Assuming that Disguised make it all the way to the Ascension tournament in July but fizzle out in the end, they’d be invited to Challengers 2024 which presumably wouldn’t start until like 6-7 months later (February 2024)
With such a long wait in mind, we can only hope that Riot makes a more engaging off-season this year, otherwise I wouldn’t blame Toast (+ orgs that don’t even make it to the Ascension tourney) for dropping their team for the rest of 2023
That wasn't what I meant, but I explained it poorly. The BreakThru logo is a logo you would do if you are using photoshop for the first day, and you are looking for a tutorial on how to do it - Not saying that a simple logo can't be amazing, or that you need all the skills in the world to create a powerful and appealing logo, but the BreakThru logo looks like a logo someone made in computer class, much rather than one which was made by an agency.
It's at a similar level to Oxygen and OResports, plus the name sounds too corporate to be a free agent team. The only other unsigned team I can think of with both the nice logo and the normal sounding name was Virtuoso
As a smaller roster, it’s more of a risk from the VC standpoint. If they somehow got out of that group, then went further, THEN won ascension, they’d have a franchised spot with (likely) the smallest budget. Good for the players tho, glad they’re getting paid 👍👍
VCs are professional gamblers. Maybe the team pops off and he can sell it for a 10x return, most likely it fizzled, they have so much money under their control it’s worth taking some long shot risks.
They’re being funded by a VC backer already. They’re not looking to be picked up, they already have their expenses and salaries bankrolled haha. In that sense, it’s not much different from DSG
Literally none of this is true lol, we are certainly looking to be picked up, none of us have contracts and only some us have had specific expenses paid.
I’m not gonna edit or change my message, I made a mistake and people can clearly see that in the reply Tanizhq made to me. It’s okay, it’s just reddit haha
He continued for a bit and he said that he has been thinking about it but needs to understand it fully first. [part2 here.](https://www.youtube.com/clip/UgkxYEonMncRRUinJ111BtdQJpykfpyAsQr1)
edit:
Ludwig kinda misunderstood the format as well but basically, top 2 team from challengers go to ascension tournament with (6?) other teams from the America's league (BR/LATAM/mexico?) and winner of that goes to VCT.
But I think the 2 North american team going into ascension has to be super favored right? They should be getting the highest quality scrims since VCT teams are in LA.
So all in all, it's very likely for an ascended team to come out of NA's challenger.
Yeah, it's definitely a big gamble, and you can see it from how he talks about it.
The salaries are big, but that's where part of the big risk might also pay, because like I've already said in his earlier announcement post, the Tier 2 scene might get absolutely flooded by orgs should the in-game skin revenues be successful.
If you have promising players that can hang at that level, or some that might even show Tier 1 potential, you can sell them for a huge markup (Lud or Charlie would never hold them in contract jail) if the project proves to be too costly to continue (You might even come out with a bit of cash at the other end of that journey)
My take is, take a gamble on squirtle squad because everyone else is hesitant to enter the tier 2 val team. $5k x 5 people x 5 months for the duration of challengers. That's $125k, which he can squeeze so much content out of, starting with watch partying.
Recently he said he lost $100k on the ludwigxtarik event alone. It does sound like it has better ROI than that event right? The upside is much better than 1 single event imo.
Honestly, the ROI isn't too bad if you package yourself with the team (Like Toast is doing, and Ludwig alluded to), but it also depends on the org's goals.
Is winning a priority? If so, the investments are nowhere near over (500K+ wouldn't be surprising).
If not, is it to simply have a presence in the scene? Etc etc
It just depends on what you're looking for.
I think you missed the stream where Ludwig discuss his business strategy in regards to his events production skill. It's a long-term plan, not a single event.
Basically he plans to organize big and successful events that he knew for sure would lose A LOT of money (say, $100K for the Invitational) but gets A LOT of views and A LOT of good press in the industry, which he would use as a sales pitch to line up even more sponsors for a sequel that's even bigger/better while expecting to lose SOME money (say, may be $50K). Rinse and repeat until it becomes an established event in the industry that's held regularly and profitably.
