Hearthstone's world champion will win $100,000 at BlizzCon

Blizzard will offer $250,000 to the best players of its new free-to-play card game, Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, at the game's world championship, to be held at BlizzCon 2014.

The winner of the tournament will receive $100,000; second place gets $50,000. Third and fourth place take home $15,000 each, fifth through eighth place finishers get $7,500 each, and ninth through 16th place will get $5,000 each. Just 16 players will qualify for the tournament through four regional tournaments.

Qualifiers will be held in Europe, the Americas, China, and a Korea-Taiwan grouping. Blizzard announced the format for the European tournament alongside the prize pool. The European tournament is basically identical to the Americas format, with the top 16 players in ranked play invited to qualify alongside the winners of other community tournaments between April and August. Ultimately, 130 qualifying slots will be offered, with the remainder being filled through "last-call" tournaments prior to the qualifier.

The final will be held at BlizzCon 2014 in Anaheim, beginning on Nov. 7, Last year Blizzard staged an eight-player tournament for Hearthstone while the game was in beta.