Or more accurately, “The Road to the International 2023: A Practical Guide”

The what?

The Road, my friends. The Road. Most people skip these introductions, so let’s go quick.

What was SUNSfan warning us about?

• Was it beloved grassroots organization Beyond the Summit being shuttered? BTS did not receive any DPC tour coverage rights this year which, along with an overall downturn in esports, may have been the death knell for this long standing Dota institution.
• Was it ESL not getting any DPC tours? ESL also wasn’t given any league coverage this year, so they decided to just make their own non-DPC circuit. The ESL Pro Tour, or EPT for short, consisted of two DreamLeague events and culminated in the Riyadh Masters 2023 LAN event with a whopping $15MM prize pool.
• Was it the DPC getting canned? After this year, the DPC in its current form will cease to exist. Valve seems optimistic. The community does not.
• Was it the Battle Pass getting kneecapped? You may notice that the prize pool for this TI is astronomically lower than previous years. Valve has made the conscious decision to not juice TI’s purse with a cosmetic-laden Battle Pass with the implication that more content will come after TI fervor ends when more players are excited to actually play Dota, not just watch it.
• Was it the TI format changing? In an effort to make group stage games higher stakes, Valve has now split the 20 TI teams into 4 different groups. If you make it past groups, you’ll be placed in a playoff bracket the following weekend. These two legs are all part of The Road to the International. The final, final weekend, with the top 8 teams, will be considered the ‘main’ International.

These forewords are typically more for my benefit so I can document all the significant happenings from the year.

I know what you’re mainly here for.

The Invites

Team Liquid

miCKe

Nisha

zai

Boxi

iNSaNiA

Coach   Blitz

Analyst   Jabbz

How did this roster happen? After MATUMBAMAN died last TI, a void was left in this roster. Thankfully, the Team Liquid Academy Team, also known as “Team Secret,” was hard at work training up another prospect ripe for the picking by the name of Nisha.

You know how you probably associate Sumail as being on Evil Geniuses for like… ever? King played on EG for four years, from 2015 to 2019. Nisha on Secret? 2018 to 2022. Four years is a long time under one banner and despite a stellar 2^nd place finish with Secret last TI, he seemed ready to move on.

How was their DPC year? 2150 points

So the year started off– wait, sorry. Gotta fix my formatting.

So the year started off pretty good for Liquid. Nisha instantly gelled with the team and they got a 2^nd place finish in Lima despite Boxi having to leave mid-way through the tournament.

But then it happened again.

And again.

And again.

It would’ve been funny if it wasn’t so sad. Actually that’s a lie, it was still pretty funny. After being stonewalled by a Western European nemesis for 3 LANs straight, Liquid finally conquered their demons at Riyadh before once more fumbling the bag against Team Spirit in grand finals.

What would success look like? Fun fact: Do you know who the highest earning Dota 2 player that hasn’t won TI is? It’s zai. Even more impressive is he’s done that without ever even being in a TI grand finals.

Can Liquid finally get a win? Or is this team just destined to always be a bridesmaid, never the bride.

Anyways, a Western European nemesis, you say? Who were they? I bet it was Team Secret. Ooh, or maybe OG? Tundra? NIGMA?!

Nope. It was

Gaimin Gladiators

dyrachYO

Quinn

Ace

tOfu

Seleri

Coach   Cy-

How did this roster happen? This is the same lineup as last year barring some cool, calm, collection. While on the brink of contemplating retirement when Quincy Crew/Soniqs disintegrated after last TI, Quinn was given the opportunity to export himself to this Western European squad, taking the place of former midlaner BOOM. Meanwhile, BOOM went to Secret and Secret went boom.

How was their DPC year? 2140 points

GAIMIN was Liquid’s nemesis???

That’s correct.

If you didn’t have any opinions about this team last year, I wouldn’t blame you. They were distinctly ‘middle of the pack’ material by WEU standards.

