The EPICENTER Xl tournament is the first in a series of Dota 2 tournaments in the next few weeks. With the top teams in attendance at most of these tournaments, every event sharpens the possibilities of teams who will be invited to TI8.

The group stage of the EPICENTER XL tournament has come to a conclusion. The remaining teams are now involved in a race to secure the top four position at the event. A top 4 finish guarantees DPC points, which is the ultimate goal for several of these teams. The event has already thrown up a few surprises and some fan-favorite teams are already out of the event.

Na’Vi and Newbee are out of the Major

Na’Vi and Newbee are the two teams which are already out of the tournament following poor performances. Natus Vincere lost to Pain Gaming in the group stage which sealed their fate. The CIS squad has been surprisingly inconsistent in the tournament. They had a 2-0 victory over their CIS counterparts Virtus Pro. The 2-1 victory over Virtus Pro was a very shocking victory, even to loyal fans of Natus Vincere.

But the team has been inconsistent and their losses to Newbee, OG and more importantly Pain Gaming came as a huge blow to their fans. Na’Vi relies heavily on the early game fights and a strong Roshan lineup to secure their advantage in a game. But with Pain Gaming putting forth some really unconventional item choices, Na’Vi seemed to be confused on how to handle the Brazilian squad.

The early exit in the EPICENTER XL Group stages puts Na’Vi in a dangerous position. They are still not in the Top eight of the DPC rankings ( currently positioned at No. 10). They will be attending two more Majors this season, but their chances of qualifying for a TI8 invite look extremely bleak right now.

Newbee saw an early exit at EPICENTER too following surprising losses to Pain Gaming and Secret. Sccc has been strong in his individual performance, but the team seems to be lacking in their execution. They have three more Majors to attend in this season, so they still do have a small chance. But if their current form is any indication of their future performance, Newbee is going to have a difficult time.

The Upper Brackets – Led by Virtus Pro

The Upper Bracket Matches are extremely important since a win in the Upper Bracket Round 1 qualifies you to become a Top 4 team. The DPC points will be given out to the Top 4 teams so the matches gain a lot of importance.

Virtus Pro has been looking very strong and continues their dominant form so far in the tournament. If their latest matches are any consideration, they are willing to experiment and mold their team composition. They have shown us how an aggressive team fighting Lycan can be an asset to the team.

This presents a totally new side to the team’s playstyle, which has mostly been around enabling Ramzes666 to flash farm. His signature heroes such as Terrorblade, Lifestealer, Troll require quite a different playstyle to them than playing a Lycan. He has played around 8 different heroes so far in the tournament and their versatility is evident from this fact. The Virtus Pro team has been known to be extremely aggressive once they attain some core items. With Lycanthrope it is quite the same, however, the team reached their core items way sooner. The pushing power of Lycan definitely helped the team as they went about taking down towers for free.

Top 5 players by GPM in pro matches during 2018. @paiNGamingBR‘s hFn is one of the elite farming players right now- not just in SA but in all of pro #Dota2.https://t.co/lODyEfyW1Z pic.twitter.com/CHziYVMRh5 — Nahaz (@NahazDota) May 2, 2018

Having already secured an invite to TI8, it is always interesting to see how Virtus Pro manage to remain on top of the leaderboards consistently. They are the favorites to reach the finals and potentially win the finals as well.

PSG.LGD – Can they stand up to the might of Virtus Pro?

The LGD roster were the finalists at Dreamhack Asia Championships 2018. They had a very close 2:3 loss to Mineski which put them as a top contender for a TI8 invitation. So far at EPICENTER 2018, the team does look very strong. They have only one loss to Liquid, but that was always going to be a very close match.

Their last three Premier tournaments have seen the team reach the finals in two of these events. Their incompetent early group stage exit at ESL One Katowice 2018 will definitely haunt the team. But so far at EPICENTER XL, the team led by Fy has been putting up a decent. Granted they were in the easier of the two groups ( Group A ) the team still managed to score convincing wins over Mineski and FlytoMoon. The biggest disadvantage for the team is in their veto stage. They are extremely predictable and often go for a very similar style of gameplay.

The LGD roster will be looking to secure a decent position at EPICENTER XL. Their DPC ranking is 8th and they are the most vulnerable to being out of contention for a TI8 invite. They will be attending the MDL Changsha and Chinese Supermajor, but their performance in this Major will be crucial to their DPC positioning.

Team Liquid and OG – A thorough mismatch

It is slightly surprising to see Team OG in the Upper Bracket. But when you have an easy group ( especially with Na’Vi and Newbee underperforming by a mile), it’s an easy route to the Upper Bracket. But as they will be up against Liquid, they are definitely going to have a hard time.

Team Liquid is a team that is full of superstars. The likes of Mind_control, Miracle, and GH need no introduction. The team has shown us a lot of variety in recent matches, but seeing Miracle back on his traditional heroes is definitely a sight to watch. Team Liquid is undefeated so far at the Major and is almost surely going to reach the finals. They will, however, most likely be facing Virtus Pro in the Upper Brackets Finals. That will be a match to behold as Virtus Pro have mentioned that Team Liquid is the only team that had given them problems.

The Lower Bracket teams – Do they stand a chance?

There are several teams in the Lower bracket and surprisingly ( or not) Mineski is also a part of the lower bracket. The DAC 2018 winners have been surprisingly ineffective in this tournament with really weird vetoes and playstyles. There seems to be a miscommunication of sorts on the roster as we repeatedly see multiple calls during a team fight. While some players might be backing off, some re-engage in the team fight and ensure a very divided team fight. We have seen this multiple times so far at EPICENTER, but maybe they can redeem themselves in the Lower Bracket. It is going to be extremely difficult to do so as all the Lower Bracket matches ( Round 1&2) are Best of One matches. Mineski will be facing off against Team Secret, which has not been too impressed with their performance either.

Team Secret lost to Na’Vi and OG in the group stage along with the expected loss to Virtus Pro. The team has relied extensively on Puppey creating the space for the team, but with his vetoes favoring certain playstyles, they have not been able to play as aggressive as they want. The lack of space for their Position 1 players often results in a big gap at the top of the net-worth charts. The Secret lineup needs to create more space and help out Ace and MidOne. They obviously need to reinvent their playstyle in order to possibly have a chance to get a Position 4 placement at EPICENTER XL.

Mineski and Secret do stand a small chance of potentially making it to the top 4. But they will have to face off against several strong teams who will come down from the Upper Bracket.

The Wild Cards – FTM & Pain Gaming

No one really had any idea how FTM and Pain Gaming would perform at the Major. But their playstyle and the fact that they qualified for playoffs speaks volumes of their draft and gameplay. FlytoMoon has had an easy path with victories over teams such as Mineski, Complexity, and Empire. But Pain Gaming definitely has been one of the revelations of EPICENTER 2018. HFN being the second highest GPM in the entire tournament creates such a huge buffer for the team. When you have your position one player performing better than the likes of the Miracles and Resolutions of Dota, you know you are in a good position.

We don’t expect FTM or Pain Gaming to compete for a spot in the Top 4. But with their performance, Pain Gaming might just be the dark horse of the tournament.

The teams favored to reach the Top 4:

Virtus Pro Liquid PSG.LGD OG/Mineski

EPICENTER XL schedule takes a one day break after the Group Stage and will resume with the lower bracket matches on 4th of May, 2018. You can catch the action live on EPICENTER’s Twitch channel.