⚠️ VOD is unavailable.
ewc_legiongauntlet_en VODs on twitchBroadcasts 30+ hours are truncated. View the Raw Transcript VTT for the full version.
Are you feeling confident? Okay, I think step two is you could try this one.
Maybe cut it in half for you guys. It's pretty, it's very, it's called Comté.
It's very classic in French. We eat it a lot. I don't think it's too, too tasty.
You're obviously allowed to not like it.
It's good. It's fine. Yeah. Okay. Cool.
And this is when it gets tricky. This is when, you know, I'm gonna,
I'm gonna leave it for you guys if you want to go there or not.
There's camembert. It's good, but it's a strong red paste and then this one is final boss
So let's go this one first. Yeah, you want? Yeah
We'll see how cheese educated your
We'll finish with the sweets so you finish on sweet taste
Yeah, very strong. Okay. Okay, so if you're staying camembert is very strong you could try
This one is called Monster.
It almost sounds like Monster in English and I think it's pretty appropriate.
So if you were bearing, you could try a little, a very little slice.
Just for your own experience.
I'll cut it for you guys.
Small piece.
Very small piece.
Just so that you know all the curiosity you can say, I tried it.
I mean, it's good.
But it's very strong.
It is very strong.
So I wouldn't have more than one piece.
I imagine you're with this comeback with another thing.
Yeah, probably.
Okay, you're going for the bigger one.
Okay.
Jesus, the smell is already...
I mean, the comeback bear smell is worse, honestly.
Okay.
This one is more competitive.
Yeah.
That's not very good.
Not for me.
Okay.
What about you?
I think it's okay, but...
I think the Canberra is worse than this one.
Okay, you thought this one was stronger?
Yeah, I think the Canberra is like the final boss for me.
You could try this one if you want to, else it will be good for the kids, up to you.
I like it, because I want to take the pace of the skis out.
You'll get it off, we'll finish with nice sweets.
Does people eat this with the cheese?
Yeah, actually it's a thing, you know, in France we spend a lot of time outside in Paris,
like you go have a drink or, you know, coffee.
And a typical thing you can order is a plate of cheese and
called chocolate cheese, like a bunch of, you know, ham and sausage please, don't worry.
Very good. That's good.
Cool.
What if I dip here? Can I?
You can, you can. I've never seen it before, but you know, that's what it does.
It's like mayo, you know?
It makes culture and then all of a sudden you build a new cuisine, you know, that's how it works.
Like a tattoo, you know?
Yes.
Okay, how do you go? Was it good?
That's good.
Okay.
I've never seen this before like the sausage with the cherry cheese, but you know, it's a good side
All right, and then the other ones nothing can go wrong basically you have macarons you have this is called
Petit écolier in French it means little little students I guess like because you see you have on the
It's yeah, because it's like it's very old-school
So the logo is very normal.
So both the...
Yeah.
The bucket chocolate.
I'm not sharing this like this.
I'm relaxed because you know I was a little bit stressed out for you guys with the cheese,
but this one is... I don't know if you have a good time.
Yeah, it's very good.
Yeah, there we go.
Nice.
Anything relatable that you guys know that you might have at home?
In Brazil we have like it's basically the same thing.
It's like chocolate with a little bit of... what's the name?
Biscuit? Yeah, it's like biscuit.
I won't go too far and say it's the same thing, but it's the same idea.
The biscuit like underneath is like very... it's a typical, you know,
boys and girls that's called like under your...
Virgins.
Where kids...
There's a funny thing about the French cuisine in Brazil is we have a lot of influence from French cuisine
and then we cut it and then make it like Brazilian.
And then for example, we have croissant, but then we take the croissant, open it and put cheese inside the hand,
a bit of salad and eat it.
Salad, and then we can also do the sweet and then like, ah, it's too salty, right?
Then you open another croissant, put Nutella, nuts, and mmmm, the croissant.
It's bread, so I'll make it, I'll not say, we make it better, okay?
No, you need to think of the baker.
No, he wakes up at 4 a.m.
It's ancestral technique, you know, the croissant, like he's learned it from his father,
from his grandfather, his great grandfather, and then he comes up with the,
everything is about balance, you know, like all the ingredients, it has to be perfectly balanced,
and then the masterpiece is out, it's the croissant, you know, and then you go in,
and you put some salad and some Nutella and the guy just wants to die.
He wants to retire.
Yeah, we just ruin the cuisine of every place.
It's kind of like you take Mona Lisa and then you're gonna draw on it something on top of it.
It's a masterpiece. Just let it like this.
I feel like the majority of the desserts are like...
They take a carbohydrate.
Yeah.
Put a lot of...
Jam.
Put a lot of sugar.
Put a lot of butter.
Butter?
Yeah, that's it, mustard fish.
And it's good, it's good.
Forget me, Ron.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the point, yeah, the point.
It's very good, and very fluffy.
Yeah.
I like this one.
In Brazil, we would stuff it.
Yeah, sometimes.
Yeah, with salad.
Yeah, it's missing Nutella.
It's missing Nutella.
Is this sweet?
It is sweet.
It's very sweet.
Yeah, I want to have it.
It's probably one of the sweetest we have here on the table.
Yeah, I don't think there is a smell to it.
It's very hard.
It sounds like a piece of sugar.
Like a hard piece of sugar.
It's quite sweet.
It's a little bit more plain than this one.
I like this one better than this one.
And then you have the very famous Nagawain.
Actually, I'll give you a try to the pronunciation spelling.
They say it's a fan.
So like you're saying the name of our president.
I mean, you can't understand that.
Macaron?
I guess you have chocolate, strawberry, and I don't know the last one.
What do you recommend?
Maybe vanilla or something?
What do you recommend?
I haven't tried them. I think all of them are good.
What's the most classic here?
The most classic? Maybe vanilla?
I would say, yeah.
I'm not actually sure the answer here.
Good question.
My run is very good. I really like this one.
It's not that sweet, right?
Not that sweet.
And the better they are, the better the balance is.
If they're really sweet, it probably means it's not the best.
I've heard that it's very hard to make it.
It's kind of like a luxury pastry in a way.
They spend a lot of time making them, so that's why they're so expensive.
Maybe if we win the tournament, we can't afford it.
You can bring like five or six to your parents when you go back or something.
Yeah.
I'm really impressed you guys actually went for the cheese, so good of you.
So I'm gonna take one more?
No.
You can take as much as you want.
You can take as much as you want.
Good.
All right, awesome.
Well, thanks for watching.
French tasting.
Looks like P-Vision is also getting their camera work done.
Look at this pose.
There's a lot of vision.
You can see by where he puts his hands.
He's drawing a lot of the eye down to this area.
It's very dangerous.
We'll see what he wants to do after that,
because naturally most, oh yeah, get on there, boy.
Spread, oh, oh!
We gotta get in for this one.
Look at the face of the eSport player.
Yes!
Oh, this is sensual.
That's very good.
Oh, how do you get him to look so sensual in these?
I guess it's his natural talent.
He just looks like that.
That is natural talent.
Can we get him to just do one little wink to the camera?
I think that'd really help.
Can you wink to the camera?
Just one little...
Just wink.
Just wink, just one wink.
That's a wave, dude.
Ah, damn.
He just ain't got the Riz.
What can you do, what can you do?
Look at this.
God damn, they high up.
I like those pants.
Those are very intense stuff.
What game do you think they're in?
Maybe they're in League of Legends,
looking down on us like they always do.
No, no, it's fine.
Don't worry about that, you know?
No problems here.
What game are they from?
We should ask.
She looks extremely serious.
I'm not gonna talk to her though.
She is a master of her craft and I will not be around
over there.
You'll have to bleep that out.
But that's your master of the craft.
I have zero master of any craft.
That's why I have this dog job.
Thank you so much puppy.
Absolutely.
Oh, what?
Don't undersell yourself.
Come on, you're good at this.
Thank you so much, Puppers.
That's my boy.
What pose are you gonna do?
Are they making you do a pose?
I like the crap pose, you know what I'm saying?
Crap.
Ah!
Have it like a pain face.
Gerdie!
That's a good one.
Oh, hype people up.
a lot of experts here looking as cool as possible.
Look at this, we have collapsed.
He's doing the classic come and see me at the bar move
and he's flipping us off.
Don't do that on camera, we have to blur that now.
That's very nice and we're getting
extremely mean mugged by the camera crew.
So let's try to leave collapse alone here.
As now, let's go film these guys.
This is Team Spirit, the defending champions of last year.
They're all casually talking.
Let's see if we can see what's on his phone.
I wanna leak this to the internet here.
Here we go.
Zoom in on his whatsapp. Hey
That no problem. Don't worry about that. You guys ready for media day. Yep. Now. This is the best media day man in the world
This is Team Spirits media manager
I recently saw a video with him putting a pot on his head and smacking it several times
You're the best media guy in all of Dota 2 has a feel to be among fellow professionals. Yes. Yes, very good
Thank you another banger interview. I appreciate you so much
I don't want to talk to him, Miposhka.
This guy, an old clad, come here.
Hello, my brother.
Welcome.
Are you not bald?
You look great.
Not yet, not yet, not yet.
You can't say bald brother.
That's part of getting into brotherhood.
How does it feel to be back, big dog?
Welcome home.
I feel good.
I feel good.
But actually, I see the toughening changed.
Okay.
Yeah, I'm like tired or easy.
You said you would never come back unless Team Spirit paid you a bbillion-gajillion dollars.
That's true.
Is this what happened?
No, no, it's not.
There is also a difference.
Oh, okay, different thing.
All right, well, we're happy to have you back, Moposhka.
You guys feeling good?
Exactly.
Hell yeah, that's a picture right there.
Cut and print, baby.
All right, fam, we are here at Vici Gaming.
They're doing what we like to call hero shots, all right?
That's where we make them look cool.
They take a picture, maybe a cross arm,
maybe a look to the side, maybe a look to the right.
Let's go check in on how things are going in here.
Hi, we're filming you today.
You doing all right?
I'm good, thanks.
How are you?
Great.
How's the hero shots?
Perfect.
Going great.
Does he look heroic?
It does.
They're going natural.
of the players. I like doing like this, just the typical. Oh, the whisper. Yeah, I like
doing that one, but then like just switching it off a bit, you know. Can we get a whisper?
Can you hit us with a whisper? Just one. Oh! Okay, that was hype. You were right. That
was good. All right, fantastic. Sir, what is your favorite thing to do on these? Uh,
you got a catalogue. Look at that, the catalogue. The cross. Oh. Oh, the mean mu- Oh, these
are good. Okay, so you're gonna go with the cross? Yeah. Okay, come on. There's better than that.
What if you did... Oh, that's it. The power pose? Mm-hmm. Okay, can you show me one of those?
The legend pose? Just give me a pep. Oh, god damn, look at those guns, baby. That's the one.
Do that one. All right, great. Photos are very fun. Go take them at home. Another killer transition.
Now, one of the things I heard we're doing here at EWC this year is giving out some things
to the fans. I believe they're getting signed cards. I guess I can't say Pokemon on air,
something like small pocket monsters of the players. And look at this. Let's go ahead and
watch them signing. Hello, Sardinarupa. We just want to look at your signatures.
Incredible. Look at that. That's Jabs. Wow. What a great signature you have there, Jabs.
How long did it take you to formulate that unique signature?
Yeah, maybe like five seconds.
That's really good. Could you do me a favor and make a mistake on yours? Because, you know, those are...
Well, they're worth more, like a factory mistake.
A factory mistake, he can make it special.
Can you make one really special so that we can extend the offer?
What are you going to do to make it special for me?
It's a special one.
That in itself is special.
Thank you so much, yes.
But I hope your Pokemon cards go out very well.
Thank you so much for having them do this,
this beautiful task, Jabs.
I'll never forget the incredible signature
that I've seen here today.
Great work, Team Nemesis.
and now say the nemesis catchphrase
what
okay that was nice
whoo
he thinks he can come in here and play my game
you uh... you guys uh... not enjoy larger map
How do you feel about it?
I think it makes the game kind of still in a way
where you don't really have to improvise much
or like be innovative in that sense.
It's like kind of your thing,
your robotic gameplay, every game that you use,
whoever clears the most camps under like 15, 20 minutes,
it's potentially gonna win the game.
That has what the game has become at this point,
at least in my eyes.
I can see that, but would you agree
that the old map was kind of solved in a way?
Yeah, but it was much more interesting to play those games and to watch those games, even I would say you had to fight it out all the time, you know, big comeback fights or because if you wanted to really force fights, you were able to do it in a previous old map, but now it's impossible, it's super easy to dodge, you can just farm your way back in every game almost.
G.H. you agree?
I mean, I partly agree with what Sunay said.
I think the old map used to, it was, I would say, 90% figured out.
So whenever you were kind of stronger, the pressure points were really specific.
You could go somewhere and force a fight, force rotations, force the enemies to do something
specific.
And now it's a bit more lenient when, like the pressure points, they turned, they became
a bit more.
And at the same time, you don't really care much for them, so you're willing to sacrifice
some things so you can get your farm up.
I believe the change makes it a bit more that you cannot force a teamfight whenever you'd
like to.
So everyone can dodge for like 5, 10, 20 minutes and then look for the one fight that they
would like to take, which makes it a bit less action packed, a bit more on the stalemate
side until one team figures out perfectly how to close the map and then it will go back to more
teamfights and more action pack. Omar, DeVy, is there any changes you would want to see in Dota right now?
Maybe, just I mean I guess my issue was figured out by last patch because I had an issue that
actually you enter the game and you just can't lane on off lane actually, you just forfeit it.
I feel like it's it has been solved a little bit. It's becoming better, but I feel like it's still not there
I still have this feeling in my heart that sometimes
not not not sometimes but
safe lane are automatically
Supposed to win the lane and now on often just need to figure out how to actually survive most of times
You go to lane with idea to survive
than just to win the lane and maybe they can make these lanes a bit more balanced.
I mean it's like you say, it's a con with two faces because you also have a safe lane.
You also do it to the enemy but I feel like it's just more fair if it's like balanced on both sides
where you actually get to play two full balanced lanes and just better plays should win.
That I would say.
Yeah, I never think that much if about what I really enjoy a patch or not, or the meta.
I try and just be happy with what the game is and try to do the best I can.
I would say just more events, you know, more players, you know, the casual players, like
the clown fall, the crown fall.
It's fun.
It's funny when you said more events, I thought you were going to be talking about tournaments.
I thought you were talking about more tournaments has a good point though I think like
Yeah, I'm more stuff for the casual daughter there. I think if more people play daughter the East Pearl will go
Return I think the game itself. Okay, I know I've played competitive for like four years now
and I don't remember like all this was a fun patches with that patch. It's just
You just adjust
Do you ever I okay?
Maybe fun aside, do you ever think about it as like,
this is a good patch for me?
Or is it always just a patch that you're gonna adapt to?
And I don't think I ever asked myself that question.
Is this a good patch for me?
I just try and do what's best, try and adapt.
I'm sure some have been good and some have been bad,
but I don't see the fruits in thinking about it.
Just have to adjust all this.
So I'm always curious.
You guys are an off lane duo, right?
When you guys first started playing together, were there any problems or disagreements?
How did you guys get on the same page about how to play the lanes?
Actually, when we first started, I think we started off pretty good, I would say, right?
I think we were...
I think mediocre. I was playing individually a bit worse when I turned the team.
If one guy plays individually worse, it makes the lanes worse.
In general, I think our laning has never been problematic.
Yeah, we do make some mistakes here and there.
Our laning does vary sometimes.
We lane worse, sometimes we lane a bit better.
But I think on average our laning is OK.
OK to decent, I would say.
That's pretty good.
Not the second instance.
Alright, let's talk about some big life stuff.
I had some announcements.
Some mail said maybe this is going to be your last TI.
You might be retiring. You put a maybe on it.
Yeah.
Okay, so why now?
I'm kind of tired to be honest.
I competed too long.
I mean, you've been competing longer than like you're young,
but Dota years, like you've been competing since you were 16.
16, 15? 15, yeah. 15. It's a long haul. It's been 12 years around. I mean, it's more
so like, no, I don't really feel like that I can't do it anymore. It's more so like my
heart is not fully into it. So I don't see a point continuing in that regard. But for
example, like if we somehow end up winning this year, then I might think about going
for the third one, you know? Sure. But I even then I'm not sure, but that would be the only
any condition for me to keep going.
GH, you've also been doing it for a while.
You've won a TI.
Are you thinking about retiring?
Does that even cross your mind?
I mean, you took a break, right?
To be completely honest, of course,
a lot of ideas cross our minds.
It's just that I don't tend to entertain them a lot.
So I haven't made any decisions
that involves this decision exactly whether I want to retire or not, just looking back
in the day I would look forward to three four years now I'm looking forward to the next
two or three months.
I think the time stamp of how long I look forward to has changed a lot because the more
I grow the more I understand what fully matters in life and how to allocate specific amounts
of time to them.
So I have some thinking to do, I haven't made my mind up completely yet, but I'm thinking
what's up.
Okay.
All right.
Fair enough.
Samel, looking back on your career, what would you say you're happiest about, what you accomplished?
The winning TI?
So certain teams that you are more proud of?
I think my time in EG, I think it was post-TS6,
that roster I really liked, I really fond memories of that roster.
We just had a good time living together.
Yeah, I would say that, other than winning TI, I guess.
But to be honest, even winning TI, I didn't really feel that happy or anything.
Like, at that stage, I felt like it was like, it was meant for me, you know, and even like,
I took it for granted kind of, like, I was like, who else was supposed to win, if not me?
So it wasn't much like happiness or anything.
I mean, at that point, it was so early on in your career, you're pretty young,
you're also so much better. Like, that was one of the biggest differences in player-to-player,
like the mid-diff, that was one of the most extreme ones that I think we've ever had. So yeah,
I guess in many ways it did feel like it was just like, it was guaranteed. Yep.
And then you, you know, the rest of your career, you had to work a lot harder for it.
No, I mean, I feel like that's one problem. Like, I was never really a hard worker in that sense.
So, like, when the skill gap starts closing a bit, and people just put more hours into the game, and I didn't, I never did.
So, yeah, I mean, I guess that would be my regret, maybe, in a way.
But I'm not sure, like, even if I would go back, I'm not sure if I would actually put more work in.
So, maybe it's just the way it is.
I'm spending the next two months in Paris and already deeply regretting sleeping through
four years of French in high school.
But say goodbye!
To avoid being an ignorant American tourist, I found myself a French shooter to really
help me learn the language.
And there she is now!
Everyone, this is Kitty, aka La Petite Sean, and a little bit of Duolingo on the flight
over.
I'm excited to learn from you today!
Where's your blade?
I don't have one.
Oh!
Look, I was told I'd be talking about Rainbow Six and Ballerin teams today,
but instead they put me with this emerald Paris knockoff.
I think I can make it work, but she called me her little dog?
Ok, so we are at a flower shop.
We call that in French, des fleurs, des foires.
Okay. You know what? It's okay.
We will travel to another world.
Okay, perfect.
Who's the hero?
Forgery.
I can't wait to visit all of these cute restaurants all around Paris
or Breziers, as the French call them, right?
Yeah, that's the words.
Okay, so if I wanted to order a baguette, what would I say?
You would say
Voulez-vous, vous voulez-vous coucher, coucher avec moi?
Perfect.
I'm gonna go try it out!
Ooh, this is really cute.
How would I ask to try this on?
Oh, actually, you can say
Je mange des gens.
Je mange des gens.
I eat people... Okay.
Ah, I eat people.
No, I don't eat people.
Ah, I eat people.
I eat people.
No, I don't eat people. It's the dress.
It's the dress.
No.
I eat people if you please.
No, I don't eat people at home.
She has been the best teacher so far.
I feel like I'm picking up the language really quickly.
I mean, whenever I speak with real French people,
they seem so surprised by how good my accent is.
I'm doing a tray bowl.
She, I did it!
She even gave it to me for free!
Oh wow, that's amazing!
Come with me.
Do we get jammed?
Okay, so as I get it, the French don't really like the American tourists, right?
Not really.
So what can I say to have them truly embrace me as a local?
Just tell them.
And Buffy A. Plumeir!
He's f***ing out!
Buffy A. Plumeir!
Kitty!
Kitty, it worked!
I've accepted you as one of my own!
I'm off to see Paris and it's all thanks to you!
Play is in our DNA.
Whenever we let it out, it becomes our superpower.
Now imagine an entire city being built to superchargers.
Kdea city powered by play.
And I'm talking about all of that with the people on my left. It's Effie and BSJ vs. J. How are you doing this morning?
I'm doing great. She ever I got my coffee. I'm energized. I'm ready to go. Yeah
Thanks, Brian
No, I'm really excited. Um
It looks like
There are a lot of contenders in this tournament in each group
But today we're doing groups D and D and I truly believe the winner is in one of these groups
the winner of the whole thing.
The whole thing.
Alright, alright, big promises.
Of course, yesterday we did finish Group A and B, so we can take a look at the SSC Rewind
to see how that all played out because it was exciting.
But some of the series, especially in Group A, were just a little bit on the one-sided
side of things that I'm talking in particular about Extreme Gaming taking on Team Falcons
a rematch of the TI Grand Finals, and Game 1 definitely had some flares of it, Brian,
but at the end of the day, it still wasn't enough for Extreme.
Yeah, it's been watching Extreme.
It's been a tad disappointing throughout this tournament, because even though some of their
games have gone late, it just oftentimes feels like they're not in control of the game, and
they're often kind of playing the other team's game, and that's, for me, one of the telltale
signs of a team that's going to struggle as the tournament goes on.
And then on the other side, we had for group B, we had Team Liquid versus Aurora, and we
know Aurora has been on fire and they are consistent in being a very, very strong Team
Liquid consistency, especially this group stage, actually seems pretty far away.
Yeah, consistency and Team Liquid are not two words I would use in the same sentence
to use.
Liquid are an incredible team, oftentimes it's very hard to know what version of them
but you're gonna get and if they're gonna show up or not, but they're not known for their performance during group stages, you know?
So the true test will be after.
Yeah, and another exciting development, of course, that while this game was going on,
we had another blockbuster of a match between P-Time and NIGMA Galaxy happening and basically the series with Aurora and the series with
NIGMA Galaxy, those two teams were fighting for the top spot in the group and that ended up being NIGMA Galaxy because they did too
out their opponent even though if you watched that first game between them and P-Time you would
have probably thought that P-Time was gonna win that one but that was an epic comeback and we do
have some of those here this week so the Dota is good the Dota is great it's not the only game
that's going on though because yesterday is actually the day that our first title finished
Fatal Fury crowned their champion the first key is locked in Dark Angel playing for Navi one
on Fatal Fury, beating out Mitsuhashi, who's playing for a Virtus.Pro, but the thousand
points for the club championship go the way of Navi, a fantastic start.
And of course, keep in mind that if you are rooting for a particular club, you need them
to get at least one championship, otherwise they don't even have the chance to become
one, because you're basically not allowed to be number one if you can't even get number
We want consistency while being able to be at the top, so Navi off to a great start there with Dark Angel.
We'll keep you informed of what else is coming on all the other games of course.
But here we are focusing on the Dota and we are going to show you guys how the groups have played out thus far.
We did solve group A and no tie breakers in this one.
I feel clear favorites there with Team Falcons.
Yeah, I mean Team Falcon since their formation and Dota have just been one of the best teams
if not the best for some of the years that they've played so this one here is no surprise.
They didn't necessarily have the strongest season but it was still a pretty strong season
from them and this is about the time that you would want Falcons to peek.
Yeah, they are peeking at the right time.
We said goodbye to Game Religion and poor rangers there at the bottom of the group.
Then we are taking a look at group B where they were in the end of the day
Also, no tie breakers with Nick my galaxy keeping their fate in their own hands by two owing pizza yesterday
Yeah, I mean, I think both of these groups had a bit of a surprise
Rooney there's getting third in group A and then they were galaxy taking first place in group B
I think that you know while a lot of these groups have shaped up to be very lopsided where you see like nine or one one and nine
Eight two to eight like pretty big discrepancy between the top and bottom
There were a few surprise placements and I think that's something that's exciting to see this early on in the tournament
Yeah, especially in the galaxy such a fan favorite
I don't think a lot of people would have on their ring of current that they would become first in their group
Let's take a look at what's happening group C because group C and D are not yet solved
It is looking pretty solved though
I mean there's like a clear okay bottom of a pack in the middle of the pack and
And that's what between P vision and team spirit, which coincidentally we're going to watch play today. It's going to be a banger. But between these two teams, I really do think there could be a winner here. They're both looking really solid, but P vision just look a step above the rest so far this tournament.
Yeah, they're the only team that did not drop a single game in this entire group stage as we can take a look at group D
Which is considered to be the group of death
There is quite a divide here as well
But this is the group where most things are still undecided
Other than Brian, I see Insanity going out. The rest is looking still very stacked and very even
Yeah, 1W is gonna be changing their name to 1L as they've been winning pretty much all their games throughout the course of this group stage
But their last game against OG was actually the game that they lost and you know
We see that OG is only one game ahead of fourth and fifth place if you could fifth year are completely out of this tournament
So I think this is by far the most exciting
Group because of this third like obviously the first and second place matters
But at the end of the day both those teams are advancing we have three four five
This is the only group with a really meaningful like round robin potential for the tiebreakers and the fact that OG
Gave themselves the leg up by taking a game off of 1w who was previously then defeated. That's pretty awesome
Yeah, and they're also the one responsible for the loss of Jannex head
So definitely OG having some some group moments in this group stages
this is what we're gonna see today on this stream and
We already set the vision for a sea spirit super excited for that one
I want to focus our attention first a little bit on the second series of the day because 1W and Jannex
We saw them just both sitting at 7 and 1 and that means that these two teams are in contention for first of the group
That means if this series goes 1-1
1-1, we want more, Brian, that's not enough.
Yeah, it effectively becomes the best of 5.
Yeah, at that point, and it's not even the grand finals yet,
sure, maybe it's a spoiler though.
Even though I agree with Mira,
P-Vision and Team Spirit are definitely up there for,
I think P-Vision is my favorite out of all these teams.
If I had to choose a winner today, it'd be them,
but I think that the crown
will almost certainly be one of these four.
I agree completely.
All of these teams are in such good form right now.
P-Vision, their drafting just looks absurd to me.
Like they've been cooking on every single draft
and I do feel like they've delivered every single day
that I watched it happen.
Whereas with Team Spirit,
there's been a little bit of draft fumbles here and there.
Yeah, I guess for our first series of the day,
which we are also having as our Sony story of the day,
we got on one side the defending champions
in Team Spirit and on the other side,
the team that people think will be the future champions.
So very exciting match up coming your way there.
Before we get to that series though,
Let's focus our attention on some of the meta things that have been going on here, in particular, the start of the group stage.
You heard Tofu say that this might be the event with the most diverse hero pool yet, and here we see the unpacked picked heroes.
The heroes that you see the slight hue over are not picked, but they have been on the radar, they have been banned, so not entirely forgotten.
And any heroes, Brian, that you feel like, wow, I was not expecting this hero to be unbaked?
I thought we were going to see Phasesvoid.
Honestly, out of all the carries, out of all the slow carries, we were seeing him a decent
amount in the last month.
But I think right now the laning stage is so important in this meta of range-dominating
lane carries turning into summons off laners.
I think the main weakness we're seeing amongst all the carry heroes here is they buy battle
theory or their slow tempo and they would just get ran over by what we're currently seeing picked.
Yeah but what a cool patch that a lot of the unpicked heroes on the screen I believe we still
will see at some point during this EWC because heroes just right off the bat I'm looking at Marcy,
I'm looking at Facisoid, I'm looking at Magnus, I'm looking at Legion Commander, Troll, Warlord,
and Tinkerer. I think all of these heroes will have at least one game at this tournament and
And Nipo is a pocket pick for a lot of the carry players.
Yeah.
My people say it's a, see it today, and it's the time I can play.
So for me, quite, quite a promising graphic because only like three heroes on the screen,
I look at them and think, okay, these are awful.
Name is Shane.
Name is Slark.
Our cordon and team age.
Chaos Knight.
Chaos Knight.
I mean, Chaos Knight, yeah.
Yeah.
No, we will probably see, I mean, I mean, I had ventral spirit and they don't even mention
But I would imagine I thought we were going to see her as she was definitely popping up in a lot of the high-embrer pubs as a carry as well
We'll see if any of that happens today that we're focusing our attention on the first series of the day
It's the Sony story of the day be vision versus team spirit Brian epic
Yeah, I mean I I'm honestly
So excited for the dynamic of this series because P vision they've consistent no one himself said in the interview
They just know how to get a goal lead that that's just something that puppy's been kind of drilling into them over the last few months
And at the same time to your spirits been the comeback team of old but and they even made a couple comebacks throughout this tournament so far
You know for me, this is almost the David vs. Goliath in the situation in the sense that
Me and me and Mira we've just been raving about how good
Pivision's drafts are this throughout this entire tournament and team spirit is the team that always finds a way to make a lineup that works
and they will give themselves a win condition.
So I just hope they're still getting a chance to effectively play Dota
when the game is 20 minutes in, because they're not so far behind with no plays.
Yeah, to me Team Spirit very much feels like they're in the ironing at outstage,
which is funny to say because they've done really well in their group.
But a lot of their games that they've won have been combats,
and that's not necessarily a situation that you want to be in drafts
where you get mega creeped when you win the game,
or you've lost the early game and you're down 10k net worth and you have to take the fight to
make a comeback. That means that somewhere in your drafting stage you must up the lanes or the early
game. And versus a team like P-Vision you can't mess up the lanes in the early game. So I do wonder
what they have prepared today and what they've talked about because Yatoro mentioned in his
interview that they still haven't decided what to focus on in their draft. Is it lanes? Is it mid-game?
They're still figuring it out. They are for sure. We are going to focus our attention first
on P-Vision, this is a team. Again, they have not dropped a single game and they look so solid,
they look very stable and I'm sure they're looking quite confident going in today.
Don't take my word for it. Let's take no one's word for it.
Hey, I'm here with no one of P-Vision. You've got a big match today. How are you feeling?
Okay, I spoke to nine class earlier and I asked him about your guys' improvements recently because
I feel like your consistency has gotten better.
He credited some of that to Puppy as a coach.
Would you agree with that?
Yeah, for sure.
What kind of stuff is he fixing?
Nine Classes described as teaching us how to play Dota the correct way rather than maybe
chaos.
Is that sound about right for you?
Sound about exactly right.
So what was the chaos method like where you guys just individually making calls and going
with the flow and sometimes things going?
Was it like that?
I would say we haven't seen the whole picture probably and he's shown us this because like
probably me and Duka on the previous team were like the captains both and we were like the calling
lots of like probably everything on the team and when Pape came we understood why this is good
and why exactly we need to do and why we don't do some other stuff. That's really helpful that
sounds like the perfect thing that a coach should do for a team awesome. He's playing Dota for French
for years. I mean you guys have played for a long time people but yeah puppy is definitely very good
strategy that is very that's very helpful for you guys um nine classes been playing normal heroes
lately he's in a cage are you guys gonna let him out ever coming in like nine classes playing
normal heroes boring stuff maybe why don't you let them play a little weird stuff you know put
him in the cage you don't let him out he's a trapped animal you know true but sometimes while
wrapping the the this animal because the patch is like they're killing their hero he's here is
actually on post for like monkey slark this all this crazy stuff that he was
buying for an existence all stuff it's all fixed but I think valve brought you a
key recently they said hey no more spectating your friends pub games true
but they didn't bring the some heroes that is good ones you know okay so he
needs good heroes and the cage to be open okay and the myth as well because
metro right now is kind of fast so he cannot play the slow heroes some hero
that he can like slowly farm a hand that might hit the server, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And not every time.
I'm a Correa.
Okay, that makes sense, yeah.
I'm glad you understand the value of your teammates.
Um, in terms of your upcoming match against Team Spirit, very good team.
How do you expect to use that?
I feel like both of you guys have gotten better recently.
Oh, I would say it's going to be just decent match when we see Goho was going to win this
home.
Okay, we'll see how it goes.
Well, thank you for joining me and good luck in your match.
Thank you, bye.
A decent match.
It could be a little bit more confident than that, but I think that comes with the territory.
I feel like P-Vision has this air of respecting everyone that they go up against.
It probably is part of the reason why they're so successful.
Net on the rest of my...
It's a little bit better than Boom's interview where he was asked,
how are you going to do against P-Vision?
He's like, yeah, we're going to get O-Dude.
I think he's a bit more confident than the boom was.
But at the end of the day, no one...
He's a very insightful dude, but I feel like going into games,
you'll get a different post-game interview from him than you will a pre-game interview.
Because before the game, he's just like all eyes on the prize, but afterwards he's willing to share a bit more ideas usually.
Yeah, I think they also just know how good they are right now.
I can kind of feel it every time one of their players talks to us and you don't want to come off as unlikable, I guess, or not humble.
But it is important to respect the teams that you play against.
And while P-Vision are looking like the strongest team this tournament, everyone's up their tails right now.
them. Everyone is on their tail and Team Spirit will be on their tail very very soon. Team
Spirit only dropping one game in this group stage so far only in the first series that they played
so they have also improved and everybody always regardless on how they do in a group stage they
respect Team Spirit because Team Spirit is considered a championship team. They step up when they need
to. They also are your Kadea title defender.
Team Spirit, one of the undisputed best teams in the history of Dota are back at the Esports World Cup
to defend their championship title. Their run through the Esports World Cup 2025 really highlighted
the dominance of Team Spirit and why you should never count them out. After finishing first in the
group stage, they went on an undefeated run through the upper bracket, knocking out the
best teams in the world without dropping a single game.
The team has been through some changes since the eSports World Cup last year, and their
current roster consists of Utoro, Laurel, Collapse, Not Me, Rue, and with Maposhka returning
as their new coach.
While they've had a rocky few months, a constant of Team Spirit is that you can never underestimate them in extremely high stakes events.
Where other teams fall due to pressure, Team Spirit thrives.
Esports World Cup 2026 will be a chance for Team Spirit to prove that this still holds true.
Never count them out, not in a game, not in a series, and not in a tournament, no matter
how they perform throughout it.
It's literally that respect that has been there.
And if you're wondering, like, you know, what is it like for the players, well, collapse
It's actually for EWC. It feels something very particular.
How are you feeling about your play right now?
You've been a fantastic player since your break out, obviously winning TI.
Do you have ebbs and flows about how good you're feeling about your play?
I noticed I have some buff on Riot.
Like on EWC tournaments, like from the first one maybe.
Do you feel it or do you just feel the results?
I feel by the results and also it's like I feel just like in the air you know just I
feel some buff so I can't win I'm playing better sometimes I can like solo just win
games by solo and just something that is.
Okay well we'll see that happening.
Some strange feeling I don't know.
I'm happy. I'm looking forward to seeing it. Thank you so much for the interview and good luck in your matches. Thank you
A buff that makes you feel like you can solo an entire game. I need me some of that Effie. That sounds powerful
That sounds awesome
I would like to win some pubs feeling like it's solo of the whole thing
But there are so many games I can recall off the top of the head of collapse like turning impossible situations
He's already had Aegis matches in this tournament like there was one game where he's matched two Aegis's
in one game like he is right that there is something in the air for him when it comes to you to be saying
Yeah, I mean some of these teams like pVision for instance
It's like fundamentals it almost looks like is how they win but other teams team spirit being the most notable one
Just have this like x-factor where at any given moment a player can step up
I think it was really displayed at its prime when they won their first ti like that
There were just games where they were behind and yato or just get a rampage out of nowhere
and the most important part about this for me is that it can be really anybody on their team.
And that's something that we'll have to keep an eye out for today if P-Vision lets their guard down.
Yeah, it's actually also very cool that even though since that TI, there's been some roster changes,
but they keep that vibe of always being able to close a game out,
no matter if they're up against Mega Creeps, like we saw in the very first series where there was
a Mega Creep comeback by them already. And we're looking very much forward to this upcoming series,
between P-Vision and Team Spirit, and to get it properly started, we're heading over to the stage.
And here we are friends, welcome back to the notable Legion Gauntlet. We're here with you,
It's a hell of a day, and we are the one that matters here in our groups the final day of it all and from this moment on
Slacks it all gets super complicated and survival, so I wanted to get our emotions out of the way
Sure just for the beginning yesterday. I'm sorry. I wasn't here with you. Yeah. I'll tell you the story
What happened? I got dressed. I was ready to go
I went to the door and it was locked. Oh, no
I heard cackling on the other side of it, as they're running away in the hallway.
I don't know if it was Sunspan or somebody else, but all I'll say is, I just got stuck
watching Dota in my room the entire day.
I'm so sorry, but I missed you, because I'm watching you on the stage, you're doing great
as always.
Thank you.
And I have a warm heart, and I wanted to draw something as a thank you for being a wonderful
host.
Oh my god, it's beautiful.
This is for you, Slacks.
That's beautiful art.
Let's go on.
It's you and me.
Look at that.
to sing great. I'm really gonna treasure this forever. Thank you so much. That is so wonderful.
I'm gonna put that in my nice little forever box right there. Thank you for that. I loved it,
Milo. All right. We got games to go through. Survival and game. No, it's okay. It's okay. I
love it. I'll deal with it. Go ahead. Today is about trying to make it out and escaping survival
stage and our first match between P-Vision and Team Spirit. That is one for the age. Oh,
We got P vision team spirit. I'm not joking around anymore. Alright, these are the best two teams here, baby
I'm not gonna say that in front of all the other teams. I haven't arrived yet obviously, but in this group
It ain't no thing. All right, everybody knew that P vision was gonna be you know what forget it
I'm not gonna get into a whole speech. You guys want to see some teams? I know you do
So let's make some noise for our first team head to the stage. It's P
P-Vision!
P-Vision baby everybody said this team is gonna wave top of all the tier lists
Top of all of our hearts and here they are again. They have not lost a single game
At all nobody in the groups has that record. All right. These guys are invincible so far
They have no one touching them eight zero, baby, and they're looking for that nine zero here today
We'll see if that'll matter against their opponent or EWC 2025.
No to two champions, Team Spirit!
Yes, you heard it right, ladies and gentlemen.
Our champions from last year are back.
And they're at number two right now in their group with a singular game loss.
At a rocky end of 2025, but recent resurgence.
I'm going to tell you that deadly combo, Mbushka back as coach.
And then the unknown entity, not me.
I'm gonna tell you that name is a lie because he is him
Ladies and gentlemen, and he's on to show you what they've got. They do face their toughest opponent yet in the groups
So today is a big test for both
Absolutely both these teams know each other so well both of them are always on the top of the brackets and today
There could only be one winner to skip through survival and head to that top slot
So please let's get those keys in if you would please
Captains get ready to shake hands now. Let me tell you what else I'm about to know to these two captains hate each other
All right, they're always on telegram talk it's back. There we go
The handshake is made fantastic. We are shook
I got the jibberish right now. I'm feeling it baby. All right guys
Let's get ready for one of the hyphest games we've had so far as we pass it over to the panel
We got P-Vision with an 8 and 0.
record and team spirit with a 7 and 1 record and for the people who are doing the math that means
that if team spirit 2-0s this match they are top of the group rather than p-vision so a lot of
stake here because being able to skip the survival stages is a grand prize let me tell you that
of course p-vision only needs to win one game in order to do so we'll see how this goes for both
Both of these teams, Effie, this is the toughest opponent they've had within this group.
We always knew it was going to come down to this.
Yeah, for sure, but I can imagine Team Spirit feel like P-Vision is this big wall to climb
right now.
Like, they are definitely the team to beat here.
They are the team that everyone has on their radar.
But Team Spirit are the kind of team that could wake up one day and just be the best
team in the world.
You hear it from pro players all the time.
I heard you from sub on this panel, but Team Spirit in top form, you can't win versus them. Good luck.
Yeah, I think going into the series that you mentioned, she was that
they only need to win one game on the side of P-Vision. And what I think is funny about this
format with the best of twos is the reason that is is because Team Spirit lost a game to Maus on
the first day of the tournament. So I think the difference between these two teams, Miro's, talking
about is that Team Spirit, they're always leveling up throughout the course of the tournament. I always
expect a team like P-Vision. They usually show you their cards at the start of the tournament,
if P-Vision's looking top form, if they're going to win the tournament, you'll usually know from
day one. And so today, it's like, I think this would have been a completely different match
five days ago. And I think Team Spirit's got the best chance having it happen now.
So you're saying Team Spirit is happy that they have their toughest opponents at the end, whereas
P-Vision, they might rather seem it the other way around. I think you're going to get the exact same
P vision, yeah, no matter when it was and team spirit is going to be have leveled up at this point. So I think for P vision, like obviously they're not thinking about these kind of things like, oh, we show them facing them a day before, but definitely I think this favors team. It's giving team spirit the best chance. And I say that because even though team spirit is a defending champion, they're one of the most legendary teams of all time.
Like, man, if you guys have not been watching this tournament, like, P-Vision,
they're the one team I've watched where not only are they executing, there's, like, lanes they're
winning that they're not supposed to be winning, but then there's also these draft strategies
where I'm just looking at it, I'm like, I know with my Dota knowledge that they're favored,
but then I can't even explain why sometimes, and then you get into the game and there's, like,
this 15-minute period where, or, like, 15 minutes of the game, it's an even game, and suddenly it's
8k because they just hit this timing, and they're so synchronized, like, they're a Caudal team,
their Wisp team, like it's just these heroes that it's not individual understanding, it's the whole team rambling around them.
Well, I got a tiny bit of an update for you, Brian, because I just see just Faces Void being picked, so you...
Not this, not in this draft. Come on, guys, we're not even in a draft.
I'm not saying. First pick Faces Void.
No, no, no. F2 gave me a play, so it was no longer done picked here, so your prediction there came true for sure.
And I want to talk about our upcoming draft as well, as I want to know what we should be looking out for F2 here.
Is there any any player in particular any role in particular any hero in particular that you feel like is key to winning this match
Yeah
So I think for a lot of this tournament the two and four flexes have kind of been king in that first phase
Obviously, we have the usual suspects like the range carries the lone druids the draw rangers
Are you solving them or you're dressing them within the draft?
But for p vision in particular I think about the flexes between no one and nine class
They have this Earth Spirit that they can play on 4 and 2 that looks fantastic
They have this Coddle that they can play in 4 and 2 and they've only played it on 4 this tournament
But the Flex2 is always there and they tend to build their drafts around these
Yeah, I'm actually curious if Team Spirit leads Isle in pretty much everybody's been banning it against 9 class
You know, we talked about 9, a long story of the tournament has been 9 class not playing the Monkey Kings and the Slarks
He's still his own unique player. He picks heroes that it's not that nobody else is picking them
We know some teams are also picking IO like GH for Digma Galaxy for instance, but they're heroes that are very
Particular
Playstyle that require everyone on the team to kind of like buy into the game plan
I owe more about like the global map movements coddle about the macro play with the sustain from illuminate and the team balling around that
And I just think personally watching the coddle
There's so many things you have to factor. He pushes waves, he stacks camps so you have to invade them, and then he also creates this
insane amount of sustain that you have to be able to actually do damage through.
You see them go like Caudal plus like a Largo, like one other
sustain hero, and suddenly it just becomes very difficult.
So I'm surprised, I'm not surprised per se that they left it in on the side of Team Spirit, but they kind of know what they're getting into.
They've left both in Io and Caudal.
Yeah, we also see them taking quite a while to remove Lone Druid from the pool and as a first pick team
That's a that's a big decision
So makes sense
But they seem to be preparing for a Shadow Fiend opening pick for themselves or at least trying to bait pVision into banning out
The Shadow Fiend who's now also taking some time there is indeed the Shadow Fiend ban
So let's see which hero they'll go for as their opening pick with the Drown the Earth Spirit and the Shadow Fiend ban some of the the most
heroes already. I think the only odd one out that might have given them pause, Effie, is
the Hootwing. We've seen Hootwing a lot, so I don't think it's that surprising to see
her banned, but to see her first face banned. Maybe that's a little bit more surprising.
Yeah, I've noticed Peppy does this thing where he'll make, he'll kind of single out
a player and think that they have really strong heroes or one really strong hero, even if they're
not necessarily in meta. For example, versus Maus, he just found all of Chrysalis' heroes.
So to me, this says that he's identified. There are players that have less heroes to
work with, and this is the threat that he sees from the team spirit supports, the Hoodwink.
Yeah, we have actually Tree and Protector, and Ignore.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I'm like, they chose, they prioritized Bane over Tree
and Protector. I think it's because it trades really well with the likes of the Caudal and
the IO. Maybe they're thinking like that sort. I'm telling you, even though these heroes
are not being picked or banned yet, they're being considered on every single stage of the
draft.
And so our revision actually ends up going for the Kez.
I'm wondering out of all the carries right now, because a lot of times against Bane you
want to pick a carry that has illusions or like multiple units of some kind so that you
can wake yourself up from the nightmare, you can still do damage while your fiends grip.
If you're going to pick Kez like this, I assume they're going to go for a save, whether it's,
I think the most likely one is Ringmaster, that we've been seeing against Bane.
Is there any other reliable fiend script cancels or saves Mira that you'd be prioritizing against the Bane?
I mean, there's things that are less popular, like the Shadow Demon and the Oracle,
that maybe we would see a team like Yandex or Liquid Play, but I don't necessarily think we'll see come out here.
So maybe that is part of the discussion of the Bane.
that the that they don't really play the heroes that are generally good against
them that makes sense I mean these teams I obviously they're scouting very
specifically I know I know Team Spirit often adjust their opening to the team
that they're up against which some teams will just be like here's what we do
they hope you figure it out or maybe don't hope you figure it out but Team
Spirit they usually cater to the exact team they're playing you know I do find
those cards opening quite curious from P vision because they haven't done it
the CWC so far and you look at Team Spirit's bands, the axe was in the very first phase
which is also kind of an anti-Kaz hero. You secure that band early on and Yatoro did bust
out his first Kaz versus Rekomix the other day. So maybe there's some scrim information
going on that Team Spirit would have picked Kaz. He even decided to pick it early and
they also think it's a great hero against Collapsus Heropold.
Yeah, I also think it's... I think
Kaz is like top of A tier for carries
I think S tier is literally Drow, Shadowfiend and Lonejord and I think they might be
arguing like, oh
All the top three carries are already banned out
So there's limited slim pickings left and by taking Kaz you're gonna be stuck taking a ranged carry
I think most of the other ranged carries we saw TA for instance played against Kaz
a lot of them struggle against the parry mechanic, the gap closing mechanic, the burst damage and
And Kaz with any sort of buffs, I mean, Kaz without any buffs is pretty insane, but if you give him an IO overcharge,
I wouldn't even mind if they end up going for something like Invoker.
I think Team Spirit could even just take Invoker here because of the Bane nightmare set up on Sidelanes.
And you know, if they do take the Invoker, that opens up the Faceless Void potential.
True.
Which is an EWC at tourist specialty.
And Faceless Void's quite good against Kaz.
Because one of the few heroes that can actually lock him down and take him out before he gets off is free Satanic, free Dispel, free Silence and you know, Invis and everything off.
We don't see a lot of Titehunter, this EWC, and it was very popular just a couple months back. What makes him good here?
That's extremely good against Kaz because Titehunter has his built-in Dispel versus the Kazurai Katana, which is where all of Kaz's damage comes from.
from. So he is one of the melee heroes, doesn't get bullied the same way as others do versus
Kez. And also that Shard, the Tide of the Deep, whatever it's called. I keep forgetting names,
but it's really good against Ayo as well. Yeah, I think, I mean, the reason why Tide mentioned,
for all the reasons Mera mentioned, later on the Cows, Rekatana automatically just gets dispelled,
but also in the in the landing stage, Kez is like a chip damage hero that attacks you a bunch of
times and having the built-in damage block as well. So, Tidehunter does to some degree
deal with both stages of Kez's game. What I'm seeing a lack thereof right now for Team Spirit,
it's like Willow kind of does it, but they're not. Okay, you have the, you have the Ravage,
you have the Tidechart, you have the Willow spells to follow up, but through this IO heal,
I don't think this is enough. So, where is the, you know, finishing blow coming from?
And I'm just, because you can't really pick a hero like Phasus Void, for instance. They
They have all the lockdown right now.
I think Yato's hero has to be a lot of damage.
Or I guess, I think Yato and Laurel's hero
both have to be a lot of damage.
I wonder if Laurel whips out something like the Lina
that we've seen a couple of times.
Just, I want to see heavily fixated on damage
because they've done so much for control
and team fight right now.
I still think the invoker is quite solid
with the brown balls set up on one lane
and the nightmare set up on another lane.
That could be the damage solution.
But I want to talk about Lilah a little bit
and her dynamic with IO.
She's a hero that's become popular more recently, but I do think she can provide you that little
bit of early game damage boost versus Io before he gets a lot of the sustain in.
And she kind of functions as an anti relocate hero in the sense that if she's ready and
the relocate's coming, she can layer her brown balls on top of her terrorize and buy her
team a very valuable four seconds.
That's a good point.
Against like Willow and Dawnbreaker, these global teleport ins, it is nice to just have
Stuff to throw on the ground that is often some pseudo reliable
So they do go for the heavy sustain line
We talked about coddle plus Largo something they ran a couple days ago
But now they're doing IO plus Largo. The one thing I like about the Grimstroke is
First off you usually want Grimstroke to be in lane with carries that have some sort of innate gap close
Traditionally, it's like anti-mage Ricky PA Kaz is just the better version of all of these
He has a lot of other aspects of his kit, but he also has that so he'll utilize the ink swell
But then also
Phantom
Phantom's grasp I think it's called the second the second spell for Grimstroke
That's one of the few spells in the game that is not removed by tight hunters Kraken
So you can actually reliably silence him the embrace
Yeah, that's kind of the silence. Yeah, and he shoots his wife. Yes, his wife will shut tight hunter up before he ravages
It's kind of like a soft disruptor ulti, even with much lower cooldowns.
So that's actually a really great point.
It is also quite effective against the Vayne.
You have a means to cancel the Fiend group early on.
But I do like this Largo quite a lot.
You talk a lot about the sustain on this draft.
But I also think the way a lot of Largos have been playing in the late game, they're
taking catchy lick tones, I've noticed, in that catchy lick range.
So you can also have a means to reposition away from the Fiends group later on.
you can also just follow the rambles from Lolo.
It's a really good solution here.
And there's still the invoker that we talked about.
So they got the synergy there,
potentially faces Voidbound incoming as well
because it seems like Team Spirit is very much
in agreement with you guys
on how you talk about this draft.
Is there any other hero other than Doom
that can really help stop some of the regeneration
coming in from P-Vision because I can't see anything.
Yeah, the thing when I look at
PVision's draft is you need to go through the sustain, but then you also
Need to have like staying power the problem
I have with like a facelift void is if the coroner doesn't get like two kills then
Everybody is back to fool. Yeah, then what do you do from there? Yeah, so I think I
Wouldn't mind they have two options
They have like sustained damage carries like Terra blade that just dish it out a lot of the primals or the SS and the drows
that are already gone, but then you could also maybe go something like the PL that we've
been seeing pop its face up because right now, you know, P-Vision's draft doesn't really
have a way to kill illusion heroes.
And so if you take the long fight that way where you wear them down, I think that could
work too.
