The Dota 2 International is fast approaching, and yesterday Valve announced their six invited teams to this year’s iteration of the competition.
OG, Evil Geniuses, Newbee, Invictus Gaming, Team Liquid and Virtus.Pro are the firs to see invites to the competition. Three teams from Europe, two from China and one from North America. Both Newbee and Invictus Gaming are former champions of the International, the same applying for Evil Geniuses. OG have won four Valve Dota 2 Majors. The notable change here is that for the first time in the history of the International, a defending team will not be among those invited. Wings Gaming, unfortunately, split after the International due to issues between the players and the organisation.
A number of things are changing this year for the international including the removal of the Wildcard spot. From June 22nd to 26th online open qualifiers will take place in each respective region where those teams who qualify in the open regional playoffs will head to the regional playoffs where they will face against a set of invited teams from each region. The open qualifiers are open to anyone who wishes to compete. If you’re willing to compete, your best bet is to play on EU. There won’t be much time to rest as the next leg of qualifiers begin on the 26th of June and will run till the 29th. These will be the regional qualifiers made up of invited teams and open qualifier winners. Two new regions have been added – South America and CIS.
Image via Wykrhm Reddy
The main event will take place at the Seattle Key Arena on August 7th to 12th, and there are a few changes to this year’s event. 18 Teams will be heading to Seattle for the final stage of “qualifiers,” up from 16. This is due to the new regions and the fact that three top teams from each region will head to Seattle. At the International, the 18 teams will be split into two groups with the bottom two teams heading home before the playoffs.
Dota 2 is in a rather good place leading up to the International with no clear team dominating the competition. This means this year’s International is going to be an exciting one, but I’m back OG.
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Last Updated: June 20, 2017
