posted by Tezzeret,
Western Qualifier:
May 13th - 19th, 2013With so many good teams being invited to the Western qualifier, this is arguably one of the most stacked tournaments of the year. It is also possibly the closer fought qualifier of the two regions. With half of the teams having recent roster changes, the field is also highly difficult to predict, as old wisdom may fall short in the coming days.
The Old Dogs
Evil Geniuses and Mousesports have been long time top tier teams of the western scene, and were not far from consideration for a direct invite, if it had not been for greater inconsistency, and in the case of EG a prolonged period of absence from the scene, both of these two teams might well have seen themselves already invited. However, with both teams trying to inject some new life into their rosters for this qualifier, they are the teams who have to defend their ground against the onslaught of talented challengers.
Young Hounds From The CIS
Meanwhile, before the shuffle began to take place, two teams were on the ascension within the CIS scene, the second place finishers of RaidCall EMS One Spring Season, RoX.KiS, as well as the second place finisher from TechLas Cup LAN event in Moscow, iCCup. These two teams may have been slightly overlooked with all the buzz surrounding the newly formed star studded rosters, especially as earlier predictions of Artur 'Goblak' Kostenko returning to lead his former teammates in iCCup fell through, but they are certainly out to prove that had they only been given a short time longer to grow, they would have had to be in consideration even for a direct invite.
Redemption Song
Two teams which have had a rough while after a period of dominance are certainly Team Empire and dd.Dota. After losing Gleb 'Funn1k' Lipatnikov to Na`Vi, Empire stuggled to find stable ground, in the end seeing their former core split into two. The half that remained has now rebuilt around Dmitriy 'LighTofHeaveN' Kupriyanov, while the other half joined up with the French players of dd.Dota, who made up the core of the former mTw roster which won the Western Qualifiers last year. For both of these teams, this is now a quest of redemption, of vindication, as they seek to prove that they can once more reach the levels of their former successes.
Waiting For A Come-Up
Two teams who have constantly been on the verge of a breakthrough make up the final contestants for the Western Qualifier. Absolute Legends have not only a big name sponsor behind them, but also the Danish legacy of Meet Your Makers to live up to, but have not quite managed to make things click with their promising roster. Meanwhile, QPAD Red Pandas represent a very different kind of potential, presenting several young talented players along with a harrowed Starcraft 2 veteran and the might of a LAN environment, which however has after some initial success fallen short of the hopes of many fans. Both of these teams are not with their backs against the wall looking to make things happen at the 11th hour.
Western Qualifier Schedule and Format
The eight teams will be split into two groups of four, which will then play a miniature best-of-three double elimination bracket (GSL style) which will produce two teams which will advance to the second stage of the competition.
Image by GD Studio
Following this there will be a second group stage identical to that of the first group stage. The top two teams will then proceed to play a best-of-five Grand Final, the winner of which will qualify for the International 2013, while the runner up moves into contention for the Wildcard slot, to be played right before the event itself between the wildcard contestants from both West and East.
And according to GD Studio the Groups will be released in two days time live on their stream:
The groups for the TI3 Western Qualifier will be announced live on stream this Saturday at 8pm CEST.
— The GD Studio (@TheGDStudio) May 3, 2013
Schedule
May 13th 13:30 CEST: Group Stage 1: Group A, initial matches and winner’s match (3xBO3)
May 14th 17:00 CEST: Group Stage 1: Group A, loser’s match and final match (2xBO3)
May 15th 14:00 CEST: Group Stage 1: Group B, initial matches and winners’ match (3xBO3)
May 16th 17:00 CEST: Group Stage 1: Group B, loser’s match and final match (2xBO3)
