Blizzcon 2009 Live Coverage

Blizzcon 2009 has begun and the paid stream can be found here which shows all of the Blizzcon content while the free stream can be found here which should be the one where you can watch all of the WoW matches that they decide to live stream.

Paid Stream: http://blizzcon.rayv.com/

Free Stream:  http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/video/stream-wow.xml

EU Free Stream: http://eu.blizzard.com/blizzcon/video/stream-wow.xml

WoW Brackets: http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/tournaments/index.xml

Azael also wrote a really good preview on all of the participating teams that you can read here if you need to get caught up on the competition this time around.

As a correction to my previous blog, Woah will be running warrior/warlock/druid and not dk/warlock/druid and thus I feel their chances to win will dwindle greatly, however I'll stand by the pick for them winning despite coming in 2nd place to X6's PHD at European regionals. Ocelote and Kae finally get their time to shine and Inflame will be looking to take them to the promised land, so despite having a less powerful comp overall, I still think they can pull it off.

In other Blizzcon related news, the new WoW Cataclysm expansion that's been rumored about has been confirmed to be true and you can find the Q&A on it here.  In addition, Blizzard also announced that the new Diablo 3 class will be the Monk and you can read about that on their official D3 site here if it ever decides to load.

As per the schedule, WoW arena matches should begin at around 4pm EST so stay tuned for the first matches soon.

Updated match results (thanks to Tyveris and AJ):

Winner's Bracket Results

Match One: SK Gaming (3) vs Woah (2)

• SK Gaming (W) vs Woah - Blade's Edge
• SK Gaming vs Woah (W) - Ring of Valor
• SK Gaming vs Woah (W) - Dalaran
• SK Gaming (W) vs Woah - Blade's Edge
• SK Gaming (W) vs Woah - Ring of Valor

Match Two: x6tence (3) vs Button Bashers (2)

• x6tence (W) vs Button Bashers - Blade's Edge
• x6tence vs Button Bashers (W) - Ring of Valor
• x6tence vs Button Bashers (W) - Dalaran
• x6tence (W) vs Button Bashers - Blade's Edge
• x6tence (W) vs Button Bashers - Dalaran

Match Three: DKP (1) vs TSG (3)

• DKP vs TSG (W) - Dalaran
• DKP vs TSG (W) - Ruins of Lordaeron
• DKP (W) vs TSG - Ruins of Lordaeron
• DKP vs TSG (W) - Ring of Valor

Match Four: Shipit (3) vs All Pass (2)

• Shipit (W) vs All Pass - Ruins of Lordaeron
• Shipit vs All Pass (W) - Ring of Valor
• Shipit vs All Pass (W) - Blade's Edge
• Shipit (W) vs All Pass - Dalaran
• Shipit (W) vs All Pass - Ruins of Lordaeron

Match Five: x6tence (1) vs TSG (3)

• x6tence (W) vs TSG - Ruins of Lordaeron
• x6tence vs TSG (W) - Ruins of Lordaeron
• x6tence vs TSG (W) - Ruins of Lordaeron
• x6tence vs TSG (W) - Nagrand

Match Six: SK Gaming (2) vs Shipit (3)

• SK Gaming vs Shipit - Ruins of Lordaeron
• SK Gaming vs Shipit - Blade's Edge
• SK Gaming vs Shipit - Ruins of Lordaeron
• SK Gaming vs Shipit - Nagrand
• SK Gaming vs Shipit - Blade's Edge

Loser's Bracket Results

Match Seven: Button Bashers (3) vs DKP (0)

• Button Bashers (W) vs DKP - Ruins of Lordaeron
• Button Bashers (W) vs DKP - Ruins of Lordaeron
• Button Bashers (W) vs DKP - Ruins of Lordaeron

Match Eight: All Pass (0) vs Woah (3)

• All Pass vs Woah (W) - Ruins of Lordaeron
• All Pass vs Woah (W) - Nagrand
• All Pass vs Woah (W) - Ring of Valor

Left to play:
Winner's bracket finals and remainder of loser bracket tomorrow (Saturday)





SK Gaming vs Woah
Game 1: So all I saw basically was Kae dying, Ocelote doing 3k damage, and then more of "Buffering Stream." This stream looks promising.

Game 2: Fast game with an early PS from Realz on Enforcer but it wasn't enough as Enforcer proceeded to die after Realz got stuck in a fear that he couldn't break shortly after. Woah ties it 1-1.