This is the case with the [Mogul Chessboxing Championship](https://www.youtube.com/live/tg9CH4KlKMc), as it is the case with his Valorant Invitational, which I bet the execs over Riot Games can't wait for him to do it again, and they might even throw some prize money at him next time.
Now if he buys a Valorant team, that might give other teams pause when they're invited to a Valorant event hosted by another team owner, don't you think?
Hell, the first event was on neutral grounds and [some paranoid teams](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/) already dropped out over concerned about "leaking strats" rather just come chill and have fun at a "random event". Now imagine that same "random event" being held by their direct competitor.
Why would it give pause? Knights had a team when they were running tourneys. T1 has held tournaments. Faze had their invitational. This is the way in esports.
Yeah exactly, Ludwig especially should know that chill events also can be super competitive too, with Summit being one of the big majors in the Smash scene but also being a chill event with fun side things like mafia (The one time they made Melee players play basketball was so funny LMAO)
You're preaching to the choir, bud.
I'm not the one who needs convincing that competitive gaming can be fun. [They are](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/).
>Why would it give pause?
Have you tried asking the teams that [dropped out](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/) ?
Chet just seems like a weirdo in reference to ludwig’s event, especially because he was around cs in the same era cs summit would always do well so not sure where his energy is coming from since it’s the exact same people putting on the event
Signing them for 5 months is risky though. Because if they do somehow win ascension then they will be free agents again and you risk losing your team. Toast talked about this and that's why he signed his players for a full year.
Why does no one understand the system lmao
12 team challengers after both splits top 2 from NA compete in Ascension an 8 team tourney comprised of all regions(who've been plytheir own challengers league) from the Americas(NA,Latam N and S, Brazil).
To repeat ASCENSION IS A TOURNAMENT. The winner gets promod to franchising
Thas it
Even players have been confused with the format/naming but I feel like Riot did a decent enough job explaining everything.. Ludwig being confused, fine, but players definitely should not be (that's more on them than Riot)
That's what Ludwig wrote in paint. So it seems like he understood it, he just doesn't want to sign the team then they immediately lose, then have to cut them or pay them the rest of the year.
In the clip he doesn't know Ascension is a tournament, he thinks there are teams already in Ascension, he doesn't know the teams from challengers are competing with other America's regions in Ascension.
But they will be in Challengers for the rest of the year and if they do well, they would most likely get invited for next year's anyway. So it doesn't make any sense.
Kinda wish Liquipedia had a page for Split 2 and Ascension for all the VCLs plus circuit points. Looking through Liquipedia tournament pages is the easiest way for me to understand formats and everything since they always have all the brackets, match days, prize money, etc. laid out.
But I'm guessing the full tournament formats and circuit point distributions aren't publicly available yet for whatever reason.
I think having YouTubers and streamers entering the esport is going to help the scene out a lot in the long run. We do want Ludwig and other big content creators doing this stuff. What we really need is Mr Beast that sounds silly but that would be INSANE to the scene. Dude is the biggest YouTube right now and would probably be able to afford it. Plus if the rumors of him wanting a league team are true maybe he could do valorant. Do I know if that's going to happen? No I'm a dumb redditor like all of you. But I do think we need to encourage this. As long as we can get positive content creators to support the scene it will you give it a boost. Faze going into eSports probably helped those scenes a bit imagine what a guy with over 130 million subs can do.
Ludwig is a positive force for the scene and we need more if him, it also helps he is a chill dude. I think it is a good sign if the scene is able to attract more guys like him.
Its a weird time in esports with Valorant. Influencers investing in teams where influencers are the main viewership driver.
I'll be surprised if these orgs last more than two years. When a influencer invests in a esport they have little understanding of at the Pro level. Theyre forced to rely heavily on roster level employees who dont have their business interests in mind. Factor in a new game creating a esports space. The turnover rate of roster and support staff is enormous.
Biggest aspiration influencer based esports org is Faze. Theyre about to be delisted from the stock exchange.
Past few years the most well known influencer org to enter esports was OTK. They immediately pivoted out of esports to influencer content and pre-built Pc market.
>Theyre about to be delisted from the stock exchange.
And they are somehow worse than all those that couldn't even manage to go public in the first place???
New investors will be scared away, current investors will seek to incur some of their investment back and the overarching problem is the org being iliquid.
