2024 Avatar World Championship [IC|Closed]

[Alleniana]

2024 Avatar World Championship

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Welcome to the 2024 Avatar World Championship, hosted in Kasaoka, Senria! This thread is for in-character posts relating thereto. Please do not post here unless you have been accepted into Kylaris.

Any and all relevant content may be posted here, including news posts, social media posts, infographics, narrative prose, etc. You are encouraged to crosspost here and in other relevant Kylaris threads, such as the Chirpr Feed, the News Thread and Vox Populi. Most information about the tournament can be found here, on the wiki page. You can also find a primer for the esport of Avatar generally here.

Please enjoy the tournament!

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2021 | 2022 | 2023

[Casanor]

[Liecthenbourg]

[Alleniana]

[Casanor]

[Liecthenbourg]

[Imperii Ecclesia]

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SPORT: S5 AGAINST LES AMATEURS THROUGH THE YEARS
After losing their most recent matchup, where do these two long-competing teams stand historically?

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ANDREEA ASOTRIANI (@IroNLight)
^{11th DECEMBER 2024 13:03 | KASAOKA, SENRIA}

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Kasaoka Convention Center's World Unity Hall, where the AWC finals will be held, which both teams are trying to reach.
Photo courtesy of the Ioan Acirili.

KASAOKA, SENRIA-

Les Amateurs, an esports team from Gaullica, are one of the most historic teams in the history of Avatar. From winning the very first Avatar World Championship in 2023, they have been consistent competitors on the international level from the competitive East Euclean region for years. With 9 appearances in the World Championships, they share the record for greatest number of appearances with S5 Gaming, although unlike S5, they only have 1 championship title. As the two teams with the greatest numbers of appearances, they have squared off against each other many times. Over this long period of time, how exactly do the matches break down between the two?

Les Amateurs is an older team than S5, which was only formed in 2016. They competed in the 2013 premier tournament, and were named as world champions- however, although S5 did not yet exist, they played against S5 captain and veteran Sagacité on the UL Philosophers, whom they ultimately triumphed over. They ultimately failed to earn a spot to the 2014 or 2015 seasons. They returned for the 2016 season, S5's debut season and first championship year, and have appeared in every tournament since except for 2019 (when S5 won its second championship title). The team has gone through massive changes in their 11 year history, and were bought out by Rouanet. Because S5 was not present in 2013 and Les Amateurs were absent in 2019, each team has only faced against each other in 8 Avatar World Championships.

Match counts are given in the format of S5 to Les Amateurs.

2016

In their first game, S5 managed to snag a victory over the East Euclean team on their road to a Championship title (1-0).

2017

Les Amateurs turned the tables in 2017, defeating S5 in the seventh round, although they did not play again. 0-1.

2018

In 2018, the two teams faced off in the Round Robin stage once, with Les Amateurs prevailing (0-1). Then the two would face each other again in the round of tiebreakers, where S5 would take the game to advance to the upper stages of the playoffs (1-1).

2020

With how poorly S5 was doing this tournament, Les Amateurs walked over them in the one game they played. 0-1.

2021

S5 came from behind with a late game comeback to clinch the one round 5 game from the Amateurs, making the count 1-0 for this year.

2022

The only time the teams faced each other was in Round 5, where Les Amateurs managed to inflict one of the few losses which S5 suffered on the road to the championship, leaving the count for this year 0-1.

2023

The two teams first squared off in Round 1 of the Round Robin, where the Les Amateurs managed to snag a close victory. (0-1)

In Round 1 of the Tiebreakers, Les Amateurs once again beat S5, forcing them to play a second round to knock out the Sainte-Chloe Monarchs. (0-2)

Both teams met again in the Eighth finals, when the Les Amateurs got off to an early lead (0-3), before S5 took a game (1-3). The next three games bounced back and fourth, with each team trading victory for victory (1-4, 2-4, 2-5, and 3-5). However, with the playoff series tied 3-3, S5 Gaming managed to pull out a clutch win with a strong performance in the midlane, propelling them on to the final four contestants and knocking Les Amateurs once again down to the fifth spot, although S5 collapsed in the next series and was unable to advance. The season ended with the Amateurs on top, 4-5.

