The Grand Melee - Announcement and Discussion

Some time ago, the secretive Order of the Sheep teased us The Grand Melee, an Age of Empires II: DE happening in Hannover at the DreamHack LAN event, from the 15th to the 17th of December.

We are now happy to deliver the full message to you.

Settings specifics
The whole event will be played using the DWL game mode, also known as 9 villagers start game mode. It will allow for quicker action, while keeping the openness and strategic diversity of the standard RM mode.

Main event
The Grand Melee main event will consist of a single elimination bracket, featuring a total of 8 players.
15th of December
Quarter finals best of 5
16th of December
Semi finals best of 7
17th of December
Third place match best of 7 and Grand final best of 9

Participation
Firstly, as per their performance in the RedBull Wololo: Legacy tournament, Liereyy and TaToH has been granted an invitation to the main event.

Secondly, the other 6 participants will have to come on top of the entirely open qualifiers happening on the 3rd and 4th of December. The registration is already open and you can sign up here on start.gg

Prize money reward
The monetary reward will amount to a whopping $100,000 split between the 8 main event players as followed:

1st place: $40,000
2nd place: $20,000
3rd place: $14,000
4th place: $10,000
5th to 8th: $4,000

Where to watch?
The whole event will be streamed on Twitch at: https://www.twitch.tv/theorderofthesheep

On top of that, the qualifiers will be completely open to broadcast, so you can catch them live at your favourite streamer’s channel on the 3rd and 4th of December!

Details for the broadcasting policy of the main event will be announced soon. Stay tuned...

Join the Discord server now!
Chat with us and get all the latest updates regarding The Grand Melee at https://discord.gg/vT9NWJJtp5

You can also use this announcement thread to discuss about the tournament and to send your questions and feedback.

See you soon!

 

Ok cool cool we did the sheep thing, can we have KOTD or HC now?

 

Don't worry, their big LoL and CS:GO sections are carrying them enough. But sponsors for future aoe events will also take this tournament into consideration about spending future money on AoE2, especially on lan tournaments.


I just point out the discrepancy between players, prizepool and viewers in both rts games. You think aoe2 events will keep hosting 100k$ tournaments while pulling half of the viewers than Sc2 events with a quater of the prizepool?
Also the HSC22 is a good example how to do an exciting 1v1 tournament with more than the same 8 players we see all the time and create a funny and cozy lan atmosphere. The Grand Melee is aside from the games which are good, in nearly every other aspect a good example how not to host a lan.

Plenty of other AOE2 events got great viewership. I hope people have the mindfullness not to use the viewership of one tournament (that was announced late and streamed at inconvenient hours) as a benchmark for the entire scene.

 

Plenty of other AOE2 events got great viewership. I hope people have the mindfullness not to use the viewership of one tournament (that was announced late and streamed at inconvenient hours) as a benchmark for the entire scene.

People are reflecting on how hastly, poorly this tournament was conducted. So much money involved and not a great show

 

Uff, such a great final in terms of gameplay but what a bad organisation.
How rushed can the ending be? They just arrest Hera mid interview and that's it. Then you have Ellie telling us to stay tuned but the stream ended. Maybe she was talking to the live audience but oh boy was this badly handled.

 

Idk the post-match thing with the "arrest" was ok, at least they tried something.

And surely that was much better than the pre-match show!

 

Reading this thread is very funny. Looks like this tournament was a shitshow.

 

so just like Russians get offended and complain politics when game devs annouce donating money to help Ukrainian civilians suffering from the war or are against the war. There either is no war or you cannot talk about it because people dying is not relevant, it is reallly just political talk according to you. I guess classicpro got admin loss for politics in Warlords and not because there happens be war causing power outage.

Mouttie: "i don't want to hear about thigns i don't like so i say it is political"

Add to that the replacement 'showmatch' and who got paid there.
It became a very apolitical disgusting thing ...