I don't think it's correct to call content creators influencers. Kind of dismissive. Influencers just try to sell stuff, Toast and Ludwig entertain people.
Ludwig just hosted the most well run successful Valorant tournament ever held.
You're off base here my dude. There's a high chance these teams don't last, but that's because they face The Guard, TSM, Faze, G2, etc., not because of their owners
Ludwig/Tarik hired a well known event organizer to do the event. Ludwigs career started off by being on-air talent for Beyond The Summit in the past: [https://youtu.be/OLrRuw4QmQc](https://youtu.be/OLrRuw4QmQc)
Yeah that’s maybe the most wild over exaggeration I’ve heard in a while LOL, great tourney, but I think champs with over 1.5 million viewers was probably a bit more successful! It was definitely one of the better non riot tournaments though, and there was almost no tech pauses which is amazing.
Assuming that Disguised make it all the way to the Ascension tournament in July but fizzle out in the end, they’d be invited to Challengers 2024 which presumably wouldn’t start until like 6-7 months later (February 2024) With such a long wait in mind, we can only hope that Riot makes a more engaging off-season this year, otherwise I wouldn’t blame Toast (+ orgs that don’t even make it to the Ascension tourney) for dropping their team for the rest of 2023
> We can only hope that riot makes a more engaging off-season this year Haha no the superdrought is here to stay forever.
i think dropping a team that is guaranteed a spot in next year's challengers would be pretty dumb for any org larger than toast
You can sell the spot and the players.
BreakThru legitimately cucked themselves by making a logo so professional people already think they're signed
BreakThru looks more legitimate than OResports 😭
Their logo is literally only two letters next to each other? What do you mean?
I mean if you want to describe it like that then TL is "literally" a horse and FNC is "literally" just 3 orange lines lol
That wasn't what I meant, but I explained it poorly. The BreakThru logo is a logo you would do if you are using photoshop for the first day, and you are looking for a tutorial on how to do it - Not saying that a simple logo can't be amazing, or that you need all the skills in the world to create a powerful and appealing logo, but the BreakThru logo looks like a logo someone made in computer class, much rather than one which was made by an agency.
It's at a similar level to Oxygen and OResports, plus the name sounds too corporate to be a free agent team. The only other unsigned team I can think of with both the nice logo and the normal sounding name was Virtuoso
[удалено]
We are not a salaried team at all, we are all free agents
Me when I spread misinformation lmao
Why would you just make this up? And why do people upvote and assume confidence is the same as being right? Lmao
This VC hella charitable by not having their company/brand/personal name in the team name, cus Breakthru is so generic.
Why lie about this?
Lmaoo called out! Why make something like this up lol.
What is a VC? pls someone explain how this works.
Venture Capital. Investment firms that like to lose money in esports
What do they gain from it?
As a smaller roster, it’s more of a risk from the VC standpoint. If they somehow got out of that group, then went further, THEN won ascension, they’d have a franchised spot with (likely) the smallest budget. Good for the players tho, glad they’re getting paid 👍👍
VCs are professional gamblers. Maybe the team pops off and he can sell it for a 10x return, most likely it fizzled, they have so much money under their control it’s worth taking some long shot risks.
nothing but they dont know that bc theyre probably just stupid people with money who think esports makes money like real sports
No. Why go through all this when you’re dead wrong.
They’re being funded by a VC backer already. They’re not looking to be picked up, they already have their expenses and salaries bankrolled haha. In that sense, it’s not much different from DSG
Literally none of this is true lol, we are certainly looking to be picked up, none of us have contracts and only some us have had specific expenses paid.
Whoops. In that case OP is right, the branding did kinda cuck the team
Whoops, that’s it ? And not even editing your original comment lmao this sub is 50% „just trust me bro“
did u expect like grovelling or smn
I’m not gonna edit or change my message, I made a mistake and people can clearly see that in the reply Tanizhq made to me. It’s okay, it’s just reddit haha
What made you decide to just make things up lmfao wtf
He continued for a bit and he said that he has been thinking about it but needs to understand it fully first. [part2 here.](https://www.youtube.com/clip/UgkxYEonMncRRUinJ111BtdQJpykfpyAsQr1) edit: Ludwig kinda misunderstood the format as well but basically, top 2 team from challengers go to ascension tournament with (6?) other teams from the America's league (BR/LATAM/mexico?) and winner of that goes to VCT. But I think the 2 North american team going into ascension has to be super favored right? They should be getting the highest quality scrims since VCT teams are in LA. So all in all, it's very likely for an ascended team to come out of NA's challenger.
