Written by: ReiNNNN
Defying all odds, Na`Vi has emerged victorious in EMS One after coming back from a 1-0 deficit in the grand final. Being seeded into the lower part of the bracket, Na`Vi had it tough facing Fnatic.EU in the first round and Mousesports in the second.
However, Na`Vi's bootcamp over the week has proved effective as they returned to the same flawless form they were before their roster change. RoX.KIS on the other hand will be settling for $7,000 and a second place finish in EMS One Spring. The clear underdogs coming into the tournament, viewers were surprised at how well they disposed their opponents in the quarter-finals and semi-finals.
The final standings of the tournament can be found below the match reports as we wrap up one heck of a series.
Table of Contents
Bracket
Today's matches
[Match 1] Absolute Legends vs RoX.KIS
The first game of the day started out bizarre with neither team banning nor picking the Magnus until the end of the drafting phase. RoX.KIS ran an aggressive trilane with Lifestealer, Rubick, and Leshrac against aL's Faceless Void, Shadow Demon and Gyrocopter. Gyrocopter's Rocket Barrage went to work as aL initiated on the Leshrac and quickly took the First Blood.
As the first night loomed the sky, Clockwerk attempted a gank on the Lifestealer but RoX.KIS was far prepared for the incoming offense. Queen of Pain baited aL to initiate on the Lifestealer before unleashing a world of pain on the Danes. Batrider bought his Blink Dagger 10 minutes into the game. Unaware of the purchase, aL engaged RoX.KIS only to be counter initiated by the Russians. RoX won that fight and a subsequent fight when aL respawned. The kill score was up to 16-1 in favour of RoX.KIS 17 minutes in.
With their 12,000 gold lead advantage, RoX.KIS marched into the Rosh pit but not without a fight from aL. aL responded by securing RoX.KIS' tier-one tower on the top lane and a Rubick as a compliment. However, RoX.KIS caught up with aL's retreating heroes, got themselves some revenge kills and took down another tower.
In desperate need to pull off something huge, aL blew three of their ultimate on a Queen of Pain. aL paid for that as Queen of Pain bought back immediately to rejoin the fight near the ancients. RoX.KIS' gold advantage went up to a whooping 20,000 as they claimed the second Aegis and pushed top for the game. Despite pulling off a perfect combo at the final battle, aL heroes were just too poor to follow up with damage.
In game two, a level one Double Damage rune nearly claimed the First Blood for the Gyrocopter as Mania's Nature's Prophet fell to a low 40 hit points before escaping into the fog. With all of his consumables down, Nature's Prophet had a hard time solo laning the Gyrocopter which was constantly spamming Flak Cannon. In the battle of the mid-lane, Solo's Silencer was able to outfarm the Queen of Pain, opting for the unconventional Glaives build. The First Blood was eventually given to Queen of Pain after a questionable decision by Bzzisperfect's Gyrocopter to dive past the tier-one tower.
RoX.KIS got themselves on the board when aL attempted another gank on the bottom lane. Gyrocopter's well placed Call Down halted aL from advancing further and secured the Russians kills on the Bane and the Nature's Prophet. Another two kills came for RoX.KIS off a counter gank on the top lane. The score is 4-1 in favour of RoX 10 minutes in.
As the game approached mid-game, things started going south for aL as they were constantly being outmaneuvered by RoX. Their gank-oriented line-up was faltering under RoX.KIS's superb movement around the map and once again, RoX.KIS was fast in building up a 10,000 gold lead. In fact, RoX.KIS was so confident that they went pushing into a Nyx Assassin without True Sight.
All aL could do at this point was to split push with the Nature's Prophet and Queen of Pain but their devastating start heavily delayed the items progression on the split pushers. Despite that, a bad decision by RoX.KIS allowed aL to go for a base trade as their teleport back was disrupted by aL's three defending heroes. RoX.KIS redeemed themselves by rushing into mid for the game.
[Match 2] Mousesports vs Natus Vincere
Disguising their draft till the end Mousesports opted for the support Alchemist in their first game, a strat we saw Fnatic did last night to much success in the laning phase. Alchemist spent a lot of time roaming around the map and only started moving top 3 minutes into the game. Na`Vi on the other hand, abandoned their off-lane and placed Lifestealer in the jungle together with the Chen and the semi-jungling Shadow Shaman. At the 4 minutes mark, Na`Vi pulled off a successful four-man gank on Magnus to claim the First Blood while funn1k's Gyrocopter was left all alone to free farm.
