlanta, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Toronto, Paris, Washington D.C., Vancouver, and Chengdu, bringing the total team count to twenty.[2] Whereas the franchising fee was estimated to be US$20 million in the inaugural season, the fee was estimated by observers to have gone as high as US$50 million for these new teams.[1] The eight teams were distributed evenly between the two Divisions, with the North American East Coast and European teams joining the Atlantic Division, and the Chinese and North American West Coast teams added to the Pacific Division.

Schedule

The 2019 season's revised schedule format was announced on December 12, 2018. The season kept the four-stage format that was used in the 2018 season, though only the first three stages had playoffs, while the fourth stage's playoffs were replaced by a six-team play-in tournament to determine the final two postseason teams.[3] The top six season playoff teams were determined by the same way they were in 2018; the top two teams from each division and the next four teams, regardless of division. The season playoffs were contested in a double-elimination tournament. Teams played 28 regular season games instead of 40, with the league citing players' mental health and additional chances to interact with their home cities as reasons for the change. Each stage still lasted five weeks, though the break between stages increased from one week to two weeks (except for the break between stages 2 and 3, which was four weeks due to the league's All-Star Weekend). Each week featured three to four games on Thursday and Friday and four games on Saturday and Sunday, totaling either fourteen or sixteen games per week, up from twelve in 2018. Teams played zero, one, or two matches per week. The stage playoffs doubled in size from 2018, expanding to eight teams, up from the four team system introduced in 2018's third stage. The top team from each division held the first and second seed, followed by the next six teams, regardless of division.[4]

The Grand Finals were held at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on September 29, 2019.[5]

Prize pool

The prize pool was increased from US$3,500,000 to $5,000,000. All eight teams who qualified for each Stage Playoffs earned at least $25,000. Each stage champion earned $200,000 (up from $100,000 in 2018), while the amount earned by the runners-up quadrupled from 2018 to $100,000. Third and fourth place teams earned $50,000 while fifth through eighth place teams earned $25,000. For the postseason earnings, the Grand Champion team will earn $1.1 million (up from $1 million), second place will earn $600,000, third place will earn $450,000, fourth place will earn $350,000, fifth and sixth place will earn $300,000, and seventh and eighth place will earn $200,000.[6]

Player contracts

The season's free agency signing window opened to expansion teams on September 10, 2018 and closed on October 7, the day before the window for all teams opened. Each teams had to sign at least 12 players by December 1.[7]

The 2019 season was also the first in which two-way contracts were in effect. Players signed to these contracts primarily played for their OWL team's academy team that played in Overwatch Contenders. They were unable to play in more than two OWL matches in a stage, nor could they play in an OWL match and a Contenders match in the same week. These players counted towards the OWL team's 12-player limit.[8]

Venues

Though most matches were still played at the 350-seat Blizzard Arena,[9] the 2019 season introduced three "Homestand Weeks," which took place in three Overwatch League cities. These were held as practice runs for the planned expansion of the Overwatch League into true home-and-away formats for the 2020 season, seeing teams travel across the globe to compete. The fourth week of Stage 2 was held at the Allen Event Center in Allen, Texas and was hosted by the Dallas Fuel. The fifth week of Stage 3 was held at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Cumberland, Georgia and was hosted by the Atlanta Reign. The fifth week of Stage 4, dubbed "Kit Kat Rivalry Weekend," was held at The Novo by Microsoft in Los Angeles, California and was hosted by the Los Angeles Valiant.[3]

Broadcasting

All matches were broadcast on the Overwatch League's website and through Major League Gaming (owned by Blizzard), and by third-party broadcaster Twitch. On the first day of the 2018 season playoffs, Disney and Blizzard announced a multi-year partnership that would bring OWL and other organized Overwatch competitive events to ESPN, Disney XD, and ABC, starting with the playoffs and continuing through the 2019 season.[10] On January 28, 2019, Blizzard announced that new dedicated esports channel Esports1, owned by German sports channel Sport1, would be broadcasting Overwatch League events in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria.[11]

Regular season

A team's standing was based on their overall match win/loss record, with ties broken by map differential, head-to-head map record, and head-to-head match record, in that order. If a tie that affects the qualification for Stage or Postseason playoffs still cannot be broken, the teams were to play a tiebreaker match.[12]

The season playoff teams consisted of the two division winners, four wild card teams with the best regular season records regardless of division, and the top two teams from the play-in tournament.[13]

