The first ever Dota 2 caster shuffle has forced Valve to quickly implement a transfer deadline for broadcast studio talent aimed at stabilizing the casting ecosystem with a “studio lock” to take effect this week.

The newly formed MoonDuck Studios was the big winner this shuffle, landing up and coming rising star Owen “ODPixel” Davies.

“The casters for both BTS and JD need to get their shit together and produce some good commentary,” said Davies while massaging his extremely large head.

After hearing of Davies comments, joinDOTA lead caster Toby “TobiWan” Dawson replied, “Please cast a major LAN final before you talk.”

MoonDuck also landed what many consider Dota 2’s best analyst, Troels “Synderen” Nielsen. However, analyst analysts are predicting that the meteoric rise of William “Blitz” Lee could put Nielsen’s position in jeopardy. Less than a year ago, Lee was barely known as a caster, making a humble living as a professional Dota 2 feeder in South Korea.

“Blitz is a good caster, a bit overrated in my opinion, but definitely okay to be in a top studio!” said Nielsen. “But to say that he is one of the best analysts is really exaggeration, he cast like 10 games in a high level LAN.”

MoonDuck’s acquisition of analyst Andy “Draskyl” Stiles will dramatically weaken the casting lineup of the former #1 ranked GD Studio, as illustrated here:





It is still unclear how the best western casting studios will do against the more established Chinese ones.

“Chinese studios cast slowly and methodically, but they don’t adapt well to casting new heroes like techies,” said Andrew “Zyori” Campbell, who recently shuffled from Beyond the Summit to MoonDuck. “But I’m really scared of the Korean commentators, who I expect to be dominating the casting scene by 2017.”