I think I like the TV suggestion a little bit more than PL because in the late game,
Grimstroke gets his eggs and you always have the PL illusion, which is really strong
And I think with just a carry that can buy an early Scotty could be very useful and TB
That's one of his natural items anyway. I always forget about the Grimstroke ads
Yeah, I mean that honestly might be another reason why they picked it is because illusion heroes are pretty good against their drafts
So Grimstroke gives them everything we said plus that if you do pick it, okay, they banned Lushrack
They want PL. I'm just saying they banned Lushrack. There's no other reason to ban Lushrack
but if we're aware of Shirley P vision is also aware of that, it's kind of got done.
I mean then the question is do they think they have another answer to it?
Ooh, yes.
Sheaves.
I mean, I guess I don't want to say it's the only reason.
Iowa Lush is quite a duo, so that, you know, if Quinn were here, he would be talking about
how good that duo is for the former Game of Gladiators.
Is it really needed for Iowa to have another combo, or you feel like it's enough with Kez?
I think they do need a mid-game combo.
Like, right now, Kez is going to be the guy you tether when you get Aegis and you're trying to go high ground.
But somebody to run around with that's just going to dish out a lot of damage
You have two enabling supports and you have Largo who's also an enabler
So I think they do need to solve the zero to 20 minute damage problem
Do you think faceless play does off the table here Brian? I know it would give their draft a
lot more weed and a lot more cool down dependence, but
It's so hard to not be tempted when you have that in both. Yeah, I mean if you're I wouldn't be surprised if they pick it
but I do think it makes the game one mistake away from losing at any given point, which
if there's a team that I would trust to execute and a player to do it, it'd be Yotaro, but
I guess I would prefer not to put myself in that position.
It's very intriguing that the two stunning carries and Tiny and Sven get banned. To me, this says that
Peavision believed that the only way to get Invoker into this game is to just get him those
some strike kills with the stunning heroes on the sidelines and they're comfortable outside of that.
Yeah, they might actually go alchemists, I'm just realizing. Like, having a stunning carry that
hits a mid-game timing, they kind of have damage issues right now on P-Vision for the early game.
Can you guys tell me why or if maybe Ember Spirit would still be good or not good for P-Vision?
That's a more fling, by the way, that's unusual, but I want to talk a tiny bit about the Ember Spirit
because this is one of the most picked and still incredibly successful heroes of the CWC.
I love that you asked that question, Sheaver, because you know what the best carry in the
game against Ember Spirit is? Morphling? Morphling.
I think they actually factored that into their last pick, because Ember Spirit has been the
premier midlaner, and even if you can dispel his Flameguard, they don't really have hard lockdown
for him for a while until Tide Shard, and once again, limited damage. Ember Spirit punches that as
well. I think both teams are relatively low on their early to mid game damage unless they're able
to chain a bunch of spells on you. They both like, I think combo breakings are gonna be a big thing
this game whether it's like four staffs, glimmer capes, you know, catchy lick. I think that I think
a lot of times it's gonna be does this team manage to burst the guy with a symphony of spells?
When I see Morphling and I'm looking, oh, is that Largo mid or is that Nightstalker mid?
It's a logon. Wow. They're taking a page out of a gamer Legion's book who did that earlier on
You know what that was very successful when he did it. It was against Earth spirits that time, but it did look very good
What do we make of it? I have a guide mirror
Sorry, I just think that this night soccer was a great pick against team spirits heroes
Like more fling is also that early scottie buyer that we mentioned that could give them a lot of the anti-heal
But night soccer will always give you a way to play into more fling without silence
and just try to run at him in the early game.
The same applies to this Nightstalker running up the Invoker.
So, Pivus and Eris saying,
we're not even gonna let you reach those item timings
and we're just gonna run early with this Nightstalker.
Yeah, I've, I literally leaned against Io Nightstalker recently
and it's a surprisingly strong lane.
You think of Nightstalker as kind of a creep
for the first five minutes of the game,
but Io tends to get him past that stage.
I don't think Bane Morph is gonna punish it too hard
and then once it hits five minutes,
I think Nightstalker is one of the few heroes
that can threaten to boot more fling out of lane. You're not going to kill them most likely,
but you are going to force them to be low and potentially pressure his tower with
any sort of extra rotation. I guess they don't really have that rotation. Like, I don't think a
Largo is going to like walk to your lane. I guess all you can say is this Team Spirit,
like they have really amazing team fight, but man, this map is terrifying to play here against
Akez who's going to be playing off map. IO relocates going to bring two extra heroes in,
and you have Night Stalker vision at all times,
so, Peavision's gonna get the fights that they want.
It's just a matter of his team spirit
gonna be able to brace themselves for it.
And to answer your question, Sheeves,
it was just such a strong Night Stalker pick
that I think they wanted to pick it regardless,
and that's why they flexed the Lergo,
and now you just have to play through your off lane.
You have to play through, noticed, on his Night Stalker,
and no one's gonna take more of a,
I'm gonna farm my items, and I'll join in,
and I'll give you the auras,
but noticed is the playmaker for P-Vision in this game.
So what do we expect coming out of Spirit?
Because if there's all this stuff happening
on P-Vision's side of the map,
and they will try to influence obviously
on Team Spirit's side of the map,
like how are they gonna try to make sure
that this morphling will get the time that he needs,
and the invoker will get the time that he needs.
Go ahead, Nero.
It's just a very classic Team Spirit game
where they're gonna have to weather the storm.
This Night Soccer did create a lot of problems for them.
One thing I can think of is,
If you can get this Invoker some Sunstrike kills early, maybe he can rotate, but otherwise
they're going to run into this really difficult mid-game timing against P-Vision.
This is not a fancy answer, but in the spirit of Maposhka, the coach for Team Spirit, I
think Rue is going to need to tank some ganks this game, because at the end of the day,
you lack map mobility compared to P-Vision.
If we had a map mobility score, it's like 10-2 in this game.
So I think that there's going to be times where somebody on Team Spirit just has to
let the Nightstalker ulti kill them,
and I actually think it just has to be Bane,
and that's how they're gonna get past the early game,
but if they manage to stall this game out,
I think they scale better on the side of Team Spirit,
and their team fight, there will be a point
where you can't fight into them.
Let's find out if Team Spirit can manage
to stall the game out, where P-Vision will run
all right over them.
It's time for game number one of this two-game series
with Sunspot and Kezu.
Welcome, game one, indeed, P-Vision versus Team Spirit,
and this is gonna be a doozy and a hack.
Hell yeah, I've been waiting this time. I fully believe you like this is some of the best games
I think that we will see and it is towards the end of the group stage very important match up here for both the teams because
You want to go straight to the playoffs here Shannon
You don't want to do some you know other stuff or something you have to play some other teams single
And none of those shenanigans play clean and move on a purpee vision
That means a single game victory in this series is enough to do just that spirit have to two O
But in the meantime, they are pretty comfortable in that second position as well
And they played extremely well in this tournament so far despite the single game loss that they have suffered thus far
Yeah, we have some interesting picks. They're kind of a last-minute
Switch up as noticed Night Stalker last pick in the off lane which moves the Largo played by no one to the mid lane
Honestly, a lot of very cool things here like first of all you pick the morph into the Largo because you know Largo in the off lane
He doesn't pressure very much. It's one of his weaknesses
So you get a very nice more fling pick because you think he's gonna do well in the lane
But then they swap it up in the end
So it's like you know one upping each other and yeah
Ionite stalker together the whole P vision early game draft my god if you're a spirit you need to play
Incredibly well to not get dumpstered on your map early on there's no one with a lick under range creep to make the Sunstrakness
I like nice little cheeky play
Does have some thick cheeks on that Largo as well.
They have a lot of healing.
I mean, I.O. Largo on the same team, especially when it's a mid lane Largo, what do we expect to see?
What we're expecting to see is early game aggression.
Look at all of their lanes. Largo does very well mid against the Invoker.
Nice talk to I.O. as well.
I guess Morshling doesn't pressure much. He just wants to farm on his own.
And then your safe lane is Grim, Kez.
Sure, it is up against a Tidehunter, but I play Tide against very good Kezes,
and they can maneuver around the anchor smash like even though Tide is a good answer to
Kez, Kez still free-forms in this lane.
So you were very excited to see the Morphling pick?
I was not, of course.
Of course not, because you hate like half the Dota heroes.
No, just Morphling and Terrible.
There was just a period of time for like two years straight that they were just picked
every single game.
So it's just, I need a break.
No, that's true, but you've had a break for a month for a while.
It's just been dead.
Not enough.
Give it another year.
No, no, no.
that they changed like his base stats, which means you don't have to skill like attribute
shift early on. It means you can go adapt the strike, you can go wave form, you can
actually play pretty aggressive. They also buff the innate more where the more adds
you have, the more attack range you have. I don't think it's like crazy changes overall,
but the thing is also, this is a Yatoro special. You know in these big tournaments, you're
gonna get the Yatoro draw, Yatoro faces for Yatoro, Morphling. So I'm honestly, I'm all
for it.
You know, it's funny, I was excited in part to see the Morphling only because of the new
set which he did equip initially and then change last second to this.
Hey maybe he hasn't like played it in PopSex, sometimes you have a lot of this feeling where
you know you remind yourself when I've played this skin I've won all these amazing games
I don't know if it's that or if he's just actually his skin is gorgeous.
Mostly placebo as the sun strikes coming from nobody but 9 class will be taken out eventually
by Yatorov, he can find one more right click, make it 2, first blood to Yatorov.
I mean, they got the level advantage and just immediately get to play off it.
Think here, if you're P-Vision, this will certainly not a kill that you wanted to give up,
because Nightstalker IO, you know, early on,
showing you it's not that you're gonna beat up the morphling,
but you wanna damage control through this lane,
don't give up anything and then play aggressive in the nighttime.
Speaking of nighttime, let's talk about the Nightstalker.
To me, this hero is a hit or a miss.
Based on your reaction thus far, so can't do a lot of damage.
Will dodge the Sun Strike, Shadow Realm.
Very fire in the air. He's gonna be able to survive as a result. But look at the pressure being made
Let me gift it some tangos that night stalker
Feels like it's either incredible or terrible and there's not much in between
Has that changed at all? Um?
I would say it's still similar
But it has a lot to do with like the overall state of the game and what temple you can play in and I like it a lot
With the p-vision draft here this time around obviously, you know, you're good against Morph early on
I will say once Morph gets to like his third item, fourth item, he can just stand his ground and you know
Honestly, just kind of kill you, but I do think that P vision are very much equipped for a good night's of the game
No one in the mid lane 21 and 3 versus Laurel's 14 and 2 so great start for P vision there
Also like from Spirits perspective if you're giving the early game to P vision, what what's their game plan?
Well, their game is like, I don't know if they can stop it, that's the tactic.
He's just dead, so I think our smash takes him out via collapse.
This is one thing that I need to talk about, because usually when you pick Titan as a matchup,
it's because, you know, you get Crack and Shell, level 1, you get level 3, you have level 2 Crack and Shell,
and you just kind of withstand the pressure, but they're going a completely different route.
They can just play aggressive with the start, little plus 4, notice taking some pressure.
I'm away from utoros on strike, does hit but it's shared, notice likely we'll be able to walk away.
Still overall a lot of pressure but yeah you can see the full stat build that we just saw, utoros are doing a very good job up here.
But talking about the early game, I don't know if Sphere can really push back all that much.
I mean they are doing a good job in the laning and they're not me. We'll take a death to his name.
That class won't be too sad about that. It's a nice solo XP. As you can see his CS is top
two already in the game, so he's having himself a great lane overall. That's more action mid
lane. No one missed a bit of harassment. And in terms of the six minute rotations for the
The power runes? Which team do you think has the advantage?
It should be P-Vision. I think just simply the fact that you have no one mid who's winning the lane.
I also like what he has queued up currently, you know, phase boots into an urn, probably a vessel.
As 9th class is here with a play.
Yeah, Laurel. Good timing from 9th class.
Gets all the spirits right on top of his face with the frog stomped to help out.
Good kill from P-Vision.
Now, they're very nice moves. You can see Namita also notice that he has perfect lane control.
This was right before the nighttime.
So if you're P-Vision and 9th class, you kind of have three real estate.
You want to keep playing with the frog in mid? You want to rotate to notice up top later again?
You absolutely can do either.
Nightmare.
This is going to be a pretty difficult hero to take out, especially with the IO nearby, no one.
Icewall not going to be there really, but they get the brambles, it's not me making the rotation, that was needed.
And nine class.
That's right.
Right does destroy him, so two kills from Laurel.
So despite that death, he's right back in the driver's seat.
Cannot stress enough how much these early kills actually matter because P vision they have a super aggressive early draft
And if they're in a good position, they can definitely run you over. So very very big counter play here on their respawn
And talk to me about this grim, I mean normally we think of two things which is the ink swell targets
Yep, and well, we don't really think of sold mine targets as often because I feel like that's kind of icing
Okay, it's more that the the agonist scepter later in the game the dark fortress. Yeah, it's definitely a big bonus
I think first of all, I like grim a lot more than you know what the hero used to be
I think with the innate where if you click people or if you have any spells and then you see them in the fog
It makes it super nice and easy to trade
Satanic oh boy, he's gone. I need the Sun strike this lane is going swimmingly
I'd spirit are getting some outplays on the lanes currently
Yep silence right on top of Laurel. So his double kill will be thwarted
Nullified at the Tier 1 tower, now being pressured from P-Vision.
This is a very, very heads up move from Notice. I love that.
Morphling in the top lane, sure, if you go up against him, it's like only one farm fest in terms of the CS,
but if you go mid, what is Morphling's answer? And what is Tidehunter's answer? They don't want to move from their lanes.
Yeah.
Tank, left alone for the time being, gonna get Sunrunner's Tier 1, but happy to farm away at the moment.
I think also so what's nice with Grimstroke is we've seen a lot more people go for like the silence
Which is quite nice against a tight hunter, but like all of this losing your tier one mid tower minute seven in a greedy draft is
That's a big deal
Again Satanic getting ganked out from your Toro coming through the gates on strike does hit
But you can see collapses the one taking the brunt here as more rotations
Vietnoluan with all the heals to work with and see the power of this Largo already level 7
Usually in the off lane you're not going to be able to do anything like this
Probably have the ultimate by now. Absolutely not hit be lower level than this but
Rude at a very good job
He stole the enemy wisdom shrine then TP spot him and takes his own and I do think that when you're the team that needs
Time stealing a wisdom shrine is so damn strong like because it is the supports
They need to back up the course to make the moves in the early game
So both 9-class and 2-com is definitely will be still down here
And what is the theory behind the the IO pick other than the fact that you have this double heel core on that core
But first of all, I think the hero is very good
It's also here that is nearly perma band against Keyvision and it works so so well in this draft
And with how you also want to play at the moment
He's gonna take the ravage Sunstrike as well. So another death for the chicken man
and that's three for Satanic already.
They collapse, continuing to dominate this lane.
Despite that little death he had earlier,
is gonna be very happy with how things
are progressing so far for Spirit.
Ducales, find his way in the tree line,
but collapse in company, they will surround and take him out.
Okay, yeah, a lot of these early moves,
I do think that Spirit are getting more
out of this early game than honestly they deserve.
Getting multiple kills in a bottom lane,
Trading the top four to bottom pressure at the moment and taking P-Vision's safe lane power,
I'm not gonna lie, they should be very happy with how the game is going at the moment.
We've had P-Vision games where even behind, it doesn't feel like they're rushed at all.
And if they get to that mid to late game, especially with the likes of Kez,
how good is their late game? Because just looking at the heroes,
it doesn't seem, you know, Geeks will not be there in time.
timing on the TD their late game is still honestly quite good like you've got
Grim against Morph it's a good illusion obviously it depends a lot also like
the itemization can you force your Toro to like buy a butterfly MKB within the
illusion kind of owns himself or is it gonna be something different but a lot
of Nightstalker draft is also about the mid game the post laning stage because
if you're P vision you run somewhere as hold that nice last in a grand boat full
bedlam 9 class actually dead straight up it's gonna be a trade will be a 1 for
But yeah, Naisaka owns the minute to 20 marches, usually like the king of the map, just using your ult against these heroes like Bane, Willow and Volker.
None of these heroes can really stand their ground early on, so even if D-Vision are slightly behind early on, I would absolutely expect them to take over the map within the next couple of minutes.
Notice working on a blink dagger as his first main item after the drums, so just looking to be ultra aggressive.
We'll see how that works out for them.
I mean, it kind of aligns with what their lineup wants to do.
This does seem very early-centric overall.
Yeah.
With a little bit of kez in the late game.
Because they definitely, like, eventually what they want to reach is like the I.O.
Largo together as, let's see, we have got a sleeve set up, but I think this is more
pressured than really anything else.
Because they don't have the easiest play-make, right, on pVision.
If you're Spirit, you're happy keeping a very stale map where not much is happening,
Tide, Bottom, Yatoro stays top.
of the place kind of have to be initiated through the night stalker and him having to go dumps
playing it's not a bad deal by any means but it is very early game-centric
and does the build change at all for any of these heroes based on the position it's like
Largo for example has a soul ring going for spirit best we don't see that
offline very often okay okay terrorize octa three with the sun strike it is going to hit the IO
Well, that's the death of 9th class.
Very nice.
I'll be just protecting their own area.
As they're not quite done yet, there's
long throwing out a random tornado into the meteor.
Not best.
Looks like Naphne will be the eventual trade of supports.
We have revenge tonight.
OK.
Still, we're seeing some really good things.
Like, this is just players understanding, kind of,
the limit that they can play on.
You know, Naphne in the jungle gets a terrorized into the bedroom
just with a Sunstrike combo.
And while there's a one-for-one trade,
It gives a lot of space to Team Spirit.
The laps can take a nice juicy stack here, though,
with the help of the Meteor Hammer from Laurel.
Also going to have the Consecrated Wrap soon,
and while they do have good heroes to, like, deal with what Spirit have,
need to say it again, I do think that this current state of the game is beneficial for Spirit.
Yeah, first grip of the game, adaptive strike with the Sun Strike as well.
Lots of strikes, in fact.
Waveform to finish the job, and Ducales a little bit too late to the party.
won't suffer the consequences though
nice play, I do think that Ruzq
like I said before, he's getting off a lot of good plays, first
double wisdom, shrine, steel, you get a lot of stacks going for your tide, now finding display on
note is closest to your one tower
so after the meteor hammer is going to be boots of travel for Laurel
and
Of course the blink for the tide after the concentrated raps, nothing too crazy.
I'm still looking at how P-Vision want to progress the map currently.
Of course you have IOEF Nightstalkers all available. Looks like they are in collapse here.
Very tanky with the raps.
Gonna see the nighttime come from notice, and this is gonna be able to get to the Sloan with the Void Terrorize is coming.
Good one.
Hits 2 is collapse.
That's enough distance to get away.
Nicely done from not me.
See if they can turn us into something else.
Relocate up top, it doesn't really look like it.
Yes, we're able to dodge two sides of the map now.
Need to commence very well on their map play here.
A lot of the time when they want to keep an open map, they're playing like a 2-1-2 split.
You have one of the cores that is always bodied by one of the supports.
So there was not me down bottom, very good terrorizing.
At the same time, RU up top protecting your Toro.
And nine class.
class. The support of the ramble, sun strike, should be a kill. Nicely done from spirit
claps, actually changing his itemization. So after the wraps we'll be going for a
yule's. Very interesting. Okay, I mean is this obviously a good way for him to, first of all,
use your relocate cancel, which is quite nice later on. And I think also when this
nice soca like runs on you, you can yule him then still find a position to also get the
ravage off for yourself. So actually I don't really mind it. It's also a good item when you
You want to play like a more open map, right?
You get more mana regen, a little bit more movespeed.
If they gank you, it's easier for you to get away.
No one hasn't really found a real entry into this game yet.
He does have the Vessel available and will get the 14-in active rune.
Yeah, that's true.
I feel like Largo, once he gets that second item is when he really starts to pop off.
I mean, question is, does that change with the build that he's actually going?
Because Spirit Vessel, like we said, is not the norm.
You're going to see Kaia, you're going to see Ags.
Yeah, I think it's still going to be like the Kaia.
maybe some Tire Saanj if he wants.
You could look at a Lotus potentially.
I think it's quite good against both the supports.
Like if we look at both Bane and Willow,
they don't really have any counter play.
If you pre-load this, Bane can't really play.
If there's a terrorizer, you can always take that off as well.
But at least even though there's been a lot of games that went,
or a lot of kills rather that went spurred's way,
it is only a 2k gold lead.
True.
Interesting. He just got to TP away.
I don't know if the Incso wasn't available,
What not me getting out scott free even with the relocate being used during all of this
Mac now online or nine class so weird to see him play these kind of
We're not the IOs a standard. It's not a nine class
But I can't his cogl in I do think like over time this guy got to he got to calibrate
You know from being the weirdo hipster monkey guy who just jumps around on trees
These are starting to definitely develop his overall hero probably makes a little bit more sense
because you can kind of roam free, you can be greedy with farm, IO, not really being greedy.
I mean, I guess the thing with IO nowadays is that you can play it again with Maxing Spirits, it's quite good.
So if you do have a good lane, you can kind of do this, or when the game slows down, you can just farm some camps and be chilling.
He was also like some 25-game win streak, as a hold that for a moment, so panic.
Yeah, already uses the XO Splash and collapse, it's gonna be hard to do this without Rue.
Will he be spotted?
There's the fiend's grip.
They get everything they need.
Just a single fiend's grip is more than enough.
So great pick-off for Spirit.
As noticed, people get out just fine.
They're gonna turn their sights on a not-mean.
So it'll be a support for a carry.
Not exactly what you would write home about if you're P-Vision.
There's no one's gonna get dust tornado.
Not gonna hit. They get the EMP though.
And then no one out of man has an apokalano.
Big ravish coming out from Collapsing 3.
As 9-class gets the mech, keeping no one safe for the time being, but he dies shortly after, noticed.
It's gonna be a nightmare.
Is that just in time for the relocate?
That was really close, as notice dies as a result, so two core kills...
in favor of Spirit.
Three, if you count the tests from earlier. 9-class comes back to 3LK.
And the tornado is gonna clip him, and Jucalus is linked up for the time being.
That's gonna be a fourth kill overall, and actually a full team life in favor of Spirit.
Absolutely disgusting display from that.
Yeah, just the understanding that they're pressuring bottom and they do attack mid at the same time because they know if something happens there, they can TP over.
I also didn't quite spot what happened at the end was to sleep on notice. I don't know if Rue got like a dodge on the overall relocate towards the very end.
But I think just the understanding here that after killing bottom, you can still fight mid and obviously there's reinforcements, right?
Do you see collapse he's like keeping over and making this happen because yeah, I think he did it
They're definitely struggling here. Oh bottom. Oh boy. We got some trouble for satanic trying to kill up
Laura taking down. He does fall. This is really close those satanic will go down to the anchor smash
So another dead. I mean, yes, they lose the invoker, but that's five deaths on Kez already
They're gonna turn things onto collapse now
Rotations coming through he's outnumbered, but he is quite tanky not me in the area with the bramble
still has terrorized at the ready. Just the threat of that's gonna be enough for him to
be able to walk away. Any damage really to Colossus, the build that he currently has.
We'll say though, the play that Satana got here, definitely worth it for him. Like, you're behind,
I think there was a streak on Law, he got like 600 gold, and like he said, he has 5 deaths,
but his net worth is still very, very good on the Kez. Obviously, you'd prefer not to be
a thousand gold behind Yatoro's morseling. Needless to say, that guy is the hero off the game.
Yeah, absolutely.
New Toro now with the Mantis style.
Took along with the lads that he picked up earlier.
Will be a Hurricane Pike and...
Yeah, I wanted to ask about the itemization in terms of late game versus the Grimstroke.
Do you avoid certain items? He looks like he has Butterfly Q'd up.
I mean, do you want to avoid going Butterfly and MKB together?
That's defining a fall into the crippling fear TP is coming.
He gets the attribute shift up, there's the Raptor Dance, it's more than enough.
As the terrorize a little bit too slow notice gets the kill big one on to the atoral first step to the game
I'm happy for them that they find display because their draft absolutely can't do this probably could have done that even earlier as well
No, just looking on not me was very quick on the side of it gotched for his efforts though
Now stuck inside the bramble double route indeed Sunstrike not needed
They get the trade obviously not the one the spirit wanted, but still
Could be worse for sure. Like you said, they should not be up in this early game. At least that's not, that was not the plan for P-Vision.
They're gonna bleed another hero here on Bucalis.
They get to go back to the morphling itemization, and so we see that Gatorra has a pike here. You need to play with pike or BKB against Nightstalker. Very important.
Wait, hold up. They're not done yet.
Oh no, Satanic, another grip reserve for him.
Sun-strike, there's the ravage.
Io trying to heal him up, but it's not enough.
Six deaths on Kez.
And so you're trying to turn this around a little bit.
Notice does find himself a support,
and now Meteor coming for the frog, into the gush,
into the anchor smash, and into the death.
So it's just Domino's falling over and over for P-Vision.
This is without your tour.
I don't know how Collapse does this sometimes.
Remember the axe game he played the other day
against Necro?
But he's top net worth again on this time.
Obviously, Tide is incredible against Io when you get there and you don't have to pay against Io's Slark,
Io Ursa, these combos that kind of own you.
But still, another one of these performances where also Rua, there's some overperforming going on from these players.
Absolutely.
When's the last time you saw Satanic die six times before the 20 minute mark? That is a rarity.
It's definitely been a while, but they just have that number in a lot of these players right now.
Yeah, and like you said, Yutaro hasn't been eating in these fights, really.
He's shown up for a couple here and there, but...
for the most part, just been left uncontested.
It matters a lot because when you have this Morphling come out,
they have heroes that can deal with Morph...
I would say Morphling, like, the early game and the mid game.
You can collapse on him with the relocation system, Nightstalker Silence.
But the more you get to, like, the mid game, the 20-minute mark, the 25-minute mark,
Morphling starts itemizing against Nightstalker to not die.
Like, first of all, it's too far, but then it's too survived.
survive. So this is absolutely not the spot they want to be in.
Yeah.
Let's see if Satanic can make a comeback. We have seen many of those for this lineup.
Again, they have yet to lose a single game at this tournament so far. They're going to
turn things right on top of Laurel. He gets demolished. Relocate, use Satanic, desperately
needing that kill.
Well, and that is the power of some of, you know, their overall mobility. You have Night
Stalker. You've got to relocate.
Oh, this is great news. They can go for Roche.
Yep, they can.
Don't have to worry about Invoker for 40 seconds.
We just got the Fresh Desolate.
Where's Collapse? That's all we care about.
He is alive. He's got Blink. He's got Yulz.
Oh boy.
Guys, we know the drill.
A little early, little early Collapse.
Instinctual.
Goes into the pit, pops the crack,
and Shell gonna dodge the entirety of the Raptor Dance.
And Rosh is not happy with this display.
Oh, it's daytime now.
Like, he's gonna try to go for Rosh himself.
He's already at half HP.
No one's gonna get a silence on the back line.
Rib stroke all connecting a bit.
It's Satanic.
He's pretty lucky to connect to fight 9-class.
And Collapse still working on this Rosh.
and he's getting quite low, his health is way too high,
Yatoro gets the Aegis, they get the kill as well,
and now nine class will suffer the consequences
along with Satanic with his seventh death as spirit.
The Roche defenders, so good at it,
DeCaulis will be another one to fall for P-Vision.
Technically it wasn't collapsed stealing,
but he did start the trend here.
It's always the reason why this team gets Roche
one way or the other.
Either he steals it or he makes five people hate him
And then your Toro's like, worry bro, I got the security over.
A single casual waveform, just taking that form.
So all the hard work was collapsed.
And this is the stuff that you're going to see,
like the most high-skill matches,
like understanding that you can go here.
And even though you're not fully stopping them from rushing
or you're not going to be stealing it,
you make so much time.
It turns into the daytime.
Look at how much space and effort he's just tanking overall.
Notice as well, he's forced to jump in during the daytime.
And then Yatoro's like, he have a nice layup, I got this one.
Well, they do get him, which is probably therapeutic if nothing else, but Yatoro basically had nothing to do other than wait for him and then he just cleaned up.
Oh man.
The table was set by Collapse and Yatoro went ham.
He devoured that buffet.
Now it's a 10k lead with the Aegis on hand.
Want to see what type of like plan even the p-vision are looking for here
Definitely not an easy game to execute from this point onward
These do still have a lot of power spikes that are coming obviously their scale
It's like you know nothing bad at all yet longer you have night stalker
You have Kez if you can get a couple of bkb's going your way
I think that would be one kind of timing that they'll be looking for and of course the dookie-dook agatom scepter on the Grimstroke
Oh, it's very good against the morphing
It's Satanic and have double-digit deaths this game.
He very likely could. He's at 7.
He's not far off. He's going to need to turn this around if P-Vision are going to hold on at all.
Remember, they only need a single game in this series to secure top of the groups here.
Yes, third, ain't having any of that. They like to place very high end while at EWC.
I want to get the 2-0 here.
A spirit with the Aegis for another two and a half minutes.
Jules as well?
How much they want to get out of this?
Obviously just taking the Roshan General is a great deny.
I believe that they should be getting instead of two and a half minutes.
This is a very high chance you're getting all the tier 2s and outpost control which
then just gives you the overall map.
There's no need to really push for a Rax.
You could hit the high ground to force people back, but I think closing out all the tier
twos would be the main objective.
As Collaps found himself stuck in a tree line.
It happens.
Not as bad as one of the PGLs when he got stuck on a cliff for six minutes.
I feel like that was maybe also Tidehunter.
I think he ended up using a ravage because nothing happened.
I'd like to remember that.
You just are TZ.
No, Collaps doing his best effort to take the record of the cliff man.
Still Tier 2 is up and running for P vision.
Cute little animation on the froggy frog.
Want to see later, you know, because you can turn into the Largo, maybe steal the croak,
give it to a Largo if you want.
I don't know if that's like his main target, I think turning into the Caz is also pretty
chill if you want.
Of course, Night Stalker, you can steal the silence.
I'm sure he doesn't want to turn into Largo on a flight, it's not, can't be dangerous.
You can steal the spell and like, smoke and just run around.
I'm not saying that, it's just that surely there's better options.
Like even the Night Stalker would be better I would think.
Honestly, I don't really know.
I think if you wanna like, if you wanna make Laugh pop off, which I don't know if you need
to help and do that because you're already owning anyway.
He has no support.
That's a Morphling carry right there, KU.
Let's see how Toro though, bro.
He's a big picture type of player.
True.
But honestly at this point too, I think his ult is kind of a bonus.
He might just go ramp and even without it.
And there's 50 seconds left on the agents.
They clear every single tier 2 tower and they picked up a gem.
What's the agonim scepter timing?
Oh my god, I was actually memeing, but he has a greedy enchantment on Grimstroke, so
he's only 1,000 away from Darkportured already.
That's kind of crazy.
I mean Grimform starts, you can see the waves of Inkswell.
Still.
They find themselves a little Nightstalker meal.
Let's just treat.
And this is what I'm talking about with Nightstalker.
If the game doesn't go extremely well early, this hero feels like it feels bad to have on it.
You might as well have just picked any other off laner.
They definitely expected this game to go better because Nidalee's talking even with not the best early game.
If you find ways to go on the enemy draft, like collapse on a guy, you have to relocate.
I do think that maybe it has a bit to do that no one is playing Largo.
Usually he's, I think, a lot more of a playmaker for the team.
Set up the tempo, set up the place overall, like get all the relocates going.
Maybe a little bit too cute from P-Vision.
I mean, maybe. You did last play this Nightstalker to make a lot of things happen in this early to mid game.
And I don't really think that happened as you're told, with the end of the ages going for a lot of pressure.
We'll get the tower.
It is fortified, so maybe not.
We're gonna play it safe. 13K lead has truly ballooned after that Roche fight.
Yeah, and also...
Now she was online for Laurel.
You have full map control.
SP vision, they set up two pretty good wards out.
You can see the one here on no one and one on the bottom side of the map, but
collapse, walking around with a 13k gold lead and a gem.
You will soon say goodbye to most of your map.
Carl finds himself a frog now.
Delicious treat after delicious treat.
Even a fiend's grip, this BKB completely useless against that Cabo in nine class.
Don't think they spotted him just on the outskirts of the dust.
It's taken the correct way. It's got a couple more seconds. We'll make it out.
It has the Holy Lock, a Glimmer Cape and Mech.
And for no one saw that BKB, it'll be Ag's next, so...
Man, it's just tough to see a comeback without Kez going crazy.
At this point, my eyes are on the Dark Portrait.
I think you get the Waffling Illusion.
I'm pretty sure if you're nine plus you're chattering that one. You're not chattering a hero anymore
You're chattering that illusion and trying to make it go ham. The only thing with Morph illusion is it's honestly like it doesn't have the highest HP
Of course, it's gonna have a butterfly which at that point it's gonna be quite strong
Rue trying to set up, but of course nice offer notice
Collapsed with the ULT's and it says really paid for itself over and over not me gets that one
That's why Top Tier vision is so, like there's so many small things going into it, like look at Spirit, they're warding their own triangle because when you're up this much gold, you understand that the enemy team they need to start being creative.
They're gonna farm your top jungle, they're gonna try to squeeze in here or there without this ward. You're not flying in this kill on a random knight, so can you in your own triangle.
But this is just game sense and understanding of what the enemy team can do.
Well, they have the axe, so the question is, do they just wait for Spirit to come high ground, although there's no Aegis, so they really aren't in any rush.
Do they go for a smoke play?
It's going to align with the butterfly, which, weirdly enough, the Grimstroke is going to be kind of happy about.
At least about this timing, it's definitely the most you're happy about.
I would assume if you're a P-Vision, I don't know if you need to smoke necessarily right now, but you need to be contesting the second roach.
That's going to be the name of the game currently, where also you see them use a relocate in the top lane, you know push out some more waves, squeeze in a little more gold, try and get no one closer to his agonimceptor.
And Laurel is just looking for anyone to leave the base for P-Vision.
No one connected to Io.
Gonna lick off Collapse.
Rest this team nearby.
There's the Yules.
They wanna force something here.
They're gonna ramble into the Anchor and they get a nightmare onto the cache with a
Grip as well.
Meteors, everything used.
Saitanic is already dead.
They couldn't get anything going for P-Vision.
They're gonna lose some buildings.
Again, it's just perfect setup.
They have a ward on the gate outside the base.
They see Satanic walking immediately and they just get him.
This is 40 seconds down without a no relocate available anymore as well.
This is a free rat.
Yeah, not even Dark Portrait used.
It's daytime.
And another Yule's play onto the Grimstroke will even have time to use the Dark Portrait.
No!
45 seconds with no Ducalis.
This is back to the shot.
This is two sets at the very least.
not more honestly i think without the grim available even if test response you
can just keep going another anchor this time on to i with the
damage coming up from the dark willow as well sun strike not needed yet again
because the damage is overwhelming for spirit now who's dying next let's keep
up the one by one train well i want to see the dark portrait at
least once he's going to be up in 15 seconds this
This is an Alacrity Morphling.
Just a casual force of the mega creeps.
No big deal.
An Agatom Scepter by Laurel.
Okay.
This is going to be Cataclysm, it looks like.
You've got the ravage.
You know that some people are definitely going to be stacked up.
There's no summons, no illusions to tank any of that.
As a spirit, we'll play this very cleanly.
Get nearly everything apart from one melee racks.
Now Roche, of course, is going to be dares for the taking.
Say, Tannock, we've seen this so many times.
The only one not smoked right now.
They are scammed out.
Yeah, they are aware, but again, spirit at the major advantage.
Now, 30 seconds to rub.
You see, just wait for that.
And this is a, it's just a tough one to also contest here.
Like, how do you do it?
You know, spirit, they have outpost control.
Of course, there aren't any bi-picks available yet for them, but even so, you have incredibly
fat heroes.
You're tunnelers are all getting very close to Asgadi, you have Rue who's getting close
to an Agni-Scepter.
Also, I love that Collapse.
In my opinion, this is an underbought item, the Kralos Kroger.
Just the passive where you reduce enemies' health restoration by 30%, we see a lot of
Kautos, we see a lot of Necros, there's Ios in the game.
It's like also, you get, you go very fast, you have a Ghost Scepter.
It's quite nice.
This is an item we should see more, especially when there's heals in the game.
Yeah, it's pretty cool.
There's the Roshan Belt, one of your favorites.
That's right, P-Vision, they're gonna try to go for this, but all C-Spirit are already ready.
They're gonna try to go on to the Dark Willow to start things out, looking for the ravage.
His collapse is gonna reset a little bit, pops a crow's jeer.
Flyback instantly from the Dark Willow.
So P-Vision get a single kill, can they get more?
Relocate.
No one with the BKB.
Notice also pounding the Dark Willow, but there's a grit this time reserved for the proc.
It's gonna be cancelled, but eventually, Yatoro just finishes the job. Double kill for him.
They already called GG. They know this is over, as a cataclysm is gonna be there for the style points.
Triple kill for Yatoro, make it an Ultra, and make it a Rampage.
Beast mode enabled for Yatoro and the likes of Spirit, who are now one game away from securing themselves.
Number one in the game.
Oh, this is gonna be a spicy next game, because Spirit, they are like...
This is some prime form, you know, they passed out the morphling after a long time.
I think Ruer as well had a lot of small but crazy plays in this game,
starting from the Wisdom Shrine, setting up all the correct sleeves into the grips around the map.
And if you're P-Vision, I think you definitely did not get going the way you wanted,
especially with this early draft, like the IO, the Largo, the Naisoku,
you didn't really get any plays going. Spirit, Masterclass.
It felt like it was a little all-in on the early game for P-Vision,
that things didn't go picture perfect, that they were going to suffer the consequences,
they did just that. In the last second, switched to Largo Mid, Nightstalker Offlane, talked about
if Nightstalker doesn't have a good time, he is a completely useless hero in the mid to late game.
Yeah. They have to be the ones that are setting the pace, so that was not the case here.
It takes really big credit to Spirit. It's your previous, and also you need to step up,
like the gameplay. It has to go up. Like what Spirit did in these lanes, I think is not normal.
Like 304 deaths on Satanic's Chess in the safe lane, but like minute 10, Yatora having a full
He has one death to his name. You picked off lane Nite so that you at least pressure this warfling a bit or play with more relocates
They did not get those plays going
Lot of Sunstrike's hit and collapsed me again despite the scoreline
4-2 doesn't look that impressive. He this guy absolutely owned this game on the Tidehunter that Roche play
Which will get the highlight. I'm sure coming up next but this better be a highlight
It is just sickening how consistent he is at doing this
didn't get the Aegis Steel himself because they killed Roche and he died first but
Yatora was the greedy boy and took it for himself. There just has to be like a
rule when this guy is alive you need to either kill him first stop roaching
fight him do something because you know that this team it doesn't matter if
someone is dead if they if there's something they don't have if they have
just a sliver of any type of chance to contest they will be there and they will
almost always. I mean I wonder what their percentage is. It's too much. Their success rate at
Taking the ages and it's absolutely absurd as we go to the panel
Thank you very much gentlemen something in the air indeed Brian
There's something in the airport collapse at EWC is just magical
Yeah, there's been a lot of serious so far where we go into the team that were like on paper
They could win but in general the results have just gone the way that we would have expected and I this was such a
I don't even say it's like a surprise, but I'm like excited to see that Team Spirit won that game.
Because first off, if they lost game one, then game two wouldn't have mattered.
Now we're effectively in the best of one to decide who wins the group.
But that was an awesome high-level performance from Team Spirit.
I was honestly a good performance from both sides, but I think they threw more punches effectively in the early game.
Yeah, the story of this game was, can Team Spirit weather the storm?
Because we saw this really strong early mid-game timing from the double sustained heroes from P-Vision,
But they didn't have to weather the storm. They were the storm. They were setting the tempo at some point in that early game
They made all these tiny little moves at the start that we're gonna look at earlier
I mean, we're gonna look at later that gave them a bit of that lead
But he vision just could not blame to them at a certain point
And I really liked they were able to bring their more fling through the gate and play off of him early on and
He vision they were definitely caught off surprise. Yeah
I I know we're gonna look at how a spirit was able will be able to
Set the pace, but I wonder why
P vision was not because is it is it the large we haven't seen them do longer on mid before Brian
Is it did you feel like it played out the way you wanted it to obviously it lost?
But did you feel like it still had the impact that?
People didn't want it from it
I mean, I thought what was really cool about the Largo mid was that you know, we were talking about pregame
It is Largo gonna rotate to Morphling's lane or like what how are they gonna do this?
but they actually brought the Nightstalker IO to Largo's lane,
so they almost treated him like he was an offlaner in the sense of how they rotated the early game.
I don't think the Largo was meant to have...
Like, it wasn't the pick that was meant to win them the draft.
Like, the Largo was rotated to mid, I think, in order to able and enable this Nightstalker,
but at the end of the day, it did not have the impact you wanted, because you bought this vessel.
And you did get one crucial kill on Yaltro's Morphling before his Manta came out,
but, you know, you mentioned that, like, why weren't they aggressive?
I honestly feel like there were so many small plays from Team Spirit, whether it's Yachter or going through the game,
whether it's Rue going towards the mid lane, like there were just so many cool rotations and
like this was by far the most enjoyable early game for me to watch, like I know Team Spirit came out on top,
but they were just, it was literally watching a fight where they're, they're storing punches back and forth non-stop.
Yeah, and I do think they just showed up very heavily online today on Team Spirit, like four p-visions dropped to work
And we could have seen an entirely different game if the lanes hadn't gone so well
They needed to get a couple of the early game kills group up early and take advantage of
Team spirits heroes needing more scaling and more time
But that lane on top with Bane and Morph lane actually ended up doing really well against the Night Soccer
Which maybe they didn't factor in and that Tidehunter also had a fantastic lane
So you had two side lanes that won and sure you got a kill on Invoker in the early game
But because the side lanes were able to move their supports around Invoker also had a good start
Yeah, so let's take a look at those moves that the supports were making because those were
Instrumental to having team spirit be in this position
Yeah, I just want to shout out ruin specific because he was everywhere on this sprain
But this is him setting up for the kill on no one's logo after
Laurel had died in that early game and we see no we see not me also joining from the side
But this was essential for Laurel to get back into the game after him getting killed earlier on and this isn't the only time
We're gonna see Rue pop off here in this early game
He actually goes and steals the wisdom rune enabling team spirit to get a double wisdom rune
He actually just walked for free behind the ionite soccer and did the last second nightmare in this clip
We're gonna see not me catching
Satanic's kez with that last second bramble clipping him and then they were able to take advantage of
500 level six in this clip
We also see not me just getting the kill on IO between four heroes and sure they get the trade
But that is a trade you take any time brain. Yeah, meanwhile throughout all of this we see it 12 minutes into the game
They're taking like a five stack ancients
I'm just looking at all these earlier game rotations and I'm like when did he
Find the time on route to stack these camps five times amongst all of these gangs
The fact that they were able to like Mira said they had a good start to the top lane that allowed
Rue to effectively rotate between mid and bottom and then also in the meantime be stacking a camp like
There's just so many little factors that ended up there.
And I think, for me, it's obviously Rue's a very good player.
I think he massively overperformed this game.
Like, this is the type of thing we talked about in the pregame,
which is that any player at any point for Team Spirit can step up.
I feel like multiple players at multiple different points stepped up.
And for Rue specifically, this might have been one of the best early games I've ever witnessed.
So where do we want P-Vision to take this?
Because this was an outplay, right?
Right because we looked at the draft for like okay on paper. There should be p-vision early and then spirit late
That's kind of like their plan and it turned out to be spirit all the way basically so with the plan of p-vision
There wasn't much wrong with it per se
How are you gonna adjust with me? This is also their first loss effort
So we don't know how they do with adjustments. It very much was and I do think this is not the most difficult adjustment
adjustment because their draft was very one note. It's like we have sustain, we're gonna run at you
and we're gonna heal and you're not gonna be able to do anything with your late game. It's just a
matter of making sure that you can fight at all stages of the game and they could just change up
their mid hero and not have a Largo, have something like an Ember Spirit that can play Tump though and
it would make it easier. I mean based on what Team Spirit's done this event which is like good
performances but nothing mind-blowing, I was p-vision after that game I'd be like okay you got us like
I was not ready for you came you came ready to play today guys
I'll just say that there's little I always appreciate the little item choices that players make this was a really cool yule's pick up from
Collapse on tide. It's so amazing defensively against the silence of Grimstroke as well as Night Soccer
But also willow has a support like if you don't have Bane there and you don't have this yule's
There's no setup for kills on the map
But because you have this yule's that's what item willow usually goes for and it sets up all of her spells
So it kind of gave them this extra kill combo on the map, and I think P vision they just weren't ready for this
That I think that's why Satanic died there were multiple times where if I'm looking at on paper at Team spirits draft
I'm like they don't really have the setup necessary in order to kill me
They have a bunch of soft disables. I'm like a mobile guy with a dispell and everything
But yeah, just well played over all around. I have a more fling question for you or rather a question about more fling
Okay, this was the second game. We saw more fling the first win for more fling
Could it have been any other carry or was the fact that Yutora was Morphling a deciding,
big deciding factor here?
I would say it was a big deciding factor and I really like the confidence to get there
because I don't think many heroes could have been able to out-seize a Nightstalker like
that and also the self-sustained and durability of a Morphling is what enables Bane to move
around.
If it's a typical carry hero that gets bullied out of lane and needs the babysitting, you
don't move around like that on her.
So definitely a really cool pick.
It was the second Morphling game at the CWC, the first win.
So there's something there, Ben.
Yeah, there's like this, there's like group of five carries.
There it's like Life Stealer, Morphling, Weaver, Tiny.
They're like, they don't really jungle very fast, but they're also really good at staying
in their lane.
And you wanted a hero that, what like Mira said, is self-sufficient, but also the bonus
of the Morphling is against Io specifically, you want a carry that, it sees a reload coming
on top of it and it has an escape plan.
They managed to form and gank him one time, but that illustrated, it required a slick
into a Nightstalker silence, into like a perfectly timed ink swell, I mean, it was just, that
was the Morphling, what he always creates is you need a very specific answer in order
to be able to kill him, and Yachter I think better than anyone else will recognize.
Your draft is kind of awkward when it comes to killing Morphling, and the Night Stalker
pick was amazing for P-Vision's draft, but it did not solve that individual problem unless
they got momentum, which the Morphling also stopped.
So I do think it was a very pivotal little pick.
Yeah, I mean there are a few heroes in Dota that even when they're not good and they're
nerfed, I was talking to Vyn about this in the green room, but they fill you with dread.
Like they fill you with a sense of despair when you're playing against them because
You feel like you're racing against the clock and
Morphling is one of those heroes like if you don't win the early game and you look at the enemy draft and they have a morphling you just
All your hope and optimism is like slowly
Going out the drain and I feel like that's what it must have been for Paravision
Well, it sounds like they have a lot to recover from and this is their first loss in the group stage as we said and it's
It's an important series
There's only one more game left between these two teams in this group and this game will decide
because there's no chance for time-breakers in this group.
So this one game will decide which one of these two teams gets to skip the survival stage
and is instantly locked in to top 8 here at this EWC.
A lot of pressure on this upcoming game.
Let's find out how our commentary team of Sunspen and Kezu feel about this series in particular.
We were there for every click, every clutch, every respawn.
We were there for the years of grind and we're here now the proud founding partner of EWC
Powering the biggest event in gaming shoulder to shoulder with the world's best
Making history
Greatness deserves a stage
Lenovo Legion reach your impossible
Hi there, SunsFan here with...
That's me, Kezu.
Well, it's just Kezu, but yes, welcome to another series of great Dots.
We have P-Vision versus Team Spirit.
I mean, one of these teams is undefeated.
That's P-Vision, Spirit.
That's correct, right?
Yes.
Just double-checking.
You never want to be wrong here.
What do you think about this series?
I mean, these are two top dogs of the group.
True. I mean, like you said, P-Vision, they're still undefeated.
To me, they look a little bit better than Spirit, but at the same time, without throwing
some shade at the other teams, I don't think these teams were tested that much yet.
So it's a good test for both of them to actually play against an S-tier team.
That's right.
Now has Yatoro shaved his head or changed his hair color today?
Is that a question to me?
Yes.
No, it's not.
How do you know?
Have you seen him?
No, but I can tell.
He waits for the final day.
That's when he comes with super saiyan hair or blue hair or bald head.
Okay.
Nobody cares anymore.
This has gone for too long.
for the next series, thanks.
This year, the EWC Dota 2 format is more cutthroat than ever.
This is how it's going to go down.
The tournament starts with the group stage.
The teams will be split into four groups of six,
where they'll play in a round robin format.
The top teams of each group qualify straight to the playoffs,
and the bottom two are eliminated.
The remaining teams move on to the survival stage,
which is a single elimination,
best of three gauntlet style bracket.
The team's final chance of survival.
The first round of the gauntlet bracket starts with the third and fourth placing teams from the group stage.
The winner will meet the second place team from group stage in round two.
Only four teams will move on from the survival stage to the playoffs.
The playoffs are a best of three single elimination bracket,
where a single mistake can be the difference between moving on and being eliminated from the tournament.
A third place decider will be played for a bigger chunk of the prize pool,
as well as valuable club championship points.
The Grand Finals match is the best of five for the two teams that have fought their way through each stage of the tournament.
Only one of them will remain undefeated and claim the EWC 2026 Dota 2 trophy.
We're getting ready for game number two between P-Vision and Team Spirit, a unique situation
for P-Vision.
We don't know what they're gonna do when they're a game down because they have not been a game
down yet.
Meanwhile, Team Spirit, when they were one game down, they did not lose a single game
since.
We know what they're doing.
What's coming our way in the draft that remains to be seen as we're narrowing in on that one.
I want to know what they should be doing, what they should be addressing.
Is there anything in the opening that you would like to see changed?
Because we did see Team Spirit prioritizing that overall first pick Bane
in this game in particular, and we saw Rue on Bane,
and you highlighted him specifically because he made it look S tier.
Yeah, he did a fantastic job, and conceptually it's a great hero versus P-Vision
with a lot of the strategies that they want to run.
The IO being an example, the Kez opener that they played didn't necessarily work out.
So if Team Spirit run back this starting Bane, I don't think we're going to see that Kez into IO follow-up.
I do think they're going to fall back on their Keeper of the Light that they just look so strong on here.
Yeah, there's so many dimensions to drafting that I remember saying this in Game 1 as a
carries perspective that if I'm playing against Bane, I'm either picking like an Illusion guy
or I'm hoping one of my supports has a reliable fiend's grip cancel, otherwise my game is just
generally really hard to play. And I think pVision might have gone a little bit too all-in on their
own draft, and there are times where there's a healthy blend of dealing with the problems that
are presented to you by the enemy team's draft. I think because pVision played around their own
timings almost entirely with their draft, that means that it will fall pretty flat when you
lose momentum or steam in the game. Like even just as simple as they open Bane, you have a reliable
save from Fissure. Like that's just, that's the kind of simplicity that I would like to see
inserted back into to P-Vision's draft. And so I'm just going to be keeping an eye on this game,
because you know, as you mentioned, neither of these teams have really been tested yet. And I think
It's like in theory, it's like, okay, yeah, you're not going to underestimate your opponents,
but at the same time, these are things they probably have been getting away with, where
they're allowed to play for their own draft, and you have to step it up and think about
what Team Spirit's ready to bring it today.
So what problems is Mapoche going to present with Puppy in game two?
Well, we have a slight change in Bans, only a very slight.
