The International 3

Day One Recap

Upper Bracket Recap Draft Analysis by phantasmal

Game Recap by Vykromond

Upper Bracket R1 A: Na`Vi vs Orange

Draft Analysis

Game Recap

Upper Bracket R1 B: Fnatic vs TongFu

Draft Analysis

Game Recap

Lower Bracket Recap by Vykromond

Lower Bracket R1 A: Dignitas vs Rattlesnake

Lower Bracket R1 B: LGD.Int vs Mousesports

Lower Bracket R2 A: Orange vs Dignitas

Lower Bracket R2 B: LGD.Int vs Fnatic



CREDITS

Writers: phantasmal, Vykromond

Gfx: riptide, Heyoka

Editors: riptide, Firebolt145

Photography and art via

Writers: phantasmal, VykromondGfx: riptide, HeyokaEditors: riptide, Firebolt145Photography and art via Valve and R1CH

It's been an exhausting day for players and fans alike, but here we are at the end of the first day's play at The International 3. Na`Vi and TongFu advance into the second round of the Upper Bracket, while Dignitas, LGD.int, Mousesports, and Rattlesnake have made their exit from the tournament.Don't let that fool you though; we're still far, far away from the finish line, and we're sure that the tourney's best games have yet to be played! In just a few hours, Day 2 gets under way, with Alliance, LGD.cn, DK and iG going head to head in the Upper Bracket and Team Liquid, MUFC, Zenith and Virtus.pro battling it out in the Lower Bracket.First though, we have a day of great games to look back on, and that's exactly what we're going to do. Be sure to stay with TL Dota 2 Coverage as we take you through these next few days of non-stop Dota!The opening bans were predictable. Orange targeted Na`Vi's Dark Seer, whom Na`Vi have never not picked if he was available, and the ever-necessary Wisp. This tells me that Orange did not want to take Dark Seer with the first pick of the game. They would much rather secure Visage and might have expected Na`Vi to try to steal Visage away.Na`Vi targeted Batrider and Outworld Devourer. Neither were a surprise, but I feel OD was a mistake. He's counterable, and Visage was way too important to Orange.Orange opened with Visage as I mentioned. Na`Vi responded with Weaver+Naga. Orange finished with Nature's Prophet.What strikes me about this stretch, and the draft as a whole, is that Orange took heroes they were comfortable with; NaVi did not. Na`Vi had not played Naga or Dragon Knight the entire tournament, and Naga was taken only to deny her to Orange. They didn't really have a plan on what they wanted to accomplish with her.The other big story of the draft is that Orange had planned for the Weaver pick. Ravage into two stuns with two extremely large nukes from Alchemist and Visage.Finally, I'm really surprised that Na`Vi didn't ban Alchemist. They have respected that hero so much in the past, and his ban seemed more warranted than either Sand King or Gyrocopter. I get the Gyro concern given the Tidehunter, but I feel that Orange would have been much more vulnerable with a fragile hero for their 4-protect-1ish strat. Alchemist is also way more of a straight carry threat than Gyro, which makes him a better fit for what Orange was going for. Maybe Na`Vi has lowered their opinion of Alch due to his low win rate this tournament, but I'm not convinced that's legit and think it might be a compositional issue.And yeah, commentary team said the same thing I was saying to myself: Mek beats no Mek.Same opening bans on Orange's side. Na`Vi adjusted to ban Visage instead of OD, which was the best adjustment they could have made. Orange values Visage tremendously, with 8 opening round picks from them for the hero.Na`Vi got Chen and Lifestealer, heroes that they're comfortable with and that are very hard to counter.Orange got Razor and Nature's Prophet. Prophet is a no-brainer. They like the hero and he's extremely flexible. Razor is ok as a Lifestealer counter if they lane him correctly.The next set of bans were interesting. Na`Vi did the right thing here and banned Naga instead of drafting her like they did in round one. They also banned OD, which seemed to indicate that they wanted to give Dendi an int hero mid.Orange banned Storm Spirit and Rubick. Rubick is a hero that Na`Vi likes, but if you're banning Storm Spirit for the Dendi factor and Lifestealer infest synergy, why not ban...well, we'll get to that.Orange got Shadow Demon and Sand King, two supports that I do not like. I don't know what exactly disruption is intended to set up in this lineup, and without that I don't feel Shadow Demon is justifiable anymore. Sand King also feels especially questionable going into the Hand of God + Mek combo that surely will be coming from Puppey.Meanwhile, Na`Vi got Bane and Bounty hunter. Nothing especially notable here.Final bans were TA for Na`Vi and Pudge for Orange. I approve of Na`Vi's ban because TA would have given Orange the tricore they desperately needed. Prophet and Razor