May 17th 14:00 CEST: Group Stage 2: Initial matches and winner’s match (3xBo3)
May 18th 17:00 CEST: Group Stage 2: Loser’s match and final match (2xBO3)
May 19th 17:00 CEST: Grand Final (1xBO5)
Qualifier Teams Rosters:
Mousesports Adrian 'Fata' Trinks Dominik 'Black^' Reitmeier Pascal 'paS' Lohmeier Max 'Qojqva' Broecker Troels 'syndereN' NielsenAbsolute Legends Brian 'MaNia' Strandby Mikkel 'miGGel' Berg Jesper 'Miracle' Nyhlén Jonathan 'unicorn' Arge Christoffer 'Ryze' Wintherdd.Dota Artur 'Goblak' Kostenko Sebastien 'Ceb' Debs Titouan 'Sockshka' Merloz Thibault 'Funzii' Calonne Airat 'Silent' GazievRoX.KiS Stanislav 'BzzIsPerfect' Glushan Gleb 'hardEEv' Ushenko Vladimir 'Yol' Basov Andrey 'Dread' Golubev Aleksey 'Solo' BerezinEvil Geniuses Clinton 'Fear' Loomis Jimmy 'DeMoN' Ho Robert 'Bdiz' Tinnes Jio 'Jeyo' Madayag Alaan 'Bamboe' FarajQPAD Red Pandas Niklas 'Wagamama' Högström Hampus 'Mini' Olsson Wehsing 'SingSing' Yuen Kyung Hyun 'SeleCT' Ryoo Jesse 'JerAx' VainikkaTeam Empire Visar 'Valeera / twiSta / faker--' Zymberi Vladislav 'blowyourbrain' Morozyuk Roman 'Scandal' Sadotenkov Damir 'Mitch' Skaricic Dmitriy 'LightOfHeaven' KupriyanoviCCup Maxim 'Jackal' Doroschenok Oleg 'wejustzik' Zinovenko Roman 'Resolut1on' Fominok Andrey 'alwayswannafly' Bondarenko Andrey 'Mag' Chipenko
Eastern Qualifier:
May 20th - 26th, 2013As ever with the East, the Chinese teams look to dominate the qualifier against a varied field of talented teams from accross South-East Asia. With most of the big talent from Malaysia and Singapore already invited to the event, will the challengers be able to put up a fight? Let's have a look.
Our Chinese Overlords
Having won the Eastern qualifier last year without dropping a single game, TongFu will be looking to repeat their dominating performance. With Yang 'KingJ' Zhou solidifying their roster, they may very well do that, but they will face stiff competition from two teams that were formed after last years International, namely ViCi Gaming and RattleSnake.
While ViCi represent youthful talent, their playstyle has so far harkened back to old 4-protect-1 strategies, and looks unlike to have changed with the addition of legendary farmer Gong 'ZSMJ' Jian. Meanwhile RattleSnake represent a often more experimental take on the game, not being afraid to borrow strategies commonly seen in Europe. The wildcard of the group is Rising Stars, a team that was formed around the same time as RattleSnake but which has not quite come into their own yet.
Familiar Challengers
Even though MiTH.Trust and Mineski have not made headlines lately in regards to their performance they are still considered to be the best teams their respetive countries have to offer, and the names of the respective organization are well remembered within the Dota scene. In particular MiTH may pose a threat to the Chinese teams.
The Underdogs
The perennial underdogs include up and coming team First Departure along with Neolution.Int. Both teams have had strong showings in tournaments based in South East Asia but never seem to be able to get that "big break" when going up against more seasoned opponents. Their big strength will be that the qualifiers are played online, with Singaporeans having famously good performances due to low pings.
Qualifier Teams Rosters:
MiTh.Trust Trai 'Tnk' Akaravinak Chanon 'aabBAA' Chiwpreecha Nattapong 'r5r5' Petkong Pipat 'Lakelz' Prariyachat Noppadon 'FeiMao' PaopongprapunVici Gaming Chen 'Cty' Tianyu Lu 'Fenrir' Chao Xu 'Xtt' Xuntao Xu 'Fy' Linsen Gong 'ZSMJ' JianFirst Departure Galvin 'Meracle-' Kang Jian Wen Paul 'Hana' Tan Ke Da Wilson 'Poloson' Koh Chin Wei Chan 'Lubby' Jun Jie Jonathan 'Scripted' Lee Wen JunRattleSnake Zhi Cheng 'LaNm' Zhang Kai 'kabu' Zhao Peng 'Icy' Wang Luo 'Xi' Yinqi Guo 'Sag' LiRising Stars Xiaodong 'InJuly' Yang Yuxiang 'Air' Yin Zhang 'Rabbit' Wang Su 'super' Peng Silong 'xdd' LiuLedion Dreamz Hiroshi 'Yoshi' Yoshimoto Hiroshi 'Owey' Dela Cruz Julius 'Julz' De Leon Lloyd 'LA' Alfred Patrick 'JyC' PascuaTongFu Chen 'Hao' Zhihao Zhang 'Mu' Pan Wang 'SanSheng' Zhaohui Wang 'Banana' Jiao Zhou 'KingJ' YangMineski HyperX Raniel 'Yani' Ogdol Jose Miguel 'Gio' Ramolete James 'Wootz' Valdez Ryan Jay 'raging-potato' Qui Joshua 'Owa' Dela Serna Joven 'Joven' Pancho
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