x0tek's CFCL Elite Team Analysis & Rankings

Hey guys!

CFCL is here again, so I wanted to start it off with a bit of content 'cause it's exciting.




Now, I am going to seed the teams by their RELATIVE SKILL. However, there is an important point to note:

UK / EU / Egyptian teams will have to play on the NA server only 17% of the time.
NA teams will have to play on the UK server 34% of the time.

Additionally, with the exception of Rawness and RuLegends, EU players average between 90 and 110 ping on the NA servers, while NA players average (currently) between 50 and 80.
On the UK servers, NA players average between 120 and 140. The EU players average between 10 and 40.

This means that, given NA teams will play at a disadvantage twice as often as the EU / UK teams, and that the disadvantage will be more severe. Thus, it is more likely NA teams are "upset" from their position in the final score. This means my "seeding" of teams is not necessarily how I expect the teams to perform. Predictions will have to be a separate thing!


So anyway, here we go:


1. Flipside Tactics

While it is not currently updated on the website, Snox has rejoined his original sponsor of Flipside Tactics. His roster is solidified by "Forty" and "Bl4me", two of the strongest aimers in the EU community. With mainstay "Se7en" a strong fourth, and "pew" solidifying the fifth slot, Flipside is the team to beat in the first month.


2. Penta

Perhaps shocking given their relative dominance of the EU scene in recent months, the loss of Snox is a severe blow to Penta's overall fragging power (duh, he's one of the heaviest hitters in the world). However, Phaze has an uncanny ability to pull his rosters up around him, and when paired with stunning players like Kreedz and NLS, Penta remains a formidable force whichever replacement they find.


3. getBrikt

The best team in CFNA for the last 6 months. FinalDown, Yuuki, x0tek, Imag1ne, and Michaelxv205.


4. Carbon

Having placed 4th place at CFS in 2017, STDx celebrated by cutting 40% of their team, Ayrin and Michaeldrk, replacing them with Kaiz and Brando. Having lost their sponsorship, they re-launched their new team under the Carbon tag. I am hesitant to place them this highly, given xfam0usx's history of under-performance, and the relative novelty of this unproven roster. However, Carbon's past as one of the most dominant brands in CFNA speaks for itself, especially when comprised of such highly-skilled players.


5. RuLegends

RuLegends had hit-and-miss performances last CFCL Elite. They fiercely competed some months (even winning one), but had dismal results in others. However, historically, they have always turned up to be a threat at every level of international competition, and I expect this year to be no different.


6. mindpLay

Michaeldrk and Ayrin's new home, "Mindplay" is a new hopeful-superteam on the NA servers. The two former STDx members are grouped with a supporting cast of "Solo", 2016's best player; Ying2, a semi-professional player from China; and Desper, a longstanding tier-2 player in the CFNA community hoping to prove himself with his first solid team.


7. - 8. FinalGaming

PlayingDucks has morphed into FinalGaming, Whiskey and Viox joining forces with Run1x, ReijN, and CRS. All three of these players could be superstars on a worse team, so I expect them to create upsets left and right.


7. - 8. Rawness

Rawness is the #1 team in Egypt, and have been improving by leaps and bounds. I could easily see them rising on this list. However, historically, Egyptian teams have struggled due to a large ping disadvantage (200 ping vs 50 on NA servers, 80 ping vs 10 on UK servers), so I anticipate a struggle on their end.


9. - 12. ANV, Cursive, Xq Intense, and Instinct.

Honestly, while I respect many of the individual players on these teams, I do not see them upsetting very many teams (outside of FinalGaming or Rawness).



Either way, this will be a great month for the community, and I look forward to competing against everyone ^^
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Comments

  • EX0T1C wrote: »
    4. Carbon

    Having placed 4th place at CFS in 2017, STDx celebrated by cutting 40% of their team, Ayrin and Michaeldrk

    lul .
  • your teams seem to be #1 always when nothing is going on
  • smashtime wrote: »
    your teams seem to be #1 always when nothing is going on
    lul .
  • Why would you rate XQ so low when they beat F3 at IEM and beat out Reijns team in the qualifiers for it? Just wondering. IMO they have proven they are at least 3rd best in EU currently.
  • First of all Reid, you're literal dog feces in this game. Slience is a known cheater on your team. If you classify your team as number 1 in the list you are strongly mistaken. Other than smoke glitching like i previously stated.. your skills are below the average Egyptian players that i meet in UK ranked games.
  • [QUOTE=[MOD]Zzxq;n6856383]Why would you rate XQ so low when they beat F3 at IEM and beat out Reijns team in the qualifiers for it? Just wondering. IMO they have proven they are at least 3rd best in EU currently. [/QUOTE]

    probably doesn't know em
  • [QUOTE=[MOD]Zzxq;n6856383]Why would you rate XQ so low when they beat F3 at IEM and beat out Reijns team in the qualifiers for it? Just wondering. IMO they have proven they are at least 3rd best in EU currently. [/QUOTE]