So of course the teams change sides, but now first pick, go on the way of P-Vision.
The only change in Bans is that the team that has first pick, instead of banning apps, they
ban Doom with a T and Doom ban in the second phase, of course, and of course the change
with the Willow position for most likely getting picked up first.
That's really interesting to me because I thought the support that P-Vision would try
to steal is actually the Bane, but they go for the Willow instead and they double down
on the hoodwink first phase ban.
To me, this says that they think that the offlane is the problem actually, and that
if they ban Hoodwink and take Dark Willow, then there is not a strong enabling support
for clubs.
But I still think there are some that exist, like the techies, for example.
Yeah, I do think there are potentially other options.
I think what's really fascinating for me right now is...
Or the Rubik.
Sorry.
Yeah, Rubik's a decent answer.
I'm just thinking maybe Triant's power is purely in the two carries that are banned every first
round, the Drown and the SF because we've been seeing it more and more that teams are
banning the carries first round and then they're just skipping Triant Protector, a hero that's been
picked or banned pretty much every game thus far and I guess I mean there's times as you go on later
in the tournament if you ban a combo piece that you're effectively banning two heroes I think people
think they're getting two for one by banding is and that's why they're doing
effectively three for two I guess by banning SF and drought together in
her big god do you also think that's if you would pick tree in first phase you
kind of lock yourself in a little bit in terms of what type of laning partner
you'll give with the with the tree and and maybe what type of offlaner your
enemy team can play into it whereas with these two picks world's your oyster you
You can go anywhere.
Absolutely.
Yeah, if you have Tram Protector, you are like, okay, what range carry are we gonna pick?
But like you said, we virtually know nothing about what the guy's gonna do.
I think it's funny, because sometimes you get the, okay, let's just pick Drow.
You know exactly what our strategy is, but can you beat it?
And sometimes it favors teams to just say, okay, we're revealing absolutely no information.
Because Rukic and Willow, they're kind of just standalone strong laners.
It doesn't particularly say anything about their lane duo or their counter-matchups in the game.
I don't really factor this in too much. It's like both of them offer unique things, a little bit of damage, a little bit of teamfight.
What do you think so far, Mere?
Well, they do under-fanning their treat, so maybe it's just a team-specific thing for later down the line, but I definitely agree.
I mean, taking this year because of the response to the lane, I think it was just taking that strong support for not me before they could take everything out in that second phase.
He's had some exceptional performances on it, and you do have good spells to steal from Lulu.
She's not the best steal, but she's pretty solid for Rubik.
I have to ask if there's like, or I have to imagine if there's any block picking happening with Rubik.
Like, is there anything that P-Vision would normally go for as like a synergy with...
Willow, they're not really that big on the Underlord, which is really the only counterpick that I
can think of for picking Rubik?
Yeah, because it's nice to lock in Nami's hero, but why now, basically?
Like, why prioritize Rubik over all the other heroes?
It's like, it makes sense as a pick, but I always wonder what's the reasoning
for it being the best pick on that spot?
I think that, like I mentioned, Peavision are kind of targeting this
offline by banning supports.
So you ban Hoodwink, you take Willow and you're essentially saying
We took the best two
So they wanted to lock one in before they get on that in the second fifth
This reminds me of the mouse series where puppy banned seven carries against crystal castellus
And he still left his hero to last and then there was like nothing left. Okay. Let's pick DK
So I guess that's probably what they're perfect
like you said if they don't pick Rubik here then
Then P vision has the two bands not for the five which they ban the tree and fame
But they could have banned two fours and there's likely no
So, got too many good options left.
Yeah, I think for sure that's what it is.
And we see a winter wyvern come out.
And this hero typically is a response pick to heroes like Loundred,
but I think it's also a very effective response versus lanes like Axe
where they want to just chip away at you.
They want to press battle hunger, they want to make sure you're never at full HP.
Winter Wyvern, now that you go level 2 heal,
you can counteract a lot of this style of lane.
uh... i also
hats off the puppy for this one because
if i'm a carry and i'm against pain i need a piece of cancel if i'm a carry
and i'm against acts i need something that prevents me from dying to blade
milk hauling
yes i can play around it i can buy us and why i can buy kbkb i can position
myself
but it makes it so
the heroes that traditionally would just died of that no matter what's
i can pick them in the trap i can itemize not purely for the acts there are
four other enemy heroes in this game so
the Wyvern Cold Embrace prevents that combo.
It's like, I think the laning stage is a big part of it.
You have the sustain to go through the battle hunger.
But for me, it's much more about that mid-delay game.
If we have Wyvern standing behind the carry,
it just makes Axe's job a lot more difficult.
You often don't want to pick Kez into Axe.
Am I saying it's great?
Not necessarily, but I would say this matchup's way worse
for Kez without the Wyvern than it is with it.
Yeah, I think this Wyvern kind of makes Kez's life easy,
not just on lane, but for those blademail calls
that you talked about.
And now the Swiver is actually looking
like the most important hero so far on Key Vision Straf.
So now if you're a teen spirit,
you have to think to yourself, we gotta jump this guy.
Like we gotta pick some Laurel Amber, some Puck,
something that can just run at this backline nonstop.
I thought they were gonna go Storm
cause I think it's a little bit harder to counter.
I think Puck is quite susceptible to maybe like a Viper.
This is a sick Viper mid game.
I actually think no one's gonna whip out the Viper response
because two ways to deal with Puck are two,
or three ways to deal with Puck.
One is to have so much sustain and beefiness
that Puck never does meaningful damage.
Another one is to have Instastans.
And the third one is to just dumpster it in lane.
I don't think we'll see the no one sniper.
That's like another option for really slaughtering the Puck.
I think against these specific heroes, Viper's the best.
But then maybe giving away Viper ult is bad against Rubik.
I wouldn't personally factor in the rubik with my pick here.
Yeah, I think Ember can be solid enough.
Even we've seen no one have some great games on him,
especially versus Puck.
But I just do want to say they had to take the Puck here
because if you don't Puck, you're getting Pucked on 18.
Puck or be Pucked, I think is the saying.
You gotta Puck them before they Puck you.
Exactly.
Only one meaning to this.
Only one, but the Phoenix does come out for Team Spirit.
It gives them that little layer of coverage, you know something some long-range damage to follow up on the call
Some team fight control versus the winter wyvern
That's a good enough time. This is a tough pick I think
Like there's just a
There's a lot of different approaches you can take or you take the lane dominance
You can take the map movement gameplay like the ember spirit like ember
The thing about ember is I think he's yeah
I didn't love the Ember because I wanted a hero that wanted to like play around his team.
I think on the map right now if you're by yourself, you're probably gonna die no matter what hero you are.
So I would rather having a hero that leads the charge and has follow-up from his team.
Slardar makes a bit more sense there. We've seen teams go for like Slardar or sometimes like Earthshaker as a response to this puck mid.
You think for sure it's mid Slardar? I wouldn't say it's for sure, but
But, Slardar generally struggles, Slardar is almost all right-click in the laning stage,
like yeah he has Slytherin Crush or whatever, but his crush is only as powerful as the amount
of times he can hit you afterwards, so picking him against attack speed slow fives, like
Crystal Maiden or Phoenix, is not ideal in my opinion.
Agreed, I mean if I'm Phoenix and I'm playing against Slardar on lane I'm pretty happy,
but if I'm playing against the mid-Slardar who's got an early blink and is forcing me
to press dive or forcing me to use super
you might even have to supernova
when I don't want to that's miserable
yeah definitely a good fit in the middle here
they banned the centaur so it looks like team
spirits anticipating the sword are mid as
well on the same page on the other side we
got the terror blade already removed what
would you like to see get portal play at
this time around they is gonna get over
last pick so he is gonna see which off
later he will have to deal with online
Kind of an annoying pick for him right now just because of this winter wyvern that's going to be like
Kind of countering a lot of that physical damage and you're playing against kez plus slaughter
You know, you're gonna get first
So I so thinking okay win ranger seems premier, so they're probably gonna ban that so hero
We haven't seen too much of but i'm predicting a moira to pick
Oh
Goes through the
Wyvern cold embrace
It's a ranged hero that has a defense mechanism against Kazarite Clicks as well as Slaughterite
Clicks. That's what I actually think that's the best pick. I don't admit, Muerta's fallen off quite
hard, but we have started to see teams dip into the the B and C tier carry heroes. So I imagine
it's on P vision's radar that they're probably going to pick a ranged guy or girl in the case of
Muerta. They have a Willow Centaur would have been nice. I think any setup stun hero for Willow and
lane. Underlord would be okay too. The ultimate willow combo is, oh they still
went out the ember, just respecting that side as well, but is the Mars. We have seen Mars come
out a couple times, I don't think he's been very successful, but go with the pangolier.
Okay, I mean this pango can be played mid, it can be played off lane, but it does feel like when
it comes out no one just wants to run it on the mid lane. The thing is, I think I would still like
to see it be played on the offline because you're playing against a puck. It can go very wrong for
you very fast. I think TA now becomes an option where it is still good defensively but then you
have nothing to hit the roll. They go a completely different route. I was one of the unficked heroes
today in the graphic as well and she showed up and on paper it's fantastic not even for
the hero dynamics or interactions that you'll probably mention Brian but just for the map play
like there's actually not that much wave clear coming out from this larder and kess draft
early on like sure it's gonna exist later but Naga could create a lot of wave issues in this game.
If Naga gets it's a weird timing to say but if Naga gets to treads level five then that's the
point where the illusion time is about a hundred percent you're actually getting meaningful rip
type procs when it comes to pushing the lane like it's it's very difficult to slow their
during crush and kill the illusions in time.
A lot of this lane against Willow, Slaughter,
what Naga does best out of all the carries
is she just shoves the lane and leaves
and there's no tower pressure from these heroes
on the side of P-Vision.
If Yattrow gets to that point
where he can just send two illusions at the wave,
he's jungling camps, Rue can just leave him alone,
they can play through collapse.
I actually think those first four levels on Naga
are gonna decide this game, quite frankly,
because I think if he gets there,
then they don't have any answers.
It's quite the good carry matchup against Kez, right? Kez isn't really known for clearing
AoE damage early on. He's kind of big single-target burst into disengage, which you can't comfortably
do against Anaga.
Yeah, Anaga also, the build historically, and I think he will go this game, is Manta
and Orcid, and that's just destroy Kez on the map. Like, the big thing for Kez is he,
there's very few heroes that can represent meaningful kill threat on him from the carry
roll, and especially when you're playing the map, like, yeah, you have like the Urshas
and stuff that will burst them in teamfights, but there's very few that will set up the kill on the
kez. And so basically I'm looking at bottom lane if Yachtaril has the start that Naga can get.
They actually nerfed Naga's early game because in 7.41 she got some meaningful buffs and she was
getting picked a lot in pubs and had a really high win rate. They nerfed like her base attack
speed and stuff like this. So that's the only question mark I have. If he gets to that man to
to work at Butterfly Heart, like I think Naga's unstoppable this game.
Well, let's find out if this Naga is going to get unsuppable, and if Team Spirits can
punch their ticket to the playoffs, or if it will be P-Vision instead before we head
into the game or heading to a gaster, Suns Fan and Kezu.
Thank you, Sheva.
Yeah, welcome to game number two, Suns Fan here with Kezu.
We've talked a lot about collapse, and his age is steals throughout his entire career.
Do you have any idea how many that may have may be wow? That's a great question. I'm glad you asked because
Everybody I've got my brand new. Oh, look at this. So light to my Lenovo Legion
So you want to know collapses ages. Yes. Okay, WWD when did collapse steel ages last?
Says here yesterday. He's 47th ages. It's a record. Yeah, I mean guys pretty good
It's definitely a record. Nobody steals as many ages. You want to hold this. It's very light. Oh, wow
Okay
Are you giving it back to me if you want me to cast the game at some point you're the cast so I'm just the analyst
I gave you the staff. I appreciate the status we get into game number two
Between spirit and P vision. We have some interesting picks you let out an audible gasp
When Naga siren was selected. Did you try to emulate the gas for that out? No, okay?
I was just saying you gasp. No, I like this is the thing was for it and yet or I am a little bit of a fanboy because this guy
I just love watching him play and I think he has very specific
Like heroes that come out, you know specific scenarios calls for specific heroes
And I do think this is quite a good naga game like outside of pango
None of these heroes really deal with it very well
You also have a lot of good combinations like you have you can always protect the egg or set it up
Even with song of the siren and also ax loves having naga in the lineup like later on ax wants to play on pickups
You want to follow up damage naga always gives that for you?
So, honestly, I think it's a very, very cool naga pick.
Also the first one of the tournament.
And who else better to do it than Gatoro?
That's right.
And P-Vision, on the other side, again,
they need to just win a single game.
This, well, now the both teams are in the exact same position.
Whoever wins this game is top of their group.
But P-Vision had two attempts at it now.
Is this gonna be enough for them?
They have a lot of physical damage going on here.
You got the physical damage of no one on the Pangolier,
Slardar, of course, and Kez on top of that.
So I'm sure itemization coming up from Spirit will be a lot of armor heavy things such as assaults and I mean
Is this even a blade mail game a lot of times we don't see Axe even pick that up. No, this is very good
I do think it is a good blade mail game
It depends a little bit like you want to go either helm of the dominator or blade mail
I don't necessarily think he needs to go dominator
It's more something you do in lanes where like you want to split up so I could see more the space big
Bracer gold blade nail blink and just play on that but yeah armor is definitely something you need to get against this dire draft
You're playing against pango and slaughter and a casual dish out all this physical damage
So, you know low this is you talked about the AC whether it's any other items
You can get out like the flats or you know on the neutrals if you get some medallion all of this is definitely what you want
Yeah
The cost playing the winter Wyvern we're used to seeing that coupled with a drought type hero
But it's gonna be the Kez instead
You think there's any different interactions between the two as we get into the later stages of the game?
Honestly, it's just very very strong and to go back to the blade mail part
Like winter wyvern makes blade mail a lot worse of an item because obviously if you jump the kez like later
If two colleges drops the cold and pray like the cold embrace, you know satanic isn't gonna be hitting into the axe
So we'll see what he's gonna do. Let's go out. He's gonna take the wave and farm the walls
Yeah, last game we start collapse on this hero. It was
He something to behold. Oh, yeah, I mean he just destroyed the entire game and that was against a last pick necrophos
Like that is not normal and look what he's doing right now because he's farming the side cat
He could actually steal the water room and you can tell that you just throw the tip up because of who does that?
No one does that. Yeah, that's true. We're not literally him. Yeah, nobody does that. Okay, as he all chance me moho dumb
Yeah, that's definitely English. Oh, yeah, definitely
That's uh, usually that comes out when the cats on your teeth. I think that might mean suck it. Oh, I see
It's collapsed gonna get gone on a bit by Satanic the battlehunter applies to him. No
Glass will be able to walk it off not me playing the rubic this time around. How good are his steels?
They're pretty good. Oh, let's see. They are decent. I think you're definitely looking most of us
I didn't think he was in trouble here, but Satanic, getting him onto the very low HP, he's going to get cold embraced now.
Back to respectable amount of HP, but the battle hunger and the right clicks kind of nullify a lot of that heal.
It's still quite good for a P-Vage here.
Lotus is up as collapse, he's just dead.
A heal?
Overplay for sure there.
Okay, Satanic gets first blood.
Meanwhile, a couple more kills happen in the bot side of the map.
Just supports fighting the dust is now Lotus versus Yatoro.
versus Yatoro?
It's definitely the type of lane where Yatoro is happy the longer this lane goes,
but Slardar Willow can definitely pressure early on, and they can win.
You can max out the stun, which is kind of what you want to do on the Slardar anyway.
I think Willow is quite good at trading. Obviously Phoenix is pretty strong, plus 5,
but there's some downtime you can play around when there's no illusions,
when there's no fires, whereas you'll be quite happy.
But yeah, I definitely do like the Winter Wyvern Kits combo.
We've talked about it a few times.
I mean I'm getting gone on this top lane very aggressive for p-vision looks like
he's just gonna die it will be to Satanic's right click a much better
start let's say than last time around satanic the maybe end of it was seven
last count I saw a camera at least seven maybe eight he did lose like more than
half his treads on the career that Philapse would get to kill so that
doesn't matter but I don't want to see what not me is gonna be able to cook up
cook up on the rubik you talked about the spell seals it's definitely more so
So the terrorize, the winter's curse, cold embrace I think as well, especially against
these heroes like the triple physical is what you want to be doing because Rubik to me has
looked quite atrocious in this tournament.
He's not as good as other fours, so you've got to have the correct steals and you need
to play very well.
And what kind of builds can we come to expect from your Toro?
It's still very, very similar, like when you play Naga you always, you have to go Mantis-style.
There's still a lot of people that go for the Orchid after, and I think it's just when
you think of itemization in general, or how the mid game is played, so Naga opens up the
map with Manta, you do it even more, then people need to split, then you get the Orchid
for your own mana region, but also to actually pressure on the map, which is very, very good.
And I think after that you can look for some different itemizations, I think Butterflies
is always very good.
Same with Heart, Scotty, later on you want a Bloodthorn to just completely decimate people
with your illusions.
I think the lapse after that death is back into the jungle and it will be a first item blade mail.
Mm-hmm.
Love to see it.
Nice collapse now, found by Ducalis.
Ducalis is taking a lot of damage. I mean, Mudgones are excellent for this.
He's going to get a courier as well and be able to walk away, although TP Ramble does hit with the Shadow Realm to follow as 9-class,
able to bring collapse down for the second time this game.
played by 9 plus there. Good read and also with the pre-shadow realm just to buff up
all this damage initially. As you can see, satanic did get his core so he's got the
treads unlocked, he's got the urn as well. This is what we saw pure do as well the other day.
It's just great early stats. You nearly always go for plays with this hero as well.
9 class back towards the mid side. There's a 6 minute power rune about to spawn to call us.
He's on by collapse now. As you can see, this washbook will need quite a bit of damage. It
and actually be able to get this kill on the Bucs to be close to get to the high ground, Laurel.
Maybe it will take out 9-class in turn as no one now completely surrounded,
although they're going to target Dukalis instead, as he will bite the Dust so too dead for P-Vision.
And even the Chicken Man coming to play, they'll get the kill on the Rue, but the question is at what cost?
The first rolling throw from no one puts K'Lat back onto the high ground,
and that's going to be not the greatest from P-Vision.
Really good overall rotation by Spirit, and again, these are the small things as Yathorok.
That's a fairfire available.
Oh boy, crush.
He does an attack, fairfire.
Lotus is not going to spawn on Yatori, desperately needed it, so notice.
Notice gets a solo kill onto the position one.
That's a big one.
I also think that's the type of play they need it, because earlier, you saw Collapse,
you know, he's respawning, he just TP's to the mid, and this is why it's important
that you look around, like what is actually happening.
You don't need to, you know, bring that TP into the top lane just because you're the
off-laner, looks around.
But in the meantime, P-Vision, double wisdom shrine by the looks of it.
Yeah, this is much better start for their game, and Collapse, the only level 4, is going to take a full Raptor dance from Satanic under the tier 2.
He will dodge one of the Echo slashes, and the Blood Grenade, it seems, to call us a little bit worse for wear, but here comes 9 Collapse out of nowhere.
Doesn't do that much damage at this stage of the game, so Collapse does survive, but again, these Wisdom Shrines, this is starting to stack up, start of a bad lane for Collapse.
And then again every time we say that he somehow finds a way back in the game
He knows what's up, but it's still very nice move from them
You know you get to invade into the wisdom shrine you steal half of a stack you make him go low HP and
Collects that we suffering when it comes to the level department not even level five yet
Where satanic is starting to push on to level seven being already level six and a half
Let me talk about rule. I mean Phoenix haven't seen Phoenix that much yet tournament
It's very good against the two supports, and also against the Sardar.
Yep, you call us. Gonna get bursted by Laurel. We're gonna see the first coil of the game.
There's a aim and a rune spawning, not me. Looks to be the sacrifice coming out from Team Spirit,
but the Illusion Orb is enough to outclass 9 class, and Laurel gets that Haste Runes,
and now he can play around with Satanic a bit. Get back to lane.
Laurel's just getting all the active runes. First the Amplify, now the Haste.
the two best runes we can kind of ask for,
at minute six and eight here,
we'll still continue pressure onto no one.
This is half a tower down at minute eight,
like this matters, like these early little chip downs
on the tower can definitely swing some of these matchups
because in the start, you're obviously not gonna commit
on a full HP tower, but 10 minute rune,
if you bring a couple heroes, you win a fight,
this half HP tower might just be gone.
Every time we pan over to collapse,
he's either getting pressured out or in the jungle.
A rough, rough start for him.
bottom net worth of the cores but I mean looking at just the net worth alone
though you can see no one is pretty far down there as well and it happens from
a lot of these mid moves right like the first time collapse goes there seals the
water room then he doesn't get the active rune on 6 he doesn't get the active rune on 8
but I've been very much liking how satanic is moving here in this early game
he's been made a couple of times he's invaded the wisdom shrine now he's going
into the off lane and this is very good and needed pressure into yatoro's naga here
Here's an awesome pressure to this Tier 1 bot, Satanic, and the rest of the...
Up P-Vision should be able to clean this up relatively easily, as Kez will be going for the Mage Slayer,
so I assume Pango will not. It'll be the Diffusal Pact.
Yeah, definitely. Diffusal will allow Pango to play around other things later,
and they see Lutney who's very deep here, as he is in the corner now.
Now, Swashbuckle mostly misses there, it looks like, attempting to TP, but the Rolling Thunder will cancel that immediately, so eventually they will kill him off.
I like that he cancels it, just to make sure that you don't bounce him onto the low or high ground towards the side there.
Ten minute rule, let's see if Laura can go 3-4-3 on this one.
I'm trying for it.
Let's not get it here.
Pressure up, I do call us now with that Arctic Burn, and the Blood Grenade really doing his job.
Laurel, we'll be able to eventually lose your orb into the tree line, Satanic, with Raven's Veil giving him vision and the kill.
What a bait from P vision, very nicely played.
Yeah, so this is one of the ones to call us up to, but he's just slowing him down, kind of baiting him to linger a little bit longer.
Then Laurel, of course, getting himself stuck in the trees. I do think he would have gone down anyway.
He's Satanic, who found a very nice route to connect onto it.
noticed on the slaughter second in net worth which for a slaughter I feel like
the early game can be a struggle at times because not exactly a great farmer
no it absolutely can but against this lane like Phoenix Naga not the strongest
lane doesn't have the most pressure doesn't really have like very high kill
capabilities it's more the type of lane where you want levels you want gold you
want to prolong the game and I think if you're noticed if you just pay attention
attention to where Lawn is on the map, you're not really dying.
Like, a Rubik isn't really going to gank you, Norse and Axe was being shut down, so it's
all about Lawn's early game with the coil here, so I expect Notice to have a very good
time.
Yeah, Notice only about 400 away from the Blink Dagger, and you can expect the aggression
to come.
It's going to align pretty nicely with the Diffusal Blade coming up in the pango, and
Satanic, I mean, I'm not sure if he's even wanting to participate in fights, but Kez
is definitely a hero that can do that, and he's going to have Mage Slayer as well.
You definitely can.
Like the type of hero you generally win your lane, which also means you can constantly push your lane
Which makes it easier to look to other sides
Maybe TP to the mid tier one go to most of these active runes
I do also wonder if he wants to go for a specific or different item build later
Like maybe if it turns into an incredible Naga game
Maybe there's some battle theory or me on your route later on or maybe you just commit to the desol
You know with your slaughter with your pango play on like speeding up the game taking faster rolls
She's taking faster towers. Are we seeing battle theory ever?
No, not really, but perhaps you know, maybe there's this type of hero, you know, Naga is a hero that drastically changes the game.
That's true.
So you might have to think about some itemization.
Mechanics, opening things up onto Laurel, collapse in the air.
Nice curse!
There's the curse, though, putting the puck in a precarious spot, and the last right click is enough.
As Ducalus claims the kill and now collapse on the run, and a stuck-in-no-man's land pops the blade mail.
As a cold embrace comes out from Ducalus, Satanic, looking to finish it, though, with the Echo Slash.
It's a nice call from collapse. He's not gonna have any backup. So the chicken man will claim him as no one finds a little juicy stack here
You can see it in both these games like when I your team has a small edge
Or they know like what they get away with they just fully execute
Satanic being one of the best cases. I am very impressed with his early game here. You're a keyboard
It's got some nice keycaps on there. I gotta be gotta be dripped out. That was a pudge head
And that's a dead Rubik, level 4.
Just like it, notice level 10 versus the 4, yeah.
One is greater than the other.
So showing off that blink dagger now.
They are keeping top.
In one minute you've got a Wisdom Shrine available.
Looks like North is it cancelled after all.
There's that Pudge again, Wisdom Shrine.
There's a...
That's Brodo.
That might be copyrighted there, it's all good.
And we'll keep showing it, it looks fancy, I like it.
I'm sure the orange one is.
I don't know what she is.
We'll get a full screen of that later, of course.
Of course, let's get a nice zoomed in picture at some point.
No one on the tier one mid.
There are some TPs coming in from Spirit, but...
it'd be tough to defend this.
It's gonna be a free tower.
Like, you've got the shield rune as well, and...
if you're P-Vision, you know that you are so far ahead currently in this early game,
and you're gonna want to keep up the pressure.
There's a naga on the enemy side, there's an axe on the enemy side.
These guys, they all need...
A lot of gold and a lot of time and it's not really changing anytime soon like the man to for Naga
It doesn't change the way the game is played
It's only gonna be collapsed this blink and then maybe later the orchid so for P vision good Lord
I looked at collapse. It's the blink is so far
Geez just a hundred away from that. So that's gonna put them on the okay the curse
It's a soul actually no it does connect with the why Vern
violence
The Satanic is coming in, but he's completely outnumbered. Might have bitten up a little bit too much to chew.
The Egg is placed as well. It's not a pangal on the run.
They're gonna get a nice call into the chop from Collapse.
Gonna try to turn this around onto the pangal as well as no one falls.
So somehow these are just gifted to Spirit. A little bit too greedy from P-Vision. And just like that, they're back in the game.
I don't know if the last minute could have been any worse.
Not just did they give up three kills while being ahead. They lost both wisdom shrines.
Like, Yatoro went aggressively with the song, stole that one, and they got their own one on top.
Rue was level 4 when we watched him a minute ago. He's level 7 now.
He actually has a daughter game to be played now.
Crazy.
Alright, let's look back at Collapsus. He's, oh yeah, a lot closer to that blink dagger now.
Yeah, it felt like they overstayed their welcome, and then this is the domino effect, right?
One person coming to help another, and then no one coming in to help say tannic.
Yeah, and it's like, everybody ends up paying the price.
Yes, you get the call, you get the dunk front collapse as well.
First one of the game for him.
It needs a little bit more of that as no one is not happy with the turn of the events.
I mean, they were in a pretty good position to kind of snowball this slowly in their favor,
but you see the Ravensdale stolen by not me.
Well, it's quite good on Rubik too.
He just uses it and runs the hell out of there.
Time to buy dust.
Now you do have the shard coming out pretty shortly, it actually already is online for
notice.
That's quite nice, of course, you know helping out, you start making sure you apply the corrosive
to everybody.
It's also nice against illusion heroes because it just means you can start with the blink
crush, they're gonna have to mantar, then when they walk away you can still apply the
actual corrosive phase on the real one.
So it's always been a big fan of this shard, it's also quite good for like his overall draft,
right?
because you're playing with the pango.
As you notice, we'll be opting for the BKB, no big surprise,
and after that is when it kind of opens up on what type of build you want to go for.
He's opting for the Lotus so far.
I do like it for now.
I would assume that also it has a lot to do with, like, first of all, Naga Siren, right?
The way Naga kills heroes later, and Snare or Kit, at least one of the two, sometimes both.
So, Lotus overall is quite good.
Well, maybe if some of the supports can buy it and you can skip yours,
could also be the type of game you know he's looking for. BKB, the Agatheum Scepter later
is quite good. Bonus armor, bonus status resistance, always very nice against these heroes.
What's that? It's a panic for now. He will just go for a Dispel of his own, honestly.
Yeah, so it doesn't look like he's itemizing for the Naga, at least not yet. And maybe
that's the play until she's a problem? Yeah, I honestly think that it's quite good this
way. Late game you're not going to get battle here, so it would have to be in the ulnar,
I assume. Because Radiance doesn't have the, I mean, nothing but it would go Radiance.
It doesn't work against illusions the same way it used to.
It's quite weak.
So there's just more playing around the fact that you just killed the rest.
And you can kind of ignore Naga I think for a long time.
It's more about can you survive for a map play?
And I think that's where the man that comes in, that's where the Lotus Orb will come in later.
So definitely don't mind this type of idea from P-Visioneer.
And that collapsed Blank Dagger online.
He is a hero all of a sudden.
One and three start for him.
And it's not me.
We'll be picked off quite easily from P-Vision.
And again, they're really invading this triangle over and over and over.
Hey, Arba, I'm looking to feel at the moment that they are happy.
Of course, they are ahead, like 1k gold, right?
Also soon after the room coming out on 18.
I wonder how they will look to speed up the game.
Like, there is definitely an easy road for them to take.
Obviously, they don't have the best, like, tower-taking capabilities,
but you could look to pressure out Spurt and Spurt are incredibly good at this situation.
Oh, they find the Rolling Thunder into the cross, Terrorize will miss the face shift in time,
but they have to bramble and Laurel not enough to get away, big kill for P-Vision.
No, they still got him, that's very nice he done, even if you know Slythe missed,
maybe misplay of the stun staggering there,
because you need to stop Spurt from being racks on these side lanes, you know that what they need is time.
Yeah, Yataro does get the Orc. I mean, when does this hero start becoming fearsome as we're going to see Jakalus get, well, not quite chopped?
Not a little bit unlucky. You would love to have the chop stack in this game. This bonus armor is ridiculous.
That's true.
Against the Dired Raph.
Is it third item for Naga when you start worrying?
Orc is like the first time that you need to actually pay attention to where she is.
I mean I guess Naga's game doesn't really change right you continuously play on map state and when people split
That's when you can be really aggressive teamfighting. He's never really that much up to you
So I think until he has like hard maybe butterfly. I don't think we'll see him all that much
And the orchid already
Optimizing for this. I mean kez eventually is gonna get he has the manta
Slarar will be getting bkb. Pango, that's the interesting one
Do you upgrade your diffuser a little bit earlier to get that to spell or do you itemize for something else like?
I mean we used to see Lotus back in the day, not nearly as much now.
Yeah, I think you still can...
Any type of Dispel is good.
Firstly, I wouldn't really mind if he can be either just because you're also playing against...
...like the Puck, so I have to see what he goes for later.
But I do think it's something that you don't need until, like, fourth item, maybe?
It seems for now he's queuing up the Aghanim's and honestly, I don't blame him.
I think he needs to deal with Naga aggressively, not defensively.
All right.
I forget who we were casting with the other day,
and so we're going to see Yatoro getting gone on.
Will be able to sing his song and TP out.
Would have been a huge kill for P-Vision.
Might have to settle for Rue instead.
Roussouke's will give all the vision they need.
Puffs the egg, but they should be able to get this quite easily.
But the axe call comes in from Collapse.
That's the last moment.
The egg does die, though.
And the raptor dance to follow means Collapse will fall
as well as not me, so a really good attempt, but ends up hurting them now even more than
just a simple Phoenix kill.
Who wasn't in the call other than the Winter Wyvern, because I thought it was only Dukalis
who could hit the egg.
I guess maybe Satanica and Adojof is either a quick rapper sense or a mantis style.
I don't blame Collapsier for this play in here, like going for the egg into the follow-up
stun because it looked like he could potentially have gone for a save here.
You see Collapsed coming on the left, he vanted it.
And he did not know he was there, so that is just really nicely played by Satanic.
I think that egg would pop. Like to Collars alone is not getting off like 4 hits on that egg during that time.
Yeah, that was super close.
Alright, Satanic in the zone.
Yeah, just needed a warm up game.
True. Instead of having 7 deaths, he has 7 kills.
That's right.
He split-flopped that one.
Somebody told him you should be getting more kills than deaths, and he's like, oh yeah, forgot about that, my bad.
about that, my bad?
Yep, that's definitely what Puppey said in between the game.
Have you tried killing them?
Very toxic.
Tier 2 Tower will be going for P-Vision.
And Butterfly looks to be on the menu for Static.
So against the Naga Siren, I mean, the Bloodthorn,
I assume, will come out at some point, though.
Definitely.
And that's also where it's going to be important
that the supports also look at a type of dispel.
Yeah, 9-class is doing up with ULTS.
I do think you want multiple notices later if you can.
That is how you destroy Naga. Naga never really wants to commit, it's always about the ensnare, the bloodthorne, the type of, you know, kiting and poking you.
So you do get the shard on the collies.
Farro? Farro?
You get to lose your orb on to three, but the coil to follow has to get out.
It's getting pursued though, they actually get the Corrosion Pace, so they have the vision now.
Now their loser orb, that should be enough of a gap to get away.
Yup, Puck doing Puck things.
We'll be a Parasma into an Octorine, so going for big ticket items on Laurel.
That's definitely what they need. We have seen Laurel pop up in a lot of games in this tournament.
I mean, I guess that's a good and cool thing about Team Spirit, right?
You can count on kind of all of them when needed to have one of those pop-up performances.
Collapse.
Almost having a game-changing call there just a few moments ago.
We'll be opting for the BKB.
It is quite difficult, he's actually queued up a ghost scepter after that interesting
Honestly, I don't mind it because it could turn into like these type of situations where you're kind of forced into a fight
And if you go scepter, you're not really dying to anyone
Like all these three cores aren't gonna be killing you until there's like a nullifier later. Only the bedlam is kind of a problem
Okay, will this be a free roge class? Where are you? It's rush time
They do see him on a ward forming in the jungle. So I think for now they can a seamstake
save. Hard rate at the study. I'll wait. I'll wait. You're hard way up, hard way going up.
Just kidding. We got it for free. Yeah, they'll get there in time.
And it's pure, or satanic, right there. Pure is here. Satanic.cure.
Now of course. We'll get the Aegis. He gave you a freebie out there.
Oh, Ramble actually canceling the TP and the Terrorize to follow Laurel.
Absolutely destroyed. They have been on top of him. Four deaths.
to the fuck's name.
I see that.
I do think that you can tell that
the top teams they know how to close out the map.
You have a gem that's been killed by Dukalis.
You have 3k gold as a hold up.
You're missing a 1.
And to the Orca, do they have enough damage to burn?
Hold the brace.
The rush comes out at the last moment
into the curse as well.
The counter-curse right on top of the Pangolier.
The song trying to get out for the PKPs
are mitigating all of this damage.
Oh, it's a gem.
Yotaro gets the song up just in time.
They kill off the pango and they get away with it.
There's a crush misses as well
So another TP out as Rune looking to find a kill at Ducalus
He just evaporated to the one right click
Actually, he nearly got him because he has the tripling crossbow and like all the damage coming out onto Ducalus
I can't believe that it was a one-for-one trade and not me gets out with stolen curse
Like I don't care that he doesn't die the fact is that he lives and keeps the curse for the next slide. Yeah
Yeah, not too shabby
I see a replay here.
And my class, apparently, okay, there we go.
No, this one.
Placing a nice war two, end up catching no one here.
You can see the power of the orchid, like if notice isn't this close, and they don't
get this counter play with a very good curse that was stolen here, and he barely got that
song off also.
And he actually dodged the shield crash with the Mantis style.
Look at this crush!
Yeah, that's as close as it gets.
Needs to get that chasm stone, I think.
Would I have that one?
I'm surprised we're not seeing more casual chasm stones for any hero with AoE.
I mean, it's just sometimes hard to slot in just because...
I mean, it's an item slot. That's one of the problems.
There was a while we saw it a lot unlike Snapfire early on as a support,
the support, which I think is quite good, obviously for the globs. It's like more when
you can build it into the bigger things later.
Yeah, I guess Collapses will be getting Sheeva's at some point in the game.
No, it's gonna be a necessity, I think, that you get it.
I mean, that's the worry I have for P-Vision, is that they're just very one-dimensional
in the damage department.
It is true, but it's also when you're overwhelming in that damage department, you can still, like,
you can cut through some of the rest, because it is a lot of Minus Armor. Like, it is Slardar
I'm Prango and I think also at some point as a collapse looking for a call
Like starter has one of these strongest 25 talents, you know, we don't need to talk about like it's still quite far away
But I'm dispellable corrosive haze generally anything a dota without counterplay. Hey, he does have curse
But he's gonna get blown up and that would have been a really good curse. This didn't have the vision so they delete it
no longer with that
Potentially game-changing ultimate steal. That's a good and quick kill
and they immediately also kill the Observer Ward that they just placed with this fresh gem
that Mr. Notice is currently running around with, which is going to be a secondary gem,
a secondary ward, so this is already...
Basically, you got half the gold back from the gem,
and if you look at Spurred's vision on the map now, there isn't a single Observer Ward.
It's all going to be...
You need to get the lanes out, you need to have illusions swarming,
and hope that you can place wards that aren't easy to find.
And Yatoro getting pretty close to...
I assume... Wait, what?
Did he not finish heart might be on the career. You might just have too much gold
He just buys seven items at the same time. He has oblivion step and blood bar in his backpack or his stash rather
So where's the recipe for the heart? Okay? Well either way, this is a shit ton of farm out of nowhere
He's got it on his courier. I guess he's just waiting for everything to the then come out at the same time
That's so yeah, he's basically getting a double item timing. That's the heart will have to say a lot of that
Yeah, that's the thing.
You can see it sometimes like Alchemist if he's Corridized, but not really on like normal
heroes.
Is he trying to hide it, and then when the Aegis expires they smoke and take a fight?
The 2000 IQ play.
Yeah.
I mean, how often are these players, like how fast are they clicking to see inventories?
You click all the time.
I think especially, like any type of downtime needs to be used to understand where enemy
heroes, what are they building, what are they buying.
Right.
Titanic only has 30 seconds on the Aegis, so we'll attempt to go for this Tier 2 tower as a BKB now online for collapse.
So in terms of the buildings, P-Vision still leaving a little bit to be desired with this Aegis.
Alright, do you think they got enough out of it?
I think they're fine that the game is, because they're progressing it in an okay manner.
You've got bottom tier to tower, and you are taking a lot of position away still.
The double item into smoke.
Well, that's that word I think did spot the smoke so P vision should know this
But this is still a very good move from spirit because you push in a lot of the ways you force in P vision to retreat to their own
Side of the map, so they are split at least for the time being you know
Even if the smoke doesn't hit it could give you some space push in some more lanes or get out some observer words for the secondary Roche
That's not me of course will be the one to throw out the observers and he's working on a ghost scepter as well
So might be saying multiples mm-hmm on the spirit side
Now counter smoke from pVision
No one leading the charge notice ready the pounce
On the first target you can see a toro and the rest of spirit kind of dodging this unknowingly
I'm sure they're aware that something is happening a
Little bit too quiet on the map right now, Rue. He's gonna pop the smoke as the egg red is gonna get crushed and destroyed
He's out of his fight already.
Now to get the counter initiation, collapse, already taking a ton of damage with Satanic.
With that BKB, needs another right click to finish it, but...
He's burning out.
He does burn out eventually to the damage over time from Satanic as notice gets the double kill, and that's three dead for Spirit.
P-Vision. Big, big fight for them. That opens things up a little bit more.
Honestly, this to call us into Wyvern is a big problem.
Even with a good call, like, I don't think to call us to spells made that big of a difference,
but it's just a threat. Like, where is the damage coming out from Spirit?
spirit if there's one cold embrace that collapsed nor yatora reeling dishing out any damage unless
there's a bloodthorn and even that you can dispel with a lotus orb there's you'll set there's
available like the college's links out it's just immediately fine do it just look at the call it's
honestly not that much damage there's too much team fight coming out from he was your right now
yeah he wasn't ready for that much damage coming out from the phoenix i mean if he could replay it
I'm sure he would egg right away. Yeah, and then the call to follow protects it and potentially they can turn the fight
But just over from the start for spirit
So like you're playing this into a double BKB at least currently and on it's like test is not bad at killing
Yeah, at all. He's really high attack speed especially with the butterfly BKB to boot
You have even more attack speed from the Lurikian champion. He's also gonna go for MKB like satanic is gonna start shredding people
Oh, he already is.
Yep, it's gonna be a lot worse.
That's Milifier's next on the list for notice.
He's 2k into it, so the Ghostseptors are gonna be countered completely when that comes through.
You can see another potential kill on it.
Okay, let's get the egg off this time though, and there, Laurel comes in with a nice coil onto 2,
but the egg does fall collapse.
I'm gonna get countered by the curse immediately as no one gets chopped eventually.
So they find the two kills, another chop for collapse and somehow they turn this around.
A spirit showing some signs of life.
How was this a 2 for 4?
So Tanya had an amplified damage but I think he went to kill the top tier two
not really expecting something to come out there.
As yeah, how does collapse keep pulling out like stupid numbers?
Just gets to barely live the blade mill, gets to chop some people in the head.
Not the type of fight I'm expecting P-Vision to lose there.
So, we're gonna replay here.
So, Egg comes out early this time.
Flaps is TP, but I think it's a long TP from him.
Yeah, imagine that Egg doesn't even go down there.
Very close.
And he's a Tannik, it's maybe a little close, so you can absolutely take that fight, but
Flaps goes ham.
Really nice telekinesis.
That's the shard showing the range, giving him that extra mobility to get that second chop.
When you go on people this close outside the base, you've got to be sure that that is a quick kill order you can disengage.
Colosson the tree line is trying to protect Satanic from potential danger.
Nothing imminent.
The other big part is too that you dropped the gem, like the reason why you could keep
up the map play all this time is that you're pushing in the lanes and they killed at least
three or four observer wards.
Now you're handing the gem to the Naga Siren team and you gave them a few kills.
Oh, no one.
The shield crashed back down, so he still does not have a dispel of any kind.
He has it soon.
Like you said earlier, he is looking at the disperser on the pango.
He's quite close to it.
Yeah, a lot of quality of life changes to that, being able to just use it on enemy and still dispels you.
Yeah.
Very nice.
MKB completed for Satanic, which means all the eyes are going to be on the secondary Roche,
which means also buybacks are going to be highly valuable and very much talked about here from both sides.
Collapse, I think, is ready this time for a flash defense.
He's got enough items. Could be a criminal once again.
She's now up. Notice it's gonna spot it.
And Naga can spot it anytime she wants.
Notice it's a little bit of vision here onto collapse.
So yeah, this second rush is gonna be pivotal for both sides.
The Spirit are very, very good at this. They understand.
Which team do you think needs it more, if that makes sense?
I believe it's more on P-Vision to get it.
I think there's a slight pressure building.
I don't think they feel bad by any means. They still feel great, but...
I'll say it's more up to them to make sure that they get the ages on their side
It is scary to go into that pit though with a wyvern
The curse is crazy, but then on the other side you have song you have egg you have coil a lot of a a leaf from spirit
Do college was growing perfectly on the map kind of understanding that's where it are the smoke. There's two ways that they can be going
Looks like also
Gatoros deciding to not go for the butterfly as there's already a completed MKB on satanic
We'll look to go for the disperser instead.
Who's the first team to get a pick off, or do they just straight up try to go for Roche?
I wonder if P-Vision will just wait for Roche to move to the bottom side.
Then if there's a teamfight there, you kind of have some of the buyback advantage, and you can set up the area first.
We're going to make it on the aggressive with the smoke now.
They are doing that, scanning the Roche, just to make sure that Spirit aren't sneaking it at the same time.
Spirit now with a countersmoke as they do the old clockwork roundabout with Laurel.
If you spot Laurel, just getting the smoke off of a couple of heroes.
As the Crush comes in from notice, they find a connection onto the pump.
Look at the damage! Just dead! Just like that Laurel.
80 seconds put in the pit collapse. He wants Roche.
Six seconds.
coming in from no the bkb pop from notice they really get to the pit and
now the song comes out he's gonna be outside the pit but say Tana kills off
Yatoro right away and now collapsed with the caulking he's still another agent
he gets it again how does he do it unbelievable he gets the battle he's
trying to finish the job the buyback came out from Laurel's down notice on the
run the vision trying to run away and his heads gets stunned up but he'll be
He uses ult down to get some HP back, but the counter-raster dance coming in from not me, doing massive damage and out of coil as well.
The chop number one from Collapse brings Satanic to his knees as no one called up.
Notice he's still there, Collapse is completely surrounded here, obviously having that Aegis.
And so you can be able to get that.
And Rue actually just dies on the sidelines to a random shield crash, and just like that, it's a full team-like with a spirit.
So they lost the Aegis in the end.
The fireback comes out from Laurel, it looks really good at first for Spirit, what happened?
They paid a huge, huge price, but I think the fact that Yatoro just died so early on in this fight,
they're just running out of juice eventually, like what is that, 48 damage on your Naga?
It was Ruu who's actually like just leading the charge there.
Oh my god, I didn't even notice.
You know, P-Mission just, like, they just got a very nice good initial go,
even with Collapse getting the Aegis again.
They just keep the fight going, like way too nicely, and I think this initial go on Laurel is very good.
Like, when you have this Roche standoff, it's a lot about this, like, midway, how can you control it?
And even with the song and, like, the sunray, it looks all fast, you're told, just...
He just melted!
Yeah.
How does Collapse do this?
I mean, it wasn't a snatch, so it's not gonna add to his stat, but this was effectively one.
What if there may be slightly faster on the curse, thereby, to Kallus?
But even so, what's a great fight for them?
With Nutney, stealing the curse, pushes himself out, very good telekinesis, and then also stealing the rapper dance.
But still didn't really change the outcome all that much, and it was a very costly fight for Spirit.
Sure, you got the Aegis, but you paid with six lives for this one and a Vibax?
Yeah. And the Aegis, technically.
Yeah.
Alright, that's what happens, I suppose, when you're in position one is not able to get anything off, really.
really he pops the song but the BKBs were still up and running so not having any effect
Little bit unlucky thing. I thought he was gonna get pushed outside the pit as collapse
He's gonna get first now
It's not me trying to steal something but it gets nullified and destroyed by noticed as collapse now
He pursued by Satanic with that Ravens valiantoral gonna get help with that coil on the other side
Just gets bursted by satanic that chicken man is out of control at this point
BKB's are down and out as Laurel in no man's land again does find a kill but now he's gonna pay the price
that's effectively a dieback for Laurel 90 seconds on the deck.
They don't lose a single core.
They're finding all the right moves at the moment and all the right connections in this game.
You lose your two supports but this is Laurel out again and it's not just a normal death.
It's a death where you know he doesn't have any Vivec available.
This is an 11k lead and I mean from the earlier play, you know, this is what spirit does
They take risky plays this time. It did absolutely not pay off on the Roche
Is your Toro trying to cut some waves but
Honestly, not really gonna do all that much top lane is pushing in satanic has a satanic to his name as well
This case is a major problem. Yes indeed and that's the hero I fear more than anything
Naga is just I find to be very annoying in games and you kind of pressure quite a bit as your Toro
and very soon face the wrath of the chicken man or only thunder coming in from no one as well
I will find a connection
What?
Titanic gets the tower will exit for the time being of course remember they don't have the Aegis
That song?
Oh look for an egg with a collar
Egg as well they're gonna try to time this correctly with a sunray to follow as collapses here as well
They get the stun from the egg
Where is the call exactly? We'd be able to purse down decals in the meantime the atorals out of mana though has to exit
If that's it, then Spirit not gonna be too happy.
Decent execution wasn't the best done onto Satanic, but of course you're kind of like forcing some of the back lines to come a bit closer.
Maybe Lucala's finding himself slightly out of position.
But P-Vision just unlocked one of the most OP Exodia talents on Slaughter here.
Undispellable now against this Radiant Draft Chord.
You've got decent armor coming your way, but if you have haze on you, Naga only has 10 armor.
If you get lucky shot, you're gonna start being literally around neutral.
Now I was wondering why Collapse wasn't offing for a Sheeva's but that's because
Lara has it already. I don't want to double up on that. So goes for the
Crella again as noticed. It's going to notice Collapse in the area. You can see
Rue easily rolled on by no one. They're gonna go for the support so the Rue
bit will bite the dust next. Just like that. No supports to work with for spirit.
No one's also doing a really good job at top of the world.
Gets nullified BKB from notice trying to finish a job before the song comes up
But it's down for 25 seconds. Anyway, just needs a bash. We can get through the evasion
There's the fashion to the swashbuckle another death for your total head buyback, but he has to use it at this point
It's gonna be a rough rough road
These are all just big moves and you can definitely tell that strength coming out from the P vision heroes here
It's very hard to deal with them. There's just a lack of damage overall from spirit. I also want to commend no one
and he's covering his ult very well, against not me.
He's trying to steal his ult, but he's always just roll-uping for like 0.1 seconds,
so you can never get the rolling thunder.
Radiant's middle tower is under attack. Radiant's curio has been killed.
Well, at least that means he can't use the roll-up in more meaningful situations.
Well, it's not really needed to do so.
Yeah, I guess so.
Seems a little bit too easy. All of these heroes are very difficult to kill.
Satanic on the buildings now. It's called up with Lord of the Fallen.
They actually have so much burst damage, he's getting super low, trying to go for Raptor Dance.
A decent amount of HP comes back to him, he's gonna turn the side stand with the Laurel,
who gets bashed up and killed off again, collapsed next on the list.
A good attempt from Spirit, but just too much to handle from P-Vision's side.
They had Yatoro available to buy back, but now he's gonna respawn naturally without two cores.
So you're just getting megaed now.
I don't know how you can hold, and I also don't know how Zatanic was able to live through it.
It's like one HP gets up this time and just feels nearly to full
I don't care that this is your portal. I don't know how he holds his 3v5 now
Not happening
They will get maggot, but again, we've seen spirit level up against me
It's before they they've done they've come back from worse situations
Sniff me a tough one and remember this is a very important game
Yeah, with his victory, P-Vision, if they're able to hold on, will secure first place in the groups.
Satanic working on the tier fours now, 40 seconds for Laurel, 30 for collapse.
And the rest of Spirit just wading it out in the fountain.
They start to bleed, and they get some pickoffs with notices blowing somebody up,
then they're not going to have a true 5v5 defense at any point the rest of the game.
There's so many ways for P-Vision to just protect each other. You have Lotus Orb, you have an A on this one, a Winter Wyvern, Cold Embrace. Here's the roll.
Linkunder again, just to buy some time here, your Toro does get off the song.
He does catch.
He can catch the Kez.
Linkunder again, no one.
As to the other side, if I'm the U-Want to collapse, as Ninclas will be isolated at the very least for Spirit, they get something, but not nearly enough.
Nancous kind of just giving his life to make sure that Collapse doesn't have a follow up there by canceling his blink
Should give them an absolute free disengage
And Raven fail there's the call from Collapse and he a lot more damage on target
But notice onto the back line looking for the supports as there's the curse to hold him in place satanic now getting all of his life back
Focusing on the egg. It's gonna be close. Oh, yeah
Delicious egg to be consumed for Ken satanic now on the outskirts of the fight as the rest just focus on Collapse
but Laurel is there, they're doing a ton of damage.
And the Atorio, that's the issue, is he just cannot stay alive.
They call GG despite the buybacks coming out.
And P-Vision, number one in the groups.
Yeah, these guys, they definitely leveled up in the second game.
