TI9 Group Stage Meta Recap: Everything Can Work
Despite all the craziness, the group stage didn’t end up in any tiebreakers, but it still was the most entertaining group stage in the history of the International. The most interesting and the most diverse.
One hundred and ten unique hero picks, one hundred and fifteen contested heroes. Truly, everything can work. Except for Night Stalker and Riki, apparently, but there is still plenty of time for these heroes to show up.
Meta Staples
There are three somewhat problematic heroes right now: Alchemist, Enchantress and Shadow Demon all have 80%+ contest rate. All three of them also have 55%+ win rate, so their popularity is definitely not misguided.
Shadow Demon was probably one of the more predictable popular heroes. Soul Catcher is one hell of a spell that can turn most AoE nukes into instant kills. It makes opening kills that much easier, and the hero also provides decent lane presence and safety for the situations where your team is the one getting initiated on. He is good when you are ahead, good when you are behind and very versatile. We expect the hero to remain incredibly popular.
Alchemist is kind of weird, though. On one hand, he should be a risky pick that heavily relies on the laning stage and the first ten or so minutes of the game to get tempo. On the other, recent changes to how Aghanim’s Scepters work allows him to directly translate his gold into useful upgrades until the very late stages of the game. His popularity is probably going to decrease slightly as the tournament progresses, with better teams simply finding more ways of shutting the hero down. Alternatively he will become the highest priority first phase ban for the second pick team.
Finally, there is Enchantress and if you are a support player you know how annoying this hero is to play against. After receiving several buffs in a row, the hero is now among the most banned heroes of the tournament since she can withstand pretty much any lane, has great damage output and can also provide some extra pushing power if needed. Her ability to purge buffs also comes incredibly handy when playing against heroes like Ember Spirit or Ogre Magi. She is also very likely to remain in her priority ban category for the rest of the tournament.
Overrated heroes
Lone Druid, Mars, Phoenix, Pugna and Pudge all have <20% win rate in at least five games. Teams experimented with them, but they rarely worked, making them very questionable picks going forward. But they are not the overrated heroes.
Omniknight, Grimstroke and Outworld Devourer all win less than a third of their games, despite being picked somewhat frequently. Al three heroes received some nerfs going into TI and it seems the players are just starting to understand the implications.
There is still a place in the game for both Omniknight and Grimstroke: first provides one of the strongest buffs in the game that can turn your carry into an unstoppable machine, while the second can still lead to some amazing combos, but it looks like the OD’s future is really uncertain. There are so many viable cores in the game right now and it is likely we won’t see any more of this hero, unless it is a 10th surprise pick in a perfect game.
But the medal for the most overrated hero still goes to Ogre Magi with a 45% win rate across 51 games. The hero has been played as both position four and position five supports, as well as in the offlane and it seems he doesn’t really work consistently. He can frontline, but his impact on any given teamfight is very restricted, especially in comparison to heroes like Sand King, Earthshaker, Centaur and Tidehunter.
Moreover, regardless of position, Ogre Magi players frequently go for no points in Ignite and that is an interesting new development, one we do not have enough data points to analyze. Though we can say that at least statistics-wise so far it is the build that leads to the highest win rate. We expect less experimentation with the hero going forward, since his ability to frontline, initiate and soak up damage as a position three core is not on par with the competition.
Underrated heroes
Abaddon, Dragon Knight and Earth Spirit all had great success during the group stage, but were mostly deemed unworthy of bans. We highlighted Dragon Knight in our predictions post, but the hero turned out to be a lot more popular than we expected, with eight games in the group stage already. His level 20 talent is what allows him to win most of his matches, since it solves a lot of the farming problems for the hero in the later stages of the game.
Abaddon was picked sixteen times with a win rate of over 60% and given the rise in popularity of Mirana, he is likely to continue on being a viable position five option. Earth Spirit is still the good old Earth Spirit — he was played only by four teams, but all of them had great success with this incredibly niche hero.
We expect both Abaddon and Dragon Knight to start rising in popularity, as the tournament’s meta starts developing. Earth Spirit is still too specific of a hero that must be trained, before he can have an impact.
Closing Thoughts
It is really hard to analyze the current meta. Everything can work and even Pudge won one out of his five games somehow. That means we can’t give you our usual suggestions of what to try in your pubs or what heroes to increase your MMR on.
