The first DPC regular season of the year is in the books! DPC Week Eight over in China wrapped things up on Sunday, determining the final Major participants.
Though they are now in separate teams, only Ame will make it to the Major over Maybe. (Photo courtesy Valve)
This week saw Invictus Gaming successfully defending their top seed placement from the previous week. This was in spite of Aster handing them their first series loss of the season, which set both up for a tiebreaker match on Sunday. Meanwhile, PSG.LGD Gaming squeaked by through the tiebreakers as well, bagging the final wild card stage slot in the process.
Invictus Gaming Reign Supreme
Although the 7-0 dream run was denied by Aster on Saturday, iG ensured that they would come out on top nonetheless. Their flawless record was ruined after Aster put on an outstanding performance. This was especially true in the second game, when Aster duly punished Zhou “Emo” Yi for not buying Black King Bar on Storm Spirit. This caused iG to fall way behind in the mid game, which Aster capitalized on to close out the series.
But of course, they came back with a vengeance the very next day. Emo made sure to make up for his poor judgment in the previous day, by slapping Aster around as Morphling. He destroyed Liu “White丶Album_白学家” Yuhao in lane—despite the latter’s Queen of Pain pick typically enjoying a favorable matchup against Emo’s hero. This translated to a blazing fast 16-minute Linken’s Sphere timing for the iG mid laner, followed by an Eye of Skadi at 27 minutes.
Just 12 minutes later, Emo had a Divine Rapier in his possession. He would not relinquish the item for the rest of the game. The Rapier helped him deal a staggering 58,000 points of damage to Aster’s heroes, as well.
Clearly uninterested in giving their opponents a chance to bounce back, iG ran roughshod over Aster once more in the second game. Emo once again led the way, utilizing the 11-minute Aghanim’s Scepter donation from Thiay “JT-” Jun Wen’s offlane Alchemist. This enabled his Void Spirit way earlier than Aster was expecting him to. From there, it was just a matter of imposing his will on the map, taking heads and ensuring that Aster couldn’t even play Dota.
Emo’s incredible play thus secured iG the all-important Major playoff berth, where they will join the likes of Fnatic and Team Secret.
Elephant Miss Out on DPC China Wild Card Spot
On the other side of the tiebreakers, it was all heartbreak for superteam Elephant. They were unable to fend off PSG.LGD Gaming in the deadlock deciders, dropping both games despite their best efforts.
The first game was pretty close—in fact, the kill scores were 14 and 17 in favor of LGD. But it was the virtuosic play of Wang “Ame” Chunyu that won the day. His 10-0 performance as Juggernaut was just enough to keep the game well out of Elephant’s reach. He was completely untouchable, recording almost 38,000 hero damage and even healing his team for 12,200.
The second game was also fairly even to start off. LGD gathered only a small lead through the laning phase and mid game. Elephant even wrenched the lead from LGD for a few minutes in the mid game. But a teamfight gone awry swung the lead back, and from there it was smooth sailing for LGD. Ame’s Monkey King was too much for Elephant to handle, especially as it was backed up by Zhang “Faith_bian” Ruida’s Pangolier.
As a result, LGD will have a shot at one of two wild card playoff spots in Singapore. Elephant, meanwhile, will have to lick their wounds and try again in the next DPC season. We know they’ve got serious potential as a group—so perhaps some more practice is in order. Hopefully they don’t disband or get rid of too many roster members going forward.
With the last remaining DPC China matches now out of the way, we can now look forward to the first Major of the season. This will also be the first actual cross-region LAN event in a long, long time—so we definitely can’t wait. Stay tuned to Hotspawn for our upcoming previews and coverage of the event!
