Welcome back to the world’s most trusted vertical for Oceanic Nationals news, the Snowball Esports predictions. I’m your blue-tick-wielding host, Andrew Amos, and I’ll be taking you on a trip through the first week of Stage 3 with our expert predictions, and the off-season that was.
In case you’ve been living under a rock since before the Mexico Major when Knights had their trip canned (like I did, although I did reappear to watch Invictus’ SpeakEasy tear the world a new one) — a lot has happened.
There’s a new team in OCN. Goodbye LFO (a sad day it was), hello Overt. At least my predictions will be saved by not tanking them on the boys. Overt were the leaders of OCL, the second-tier, and won Stage 1, so they’ve got some bite.
Outside of Overt, pretty much every roster has had some form of change. Some of the LFO boys like Wettables and afx found new homes. Derpeh has joined ORDER as a coach. Bouncinballz is gone from Roflcopter (running out of petrol power?).
And oh my god, Ethan is back. Yes, that Ethan. And he’s on the Chiefs. I love Vast, but Ethan is going to absolutely tear things up on that roster (washed or not).
Even our expert panel got in on the roster changes. We say goodbye to Raven (didn’t like him anyways), replacing him with two way better equipped “experts” so we can hopefully live up to our name.
Rappel is joining us, lending her amazing observing skills to our insight into each Gameday, while Vast has joined the casting desk after retiring from professional play after OCN Stage 2’s high of winning.
- Michael “Guzz” Gurrie: OCN & APAC South caster
- Jake “Zenox” Brander: OCN & APAC South caster
- Rob “Manic” Munday: OCN & APAC South caster
- James “Devmarta” Stewart: OCN & APAC South caster
- Isaiah “Vast” Patterson: Former Chiefs player & OCN caster
- Mandy “Rappel” Powers: OCN observer
- Alex “Skye” McCallum: Caster and observer
- Andrew “Ducky” Amos: Snowball Esports journalist
Without further ado, let’s dive into the first week’s action (back to two Gamedays a week people!).
Knights vs Overt (Friday 7pm AEST)
Prediction: Knights win
Talk about a trial by fire for Overt. Facing off against the APAC South champions in Knights as a freshly-promoted team from OCL is certainly one way to be introduced to the big leagues.
Having spoken to Soya, Overt are just hoping to take every game as a learning experience for Relegations later this year. There’s no better master to learn from than Knights. They can bring their “loose” frag-heavy style of play to some of the best aimers this region has seen.
For the Knights, it’s a nice way to ease back into OCN. With that being said, they are known to ease off the gas a little too hard in this league, and with APAC South the obvious goal, it’s the perfect time for Overt to make a statement and snag a win.
Is it likely? Probably not. You’d expect the APAC South champions to deal with a fresh faced team with no top-flight experience pretty easily without much counter-stratting. But this is a great launchpad for Overt to prove they are worthy of being in the big leagues next year, and avoid wallowing at the bottom like LFO did.
Roflcopter vs ORDER (Friday 8pm AEST)
Prediction: ORDER win
Is the petrol-powered machine over at Roflcopter starting to splutter at the final hurdle? Bliss put some distance on them after Stage 2 in the race to APAC South Promotions, and this off-season has likely hurt their chances of bridging it.
The team has lost Bouncinballz, who was their definitive best player throughout Stage 2. While it might free up others like Boydy to fill in the fragging role, and Wettables is no slouch, it’s a bit hard to justify this as even a side-grade. They also swapped Campo for Kkin (with the former moving into a coaching role), which is still a huge experience loss in the server.
Order — for once — has managed to keep a stable roster across an off-season. They’ve even added some big guns in the engine room in Derpeh, one of this region’s greatest tactical minds if his time on Orgless and Wildcard is to go by.
Can Order finally break their curse and live up to expectations? The stars are aligning, and a solid showing against a weakened Roflcopter (on paper) could go a long way into catapulting them into the Top 4.
Chiefs vs Knights (Saturday 8pm AEST)
Prediction: Chiefs win
The hottest rivalry in Oceanic Siege has come around again. While we were denied a Chiefs vs Knights grand final for Stage 2, we at least saw them meet up in the semi final. It wasn’t even close, with Chiefs breezing by their (then) Mexico-bound counterparts on their way to a strong title defense against Bliss.
Now, the Chiefs have got Ethan. I cannot reiterate this point enough, but Ethan might just be my favorite Oceanic Siege player of all time. His heroic Consulate game for Wildcard against Ferox in Six Masters is etched into my mind permanently.
This is also a very Chiefs-sided rivalry. Across Stage 1 and 2, the Chiefs have been Knights eight maps to two. Even if Knights have gone on to win titles in APAC South, the Chiefs are their kryptonite. It’s hard to exactly tell what it is — maybe fragging power? When Worthy is on one, it’s hard to topple the Chiefs, and they’re doubling down on that with Ethan.
It’ll be a big challenge for Ethan in his first week back. However, if he’s ready to heed the call and start dropping double digits like it’s nothing again, it’s hard to see even the Knights stopping them.
Oceanic Nationals Stage 3 2021 kicks off on Friday, September 10, at 7pm AEST when Knights take on Overt.
You can catch the action live on the Rainbow Six Bravo Twitch channel.
