Favorites in battle! - 5 The Battle of Favorites! - 5

I decided to reminisce about how the beloved tournament started and opened a thread about the very first tournament. As with all great things, the tournament was organized completely by chance. Back in 2008, when online activity on HW was just starting to pick up, a newbie spammer named Корень Зла (Root of Evil) appeared, who later became Корень Добра (Root of Good), then Light Got, then Light God, and finally he got banned :D. He posted in every section, created his own clan, tried to do many other things, but his efficiency was close to zero. Due to his endless activity, he decided to launch his first (and only) grand project: simultaneously holding online tournaments for all versions of Heroes, where each player chooses their starting town. To be honest, I don't remember what happened to the tournament in other versions, but it clearly didn't take off there. In the Heroes 3 section, participants began signing up actively. Some were already strong players at that time, while others were just beginning. For example, this was my first online tournament; I didn't want to play for a long time, but we agreed with invisible that I would play an online tournament, and he would play offline. Players from HW also signed up, who are now known to everyone: Loi, StikyFingaz, Деконтаминатор (Decontaminator), TaKotoraya, SS-D, invisible (who traditionally withdrew), as well as strong brothers from St. Petersburg, Dudge and uran, Nagan-4, who had just appeared on our forum, and several experienced players from HP: Vigo, vitalic, Dreamcatcher, Hardcore. At that time, the rules of the game were not like they are now; Necropolis was almost unrestricted, and most chose this Castle. There were also many Ramparts and Dungeons, as usual. During registration for the tournament, as befits a true great organizer, he gradually started neglecting the tournament, unable to cope with his work. Who knows what would have happened to the tournament if moderator ewgeniy hadn't come to the rescue, taking over the organization and running the tournament very professionally. As for the system, there were three stages in the group stage. First, 6 groups of 4 people each, then 3 groups of 4 people each, and finally, 1 group of 3 people in the final. The template was only 2sm4d(3). I don't remember much about the entire tournament struggle; I remember playing Inferno and winning against the founder of the seasonal rating, SS-D, in the first round. In the second round, I played against the future champion, who played Necropolis with Galthran as his starting hero, along with an upgraded stronghold and improved vampires. I had Aiden, a mage from prison, and my whole hope was on Armageddon in GM4, which, of course, didn't happen. In the last game, I had to let my opponent through due to an upcoming session. I completely don't remember what happened in the other groups (/topic/at/177342/ you can find the tables here). Two brothers from St. Petersburg and Vitalic made it to the finals. In the very first game of the final, Dudge vs vitalic, a quarrel arose (well, how could we do without it?) over a bugged passage. After arguments, it was decided to replay the game, but even the replay didn't end peacefully due to another rule violation (I don't remember who violated what). As a result, victory was awarded to Dudge, and they didn't play against his brother Uran. And so, the first winner of the tournament appeared!

Time passed, the forum developed very actively, many strong players joined the forum, players from heroesportal also joined, where many new faces appeared, as well as heroes.by with its real "papacy" and unwillingness to play sm-games :D, and Pit appeared, and together we decided to jointly hold the second tournament in this series with the motto: "Your favorite race is being removed, but you still want to play it? Then come here!" But that wasn't enough for a full-fledged tournament, and we introduced a truly innovative idea for that time – BANNING TEMPLATES. There were already 40 participants in that tournament, and I will remember the group stage of that tournament for a long time.
Pit for LM won the tournament, and the tournament became traditional and beloved.