Overall standings

Pos Div Team
 Pld W L PCT MW ML MT MD Qualification
1 PAC Vancouver Titans 28 25 3 0.893 89 28 0 +61 Advance to season playoffs (division leaders)
2 ATL New York Excelsior 28 22 6 0.786 78 38 3 +40
3 PAC San Francisco Shock 28 23 5 0.821 92 26 0 +66 Advance to season playoffs
4 PAC Hangzhou Spark 28 18 10 0.643 64 52 4 +12
5 PAC Los Angeles Gladiators 28 17 11 0.607 67 48 3 +19
6 ATL Atlanta Reign 28 16 12 0.571 69 50 1 +19
7 ATL London Spitfire 28 16 12 0.571 58 52 6 +6 Advance to play-ins
8 PAC Seoul Dynasty 28 15 13 0.536 64 50 3 +14
9 PAC Guangzhou Charge 28 15 13 0.536 61 57 1 +4
10 ATL Philadelphia Fusion 28 15 13 0.536 57 60 3 −3
11 PAC Shanghai Dragons 28 13 15 0.464 51 61 3 −10
12 PAC Chengdu Hunters 28 13 15 0.464 55 66 1 −11
13 PAC Los Angeles Valiant 28 12 16 0.429 56 61 4 −5
14 ATL Paris Eternal 28 11 17 0.393 46 67 3 −21
15 PAC Dallas Fuel 28 10 18 0.357 43 70 3 −27
16 ATL Houston Outlaws 28 9 19 0.321 47 69 3 −22
17 ATL Toronto Defiant 28 8 20 0.286 39 72 4 −33
18 ATL Washington Justice 28 8 20 0.286 39 72 6 −33
19 ATL Boston Uprising 28 8 20 0.286 41 78 2 −37
20 ATL Florida Mayhem 28 6 22 0.214 36 75 5 −39
Source: The Overwatch League
Rules for classification: 1) winning percentage; 2) map differential; 3) head-to-head record; 4) head-to-head map differential


Stage 1

Stage 1 ran from February 14 to March 17, 2019, with stage playoffs taking place from March 21–24, 2019. The two division leaders, and the following top six teams, regardless of division, in the Stage 1 standings qualified for the Stage 1 Playoffs. The division winners were awarded the top two seeds, while the remaining teams received seeds three through eight based on their Stage 1 records.[13] All matches emanated from the Blizzard Arena in Burbank, California.

At the conclusion of the first stage, both the Fusion and Defiant were tied for third place after considering all tie-breaking resolutions; similarly, the San Francisco Shock and the Seoul Dynasty were tied for sixth place. By league rules, both ties were to broken by an off-stream match. While the sixth-place tie was decided in this manner, the Defiant and Fusion mutually agreed to settle the third-place tie by a coin flip. Due to issues on reporting the coin flip, league commissioner Nate Nanzer stated that the league would not allow teams to decides such ties by one in the future.[14] Template:2019 Overwatch League Stage 1 standings

Playoffs

Stage Quarterfinals Stage Semifinals Stage Finals
         
1 Vancouver Titans 3
8 Boston Uprising 0
1 Vancouver Titans 4
7 Seoul Dynasty 0
4 Philadelphia Fusion 3
5 Atlanta Reign 1
1 Vancouver Titans 4
(Pairings are reseeded after the first round)
6 San Francisco Shock 3
3 Toronto Defiant 0
6 San Francisco Shock 3
4 Philadelphia Fusion 0
6 San Francisco Shock 4
2 New York Excelsior 1
7 Seoul Dynasty 3

Stage 2

Stage 2 ran from April 4 to May 5, 2019, with stage playoffs taking place from May 9–12. The playoff format did not change from Stage 1.[13] All matches emanated from the Blizzard Arena in Burbank, California, except for the fourth week of play, which took place at the Allen Event Center in Allen, Texas – the first of three "Homestand Weeks" of the season. This stage's Homestand Week was hosted by Dallas Fuel.[3]

The second stage was the first in which assault map Paris was available for play. It was also the introduction of new support character Baptiste into professional play. Baptiste was designed by Blizzard as to disrupt a three-tank, three-support composition (frequently called GOATS in the game's player base in reference to the non-league team that popularized it) which had been dominating Overwatch's metagame for several months prior to the 2019 season and had been frequently used by teams during Stage 1.[15][16]

Due to the tiebreaking issues in Stage 1, the League updated their tiebreaker rules to include head-to-head records across all stages, strength of schedule, and common opponents records.[17] Template:2019 Overwatch League Stage 2 standings

Playoffs

Stage Quarterfinals Stage Semifinals Stage Finals
         
1 San Francisco Shock 3
8 Shanghai Dragons 1
1 San Francisco Shock 4
7 Hangzhou Spark 0
4 Los Angeles Gladiators 0
5 New York Excelsior 3
1 San Francisco Shock 4
(Pairings are reseeded after the first round)
3 Vancouver Titans 2
3 Vancouver Titans 3
6 Dallas Fuel 0
3 Vancouver Titans 4
5 New York Excelsior 1
2 London Spitfire 1
7 Hangzhou Spark 3

