Overwatch developers embraced chaos on Nov. 30 by unleashing the Creator Cup Experimental Card onto the world, which included interesting and downright weird changes for most of the game’s heroes.
While the patch did what it set out to do—get more people playing Overwatch and actually have fun doing it—the real reason for the update was to set up a community tournament, the Experimental Card Creator Cup.
Members of the Overwatch community have assembled teams over the past two weeks to fight it out using the rules of the Experimental Card and the power of Orisa’s extremely important Christmas hat to earn prize money and infinite bragging rights.
Three regions—North America, Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), and Australia New Zealand (ANZ)—are eligible to compete. EMEA and ANZ have a first-place prize of $4,500 each and North America clocks in at $5,000. Several second, third, and fourth-place rewards are also available.
Here’s everything you need to know about the 2021 Creator Cup community tournament.
Teams
The changes in the Creator Cup Experimental Card were developed by three of the Overwatch community’s most popular creators: tank expert Flats, support main Violet, and DPS specialist Somjuu. All three will be participating in the tournament.
Ladder Rats brings together Violet and Somjuu alongside other notable Overwatch personalities, like Warn and Eskay.
Florida Mayhem-signed streamer Flats will be teaming up with his usual ranked mode duo, San Francisco Shock streamer Emongg, on Power of Friendship. Popular support player mL7 and fellow Mayhem content creator Jay3 round out the team.
Overwatch League participants are few and far between considering this is the offseason and their time of rest, but Boston Uprising flex support Crimzo will play on team Caked Up with content creators SVB and YourOverwatch.
Atlanta Reign off-tank Hawk will play on Bring Back 3 Stack with former Reign DPS SharP, former ATL Academy teammate Sugarfree, and main support Aspen.
Schedule
Creator Cup games kick off at 7pm CT on Dec. 10, where teams will play two sets of initial matches against opponents. Three more rounds go down on Dec. 11, beginning at 3pm CT, and the tournament culminates with three final rounds on Dec. 12. The Creator Cup grand finals will begin at 5pm CT on Dec. 12.
Individual players will be streaming their points of view over the next few days. Overwatch forum community manager AndyB confirmed on Twitter that no official streams are planned for the event.
