posted by HolyMaster

ADVERTISING:

KaiPi

Stability Matters!

Absolute Legends

QPAD Red Pandas

RoX.KiS

iCCup

EG or Mouz? Out of the question.

Evil Geniuses

Mousesports

The Unstable Trio

Team Empire

dd.Dota

mTw

The final decision

4FC

Artyk

Summing Up

It looks as if only a few of us were not surprised when the invited teams for the Western Qualifier were announced yesterday. I was one of them. In fact I was predicting exactly those eight teams to be in the mix. But more than half of the almost 200 comments we have are discussion around one question, the topic of the spontaneous show byyesterday: Why isnot invited?First of all, even though I have more insight than others into this matter, I can only assume what ledto this decision. What I can safely explain to you is why I would have done exactly the same.What I heard many times during MAAD yesterday (e.g. from the understandably disappointed): "Every team changed it's roster, so this can't be a reason". Sorry guys, you can say this 100 times, but it is still completely wrong! Roster changes might not be the only reason, but they certainly play a role.Out of the eight invited teams, four have not made a a single change recently:announced its current roster at February 10th.finalized its lineup at March 4th.had its last change at March 27thNot sure about, but they definitely had their lineup before March 23rdAll of these teams have played with its current lineup for more than a month. RoX.KiS in its current state is the most recently modified team of the four, but their strong results made them indispensable for the qualifier. The other three teams have not shown impressive but at least solid results. That doesn't make their invites safe, but it is an advantage.The next two teams areand. There's not much to say about them. Both of them exchanged one player very recently, but have had a stable lineup for half a year before that (with KuroKy leaving Mouz being the only exception). EG and Mouz are big names who have been around for a long time and showed great potential. Both of them could easily afford one roster change. Their slots were still safe.That leaves only two truly unstable teams:and. Just like KaiPi, these two teams have had major changes quite recently. So let's make a comparison.Empire was probably the strongest European team in the last four months of 2012, winning many tournaments. However only two players are left from their successfull lineup.andare decent additions. I wouldn't rate them higher thanand, maybe even a little lower. But the third addition is, and that has probably been the deciding factor in favour of Empire - besides the team's history. If it wasn't for Light, Empire might have not been invited in my opinion.Let's get to dd. Just like KP, dd has been a very unstable "team" for many months. Both of them have absolutely nothing in common with the original lineups under these names (KP was originally from Lebanon, including players like Babarrr and Asuna; dd was Danish, evolved out of the former Copenhagen Wolves). KP has without any doubt been the stronger team out of these two in the past two months. But the two additions on each side changed that. The core of dd are the three French players who won the qualifier last year with. They are now joined byand, who have had great success with Empire, with Goblak also being a great captain of course. dd's Lineup simply appears to be stronger now by just looking at the names. Maybe that turns out to be wrong, but since both teams haven't proven anything with their new lineups, the potential can only be estimated. And KP slightly loses that comparison.I'm not saying KP doesn't deserve to be invited. They would have been a legit choice. But it's also completely legit to not include them. It's a tough call between these nine teams, but in the end KP has been my #9. I also want to mention that(my #10) and(my #11) have been quite close as well in my opinion. They would have deserved it too.In the end we had a bunch of candidates and they got judged by several factors. I think these 3 are the most important ones (in that order!):1. Potential2. Stability3. AchievementsEG, Mouz, and RoX were safe. All other comparisons were tight. While KP slightly beats QPandas or iCCup in potential, they clearly lose on stability. While KP beats dd on achievements with the same stability, they lose on potential. While KP is (maybe?) on par with Empire in potential and stability, they loses on achievements.A couple of factors have to be considered, while choosing the right teams. There's not that one thing that decides everything, so many elements influence the outcome (I just mentioned the three who are - in my opinion - the most important ones). Again, it's REALLY close. It would have been perfectly fine to decide otherwise. But it's understandable for sure. Last but not least it was certainly not helpful for KP to add the only player, who didn't get his visa for the USA last year.Do I think KaiPi would have been invited with their old lineup? Yes. But they risked their slot and ultimately lost it. This also serves as warning for next year: If you change your team during the invite period, you might (MIGHT!!) be punished for it.My suggestion to Valve: Give the teams a deadline. March 31st or something like that. Only teams who don't change their lineup after that deadline are considered for an invite or qualifier spot. That way they at least have one month to prove themselves instead of leaving it to pure speculation (dd vs KP!), regarding which team will be stronger.And now, let's enjoy the qualifiers!