If you didn’t have any opinions about this team by the end of this year, you’re a unicorn.

The Lima Major win was the honeymoon period. A new WEU team was on the block. First Dutch Major champion with Seleri. Quinn, who had been struggling in NA for years, finally earned some validation. But in Berlin it was like, oh okay, it’s happening again. But… back to back winners, that’s exciting! Then come Bali, even the most neutral Dota esports viewers were starting to get a little agitated by their presence.

It’s a fascinating case study of a team that most people barely ever thought about, to a team that a lot of people began actively disliking. I believe there are a variety of factors.

One is that, well, they’re just very good. And if you’re constantly very good, people get annoyed that you keep making everyone else look very bad. This isn’t even just patch luck. The game massively changed during DreamLeague S19 and they still kept winning everything. The strange thing is, they’re not necessarily boring to watch (which is most people’s argument against Tundra), they’re just classic Western European clean Doto.

Two is compounded by the fact that Liquid were doing them no favors by getting bopped in every single grand final. It was almost predetermined. OHH BOY, GAIMIN IS IN GRAND FINALS AND LIQUID’S MAKING A LOWER BRACKET RUN, GEE I WONDER WHAT’S GONNA HAPPEN NEXT.

Three is Quinn. To put it lightly, he’s a very colorful individual in pubs. And that, combined with an ego that was polished to a mirror finish this year, is a dangerous combination. I don’t think I’ve seen people enjoy hatewatching a player this much since the days of internationally renowned day trader EternalEnvy. The worst part is even the hatewatchers will admit that the rest of his team is very likeable, which makes him an even stronger focus of their rage because they can’t diffuse it throughout the roster.

What would success look like? They already made Dota history by being the first team to ever win every major of the season. Ya gotta finish the story now.

Also, I unironically believe a large number of Redditors may just straight up kill themselves to avoid living in a timeline where Quinn Callahan is a TI winner.

Tundra Esports

skiter

Topson

33

Nine

Sneyking

Coach   Aui_2000

How did this roster happen? Ah yes, the current reigning TI champio– IS THAT TOPSON?

Yes, but show some decorum. The main reason Topson is here is because Tundra, specifically Saksa, had a pretty rough year and was mysteriously missing from a handful of events before publicly opening up that he’s been struggling with anxiety, sleep, and mental health. Even TI winners are human.

In the eleventh hour, Topson, who had spent most of his year farting around on the meme-but-jk-not-really-meme team Old G, was called up to bat moving Nine to 4 position duties.

You couldn’t pay me enough to cover all the Old G drama this year.

How was their DPC year? 1660 points

As mentioned earlier, you’ll notice a lot of stand-in asterisks by these results. For DLS19, Aramis stood in for Saksa. For DLS20, Malr1ne stood in for Nine. And for Bali and Riyadh, coach Aui stood in for Saksa.

Despite all that, pretty solid results for Tundra despite Wraith Pact being removed in April, eh?

What would success look like? I don’t mean to alarm you, but we may be witnessing the potential of 3 time TI winners Topson and Aui as coach!

Sure, Topson already played a few matches with the Tundra boys during September’s DreamLeague S21 and it was… fine? They only got 5-6th out of a 12 team tournament.

BUT IT'S TAAAPSEN!

9Pandas

RAMZES666

kiyotaka

MieRo`

Antares

Solo

Coach   DM

How did this roster happen? Starting from EEU Tour 1, this roster formed under the HellRaisers tag with Daxak, kiyotaka (formerly depressed kid) (as in, that was his name), Miero, Antares, and Solo. Apparently there were some… “personality clashes” with Daxak, so Yuragi stood in for him at the Lima Major despite very much still being on OG.

Beginning of EEU Tour 2, Ramzes left his Darkside roster and reunited with papa Solo for the very first time since TI9’s Virtus.pro.

