posted by Sun_Tzu,
FXOpen as they take out the third game of the NSL finals.
Due to the Korean Dota 2 scene being in the infant stages, the games over the course of the Starter League were at times fairly chaotic and one-sided, with teams opting for high agression play and going for kills together with unorthodox heroes such as Meepo seeing quite a bit of play, instead of more control orientated play.
With March's experience in the Dota scene during his stay in Canada, FXOpen were the clear favorites in the league. Alongside veteran players such as Febby who played briefly for such teams as Kaipi and an early rendition of No TideHunter, they were able to breeze through the bracket, eliminating DCrux as well as Kellogg Tigerpower.
Meanwhile E`oT had a harder road to the finals, as despite being the more experienced team they were forced to play out an entire best of three series in their first match against Best Magic Skill in their round one match. The same thing happened in their semi-finals match against Bird Gang, but luckily for them they were able to come out on top, eventhough Birdgang were slight favorites going into the series.
Team Eye of the Tiger vs. FXOpen
Drafts of the series can be found here.
Game 1
E`oT tried to offensive trilane in the first of the finals games, hoping to give space for Outworld Devourer and Meepo to take over the game, but ended up outlaned as Meepo went up against Lich and Bounty Hunter on the bottom lane and had a rough time, as well as Kim 'QO' Seon-Yeob on the mid Templar Assassin doing far better than he should have against the opposing OD.
Once the two teams started clashing the presence of Meepo quickly began working against E`oT, with the Chain Frost bouncing freely around the opposing team and making it nearly impossible for the opponents to try to contest fights, as FXOpen took the high ground by 18 minutes in and closed off the game.
Game 2
After having gone without a single death in all of the tournament up until this point, Kim 'Febby' Yong-Min on the Broodmother broke his record, joining his teammate Tae Won 'March' Park who had similarly lost his perfect streak in the first game of the series, as E`oT got off to a lot better start and were able to trade kills during the lanes and keeping the game fairly close.
Things however went quickly out of hand for E`oT when QO once more stepped up to make the big plays, this time on Storm Spirit with which he was able to zip around fights, dominating mid game engagements. By around 25 minutes FXO were far enough ahead to not want to leave the E`oT base, even as Yoon 'baNhwa' Deok-Soo on Nature's Prophet was split pushing the FXO base and banging away at their top lane Barracks. In the end the valiant efforts of baNhwa did not matter, as FXO closed out the game by 30 minutes, going up 2-0 in the series.
Game 3
For the third game FXO went for style points, putting QO on to Meepo and going up 7-0 by 7 minutes in, before the game devolved into an absolute bloodbath, which ended up favouring E`oT's baNhwa on the Axe, even though FXO with the Bounty Hunter kept slightly ahead on kills.
The attempted comeback was halted in it's tracks by 16 minutes, as FXOpen took a Roshan and E`oT ended up losing their full team trying to contest it, making it 16-25 in kills. Another five deaths at 20 minutes for the Aegis on Meepo allowed FXO to put pressure on the base at 21 minutes, forcing the final 'GG' of the series two minutes later.
FXOpen defeats Team E`oT 3-0 to claim first place.
Final Standings
1st - FXOpen- 10 Million Won (~$8,700) + Paid trip to The International 2013
2nd - Team E´oT - 5 Million Won (~$4,350)
3rd-4th - Birg Gang & Kellogg Tigerpower 2 Million Won (~$1,750)
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