DreamHack announce Atlanta BYOC qualifier for ESL Pro League Season 23

ESL have announced a significant shake-up of the road to ESL Pro League today, announcing that two BYOC tournaments at DreamHack Stockholm and DreamHack Atlanta will each provide a single spot into ESL's top-flight competition.

The events, titled DreamHack Knockout Atlanta and DreamHack Knockout Stockholm, will take place this fall and will also boast a $10,000 prizepool.

The decision to move forward with BYOC tournaments at two of their DreamHack conventions harkens back to a much different era of competitive esports in Counter-Strike 1.6 and early Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, when teams would lug their setups to various competitions to battle for standalone prizepools and qualification to larger events.

In recent times, BYOC events have become increasingly rare, especially in North America, with TOs like Fragadelphia providing setups on-site for competitors. As such, there has been much discussion about what kind of teams these events will attract and how bringing equipment from home could affect the event — both for integrity reasons and cost reasons in the era of ultra-expensive PCs.

DreamHack Knockout Atlanta is set to run from October 31st to November 2nd and will feature a team cap of 32 teams. The latter fact is notable as the Stockholm Knockout tournament is supposedly seeking up to 128 teams, a notable difference in scale between the two events.

Teams interested in attending the event may sign up here, with tickets currently going for $845 without a coach.