Watch rewards and drops returns for MSI 2021, schedule revealed

The 2021 Mid-Season Invitational is under two weeks away and will include watch rewards and drops for the most dedicated viewers. 

After mixed success with stream drops and watch rewards during the 2020 World Championship, Riot is bringing it back after listening to community feedback. The rewards for MSI are looking to be much better with unique items and not only lackluster drops of Blue Essence. Riot has also presented the MSI schedule, which viewers will have to watch live to gain rewards and watch the best games League of Legends has to offer. 

At this year’s MSI, the 11 defending champions from each big region will compete for the first international trophy of the year. Originally, there would be 12 teams but GAM Esports from the VCS won’t be attending due to travel restrictions. 

This would usually mean a change in the format but Riot has decided to stick to the original plan and only have three teams competing in group A. In group C, the biggest clash of them all will take place during the first stage of the tournament as DWG KIA and Cloud9 will clash against each other. 

New watch rewards and drops coming for MSI 2021

When watching all the exciting matches at MSI, viewers can look forward to a large selection of potential loot drops and rewards from missions. To gain rewards, fans have to watch the games live through Lolesports.com. To receive the rewards, everyone must be logged in to the site with a League of Legends account. 

When logged in and watching live, there will be a chance at scoring one of the new drop-exclusive icons and emotes. Furthermore, there will be a chance every day for some in-game content and rewards from the LoL Esports partners.  

As the last bounty for viewers to hunt, there will be three in-game missions that can be completed by watching through lolesports.com. These will unlock after watching one, five, and 10 live games or vods respectively. The missions will unlock Blue Essence, a Hextech Chest and Key, and an exclusive emote.   

MSI 2021 broadcast schedule has been revealed

With lots of exciting matches and potential rewards to look forward to, the only thing left to do is wait for the show to begin. The tournament will kick off on May 6, with a live broadcast from Iceland. The tournament will run until May 23 when it concludes with the grand final. 

The tournament will consist of the group stage, rumble stage, and knockout stage. Throughout all stages, the games will begin at 6 AM PT and 1 PM GMT. The times for the games are looking to include as many regions as possible, even though some regions will likely struggle to keep up with all games in the different time zones. 

The tournament will be played on patch 11.9 with Viego and Gwen disabled.