My Wildcard & TI experience + some roster talk. Long read -

Ti6



Warning, this is a long post and english is not my mother tongue. There was alot mote to write but i tried to keep it as short as i think i can.



Arriving in Seattle. Beautiful weather, amazing people, incredible valve employees who own at their jobs and Lan vibe. Can you ask for more?

The feeling of TI is one of a kind. We have been preparing alot for our Wildcard games, the other contendors in the Wildcard were Complexity, Ehome and Execration. Alot of time was invested in research and playtime to make sure we are ready for this stage.

We got to know the groups one day before gameday during a meeting with valve. We were set to play complexity first. The team who knocked us out of the Epicenter Wildcard stage. A team that I know very well personally due to our times in HoN.



Gameday.



We are being walked to our rooms by Valve staff. Suddenly, we hear music playing from a boombox behind us. We turn around and realize that Swindle is running with a boombox on his shoulder playing ghetto music and staring at us while we look backwards. Alright.



We end up losing game 1 as col play very well.

Luckily we bounce back and win the next game as a team with a very good Nyx Assasin pick called by Era.

I recall i play Beast in game 3 and get firstblooded by Batrider and Earth. The game progresses, slowly but surely we take the lead and we end up walaking away with the win.



Seeing their faces when we went to shake their hands to say gg was devastating. Anyhow life went on and they still had another chance.



We matched up against Ehome who beat Execration. Not much more to say than that we got trashed by Ehome and they secured themselves to be the first wildcard team.

After our games we were told that Execration beat col 2:0 in 2 very fast games.



Long story short we beat Execration in game 1 and pull out a huskar in game 2 where we play a seemingly perfect game with 0 deaths snd Execration end up GG'ing resulting in our spot in TI!!!!!!!! Hell YEAH CAN YOU IMAGINE THE FEELINGR AND HYPE thats flowing through us at that point?!?!



Now more general talking. Our groupstage was awful. We the last games more as practice games for ourselves. The good thing bout the groups for us was that we are able to learn alot from all these games. We played against the best of the best. Those replays are gold. Playing against them and going up against their movement is amazing and helps you learn so much.



Groupstage is over, main event starts.

8 teams upper bracket, 8 teams lower bracket.

We were scheduled to play Fnatic, we were fairly ok with that outcome at the point considering the other teams that were also in the loser bracket.

Gametime vs Fnatic.

Running onto the stage with the introduction and the music was one of the best feelings i have ever experienced. I will never forget it and i will embrace it.



We end up losing vs fnatic as they are playing better and seemingly have a good strat vs what we prepared for them. Sadly this was the end for us at this point. Still happy for us as a team that we made it this far, but dissapointed in myself cause I feel like I can do more and I didnt play good Dota for the majority during TI. Looking at other tier1 offlaners i just go like, wow. They are so good and do so much for their team.



After this the next big point was when OG was 'upset' twice in a row. I honestly was very close to tearing up. I know how much it means to everyone and especially them, i was very moved by them losing actually.



The again TI was crazy this year, many underdog stories, upsets, incredible games and so on. Dc; fnatic & tnc deserve alot of credit and praise. I truly hope OG does not make any switch, sadly im fairly convinced they will.. I personally think that team unity, being comfortable with the team, being able to talk about the game, talking about what you could do better as a team or individual is more important than skill. A team that has gone through certain scenarios, for example they lost to a strat a few times which was played by a great team, they simply learn from that everytime and its just alot easier to play against it next time if you talked about what you have to switch up in order to win.



Im very unsure about the roster shuffle. The thing I hope for is that people are looking to play with other people, where they will enjoy playing together and are able to learn from one another. Thats all you want really, or atleast for me, thats all you need.



Im very happy that i got to experience TI. I watched alot of games and simply cheered for OG, liquid, Universe, Wings or just in general good Dota. Im very happy Wings won as they are very innovative, young, expiremental (?) and obviously faith bian.



My biggest inspiration is Universe and rapidly im growing into a faith bian fangay, At first my nickname for him was king of rosh, now its just 'King of Dota'.



Id like to thank all of you out there. Especially some people.

First off, my Team. You guys own, thanks for making this possible for me. Tal, Johan, David, you guys are among the best and nicest players in dota, please remember. My girlfriend who was with me during TI and always supports me. Specific people who are always there for me and help me get better & always answer my questions when i have any. My brother, the best brother in the world, and my lovely parents. Last but not least, every player and staff/talent i talked to at TI, yes, all of you. You're all wonderful and Ill do everything in my power to get to more lans and improve till I become the next Uni_Faith.

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