It's looking like it will be a close playoffs run for the teams who made it. I would make a write-up for Week 7 but the only one worth writing about is OWN vs. e-boy (2-0) so I'll just say real fast congratulations to Joey Lemons for their win and it is unfortunate that they did not have the chance to make playoffs due to Match Points. You guys are looking like you'll be even stronger next season if you stick together and, in all likelihood,next time you'll be in playoffs yourselves.

Playoffs Power Rankings:
1) division dysphoria
2) gotta blast
3) 1 Korean, 9 Keyboards
4) marker and e-boy

Playoffs Week 1 Predictions

marker and e-boy vs. division dysphoria (2-1)

With the unfortunate decisions of division dysphoria in regards to organizing the match, they will be beginning the match down 1 map (effectively the score is already 1-0). The maps still to be played are Ashville and Swiftwater. e-boy has had consistently strong performances on Swiftwater throughout the season, as well as in recent weeks defeating both Home Depot eSports as well as a potential Advanced team for next season (led by false) with relative ease. While neither of these teams are exactly high Advanced, it is good to see solid scrim results going into this match. The same, however, can be said about dysphoria, who had a strong performance against the Invite team Impostors (though they did not manage to win) as well as a win against gotta blast. The biggest decider on Swiftwater will probably be the absence of team leader brandon for dysphoria. Theoretically, he will be replaced by Mono72 but that's still up in the air. This map seems about equally favorable for both teams, and either team playing better than the other team will probably give them the necessary edge to win.

Ashville will probably lean a bit more in the favor of dysphoria. Historically dysphoria has been a powerhouse on KOTH maps, beating solid teams in On God, OWN, and fellow playoff team gotta blast in matches. While marker and e-boy has has a more mixed schedule, beating both On God and Banned from RGL but losing in a close match to 1 Korean, 9 Keyboards on Product. Mono72 and extrasolar are both proficient players but they might have trouble doing as much work as possible with the strong pickup of randyw for e-boy, giving them a strong chance of beating out the solid flank of Cheers and diego for dysphoria and rounding out the abilities of pup for e-boy.

Player v. Player Matchups:

randyw > Cheers (Large Advantage)

randyw has played multiple classes at a top Invite level. He is simply a solid gamer, and one who would be a strong pickup for any Invite team, and who has the ability to dominate in Advanced. Cheers is a good Scout for Advanced, but he's just not as good as randyw.

pup < Diego (Small Advantage)

Diego's ability to do a ton of work on the flank and with his bombs have been a huge help to dysphoria's dominance during the regular season. I have no reason to think that he will slow down during the match against a solid high-Advanced Soldier like pup who has also found success, albeit not as much.

Plurl > cookie (Large Advantage)

Plurl has been at the top of the division since the beginning of the season. His only real competition is to be found in tacos for g2b but, even then, I doubt that he is heavily outclassed. Cookie is a good player but I doubt that he will do anything truly remarkable on any of the two maps to be played.

Avian = ?

I am not sure who the demo is for dysphoria for this match. If it is, as I have heard, Mono72 then I would give a slight edge to Mono72. If it is some other (good) demo then I will give a slight edge to Avian.

Bonesaw < extrasolar (I suck)

70 FPS is c r a z y man.

raisins < Abridge (Small Advantage)

Abridge may be offclassing but the man is just good at the game. raisins has been struggling in recent weeks to put up the kinds of numbers, especially ubers, that other medics have been able to. Whether or not that is just a team-based issue, it is what it is.

Lasky < Reptiguru (Small Advantage)

It is Engineer. Both of these players are fine and both are about equal on payload. On Asvhille I believe that Reptiguru will have a slight edge due to his superior DM. That's about it.

Markers < Piney (Small Disadvantage)

I think that, if either Sniper is playing very well, they could have a HUGE impact on the performance of their team. Both teams rely upon their Sniper to make room for them to push, so one can only hope that neither is having an off day. That being said, I think that the performance of the Sniper will also depend a lot on how well their teams protect them. Expect both to be fragged a lot by the spy.

agb > Zokie0 (Medium Advantage)

I think that, at this point, it is pretty much certain that agb is the best spy in the division. Whether or not he will show that depends largely upon how much he decides to chimp out after he dies to pyro.

MVPs of the Match: ult for being on the roster.

gotta blast vs. 1 Korean, 9 Keyboards (2-1)

The maps for this match are Product, Swiftwater, and Vigil.

I am not sure how well-prepared either of these teams are for these particular maps. Both have had multiple scrims over these past two days on maps nowhere near those which are being played (as it goes in playoffs). With the lack of scrim preparation I will be basing a lot of this off of their previous results on these maps.

