And due to last place at the major, both Secret and EG have roster swapped again. Universe is back to EG and Secret has Bulba. Eg and Secret in open qualifiers now.

 

The Na'vi vs OG match was painful to watch, but they made up for it in the Alliance game.

Na'vi vs DC and MVP vs ... everyone are the standout games of the tournament so far.

 

QO armlet toggling = next level.

 

There have been some really good games this tournament - Liquid v LGD game 2 was amazing. Probably my pick for game of the Tournament so far.

Going in to the tournament I thought phoenix and beastmaster would have been the top picks - those heroes appear to be figured out now. It's all about Disruptor and Slardar.

 

It's all about the LS Bomb. Slardar is such a huge combo with LS being so strong at the moment. Phoenix is still pretty strong because the meta is seeing a lot of Str Hero and Sun Ray is soooooo strong with that. Just two points early on 20+2.5% of their HP damage per second for 6 seconds. I've been playing him a lot in pubs, and ranked; it's amazing how you can just zone out or get an early kill with this ability.

I didn't see the whole of Game 2 of LGD/Liquid, had to leave in the middle, but came back in the end. Was pretty impressive...Disruptor Jerax with Scythe and Refresher...yeah yeah. GG

 

Lifestealer is at must ban point now I think hero is too good to let through the pool.

Interestingly enough Wisp and Dark Seer both got let through the pool both LGD/liquid games. Dark Seer I feel is super solid pick so many things you can combo into with Vacuum (MVP combo'd it with AA blast early in the day was sick) and he always sets you up for good lanes it keeps the draft really flexible too.

I think teams are starting to realise Phoenix's limitations, he is weak in lane and Sun Ray falls off after BKB's are picked up. It's good for first 25-30 mins if game goes later than that Phoenix falls off hard. Mostly I think it will be picked to combo it with big team fight lock down (like Void). OG managed to beat Void+phoenix from Newbie though and thats with Kpii playing probably best void in world at the moment.

 

Newbee's phoenix was weak on that game. He gave off first blood cause he absolutely wanted the 2min bounty rune. I agree with you though, Phoenix does fall off at some point since he does so much magical damage. With the return of STR heroes, the BKB is one of the core item on many of them. But against core which do not prioritize it nor pipe, he's really really strong still.

I so want my friend to play Io when we play in group but he refuses.

 

MRW no Americans in tourney except Moon.

 

SOme pretty fantastic games so far. Enjoying the hell out of this major, not only because it's one of the only tournaments I can watch form start to finish. Bloody time zones.

 

This NB wisp in game 2 vs Liquid is one of the most painful things I've ever watched. It looks like a 3k pub playing it.

 

Well, the dream of having another major with a no-previous Valve event winner can be true now. Liquid better win this one and complete the circle.

 

OG become the first team to win two valve events.

 

Open qualifiers coming up! Shame I've got exams

 

Looking back:
Major Manilla: Awesome tournament with great plays by Liquid yet again, although not good enough against OG. The production value was top notch and I this tournament itself did set up really high standards! Those split screens were amazing and it actually managed me to stay out of the ingame client and watch it on twitch instead.

ESL One Frankfurt was okayish. The Playoffs were sadly bad due to Liquid and OG, the two best teams, facing each other way too soon. So the finals were pretty one sided for OG in the end.

Looking at whats happening now:
Not much happening right now. The Immortal Treasure 2 was released and it did not change much at the TI2016 prize money:
http://dota2.prizetrac.kr/international2016

I am not even sure if we will surpass last years record of 18,5 Million USD...

Edit:
typo

 

I feel like Valve made a huge mistake making immortals 2 and 3 only available at stupidly high battle pass levels. Most people can't afford the $100+ it takes to get just all the non rare ones. The terrain being level 125 is bad enough

 

The lack of stretch goals is probably the biggest flaw imo. There's nothing to work towards as a community.

 

Level 1 gets you one of each, by the way. They are still going to be on the market after the time is over (if the pattern holds, for only a few cents each) so you can get the ones you actually care about.

I agree about the lack of stretch goals. There's only a single one for beating last year's total, which seems incredibly lazy.

 

I think they've tried to integrate stretch goals into battle pass levels. Either way, it's not great.

The only thing that might make me sink money into this battle pass in the terrain. But even then, im not sure I really care enough.

 

DC currently playing COL in a BO5 for the 2nd qualifier spot. Loser goes into wildcard.

 

DC vs CoL game 5 was some epic shit. Grandgrant has been streaming the recently restarted NEL for like 6-8 hours.