And that is what is great about Dota right now. The game is at its best, you are free to try weird combinations, experiments and figure out what works for you and what doesn’t. This process of exploration is what got lost with the rise of the competition and right now is probably the best time to recapture the magic of simply playing Dota and having fun. So, maybe, instead of looking through data, trying to analyze every bit of information that can give you a competitive edge, simply go and play some games. That’s what we are going to do.
I think I will continue updating the Fantasy League guide in the comment section here, so:
Main Event Day One Quick Thoughts:
We are picking from TNC, VP, PSG.LGD and Vici Gaming, since they are playing a bo3.
MID:
Somnus/Maybe is a clear leader in this category. Not only does he have the second highest average score of all mid players, but he also has an arguably easier matchup vs. Virtus.Pro. The relative power levels between the teams in different groups will remain unknown until after the first series of matches, but VP does look subjectively weaker than they did last year and, perhaps more importantly, weaker than PSG.LGD.
You could argue for Armel/Ori simply because their series are more evenly matched (=longer games) and both of them are good in terms of stats, but so far the game length didn’t necessarily directly correlate with the amount of fantasy points for core players. Despite having an average game length of ~50 minutes on TNC, compared to ~38 minutes on PSG.LGD, the average amount of fantasy points earned by Somnus/Maybe is 1.3 points higher than Armel.
CORE:
Paparazi and Gabbi are the two highest scoring cores in the games tomorrow, but they are playing against each other, so that might be a bit of a problem. Ame is only 0.8 points behind them and should probably be one of your guaranteed choices.
Second choice should really depend on who you believe is going to win in VG vs. TNC. Vici Gaming does look like a stronger team to us, but upsets do happen. We are still going with Paparazi, since stats-wise they are a better team with higher KDA and overall winrate.
SUPPORTS:
VG.Dy all the way. No matter what happens, he scores incredibly well in his games and he is also playing against TNC, who have the highest game average of all teams. It is probably the safest pick for Day 1 of the main event.
Second support is a bit harder. Tims is statistically the second best choice and the man is a beast of a player. Third best choice is LGD.xNova and he is 1.1 points behind on average.
It would be easy to simply tell you to go for Tims, but with position four supports we really need to take the matchup into account and, as discussed previously, we lean towards Vici Gaming.
Tims average for the games they lose in is 15.46. It is 18.39 overall and 20.67 when TNC wins. xNova scores 17.25 on average. He also scores 20.17 when they lose, but PSG.LGD only lost three times so it is hardly significant data. Overall, as you can see, it is important for position four supports to take off and be on a winning team to outperform position five supports.
Since only two best games of a bo3 count for fantasy, there are three different expected outcomes for Tims: 30.92 if they lose two games in a row, 36.13 if they manage to win one game, but still lose the series and 41.34 if they win the series.
xNova, as a position five support, is expected to score 34.5 regardless of the outcome, at least in our super-simple (and statistically somewhat stupid) model.
While writing this I was trying to construct an argument for xNova and how it is a better choice, but after doing my weird calculations and realising that TNC taking a game off VG is definitely not impossible, I am finally convinced that Tims is worth the risk.
Lineup for Day 1 of the Main Event:
Paparazi, Ame, Somnus, Dy and Tims
Mr kawaii fantasy lord whatd you put down for your bracket predictions
Even IO carry did worked.
So what do you think about the unpicked heroes? (Surprisingly, no heroes are ignored, just unpicked/unbanned)
Dark Seer is somewhat a bit of surprise to me. Is it because he's in awkward position between elusive offlane vs tank offlane? Or is it due to popularity of melee carries?
KotL also is a bit of surprise with his buff on "mana leak". Is it because meta favors a much tankier support?
Clockwerk has the same position as Dark Seer. Although he has a good combination of nuke and better innitiation, he's still unpicked
Again another offlane, Brewmaster and i am seeing a bit of pattern here. All 3 are melee offlane who isn't tanky but also has no reliable escape. Even Underlord has been picked at least once, but no room for them?
The last but actually pretty predictable are Ursa. Ursa was really kiteable and basicly Troll Warlord without disable (and again, no good escape).
But what do you guys think? I am just an ancient 1 who barely know how today's meta work
Not a single word about Io carry? Seriously?
For those wondering about the IO carry, it's a bit of a misguidance to call that the 'carry'. Yes he got priority farm, sure he got a maelstrom, but the real carry was Topson in the game, and Ana ended up having more deaths than kills in the game. It worked out more than it straight worked if you ask me.
^^^
On group stage Ana do IO 4 times with K/D/A :
1st : 11/5/16 (giving 36% total damage from team)
2nd : 9/2/6 (36% damage)
3rd : 6/1/16 (28% damage)
4th : 4/6/14 (28% damage)
So for me, Ana also carrying the game.