Realizing that their top tower is going down, Na`Vi rotated Shadow Shaman there but he was instantly solo killed by the Phantom Lancer. Dendi pulled off a spectacular play 6 minutes into the game both him and Magnus was trying to contest for the first night rune. Rubick was there to back Magnus but Dendi lasso'd Magnus onto a cliff and turned the engagement around. Batrider paid the kill with his life later on as he got greedy and tried to go for a second. Meanwhile, the rest of Na`Vi pushed down two towers on the bottom lane.
Na`Vi performed the same strat they used against Fnatic yesterday and started roaming the map together, more obviously to prevent the game from going late game and Phantom Lancer turning apeshit. However, they were unsuccessful in many occassions to start an engagement due to good positioning by Mouz.
With the bigger share of the map, Na`Vi outfarmed Mousesports and the once superior Phantom Lancer net worth fell into third place behind Gyrocopter and Lifestealer. After a bad move by the Clockwerk to engage Na`Vi causing the death of four of his teammates, the Ukrainians took down Roshan and won another big fight in front of Mouz's base. It quickly led to a base breach but Mouz just barely hang on to their barracks.
Soon enough, Na`Vi regrouped in the mid lane and took down the barracks. Na`Vi ended the game at 38 minutes with a whooping 30,000 gold lead over Mouz.
Mouz's draft was perfect to go against the Juggernaut trilane but Na`Vi, with their next level plays, laned Juggernaut on the off-lane against the Gyrocopter, Rubick and Undying. The reinforcement came from Keeper of the Light as Mousesports was starting to mount up a push but as soon as he went away, Juggernaut spilled the First Blood.
After his death, Juggernaut joined the rest of his team on the top lane and they successfully took down the tier one tower. Dendi performed yet another spectacular play 8 minutes into the game, diving into 3 heroes and picked off 2 by himself.
Things were definitely looking grim for Mousesports as Na`Vi once again mowed through them, took down a tower, and then mowed through them again building up a gold lead of 5,000. All the space and distraction created by the Storm Spirit allowed funn1k's Clinkz to built up an Orchid within 13 minutes.
Na`Vi's lead became bigger and bigger as Na`Vi rampaged through the map and Storm Spirit and Keeper of the Light combo proved to be a big nuisance in battles, ball-ing short distances to avoid hits to have his mana fully replenished every 14 seconds. Despite pulling off a good Reverse Polarity, Mousesports heroes are just too incompetent to take on such a snowball line-up from Na`Vi .
Six team wipes later, Na`Vi finally pushed high ground and will be the second team qualify for the grand final.
[Grand Final] RoX.KIS vs Natus Vincere
In the first game of the grand final, Na`Vi earned themselves a minor victory anticipating for RoX.KIS to abandon their off-lane and warded neutral camp spots to slow down the progression of the Dark Seer. Unfortunately, Dendi's Queen of Pain still ended giving away the First Blood to Solo's Warlock which played exceptionally well in the middle lane. One pulled creep wave allowed RoX.KIS to push down two of Na`Vi's bottom towers. As Bane and Magnus was attempting to deny the tower, Bzz's Gyrocopter sneaked in and managed to land the last hit on the tower. RoX. KIS was quickly up to a 3,000 gold lead 5 minutes in.
Moving back to the middle lane, Queen of Pain is being heavily pressured due to Warlock level two Fatal Bonds. Dendi was forced to bottle crow just to stay in the lane. With their gold lead, Chaotic Offering and Fatal Bonds, RoX.KIS converged mid and forced down the tier-one tower. Na`Vi watched helplessly as RoX.KIS moved towards the top lane and took down their fourth tower 12 minutes into the game. Game was fairly quiet with only one kill on the scoreboard.
RoX.KIS kept their aggression as they moved towards mid for their fifth tower. Funn1k's bad positioning with Magnus allowed Clockwerk to land his hook and funn1k ended up using the Reverse Polarity on just one hero. A big Call Down annihilated two heroes and Na`Vi quickly called the gg 17 minutes in.