are not hard carries by any stretch of the imagination, so having a third early carry would supplement their early damage.Finally, Na`Vi picked Puck, the hero that really should have been banned instead of Rubick. Orange took Beastmaster, giving them no real carry. He does ok in mid, but they overinvested in shutting down Lifestealer in the later teamfights while giving themselves no carry threat and a lack of early pressure from their supports to get them to those teamfights. Razor+Shadow Demon+Sand King is a complete waste of a defensive trilane.Game three was dumb. Opening bans were the same. Na`Vi's opening picks were the same. Orange switched to Weaver and Bounty Hunter. I don't know what Orange was thinking with Bounty here. They haven't played him the entire tournament. Was this to deny Na`Vi and did game two just scare them that much?Orange banned Nature's Prophet and Storm Spirit. Why ban Prophet, a hero that Na`Vi has only played once when you just had Na`Vi destroy you with Lifestealer+Puck?Na`Vi banned OD and Nyx. Nyx over Naga is interesting, and I don't know what to read into it. Maybe they feel Nyx causes more problems for...Na`Vi picked Puck and Rubick. Completely unsurprising. OD's ban was to set up Puck. Orange picked...Sand King and Windrunner? I don't really like Windrunner right now, but I definitely don't like her as anything other than a suicide solo.Final picks were Tidehunter for Na`Vi and Lone Druid for Orange. Na`Vi's Rubick must have used spellsteal on Orange's game one for Weaver counters.Windrunner and Sand King do some dumb aggressive duo lane. Bounty Hunter roams. Orange gets no real pressure and Na`Vi exploits the exposed Lone Druid and never looks back.I have no idea what Orange was doing here after what was a really smart game one draft. I really think they should have tried Alchemist again in either game two or game three. It also feels like Orange's carries get really sketchy if you get rid of Visage. Their Naga looks good, but she's a pick for very specific situations/lineups unlike heroes like Visage and Rubick who can fit into almost any lineup.The first series of the Main Event was all out aggression from even before the word go, with a two-for-two fight and first blood for Orange. Though both teams seemed to want to force fights in game one, Orange came out ahead by a hair in more than just a few of them, with kyxy's Tidehunter playing a major role in nearly all of them. Eventually, the Malaysians just pulled ahead and took the first game.Of course, Na`Vi struck back in the next two games with strong drafts, great laning, and teamfight execution. In game two, Na`Vi used the Puck Lifestealer core combo to put tremendous pressure on Orange - pressure that they then exploited well with Bounty Hunter's Track. In the final game, the CIS team countered a solid Orange lineup by beating them handily in the laning stage, and just never lost the lead after that.In this series, Na`Vi reminded the world that they've been in two consecutive TI finals for a reason. As Puppey himself pointed out, they 'always lose game one'. They didn't lose the series, however, and they go into the Top Six as one of the top contenders for the Aegis of Champions.TongFu started by banning OD and Wisp. Unsurprising bans. TongFu has banned OD 9 times out of their 14 prelim games. I believe this is to open up mid for Puck/Storm Spirit picks, as they are 5-0 when playing those heroes and 3-6 otherwise. Wisp was banned against Fnatic 10 times, and 3 times by them.Fnatic replied by banning Dark Seer and Batrider. Dark Seer was TongFu's most played hero, and this was only Fnatic's 2nd ban on Batrider in the opening banning phase, but TongFu had received 8 Batrider bans which is tied for highest in the top 8 teams.TongFu grabbed Na`Vi's Lifestealer and Chen. Lifestealer was their most common carry in the prelims. Chen was only a hero they used twice, but it is Chen. Doing so also denies it to Fnatic.Fnatic opened with the Weaver+Treant gambit.TongFu's second round bans were Dragon Knight and Timbersaw. Dragon Knight isn't a surprise. DK was Fnatic's second most played hero after Weaver, and Fnatic still needed a mid. Timbersaw was played twice by Fnatic, but I don't know if it was mid. If it was, then this makes sense since they've already banned Fnatic's most common mids in Dragon Knight and OD.Fnatic banned Storm Spirit and Visage. I think Fnatic made a mistake with Visage. TongFu had plenty of other supports they could grab like Rubick whom they've played three times. Fnatic could have banned Storm Spirit and Puck and basically forced TongFu into mids they were less comfortable with.Ok, I wasn't even looking ahead on the draft list but TongFu grabbed Rubick anyway, along with Puck. Fnatic grabbed Crystal Maiden and Nature's Prophet. I covered the TongFu