The third Major of this DPC season has just finished. We saw some epic Dota throughout the duration of the event. Apart from that, here is what we have learned from it.
Probably the most important thing of all is that the European powerhouse Team Secret is indeed beatable. Many people thought that this was not the case before this tournament started. The reason for that is the fact that they have played nearly flawlessly during the last couple of events. However, at DreamLeague Season 11, Team Secret showed that even they have certain weaknesses.
Secret finished first in their group but despite that, they lost their first Upper Bracket game against Vici Gaming. Finding themselves in the Lower Bracket, the European team was able to deal with Infamous, J.storm and Keen gaming with little to no effort. However, their next challenge was the best CIS team for the past couple of years – Virtus.Pro.
Ramzess and No[o]ne were able to rip through Secret in one of the most interesting series of the event. As Puppey said in an interview, sometimes it’s a good idea to lose in order to learn from your mistakes.
One of the most popular heroes of the entire tournament was Shadow Shaman. The pesky support delivers incredible CC and utility to pretty much every line-up in the current meta. Most of the players nearly always rushed a Blink Dagger but as the tournament evolved, so did the item choices. A very popular build for SS was Aether Lens and a straight BKB rush. By doing so, the hero was able to get the full duration of his Shackles, which is a very important spell, especially during the later stages of the game.
Other popular item choices were Blink, Aghanims and a Glimmer cape. Judging by his popularity, Shadow Shaman is definitely getting a nerf pretty soon.
The other go-to support pick during the Major was Oracle. He fits in the meta very well because he often does damage and has a pretty good lane presence. Of course, the biggest reason for his popularity is the fact that he is pretty good against some of the most popular core heroes right now. Dark Seer, Necro, Ursa and Doom are just one of the examples that really struggle against Oracle.
On top of that, Oracle has always been good with those types of heroes that like the long fight such as Viper and Death Prophet for example. That’s where False Promise comes into play. It allows those core heroes to have more presence in the team fight and ultimately – to do more damage.
The Chinese team has been one of the most unstable teams in terms of their performance. Sometimes they seem like the best team in the world, whereas in some events they are just “another team”. This usually means that they are not the best choice for betting. However, we can safely say that this has changed after their most recent performance. Just a few days after winning the StarLadder ImbaTV Minor, Vici Gaming was able to sweep through their enemies at DreamLeague Season 11 too.
Beside Vici Gaming, every other Chinese team also did a pretty good job expect EHOME, who lost in the first Lower Bracket round against Infamous. PSG.LGD and Keen Gaming both got eliminated in the 4th round of the Lower Bracket.
Three Majors, Three Grand Finals. This is Virtus.Pro. Similar to last year, they have already secured their spot for TI but that doesn’t stop them from winning tournaments. The CIS powerhouse have had an outstanding DPC season and they are definitely one of the main contenders for the upcoming TI 9. Make sure to keep a close eye on them as they are one of the best betting options out there and there are plenty of events left for you to take full advantage of that.
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