Hearthstone Masters Ironforge details revealed

Blizzard Entertainment and ESL are hosting the Heartstone’s Masters Ironforge this weekend. Over 400 competitors are competing for their shot at a $250,000 USD prize pool, along with several other 2021 circuit-related awards. Here are the details.

Hearthstone Masters Ironforge will be played in the four-deck, best-of-5 Conquest mode with a ban format. Players who manage at least a 7-2 result will qualify for a Masters Tour Orgrimmar invite. 

Day one of the event contains  Five rounds of Swiss brackets. Moving on into Day 2,  there are another four rounds of Swiss, creating space for 16 teams. After that, there will be a top 16 single-elimination round, creating a top eight. Day 3 is the final playday. The top eight players that remain will compete in the Playoffs, where only one is crowned the Masters Tour Champion.

The Masters are an important part of the Hearthstone esports ecosystem. Due to the ongoing global pandemic, Blizzard is holding all six 2021 Masters Tours online. Each Masters Tour will feature a $250,000 (USD) prize pool divided among the top 200 players based on final standings. As players won’t be able to travel from around the globe to compete together,  the 2021 Masters Tour back to Hearthstone’s roots with Azerothian based events. To ensure fairness of the global online league, each event will run at timezones where they would otherwise host events. Orgirmmar is the European timezone, event, while Ironforge is the Pacific time, etc. 

The events are important as players can earn spots in the grand final of the year. Invites to Grandmasters 2021 Season 2 will be based on the top points-earners from each region for Masters Tour Asia-Pacific, Montreal, Madrid, Ironforge, Ogrimmar, and Dalaran. The top 25 players from each region are also on a ladder, which helps determine the best players for invites. 

Hearthstone Masters Ironforge will go live and be hosted through the Hearthstone esports channel on YouTube. The broadcast line–up for the event features the likes of TJ “Azumoqt” Sanders, Darroch “Darroch” Brown, Jia “Jia” Dee, Neil “Lorinda” Bond, and Alex “RavenCasts” Baguley.

 

Blizzard is really ramping up its content release. This week contains the HS Masters Ironfroge event, along with the usual WoW Esports weekend events, which recently launched its 9.0.5 patch, which shakes a few things up. Lets see what the latest Hearthstone changes do to the competitive scene.