ESEA vs. FACEIT: A Haunting Halloween Tragedy
The rivalry between ESEA and FACEIT continued to brew on Halloween night as ESEA unveiled their new Rank S, including a LAN event and daily payouts, but lying in wait to pounce on their prey, FACEIT revealed double their ordinary prizepool, including a higher daily payout, and a new win streak system.
On ESEA's side, the company detailed their new Rank S system, involving a change in the scoring to revert to the old ways (+6 points for a win, -4 for a loss), a player base rebuilt to fit only the current professional player scene, and a daily payout of $1,000 for the top five placements of:
- 1st - $400
- 2nd - $225
- 3rd - $150
- 4th - $125
- 5th - $100
The big ticket prize of Rank S now becoming the Rank S LAN in Las Vegas in the Spring of 2019, boasting the league's best players through invites and a new qualification process.
Move downs would work within ESEA's new implementation of "seasons". On a three month system, players will have to play their five placement matches to achieve their seasonal rank, and will then only play their PUG's against people within their rank (ex. A, B, C, D).
Rank G and Rank A will also see some changes coming soon, as G now features a player base built around MDL players and a weekly $1,250 prize pot. The top two Rank G players of the season will advance to Rank S, and for Rank A players to make it to G, they'll also have to go though the new A+ Club to qualify.
The A+ Club will pit the top 100 A+ players in a two-day qualification tournament to see which two players will qualify for Rank G the following season.
From FACEIT's end, it didn't take long for them to steal ESEA's thunder. From doubling their monthly prizepool to $38, 750 and introducing a daily prizepool of $1,250 ($250 more dollars per day than ESEA), FACEIT quickly stole the hearts of players with their new incentives, including Ethan "nahtE" Arnold of NRG.
Not only is the money serious, but FACEIT wants the players to take FPL serious as well with their new win streak feature which will give more points to players who continue to win so they take each match seriously.
FACEIT's original tweet included that they have more to reveal, but ESEA isn't backing down from the fight either.
UPDATE:
To combat the daily FPL prizepool FACEIT set at $1,250, ESEA have announced they will be increasing their daily Rank S amount to $1,500 in NA only. Rank S in EU will still pay out $1,000, Rank G will continue with $1,250 weekly and Ranks A-D will split $90,000 over the course of the year. With the new prizepots, ESEA are committing $1.2 million to the annual pay out.
UPDATE 2.0:
In an attempt to mock ESEA, FACEIT announced an increase to their own prizepool, upping it to $1,501 in daily prizes for NA FPL.
ESEA isn't here to outdone by FACEIT however, adding an additional $250, totalling $1,750 a day for Rank S players.
