Yup, looking forward to this. We're planning on inviting people to the flat and listen to the matches here. We're pretty big fans

I'd like to see secret perform well, I really like Puppey and s4. EG is also one very interesting team to see play. I'd like for the winner to be something other than an asian team. We've seen them dominate in the recent tournament. Let's hope western teams have some tricks ready for ti5.

The new open qualifiers format is going to be awesome, we might see some new team.

 

I don't really have a team I am attached to at this point, but there are some individual players I love to watch. If I had to pick one, I'd probably go with 430. The only person still capable of making ember look like a real hero.

 

Invictus Gaming, why? Because in BurNing we trust, that's why.

 

430 finally has a 1 player who isn't Luo to pick up the slack after he dominates the midgame.

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That EU qualifier is going to be brutal.

 

Rooting for C9, EG, and VG.

Starladder showed how far ahead VG was of the rest of the attendees, EG is leagues ahead of the rest of the West, and C9 can take either if they stop chocking. IG and Secret behind them, but IMO out of the current teams, it's basically tiered:

Tier 1: VG, EG
Tier 1.5: C9, IG, Secret, Malaysia
Tier 2: Empire, VP, Newbee, LGD

Would give tier 1 teams 1:1 odds against each other, tier 1.5 3:5 odds against a tier 1 team, and tier 2 teams 1:3 odds against a tier 1.5 team and 1:3 against a tier 1 team. Assuming BO3. All of them can take games off each other, but in a BO3 I expect it'll take some serious tilt for VP or Empire to take a series off of the likes of EG or VG.

 

Rave got snubbed I`m rooting for Burden United in the EU Qualifiers and for the International with Vici Gaming or Cloud8

 

Looking forward to this one.

Secret, EG, VG and C9 are my favorite teams right now, so I'll be cheering for them mainly.

What I really want to see though, are great games. Not like some of the ones we had last TI.

However, 6.84 which was recently released seems like a very good patch, and I think it won't disappoint for TI at all.

 

Wouldn't mind seeing Sing and co. make it through the EU qualifier, but there's no way Alliance isn't taking it. 6.84 buffed all of Bulldog's heros.

 

Bulldog's the only player on [A] that's currently up to par though. Didn't you see the series against Na'vi yesterday? It was like the other 9 players went on hiatus, not him.

 

I'm really liking 6.84. Currently on a 8 win streak only using Ursa (3,850 MMR).

 

ROOT4ROOT, even though I have very little investment in DOTA 2. Just love Starcraft and team ROOT.

 

Pajkatt has been stomping for the most part in the last month, though he has a tendency to tilt hard at times. Loda and Akke are still the same players they were when they won TI3 and the meta looks to be switching back to something more like the TI3 meta than it has been in 2 years. Alliance are on a pretty sharp trend upwards even if they do have one bad series.

 

Yeah, I think that Alliance will be the ones making it out of the EU qualifier. Though it will be a tough fight. Navi has fallen far from their glory days sadly.

It's a pity that there's only one slot from the EU, as it's the strongest looking region right now when it comes to teams that aren't direct invites.

 

EU qualifiers is really hard to predict. NiP, Na'Vi and Alliance are solid teams. Plus the others are pretty good too.

The new patch is going to make things very interesting. So far the tendency has been for early teamfights and less farming in the early game since they changed the bounty from creeps (less) and increased the bounty from hero kills.

I'm afraid the increase bounty from barracks and buff to Nature's Prophet will result in more rat dota, which is the less interesting to watch.

 

Oh btw, if you guys hadn't seen it yet, this is pure gold. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmK__ooAs-4

 

Anyone been watching The Summit 3? I don't know about you guys but all the ads between games is getting annoying.
I don't mind the stompy games though, pretty entertaining.

 

The Summit is out of my time zone. I had to watch the games on BTS's youtube channel afterwards.

I'm usually the position 5 player when I stack with friends so I'm really enjoying watching Kuroky play Visage and Rubick he is the best guy in the western scene on those two heroes so today was pretty sweet for that (the three man stolen thunderclap in the game against LGD was sick).

I think teams are under estimating potency of Visage + Dazzle support duo those heroes are insane together at the moment. I think Drow + Visage combo will be nerfed it used to be an occasional cheese strat but visage is now verging on first phase ban worthy the hero feels like Elder titan was about six months ago (i.e. Broken).

It's also interesting that in pro games this patch Batrider hasn't been a factor at all after years on top he has finally been hit hard enough with the nerf bat to drive him from the meta.

Edit: I checked dotabuff Visage has a P+B rate of 100% and a winrate of 75% currently for Summit 3 finals so teams definitely know how broken he is.

http://www.dotabuff.com/esports/leagues/2661/picks?date=patch_6.84b&hero=&region=&duration=

 

Bat will be back, don't worry. That hero will never go away. I've watched a few games from the Summit, but the first couple rounds in tournaments like this are pretty stompy. The bracket should be better.

Empire beat VG on LAN the other week, so they are currently the best team in the world amirite?

 

Empire are either the best or worst team in the world on any given day, depending on what they've eaten for breakfast.

 

I love the casters during that match (BigDaddy, EE and Fata + b0ne7). It was very interesting to hear their input during the game but you could also see how they probably act during a game (BigDaddy: OMG! He used mek, he used mek, they need to backoff! Ooooh! CLAP BY KURO!). That play was indeed one of the best of day. Imagine if s4 scream had hit the 3 hero at the same time after instead of only 1. Would've been even more beautiful.

Dazzle has always been a very strong hero. People underestimate his power when playing against axe. Players just see the grave being countered, but that clutch saved by Puppey, using his heal only during the dunk pushing his teammate health over the dunk threshold AND THEN grave him was a sick move and prove his viability for more than just the grave. Plus the bonus armor from his ultimate is just awesome for early pushing and teamfights in general.

The whole Drow+Visage strat is strong, but is not enough as we saw with Secret yesterday. When they draft such a thing they try to get as many ranged hero as possible (Dazzle/Viasge/Drow/Razor/Can't remember the offlane they gave zai). It makes your support hit so hard that they can zone out anyone early which allows the strat to be viable. If you don't have that early bonus damage because you're melee support, unless you are very tanky it's a lot more difficult to pull off.