Guides — beginner, bracket follower and coach level
The guides desk publishes 24 long-form guides, organised by reader type: causal viewer, bracket follower, coach / analyst. Every guide has a verification stamp, a corrections contact and a published revision date.
Causal viewer reading list
How esports tournaments actually work
A 15-minute primer on what a tournament series is, who runs the publisher feed, and how a bracket becomes final.
Reading patch notes
A reader-friendly primer on balance logs vs meta shift, with three worked examples from the past year.
Where to watch — by region
A quick read on which platform to use, which language tracks are available, and which accessibility features ship by default.
Bracket follower reading list
Map veto — step by step
How a map veto is set, why coaches pick the maps they do, and how to read the bracket line on a fixture card.
Economy in tactical shooters
An editor's read of the buy phase — when to save, when to force, and how the BO5 economy floor sets the season.
Reading a coach interview
What a coach means when they say we'll ban the map, and how to separate editorial read from verified quote.
Coach and analyst reading list
How the desk verifies a score
The full process — publisher overlay, governing-body wire, tolerance window, escalation. Designed to be re-run by an analyst.
Tactical map boards — how to read one
How the editorial map-art is constructed and how a reader can reverse-engineer an Lvlup-style board for their own team.
Building a coaching notebook from public data
A complete walk-through — sources, aggregators, normalisation rules, and what counts as a re-publishable dataset.
Six things the guides desk checks before publishing
Source list
Every guide lists its sources at the bottom — including which are Tier A, B, C.
Verification date
Each guide has a verification date — the date the desk last re-read its sources.
Correction log
Each guide has a public correction log; the desk tracks corrections and re-stamps the guide.
Editorial stamp
Each guide is stamped with the editor's handle at the top of the article body.
Reader feedback
Reader feedback is logged and answered where the underlying data is public.
Revisions
Each guide has a published revision history visible to all readers.
Pick a path that fits how much time you have
Causal viewer
- One match preview per weekend
- Weekly patch-watch digest
- Single game-chapter follow
- No login required
Bracket follower
- Daily fixture timeline + alerts
- Regional bracket fragment + map veto
- Patch-watch alerts on three games
- Companion app access
Coach / analyst
- Full match preview ledger access
- Tactical map board + callouts
- Film-room notes for every game
- Evidence-tier detail
Guide FAQ
How a guide moves from desk idea to published long-form
A guide is the desk's second-largest editorial artefact — long-form, multi-section, with a verification stamp and a corrections log. The desk treats a guide as a year-long project. Most guides run 20 to 50 minutes; the desk writes them in two passes — a first pass for the verified skeleton, a second pass for the editorial layer — and the desk commits to a quarterly review against the live source ladder.
The first pass — verified skeleton
The first pass is the verified skeleton. The desk lays out the guide's section structure (intro, scope, definitions, working method, frequent pitfalls, conclusion), then fills in the citations. Every section is anchored on a source list at the bottom of the guide. The source list tags each citation Tier-A, Tier-B or Tier-C, with a published access date.
The first pass is reviewed by a second editor. The second editor re-walks the citations against the live source ladder and flags any citation that has dropped a tier since the guide's first publication. The second editor signs the guide off as Tier-A/B/C clean before the guide moves to the second pass.
The second pass — editorial layer
The second pass is the editorial layer. The desk writes the editorial scenario language into the guide — the "what the desk reads", the "where the desk stays out", the "how the desk handles a disagreement". Editorial language is stamped EDITOR'S READ or editorial scenario throughout.
The second pass is where the desk adds the desk's own analysis. The guide's working method section is editorial; the source ladder at the bottom is factual. The two layers do not collapse.
The quarterly review
Guides are reviewed quarterly against the live source ladder. A guide whose Tier-A citation has shifted to Tier-B is re-stamped; a guide whose Tier-B citation has been removed is re-walked against an alternative Tier-B or downgraded to Tier-C. The quarterly review is logged on the corrections page; readers subscribed to a guide receive a re-stamp notification.
What the desk does not publish as a guide
The desk does not publish a guide whose entire body is editorial scenario. A guide needs a verified skeleton first; editorial scenario is layered on top. Where the desk cannot verify a section's claims, the section is filed as a standalone Tier-C editorial note, not as a guide.
The desk does not publish a guide that does not pass the second-editor sign-off. The second-editor sign-off is what makes the guide publishable.
The desk does not publish sponsored guides. The desk takes reader support via the companion app; the editorial coverage itself is never sponsored.
Three reader paths through the guide library — and how to pick one
The guide library is the desk's largest editorial artefact. It is organised by reader path: causal viewer, bracket follower, coach/analyst. The three paths are not mutually exclusive — a reader can move across them as their time and interest changes. This page is the working method for reading the library by path.
Path A — causal viewer
Path A is the lightest reading path. It is built for a reader who has 25 minutes a week to spend on esports coverage. Path A's reading list includes one match preview per weekend, a weekly patch-watch digest, a single game-chapter follow, and a single team or single tournament alert. No login is required.
Path B — bracket follower
Path B is the medium reading path. It is built for a reader who has 90 minutes a week to spend on esports coverage. Path B's reading list includes daily fixture timelines and alerts, regional bracket fragments with map vetoes, patch-watch alerts on three games, and access to the companion app's editorial-section feature.
Path C — coach/analyst
Path C is the densest reading path. It is built for a reader who has 5 hours a week to spend on esports coverage. Path C's reading list includes full match preview ledger access, tactical map boards with callouts, film-room notes for every game, and evidence-tier detail on every citation in every story.
How to move across paths
Readers move across paths as their time and interest change. A reader who starts on Path A and finds they want more coverage can move to Path B without re-subscribing — the Path B content is already in the newsroom's coverage, and the only operational change is the alert cadence.
Readers who find their path is too light or too heavy can re-weight the alerts and reading lists through the companion app. The newsroom's coverage shape does not change based on the reader's path choice; the path choice affects only the reader's reading list, not the desk's coverage.