Gwent Challenger tournament pits amateurs against pros for $100,000 in prizes

CD Projekt Red has announced the Gwent Challenger tournament, a one-off competition organized in partnership with ESL that will pit four of the best players in the Gwent community against four battle-hardened pros for a share of a $100,000 prize pool. 

"Gwent: The Witcher Card Game was created because The Witcher community wanted it," CD Projekt Red co-founder Marcin Iwiński said. "Now we’re seeing more and more gamers wanting to play Gwent competitively, so here we are with a chance to play against some heavy-hitters, and a prize pool to spice things up." 

Registrations for the qualifying round are open now and will remain so until 11 am ET on March 22. The top-ranked 256 players from the Temeria Division (Pacific time zone) and the top 256 from the Redania Division (Greenwich Mean Time) will be invited to take part in the first round, scheduled for April 8. 16 players from each time zone will advance to day two, and the top two players from each side will then square off against the pros: Jeffrey "Trump" Shih, Adrian "Lifecoach" Koy, Peter "ppd" Dager, and Kacem "Noxious" Khilaji. 

The first-place winner will go home with an extra $60,000 in their pocket, while second place will get $20,000, and third and fourth place will get $10,000 each. You have to be at least 13 years of age to take part (with appropriate parental consent), and yes, you must also be in the closed beta—do that here if you haven't already. Full tournament rules, signup links, and other details of relevance can be had at playgwent.com. 

Speaking of Lifecoach, we had a lengthy conversation with him recently that touched on a variety of topics, including his decision to move from the Hearthstone pro scene to Gwent. Look for that interview to go live early next week.