Who will be crowned as this year’s world champion?
After three days of action-packed battles for the Halcyon Fold, only two out of the 12 best Vainglory teams remain in the running for the lion’s share of $140,000 and the most coveted Razer 2017 Vainglory World Championship title.
North America’s Tribe Gaming and South Korea’s ACE Gaming were able to claim the grand finals slot after withstanding the onslaught of tournament-favorite Cloud9 and home-crowd-empowered Impunity in the best-of-five semi finals.
The Cinderella Run
Team Tribe came into the Razer 2017 Vainglory World Championship without much expected from them. After losing to Team Solomid in the grand finals of the Autumn Season of the Vainglory 8 for North America, Tribe was luckily able to attend the biggest Vainglory tournament of the year as a Wildcard contender.
Before the Vainglory World Championship started, Tribe admitted that entering the tournament as a Wildcard takes pressure off their shoulders, “we can compete with the best teams without losing sight of our goal,” MaxGreen said.
From humble ambitions, Tribe turned into an unstoppable force once they got onto the Kallang Theater stage. They were able to eliminate defending Vainglory world champions, ROX Armada, as well as their western comrades in G2 Esports without dropping a single game.
After shutting down Cloud9 3-1 in the semifinals, Group D’s top seed ACE Gaming is the only obstacle left for MaxGreen, ttigers, and DNZio to complete their Cinderella run and claim the Razer 2017 Vainglory World Championship crown.
Eyes on the Prize
From three, East Asia’s representatives for the Razer 2017 Vainglory World Championship plummeted to one right after the event’s first day. That one team, however, has survived until tomorrow, the final day of the tournament.
ACE Gaming came into the world championship not just to play, but to ultimately win. They were able to qualify for the tournament after punishing ROX Armada in the Vainglory 8 East Asia leg. Coming into the tournament, ACE showed that they still have momentum from defeating ROX with their sweeping of Team Solo Mid in the group stages.
The only moment ACE showed vulnerability was when South America’s paiN Gaming took them to a full best-of-five series in the quarterfinals. Youngjoo, creatioN, and T4SA, were definitely rattled after the five-game bout but their victory gave them the confidence to carry on through the semifinals.
ACE knew that competing against a team backed by home crowd cheers would have them at a disadvantage, but they were still able to find a sneaky way to make it through the grand finals. The Singaporean representatives were outsmarted twice in the series by youngjoo, CreaTion, and T4SA, as their objective-oriented gameplay was left unanswered.
The best-of-seven grand final match between Team Tribe and ACE Gaming for the Razer 2017 Vainglory World Championship will start tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. SGT.
Also tomorrow, at long last, the unveiling of Vainglory’s 5v5 mode.