picks. Prophet is a little weird here, since Fnatic has only used him once in the entire tournament, but he's Trixi's third most used hero outside of the tournament.Fnatic banned Bounty Hunter, expecting an offlaner. TongFu banned Templar Assassin to further limit Fnatic's mid options. Fnatic finally picked Viper for their mid, and TongFu came out with a surprising Gyrocopter pick.Same bans from TongFu. Fnatic changed their Batrider ban to Alchemist. TongFu immediately snatched up Batrider, and Fnatic responded by grabbing Lifestealer and Chen.This stretch is really interesting to me. Fnatic must have known that TongFu would pick up Batrider, so I'm inclined to believe that a) they believed they could counter Batrider and b) they wanted to secure Lifestealer while still having the second pick.The final pick of the first round was TongFu grabbing Visage. Nothing especially noteworthy.Next bans from TongFu were DK and Vengeful Spirit. DK we've already covered. Vengeful Spirit is really noteworthy. Not only did Fnatic run her 4 times in prelims, but as was pointed out by distilledawesome on Reddit, Fnatic used her as a counter to Batrider's lasso initiation. TongFu did a great job scouting this out.Fnatic on the other hand banned Razor and Weaver, and I can't figure out why. TongFu did not use Razor in the entire tournament and went 0-2 on Weaver. Meanwhile, Fnatic is capable of using both those heroes and seem to me to only be limiting their own selections for very little benefit. Instead they could have hit both Puck and Storm Spirit and forced TongFu into using a mid they were less comfortable with.The next Fnatic pick was Venomancer, and they spent a huge portion of their reserve time making the decision, if I recall correctly. Fnatic was possibly expecting to get Vengeful Spirit through the ban phase and wasn't prepared for her to be banned. TongFu also grabbed Gyrocopter for the second game in a row, and both teams got their mids in Puck for Fnatic and Storm Spirit for TongFu.Final bans and picks were a bit whatever. TongFu banned Bounty Hunter, but Fnatic grabbed Prophet for their offlaner. Fnatic banned Enchantress, but TongFu picked up a second support in Bane.To start off their series, Fnatic got cute, and TongFu got deadly. The story of this game is that Fnatic went for an offensive trilane with Weaver, Treant, and Crystal Maiden. Maybe they were expecting an offensive trilane from TongFu, but this was a mistake regardless. 6.78c Treant cannot offlane or offensively trilane. He needs levels too desperately, and he's not going to find them in an offensive trilane. Adding to that, their Viper won the laning phase handily but did not achieve anything thereafter, and a Viper that isn't snowballing isn't a useful Viper. Tongfu simply rolled Fnatic straight into game two without breaking a sweat.Once again the lanes didn't favor Fnatic. It is very important to note TongFu's strategy in shutting down N0tail's Chen. They warded very aggressively to force him to go to the opposing jungle, and then used their aggressive trilane to get Gyrocopter some rocket barrage kills and starve the safelane Lifestealer of farm.Fnatic did manage to recover, and their Puck dominated mid to the tune of a two level advantage, and good positioning from Chen and Puck and a one player advantage also let Fnatic finally find a footing in the bottom lane and make some trades to finish N0tail's Mekansm.However, the bad habits then set in. Hanni got picked off twice, once before his very early Boots of Travel and once after, and TongFu got free stabilization time. Fnatic stalled out as Hao first finished a Butterfly and then a Satanic. The second Roshan then turned into madness when Hanni initiated perfectly with Era's infest bomb, leading to sequential buybacks from both teams. When Hao peeled off, Trixi mopped up TongFu and got the Aegis. However, on trying to repeat the trick, a defensive Force Staff on Hao barely saved him and he Satanic'd back up to full life off the bodies of three players. After that, Fnatic simply couldn't find good fights anymore. TongFu on the other hand, built more, and more, and thereafter took the third Roshan for free. A good high ground gank on Era prevented his abyssal and forced a crucial buyback that TongFu leverage into their second win.Major props to TongFu. They looked shaky sometimes in the prelims, but their strategic performance in this game was absolutely surgical. They advanced into the next round, and in the process showed everyone that they are definitely not to be counted out just yet!Dignitas ran a mixture of old and new with Morphling, Io, and Timbersaw. However, it turned out that Rattlesnake was baiting the Io, wanting their pocket CK matchup. Early on, it seemed like things might work okay for Rattlesnake, especially when they