Z33K Launches North American $50 Daily and Monthly

[fletcher]

Z33K is turning 1 year old! As part of the celebration we’re launching the $50 NA Z33K Daily and the NA Z33K Monthly!

We’re also launching the Z33K point system, Z33K TV, a new look for the website, embedded brackets, and the ‘Allow Latecomers’ feature for player-run tournaments.

The Z33K Launch Tournament was held September 6th, 2010 and three months later the Mondaily #1 took place. The series is now the longest running daily tournament in Starcraft2. There have been more than 250 dailies with over 15,000 signups.

This success is due to you, the wonderful Starcraft 2 community, and your insatiable desire for competitive tournament play. Thank you! Thanks also to our staff, made up entirely of volunteers who dedicate many hours building what has become one of the pillars of competitive play in the Starcraft 2 community. Thanks to our sponsors and everyone who has sponsored an SC2 event, you’ve dedicated resources to support what we love doing and we appreciate it.

“We saw a lot of interest in the weekend and tuesday/thursday tournaments on z33k, but we wanted to create something more consistent on a daily basis. Today it is something players can rely on for organized competitive play.” – Max LaRue, Z33K Co-Founder and creator of the Daily

The Z33K NA Daily is nothing new, but starting September 1st it will include a $50 prize pool every day. It is open to anyone who can play on the North American server and is designed to be accessible, consistent, and rewarding. It is held every day at 6:30 pm PT / 9:30 pm ET / 03:30 CET / 10:30 KST at Z33K.com.

NA Z33K Daily prize pool: $50 USD
1st place: $35
2nd place: $15
(winners paid via paypal)

If you aren’t able to play on the NA server, we also have an EU Daily (currently) with no prize and many other great European events.

We’re also excited to announce the NA Z33K Monthly with a significantly larger prize pool than the Daily. The NA Z33K Monthly is a 128 man invitational and the only way to qualify is by playing in the Daily. Starting September 1st you’ll be rewarded for every daily you compete in via the new Z33K point system. These points will help decide the top 128 players and seed the Monthly bracket. Placing 1st or 2nd in any daily will also automatically qualify you for the Monthly. Prize: TBA.

"To sustain long term competitive growth, the StarCraft 2 community must provide clear paths for players to progress and advance along at every level of play. The z33k Daily has been a great way for amateur players to prove themselves in a tournament setting, and my hope is that the Monthly extends the possibilities for the common player to achieve." - Lane 'Lux' LaRue, Z33K Founder

The point system is detailed here. Standings will be released on or before September 1st when players start earning points.

Z33K TV will be the choice stream for Z33K run events and to kick off it will be showcasing the Z33K NA Daily and Z33K NA Monthly. Our lineup of casters is TBA, but they'll be bringing you action from every Daily and Monthly!

"Only a handful of casting and production teams have managed to overcome the numerous pitfalls and maintain a presence. We are going to take an incremental approach to event coverage, and see where that leads, just like we did with the tournament system. This is expected to be a slow and brutally painful process, but we’re all very excited to get started" - Lane 'Lux' LaRue, Z33K Founder

"E-Sports is the most accessible and competitive sport. It has no borders, it has no disqualifying factors, it doesn't wear the body down like traditional sports, yet it sends the same chills down your spine when you win, lose, or watch champions rise and fall. Z33K provides an SC2 platform for gamers full of heart, passion, tenacity, and devotion to follow their calling and establish themselves as the best. If $50 every day isn’t enough to whet your appetite the Daily tournament is getting spiced up with live casting too! The $50 daily is the beginning of a consistent competitive and viewing experience where fans of e-Sports can follow their favorite players throughout a season or become fan favorites themselves." - Justin Herbertson, Visionary

Part of the Z33K TV vision is to lower the cost of entry for new viewers. This means working to add relevance and context to games. We want your feedback and we want your help. Interested NA casters should email jobs@z33k.com.

We’re also extremely excited to release our brand new home page and redesign. It’s sleeker than before and better represents the quality of the Z33K backend. Our goal with the redesign is improved functionality and appearance. Please tell us what you think here.

Embedded Brackets:
New features have been added as part of our commitment to make tools available to the community for organizers to host their own SC2 tournaments for free. Included in this update is the ability to embed brackets on a remote website – simply paste either the iframe or javascript embed code from your Z33K tournament into your page source.

