Meta analysis of the ESL One Genting 2018 tournament

ESL One Genting is an amazing event. From the Facebook drama and Evil Geniuses returning to Tier 1 form, to Newbee winning sweet revenge after a bitter loss at TI7. This is a great tournament with fair format, good crew and lots of great memories. In the end, it doesn’t matter where you are watching Dota, what matters is the quality of the game and ESL One has certainly satisfied us at this point.

This is a tournament with a large number of heroes participating. Out of all the heroes, only 16 of them went unnoticed in a total of 60 games, and 20 were unpicked. While it doesn’t stand out when compared to the TI7 era, it’s still too early to say that we’ve fully understood patch 7.07 and the possibility of upcoming balance updates.

Obviously, in any major tournament, there are always heroes that stand out. They can be lousy or buggy and understanding the reasoning behind those picks and bans will definitely not only improve your vision in reading drafts but also give you a better perspective in the game. rank.

THE MOST COMPETITIVE HEROS

Tiny, Bane, Omniknight and Phantom Lancer are the highest rated heroes in the tournament, with over 70% ban/pick ratio.

Tiny is the most popular hero, reaching 92% of the competition rate, a total of 39 bans and 16 picks in 60 games. Even without the Agility boost and extremely low armor and attack speed, Tiny’s ability can overwhelm the safe lane in even 1v1 situations. Thanks to his ability to farm quickly and a lot of appearances in the early and mid game, making Tiny an extremely annoying hero to fight. With his ultimate and Talent increasing effect resistance, a Tiny in combat is an unstoppable force. Out of the 16 games Tiny was picked, he won 12. That not only makes Tiny the most competitive hero in the league, but also one of the most successful.

Omniknight at the time also had a steady pick up in the game. Omni was criticized for being too greedy in the support role, especially the XP part that is extremely influential if the core is in the offlane position. Things changed dramatically in the offlane position in 7.07 when farming and getting experience in lane became extremely difficult now. Therefore, teams are forced to adapt with strong heroes like Tidehunter, or pick champions with less greed (less need for items) to be effective. Omniknight is clearly effective in this case, being able to pressurize in 1v1 and 1v2, while still being quite comfortable eating XP alone if the opponent decides to triplane with Omniknight.

There’s also Phantom Lancer – the carry that emerged with the Battle Fury change and is the champion that sets the tone for Fury. It’s hard to say how effective this hero is, with a win rate just above average at 53% out of 15 games (which is pretty good), but teams are definitely shy against PL. Probably because it becomes extremely difficult to handle Phantom Lancer – PL can escape, farm as fast as Battle Fury but not push lane as fast as Anti-Mage. This can turn the Phantom Lancer into a slow-exploding bomb, making it easier to control the game when the clock hands up to 35 minutes in the game, thanks to its extremely good farming ability. When compared to Anti-Mage, Phantom Lancer has better DPS, thanks to its crit increase talent at level 25.

THE MOST SUCCESSFUL HEROS (ON 15 GAMES)

Disruptor, Rubick and Lycan definitely stand out in this tournament thanks to its success, followed by Tiny.

Disruptor explodes in the pro scene in CIS. This hero is suitable for active phases and slowly takes a place in the hearts of global teams. Disruptor is great at dealing with agile heroes who rely heavily on skill sets and on their ability to run away to stay alive. Additionally, Disruptor also indirectly increases your team’s push, as you can send an enemy that has teleported to a turret back to its original location. Glimpse can also be used to force combat or avoid combat, making Glimpse a versatile move with huge potential.

On the other hand, Rubick is as strong as his enemies. In the current meta, popular heroes often have high impact moves with high cooldowns. As a result, a good Rubick should have no trouble stealing game-changing moves, like Tidehunter’s Ravage, Omniknight’s Repel or Guardian Angel, or Sand King’s Burrow Strike. In addition, recent changes make Rubick much more effective at dealing damage, helping teammates to be more proactive. Things are mostly late game, but with the benefit of high damage nuke with high armor objects that cannot be underestimated.

Finally, there’s Lycan, the recently mentioned hero. This hero is growing in popularity, appearing in the meta thanks to the perfect handling of EG’s Fear. In the current situation, Lycan is capable of doing a lot of things – is a strong pusher, can split-push well and is also strong in teamfight, thanks to his high damage output and ability to focus on supports. Lycan can’t go head-to-head with the vast majority of hard carries. However, this happens very rarely, because in teamfight, Lycan usually starts by taking out the supports, quickly turning the game down to 5v3 with the advantage in his favor. lycan is definitely a hero to watch out for and cannot be ignored, as warned by the CIS teams.

UNDERSTANDED HEROS (OVER 15 GAMES)

When a hero is picked by the losing team, it doesn’t say much. But when the same hero is picked by multiple teams and the results keep losing, it becomes data for statistics. This case applies to the Witch Doctor and… Tusk.

The idea behind the Witch Doctor is pretty straightforward – Paralyzing Cask is a great move against summons, as it can stun for up to 5 seconds. That is in theory. As such, the Witch Doctor is seen as a ‘light’ counter to Lycan – as you can’t slow the hero, but you can virtually disable entire armies, reducing the damage dealt by a huge amount. In practice, it rarely works, because the Cask jump is unpredictable. It can jump over unnecessary and often unreliable objects. Teams ignore Lycan and think the Witch Doctor is a good counter. Unfortunately, this hero only won 2 of the 15 games in the tournament.

Tusk is completely different. This hero is picked a bit more and also wins quite a bit, but has a win rate of only 36.084%. A lot of people think of this hero as the new Earth Spirit – Earth Spirit is so nerfed that very few people can take advantage of this hero in the professional arena. Tusk went to sup4 in mid early, pressured the opponent in mid and looked for opportunities to harrash to create space or finish the opponent. Tusk’s skill sets are difficult to execute correctly, but they can turn the tide of battle. Ice Shards have all-terrain abilities, with the potential to save the team with Snowball. This hero is no longer in the “learn” stage because Tusk has been around for a long time with successful matches. It seems that some pro players have become ‘flooded’ when using Tusk, as evidenced by Shard’s failures or not optimizing Snowball’s power.

EPILOGUE

Dota Pro Ciruit gradually improved its role when the choke before the Tet holiday of Chinese teams had also decreased a lot. Soon we’ll have better formats, more teams, and lots of good Dota, and usually they start in the regional qualifiers. There are still a lot of issues to address and questions to answer, but for now, let’s focus on what’s most important to Dota – the game itself.

Source: Dotabuff