Team Elo Ratings

Team Elo Rating KSV Black 1838 Fnatic 1717 Ballistix 1661 Dignitas 1641 Roll20 Esports 1591 Super Perfect Team 1545 CE 1482 Beyond the Game 1427

Tournament Format

Personal Predictions

Simulation Results

Team Name Avg. Points Winners'

Bracket % Losers'

Bracket % KSV Black 11.2 99.4% 0.6% Fnatic 9.1 90.0% 10.0% Ballistix 8.0 74.5% 25.5% Dignitas 7.6 66.2% 33.8% Roll20 Esports 6.6 40.1% 59.9% Super Perfect Team 5.6 21.3% 78.7% CE 4.4 6.5% 93.5% Beyond the Game 3.4 2.0% 98.0%

Team Name W-D-L Points Avg. Expected

Points Winners'

Bracket % KSV Black 0-1-0 1 10.7 (-0.5) 99.0 (-0.4) Fnatic 0-1-0 1 9.6 (+0.5) 93.3 (+3.3) Ballistix 1-0-0 2 8.7 (+0.7) 83.6 (+9.1) Roll20 Esports 1-0-0 2 8.0 (+1.1) 70.2 (+30.1) Dignitas 0-1-0 1 6.9 (-0.7) 42.5 (-23.7) Super Perfect Team 0-0-1 0 4.2 (-1.4) 3.4 (-17.9) CE 0-1-0 1 5.1 (+0.7) 5.1 (-1.4) Beyond the Game 0-0-1 0 2.8 (-0.6) 2.8 (+0.8)

Hey everyone, the Gold Cup World Championship starts on Monday, as we look to see how some retooled rosters play at the last event of 2018. GCWC is typically the only event we get to see full strength Chinese teams due to visa issues at other LANs, so we'll finally get a chance to see if China really has fallen behind like Blizzcon suggested, or if they can rise up and generate some upsets.I have adjusted team Elo ratings due to roster swaps, as well as shifted all ratings uniformly down to maintain that the Average internationally is 1500. I will not go into the entire process here, as the Elo ratings will be it's own post once I know all Korea and Chinese roster changes (there has basically been no news about this at all in the West). However, the table below lists the adjusted Elo Ratings of the 8 teams at GCWC.KSV Black (formally MVP Black) has not had any roster changes (at least that have been publicly announced) since winning Blizzcon. The top competing teams, however, have all roster swapped since -- even Ballistix is replacing a retiring Swoy. We'll get to see these new rosters and whether or not there are growing pains. I have no news at all whether or not any Chinese teams have changed rosters.The tournament features a full round-robin phase over one week where every team plays every other team once in a 2 game series. A 2-0 victory is worth 2 points, a draw worth 1 point, and an 0-2 loss worth 0 points. It's worth noting that in past such events (including Gold League's regular season and the Mid-Season Brawl) a 2-0 victory was worth 3 points. This has been changed to just 2 points.After the round robin phase is over, all 8 teams will be seeded into a double loss elimination Phoenix bracket. The top 4 seeds are seeded in the winners bracket, with #1 vs. #4 and #2 vs. #3. The lower 4 teams will be in the losers bracket (and will be only 1 loss away from elimination) with #5 vs. #8, and #6 vs. #7.This tournament is very difficult to predict due to several factors. Roster swaps mean we really don't know how good Fnatic, Dignitas, and Roll20 are. Similarly, we don't know how much Ballistix will struggle without Swoy. The biggest wildcard is how well China will do in their home timezone with their 5 man rosters. Beyond the Game was especially undermanned at Blizzcon, with only 2 of their normal 5 players. Will China show that they are still a strong region?However, despite these concerns, I do believe KSV Black will take GCWC. Even with the rosters of Fnatic and Dignitas likely improving for the long run, these teams have not been together long enough to match the synergy that KSV Black showed at Blizzcon. I'm predicting top 4 to be Korean and European, with Roll20 finishing either 5th or 6th in the group stage alongside SPT. While I think Roll20 is a good team, and could take maps off the top 4, I think the recency of the roster changed paired with the most dramatic time zone change of any team a GCWC will throw them off.Below are the current simulation results for the teams involved in GCWC. This predicts their averag points over 100,000 simulations, as well as their chance to make winners' and losers' bracket (Top 4 or Bottom 4).I will update this table ever day to track changing odds. Either check back with his article or follow me on Twitter at @DeathBySmiley.Pre Day 1Post Day 1 - Changes from Pre Day 1 are denoted in parentheses

Post Day 2 - Changes from Post Day 1 are denoted in parentheses

Team Name W-D-L Points Avg. Expected

Points Winners'

Bracket % KSV Black 1-1-0 3 11.2 (+0.5) 99.7 (+0.7) Fnatic 1-1-0 3 10.0 (+0.4) 96.5 (+3.2) Dignitas 1-1-0 3 8.5 (+1.6) 86.0 (+43.5) Ballistix 1-1-0 3 7.9 (-0.8) 71.5 (-12.1) Roll20 Esports 1-0-1 2 6.4 (-1.6) 29.5 (-40.7) CE 0-2-0 2 5.9 (+0.8) 15.0 (+9.9) Super Perfect Team 0-0-2 0 3.7 (-0.5) 1.8 (-1.6) Beyond the Game 0-0-2 0 2.4 (-0.4) 0.1 (-2.7)

Post Day 3 - Changes from Post Day 2 are denoted in parentheses

Team Name W-D-L Points Avg. Expected

Points Winners'

Bracket % KSV Black 2-1-0 5 11.7 (+0.5) > 99.9 (+0.3) Ballistix 2-1-0 5 9.6 (+1.7) 95.6 (+24.5) Fnatic 1-1-1 3 8.3 (-1.7) 78.2 (-18.3) Dignitas 1-1-1 3 7.7 (-0.8) 68.8 (+17.2) Roll20 Esports 2-0-1 4 7.1 (+0.7) 44.2 (+14.7) CE 0-3-0 3 5.9 (0.0) 12.2 (-2.8) Super Perfect Team 0-1-2 1 3.9 (+0.2) 1.8 (0.0) Beyond the Game 0-0-2 0 1.7 (-0.7) < 0.1 (-0.1)

Post Day 4 - Changes from Post Day 3 are denoted in parentheses

Team Name W-D-L Points Avg. Expected

Points Winners'

Bracket % KSV Black 3-1-0 7 12.2 (+0.5) > 99.9 (0.0) Dignitas 2-1-1 5 9.1 (+1.4) 97.8 (+29.0) Fnatic 2-1-1 5 9.1 (+0.8) 96.3 (+18.1) Ballistix 2-1-1 5 8.1 (-1.5) 81.3 (-14.3) Roll20 Esports 2-0-2 4 6.3 (-0.8) 16.6 (-27.6) CE 0-3-1 3 5.8 (-0.1) 5.8 (-7.0) Super Perfect Team 1-1-2 3 4.7 (+0.8) 2.2 (+0.4) Beyond the Game 0-0-4 0 0.9 (-0.8) < 0.1 (+0.0)

Post Day 5 - Changes from Post Day 4 are denoted in parentheses