Stake Ranked Episode 3 is set to begin on Wednesday in Barcelona, Spain, featuring a $100,000 prize pool and utilizing a double-elimination, best-of-three bracket until the best-of-five grand final to crown a champion.
The eight-team tournament will mark the debut of HEROIC's new roster with Antonio "MartinezSa" Martinez and Ludvig "Brollan" Brolin, with the team facing off against 3DMAX in their opening game.
Also among the attendees are paiN, Gentle Mates, Wildcard, and reigning Stake Ranked champions Ninjas in Pyjamas, who will play their second LAN with academy member Roman "n0te" Hamze after suffering an early elimination at XSE Pro League Guangzhou.
Gentle Mates will also play the event with Joey "CRUC1AL" Steusel as a stand-in after losing MartinezSa to HEROIC. The French organization is in the midst of negotiating the sale of its roster and an exit from Counter-Strike, and a good result to increase its VRS rank would go a long way in helping those talks after losing a key member of the roster.
The opening matchups for the event are as follows:
Ludvig 'Brollan' Brolin
Roman 'n0te' Hamze
HEROIC
Ludvig 'Brollan' Brolin
Linus 'nilo' Bergman
Tim 'susp' Ångström
Antonio 'MartinezSa' Martinez
Christoffer 'Chr1zN' Storgaard
Joonas 'doto' Forss
Wildcard
Nemanja 'nEMANHA' Đukić
Miłosz 'mhL' Knasiak
Danny 'Cxzi' Strzelczyk
Ethan 'reck' Serrano
Jadan 'HexT' Postma
Łukasz 'splawik' Jahns
Gentle Mates
Alejandro 'alex' Masanet
Alejandro 'mopoz' Fernández-Quejo Cano
Pere 'sausol' Solsona Saumell
David 'dav1g' Granado Bermudo
Angel 'repk3ys' Gracia Navarro
Antonio 'MartinezSa' Martinez
paiN
Vinicius 'vsm' Moreira
Rodrigo 'biguzera' Bittencourt
Guilherme 'piriajr' Barbosa
Rafael 'saffee' Costa
João 'snow' Vinicius
Henrique 'rikz' Waku
Joey 'CRUC1AL' Steusel
3DMAX
Bryan 'Maka' Canda
Lucas 'Lucky' Chastang
Kévin 'misutaaa' Rabier
Jeremy 'Kursy' Gast
Filip 'Graviti' Brankovic
Damien 'wasiNk' Dufour
Ninjas in Pyjamas
Marco 'Snappi' Pfeiffer
Martin 'stavn' Lund
Rasmus 'sjuush' Beck
Roman 'n0te' Hamze
Kacper 'xKacpersky' Gabara
Richard 'Xizt' Landström