«Previous post | Next post»

Eyes on the prize. Puppey brings years of experience into his games of Dota 2 and directs his whole team incredibly well

Team Secret has so much in their pockets. 2 straight LANS, MLG, NYC. They are the new Team DK, built to win, but with slightly better synergy in the sense where Puppey is the top dog in the chain of command. Old DK had plenty of strong personalities and conflicting voices – that compromised the team’s strategy, even if their teamfights were always highlight-reel worthy.

Puppey lifts the second trophy for this iteration of Team Secret – one of many for the veteran.

How did such a new Team Secret win Nanyang? Through some luck, and the incredible skill they already have. With only one LAN under this team’s belt, they are hardly expected to be as dominant as they were.

Today’s Team Secret. MiSeRy, W33ha, Puppey, Pieliedie, EternaLEnvy. [Godz, XiiTuzi, iceiceice]

Against yesterday’s VG, Team Secret had luck on their side. VG whiffed on many support rotations, which would go on to cost them the game. The most notable example for this is when VG faced Secret in Game 3, where they committed too much for pie’s Bounty Hunter. 15 minutes in, Secret had 10k net worth (Battle Fury, Power Treads, Vladimir’s Offering, Poor Man’s Shield) on Anti Mage at 17:00, with BurNing second at only 6.8k, and BurNing had a Midas. It went downhill quickly from there, and Super definitely did nothing to help.

2-7 Killscore, but the Net worth graph tells a different story.

Super is a feast or famine core; against w33ha, that’s just telling w33 to win his lane if he can, which gives them the edge. W33 either wins or breaks even, w33’s shadow fiend games are how super should have been playing his Shadow Fiend from behind, making sure to maximize souls and farm instead of trying to gank after falling behind. Crucial misplays from the VG core lost them game 2 when Super would not press lanes for advantages, allowing w33ha to free farm.

Secret is incredibly skilled in the sense where each player is the best in their role. Pie is a (6), envy’s carry/AM is as fearsome’s as BurNIng’s, Puppey is a god drafter, MiSeRy can do anything. w33ha plays mid for a living. It’s a so-called “dream team”, and the way to punish their greed in the mid game is to win the laning stage or break even, difficult against Secret’s skilled players.

They are also humble enough now to recognize when they are “wrong”, something that many top-tier players lack. Simple hubris always loses games.

EternaLEnvy hard engaging on VG’s relatively slow heroes (Travels on Shadow Fiend) to allow w33ha to catch up. He is all alone now, but in 4 seconds, his teammates will catch up.

Secret’s weakness is how they enter fights. Usually, they’ll use their advantage to hard engage and allow other teammates to catch up (EE in-game 1, with a doom, MiSeRy’s slardar, sprint-crush-blink working so well simply because it’s exactly how secret play.) alchemist is fearsome because the radiance he’ll eventually get cancels slardar blink, disallowing the easy engage. The games Secret tends to win are those where EE becomes farmed and builds damage and/or w33ha gets ahead. Manage to shut either down, Secret will be limping the whole game. The problem is that the other 3 of Secret does so much to secure w33 and EE. Every game VG tried to early gank misery instead of w33 or ee, they lost the game because ee got too farmed.

Pointless kills. With the supports getting the last hits, pieliedie’s deaths only created space for Secret, wasting VG’s time hunting him.

Another unique thing about Secret’s strategy is that they prioritize getting Roshan as soon as possible. This is made easier by w33ha as he always plays high-damage midlaners which can get Roshan easily like Meepo, Windranger, Shadow Fiend. The ability to deprive Team Secret of their aegis was incidental to Vici Gaming; in Game 2 notably, Vici did not think to control Roshan and ended up allowing w33ha to snowball under the safety of an Aegis, forcing VG to make more mistakes in being unwilling to take SF’s aegis away with their ultimates.

5-2 scoreline, but MiSeRy draws attention to the top lane, allowing Secret to secure Aegis to w33ha.

Whoever does the strategy for VG didn’t recognize Secret’s threats enough. Super drafted straightforwardly; they actually needed the range to harass Secret’s cores which played very safe. Puppey’s dazzle (which he eventually started to prioritize) serves a very important role in snowballing Secret’s farm: the minus armor turns a shadow blade into a desolator. Conversely, when VG got dazzle, Secret was always missing just that little bit of damage to win the game.

EE plays melee carries the best. His shadow fiend… well, let’s not talk about that. Ember, doom, AM were his top performers in this LAN, winning two games with that freaking AM against VG.

Jacky “EternaLEnvy” Mao, after his first AM game, came out to talk to some pro players sitting in the front row.

Secret actually has the potential to take it all again until they get figured out; becoming a victim of their own success. Puppey really proves that dota 2 games can be won in the drafting stage, and pre-game strategies always give you the best chance to win a game since everyone knows what they are doing without thinking too much about it. Having one less thing to think about leads to better mechanics and gameplay,which is why you constantly see pro players truly shine in teamfights, because that is the moment where everything else doesn’t matter. Anything that happens pre-team fights are already advantages. You can’t do anything about those.

A photo booklet by yours truly for this event! Prepare for the next event, the Frankfurt Majors! Follow my social media if you like my writing and want me to continue producing content; I need followers, so I can bargain for myself and make a living!

If you enjoy my content, please follow me on twitter @TheFreakofnatur, facebook at Chen Yiji and email me at [email protected]. Until next time!

Chen Yiji
The Gaming Ground
Twitter: @TheFreakofnatur