Updated Featured Stream Requirements:
- Full time or part time progamer that has made a WCS Championship appearance (Winter, Spring, Summer) closed bracket
- Full time or part time progamer that reached the final bracket of a WCS Championship qualifier this season (the Championship Qualifier, and not the smaller regional ladder qualifiers)
- Full time or part time progamer that has earned WCS points from a premier tournament main event
- Full time or part time progamer that has won a major tournament
- Full time streamer on a professional team that has at least 100-150 constant viewers
- Content producer or community member that has contributed a lot to the scene, who has at least 100-150 viewers
- Full time or regular streamer that is considered insightful and informative who plays at a high level, with at least 100-150 viewers
- Full time streamer with at least 200 constant viewers
To explain some of these changes: the new WCS system has made it such that there is no longer a real Challenger League and anyone can basically get into what amounts to a large qualifier. As such, the bar has to be raised in order to match previous expectations for featured status. Qualifying through ladder should be applauded, but it serves as a second chance qualifier and not a true "Challenger league" like last year. As such, only the winners will be eligible. On the other hand, the Finals of each qualifier (with direct invites into WCS Championships) is held first and is as close as we have to a league that is attended by all the best players from eligible regions (split between NA and EU scenes). Therefore, those players should qualify for featured status.
Next, with premier tournaments now region locked, the bar has to be raised as well. We have moved the requirement up to a Top 4 placing, as opposed to just reaching the bracket stages.
Naturally, some players have already been grandfathered into featured streams from last year. Should they meet some of the grounds for defeaturing, they will be removed. Hopefully that doesn't have to happen and we can avoid all the awkward PMs. Ground for defeaturing are largely the same.
Grounds for De-Featuring:
- On-stream conduct determined unacceptable to Team Liquid. This includes acts of racism, homophobia, hate speech, and general assholery
- Inactivity for more than a year
- Failure to return to the final bracket of a WCS Championship qualifier, if the streamer does not meet any other requirements
- Proof of viewbotting or artificially padding one's viewing numbers
- Proof of stream cheating or hacking
- Being permanently banned on teamliquid.net for unacceptable posting
- Consistently low viewer count below 100
We'll keep an eye out for this over the year as usual, and we will make adjustments should the new WCS system deem it necessary. If you have any complaints, I guess you can post here or PM me. v_v
Last year's requirements can be found here.
Temporary Featured Streamers of the Month
Due to the recent WCS changes, it became necessary for us to revisit the featured streamer requirements and adjust them for the new system in 2016. Sadly, the new system has a Challenger league that is of no use for helping us feature new and up-coming-streamers in an objective and fair way. If we were to feature every single streamer that made the various Challenger leagues around the globe, then it would effectively make the list meaningless. However, we would have been accused of favoritism if we decided to pick some and not others who had similar qualifications.
After much contemplation, I've decided that the best way to go about this is to have a small list of "temporary featured streamers of the month", where we give a temporary feature to the streamers on the cusp of making the list due to their qualifications (tournament placings, quality of work, streamer numbers, etc). Their feature will last for an entire month, and if they are able to prove that that they deserve to stay featured then they will stay featured. It becomes imperative, then, for these streamers to continue working on their streams during this period in order to stay on the list.
- Temporary Featured Streamers of the Month
- 3 streamers per month, lasts the entire month
- Chosen from on-the-cusp streamers and pro players who stream often
- Preference will be given to streamers from different regions, if possible
- Feature can be revoked should the streamer go inactive, exhibit unacceptable behavior, or viewbot/cheat/hack
- Feature expires at the end of the month
- If the streamer maintains 150+ viewers for a majority of the period, he will keep his featured status
- If the streamer's numbers do not improve, then he will lose his featured status
- If the streamer maintains 150+ viewers for a majority of the period, he will keep his featured status
- Previous Temporary Featured Streamers may be featured again
For the month of April, I've chosen the following three streamers
- deth - If you follow Maynarde on twitter at all, then you should know about deth.
- NoRegret - The Canadian zerg is off to Korea to follow his dreams, and practicing at the MVP house is certain to teach him a thing or two. He's also a popular streamer, and worth checking out.
- Lillekanin - While he has had a spotty record in the past, we always try to give second chances. He is one of the more experienced players in premier tournaments currently not on the list, so he definitely has the skill.