The Archon Team League Championship is over and Team Nihilum has emerged victorious! The team takes home not only the notoriety but a $150,000 prize as well.
Team Nihilum was represented in this tournament by three players, Lifecoach, Thijs, and RDU. These players are, of course, no strangers to the tournament scene. Lifecoach has won several tournaments this year including the Viagame House Cup, and is considered one of the best Hearthstone players in the world. Thijs and RDU are also prolific tournament players.
Fighting against Team Nihilum in the finals was Cloud 9, consisting of Strifecrow, Ekop, and Kolento, again, all heavy hitters in the Hearthstone community. Nihilum won a decisive 6-2 victory to secure the championship, but the road was a long one. Over the last couple months, 8 teams played against each other racking up wins to become one of the four teams invited to the championship.
Finally, after three grueling days of play, Team Nihilum and Cloud 9 rose above the other two teams, Tempo Storm and Value Town. Nihilum took an early lead in the finals with Thijs quickly securing wins with both his decks and Lifecoach and RDU each taking 1 win apiece. Unfortunately, RDU struggled to find a win with his hybrid hunter deck, giving Cloud 9 their two wins and getting benched in the process.
Because of the bench rule and Thijs already winning with both his decks, Lifecoach had no choice but to play patron warrior into Ekop’s demon zoolock deck. While Ekop got some good draws in the early game, Lifecoach managed to draw the perfect Warsong Commander + Grim Patron combo and was able to crush Ekop’s whole board of minions and take him down to 2 health. Ekop had no choice but to concede.
With RDU’s hunter being the only possible deck left, Cloud 9 sent in Kolento with a dragon priest deck. Unfortunately for Kolento, he was unable to draw into any of the big taunts that the dragon deck uses, allowing RDU to get in a large amount of face damage. In the end, Kolento decided to “go big or go home,” opting for an aggressive play that gave him a strong board, but left him low on health. RDU had just the right amount of damage in his hand to finish him off with exact lethal damage, claiming the championship for his team.
Congratulations to Team Nihilum on their incredible victory. Hopefully we’ll see more of these types of tournaments in the future as they add a great amount of variety to the tournament scene. We will also try and post decklists from the tournament if they are made available, as these will be a wealth of great decks to use on the ladder in the coming weeks.
