With less than 12 hours before the first post-shuffle LAN event, we take you on a quick tour of MDL's Autumn Group B competitors.
MDL Autumn 2016 is the first LAN event after the Fall Shuffle, and it's a must-watch tournament given the teams coming to China this week. OG, Team Secret, Vici Gaming, LGD FY, Evil Geniuses, Newbee, MVP Phoenix, and IG Vitality are the eight teams showing their new rosters at work for the first time. Featuring a starting GSL Group Stage, MDL Autumn offers plenty of time for its competitors to adjust and calibrate their strategies. The tournament will run from 28th of September to 2nd of October in Xiamen, China, at the Xiamen Exhibition Center.
OG - two amazing drafters
image credits: Wykrhm Reddy
The Fall shuffle shook the two-time Major champions roster quite well, but their new line-up still looks strong on paper. Although many would say, even before they have played any official game, that OG will never be the same without Amer 'Miracle-' Al-Barkawi, the addition of Gustav 's4' Magnusson and Jesse 'JerAx' Vainikka could be exactly what OG needed to cover the big loss from this shuffle. S4 found immediate success the first time he left Alliance for another team for two reasons: first, because the new adventures are always bringing a boost of energy and confidence; second, because his extremely trained drafting skills found a good partner in Clement 'Puppey' Ivanov.
The same thing could happen with OG, as he will now have yet another amazing drafter and captain on his side: Tal 'Fly' Aizik. Apart from the lethal combination that can result from this drafting duo, OG will surely surprise everyone once more with their discovery of Anathan 'ana' Pham. It’s true that OG’s success will heavily rely on the young and very inexperienced ana in mid, but if there’s a team out there that showed in the past that they know how to accommodate the newcomers to the pressure of high end competitive scene, that must be OG. Quite flexible with s4 and Johan 'N0tail' Sundstein capable of switching around roles--and with nothing to lose at the start of the new season--OG may look at this first LAN as the starting point of another success story for their name.
Invictus Gaming Vitality - big expectations
Although many of you are not familiar with IG Vitality’s players and records, the truth is that this is one of the few Chinese teams grinding their way to success, and they're doing it with the same roster they've had since the Shanghai Major shuffle. Although they don’t have any achievements in any of the international tournaments, IG Vitality consistently placed top three of the many Chinese leagues of the last several months. They are coming to MDL Autumn 2016 as the first qualified team from China after 2-0 sweeping the star-studded Vici Gaming J. Prior to this LAN they only participated at VPGame Pro League Season 2, held at the end of July in Changsha, China, where they were crowned Champions.
For most teams the post-TI6 period is associated with vacation time and with the big stress of the Reshuffle, but not for IG Vitality. Although they dropped their entire roster in the recently closed fall shuffle like all the other Chinese teams (only to pick them up shortly after), IG.Vitality kept practicing and training together, according to Bai 'rOtk' Fan. They were the only team who actually did this from the Chinese region. The same old Chinese Dota 2 god, rOtK said on one of his streams from the shuffle period that he expects IG Vitality to have the fastest breakout in the fall season. We will find out if his expectations are accurate in a few days time when MDL Autumn 2016 concudes.
Evil Geniuses - dream blue?
image credits: Evil Geniuses
Even though some of the changes were expected, EG still took everyone by surprise when Peter 'ppd' Dager announced his decision to step down from the competitive scene, almost eclipsing Clinton 'Fear' Loomis’s announcement. After losing their two pillars, EG kept the hype at high levels with the addition of Andreas Franck 'Cr1t-' Nielsen, who not only changed the dream green battle cry to the bleed blue one, but boy oh boy what big shoes he must fill now.
How many players out there would have the guts to even try to lead the NA powerhouse? Looking at the recent past of Saahil 'UNiVeRsE' Arora alone, it’s clear that captaining the strong individuals of EG is not a job for everyone. Arguably the best offlaner in the world, Universe failed to adjust to new tactics and ideas in his three months stay with Team Secret prior to TI6, and the lack of synergy cost both EG and Secret their invites at the biggest event of the year.
On top of that, Artour 'Arteezy' Babaev is again back with EG, but for the first time this year he is not overlapping with anyone on the carry role. This can be seen as a change in his eternal bounce between Secret and EG, and can give Cr1t a clear idea on how to use him. Regardless of how good each of the EG players are individually, the changes from this fall are huge for them. It won’t be a surprise to see them struggling at the first LAN appearance together.
Vici Gaming - new but not quite
image credits: Wykrhm Reddy
The new Vici Gaming line-up is in fact not so new at all. After they changed only one player in the fall shuffle, Vici Gaming Reborn got promoted to the main team and are ready to prove they deserve it. But despite being the same team from the previous season, VG is hard to predict in terms of their LAN performance. Bouncing from incredible to disastrous games, the VG players registered a lot of ups and downs prior to this shuffle. From StarLadder i-League Invitational Season 1 Champions to 7th/8th place at the Manila Major, to claiming a spot at TI6 via Chinese qualifiers only to finish bottom four in Seattle, VG has been all over the charts.
At this MDL season they come with a new mid player: Zheng 'ghost' Jie. His LAN experience is restricted to VPGame Pro League Season 2 from July this year, and it’s quite hard to believe that the Chinese crowd's cheers will grow them wings in Xiamen, China, this week.
