Only a few days after the May Melee has ended, the Overwatch League has announced their new event, the June Joust. With this new esports event comes a new format and a new meta. As you would have expected, this will affect anyone planning to place bets on the upcoming event.
This new format will include changes to the hero pool rotations, a casual patch, and new match settings. If you are interested in the upcoming event, you can check it out very soon. It begins later this month, and it will run from the 21st of May until the 12th of June.
The major format changes
They will use the basic structure of the previous May Melee event, however, there will be some minor changes to the format, especially when it comes to the issue of the tiebreaker. They want to mitigate the need to play any extra tie-breaker matches. This is a relatively small change to the format and will most likely not effect the Overwatch betting odds.
Here are the changes according to the Overwatch League website:
- Map differential
- Head-to-head records in qualifying matches; for ties among three or more teams, this step is only applied if there is a head-to-head sweep (i.e. if one team has defeated each of the others or lost to each of the others)
- League points of all opponents within the tournament cycle; the team with the most opponent league points will qualify
- Map differential of all opponents within the tournament cycle; the team with the highest opponent map differential will qualify
- If a tie between two or more teams remains, postseason tiebreakers will be applied
The new hero pools
The change that will have the biggest impact on the esports betting odds is the changes to the Hero pool that teams can draw on in the event. The League made the decision to choose four heroes that were played regularly, they had to have a 10% or more pick rate. The heroes chosen were:
- Damage: Tracer, Sombra
- Tank: Reinhardt
- Support: Zenyatta
This will definitely change some odds on the esports betting sites. The winner of the May Melee, Dallas Fuel, used both Tracer and Sombra as their DPS heroes in the event. They will have to change up their tactics if they want to stay ahead of the competition. We could see some major upsets if they aren’t able to adapt quickly.
The new map pool
The Overwatch League has also made some changes to the available map pool for their new event. The following maps will be in rotation for the upcoming June Joust:
- Control: Busan, Ilios, Lijiang Tower, Nepal, Oasis
- Escort: Dorado, Junkertown, Rialto
- Assault: Hanamura, Temple of Anubis, Volskaya Industries
- Hybrid: Eichenwalde, Hollywood, Numbani
If you are interested in Overwatch esports and want to check it out or even take a punt and bet on the upcoming events make sure to check out the June Joust when it debuts on May 21st. The first match is between Paris Eternal and the Toronto Defiant and it is sure to be exciting.