How was their DPC year? 1496 points

This year, EEU has been a rock paper scissors between three teams: 9Pandas, BetBoom, and Team Spirit. Each of them took a turn topping their regional league, but Pandas had the highest DPC LAN finish at the Berlin Major despite Rodjer standing in for Solo.

What would success look like? Pretty much every year that Solo and Ramzes were teammates at TI, they were considered favorites. I would know. I put them into my Compendium predictions to win it literally every time. Then that old VP would proceed to consistently drop the ball at TI7. And TI8. And TI9.

For some, the real success would be beating Gaimin specifically, but I think the Ramzes x Quinn rivalry horse was stomped to death in an elevator Refn-style one too many times this year.

Evil Geniuses

Pakazs

Chris Luck

Wisper

Matthew

Panda

Coach   Vintage

Coach   kaffs

How did this roster happen? Whoa now, tsunami. Don’t mean to tell ya yer business, but it seems to me like there’s been a bit of a misunderstandin’. This here ain’t EG. This some kinda… what sorta woke flags are these… this some kinda South American team? Now boy, you know that ain’t right. EG’s a North American org, yes sir! Always has been. North American pride and joy right there!

Nope. Not anymore. At the beginning of this season, EG very unceremoniously (and then got cyberbullied into ceremoniously) dropped their North American roster after spending 11 years in the region. The phrase “end of an era” gets thrown around a lot in esports, but like… every TI since TI2 with a North American EG? Wild.

As they shed their NA skin, Evil Geniuses formed a South American superteam out of last year’s Thunder Awaken and beastcoast rosters. Pakazs, Matthew, and Panda came from Thunder. Chris Luck and Wisper came from beastcoast.

How was their DPC year? 1470 points

When you saw the Lima Major you just knew things had to be hype for South America. Peru is the strongest it’s ever been and they finally had a LAN on home soil. Alas, EG was only able to scrape a top 6 finish. Amusingly, they got eliminated by ex-Evil Geniuses Arteezy and the gang.

They maintained their momentum into a 4^th place finish at the Berlin Major. That’s the most significant placement a South American team has gotten at a Valve Major since paiN Gaming’s 3rd place finish at ESL One Birmingham 2018. Though, Birmingham’s tournament format was on crack, so let’s just gloss over it and go with Berlin being the new South American bar to beat.

Let’s also gloss over the last third of the season because… oof.

What would success look like? I’ve never seen a team where you can so clearly interpret how well they’re going to do on any given day just by looking at their faces. I’m serious. Watch the VoDs on their elimination days. You’d think they were being forced to walk out on stage to play Dota at gunpoint.

For what it’s worth, it is a Seattle TI. So there’s probably a lot of EG jerseys being dug out of closets and dusted off with wives asking, “Why do you still have this? And who is Universe?” Will these vintage EG fans be rooting for this team? Probably not, but don’t tell the players that. Big smiles, EG boys. Big Chris Smiles.

LGD Gaming

shiro

NothingToSay

niu

planet

y`

Coach   xiao8

How did this roster happen? There were kinda two retirement tours on display at last year’s TI. Matu’s was the “I’M OUTTA HERE BITCHES” vibe and Ame’s had more of a “Your father doesn’t want anyone to make a fuss” energy. Nothing was ever formally announced, but everyone suspected it, and his absence this year confirmed it. LGD ended up filling Ame’s carry shoes surprisingly well with young EHOME talent, shiro.

Faith_bian also retired and finding a replacement offlaner was… ugh, you know, years ago I would’ve looked up some deep elaborate Chinese idiomatic lore phrase to drop here, but I’m a busy man these days. I’m just gonna hit you with the Google Translate. Finding a replacement offlaner was a total 节目充满狗屎. Yeah. I’m sure that means what I want it to.

Tour 1’s offlaner was 项羽/xiàng yǔ, Lima Major was old eLeVeN, Tour 2 and Berlin Major they had zeal, and Tour 3 onwards has been niu.

