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Since its introduction in FIFA 17, FUT Champions has been Ultimate Team’s prime competitive mode and is most likely the most popular thing about the mode among the competitive community. However, since players have been forced to play 40 games over two days, it became very intense and difficult both physically and mentally for most players. Pretty much all content creators have been begging EA to reduce the number of games that you have to play, among some other things.

EA has finally published a new edition of Pitch Notes, which is EA’s way of being transparent with their community. This has been a great addition to EA’s actions as a game developer. It allows employees to give more information about the game whilst pleasing most of the community with the way that it is presented. I will be overviewing the latest notes, whilst giving my own thoughts and referencing key points throughout. If you want to check out the full article by EA, you can find it here.

What is FUT Champions?

FUT Champions is the entry to esports as well as competitive play in Ultimate Team. This mode gives the best rewards and allows players to qualify for EA’s regional events if they place in the top 36 on their platform. In addition to this, FUT Champions is the way that most new players get recognized by organizations and EA themselves.

You used to qualify for FUT Champions through winning the Daily Knockout Tournaments, winning Division 2, winning Division 1, or by holding Division 1 in Online Seasons. You can also qualify by getting to a certain tier in the previous week of FUT Champions. However, it is common knowledge that the Divisions mode will be replaced by FUT Rivals/Division Rivals. This is the new way to qualify for FUT Champions, which we will elaborate on further below.

Qualification overview

The ways to qualify for FUT Champions have changed with the introduction of Division Rivals. You will now have to get a specific rank in Division Rivals to qualify for FUT Champions. (We will be featuring a Division Rivals-specific article soon on Daily Esports.) You earn FUT Champions points in Division Rivals. As you get a higher rank in the new Rivals mode, you will get a larger multiplier on your points, which will ensure that you get your points as fast as possible. This method of qualification also allows more players to experience FUT Champions, which is what EA wants.

Finally, players will now have to activate their FUT Champions token once they receive it. This means that players can choose which weekend they play in. If someone qualifies one week, they can use that token in the next week, or a month later. This is great for most of the players in the community that have 9-5 jobs or go to school.

FUT Champions re-qualification

In previous years, if you got 11 wins out of the 40 games in FUT Champions, you automatically qualified for the next weekend. However, in the new game, you will get points after the previous weekend. These points go towards the next weekend’s qualification run. It is unclear, but it once again looks like you may be automatically qualified if you get 11 wins. EA says this:

In FUT 19, we’ve built on this approach by granting FUT Champions Points based on performance in the Weekend League. Starting at tiers with 11 wins or more, the rewards earned will include the full amount of points required to join another Weekend League. Additionally, every tier below 11 wins also includes some FUT Champions Points that will get you closer to another attempt at qualifying for the Weekend League.

Total games

As mentioned earlier, the number of games that were required to be competitive in FUT Champions was way too much. Forty games were often difficult for most players to complete; this includes influencers who play the game for a living. The whole community was excited when EA announced that FUT Champions has now gone from 40 games a weekend to 30 games. This will allow many players to complete all the games and get the best rewards possible.

EA has also said that they will specify what this means for competitive FUT and FIFA 19 events in the future. This was one thing that some professional players in the community were worried about.

Rewards

As of FIFA 19 release, players will be able to claim rewards weekly, instead of monthly. This means that players will not be penalized for missing a weekend here and there. In addition to this, the monthly rewards will be replaced with weekly player picks. This means that players will be able to select one item from a small selection of FUT Champions items each week. This is great as most players will not be able to play each weekend. It is also unclear as to whether we will still get the coin and pack rewards weekly, like previous years.

Also, PC players will finally be playing the same amount of games as console players. Previously, PC players only had to play 25 games in a weekend compared to the console’s 40 games. This made it unfair when it came to event qualification for the three platforms. They will now play 30 games along with the rest of the player base.

Matchmaking in FUT Champions

Matchmaking has been a hot topic in the professional scene of FIFA for a couple of years now. Players in lower tiers are being matched with Elite or Top 100 players. This needed to be fixed, and EA thinks that they have the correct resolution to the issue. They have this to say:

The first important goal for FUT Champions is to ensure that every weekend is a clean slate for players to compete for wins and rewards. To do this, we use something called ‘form’ as a key driver of matchmaking in each Weekend League.

Everyone starts each weekend fresh at zero form, moving up or down with each win or loss. In football terms, match form of W/L/W/W/W would result in a +3 form. Players with similar form are then paired in matchmaking.

This new “form” method of matchmaking will ensure that you play against players with the same record as you. This means that players who are unbeaten will get harder games as they progress. This is also the case for players that are on a losing streak; their games will get easier if they continue to lose.

Conclusion

As well as all of this news, EA revealed some small news about features such as FUT Champions; you can check that out in their full article.

What do you think about the new FUT Champions changes? If you enjoyed this article, you can check out the rest of our FIFA coverage here.