EPTThese are some opinions after what we have witnessed during this TI. First things first, Valve did a very good job in terms of improving the spectator experience compared to TI4. I don't say TI4 was bad, but it lacked content to make us, spectators, feel closer to the TI experience.
Now, let's go to some topics I would like to address. Note this is just personal opinion.
Team Secret: the failure
I don't want to go too hard on the players, but I think this is the biggest disappointment in competitive dota 2 history. At least, in terms of team performances. You can say, for example, that Alliance and Na'vi or even Newbee fall is even more dramatic, since these teams are TI champions. But all those failures were kind of slow falls. In the other hand, Secret early elimination was impossible to predict prior to TI. It was just too shocking to see one of the contenders getting crushed in 2-3 days. I mean, they varely took down iG.
I don't particualry want Secret to disband, but IMHO, Secret creation had 2 goals: being the top team in West Dota and win TI. Even if the first objective was achieved, the second is just too big of a demolishing result to not saying that the project failed. I'm probably overeacting a bit, but I'm sure that Secret didn't end the tournament saying "oh ok its fine, we played well and won a couple of matches on the mainstage
".I could write a full blog talking about Secret, but let's finish this: we can have hundreds of pages discussing about Secret mistakes or misplays. We even have this article in which we can read all we need. But in the end, the most important factor IMHO was overconfidence and underestimation of opponents.
The Heroes
We have this nice database of TI picks by poidrac to see win rates and picks+bans. Head there if you want a more in depth discussion.
The winners:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/nVBP8FN.jpg)
These 3 heroes played at least 25% of matches during the TI (exluding wild card), this is 40.75 as minimum.
Bounty Hunter and Storm Spirit are 2 things I didn't expected to succed that much. Even if we know BH got significant buffs and the metagame was shifting to favor him (lots of teamfights and killing around), usually heroes like him were easy to counter with dusts, wards or gems. The point is that you don't want to put that much effort on disabling a support like him since in your most probably mental setup you're like "fine, just don't feed him with kills". This is when heroes like Storm, Gyro, QoP, Lina; good early fighters, come in place and fuck your networth with track kills.
In terms of Storm... I don't have the stats, but I wouldn't be surprised if his 'come back' ratio is high. I gotta say that something is ... wrong with the hero. He is not suposed to come back that easily and I expect some nerfs of lateral nerfs come to him since it just doesn't feel right. Maybe my understanding of the hero is worth of 1k mmr, but I think is not that much about of Storm but a lot about the comeback metagame.
Nothing to say about Gyro, we know the hero is strong now.
Some interesting niche picks that went well:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/EnEW2cO.jpg)
CM and TA played around 13%-18% of games which is not that few at least in CM case. I really enjoyed seeing TA doing good in a tournament since she varely sees action due to the counters she have: usually anything that breaks refraction fast. Something TA does like no other hero is carrying a game when the LH count is around 60. Or better said when she can get those not-so-expensive core items like Blink, Deso, etc. With the current metagame, that is very nice to have in your lineup.
CM strengths are usually stated as farming jungle and lane dominance. With some natrual carries like Gryro, AM and PL as well as heroes like Storm becoming popular, you shouldn't be surprised to see her having some good time.
Some popular picks that went bad:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/AEqVOx7.jpg)
Why Razor. I mean, is not a bad hero and it's not like he is useless in the current meta. But so many things can go bad for him. For example: Lina, QoP and Tusk can kill him and make his mekansm value being low. Since Razor needs to stay alive for long periods of time, heroes that can kill him too quickly, forcing him to BKB (oh wait, BKB piercing abilities) or Scepter, which usually came online just too late to have an impact. The hero stills good for 5 maning towers, but the aggresive metagame doesn't actually means having to 5 man every time.
If you take out Secret matches with Shadow Fiend, this is, 4 less games, 4 less loses, same victories. His win rate should be around 44%. Is not that bad if you think about it, it puts him just below QoP who had a bit less than double his matches. It's hard to me to tell if SF had a bad tournament or a low-average one. I think I'll stay with the second statement.
Winter Wyvern was not that successful as we expected. A very minor win rate that put her behind Dazzle or Naga Siren. I should have talked more about Naga. But I guess that even if she was a surprise for me, there are other heroes to talk about.