Game 3: Stream is choppy as hell for me but the game was on Dalaran arena and Woah made the game go very long which favors the WLD, particularly on that map making it difficult for RMP to burst anything down without cooldowns. After basically running Realz OOM, Woah scores another kill on Enforcer taking the series to 2-1.

Game 4: Blade's Edge Arena. SK opens on Kae with a huge early burst but he gets his peels from Ocelote and Inflame but stayed on bottom for too long it seemed and got caught in another burst later on in the match that eventually killed him. Series now tied 2-2.

Game 5: The last game took place on the dreaded Ring of Valor this time, which heavily favors the cooldown rush of RMP against WLD and SK trains Kae all game long. For some reason which I have no idea, Kae stays in caster form the entire time like he does every other game instead of going tree form. Despite the armor value being similar to caster and travel form now, you get much more efficient and stronger HoT's in tree than in caster. Eventually Kae drops once again and SK takes the series.

Score: SK defeats Woah 3-2





x6tence vs. Button Bashers
Game 1: Button Bashers (HON) betrays their roots and comes out with a surprising curve ball of paladin, SV hunter, destruction warlock to counter x6's PHD. Button Bashers get x6's hunter low at only one point in the match on Blade's Edge here but x6's DK did a well-timed AMZ and basically controlled the rest of the fight. x6 switched constantly between the hunter and warlock and eventually killed the hunter to take the first game.

Game 2: Same comps for both teams, second game taking place on RoV. If you blinked you probably missed this match as HON comes out with amazing burst on the x6 hunter (Siler) and dropped him an amazing burst chain 100-0 almost instantly. Even a strangulate on Orangemarmalade (HON warlock) wasn't enough and they tie the series 1-1.

Game 3: Both teams keep the same comps and play this match on Dalaran arena. It was basically a repeat of the last game with HON doing ridiculous burst and sustained damage on Siler the entire match. HON eventually scores another kill on Siler before he can LOS behind their boxes in a huge burst from Orange. HON now leads the series 2-1.

Game 4: x6 loses confidence with their PHD and swaps to WLD (arms warrior, affliction warlock, druid) to try to counter HON on Blade's Edge Arena this time. X6 bladestorms on the HON hunter very early on to try to get a kill but HON kites it off fairly easily. x6's druid plays extremely well this game not only keeping up his team with ease but also pulling off clutch CC's on both the HON paladin and warlock as x6 trains the hunter almost the entire game. Eventually the paladin falls too far behind in healing and the HON hunter dies and the series is now tied 2-2.

Game 5: HON goes back to their traditional RMP for this last match and X6 remains as WLD. Match taking place on Dalaran arena which favors the WLD a bit here late-game. x6 pressured Orange (HON mage) most of the game. HON, being alliance without WotF was being controlled most of the game and x6 forced HON to ice block early. Immediate pressure when coming out of it resulted in a kill on Orange a few seconds before hypothermia came off. x6 wins the series with their amazing comp swap.

Score: x6 defeats Button Bashers 3-2





DKP vs. TSG
Game 1: First match on Dalaran arena with both teams running their expected comps. The fight starts early with DKP sitting on Veex's warrior and getting him low at one point, but after recovering, TSG goes extremely offensive on DKP's priest with a strangulate followed by a bladestorm and he died in the bladestorm, giving TSG the first game of the series.

Game 2: This match takes place on Ruins of Lordaeron. More of the same this game with TSG's Valrath going on DKP's priest early on and DKP sitting on Veex yet again. With diseases spread on everyone on DKP followed by a bladestorm, the entire team was rotting all at once and eventually DKP's priest dies once again after a strangulate. TSG up in the series 2-0 now. I really think DKP needs to pressure the DK more against this comp in order to win.

Game 3: Once again the match takes place on Ruins. DKP opens on Valrath this time around, Veex charges DKP's priest with an immediate recklessness but then has to go defensive immediately when quick swapped to. DKP's rogue pressures Zilea early to harass him and get his trinket. A quick swap later by DKP to an already-low Veex (from Zilea being pressured) resulted in a kill as Zilea didn't even divine shield in this game. This takes the series to 2-1 in favor of TSG still.

Game 4: Ring of Valor this time; DKP doesn't learn too much from the previous games and goes on Veex from start to finish while TSG stays on the priest from the get go. Unfortunately a priest eventually runs out of cooldowns and time while a warrior can sit shielded however long he wants and TSG eventually kills the priest in another bladestorm yet again, giving TSG the series. Zilea performed pretty well as a holy light slave, as predicted.