Also, before you ask: Yes, Ame’s was kind of the classic “Chinese retirement” because he literally just won the 2022 Asian Games with Team China despite not playing competitively since last TI.

NOTE TO SELF - IT’S JUST LGD NOW. NOT PSG.LGD. DON’T CALL THEM PSG.LGD ANYMORE. CALL THEM HONKAI.STAR.RAIL.LGD IF YOU HAVE TO.

How was their DPC year? 1284 points

China has been in shambles this entire year. Tour 1 was fraught with many match fixing suspicions which boiled over in a massive ban wave after Lima. LGD quietly kept their head down the whole time, but perhaps went a bit too far down because they themselves didn’t really have any notable results this season.

What would success look like? Throw a dart at a board of all TIs ever. Odds are you’ll hit one where LGD were considered favorites to win the whole thing. This year? Definitely not. Regardless, with LGD being the crown jewel of Chinese Dota, a great deal will always hang in the balance of this team’s performance.

Needless to say, a lot of responsibility.

Shopify Rebellion

Arteezy

Abed

SabeRLight-

Cr1t-

Fly

Coach   BuLba

How did this roster happen? You already know how this roster happened. Well, most of the roster anyway. After TI11, Nightfall got replaced by Saberlight from TSM. Great you’re all caught up.

The organization, on the other hand. How did that happen? I mean, it’s not like some multibillion-dollar company’s just gonna randomly decide to start investing in esports while the bubble is popping and sponsor a bunch of superstars recently dropped by their org who are playing in one of the most expensive yet competitively starved regions in Dota 2 of all games.

But that’s exactly what happened.

How was their DPC year? 1170 points

Hopes were high after their Lima Major 4^th place finish, but the shine dulled pretty quickly. Abed also had visa issues getting to Europe which led to Iranian player Mikey standing in for DLS19 and MIRACLE standing in for DLS20.

They did recently reach grand finals at DLS21 in September, but it’s the LAN results that continue to elude them.

What would success look like? How funny would it be if Arteezy’s first Valve Major win is the TI with the lowest prize pool since he started competing ten years ago.

Talon Esports

23savage

Mikoto

Jabz

Q

Oli~

Coach   SunBhie

How did this roster happen? 23, Mikoto, and Q were on the TI11 Talon. Oli left iG and finally returned to his home region and Jabz left Fnatic with SunBhie in tow.

How was their DPC year? 1120 points

Lima Major was a hot start for Talon and they left Peru with a bronze medal after losing to Liquid twice in bracket. Once in uppers, and again when Jabbz proved superior to Jabz in lowers. In Berlin, they fell to EG during their miracle run and that somehow spiraled into a 4^th place finish during Tour 3 which meant they’d miss the Bali major in their home region.

Talon spent their time off constructively and came back on LAN at Riyadh with a vengeance. Unfortunately, they get bounced twice by Team Liquid again and got 3^rd again.

What would success look like? China’s been in shambles this year, but SEA’s been in shambles for like the past 4 years. Last TI was catastrophic, but Talon’s got a good head on their shoulders. No visa issues. Mikoto won MVP at Riyadh. Jabz’s captainship seems stronger than ever.

They’re just a real bunch of stand up guys.

beastcoast

Parker

DarkMago

Sacred

Scofield

Stinger

Coach   Mariano (Papita)

Coach   Raykill

Coach   Valqui

How did this roster happen? The community largely considered Evil Geniuses to have benefitted the most from the post-TI11 SA shuffle which left beastcoast to pick up the fragmented pieces. Scofield and Stinger have been beastcoast since 2019, but DarkMago and Sacred came from Thunder Awaken.

K1 Hector was also beastcoast’s carry since 2019, but he departed before the Bali Major citing health issues and Parker took his spot.

How was their DPC year? 1040 points

It’s been a quiet season for the boys in aquamarine. For every superteam, there must be a… civilianteam? Let’s just say the EG roster shuffle results were not very kind to them and having to change K1 at the end of the season probably didn’t help. Their TI invitation chances were in jeopardy near the end of the season, but Shopify Rebellion did them a solid and lost in first round of Bali’s lower bracket to get beastcoast 300 points with top 8.

