Filip "NEO" Kubski is our MVP of DreamHack Bucharest, and here we will explain why, as well as present our EVPs and other valuable players.

The second notable LAN event after the summer off-season, DreamHack Bucharest, took place last weekend with $100,000 on offer. Two of the current top 5 teams were in attendance, Virtus.pro and Cloud9, and they were challenged by six teams that also had a place in our top 20 ranking before the event.

At the end of the day, it was the favourites that met in the grand final, Virtus.pro and Cloud9. The Poles came out lifting their third trophy of 2016 following a relatively straightforward 2-0 victory over the Americans.

With the short recap out of the way (you can read a longer one in our What we learned article), it's time to focus on the individuals that stood out the most in this event.

We'll start by presenting you all of our MVP, EVP and VP choices and later go into more depth explaining what it was they did so well.

You can jump to any part of the article at this point, as each player's name links to the section of the text about their performance. If you're wondering what these terms stand for, as well as others mentioned in the article, jump to our glossary.

MVP: NEO rekindles the old flame, again

After the disappointing way their StarSeries S2 campaign ended the week before (finishing last in their group), Virtus.pro came to Bucharest for redemption. Filip "⁠NEO⁠" Kubski was the only player in VP who put up above-average numbers in Kiev, which in hindsight might have been a sign of his rising form. The 29 year old player this time showed up in a way he hasn't for a long while, posting a 1.22 rating for the event – his highest since ESL One Katowice 2015 (where he had a 1.27 rating). While some might assume we named NEO the MVP for his clutches in the semi-final, it was his overall play in the tournament that earned him the honor. His 0.79 kills per round may have ranked only 5th, and his 1.22 rating was 3rd best, even behind a teammate of his, but it was his impact that made him come out on top. He led the tournament in damage dealt per round (95.8), was one of the hardest players to kill (0.59 deaths per round) and most importantly was the most impactful player in terms of getting multi-kill rounds, opening kills or clutching for his team (according to our new formula, he had a 1.46 impact rating). And the damage he dealt not only led to kills of his own, but also kills for his teammates, as he led the tournaments in assists with 0.26 per round. NEO's performances were consistent, as he played well in every map even including the one loss, and he made a contribution in 74.3% of his rounds which puts him well above average. Lastly, it was impressive how his performance improved as the tournament went on. In the group stage he wasn't needed much, but when the playoffs came around he reminded us all why he was once a superstar and why even last year he was among the top 20 players in the world (#17). In the semi-final series against dignitas he didn't see much action in the beginning (on the CT side of Mirage), but then went on to make a 1vs4 clutch when the sides changed which practically sealed the map. dignitas tied the score on Cobblestone and it came down to a nail-biting finish on Overpass. And it was on Overpass where NEO made the play of the tournament, maybe even one of the plays of the year, winning a 1vs5 clutch to clinch the series for his team and proceed to the grand final. Check out the action below:

NEO didn't stop there, as the final vs. Cloud9 turned into a fragfest for the old Pole, especially on map 1 (Train) where he had his fun with the less experienced Americans (28:13, 116.2 ADR, 1.65 rating). He ended up having a great second map too (Cobblestone), getting 21 kills and 11 assists with 114.6 ADR, which made him the best player of the grand final and confirmed his MVP title. With all that said, a stat that usually shows quite well how important a player was for his team is the percentage of rounds their team won when that player got at least one kill. Virtus.pro won 79% of rounds (73 of 93) when NEO had a least 1 kill, which ranks him shared highest at the event. This is his first MVP title of the year, and first since July 2015 at CEVO S7 Finals, and it came only a week after his old rival Patrik "⁠f0rest⁠" Lindberg got his at StarSeries.

EVPs: Extremely reliable byali, Magiskb0Y's stock on the rise, n0thing & TaZ like in the old days

If any player were to compete with NEO for the MVP title it would be Paweł "⁠byali⁠" Bieliński who played a flawless event. Virtus.pro's youngest member had the highest rating in the tournament (1.26), contributed in the most rounds (superb 81%) and had the most positive round shares (+15.1 difference). The most impressive part is how reliable he was, as no player managed to end the round with 0 damage less often than byali (only 17% of his rounds). He was perhaps the best performer in the semi-final match vs. dignitas (65:52, 91.4 ADR, 1.17 rating for the series), in which he set up the third map win with 6 kills in two rounds that put VP on match point, leading up to the big clutch. The reason he didn't get the MVP nod is because he didn't make as much impact as his experienced teammate in the rounds Virtus.pro won throughout the tournament. But a close second and an EVP will have to do for the 22-year-old who missed out on last year's Top 20 after being 13th in 2014.

Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif went up from a VP selection last event to an EVP in Bucharest, as he showed even better play in his second international outing with dignitas. The clear star of the team this time, largely thanks to a superb performance in the Virtus.pro semi-final in which he was the top fragger of the series (73:54, 96.5 ADR, 1.36 rating), established that his name should be closely tied with dignitas' improved results in these two tournaments. The main thing he brought is pure firepower, having put up 0.84 kills per round including a tournament-high 24% of rounds with a multi-kill. He also proved to be the new headshot machine in town, as he led the tournament with 0.54 headshots per round, surpassing the numbers G2's Adil "⁠ScreaM⁠" Benrlitom put up in StarSeries the week before.