I think from the laning at the start, with how they're moving around early jam,
you keep taking over like all this map.
And yeah, I think Spirit, looking for this last pick, Naga,
it was annoying, but I don't think it really did what they envisioned it to do.
And yeah, I think you just have P-Vision.
They stepped it up in this one and they looked extremely I mean it was very close to start the game and
I mean collapse had a rough rough start, but then as usual
Yeah, he finds a place to get back into the game
They take two roaches that they shouldn't really had or was it one?
I'm losing track of that. That's double ages, right?
I think so I feel like they did but either way it just wasn't up
He didn't have been on another level of everybody throughout this entire tournament thus far game one was the exception
But not the rule apparently.
I think it's just like this time around again, you have no one on a more playmaking type hero.
I think the Largo and the Night Soccer combo in Game 1 just didn't really work out.
But you can tell when this team has an early game aggression that is easy to play through,
I think people are the scariest team in the tournament.
Yeah, absolutely. And if Satanic doesn't have a start like he did in Game 1, where he ended the game with 7 plus deaths,
I say plus because we just genuinely don't remember anymore.
And there's no way for us to look it up. Maybe we can get out that Lenovo laptop and check it out.
I'll check out the Novo Legion.
And Satanic, he ends this game though.
16 and 2 just completely opens up with the Chicken Man.
I really like the itemization. I think the early Lotus Orb, I think notice as well, like 6-1 and 24.
I think he had perfect itemization, same with Satanic.
Probably the same can be said for most of them, which is just when you're in the zone and you understand what needs to be happening,
I think that's definitely what they're displaying here.
They did have one or two overplays, you know, classic team square, finding the type of ways
where they pressure you to maybe overstep a little bit, but apart from that, honestly,
quite quite clean display here. I have to say, though, even though
NotMe ends the game with 13 deaths, he had some great steals in this game that gave Spirit a shot.
But people were just more crisp, I feel like, as they've been throughout the tournament thus far.
This winter Wyvern is a problem. I think this hero needs to be respected a bit more,
And especially with the chicken man, like combo'ed up together,
like this cold embrace and all the curses,
it's just, even when they're not being used,
they're constantly a threat.
You need to play around it, you need to think about it,
you need to find smoke on the Serial and make it happen.
So yeah, I think, went to Wyrom.
Hero, we're gonna see quite a bit more.
Yeah, I would think so.
As we see the end stages of this game, or P-Vision,
we're just winning every single fight without putting out much of a sweat.
But they end the game with a pretty good performance from everybody, I would say.
And they end the groups as the number one.
And I think at the same time too, if you're Spirit, obviously you face up,
you did pretty well.
Like, 1-1, honestly, it's fine.
So I think Spirit will still see them in the playoffs.
Yeah, let's go to Slacks with an interview.
Absolutely, we are here with no one.
So good to see you again.
Congratulations on that match.
You guys only lost one single game in the entire groups.
Are you happy, or are you disappointed that Spirit was able to steal one game from you?
I feel like, for now, I'm disappointed.
Because, yeah, I wanted to play Largo, but we just lose two lanes so hard, so we cannot play Dota.
Ah, you had to be kind of serious, huh? Okay, fair enough, fair enough.
You have faced Team Spirit so many times. You must know this team so, so well by now.
Is there a specific strat where you're like, okay, we have to really focus on Collapse,
or do you just know them so well, you just play your own game?
Is it more about countering them or being you?
Yeah, it's all puppet job.
I really am.
Puppet decides what to do.
You're just puppets of the piping.
Damn, all right, all right.
Very on brand for Dota right now, very well.
So this is a pretty rare thing.
Most teams don't come into a big competition like EWC.
Everybody knows they're the team to beat.
Everyone knows they're so good.
Yet they do so good in groups.
What the hell is going on with the other teams?
Did you feel pressured in this groups?
Sir, are you just that far above everybody else?
No, to be honest, I think maybe we have the weakest group of all as well.
And this was the first time that we met in the groups.
That's how I felt, at least in the games.
Yeah, so the main series will be in playoff right now.
OK, OK, so you're expecting things to get a little tougher.
Now that you're out of this room, maybe face off against some people.
Who do you think is the best team besides you guys right now at this event?
I think all eight top teams can win this tournament, to be honest.
who will go to the playoffs.
So there is no only one.
It depends on the day, on the draft, on the feelings of the players.
I think Yandex can do it, Falitons, Wii, Spirit.
Because I know I'm sure these guys will get through as well.
One win as well is super strong.
I like what you did there. There's no only one. I like that.
That very good, very good.
Alright, well, thank you for an incredible series.
It was a pleasure watching you guys play.
Last, please give it up for P-Vision one more time.
For a...
I don't know what that meant, but thank you very much.
Alright, let's go ahead and check out how that game was for the panel as we get ready for our next.
Thank you very much.
Thanks a lot to break down here with this game too.
We ended the draft talking a lot about what Naga Siren should be doing,
or rather what she was working towards to be able to become the unstoppable force
that we sometimes see Naga Siren's get to.
We did not see her become that unstoppable for us Brian. Yeah, the thing about Naga that's different than most of these
map playing carries like terror blade or Phantom Lancer is that
She doesn't really carry the game later on the way that Naga wins is through the map control aspect of things and I mentioned
When the draft came out like I'm looking at level five power trades Naga because that's when she
Created she starts the snowball because the snowball for Naga is that you always have the lanes pushed into you
You're always playing with less information. You're scared of the Mantle Orchid timing. You don't have your dispels yet
But instead notice actually gets a solo kill on him on Yachtaro at level five at that point
And suddenly you're losing your tower kids hits as Mantle before that and the game just looks completely different
I feel like Naga's formula does require her to get off to a good start
Yeah, you mentioned that Naga does feel like a weaker laning hero enough
She's been nerfed in the laning stage friend
but typically you look at Naga plus Phoenix versus Florida
and you don't think that's the lane they would struggle in,
but they did and Naga losing that side lane,
whereas we saw how the off lane was targeted
within the draft stage from P-Vision,
that one was expected to lose.
Suddenly you're playing a lane down on a last pick
that you thought would give you a lane up.
Yeah, I think this also speaks to why they picked Kes
where they did,
because I think Team Spirit purposely picked Axe early
in the draft saying,
don't we're kind of block picking your case it does feel like there's just these carries right now in the
meta the drowsy sf's that are getting banned the loan jerits but a lot of carries right now there the
reason why we haven't seen naga siren is because there every hero has like a win condition a situation
that they thrive and i know on paper i literally learned this lesson myself like a few weeks ago
and i was hoping that yatra was going to show me how to do it like yaga just feels like a really weak
laner right now and they have targeted that with her nerfs. And when a hero's formula is,
like, you, I think this is about as good of a lane as Naga can ask for. You have a solid
heal support that will help you trade. You're against no tower push, no illusion clear,
and yet you're still losing. So for me, I really think this should be a lesson,
or it can be a signal to everybody that I think Naga's might be one of the few heroes that it's
hard to say in Dota, but unpickable or not. Yeah, definitely didn't look great in this
scenario, and I believe we'll see it in action another time, but it definitely did not work
out. I want to also point out that the 18th pick that we talked about for PV was the Slardar,
was their most important pick, and we saw noticed on this Slardar pop off, I think.
Yeah, he always delivers from his item builds to his gameplay. I mean, there was one small moment
that I don't even know if it was intentional, but Team Spirit were gearing up for his smoke,
and he was standing on the high ground and he just breaks the smoke as it all finds Larder
and then goes back to farming. It's little things like that that really add up and
this Larder winning the lane just made the game so different for them. I do feel like a different
game could exist. And Peter's a fantastic job in this game too. They've shown us that when their
drafts aren't one note that they just look like such a monstrous team. And I do want to shout out
how well they played around Laurel's puck too.
There were a couple of times where they just chased that puck down
and killed him in that early game.
There were also moments where Laurel was trying to play them up
and he would get clipped by a brown bull into having his TP terrorized.
It's things like that that really add up and all of a sudden your puck,
you needed him for the map play. Can't provide.
Yeah, I think puck still at a sup 30% win rate.
My camp people make puck work.
I'm a firm disbeliever in this.
It's like the third fourth pick of the draft on your side and then the enemy team has a response pick
I just feel like puck is we're learning where it's like easy to say in hindsight, right?
But we're learning that puck seems punishable whether that's because you
Shot down the puck specifically or you just pick these kind of greedy or mid laner
It's not like pangos are horrible later or anything
But I feel like every laner that plays against puck is just getting off to a really good start and teams are realizing
Let's not try to beat the puck
Let's just play for our own tempo and then we're seeing like I don't even think of willow as a hero to catch puff
But nine class yet a couple sick TP moves that game mirror was mentioning where he cancels a puck TP like kills collapse when claps is level five
These type of plays just blow them up wide open and then it feels like pucks playing this
Annoying split push game and you kind of to what end is the question?
Yeah, I kind of needed to be Naga on the side of team
Spirit that needed to play the annoying split push game, but needed to do so successfully
It didn't really work out that way. I believe Brian you're going to showcase exactly why and how important it is to have those fights go
Well, yeah, so I had a couple clips
They actually show the dynamic of this sort of draft
So if we look at this first one and we zoom in on the map
We see that Slardar is showing himself in the bottom lane there
And that means that when team spirit sees their triangles getting invaded
They're gonna protect their ward and they're going to play around whatever, you know fight
They could take where they have the numbers advantage
So they go on to call us here on the Wyvern and then even though he ends up getting cursed on the puck
There's just not that extra follow-up from that early Blake Sardar and team spirits one of those teams that every time you give them this opening
They're going to take it really nice egg placements collapse doing the you know poor man's acts walk into call there
And this goes their way of the team spirit now if you take the next clip where if we look at the map this time
We see that team spirit is the ones that are completely separate on that
We have Rubik here. We have Puck on top. So now
P-Vision is the one that feels very confident to simply run at Team Spirit in the lanes that they are showing.
They force the song first. They're gonna continue pursuing and Team Spirit gets a little bit of Savior Buddy syndrome here
But it just feels like when you're playing like they even the game on Team Spirit
You notice how they're actually slightly down on P-Vision right now. Sick man to die by Satanic by the way
But when you have all your numbers it goes well
And when we see these types of drafts like this is what team spirit's gonna force you to do over and over again
Cuz we go to the next clip. It's the same story
We see that kez is actually going to be top without like he's not with his team on
Satanic and even though you don't have a naga sign
It just shows that even when you're down AK
Even when like your carry is literally dead if they don't have the numbers and you manage to get the combos
Like you can win fight at any given moment and this for me
He just kind of tips my hat to P-Vision with there are so many ways to mess up this game.
I feel like a lot of teams would end up letting Team Spirit back into the game with these crazy
wonky map movements.
And you just see like you're bound to have these one or two slip-ups.
You're even going to get the Team Spirit Aegis steal that seems to happen every single game
for some reason.
P-Vision is on top for a reason.
Yeah, they are on top.
And the man that we had the interview with earlier is maybe even a step above the rest.
is no one with the MVP for this series, Effie, well deserved on his Pangolier here in game
two, of course also playing an okay Largo in game one.
Yeah, I mean he said it in the interview, it's like I really wanted to play Largo and
I wanted to make it work and I hope that they don't bench it forever, that maybe it will
change a thing or two so that we can see it again because it is a very cool flex and
other teams have shown us that it works, but no one on his Pango, like what more is there
to save off this guy. He was in a situation where he could have gone for the Sword Armored,
which is more comfortable against the Puck even, but he goes for his Pango anyway.
We saw the difference being night and day when he can stop the tempo for his team,
be the one controlling the background, the one going in.
Man, this looked like a miserable axe game. I think for no one, he was the catalyst for pretty
much all these plays that we're watching. That's just what Pangolier does. He's so disruptive
as a hero, and they didn't really have damage answers for him in this game, so he had pretty much free reign
driving the wheel, one might say, and even outside of his Ulta, he's got the disperser. I really like the atomization from all of
P-Vision here, the Naga Net
Bloodthorn combo, that is the way they're going to kill you, that's their main source of damage, and they have like a disperser, a lotus,
you know, Mantis, Satanic, on Satanic, and then they don't even have the Wyverns pull embrace, so all these fights, it's
Yes, they're pushing their buttons amazingly, but it's just so important to note that all these little items add up so fast
Yeah, that also just takes me back to the draft
We've praised p-visions drafting over and over, but I think they did two things that were really
Stand out to me in their draft phase, which is they layered the wyvern with the kez
Which is not something I think of as a cover hero
But it does cover most of Kez's counters and it shut down the offline at the same time
Well, targeting, not me as heropool, at the start, they ban the hoodwink, they take the dark willow, every draft, it seems like Poppy identifies one player that he wants to kind of make the weak link through the draft, and this time around it was the position 4, and we saw the difference in that game 1 and game 2, just the difference of having the willow versus the rubik.
We have now got our top spots locked in here for Group C. We already knew that Group C was not going to have any tiebreakers, no fancy shenanigans, but we also knew that if Spirit couldn't 2-0 P-Vision, it would be P-Vision at the top of the group and they didn't get to keep their clean record, did drop a game.
but they do get to keep their top spots and therefore secure top 8.
Not all games are done yet in this group.
There's still a mouse versus Vici going on on the B stage as well, but it's set.
We know what's happening. Also, mouse versus Vici, yes, they are fighting for third, fourth place potentially if Vici can 2-0.
But to be honest, I don't know who's ahead right now, and if you know Dota then anything can still happen.
we can take a look at the schedule of today as we did get our first series done. It was a tie.
Wonderful scene. Now keep in mind if our next series is a tie 1W and Team Yandex they will play
again because both of these teams are sitting at a 7 and 1 and that's very good but that's we
We need one to rise above the other, and, you know, a tie wouldn't cut it, Ryan.
Yeah, it's effectively a best of five that you can skunk them in two games.
You can what?
It's like a ping-pong term, sure.
But basically, it's a best of five that you can win if you win 2-0.
That's basically what we're dealing with with the 1W and team.
Yeah, next game, for me, these two teams, I'm very excited to watch them play as well,
because they're a very different type of skill than what we just watched.
watch. PVision is a lot about the lanes and the momentum from there. Team Spirit is much
more about the team fights and the Tombax. For me, I feel like Yandex and 1W, we're going
to see a farming game, farming efficiency, a lot of GPU.
Exciting.
I love it.
Well, I am looking forward to it. This is already a grand, we just witnessed the potential
grand finals and we're going to witness another one a little bit. For 1W and Yandex, we're
also going to find out how our commentary duo feels about them.
An embodied was built to move.
Not trapped at the desk in one single posture for 12 hours a day.
It's time your chair evolved.
This is Secret Lab Titan Evil.
Ergonomically engineered for you.
Gamers.
Hybrid workers.
Artists.
Backing every move.
Hi there, SunSan here with Kazoo. We have won W versus Yandex. The lights are bright
for us here and also for the game. You're probably seeing this in-between game number
one and two and there's been a lot of positive. I would just assume because 33 is in this
series and if the lights are even on a little bit, it will be paused. It will be paused
his very sensitive constitution of his eyeballs.
So back to the series, what do you think?
It was a great intro, 40 seconds of lights and one player.
I'll bring it back to you.
So 1W and Yandex.
Honestly, I don't even know who's favorite.
Yandex are really good as are 1W.
And this, like in the other one,
I would have favored like P-Vision overall.
But in this one, honestly, I have no idea.
All right, all depends on the lights.
See you guys.
All right, time for more trivia.
I've got Mao, stuff that Panto as well as Chrysalis joining me.
One W team, gotta get used to that.
We've got Ari and BZM.
And we have both Collapse and Rue here
to talk about some of the past.
Do you guys remember last year's EWC?
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I feel like it should be.
You had memorable since you guys wanted everything.
First question is, what was the most picked hero
of the eSports World Cup 2025.
No.
Anything?
Maybe Tim?
Was it a drink?
Trayvon's Pixel?
Or was it 12?
Zane?
Lion?
No.
Maybe.
No, might be more in Ru's category.
It's a support hero.
Shadow Shaman.
That's right. Shadow Shaman.
He remembers.
He remembers.
Shado Shaman 39 picks.
That was with the broken...
The second one was that.
However.
This next question, we're asking all the players,
and they might get it right, they might get it wrong.
I expect you guys to get it right, because the question is,
how many total matches did Team Spirit lose in EWC 2025?
One.
The groups...
I have no idea, so I'm gonna say two.
One.
That is correct.
Oh shit, I was gonna go like one, two, three, four, and have them be like wrong but I just
got it.
You just thought that was right.
Four accidents.
I'm a jigger now.
I'm a jinger.
We were playing with six of them, yeah.
I don't remember.
I thought they lost the game.
No, no, no.
They almost lost the game.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, they should have lost the game.
Yeah, they should have lost the game.
And then it went to 69 minutes game and 10 minutes of choking.
That's the one I don't remember.
Yeah, and then they got two.
That's a hostile interpreter.
What was the Shopify Rebellion roster of EWC 2025?
Hellscream, Kimada, Scam.
That's right, it was Scam.
Oh, wait. This roster.
Scam, why?
Scam was Hellscream?
Yopash?
Yopash, maybe.
Oh, I remember now.
Yopash?
What's it called, Yopah?
Yes.
Yes, it was.
The Vailama?
Inhuman?
Saberlight.
Oh, glass.
Amar.
Oh, no, Saberlight.
Go through all the off-laners, Shopify, Rebellion had.
He is now on MiGmaGalaxy.
Uh, Vailama.
Vailama.
The Vailama?
Yeah.
Vailama.
Yep.
Tomato, Yopah, Sabailama, Hellscream, and Scam.
What the f**k?
You said it, not me.
I didn't say that.
All right, what player?
This question always makes me laugh.
What player had the best KDA ratio at EWC 2025?
Uthoril.
It's not Uthoril.
Ammar.
No.
Eiffel.
That's a good guess, but not quite.
Probably, you know, a lot on Uthoril.
Maybe Phillips.
No, no, no, no, no.
Not us?
No.
Not from our team, right?
I'm not from your team, you're correct.
Bro, I think it's GPK.
Yep. GPK.
It's always has to be GPK.
Of course, of course.
Even though he's like, moving tournament,
he's gonna be like, top one.
Of course, that's what he does.
GPK.
Really?
Yep.
He had a KDA of 10.43.
GPK?
That's right.
I thought it was GPK.
I thought it was GPK.
Could you watch EWC 2024?
Not sure.
Alright, so you have to carry this question.
Yeah, but...
What was the most banned hero in EWC 2024?
Sand King.
No...
Was it?
I remember we banned Sand King, like, all games.
Yeah.
And one game we didn't ban.
We got smashed.
And kicked out of the parliament.
I guess other teams felt differently about it.
Two years ago.
24.
Okay, we played that together.
We played it 24.
We played that one together.
The most banned hero?
Oh, that's close, close. Not quite, not quite.
Chrisless. Monkey King.
Ah, Monkey King, you get it right.
Well done.
Let's keep playing.
Yeah.
Monkey King.
Yeah.
Do you remember that?
Why though?
It's because of the genkiyo.
It's a good style, I don't know.
I'm not sure.
It had 174 bands.
We're done.
Thanks for watching, I guess.
I don't know how they're going to post this now.
Ha ha ha!
Whistling
Can we get going? I've got to get to the Dota tournament before it's over.
Dude, it's only the end of week one.
Oh, okay.
Okay.
Either way, I will need paid for this, I don't work for free.
I don't have regular money, but I do have this.
Okay, let's go.
You are watching Dota 2 Live from Paris here at the Esports World Cup, and we're getting
ready for potentially the final game of the day, depending on how they do it, and depending
on how others will have tiebreakers today, potentially.
We're talking a lot about a series that is also potentially also at Grand finals.
I know a lot of potential in this one.
We got 1W and Team Yandex going head to head, an absolute blockbuster.
It's a two game series, and I got two people here to talk about it.
I got FE, I got PSJA.
I think this is the best series of the day.
I wanted to be at the Sony series of the day.
You went for the other one, but this is mine.
I beat Ojiishir as what we're going to see in this game is a lot of GPM and a lot of farming,
but in two different ways actually,
because GNDex has had one of the,
if not the lowest average game time,
they get off to an early lead and they,
if they have that lead,
they will run at you nonstop
and close out the game in about 30 minutes.
While on the other hand, if 1W has the lead,
you feel like you're in that movie
where the room is collapsing on you
and eventually you will get squashed,
but you have to wait for your inevitable death.
And today I hope to see the former
because that's more exciting.
So that would mean 1W maybe falls behind a little bit early
and maybe stalls the game out for 60 minutes, Mira.
What are you hoping for?
I would agree with that mission.
I mean, I feel like it would be doing it to service team
Yandex to call them a GPM team.
They're very much a fun team to watch.
Like they do like to run at enemies.
They do have interesting picks.
And while they do a lot of map efficiency plays,
they tend to group up more and hit earlier timing.
So as a spectator, I would obviously like the former,
as you mentioned, but 1W are a rough team to go up against and do that.
1W have really stood out to me in this tournament on one thing in particular, is that they are
excellent at staggering fights and making sure they are never taking a fight as 5 against the enemy 5.
They've just been constantly making sure there's a dead hero on the map before they make any plays
and maybe that's why their games go a little bit longer.
Yeah, and we saw in the groups that 7 and 1 is looking nice at the top and we'll know that one of
of these will go to the first place and one of these will go to the second place but you
also saw the bottom half of that group. We don't know yet who is going to get eliminated
in that bottom there so that is going to be a very, very spooky. We're focusing our attention
on 1W first and that's with us taking a look at how they got here to begin with.
His current version of 1W team was created when they picked up the former Tundra roster
of Pure, BCM, 33, Ari, and White Mott.
The roster is one that should be familiar to any Dota fan out there.
And they are definitely no strangers to winning.
Their road to EWC was done under the name of Tundra.
Regardless, it was as expected, very smooth and painless.
The first place finishes at DreamLeague Season 28,
as well as ESL One Birmingham 2026.
One W team earned their first place at the EPT leaderboard
and a direct invite to the Esports World Cup 2026.
With all this being said, you might think 1W is by far the best team in the world.
It kills the Shattered even, kills Triple S, that's a dieback for him, leaving no one for last.
All par vision will fall.
They certainly were one of the best teams in the world, and perhaps they still are.
But the last few months has been a bit of a reality check for the team,
with several disappointing results.
Time will tell if 1W team will be able to step back up to their former glory.
Here at the Esports World Cups 2026.
I feel like time has told already by now that 1W is back to where they were.
At least they're making a strong case for themselves.
They've got four titles in this season.
Four number one finishes.
That's amazing.
Yandex has got three.
They're right in their heels.
They won the most recent tournament.
They're doing super well for themselves as well.
And I do want to focus a little bit on maybe a little rivalry here if we got 33 versus Soxa.
Yeah, this was the former All Flay and Duo that crushed everybody being split into two.
Probably due to maybe difference in ideas. That's usually why All Flay and Duo's center break.
And while Soxa did bring a lot of that former Tundra energy to his team,
I would associate him with more active play than 33.
My, so Asakus plays the map macro wise as well, but I'll never get this out of my head.
There was one game that they were winning and he was Nature's Prophet support and he
TP'd on an Alchemist who was farming a camp next to his own tier 3 tower at 12 minutes
into the game and then denied creeps in front of his face.
Like it wasn't a TP gank, it was just TP and deny his creeps.
And for me that was one of the most, you know, signature plays that a team like this makes
because they are super aggressive, whether it is by killing you or whether it is by invading your farm.
And when it comes to this matchup between the two teams, I'm actually looking a lot at Pure,
because I think he is going to allow 1W to get out on the map,
and I think that he's up against a very scary lane duo between DM and Soxa.
And for me, when Pure is having a rough game, that is the most...
For me, Piers' performance is the most telltale of how 1W is different.
I agree with that entirely. Not just from the team dynamic being that way, even before the patch,
but in this patch, it is the safe lane bully patch.
And you need your safe lane to come out on top.
If at any point they are in, it feels very, very difficult to play the game.
And there are a couple of moments this tournament that come to mind.
And like there was a moment where 1W drafted a mid-nature's profit for BZM and they have
Pyrrha and his guys.
And Pyrrha was playing more like the two.
He was going in first, tanking a lot of spells, dying in some of these fights, but BZM just
carried the game all the way to the late game.
And I think that dynamic can be replicated also for 33.
If 33 has a more difficult game, Pyrrha can be the one making space for him to make a
comeback.
Yeah, I want to focus a little bit on the most veteran player, one of the 10 players
we'll have on stage.
I'm talking about Saqsa and also Purge is talking to Saqsa.
Hey, I'm here with Saqsa from TME and X.
You guys have been playing great so far this tournament.
How are you feeling as a whole skill-wise?
I think skill-wise we feel great.
We feel in good shape.
Just I think some of our players have been sick.
So that's kind of like the only part that's kind of holding us back a bit.
But overall we feel pretty good about our gameplay.
That's great.
I'm curious how much your guys' strategy has changed
from the start of the tournament until now.
I know there's not that many games being played,
but do you feel like you came into this tournament
knowing what the meta is,
or is it changed based on games so far?
I think it hasn't really changed that much.
I think the heroes we still value
that are still kind of the same.
The only differences, I guess,
we try to break some of the Inba heroes,
like London Red, for example,
we played in the last series two games.
So I think just our priorities
in what heroes you want to play against has changed a bit.
So I feel like in some past tournaments,
You've been a part of some teams that did break metas in terms of like itemization, like Wraith Pact is an obvious one or
There was that one tournament you bought solo crest a ton in your pubs right before they happened
Is is that kind of development still happening often in dota 2 tournaments or is it very like patch dependent?
I think yeah, it happens definitely. I think
Are there any outliers right now that you can think of?
Hmm
Maybe essence of the solar is a big one. I think this item is kind of should be bought almost every game because just the division it gives
Other than that, I'm not really sure.
Yeah, I can't really recommend it.
I start with that item personally because I don't necessarily know when I need to use
it.
I mean, there's obvious reasons.
This guy's invisible or whatever.
But to use it a lot to like this, they might be here.
I need to make sure they're not here before I go up a cliff type thing or is it more like
teamfight initiating?
Like, what's the best way to use it in your opinion?
I think, I mean, just to catch somebody is the best one usually.
I think also if you're doing like, let's say you're doing an objective like Roche and
you're doing Roche and you want to, you can just put this thing on the stairs.
and they have to pass through it, and it's going to give so much vision.
I think there's many different ways to use it, and I think it's almost always going to be useful.
If somebody smoked and you hit them with us in the system, do you just get vision of them or do you get some of their team?
I think you get the vision of the area, and you get vision of the hero a little bit.
It's like you still smoke, you don't actually see him.
It's like charging an invisible hero, kind of?
Yeah.
Okay, gotcha.
How do you expect to do in this upcoming match? 1W is who you're playing against, it's the best other team in your group.
Do you think you're going to beat them?
I mean, I think they're a tough opponent, I don't know, maybe 1-1 and we play at Abreaker again after.
Okay, well, we'll see how that goes. Good luck in your match, thanks for joining me.
Thank you.
That wouldn't be the worst scenario in my case. I love Saxa and hearing him talk about how he intends to or how he tries to break the game
and find the little ways that you can abuse items or find items that should be used more.
F.E., anything in particular that you've seen from him this tournament that Saxa has been on top of?
I think, for me, when I think about Soxa, I think about how he's enabling his team for
success in the first 10 minutes.
I know we're talking about items, but for me, I think more about heroes and what heroes
is going to get his hands on.
Because if he gets that Keeper of the Light, it feels like such a wall for the enemy team
to climb, Brian, because he's stacking that triangle.
He's moving at the correct times, and he just opens up for so many combinations with his
midlaner.
I mean, I like Soxa so much because I mentioned that in the game where he TP'd in and died
creeps.
like earned silver edge like that was his build as support nature's profit so he's he's one of the
few players i've seen from the support role that's really experimenting with the items that he's buying
yeah he says go for the essence to silver every single game or whatever but i don't think i've
ever seen silver edge rush on a support in in my recent memory there's only the only shadow demon
i think i've played at least you so far let's still see something in the here maybe we'll see
it come out here i want to talk about their kryptonite because both of these teams only
you drop the one game, both these teams drop that one game to OG, which is a team that
a city have 404, so it's not like, oh, that's the other, you know, super high expected to
do well team. It is a team that we expect generally to be in the middle of the back.
How were they able to take games off of these giants?
I mean, OG for me, at least is one of the highest absolute value between their skill
floor and skill ceiling. Like on their best days, they, we've seen them make it foreign
tournaments and then on their worst days they drop out in the bottom four so I
think largely for OG it's just they have that skill factor and sometimes it's
that consistency with their drafts but I think there's a reason that they took
games off these teams because they've often gone 2-1 or 1-2 in best of threes
in these tournaments because they're a team that's hard to beat twice in a row.
But it's also noted that the games that these two teams dropped to OG, they were late game games.
They went very long and very far and I think Yandex in particular, it's funny to say this
because it's not like they're drafting the full lineups, but they're ending in 30 minutes
and they don't have a lot of experience at EWC going into about 50 plus minute territory
and teams like OG, they thrive and that carries.
So what are we going to focus on for this giant match we got coming on?
Is there a particular lane we have in mind that we're going to look at?
Is there a particular heroes that we're going to be wary of?
heard socks that talk about, you know, they have tried to let Lone Druid through. Three
times in a row they beat it, Effie. You talked about it yesterday. Do you think they're gonna
do it again against a team like 1W? Could be risky.
Yeah, I think Yandex are not afraid of Lone Druid. They've solved it. They've eaten it like four
times in a row now and they're okay to let it through. For this series in particular, I think
these mid support flexes that are in the story of the tournament are still the story of the series.
We have to look at that Earth Spirit. We have to look at Keeper of the Light and Snapfire in
in particular.
I think they might ban Lone Druid today because I know DM in his interview said that he specifically
believed LGD was a weak Lone Druid team.
So perhaps it's something like we know how to break these heroes if you're not like a
master of it.
One thing I really like about how they broke in the meta is first off DM is one of the
most signature enigma players in the world.
There's a hero that's been propping up against a Lone Druid.
It's a really strong offlaner in general.
But also Phantom Lancer, I was really surprised to see not many other teams picking Phantom Lancer.
They've used it a couple of times, success on Watson, really good against all the range carries right now.
So I think they're one of the few teams that I would feel really confident.
They don't have to pick the broken early carry for Watson, that he has these like situational picks
and he understands these matchups as they scale really well.
Yeah, and you mentioned the Enigma. I think a lot of teams have been banning out the Enigma against Yandex in the first phase.
That generally means that there's a lot of heroes left in the pool that we normally don't get to see.
Are there any more of those heroes that we feel like they should be banned that are not normally banned like the Enigma that comes to mind?
I would ban The Nature's Prophet if I'm not.
Hmm, I'm not gonna think about both teams use this hero.
So, a lot of times you ban the hero that you feel that the other team utilizes better than you do, so I guess my eyes are on Nature's Prophet this series.
We're gonna find out what's gonna happen.
both these two teams very familiar with facing each other,
even facing each other in the best of five Grand Finals.
The ESL and Birmingham, it has mostly been 1W
that comes out ahead.
Will today be the same?
We are gonna find out, but to find out,
we need to head over to the stage to get the players on.
Welcome back, my friends, to the Lenovo Legion Gauntlet.
We're back in!
And game number one was already great
to set the stage for today,
where each one of our two teams,
And the game that they won, absolutely smashed it.
Absolutely, man.
That was what we came here to see.
Two talented teams that have faced each other a billion times,
absolutely dominating in the game they won.
It's like the one that you didn't see.
Maybe you thought that other team was bad.
But every game is different and though to me, though,
absolutely couldn't have said it better myself.
But our next group, where we're going to move on to group D,
it's been called the group of death.
Three teams that are fighting for two spots.
We got two teams at the top, fighting for the number one position, and guess what, Slacks?
Come on, they're up next.
Oh, here we go.
All right, all right, are we ready to welcome them in?
Let's do it.
All right, headed up, my friend.
Let's bring them on.
Our first team to the stage, 1W.
Well, it's 1W, but they got seven wins here.
So according to the singular game loss, the win train does not seem to be stopping any time soon.
They set expectations high, last CWC when you knew them.
That's Tundra, but the game might have changed.
However, Ice Cold and their vans
has we've seen in every game so far.
This is the one they've been waiting for,
the entire group stage.
These guys don't take breaks.
These guys don't ever take a breath.
Yeah, sure, you know, last season we saw what happened,
but they're back again.
This team is back to their full strike.
So let's spray out some heck of an opponent for them.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's Yandex!
Now you might recognize some of these Yandex guys.
In fact, Soxa used to be on Tundra
back when they were here at EWC.
New team, new time, same revenge.
I know that guy and he's petty as hell.
He wants to come in here and absolutely destroy them
at EWC, but no, as Tundra may have fallen off
a little bit later in the season,
there was a team that picked up all that slack
and you're looking at him.
So, two iconic teams from the last year
gonna go head to head at what is sure to be
an incredible battle.
I'm telling you, this might be a preview of the final.
Don't you put that on them.
Don't you put that on them.
Preview of the final?
I believe that could actually happen.
All right, Domen, are you ready to put your keys away?
Absolutely, please, keys to the stations, my friends.
And we will have to see if they will actually handshake.
I don't know on this one.
This one is ready.
Will we see the h-
OOOOOH
OOOOOH
What the f-
Professionalism
I can't believe it
Alright guys
Well let's get into this star studded match here for you
Before we do though
Let's head to the panel
To get their thoughts
On the next series
Thank you very much gentlemen
W.E.A.M.
That's how you take in their seats
And we are getting ready
For the action very soon
And I do think we got a nice
You know battle of the dojo later on but first is the battle of the brains at me
It really is and I'm so excited to see where this goes because I was thinking about it this morning
And I don't really know what direction these teams will take
They're gonna fight for a lot of the same heroes, but they might go in different directions entirely
We might see the you know the witch doctors come out on one side whereas the other side just stays true to the coddle the IA
It's curious.
Yeah, we are at the stage of the tournament where it's to pick your poison mode.
We know full well, like Soxa said, coming into it and it's been solidified what heroes
are the highest priority.
But yeah, my favorite part of this tournament, and Soxa also said this is you get to pick
the heroes you think you can beat and you can break the meta that way.
And for these two teams, it's like, yeah, you've been breaking the meta so far against
teams that are not quite your caliber, I would argue.
At this point, have their strategies against the best heroes really been tested?
I don't think so, so I would love to see the enigmas and the PLs specifically for Yandex,
because I'm wondering, is it only because you are better than the teams that you were
playing against before?
Yeah, they're definitely a little bit of the head and shoulders above the rest in this
group, and it is interesting, especially since we've been calling this the group of
deaths, and yes, there will be deaths.
Of course, there's two teams that will be eliminated and it is not yet clear who the
second team will be for that.
But these two teams, have they truly been tested?
It makes you wonder, because indeed, I agree with you, Ryan, maybe they just haven't yet.
I mean, we were raising LGD yesterday because they broke the record for the longest loss
against Team Yandex, which was 32-55, and then in game two they beat it with a 33-43
We are not exaggerating with how fast this team is winning games.
And you know, this was in my opinion the hardest group in the tournament.
So the fact that they've looked so unchallenged up into this point is even more impressive.
I want to talk a little bit about support picks, actually.
You did mention a lot of the cores that you would like to see,
but I think there are some support picks that if they're left through,
you can build your entire draft round.
In the last series, we saw Train Protector basically ignored completely.
You cannot give a SOAT index at all.
at all. It just opens up way too many of Watson's heroes and Malady just pops off on it completely.
And heroes like Slapfire, which are like the 20th most contested, other teams don't think
about her that often. She cannot go unignored in the series. We have two really good mid
stopfire players and two really good support slumpfire players.
Yeah, I think Trant, you know, last series we, I think we saw one bad on him in game
two, but that's, I think, Nero, you hit the nail on the head that Trant's all about his
lane pairings and the fact that Watson has so many options from the range carries, I think
he might be the best TA that I know of. And having those extra 3 or 4 and Terrablade also,
these are great pairings with Triant, and so a lot of teams it's like, okay, no Drought
of SF, we feel confident enough playing against this, but I would not give that away.
There's also the vein that Whitemon has looked monstrous. That vein has put 1W through so many
pick off late game macro situations and I do think that is something that Yandex can
look to steal. Of course there's the keeper of the light, Ari himself said he thinks they're
probably the best cuddle team, they understand the hero better than everybody, but come on
you're playing in Soxa, he's also an excellent keeper of the light.
And they just profit on the nickname that you guys both mentioned, they're already
removed from the pool, so is the bane that you talked about and I didn't want to talk
about potential first picks because a lot of heroes you just mentioned, all first pick
material. So a lot of that is going to be considered by both of these squads as we have
got first pick on the side of 1W. So they are going to be going for that overall last
pick for Yandex with so far banned out the Invoker and the Bane. We're still waiting
for one band coming out from 1W before we see those final bands, but it's already quite
clear that it's going to be very different from our previous series that we've had because
both Invoker and Bane were not in those first phase bands last time.
Yeah, I thought the Bane and Voker might be considered a pairing as well, something we've seen very commonly from 1W.
Every time you play in Voker, you want the reliable Sunstrike setup, so obviously it's BZM.
I think he's widely considered the best in Voker player in the competitive scene.
I actually thought if you banned out of Voker, you didn't have to ban Bane, because also, you're not really afraid on DM to play the Summoned Serials, which tend to do quite well against Bane.
But yeah, they're giving a lot of respect to Wygon, saying it's not just about that combo, it's about all the other things you're doing too.
You're a lone druid still untouched in the manning phase.
Yep, just like covered by the next pillar.
Darkseid, Shadowfiend, Drowranger.
Keeper taken out in the first phase too, lots of respect from the support heroes.
You were talking about the pivotal support heroes, it's one of those where I couldn't
have predicted exactly what they would ban, but none of these are surprises.
I think the axe might actually be the most surprising ban out of all of these.
either planning on going for Drow right now or Kez and they want to get rid of the Axe.
I can't think of any other reason really.
Yeah, I mean it has to be a Kez to start with because I feel between Axe and Suntor and
you're playing against 1W, you're playing against 33 in particular.
That Suntor has been much more problematic than the Axe for a lot of the teams.
Or you could just go for Lone Druid because it wasn't bad.
We've seen Yandex beat the Lone Druid time and time again, but as we said that was against
a different caliber of team, can they beat the pure Lone Druid?
And I actually thought they were going to go underlord because DM was saying like they
did do it yesterday or two days ago and it is Lone Druid's worst matchup according to
the stats.
But Centaur has been an absolute premier off laner this event and I think for good reason
This, anytime you have a hero like Settar,
Settar is innately a very greedy hero.
I think a lot of casual Dota players will think of him
as a blink initiator that can maybe save
with the leg in cart,
but this hero wants to play on his island
and use his ulti to help occasionally.
And the fact that people are often able to go
for this home of the dominator
into a heart of Tarasque second item,
this allows him to just spam double edge in order to farm.
And that's, I think he's just a premier pick right now.
And that's why he's getting picked here.
Yeah, I also think that I probably would have liked to go for the Underlord, but you only have one ban left and we talked about the Centaur as like 33's number one hero this patch, so if you're not stealing it, you're giving it away or you're wasting your only ban left in the second phase.
Actually, that's a really good point because I think if they would have almost certainly taken in on 1W
If you don't take it there, but also
Because you pick Centaur, Centaur has been the best offline pick against all of the ranged people
Like because the retaliate in lane, the gap close that you offer your entire team was stampede
So now I think they effectively forced out the draw SF bands and then you have the win ranger
access available as well and Centaur is absolutely unplayable we was it nightfall
we saw yesterday full to zero himself on retaliate aura I mean it does check
out it was pretty funny to watch the retaliate or a talent is pretty wild at
level 25 but it is an unplayable matchup so I think they're actually doing it to
simultaneously deny pick like Mira said and enable Watson's hero there's still
the Templar assassin in the Terrible that you could play in response to Centaur, but
those are definitely harder to make work and they go for the Hoodwink who was ignored in
the van phase. It would have been her or Dark Willow to play the Centaur, but this lane
is basically unbeatable. There's not really much you can pick against it.
Yeah, I'm actually interested because that's, I would agree, that's an incredibly strong
lane and Lone Druid's also widely considered the strongest safe laner just purely off a
laning prowess so I think even with lone druid you need to invest fully into lane strength
here for white mon all the premieres are taking on maybe clockwork we haven't seen like the
fact that he's just in there as I will select the willow first but that's your four right
so you still need to find a five hero that can play into centaur plus foot wink there's
kind of tough I mean I guess wyvern is an option stocks of him going up yeah I think
the main concern always because we saw I think LGD have this problem is you need to be able
to kill Centaur at 20 minutes into the game because this guy will have 3000 plus health
and so I think Willow makes sense a lot. You mentioned like her and Hoodling being the best
two forwards right now but she also offers a lot of damage. So they go for Urspirit.
I was wondering how the mid game or the mid lane matchup dynamic was going to go here.
That's likely a mid Urspirit because Willow, I guess Willow could be five but I think that
bit of a weird flex. But my idea was like if they don't pick their mid here, then the
index will probably pick their safe lane duo and then they'll leave the overall last pick
for Chira. But now that you see this earth spirit, is there anything they think they
can pick to punish it?
I mean, there's all the melee punishers like the Husskar, the Negrifos.
It's really good against Lone Druid as well.
We've seen Lena punish it. We've also seen actually Largo punish it, but that was just
the one time and still lost the game, maybe if you won the lane.
You can also mid Slaughter versus Earth Spirit and do pretty well.
I'd be down for that, yeah.
There are options here for sure. Ember Spirit is also the best Spirit brother against Earth.
True, and still with an exceptionally high win rate at the CWC.
a lot of time to think about it. It's not just this one they're selecting, there's also the
next one. They take two picks here and they also have to consider what 1W wants to do with their
fourth pick, which is their most important pick in the draft that they can protect with two vans
afterwards. Yeah, and it would be really cool if Yandex stole one of the really strong laning fives,
like Lich or Winter Wyvern, but that would take them away from their specialties, like which
Doctor that other teams don't play and we said wyvern was good against londrew with himself as well, right?
But they'll go for the unvying nonetheless
And the Lena does come out to counter the airspace. Yeah, they're they're telegraphing so hard that they're gonna be picking waltz in a ranged carry
But like there's a bit so they're gonna see two bands obviously on top of the drow in SF, but
The Lena yeah, we really I like that a lot because you just need the bear kill to be convenient
You need to have a hero that either can teleport like Underlord. You can pick a mid-bots builder like Lina
I'm anticipating the
Magic build for Lina the like Kaia and the bots aggs. I have a very important question. Yes
Because we have seen Lina against Earth Spirit a couple times and she does well
however
Wasn't it Watson that like
Reinvented slash invented Lina carry to begin with is that even anywhere on the radar right now?
or is that dead I think it's like in theory it's possible but I also feel
like the range carries right now are not like maelstrom buyers for the most part
they're usually the stat builders but I don't see why not it's definitely a like
an incredibly scary lane with undying Lena but I think with the way the map
gets played right now you generally want your carry to Lena's not really a lane
dominator she's strong in lane but she isn't oppressive the way that like a
draw an SFR. Well, let's do a Largo, but this one is for 33.
Yeah, I mean, from his usual suspect, it would have been the Largo or the Darkseer, and it's
really hard to pick Darkseer blind with the Largo. You know, you can play for the sustain
in the mid-game. You're going to have this Earth Spirit going in. You're going to be
able to back him up with the damage amplification on his Will Valley Blitz song, which is a pretty
cool combo, but there's no usual I'm gonna make Largo's life easier here. Usually it's
the keeper of the light, you know, with the stacks, the bonus mana. It's banned out this
time, so this last pick really should try to combo with him a little. But that's a tall
order to do from the position 5. We know this will lose probably before.
I think the only reason that Lena might get rotated to carry is if they want a Huskar
here. I don't know if that's, I actually don't know how good, if
Chara Jr. plays Huskar, but I was just like looking through matchups and stuff
and I know Huskar is really good against Lone Jurid, he's also really good
against Largo. So it would potentially be a sick draft win there, but sometimes
you can overcook and, you know, for all we know, Watson hasn't played
Carrie Lena in a year. So you don't want to do that, I don't think.
And we got still a carry ban coming out for 1W with the Kez and now also the Tusk ban.
I love the Tusk ban.
Lonejord synergizes really well with the tag team because your bear and the hero itself
also both count for the tag team.
So you kind of have like 60 base damage as Lonejord when you combine the bear and the
hero but you're getting double the value out of the tag team.
It's probably just going to lift your wyvern.
But the Tusk taken out, I mean, you need something that can write, like, Vanus and Tor, and Wyvern
does allow that, and the Lich would just be a nice combo with the Largo plus Earth Spirit.
We no longer like the clock that we mentioned earlier.
I think the Tusk was better, but I think Tusk, or I think clock is still a viable option.
It might even be their ban here.
The Terrorblade was the other carry ban, so only carry bans for 1W.
There's still that TA for Watson.
I can't forget about that.
I don't think he's busted it out this tournament yet,
but that was his most played hero during qualifiers.
I was just looking around.
He hasn't played Huskar on Cheer Junior
in the last eight months in a competitive match.
Okay.
We do have that clock band coming out.
That's predicted.
And we got a hero needing for 1W,
a support, a hero for Whitemon.
A hero that they don't need to think about too long
because they only got like 20 seconds left.
Yeah.
And it looks, as you said, Murphy.
You know, you just put the armor on your green boys,
you got a couple of them that really like that frost armor,
but mostly you just need something to help you on lane
and there wasn't much left.
I like Clinkz a lot for...
Hmm.
Been a little while since we saw him.
Yeah, I've seen a couple of them this tournament.
Yeah.
But they were, I think, the first couple days.
Yeah, exactly.
Not like yesterday and today seemed to be absent
even though he was so dominant in the first few days.
yeah i think the problem with clinx is that he's easier to collapse on than a lot of other
carries right now but i think it's going to be difficult to do that given the pressure
from hoagwood centaur and the undying lane
you have a lot of meat shields for you so i was just thinking maximum damage they might
just go to the ta route
but i would still look if they have it in them i think huskar is like a free win here to be
honest with you but i
yeah they end up going
is that slardar? that's mid slardar and carry lina
It actually is currently in a wow.
So we mentioned the Midslardar earlier, like it is just a fantastic hero to play against Earthspear and Mint, but I didn't think they would actually flex this Lina the way that they did.
It's very cool. It makes Lina stronger by making her physical damage more relevant because now she's kind of a magic damage hero.
It's going to be able to do a lot for them with that early blink dagger and it's obviously their anti-Londred, anti-Bear hero,
hero, but it is a bit riskier because Lena is still untested as a carry this much.
Yeah. And the question is if it's going to work out. We did see some Maelstrom buyers
here and there, but that was against a PL. So I don't know if that, if we're going to
see that. But if Watson's playing it, Brian, you have to believe it.
Yeah, I mean, the obvious Maelstrom buyers of the patch are Midnature's Prophet and
Winranger, and both of them, what they have that Lena doesn't have is Winranger has Winrun
in lane she's very hard to gank and the nature's profit just plays off map because you can
teleport anywhere he wants.
Lina doesn't have these luxuries, but also so I think Lina is much more punishable but
at the same time you're playing with a Loan Druid lineup, Loan Druid just wants to hit
creeps for the first 20 minutes, Largo generally wants to just hit lane creeps or creeps in
general for the first 20 minutes as well, yeah you can go like a meteor hammer or like
an earlier utility item to run around with your team but I don't think they have too
much punish for this so I think that's why they've elected to like I think Lina does
have weaknesses that these other meta carries don't, but I don't think they can really exploit
them here.
Profit was first phase ban, so they had that 4 sides already there for 1W, but yeah, Windranger
could have been an option there.
They, I feel like this is, this was strategized beforehand.
It's kind of like that Nightstalker pick last series where it's like the Largo got rotated
mid and it wasn't about the Largo, it was about the Nightstalker.
So I think that this Lena is a substitute for the other carries in order to allow Chiro
Juno to get this awesome Slardar game.
is a good I think it's good I mean I think Largo's gonna have a really rough
lane and a really rough time entering the Smith game but the window for failure
is kind of high for a carry Lena but I think Watson can pull it off the very
important game here between 1W and Yandex can one of the two to all the
others we're finding out together with Kizum and Sansfan thank you so much
indeed this is a really hype match Yandex versus 1W
Some would call it a doozy absolutely as we are in a pause because 33 is in the house everybody
We got the lights on right on his face means the pause needs to come
It's just tradition at this point Kezu
What do you think the meta is on the light situation with these teams?
You got to emulate what you got at home, which is near darkness, but not full
You can see a little light on white man's face that is probably not acceptable for him
That's too much for 33. It's okay. Apparently as long as it's not him a okay as we have a smoke on both sides
Yeah, what do you think of these lines?
Lena carry I'm a big fan. I would I'm a bit intrigued to see what he would build
I haven't seen it yet, but I would assume that you should you could tap into a specialist array on Lena
We heard lots of talk about the melstrom, which I think if you want split damage then pumping out a bit more magic
It could be good, but I think you want stats on heroes, so I think Specialist or Rey could be kind of cool.
Of course, Watson, like they talked about, he was one of the OG Lina carry guys, so I trust him to know what he's doing.
Okay.
DM will be able to get the bounty, but he's going to take some damage in response.
We see a Lich picked. I'm very excited about a lot of these heroes.
The one here we won't mention is Pure on Lone Druid. Nobody gives a shit about that.
But what I can tell you is that Yannix has been destroying this hero like three or four times.
That's true in this tournament. So they know what's up and you know actually what's funny
You know both teams have one loss each to their name, you know, which team beat both of them. No, oh gee. Oh
gee
But thanks, you know, you gotta maybe need something crazy to beat, you know, the teams out
But of course here these are the two best teams in the group currently
Nothing interesting snap you're welcome. What's their record overall? They're both seven and one. No, oh gee
I think four and four Wow, so half the wins from the best teams
I mean that's the thing with OG that I've known have to talk about OG all of a sudden
But you know we are you brought it up. I feel like they underperform against they overperform against
Teams that are just tier one
And then when they're with teams that are supposed to be worse than them they actually underperform which is weird
They're in confidence insistent now back to our game. I'm gonna talk about OG a little bit. What do you think it stands for?
Original gangsters.
That's not something original.
Ganja, that's not something.
Alright, now we're back to the game.
Of course, one over the line.
33 is playing the Froggo this time around.
And it's been very strong.
We saw it mid obviously in the last series,
but no one did not go well at all.
But that was more of a...
They were kind of all their eggs in one basket kind of deal.
Whereas this time around,
very traditional at this point off lane Largo, very stable. You have BZM on the
air spear which is kind of that pop-off, ganking type of hero. I like the mix that
they have overall. I think both drafts are very very strong overall though. I
would say like this is an incredible Lina game not just against 1W Serious
because if you think about it against Lundred you want to be on high range or
you want the melee guy that can man up. Lina fits you know the high range same
with Largo he doesn't none of these Serious gap close very well. It's only
Even if they get close, it's into a tombstone, you have a Corrosive phase for more damage,
you have Stampede and a potential card later on in the game.
So I do think you have a lot of weight on BZM shoulders and the two supports to like offset a bit of the early game and get those teamfights going.
I hope they get the horse card out of the center eventually this game.