Score: TSG defeats DKP 3-1





Shipit vs. All Pass
Game 1: All Pass comes out running cleave (paladin, warrior, DK) instead of their standard RMP in hopes of countering Shipit's PHD better. Shipit's hunter is SV spec'd as opposed to BM. First match on Ruins of Lordaeron. This match goes back and forth with All Pass changing targets a lot while Shipit primarily focuses the warrior, keeping him defensive most of the game. Shipit eventually gets a kill, though, with unrelenting pressure on All Pass' warrior as he didn't LOS enough damage around the tomb, giving Shipit the first game.

Game 2: Ring of Valor this time; Shipit goes straight on the warrior of All Pass while All Pass struggles to find a good target, often just putting mild damage on the Death Knight of Shipit. The paladin from Shipit is forced to bubble early and All Pass swaps to him when he comes out of it scoring a kill on him, but Shipit gets a cross kill on All Pass's warrior. Unfortunately, paladin/dk beats hunter/dk and All Pass wins the 2v2, bringing the series even at 1-1.

Game 3: The third game is on Blade's Edge Arena with both teams keeping the same comps, however, Shipit's DK specs Frost for this matchup thinking it will work out better for them. Seeing this, All Pass decides to train the frost DK of Shipit hard early on while Shipit focuses on the other team's warrior. The warrior gets very low and surprisingly doesn't die to a kill shot but All Pass recovers from it. All Pass then reverses the pressure onto Shipit's hunter and bursts him extremely low but Shipit also recovers. The Shipit paladin plays amazing here keeping both his teammates up when they're both extremely low and he's not sitting pretty himself. Shipit eventually takes down All Pass' warrior but with Shipit's paladin being OOM and low HP himself, All Pass manages to kill Shipit's DK and bring it down to a 2v2 of DK/Paladin vs. Shipit's Hunter/Paladin and with a huge mana advantage, All Pass eventually wins this 2v2 again, taking a lead in the series 2-1.

Game 4: This match takes place on Dalaran this time around with both teams keeping their same comps. Shipit's DK remains Frost while All Pass' DK stays Unholy. I believe Shipit is disadvantaged because of this. Shipit trains the warrior while All Pass trains the DK. Shipit eventually has to use hand of protection to save the DK from death, but Shipit turns around and forces the pressure back onto All Pass' warrior and scores a huge burst kill on him before he can line of sight the hunter damage. This evens up the series for them at 2-2 and forces a final, decisive game.

Game 5: Final game on Ruins of Lordaeron with both teams remaining their same comps they've been playing. All Pass paladin has to bubble almost immediately while his team goes on Shipit's hunter. Shipit puts a ton of pressure on All Pass' warrior and split damage on their paladin at the same time putting huge damage out on both of them at the same time. All Pass' paladin can't heal through it as he actually goes down first followed immediately after by the warrior. Although it was a good effort with their countercomp, Shipit comes out with the win and I must say that their paladin was absolutely stellar in this series and played better than almost any other I've seen at a tournament this year.

Score: Shipit defeats All Pass 3-2






x6tence vs. TSG
Game 1: X6 makes the hugely unexpected move of mirroring TSG with paladin/dk/warrior. x6 goes on Zilea while TSG goes on x6's warrior. Zilea was forced to bubble early while the warrior survived. x6 then made short work of Zilea coming out of his bubble and finished him off to win the first game of the series.

Game 2: Both teams keep their same comps in this mirror this time on Ruins of Lordaeron. TSG begins with the same strategy of opening on x6's warrior while x6 goes on Veex, as well. Zilea drops extremely low from spread damage and sac damage is forced to bubble after x6's paladin did, as well. TSG stays on x6's warrior the entire game while x6 goes on Zilea after his bubble is off once again. After getting Zilea extremely low (under 500hp), Valrath interrupts a heal on x6's warrior and they're able to finish him off while Zilea recovers. This evens the series at 1-1.

Game 3: Same comp for both teams once again on Ruins map. Both teams also go on each other's warriors once again. Another really close game. Both paladins bubble around the same time but following the bubble, x6 goes on Zilea (TSG paladin) while TSG goes on the DK of x6 and TSG managed to kill x6's DK just before Zilea went down, allowing him to barely cling on to life and stay alive. TSG goes up in the series now 2-1.

