14 Sep 2015, 23:21

in case you missed it

zoom won

community-picked

the very first quick search game on Manchuria

a treaty cup

[div style="text-align:center'"][hr][font size="4"]Fellow AoE3 fans,[/font][/div]Here we are, after the final of the second AoE3 Seasonal Championships. RTS veterans Samwise12 and ACERGAME09 battled in a best of 9 and it was close ([a href="http://www.twitch.tv/esoctv/profile/past_broadcasts"][/a]). The first 3 games were walkovers, but Sam had to concede the next 2 and suddenly it was looking like anyone's series. The 2 games after that were close too, ACER winning one and getting in a great position in the Brit mirror on Cascade. With the chance to tie it up ACER had 10 more vills than Sam and a slightly better army, but Sam punishes mistakes like no other and ACER made a couple too many. In the end, Samwise's meta builds and overall crisp mechanics got him the victory. The title is his now, and I hope we'll see him defend it in the Winter tournament. Any good Champion will show up to defend his title, right? ') Grats to Sam!As for the betting event, [a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MEhGlu6RCW85fv62Gd8pcIhhWmmAEW5YTi-F6c9-tJk/edit#gid=247843266"][/a]. Grats! Seriously that kid was hacking.Many thanks to the players, the tournament admins, the sponsors and perhaps most importantly the viewers for another great event! I'm sure we're all looking forward to ASC Winter.[div style="text-align:center'"][span style="font-size:12pt'"][/span][/div]We'll be playing on a patch where the rated map pool will consist of balanced maps, where Dutch and Portuguese have means of winning games, and where the hackers are out of quick search, among other things!will be a project for and by the community. After the first release the patch will continue as an ongoing project. Call it an "Open beta", if you must. There will be a public board on ESOC dedicated to discussion about civ balance, the map pools, and whatever else patch-related and we will continue to patch the game. This approach is made possible by the work of our insanely awesome developer @musketeer925, who made an auto-updating launcher. This allows us to continue support for the game and patch out balance issues per tournament season. It could allow us to do cool stuff like rotating map pools, too. Users won't have to manually install any updates.As for the first release, expect it soon. [strike]at the [/strike]. There's still work to be done, but we're close and we're excited about sharing the patch with everyone. A reminder about the most important features, which should all be in the first release:[ul type="disc"][li]Improved civilisation balance.[/li][li]The possibility to play ESOC maps in rated games.[/li][li]Very easy switch between ESOC patch and the old patch.[/li][li]Anti-cheat measures aimed specifically at the infamous "moesbar hack".[/li][li]Auto-updating functionality which means no manual updates.[/li][/ul]Our biggest advantage is this community, which stuck with AoE3 throughout the years. The game is almost 10 years old now, but it's alive and kicking thanks to all of you awesome people. Even Microsoft had to acknowledge it, now working to replace the very old servers. But alive as we are, this patch needs all of you to succeed. We're counting on everyone to spread the word about the patch anywhere AoE-related, especially on ESO itself. But most importantly, simply play the patch after it's releasedThe patch will feature new map pools including a [a href="http://eso-community.net/thread/2560/poll-which-maps-quick-search"][/a] mix between ESOC maps and RE maps used for quick search. Recently me and Incognoto played [a href="http://i.imgur.com/ZNs4v8u.png"][/a].I'm sure you all want to hear about the balance changes. Unfortunately there isn't much I can give away quite yet. We're still in the middle of testing the changes and most of them are still uncertain. Expect finished patch notes with release and not before.I will say this though:[ul type="disc"][li]Wood wall HP will be reduced significantly.[/li][li]Elmeti, Mamelukes and Lil bombards will be untrainable in fortress age.[/li][li]Portuguese villager cost will be reduced.[/li][/ul][div]Feel free to ask questions about the project or make suggestions! Most of the ESOC staff will be active in this thread.[hr]And the patch isn't even all that's happening. There's [a href="http://eso-community.net/board/68/tournament-information-discussion"][/a] coming up, organized by Cometk (black_thought) and charlemagen. And perhaps yet another event is coming, too.Meanwhile, we'll have the weekly Saturday smackdowns featuring Zuterjection (the famous casting duo Zutazuta and Interjection) to look forward to. No shortage of AoE3 content in other words!Keep in mind the Winter tournament is not fully funded yet. If you like what we're doing here at ESOC and want to show your support while funding future tournaments, [a href="http://eso-community.net/page/donate"]donating[/a] is the way. Small or big, anything helps! Every donation received will go to the funding of future tournaments.[/div]