    I think you make the classic mistake at using 1 or 2 performances to judge the character of a roster, rather than an aggregate of several months of performance, nonwithstanding their player change. Additionally, across the 4 EU competitive players I asked, not one listed XQ intense in their top 4.

    I stand by my ranking for them, but we shall see.
  • 3. getBrikt

    The best team in CFNA for the last 6 months. FinalDown, Yuuki, x0tek, Imag1ne, and Michaelxv205.

    Best team in NA made up of every played that i've hackusated in the past but then put together because I am a hypocrite.
  • I have no idea why Snox rejoined with F3 when he had a semi-decent thing going on with Penta. Penta is without an excellent close quarters fragger and F3 is without an excellent sniper since Seven is not on a comparable level to Phaze in that position. I also don't know what happened to Vizee and Jin either. Did they just get cut or did they leave the competitive scene altogether ?

    Why the top two EU teams are rated as highly as they still are is beyond me when they've been on a bad streak for over a year now on tournaments officially hosted by Smilegate. CFS 2017 wasn't even F3's low point yet none of the teams they faced such as HG, Carbon (formerly STDX), ruLegends were overpoweringly strong so I don't know how Snox rejoining and replacing ReijN/KREEDZ with Forty/Pew will change much in the grand scheme ...

    I'm wary of the top picks since just about nearly every team has something to prove ever since CFS aside from Penta and not just Carbon as described by OP when even his own team has had a roster change ... (OP's hype about being the "second best" in NA didn't come to pass either when he also ended up being 3rd place at the last CFS NF, no offense of course)

    I also don't agree with OP's assessment of XQ either since the team performed relatively admirably not once but TWICE when they beat Squad (now Final Gaming) for IEM qualifier before beating F3 and both of them were HIGH STAKES match ups instead of scrims or small time community hosted competitions like EGLP that OP seems to implicitly put a lot of weight on ...

    I'd argue high stakes tournaments are more relevant in assessing the strength of a team rather than whatever metric OP seems to prefer since prestigious competitions are few and far in between with CF and consistency is already factored into competitive play since a map often takes more than 30+ minutes to play ... (I can list out a few of the tournaments where the case probably is true)

    After all, there are hardly such things as "do overs" in a real live massive tournament ...
  • smashtime wrote: »
    your teams seem to be #1 always when nothing is going on

    Well said
  • I have no idea why Snox rejoined with F3 when he had a semi-decent thing going on with Penta. Penta is without an excellent close quarters fragger and F3 is without an excellent sniper since Seven is not on a comparable level to Phaze in that position. I also don't know what happened to Vizee and Jin either. Did they just get cut or did they leave the competitive scene altogether ?

    Why the top two EU teams are rated as highly as they still are is beyond me when they've been on a bad streak for over a year now on tournaments officially hosted by Smilegate. CFS 2017 wasn't even F3's low point yet none of the teams they faced such as HG, Carbon (formerly STDX), ruLegends were overpoweringly strong so I don't know how Snox rejoining and replacing ReijN/KREEDZ with Forty/Pew will change much in the grand scheme ...

    I'm wary of the top picks since just about nearly every team has something to prove ever since CFS aside from Penta and not just Carbon as described by OP when even his own team has had a roster change ... (OP's hype about being the "second best" in NA didn't come to pass either when he also ended up being 3rd place at the last CFS NF, no offense of course)

    I also don't agree with OP's assessment of XQ either since the team performed relatively admirably not once but TWICE when they beat Squad (now Final Gaming) for IEM qualifier before beating F3 and both of them were HIGH STAKES match ups instead of scrims or small time community hosted competitions like EGLP that OP seems to implicitly put a lot of weight on ...