I mean the tombstone save, if they want to go down that route, I feel like that was nerfed so long ago, we barely see it now.
now but if they take Tormentor which they do have Slardar so there's a good chance
that they're the ones to get it first there could see some valuable shards
coming out because boomerang as well very very good for Yandex's side yeah
especially like they have a lot of damage especially within their like two
supports but can't can't really ever count off 33 on any lineup or any hero
that he's playing I think he's looked very good on the frog and also you know
croaking up an earth bird is definitely very good let's CJ we see them on the
before. Not just in this tournament, also before. He is a menace on this hero.
He is against the melee, so it's gonna be a little bit easier. He's pure taking
a lot damage to the acorn shot, bouncing several times. We'll get back to his tier
one, Whitemon. We'll do so as well. So DM and Sox are doing a good job of keeping
this aggression on. Bushwhack cancelling the healing salve with the blood
grenade to follow. As pure, he will survive. No, he will not. That was
Actually enough. I'm pretty sure not see that very that was perfect damage
I'm pretty sure now like if the tower would give any more HP region than one
He would have lived there, but socks are sneaking in crazy. That's an incredible kill
Socks of my boy. What a beast
And they lose some resources with the healing salvo as well
It's just a very good start on that bottom lane then and like you said this mid lane
Definitely going away of cheer junior at the moment
I mean, what can even do as BZM here? You kind of just got to take it.
I mean, you're definitely outmatched in this matchup, but there are other lanes where we've seen Earthsworths buy bottles.
It's using a lot of trouble. Level three stun.
If he is coming, BZM, one more right-click would have done it.
Ari gets off the bramble. Not going to get any of the water runes left. He's going to get both here.
Actually, he can turn the sights onto Ari instead. The crush is there. And Ari, very low level.
In that shadow run, we'll save him for a bit, gets through the treeline.
We'll live.
Yeah, water room control on Chura Junior's side.
See the Earth Spirit having to walk all the way back to base as well.
So already great advantage.
It's a good perspective by CJ2.
Like he doesn't die for the kill. Maybe you could have, but then you know if the Bramble connects, you're gonna give up the kill.
Yeah.
There's no 33, he's alone in the top lane. That's DM.
Taking some pressure, but he is building towards the tower.
I'll push back. Do they try to turn this around now?
But DM will have to hook Stomp and get out, but DM does kill off Whitemon with a return, I guess.
What a no-world.
It's just a Blight Stone, level 2 acorn shot, he got at least 2 bounces as he comes undying.
Yeah, and Pure now gets pushed back to a Tria, double kill for DM when it looks like he was about to be killed off.
Instead he gets 2 kills thanks to the rotation of Soxa, who has been all over the place to start this game.
Yeah, he's been everywhere. And you know, just from the thing earlier, there's pressure mid.
So that's where R&T hit us. You're trying to return the favor onto Watson in the top lane.
Yeah, Watson gonna get licked in.
Stick it for me.
The area with the Shadow Realm should be able to finish it here.
And they will do so. So at the very least for 1W, they get
somebody on that mid lane, crush onto BZM. You can see the Corrosive Haze is already there.
Level 6 versus level 4 and BZM dead to right. So crushing defeat in this mid lane
and bottom and really the only saving grace is that top lane but you can see
Lena despite the death still doing very well in the farm department.
Yeah, thank god they were able to squeeze in that kill on Watson in the top lane because
you're down 3k gold, now 600 runes should also go CJ's way and honestly this
bottom pressure I mean let's see onto DM because I don't really see him dying in
this lane but you know pressuring him while Ari is here so they blocked that.
Yeah, it does get up the hook stuff another Bramble coming in so it's a beautiful bush
We're going to swack out the three heroes but it's not going to save the Centaur.
Overhiked.
Very much so.
They are finding good connections though.
With Aria in the safe lane and getting some kills.
Earlier they find it onto Watson up top and now onto Deon.
Remember, 33 and Soxa used to be teammates. Soxa goes to another level when he had to face off against former teammate.
He's kind of showing it here in this early game.
All his spells kind of on point, very good on the rotations as well.
CJ's really trying to work something here into this lane as he steals all the creeps
apart from a little Johnny Cobalt.
I assume Blink Dagger will be the main item coming out of him from the mid lane.
See if he wants to rush it.
I mean, is there any other build from a Slaar Armid?
Not really, I smell it. I like his positioning here.
Just like, this guy does this in so many games.
Put sound to Tombstone, there ain't no way you're killing that.
Although several members now 1W have joined the party, the Malady eventually will take away.
Making it really annoying though, so we're not gonna get the fast one.
They get the sinister gaze, Watson comes in as well, he's gonna get the Lugudov late and 33 is dead,
and he's gonna get the shrine. What the hell would that happen?
Honestly, what it would be. This is probably the best early game on Dying Play I've seen all year.
Disgusting. You wasted so much time.
Yeah, and he's instantly back up.
You know, you got a free agent on a dine, you make use of that, then make them work for like 20 seconds, so then what's then again?
We're seeing a lot of these layouts, you know, from the supports, they make space for 20 seconds, 25 seconds, and the carry's like, yep, thank you.
Man, what a masterful early game from Yandex so far.
Really, only the death on Lena has been the smallest thing going away of 1W.
You gotta see two players.
I'm trying to get some stacks off.
They're gonna need some levels on the heroes.
I think the ultimates on your supports, of course, is very, very important, because Longdruid, as we know, doesn't really interact, and Ike 33 is looking, though.
They're gonna roll in with the help of the Bramble, Sox in the area, how many Bushwax are you gonna get this time?
Only the one, you get the lick back in as well, but Malady joining the party, they're gonna lose the Slardar, no, it gets up the sprint just in time,
and Malady puts down the Tombstone as BGM, with all the vision in the world, Malady takes him out, as the Tombstone now being pursued,
But he's all the now he's a complete beast of burden double kill for Malady
They're trying to go up 33 as well. They get that kill as well. This is ridiculous
He does fall in the end, but my goodness Yandex getting basically every trade to go their way
I mean now that Malady is cooking. I kind of love this guy, you know, he pops off in interviews
He's pumping off from this game a great way up up goes mid gets the flesh gold in mid fight
He's the same level as pure right now
Yeah, and pure, he's been AFK farming the whole game as you should on a carry, but
like, looking at all of this, it takes him so much to try and kill CJ.
You know, even the Sampeet comes out, and again, perfect timing on the Tombstone.
That skill gives him 6. Well, not quite, I guess a creep died as well.
That extra HP allows him to stick around a little bit longer,
and help secure a couple more kills.
Yeah, thank God for 33 that he gets the Frogstone buff there at the end
to ultimately squeeze in the kill.
Gonna kill the Dominator creep, so at least you know for one dub,
you've got your safe lane going, well that smoke was definitely spotted,
if anyone of the Yanik players have their eyes on that.
I was really looking forward to this specialist array, it's gonna be Maelstrom.
Okay, unlucky, maybe one of the next times.
Still thinking it's something that Lina could potentially go for,
but I think for what's in it applies, you don't judge his item build.
I've been through this before, sometimes you can, let's be real.
You can you just got away. It's gonna take a chain frost will put down the tombstone dies shortly after since he is free gold for
1w I mean good riddance screw this guy like if you're 1w you just want to get this guy out of the game as quickly as possible
What's in this peeing the top tier one tower? I don't think they want to just give it up too easily here
Nothing's got the Laguna blade
Of course, the very classic Lena Carribill, you max out your passive, you have very good
talents for Carolina, you have damage, you have magic resistance on 15 if you want, you
get more percentages on your fiery soul at level 20.
Watson, spotted by 1W, gonna be far enough away that they can't really connect, no chain
cross anyway.
comes back to lane immediately gone on. Don't know if this one is good let's see. Yeah he does not
quite have his ultimate gonna try to go through the gate the rolling not quite there but they have
the damage. So another death to Mal. They really are hating on him for now to his name. You're okay
let's see because the top tier one will still die like this type of delay I don't really think it
it did much. If they get to hold the tier one it's great but we'll need to see if Yanix can
and pulls a defense here.
And they're gonna do just that, at least attempt it.
Two supports on the high ground,
Bramble gonna prevent them from going any further,
although now Blink Dagger being shown from Chira.
It's slowed up a bit,
but we're gonna find at least one here, surely.
And it's White Mod.
One more Bushwack for the road from Sox.
Now look at how many Bushwacks,
how many heroes per Bushwack this game.
It's probably like 1.8 or something.
Yeah, it is definitely quite high, but turns out, you know, I take back what I said earlier
The two little plays that Malady went for here did allow them enough time and space
We're going to come back to her right on top of 33 with that blink
Corso pays to follow socks up can't get the bush back this time cast her curse indeed if 33 is healing up
But it's not gonna be enough Watson joins the array here for a rather
Sure, I feel like I put specialist array in your brain and all yeah, you did I was really excited
I'm sorry. You'll just get the normal kill.
There's no chance he goes both then. I take it.
Yeah, I don't think you can.
So you kind of have like similar things.
Unless in like late game we want to see a Hydros breath.
I guess you could, but then it also kind of depends.
Do you need to upgrade your Dragon Lance or not?
You want a Pike. Can you be greedy and go Hydros breath instead?
Pure as bare in a...
bit of a battle here with Centaur.
And of course he didn't mention, I mean how good of a lone Druid game is this?
We've seen the Slardar matchup before, that can be a little rough.
Honestly, out of the longer against we've seen, I think it's fine at best.
It's not good against Lina, it's bad against Slardar.
I think even untying is annoying for you, and so is Centaur.
So how is it fine? We'll get back to your definition of fine after this,
and Centaur gets gone on and killed off.
Because the hero itself is very good.
Oh, I see, so he's just, he's double S-tier and he goes down to B, which is fine.
Something like that.
Okay, that's a good recovery from you.
Yep, keep it up.
Very good analyst.
I am.
Go, Tassler, back to you.
Have a smoke.
Have a smoke.
Yep, I was about to say that.
Sure you were.
6k, 3 hand ag.
I'm going to try to find a connection here and cheer up.
I'm going to try to backstab.
That's safe.
I'm in 3.
Oh, god.
Big crush comes out.
The gunna blade!
Long drew it dead right off the bat.
3 dead in fact for 1W with no recovery in site 33 attempting to run but the zombies are catching up.
Not really actually, the frog is faster than that.
Holy...
What is that camera view?
We need to get the bash.
And the kill goes their way.
4 dead for 1W.
Yandex with the backstab, masterfully done.
Yeah, nicely done. You get a 3-man crouch into at least 2 of 3-man LSA, immediate combo onto the long grid.
Definitely caught 1W slip in there. Not something you see too often in the early game that you're dead stacked up like they were smoking for a while too.
Oh my goodness. Disgusting. Just immediately dropping like two heroes. I mean this fight is cooked before it even started.
Yeah. I mean a single Laguna blade and crush puts pure to about 10% HP.
Yeah. He is a squishy boy without that hole.
We just find the perfect half 33, it's like, oh, oopsie.
There's a little light on his forehead, maybe that's a bit of a misplay from him, not to pause again to take care of that.
We'll get the fix for game two.
Well, let's see. Pure. Working on the...
Holy build that Lundrude has, of course.
We only have option to the Agonist Scepter, and there he is again, close to 33.
We see the reflection there, it's just a bit, just a bit.
Yeah, this is out of control for the index now. 9k lead. They have a great
Roche lineup as well. In terms of push, how would you put this? I mean, Lina obviously long range. Quite good.
Yeah, I think it's it's decent because like Centaur, you're very tanky later. You have return. Lina is high range
And you have like Tombstone and good team-fighting.
Meteor Hammer is completed. So 33's farm will be pretty good.
He's gonna get ganked though. Clifstomp finds and Malady there.
as a flesh gone, puts down the tombstone, but a terrorized comes out onto two, with the Bedlam to follow.
Chain Frost as well. They do separate successfully as Malady might live through the day, along with the Sender.
Gonna turn this around to 33 instead, and have the Laguna Blade Reserve for White Mom.
They do take out the Lena though, but it's at the cost of three members of 1W, and maybe even more.
BZM gets caught, Bushwatt finds him into the Crush, and the Bash had another one propped up.
So Chira with a triple kill on this slugger. He is completely dominating this game
And all these plays are so expensive for 1w like even though Watson dies and I like his itemization
You know the trap and he has the mouse storm into the boost travel
You can always just TP in on the Dominator creep, but even so you lose three to four heroes in return
I mean this fight was before BZM finish up the vessel
You really need that one and all he doesn't have magnetize yet
We've seen it many times where magnetize doesn't get skilled early, but level 10 and level 11
I feel like they need it in these fights.
Like imagine a magnetized roll in here.
Yeah, for sure.
They're so close to getting several kills, but...
I mean, they do get an important one.
And as the case has been this game, the cost is too high for 1W.
It's also Madaddy from all these plays.
He has Double Bracer, Treads, Magic Wand.
Uh-oh.
DZF.
This is still the replay.
Oh, sorry.
I was testing some other stuff, I wasn't pulling a U.
Oh, these are all pure.
Okay, there we go.
Imagine if in the replay I had talked about unknowingly what has actually happened, that would have been good.
Next time.
We will not see the Hydra's breath.
The only thing we can predict are the early game pauses for light.
But those are very easy, they're like a given.
Yeah, true.
I believe we will not be seeing a specialist's array or a Hydra's breath as he will be turning his Dragonance into a Hurricane Pike on Delina.
Yeah, very nice.
As DM's body is just forcing three heroes to run away from him, not a good sign.
Yeah, that's true. Four members of 1W on the retreat now. They've seen this blurced set that is Centaur in the courier outfit.
You just can't handle it.
Also now, actually, you've got a Lotus Orb completed on DM, so let's talk about the Magnetize Bud.
If you're quick, you can just immediately dispel it and even own all of it, or at least take it away from one guy later.
10k lead for Yandex.
1W are really grouping up right now.
Are they expecting a fight?
Might be just, I think they just want to be ready for Yamaha to like, for potential play.
They do roll on him successfully, lick him in, the crush comes out, but that's enough
damage.
Great pick off from 1W.
That's an insanely good one.
I think especially also, if you look at their wards, like they have a lot of decent control,
a mid river ward that spotted CJ walk over to the top area. Mid river in nighttime is
the most dangerous area on the map. It's definitely something that CJ needs to respect.
Well, next time, that won't be so easy. Cheer about a thousand away from BKB. And for Watson,
you talked about the hurricane pike. I mean, does he need a BKB this game?
Honestly, he could also play on like a... I think Zatanic even later. I mean, BKB is
It just depends on how greedy he wants to be I think if they can get him like a solar crash and like a timed part
I don't really think you need a BKB. You can just play around like positioning
Maybe a shadow blade a silver edge into data. Let's attack and play on that. I would probably like it a little bit more
The lead has kind of been stuck in place
It's gonna find centaur now the terrorized not gonna be there in time DM gets the stampede off
off, the rest of Yandex now catching it off, Whitemon, sacrifice for 1W.
They got owned by the neutral creep, like Ari was going to connect the terrorizer, they
just got congregated.
Not done yet, BZM, trying to get the role in, but a nice positioning there from Chira
Jr. Malibu turns into a disgusting golem and they'll find another kill off the back
of that.
Turning around onto Purena, already half HP as Laguna Blade available still, they find
a support on the back line, is pure.
Trying to get to the other side of the wall, he'll do so.
So just like that, three dead in favor of Yandex.
Another bushwax, Soxa.
Okay, Watson stuck.
Okay.
We'll TP over the gate. I'm surprised we didn't yell about the Tombstone Shard.
That's Malady just went hopping into it.
Oh, I didn't even notice he had it. Did they take out the Tormentor?
It's 19 minutes.
He bought it?
Yeah.
Dude, Bro has been cooking this entire game.
this anymore. I feel like I never see it. Well, not very often. This is why I led a brother cook.
That's awesome. He has shards, and he's about to buy a blade mail.
Alright, I just had to, now I have, oh, alright. He's going to die here.
Whitemon in the area. Those sharp shooters are up from Sox.
Little position to the south is Whitemon. Really wants to find a connection.
He gets the sinister gaze onto the Slardar, and cheered on some Trouble DM in the area as well.
Cheered does fall. The Laguna blade comes out from Watson from the south.
They get one core kill as BZM trying to roll away does have the magnetize on the several heroes Watson with the LSA missing
And with that I think the index tries to back off although Malady who get a nice lotus to try to back away here
BZM continuing this magnetize. I think the fight breaks up now. So ends up being mid laner for off lane
Favorite for that is 1W. Absolutely one for one trade at this point. It's very very good for them
BZM looking to work on a BKB
And like we all know, this is not really long, do as long as timing it.
No, he's got only the Mjolnir, so of course he can kind of join fights if he wants to,
but he'd still prefer to just get some more space.
Yeah, we'll be at BKB for the next item on Watson.
As DM, we talked about the Lotus already, it's going to be hard afterwards, 2K into that.
Nice save from BGM here, onto Mr. Whitemonk.
But yeah, I think with the BKB, it's gonna be quite hard to take down Watson and also,
first Roche, honestly, it should just kind of go to Yandex.
I mean, even if you go and try and contest it, you're fighting into an area that's just
plastered with a two-shot.
Now, we have to see if it collapses somewhere in the crowd, this thingy.
Did I take over, like you said?
Otherwise, yeah, I think, I would think that this is a free Roche pretty good.
That would be a sick Joker.
Like if you swap in a player for like 30 seconds.
That's right.
That would be nice.
Next Midas mode.
Alright, so Undying already had the Shard, so DM gets a free one. That's excellent.
Oh, what a dream if you're playing Synthar. Like, you already have very close to heart.
Also, when you play against London, it's really easy to rack up the stacks on your shard,
because you can just keep using it on the bear. Counter is a hero unit, you just stack it up with your heart.
Do you think teams ever talk about this idea of, if a support is off to a good starting able to afford a shard
hold that thought, crush finds VZM, Chara showing off the BKB, it's gonna be a free one.
Uh, what was I saying?
The shard is this, hold that thought again, it has a very important DM.
Being licked into the chain for us, Lotus, he's fine.
Okay, so you can hide back to your great point.
Back to my point, I've forgotten now.
Shard, that's right.
Yeah, if you're off to a good start on a support, did they ever talk about let me buy a shard to give my core a chance to get the tormentor?
It's very, it's not really something you talk about a lot.
I would say it's more about specific, more niche.
If you have like specific heroes where you're like,
wow, if we get this now, yeah.
Like let's say you're owning in the game.
It's like minute, I don't know, 21, you're super owning
and you can get your mid Viper or Shard or something.
Then you can go in.
I think then absolutely you're gonna do it.
Otherwise, I do think that support items
are actually very valuable.
Like I would rather have 1400 gold on a support more often.
Well, the other reason I mentioned that is because
I can't remember the last time I've seen the Undying Shard actually be purchased.
Yeah, it's true. I think it's still usable.
I'm not saying it's bad. It's just versus the original form of it, it was completely bonkers.
Oh, for sure.
It's just the user's having such a good game, and honestly, it just makes sense as Pure is in...
Yeah, he does have the A.M. Scepter. Bushwack is dodged,
but for us, A.M. gives them all the vision in the world.
It's the bear or the lone druid. Pick the target, young man.
Nice. Pure.
Double save.
It's gonna get saved by BZM so they'll focus the Baron instead.
He died from the Bear Dime.
Oh my god, I didn't...
Oh my god!
Oh no!
Well, it was a great try by BZM and he'll be bailed out.
Oh my god, how much damage does that do?
That looked like 450 pure damage.
Damn.
On pure himself.
Pure damage against pure, it's a counter.
Yes.
That is truly unfortunate for 1W.
They're in a huge hole, 18K lead for Yandex, DKB now in line for Watson as well, so they
can get ultra aggressive, they can go for Roshad.
Any type of like they could have done this 10 minutes ago.
They could, but they're just continuously playing for the map play.
I see.
That's a lot of gold for them.
Why are they focusing the bear and not the hero, but one Laguna blade, he's low enough
to die to the bear.
Oh, it's also so much gold.
You're not just getting the hero kill, you're getting the bear kill first.
It's basically like a double kill.
Yeah, that was nice.
Chirra.
Well, Leimon, it was nice knowing you.
He's fine.
Yeah?
Yep.
The lead continues to grow now.
I mean, surely they go for Rosh now.
Or do they want to get some tier 2 towers first,
because they don't really need the ages to get those?
I mean, they definitely can do that first.
I think the way that you go about it here,
when you're up this much, is that,
Roses, yours at any point, you want to keep a foothold on the map.
You don't want 1W to walk out on the map.
Once you know you have them locked in with good vision, then you can do that.
As Pure and BZM are farming on top of an Observer Ward.
Luckily it missed.
Push back, find BZM, DM in the area as well.
Looking for the hoofstomp, we'll not get it.
Good roll.
But if people want to gain a Ma-mar, if you're ahead in a Dota game,
you should ward exactly like Gandex are doing.
You want to put wards on the outskirts of the map, you want to see these rats on 1W run out,
you want to know where they are and go run at them and just keep forcing them back into the base.
As there is your chasm stone, of course it's not casual, because it's being built into the Shiva's Guard.
It's casual for now.
Okay, give it...
not anymore.
Damn it.
I thought we'd see a lot more of that when that originally came out.
Bring it up a bit next game.
Here's a free rush, chasm stone.
Did I first flood this game?
Actually, I don't know.
Hmm, Soxah, how can we forget?
I can't talk about how big he is.
That's right, he's a tall boy.
So the first ages of the game goes to Watson.
Having a terrific game on the Lena carry, which we don't get to see all too often.
Has a Hurricane Pike BKB, male Strummelangu, who's a boot to travel, so Gateless is next for him.
Cheer up.
Gonna be... not going in here it seems.
No, CJ is just dodging them for now, closing in on his own aggadams.
I feel like Essence Distiller has changed gameplay quite a bit.
It is such a cool item.
Very good item.
Great addition.
Now to roll in from BZM onto several heroes.
Gonna go for the bear first.
Laguna Blade applied to BZM, to him still in place.
And I think 1W is gonna try to back away to get out of the radius of that.
for the Stampede, gonna bring them back to the radius of 1W.
BKB from Chira Jr. gets the crush on the 33,
Watson with the LSA, and the right clicks from below
should be more than enough than now BZM.
Nice block off by Chira Jr.
And BZM, push whack to a tree, another core dead for 1W,
and the LSA connection, canceling the TP,
it's all Yandex here in game number one.
It is really difficult for 1W to really do anything.
Also now Watson, level 20 talent unlocked.
You love this one on Delina, more movespeed, more attack speed as, yeah, DM, I think he's just going to be playing with his food here.
4,000 HP on the centaur, I don't really know if they can touch him.
Yeah, that's a beast.
And even with your having his bear in the fight, if your hero isn't there, you only have one bear, and it dies within like 4 seconds against the Sardar and Delina.
As Watson is going to need a creep wave to get some stacks, so DM, don't touch it, it's reserved for Watson.
Not sure with the agonim scepter, it's gonna be that much more tanky in these fights.
Slardar mid looked very good in the last series as well, I'm a bit surprised that it died off.
I think that sense of course he had a great lane against the Earthsburg.
Boxing getting rolled on by VZM, nowhere close to the range needed.
Yeah I mean, it does help that it was against a melee hero obviously.
Yeah, I mean, other than the Huskars and Vipers of the world, I feel like Slaughter against
Rangers is generally okay still, right?
He does pretty fine against most.
It's not like you're gonna win the lane.
Yeah, you just get kind of spammed by a lot of Rangers heroes and then there's like your,
probably like some of the heroes like Vipers that are really annoying to lane against,
but most of the other ones, you're fine.
Of course, you want to play it into a melee, melee, isn't that how you keep telling me to
say it?
Thank you.
You sound much more intelligent now.
Surely, that's it.
Great take by you.
bouncing words makes you smarter
if you try speaking a second language
uh... yeah
i'm very bad at it though
be sure and the mother has seen
discussed that you foresee
back to the game we go twenty two k lead free and
okay
cheer up
having himself
excellent game they're going to be
met by
Lena, Mr. Watson, I believe the Daedalus is on the way, so this is a great timing overall.
Yeah, it is prime time to go. If anything looks bad, you can keep using Soul Ripper Watson, get up his HP.
You have a secondary Lotus Orb as well, now on Malady, you can always save him, and honestly, now with the Tombstone drop,
you have full night condition, you see everything, and it's really hard to jump into this.
Free Tower.
What can they do? 1W.
All these tanky, look, three of the four behind them are just so tanky, there's a roll and a kick out, as Wachira Jr. deletes Ari as Watson now with a Laguna blade onto BZM has to roll away with a BKB.
And look at all the space being made by Wachira Jr. on the back line, they get another kill, and this is just disastrous.
1W surely this game's about to end. They can't do anything. The bear finally coming in to play doing a little bit of damage
But a little is not gonna cut at this stage 25k lead with still the Aegis. It's at least one lane
Probably two. Yeah, why don't people stop playing loan droid against the team?
They just seem to have all the answers game after game after game. It's true
Well, he goes a great thing it sure is
The licking. Watson.
Not that bad.
Only up to one is Watson able to right click from the floor.
Corosal Hayes really helping his cause here. Terrorized.
Not going to do a whole lot as the LSA into the Laguna is enough for 33 to fight the dust one more time.
20 seconds down and out. No creeps actually.
And now they do.
Here they are. He's going to heal all the way to full with the Aegis.
I love being the type of guy where you look for a specific plan to come back, but I think
it is really hard to come up with a realistic plan that you believe in here, if you're one
done.
As this could be...
They fake back.
Sinister Gay is not going to do much here.
They delete two.
And GG's just going to be called.
As game one goes to Yandex and Mike, goodness, they put on a performance.
They had this game from start to finish.
Like, really, Sokso with some of the early rotations that they had.
Malady with a super cool wisdom shrine play.
I think it's well that set them up for success a lot.
Honestly, I do think that this is a type of game that you can write off pretty quickly.
It's like, okay, you played along through it again.
They've beaten it so many times, you know, go next, try something else.
Because this series is incredibly important.
Yeah, for sure.
Alright, if I was to give to MVP, it has to be a co-MVP between Malady and Sokso.
The support duo was absolutely ridiculous for Yandex.
We saw how many Bushwax Sox was getting early. He was in every single lane it felt like.
Yeah.
On dying at that one play at the shrine, that was like that really capitalized their lead, and they never, never lost the lead from there.
Also, like when you look at the lanes overall, I think it was just not that easy for 1W to play, like, DM did very well done bot, and CJ obliterated the mid lane.
Then you had, like you said, you know the two supports running around, Madadi and Soxer, just continuing to ramp up the pressure of Watson,
Set up for a perfect game of one of his best heroes.
So yeah, I think game two, 1W, got to scrap the draft and bring some better gameplay.
I think the interesting talking point here is what happens to Lone Dru because it's banned a lot, right?
And if you're 1W, you apparently can't pick it against Yandex.
So that puts Yandex in the driver seat that they want to pick it or if they just let it be banned.
I just think you can play against it too, like what they're showing as counters.
It's not like 1W can't play it themselves. I think also like it's 33 not happy.
I mean that's what's big. I think like you're up 6k gold and it's not usually you see a play like really hit like this
Not against a team like 1w. Yeah, so I think next game they'll come in more focused slightly different plan and we'll see a more
Even matchup. I don't think we ended up seeing really any grab allies. No Johnson himself
Yeah, that's the one that you didn't see the one that I did. That's really sad to me
He's gonna have to pick it again because now the
Start up the game with just completely taking over and from there
That's exactly what you want as a core hero to have your supports kind of lead the charge for you early on and give you space to
Get to this point where Watson just hurts big time and cheer a junior of course
No slack himself. No like this order is really good
And if you look at 1w generally speaking they play around like easy envelope with their two supports
But when your lane is this difficult, it's just so hard to play through BZM. Alright, shit out!
Thank you very much, Satzvan and Kezu, you're to break it down, and I think Yandex has solved
it.
I'm not sure if we're going to see a long group again in this matchup, maybe on the
side of Yandex themselves, who knows.
I do think we're going to see Lina in a carry position potentially more often, looked very
good in the hands of Watson, but I'm going to start with the real reason why Yandex won.
F.E., the support, Joe, you already knew that there was going to be a lot of focus on the
supports in this series, in this game, and definitely delivered.
They really did.
I want to blaze Soxa a little bit, because he's one of those players where it feels
like you can't ban all of those heroes, but when he gets the most contested meta hero
in Hoodwink on 4, he can single-handedly win lanes for DM.
I mean, that felt so easy for him.
He was getting like fast, tick kills with blood grenades.
He was making sure that Loundarid could not get up to a good start, but he was going mid
and owning there. And we can talk about melody as well as undying. But I know you had a couple
of things to show us later, Brian.
Yeah, I mean, both everyone on the side of the index executed so well. And I also want
to say strategically going into this game that it felt like we were playing six days
ago when it looked at 1W's draft, like they were just picking on the meta heroes that
started out this tournament. And something we've been talking about is that the meta
is going to get figured out. And what that means is that people are learning the responses
So the heroes that are good and, you know, I think Puck for good reason has fallen out
of favor because people are punishing it with these aggressive greedy melee heroes and we
just saw the same story for Earthspear.
We've seen it a couple of times now.
I think we're like, we saw Nightstalker have to get banned out to enable Puck.
I think we're going to have to start banning Slardar to enable these greedy mid laners
because Puck and Earthspear specifically, they don't do anything to shut you down.
You're not really like annihilate.
I mean, honestly, Chiragina worked in this lane.
I don't know if it's supposed to be that bad.
But at the end of the day, you're picking it
because you get away with Slaughter.
Slaughter has a lot of unplayable matchups.
Like if you're Slaughter against like in Poker Mid
or any other ranged hero with a slow,
you just can't really play the game.
And so my eyes on the draft are the fact
that Yandex is using the flex of heroes like Lina.
They're really giving themselves so many options
to give you that cheesy last pick.
We were theory-crafting.
They could put it, but they could put it carry.
What are their options and when you have that many options to talk about that means your draft is just really well put together
Yeah, I'm what you mentioned about the earth spirit
I think our spirit is very strong in this patch
But his biggest strength is in teams that can flex into four when they need to that's I you don't really reveal
Okay, we picked our quillo into earth spirit knowing what the flex will never come because then he's in a position
Where you can get a scarred or a slardar or whatever anti melee here are
Yeah, whatever anti melee hero exists, you can exploit it.
So I think maybe the mistake was below plus Urspirit, but honestly for 1W, if it's only
BZM playing Urspirit on that team, then maybe they should move away from it in this series
because you have to ban it against P vision because if no one gets it or Nencloss gets
it, they're going to completely pop off, but it does seem like BZM is the only Urspirit
player on this team.
does. And I do agree with you, Brian, that it did feel a little bit like beginning of
the group stage versus adapting to what has been happening a little bit on the drafting
side. I'm not sure we're going to see in game number two, a little bit of a shift on both
sides, of course. But we are first going to focus on the I'm dying, I believe, a little
bit more on Malady. Yeah, as a core player myself, I'm going to appreciate when I get
absolutely carried for the first seven minutes of the game as we're looking at the bottom
lane right now and he's going to be getting gone on here on DM, but just pay attention
to the mini map as you're going to see the Undying going through the Twin Gate at the
start of this, the foresight coming out from Malady as we fast forward a little bit through
this, it's like, oh, they're going to, you know, this is wrapping itself off, here's
like, I have a retreat path, no, there's a Tombstone casual Undying rotation through
the Twin Gate, that's rotation number one.
Rotation number two, you guys probably saw it if you were watching the game live, this
is one of the coolest plays I have ever witnessed at the wisdom shrine specifically.
So there's going to be some bramble mazes on the ground.
I want you to see how Malady is going to walk in and out of the area of the wisdom shrine
around the brambles.
He's like doing a little like U formation such that he's not taking that extra damage
by just enough time for Watson to connect and ends up netting his team the wisdom shrine
when there are three heroes from 1W there.
And then, last but not least, the gigachat undying with the start that he's had, he's
going to be very high level, he's just always right place, right time.
Undying's real only impact in the early game is to walk into the middle of people and lay
down a tombstone behind them and that's what he's going to do.
He's going to get level 6 from this first kill on BZM and then he's going to, you know,
you're like, ah, you're going to be able to bring him down, but that bonus strength coming
out from popping that undying ulti and these little threshold things, one play leading
into the next.
Yeah, that's about the most you can take over.
We saw Rue have a stand-out performance in Game 1 for Team Spirit last series,
and now we're seeing a step-up from the 5-position for a team you indexed.
An absolute step-up, and to be honest, very scary.
I think nobody wants to face an undying like that.
It gives me the question, Effie, was this outstanding performance from sports on one side,
or was Laundra just figured out?
Or is Lunderwood going to be effective because it could have been any carry that got shut down that hard, right?
Yeah, I mean I think I
Would look at this as
Let's just not pick Lunderwood against the undux. I mean they beat it four times in a row five now
Like they're a team that are clearly very comfortable against playing with playing against Lunderwood and again
They have not been playing against weak teams. They are in the strongest group in this tournament
and they're still consistently beating Lounderwood.
So I think maybe when W is just trying to assess
whether or not their Lounderwood could withstand it
or if maybe they frog-checked other teams potentially.
But that doesn't seem to be the case.
I don't think Lounderwood will be picked in that next game
if he's not banned.
And do you think that in the previous series
we saw the hoodwink getting first phase banned?
Do you think that's where we're heading?
I mean, you either take it for yourself
or you just, you don't give that to Soxa.
I mean, he did way too much with that hero.
Yeah, like in the Team Spirit series in Game 1, I was like, oh, Team Spirit, like they weren't
really meant to win the early game.
So this was like purely outplay coming from them and going into Game 2, it's like, okay,
P-Vision making clean that up.
In this series, like I, my first impression, it's a first impression from one game.
I think that Yandex is so far ahead of 1W in terms of how they're thinking about the
meta and the layers of these heroes is like, okay, Linger, what does this hero do?
He gets groups for 20 minutes.
Sometimes you can't pick Carrie Lena because she's very easy to invade, very easy to gank.
A lot of carries just go through that twin gate and boot her out of lane and she's useless.
But that's something we can punish because they have loan druid.
It's not just the lane matchups.
It's not just like it's everything I feel like they're thinking about.
And I think they got absolutely worked strategically.
They're gonna have to like, I don't even know if it's fixable.
That's how I am seeing this series.
1W is considered to be one of the strongest teams here.
When you said it yourself this morning,
if you're out of the four teams we got on this stage,
one of them is currently the winner
and the rest will probably somewhere
be in the top 1Ws, one of those.
So surely they're gonna be able to adjust
to something like this.
Yeah, I would hope so.
I mean, for me, the adjustments that I thought
we're gonna see are not this first pick loan druid,
but also maybe just not the Earth spirit for BZM
if they're unwilling to flex it.
Because if BZM is in a position
where he gets later picked within the draft,
he can do a lot for 1W.
I guess to be clear,
I think they will adjust by Tuesday.
Like I think if you give them like a day and a half,
they will, I honestly sincerely believe
this is like a wake up call where it's like,
wow, we have not been thinking enough
about the drafts coming into the game.
The games have been too easy.
Yes, the games have been too easy.
They really came into play today and it's like,
are they going to make adjustments?
Is it going to look better in game two?
I absolutely believe that.
But I, but just strategically it looked
like the gap was too large and it didn't seem like
the index didn't eat like it's not like they threw a curveball I feel like that
was just a smart well laid out draft so based on this you do think that yeah
next we'll take the next game as well yeah it's not enough time to adjust I
personally feel that way like it's one of those where for all I know you remove
the loan jurid and everything's perfectly even but just from the outside
looking at it look like a complete strategical outclass
Do you share that vision, Effie?
I don't know. I don't think game 2 is going to look at all like we saw in game 1
because there are a lot of adjustments they can make that would give them an even playing field.
Like taking the Suntour for themselves when they have that pick open instead of the Linger,
I think would have given them something else because like the issues that I saw were
the hero pool for the often being very limited, the Suntour steal until picking Largo and not
off the best Largo game. I think things like that can be fixed by just prioritizing it
earlier. Well, I don't think it's that dire, but I completely understand why you buy anything.
So, well, we're going to find out one way or the other. Keep in mind that both of these
teams, well, now I guess only they wanted to 0 because 2-0 locks them into the playoffs
straight away. Whereas, if now 1-W can get an extra win here and tie the series, they'll
play again against each other in the best of three because we need to solve this tie.
both these teams tied at the top spot and that matters a lot and if you're now confused
by these numbers and by Brian mentioning what's happening on Tuesday don't worry we got you
covered.
This year, the EWC Dota 2 format is more cutthroat than ever.
This is how it's going to go down.
The tournament starts with the group stage.
The teams will be split into four groups of six, where they'll play in a round robin
format.
The top teams of each group qualify straight to the playoffs, and the bottom two are eliminated.
The remaining teams move on to the Survival Stage, which is a single-elimination Best
of Three Gauntlet-style bracket, the team's final chance of survival.
The first round of the Gauntlet bracket starts with the third and fourth placing teams from
the group stage.
The winner will meet the second-place team from group stage in round two.
Only four teams will move on from the Survival Stage to the Playoffs.
The Playoffs are a Best of Three single-elimination bracket, where a single mistake can be the
difference between moving on and being eliminated from the tournament.
A third place decider will be played for a bigger chunk of the prize pool, as well as valuable club championship points.
The Grand Finals match is the best of five for the two teams that have fought their way through each stage of the tournament.
Only one of them will remain undefeated and claim the EWC 2026 Dota 2 trophy.
The Esports World Cup.
The most elite competition in the world.
Its trophy system is built to match.
The Club Championship Trophy,
awarded to the one club that rose above the rest
and reigned supreme across all EWC games.
Every participant earns a key engraved with their name.
That's their right to compete.
Reigning champions hold a key unlike any other.
The Game Trophy is the ultimate prize
for every games champion.
incomplete until a champion's key is inserted.
The champion's key frame is locked into the totem,
a stone marker of legacy,
etched with every EWC champion.
The losing keys are crushed.
The champion claims three,
a personal reminder of who they defeated.
The rest are preserved beneath the totem in resin.
Every fallen contender captured forever.
Will you be remembered?
Or forgotten beneath the totem?
At EWC, nothing is granted.
Everything is earned.
We're getting ready of game number two!
It is 1W and Yandex on the stage and that game too is coming your way.
It is drafts time very soon and I want to know what to expect.
We already talked a little bit about this because game one was strategically all Yandex.
was all theirs, they were on top of things, whereas 1W left behind in the dust a little
bit, left scrambling, trying to find a way back into a game against a team that is not
going to be making mistakes big enough to make a comeback off of.
Maybe this time around though they have had 15 minutes to think about what to do next.
Surely, Effie, surely they'll come up with a better plan.
I think so.
I would just look at the lanes if I were 1W. How can I draft the most ideal lanes for us so that we can play Dodo later on?
Because team Yandex right now are the fastest team in the tournament.
They draft winning lanes and then they go for the early game group up.
They don't let teams like 1W who like to play them up actually play them up.
Maybe there are other teams that have hesitancy going high ground, but this is not one of them.
So when you face a team that wants to end around that 30-minute mark,
You have to make sure you don't let them be strong around that time.
I have to tip my hat to Watson specifically.
I think as we're going, I know we praised the supports in their play last game,
but I think having a carry in this current meta that can just whip out PL,
just whip out Lina, just kind of, like he,
I think he's making their drafts much more multi, like a dimensional
than a lot of other teams from their carrier.
Okay, like we saw Yattaro like without the morphling last series and that meted them a win on team spirit
I I'm kind of making the maybe not so bold prediction that the versatility of carry players is gonna be a pretty huge
Factor of moving forward in the tournament, especially with the love of them band out
That's actually seems like the kids that the bands are gravitating towards carries in the first round
We'll see probably still a drama shelter theme band so far. This is exactly the same other than
who goes first. So we have got Yandex on the radiant side this time around,
1W on the dire side and it is Yandex with first pick that means they get four
bats. The three bats then those are the three and those are very similar to
previous game apart from the Earth Spirit. Loan Druid does get banned out by 1W,
They still do remove the enigma and the nature's profit leaving in actually the two carries like draw and shadow paint
As just men's and the tree and protector still in as well
Yeah, I think if you're a 1w you have to ban lindred you don't want to play against that
You're not like yandex that are constantly letting it through and beating it and the air spirit ban is a bit of a surprising one for me
But I kind of understand it with first pick on yandex because in that last game
They didn't have it and they were able to counter pick it on a on 18 or 24 even
So they counter picked our spirit with Lena and then they flexed at the very end the side are in this game
They don't want to deal with like an 18 or spirit coming out from the museum after they've already shown your material
Yeah, and I of course man tree into native profile swapped around but they can both get back anyway
So it doesn't matter send to our first for yandex. Yeah, I'm not surprised that this here. I was getting
I have elevated in his priority in the draft because every time I've seen it
Even when teams beat it, it felt like you had to pick three specific heroes in order to kill this guy who has 3,000 HP at 20 minutes
And if you don't have that, it's such a huge problem to address and if you don't address it you literally
He just runs you over because he buy they buy an early shard that strain stacks up really quickly
Your reduction feels kind of hard to come by right now
We even saw DM go back for a like stop by for a Lotus before he went for the heart
So there is a bit of versatility in the way that the serial can build and
he's also just insanely good against all the range carries and
Quite frankly, I think we're seeing the result of a meta where the carry like slarks
Ursa's and monkey King type carries that pick on these
Really tanky offlaners like since our they're just unpickable. It seems like right now
I think monkey King might be the most pickable out of all of them
So I'm curious if we potentially start to see Monkey King go up in value because of these Centaur first round picks
Yandex did first base by an axe previous game this time
It will be there as an answer to the centaur
Not the hero that I think we should keep on our radar just in case you mentioned it many times before I feel the keeper of the light still in
For sure that one's the big one here, but last time Yandex were like, okay, I was 33's hero pool
We're going to ban the axe early on and we're going to take the centaur so that we make
sure he doesn't have his farming mechanisms, his ability to play behind towers, to farm
the camps that free up the triangle for his own mid laner.
And between centaur and axe, centaur is much easier to make work than an axe.
Like axe drops can go very wrong, but when they'll just go for it anyway, it doesn't
necessarily interact with the centaur in any capacity.
It's just that they want that ability to form ahead of the tower 433.
Yeah, maybe I'm underestimating Axe as a hero.
I mean, we saw Collapse own with it two days ago, but I don't know, I just feel like this is not a worthwhile trade.
From what I've seen so far in this tournament, it's like a very much a vibe check for me right now.
The Axes have looked situationally impactful while every single Centaur I've watched,
lose has had such immense impact in the game. So I think this is an uneven trade. I'm not
sure why Axe is necessarily a response to Centaur either. I mean, I know both of them
are very good against the range carry meta. And like Mira said, they do offer similar
things in the laning stage and stuff, but I do think Centaur is more reliable. I think
the biggest thing is that like a lot of Axe's bad lane matchups in the support role or dispels
or like any form of save from a call, there's not really a support equivalent counter to
the center
and they're just picking it the fight that's and that's why
i'm sorry i was i was thinking that i'm saying the trade like why are you
willing to give them center for the sake of access and that's the part i don't
really understand
giving the trade protector would be a mistake and giving london for
one of the eight they're not one of the teams that have been giving it away to
meet it like and that's
so maybe they're not as comfortable playing against it i guess in that case
you would make the argument for
let's give away a nickname instead of the sumptor and just pick something to
counter an online
yeah it's not it might be another situation where
the heroes that traditionally come in a lot personal back and gyro they're not
really getting picked either
so these could all just be
you know there's so many layers to this of why they think all this year was
harder harder to deal with than this one
why bring
being picked against acts once again
i think i like a contest like we just saw
I don't I think that Watson would not do that because I think he's so versatile
I it's not that he wouldn't do it
But I think it would serve them to like pick their four position here and hold off on Watson's pick, but I
Think he can be given more information the willow is still in
I think they wanted to go that same route
I mean not the easiest willow game versus range carries like very good
we've we've seen Marana a few times I'll be honest mostly in the morning games
and the cost are not a fan very strongly so even well maybe a little bit
different in the hands of the sexes I think I actually put Marana in like the
Coddle category in the sense that if you're not building around Marana then she is really
underwhelming.
I think even more so than Coddle in terms of underwhelming because if you don't have
the follow-up damage, if you don't have some heavy utilization of the vision of Moonlight
Shadow, if you don't have Catch that sets up the arrow, like these are just things where
Marana, she's just kind of a worser version of every support.
If she doesn't have those things, I think she's really strong on lane.
They have the Centaur set up. Even like Curse into Arrow is pretty, is actually a pretty
decent combo. It threatens heroes like Pock and stuff like this.
Yeah, I was going to mention that I think they're going to pick Clockwork with the Drawranger
and Marana, you just pay the price. She's a hero that can play against Cods relatively
comfortably and it can be as simple as Yandex just thinking they need strong lanes to win
because they snowballed so hard and not risking.
Yeah, absolutely. I guess if you're going, is there something you like more about Marana
As opposed to like Willow, for instance, like why why Marana over Willow?
Because I think they're both strong laners, right?
Or do you think she batches a better against Claw?
I think Marana just plays better against Claw, but I also think it's hard to be Willow against heroes like
Beringer that can like gust you away.
They don't necessarily get caught by your spells.
They're playing from a distance.
It's it's a tough one.
She's not one of the carries that are comfortable for Willow, unless Willow's snowballing.
Got you.
We still see Willow coming out, Ari will play it.
Two games in a row.
I'm a big life stealer fan here.
Yeah, now Willow for 1W, that's a strong Willow game
because you have a lot of magic damage versus
1-2-yvern, which is very important.
I didn't think they would do it.
Sorry, sorry, I didn't know that.
I just didn't think they would do it
because Axe is traditionally a hard peel counter.
Peel like absolutely destroys the rest of this lineup.
Don't get me wrong.
I got told yesterday, I asked this very question to Seb about Axe and PL, and he said, the
best PL players, they are able to make Axe look stupid.
They'll always have a doppel.
It's one of those in the laning stage you just can't really do much to him, that's the thing.
Like, for me, I'm more so looking at the lane, and in the middle of the lane game, it's really
not that bad at all, because-
He can use those words by the way, he didn't say it's stupid, just wanna point it out.
I mean, P.L. could absolutely make you look silly because Axe is a heart-committal blink stun
meant to kill somebody at the very start of the fight hero, and if you blink, all five illusions.
It do look kind of goofy, especially when we're playing from bird's eye view and we can see which one's real.
Yeah.
Um, I am shocked because P.L. has, if you guys watch like, immortal level streamers,
P.L. is in like half the pubs. He's in like every game, and he's a hero that does require...
it's like harder to play against PL than it is to play with PL so I think he
punishes pubs a lot more than he does professional play but so far Yandex is
the one team that's repeatedly ran PL to success and I don't think Axe is
enough so I hope that one win like they're banning out Lushrack I hope one
when their 1W does not you know think oh we got to cover with just Axe I hope
there's a hard PL counter coming in here
I mean, the Lush Rack is the big one that you think about.
What else could you pick against Peel?
Because Invoker's also taken out in that first phase, and that's AoE damage.
Yeah, I mean, generally speaking, it's mostly about heroes that are willing to walk into
Peel, and they're not like members, a great example, they have to bend themselves because
the index picks first.
I'm just like, it's really hard without a hero list, but it's, I don't think of counters
as like Urshaker.
I'm thinking of counters of heroes that early game, like Primal Beast for instance, they
like walk at the peel and you just can't really do anything about it.
Does Puck count as a counter?
I know she's been bad, but...
Puck would work.
Dream coil everybody?
Puck would absolutely work.
It's not a hard counter, but it would give them answers for sure.
You know, you mentioned Shaker, and I think that if Yandex pick a melee midlaner, we might
actually see the Shaker come out for a museum.
Yeah, I could do that.
Like, that's one of his preferred heroes.
While we're waiting for this, I do want to talk about the drafts as they are now, because
while it is true that PL and Axe have like nice dynamics online in the sense that you
know, PL can press doppelganger and then you can remove the battle hunger and then you've
also got the wyvern healing you, I still think it's a great matchup for Axe later on.
I mean, if he's not being made to look silly like you mentioned, James, and the Stroud
plus clock lane is very strong. Also, this is an air shaker steel, which is easy. Before
we talk about that, I just want to say that the lanes on 1W look very solid when they didn't
match for a skim. We'll see how the mid lane is going to look because with the Slardar
ban after the Ember, that shaker definitely feels like a steal. Let's Brian tell it.
Necrophos dude, just go for it. I actually think Necrophos is disgusting here. I was
is thinking about I'm like ranged heroes that punish shaker and buy like
radiance or punish PL I I think it's a sick necker I think this is like a really
five-head play to like ban out the ranged lane dominators and pick shaker but I
think you missed one. It's not a PL counter that's that's that was my
concern but I think they have two favorable side lanes right now like a
PL's finding its axe but he does lose the lane generally like you're not gonna
punish the axe then you have Flocker or Drow on the other side lane I think if
You were to just all in lanes with Necro here.
I do think they have other options, like, but
I would love to see the Radiance Buyer that connects to fights.
If they do go for that, would they still be on a timer?
Like, those Phantom Lans are still just eventually close out of game?
Yes, but it's one of those where if you're down by 20k all game,
doesn't really matter.
What do you make of the qualp?
I like it. I like it.
What do you like about it?
I like that it wins lane versus shaker,
and I really think that's the approach that 1W needed to take
in this game too, they just needed to draft strong lades for themselves.
I think they do have win conditions within their drafts and it is a strong axe game which
was picked second.
So all they have to do is not lose that 5k net worth advantage from the landing stage
and I think their draft will play itself whereas I know it was an 18 PL but it does not look
like the easiest PL game to pull off for me.
I think the thing about PL is most games are similar to Naga that we just saw, it is decided
than the first 15 minutes.
If this game is remotely even, then Yandex is won.
But I don't think it's going to be remotely even.
I think they are going to fall five to 10K behind by 20 minutes
on the side of Yandex.
If they don't, I think it's just going
to be a massive outplay on their side.
I would probably, this draft, it looks a lot better for 1W
than game one.
I don't think Yandex got the better half of it this time
around.
I like the PL, and I like the idea of the shaker.
It's creative, but it's not nearly as much of a gotcha
as I think they got in game one.
So we feel like this game too,
the adjustments from 1W are good enough
to, if they play well and they don't get outclassed
in the laning stage, they should just be getting
that advantage and they should be able to write
that advantage into a win.
For sure, I mean, in that first game,
they really could not play after the laning stage.
This time around they can and the big thing was,
was Ack's gonna be exploited in the laning stage?
Because if he gets shut out of lane,
then they don't really have place to make.
But I think Axe got away with his lane,
which is the big one for me here.
I think that's the big weakness of PL,
is that you are not the ranged carry
that's gonna shut this Axe down.
He should get a really good game on 33 here.
You guys wanna put a timer on this one?
Because 1W tends to slow it down,
I think they're gonna get a pretty massive lead
and then gradually ended at like 40 minutes.
40 minutes?
Before PL's too much of a problem, yeah.
I see FN nodding along going for about 40 minutes.
Let's see if this is a tie and we'll go again, or if Yandex can pull ahead and take this one to an on-game top spot in the group we're heading over to Salsman and Kezi.
