(Banner photo: @ fnaticmegafanr6 on Twitter)

Held at PAX on the 27th of October, the Six Masters 2018 was the biggest tournament in Asia-Pacific (APAC) with a prize pool, and followed a tightly contested Season 8 APAC Finals. The four teams of Fnatic, ViewSonic.DarkSided, Athletico Esports, and NORA-Rengo went head-to-head in the hunt for a slice of the A$25,000 on offer.

Semi Final 1: Fnatic 2-1 ViewSonic.DarkSided

Maps: Oregon (6-7), Border (6-4), Villa (7-5)

Fnatic: Magnet, Lusty, Acez, RizRaz, NeophyteR

DarkSided: JackDaddy, Cutie, Fletch, speca, Virtue

Traditional Australia-New Zealand (ANZ) rivals took to the ESL Stage in the first match of the day, and kicked things off with an absolute thriller. The two sides had met many times before, and the last time the two had been at LAN, Fnatic had won the ANZ Cup Grand Final by a scoreline of 15 to 1.

More recently, the two had met in the ANZ Pro League where Fnatic had won 6-1 on Coastline, but drawn 5-5 on Oregon. While most were expecting Fnatic to take the win comfortably, DarkSided took the fight to them by taking the win on Oregon this time, and forcing Fnatic to almost full-distance on the subsequent maps.

Semi Final 2: NORA-Rengo 2-1 Athletico Esports

Maps: Clubhouse (5-7), Bank (6-2), Clubhouse (6-2)

NORA-Rengo: Wokka, Merieux, JJ, ReyCyil, Papilia

Athletico: Todd, syliX, Derpeh, Ethan, EmoRin

The second semi final started off with a very similar storyline to the first. The heavy favourites, in this case NORA-Rengo, lost the first map in overtime to the underdogs, in this case Athletico. Unlike the first game, though, there would be no further close maps.

Going on to Bank, where Aerowolf had beaten Athletico 7-6 at the Season 8 APAC Finals, the Australians lost again -- but by a far heavier margin to the APAC Champions. Clubhouse also ended with an identical scoreline, sending the Japanese through to the Grand Final.

Grand Final: Fnatic 2-1 NORA-Rengo

Maps: Coastline (3-6), Clubhouse (6-1), Consulate (6-3)

Fnatic: Magnet, Lusty, Acez, RizRaz, NeophyteR

NORA-Rengo: Wokka, Merieux, JJ, ReyCyil, Papilia

In a rematch from the Season 8 APAC LAN Grand Final in Tokyo, it was Fnatic that emerged victorious. Having played the APAC LAN match away from home on NR’s home turf, it was their turn for a home advantage. As had been the pattern the whole day, the eventual winners lost the first map before staging a comeback on the following two.

Surprisingly, despite consistently poor performances on Clubhouse as recently as the APAC Finals, Fnatic crushed NORA-Rengo by a scoreline of 6 to 1. While it looked like things would be closer on the third and final map, it was Fnatic again who took the map win, and thus became the 2018 Six Masters.

It is of note, however, that NORA-Rengo would have had less of an incentive to stretch their legs in Melbourne given a much more real possibility of the Japanese squad making it far at the Pro League Finals as compared to Fnatic. The former goes up against Rogue, and then either FaZe Clan or Mock-it Esports, while Fnatic is slated to face Evil Geniuses and then probably G2 Esports if they make it past the North Americans. Despite that, NORA-Rengo's loss was not for a lack of trying, indicating that Fnatic learnt from their mistakes in Tokyo to come home and secure the win of their own accord, as well as the A$10,000 cash prize.