What’s Going on at DAC 2018

Dota 2 Asia Championships 2018 is getting close to its end and only 6 teams are left in the competition. They’re fighting for a total of $830.000 and 1500 qualification points for the next edition of The International.

The story so far

Dota 2 Asia Championships 2018 has been full of surprises and many of the top teams got eliminated much sooner than anyone expected. OG left the tournament right after the Group Stage, finishing 7th in Group A with 3 wins and 4 losses. The other 3 teams that joined them at that point were Keen Gaming, Effect and paiN Gaming.

The Breakout Stage of the Main Event was an unusual element for a Dota 2 competition. And I’m pretty sure there are a lot of teams that hated it.

Newbee, Team Secret, VGJ.Thunder and Invictus Gaming were eliminated as a result of its existence and some people raised concerns on Twitter about the large variety of formats that are being used for Dota Pro Circuit LAN events. Here’s what Philip “Tallgeese” Aram (EG’s manager) had to say:

“EG Dota hasn’t played the same tournament format twice this season. That’s a huge issue. Variety is fine, but every LAN is some experimental format. Not a single one has been good enough. You need bo2 RR or GSL groups, an 8 team or more double elim bo3 bracket, and a bo5 GF.”

The first round of upper bracket matches saw Evil Geniuses, Virtus.pro, OpTic Gaming and TNC Pro Team lose their direct matches against LGD Gaming, Team Liquid, Mineski and Vici Gaming respectively. North America lost both of its representatives in the subsequent round of lower bracket encounters, as Evil Geniuses lost to Virtus.pro and OpTic Gaming lost to TNC Pro Team.

At the moment we’re left with 4 lower bracket teams (Vici Gaming, Virtus.pro, Team Liquid and TNC Pro Team) and 2 upper bracket ones (LGD Gaming and Mineski).

Betting predictions

LGD Gaming vs. Mineski

Mineski is the slight favorite here, having proved itself against some of the world’s best at this event. Mineski finished Group A in 2nd place with 6 wins and 1 loss (against Virtus.pro). So far, they won against Team Secret, Evil Geniuses, VGJ.Thunder, and Vici Gaming among others. On the other side, LGD Gaming lost quite a few games against relatively weak teams such as OG and OpTic Gaming.

Vici Gaming vs. Virtus.pro

Virtus.pro is the strongest team in the world right now and the number 1 team in the Dota Pro Circuit rankings. So I fully expect them to win this match against a Vici Gaming that was very inconsistent throughout the season.

Team Liquid vs. TNC Pro Team

These two teams already met each other twice at this event. The first Bo1 was won by Team Liquid while the second one was won by TNC. Going into this Bo3 series, TNC is slightly favored to win simply because Liquid is not in good shape right now and has lost many easy games throughout the tournament.