2024

In the latest matchup between the two teams, Les Amateurs once again triumphed over S5, providing S5's only loss in the first round of play. 0-1 so far.

Conclusions

Of the total AWC games played against each other (17 games, although 9 of these were in the same year), Les Amateurs holds the superior record, with 10 wins over the 7 wins of S5. Out of Round Robin rounds only, the record is 2-6, overwhelmingly in favour of Les Amateurs; however, in tiebreaks and later playoff games, S5 has the upper hand, at 5-4.

This information shows how Les Amateurs has proven to be one of the biggest challengers to the three-time AWC Champion team- especially in the Round Robin stage- even if they themselves have not been able to replicate further success down the line. Time will tell how future games between the two will continue to develop.

Andreea Asotriani, or IroNLight, is the Novini's chief correspondent on Tengarian and International esporting events, particularly the esport of Avatar, and is the Novini's liaison with S5 Gaming. She is married to Cyriac Asotriani, and has four children.

Comments [ 3,112 ] | E-mail
© SOLARNI NOVINI 2024

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3,112 comments

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MORE HEADLINES

• Match breakdown: S5 Gaming vs Rikan Kaminari
• Match breakdown: S5 Gaming vs Wekmani
• Match breakdown: S5 Gaming vs Les Amateurs
• Sport: Sagicite once again disproves myths that he is "too old"
• Covaceva's visit to asylum seekers from Miersa.

[Imagua and the Assimas]

Kasaoka, Senria

The Wekmani was floundering: founded in the wake of the Arucian Angels' collapse after 2022 and the Bank of the Orient's reluctance to invest enough money to keep the Angels in competition, it was home to Toby Williams and Camille Leroy, two Angels who did not join the Imperials, and who inexplicably found themselves in a different position than what they were used to because their coach, Brendon Sparre, wanted them to go in those spots for some illogical reason even though their performance this far suggests that this was the wrong spot for them to be in.

Sure, they had done well in the regionals, only being beaten by the Casanorian Bucaniere Squadra, and sure, they have beaten the other Arucian teams, but they were floundering in the world championship. They only won a mere two games: the first against Group FALKN on the 11th, and the second against the Frigatebirds on Friday, and lost four games. And perhaps that is to be expected: the Angels had the backing of the largest bank in Imagua... or at least they did before the bean-counters made conditions so intolerable that virtually everyone on that team jumped ship, either to join up-and-coming teams funded by the most important team in Arucian Baseball, or founded groups like the Wekmani.

But in Sparre's eyes, it was no excuse for the Wekmani's poor performance. He had two of the best players in the entire Arucian on his team, plus a bunch of up-and-coming Avatar players that Sparre saw a lot of promise in: Nico Santavicca, who plays as santavicca; Leo Gola, who plays as Gola, and Ewan Snow, who plays as mEara. After coming to the brink of elimination, Sparre knew that he had to turn things around. He decided to call a team meeting.

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Once every member of Wekmani had arrived at his hotel room, Sparre cut to the chase.

"We lost four of the six games we have played so far. We only have one more round to make it out of the group stages," Sparre began. "We need to win all three of the next games so we can qualify to the next stage of the competition: if we lose even one, even by a single point, we are absolutely fucked."

"Is that clear?"

Silence filled the room like carbon monoxide fills a car trapped in a snowstorm. For quite a few moments, the room remained in silence.

A meek "ya" came from Ewan Snow.

"So, this is our plan," Sparre said. "From now until game-day, we need to spend at least six hours a day practicing our Avatar skills."

Just as he was about to see Toby raise an objection, Sparre said, "And focus on the lanes that I have assigned you and that you have been competing so far in this championship."