Thank you, Shiva. Indeed, Yandex versus 1W Game 2. If you had to guess now, will there be a tiebreaker, or will Yandex 2-0?
There will be a tiebreaker.
You think so?
It's a tough choice for me, because I do like the chances of PL, but if 1W play well, and I think their lanes go as they are designed to, and the game gets played like very nicely, I do think it is in their hands whether they will win or lose this game, because while it is a very, very strong PL game,
QWAP can pop off, QWAP is quite good later on, so it's a lot about how do the early lanes go, how about the early rotations, can Saqsa do what he did last game.
I do think it's a lot harder with Marana to try and apply similar pressure as the hoodwing.
Yeah, let's talk about some of these things here. Let's start with the Phantom Lancer. What does it bring to the table? Why have we not seen more of it?
It's just a very, it's always been a very specific hero. He needs, like, yes, special requirements, right?
But in this game he's quite good.
I would say Kuap is by far the best hero that 1W have against him.
You're in a very OG draw counter.
You're very good against both the supports.
They have barely any AWE clear.
You can even just farm Cogs all the time, which is also like, you know, just bonus gold for you.
And the hero is very different than it used to be, you know?
No diffusal.
You're nowadays just like Manta, Aghanim's into some hard or Scotty.
So very, very different hero. I need a lot of time.
Explain the innate.
So, the innate of PL is, first of all, I think something cool that people don't really know.
So, you have one doppelganger illusion that deals zero damage, but with the innate, even this one deals damage.
So, first of all, it's a lot harder to understand which one is real and which one is fake.
And when you spawn illusions, they are way stronger than they should.
Like, the damage is really, really high with the innate, which also goes up.
Very close to the brambles.
Yeah, looks like you'll be okay, Sokza.
Well, not because that is a battery assault level, 1 o'clock work.
I never thought I'd see the day and 1W with the first kill of the game as a result.
Watson still being pressured heavily here.
That's a wraparound.
He's missing a lot of CS.
Yeah, that's both of them.
Should get this one.
Yep, these range creeps.
33 is very healthy.
And you see, Malady also quite low.
Looks like he might just fall here.
Early call picked up from 33.
Fairyfire not gonna be enough to save Malady.
So already a 2-0 start for 1W.
That Sox is stuck inside the cogs.
Another kill going away with 1W.
This is why Brains need to be turned on, Chenan.
Look at these skill bits.
You have battery assault in the top lane against the Marana who has arrow level 1.
Screw you, idiot. I'm gonna kill you.
Bottom lane, you are axed against PL.
I'm not skilling Battlehunter.
You think I'm stupid?
Boom. No, you go counter healings, you go call.
Screw your stupid doppelganger.
And he's going Ring of Health into probably Vanguard on Axe.
This is why auto-pulleting in Dota is so punishable, and if you actually think about what your heroes can do and what you're up against, it can look like this. This is beautiful.
I feel like not, even with the pro players, they still go for the cookie cutter builds, but seeing this on two different heroes, I mean, 33 is obviously a huge exception to this in general, but, you know, that's awesome to see.
It just shows like full understanding of what is happening because this top lane
This is gonna be a problem if you're the same for a Marana first. I mean Marana's already
I'm not gonna call it a grief hero, but if you're arrow level one, you're not really adding much right now
Yeah, trust me. I played with yaps or back in the day. He would steal all my creeps with arrow
And just go into the jungle get some neutral creeps no big deal
Yep, it's Malady will have to cold embrace himself. That's a good way in a very precarious spot
This 33 gets off the call should be a free kill on the other side shadow realm
Keeping the dark little alive and not really threatened that much by Watson. Anyway, yeah
Now they are going sick a mode in their lanes and socks are still level one my goodness in your line
Not the dogs not quite there, but the right clicks will suffice so still stuck on level one Marana
Well pure is more than nice than the most last hits on radiant
That is insane
Yeah, they are it's just 14 Wow 2k lead at minute 3. This is a speed run of like records. That's for sure
Geez, I mean, maybe they didn't know that they had to read what battery salt even did because this hasn't been a spelling
So well, I have this guy from on it. I wouldn't even be surprised if it's like 33 telling him yo like this
Yeah, this is soxie. He's gonna go arrow level one
That's true, there's no knowledge there for sure. Oh, yeah
They had the gloves of the haste on it and everything going wrong for Yandex
This is I'll say a whole big arrow coming out from socks
And that's why you go arrow early. Oh, he's level two now either way, but you're a junior getting that coming to the end
They saving grace perhaps you need that one. I'm surprised he found an angle on that one
Very very nicely played by socks or somehow he does it again steal the rune
Yeah, 33 getting everything out of this lane still body blocks
We're a nice job, Malady slowed to a crawl, but he should be okay.
In the mid lane, it is quite even on a CS despite that kill.
This is going to be an incredibly big axe. You are not stopping this guy in this lane, sure.
Axe is very annoyed by Peel, like later in the game, but early and in the mid game, Peel doesn't do anything to you either, so you are going to...
Which is very nice for the axe.
Yes, should mention first pickaxe
True after the yeah center and first pick for 1w exactly
It's 33
It's gonna be fine here. Yeah, I don't do the numbers like the crew players again
It's pick 15 is the start 29. It's 9 pickaxe
Whatever it's fixed and for the other cool thing. No, this is just probably a nerd
He's talking about yeah, whatever. That's why you're the caster anyway
Ashley, your shield's super nice. Like, if you have a free game on Axe early, you're going to immediately get him.
We tried a more HP region as White Goat with the battery assault, running down the centaur.
And even BZM, blinking in, gets the Shadow Strikes and now DM is going to be slowed up.
And White Mon, not able to get him inside the car. I'm not sure if that's what he wanted to do.
He definitely wanted him inside.
So, DM, outrunning him for now.
Well, the problem for DM is, sure, you don't die, but 33 has six and a half times your CS.
Yeah, that's quite a bit. That's pretty good.
Yeah, and he can creep-skip all he wants, which means, I mean, at the very least,
Watson is able to get a lot of CS as a result of this,
because he can definitely last it under the tower.
Yeah, he's at least getting, like, a little bit of space, as 33, of course, is ultra-maximizing himself.
RuneBGM will take that one.
It just feels like...
Ari will fall.
Just feel like when you're...
You have this much momentum.
The runes just seem to go on your side every time.
So you get the free rune there for 1W.
Tell me about this Urshaker, what the purpose behind it is supposed to be.
I do think it had to do with the fact that they were toying with the idea,
and they also mentioned on the panel, it was a little bit of a steel pick for 1W.
1W, you know, definitely could have been the case. And I think also when you look at how PL, as whole said...
This is a huge kill. Nice doppelganger right into... Okay, Echo Slam comes up.
They deal damage. They do. Like when you think about how the mid game is played, or like later when these heroes have some items,
Earthshaker PL teamfighting is ultra toxic. It's just illusions running a do-shaker with his shard.
He's just gonna fish or tow them on the ground. Yeah.
Now they're going to find DM in the cogs this time and that's going to be an easy pick up for 1W, 2K lead, 7 minute wisdom shrine should be theirs as well.
Well, now they sort of be a sneaky guy again.
Yeah, I don't think he's going to get away with it though.
With BZM there to force him out eventually, surely.
And we'll be able to grab it.
So, 1W, both shrines their way.
It has Claw from 33, but it's just on the creeps, and his CS is still insanely good.
You can see the top net worth in the game right now.
He's pure who we haven't even talked about, the Drow Ranger.
Feels like this hero getting up to a good start, just so hard to fight back against it.
Nearly a given. You need a very good lane performance, or you need some Darkseer plus one,
or you need your mid to pop off and go over to that lane because, yeah,
Drow is an incredible hero and an insane laner.
And they took the safe linchar one tower.
DM's net worth is the same as Wythemon.
Been a while since I've seen that.
Yeah, that's not good for those out there that don't know.
Not good at all.
No, not 101.
Yep.
Time to turn that Centaur into a...
...chopping the hero.
...feels like.
Yep, gets the move speed 33.
I mean, he's not scared of dying at all right now.
Has a ring of health, has the...
Whatever that chain mail is called now, Splint Mail of course.
The worst icon in the game still doesn't look like it's from Dota.
What does it look like?
It's just a different game entirely, yeah.
It's Chara Jr. found in the jungle inside the cogs now.
The battery is so... they don't have that much damage.
I think he gets out, although BZM joining things up.
He gets the Shadow Strike and now that...
Oh, the miss is the last moment!
TP should be successful here, and there's the building.
Well, TP is from his QA3 to the fountain,
I don't think he needed to do that,
but either way, you know, living, forcing heroes away,
4K lead for the 1-doubles here.
I was not expecting a series quite like this,
I have to say.
Maybe like ultra stomp one way and the other?
Yeah, I thought this would be like some 60 minutes.
I mean, it still could be, of course,
it's not over by any means,
but I feel like one thing for 1W that I appreciate
is when they get off to lead, they almost never give it.
It feels like they're very, very consistent at keeping this lead and growing it,
because 33 is the biggest min-maxer in Dota.
That's kind of the specialty, that and turning off the lights.
Oh, of course.
Well, they're definitely very good at understanding what to do with your lead,
how to grow your lead, and not really hand it off.
And I think here too, they've been doing this a lot in this tournament.
When you get this Tier 1 pressure going, when you win your safe lane this hard,
it's so easy to bring your carry into this move.
I'm hot.
Okay.
Can we get Echo Slammed and we'll be killed off,
I don't feel good for Chura Jr. It's just a support at the end of the day
Now the question is are they making stacks for this urshaker to try to get back in this game?
I don't think they could because white one was in the triangle earlier. Yeah, it's blocked right now
Yeah, he's blocking some stuff out. They have a lane board top. They have a lane board mid at least for Yandex
They understood their assignment, you know placing some defensive wards which earlier spotted white one walking in
It's a 5k gold lead. I mean when you look at this game as a whole like forget how the lanes have done
Okay, does this look like a good axe game just on paper?
You do have Wyvern to counter, right?
You have decent follow-up damage, so it's an OK axe game.
It's an OK.
But now that he's 5k gold up, it's a 2k axe.
Well, yeah, now it's a different story.
But do you think they...
It's more the fact that they first picked it on 1W.
Do you think they responded well enough from the Andex side?
Winter Wyvern has a good response.
PL is...
Honestly, I think that responses are OK.
The problem is that the gameplay has not added up at all.
Right.
BZM, going for Watson, Shadow Strike onto the correct one, into the Sonic Wave, and the
Rocket Flay to follow Watson, I believe had a Lotus to stay alive, so should be okay here.
Socks forcing the rest out.
The no kill there.
Yes, it's quite low, but it does mean that BZM is now kind of off the map for a while,
right, like going down bottom, using all your mana, does have to TP back to base.
And also if you're thinking about what Yanis can do right now
You don't really have any items yet that change the pace of the game, right?
You don't have a hookshot that you can smoke with you don't have to shake the blink yet
So once CJ gets his hands on that you should be able to see a blink because until then the whole map is kind of
1w is really safe. Yeah, for sure
Again they're trying to trying desperate
I mean for PL as a hero when is it supposed to come online like when do you start fighting with this hero?
You kind of chew on three items it feels like for most it's definitely like to play you had you go Manta acts
But it's still more like you're not really engaging in the fights yourself early on you're joining the fights that are starting
So for him he's one like a I would say put him in like a TA territory where you keep farming until you have a couple core items
And then you can look to join your team
So he's very happy if he just you know gets away with it is a great yellow game still
Waiting to see it
Might happen. We'll see if Yanix can delay it until then
Once they have moonlight shadow winters curse at the shaker blink as you think we'll see Yanix pull out a couple plays
White man showing himself Ari's gonna join as well white man
We'll get taken out eventually to arise a land of wonders already going for the damage onto the white room
But here Juni is gonna share some of that gets the enchantment photo minute kill so Watson
double on the PL.
Francis style almost finished as well.
Yandex are finding some good plays here.
They are, they go slam, they get the fissure as well.
The stun lock is there in general for BZM.
Triple kill for Watson, so despite losing two,
1W walk in and just get them more kills.
I like what Yandex are doing,
like look at the vision in like their own jungle
and in the bottom lane.
This is the only territory where honestly
they kind of want to fight, so 1W.
They need to be a bit more careful what they give away
Because you have a very clean lead, and this is not the type of game that's just gonna be a freebie.
There's a Shaker that has a PL, these heroes scale incredibly well.
You know, this DM trying his best to get back into this game has a Helmlet Dominator, of course.
So we're going for Lotus as a secondary item, so...
Against the Bramble, against the Gus, against the Shadow Strike. I mean, how does...
Qwap... I'm assuming Ag's against PL is insanely good.
It's ultra good. I mean, Qwap is kind of like an infinite damage late game hero.
So she is very, very good, as now there's a newly obtained Moonlight Shadow.
Yeah, 33 is gonna be the recipient of that already at half-out this cheer of junior with the fissure easy pick-off despite having to blame me on that for 33
Trying to go for the same playoff pop on DM
Yeah, so it's gonna be an off lane for an off lane one is not the same as the other though. You can look at a net war. Oh, yeah
Absurd nearly being doubled up even after these two deaths to them
You can definitely understand it. If you're 1W, you want to keep the train going as Malady going for his SIGI play, what it seems to be, stealing the Wisdom Shrine.
Yeah, he sure does love it. He's got a clock set to that every 7 minutes.
It's also getting it, very nice. Even earlier, you know, he didn't get it, but he forced BZM there in Game 1. He absolutely owned in that area.
looks like CJ is gonna go for an early shard on the shaker can't really go
wrong with either the Kaia or the shard it's just very nice and easy setup could
mean that you can just fish your told him set up the arrow without needing to
blink in with your main hero very nice oh my goodness damn just the sound cue
alone was enough for him to blink that is insane baby you're in sync I don't
understand if this was a pub that guy would be reported 100% hacking that is
It's insane.
Yeah, check in PC on that one.
That wasn't even humanly possible.
And Soxa, nice arrow, does hit onto the shadow realm, Dark Willow.
So it will be a kill eventually.
And it's always a trade though it seems.
And this one if they can get it is a bigger kill, but damn good TP on the high ground.
I wonder what 1W will talk about now in the next couple minutes, because this jungle,
when we'll see the blink out here.
Maybe he wasn't the sound he could have just blinked after a getting the creep maybe there's also a chance at the ward spot
As him on the edge at the possible sonic wave deletes cheer a junior
Yeah, big curse comes out some melody able to take out white mon in turn is pure now on the run as Watson
Continuing to chase gets the spirit lance there as well as socks is right clicks and the star storm
It's enough to initiate from 33 but the air is gonna hold in place cold embrace now under Watson still staying alive until the chop
comes through for 33, trying to turn this around now,
on to Malady, a second chop for the Axe.
Nicely done from 1W despite losing their position 1.
33 came in really caught, because that did not look good.
Like if you're handing kills to the PL right now,
you're going to suffer a lot.
We also know what this hero does with very high net worth.
He lights on somewhere.
Oh, of course.
Initially starting this fight quite cleanly, getting CJ out of it.
I mean, this curse was also quite good.
But 33 did get enough time to move on over here.
This pure would definitely just die so cleanly to Watson.
Yep.
I mean, a 33 counter initiation here.
Perhaps a half second earlier if Pure survives, there is a possibility of that, but still, it won't be too bothered by it.
Other than the lights, of course, which is why we were paused.
Giving the sign to DM, the gang sign, it's time for you to pause, brother.
Five K lead now for 1W.
The game at least did stabilize. Four Yandex overall.
I guess it's more so that the map stabilizes a little bit, obviously in terms of the game
they're still in a lot of good spot whatsoever.
They dodged hookshot.
We'll look off the mark for Whitemon.
Fancy footwork by CJ there.
He will be working on the shard now, so the fissure with the extra stun from Enchant Totem, always a classic.
Want to see also, eventually, like, if you are able to work on an Aghanim Scepter.
It is quite good to give you anyway a week clear, Satsa.
clear, Saksa.
Sam Peter tried to give him some space.
I don't think he's getting out of this, though.
See Saksa with the most emotion.
We'll see all day.
Slight tilt of the head.
And when it comes to the Roshan eventual talk,
which team has it better?
I mean, in terms of taking Rosh,
surely it's 1W, but...
It's definitely 1W.
Fighting in the pit, though.
I mean Yandex have some crazy spells you got echo and curse yeah, and also like one doubt
It should be easier for them first of all your head means you have more items more gold to inject into more damage
But probably most of the 20 to 25 minute mark
I don't think you want to be going there yet. You have no one really to tank and you would give up a lot of your map control
I'm gonna shot this time hits white mod
Malady gonna try to walk it off and then my shadow will help quite a bit. Might actually just get out of it as a result
Unless they connect. Dust not gonna be there the dust I believe clipped him
Shadow strike applied now and in the tree land attempting to TP a good a good attempt, but not enough
As we're approaching the 20 minute mark where I
Assume 1W will have the advantage in taking that first tormentor
Terrorize into a- okay, Sonic Wave. Just a free end of that one.
No, just take them out, because why not?
In the meantime, they're also made sure to defend their top tier 1 tower.
Cannot stress enough, if you have this type of a grip on the game, you want to hold all your tier 1 towers.
Because the top tier 1 is slowly getting chipped by DM being very annoying with his Dominator creep throughout this entire game.
Of course, needless to say, we're getting all the greedy enchantments on all of the players.
Axe has it, Centaur has it, Winter Wyvern has it, Marama has it.
I don't think we're going to get a big pass before TI at this point, but surely that gets nerfed. That would be nice to see.
Post probably. Or you have a little bit more of a setback like we talked about.
Maybe it should also lower your spell damage output or something that gives you some type of drawback.
Very true.
If it lowered attack damage and spell damage, how popular would it be?
I think people would still take it on specific heroes.
I would also say that that's the choice.
I would say that if you can nerf things, but people would still take it, it's a warranted nerf.
Because people would absolutely still take greedy enchantment.
It's a very unique type of thing that you don't really get anywhere else.
Dota is all about gold.
Yep, true.
as most of these players will tell you.
And what point will Yandex be able to fight?
I feel like they've been on the defense of the entire game.
But looking at the PL, the Agatham Scepter is done in 200.
You can see Chir on the Earthshaker just starting his BKB now, just 1000 in.
So, kind of a ways away. The Lotus also a ways away for DM,
so it feels like they're not really getting any big itemizations coming in anytime soon.
I think 1W are the ones that are looking for a fight, like more so.
Yannix can definitely look for some chip or a poke.
You know, a Fisher into the Taldum, gets some illusions out there.
So Yannix are definitely the ones to...
I would say they benefit a little bit more from a slow down game and keeping it at this pace.
Do have the Agathams completed on BZS.
Soxa, wrong place.
Yeah, wrong place from PPP.
B fault TP!
Ooh, that was actually close.
About 20-minute mark, we know what that means.
Tormentor will be taken by 1W.
And the Wisdom Shrine, you better look at how ready they are with the two supports,
but this around Maddily, making the correct call.
He's not anywhere close.
I can see BZM on the Queen of Pain, has the Agamceptor.
I'm also happy that Pure Changes' item build.
As you have like 3k both safe and wanted to go Mantis out, which I don't think you need.
I definitely prefer the Agatom Scepter here. Give yourself some more damage output, some illusion clear.
Also the Hypothermia against the Cold Embrace heals later.
And you also just farm way faster with the Agatom Scepter. You can even just farm with some Frost Arrows on the Ancient, whatever it is. Make it easier for yourself.
Yep, he's only 600 away from that now.
33 the last remaining core we had a mention DKB still a bit away
Both teams probably gonna chill a bit until these big items are
Purchased up and get to go the Lotus does come online a little earlier than I thought for DM
This is a very natural move here. Let's see if the annex can find someone active rune spawn timing is always a
Very easy way to try and use one of your timings catch someone off guard
And a haste rune, they're gonna try to bait this maybe.
And 1W are not biting on this one.
And Chira Junior initiated on 533, the hook shot to follow, shadow strike applied to him, the goalie brace keeps him in place, the gust is there though.
Guys Chira getting all the right clicks he wants, Chira Junior had no chance.
It is a trade for Whitemon, but not even enough from the index's perspective.
Honestly, that was just a good read by 1W. You see a lot of teams that in that scenario, the first guy, like your Queen of Pins just jumps on this haste rune and takes it, but...
Very nice discipline just waiting they break the smoke and 33 gets his own engagement even though the enemy team were the one smoking
There was the axe love that one super strong in the draw ranger
Lead not growing that much though for 1w so kind of been stagnant at the 5k mark
The good thing for them is that they're important heroes. I think are getting the farm and what is a good answer to peel
It's going to be about the time I think later, it's going to need Watson with like what's
he buying now.
He's got the Scotty queued up and I do think eventually you need a heart to kind of like
match the cobs damage I put in the fight, like kind of offsetting it.
I think otherwise Desi will just plow through these heroes.
The thing I don't have a sense for right now is how good PL is late game.
Like let's say 45 minutes and beyond because back when it was more popular, let's say
two, three years ago, it would start falling off at a certain point.
I think he's still very, very strong because now what's happening is that they're getting
like some items, you know, like the, you have the ax on draw, you have the couple items
on the block, so you deal with them quite well.
Hold on.
Okay.
You get pushed to the other side.
He gets cold and brazed, but he's just getting bounced left, right and center, killed off
Easily by 1W
And they're gonna get Malady as well and unlikely it gets off the curse at the last moment, but
It's not buying that much time
And that should be a Roche now for 1W one thing
It's just that the Yandex are finding the perfect start to the fight CJ is the most important hero like for the radiant draft
If there's no shaker, there's no team fighting. You need this guy to stay alive to keep the fight going for the PL
So honestly most of the team fighting for Yandex will be around Watson and CJ
So, need him to have a little bit better positioning or to shaker or to wait for his BKB.
Let's see, Watson. An ultimate orb away from finishing the Scotty. And then I assume after that you go some sort of damage, right?
Daedalus, butterfly me? And I guess butterfly against Straus not particularly good.
I don't know yet exactly what he's gonna go for. There's also a world I think where he could go hard
But I'm never a fan of going Scotty into hard. It's kind of like a
Forbidden dual combo because it's like just very survivable
But to be fair feels the type of here that if you just stay alive throughout the fight that is how you win
You don't necessarily need to have five damage items to clean people up, but better. It's like you need one
Yeah, I mean at least but his illusions are very strong. I
Need to see what he goes for after the Scotty if I apply obviously is good damage output
You don't care about the draw in that case.
I mean, I guess she won't really get to hit you all that much anyway. Obviously, she has multi-shot.
Not sure if he's done the math on what's best for him.
Let's see how much real estate 1W can get with his first Aegis of the game.
I think also that Orc at Bloodborne could be something quite good on the PL.
good on the PL, obviously if you can squeeze it in against the lineup, that doesn't have
that many dispels or loader swords.
I can see the Bloodthorn being quite good.
I like that.
I think also like a potential Silver Edge.
You have a lot of options on the PL, I think that's another good thing.
Silver Edge, really.
Just like Shard is a mini Silver Edge.
Not definitely it's true.
I would say that's like more the defensive one, you can play more aggressive with other
options.
But we'll just wait and see, because honestly at this point this game is going to drag
How does the so if you get the shard on PL? I just remember the really old version of this my apple that thought
as they are
About to be in contact with each other pure obviously the ages in tow they get vision they're not not quite a range
Good attempt, but no connection made
So about the shard was a back in the day
The fact that I'm bringing this it might be doda one. I don't even remember. It's like so long ago when you went in this
with his old skill. I met old doppelganger. You could tell that he used it because there's like a
slight animation. Is there anything like that? The only in this interaction I know of Giel and
Dota 2 that I've played is with their shard. The only doppelganger I know is this one. You
create one illusion that deals no damage but takes the same damage as yourself and that's it.
Yeah, but the shard is with juxtaposed people.
Yeah, so you now create one illusion, you go Invis.
I don't know if there is like a cast animation or anything.
No, it just happens pretty much instantly.
Illusion starts walking, you go Invis.
You also have some movements, which is quite nice. Obviously you want to like start disengaging.
As it looks like for now, he is queuing up the Orcith.
Yeah, I like that.
I feel like he is survivable enough.
It's also, it fits Pia's, Pia's kit like very well.
You're more like looking for pokes, maybe a DKB, kill a support, disengage.
And PGM.
Does have a shield rune.
Front lining, cold embrace, okay.
Get the Eccleslam on the other side.
The Hookchecks are trying to save him, but 33's already dead.
Sonic Wave comes up, it's enough to take out Chira, Junior.
So it's a one for one and now PZM taking the front of the damage from Watson's
going to turn his sights to Whitemon instead.
Pure very isolated right now.
Look at this.
Look at the illusions.
That is a big agonist scepter from the PL.
Take out the Aegis now as Ari with the Tear Wave comes out.
I think I turn now onto Drow Ranger. No support coming out whatsoever from 1W.
Watson actually has a lot of damage, almost kills off Watson.
Gets off the doppelganger though.
Cold Embrace there. You can see the Shadow Strikes really starting to stack up.
As Ari jumps in to try to finish the job, not going to have it quite yet as the double kill comes first for Watson,
but the PL eventually does drop down.
I wonder how much damage was done from the Shadow Strike Ags.
Oh, a lot, trust me. They found a very good jump there initially, on to 33.
I even feel like Watson could have lived towards the end of the fight there, tanking some of the, like,
Aries' web lab with his illusions. Just the fight recap is kind of trolling us.
Yeah, the casuals, 7300. Yeah, it's good. Very nice.
You can see the power of Watson. If he's not the first one that gets going on and he just gets to keep creating illusions,
These are super nuisance for these heroes.
Imagine if he had Orcid there.
Imagine if he could cheat some gold into himself. That's nice.
See the replay here.
But pretty much right off the bat, Chira Jr. and Axe just trade lives and it's a 4v4.
It's just like, sure, Pure has the Aegis, but DZM gets kind of forced away,
and Watson just gets to go ham. Like, they get Axe first, now the clock then it just chase down.
Pure on his Drow Ranger.
Also, of course very easy setup on the ages with the arrow
Even with the mountain didn't luck out on his man as well and a terrorized missing there kind of a big deal as well
So much damage still though from pure. I want to see the end like
Like those illusions you like my brother Watson, so maybe tank a bit but Ari finds himself a very needed kill towards the end
That's the most stressed I've seen him fight Stolik in nature
That's the game, it's nearly even.
Yeah, somehow, Yandex have crawled their way back into this game.
And the question is, can they continue this momentum?
Mechoslam back up.
The replay, that fight was so long.
Every small backup.
Yeah, we're back on a new team fight.
There are a lot of things coming out, like starting the fight overall for one to be,
it's not that easy.
Like, if you hook in, I think you're nearly instantly dying on clock.
And even so, like, if you jump in with axe, it could be on illusion,
there could be a random fissure that's, like, stunning the people that want to help you out.
So I don't think that the game is getting much easier at the moment.
There's a few good tools coming up for Yandex.
BZM working on Octarene next.
Alright, what's close exactly to coming?
So, Drow, Butterfly, not too far away.
33, it's just gonna be an E on this, so not a crazy item, but that's almost done.
That's also the other thing, like in the mid and late game, it matters what actual items are coming out,
like what is it changing for the game state, and I think every single item coming out for PL is changing what he can do.
Similar also, I think for DM, he's finally reached a state where he has a heart, he has a lotus,
he's starting to actually be a menace and staying alive.
I think the biggest thing we have coming out for 1W will be BZM scaling.
You know him getting the Octary and him getting the Shiva's because it's all about his spell usage and him staying alive.
Another Tormentor taking for 1W and the Shard goes to Ari.
It is a good Shard for the Cursed Crown but I wonder if they were hoping for, see who's the top net where it's pure.
So BZM would have gotten it otherwise.
Yeah, honestly would have done a little bit more.
I think that bonus brambles against a PL lineup, it's just going to be tanked by illusions.
It doesn't really matter.
Going for a smoke on Smoke here.
Oh yeah, they're about to collide.
DM gonna lead the way with that hard.
Although Soxa might be the one to block the smoke.
There's the blink out from DM.
I think you're rather shade.
DM.
And isolated right now.
It's the Curse on the micro.
God, Pure just destroys his teammate at Whitemon.
He got a huge arrow onto the QWAP as well
and just like that, two dead for 1W.
And Yandex takes the lead as a result
and the question is,
how fast is this roast spawn?
We'll find out in five seconds because if it's a quick one
They can take that out before that co-op comes back. Yeah, and they honestly will kill
It is not it's not at all. It's just gonna be another free kill. Yeah, okay, very good
Good slugger there. I think you're up
This is the other problem when you play against a hero like PL generally
You can only kill him if you need to commit right is like it's 3200 HP hero with a golden brace behind him
Whereas if you look at the index, it's a lot more chill if you see any dot blink curse with one guy next to it
We saw it there. That's a free clean if you see a fisher told him into arrow
That's how easy and I it's too simple and I think it's too stressful and too high for 1w to get the golden day on
Finally this tier one tower is gonna die. Mm-hmm. Damn with that return. He's got shard now
feeling good about himself and
Is this an axe game at some points?
It's, uh, not really.
Every game is kind of an act game, if that's the case.
Worst case, it's a save, but usually you want, like, a range right clicker.
Yeah, I mean, just think about how one win kills heroes.
I think you need to hookshot and then get some claps on the guy or an axe call.
So, if eventually you're shutting down, like, the one or two ways that they can kill,
it will always be good for you.
Maybe you won't be saving the PL, because I think the PL will be saved by a cold embrace or a fissure,
and most likely he will stay alive.
Worst case scenario is just a mini stampede for yourself, which is fine.
Once Watson gets his heart, I know we're talking about the PL a lot and it's only a 2K lead,
but they are already having issues and once his heart is out, he's gonna have like 4K HP
with a Winter Wyvern constantly cold embracing him in the back.
He's not too far away. Next fight he will certainly have it.
And then I assume he'll upgrade to Bloodthorn after that and then I mean,
Yeah, boots are not that important for PL, I would say.
Is his shard not worth purchasing?
I honestly don't mind, I don't think he needs it yet.
I think it's like...
I wouldn't call it luxurious, but you want to build other things first.
And also, like you said, you don't really need boots on his hero.
Like with Aghanim's, you have like a 1400 range charge,
or like a 3-second cooldown, you're constantly just zooming around.
So he's definitely still got some slots to work with.
And I guess we can look at Pure.
Like, Pure and BZM are gonna be the ones I think that need to deliver when it comes to the damage.
And it's 33 that needs to find a call.
A good one.
Smoke from the Andex, or early DKB from Chira Jr. Oh boy.
He echoed as well?
I think he got his Glyn chance to buy the multi-shot right as he was going.
Oh my goodness, that is rough.
Unfortunate timing for him and quite fortunate timing for Pure there.
That was a free go.
Pure luck.
Yep.
Wow.
All right, well that sets them back a bit not luck or skill and now the issue you don't have echo slam for this Roche fight
If it happens it is a bonus
I do think it like in other games you need it more so because it wishes also why I like to shake her not for their draft
Like PL Marana and shake are all very pokey heroes in nature like from the mid game onwards, right?
Fisher told him there's illusions running at you. So I think the echo not being available is okay
I mean 1W know this right they do surely but even I mean do they know I have to see the
replay actually don't know if they had vision I think they were smoked and moon lighted so
I don't think they saw it okay they probably saw the BKB right like once you you saw that
he was fishering and then BKB right but they actually they may not know yeah I mean based
on how passive they're being I don't think they know actually I actually working out
for Yandex a bit because they can get more farm throughout the map technically.
Because I think it's very difficult. Like you're playing into this radiant
draft and you need a very specific go. Like it's 1W like engage a fight and it's not good.
It will be lost on the spot because like I said if you want to fight a PL you need your first
hit of engagement to be clean. Whereas Yandex they can just toy around.
Yeah look at this they're still sticking around here. I guess both sides on across the river
now. It's a quick pause as they are back ready. I mean Echo is back up in 8 so we can go back
to this Roche stalemate. We got a couple of 4 staffs of course on 1W so they can always try to
you know delay the initial start of the fight you have double supports you've got the pike on
pure as well. It's certainly not easy. It could also be the type of game where it is so hard to
to get this initial goal that you're not really playing for. You are just poke, force-backed
and look for secondary round of engagements.
It's going to land with a DKB on DM now. That's why Mon is cogs are seen despite being
in smoke. So Yandex is very aware of this. That is 1W. God, it's so weird to say.
They get a w in this series is a better question and they do need it to tie it up vision of malady
You take that talent for rocket flare or not
That's DM. Oh, he gets initiated by 33 the multi shot the fall on the other side easy
I'm already pop the BKB not to really any use as a big curse comes out
So that's a lot of damage to 33 he's gonna die to his own teammates and 30 has to pop the BKB in retreat now
Now, Valley trying to finish the job, DM will do so, and now the BKB TP for the drought successful.
But again, it's costing you a lot of members of your team, although on the other side, Yandex, losing a couple members themselves.
Support and mid for Yandex out, meanwhile, Offlane's support for 1W.
Really, that's your initiators.
Yeah, it is a good hold though, from 1W.
I think right now, if you get any gold and XP injected into BZM, it's kind of what you want.
He is your best answer against what you're playing into right now with this ultra-fat Watson PL.
Because he's getting close to his shielder, he got his 20 talent early, able to scream of pain damage as well on the clock.
Can maybe squeeze him into the 25 territory as well later.
They're going for Roche.
Under the noses of 1W, don't have to worry about 33, Ari.
Nice positioning, you always have to terrorize to try and go for a steal here.
White one is well coming over.
A lot harder to make work unless you have that rocket player in there, which they do now, and Rosh is going to belch as a result.
DM taking a lot of damage. The Drow is ripping through him. A nice cold embrace to save him for the time being, but there's still enough magic damage to rip through him.
On the other side, though, Pure gets destroyed by Watson.
And that's the biggest kill of this fight.
In the end, X.
They still have two members up, and Rosh is low.
Well, R and W, despite the Drow being dead, they have four members at the ready.
Yeah, Ari got Melody in the middle of it all. I think without any buybacks, they can't contest his best on it.
Sonic Wave finishes it, so BZM takes the Aegis as Watson, applying some pressure.
I don't know if he wants to fully commit here.
Lockwork inside the pit will be the sacrifice for 1W.
Just dying to random spells and delusions.
Did they pick up the banner, I guess?
At least they picked up everything in the middle of that.
That's okay.
Watson pinged out the...
Yes, they got it.
There we go.
Get something out of it.
Well, they did get the Aegis, which is the main thing that matters, and you also have a Catalyst on BZM, so, honestly, very many good things going their way, to try and kind of punch back here on this one.
I'm pretty, like, pure die-to-an-arrow, right? I think Saks has set him up fully on, like, the Glacier.
It must have been... I don't know how he... I don't know how he died to the Sunblock if he's needed.
Boom. Yeah.
Into Watson's right click.
Hey, he's just dirty.
That's blown up immediately.
I did a good job towards the south side of the screen here as well, killing Malady, who's had some insane team-fighting with the curses.
He will watch white monsters die to illusions and a frisher and a shard.
Yeah, disgusting.
Eh, we're dead.
Okay, well, 1W coming out of that Aegis, definitely...
It doesn't equalize the game, but if Yandex had gotten that this would have been very difficult to come back for 1WM
It's good right now that kind of put themselves over this like a PL is still very strong
Like what's it is this wrongest hero of the game
But he kind of hit his I would say the exodia moment was like five minutes ago
It's still here now, but it is slowly tapering off
You have this guy you have the heart to be very tanky
But they're getting the next set of talents on the club on the draw ranger and the next set of items
So they definitely can't work with it
I mean, this talent on PL is disgusting. He was already hard to kill. Now it's a six-second cooldown on the doppelganger.
And all his illusions hurt. It doesn't even matter. Like, with the innate now, his illusions are so strong.
It levels up with his ult, right?
It's every three levels.
Oh, it's per levels, I see.
So he is racking up quite a bit of damage.
So getting level 30 actually matters here.
Oh, it does.
And where's the room to grow here? So obviously the treads can be deleted and
adds can be consumed. So what two items you want to round it up? Because I feel
like this is going late game. Extremely late game. Probably that I could see like a
satanic also later. Maybe like silver edge satanic. There's also like data list plus one.
I think I like that though. Like I wonder where he will take it. Like I think you
could go silver edge plus one. I would assume it's like a combination of satanic
Daedalus with Tannix Silveredge. Unless he wants to blink to get on top of the
Drow Ranger. How good is Silveredge against the lineup that is already
worrying about moonlight shadow? Yeah, Silveredge is maybe just not that great,
so maybe scrap that. I like the Satanic Daedalus. Yeah, I think it's probably the
best. Unless they do feel like all they need to do is for him to
immediately connect on a play, because you're gonna play against Pure's Drow
Ranger who's already queuing up the Blink Dagger. That's honestly, you need it.
Drow Ranger is very similar to PL in a way that you just need to stay alive.
People will die. So all the silver edges and blink daggers are very good for you.
All right, going for the gold here.
Everybody has the shard.
At the very least denying it from the radiant side as they are missing two shards on both supports.
Unacceptable. Very unacceptable.
I'm wondering now, if your wipe on, if you can swap maybe like going for an Agon of Scepter on the clockwork?
Oh, it's not like insane against the PL, but it's good.
You can cancel multiple blink daggers that you're playing against, right, from Shaker and the Centaur.
Because maybe you can start thinking about bigger pictures.
He is obviously going for the Lotus, which is great to take off the Bloodthorn.
So absolutely, I don't mind that.
We're getting into late game territory now. Very, very even game.
Yeah.
With Aegis right now on to BZM, just for another minute.
I doubt Yandex are gonna want to force a fight here, surely, they are smoked though, a little bit early for this considering the Aegis Tire, maybe that's part of the ideas, catching them off guard.
So they counter smoke down from 1W.
They have decent vision, they also have Moonlight Shatter if they do want to end up using it.
No, that rocket form, they're gonna get the stun right now onto Watson, he'll pop the BKB, trying to get the Winter Wyvern, but the E on this is gonna save him.
Meanwhile, the Fissure has a drought, Cure is already at half HP, has to try to get away, but of course, Watson's just gonna continue to pursue, they've forced out his BKB, so it's a Wyvern for Clockwork,
and has a star storm enough from Soxie to kill off 33, and BZM getting silenced with the Orchid, getting brought back into his base, but that's gonna be the Aegis, and now Cure's still on super low HP, keeping a distance with that multi-shot.
Fissure now, BZM. Continuing with the sh-
Looks like they're not going to go on top of them.
Re-initiate, actually. BZM does. They'll hope some time could be there because he still had the BKB.
I can hear.
Terrorize comes out into the Sonic Wave. BZM's trying to finish this off, but Watson gets the load
it's applied to him, and now he can turn the site onto the supports.
Here's what you bought back. Here's the right that's coming out from Pure at the last moment,
and that's going to be the death of the PL.
And now Centaur left to his own devices attempting the TP out is fine
They finally get the Phantom Lancer it costs a lot though. It comes to buy by back
It's very much worth it. You're starting to get like all these level 25s on the heroes BGM with the blink talent
You have also pure with his 25 gets more multi-shot ways very good against the PL as well
And now you've got 70 seconds to clean up the map a bit if you want
Looks like Soksov wants to go for a Wind Waker, which honestly makes sense.
This was a good fight overall because they did kill Malady nearly instantly, which is
I'm pretty sure this is their best fight.
Taking this Winter Wyvern out of the fight is incredibly good for them.
Got to get on this for Malady, keeping him alive a little longer, but does get chopped
in the end.
I think that pure survival is kind of shocking.
necessary so as well and you could see BCM got a ton of damage out in this fight. Of course,
did have the DKB to cover him on the respawn. Pure had great positioning, like going to base
and then keeping to the outpost to come from the south side here to clean this fight up.
Ultra necessary, just clips him barely with the silence.
I like that Watson is queuing up the disperser. Kind of forgot about that one to be honest,
Honestly, I think it's an ultra-good lakim item, more mobility for yourself for all the illusions, and another dispel.
Yeah, that's true.
Get some close-ups here of the rivals, of course.
That's right.
Ooh, and a swift blink coming out for pure.
It makes sense.
Good lakim item, it's all about the positioning.
And honestly, him staying alive is quite good for his team.
Obviously, Drao getting to hit is great, but also giving Drao'ora out there to BGM who's getting to hit.
getting to hit. Obviously it's more about the spells, but just pumping up some armor into your allies with the Willow and the QWOP is great.
This tier 2 being pressured just a bit. Chira Jr. didn't mention he did get it a while ago, the refresher.
This means the M arrowed up. This is going to be a lot of damage applied. At some distance though, and a low to supply to him, he will blink out.
That was with very little commitment from the annex so BZM is going to be very careful
He's been known to be a bit of a YOLO type of person and it's definitely been
Keeping it together, but as we can see it doesn't take a lot from the annex
To force out quite a reaction
Watson
5.5k gold obviously wants to retain buyback for these fights.
So it'll be a while until he gets another item.
Oh, I guess he could sell treads to get a little injection as well.
Yeah, he's still gonna need quite a bit more to get at least like 2k,
maybe 2.5 even with selling the treads.
Well, this is one of the more even games we've had lately.
Whose shoes would you rather be in at this stage?
I think maybe still slightly radiant. I think like on Yandex
It's definitely getting like it is getting closer 71% real. I don't even know why we look at this percentage
Honestly, I'm not that surprised. I think at the least it should be 60 40 because it is still by nature
Just easier. I think for radiance because like even so let's say the fight starts
There's a card available if they find a good go with a Fisher arrow
Like you can just double echo someone out of the game as well if you want to
Like I think it's cool if any of the course die instantly on 1w the fight is kind of cooked
But to reach that
Like titles scenario. I think it's just way easier for Yandex to have it as it is for
1w
Definitely eyes on bzm though. His scaling is working out quite well here for them
Nice illusion rune coming on now
Now, a few heroes that absolutely loves to see that.
Well, it's a very early Roshan spawn, and Soxa has a Wind Waker, so if they all in Malody,
they can still try to save him.
Of course, I think when he drops, there's still a lot of shit flying his way.
Yeah.
Queen of Fame, all of BZM spells, multi-shot.
Wait, I thought he had an E on this.
I'm going to see the arrow come in, full arrow duration, a 33 coming in with the counter initiation
with the call as well.
BZM staying alive.
It's a sonic wave and it looks like nothing here as pure getting on by the centaur along with socks and nearby the
Equislam is off camera as pure now on the run the solo curse they're gonna surround tactics on him the BKB
Runs out and the arrow finishes the job 33 now has to try to run away
We'll stop not gonna hit because of the BKB white line gets the cogs up the buyback now comes out from pure
It's 33 is gonna be seen thanks to the section placed by socks a awesome at DM
They're happy to leave socks into his own deck as he drops to the deck 90 seconds out
And the Andex now on the run. BZM gets hoof stomped. No more arrow follow-up though.
Into the fissure. They have the vision. Doppelganger, nice Jarrah Jr. with the
Eccleslam onto two. Trying to apply some pressure now to BZM, but he's gonna heal up
next to the Bloodstone, and it's a now attempted TP from the Centaur. DM out.
As Watson will leave Malady to his death. Splitting the uprights to try to
a little bit of havoc for BZM. Looks like the PL will live in the end.
That looks like we got another BZM show on our hands.
Yeah, this is.
Because he is really, he is popping off.
This cost him a buyback, of course.
8000 damage by Centaur. That's pretty good.
Yeah, he's just getting a lot of double edges off of like multiple stacks.
Same with the Stem P damage, it's very, very high.
So, sure, you did have to use the buyback, but you're just getting an Aegis in return.
An easy end now as well, unlike the choice of the Bloodstone. He is like, you go full HP instantly if there's some PL delusions out in this fight.
Honestly, these round of items, they are pushing 1W quite high up there when it comes to their own strength in the teamfighting.
I believe that was a fight, but it killed NailaD first, just queuing up a Shadowblade at the moment to maybe help him out with some mobility.
Am I- I thought he had Eon disc early. Did he sell it? Am I- Did he not have it before?
I don't think he had it.
I just wanted to have an Eon disc. Maybe it was-
I'll be surprised if he had it and sold it to have it.
It's possible it was 33 because it was right on top of him.
It's only him.
You were talking about the one mid-side where Wyvern got jumped, right?
Yeah. It must have been Axe right on top of me.
I just- Huh. I don't know.
Yeah, because now that sounds a little bit familiar.
Either way, Aegis now for Pure, they have the Cheese, they have the Roshan's Banner
and of course the other Roshan Banner from the second Rosh is on Chira still, very important.
Damn, 5k health going for the upgraded Blink, so gonna have a lot more of that came from.
was trying to get really fully slotted here
very low cooldown on the multi shot as well for pure course with all of his
talents
late game on the ground very very very strong
you see all the left side just full multi shot
it seems satanic is the final item that he is
gonna try to grab here
I mean, it will help him...
And you're really starting to run out of space.
Yeah, it will help him stand his ground, of course.
On pure.
He's dealing a lot of damage, that's...
What a shot missing.
Well, CJ's been having a pretty good dodge rate on that one.
That's true.
Level 24 on the Earthshake, what is the 25 talents on him?
He's got the Enchant, Totem, Cooldown, and Equal Sam Cooldown.
I think they're both fine. I mean, whenever you have Axe, you always take the left one.
Yeah, he does not have axe.
But I think also once you have refresher, the Echo Samp cooldown becomes a little more redundant.
Cause like you kinda wanna only fight with double Echo anyway.
Janek's looking for a fight, BZM onto the south side, blinks right into them unknowingly though.
Pure, hop them at them, take off the Orcid. There's a hook stop from DM.
Offs the Ghostseptors, stay alive, gets four steps as well.
There's the curse. Is it enough to take out the Clockwork? Not really. The Drow is not in range.
Ian, this procs for Whitemont.
Their ride's gonna be cancelled up.
As you can see the clockwork is just taking heavy damage just from the illusions in the
roster, but a nice Wind Waker to save his life.
White mod, but the Fissure comes in, one more star storm for the road, and the Wind Waker
from Sox is going to keep him safe.
Sonic Wave clipping a couple heroes, but I think this is retreat home for 1W, or at
least a soft reset.
Ah, this is nice.
It's been a while since I've seen a late game where both teams can play on a lot of
cold, jump in, Wind Waker out, and when people stay alive you still get the Fissure into
arrow.
the call only onto creeps though BZN jumping back in with that bloodstone activated a little bit
isolated right now. Echo is going to be along with the Echo. Aril is coming as well. He pops the BKB
and he's able to blink out just barely getting four staff blinks again and now Watson they find the
clip onto the Drow Ranger. Look how fast Watson is. He's going after BZN but he's going to kill him
though gets to the high ground again. Finally out of vision but now the Aegis is down. It's pure
on top of his Glacier, taking a ton of damage now from Watson.
Do they have the vision though, trying to get away?
Or Saff gets on the Glacier now, but that's too much damage.
And it's 33 TPs out in the cover of his BKB.
Great fight again from Yandex.
But that chase down was ridiculous.
He nearly got easy towards the end of it, but pure.
After respawning...
He's there for two minutes!
He chose the wrong way to blink out after respawning.
He blinked right into Watson's hands.
And they know there's no Biobank available.
Like, if you...
Maybe you don't time it the second directly,
but his Biobank is still down for two minutes and 40.
You should know it's down.
Yeah, for sure.
Let's see if BZM can pull up another show.
It is hard to push into an axe and a co-op with Agz.
Watson already at half health here.
The building damage is not particularly great.
Sonic Wave, a hookshot from Weiman.
BZM blinking in as well.
Climb on with the 4-step, orcated up though, another win-waker, keeping him alive.
Eandus procs as well, hooks up from DM.
There's the curse though on the other side, 30-3 with a call, but he's taking a huge amount of damage, attempting to get out.
But he gets chopped to the ground himself, does have buyback though.
And now, Bramble's being quite the nuisance.
Feels like DM needs to just tank this tower to be able to take it, because Watson...
I mean, very difficult for him to do it alone, so 50 seconds, no draw, but this is such an annoying line I have to push into.
They're doing a really good job of force-cart.
Work force for the Centaur is BZM, just brushing it off, and this tower's taking no damage at all.
This is where the over-throw practice comes into play.
Mike Rose was using hookshot, wide-long, and pushed the Centaur back in, but there's the end ghost, and right on top of BZM, they have the damage, he's dead.
Let's have his buyback though.
So three dead now, including the drought from earlier,
so that makes four.
You're doing a math with me.
Doing the math?
And this is going to be a full set of racks,
and they're going to have to force these buybacks out.
You're going to have to buy back something,
or you're losing probably all sides of the racks here.
They're waiting for the drought to be up, I'm sure.
And then they're going to buy back in full.
And the question is, how much can they get out of it?
First buyback comes out from the clock.
All right, I love doing quite a bit of damage.
Sox is actually just dead.
Any edge?
Not quite.
There's a battlehunter, 33, chops him to the ground.
And with that, everybody buying back, except for Pure, of course,
all they get is the support.
So Yandex going to be extremely happy,
and now a late game butterfly.
Ken is against the droplet.
Once you eat that axe.
Honestly, most of him is more about his own damage output,
I think, than it is for surviving against the Drow.
Yeah.
It was killing him anyways, kind of BZM was really putting on a show, but now you have multiple wind conditions.
No bibeg on AXE, no bibeg on clock and no bibeg on BZM.
Achir actually did go for the Enchant Potom cooldown, so I assume he's going AXE now.
You'll eventually go AXE, so it's fine.
It's definitely the better of the two.
Once you have Refresher who cares, also like the Yashakaya.
It's all about getting your fish out there quickly, follow it up with the totem.
See what 1W can do here. 40 seconds for Saksa. Any hero being out of the game right now is a big deal.
And the endex just, from their perspective, just got to chill.
There's 1W obviously looking for a pick off. No rush for a bit. Well, no in a minute.
Validate, links out.
And speaking of annoying lineups to push into. Honestly, the endex is even more annoying, I think.
It's both of them. There's just so much stuff flying your way.
They are doing a good job de-boarding the map right now though, 1W, during this downtime. Another Wind Waker.
I wonder if eventually someone will look into thinking or talking about a nullifier.
Of course, it's a good way how you stop these Wind Wakers from coming out.
But then the other part, it's annoying buying a nullifier at this point and slotting it into your inventory.
Remember, if the Andex wins this game, then they secure first place in the groups.
If 1W wins, then it's gonna be tiebreakers.
Gonna see this all over again.
It's a juicy one.
I'm sure the viewers wouldn't mind,
because this is a very good series.
A fissure.
DM not able to make the connection there.
There's 33 with the berserkers call,
but to get to Wind Waker,
Ekraslam onto several heroes.
Dark Will is first to fall,
and 33 is already super low now.
Able to get up.
Away to the north as DM getting saved by Wyvern,
Clockwork dead to right, so no buyback.
What the heck?
Smolty shot from Pure, just decimating everybody.
Cursed comes out of the last moment.
Not gonna turn into a kill though, as BZM keeping the pressure on buyback now onto DM.
They kill up the Wyvern, no buyback to speak of, as Pure, he's dead.
Does have buyback this time, will certainly use it here shortly as BZM.
Haven't used the BKB, faking the Sonic wave.
Trying to find the correct target, gets it off, but not able to get the kill.
Gets up to full HP from DM.
Looks like the Cursed Crown's not to be activated. Actually, the Lotus is there and Dark Willow gets absolutely thrown about three dead for 1W, only two alive now.
