Paper Rex Are Out of the Pacific Playoffs in Fifth and Going to Champions in Shanghai Anyway
Singapore's Paper Rex were eliminated 2-1 by VARREL in the VCT Pacific lower bracket. They still travel to Shanghai as the region's third seed on championship points.
Paper Rex, the Singapore organisation that has been the Pacific region's most visible Valorant team for four years, were knocked out of the VCT Pacific Stage 2 playoffs in fifth place, and are going to Champions in Shanghai regardless.
The run was short. Nongshim RedForce beat them 2-0 in the first round of the upper bracket on 26 August. Paper Rex then beat ONSIDE GAMING 2-0 to stay alive before VARREL eliminated them 2-1. Gen.G, beaten 2-0 by T1 in the same round, finished alongside them in fifth and sixth. Each took $10,000 from a $250,000 prize pool.
The seeding maths is what saves them. Pacific sends four teams to Champions. The Stage 2 winner and runner-up take the top two seeds, and the other two places are decided on championship points accumulated across the season. Paper Rex have 25, enough for third. Nongshim RedForce, who qualified outright, sit fourth on 19.
RedForce booked their place by beating Gen.G 2-1 in the upper semi-final on 27 August, taking Ascent, losing Summit and winning the Sunset decider 13-11.
The playoffs began at the Sangam SOOP Colosseum in Seoul and move to the Sajik Indoor Gymnasium in Busan for the closing weekend. Nongshim RedForce play Global Esports in the upper final on Friday, with VARREL against T1 in the lower bracket the same day, the lower final on 5 September and the grand final on 6 September.
Champions runs from 24 September to 18 October in Shanghai for a prize pool of $2,250,000. It is the first time China has hosted the event, and the last Champions before the VCT moves to an open-qualifier format in 2027. Sixteen teams are drawn into four groups of four, one team per region in each, played as double-elimination groups feeding a double-elimination bracket and a best-of-five final.
A team can therefore lose four of its five matches at the last domestic event of the season and still arrive in Shanghai as its region's third seed, which is a fair description of how much of the Valorant calendar is decided by points banked months earlier.