Small things on TI b4 it ends

uberxD

412 Posts

August 05 2015 17:54 GMT

I jsut wanted to write a little summary on some things that I wanted to write about after the first 2 days of the Main Event of the TI5.

The Cloud 9 fallacy
I know EE post in Liquiddota, and I know I'll probably get a lot of hate but I heard it from the casters and a lot of people placed a lot of hopes in C9. My question is why?
I don't want to look for C9 specific stats or make a well-done research of the numbers, but I find really weird to put this team above Secret, EG, LGD, VP/Empire. They have this common meme-joke about second places, and to be fair, they've got a lot of second places, but if we research these 2nd places and look at the quality of these 2nd places, I bet we will get very little 'worthy' second palces (tournament skill level, rivals including top teams, prize pool, etc).
They are cool guys and they have talented players, but if you really belive C9 had a shot in winning the TI, I supose that includes the assumption 'the other team plays a poor game'. If you include that assumption, I can agree on C9 being top 3 in the world or something.

Secret and the outplaying factor
Something that people says about the Na'vi poor performance is that their players, specially their core players, 'didn't evolve with the game'. Is a way of saying that they just simply don't understand, don't read or don't feel the game in a correct way. I just want to think that Na'vi used to outplay their opponents in a very consistent basis. Nowadays, you can't rely on simply being better that your opponentes. Here I come back to Secret, their lose to EHOME should not go underestimated. I think sometimes Secret just try to outplay their opponents, skipping some basics of the game (most of this is 'common knowledge'). One is that you have to addres a Storm Spirt with CC or a hard counter, and Viper is not a solution since at best it will win the lane. No more.
In short: I feel like Secret usually tries to 'outplay' their opponents as Na'vi did in their former glory days. Rotk mentioned they studied Secret. We also know that PPD is a big liar in terms that he doesn't study his opponents since his bans are usually well prepared for each team. If Secret wants to win this TI, which is almost what justifies their existence, they have to step up their game and strategy, or they can end like Na'vi, having only their talent to support their play.

Chinese dota and scene evolution
I'm not an expert, but I think one of the issues SC2 had to keep up their popularity is the lack of western players. Yes, there were (are) notable exceptions, but we had, almost ALWAYS, a Korean taking a tournament or even an American Qualifier (wtf). I really hope having at least a China vs West final, a China vs China final can bring all the good Dota you can ask, but not the best show and stories. Like it or not, one of the many factors the esports industry depends on is in viewership, popularity, personalities, brands, etc, etc.
It's funny, but the only one that always wins is Valve. Is not bad at all, is just a way too good business model (HATS!).

More on the tournament
Some of you know I love tables and data. I have this small table that shows variations of some important heroes betweem the Group Phase and the Main Event. Obviously, very low sample size for the Main Event (data day 1 and 2).

[image loading]

Sorry for the bad writing. I hope to write something way better after TI is done.

spudde123

4814 Posts

August 05 2015 18:39 GMT

On August 06 2015 02:54 uberxD wrote:
The Cloud 9 fallacy
I know EE post in Liquiddota, and I know I'll probably get a lot of hate but I heard it from the casters and a lot of people placed a lot of hopes in C9. My question is why?
I don't want to look for C9 specific stats or make a well-done research of the numbers, but I find really weird to put this team above Secret, EG, LGD, VP/Empire. They have this common meme-joke about second places, and to be fair, they've got a lot of second places, but if we research these 2nd places and look at the quality of these 2nd places, I bet we will get very little 'worthy' second palces (tournament skill level, rivals including top teams, prize pool, etc).
They are cool guys and they have talented players, but if you really belive C9 had a shot in winning the TI, I supose that includes the assumption 'the other team plays a poor game'. If you include that assumption, I can agree on C9 being top 3 in the world or something.

Winning TI is one thing, but putting them next to Empire in predictions and ahead of VP is hardly questionable.

If you look at tournaments after TI4, they got 4 2nd places at LANs before the lineup changes. In first two they beat VG (among others) to get to the finals, at Summit 2 they beat Secret and EG in groups and EG in playoffs. At Dreamleague they "only" beat teams like VP and VP Polar. While generally some top team was missing, these were not weak tournaments. They were the highest caliber of tournaments the scene had at that point. There is imo no question that during this time their results put them in the top4 in the world together with EG, VG and Secret. Or well, I suppose also Newbee still had some good results at that stage but they didn't compete internationally that much as there was only 1 Chinese spot and VG took it generally.