And that's gonna be their defense. Two versus four, Wyvern could buy back if needed.
2v4, you have no buybacks on these two heroes. Radiant have buybacks on at least two of the guys, so Watson could go ham.
I honestly think Malady chooses buyback.
But even so, it's a 2v4, you need to hold for at least a minute until you get a third guy.
Yeah, this is...
Monumental task for 1W as DM is just going to tank up these tier 4s and we'll see what the cores can do.
Pure and BZM.
He's got a rapier queued up, but you don't have time, son, to get this one.
Yeah, fortification, likely the final one of the game.
Pure, I'm not sure if he was spotted quite yet.
What can BZM do here?
He needs to get like five sonic waves right in a row, multi-shot.
and really a good amount of damage as you have, but now the ancient is exposed.
BZM blinking in, gets fissured though as pure, has to go back to the fountain.
You can see the ancient is already at half HP.
There's no way they can defend this surely.
The hookstone hits you on top of that, and now they're turning onto BZM,
gets off a nice sonic wave though to try to keep this game defended,
but it's not going to happen.
He has to blink back to base.
Backdoor protection.
They're coming.
Save them for a little bit, but the creeps are coming.
They actually help when are you serious?
Real life now for 1w, 15 seconds for the axe.
They have anything left in their tank.
They can just try to go from the throne completely if they are completely ignoring everything except the throne.
And that's going to be game. Yandex take it 2-0.
And that means they are first on Yandex Group.
Nearly put an ult to that.
That BGM got a command team even though they're on the losing side.
Doing a very good job at holding this for Yandex.
Proving that even in these difficult games
They just know what they need to do to come back, because their early game was not good.
DM had like no game at all.
They just found a couple of picks in the mid game, got a little bit of a comeback, and Watson on this PL.
Honestly, big, big delivery performance here by him.
Yeah, he ends the game 19 and 3.
Question. That's a question. Why do we not see more PL right now?
This looks like a masterful performance.
It's such a specific hero, but this CIS PL has always been the best one.
Even DM himself, he plays a crazy PL, Nightfall, probably the best PL in the world.
He once has got something to say about that now as well, and yeah.
Honestly, banger of a game, 1W still looking very good,
but you can see there's a couple of cracks in their armor.
Yeah, absolutely. And Soxa, he knows about those cracks in the armor.
He talked about the inside information here at Kazoo,
and he played with them for quite a while, at least most of the members on the team.
And comes out on top of this, I'm sure we'll see them face each other.
I'd be shocked if they don't later on in the tournament, but so far, at least at this stage, for the group stage, the NX take number one.
There's certainly some things for 1W I think to take away. There's some stuff here where you're up 5K, 6K gold.
I do think they found themselves dying a little too much in this radiant jungle early on, kind of handing a bit of gold in XP into the radiant draft.
draft and it's usually something 1W is very, very good about, you know, keeping your lead
steady, not overplaying, but yeah, Gammax, they found those openings and they tested
my views of them. Malady as well, some insane Winters curses in this game.
Yeah, I mean, Malady, I feel like if I had to pick a single player for MVP in this series,
it's him. He was absurdly good in game one as well. Soxa as well, but this time around,
I mean, Soxa had a really rough first few minutes, really bad.
Yeah, that was not the best part of the performance, but this is again, you know, where some of the individual players can come out, you know, with like clockwork, like white one going for the battery assault, not something you always see, but yeah, Yandex, looking clean.
Yeah, when you get to this really late game situation, the heroes that they have, very different, oh, 33, a lot of emotion there actually, somebody who turned on the light I guess, and really rage baited him as some would say, but yeah, Yandex, very, very good right now.
Let's go to the stage and get a nice little interview.
Thank you my friends on the commentary desk and welcome back to the stage.
A 2-0 victory here.
And look at who we have with us from Team Miandex here, Junior.
Thanks so much for being on here with us.
I want to ask you a technical question.
First, we are Shaker.
It's only been played three times and won in all three times.
The third one was in this game here.
Why the pick?
What's the reasoning behind it?
We won three times and won today.
Tell me, what's your secret? Why did you come here today?
It always feels good to play on stage, just in front of viewers, it's always good.
Do you feel nerves are leaving bit by bit as you head deeper into the tournament?
No, I don't have any pressure.
I'd love to hear it. And Speedovic, at this point you and 1W have been playing against one another one in a million times.
Do you consider them your big rivals overall?
I don't know, they're just good and they always coming for us and we feel them.
Is this revenge for Birmingham?
Not yet.
Do you expect to play them in the final?
We expect them.
Very much.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Appreciate it.
Let's cheer up.
That's Team Yandex victorious.
And thank you very much.
A solo translator.
We'll send it back to our panel.
Thank you very much.
Yandex taking this to a zero victory means they are not undefeated, but they are undoubtedly the best team in the group of death.
Congratulations to them to secure your first place in there.
therefore also skipping the survival stage
and going straight to the playoffs.
This game number two though was quite crazy,
quite mental here, Brian.
This was a good one to end on,
and we could see why these two teams are so close.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think, you know, 1W definitely showed us much more
of what they're capable of in that game too.
I still think Yandex, like they were,
I think they were in a comfortable position
that entire game.
Like, I think we all expected their landing stage
to not go so hot.
They did not draft for the lanes at all.
And we did see a couple of those key slip-ups coming from 1W in the mid-game there.
And I think that even with, like, even footing, I think if the drafts...
I would even argue it was slightly in favor of 1W in the draft.
And I think if the drafts were reversed, I would almost believe that Yandex would have won.
That's, like, the vibe I got from that game.
But it was very close later on, compared to what I thought it would be.
Like, I thought the PL would get out of control, but we'll play from both teams at the end of the day.
I mean, watching Yandex is so fun and CJ's becoming one of my favorite mid players very,
very rapidly. I think that the way he's been playing this tournament is so decisive. He has his
own flair. He looks so good on the slardars, but stealing the Earthshaker was such a bold
call by him and it worked out beautifully. I mean, every player on Yandex delivered today,
but I do think CJ is the most improved out of the Skull Roster.
Yeah, I want to also take a moment to talk a little bit. I think we're going to talk about
about them later as well, but to talk about the safe lane of Yandex with Watson and Melody,
I feel like this is the safe lane.
We knew that they were comfortable together.
We heard the stories, they joined gaming together.
We knew that they're kind of like a package deal.
They enjoy leaning, playing together, and we've seen them do well.
We've seen them do very well.
But I feel like this series, they smashed it.
They knocked it out of the park.
Yeah, Mira backstage you're talking about the fact that they look like more more like game and gladiators
Yeah, I mean it's funny because we're like oh you could say they have the game and gladiators DNA
But when they were on that team they did not look like this
I feel like they've leveled up together and Watson is an extremely talented player
But he never really was in the right team to make him shine and at this tournament with the index he's been playing very fast
But he's also been doing it with hard carries and in this game, too
We've seen him in a position that we're used to seeing him in on previous teams or he's the only one doing well in the game
He's the one win condition and he has to drag his team through a hellish early to mid game
Which is basically what happened. There was the ticking time bomb of the PL
But there is also every lane losing and him having a lot of his shoulders and he really delivered
Yeah, he delivered
Malady delivered. I think both games we heard our commentary team say it like on the on dying and on the
Wyvern in this game as well Brian absolutely shining star. Yeah, there's one guy that I don't think he bought a single support item that entire
You know what you're like 18k melody was Frank one on leaderboards for quite some time
Especially before he was you know when he had a reason to grind for that before he was on a tier one professional team
This guy is something else when I looked at his inventory and why for him like treads blink
Hurricane bike
You know that he was he was well positioned throughout the course of that game. There were a few cold embraces that I think might have gotten
Watson in trouble, but I think that was an incredibly difficult game for him to execute
So I think it takes a lot of confidence to play here like Wyvern who can effectively grief your team in multiple different ways
either cursing targets that you're trying to disable or by
Cold embracing your own teammates when they're trying to run away
But his I think he's on dying performance like that. That was a clock
Probably the best support performance I've seen in the first eight minutes and I just watched Rue earlier own on that one game
So that says a lot. It does say a lot and still it's not enough because he is not the MVP
I'm so sorry Maladine my pain maybe got a little bit robbed
But I'm also a little bit biased towards support, but it is Watson that gets the MVP here
well deserved Alina carry game we did
Kind of see it coming as an option, but were we truly expecting it?
not really, if you were asking at the start of the day, I'm like, maybe 5% chance, we saw it in action, and I now think we're gonna see it in action more so.
His PL, he delivered, he knew what he had to do, and overall very much on the ball.
He's such a top-class player and it just makes me so happy to see him on a team that
enables him and understands him, because I feel like ever since he came into the Competitiveness
Team he always had it in him and he was always owning Impots, but it just never translated
to professional Dota in the same way until he found this team and it really was just
a matter of chemistry and all of the pieces connecting.
But having a carry that can basically do anything for you is so ideal.
If you want to play fast, he will play fast.
If you wanna pick him something like a Lena to carry Flex,
guess what?
He invented that like three years ago, you know?
You wanna pick him something to play in the Ultra Lake game
and he can do it.
So he's just owning right now, Brian.
Yeah, I feel like it's his early stages of his career.
He was known to be the guy that was gonna have
a thousand CS on Terra Blade and seeing him
on heroes like Lena and like Mira mentioned,
if he's offering you, a lot of scenes are struggling
to find those crucial flexes in the draft
that give you the gotcha pick
And I think in game two, he was the wing condition,
but in game one, he allowed for the Slardar on Chair Jr.
to be the game winning condition.
And there are a lot of teams where in theory,
there's something you could pick
that would absolutely destroy the game.
But a lot of times you have some player limitation somewhere
that makes that not possible.
And yeah, I really,
I think he's shown a tremendous growth over the years.
Yeah, he also said that you think that 1W
needed a little bit more time to adjust.
Brian Bennett on Tuesday, they'll be back in action,
Luckily for them, they have one extra day, because I think in the survival stage, they
get to be seated into the second day, because they get second in the group with this.
So they got until Wednesday, but this is a team that we know, if we can adjust and will
adjust and will be very scary.
For sure.
I mean, they looked a lot better in this game to the already, that was an incredibly dominant
laning stage.
And they just had a very difficult late game scenario to be put in, because when you're
You're playing Dravanger against PL in the late game, that's just miserable.
I mean, you were talking about it Brian, how it's impossible, there's no item you can
really buy to help you, and with all that being said, the fact that it was that competitive
at 50 plus minutes, says a lot about them.
It does say a lot about them, we can take a look at the group standings here for the
group of Death, Group D. It is not completely over yet.
Right now, OGN Virtus.Pro are actually playing an incredibly important game, because as you
You can see they're tied, and whoever wins this game too, that they are playing right
now on the B stage, whoever wins makes it through.
Whoever loses gets their key crushed and gets a ticket home.
It's a painful reality for them.
Yandex gets a 9-1 and 1-W now, of course, sitting in second place.
And LGD there as well in third place guaranteed after their 2-0 victory today against IC Insanity.
So that is Group D almost done.
As you were able to tell, there is no chance of tiebreakers in this group.
But of course, we will wait regardless until OGM VP are done,
because after that is the only time when we'll be able to show you guys the bracket.
And when I say show you guys, there will be a bracket reveal show.
So make sure you stick around.
I want to hear some final thoughts on the day we just had, though.
I mean, obviously we saw two amazing series.
I do think Brian, a little bit biased.
But if we look at both series,
second series delivered a little bit more.
Yeah, I think so.
I mean, at the end of the day,
I think we were saying at the start of the day
that these four teams were likely gonna be,
like very likely gonna be one of the people
at the podium at the end of this tournament.
And I think that today showed it especially,
I think P-Vision talked about the fact
that they experimented a little bit,
giving no one Largo in the first game.
And he just wanted to try it, but then it fell flat.
I really do think P vision and in the index show set themselves apart from the group right now and
Truly, I don't think any of these teams were tested to the fullest going into today
And I think that the meta was developing enough that
When we see the best teams played against each other and then they're all like now
We get a much better gauge of what is actually good with the heroes like what are the counters that are worth being concerned about and
I think that homework that these teams have like the next day or two
You're gonna it's gonna be really important because you can't you can't afford to lose one game for free in a
Format that is so unforgiving like this one. Yep single elimination all the way through from this point onward. It is indeed
unforgiving do you think that it's a good thing that
P-Vision dropped a game FV considering they haven't dropped a game before today and Team Spirit made them drop a game
And obviously they can blame it on the Largo mid, but you know, sometimes
It's nice to get that check and to be able to at least experience the process of adjustment and getting better
For sure, I mean for them it's a good thing for them to learn
But it's also good thing for other teams to see what works against them potentially
They have to face off of them, but going through a group stage undefeated
isn't as good for a team as it sounds because that's usually when you have more margin for error and
You don't want to be exposed in what your weaknesses are far too late into the tournament.
So, P-Vision are going to learn a lot from their series today,
and they're going to apply it in the next few days as well.
I know we said about all these teams, we're expecting to see them at the top.
Not that we've seen them do well.
P-Vision and Yannick, they do look very good.
We also have Falcons and NygmaGalaxy, the other two teams that are directly seeded into the playoffs.
you have a favorite. I'll put them on spot. Out of all the teams. Out of the four teams
that are guaranteed in the playoff bracket. I'm still sticking with P-Vision with Yandex
in a close second. I like Yandex a lot actually. They really love me over there. Nobody believes
in me. My galaxy, come on. I dream to be there. They did. I did not fluke their way to the
top of this group. They did not. They looked good in the few games that I saw them play,
the males fitting quite well into the carry role.
And I feel like Nigma in the past
always found a way to lose the game, right?
That was the Saturday.
They'd put themselves in a favorable position,
but something's different about this roster
where they're actually closing it out, Mira.
They are, Brian, not anymore.
I thought Nigma does not exist.
Yeah, we forget about that one.
It's a new era.
All right, well, we're obviously gonna see who takes it
in our Grand Finals next week, Sunday,
but right now there's also Grand Finals happening.
just not endowed it too. They're happening in Valorant on the STC Arena and we are going
to check in with Chris who found Janniro to talk about it.
We're not going to crowd. We're going to make our way into the crowd here in the STC Arena.
We've got Ian Chambers yapping in my ear here, Janny as usual. But Valorant concludes today.
We just had our third, fourth place matchup going down. That was a great game.
But let me know what's going on over here in Valorant today.
Yeah, a lot of upsets I would say here in Valorant specifically, especially when we're looking at the title defenders, which were heretics.
They had a thousand club championship points last year by actually winning the Valorant title.
This year, however, they made it out of the group stage just to be eliminated on that first game on the stage, which is quite painful.
Vitality as well. They got eliminated in the quarter-finals. A lot of question marks there too.
Yeah, so I suppose with all these teams, they're not on the door to side of things, but club championship-wise,
These teams are expecting to be at the very very top, but we have our finals today. We're already good to go on now
How do you think that's gonna go down? Yeah, it's 100 thieves against NRG. Honestly the favorites
I would admittedly say would probably NRG. They are the champion defenders when it comes to Valor and they won that last
International so
100 thieves got that workout for them. But when it comes to the grand scheme of things
I do believe that 100 thieves has more teams competing so for them to be able to get that first win
makes them eligible to be club championship winners because of course you need that you need that one win right that's all you got
Of course, of course. Well, let's see if they're going to be able to do it
Good championship heating up already here in week one. We've got six more weeks to go though
We'll check in you well quite a little bit more often. I would imagine you but thank you very much and we'll speak to you a little bit later
Thanks
Thank you very much Chris and Janniro and we are gonna continue on with the Dota because it's not yet done
We will have the bracket reveal show, but we cannot show a bracket without
OG and VP finishing their series. Keep in mind that whoever wins this game stays in the competition. Whoever loses is eliminated
So a lot on the line. We're gonna have you watch that game right here
So you don't need to move anywhere and we'll of course be back afterwards. So enjoy OG versus VP
And complicate things for Raven and his Glores, that's been a very big part of finding some
of these openings here on the side of OG.
Terminator is there, the side of OG actually looking to swing back up top as the side of
VP do back off completely.
What do they want to do with these ages right now?
I mean surely they have to look for an opportunity to hide under drawing lines up top.
Just a straightforward push.
It would be best to get a pick off.
She could.
You are smoked up.
I've got the refresher on the Beastmaster as well.
Grab himself the Alpha Wolf.
That is a lot of damage for the Terrorblade and for himself.
Yeah.
We'll see if they can actually find the opening.
Mid lane, Ember, they saw the slight.
This is kind of far out.
Hellscream is nearby.
If you start the fight on Hellscream, I feel like that would be best-case scenario, top.
They're just gonna see, I mean, they're gonna like force them back, I guess.
That tier 3 is about to die, and well, VP's gonna smoke and do their own wrap around here,
see what they can get.
Wifi head on into the ages if you can surprise them.
The Lincoln Sphere is being replicated over.
In the light?
In the light shadow.
And they're starting, they're going in with the gem first.
Blink to safety, but they manage to find Scam to start this fight.
He's gonna go down, Natsumi goes right onto Tamato, but he's got a lot of damage, but
there's the roar.
Tuck, he used to pull him back, but he goes right into the magnetized, the second roar.
They need to get Tamato to safety.
They're trying their absolute best.
it's not enough they've just surrounded him he's doing a lot of you're kidding me he still lives
not so he's all alone all alone oh no saberlight how do you keep him alive
just way too many dispelts on hand it's all that lotuses it's a two charges on the
mcatchy lick it's just too much for you to have to play into they couldn't focus that damage down
and VP swing out with an 8k lead. There's no lead. That's just too much. It's all the
dispelts. Yeah. Standing in the middle, he gets a satanic off, he gets some control,
get catchy licked in the back. Right there, say what? Just always next to him, giving a lick,
keeping him healthy, licked again, and just all the way. Just not enough to kill. I can't believe it.
It's unbelievable how much he's able to keep himself alive.
And during all of this, you have Abed and Fly just completely
ripping through the back line.
And it's just an immediate turnaround, the high ground
crumbling here for OG.
And it's potentially their tournament lives.
Fortification is going to come out.
This is the last one that you've got.
They're looking for Abed.
He has a BKB at the ready.
You have to open with the stun, terrorize, it's not going to connect, able to dodge it out.
The respawns are coming through.
Terrorblades up in 7, they want the mega creeps, but is it too greedy to stick around?
I think VP are going to take it safe and back away.
That is just insane, that was OG.
I can't believe that happened.
It was OG with the Aegis, OG with the refresh, and it just is all for that.
I like they roared the satanic, but he is his side gunner was hitting you a spirit
Yeah, and then they roar him again. I know what you do here if you're oji
Because we've talked about what you've had to do you've had to look for the back line
This rubik was an issue earlier on the Largo is an issue now as well the Largo is so strong
How are you supposed to focus on all of these heroes at once?
You have to get the rubik or the Largo like you and then
Tomato just gets to do whatever he wants in the fight, which is even scarier. I don't know
I have the Largo so tanky too if you go on to Saber light. He's like what?
3.6 gauge be something like that. Yeah, it's just so hard to kill lots of armor as well because he's got the Lotus
That divine's coming for Tomato. He's got his accent available. He's just locked the agonist up there for the moment
Just going on to the goal just in case
Nice.
No shotgun defense has to be perfect somehow.
They know the buyback probably more important at the moment.
Obed gets his level 25, a big pick up for him on the Ember spirit.
With the Croats of Genius, he's going to be doing a lot of work in these fights as that
refresher completed.
They're going to pop another Moonlight Shadow here on OG, see what they can find, vision
onto Obed mid.
But the telekinesis, it's gonna come out immediately.
A great stun comes in from Yobaj, but he still gets the fear off.
Can they click down the ember?
They do, not Sumi.
Doing a ton of damage on Yobaj, trying to get Hellscream, trying to get the roll away.
He does for now.
But they're onto Tomato.
The helicopter needs help.
He's trying to get the kill.
They get the kill, not Sumi.
He's too damn strong.
Taking down Fly will be next.
He gets the Sunder onto Tim's Albed with an exchange able to get out for now.
This is the fight OG was looking for arrow.
Oh my goodness.
I mean that's what you need to get done, right?
Like they do manage to get the control onto Abed,
but that's bring for meal podge into the back, finding health cream, forcing him to roll away,
and interrupting the back line shenanigans.
That's what allows them the isolation onto Tamato.
All those saves, all you need to do is somehow break it apart,
and this forcing of the Hellscream away suddenly played a pretty darn big part.
Saberlight as well.
He's not the comfiest there, didn't have the licks.
He was trying to save Hellscream first without the lick.
The damage was there from Natsumi.
And again, a nice thunder at the end just to ensure he wouldn't die having to sacrifice his good friend, Tim.
But, OG, back in the picture, there's still 8k behind.
It doesn't feel like it, right?
It feels like it's anybody's game.
There's no difference here.
We're just going to go right back up the other side of the graph.
The concern is still these racks.
You've got two lanes of super creep shoving in.
You've got some time until next time,
or Sean, respawns will be back up for it.
I have to say, heads up from Tamato again,
holding onto that buyback,
not fully assembling up just yet.
Jiro is going to be respawning here, so Tamato decides, okay, maybe I don't go Divine Rape
here.
He's going to take the accent and go for the Monkey King bar instead.
He's just got to get to the side shop.
He's going to hold his buyback again for now, but I think the butterfly from the Terriblade
absolutely caught them off guard.
You don't have that evasion, Pierce.
You don't have a way of just going through that EHP
or not seeing a little bit of the smoke out.
Quick shout as well.
Everyone from streaming below as we are going
into a big fight here.
It's a good time to get here.
Tomato under the cover of the smoke.
He's got the Lincoln's from that Largo on top of them.
There just gotta run back the other way.
They're pinging the bottom lane of racks.
They just need to cut the waves
and then maybe they can threaten mega creeps
Or at least force OG back into the base.
He could lose Borscht on here though.
Yeah, mid lane's cut. Terrible cutting the mid lane though as well.
They're not gonna let those minions end up towards their base.
For everyone who is just joining us, this is potentially the elimination.
One of these teams could be going home here depending on who wins.
As Raven once again continued to threaten these racks just split pushing on this beast master
With the help of the terror blade illusions. It's doing a lot of work. He's gonna get him sooner rather than later
I was actually forced to go back just a tad bit as the tier 3 falls. Yeah
Roshan's up. Oh, he's got the long smoke around, but they're gonna have to come in from the low ground. Oh
Rubik went straight across he's gonna try and take the outpost
It's a smart outpost take because they know Roshan's about to move, but Hellscream's gonna get found instead and he is all alone
Quick pick off for OG and he's dead for 75 seconds
We've seen how big the Rubik has been in these fights with these saves. Can they find more scab?
It's the lethal way for now
That call down doing some damage
The racks are exposed now by the way as well right here tree fall creeps are pushing in
They've done a good job of just shoving the creeps away like they've managed to cut through all the creep wave is running in as well
So you've got a 50 second window Rochon switching sides
OG should be able to kill Rochon in that time period. They are setting up for that top Roche
They have to wait in about 10 seconds before Rochon will get into the pit
You do have to be careful because Tomato could push mid and threaten the mega creeps on the bottom racks
They're gonna scan
That is a scary high ground to go into they've got great ward vision to model with the lincoln's look get him on the yule's
Gets catchy licks safety number one trying to get him out four staff comes out with the lotus yopas force the bkb
They don't manage to connect on this and rubik's coming up in about 15 seconds
This is so not a lot of commitment though from og they still have plenty in the tank here
Can no BKB and Yopah just pretty good.
Your base.
You gotta go back and address the base.
Or get the D-Words.
Who's gonna go back and repair?
Maybe they can send them Illusion that's pretty far and Tsumi's gonna like to do it.
It's gotta be the TV Illusions.
They've got to keep an eye on that Oshanda.
The moment that gets picked up here, the full MKB on Tamato, that's gonna make the difference.
Yeah.
You don't quite have that yet on Otsumi.
So, Evasion pierced now up in the gyro, that should give him, again, a slight advantage
in prolonging or surviving these fights.
That's just so tense.
We said in the draft, man, when it comes to the TV gyro matchup, it's a coin toss, whichever
team gives the zero just a little bit more space in the fights is the one that's going
to come out ahead.
I will say one thing though, when it comes down to like an ultra late game scenario,
the one advantage gyro has, it's a lot better for a divine rapier carrier.
That is true.
That's the one thing.
Roche slowly beginning to motto, the only one showing they've always got someone outside
to save.
There's no roar.
They have no idea.
No.
It's going to go the way of VP, but you do not make the time.
Ice path does come down to protect it and they will grab all the goodies.
Roche banner will be picked up by fly on a moment or not.
They were like just giving everyone a bit of a dispell.
So two lives up on Tamato.
Samurai's got a BKB now, that's pretty huge.
Out.
At least MKB's up now as well for Natsumi, so you can pierce through the dry row.
It's all a matter of how you approach these fights now.
Can you actually get onto the Rubik?
Can you actually kill off Saberlight with his BKB?
Because if these two heroes are alive, Tamato has so much space to just play his game.
There's way too many saves on the side of Virtus.Pro.
Otherwise, if you just let Timato and Natsumi get at it, as long as Metamorphosis is up,
the terribly it has been looking a little bit better here.
It's just that it's not in a vacuum.
You have to think about all these other heroes.
You have to think about Ruvik and that Largo.
Just too much disdain, too much saves, too many dispelts.
I mean the damage is right there.
You can see Natsumi's got it.
It's just he can't do it alone.
You have to remove that Rubik and Largo.
Is there a world?
And I think it's coming up here.
Scam is starting to itemize a little bit more as a core.
Octary next.
I would honestly like to see him shift.
I mean magic is fine.
If this game goes long enough like a right click morana would be certainly helpful in
split pushing waves.
And we're going to find out.
They've got the banner that can place it pretty deep here thanks to it being the fourth
Rosh. They do have to protect and pump the illusions, but this will give them time to
try and siege the high ground. Tamato, bring us those flip blinkers right up onto the high
ground Lotus, protecting him for now. This will be the last fortification here from OG.
Top lane is pushing pretty well. He's gonna get the racks. He has to go back on
On AWP, and Reflected Roar trying to catch him away, AWP comes right back in, trying to do what damage he can't with the fear.
It's already caught the backline, and Yopaz with a huge magnetized, just ripping through Hellscream as well as Saberlight.
Trying to get the roll away, he might survive, but can they get the Earth Spirit? He rolls back on over, he's found Fly.
Tamato is all alone on the backside of this fight, he's gonna get low-stuck, trying to survive, but not Sumi's coming in.
They need to take down this Earth spirit. Big macro pyroplate.
Yopaz, you will finally burn. He has the buyback.
He's not healthy at all, but something's going to come through.
But Tomato is standing his ground, and the macro just ripped them apart.
The refresher from Fly, they were not aware.
They're tier 4s. They're about to fix this.
And that is buyback after buyback being committed.
But that Roshan making a massive difference in this fight.
They still somehow managed to hang on to the racks, which I guess is the craziest part here for OG.
They needed to force the buyback, right?
Yeah. It's...
Oh, it's so risky.
Natsumi really wanted that kill on Tamato, but staying right on edge of the macro pyre kind of hesitated and going in and out.
It's so much damage. Tamato's just going back in.
Yeah, I mean, he quickly cleans up the racks.
There's no fortification. They're trying to test the waters on the buyback status
But with this it will be a mega creeps and you'll have a lot less opportunities to continue to rat now on this
beast master
Oh scam you need to be very careful that is a lot of damage coming through and in comes the ember maybe
I'll catch a look to dispel on the tier four as they go
Vp are very close from securing their ticket to the elimination.
He's a kickback!
Hold on!
No BKB for limited against the Blink out.
Magnetize is going though.
Yopaj.
He can carry the fight himself.
But they're afraid to chase.
They don't have their terribly.
They forced them out of the base.
Vp can just reset.
They smoke up right away looking for their opening.
Raven would be the best choice
It's gonna be close. They don't have vision quite yet
They're gonna back away if they see that amp damage room it's not gonna make the fight any easier for the side of og
On the wrong side now, so
I'm not you might not be able to snag it before this next fight breaks out
There's no way you're stalling this out for the next Aegis as well inside of VP, unless this fight goes really, really bad somehow.
Still holding on for the Divine Gold on a Tamato.
The Ember is checking for the rune right now, so he's gonna get that amplified damage.
I mean, it's great on Ember, right? It doesn't need to go onto Tamato.
Abed coming in right now.
They get the vision on the rave and the pullback!
What a play, can he get the save to the DKB? Only a few more seconds. The missile's gonna connect, but oh he gets the blink out.
That essence distiller, very good scouting on the high ground.
That was so close.
He just had to be so careful. Oh, he's so far behind now.
VP, can you got Medbecreep's advantage?
They can pick and choose what they want to do, two minutes left, two and a half minutes
until we see that Roche timer come in.
It doesn't feel necessary, but so much on the line that you really want to risk it.
You've still got buybacks anyhow.
It's not necessary.
You have to wait for the safety net of Roche.
Oh, gee.
They're going to have to work hard to find some mistakes here.
It's just so hard to play this game.
Again, you've got to find Saberlight.
They've got the find, health scream, easier said than done, all of these lifts, all of
these catchy licks, just giving Tamar there so much room to play his own game.
Even Fly would like the refresh hard, like that did so.
The second macro part just instantly ruined Natsumi, who was already hesitating that fight.
You can't move out of that, no.
It's a nasty amount of pure damage to kind of deal with.
20K lead for Virtus.Pro as they've got the map in their control.
And they are really just one step away from staying in the survival stage.
Very quick response from him gets the jump out of there.
The lines are drawn.
They know, keep the lanes pushed, keep OG locked inside their base.
There's any orb that doesn't enjoy these kinds of games it is or would you?
So you do have that.
I mean, this is...
Parford course.
Yeah, that is true. I do feel like it is...
It's just a matter of...
What wacky things can you do in this game?
It's in the nature of both the teams, kinda.
I suppose.
You've got tier 5s coming up in a few minutes, so that optimism with some of the baubles, well...
Would you hit our first tier 5s?
So baubles...
You might get some value here and there.
You've got the heart being formed there by Tim's heart being formed there's the rapier
There's all rapier. It's finally here. Okay, pull out the butterfly. I mean it makes sense, right?
You've got an MKV. Yeah double Lincoln spheres being picked up as well. This just feels impossible
I mean all about as Lincoln's and a on disc plus the refresher and Largo at all times plus
Oh, it's so hard to find the initiation on the side of OG, but it's not impossible
We've seen them do it before. Yeah, it just it requires so much patience and like so many things to go right
You've got to be water on a lot on literally max three minutes on the dot
And that's uh, suppose that's in favor of OG. I mean, I don't know whoever just wanted to see a long game
We're in for it
Come on get some tier fives up farm some jungle camps
I mean, what are we looking for here in terms of tier five items? I mean Stygian for gyro. I'd imagine
Yes same with terribly most likely
Yeah, I'd say maybe
there's an argument for
Minotaurus horn as well just to have another dispel. Yeah, as BKVs are starting to shrink down
so
They're dicey callers they're all farming for their tier fives
There's a domain ones. I don't know if you really have a use for like which vein there's like harmonizer for the ember spirit
that's a reason all is good for the ember that's true even
rich spirit but
kind of the damage really worked well
suppose it could be
your morana would also enjoy a stigian but if you already got one in the tb then
you're probably looking at probably a witchbane actually in a morana just
having a dispel on hand on your support
i do fight pretty nice
see how many people keep bobbling here shadow prism huh
probably not many options there for
Tim's good old the zoom bloodline for a jacquero
That's a good one. Oh and hell screams bobblin. We're ready. We're in for the long haul spell amp is it?
Cool down action. All right, and on your plunge. What are we getting?
in his bubble, I
Mean, oh, it's not good. We got pretty much everything you could want on the side of VP in terms of your jungle items
All they have to do is really just march into high ground at some point.
They are going to sit out here and wait for O'Shawn, John.
It's going to be another minute of this.
Yeah.
That's nice.
It's good for you.
I mean, look, when your tournament lives are on the line, you do not want to mess up
in any way.
You know?
Yeah.
Walking high ground and giving a rapier to TV is a really good way to lose.
Yeah.
That's like what I like to say.
Never underestimate your ability to troll again.
A terror wave is online.
It's been a while since I've seen that one.
It's been quite a while. At least getting the secondary metamorphosis is nice. The fear could be useful too.
How useful? We'll have to wait and see.
They're just going to be hanging around. Fall in Sky for Raven.
So you've got a little bit more mobility on a Beastmaster at the very least.
This is some high-end gameplay from South East Asia.
Alright, there's the Stygian for the Terrorblade, gets Fleetfooted as well, so
lots of them to be quite fast, and the Harmonizer for Yopaj, that's a great one for the Earth
Spirit, he's going to be very happy to have that.
Pity about leaving Bobble, but that's what it is.
He wants damage, and he wants it now, Roshan respawns, they knew it had to be so quick.
It's losing health and quick, they're going to bait the roar, head right up onto the high
ground.
OG.
if OG walk headlong into them.
Oh, that's so scary.
Kal Scream is here.
They got vision attempt, he steals us.
Okay, push on time so fast.
They are gonna get everything.
Refresh, Shard and Fly again.
Double Makropire.
Caught them off guard last time.
Don't have to re-rate for it.
They're gonna play some wards on the high ground
and see what they can do.
Tomato.
Ready to go.
Second divine rapier if you want it.
and here comes the smoke I mean you just said Abed onto the high ground to scout
surely right yeah why not with the and I scoped very low risk just get that
information going Abed's hanging back though they're hoping to find someone
outside of base at work almost tier 4 very low you could sneeze on it and it
would die at this point pretty much VP they still okay so their fortification
has Refresh which is big folder on the high ground, Tamato protected of course by the
Largo, here comes Abed. Lots of damage here off the Ember Spirit forcing them back into
the base, the Throne now exposed. Patient play here from VP, buybacks for the whole
team but only three for the side of OG, a single mistake could cost them everything.
BKB comes out, Yopajic goes for the kill, he doesn't get it!
He has to roll away!
The telekinesis save will bail him out, I don't even know what just happened!
It looks like he got him on the in-champ but something didn't quite connect
and now Yopajic is all alone!
He has no buyback, it's 125 seconds!
The tear away fears them off but...
they just get pulled to safety!
It's just too much in the backline. It's been the consistent issue for OG. You don't find
that Rubik or Largo. You just, you really not going to find anything.
He's on the throne. Tamato wants to end the game. He knows he's got plenty of backup
here, Natsumi. Bad meta. Freshly popped. You've got to respect him. There's so much damage.
jump in, Tamato with this with Blame tries to pop it.
If he can, he just gets shredded, Natsumi, on a different level.
He's going to have that second life, but no Satanic available.
Does have the BKB at the ready.
They could try to die, force the kill, often on Fumi.
He's falling low, has to Sunder if he wants to keep himself in this one.
The Throne still exposed, but they have that fortification.
Tamato just kills Tim off the flat.
Well, buyback right away.
Saber-Lite caught off in sight, tomorrow's gonna pop the DbG, get down the game!
But the amatric, get the kill, put the throw, it's gonna go down!
VP may be ending the life here for OG, we're gonna have to check the brackets, but they are safe now
and we'll move forward to the next stage.
Outstanding play coming out from VP, unfortunate for OG who again have had a little bit of a rocky time
overall trying to find our identity, they've managed to get through qualifiers,
They managed to get here based on their E.P.T points, but they don't manage to stay for too long as V.P.
Have proven themselves to be the better team.
Look, they execute on these drafts really well.
They managed to play around quite nicely. Actually, their execution here was just so on point.
And I have to say, Saberlein has just been looking amazing.
But he's always been a great player, I think, no matter what team he's on.
But him making the Largo look good, and that takes a lot of effort.
And he certainly made that hero look like an absolutely broken unit in that game.
Just all these catchy licks, all these ways of dispelling,
all these ways of bailing out your team, it felt impossible for OG.
There's just, it felt like you had no play
because of how much backline save you had along with Hellscream.
Yeah, and Hellscream, I mean, Rubik is one of his best heroes.
And this is definitely one of those games that kind of highlight it.
He was able to just always save Tomato.
They had a couple times right on OG where they managed to win some fights and and start to turn the game around
I think they did a really good job on Raven constantly split pushing. I
Don't know what happened in that final initiation. It looked like he got the enchant remnant
But then somehow Tomato didn't get enchanted
I don't know what went on there. It looked very odd because it definitely went on cooldown. So I'm not sure
Maybe he used it on a 3% hold on to it.
And might have just been super unfortunate. I don't really know. I mean, we'll have to look at it another time.
But that was, maybe we'll see it in the highlights.
Mayhemps.
That is one of those things where it's like, Yopah's risked everything for that.
He went in to try and get the In-Chain Remnant kickback, and it just... something went wrong.
Yeah, didn't quite pay off. And again, at that point of the game though, it just felt like you had to get everything right here
in order to find that hope of the win for the side of OG, a really rough go for them.
I think, you know, if they just, it feels like, you know, if you're OG, you're looking
back, maybe game one should have tried something else with a draft.
If they'd ran a draft like this, if they gave your impetus something like the Beastmaster
in game one, then you might not be in this situation.
You might be, you know, clear, caught, sealed, and cleared for the survival stage, not quite
the case.
Just so much back and forth to the team, it was a very patient game as well, Ricky.
We were at 24 kills at 42 minutes, both sides were very conservative, didn't want to make
mistakes, didn't want to allow any opportunity to lose out on making it true on a survival
stage and Virtus.Pro again, they just had way more tools to save.
They really made that Largo look less.
You can see that the two fights that OG almost won, it's them getting the initiation, like
in this one for instance, they get the initiation onto Hellscream, they isolate Fly, isolate
Tamato and then we're like, okay, OG's back, right?
This is how they win the game, but when you're just sitting the whole team behind your gyrocopter
and Abed can go in, create tons of chaos on the back line, it's so hard to play this game.
I got to get the credit right like OG they held out as long as they could,
but VP was the better team today. And getting this, this was the series.
You said at the very beginning they have to get a two-0.
There's no other option if they want to stay in the tournament,
they had to get the two-0 and they showed up today and they managed to get it done.
Yeah. I have to say as well, like this refresh run,
why give him the shot every time, like, you know,
like it's not students just walking back and forth, figuring out what am I supposed
to do? I'm like, I'm trying to kill this jar of copper in the macro part.
And then when the second macro part comes in, it's just, he's fully committed.
He gets a Desmond Blood right as well, like every team could ask for, the AoE, it's just impossible.
You can see just again how pumped up the side of Virtus.Pro is as they get to stay alive.
It's the survival stage.
It's a long journey for the side of VP, but it's looking better here to close out in
the Ept and the Esports World Cup for the side of Virtus.Pro for sure, right?
I mean, it's a long time coming for these guys.
They've been putting in the work and there's been moments where we saw in this group stage
but they looked really good.
But we always talk about,
can you consistently perform like that
through the group stage to make it to the next time?
And so, having to say, we've got an interview here with Fly.
How are you feeling, man?
This has been a stressful couple hours.
Yeah, it's been crazy.
The series was crazy.
We knew what today's gonna be like.
You know, it's do or die for us.
Obviously, we've been shaky,
just very gross, some inconsistency,
but I'm really glad we showed up today.
I think they also showed up, especially in Game 2, they made the game super hard for us, so it was a good series, I think.
Jon, I'm going to let you start this one off, because I know you've got a lot to talk about, Sam.
I am so curious why. You know, coming in, you said it's been a rocky year.
What were the expectations like for Virtus.Pro overall?
Because you are a team, and you're a captain that knows how to guide the team's excellence,
and it's been touch and go. What was the expectations this year?
We honestly came in and we just said there's no expectations.
Unfortunately we lost TI calls and it was a down moment for us for sure.
We were sad for a couple of days and then we sort of decided to talk all together like,
hey you know like we just want to come here and play our best.
Whatever results happen, happen.
You know, we know we're not going to beat like these tier one teams easily.
But if we play without any pressure and just play our A game, we can definitely take games off people.
And I think it shows sometimes. Today was us thankfully one of them, so no expectations for sure.
Fair enough. I'm curious, what was that journey like for VP in terms of, you know, changing throughout the year?
Like, what's different from VP now to, you know, to start with seasons?
At the start of the season, we had some different players. We had a little change up midway and I think we've been growing as a team.
I do believe we've gone better, but we've never quite hit where we wanted to as a team.
So it's been like a bit of a rollercoaster, you know, sometimes we're like, oh my goodness, we can really like own some of these games and we have a lot of trust.
Sometimes like a performance is not there, trust is lost, it has to be built up again.
Teams are complicated. There's so much ebb and flow that goes on through that and so many different dynamics.
It's been a rocky but fun year and I'm really hoping, you know, we have a good run this tournament and just passing through this group stage is already a big win for us.
So I think our group was hell hard not go lie really was among the harder ones
Were there any surprises for you like
Any heroes that you think came out that you guys weren't ready for didn't expect any teams that you think did better than you'd expect overall
I said yourself. I think a lot of what you would expect happen
I think one win put on a really good
Show because the last couple tournaments they weren't as strong, but now they're like back on form ready for EWC ready for TI
So that was a bit of a question mark coming into our group, but I could tell from practice they were already good
obviously, you know people don't get to see that but
Nothing too crazy, you know Yandex destroyed us. That was a fun one
I mean everybody I wouldn't take it personally. They absolutely bulldozed this group
So and they're average green like average wind time was like sub 30 minutes. So yeah, it's not not on you guys
That just happened to everybody. Yeah
So, I would say like going into Game 2 you said they made this game super hard for you.
You guys seem to have a lot of, I would say a lot of agency and how you could control
the flow of these games.
What was it about OG and Game 2 that made this so difficult?
So specifically I would say they had like Beast and TB.
So they kept pushing in waves, you know, Ghost push, like Illusions pushing waves, Bore,
Summons, whatever.
So we were never able to fully close out the map.
And it's something actually that we got better after losing to Yandex,
like we played against their Enigma twice and we kept faltering for this kind of pressure.
We looked at those replays and we took something from it.
And I think if we haven't lost to Yandex the way we did, we actually would not win today.
I think we did a much better job of not bringing too many heroes back on the map
and reacting to their pressure where they're going to jump on the pushed wave
some Beastmaster and TB, they caught us a few times,
but overall we were able to go behind Tomato
and cause our own sort of pressure points.
Yeah, that was amazing.
Yeah, I mean, this was a heck of a series
to end the group stage.
I mean, you guys, like you said,
you had to come in today and show up and you did.
So obviously big congratulations.
We're always happy to see you guys push forward
and continue to improve.
And that's best we can hope for in the elimination stage.
Fly, thank you so much for joining us as always.
And hopefully we'll talk to you again soon.
Thank you guys.
Thank you.
Boy oh boy, what a day.
We've got the grand finalists of EWC 2025 here joining us
today, we've got Falcons and we've got Team Spirits.
There should be a fun conversation for at least one
of you guys, I suppose, to talk about the grand finals again.
But both of you guys have been in a lot of grand finals.
So the first question is, how do you prepare mentally
for being in a big finals?
I'm not answering the question.
You shave your head, apparently.
That's what your go-to is.
I don't know. It's like a basic game.
I don't know, not much prepared.
Just play this one.
Yeah, it's just millions of dollars.
It's not a big deal.
Sometimes, you know, sometimes.
Like, just playing is your best.
It's basic.
You don't need to shake your hands.
Head is something like this for me.
I mean, probably the best not to think about.
I'm sure.
Just play this one.
You draw?
Yeah, I totally agree.
It's my favorite.
Ask me this morning, I guess.
All right.
Well, there's not a really specific preparation.
Like, just try trying to get the best rest you can.
I mean, I'm considering sleep and then kind of just like, at least I'm like lying down
on my team that they're having a good preparation as it like drops twice and you just, I'm just
I'm just going to do as best as I can, usually, and pretty much.
Amar?
Well, first of all, you start by panicking, because you're playing Grand Finals, you're a human being, and then...
I mean, he's always panicking against spirit. That's like...
Yeah, it's like default. If I see spirit, I'm panicking, like, automatically.
Because I know they can one time become the best team in the world, it's impossible.
Yeah.
So that's the...
One time, PicoDefo collapsed.
Or different colors.
You panic, it's Grand Finals.
Wait, when are you panicking? You panicked the night before?
You panicked right before you go on stage?
No, I panic the moment I know my Grand Finals opponents.
At the start of the tournament.
Because it's bigger than the tournament.
Yeah, but like...
Most of the times I play against them.
So I panic before, then I panic all the way.
Till I sit down and support the play.
They don't want to say about to play? Okay.
Chill. It's time to play Dota.
That's all I need to think.
No more millions, best in the world, all this much.
I've got to do it.
Not because of this.
Okay, so did you have that panic at TI for Extreme?
They weren't Spirit, so...
No, at TI it was more chill.
More chill?
No, no, no. I was actually...
Remember, I was panicking when we knew that we were going to play Spirit for Elimination Game?
Well, that's what I thought.
You guys, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like...
When he was sitting outside for like two hours until like 2 a.m. and I'm always keep crying the whole holding his hand
And the head and like just saying we're gonna play this spirit. It's a misery. We the destiny has been decided
Something like that
No, we also heard this fun story that we we're not gonna play Falcons it first time we see we're gonna play against some heroic
As I remember yes, like sometimes in one to our they like say okay you play against Falcons
We say, oh, okay, like an elimination game against Falcons, always fun, like, okay.
We're like some players like disappointed because of this, like, why do they change?
But they take it and lose it. That's all.
Sad, but true.
All right, so it's been a year since the finals.
What has changed about you guys?
What has changed about your team?
What has changed about your mentality?
You're still panicking.
Did you panic coming into this,
knowing it was a podcast with spirit? No, it is not collapsed. So what's changed for
you guys? I mean you guys... We changed a lot of players. We changed two coaches.
Coach, then five, then four. So a lot of changes ahead. So new year, new us.
I would say, yeah.
Not the same.
His falcons are probably the same.
All the stuff.
They have all the team, all the same.
But we have changed.
Not a bit, a lot of change.
But at least we have Mapochka.
I was about to say, bringing back Mapochka.
Was that nice?
It was a nice reunion, I assume.
All dogs in town.
All dogs is back.
Well, I mean, while you guys have stayed the same,
You guys have been the same, you guys are the longest running roster.
Yeah, and you're asking us about something new.
I mean, so, I mean, surely something has got to change year over year.
You're TI champs now.
Well, the mindset didn't really change, it's just more like less stress, generally.
I mean, except the mark, right?
Pretty much. I mean, I wouldn't say, and actually something changes, like just replaying tournament to tournament, like,
I'm more getting excited, it's getting like tier rings, let's say, and the Riot is like...
I mean, I still respect Riot as a tournament and I generally like to play it, but it's generally like...
Let's be honest, TI is more as a achievement, it's like people respect more.
Sure.
Because you're writing down your name, right? And the Riot is like, it's a second, so I'm more going to be prepared for TI than this.
That's fair.
Ma? Nothing changed for you?
Well, a lot changed.
We're not going to pick some King, Prime, and Shaker, because for some reason it's a series of garbage.
There's a big problem. My midlaner cannot play his Dota heroes.
I cannot pick Razor and Mares, because I don't know what Valve decided to not give them facets.
I think...
I think next time, just take the photos with creams and just live here.
Yeah, I will pick Necrophos. It's fine. They can know.
We did talk about your hate for that hero.
Hate? Yeah. I love Necrophos. I asked you about
you were playing Offlane Ancient Apparition. Oh yeah, of course I hate Necrophos, of course I hate Necrophos if it's against me, I would pick
Ancient Apparition every game. But if you're playing it,
it's all good. It's the best hero. It's the best hero. The best shit, I just follow.
I win any lane, but nothing really changes inside the team.
It's just the same team, five NPCs,
One NPC on the coach, he's going to come, robots try hard and play a game and
when we lose we're going to disband, if we win we're going to
decrease chance of disband. Okay, okay. Might still disband. Yeah. Maybe pull an EG,
just kick one person. No, no, no, no, disband. Okay, disband entirely. Fair enough.
We've got the grand finalists of EWC 2025 here joining us today. We've got Falcons and we've
We've got team spirit.
We'll start with you guys.
How do you deal mentally with getting second place?
I mean, I always say I'd rather not get second place.
I'd rather have like further four, if you're right.
I mean, the third is like the best,
because like, at least you're getting to the last day,
but you're not getting the second,
which is like, you know, one step before getting to win.
So I would rather actually have four places.
I'm grateful to be second.
I don't know what these people say, everyone says that they don't know my second.
I'm grateful, give me that final day, give me the grand finals.
Yeah, you just want to be in the grand finals.
I'm taking it, I can be so close to winning, it's all fine, I can win.
They're all good things.
Now obviously, if you lose the grand finals and it's your fault,
now that's when it hurts the most.
But it is your fault, really.
It was only one tournament, it was last time four.
We lost against Stundark because I grieved on Mars.
I'm tied to level 4 hoodwing as level 10 Mars, minute 10.
So that one, it's my head, but generally I'm still grateful and blessed I'm second place.
More money.
That's true, more money.
That's always a good one.
You guys have not had many second places.
You guys had that one at Arlington, Major?
No, we have a lot of Arlington, Wallachia.
Yeah, this can go to free time, second place, you know, okay, that's true, I forgot.
I'm more agree with maybe Maureen also, like maybe third, four more
fines for me. And second, it's always like a lot of conversation where we lose,
like all this stuff, grand final, and it's always hard for me.
So maybe better like to not go to the like this grand final and lose.
It's hard anyway, but maybe it's better to not do it.
If you lose four plays, five, six, it's okay.
If you lose finals, it's always depressed.
Even us as a team, because everyone is depressed.
Not a single person, like, okay guys, it's fine.
Not everyone is depressed. Everyone feels it.
So it's like...
Do you really agree with this one?
I see a trend here, I see a trend.
Okay, final question.
Who do you think are gonna be the two finalist teams this year?
EWC 2026?
Mr. Gilles DeGray and Juan Miu.
Final is at the last.
How will the info parry plus players gonna be like Aurora or...
I mean, Eiffel has to like get at least with a final.
Of course, of course.
I aiming for that.
But he's not probably the Halloween.
Like I've always.
Surely he's going to break that curse at some point.
At some point, but it doesn't mean that this year.
Okay, fair.
So, yeah, pretty much.
I would say, I would say, I would say that whoever is going to be third place,
probably, whoever is going to be in final,
if they're going to get the callus, if not, there's going to be, like,
some LGD plus potential Astor Spirit.
Hmm. Okay. Oh, actually Yandex. I've got Yandex against Pichu, he's going in final.
Amar? Easiest thing, Aurora against Spirit. One of them has to be a three times real master's winner.
That's true. One of them, like Aurora?
Aurora have Mira. No, Mira. Mira is like Faggot.
All right. What about you guys? Who do you think the finals are gonna be? We'll start with you.
I would say Yandex for sure, and some random team.
Some random team?
The second one, yeah.
Do you think the playing field is pretty even between most of the top teams?
Yes, I think so.
So it's just a bit of luck and a bit of menop?
Why Yandex over everybody else?
It's just good.
It's better than others.
You got 6-7.
You got 6-7.
I thought the logger gave me the answer.
GLaF also pulled the 6-7 meme on me.
I asked him, I was like, has this made it to Russia?
He said, no, we just know the meme.