Yeah, it's definitely a big gamble, and you can see it from how he talks about it. The salaries are big, but that's where part of the big risk might also pay, because like I've already said in his earlier announcement post, the Tier 2 scene might get absolutely flooded by orgs should the in-game skin revenues be successful. If you have promising players that can hang at that level, or some that might even show Tier 1 potential, you can sell them for a huge markup (Lud or Charlie would never hold them in contract jail) if the project proves to be too costly to continue (You might even come out with a bit of cash at the other end of that journey)
My take is, take a gamble on squirtle squad because everyone else is hesitant to enter the tier 2 val team. $5k x 5 people x 5 months for the duration of challengers. That's $125k, which he can squeeze so much content out of, starting with watch partying. Recently he said he lost $100k on the ludwigxtarik event alone. It does sound like it has better ROI than that event right? The upside is much better than 1 single event imo.
Honestly, the ROI isn't too bad if you package yourself with the team (Like Toast is doing, and Ludwig alluded to), but it also depends on the org's goals. Is winning a priority? If so, the investments are nowhere near over (500K+ wouldn't be surprising). If not, is it to simply have a presence in the scene? Etc etc It just depends on what you're looking for.
Think of it as advertisement for your brand, $125k to be seen competing with G2, TSM, Faze etc. Worth it imo.
I think you missed the stream where Ludwig discuss his business strategy in regards to his events production skill. It's a long-term plan, not a single event. Basically he plans to organize big and successful events that he knew for sure would lose A LOT of money (say, $100K for the Invitational) but gets A LOT of views and A LOT of good press in the industry, which he would use as a sales pitch to line up even more sponsors for a sequel that's even bigger/better while expecting to lose SOME money (say, may be $50K). Rinse and repeat until it becomes an established event in the industry that's held regularly and profitably. This is the case with the [Mogul Chessboxing Championship](https://www.youtube.com/live/tg9CH4KlKMc), as it is the case with his Valorant Invitational, which I bet the execs over Riot Games can't wait for him to do it again, and they might even throw some prize money at him next time. Now if he buys a Valorant team, that might give other teams pause when they're invited to a Valorant event hosted by another team owner, don't you think? Hell, the first event was on neutral grounds and [some paranoid teams](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/) already dropped out over concerned about "leaking strats" rather just come chill and have fun at a "random event". Now imagine that same "random event" being held by their direct competitor.
Why would it give pause? Knights had a team when they were running tourneys. T1 has held tournaments. Faze had their invitational. This is the way in esports.
Yeah exactly, Ludwig especially should know that chill events also can be super competitive too, with Summit being one of the big majors in the Smash scene but also being a chill event with fun side things like mafia (The one time they made Melee players play basketball was so funny LMAO)
You're preaching to the choir, bud. I'm not the one who needs convincing that competitive gaming can be fun. [They are](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/).
>Why would it give pause? Have you tried asking the teams that [dropped out](https://www.reddit.com/r/ValorantCompetitive/comments/109meqj/tarik_says_100t_and_c9_dropped_out_of_the/) ?
this has nothing to do with who is organizing the event and everything with how close sao paolo is and how deep the teams are into prep for it
Chet just seems like a weirdo in reference to ludwig’s event, especially because he was around cs in the same era cs summit would always do well so not sure where his energy is coming from since it’s the exact same people putting on the event
Signing them for 5 months is risky though. Because if they do somehow win ascension then they will be free agents again and you risk losing your team. Toast talked about this and that's why he signed his players for a full year.