After the lineup changes they were 5th-6th at DAC, Empire and VP were eliminated in EU qualifiers. They were 3rd at SL12, Empire and VP were again eliminated in qualifiers, in fact largely due to losing to c9. At Summit 3 they dropped out to EG, VP and Empire were again eliminated in the qualifiers, once again due to losing to c9. At MarsTV they were 3rd after losing to Secret, and at ESL they lost to iG.

There is no argument to be made to put them above teams like EG or Secret before TI. It was also pretty unrealistic to think that c9 would suddenly win TI when they haven't been really close to winning titles in previous tournaments. But there is no "fallacy" here, their results speak for themselves. They are behind the best of the best, but are one of the only teams who consistently qualify to tournaments from the EU region and place decently. Not sure who you were listening to but I don't think anyone was actually calling them a favorite. Maybe a "dark horse" so to say, but not really more.

In general it seems to me that a lot of people have a very strange view of c9. It's either that people laugh at them and completely downplay their accomplishments, or it's that they expect them to overperform and surprise the best teams like Secret and EG, when they really haven't managed to do that with their new lineup.

uberxD

412 Posts

August 05 2015 19:13 GMT

You are right in a lot of points about C9. Then again, they are definitely a top 3/4 West team. But in TI, you have to ADD chinese and SEA teams. In world-wide positioning, that means C9 should be somewhere 5th. And that's making some assuptions about other teams. Then again, they 3rd pace in SL for example, came after defeating Malasia, Tinker and Alliance. THen they lost vs iG. That's why I talked about the 'quality' of their high-place finishes.
In the end I'm ok with Cloud 9, but sometimes people in analysis desks or reddit give them, as a team, a bit much credit.

spudde123

4814 Posts

August 05 2015 19:24 GMT

On August 06 2015 04:13 uberxD wrote:
You are right in a lot of points about C9. Then again, they are definitely a top 3/4 West team. But in TI, you have to ADD chinese and SEA teams. In world-wide positioning, that means C9 should be somewhere 5th. And that's making some assuptions about other teams. Then again, they 3rd pace in SL for example, came after defeating Malasia, Tinker and Alliance. THen they lost vs iG. That's why I talked about the 'quality' of their high-place finishes.
In the end I'm ok with Cloud 9, but sometimes people in analysis desks or reddit give them, as a team, a bit much credit.

Certainly them placing 2nd in a bunch of events or 3rd at SL doesn't mean that they are truly 2nd or 3rd best in the world or something. Always some teams may be missing, and a single event has quite a bit of variance anyway involved. But you also have to keep in mind that for each of these finishes, all the other teams that participated were behind them except the winner or the 2nd place finisher. All the other teams did worse than them. That's why c9 is always in the discussion, they are always around and generally get deep into tournaments. None of the tournaments they did well in were weak. In fact this spring they only competed in a select few tournaments, the most competitive ones. It's just the reality that almost no tournament outside of TI/DAC has every single one of the good teams present. Of course they shouldn't be talked about the same way as Secret who have won several tournaments in a row for example. But I don't think anyone has done so.

But as far as this TI goes, I don't think many would have predicted the Chinese teams doing this well. If we look at the last international tournaments, at ESL VG got crushed by EG 0-2. At MarsTV LGD lost to Empire, EHOME for example lost to c9 in the group stage and to Secret in the playoffs. CDEC didn't do that well in the groups and lost to VG in the playoffs in really quick games.

Again, I don't think there is really any sort of fallacy. Basically everyone was putting Secret and EG in their top3, most also put LGD in there. At least on the English stream c9 was only talked about as a team that has an outside chance. And imo their impressions about c9 are still influenced by the old c9 before the lineup changes. Back then they really did beat VG twice, they beat EG at Summit 2, they beat Secret in the groups there, etc. Imo back then they had a bigger potential for a big performance, but they also dropped some questionable games. But with this new lineup while they haven't lost to bad teams on LAN, they haven't really had the same potential for suddenly surprising. Instead they are steadily a bit behind the best teams.