Dream team by stats:
Is very hard to select a MVP team just by stats. That's why I think that a Dream Team based in less objective data is better... is just too hard to pick stats in Dota and associate them to a role without considering, for example, how usually support stats drop as long as the timer grows up. First, I'll pick my Dream Team not considering stats. Obviously, Im picking between top 4 places in the tournament.
Carry: FEAR. Having a carry that can CS constantly is part of the carry deal. Having a carry with decent hero pool isn¡t that much of an advantage. Having a carry that can fit in some pocket strats like Clinkz or Razor (Not so good there tho), is something that I value a lot.
Solo Mid: MAYBE. I will go with the stats here but not because of the stats. Again, the hero pool of Maybe is something that I enjoy. Having such an impact with different heroes is something you value a lot in the mid lane to create uncommond matchups or to deceive your opponent into unpredictable lanes.
Offlane: UNIVERSE, Hands down this guy here. Clock is one of my favourites heroes and Universe didn't play Brood. Something I like too. To be honest, I rarely see Universe underperforming or being the reason why EG loses a match. His hero pool is decent but what Universe does better is just not losing that hard. Perfect teamfight excecution and great decision making.
Support 1: FY. This guy carried VG very hard IMHO. Also, another favourite hero of mine is Rubick. Not too much to add but I like aggresive supports that try to take the early game for their teams with good plays and that can have such a big impact in the mid-late game.
Support 2 (C): PPD. All teams needs a great captain. All teams needs a (no salty) PPD. Another good reason? He is a support and IMHO, supports are better captains. We can agree that maybe he is behind other supports-captains-drafters in terms of playing, but this guy showerd great performance in TI and used his best tool to lead his team to victory: smart drafts and strong leadership. IDK if that 20 min gg was totally on purpose, but I want to assume he just didn't want his team to go through a exhausting game just to lose anyway. Is PPD now the best captain in Dota 2 history?
Note I didn't pick CDEC players is not like I don't think they are good enough. But is just that I don't know who to pick besides maybe Agressif. This is probably a lack of information from me so I hope you don't punish me that hard.
Now, with the stats the dream team is:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/NMhQQlH.jpg)
Again, is hard to pick average stats in some position to determine if a player is better than another one. Dota is just too complicated to do. So here are the criteria:
CARRY: ok, average LH sounds OK since it's the main role of a carry for all the game. Even if some picks or styles may differ, a good carry must keep a good CS no matter what.
MID: hard to tell. I've picked (K+A)/D because the mid is some kind of a carry that has to get some scores in Kills since most of their heroes will get a lot of kills and assits since they will be present, theorically, in teamfighs before the carry does. Is important that the mid player don't die in crucial moments or you can get an s4 QoP. At the same time, Sumail Storm was focused hard by CDEC, but the nature of the hero (I think?) pays off better that kind of trades.
OFFLANE: I chose the same stat than the MID since different offlaners have different approaches but in general, considering the offlane hero pool of this TI, they must have some impact in terms of assists and kills. This with a good no-feeding-the-safelane approach.
SUPPORTS: this is the hardest one. I like aggresive supports but usually supports stats will drop during the game. Ward stat is deceiving because is too much of a basic task (not saying is easy) and having top networth depends a lot on hero picks. In the end, I picked an early game focused stat that shows how much effective work a support gives to a team in terms of giving an advantage to your team, and applying pressure to the enemy team.
I'm really happy to see N0tail in this list. Misery was also very close if you consider one stat or antoher.
I was thinking in applying the 'farming support' stat by taking the avg LH. This brings up Sonneiko but even if he played well (by that stat), Na'vi did so badly in the tournament that I think in that case is deceiving. Aui is in 2nd place in that list.
That's about it. I really liked this TI since I went on vacation 2 weeks ago. I watched lots of matches iwth my father and brother and we enjoyed the tournament. TI always bring my love for Dota back to me and turns on my willingness to write about dota. Too bad in this part of the world writing Dota is not popular. Is not about views and money, is more about the lack of interested people beyond the 'how do i win with x hero and rise my mmr' or 'who do i bet to'.
Hugs!