    I'd argue high stakes tournaments are more relevant in assessing the strength of a team rather than whatever metric OP seems to prefer since prestigious competitions are few and far in between with CF and consistency is already factored into competitive play since a map often takes more than 30+ minutes to play ... (I can list out a few of the tournaments where the case probably is true)

    After all, there are hardly such things as "do overs" in a real live massive tournament ...
    When winning or losing makes all the difference in a team's livelihood then the competition becomes a totally new game ...

    Carbon (formerly STDX) and maybe even ruLegends too at the last CFS GF is the reason why F3 or EU in general got uninvited from CFGI this year despite in the past Smilegate constantly making exceptions for the tiny EU scene since it was considered the "second" best region during last year but now that we can clearly see that EU is nowhere near being close to the second best anymore means that it is them that has more to prove than ever to regain their audiences trust in their skills ...

    I guess we'll see when the matches begin either way ...
    Ok, your first paragraph explains what happened to you but what about Jin ?

    It's not just online tournaments that you guys kept faltering on (IEM 2017, CFGI 2017, CFSI 2017 and lastly CFS 2017 but none of that is counting CFPL too) and as for your second paragraph, HG just served as humiliation for the chinese last year when EVA Team smashed them to pieces of which out of all the regions with national leagues such as CFEL/CFPL are currently from the weakest region (Vietnam) compared to the other bunch ... (Brazil, China, Philippines)

    Outside of CFSI 2015/CFS 2015, HG didn't keep their distance from the other international teams just as how EU as a region did not keep up since CFS 2016. HG has NEVER won a single CFPL season before either as far as I can remember so they are not the hardest pushovers out of all chinese teams ... (It was All Gamers who was the second strongest chinese team during CFS 2017 but they couldn't participate with their current roster at NEST 2017 to qualify since AG was eliminated with their old roster so Tencent decided to reform TGF instead for NEST 2017 when they were disbanded at the end of CFGI 2017 with players such as Chonger and TF joining AG and the rest going on to form PG)

    Their more like TOP10 and it's obvious you didn't follow CFPL S12 beyond the entry stage if you think it was HG who were the champions so here's the actual rundown on the playoffs XD

    Quarter finals: AG vs EMG (2-0 AG wins), Q9 vs PG (2-0 Q9 wins), 5G vs HG (0-2 HG wins), SV vs AE (2-0 SV wins)

    Semifinals: AG vs SV (3-1 AG wins), HG vs Q9 (0-3 Q9 wins)

    And in the finals it came down to AG and Q9 (Qing Jiu, the chinese team that fam0us participated with during CFPL S10) but despite AG being the massive favourite to win the championships, the finals ended up with a score 2-3 with Q9 being victorious ...

    When superstar monsters such as Bean (best sniper in all of CF currently) and K (it's linkin and I mean the guy who plays god tier with an AK who was also associated with 70kg long ago) on Q9 or the other crazies at AG and SV, HG will always be a distant fourth compared to those 3 as long as they exist ... (it's nuts in itself how there was a team that could top the team that eliminated SV)

    wow .
  • I have no idea why Snox rejoined with F3 when he had a semi-decent thing going on with Penta. Penta is without an excellent close quarters fragger and F3 is without an excellent sniper since Seven is not on a comparable level to Phaze in that position. I also don't know what happened to Vizee and Jin either. Did they just get cut or did they leave the competitive scene altogether ? Why the top two EU teams are rated as highly as they still are is beyond me when they've been on a bad streak for over a year now on tournaments officially hosted by Smilegate. CFS 2017 wasn't even F3's low point yet none of the teams they faced such as HG, Carbon (formerly STDX), ruLegends we're overpoweringly strong so I don't know how Snox rejoining and replacing ReijN/KREEDZ with Forty/Pew will change much in the grand scheme ... I'm wary of the top picks since just about nearly every team has something to prove ever since CFS aside from Penta and not just Carbon as described by OP when even his own team has had a roster change ... (OP's hype about being the "second best" in NA didn't come to pass either when he also ended up being 3rd place at the last CFS NF, no offense of course) I also don't agree with OP's assessment of XQ either since the team performed relatively admirably not once but TWICE when they beat Squad (now Final Gaming) for IEM qualifier before beating F3 and both of them were HIGH STAKES match ups instead of scrims or small time community hosted competitions like EGLP that OP seems to implicitly put a lot of weight on ... I'd argue high stakes tournaments are more relevant in assessing the strength of a team rather than whatever metric OP seems to prefer since prestigious competitions are few and far in between with CF and consistency is already factored into competitive play since a map often takes more than 30+ minutes to play ... (I can list out a few of the tournaments where the case probably is true)

    After all, there are hardly such things as "do overs" in a real live massive tournament ...