For the first time in EMS One, Io made it through the first ban phase and it was immediately picked up by RoX.KIS as they drafted around Chaos Knight for mid-game supremacy. Na`Vi started out doing an offensive trilane in game two but the two supports bizarrely moved off the lane giving funn1k's Brewmaster a hard time. As the Rubick returned to the lane (Jakiro went bottom), he was immediately chained stun and killed for the First Blood. Rubick did not return to the lane and RoX.KIS nearly killed the Brewmaster if not for Vanskor missed Impale.
As soon as Enigma hit 6, RoX.KIS bundled up on the top lane and threatened two towers before Na`Vi's reinforcement arrived. RoX.KIS retreated after one tower. The immense mid-game pressure from RoX.KIS allowed Nyx to free farm on the top lane for him to reach level 6. Although all was going well for RoX.KIS, Na`Vi narrowed the lead after some good engagements and Gyrocopter ended up on the backfoot, killing only 40 creeps 12 minutes in.
A big engagement broke out at top as Chaos Knight and Io once again was behind enemy lines and was caught by four heroes. Reinforcement came for them but it was a tad bit late as RoX took another bad fight for Na`Vi to make a comeback. However, RoX did manage to get a revenge kill on Phantom Lancer shortly after.
16 minutes into the game, it has appeared that RoX.KIS was playing directly under Na`Vi's hands. RoX.KIS' Chaos Knight and Io ganks were ineffective throughout mid game as the Ukrainians were always ready to greet them. The gold graph was pretty even at that point but Na`Vi's Phantom Lancer was getting fatter by the minute. RoX.KIS carries were not farming and were constantly look for pick offs, which Na`Vi was not willing to give up.
Instead of continuing with the ganks, RoX.KIS switched their game-plan, making Gyrocopter split push whenever Na`Vi bunched up as five. Gyrocopter took down two towers on the bottom lane as Na`Vi was making a move on the top lane and sieged the base tower before moving back.
A few even exchanges were performed during 20-30 minutes with most of them coming out slightly in favour of RoX.KIS because after all, their carries did not end up dying while Na`Vi's did. RoX.KIS took down the Roshan 29 minutes into the game after they allegedly blew their Black Hole but still managed to emerge victorious with a 3-1 exchange.
RoX.KIS did a big mistake relocating the Chaos Knight and Io into the Magnus who immediately used his Reverse Polarity while the rest of Na`Vi burst down the Io. The knight's back-up did arrived but it only ended up with Na`Vi team wiping the Russians for a big gold swing. After that engagement, the Phantom Lancer was no longer stoppable as Na`Vi pushed into RoX.KIS' high ground.
>> Watch the VOD part 1
>> Watch the VOD part 2
Even in such an important game, RoX.KIS was daring enough to go for the offensive trilane with Axe, a hero we don't see often in the competitive scene. Instead of levelling the Counter Helix, Dread opted for Battle Hunger at level one for harrassment but that ended up costing his team two kills as they kited the Axe and killed his supports. Na`Vi on the other hand, ran the Templar Assassin on the hard lane against the Lifestealer. Axe transitioned into the jungle after he sent Phantom Lancer home on 50 hit points.
The Axe pick up started turning out to be very unreliable for the Russians. Na`Vi's mainstream heroes proved to be clearly superior and the Ukrainians in general were outmaneuvering RoX.KIS as the decider entered mid-game.
The kill score was quickly up to 1-8 by 12 minutes and Na`Vi secured Roshan after heavily diving into enemy territories while escaping with no casualties. The kills continued to pile on for Na`Vi with funn1k's Beastmaster leading the ganks. Na`Vi took their time, farming RoX.KIS' jungle and went for the uncontested second Roshan. With the second Aegis in hand, Na`Vi pushed towards $12,000 and RoX.KIS gracefully congrats the Ukrainians on the win.
Final standings
| EMS One prize distribution | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Placing | Team | Prize | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1st place |  Natus Vincere | $12,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2nd place |  RoX.KIS | $7,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3rd-4th |  Mousesports | $4,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3rd-4th |  Absolute Legends | $4,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5th-8th |  Rat in the Dark | $2,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5th-8th |  DD.Dota | $2,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5th-8th |  Alliance | $2,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5th-8th |  Fnatic.EU | $2,000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
