Photo: By Blizzard

‘Chiu on This’ is a short and regular opinion blast

Korean Contenders has ended with Runaway defeating Element Mystic. With the playoffs over, I decided to pick out my top 5 players from the Korean Contenders Season 3 playoffs. This was a hard task to do as Overwatch has defined roles which means players have very distinct roles and thus they cannot be comparable. On top of that Overwatch stats are far less telling than something like CS:GO stats which at least tell you the general fragging potential of any particular player over a period of time.

As that’s the case I’ve set up the following criteria, based on my own personal judgement. I used consistency, peak level of play, role within the team’s style and strategy, level of opponents played, and the level of form a player exhibited in elimination games. As players and teams had different styles of play, this was hard to parse, but in general I felt the most impactful individual actions a player can have in Overwatch are as follows: opening picks in the team fight, unassisted ults in team fights, level of difficulty of execution (for instance hitting multiple widow headshots is harder than pressing q for a support ult for instance), and the ability to charge ult at a significantly faster rate than the opposing player (given the context of their comps).

I’ll give a brief example to explain some of the nuances within the system. For instance, in the finals both Mag and QoQ had insanely effective ults, but in my opinion Mag outperformed QoQ in the ult department because QoQ’s ults looked to me to be a result of good teamwork as well as individual play, whereas I saw times where Mag could hit a massive shatter without any particular help or setup from his teammates.

So without furhter ado, here are my top five players from the Korean Contenders

5) dpi of WGS.Armament

Eliminated in Semifinals.

The D.Va player for WGS.Armament impressed me enough to secure the fifth spot. The reason I placed him so highly was because I thought dpi had the most impact of any player on the WGS.A team. His best series was against Busan in the quarterfinals. In that match, he consistently found opening picks, controlled the positioning of the Busan team, and kept denying Zarya ult after Zarya ult. If dpi had shown that same level of play against Runaway in the semifinals, I’d have probably ranked him higher given the level of opponents he had to play.

4) Kaiser of StormQuake

Eliminated in Semifinals.

Kaiser was easily the best player in the quarterfinals between StormQuake and MVP Space. He consistently played at a high level, whether that was getting opening picks or winning team fights with impactful ults. It was fairly close between dpi and Kaiser as to who was fourth or fifth. In DPI’s case, I favored him in terms of opponents played as his team had to play against Busan and Runaway. In contrast to that Stormquake played against MVP Space and Element Mystic. However I gave the nod to Kaiser here as he showed up just as hard in the Element Mystic match as he did in the MVP.Space match, despite the 0-3 scoreline at the end.

3) QoQ of Runaway

Won Season 3

I think the primary reason that Runaway smashed everyone in this Korean Contenders playoffs was largely due to their teamplay and synergy. Every player on the team worked well in their roles and knew how to play off of each other. As that’s the case, it was hard to pick out any particular individuals that outperformed the others. Among them though, I thought QoQ was one of the standouts on the team as a D.Va player. While not as flashy as dpi was in the quarterfinals, he more than made up for it in the finals against Element Mystic, which puts him at the top of my list for best D.Va player in Korean Contenders. He was also one of my candidates for MVP finalist (along with Mag and Sp9rk1e), but I personally gave the nod to Mag.

2) Mag of Runaway

Won Season 3

For most of the season, Mag looked to be the best tank in the league. He was consistently in the right positions, getting opening picks, following up on what his teammates did or opening up plays for his teammates to follow up on. No tank he met throughout the playoffs even seemed to challenge or match Mag’s consistency or skill. In the finals in particular, he buried Alpha and Takoyaki. The differential between him and the second best player in his role in Season 3 was one of the largest of season 3. On top of that, he was my MVP for the Finals of Korean Contenders. However that wasn’t enough for me to pick him at number one.

1) Sp9rk1e of Element Mystic

Runner-up of Seasson 3

For my money, Sp9rk1e was the best player in the all of Korean Contenders. In an era of GOATs, he was able to power his team through the sheer might of his Doomfist, a hero that Hydration once describe as fun to play because he can die easily. This has proven to be true as we’ve seen other teams run the Doomfist comp with far less success as other Doomfist players couldn’t balance themselves on that tightrope and fell into the abyss. Sp9rk1e didn’t just walk on the tightrope, he was skipping, running, and doing somersaults on it.

In terms of peak skill no one matches him. In terms of consistency he was as good as everyone barring Mag or QoQ in the finals. Even then though, I’d argue he was playing a far harder role compared to either of those players and had a far harder path given his team’s strategy was so reliant on him. For that reason, he is my pick for best player in Korea Contenders Season 3 and my MVP for the season.

As there were no support players inducted into this list, I’ll give a shoutout to LeeJaeGon, who was easily the best support player in the playoffs.

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