It was the moment i decided to completely ignore any stream with said streamer in ...

 

Games, casters ( daut, jordan, ornlu, dave, nili ) and the players were so good, and the production exact the opposite 11111.
I hoped that money would be spent on HC or KOTD as another fellow pointed out.

 

After each interview I thought 'alright, that's it. It can't get worse than that. It's only going to be better from now on'.
Then the final interview came and even though have inhaled half of the world's supply of hopium I still wasn't prepared for this. That 'nails on a chalkboard laugh', like someone nicely described it, will haunt me in my sleep for months to come.

I have never missed Riley so much as during this tournament.

 

AOE2 is one of the least "professional" esports, and I honestly love that. It's a scene of individuals and personalities, and I'd much rather have that than the bland corporatized experience so many other games offer.

I wonder if players, who cannot make a living playing professionally aoe2, also love that lol

 

@siestes heyho, I had to work at the whole Day 2 of the tournament and since then I try to find a VOD which I can enjoy. Also since then I walk with both eyes closed through social Media and stuff to not get spoiled. Disaster. I dont know why but on twitch there are 2x Day 1 VODs and now the Day 3 but no Day 2 at all. Can you fix that maybe? Or upload the stuff on youtube?

 

Calling for boycott is most defnitely political. Do people think because something is for a good cause that it makes it not political? Not to mention the amount of misinformation thrown around but people are fine with it as long as it aligns with their views. Do you not see how keeping something like that out of the official stream is the best thing to do?

What are u talking about? I dont understand. Facts: Russia wants Ukraine, Russias war does not go well, Russia is bad and we dont like that russians allow Putin, it is a choice, a tough one but still a choice. Ex yugos Ive never trusted, to much fondness of Tito. Life is politics and congrats to Croatia for bronze!

 

Its not about including perpetrators, is about making stream about what it is. Telling to vaccinate or to boycot wont achieve anything as was already mentioned. You can agree with those statements, that doesn't matter, people who cares already knows about situation. And if people are against vacinating 1 year after covid situation, talking about on TV won't make change their mind either. So in the end, what you achieve with talking such things/politics? People just want to chill watching their liked game. I have seen enough about Qatar in 9gag already.

Absurdism at its best. 9gag is a platform where visual input goes in on one end and out the other. It has zero relevance or impact on anyone's life. Saying this simply means you do not care, which is fine, but you've got to call a spade a spade.
In the end, it is all about whether it has an effect on sponsorship/viewership, as long as it didn't break any form of formal conduct. Subtly suggesting as a side remark to get a vaccin at the height of a corona pandemic, realistically it won't have a big a effect. A small joke with some dark humor about which most people perceive to be true, and most viewers aren't actual Qatarese (40,000 pop in 1960), most people will probably wimp it off at worse. Taking an entire VOD offline solely for this reason seems extremely premature, if this is the reason for doing so.

 

In the void, game quality wise, this was one of the best tournaments. The game is in a great state and they nailed it with game setting and map choices.

 

Absurdism at its best. 9gag is a platform where visual input goes in on one end and out the other. It has zero relevance or impact on anyone's life. Saying this simply means you do not care, which is fine, but you've got to call a spade a spade.
In the end, it is all about whether it has an effect on sponsorship/viewership, as long as it didn't break any form of formal conduct. Subtly suggesting as a side remark to get a vaccin at the height of a corona pandemic, realistically it won't have a big a effect. A small joke with some dark humor about which most people perceive to be true, and most viewers aren't actual Qatarese (40,000 pop in 1960), most people will probably wimp it off at worse. Taking an entire VOD offline solely for this reason seems extremely premature, if this is the reason for doing so.