    I like the thought you put into this, even though we disagree. You make some good points, but I stand by my rankings (I may, of course, be wrong, but I don't think so :p)
  • EX0T1C wrote: »

    I like the thought you put into this, even though we disagree. You make some good points, but I stand by my rankings (I may, of course, be wrong, but I don't think so :p)

    When winning or losing makes all the difference in a team's livelihood then the competition becomes a totally new game ...

    Carbon (formerly STDX) and maybe even ruLegends too at the last CFS GF is the reason why F3 or EU in general got uninvited from CFGI this year despite in the past Smilegate constantly making exceptions for the tiny EU scene since it was considered the "second" best region during last year but now that we can clearly see that EU is nowhere near being close to the second best anymore means that it is them that has more to prove than ever to regain their audiences trust in their skills ...

    I guess we'll see when the matches begin either way ...
  • I also don't know what happened to Vizee and Jin either. Did they just get cut or did they leave the competitive scene altogether ?

    I cannot longer play on big leagues like CFPL in China due to personal things so I am kinda inappropriate for a team which heads to play on those leagues. Maybe I will join at a later moment CFEL but at the moment I am just not motivated to play this game.
    Why the top two EU teams are rated as highly as they still are is beyond me when they've been on a bad streak for over a year now on tournaments officially hosted by Smilegate. CFS 2017 wasn't even F3's low point yet none of the teams they faced such as HG, Carbon (formerly STDX), ruLegends were overpoweringly strong so I don't know how Snox rejoining and replacing ReijN/KREEDZ with Forty/Pew will change much in the grand scheme ...

    There is always a difference between ONLINE and LAN matches, you really cannot compare those. HG is not overpoweringly strong xD ? They won CFS2014/2015 and every time they played CFPL in China they get good results, probably TOP5 of the world. (Currently the best team in the world but they changed their lineup. They won CFPLS12 in Shanghai)



    [QUOTE=EXOT1C] 3. getBrikt

    The best team in CFNA for the last 6 months. FinalDown, Yuuki, x0tek, Imag1ne, and Michaelxv205. [/QUOTE]

    You went on LAN, ONCE(!), in 2016. You guys never won any big tournament. I've never seen the players "FinalDown, Yuuki, Imag1ne, and Michaelxv205" on any LAN. I mean you said you are "the best team in NA for the last 6 months". Was there any tournament to play xD ? I mean, did I miss something ? Maybe this weekend cup with 5 teams ? You must be really desperate to say that you've been the best team from NA for the last 6 months. Just wow.


    greets
    vizee

  • I cannot longer play on big leagues like CFPL in China due to personal things so I am kinda inappropriate for a team which heads to play on those leagues. Maybe I will join at a later moment CFEL but at the moment I am just not motivated to play this game.



    There is always a difference between ONLINE and LAN matches, you really cannot compare those. HG is not overpoweringly strong xD ? They won CFS2014/2015 and every time they played CFPL in China they get good results, probably TOP5 of the world. (Currently the best team in the world but they changed their lineup. They won CFPLS12 in Shanghai)





    You went on LAN, ONCE(!), in 2016. You guys never won any big tournament. I've never seen the players "FinalDown, Yuuki, Imag1ne, and Michaelxv205" on any LAN. I mean you said you are "the best team in NA for the last 6 months". Was there any tournament to play xD ? I mean, did I miss something ? Maybe this weekend cup with 5 teams ? You must be really desperate to say that you've been the best team from NA for the last 6 months. Just wow.


    greets
    vizee


    Ok, your first paragraph explains what happened to you but what about Jin ?

    It's not just online tournaments that you guys kept faltering on (IEM 2017, CFGI 2017, CFSI 2017 and lastly CFS 2017 but none of that is counting CFPL too) and as for your second paragraph, HG just served as humiliation for the chinese last year when EVA Team smashed them to pieces of which out of all the regions with national leagues such as CFEL/CFPL are currently from the weakest region (Vietnam) compared to the other bunch ... (Brazil, China, Philippines)