Stage 3

Stage 3 ran from June 6 to July 7, with the stage playoffs taking place from July 11 to 14. The stage marked the first time that assault map Havana was played in the Overwatch League. All matches in the fifth week of Stage 3 were played at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Atlanta, Georgia. The event was the second of three "Homestand Weeks" of the season and was hosted by Atlanta Reign. Additionally, the Overwatch League hosted LGBTQ community Pride Day on June 7 at Blizzard Arena.[18] Template:2019 Overwatch League Stage 3 standings

Playoffs

Stage Quarterfinals Stage Semifinals Stage Finals
         
1 New York Excelsior 1
8 Shanghai Dragons 3
2 Vancouver Titans 1
8 Shanghai Dragons 4
4 San Francisco Shock 3
5 Seoul Dynasty 1
4 San Francisco Shock 3
(Pairings are reseeded after the first round)
8 Shanghai Dragons 4
3 Hangzhou Spark 2
6 Los Angeles Valiant 3
4 San Francisco Shock 4
6 Los Angeles Valiant 0
2 Vancouver Titans 3
7 Houston Outlaws 0

Stage 4

Stage 4 ran from July 25 through August 25, with matches in the fifth week taking place at The Novo by Microsoft in Los Angeles as the final "Homestand Week".

Stage 4 introduced a forced 2-2-2 team composition – 2 damage heroes, 2 support heroes, and 2 tank heroes, as a means of eliminating a metagame composition that became dominant in the league made of three tanks and three supports, otherwise known as "GOATS," named after the Overwatch Contenders team that popularized it. This GOATS composition was difficult to counter at this level of play and was deemed boring to watch. Blizzard had tried to introduce changes in the game to better counter GOATS, but these failed to materialize. In the forced 2-2-2 composition, players are role locked at a start of a map, though they are free to switch heroes within that role during the map. Between maps, along with normal player substitutions, players can then swap roles. This change also came to normal quickplay and competitive mode in Overwatch outside of the league at the end of September 2019.[19][20] Template:2019 Overwatch League Stage 4 standings

Postseason

Play-in tournament

The play-in tournament is a single-elimination tournament that took place August 30–31. Each match were first-to-four maps, with the higher seed selecting the first map and the loser of each subsequent map selecting the next. The winners of each quarterfinal match advanced to the semifinals, where they faced either the seventh- or eighth-seeded team, depending on their own seed. The winners of the semifinals qualified for the season playoffs and were seeded according to their regular season records.[13][21]

Bracket

Template:6TeamBracket-Qualifiers-reseed

Playoffs

Main article: 2019 Overwatch League playoffs

Eight teams competed in the OWL Playoffs – a double-elimination tournament – from September 5 to 29. The winner of each round of the Playoffs was determined by a single-match, where each match winner was determined by which team wins four maps. The final two teams remaining in the tournament advanced to the Grand Finals, which took place at Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on September 29.[13][22]

Bracket

This section is transcluded from 2019 Overwatch League playoffs. (edit | history)
First Round
September 5–6		Winners Round 1
September 8		Winners Round 2
September 13		Grand Finals
September 29
1Vancouver Titans4
8Seoul Dynasty2
1Vancouver Titans4
5Los Angeles Gladiators2
4Hangzhou Spark3
5Los Angeles Gladiators4
1Vancouver Titans4
2New York Excelsior3
2New York Excelsior4
7London Spitfire1
2New York Excelsior4
6Atlanta Reign2
3San Francisco Shock3
6Atlanta Reign41Vancouver Titans0
3San Francisco Shock4
Losers Round 1
September 7		Losers Round 2
September 12		Losers Round 3
September 14		Losers Round 4
September 15
6Atlanta Reign0
4Hangzhou Spark44Hangzhou Spark42New York Excelsior0
8Seoul Dynasty14Hangzhou Spark03San Francisco Shock4
3San Francisco Shock4
5Los Angeles Gladiators0
3San Francisco Shock43San Francisco Shock4
7London Spitfire0

Awards

Individual awards

Award Recipient
Most Valuable Player (MVP) Jay "sinatraa" Won (San Francisco Shock)
Dennis Hawelka Award Scott "Custa" Kennedy (Los Angeles Valiant)
Rookie of the Year Kim "Haksal" Hyo-jong (Vancouver Titans)
Grand Finals MVP Choi "ChoiHyoBin" Hyo-bin (San Francisco Shock)

Role Stars

Damage Tank Support
Corey "Corey" Nigra (Washington Justice) Choi "Choihyobin" Hyo-bin (San Francisco Shock) Park "iDK" Ho-jin (Hangzhou Spark)
Yang "DDing" Jin-hyeok (Shanghai Dragons) Qiulin "Guxue" Xu (Hangzhou Spark) Park "Kariv" Young-seo (Los Angeles Valiant)
Kim "Haksal" Hyo-jong (Vancouver Titans) Kim "mano" Dong-gyu (New York Excelsior) Grant "Moth" Espe (San Francisco Shock)
Jay "sinatraa" Won (San Francisco Shock) Matthew "super" DeLisi (San Francisco Shock) Lee "Twilight" Ju-seok (Vancouver Titans)

