The conclusion to the January GWENT Open introduced us to 2 participants who will be joining Freddybabes in the April GWENT Challenger tournament: Superjj102 (January GWENT Open winner) and Adzikov (January GWENT Open runner-up). This also means that 5 more spots remain to be claimed by the best GWENT players out there.
2 of these spots will be going to the finalists of the upcoming March GWENT Open, with another 2 reserved for Wild Cards — players invited to the tournament by CD PROJEKT RED. The final spot will be claimed by the player with the most Crown Points accumulated over the course of two Pro Ladder seasons leading up the Challenger.
Based on the feedback from the GWENT community, we've decided that Wild Cards for the April GWENT Challenger will be going to winners of 2 online qualifiers for the top 200 players of the Pro Ladder. It's important to note, however, that we're not making this a permanent rule. It may be the case that in the future we’ll decide to present players with a Wild Card directly.
The format of the Wild Card qualifiers for April’s GWENT Challenger will be slightly different than the one used for the December tournament. There will be two separate qualifier events, each happening over the course of 2 days.
The first qualifier will take place February 24th-25th. To be eligible to participate in this qualifier, players will need to be in top 200 of the Pro Ladder come February 21st, 11:59 PM CET.
The second qualifier will take place March 24th-25th. To be eligible to participate in this qualifier, players will need to be in top 200 of the Pro Ladder come March 21st, 11:59 PM CET.
Only players who haven't yet qualified for the upcoming GWENT Challenger will be able to take part in these qualifiers. For the duration of both events, eligible PS4 and Xbox One players will receive special PC GOG.com accounts. The tournament hosting platforms for both qualifiers will be announced at a later date — stay tuned!
Rules and format:
On the first day of each qualifier event, participants will compete by playing games in a Swiss-system format over the course of 8 rounds, until 16 best players are left:
- the Median-Buchholz tiebreaker system will be applied in situations where players end up with the same final score;
- each participant must build at least 2 decks from at least 2 different factions;
- all matches will be played in a best-of-three format and will not feature deck banning;
- no two decks can be of the same faction;
- winning decks can’t be used to play another match, while losing ones may be used again or be swapped out for another;
- decks can be modified between matches.
On the second day of each qualifier event, the top 16 players determined during day 1 will compete in a double-elimination format:
- all matches will be played in a best-of-five format;
- opponents will be able to ban, in secret, a chosen enemy deck at the beginning of each game;
- seeding will be based on results from day 1 of the qualifier;
- each participant must build 4 decks from 4 different factions;
- no two decks can be of the same faction;
- winning decks can’t be used to play another match, while losing ones may be used again or be swapped out for another;
- decks cannot be modified between matches and must be submitted to the tournament admin no later than 1 hour before the tournament.
Players are allowed to use trackers during the entirety of the tournament.
The winner of each qualifier will be invited to participate in the April GWENT Challenger, where they will have a chance to compete for their share of a $100,000 prize pool, Crown Points, the Challenger winner’s ring, and a spot in GWENT World Masters. You can learn more about it here.
[UPDATE]
Dear GWENT Community,
Our announcement of April GWENT Challenger Qualifiers caused a heated debate and we feel that we need to address some of the popular questions and provide more visibility into our plans related to both GWENT Challenger Qualifiers and 3rd party community tournaments going forward.
Q: Why this specific date (Feb 24-25) was chosen for GWENT Challenger qualifier?
A: When we've decided to have 2 separate qualifiers for April GWENT Challenger, it was done to provide players with more flexibility over the next couple of months. Players who for any reason will be unable to play in one of the qualifiers will have a second opportunity to compete. Choice of this specific date wasn't random — we need to take into account a lot of factors such as Pro Ladder schedule, GWENT Masters events, and general game updates.
Q: Can you just move GWENT Challenger qualifier to another date and avoid a schedule conflict with the Wild Hunt tournament in Philadelphia?
A: If we could do it — we would go for it. Unfortunately, in this case, moving the qualifier date isn't feasible. Avoiding schedule conflicts with non-official GWENT tournaments won't be always possible in the future — to ensure the integrity of our tournaments, we are not at liberty to share some information (such as dates of Qualifiers) with 3rd parties before an official announcement. While we can commit to communicating our plans better and earlier going forward, we can't promise that there won't be any schedule conflicts.
Q: What about the players who are eligible to participate in both the Wild Hunt tournament, and the 1st GWENT Challenger qualifier? They have to make a difficult choice now.
A: We’d like to offer reserved spots in the 2nd Qualifier (taking place on March 24-25th) to all players who are eligible to play in the 1st Qualifier but decided to compete in the Wild Hunt Philadelphia instead, disregarding their Pro Ladder rank in March. It's not a silver bullet, but hopefully, that will make things a bit easier for at least some players affected.
Q: Doesn’t the schedule conflict affect the organizers of the Wild Hunt tournament as well?
A: Despite some speculations about the ongoing tensions between the Wild Hunt organizers (N3rd Street Gamers) and CD PROJEKT RED, both parties are actually in a good relationship. We're in direct contact with N3rd Street Gamers and will continue to support them. It's important to note that as GWENT Challenger Qualifier won't be broadcasted online, organizers shouldn't be affected by overlaps in the schedule in any significant way. We value the effort from the organizers and community members who were contributing to this event, and we do want the Wild Hunt tournament to succeed.