    Outside of CFSI 2015/CFS 2015, HG didn't keep their distance from the other international teams just as how EU as a region did not keep up since CFS 2016. HG has NEVER won a single CFPL season before either as far as I can remember so they are not the hardest pushovers out of all chinese teams ... (It was All Gamers who was the second strongest chinese team during CFS 2017 but they couldn't participate with their current roster at NEST 2017 to qualify since AG was eliminated with their old roster so Tencent decided to reform TGF instead for NEST 2017 when they were disbanded at the end of CFGI 2017 with players such as Chonger and TF joining AG and the rest going on to form PG)

    Their more like TOP10 and it's obvious you didn't follow CFPL S12 beyond the entry stage if you think it was HG who were the champions so here's the actual rundown on the playoffs XD

    Quarter finals: AG vs EMG (2-0 AG wins), Q9 vs PG (2-0 Q9 wins), 5G vs HG (0-2 HG wins), SV vs AE (2-0 SV wins)

    Semifinals: AG vs SV (3-1 AG wins), HG vs Q9 (0-3 Q9 wins)

    And in the finals it came down to AG and Q9 (Qing Jiu, the chinese team that fam0us participated with during CFPL S10) but despite AG being the massive favourite to win the championships, the finals ended up with a score 2-3 with Q9 being victorious ...

    When superstar monsters such as Bean (best sniper in all of CF currently) and K (it's linkin and I mean the guy who plays god tier with an AK who was also associated with 70kg long ago) on Q9 or the other crazies at AG and SV, HG will always be a distant fourth compared to those 3 as long as they exist ... (it's nuts in itself how there was a team that could top the team that eliminated SV)
  • Why you guys are hatin on each other? It was a Ranking by x0tek , of course he puts FlipSid3 in first place , he's a big fan of SNOX . From my Perspective , it's dumb to make such a Ranking based on Players.

    No doubt , F3 got stronger with the addition of SNOX, but we still have to remember that they didnt qualify for the CFPL Season and lost both IEM Matches ( The Only Results we can go after because there's no competition right now in EU ) + they have 2 inexperienced players with "Forty and Pew" compared to the others.

    For us "PENTA" , yes of course we beat SV in 2 Maps at IEM in March , and gave a great showing even in the Final. But we lost one of the most complete Player that EU has to offer at this Point. Due to the lack of competition at that Point we took a break from CF and started to coming back 1-2 Weeks ago so we obviously have to get back in shape and try to fit in our new Player in our System.

    As i said the Ranking is just an Opinion by x0tek so we shouldn't take it that serious or even hate on each other...

    I mean he puts Carbon in 4th Place ... let's be honest here guys :D:D

    For me personally i'll just wait and see how it goes and hopefully we have a great competition for the next couple of Months with maybe some teams being better than we expected them to be.

    So yea , just wanted to write this because i saw some dumbass arguments in this Topic already.


    Greetz
    PENTA.KREEDZ
  • I love hearing and seeing everyone’’s opinion. I’’m glad we can have talks about it without people getting upset or frustrated, it’s fun.

    Kreedz, a question for you.

    If you don’t think you can rank a team based on its players alone, why do you think Carbon should be higher than 4th? This roster has never competed together, and the StdX that placed 4th at CFS cut 40% of their players. Aside from that roster, NA has always performed terribly at these events (my own 5th place 10-0 included lmao)

    Just curious as to your reasoning :)
  • You have to rank Carbon higher than both European Teams only because they had a better showing at CFS , which is the last biggest Tournament .... and they still have their core trio which got them the 4th place at CFS.
    I understand where u're Ranking is coming from , don't get me wrong . But based on Team Perfomances u need to rank Carbon the highest.
    And if you make such a Ranking you dont go by Achievements from the past 2 Years or even more , thats stupid.

    And even though i believe that SNOX is making them way better than they were the last few Months , SNOX is also a human being and needs "FORTY" or "BL4ME" to frag along side him. The past has shown that the Level between the Teams isnt that big anymore . And at the highest Level of Competition everybody has good Aim.

    That's what i basically wanted to say in the first place.

    It would've been better if you made your Ranking after the Month , to avoid dumb comments that i already wrote from some dudes but im quite sure you will make one after every Months :D

    Greetz
    PENTA.KREEDZ
  • bAZiNGAK93 wrote: »
    You have to rank Carbon higher than both European Teams only because they had a better showing at CFS , which is the last biggest Tournament .... and they still have their core trio which got them the 4th place at CFS.
    I understand where u're Ranking is coming from , don't get me wrong . But based on Team Perfomances u need to rank Carbon the highest.
    And if you make such a Ranking you dont go by Achievements from the past 2 Years or even more , thats stupid.

