It is everyone’s favourite time of the year, the Post-TI Shuffle where the best Dota 2 teams will reorganize their teams to attempt to have the better roster after failing (or succeeding) at TI.
As always, this time of the year comes with pitchforks, drama, and tons of news so we at the Game Fanatics have decided to make it easier on you by making a weekly recap of the news, in other words, This Week in Dota 2.
Evil Geniuses Kicks Aui_2000 for Arteezy
Surprisingly enough, the first team to shuffle will be the winner of TI5, Evil Geniuses. They decided that it was best to boot Kurtis “Aui_2000” Ling from their team and relegate Clinton “Fear” Loomis to the support position while adding Team Secret’s carry Artour “Arteezy” Babaev as the new carry for EG. Arteezy had previously stated that he might want to return to the mid position but with this change it is clear he wants to stay as carry, a position he excelled at during TI5. If EG can keep their egos under check and listen to Peter “ppd” Dager, they might become the strongest American team to date.
Cloud 9 Drops Roster but Stays in Dota 2
Earlier this week, Cloud 9‘s manager announced that they will be dropping their current Dota 2 team but will be staying in Dota 2 as an organization likely picking up a new team in the near future. After their disastrous performance in TI5, this move is understandable and it is quite great that the organization has not yet decided to abandon the eSport completely.
Zai Leaves Team Secret Temporarily, Team Secret Does not Disband
Team Secret had a rough patch during TI5 losing to less successful and powerful teams such as Virtus Pro and EHOME during the main event. Now, since Arteezy is going to Evil Geniuses, many have speculated that the team will disband. However, Team Secret‘s facebook announced that despite their carry leaving, they will continue together as a team. They also announced that Ludwig “zai“ Wåhlberg, their current offlane, will be taking a year off to concentrate on his studies but will stay in Team Secret as a reserve. This means it is possible he might be joining them for next TI, if he feels up for it. However, Team Secret has said that they won’t be revealing their plans just yet meaning that it is still possible that the team might disappear after a couple months.
hyhy Coming Back to Competitive Dota 2?
The Singaporean Team Zenith have also reported the return of Benedict Lim “hyhy” Hang Yong on their facebook page. He will be playing on Team ABC in the Armaggeddon SEAC Singapore Qualifiers playoffs. This player is known by most all Dota veterans as one of the most relevant Singaporeans on the scene and also starred as one of the three main players in Valve’s Free to Play movie. His return might mean a possible new Team Zenith or all Singaporean team at the very least. Don’t forget that hyhy has been somewhat active in the competitive scene as he was breifly on Kingsurf.int but this might be his first big jump into an actual tournament in years.
MVP Phoenix Loses QO and Nutz, March Undecided
The Korean legend MVP Phoenix, who managed to get within the Top 8 at TI5, is now losing most of its roster due to external issues. First, it was their mid, Kim “QO” Seon-yoop who announced he would be leaving the team to finish his studies in Australia. Then, following his footsteps, Wong “Nutz” Yeng Yih decided that is was also his time to go as he tweeted that he would be leaving the team after his promised one-year-commitment and would be returning to Singapore (maybe make a team with hyhy?). Finally, Tae Won “March” Park will be the last possible loss for the Korean team as he has previously said that he will be forced to join the mandatory military service in South Korea, thus disallowing him to leave the country. He has, however, said that he is trying to delay this as much as possible so that he can at least help transition the new MVP Phoenix. Hopefully, he will at least be able to attend a Major, as he was a key component of MVP Phoenix‘s success at TI5.
Virtus Pro Gets an Arena
The last piece of juicy news has nothing to do with rosters at all as it is the fact that Russian team Virtus Pro will be getting its own arena. Earlier this week Moscow’s Cyber Arena, an arena which hosted many eSports events and tournaments of the CIS region such as DreamHack Moscow 2014 and Moscow Fighting Arena 2015 , announced that they’d be closing down due to the arena being financially unviable. Then, Virtus Pro announced that they’d be buying the arena to host the multitude of events that occur within it in addition to improve it as much as they can. Truly a godsend for any Russian Dota 2 fans.
This is all for the week but come back next week to check out more roster shuffles and drama at This Week for Dota 2 at The Game Fanatics.