All-Star Game

Main article: 2019 Overwatch League All-Star Game

The 2019 Overwatch League All-Star Game was the Overwatch League's second edition of an all-star game that involved the All-Star players of the league. The game was played on May 16, 2019 and was the culmination of the league's All-Star Weekend, a two-day event that consisted of the Talent Takedown, a Widowmaker 1v1 tournament, and the All-Star Arcade. All of the events were played at Blizzard Arena in Burbank, California. The game was televised by ESPN2 and streamed live on Twitch.[23]

Team Map 1 Map 2 Map 3 Map 4 Map 5 Map Wins
Atlantic Division 2 3 2 1 2 4
Pacific Division 0 2 1 2 0 1

Winnings

Teams in the 2019 season competed for a total prize pool of US$5 million across regular season play, stage finals, and playoffs. By League rules, at least 50% of these winnings are split among the team's members, the remaining going to the team's owner.

References

  1. ^ a b Palmeri, Christopher (May 3, 2018). "To Fight Fortnite, Activision Is Retooling How Its Games Work". Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved May 3, 2018.
  2. ^ "Overwatch League to Open 2019 Season with 20 Teams". The Overwatch League. September 7, 2018. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  3. ^ a b c Carpenter, Nicole (December 12, 2018). "Overwatch League's 2019 Schedule Reveals Home Games for Dallas, Atlanta, and L.A." Dot Esports. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  4. ^ Carpenter, Nicole (October 10, 2018). "Overwatch League season two begins in February". Dot Esports. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  5. ^ D'Anastasio, Cecilia (May 8, 2019). "The Overwatch League finals will take place in Philadelphia's Wells Fargo Center on September 29". Kotaku. Retrieved May 8, 2019.
  6. ^ "2019 Schedule Revealed". The Overwatch League. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
  7. ^ Murray, Trent (June 15, 2018). "Overwatch League Free Agency Rules Indicate Expansion Team Announcements By September". The Esports Observer. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  8. ^ "So You Want to Build a New Roster". The Overwatch League. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
  9. ^ "Blizzard wants to 'help usher in a new era of competitive entertainment' with the Blizzard Arena". ESPN. September 7, 2017. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
  10. ^ "Overwatch League comes to ESPN, Disney and ABC". ESPN. July 11, 2018. Retrieved July 11, 2018.
  11. ^ Heath, Jerome (January 28, 2019). "The next season of Overwatch League will be broadcast live on TV in Germany, Austria and Switzerland". Dot Esports. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  12. ^ "Overwatch League Standings". The Overwatch League. Retrieved 21 February 2019.
  13. ^ a b c d e "Overwatch League Summary of Official Rules 2019 Season". The Overwatch League. Retrieved 21 February 2019.
  14. ^ Samples, Rachel (March 21, 2019). "Overwatch League commissioner Nate Nanzer promises to never determine seeding by coin flip again". Dot Esports. Retrieved March 21, 2019.
  15. ^ Larsson, Jonathan (March 29, 2019). "Patch Notes: Stage 2". Overwatch League. Retrieved March 30, 2019.
  16. ^ Franco, Joseph (April 5, 2019). "What changed before stage two of the Overwatch League?". Heroes Never Die. Retrieved April 5, 2019.
  17. ^ Steiner, Dustin (May 2, 2019). "OWL Updates Tiebreaker Rules to Include Strength of Schedule, More". Unikrn. Retrieved May 4, 2019.
  18. ^ Linscott, Gillian (June 4, 2019). "OWL 2019 Stage Three: New Map, Celebrate Love, Atlanta". HotSpawn. Retrieved June 4, 2019.
  19. ^ Beckhelling, Imogen (July 18, 2019). "Overwatch is officially putting an end to the GOATS meta". Eurogamer. Retrieved July 18, 2019.
  20. ^ Webster, Andrew (July 18, 2019). "Overwatch's new 'role queue' feature lets you play the hero you want". The Verge. Retrieved July 18, 2019.
  21. ^ Blizzard Entertainment (July 25, 2019). "2019 Season Playoffs Primer". The Overwatch League. Retrieved August 25, 2019.
  22. ^ George, John (May 8, 2019). "Egamers alert: This year's Overwatch League winner will be crowned in Philadelphia". Philadelphia Business Journal. Retrieved May 8, 2019.
  23. ^ Khan, Asif (May 6, 2019). "Overwatch League All-Star starters and game modes revealed". Shack News. Retrieved May 12, 2019.
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