It took all six games, but in the end Ceice and Elevate claimed the title of Champions at WSOE 3 Featuring Fortnite. The invited duo held off a strong late challenge from Saf and Zayt and emerged with the $40,000 grand prize.
In the end, only 20 points separated the two teams after 6 rounds of play. Ceice and Elevate bested Saf and Zayt by a score of 610 to 590. The win came even though the Champions did not claim Victory Royale in any single round.
While the event featured epic competition throughout, the story of the tournament might well be the performance of qualifiers Psalm – previously known for his prowess at Heroes of the Storm – and his partner Rhux. After advancing through an open qualifier to appear in the main event, Psalm and Rhux claimed two Victories Royale and briefly flirted with championship glory before finishing a highly respectable fourth place.
All competitors faced the challenge of a brand new in-game item dropped by Fortnite game developer Epic only hours before the start of play. The “boombox”, an area-of-effect weapon that does damage to structures, caused players to make adjustments to their strategies throughout the day. All players seemed to adapt quickly to the new item, and even enjoyed the experience of getting to try it out for the first time in a major tournament.
WSOE 3 Featuring Fortnite showcased 100 of the world’s best and most notable Fortnite players competing for over $100,000 in prizes in front of a live audience. The event was the third produced by the World Showdown of Esports in its ongoing multi-game, multi-genre tournament series. It was held on December 30, 2018, at OGN Studios in Manhattan Beach, CA.
The event featured 50 professional Fortnite players from dominant esports teams such as OpTic Gaming, Cloud9, TSM, NRG Esports, Ghost Gaming, FlyQuest, GankStars, G2 Esports, and Team Vitality. An additional 50 players placed into the main event via a live open qualifier held on December 27. Over 200 teams registered to play in the qualifier, with only the top 25 advancing to the final.
WSOE 3 Featuring Fortnite was hosted by ESP Gaming’s Richard Lewis alongside well-known Fortnite commentators and influencers Jon Kefaloukos, Alex “Goldenboy” Mendez, Troy “2LoudTX” Tuttle, and Javier “MonsterDFace” Collazo. Fan favorites Lauren Jbara and Lisa “Lucy Mae” Malambri returned to WSOE as reporters.
After a rousing countdown from Bruce Buffer, the event kicked off with a round 1 dream start for qualifiers Psalm and Rhux. The duo claimed the Victory Royale and started their march toward their eventual fourth place finish.
FunkBomb and ClipZ took the Victory Royale in round 2 and briefly claimed a spot atop the overall leaderboard. But they faded in later rounds and ended up in 14th place overall with 400 total points.
In round 3, Cowboy and Herrions leveraged their late-game high-ground advantage to secure Victory Royale. With Cowboy maintaining the high-ground, Herrions dropped to ground to finish off the opposition. Using similar tactics, they managed the same feat again in Round 4, and climbed as high as third place overall before falling to 11th place.
Qualifiers Psalm and Rhux again showed strong play and seized a late game high-ground advantage to win round 5, their second Victory Royale of the tournament. They climbed to second place, only 10 points behind leaders, and eventual winners, Ceice and Elevate.
The teams entered Round 6 with everything to play for. As the storm tightened, Ceice and Elevate took the fight directly to their closest rivals, eliminating Psalm and Rhux in the mid-game as they tried a risky strategy to grab the high-ground early. The gambit failed. Saf and Zayt managed to survive a furious end game to take the Victory Royale and earn an eventual second place finish.
WSOE returns in late January with WSOE 4. Watch twitter.com/wsoe for details.