On Viaduct I think that 1k9k has a strong chance of beating g2b. The strongest team g2b has played on KOTH is division dysphoria, who they lost to 4-0. The strongest team 1k9k has played on KOTH was marker and e-boy on Product which they managed to win 4-3. A close win is still a win, and former NKB players san antonio 1998 green mustang and Kami probably know full well that NKB, and thus 1k9k, has always been good at Product. This match will likely come down to the flanks and while I believe that g2b's flank will probably take the day with josh and nazara, you would have to be silly to totally discount J_Peg and Kami for 1k9k. The other strong class on this map, Sniper, is also looking like a good matchup between animus for g2b and Kronky for 1k9k. This should be the closest map.

On Swiftwater I think that 1k9k will struggle. g2b has had a lot of experience over the course of this season against high-level teams on this map which 1k9k lacked as they were not exactly top-Advanced material at the beginning of the season. That experience, along with the greater overall level of experience on their roster, should pay dividends in this match. That being said, if Bliztank can make something funny happen, he could almost single-handedly shift the map in his team's favor.

On VigilI I think that 1k9k is favored. Despite tacos' wealth of knowledge about this map, the rest of his team knows nothing about it. That will haunt them as 1k9k showed just how much they can punish an unprepared team when they beat division dysphoria 2-0 on this map. That hard-fought win will make them a tough team to beat on this map, especially if they are carrying the momentum from winning Swiftwater.

Player v. Player Matchups:

josh > J_Peg (Large Advantage)

J_Peg has proven just how good he is in the past few weeks. However, he is against a tragic matchup against one of the two best Scouts in the division Josh (along with randyw). With J_Peg's frag-hungry playstyle I think that he will run into a lot of issues with josh's high-level DM and intelligent playstyle.

nazara = Kami (Small Advantage nazara Viaduct, Small Advantage Kami Swiftwater)

Both of these players are good enough to do a lot of work. I think that Kami is probably the best Soldier in this division at Swiftwater Soldier but I think that nazara's raw ability is greater than Kami's at Viaduct. Vigil is a cringe map for soldier so I do not expect either to do much on it. If they do, congrats. I do not expect Soldier to be a deciding force on this map.

tacos > Bliztank (Small Advantage)

Bliztank is no pyro main but he has proven this season that he is a force to be reckoned with on the class (although he has asked me to make it clear that next season he would like to play a more epic class, please). More than just that, he is also a big playmaker for his team. That being said, tacos just has more experience on the class and is just better at doing the Pyro (minus the funny). If Bliztank can pull off a funny enough play though, I think that they will both have an about equal impact.

NicKk < san antonio 1998 green mustang (Small Advantage)

I think that NicKk has substantially better mechanical ability at the class than mustang but I doubt that will overcome mustang's ability to play with, and off of, his team. mustang has shown match after match that if his team plays around him, he will farm, and I do not think that will change on the coordination-centric maps chosen for this match.

Guy > Bz (Small Advantage)

Bz is one of the most-improved players from last season to this season, going from an o k Main pootis to a solid Advanced pootis. That being said, Guy just has the mechanical skill and game-sense to slightly edge out Bz here.

ryan < x (Very Large Advantage)

The biggest factor contributing to 1k9k's ability to win against other high-Advanced teams is the ability of x to out-heal and out-uber every other Medic in the division. Ryan is a very good Medic but x has the ability to be one of the best Medics in Invite, and is not contested for his spot as the best Medic in Advanced. If he continues his streak of excellent performances, this might just be a win for 1k9k.

baocn < Constantly (Small Advantage)

Constantly and baocn are both solid Engineers at all 3 of the maps being played in this match. While they are about even, I think that I have to give a slight edge to Constantly here.

animus < Kronky (Small Advantage)

animus, offclassing to Sniper from Scout, has had a lot of success in both scrims and matches on his new class. The only reason I give the edge to Kronky here is that he has both more experience on the class as well as multiple strong performances against top-Advanced Snipers allowing his team to take wins that they, would otherwise have struggled to attain.

Nerdaloid = CraftKitty (Very Small Advantage CraftKitty)

Nerdaloid and CraftKitty are both spies who do work for their team. Sometimes both can go off but usually they both just do solid. I do not think either is particularly more crazy than the other with the caveat that CraftKitty has a far greater chance of popping off and fragging out than Nerdaloid.

Conclusion

I hope that I managed to get these right this week. If you have suggestions for what I should add going to these articles going forward for playoffs, feel free to tell me.