Game 4: A really long game on Nagrand where both Valrath and x6's warrior were HoP'd at some point and the game basically came down to mana on each paladin. Despite x6's paladin wearing heavy PvE gear this game, it wasn't enough to keep up x6's warrior as he eventually dropped after a long back-and-forth between the cleaves, giving the series to TSG.

Score: TSG defeats X6 3-1





SK Gaming vs. Shipit
Game 1: Close game on Ruins of Lordaeron with both teams running their expected lineups. Both teams trade healers extremely quickly bringing it down to a 2v2 of dk/hunter vs. mage/rogue. Both teams then trade their hunter for rogue taking it down to 1v1 of dk vs. mage and Pookz manages to beat Coilmaster with relatively no cooldowns, primarily because of the map. SK takes the first game in the series.

Game 2: Second game on Blade's Edge where SK goes for Coilmaster (DK) early on while Shipit obviously goes for Realz. After trinketting a KS, Shipit manages to kill Realz and despite losing Coilmaster right after, Enforcer also died making it a 1v2 of Pookz vs. Paladin/Hunter which he obviously would go on to lose. The series is now evened up at 1-1.

Game 3: Realz basically gets WotLK'd on Ruins and dies in the first 20 seconds. He PS'd himself with Strangulate, Gnaw, and Intimidation still up and dies right after the PS wears off. Shipit up 2-1.

Game 4: Nagrand arena this time where Realz can LOS better. After SK puts a lot of pressure on the Shipit hunter forcing an early bubble from their paladin, they swap instantly to the paladin out of the bubble and kill him. While Shipit counter-kills Realz, the hunter/dk have no cooldowns left to deal with the mage/rogue left on SK and eventually lose the game, tying the series at 2-2.

Game 5: Blade's Edge again this time. SK forces a bubble almost instantly on the paladin of Shipit (WTS glyph of salvation?) but Realz dies in almost the same amount of time from the DK and hunter. Pookz and Enforcer manage to kill the paladin right after that happens and then come very close to killing the DK but he manages a last-second pet sac that heals him up to 70% and Enforcer dies seconds after. Shipit cleans up and ends up winning this really close back-and-forth series.

Score: Shipit defeats SK 3-2





Button Bashers vs. DKP
Game 1: Both teams run their normal lineups for the first match on Ruins of Lordaeron. Both rogues play extremely defensively to avoid being opened on while the dk and mage joust each other. HON (Button Bashers) gets a full blind on DKP's rogue while they do a very strong swap to DKP's death knight and get a huge burst out on him that eventually drops him, giving HON the first game of the series.

Game 2: Very close game. DKP loses their priest early on after an early burst. HON gets a clutch fear on DKP's rogue out of LOS, then HON kills the DK, then DKP kills Numberone on HON, after which DKP's rogue dies, and DKP's priest leaves and gives the game to HON bringing the series to 2-0.

Game 3: This game on Ruins was controlled by HON from start to finish as they went on DKP's death knight very aggressively and scored a kill after a few CC cyclones on DKP's rogue and priest. HON easily takes this series in a sweep.

Score: Button Bashers defeats DKP 3-0





All Pass vs. Woah
Game 1: Both teams run their expected lineups (All Pass mage being Arcane) with the first match taking place on Ruins of Lordaeron. All Pass goes aggressive on Kae from start to finish despite having their rogue demo shouted out of stealth at the beginning. After a few openers that were weathered off by Kae, he eventually gets caught in one final stunlock and drops. Woah then counter-kills All Pass' mage while hypothermia is on without the mage using mana shield. Priest/Rogue vs. Warrior/Warlock and amazingly Woah pulls off the upset here as they kill the rogue while cc'ing the priest to steal the first game that All Pass should have had locked up.

Game 2: Woah once again goes on AP's mage in this game on Nagrand and forces an early ice block. All Pass attempts a rushdown on Kae but Woah counters by playing aggressively on the mage once again and drops him due to the lack of having a second ice block as Arcane, making the series 2-0 for Woah.

Game 3: Game 3 on RoV; All Pass immediately jumps on Kae with dispels and Woah goes on All Pass' rogue and Inflame even accidently spell locks him. All Pass seems a bit confused on which target to go on with Kae having shadow word: pain on and AP's rogue being on Inflame at the same time. Woah eventually outlasts the rogue's cooldowns and switches the pressure to All Pass' priest and drop him with ease, winning the series. 

Score: Woah defeats All Pass 3-0