If one points out that Germany, the events location, has an interesting history with its own form of camps, it only offends a mere small subset of population X, Y, and Z. A joke about the United States and certain internment camps they held for Japanese and German Americans, its treatment of its African American community, Native Americans et al. Russia and its invasion of its neighbors. France and its history of anti-Semitism. Poland and its treatment of foreigners. Britain and its history of colonization. Belgium and Leopold. China and its neighbors. Japan and its neighbors. So on, so forth, until the end of time, rinse, repeat. Covid. Why Qatar? Why not any discussion about the Tigray? Where is the care for Sudan, Myanmar? Mexico? Yemen?

While any one of these statements may or may not have merit and room for discussion in an appropriate place, what should be agreeable is that they don't belong in this context.
It's a shame that this will be talked about probably more than who won the tournament.

It's simply a matter that an individual felt their personal/political feelings were more important than the event and the players participating, and consequently that they judged any potential ramification from their unprofessional action(s) not severe enough to deter them.

One's personal politics are inappropriate in such context. No ifs, and's and/or buts. If it was not an established caster they would likely never be asked to participate in an S-tier tournament again.

But we all know nothing will happen to Nili, so I suspect you have nothing to worry about.

 

There is no dearth of people like nili in any community. Always intentionally (or not?) taking away the limelight from the real thing(Hera winning) because they project themselves as the flag bearers of the community (the WOKE virus?).
In reality any community evolves and I was glad I saw new faces including the host even though Riley is the best suited
One.

 

I skipped the whole tourney live, decided to check out the final vod after seeing the close scores
man, the interviews were so cringe i had to skip past every one of them.. experience and confidence on stage will come with time and doing more tourneys but this whole thing felt like throwing big bucks at the prize pool and neglecting some aspects of the production/staffing

the other thing, i was so disappointed in nili and his joke about worker deaths after all what he said about the qatar boycott i dont think i ll hang around his stream anymore

edit: just a thing i forgot, I love Ornlu in LAN settings man, glad he got called up to cast/analyse

 

Congrats to Hera.

I always root for Lierey in these events and events and wanted him to win today but couldn’t help but feel good for Hera as he completed the comeback. It seems like he takes the losses to heart a bit more than Viper/Lierey and he’s had so many heartbreaking losses over the past few years that came down to 1-2 small amounts things. Cool to see things break his way and he gets his moment.

 

The games from the final that I watched were great.
Also great to have several players in good shape as strong contenders.
Would have been great to also have Yo and Vinch there with strong performance, to sad they could not make it. Nice though that the opportunity for ACCM was there.

 

There were some good ideas around the production and the 'order of the sheep' thing, but unfortunately, it looks like everything was rushed. I think there's potential there if more thought is put into it.

Hera being arrested during the interview is another one that initially looked cool to me, but I was waiting for the follow up. Maybe he'd appear in that final scene with the cult folks.. but the stream ended!? That was quite odd.

The interviews were not good at all. I assume that everyone involved appreciates that and learns from it for the future. Most players don't automatically elaborate on their thoughts about the games. The interviewer needs to ask follow up questions to drive the conversation.

I used to not like Ornlu's style, but it was good to see him in this event. Looked more mature, and very impressive knowledge about the game.

 

Poland and its treatment of foreigners

What treatment xd

 

The tournament had high level game play and the organizers make good choice to invite Ornlu, who is sometimes underappreciated, as co-caster. But promotion of the tournament seemed indeed rushed. Felt like the Grand Melee rode on the hype for AoE 2, which is created by others. If there will be other edition, I hope the organizers try more.

 

In my opinion it was a great tournament. I'm there to watch games and games delivered. From the organization side there were some issues, but I think it was a decent first try. It took Red Bull few tournaments to figure things out. I hope the Order continues to organize more tournament. More organizers is always better.

 

What treatment xd

I also want to know. Maybe he means pushbacks of Lukashenkos migrants.
Sorry, I know this should be an apolitical thread but I'm super curious now.

 

It seems to me the people who fly into a rage over any mention of political stuff keep our collective attention on the political remarks they despise for longer and more intensely than those remarks would ever have commanded just on their own.