Here's the situation:
1. Both me and Daut were born in Yugoslavia and we thus had Yugoslavian citizenship. Later (in the 90s) the country broke into several smaller countries. I am Slovenian, he is Serbian. We speak different language but we'd easily understand each other speaking our native toungues. We probably live about 500 km apart. Don't bring up any Roman or Mongol Empire parables, thank you.
2. Neither of us has anybody in the top 300 (or anywhere close to it) on the ladder. Sure we can sign up, knowing we'd lose every single game of every single match against a team of two 2k players. So don't bring up »That's the charm of it, it forces players to get out of their comfort zone« BS either, thank you.
3. We wouldn't be endangering any contenders by teaming up. Daut is a top 15 player, I am certainly not. We have zero chemistry, in fact we have never ever played as allies before (to my knowledge). Hell, I don't even know if he has time or wants to play with me in this tournament (supposedly he wanted to do it in AoElympics). I figured I'll sooner finish writing this up than waiting for his reply. So there would be a lot of »charm« and »getting out of your comfort zone« if we actually teamed up and took a shot at beating some established teams. And that's the beauty of World Cup, right?
4. It's not the first time something like this happened this year either. In AoElympics (that just finished) we asked the same: host of the tournament made a poll in which captains of other teams (surprisingly) voted that we shouldn't be allowed to team (unless ofc I discovered to have a serbian ancestor which I did not do). Daut then didn't participate at all and I played in 1v1 brackets only and earned 2 medals. Would love to have played some 2v2s there as well.
5. If it was 1 team per country then it would be a double edged sword because being a 4th or 5th best player in a super strong country (being Stark or Paladin) would mean you wouldn't get to participate. But since Brazil and China can field atleast 6 total super competitive teams it's just totally unfair to smaller nations.
6. You CAN draw a line. A suggestion from earlier: if you're a top player and nobody from your country is in top 300 in 1v1 ladder (or above 1900 or whatever), then you may team up with another such player from a neighbouring country, especially if the said countries have strong historical and/or cultural connection. In the case of me and Daut both of us are in the same situation. Somebody like ProjectBelgium should be able to team up with a high level Dutch player and ClassicPro with a decent Russian player. Let Heart team up with one of the many 2k Brazilians. And same for other cases like these. We're not trying to scam our way to win the tournament, we're just trying to participate on somewhat even grounds.
1. Both me and Daut were born in Yugoslavia and we thus had Yugoslavian citizenship. Later (in the 90s) the country broke into several smaller countries. I am Slovenian, he is Serbian. We speak different language but we'd easily understand each other speaking our native toungues. We probably live about 500 km apart. Don't bring up any Roman or Mongol Empire parables, thank you.
2. Neither of us has anybody in the top 300 (or anywhere close to it) on the ladder. Sure we can sign up, knowing we'd lose every single game of every single match against a team of two 2k players. So don't bring up »That's the charm of it, it forces players to get out of their comfort zone« BS either, thank you.
3. We wouldn't be endangering any contenders by teaming up. Daut is a top 15 player, I am certainly not. We have zero chemistry, in fact we have never ever played as allies before (to my knowledge). Hell, I don't even know if he has time or wants to play with me in this tournament (supposedly he wanted to do it in AoElympics). I figured I'll sooner finish writing this up than waiting for his reply. So there would be a lot of »charm« and »getting out of your comfort zone« if we actually teamed up and took a shot at beating some established teams. And that's the beauty of World Cup, right?
4. It's not the first time something like this happened this year either. In AoElympics (that just finished) we asked the same: host of the tournament made a poll in which captains of other teams (surprisingly) voted that we shouldn't be allowed to team (unless ofc I discovered to have a serbian ancestor which I did not do). Daut then didn't participate at all and I played in 1v1 brackets only and earned 2 medals. Would love to have played some 2v2s there as well.
5. If it was 1 team per country then it would be a double edged sword because being a 4th or 5th best player in a super strong country (being Stark or Paladin) would mean you wouldn't get to participate. But since Brazil and China can field atleast 6 total super competitive teams it's just totally unfair to smaller nations.
6. You CAN draw a line. A suggestion from earlier: if you're a top player and nobody from your country is in top 300 in 1v1 ladder (or above 1900 or whatever), then you may team up with another such player from a neighbouring country, especially if the said countries have strong historical and/or cultural connection. In the case of me and Daut both of us are in the same situation. Somebody like ProjectBelgium should be able to team up with a high level Dutch player and ClassicPro with a decent Russian player. Let Heart team up with one of the many 2k Brazilians. And same for other cases like these. We're not trying to scam our way to win the tournament, we're just trying to participate on somewhat even grounds.