What would success look like? A Climate Pledge arena filled to the brim with Crest plushies.

Team Spirit

Yatoro

Larl

Collapse

Mira

Miposhka

Coach   Silent

How did this roster happen? After two years and one Aegis, TORONTOTOKYO finally left Spirit after last TI ended. In December, it was announced that a young gun by the name of Larl would be Toronto’s replacement. Larl wasn’t a complete nobody, he was on the 2022 BetBoom roster that got top 8 at the Stockholm Major and… got last at TI11. Yeah okay he was kind of a nobody. But Spirit saw promise in him and stuck with this roster for the entire season. It paid off.

How was their DPC year? 1020 points

This happened last year when they won Arlington and it’s happening again with a win in Riyadh. On top of that they also won DLS21 last month while barely even trying.

What would success look like? Spirit went from barely a threat most of the year to rocketing up people’s lists to be arguably one of the favorites for this TI. Recency bias and the theory that they only activate when the prize pool is enormous is going to be put to the test in Seattle.

TSM

Timado

Bryle

kasane

Ari

Whitemon

Coach   MoonMeander

How did this roster happen? A couple of pieces changed since last TI. Saberlight went to Shopify Rebellion and relatively unknown commodity kasane became TSM’s offlaner. MoonMeander finally got to step down from active play and found Ari, a former #1 ranked Heroes of the Storm player, to take his place. Lastly, DuBu went back to SEA and was replaced by Whitemon from T1.

How was their DPC year? 900 points

As per usual, NA was mostly a two-horse race throughout the year with TSM and Shopify. Then this horse got turned into glue whenever it was Major time. On top of that, TSM has a tendency to fall asleep at the wheel towards the end of each season. Last year they missed Arlington, this year they missed Bali.

For what it’s worth, they did make it to grand finals of the BetBoom Dacha LAN event in September but lost to, you guessed it: Gaimin Gladiators.

What would success look like? Ari’s the first British player to ever compete at a Valve Major. So if they make it to Climate Pledge Arena? USA! USA! USA! USA!

BetBoom Team

Nightfall

gpk~

Pure~

Save-

TORONTOTOKYO

Coach   boolk

How did this roster happen? The TI11 BetBoom was thrown out the window after their last place finish and this version was born. Nightfall, gpk, and Save had played together on the TI10 VP which was coached by boolk. Pure originally joined this team as the carry since Nightfall was still fresh from his offlane stint on EG, but the two ended up swapping roles starting Tour 3. Lastly, your eyes do not deceive you, that’s TI winning midlaner TORONTOTOKYO playing hard support.

How was their DPC year? 760 points

EG was South America’s superteam and BoomBox Team was supposed to be EEU’s superteam, but it just wasn’t happening. At least, not on LAN. Lima was a disaster and Berlin was more of the same, albeit with Resolution having to stand in for Pure.

They were given a last minute invite to DLS20 after SEA team Execration had visa issues and got the grand finals placement that was necessary to directly qualify to Riyadh. Nice!

Then there was Bali. Bali, Bali, Bali.

I’ll try my best to summarize: The Bali Major had a ton of technical issues. A particularly extensive one occurred during Tundra vs. BetBoom’s upper bracket match which led to a multi hour pause. This was an especially important match because if Bibimbap Team won, they’d get top 8 and, with it, enough points to secure a TI invite. The match eventually carried on and they got the 2-0. They did it! They’re going to Seattle!

[EXTREMELY LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER]

You see during the long ass pause, Pure, whom you may know as having a somewhat checkered history, got a lil’ bored. He got so bored, in fact, that he opened up RU community caster Nix’s stream. During the game. Well, during the pause, but the pause was… during the game. His game. And this was caught on the player cameras.