Toby sighed. For all the problems the Arucian Angels had towards the end, when they were made to practice on computers that were at least fifteen years old and in the same office chairs as the rest of the Bank of the Orient Staff by Coach Bachan, at least Bachan didn't assign players to positions because "those positions fit well with their star-sign" or whatever nonsense Sparre used to justify his behavior of assigning people to positions they were not good at. And at the very least, they were paid regularly.

No wonder why he had been giving less and less effort as the competition wore on: Sparre, who seemed pleasant and better than Bachan when he first joined the Wekmani turned out to be the worst person to lead the team.

"We can take breaks after three hours for an hour at a time, then we must continue playing, so we can and should play from 9 am to noon, then from 1 pm to 4 pm," Sparre said. "This way, we can be in perfect form for Round 3 and get ourselves the 5-4 margin we need to advance into the elimination rounds, and we can, to quote the Emeraudians, shock the world again."

Everyone in the room nodded without much enthusiasm.

"Is that good?" he asked.

"Yes," the room said in a unison monotone.

"Good," Sparre said. "Now let's get out and practice."

Everyone else left Sparre's room, ostensibly to go practice, but they had other ideas.

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The four players made their way towards Toby's hotel room to discuss the problems that the team had been facing. Once they had gotten in and locked the door to the room, they made their way towards the bed and a couple of chairs.

"Sit where-ever," Toby said.

As the other team members took their seats, Snow asked "What do we do now?"

"We definitely should half-ass the games we're playing next round: we should not play it as seriously as we are expected to at this level of play, especially when we are not getting paid regularly...," Toby said. "...or all that well, for that matter."

"I don't know, we're being paid alright, even if it isn't often," Santavicca said.

"That's only because you haven't played at world-level before," Leroy said. "Toby and I have, and we were paid very well during our time in the Arucian Angels until the bean-counters decided that enough was enough."

Toby nodded in agreement with Leroy.

"But my issue is the coach's personality," Santavicca continued. "He seems to boss us around way more than the coach I had back at the university club and he assigns us to roles because he thinks our star-signs makes us better-suited for certain positions? I can't understand where he's coming from."

Everyone nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, that's a bit of a problem: neither Derasmo nor Bachan treated us the way that Sparre has," Toby said. "Even Bachan did his best with what he had, whereas Sparre... I think he is in way over his head and is trying to prove to himself that he is a good coach, when he really isn't."

Gola finally spoke up: "I think we should do what Toby wants us to do: half-ass this, get us out of here, fire our coach and get a new one who won't treat us like shit and who will allocate people to where they are good at being put in."

"Absofuckinglutely," Santavicca said.

"Definitely," Leroy said.

"Hell yeah," Snow added.

"I think that sounds like a good plan," Toby said. "Of course, we might need a new name given Sparre gave us the name, but we can probably just use the Estmerish name next year, get a new coach, and make sure we get paid oft..."

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG

Their heads turned towards the door, as the loud knocking intensified. Toby got up and made his way towards the door.

"OPEN THE DOOR," a loud voice said from the hallway.

Toby unlocked the door and opened it to find Sparre waiting for them.

"What the fuck are you all doing in here?" Sparre asked. "Were you holding an orgy?"

"NO!" everyone said. "We were disc..."

"I don't want to hear about your excuses," Sparre said, angrily. "Now go back to your rooms and start practicing your Avatar skills. Now!"

"Fine," Santavicca said, leaving the room. Others soon followed, until only Toby remained in the room.

"Toby, if you hold another one of these meetings or whatever you call them, I will see to it that you will be on the next flight back to Cuanstad, okay?" Sparre said. "You don't get to sabotage my team in the middle of the biggest Avatar competition."

"This isn't your team, this is our te-" Toby began before being cut off.

"Shut the fuck up," Sparre said.

After a few moments of silence, Sparre closed the door and returned back to his room. The message had been sent, loud and clear.

[Alleniana]

[Alleniana]

[Imperii Ecclesia]

[Casanor]

[Imperii Ecclesia]

[Alleniana]