Round 3 of ARH’s first Destiny World Cup is complete! Troopers continue to hit hard, Sabine is still *everywhere,* and with just two rounds left in the Group Stage, the path to the Semifinals is beginning to come into focus. The ARH team is thrilled to share these latest headlines from the Cup.
Looking for more World Cup content? Swing by the “Destiny World Cup info hub” HERE or the #worldcup-chatter channel in the ARH Discord server. You can also check out past articles here on the ARH website or tune into the terrific streamers who are providing World Cup coverage: Thyagumm at SWDBR, LandoWonka at Echobase, Rando Mando, Gameslayer, Norman and Bastmaster
Group A Leaderboard
Fueled by strong performances from Erik (one of just 5 players to have won all 3 best-of-three matches so far), England-South controls its own destiny heading into a final match against USA-MidRim where a win would guarantee them a spot in the semifinals.
The rest of Group A remains wide open, with the upcoming showdown between Poland and Canada-OuterRim giving one of these squads a chance to separate themselves from the rest of the pack.
The most dramatic moment of the round may belong to USA-East. After starting the Cup 0-2 and losing the first match of the 3rd round against Mid-Rim, Darteo and KingGrouber pulled off comeback 2-1 wins to keep their playoff hopes alive.
Group B Leaderboard
Over in Group B, USA-Missourado remains the only undefeated squad, bolstered by 3-0 performances from both Norman and Quinlan Vos. Just behind the Americans, England-Midlands and Canada-Toronto each have their own undefeated players in Gameslayer and LiquidSnake.
With each group sending just two teams to the semifinals, all eyes will be on the final round match between Missourado and Toronto, with the winner practically guaranteed to move on. A chance of a three-way tie at the top of the group means every game matters more than ever, since “individual player wins” within a best-of-three serve as an important tiebreaker.
After some tough early losses, USA-Nationwide is ready to play the spoiler role, while Brazil and World will be ready to pounce if any of the top 3 falter.
And speaking of semifinals, now seems like the perfect time to reveal the final piece of World Cup prizing. Each semifinalist will earn a copy of this Cup exclusive Asajj Ventress card from the desk of Marcosguijr and our friends at Star Wars Destiny Brazil (SWDBR)!
Meta Review
As outlined in last week’s article (HERE), the Cup is offering *tons* of data on the World Cup meta. In just three weeks, 36 players have competed in 45 best-of-3 matches, showing up to the table with 70 distinct characters and 15 distinct plots. Those interested in a more granular view or realtime updates can check out the dataset HERE.
As always, some characters are getting more love than others. Case in point: players have only selected 6 yellow hero characters when building their team (8.6% of all characters), but the Mandalorian magnetism of Sabine Wren (played 17 times with variety of partners) and Paz Vizsla (7 times), mean we’ve seen more yellow hero more (nearly 17%) than any other faction.
The “7 appearance” club also includes Asajj Ventress (6 times with Sabine and once with Cad Bane) and a couple of big blue 17-pointers in Baylan and Luke. Just behind with 6 appearances each are Palpatine, Senate Guard (5 showings in the first round before vanishing), and Sabine’s two 13 point sisters: Merrin and Qi’ra.
Meanwhile: after running wild over the late Resurgence meta with his good buddy Maul-Consumed by Revenge, Darth Vader has still yet to make an appearance, sitting out the Cup thus far with other iconic blues like Rey, Obi-Wan, and Yoda.
Unsurprisingly given all the troopers running around, the mighty Mission that Never Ends is king of the plots, appearing 10 times out of the total 55 plots played thus far. Asajj & Sabine’s antics have kept Profitable Connection high on the list as well, closely followed by Crucial Intel, Warfare, Leverage, and Path to Mastery.