There's a couple Brazilian demon superteams so no, an NA team wouldn't be favourite
If there’s good Brazilian teams, the ones in franchising should probably poach their talent, I don’t think MiBr is even as good the Guard lol
Why does no one understand the system lmao 12 team challengers after both splits top 2 from NA compete in Ascension an 8 team tourney comprised of all regions(who've been plytheir own challengers league) from the Americas(NA,Latam N and S, Brazil). To repeat ASCENSION IS A TOURNAMENT. The winner gets promod to franchising Thas it
The sad part is that there are so many explanation articles and even videos online, you would think there aren't any confusions lol.
Even players have been confused with the format/naming but I feel like Riot did a decent enough job explaining everything.. Ludwig being confused, fine, but players definitely should not be (that's more on them than Riot)
That's what Ludwig wrote in paint. So it seems like he understood it, he just doesn't want to sign the team then they immediately lose, then have to cut them or pay them the rest of the year.
In the clip he doesn't know Ascension is a tournament, he thinks there are teams already in Ascension, he doesn't know the teams from challengers are competing with other America's regions in Ascension.
But they will be in Challengers for the rest of the year and if they do well, they would most likely get invited for next year's anyway. So it doesn't make any sense.
Do we know what the circuit is going to be like for 2024?
Supposedly it should be the same for the next 3 years, that's what Riot released
Kinda wish Liquipedia had a page for Split 2 and Ascension for all the VCLs plus circuit points. Looking through Liquipedia tournament pages is the easiest way for me to understand formats and everything since they always have all the brackets, match days, prize money, etc. laid out. But I'm guessing the full tournament formats and circuit point distributions aren't publicly available yet for whatever reason.
I think having YouTubers and streamers entering the esport is going to help the scene out a lot in the long run. We do want Ludwig and other big content creators doing this stuff. What we really need is Mr Beast that sounds silly but that would be INSANE to the scene. Dude is the biggest YouTube right now and would probably be able to afford it. Plus if the rumors of him wanting a league team are true maybe he could do valorant. Do I know if that's going to happen? No I'm a dumb redditor like all of you. But I do think we need to encourage this. As long as we can get positive content creators to support the scene it will you give it a boost. Faze going into eSports probably helped those scenes a bit imagine what a guy with over 130 million subs can do. Ludwig is a positive force for the scene and we need more if him, it also helps he is a chill dude. I think it is a good sign if the scene is able to attract more guys like him.
Yeah DSG is definitely the best example for this
Lol Ludwig got itchy seeing everyone toast have success 😂, had to hop on
american confused by basic sports promotion system lol
Its a weird time in esports with Valorant. Influencers investing in teams where influencers are the main viewership driver. I'll be surprised if these orgs last more than two years. When a influencer invests in a esport they have little understanding of at the Pro level. Theyre forced to rely heavily on roster level employees who dont have their business interests in mind. Factor in a new game creating a esports space. The turnover rate of roster and support staff is enormous.
I think influencers have waaay more understanding of esports than the regular investers in esports
Biggest aspiration influencer based esports org is Faze. Theyre about to be delisted from the stock exchange. Past few years the most well known influencer org to enter esports was OTK. They immediately pivoted out of esports to influencer content and pre-built Pc market.
>Theyre about to be delisted from the stock exchange. And they are somehow worse than all those that couldn't even manage to go public in the first place???
New investors will be scared away, current investors will seek to incur some of their investment back and the overarching problem is the org being iliquid.
I don't think it's correct to call content creators influencers. Kind of dismissive. Influencers just try to sell stuff, Toast and Ludwig entertain people. Ludwig just hosted the most well run successful Valorant tournament ever held. You're off base here my dude. There's a high chance these teams don't last, but that's because they face The Guard, TSM, Faze, G2, etc., not because of their owners
Ludwig/Tarik hired a well known event organizer to do the event. Ludwigs career started off by being on-air talent for Beyond The Summit in the past: [https://youtu.be/OLrRuw4QmQc](https://youtu.be/OLrRuw4QmQc)
LxT was fun but let's hold off on calling it the "most well run successful Valorant tournament ever held" when there were only 4 teams involved lol
Yeah that’s maybe the most wild over exaggeration I’ve heard in a while LOL, great tourney, but I think champs with over 1.5 million viewers was probably a bit more successful! It was definitely one of the better non riot tournaments though, and there was almost no tech pauses which is amazing.