I think I will continue updating the Fantasy League guide in the comment section here, so:
ye good joke buddy
@♏ikeeCS ツ
He did it more than once? Ok that's fair.
Main Event Day Two Quick Thoughts:
As the tournament progress these kinda get easier, so for the first time quick thoughts are actually going to be quick)
SUPPORTS:
Pieliedie would be close to a must. Despite having one of the toughest teams to play against tomorrow, we still have full faith in our position five support fantasy meta. Though there is a chance OG will seal the deal too fast, so there are other options.
Fly is a good, consistent pick that has one of the highest averages. Their match against Team Secret can be a stomp, but we have more faith in EG than we do in Newbee to put up a long, grueling fight, or, possibly, even win the game. For the same reasons, Puppey can be a decent pick as well.
There is an argument to be made about TNC supports, namely Eyyou. He outscores Puppey in terms of averages and is not as matchup-dependant as Tims. It might be a bit too risky to go for Tims in TNC vs Liquid scenario, though TNC might actually look better. Either way it is going to be a long series.
So, Pieliedie if you believe in Newbee and don't think they are going to be stomped by OG.
Eyyou, if you think Liquid and TNC are matched at least evenly.
Tims, if you think TNC looks better than Liquid.
Fly and Puppey if you are boring and just want consistent picks.
We are going with Eyyou and Fly. As always, mix of fun and consistency that is yet to fail us.
MID
Sumail is a great pick if you consider EG to be on par or not significantly behind Team Secret.
Armel, if you believe in the power of TNC Predator.
Topson, if you think Newbee will put up enough of a fight for the series to actually last more than two games, 30 minutes each. (OG has one of the statistically lowest game length averages)
We will go with Sumail.
CORES
Yawar is a top scoring core, but the matchup will probably spoil his average. Nisha turned out to be a consistent winner and a pretty terrible scorer, same with Ana. Miracle... was disappointing fantasy-wise this year.
We are going to go with Gabbi as one of our picks. TNC and Liquid should battle it out for long enough so that even in losses, he scores at least something. Second pick should really depend on what you personally believe in.
Go Yawar for great points if they manage to fight OG.
Go Ana if you think he will actually have to break a sweat when playing against Newbee.
Go Ramzes if you want boring and consistent.
Go Miracle if you still believe.
Gabbi is a bit of an unknown, so I will consider him our "crazy fun" pick that can pay off greatly or do close to nothing. Therefore I will get Ramzes for simple, consistent scoring.
Final Lineup for Day 2 of the main event:
Ramzes, Gabbi, Sumail, Eyyou, Fly
Main Event Day Three Quick Thoughts:
MIDS:
The moment I said these will get easier, they got so much harder. We have EG that look strong and OG that look strong, but... weird? We have LGD vs. Vici Gaming, who are matched somewhat evenly. We have the fifth best mid scorer in CCnC playing against Infamous and it is yet another match that is impossible to bet on. Finally, we have Secret vs. Mineski, where Secret are still favorites, but MidOne is such a terrible fantasy scorer...
I think I will simply go with Sumail and his best average. I still think EG will put up a fight and might even win the series. And Sumail scores well even in games he loses anyways.
If you really believe in the power of friendship and think EG will lose the series in a spectacular fashion, go with Somnus/Maybe who is the second best pick.
CORES:
Nisha is going to be our safe, boring pick. We failed with Ramzes today, but Secret did look a lot more convincing during the group stage and looked overall decent in the series against EG. It's just that EG looked really, really, really hungry.
We prefer to have one safe and one "risky" pick in our fantasy lineups, and we will bet on PSG.LGD in their series against Vici Gaming. Ame is in the middle of the pack in terms of fantasy scoring and is no match for Paparazi, but we expect the latter to lose and cores generally don't do well in losing games. If you think Vici Gaming are going to win, definitely go with big Papa on this one, since he is the top scorer.
Moreover, it might look like Infamous aren't going to make it further and Newbee will put a stop on their Cinderella story, but I don't buy it. These guys are just the right kind of crazy and relentless to actually make it work. So despite great averages, it is hard to consider Yawar as one of the options. He is a bit too risky even for our risky spot.
SUPPORTS:
At least this one is easy. Dy and Fly: position five supports, so they don't care about the match outcome, top scorers, will probably have tough, long series etc. etc. etc. We have enough volatility with cores and mids as it is, so these two should round up the roster pretty well.