Reson

530 Posts

August 06 2015 20:29 GMT

On August 06 2015 02:54 uberxD wrote:
I jsut wanted to write a little summary on some things that I wanted to write about after the first 2 days of the Main Event of the TI5.

The Cloud 9 fallacy
I know EE post in Liquiddota, and I know I'll probably get a lot of hate but I heard it from the casters and a lot of people placed a lot of hopes in C9. My question is why?
I don't want to look for C9 specific stats or make a well-done research of the numbers, but I find really weird to put this team above Secret, EG, LGD, VP/Empire. They have this common meme-joke about second places, and to be fair, they've got a lot of second places, but if we research these 2nd places and look at the quality of these 2nd places, I bet we will get very little 'worthy' second palces (tournament skill level, rivals including top teams, prize pool, etc).
They are cool guys and they have talented players, but if you really belive C9 had a shot in winning the TI, I supose that includes the assumption 'the other team plays a poor game'. If you include that assumption, I can agree on C9 being top 3 in the world or something.

Secret and the outplaying factor
Something that people says about the Na'vi poor performance is that their players, specially their core players, 'didn't evolve with the game'. Is a way of saying that they just simply don't understand, don't read or don't feel the game in a correct way. I just want to think that Na'vi used to outplay their opponents in a very consistent basis. Nowadays, you can't rely on simply being better that your opponentes. Here I come back to Secret, their lose to EHOME should not go underestimated. I think sometimes Secret just try to outplay their opponents, skipping some basics of the game (most of this is 'common knowledge'). One is that you have to addres a Storm Spirt with CC or a hard counter, and Viper is not a solution since at best it will win the lane. No more.
In short: I feel like Secret usually tries to 'outplay' their opponents as Na'vi did in their former glory days. Rotk mentioned they studied Secret. We also know that PPD is a big liar in terms that he doesn't study his opponents since his bans are usually well prepared for each team. If Secret wants to win this TI, which is almost what justifies their existence, they have to step up their game and strategy, or they can end like Na'vi, having only their talent to support their play.

Chinese dota and scene evolution
I'm not an expert, but I think one of the issues SC2 had to keep up their popularity is the lack of western players. Yes, there were (are) notable exceptions, but we had, almost ALWAYS, a Korean taking a tournament or even an American Qualifier (wtf). I really hope having at least a China vs West final, a China vs China final can bring all the good Dota you can ask, but not the best show and stories. Like it or not, one of the many factors the esports industry depends on is in viewership, popularity, personalities, brands, etc, etc.
It's funny, but the only one that always wins is Valve. Is not bad at all, is just a way too good business model (HATS!).

More on the tournament
Some of you know I love tables and data. I have this small table that shows variations of some important heroes betweem the Group Phase and the Main Event. Obviously, very low sample size for the Main Event (data day 1 and 2).

[image loading]

Sorry for the bad writing. I hope to write something way better after TI is done.

The problem with SC was that the Koreans pushed the minimum level of mechanical skill so high that the other players couldn't keep up. You needed to practice that large number of hours to stay at that level.

Dota is more of a decision making game than mechanical game. If we compare to other Dota likes, LoL is probably most mechanically dependent. HoN was probably a in between but Dota is balanced around decision making.

Koromon

United States304 Posts

August 08 2015 05:50 GMT

On August 07 2015 05:29 Reson wrote:

Dota is more of a decision making game than mechanical game. If we compare to other Dota likes, LoL is probably most mechanically dependent. HoN was probably a in between but Dota is balanced around decision making.

I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say, but LoL mechanics are quite trivial compared to Dota.

haduken

Australia8267 Posts

August 09 2015 12:46 GMT

League mechanics is all about reaction speed and landing the skill shots. It only looks more demanding because you can spam spells without worrying about it's impact on team fight timing.

In essence league is very similar to street fighter.

dota has that and more.

AP mages are fun to an extend, ADC and support is just snooze for any dota players due to lack of real laning mechanics. top and jg are okay but really their rotations and ganks are very trivial compare to what dota has to offer.

Lee Sin is probably the only champion i enjoy playing in league...

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