    And even though i believe that SNOX is making them way better than they were the last few Months , SNOX is also a human being and needs "FORTY" or "BL4ME" to frag along side him. The past has shown that the Level between the Teams isnt that big anymore . And at the highest Level of Competition everybody has good Aim.

    That's what i basically wanted to say in the first place.

    It would've been better if you made your Ranking after the Month , to avoid dumb comments that i already wrote from some dudes but im quite sure you will make one after every Months :D

    Greetz
    PENTA.KREEDZ

    That makes sense, thanks for explaining!
  • 1. Team Carbon
    2. PENTA SPORTS
    3 F3
    4/5 Getbrikt/Rulegends

    just my opinion
  • 1. F3
    2. getBrikt
    3. Carbon

    Haven't played penta so wouldn't be fair to try ranking them
  • No large upsets today, though Carbon did edge out a win over my team this week.


    F3 beat us 10-4 on UK side, then we were at 8-4 NA side when they won the final round. FinalDown carried us hard against them, 26 kills on Ankara. We've gotta do more on UK servers if we want to beat them in the future.

    FinalGaming tied with us, a pretty good effort on their part where we actually won on UK server, then went down HARD on NA and barely managed to come back for a tie.

    Carbon was down 9-4 and managed to make a comeback, winning in OT Map 1. They were down map 2 and did the same. Famous underperforming per his usual (going on 6 years now and he still can't perform on client), but Kaiz and Phat carried the load. FinalDown didn't have a virtuoso appearance, and we got outplayed down the stretch

    All in all, pretty close games among the top teams who played today AFAIK, with RuLegends taking a close win over Carbon.

    ggs to everyone. I don't know any of the other results, though. Anyone able to fill in the gaps?
  • EX0T1C wrote: »
    No large upsets today, though Carbon did edge out a win over my team this week.


    F3 beat us 10-4 on UK side, then we were at 8-4 NA side when they won the final round. FinalDown carried us hard against them, 26 kills on Ankara. We've gotta do more on UK servers if we want to beat them in the future.

    FinalGaming tied with us, a pretty good effort on their part where we actually won on UK server, then went down HARD on NA and barely managed to come back for a tie.

    Carbon was down 9-4 and managed to make a comeback, winning in OT Map 1. They were down map 2 and did the same. Famous underperforming per his usual (going on 6 years now and he still can't perform on client), but Kaiz and Phat carried the load. FinalDown didn't have a virtuoso appearance, and we got outplayed down the stretch

    All in all, pretty close games among the top teams who played today AFAIK, with RuLegends taking a close win over Carbon.

    ggs to everyone. I don't know any of the other results, though. Anyone able to fill in the gaps?

    GGs!! It was a close game for some reason I was rooting for you guys even though I guess Carbon was the underdog.. idk but ggs and no surprise about 7k aka finaldown I think thats what I was told his name was.
  • We "PENTA" won all of our 4 games against FlipSid3 , ANV , m1ndplay , FG
  • What will happend now that this month is finished, when does the other month starts and which teams will be in ? some will be kicked ?
  • Well with OP's rankings being nearly entirely off and the upcoming CFGI tournament or next month of CFCL, I think it's a better time than never for a postmortem ...

    Penta getting 1st place last month might not be a total surprise so them taking off 2 maps from SV during IEM might not be a fluke after all and with Snox rejoining them for obvious reasons makes them once again an even more formidable force to begin with ... (their pretty damn good even without Snox when they've got extremely damn spicy players like phaze, KREEDZ or nLs to back the rest of the team up)

    ruLegends placing 2nd is somewhat of an upset since all of their players faced atleast a 100+ms ping delay disadvantage even playing in the UK servers so it's expected that NA teams would be able to abuse a massive ping advantage to take some maps off of them along with some UK teams but they might've learned a thing or two ever since their number of defeats they've experienced against 2nd or maybe even 3rd tier chinese teams during CFDL in China ... (their fans should be proud that they were able to defeat a team that formerly placed 3rd in he CFS GF with a pretty big handicap to boot too)

    Carbon which is the new face of STDX but being 3rd place is just not good enough in itself when their attending to CFGI late this month and honestly instead of their new roster becoming an immediate improvement, it might've became a regression instead compared to their old roster when they placed 3rd in the CFS GF so now their even struggling against known old timers like Penta or ruLegends. Do they even care that all the other teams attending to CFGI are nearly composed of superpower players ? As they are now it'll be impossible for them to win any match against other foreign teams so whatever tactic they've developed against either EVA Team or SV since CFS won't work this time around when both of them got defeated by their second best teams in their national leagues ... (HeroKing eliminated EVA and AG eliminated SV)

    getbrikt getting 4th place is just about what I expected so no comments there ...