Mass hysteria ensues. I was on the broadcast and even I didn’t even know what the hell was going on. Does Tundra win? Can BBop Team even still play? Is Pure going to be shot out of a cannon? Are we even allowed to shoot cannons in Indonesia?

The verdict was that Tundra would be given the win and Pure would be disqualified for the rest of the event. Resolution, who had previously stood in for BeanBlops at Berlin, just so happened to be on the EN broadcast for the event. He “stood in” for BedandBreakfast and they promptly got eliminated by a very irritated Azure Ray.

Good times.

What would success look like? We shoot Pure out of a cannon.

The Regional Qualifiers

Entity - Western Europe #1

watson

Stormstormer

Gabbi

Kataomi`

Fishman

Coach   MeTTpuM

How did this roster happen? After TI11, Pure left the roster and watson came in from HellRaisers. Following Tour 3, Tobi was kicked and they randomly got Gabbi, a Southeast Asian carry player, to play offlane. Not entirely sure what the story was there.

How was their DPC year? 208 points

Western Europe is a brutal region. WEU sent four teams to every major this year and all of them would make top 6 every time barring Tundra’s 9-12th at Lima. Granted, two of those were just Gaimin and Liquid in every final, but still!

Entity made waves at Lima before losing to Gaimin and Talon, but were struggling to keep their head above water in Tour 2 and 3. Only by winning relegation tiebreakers were they able to maintain a slot in Division 1.

Then I guess they just hate ESL or something? Those are some rough EPT performances.

What would success look like? Giving us an even better game than last year’s 107 minute Bo1 against RNG.

PSG Quest - Western Europe #2

TA2000 (Naive-)

No!ob

Tobi

OmaR

kaori

Coach   Daxak

How did this roster happen? Formerly known as Ooredoo Thunders, a.k.a. “The Oreoes,” this team grinded their way up from Div 2 into becoming the next big thing.

Noob and Omar are relative newcomers to the competitive scene, but were formerly on the Coolguys roster together that competed in WEU Div 1 Tour 1 in 2022. TA2000 and kaori have been around for a few years, but always on EEU rosters. This is their first WEU team.

And the offla- DUDE I AM GETTING SICK of telling offlane stories. When did this become the most volatile role? Offlaners used to be so stable! It was the midlaners that would get passed around like holographic Pokémon cards at recess. Whatever, rant over. Tour 1 and 2 they had Wuiter. Starting Tour 3 they had ATF and it looked like a great fit, but due to contract disputes he didn’t continue with the team. They brought in Malik to stand in during Riyadh Masters before ultimately getting Tobi from Entity for their TI qualifying roster.

Can you imagine the psychological toll of playing with 4 different offlaners in 1 year? Snip, snap, snip, snap.

NOTE TO SELF - NOW THIS TEAM HAS THE PSG. PSG QUEST. GREAT! ANOTHER TEAM THAT USED TO HAVE A UNIQUE COLOR IS NOW JUST BLUE NOW. I’M NOT CHANGING THEIR BANNER, I REFUSE.

How was their DPC year? 545 points

Most of the year was covered in the roster explanation, so I’ll just gush about how exciting it’s been to watch Quest’s journey this season. After smashing their way through Tour 1 Div 2, they came into Tour 2 as an immediate threat and nearly qualified to the Major in their inaugural tour. This region’s already cutthroat enough as it is. Notice how you don’t see Secret, OG, or Nigma anywhere on this page?

By the time Tour 3 ended, most teams were beginning to statistically lock their chances of directly qualifying to TI through points, but the last 3-4 slots were still up in the air. Were Quest able to win the Bali Major, they would’ve just barely gotten enough points to sneak a direct TI invite. Believe it or not, that was a fairly realistic proposition, but their bracket run was cut short after losing to Gaimin and Liquid.