successfully ganked Timbersaw and farmed two cores. But they didn't generate that much pressure and Dignitas used Io and Nature's Prophet to play keep-away and limit any losses, including one extremely flashy play where a perfect gank on Sneyking was deflated by a stolen Song of the Siren and a defensive Relocate. By limiting their losses to one non-core hero at a time, Dignitas amassed a Linkens and Shotgun for Aui_2000 and a Bloodstone and Platemail for Sneyking. The upshot is that when Rattlesnake took the first full-on teamfight with Song of the Siren, Dignitas waited patiently and mercilessly crushed the entire team before Luo even thought to respond with BKB. Dignitas then responded with a lane of barracks. Rattlesnake were blindsided by how behind they turned out to be; their motley BKBs and Shadowblades weren't prepared for this eventuality and they didn't create enough kills on Dignitas' (constantly fleeing) heroes early on. Dignitas thus advanced, making Rattlesnake the first team to be eliminated from TI3.For this game, Mouz decided to stay in familiar territory and built a four-protect-one around Black. The game began in very tense fashion as LGD.Int sought to get as much of an advantage against Black's Phantom Lancer as possible. After two towers and a first blood on FATA-, Mouz decided to take a stand when LGD.Int moved to the last remaining Tier 1 in Radiant's safe lane. This did not pan out; the fight was dictated by Brax's Clock positioning and G's pure muscle on Dragon Knight and turned into a two-for-five disaster. The Germans next tried guile, with a gank attempt at top, but got neatly pincered by LGD.Int. LGD.Int continued to play crisp Dota to catch Black repeatedly and extended their lead in a mistake-free fashion quite familiar to anyone who observed the team in early 2013, with Brax's incredibly on point initiations leading the way. Meanwhile, Black managed to farm, but Mouz was forced to concede a lane of barracks before making an inspired defence of their mid with good illusion micro and support abilities. However, it was not enough. Mouz made fitful attempts to stop the overrun of their barracks but were forced to gg within the next five minutes. They were thus the second team to be eliminated from TI3.Dignitas, flushed with what your humble correspondent can only dub as confidence, picked a greedy lineup with four potential farmers against one of the most aggressive teams in the tournament. Indeed, Orange were only too happy to field QoP and an aggressive CK trilane in response to Dignitas' greed. At first, things seemed to go according to script, but soon Mushi got punished for a gank onto Fogged's Rubick and this gave Aui_2000 and Universe some safe farming time. Orange refocused on finding and abusing Sneyking's Timbersaw, having identified it as Dignitas's main punisher, and some masterful execution by Mushi on his signature Queen put them up 8-2. But had they waited too long? Dignitas made a strong defense outside their mid Tier 3, cleaning up four heroes and only losing Aui on the ensuing push, and the greedy lineup was already looking surprisingly developed only twenty minutes in. Timbersaw and Alchemist slowly crept towards their fateful BKBs as well. However, Orange were undeterred by the fact that the clock seemed to be ticking on their capabilities. Dignitas attempted to catch them napping on a Tier 3 push, but Orange's superior positioning enabled them to obliterate the attempt and take a five-for-zero trade. This, of course, also gave them a lane of barracks. Now on the ropes, Dignitas cobbled together an inspired defense of their second set, only to be decapitated in an ill fated attempt to seize control of the next Roshan, and Orange thus advanced in the Lower Bracket.LGD.Int sought to position themselves for a dominant early to mid game transition, but in the meantime Fnatic found development for Era's Lifestealer. Despite running a lineup that was designed to punch through Fnatic and put them entirely on the back foot early on, LGD.Int found themselves incapable of doing so and indeed lost a major engagement and several Track kills. They tried again a few minutes later and very nearly turned the fight before Era marvellously abused Infest to jump in and out of a heavily damaged Dragon Knight to complete a teamwipe on LGD.Int. LGD.Int were now down more than ten kills and more than 10k gold, and were thus forced to use their entire team to find low value pickoffs. However, they didn't have the tools to catch or kill a Track buffed racecar Lifestealer, and any fight containing him became fated to end poorly for LGD.Int. Fnatic feinted towards Rosh, then turned and burned through the entirety of the underfarmed Dire. After this LGD.Int turtled until Fnatic decided enough is enough and just walked through their base.