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Hearthstone - Heroes of Warcraft news » What Competing in HCT Playoffs Looks Like

The Hearthstone Championship Tour (HCT) Summer Playoff season has come to an end, and now we wait with bated breath to see who among the regional quartets will advance to the HCT World Championship, and who will be crowned the victor at the HCT Summer Championship.


We’ll start looking at the 16 players who qualified to the Summer Championship and their strategies in more detail as we draw closer to the event—this week, we wanted to reflect on some of the highlights from the Playoffs.

Pre-Game Studying


Ahead of their matches, players spend a tremendous amount of time trying to learn their opponent’s deck lists. Knowing what threats or tech cards you need to play around is crucial for success at this level, and while decks have been public for a couple of days at this point, players are only finding out who they’re playing against once they are on-site for the start of the tournament.



Time between individual rounds of play is more limited—but prior to the first match of the day, everyone is taking advantage of the opportunity to prepare as much as possible. Shown here, Anthony “Ant” Trevino is reviewing the deck lineup of his first-round opponent, Thiago “T4COTASTIC” Santana.