![GGBet 2021 plain]({"0":"https:\/\/cdn0.gamesports.net\/donkey_0\/0\/1.png?1642155323","1024":"https:\/\/cdn0.gamesports.net\/donkey_1\/0\/1.png?1642155323"})
The first game in the
Team Empire versus 
Ninjas in Pyjamas* series was a dominant showing for the Swedes. An early vanguard for Jonas 'jonassomfan' Lindholm's Axe meant that he was too tanky to take down, and Empire just couldn't fight around him. The Russian squad got tired of the slaughter and tapped out by just 23 minutes into the game. 
20.000 Net Worth difference at 23 minutes: Empire call the GG.Game two started out as a reversal of that disastrous showing. Jonassomfan, who was so crucial to the game 1 win, lost his first duel against
Airat 'Silent' Gaziev's Gyrocopter. The Legion Commander snowball started rolling the wrong way. With a little help of the extra damage, Empire took control of the game. They moved in a familiar pattern: pick off a hero, take a tower, go back to farm. NiP struggled against that systematic play in the only way they could.
Linus 'Limmp' Blomdin's Lina bought a shadowblade and helped Adrian 'Era' Kryeziu's Antimage splitpushing. The dirt-poor Legion Commander couldn't find a single pickoff and instead resigned himself to shutting down Empire's supports during teamfights. In time, Silent's Gyrocopter became too huge to deal with and the Russians started pushing as five. NiP fought back. Even though they lost buildings and buybacks, they managed to repel the assault every single time. But their supply of gold and disposable base buildings soon ran out. After a huge fight at the top barracks, where NiP took out Silent, they were left with only a single ranged rax.
The Swedes held their base and then took a huge fight in the river, killing Silent again and putting him on the sidelines for a full two minutes. But
Viktor 'GeneRaL' Nigrini's Queen of Pain upped the ante by sniping off their top barracks, and now NiP were fighting into megacreeps while having taken only a single melee barracks of their own. They had only one option left: to go for the throne. 
Silent gets dueled and taken out, while General takes NiP's last remaining ranged barracks.Empire's heroes were respawning. Era and Jonas were hitting the throne, but the Queen of Pain was harrassing them constantly, and the Antimage's huge health pool soon got whittled down. Finally it was up to Jonassomfan and his underfarmed LC to take the last sliver of health off of the Radiant throne, but it just wasn't enough. He got taken out when the Radiant ancient had only 40 HP left.
It seemed to be the end. Radiant megacreeps were swarming the Dire base and Limmp's Lina simply couldn't hold them off anymore. The Radiant ancient had started regenerating. But Era bought back and did the only thing he could do at that point: he sold his Treads and Battlefury to buy Boots of Travel 2, while Jonassomfan ran towards the radiant base.
Full Match VOD! (Final moments start from 54 mins in-game or 1:04 on the video)
The Legion Commander got caught, but not before Era could TP to him and blink onward, towards the precariously low throne. The Antimage, undeterred by the supports standing in his way, started hitting the building while on the other side of the map General was hitting his. The Radiant ancient got down to 8 HP as Dire ancient shattered. And the Dire ancient is not the only thing that exploded. Emotions on twitter were running wild:
WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT GAME
— Statsman Bruno (@StatsmanBruno) September 5, 2015HOLD MY DONGER
— Henrik Ahnberg (@AdmiralBulldog) September 5, 2015alright that empire vs nip game 2 was bonkers
— Clinton Loomis (@FearDotA) September 5, 2015you know a game was crazy when not even a third of your feed is Dota ppl, and your twitter feed is suddenly all Dota
— William Cho (@WillChobra) September 5, 2015After that second game, the third almost seemed like a formality. NiP were once again all business. The Legion Commander that fell flat in game 2 instead gained early momentum, getting up to 80 duel damage at 28 minutes (in stark contrast to his 46 dmg at 40 minutes during game 2). Era’s antimage gets completely and utterly out of control, almost doubling up Empire’s Gyro. In the words of Blitz: “NiP are as dominant as it gets”.
With that decisive win, NiP close out an up-and-down series to secure their spot in the finals of the European qualifier. Tomorrow, on sunday 6 September at 18:00 CEST, they will be playing Vega Squadron for a ticket to the LAN event at ESL New York!
We did it! Almost thought we won that game 2, was quite intense! Finals vs @VegaSquadron tomorrow! #GONINJAS #8hp
— Adrian Kryeziu (@EraDota) September 5, 2015
Comments