Allow Latecomers:
There are times when it would be nice to allow late-comers to join a tournament after it starts. This is precisely what the optional latecomer tournament setting allows. Until the specified latecomer time duration is exceeded, players who join the tournament will be automatically placed into the bracket, filling in any remaining empty spots. Latecomers is now available on community organized tournaments, in addition to the tools we already provide to ensure active players are in a tournament, including: invite-only tournaments with code generation, a flexible check-in system, and options to start a tournament at many different sizes. Full information can be found in the updated tournament guide.

We are very happy to announce that veteran tournament organizers Gavin (NA) and Verax (EU) will be helping to support the hundreds of SC2 tournaments popping up that are not organized by Z33K. They will be looking for feedback, ideas and high quality tournaments to form partnerships with. Contact them at Verax@z33k.com and Gavin@z33k.com.

The $50 Z33K Daily and the Z33K Monthly would not be possible without the generous support from sponsors. The September Z33K Dailies and the Z33K Monthly are being sponsored by:

OWNAJ:

OWNAJ is a new T-shirt shop created for the purpose of delivering quality T-shirts that the ever growing SC2 community deserves. OWNAJ creates T-shirts for gamers that care about the wildlife they share this world with. 20% of all proceeds go to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to help protect the wildlife we all love.

All our shirts are created, printed, and shipped by OWNAJ staff, which means they are hand inspected by real people to be of the quality you would expect. At OWNAJ, we love to give back to the amazing community that is here to support us. So be sure to follow us on Twitter for announcements regarding new products, deals, as well as a chance at winning a free shirt of your choice from our shop!

Website: www.ownaj.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/OWNAJ @OWNAJ
Z33K Event Group: OWNAJ

If you appreciate what they’re doing for e-Sports please check them out!

Z33K is also looking for more sponsors to support this and future Z33K Daily and Monthly events. Contact sponsorship@z33k.com for more info.

We're looking for talent. Some of the positions we're looking to recruit include: EU and SEA admins, Developers, Graphic Artists, A video producer, and NA Casters for Z33K TV. Email jobs@z33k.com if you're interested.

We're also looking to connect with leaders in the community. If you run a website, forum, or community and would like to work together, please email sponsorship@z33k.com.

Original Announcement
Z33K Home Page
NA Daily Event Group
NA Monthly Event Group
Point Values
OWNAJ Event Group
EU Daily Event Group

Please consider following Z33K on Twitter and Facebook for updates:
Twitter | Facebook

Thank you!
-The Z33K Team

[KeljuKuoma]

Hmm liekö kovin monella täällä NA accountia, tuskin ?

[Mairou]

Miksei näissä z33k EU turnauksissa ole koskaan raha palkintoja. Euroopassa on enemmän pelaajia ja parempia pelaajia kuin NA.

[Cruzifix]

Diamond are forever ja european pro seriesissä on jaossa 20-25 ekee... Turha sitä rahaa on haaveilla, voittajat on aina gm tason pelaajia.

Pelaajien tasolla ei ole mitään vitun väliä vaan määrällä, ja kaiken lisäksi z33k on NA sivusto..

[Mairou]

Diamond are forever ja european pro seriesissä on jaossa 20-25 ekee... Turha sitä rahaa on haaveilla, voittajat on aina gm tason pelaajia.

Pelaajien tasolla ei ole mitään vitun väliä vaan määrällä, ja kaiken lisäksi z33k on NA sivusto..

Kyllä masters level pelaajat voi helposti voittaa GM pelaajia turnauksissa.
Euroopassa on enemmän pelaajia kuin north americassa. Nyt kun north ja south american serverit yhdistyi pelaaja määrät ovat täysin samoja kuin euroopassa + venäjällä.
Ja .com sivuilla ei ole mitään kansallisuutta... ne ovat kansainvälisiä mainossivuja jotka saavat tuottonsa kävijämäärän mukaan. Jos olisi EU turnauksissa enemmän raha palkintoja, saisivat varmasti enemmän kävijöitä sivulle.

[fletcher]

We're working on getting more prizes for EU tournaments, there are some prizes and more are on their way ! hang tight