The oldest player of every tournament he attends nowadays, Wiktor "⁠TaZ⁠" Wojtas, once again set an example for the next generation. He continues to push the age limit for all professional players in CS, especially in events like this where he is one of the top performers and where he helps his team win a title. TaZ provided stability by being one of the hardest players to kill at the event (0.58 deaths per round) which is a result of his good positioning and decision making. And even when he was killed, he would often ensure that this happened in the right conditions for his team to secure a trade, with 26% of his deaths returned on within 5 seconds, the highest at the event. He did not frag poorly either, putting up 0.75 kills per round, 8th at the event. So as a player who made great contribution in numerous ways for a team that won the event, he's one of our EVPs of DH Bucharest.

Another player who rolled back the years and showed the type of performance that he was known for in the past, Jordan "⁠n0thing⁠" Gilbert, deserved to be called an EVP of an event for the first time in 2016. The 25 year old American was Cloud9's most consistent player from the start until the end of their 2nd place campaign, performing well in both group stage matches, the semi-final and even being the only one who put up a decent fight against VP in the final. The third and deciding map of the semi-final against EnVyUs was where he made his biggest contribution to his team's success, putting up 23:16 and 89 damage per round, and single-handedly winning perhaps the key round of the match. In the end he had 0.80 kills per round, 85.2 ADR and a 1.16 rating – top 5 in each of those categories – and was even the best trader of the event. Tying VP's TaZ with 26% of deaths that were not in vain, n0thing was also the player with by far most trade kills at the tournament – 0.22 per round.

VPs: Snax underperforms yet still shines, Stewie2K and shroud do so in glimpses

Virtus.pro's superstar and the unofficial MVP of ELEAGUE Season 1, Janusz "⁠Snax⁠" Pogorzelski, did not perform up to his usual standards in Bucharest but he still managed to significantly help his team as they picked up their latest trophy. He won some key clutches (5 total) for the Polish team, while generally excelling as an efficient CT side AWPer (0.38 kills per round) and aggressor (0.17 opening kills per round as CT).

Kenny "⁠kennyS⁠" Schrub found his way to another Top players list as the top AWPer of an event, this time putting in slightly lower numbers than at StarSeries but still topping the charts with 0.44 AWP kills per round. The main difference from his play in Kiev was that he underperformed in the match that eliminated his team (vs. Cloud9), but he still made a great impact in the wins that brought EnVyUs to the semi-finals, namely over Gambit and Heroic.

dignitas' Kristian "⁠k0nfig⁠" Wienecke stood out with great performance in the group stage, earning 3 PotM awards (two against FaZe and one against FlipSid3) and a case could be made that he had the biggest share in the team's success as he excelled on the way to the playoffs.

Another 3-time Player of the Map at this event was EnVyUs' returnee Nathan "⁠NBK-⁠" Schmitt, who missed the event in Kiev but reunited with the team on this occasion and even starred for them at times. NBK- was actually the best performer of the second day of competition in Bucharest as he put in a superb performance in the group's decider vs. Heroic (71:46, 96.9 ADR, 1.35 rating) and played great in the Gambit series before that. However, he then inexplicably disappeared in the semi-final against Cloud9, reducing his overall impact on the tournament to just Valuable Player status.

The only Canadian from Cloud9, Mike "⁠shroud⁠" Grzesiek, showed glimpses of the form from last year when his team reached three consecutive finals with him as one of the stars. He shined in the semi-final against EnVyUs by playing great in both map wins, but then was unable to do significant damage in the grand final.

René "⁠cajunb⁠" Borg has been fitting in great into dignitas following his removal from Astralis, and he added another successful event to the list. He continued to be a source of stability, was rarely the reason his team loses rounds, and was a consistent performer who showed he seldom has a bad game.

Unlike the experienced Dane, Jake "⁠Stewie2K⁠" Yip has been through a rollercoaster over the past couple of weeks. He was named an EVP of StarSeries thanks to his influence on getting C9 to a big event semi-final and it seemed he continued playing in similar fashion in Bucharest – dominating in the group stage and once again putting his team through to the semis. But then he had less and less influence as the event progressed, staying in the shadows of his teammates during the semi-final win and then completely failing to stand up to Virtus.pro in the final. Nevertheless, he was still the player a team relied on the most to open rounds (starting 24% of C9's round wins) and whether he got a kill or not was still the biggest determining factor for any team (C9 won 79% of rounds when he did get a kill and only 32% when he didn't).

Last, but not least, we have Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire who made so many highlights at this event that we had to create a mini-movie out of them. And as you can see in those highlights below, he did most of his damage on the T side where he was one of the best throughout the weekend. However, it's his play on the CT side that caused him to even end up as a net-negative for the team's overall round share, as his aggression was often punished (he died first in 21% of nV's CT side losses, almost twice more than any of his teammates). Still, as the team did most of its damage on the T side apEX was one of the keys to their success, and his superb aiming abilities surely didn't do any harm - 66% of his kills were headshots.

These 13 players are our "Top players" of DreamHack Bucharest, but as always there were others who had their moments such as nV's Timothée "⁠DEVIL⁠" Démolon, who had one of the best maps of the event (Mirage vs. C9 in the semis), Virtus.pro's Jarosław "⁠pashaBiceps⁠" Jarząbkowski and Gambit's Ivan "⁠spaze⁠" Obrezhan but didn't make the list.

Here are some interesting stats for the end:

That all but concludes our DreamHack Bucharest 2016 review, though you can also expect a highlight movie with the MVP's frags. We'll be back with the next Top players article after ESL One New York.