They would be tested one last time after making it to Riyadh Masters through a dedicated MENA region qualifier and fought their way to top 8. In a different timeline their run went even further, but their elimination series against Gaimin was plagued with technical issues and they lost.

What would success look like? Now that I’ve gassed them up: Realistically, making it past The Road and into The International final weekend will be an incredible achievement. True success will likely come for these players in the next few years.

Virtus.pro - Eastern Europe

Kiritych~

squad1x

Noticed

sayuw

Fng

Coach   G

How did this roster happen? The 2, 3, and 4 positions have been the same since Tour 1, but krylat and Dukalis got replaced by Kiritych and Fng respectively starting Tour 2.

How was their DPC year? 218 points

You know how I said EEU was like a rock paper scissors game this year? VP was out here playing clarinet.

Does that mean that these guys were just being gatekept and are secretly goated with the sauce? No, probably not. They showed up to Riyadh and my first reaction was, “What’s Fng doing here. Is he on the panel?”

Honestly, he probably could’ve shown up on the panel afterwards because they got absolutely blown to smithereens.

What would success look like? Not really sure. We’ve haven’t had a TI with 3 EEU teams since TI5, forget about 4. That TI also only had 2 WEU teams with Secret and Cloud9. And North America won that TI.

What the hell was going on in 2015?

Keyd Stars - South America #1

Costabile

4nalog

fcr

Kingrd

KJ

Coach   DFlash

How did this roster happen? This full Brazilian squad started out with 4dr mid and tavo offlane for most of the year. After dropping out of Div 1 in Tour 2, 4nalog and fcr were brought on to play from Tour 3 onwards.

How was their DPC year? 38 points

Wait, South America #1 Qualifier? What do you mean #1? I mean that besides the two SA teams that already made it to TI on points, EG and beastcoast, two more slots were allocated to the region for TI qualifiers. Now bear in mind, Valve determined these extra slot allocations before the Bali Major happened. At that moment, SA was consistently doing pretty well given the fact that they only ever get to send 2 teams to each major.

What would success look like? To refresh your memory: TI7 was the very first TI to feature a South American team (Infamous). TI8 had the mostly Brazilian paiN Gaming to represent the region. And ever since then, it’s pretty much always been the Peru show on LAN. The last time a Brazilian team made it to a Valve Major was Costabile and KJ’s SG esports at TI10 that got eliminated in groups.

4nalog managed to make it out of groups last year on Hokori, but it’s waaaay harder with this year’s format.

Thunder Awaken - South America #2

Knight~

SLATEM$

ILICH-

n1ght

Mjz

Coach   NaoG

How did this roster happen? After EG and beastcoast ripped at the flesh of the TI11 Thunder Awaken roster, this carrion was left to reassemble itself from scratch. Knight and ILICH were Thunder from the beginning of this year. SLATEM and Mjz jumped from Infamous to this roster starting Tour 2 and n1ght replaced the Bolivian 4 position Michael starting Tour 3.

How was their DPC year? 343 points

Thunder was actually fairly close to qualifying to Berlin and Bali, but if you can’t beat EG or beastcoast, it’ll never happen. One must wonder that if SA had three slots per major, would this team do well against international opponents? Time to find out.

What would success look like? Forget about TI, success will mainly be determined based on the health of the South American scene in a DPC-less world. No one knows how invitations or qualifiers or points or majors or anything is going to look like next year, but performing well at TI is probably your best shot at making tournament organizers look in your direction.

nouns - North America

K1

Gunnar

Moo

Lelis

Yamsun

Coach   Astini

How did this roster happen? You may recall bits of this roster from last year’s TI Last Chance Qualifier, but in case you don’t: Gunnar is a nouns staple, Moo has been rocking the noggles since 2022, and Lelis and Yamsun joined at the beginning of this season. K1’s ‘health break’ off of beastcoast lasted about a month and a half before joining nouns in July.

