There are plenty of sports fanatics out there that swear by college teams. They generally cite the passion of the players, the lack of corporate corruption and other factors that point towards a more pure expression of the sport. Esports is growing rapidly, bolstered by games like DOTA 2 and League of Legends. With more and more events like Quakecon and Evo, featuring professional players that make their living being some of the best players in the world, it’s always only been a matter of time before we began to see esports enter the college arena.
Blizzard is a giant in it’s own right within the arena of esports. Between World of Warcraft, Starcraft II, Hearthstone, and Overwatch, they definitely have slice of the esports pie. Tespa, who focuses their efforts on collegiate esports, has partnered with Blizzard to bring a new facet to World of Warcraft competitive play. While most competition has been in Arena or PvP, Tespa’s “Great Collegiate Dungeon Race” will instead pit five player teams against mythic PvE dungeons.
Outside of PvP, dungeons and raids have always been a key component of World of Warcraft, requiring planning, communication, and an understanding of the dungeon mechanics. “Legion” introduced Mythic Dungeons, which allow players to square off against ever increasing difficulty, not only against the dungeon itself but against the clock.
Teams will choose their characters from pre-made templates, and compete in three rounds of a single Mythic Dungeons to land a place on the leaderboards. The top sixteen teams will then be seeded into a double elimination best-of-three bracket until only four teams remain. After that it’s a single elimination for the fastest time in the hardest dungeons Blizzard has devised.
With $20,000 worth of scholarship prize money up for grabs, and the grand prize team receiving $2000 per player it’s easy to see that this will be a fierce competition.
You can register your own college team here.