An attempt to organize a team tournament between countries!

1. When discussing template options for the tempo tournament, there were very few suggestions. I was also looking for options myself. The goal was to find templates that met the criteria for tempo (1-4 weeks, without frequent delays of 2 months), with areas for strategic play rather than linear rushing. Of course, more areas mean more options and a higher chance of a drawn-out game, but fewer areas mean a faster game and fewer options for strategic play. There's no perfect balance. Our tournament is a show, so the question is: how can viewers and streamers adapt to a bunch of games each week that will be played with saves for several days or even weeks, with replacements? I've been trying to connect with streamers to build a large pool of streamers, so we could play various HL+U games, but I've been getting rejections. As a result, we're going back to the list of streamers (there are five of us), and there will be 8 to 18 games each week! And not every streamer will be able to stream every day. So, it might be easier not to hold the tournament at all than to hold it partially. I've said it before: the amount of support we get will determine the kind of tournament we can have.

2. mt_Dom and h3dm1 – one has 14 zones, the other has 20, and the templates themselves are structured differently. There are some similarities, of course. The fewer zones and directions for encounters, the faster the game becomes. And if you look purely at the template layout, you can find similarities for each template with others.

3. mt_Skirmish. It was ignored and forgotten on HotA. But we held 3 tournaments with it and played well. Almost always, the player who plays better wins. And there are bugs in every template. In Skirmish, as in other templates, we allow players to choose heroes – so everyone can have a mage at the start, at least. And if the starting conditions are unplayable, you can technically restart with the judges' permission. It's important to consider that HotA has established opinions, rules, customs, and it's extremely difficult for experienced players to adapt. This is understandable.

4. I think the optimal format is templates of size L (10-16 zones) and M+U (10-14 zones). If you have templates that can be played in 90 percent of cases in 4 weeks and in one session during the day, I'm ready to consider them.

5. All teams are of any size. You don't even need to register for the tournament. The main thing is that a captain steps forward, who is often online and can quickly solve problems in the team, recruit and negotiate with players, and replace them if necessary.

6. In general, the choice of these templates is a result of necessity. As an organizer, I will be responsible to the sponsor and the viewers and must look for ways to hold the tournament. The last tournament was held on some terrible and test templates, and even there were both unsuccessful and positive moments. I've already made a suggestion that you can play other templates with the consent of both sides, and then you can find someone to stream them with commentary and without copyrighted music.

I'm trying to make sure that the team we have assembled among the leading players in the tournament can handle it. I can't and won't demand that they spend all their personal time exclusively on the tournament. Therefore, if you want HL+U or long-lasting templates, I'm waiting for active streamers-commentators to help. Having 5 streamers for a bunch of games seems unrealistic. Either the tournament needs to be extended, or more streamers need to be recruited. You can't jump higher than you can and demand more from the team than it can give.

Test splash screen for a match between teams: