TI4 Grand Finals: Newbee are your Champions July 21st, 2014 23:22 GMT Text by TheEmulator TI4 Main Event Day 5

Grand Finals



Liquipedia



Focus Mode

Turn off Focus Mode [x]

TI4 Finals

Newbee vs Vici Gaming







Newbee are the champions of TI4



Dreams are something of a classic, they will never fade with time but will instead become more valuable. In one’s life we don’t know how many chances we will spend so close to our Dreams; two years later, the two of you have fought toward the final day. Xiao8, Sylar, go!



-Yao



The most coveted title in Dota 2 is being a TI champion, with every year culminating with a new world champion being announced through this great event. This year was one of Chinese Dota, with an all Chinese Grand Finals between Newbee and Vici Gaming. Newbee ascended to victory in the end, taking out VG 3-1 with complete confidence in their drafts and gameplay. They developed a plan to combat the style of Vici Gaming, and it succeeded, proving that they are indeed the strongest team in the world right now. After a shaky group stage where they were almost eliminated, Newbee came back with one of the greatest runs we have ever seen. Congratulations to our new world champions!







The International 2014 is now over, and we must sit back for another year of Dota until the next one comes along. This year's TI was one of many surprises and upsets, with teams like Liquid, Cloud 9 and LGD all advancing farther than expected. On the other hand we also saw the early eliminations of all the past TI champions, with iG making it the farthest among them. North America saw their best ever result with Evil Geniuses placing third, bringing hope to a scene that has been known as the weakest since the beginning of time. And the European scene underwhelmed as well after a decent year prior to TI.



Finals Trends



Though the finals was a high level series with both teams playing very well on the whole, viewers will understandably be frustrated at how the lineups left little room for recovery to create some truly epic games. The TI4 final is the disappointing culmination of changes to early game ganking, vision, and totally invisible smokes that have increased the luck factor in the game. Furthermore, the strength of 10-20 minute 5 man lineups led to drafts that had little tolerance for error. If the lanes went wrong, there was no way of coming back against a team of such caliber as VG or Newbee.



The primary distinguishing factor between the teams was how Newbee chose more flexible drafts in all of their wins. Instead of choosing pure deathball lineups, they placed Mu on a Puck or Brew to grab the initiative, while VG neglected the Doom or other Rotk tempo controlling heroes like Centaur or Tide that featured prominently in many of their earlier wins. Newbee’s bans were also on point, denying Super his game-changing Razor, Dragon Knight, and Death Prophet that allowed him to create so much space for Sylar in earlier games. VG’s deathball power was just not quite as strong without Super on his signature heroes, and they needed to recognize this fact and use one of their other strategies that had more redundancy than forcing it through in both games 3 and 4.



Many have ignorantly decried VG as a one-trick pony, but VG ran 3 distinct concepts in 4 games. Sadly, we were denied VG’s most refined Morphling drafts that dominated so many other teams, as they instead pidgeon-holed themselves by first or second picking Prophet every game..The reason all the games looked similar is because of how some fortunate laning phase fights and rotations led to a spiral of doom that neither team could escape from. In the end, every game was decided by laning phase movements, a poor ending to an otherwise excellent tournament.



Game 1

Newbee (Radiant)



Vici Gaming (Dire)







In a surprise move that showed their flexibility, VG opened their draft with 4 powerful initiators: Clockwerk is the most powerful early ganker, Brewmaster dominates fights once he gets a Blink, and Shadow Shaman/Earthshaker both pose a serious threat to any hero slightly out of position after they can get their own Blink Daggers. With Newbee stuck with a 1st pick Prophet who would have no ability to split push, they elected to grab a powerful 5v5 fighting lineup that could sustain VG’s explosive power. AA offers excellent defensive teamfight AOE damage, while Lion can punish VG’s squishy supports if they Blinked too far forward. Most importantly, Mu’s mid Alchemist offered a robust frontline hero who could keep his team alive.



VG’s 4 initiation heroes each had powerful burst and disables, but would fall flat on damage in the mid-game. Though Sylar’s Lone Druid is a mighty pushing and 5v5 force in the first 30 minutes, Lifestealer can slaughter the bear even with minimal farm. In short, the game came down to whether Rotk’s Clockwerk and Fy/Fenrir could rotate well enough to get their early Blinks, then restrict Newbee’s farming space due to their superior initiation. If VG’s triple Blinks were up before Newbee could get their key items, Newbee would be unable to take any fights against a Radiance Bear. Thus the game was about a subtle equilibrium: if Newbee could reach the point where VG could no longer burst them down in their disables, they would win due to the superior overall damage of the AA, Lifestealer, and Prophet. Otherwise, Newbee’s heroes would just get jumped and explode.



The key part of Newbee’s plan was to offensive tril-ane to delay Sylar’s Radiance and the double Blink on VG’s supports. For VG’s plan to work, their carry and supports all needed to find decent farm early on. Newbee was counting on Mu’s Alchemist to weather the storm with Mek, and Alch’s natural early-game survivability along with the fighting power of Xiao’s Necrobook rush, thus outlasting VG in fights.



Though a well thought out strategy, Newbee’s plan fell flat due to a combination of individual skill, superior rotations, and some typical smoke luck. The tri-lane traded 1 for 1, but Xiao8’s Prophet left his 1v1 lane and failed to secure a second kill. Though he tp’d back immediately, Fy showed a moment of genius when he tp’d to the Xiao8/Rotk lane smoked, and killed Xiao8. Ordinarily, Xiao8’s treants would have let him live from Battery Assault, but he lacked the mana after his tp foray top. This problem was compounded with Super solo killing Mu twice(!), and Sylar eluding Newbee’s subsequent smokes. These advantages pushed the asymmetrical draft equilibrium past its tipping point, which resulted in Newbee losing control over the map and the game. They could not defend towers, and they could not farm aggressively. The difference was most obvious in mid lane: Super grabbed an 8 minute Blink, while Mu barely scraped a 20 minute Mek, later than Fy and Fenrir’s Blinks!



With Newbee’s draft focusing heavily on flexible fighting power and sustain, they lacked any reliable way to change the tempo until Lion got his Blink. In short, they had no way to recover from an early deficit. Once Rotk and Super got ahead, they took total control over the game and left no safe place for Newbee to recover.



Game 2

Vici Gaming (Radiant)



Newbee (Dire)









Though VG threw a curveball in game 1, here they attempted to telegraph their typical Prophet-centered deathball lineup but then awkwardly switched into a powerful Morphling/Prophet split push. Like for Newbee in game 1, the 1st pick Nature’s Prophet left VG in a sticky situation. They felt forced into choosing the Viper to boost their early game fighting power, but then grabbed a Morphling to adequately outdamage Newbee’s aggressive 4 Protect Weaver. This left them without Rotk on his usual tempo controlling hero like Doom, Tide, or Clock that featured in their previous successful Morphling dual-core lineups.



An offlane Prophet can create space for his team, but first he needs his team to create space for him, either by taking towers or controlling the map. In the end, their draft, though mostly solid and easily able to spin out of control, had a single point of failure: the Sand King’s Blink. Without his Blink, VG would have no reliable initiation and could not control the tempo if they fell behind. Newbee recognized this and spent 2 obs wards and a sentry to block all of his jungle camps. Therefore, Fenrir would have to secure early kills in order to get it at an appropriate timing.



However, as in the first game, the outcome was almost entirely determined by early game rotations. Newbee’s supports first-blooded Rotk, while VG’s 4 man smoke on Xiao8 at 6 minutes resulted in a horrific 1-4 trade, and the SK’s Blink further delayed. Though Newbee predicted and reacted well with Mu and Hao each buying preempetive TP Scrolls, the gank was close enough that it was decided by Mu getting his Primal Split off with 1 hp.







With VG having no way to reliably recover if they fell behind, the outcome of the game hinged on this 1 hp survival.



Though VG attempted to regain their footing with their powerful split push and amubushing solo farmers, Newbee was too adept at combining farming with taking objectives, and VG could never get that extra edge they needed. Newbee won many fights with Weaver and Earthshaker just barely able to survive VG’s front-loaded damage, after which point the superior sustain and power of Weaver, Alch, and AA overwhelmed the weaker early game damage of Morphling and Prophet. Against a lesser team, VG could have come back due to their great map movements and farming, but Newbee’s ganks and reactions were simply too precise to allow them a foothold. Like game 1, even though the game looked a stomp, the balance was razor thin. Had Mu died instead of getting off his split, VG could have easily taken control and bullied Hao around before his Linkens, giving Sylar and Rotk enough room to become unstoppable.





Game 3

Newbee (Radiant)



Vici Gaming (Dire)







The series was starting to heat up after being tied 1-1 by Newbee in game 2. VG drafted a line-up focusing on more early aggression, with very heavy magic damage coming out of the AA, Ember Spirit, and Venomancer. Their plan was to deathball with a strong 5v5, but Newbee were able to pick them apart early with great rotations. It started with an invis rune on Shadow Shaman, who was able to catch out the off-lane Prophet. Meanwhile Mu was able to kill Super mid with the help of Chen. At 7 minutes things started to swing heavily in the favour of Newbee with a smoke gank that resulted in a kill on Ancient Apparition. Super was able to react and get 2 kills, but Newbee reacted even better with Mu coming in on the Puck who took out Super and Venomancer after their major over-commitment. The MVP for this game from Newbee was definitely Mu’s Puck, who was styling on Super throughout the game, and punishing VG’s movements, baiting them into bad fights which inevitably gave Newbee a 17 minute win with a score of 16-6.



Game 4

Vici Gaming (Dire)



Newbee (Radiant)







The final game had everything on the line for both teams. Newbee stuck to their guns with the draft, opting yet again for the Ember Spirit that has proved to lay waste to VG’s style of play. They picked up the Doom as well, which acted as a nice counter to the Weaver and Veno from VG. Overall their lineup focused on gaining early control with pick-offs, which has been the theme for each winner in this series. VG lost this game at the draft in my opinion, focusing too much on 5v5 presence in the mid-game and maintaing some sort of late-game potential, but lacking early strength and strong initiation and survivability against the strong and aggressive lineup of Newbee.



Right from the start Newbee scored first blood on the middle lane with a smoke gank support rotation. VG tried too hard to make things happen themselves, and at 3-4 minutes they ran into each in the mid-lane resulting in a 3-1 trade going in the favour of Newbee. The Ember Spirit got a double kill, already snowballing him ahead of the rest. In all, Newbee got ahead early against a team that desperately needed to trade even early on, and by 15 minutes the score was already 19-3 and the GG was called. VG were able to get off a few nice SK and AA ult combos, but they were only able to pick-off Shadow Shaman during these. Doom was shutting down Weaver in each fight and the Brewmaster was able to sit in the frontlines unphased by anything VG had.



Congratulations to Newbee on winning the TI4 Grand Finals!







Credits:

Writers: TheEmulator, Ver

Notes: TanGeng, Kupon3ss

Gfx: fusefuse

Editors: TheEmulator

Photo: Dota 2, Valve

The most coveted title in Dota 2 is being a TI champion, with every year culminating with a new world champion being announced through this great event. This year was one of Chinese Dota, with an all Chinese Grand Finals between Newbee and Vici Gaming. Newbee ascended to victory in the end, taking out VG 3-1 with complete confidence in their drafts and gameplay. They developed a plan to combat the style of Vici Gaming, and it succeeded, proving that they are indeed the strongest team in the world right now. After a shaky group stage where they were almost eliminated, Newbee came back with one of the greatest runs we have ever seen. Congratulations to our new world champions!The International 2014 is now over, and we must sit back for another year of Dota until the next one comes along. This year's TI was one of many surprises and upsets, with teams like Liquid, Cloud 9 and LGD all advancing farther than expected. On the other hand we also saw the early eliminations of all the past TI champions, with iG making it the farthest among them. North America saw their best ever result with Evil Geniuses placing third, bringing hope to a scene that has been known as the weakest since the beginning of time. And the European scene underwhelmed as well after a decent year prior to TI.Though the finals was a high level series with both teams playing very well on the whole, viewers will understandably be frustrated at how the lineups left little room for recovery to create some truly epic games. The TI4 final is the disappointing culmination of changes to early game ganking, vision, and totally invisible smokes that have increased the luck factor in the game. Furthermore, the strength of 10-20 minute 5 man lineups led to drafts that had little tolerance for error. If the lanes went wrong, there was no way of coming back against a team of such caliber as VG or Newbee.The primary distinguishing factor between the teams was how Newbee chose more flexible drafts in all of their wins. Instead of choosing pure deathball lineups, they placed Mu on a Puck or Brew to grab the initiative, while VG neglected the Doom or other Rotk tempo controlling heroes like Centaur or Tide that featured prominently in many of their earlier wins. Newbee’s bans were also on point, denying Super his game-changing Razor, Dragon Knight, and Death Prophet that allowed him to create so much space for Sylar in earlier games. VG’s deathball power was just not quite as strong without Super on his signature heroes, and they needed to recognize this fact and use one of their other strategies that had more redundancy than forcing it through in both games 3 and 4.Many have ignorantly decried VG as a one-trick pony, but VG ran 3 distinct concepts in 4 games. Sadly, we were denied VG’s most refined Morphling drafts that dominated so many other teams, as they instead pidgeon-holed themselves by first or second picking Prophet every game..The reason all the games looked similar is because of how some fortunate laning phase fights and rotations led to a spiral of doom that neither team could escape from. In the end, every game was decided by laning phase movements, a poor ending to an otherwise excellent tournament.In a surprise move that showed their flexibility, VG opened their draft with 4 powerful initiators: Clockwerk is the most powerful early ganker, Brewmaster dominates fights once he gets a Blink, and Shadow Shaman/Earthshaker both pose a serious threat to any hero slightly out of position after they can get their own Blink Daggers. With Newbee stuck with a 1st pick Prophet who would have no ability to split push, they elected to grab a powerful 5v5 fighting lineup that could sustain VG’s explosive power. AA offers excellent defensive teamfight AOE damage, while Lion can punish VG’s squishy supports if they Blinked too far forward. Most importantly, Mu’s mid Alchemist offered a robust frontline hero who could keep his team alive.VG’s 4 initiation heroes each had powerful burst and disables, but would fall flat on damage in the mid-game. Though Sylar’s Lone Druid is a mighty pushing and 5v5 force in the first 30 minutes, Lifestealer can slaughter the bear even with minimal farm. In short, the game came down to whether Rotk’s Clockwerk and Fy/Fenrir could rotate well enough to get their early Blinks, then restrict Newbee’s farming space due to their superior initiation. If VG’s triple Blinks were up before Newbee could get their key items, Newbee would be unable to take any fights against a Radiance Bear. Thus the game was about a subtle equilibrium: if Newbee could reach the point where VG could no longer burst them down in their disables, they would win due to the superior overall damage of the AA, Lifestealer, and Prophet. Otherwise, Newbee’s heroes would just get jumped and explode.The key part of Newbee’s plan was to offensive tril-ane to delay Sylar’s Radiance and the double Blink on VG’s supports. For VG’s plan to work, their carry and supports all needed to find decent farm early on. Newbee was counting on Mu’s Alchemist to weather the storm with Mek, and Alch’s natural early-game survivability along with the fighting power of Xiao’s Necrobook rush, thus outlasting VG in fights.Though a well thought out strategy, Newbee’s plan fell flat due to a combination of individual skill, superior rotations, and some typical smoke luck. The tri-lane traded 1 for 1, but Xiao8’s Prophet left his 1v1 lane and failed to secure a second kill. Though he tp’d back immediately, Fy showed a moment of genius when he tp’d to the Xiao8/Rotk lane smoked, and killed Xiao8. Ordinarily, Xiao8’s treants would have let him live from Battery Assault, but he lacked the mana after his tp foray top. This problem