    Flipsid3 tactics getting 5th place meant that Snox realized Penta had offered him greener pastures so he didn't want to deal with the stress of either constantly carrying around his team or not been guaranteed a spot at CFS GF even though there's potentially 2 spots for either 2 EU teams or 2 NA teams but he it's likely that he didn't want to deal with the very real possibility of losing a spot to getbrikt or god forbid being served by a bunch of former STDX rejects at mindpLay who probably hasn't played with their entire S5 roster during last whole month where Ying2 was absent. (before x1mo and the rest of his team at Q9 became the current CFPL S12 champions, he participated with Ying2 during TGA so he definitely knows how competitive play works at the highest level) F3, without their only superpower player left leaves them more vulnerable than ever to falling behind ...

    CFGI this year is becoming one of the most interesting CF tournaments in all of CF history when SV who's been dominating international competitions for nearly two straight years is totally out of the picture with AG and Q9 filing their spot as newcomers with little LAN experience compared to their predecessor. Brando and Famous might very well have a pseudo rematch with QCES with members like Linkin (k), Solo and possibly Baobao as well returning as Q9 for CFGI ...
  • Well with OP's rankings being nearly entirely off and the upcoming CFGI tournament or next month of CFCL, I think it's a better time than never for a postmortem ...

    Penta getting 1st place last month might not be a total surprise so them taking off 2 maps from SV during IEM might not be a fluke after all and with Snox rejoining them for obvious reasons makes them once again an even more formidable force to begin with ... (their pretty damn good even without Snox when they've got extremely damn spicy players like phaze, KREEDZ or nLs to back the rest of the team up)

    ruLegends placing 2nd is somewhat of an upset since all of their players faced atleast a 100+ms ping delay disadvantage even playing in the UK servers so it's expected that NA teams would be able to abuse a massive ping advantage to take some maps off of them along with some UK teams but they might've learned a thing or two ever since their number of defeats they've experienced against 2nd or maybe even 3rd tier chinese teams during CFDL in China ... (their fans should be proud that they were able to defeat a team that formerly placed 3rd in he CFS GF with a pretty big handicap to boot too)

    Carbon which is the new face of STDX but being 3rd place is just not good enough in itself when their attending to CFGI late this month and honestly instead of their new roster becoming an immediate improvement, it might've became a regression instead compared to their old roster when they placed 3rd in the CFS GF so now their even struggling against known old timers like Penta or ruLegends. Do they even care that all the other teams attending to CFGI are nearly composed of superpower players ? As they are now it'll be impossible for them to win any match against other foreign teams so whatever tactic they've developed against either EVA Team or SV since CFS won't work this time around when both of them got defeated by their second best teams in their national leagues ... (HeroKing eliminated EVA and AG eliminated SV)

    getbrikt getting 4th place is just about what I expected so no comments there ...

    Flipsid3 tactics getting 5th place meant that Snox realized Penta had offered him greener pastures so he didn't want to deal with the stress of either constantly carrying around his team or not been guaranteed a spot at CFS GF even though there's potentially 2 spots for either 2 EU teams or 2 NA teams but he it's likely that he didn't want to deal with the very real possibility of losing a spot to getbrikt or god forbid being served by a bunch of former STDX rejects at mindpLay who probably hasn't played with their entire S5 roster during last whole month where Ying2 was absent. (before x1mo and the rest of his team at Q9 became the current CFPL S12 champions, he participated with Ying2 during TGA so he definitely knows how competitive play works at the highest level) F3, without their only superpower player left leaves them more vulnerable than ever to falling behind ...

    CFGI this year is becoming one of the most interesting CF tournaments in all of CF history when SV who's been dominating international competitions for nearly two straight years is totally out of the picture with AG and Q9 filing their spot as newcomers with little LAN experience compared to their predecessor. Brando and Famous might very well have a pseudo rematch with QCES with members like Linkin (k), Solo and possibly Baobao as well returning as Q9 for CFGI ...

    xd its funny how u make a lot of suppositions bout snox joining f3, btw they lost matches cuz of protests i think so^^