I said, okay.
Well, it's a brilliant old game.
I thought I gave you the answer.
Okay, very well.
Actually, I'm going to use the strategy for the next time.
All right.
Well, this was our podcast for the finals of E3.
Finals of EWC-25.
Four other with capitalists.
Thank you, they all agree with me.
Thank you very much because I'm the host
and you have to agree with me.
Thanks for watching and we'll see you guys next time.
Hello everyone, this is Seb.
We're here for the French food tasting
with Nisha and Boxy.
All right, hello.
I guess I have to say sorry for what's about to happen.
All right, we'll be...
We prepared a bunch of stuff for you guys.
There is, I'd say pretty common, pretty riskless
and then there is very risky, maybe trap cards.
You don't have to try anything you don't want to.
They're sweet and there is, you know, rather cheese side.
You want to start with the...
You can pick me, bro.
I mean, I usually start with the sweet and then...
Oh, you start with sweet transition.
And then like...
Are you sure? I was thinking you finish again.
Okay, oh, okay. That's actually smart.
As long as you finish with sweets, so that you don't leave this room...
Yeah.
You leave this room with a smile.
Anything you feel like trying and then like, have you ever wanted this?
Yeah, you have to explain.
I mean, just by the look, is there something that's appealing?
I think I like macaroni, but I didn't try it many times.
You know that one, I'm always down.
Macaronnes is a classic.
I think you have chocolate, strawberry, and probably vanilla the last time.
They look nice.
Do you want to try one?
But they are made with egg, yes.
Yeah, so you can try it, okay.
No problem.
I'm not gonna try anything.
I'm like alone.
Any... you rate it?
I like it. 8 out of 10.
8 out of 10?
Are they sweet?
Are they dry?
No.
When I was a kid, there was this arcade place.
They gave us a bunch of like 10-year-old macarons they couldn't sell.
And I was like, this is the hardest thing I've ever eaten.
Okay, no, it's not the most sweet.
No, no, okay.
The sweetest they are, usually the cheapest in a way.
I think the best macarons is when it's very nicely balanced
and you don't feel like it's overwhelming.
And the sweet.
Okay, what else? Another sweet?
I'm down for some cheese.
We get to business, okay.
So this one is the softest.
You take one, you can dip in it.
It's also cheese.
It is cheese. It's very soft.
I think...
I'll take a bread.
Yeah, I think no risk with this one.
I'll take a bread.
I'm trying the bread.
I like the bread.
I like the bread.
Yeah, well, not the bread.
What is this?
Pan baguette?
I think it's rather Italian, these kind of things, like when they have this crispy
dip.
You pass this one.
We'll tell this level one.
Oh, I like it.
Okay.
Step one is fine.
Step two would be conche.
You know, in France, you have two kinds of cheese, I guess.
It's the kind of hard paste and then softer or creamy.
This one is very typical.
Not very flavorful, I guess.
I guess so you could try it with no risk so you would put this on like a sandwich or you could just eat it like that
Or with bread or you can put it in the sandwich. You're just like keep cheese by itself
Oh, yeah, I mean you can have bread or I think for the what you call them like the
Ducon itself if you want to cut it in half or if you're going for full up to you and you're not eating anything
Of course, I'm not eating anything. Yeah, you can have mine. Yeah, I mean it's it's fair. No, it's fine if you want to of course
No, I can't I feel like I have to okay. Well, we'll stop it now if I'm eating too
It's not too hard, it's okay, not by itself.
How strong is it on a scale of 0 or 10?
I want to know where I can take it.
I think it's like a 7, at least.
It's a 7. It's like 10 or 10.
Compared to the next two, it's a 2 or 3.
None of the trees are like the little green trees.
No, I mean this one is close.
Then you have Camembert, but this one is a little old.
So it's much stronger than what it can be when it's younger, like, intentionally old or like...
I don't know.
Or it's been on this table for a week.
I just got here a few hours ago.
It's from last year.
You can try it.
This is from the tournament in 2011.
You had it in your fridge?
Yes.
I knew it was like some bread.
No, no, no.
I'll try it on the bread.
The whatsoever.
Outside routing in the sun.
It's so strong!
It was good. I like it.
If you give this one a 7, what do you give this one?
This one was like a 9. It hit me hard.
It hit you, yeah?
It's just... I like it.
It's waiting a few hours when you feel a bit dizzy, but you know what it is.
This is good.
Put something in the food.
Good luck for you guys in the practice, too.
Okay, then the strongest is this one.
The monster.
So in French, it's actually a coincidence that it sounds like
monster in English has nothing to do with monsters.
It's called the monster in French, which is just the name.
Do you feel like trying it? Or is it too much of a stretch?
I can maybe cut like a super small piece.
You don't have to.
I think it doesn't look appealing to me.
Yeah.
And it tastes exactly as it looks.
I think I'll skip that one.
Okay.
I'm testing another bread.
I'm testing the bread.
Very wise choice.
But I would like to say, I'll try a little bit.
That's good.
But this is the last cheese, yeah?
Yeah.
I actually don't know what this is.
It's a sweet, yeah?
Yes, it is sweet.
Do you have the sweets that you haven't tried?
What is this?
Oh, this is the mini sausage on Justin Bieber.
So it's like meat.
It's like a mini sausage.
I gotta try it.
Yeah, of course.
I think you'll like it.
It looks kinda weird though.
Then you can dip it in the meat.
You're just a...
It's kinda hard as well.
I actually, some already tried that.
I've never seen it before, but you know.
Dip in cheese.
It has happened, yeah.
I don't know.
I mean, I'll do it.
It's not a thing bread again.
Yeah, it's not a thing, but you can try it.
No, this is good, this is a good sound.
I mean, I'll try the cheese.
Good 7.
It happens.
The cheese is getting to him.
You're getting dizzy?
You can take my place.
It's screaming around?
Yeah.
Then back to dessert.
Typical French biscuit, I guess.
Your typical lunch box when you're a French kid
and you're going to school.
Who's the guy on it?
Old school French students, you know.
Like they were dressed like this.
That's how they look like?
I guess so.
Is that your uniform when you went to school?
No, I came too late.
But maybe a couple of hundred years ago
I would have looked like that.
This one should be good.
No.
And you can also eat the biscuit with all the chocolate.
You have two versions of it.
I have this at bootcamp, like every time.
Oh, they took it.
But you have it with tea or with milk or with coffee or cigarettes.
I don't know.
I would love all of things.
This one is good. This one is probably my favorite.
10 out of 10.
Over there you have, it's called Madeleine.
This is very French typical.
this one over there.
Is there anything inside?
No.
Oh.
You can cut just a small part of it if you want to try it.
I'm kind of full already, but that never stopped you.
It did.
Is it like vanilla cream or something?
Like what's it called?
I think there's vanilla.
Maybe it's just a flavor.
It's not stuffed with anything inside.
No, no.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
season one that was made up you just made that up DPL CDS one and China as we
have two wards mid from Thailand very smart that tournament and a kid you
not and Michael back me up in this that tournament would determine first pick
second pick radiant dire by a 1v1 mid we had to do that every single time some
of those 1v1 mids went for 20 minutes.
It was the most crazy thing.
Well, that's a really good way to artificially extend
your entire day.
My life is artificially extended.
So it doesn't disturb me on any level.
Let's see if there are any blocks going on.
Looks like both sides.
Is there no blocking yet?
No block.
Maybe you can't block?
I have no idea.
Maybe that's the rules.
No blocking?
Maybe no blocking.
All right.
Just cell of view.
Let the creeps lay where they lie.
See how these races go.
Nice hit from Abed already.
Hit from Ty Lung.
Range creep, can you get the deny here?
No.
Abed not secure.
One mango forced out.
Abed, copping a little bit more damage here with you.
You got the third raise, actually.
Also third raise.
Oh, Abed!
Throw the double blood grenade, do it.
No denies, well.
Ty Lung already copping the better end of the trades here.
Three to two.
Getting most of the raises to stick.
We should really get rid of the SF mid and do something like tree and protector really
hype it up, you know.
Oh yeah, just something like, absolutely insane.
I'm telling you, we should randomize the tree hero pool, let the players ban out one each
and the one that's unban is what both players will play.
That's it, that's the only modification I'd make.
I think that would be pretty hype.
Can you imagine a double IO mid?
He's just trying to get first blood on the chitter trying to siege.
very stable tylen again edging out here early on six to three i'll be lagging a
little bit behind down to just the one that's still on the one boat i don't
think we blame the lag here there's no way you blame the lag i don't think you
blame the lag there's no excuses tylen doubling down on it
then have that really advantage again first two kills
cool
playing it safe still he's got the okay so he was holding his raises here waiting
for the level three timing. He's gonna prevent Abed from getting it off the same wave, which
is pretty big. Alright, yeah, here's the problem. So Abed really casts to hold the distance
here. Cannot afford to come back to the wave. No, has to wait for that debuff to disappear.
The stack damage. Uh-oh. Level three now up on Abed as well, but it's gonna get tricky.
No chip damage onto the tier one at the very least. I mean, I feel like he's never go down
of towers I don't think I've ever seen SF mid come down to a tower kill
even on the longest ones I think the longest one we've had in one of the
dream leagues must have gone for like 20 minutes and I think in the end it was
like Bob dancing around like a maniac so that was something you know what's
definitely not coming down to a tower kill in 1v1 mid what tree protector you
know that that is pretty right I take that you know what what else are the
most unhinged 1v1 mids. Techies 1v1 mid sounds pretty fun. I feel like it's
it's less unhinged than it used to be right? Yeah I mean Techies mid is kind
of like a pub stomper who serves smurfing it really does a lot. In an equal you
know two equal players and Techies 1v1 mid that sounds pretty fun to watch. Then
again it could also just devolve to like reactive taser run in reactive each
Cheddar inside my coffee right? Oh
I bet oh he's really hurt me against the seven nine to one so he's three salves now
Man, that's kind of how this goes right like you just buy a regen
Well, I'm what we need
Tyler no manna
He's got the manna. He's got the one mango. He was looking for it, but oh
I know they're blood grenade, okay get some with the fairy fire, nice bait.
Abed despite being down literally half the css is asserting some dominance here as he
hit level 4.
Stretching it out, already salved up on tai long, getting a bit of a reset.
have the two mangos in orbit just the one mango in tai long but again this exp
and slight gold advantage for resources is gonna feel a lot better for tai long
overall this ramp up into five maybe you start to see again some good raises
coming in I would like to see some of them start to play around with what's it
called that value point that weird active where your souls go feast of souls
I mean all that has it I was surprised I took it I I actually quite like it it's
It's super value. Think about it. Turkey attack speed for free.
You just waste souls. In a 1v1, it doesn't matter. You're not tanking long term here.
Over the armor. Like, value point in the presence of the Dark Lord is really good, but investing more points, I find.
Uh-oh.
For an aggressive play, you want those feasts of souls.
Level 3 raise.
High lung, very spooky.
I
Bed patiently waiting for blood grenade on the clarity. Well, he actually got it. That's pretty good. I
Mean tylong has a lot more stats. He's got the full bracer done right? I'm just a difference in the net worth
Already adding up. I mean it is big difference 33 to 14 12 to 1
Rob, it's just not been having too much to play with here.
Tylons aiming for the late game, that's 60 minute tier 5 item timing, right?
That's what we're aiming for here.
No neutrals, because you can't farm neutrals.
No, no, no.
You just, you just, they cut a leprechaun, comes out of the ground and lets you pick
from the bag.
You gotta kill it first.
Yes.
It has like 2000 HP.
You'll get there.
Yeah.
Six now on Tylons.
As the value point will rep him.
Oh.
Oh.
He's going for the dive. He's got the blood grenade forts the tower. He's got all the time long gets the kill
All right, it's one up
Just one more to go for Tylong. I bet let's get a reset at the very least. No, we're gonna do it
All right, there you go
All good not backpacking the bracer kind of cringe. No, it's pretty base. He's like I don't need to be efficient
I just need to be better
You know that is a valid strategy
Now, I have seen someone actually come back and win.
Yes, it has happened.
At 1v1 mid, despite being down a kill.
It's not the end of the world.
Oh my god, the net worth.
Okay, that's not good.
Yeah, but Ovid's been eating his net worth, you know?
I guess, at this point.
Level 4 raise.
I feel like that's...
Okay, well, he whiffed.
Hold up.
Come on.
Oh.
Ovid's still trying to hit level 6.
Oh, the blood grenade to cancel the salves!
Okay.
Okay.
Abed, sick play, on the comeback, is he gonna walk base now?
He might have to.
I mean he will, and that's gonna be recovery for Abed, right?
He's gonna be able to soak some EXP, yeah, if he just hits the tower down, that could
be one way to win out in this.
He's gonna drag the wave.
Oh, he's gonna try and leave those runes alone.
Very nice.
It's a really smart way to deny as much EXP as possible.
Are you allowed to TP in this mode?
Yeah, you can.
Fair enough.
Fair enough.
to say yes because you just did it not because I was confident at all we did see
Abed do that so yeah see Abed again he's still struggling a little bit in terms of
EXP but it's about the creep wave drag all the way back with release who needs
items we have mangoes you know or it now for sure dude he's going for the dive
he's going for the guy low he's got the boots he wants to Abed pretty good
Oh! Nice! Gets the Requiem.
He has, well, he has 20, so...
Dude, this is... okay, Tylong.
Totally planned. He's fine.
More salves coming out. Now, it's gonna go for the full reset.
Tylong's gonna get that bonus. Solo EXP, solo gold.
Double bracer, full wand. Tower just getting Sieged away.
Yeah, good luck keeping in.
No Rekwi, I mean, if Tylong sees him,
he can channel the Rekwi herself.
Abed, can you get the Rages?
He's got him.
He's actually gonna get him.
He's so dead.
Blood grenade.
Oh my god, here we go, one to one.
We're back.
Greedy there from Tylong to play so aggressive.
And he wanted the tower, he wanted some sort of angle.
Twenty seconds to respawn.
Here's the thing, though.
Awbed has committed a lot of resources for this.
Yes.
Tylon is going to come back full health with all his items.
Yes.
Tranquil boots.
Alright, that's kind of cool.
Feast of Souls on the Tower.
Look at it.
Half HP.
He's owning.
But he did go for the level 2 presence of the Dark Lord.
Legitimately, I think in the 1v1 mid, you just need the one value point and they're not
going for more armor.
You know once you're close to zero you kind of lose efficiency on minus armor anyhow beyond zero
It's like that's not the most efficient use of damage buffing
Taks be certainly a bigger part, but so far
It's all right. I'll bet
Having some up his tower now under see drops the tranquil's to hit the tower. Oh, that's very base tylon
Oh, that's so cool.
Yeah, nice salve, I got the tranquil boots.
Oh, whoop.
Raises.
More mana on Ty Lung.
I'm in a relatively better position for him to start playing around here.
Controls a wave.
Oh, did he drop the tranquil's mid auto attack?
Alright, Ty Lung's cooking.
Yeah, he's ready to go.
always active always regaining up
now it's just constantly flying out south he's got bracer's coming and a clarity
will be fine
double raise
but again
tranquil boots
all the difference
drop the tranquils pick them up yet
oh no
ty long
This is good stuff.
It's just never going on. Cool down.
He just literally never has to buy a salve.
And he's got them.
But like, he just doesn't have to like, worry about it.
No.
Nice raise. Connecting.
All right. This is the catapult that probably ends the game.
He does have a fortification on Abed here,
but Tylong might be able to just aggressively push this
and get the tower with the catapult.
Well, maybe not the creeps dying very fast, yeah, and then there's gonna be the fort, so...
I was lying, I just made all of that up.
Well...
Decent damage done to the objective.
Uh, kind of matching Abbot's damage done to the building now as well.
Solving up...
Not the best man on Abbot at the moment.
Raises to miss, Tyloon fading out.
And again, he's just so good with these tranquil plays.
He's never gone cool down.
it's like
what do you find one man
there's no way he can keep doing this alright he missed that one he missed that one
alright there you go finally on cooldown
what do you call this cringe
or is it based to play in such a youthful manner
of efficiency
i don't know, Tylong's the prodigy man, i let this guy do everything he wants
come on, Abed
show them that old timer still got it
he does have a lot of wand charges
thank you, Abed
thank you for continuing to use my favorite voice line
is it a good line?
what do you think the team is saying behind the scenes right now?
i mean, they could be yelling stuff for all i know, i don't think they're saying it
they're just watching intensely, it's twelve minutes in now
Towers are starting to drop low, Ty Lung.
His tracals are down.
He's getting full HP back.
No, he got it.
All right, fair.
Ty Lung.
I mean, we're one kill away from both sides.
One.
He's all right.
16-1 charges.
Is he going to go Dragon Lance?
Is that the idea?
Here, just to hit the building.
Looks like it.
Wish he had more of those Feast of Souls points, huh?
I mean, I'm telling you.
In a 1v1? You don't... I mean, 3 points? Nah!
3 points in Feast of Souls! Yes! Siege!
Right-click, chase, or walk.
I mean, seriously, just...
Please, someone, get more points in.
You're really doing nothing.
But right-clicking creeps and towers, anyhow.
Power trades for Abed.
So a little bit of a dream to get that right now.
At least has the brown boots.
If you can somehow find that second kill, man.
All you'll need is blood grenade down, tower.
It's starting to drop very low here.
The tower is falling very low.
Tyloan just wants the objective.
He's just T-posing on the high ground at this point.
He is.
Yep, dragon land's queued up.
He's gonna get it.
If he need- well, he may not need it.
He could potentially end it before that, but...
we'll see Abed needs to keep this creep wave as far away from his tower oh hold
on double raise nice too fast doesn't that's where the tranquil is really
coming handy just that weaving in and out Tylong and go block his creep wave
tower down to how much HP now on the radiant side it's not the healthiest
looking not much is my age of HP left whereas you're probably closer to six
oh spooky so media selves what you made doesn't quite connect on to Abed
actually oh oh I love some combinations left Abed requiem looking for it I know
So that regen is tempting, but you can't take it.
This is a 1v1 mid.
Come on.
You should have done it.
It has been very funny.
Three wards?
Three wards to watch.
To watch this 1v1.
That's three more rise than I have.
Come on.
Raise is not quite connecting.
I'll bid now, getting a little bit of tempo to push.
Beast of Souls, to chase, to chase.
Oh, he's in high ground miss.
Raise.
One, all right.
Very nice.
He did pop the tranquil, so he's gonna delay his regen a little bit more.
Did have to pop the full stick, so Tylon not stoked on that one.
But he has the dragon lance.
This is what we're talking about.
He needs this at some point.
Or maybe he doesn't.
Who knows.
Maybe it's all a simulation.
One, two, three.
Can you get a turd?
Come on, off cooldown.
Will you gun for it?
No, creep wave doesn't last long enough.
Someone should walk into Roche.
That would be the way to end it, someone should walk right in.
That would be very based right now.
War drop, Tylong again, his HP, regen up with the Trangpults, raises, connects.
Can you kill your own wards for souls?
Is that allowed?
Theoretically yes in practice, I don't know the hard way to put it up, but theoretically
yes, because that sounds...
It takes you a lot of time to kill a ward nowadays.
One more!
No mana!
Drop in the tranquils.
It's just gonna heal up the entire lung.
The prodigy.
With these micro plays.
Oh, it's just so low on mana.
Imagine not having a Kaia right now.
Yeah, if only.
16 minutes?
Come on, guys.
Could you not get a solar ring in this game mode?
I have no idea.
Is that even worth it?
Probably not, considering the HP trade off.
Man, this strength though, it's not the worst in the world.
Clarify up, Frank to regen just a little bit in Abed, Tylung, fully reset.
So he's got the full advantage, he's gonna look for the raise.
So, I mean the tower's set to fall, Tylung, she's a couple of right clicks away.
He's gonna pop a feast and go for it, he has the fort of course, but Abed kinda had a resources
goes for the double raise force to pop the requiem to get ty long out but if I
mean Ty you just go up and hit it right you got the you got the dragon lands you
just had the game here I think he's done it it's not much I can really deal
yep couple of our taxies just playing with them at this point and that is
gonna do it ty long will take well I mean I'm get I mean that's how it works
right? Gigi? Yeah, I mean someone tell me, I think so. Does anyone have the rules? That
should be it. I'm pretty sure. I've never seen a 1v1 mid go to tier 2, so. I'd really
hope not. I'm not trying to go thrown here. Abed, press Gigi. Do it. Press the buttons.
There you go. Gigi's called and I longed as it secured this higher seeding point aside
of LGD gaming, getting that third place spot, and getting themselves the slot to play up
against the fourth place in one of the other groups in our randomization. So in
theoretically a better seeding start in the survival stage for LGD Gaming
vs Pro. I mean look, this is just for a little bit of fun. The waiting
doesn't matter, but in the end I'd say all of our teams are at the same caliber
now that we've sorted out, except maybe Group B. I think I will always give an
exception for Group B and what went on there, because frankly, OG, if they
were in any other group, they would be up there. It's just a little bit
rough but it's gonna be interesting to see because depending on who VP plays up
against they might be wishing obit is a little bit more awake or less tired or
playing against a older player rather than the young prodigy of Tylong who's
dropping his track with some mid creep wave so very well played to Tylong but
yeah the back almost like I know how that almost got the cut through some good
raises and I like the value point in the feast of souls I just go all in on you
You know, just one value point in Preston's with the Dark Lord, I'm a little bit crazy.
Oh, just one point, but yeah.
Go for it right there, Preston.
It's crazy.
Yeah?
Well, it has been a long day, but that, I mean, that's the whole group stage.
We are finally through group A, B, C, and D, now completely solved, but come on up next,
we got-
We're gonna crush some keys.
We're gonna crush some keys.
We're gonna crush some keys, then it's gonna be extra fun again, because of our trophy system,
the teams that are eliminated, all have her keys crushed down,
they've been bringing her keys out in the stage,
you've been seeing them on the cams as well,
and we're gonna get to that moment relatively soon,
not quite yet.
And of course the winning team,
the winner of the Dota 2 Esports World Cup,
will get to pick three keys at the end of her journey
to put on the base of her trophy
as a reminder of the dreams they've destroyed, you know?
Who would you put in there?
If you got to pick, which three teams would you select?
Ah, I can't say OG three times, can I?
Probably not.
I love OG, but I would, there you go.
Dreams crushed down.
My goodness, look at that.
Just taking away, no one crushing another key here as well.
Isn't it great?
Look at that, hydraulic pressure.
Doesn't that make you smile?
I want to see one explode again.
That is what I'm really waiting for.
I want one to explode.
I don't think we have, and I think they've managed
Sort out the malleability of the keys that it would not like explode. Maybe give out but there's a little bit of game
So there we are all these hopes and dreams being crushed
That's nemesis right there
And reckonix I believe yeah, so coming up next I mean so these are the Asian dreams at the top of the groups, right?
So that once we get to crush all the keys, so this is gonna be oh geez and
Yeah, I'm sorry, buddy
Not oh gee you can ask them for that one when you're done. Maybe they're gonna put them in the bottom
Remember all those broken keys are sorted at the bottom of the totems. You think they'll notice I
Can't say
Whatever where I will be tonight. I will have alibis. That's right. That's right now
I see again the keys are being crushed or golden keys
The hopes and dreams of all these teams just taking away as a socks. I just hands it over and that's the og one right there
for you, buddy. So I hate to break it to you. For all the OG fans out there, obviously a
rough end to their tournament. They looked pretty good coming into today and like it,
you know, pretty helpful. Like, okay, yeah, they just got to get the one win. But VPU is
the team that showed up. Yeah. And of course, that's a different Orgis ball wind up. So
yeah, that's true. You see what Mike has to be able to do. The crusher is beautiful. And I'm
sure we'll see that crusher at work again in the survival stage because it's all
single elimination so it's gonna be fun it was a fun group stage it was a great
time casting with you Ricky and thanks for having me and I hope that gets well
yeah you know it's one of those things that we've we've known each other for a
while we've gotten to cast some stuff for a long time so it's cool to kind of do
it on land for the first time or I guess second time yeah kind of but yeah you
know Zach will be back hopefully sometime soon and you can catch some
rest but for everyone who has been tuning in just want to say thank you all so
much for watching EWC 26 that's gonna do it for the group stage here of
Dota 2. We're going to take tomorrow off and then we'll be back with that elimination stage,
so you're not going to want to miss it until then everybody have a wonderful evening and we'll see you then.
Omar, you've been on the NIGMA galaxy for a while. Who have you learned the most from
all these various rosters? I would say it's probably Kuro. He's the person I learned from the most.
I think he's probably the one who shared his experience and wisdom the most to me.
So yeah, I mean, I'm grateful I got to work with him and he actually taught me a lot, yeah, I would say.
What about inside the game or anything outside the game?
I would say both. I mean, I'm sure I grew a lot as a player.
I mean, as a player, he taught me a lot as a friend as well, like outside the game.
What do you think the most important lesson you've learned from him is?
I need to play with my mid laner.
You mean inside the game or outside?
Either one.
I mean, I would say actually the biggest one, it's actually not even the latest one, it's
It's been the topic of two years, I would say.
Just patience, like I have a bit of issue with rushing stuff.
So I need to have much more patience inside and outside.
I don't know.
Deva, you had a recent change in life, your father now.
Congratulations.
Thank you.
What has that changed your life in any way?
In any ways, I would say.
OK.
I still play a lot of Dota.
But outside of that, there's not much time for other stuff, but it's great.
Like having a little baby that's yours, that's always happy to see you.
It's, I mean, I think I've been, last two months, since my daughter was one,
I think she's been by far the happiest days of my life.
Even though my wife was sometimes struggling with the postpartum,
it's still, it's just really nice to have family.
That's awesome.
Has it changed your perspective? When you come back to like, you know, playing Dota,
I was just talking to Seb about this and he said it gave his whole perspective on life,
shifted a bit, because now like Dota was no longer the most important thing in his life.
Yeah, I mean, I think before, I said probably like he was just falling to Dota. I didn't have
much else in his life. I think even the last few years, I've tried to like balance out my life
a little bit at least. Like, of course, I wish I had more time in my personal life for family
and individual hobbies, but I've tried very hard to keep some resemblance of a balance.
So being a father now is, it's not a complete, completion. Like I did before I like try to
spend time with family and with my wife. So I don't think my view on life has changed that much.
It's like, I already value family pretty highly,
but I'm just a lot happier now.
I'm just more motivational.
Yeah. Oh, okay.
Let's touch on that then.
More motivation to like, more motivation to succeed
because now you're providing for yet another person
and family or?
I would say so.
Also, it's just harder to feel down.
It's harder to like feel bad for me.
And now after losing a tournament, you realize it's not everything, you know, like, I can
just pull up my phone, look at a video of my father, it's just, it's like a cheat code,
you know, like, you're tilted, so that's the video of your child, it's, it's nice.
It's very sweet.
I don't really have a way to, to transition off of that, but how are you guys enjoying
Paris outside of the traffic?
The traffic feels like we almost didn't skip the yacht because it's the same boat as the yacht actually.
But overall it's a cool city.
That's great. For me it's very close to home.
in Belgium. I speak decent French. I like French. A lot of my friends and daughter, my
friends I think are from France as well. So to be able to play LAN here is really cool.
Did I'm in the bus or her room? The classic Dota event like?
No, I mean this one is a bit extreme. So yeah. But at least I have a French
with me so you know it kind of helps you know he speaks fluent French really yeah he's from even
though he's from Beirut Lebanon he speaks amazing French and he likes to show off too some people
just talk to him in English and he's going to show off this is this is your chance please show off
sir this is this is not accurate I do not show off the issue is that I've been living in Lebanon
for 30 years. 32. Thank you. When I got to like 18, 19 years old, I stopped practicing the language.
And this is the only place I can just get some practice in. And so whenever I see a French
person, I try to speak French. Sometimes I fail because it's not very, not very practice in it
right now. But I try. I put something in the mic. I'm showing you how to do it.
You're ordering something, okay? The person speaks completely perfect English, you know,
like everything is understandable. When did you start speaking French? What am I to make of it?
That's fair. It's not funny to invest in. No, but I enjoy the country because this is my second time
I've been visiting France, I think, yeah, this is my second time, and the Lebanon friends
have a really close connection because of the colonial times, you want to talk about
it?
Go on, go on, there's a really big French influence in Lebanon, so this is the second
time I've had the chance for the pleasure to use my language somewhere else.
Well, I'm glad we're here then.
Gentlemen, thank you for joining me.
Thank you for having us.
Goodbye.
Good morning, Dota fans. It is Slacks here at EWC Media Day.
That is right. We have all the teams arriving to come take their pictures, get their makeup, do some interviews,
to cheer to be exciting, and we're going to walk you through each one of the teams and see what they're up to.
In fact, we have some teams coming in right now.
Maybe we can do a seamless transition.
It looks like one of our first teams of the day is Team Liquid.
liquid. Wow, look at them! Look how happy they are! I've never seen a team so happy to do media
day. Let's go bother one of them. You guys have a lot of cameras coming your way. Hello,
hello. Good to see you, sir. Are you excited for media day? Yeah, I'm super excited. Especially
media day with you is like the blessing in disguise. Well, I'm not doing it. So, I have a great day
without me, my friend. But, are you okay? What happened? I shattered my ankle, but...
What? I fell on it and then I snapped into it and now it's just up and in. Okay. Well...
to see it on camera. Yeah, show it. No, don't do that. That's going to freak out the audience, sir.
I'm so sorry. I would carry you to media day. But as you carry the hopes and dreams of the Dota
community, we love you Blitz. Feel better. Happy media day. Goodbye. The hardest job in eSports.
It's not playing. In fact, it's doing makeup for everyone that comes to EWC. These talented men
and women make these gamers look presentable for the first time out of their basements in nine months.
They are here to be on camera and look lovely.
Let's go ahead and check things out.
We've got our own boys here.
Mr. Coach, do you get makeup?
Yes.
Yeah?
Can you tell?
I cannot tell.
You look like you naturally woke up today.
You feeling good?
You looking good, bro.
Thank you.
Like, I don't need makeup.
What's your routine?
You moisturize?
OK, so you need to cleanser?
Cleanser.
Then you have to do a toner?
Toner.
Then you have to do moisturizer.
All right.
And then you're supposed to do one more,
but I don't know what it is.
Are you a mure?
Do you mule?
Yeah.
You a new guy? No. Sir, you look lovely. You don't need any makeup.
We got more Aurora Gaming boys coming in here. Look at this fresh
God. Damn! Can we get a love shot of this?
God damn! This is good. Can I shake your hand, ma'am? You did
God's work on that one. Incredible work. She's very busy. Don't worry.
Hello, sir. Welcome to the makeup chair. How much moisturizer are you looking for here today?
A lot. A lot. A lot, he says. God damn. That's the key to beauty right there. You get in there, Mira.
Thank you so much. Wow incredible job by all of our makeup artists here
They have to go through so many people all day and Dota players got to be in the top 10 worst
I can say that introduce yourself young man. I am
Nikolai BB3px from level up. How old are you? I'm 23 years old. There's no way you're 23
Does anybody tell you look a lot younger than 23? Yeah, that's always happening when I'm trying to buy alcohol
Oh, do you buy a lot of alcohol? Not a lot just for holidays. Oh just holiday. How many holidays you celebrate?
It might be two or three in a year.
Oh, that's it. Okay, that's not too bad.
How are you guys feeling at this tournament?
It feels very nice. I appreciate that I came here.
That's good. And how long have you been with this team?
I think three months together.
Oh, you're pretty happy to be here, then?
Yeah, I'm so happy.
What is your favorite thing about Dota 2?
You always can do something new.
Is that I've been watching Dota for a long time.
Is that true?
Yeah, that's true for real.
So do something new when I'm casting your team, okay?
Okay, I'll try.
Last question I've been asking everybody. I don't know why.
If your team were to break out into a fistfight,
You fight each other physically. Who would be the victor do you think I think?
Darkly will be the winner of this fight because he's crazy. Oh, so it's a more okay
It's the crazy aspect not the strength necessarily. Okay, cool. Appreciate your time and good luck at the tournament. Thank you
Welcome back my friends and as you see we're on stage, but it is not for a matchup
We've already had all of those for a group stage and next up is
survival, but also the teams that are already progressed onto the quarterfinals, those will
be the teams in the number one position in each one of our groups, which means we get
to do something that's stressful, fun, and kind of silly at the same time.
It's time for draw shows, Alex.
Absolutely, this is the draw show, baby.
We're going to tell you how things are going to be going from here on out.
Now, let me give you a very quick little explanation.
If you've got first place in the groups, you're already in the playoffs, you are safe, you
don't have to go to the survival stage.
However, if you are in the lower groups and have not been eliminated, you must face off
against another team over here.
When you beat them, you must then face off against what we're going to call the mini-boss,
someone who has qualified above you in position two.
And then, after that, the three of you, whoever survives all that, needs to face off against
the main boss, the big boss, which we will bring out.
So we're gonna take all these teams
and we are gonna reveal what order this is right now.
Are you ready to bring them out?
I'm absolutely ready.
This is all about randomness.
You will not be facing somebody from your own group.
That's right.
Third and fourth.
So that adds an extra layer of,
are we even prepared for what is to come?
That's right.
These teams have a lot of work to do,
but the time has come.
I know we have some representatives in the back
that are excited to see who they're gonna face.
You ready?
I'm ready.
All right.
Gentlemen, 16 representatives from 16 teams.
Come on up to the stage.
Damn.
Damn, hey, they come.
I can't believe they were standing in the back
without fighting each other.
They are so peaceful.
You know how much MMR there's gonna be on this stage
in one go?
More than anyone in the chat has ever seen before
in their pro games.
For sure.
For sure.
go. All of our survivors, we said goodbye to so many teams the last few days. We're
gonna get things started here and get our first head to head coming our way.
Yeah, so I'm gonna make it simple for you here. We're gonna start with the teams
that were at the third and fourth position in their groups. So we're gonna
be drawing from my left-hand side here and then we'll see who the mini-boss
and final boss will be in every category of four teams. Simple as we'll do it
four times and close out our day. Our first two teams though to join us here on stage.
LGD Gaming and Mouth Sports.
Army. No, just get LGD Gaming, Mouth Sports. Come on up. Well, oh no, you stand next to him.
This is from the winner side. Come on. You two are going to play one another. Of course,
That's going to be big damage and KJ anything that we should expect in a game.
This is going to be a very interesting match because it's going to decide who's the best assistant coach from Brazil.
So for our assistant coach from there.
So yeah, stay tuned.
Who's the best assistant coach from Brazil?
Awesome.
That's all you need to hear.
It's all you need to hear.
All right.
Who's up?
Who is the top match?
Absolutely.
But they have to face off against the mini boss.
And that is gonna be the winner of this match. We'll face off against
BB team. That's me arrow. Come on up my friend. Oh
Goodness gracious. Look at these two young gentlemen. Only one will survive to make it your way
I gotta ask that cringe question. Who do you think it's gonna be which team?
What wish them out of those two?
Um
LG maybe come on mouse come on
Well, thank you for your opinion if you could go that way join them. That's right right there my friend
You've got this very good and now we got a big boss. We do have the big boss coming up here my friends ladies and gentlemen
Welcome to the stage the man that might be putting down whoever survives this
It's gonna be
NIGMA GALAXY G.H.
Hello.
G.H.
Welcome to the stage, my friend.
You will be facing off against one of these three.
What is your prediction?
My prediction is we will be facing one of these three.
Yes.
What the hell?
Thank you so much.
That's not hype at all, G.H.
I know you're supposed to be nice.
Okay.
You have a nice word for each of them.
What do you think about each one of these teams?
teams. I like them. Great. Thank you so much for the hype, my friend.
Well, you look for can now exit through the front. Well, we now know where that is going
to go. Congratulations. There you go, my friend. Off you go. Don't be shy. All right, we're
going to do this three more times. Honestly, you heard it in the in the piece with Catalyst.
We're like, oh, G.H. He always finds time to talk. He always wants to find the space
to speak a bit of French. He wasn't doing it out over here. He was being nice. That's
Do you know what you're saying? He's a kind boy. He's not going to s-talk that right from their faces.
Goodness gracious.
He'll leave that to the game itself, to the lobby itself.
Indeed.
Next up, this is our second set of four teams out of four.
Our first team, Vici Gaming!
Oh, there we go.
Zen Q to the stage.
The other one is...
P-Time!
Oh, hell yeah!
The wits is on.
Ah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
You can say it however you want.
What do you gotta say to him?
Ha ha.
Let's, let's practice.
Easy.
Easy.
No easy.
No easy.
No easy!
Oh my goodness.
Let's.
Muy caliente, eh?
Good luck.
Good luck.
Good luck!
Very nice.
That's where we're getting out of it.
Unbelievably toxic.
Let's bring the mini-boss out.
All right, a mini-boss here today,
although usually a big bad boss.
Ladies and gentlemen, the winner of this match
will be facing off against,
da-da-da-da,
1-Win 33!
There he is, that was my boss music.
Thank you so much.
To me, you're a Dark Souls boss.
You know, you're one of the scariest,
one triple health bar, if you will.
What do you think you'll be facing off?
Um, I don't know, we'll see but...
Would be fine to play against both of them.
Oh, would be fine to play against them but he doesn't even care!
He didn't even look at you, I saw his eyes!
He didn't even glance over to see who he was!
Thank you so much 33, if you could...
What? I said fun.
Ah, I know, I... ah, off you go.
Goodness gracious.
Alright, don't check the subtitles.
The mini boss is gone.
And now it's time for the main boss, my friends.
the scariest of the scary.
You've known him before, you've seen him before,
and here he comes to crush.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's Falcons ATF!
Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go!
All right, my friend, this is a scary lineup.
Only one of them will face off against you.
Any words for your potential oppositions?
No matter from which team you're going to win,
you're going to lose against one win.
And then, yeah. God bless, I got a free matchup.
Okay, God bless the free matchup! That is not all right.
All right, gentlemen, please exit through the front of the stage.
Well done. Cannot wait to see it.
Goodness gracious me.
See, now this is a different kind of SmackDown.
That's what I'm talking about. I'm making it.
Thank God ATF was on this stage of SmackDown.
All right, here we go.
Same today. Well, we're halfway through this, right?
Yeah, we're almost able to breathe.
You can open up your collar a little bit.
You can chill out on this.
But now it is our third set of four. Joining us on stage first, Team Liquid!
Oh, damn. Ace on here. All right. Do you know who we'll play against?
Do I know it? No, I don't know it.
Thank God. It means that everything's clean. Good job, League Operations. You're opponent,
Extreme Gaming! Oh, baby. Well, now that you know who you'll be playing against,
Yeah, formulated any thoughts, Ice?
Uh, bring it on.
Oh, there we go, alright!
Bring it on, alright.
He's ready for you, Final Wards.
Uh, let's go home.
Let's go!
Fantastic!
Two very strong teams.
That's gonna be a hova match,
but they will have to make their way through.
The defending champion,
Slice the Jove,
and his team spirit,
Lara!
He nodded.
So calmly his eyebrows raised so slightly. What do you think about this matchup?
Interest matchup. I guess I don't know. We always have the same team like Lagans extremely good. They took the team so I
Don't know how best for them. Oh
The best to you guys will very well. You're so sweet if you could please head over there
Such are the words of our mini boss, but I'm afraid the main boss is coming
Ladies and gentlemen, you know em, you love em, you gotta look up to I-Line-Em, it's Saska!
AHHHHHHH!
DOOM DOOM DOOM!
Hello there my friend, I forgot the attack on Titan, do you know it?
What's the attack on Titan?
No no no no no no no no no!
That's what I should have done when you walked out, that's on me, that's on me.
Any thoughts here for these three, who do you think you're gonna be facing?
I think they're all tough opponents, but I think I'm looking forward to playing Spirit.
Looking forward to playing Spirit! Alright well we'll see what happens. Thank you so much!
Please! To the front of the stage!
Okay, we're not getting copyright strikes today.
We're definitely on the zone for this one, but Flaks, I feel like we've run out of options.
Yeah, yeah, just come on up here boys!
Hold on, you two have to say I have to reveal who the final boss is.
Alright, go ahead.
Who do we have here?
Alright, we got Root Eaters, we got Virtus Pro.
So, what's in your bonnet?
You jacked.
Best of luck to my phone.
Good, very nice. Any final words?
Shout out to my boy, Copy. It's going to be sad.
Oh, yeah!
Copy, make that printer, because we're going to be bringing them out of here!
Thank you very much.
But all right, mini-boss is, it's a flip of the coin.
Who is stronger?
Who is the mini-boss?
We're everybody on Nightfall.
You're the mini-boss, my friend.
Welcome, welcome Nightfall.
Now you face these guys before.
Who do you think will survive in this group?
50-50.
50, 50, bye.
God, it's a flip of the coin.
Nightfall, please.
If you could TP's to the other side.
And then this is out of surprise.
Just come on up.
Come on.
Thank you so much.
We gotta end this segment in something hype, please,
from the bottom of your most excited voice.
Who will you be facing from these three?
Epileptic Kid.
The Epileptic Kid returns!
My God!
Okay, fantastic.
Well, gentlemen, please, exit the stage.
We have gone through all of those.
Ladies and gentlemen, your bracket is finished.
There you have it.
How you feel, Enmilo?
Honestly, it's good.
I came into this not really knowing what to expect of the players, but I think to handle it very smoothly
So I'm excited in there, but we're gonna we have all this bracket in our brains, right?
We got to visualize it. We got to talk about it in depth
Which is why the actual experts are standing by in the panel. So let's send it over to them take it over Jeever
Thank you very much slacks and Milo
So I feel like every time a matchup got revealed like whoa, that's gonna be tough
And then I had that with every single matchup being revealed so every single series is gonna be tough
I'm here with BSJ and Epi. Epi this was uh, this is quite the reveal
That was pretty entertaining. You know what? I think people should have been a router to each other
Whoever shows more killer instincts gonna win sheaves
Yeah, that's how it works in the Dota 2 scene
He's not that you next month might be on the same team as one of the people you just insulted and then maybe they'll be sad
Yeah, I mean you might have been in the reverse of flies in copies situation where exactly about to play each other
You know wish them good luck exactly exactly
I mean honestly, it's kind of funny how the story lines always come out like Laura was saying he ends up against team liquid
RxG a lot and also
Flies playing against his former teammate. There's so many teams that don't have that overlap. How does this always happen in some way?
I don't know. It's exciting
I mean every single one of the series moving forward is gonna be an elimination series a lot of hearts
going to be broken. I think there's going to be an opportunity for a lot of these teams
to step up and I'm looking forward to seeing who does it.
Yeah, I feel like there's a lot of underdog stories that can be coming through here and
it is pretty crazy that we still, we have 16 teams left. We eliminated eight teams and
we have 16 teams left. So there's a lot of teams here for those two at this EWC. And
that means that there are still underdogs in the tournament and there are still clear
favorites in the tournament where we have the four teams that are still considered a
But my question is, Effie, do you think that out of those four clear favourites, you have
one team in particular that you feel might have the toughest opponents coming out of
their three, and we should be able to get the brackets to you soon.
I would love to see the brackets again, but off the top of my head, I think Team Yandex
going up against potentially Team Spirit again, that's the one for me.
That was the one that caught my eye too, because it's not just Spirit in that one, it's also
two teams that have a tradition of just slightly getting better as the tournament progresses.
I'm talking about extreme gaming and team liquid.
I absolutely agree with you.
I think this should be the toughest, most exciting line of this bracket.
Yeah, there's arguably four potential top six to eight teams in that one bracket of four.
So that is pretty wild.
And at the end of the day, I think all the games are going to be unique in their own right.
I was like, we just saw KJ walk past us for LGD
and they managed to squeak through in their group barely.
And I think they were one of the teams
that I was hoping to see more from this event.
So maybe not because of that group of four specifically,
but I am rooting for them as they move forward.
Yeah, they were a team that was concerned to be,
they're in group D.
Obviously, we just also saw there won't be one man.
They were in the group of S.
So yeah, we can definitely see more of them.
their opponent actually, in case you don't remember,
and that's okay, we'll soon get those ranks,
are Maus, Effie.
So they've got an opponent that in my book,
they should be able to deal with.
You should, but you know,
Maus are an interesting team because
when they get their heroes and they get their straps,
I feel like they could surprise anybody on any given day.
So you can't look at any of these teams and think,
oh, that one's a free win.
Oh, this one, no problem whatsoever.
We should really prepare for 1W instead, for example.
You can't do that here.
You cannot.
And then there's a surprise coming out of the group stage.
Feel like we got a touch up on that as well.
The biggest surprise, I think, for a lot of people,
being on top of their group,
NICMAC Galaxy, I want to talk about their line of teams
that they have coming towards them,
which is actually the Miles LGD line
with BB team in the middle there.
How do we feel about a BB team versus NICMAC Galaxy?
Because I know we've been praising BB team
on their prowess and their fastness.
And basically, I think Seb called them,
and you'll like this analogy, Brian,
they called, he called them the test.
Oh yeah, the skill check.
Are you a tier one team?
Then you can beat BB team.
Are you not?
You're out.
Yeah, I mean, I was one interview,
I think it was with DM where they asked,
like, how do you find these players?
Like, what's the qualifications for becoming on a pro team?
And he said, the first thing is you gotta be high skill enough.
And I think that's exactly what BB team requires you to do because all strategies are out the window if you just get obliterated
in all of your lanes and that's what something that this team
It's kind of like team spirit where even when they've changed their roster one or two players at a time
They always end up with the same identity. I do think nigma could do that though. I think being nigma
I think they might be finally back
I don't want to get ahead of myself too much because every team is one series away from getting eliminated
So that would be, honestly, pretty devastating, I think, for a lot of the Nigma fans out there,
because this is truly the first time that they've put on a really impressive performance in a group stage,
and they looked convincing to me, and I hope to see more out of them,
not that I'm rooting against BB Team or anything like that.
I think it's time, I think the stars are aligning finally after years here.
It's really exciting, and they also have the Lorinoff mercenary buff.
I don't know how long that lasts, so, because typically it's on a timer.
Does it have a linger duration?
I think it does have a lingering duration of a long time.
At least one round, at least one round.
So the buff is still here and they're ready to go.
No, but it's been really exciting.
Seb had a lot of praises to say about Nigma and the way that they've been drafting.
It's not just that they're very high-skilled and they're good,
but they've come in with really strong ideas and strategies and they're executing them.
Yeah, I feel like I want to still touch upon two teams that we have seen their keys getting crushed,
But there are two teams that I think have made a mark on the teams that are still in, on the top 16 teams.
And the first one is OG. They are the only team to have taken a game off of 1W and Yandex.
And I think that them getting eliminated is, I mean, first of all, brutal. Second of all, a little surprising FV.
Yeah, I would say so. I mean, that group was tough, though.
That was an incredibly hard group and it felt like every series you've kind of had to fight
tooth and nail and but the thing is you can't really blame groups because if you can't
win through your group you wouldn't have won the tournament anyway but a lot of experience
I think was gathered here for OG and they've shown that their ceiling is incredibly high
and when they can get their drafts together and feel good that day they look like the
best players in the world sometimes.
Yeah it's weird because like VP a team that just took two games in a row off of them in
in order to knock them out, they look relatively outclassed
when they are playing against the top two teams in the group.
And while OG, like you said, took a game off each of them.
So don't do a hard game.
So there's a lot of different ways to lose.
There's a lot of different ways to feel like you're one step away
from being a tier one team and for VP to take those two games.
I think VP's the more like they're better at what they do
if you ignore the other team.
But the problem is like OG, they rise to the occasion,
But then they also tend to fall to the occasion when you're against the weaker side of team, so...
Sadly, in group stages, I think that's why VP went out.
I think that often the consistency is what's going to matter early on.
The other team that I wanted to touch upon still, that for me was also a team that I was expecting to do a little better.
Though, if you were to put me on spot, I don't know which team they would replace in the 16 we have left.
But it's game religion. They came in and one of the first series they played, they had a Largo mid,
even though they didn't win that game, it looked good when they did it.
And I'm like, wow, we can definitely expect some cool stuff from this squad,
but Effie did not deliver.
They didn't, but you know, they played better than I thought they would.
And they've been on the up and up since the squad's formation.
And the fact that they looked that competitive versus certain teams,
and then if you talk to the players individually,
they said that they've been winning in scrims, that's very promising.
North American needs a team that's going to keep trying and keep improving
and keep evolving, and Game Religion is that team.
So, what do we look back on from this group stage that we really
have enjoyed as we are coming to a close of this group stage?
Honestly, I think it's the surprises, like Ningba Galaxy getting first,
like Rune Eater's getting in the top four. I think they were the same
group as Game Religion, if I recall correctly. For every team that surprises,
there's always going to be a team that disappoints. But overall, I do think
I think the groups were balanced relatively well.
We talked about the group of death,
but I'm not too surprised by all the teams
that are moving forward.
And I think we're set up for a nice bracket.
Yeah, we are set up for a nice bracket
as we can set up the bracket.
Of course, we're starting with the survival stage.
So we're gonna have the survival stage, which is this.
And it will be played out over two days,
on Tuesday and Wednesday.
And we have got some cool series.
I I'm maybe I'm a liquid extreme gaming test just from my eyes go guys. It's just it's just there
It is just there you are right and I mean extreme gaming three second place
Ti recently liquid they won one like two ti's ago and now we're seeing them the first round of a survival bracket
That is definitely unexpected. I just want to say that we just saw that 1v1 for VP versus LGD
So LGD by winning the 1v1 got to play against Mao's as opposed to VP playing its Runeaters
I'm not trying to like take a slight on root eaters. I don't know if LGD got the better
Half of this by playing against mouths. I would be a bit more scared. I think mouths, you know
They're more I think is much higher than most of these teams like they do have solid lanes
And they tend to execute what they do well, but I also think they have a potentially higher ceiling
So I think furnace pro got a bit lucky there with that specific one
And I think because of I think root eaters took third place in the group that extreme
And that's how you end up with this Team Liquid versus Extreme Gaming.
Extreme Gaming has been looking a bit shaky and I don't think it's a surprise that they've found themselves with such a formidable opponent in round one.
Yeah, every single one of these series you can make a case for either team to come out ahead and go to that next round.
And it's a scary road. And I said it's single elimination so there's no mistakes. You've got to treat it like the little bracket.
That's just as simple as that.
For some teams, that's a buff.
For some teams, Effie, that might be
a little bit of a negative.
You're right, because I do think Nervz
always play a part in tournaments of this caliber.
And there are certain teams that have looked like Nervz
have gotten the best of them, you know?
And we just saw Ty Lung from LGD play 1v1,
and he looked fantastic.
But there were also games that he played this EWC,
where I could really feel his tension through the screen.
So I hope that the teams that often succumb to their nerves
can get a grip during this survival stage.
They'll need to.
They'll 100% need you.
Thank you so much for both your thoughts today.
As we have come to the end of today
and to the end of the group stages,
keep in mind, will we not live tomorrow?
Everybody gets a break.
Teams included.
We'll be back on Tuesday though.
And we are starting a little bit later
than what we have so far.
We'll be live with two different streams.
Starting at 1PM, of course, we'll be live before that.
to talk you through everything that's gonna happen that day.
So make sure you tune in on time, 1 p.m. and we're in Paris
so you can do the math there yourself, that's all good.
We're not gonna leave you completely empty-handed
because we did have some crazy cool games
coming your way today.
So thank you so much for tuning in
and we're gonna leave you with the STC recap of the day.
I
I
I
you