Pour one out for Husky, though. Brother had been 5 position with Gunnar on 4 Zoomers/nouns since August 2020 and got kicked right after the Bali Major ended. They didn’t even kick him for a support player. Yamsun just straight up changed roles to make space for K1.

How was their DPC year? 464 points

Usually for these regional qualifier teams, we just have to infer how they’d theoretically perform against international opponents. Thankfully for nouns, we have the data. ESL graciously granted North America three slots to DLS19 and nouns got bodied. Then TSM graciously granted nouns their slot to the Bali Major and they got bodied again.

To be fair, these were pre-K₁ versions of nouns. After dominating NA TI quals, it’s been good times, right? Let me check some sources real quick. Ah yes, it appears they just finished playing in an online event Pinnacle Cup: Malta Vibes #4 and got 9-12th after getting 2-0’d by a Turkish player whose handle is “Jeezy.”

Hmm.

What would success look like? As a North American, I hate myself for saying this, but success is probably Gunnar finding a nice Western European forever team to adopt him next year. Sneyking did it, Quinn did it, Kitrak kinda did it. It… it may be time… n-no don’t look at me like that. It’s hard enough as it is. Go.

I SAID GO!

Azure Ray - China

Lou

Somnus

chalice

fy

天命 (tiān mìng)

Coach   LaNm

How did this roster happen? Lou, 天命, and some mostly unknown up-and-coming Chinese players were quietly doing thing their under “Ybb Gaming” tag for most of the year. Then all of a sudden, Tour 3, the fuckin’ China Avengers assembled and this team became Azure Ray.

Fy was still actively playing on Vici before joining, but what were Somnus and Chalice doing since their time on RNG last TI? Nothing! Lazy writing just deus ex machina’ing them back into the season if you ask me.

How was their DPC year? 400 points

Most of the year was irrelevant, but they did get a top 8 finish at Bali. Bear in mind, however, they got that top 8 by beating one opponent in bracket: BetBoom. Was that after BetBoom…? Yep.

What would success look like? Only two Chinese teams are attending this TI. LGD and Azure Ray. Last year was already surprising with only LGD, Aster, and RNG. But only two Chinese teams? Never thought I’d see the day.

Lot of question marks in the air on the future state of the Chinese scene. Is most of the matchfixing resolved? Are new talent joining the competitive scene? Will we ever have international LANs there again?

Team SMG - Southeast Asia

MidOne

No[o]ne-

MinD_ContRoL

ah fu

Jaunuel

Coach   Heen

How did this roster happen? MidOne’s been adamantly attempting to assemble a worthwhile squad as SMG (which stands for Still Moving under Gunfire. Yes, actually.) for years now. It will honestly take me seventeen paragraphs to fully explain all the roster changes SMG experienced this season, so I’ll just hit you with the essentials: ah fu’s been around since last year, Jaunuel came in Tour 3, and Noone randomly showed up during regional quals.

Unfortunately, Masaros ended up being the only player this TI to not secure a visa and Mind_Control was selected to stand in as well as Heen coming in to coach.

How was their DPC year? 133 points

MidOne spent the majority of the year taking a world tour around the Dota map. In Tour 1, 2, and Berlin he was OfflaneOne. Tour 3, he was MidOne. And from regional qualifiers to now, he’s CarryOne.

SMG’s been under SEA suppressing fire since org’s inception in 2021 and Berlin was the first opportunity for them to play at an international LAN. It was not pretty. They only won 4 games out of 16 and 3 of them were against other teams that also got eliminated in groups.

They did dominate SEA TI quals, though, so not all hope is lost.

What would success look like? Despite withering away on Nigma Galaxy, Mind_Control gets the zoomies every time he’s recruited to stand-in for another team. He subbed in for OG twice this season: Once at Berlin, ending top 6, and once again at DLS21, earning them a top 4 placement. If you wanna go way back into the archives… 2018? He also got a top 4 finish with Ninjas in Pajamas at the Kuala Lumpur Major.

And remind me again, who won TI last time it was in Seattle?

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