alliance tournament x finals weekend
reported by CCP Navigator | 2012.07.17 03:22:00 | NEW | Comments
Alliance Tournament X will bring the final round of group stage matches along with last 16, quarter finals, semi-finals and final this coming weekend. The tournament this year has seen some fantastic matches, expensive set-ups and unexpected twists and turns as well as some technical difficulties on our new streaming platform. This blog will talk about some of those issues, what we have done to address them and what you can expect to see this coming weekend.
Stream issues
This year we decided to partner with own3D to bring the tournament to a wider audience as well as streaming to our players as normal. CCP and the EVE Alliance Tournament team understand the passion for the ever expanding field of eSports and this partnership allowed us to stream to players who have never heard of EVE Online before as well as veterans of multiple Alliance Tournaments. We have seen players starting to stream now and CCP Bro will be talking in the studio on Sunday, July 22 on how players can set up streams and get promotion of these streams.
We encountered several issues last weekend with the stream and we firstly wanted to apologize for interruptions to service. The ATX team wants to put on the best possible show for everyone and we were just as frustrated by these technical difficulties. As a result, this is what we are going to do to fix the problem:
The first issue we encountered was a problem with the screen going blank. We believe this was an issue with a bugged XSplit encoder on one of our machines which was dedicated to the stream. As a result, we have moved the streaming service on to new dedicated machines and have added back-up streams should anything happen to our main platform. This redundancy should ensure that any interruptions and it should be stressed that we do not expect any, will be kept to the absolute minimum of time. Moving to a backup stream will take a matter of seconds.
The second issue we encountered was with audio desync. This has been completely resolved and will not be an issue for the final weekend
The final issue was a complete drop of our network connection in the studio right before the Darkside vs. BricK sQuAD match. We will retain a network engineer at all times to quickly identify any network issues and resolve them as quickly as possible, should they occur. In addition we will also have a second account running on a cellular connection in the arena to ensure that all rules and boundary violations are spotted in the unlikely event that the network experiences problems at the studio.
Stress Test this coming week
To ensure that the stream is tested thoroughly before this coming weekend we are going to roll out some stress tests on the EVE TV channel which we hope you will tune in to and enjoy.
On Wednesday, July 18 at 15:00, the Alliance Tournament commentators will be streaming an impromptu roam and will bring some ships out and go looking for trouble. If you have ever wanted to see Michael Bolton III or kil2 get shot up in real time, then this is your chance.
On Thursday, July 19 the Alliance Tournament team will hold several exhibition matches on Singularity where we will invite tournament teams to come along and fight against an ATX All Stars team. These matches will use the current ATX rules and will be used to look for irregularities on the stream as well as to entertain you, the players. Naturally, the ATX team will probably win everything since we are just that good.
Upcoming guests
This coming weekend will see some fresh faces in our studio.
CCP Bro will be talking about streaming opportunities for players.
CCP SonicLover and CCP FlyingScotsman will be talking about upcoming designs for EVE.
CCP Omen will talk about the EVE/Dust 514 link and the tournament ships
CCP Punkturis will be speaking about the UI
CCP Guard will bring you details about EVE player events and other community news
CCP Unifex and CCP Hellmar will be in the studio to discuss the future of EVE and CCP in general.Finals weekend schedule
As always, CCP Sunset will be taking player questions for the experts in this thread so pop in and ask something about the tournament.
Soundwave song competition
CCP Veritas announced a competition we would like to run during his guest spot on EVE TV last weekend. The Soundwave Soundboard was used during the qualifying weekends to bring the soothing tones of CCP Soundwave to players watching the stream. Due to popular demand we released the program which you can access by clicking here.
So what is this competition all about?
Simply compose a song using the Soundwave Soundboard, host it on You Tube or SoundCloud and post it in this thread. The song should be entertaining and fun and we will award prizes for the top three entries. The only rule that we will apply is that the song must not contain profanity as it will be broadcast on EVE TV.
The prizes we will offer will be a mix of PLEX and goodies from our friends at Logitech as follows:
1st Prize: A G19s gaming keyboard, G600s mouse and G930s headset.
2nd Prize: A G510s keyboard, G400s mouse and G35s headset
3rd Prize: 5 x PLEX
Predict a winner with goodies from Logitech and MMM Publishing
In addition to the Soundwave song competition we will be holding a further 32 ‘Predict a Winner’ competitions over the coming weekend in which you can win a PLEX or some goodies donated by our friends at MMM Publishing and Logitech. These will include gaming keyboards, headsets and mice as well as EON subscriptionsand copies of ISK, The Ultimate Guide and EVE Strategic Maps. Entering the competition is simple and you can post in any one of the many threads which will appear on the EVE Alliance Tournament Discussion section from 14:30 UTC on Saturday, July 21.
Finals weekend schedule
Our final match from last weekend saw Pandemic Legion bring an officer fitted flagship and four Malice’s (the Amarr frigates awarded for last year’s tournament) at a value estimated to be close to 160 Billion ISK against Rote Kapelle which they needed to win to ensure progress to the last 16. Rote Kapelle know how to put up a fight and dazzled us in a match which many have branded the best match of the tournament so far. With many groups still undecided we can expect to see some big matches and, potentially, some huge upsets on Saturday, July 21.
Tune in to EVE TV from 14:45 UTC to make sure you don’t miss a moment of the action. Our full schedule of matches is available here.
On Sunday, July 22 we will bring you the last 16, quarter finals, semi-finals and grand finals starting at 14:45 UTC. This schedule will be posted as soon as the group winners and runners up are decided.
Finally, we want to thank you, the players, for your support and understanding during the breaks in our streaming service. Our number one priority this week is ensuring that our stream is stable and enough redundancies are in place to ensure uninterrupted and smooth coverage this coming weekend.
The Alliance Tournament X Team
Originally Posted by Sakura Nihil
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