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Dota 27 years agoAndreea "divushka" Esanu

11 Majors and 11 Minors worth $14.9M in total are scheduled for the next competitive season


picture source: Valve

The annual players meeting with Valve ahead of The International brings dazzling news about the 2017-2018 competitive season.

Valve announced changes to the competitive season following The International 2017 on the 3rd of July. Back then they only mentioned that third party tournament organizers that will have a minimum $150,000 prize pool, a six region qualifier process (NA, SA, SEA, CN, EU, and CIS), and a LAN component for their event, will be sponsored by Valve with another $150,000 to turn their event into a Minor while those who can put a minimum $500,000 prize pool on the table will be sponsored with another half million dollars by Valve to make their event a Major.

With that being said, last night, at the players meeting with Valve in Seattle, it was announced that the upcoming competitive season will have 11 Majors and 11 Minors. All these events will grant players (not the teams/organizations) qualifying points counting for The International 2018 invites. TI 8 will still have regional qualifiers but the directly invited teams will be decided purely on their points accumulated throughout the season. It was not announced yet how many teams will receive an invite to TI 8 but the points system will be revealed before the next competitive season starts.

More than that, Valve will launch an official leaderboard of individual player Qualifying Points and team Qualifying Point Ranking. The entire qualifying points system will be made public before the new competitive season will start so every team out there can plan ahead their schedule.

How it works:

 

  • Qualifying Points will be granted based on placing high in Majors and Minors and will accumulate on individual players
  • Qualifying points will be awarded based on the total prize pool of a tournament, and whether the tournament is a Major or a Minor, with Majors giving more points per prize pool dollar
  • The total points per tournament will partially scale based on the time of year, with tournaments closer to The International awarding additional points
  • Roster lock seasons will still exist, and players switching teams during the approved periods will retain their Qualifying Points
  • Only the top 3 point earners on a team will contribute towards a team’s effective total Qualifying Points

 

2017 - 2018 Majors and Minors schedule:

 

Starting - Ending DateMinor/MajorOrganzierPrize pool
11 - 15 October 2017MinorStarLadder$300,000
19 - 22 October 2017MinorPGL $300,000
26 - 29 October 2017 MajorESL One$1,000,000
20 - 26 November 2017MinorPerfect World$300,000
1 - 3 December 2017Major Dreamhack$1,000,000
4 - 10 December 2017MinorMarsTV$300,000
13 - 17 December 2017Minor BTS$300,000
12 - 14 January 2018 MinorGESC$300,000
15 - 21 January 2018MajorDreamhack $1,000,000
23 - 28 January 2018MinorESL One$400,000
5 - 11 February 2018 MajorPGL $1,000,000
20 - 25 February 2018MajorESL One$1,000,000
2 - 4 March 2018 MinorGESC $300,000
8 - 11 March 2018 MajorBTS + NGE$1,000,000
16  - 18 March 2018MinorGESC$300,000
30 March - 7 April 2018MajorPerfect World$1,000,000
17 - 24 April 2018MinorPerfect World$300,000
27 April - 7 May 2018Major EPICENTER$1,000,000
11 - 13 May 2018MinorGESC$300,000
14 - 20 May 2018MajorMarsTV $1,000,000
25 - 27 May 2018 MajorESL One$1,000,000
4 - 10 June 2018MajorPGL $1,500,000

 

Obviously, Valve’s intention with the new Minors/Majors system is to stabilize the entire competitive scene, from tier 3-4 teams to the very top. With a total of 22 Minors and Majors played from October this year to June 2018, the top tier teams will clearly have to choose their battles.

Valve’s plan for the next competitive season is nothing else but a long time waited reinvigoration of the entire Dota 2 ecosystem. From broadcasting studios, which are very few at this moment, commentators and analysts, to behind the scenes people working for events, tournament admins, in game observers and so on, everyone should benefit from this huge change and more people are likely to finally be able to make a living from esports, even though they are not professional players with a wall full of trophies. 

We are looking at an exciting year to come for esports as a whole, as Valve just raised the bar for the entire industry. A one million Dollars Major held every month, with a total of 14.9 Million Dollars injected only in tournaments leading up to The International should finally legitimize esports as a real industry.

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Andreea "divushka" EsanuI can resist anything but temptations... Follow me @DivDota

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