was compounded with Super solo killing Mu twice(!), and Sylar eluding Newbee’s subsequent smokes. These advantages pushed the asymmetrical draft equilibrium past its tipping point, which resulted in Newbee losing control over the map and the game. They could not defend towers, and they could not farm aggressively. The difference was most obvious in mid lane: Super grabbed an 8 minute Blink, while Mu barely scraped a 20 minute Mek, later than Fy and Fenrir’s Blinks!With Newbee’s draft focusing heavily on flexible fighting power and sustain, they lacked any reliable way to change the tempo until Lion got his Blink. In short, they had no way to recover from an early deficit. Once Rotk and Super got ahead, they took total control over the game and left no safe place for Newbee to recover.Though VG threw a curveball in game 1, here they attempted to telegraph their typical Prophet-centered deathball lineup but then awkwardly switched into a powerful Morphling/Prophet split push. Like for Newbee in game 1, the 1st pick Nature’s Prophet left VG in a sticky situation. They felt forced into choosing the Viper to boost their early game fighting power, but then grabbed a Morphling to adequately outdamage Newbee’s aggressive 4 Protect Weaver. This left them without Rotk on his usual tempo controlling hero like Doom, Tide, or Clock that featured in their previous successful Morphling dual-core lineups.An offlane Prophet can create space for his team, but first he needs his team to create space for him, either by taking towers or controlling the map. In the end, their draft, though mostly solid and easily able to spin out of control, had a single point of failure: the Sand King’s Blink. Without his Blink, VG would have no reliable initiation and could not control the tempo if they fell behind. Newbee recognized this and spent 2 obs wards and a sentry to block all of his jungle camps. Therefore, Fenrir would have to secure early kills in order to get it at an appropriate timing.However, as in the first game, the outcome was almost entirely determined by early game rotations. Newbee’s supports first-blooded Rotk, while VG’s 4 man smoke on Xiao8 at 6 minutes resulted in a horrific 1-4 trade, and the SK’s Blink further delayed. Though Newbee predicted and reacted well with Mu and Hao each buying preempetive TP Scrolls, the gank was close enough that it was decided by Mu getting his Primal Split off with 1 hp.Though VG attempted to regain their footing with their powerful split push and amubushing solo farmers, Newbee was too adept at combining farming with taking objectives, and VG could never get that extra edge they needed. Newbee won many fights with Weaver and Earthshaker just barely able to survive VG’s front-loaded damage, after which point the superior sustain and power of Weaver, Alch, and AA overwhelmed the weaker early game damage of Morphling and Prophet. Against a lesser team, VG could have come back due to their great map movements and farming, but Newbee’s ganks and reactions were simply too precise to allow them a foothold. Like game 1, even though the game looked a stomp, the balance was razor thin. Had Mu died instead of getting off his split, VG could have easily taken control and bullied Hao around before his Linkens, giving Sylar and Rotk enough room to become unstoppable.The series was starting to heat up after being tied 1-1 by Newbee in game 2. VG drafted a line-up focusing on more early aggression, with very heavy magic damage coming out of the AA, Ember Spirit, and Venomancer. Their plan was to deathball with a strong 5v5, but Newbee were able to pick them apart early with great rotations. It started with an invis rune on Shadow Shaman, who was able to catch out the off-lane Prophet. Meanwhile Mu was able to kill Super mid with the help of Chen. At 7 minutes things started to swing heavily in the favour of Newbee with a smoke gank that resulted in a kill on Ancient Apparition. Super was able to react and get 2 kills, but Newbee reacted even better with Mu coming in on the Puck who took out Super and Venomancer after their major over-commitment. The MVP for this game from Newbee was definitely Mu’s Puck, who was styling on Super throughout the game, and punishing VG’s movements, baiting them into bad fights which inevitably gave Newbee a 17 minute win with a score of 16-6.The final game had everything on the line for both teams. Newbee stuck to their guns with the draft, opting yet again for the Ember Spirit that has proved to lay waste to VG’s style of play. They picked up the Doom as well, which acted as a nice counter to the Weaver and Veno from VG. Overall their lineup focused on gaining early control with pick-offs, which has been the theme for each winner in this series. VG lost this game at the draft in my opinion, focusing too much on 5v5 presence in the mid-game and maintaing some sort of late-game potential, but lacking early strength and strong initiation and survivability against the strong and aggressive lineup of Newbee.Right from the start Newbee scored first blood on the middle lane with a smoke gank support rotation. VG tried too hard to make things happen themselves, and at 3-4 minutes they ran into each in the mid-lane resulting in a 3-1 trade going in the favour of Newbee. The Ember Spirit got a double kill, already snowballing him ahead of the rest. In all, Newbee got ahead early against a team that desperately needed to trade even early on, and by 15 minutes the score was already 19-3 and the GG was called. VG were able to get off a few nice SK and AA ult combos, but they were only able to pick-off Shadow Shaman during these. Doom was shutting down Weaver in each fight and the Brewmaster was able to sit in the frontlines unphased by anything VG had.Congratulations to Newbee on winning the TI4 Grand Finals! Administrator