Professional scene’s uproar regarding the Majors format has been heard and starting with ESL One Stockholm Major, changes are in place.
Over the past two years, the Dota Pro Circuit featured just two Majors, and both had their format heavily criticized by the players attending them.
Both ONE Esports Singapore Major 2021 and WePlay AniMajor had the teams seeded in three different stages of the tournament, wild card, group stage, playoffs based on their final placement in the Dota Pro Circuit regional leagues and what was meant as a reward for the top placed teams, proved to act more like a punishment.
All regional top placed teams got seeded directly into the playoffs, which in theory sounded good. However, once they got to compete on the Major stage, the teams quickly learnt that those who had to play extra 12 games before reaching the playoffs were in fact given the chance to create the tournament meta, to develop and adapt their strategies and arrive to the playoffs well warmed up, with a better understanding of their opponents and in both Majors, teams coming from the wild card and group stages made a deep playoffs bracket run.
AniMajor’s grand finals, for instance, were held between PSG.LGD and Evil Geniuses, both starting the tournament seeded in the group stage, while 4 out of 6 teams seeded directly into the playoffs were the first that got eliminated in the main event.
ESL One Stockholm Major format change
ESL Stockholm Major is set to be the first DPC Major of the year and it will leave behind the seeding concept.
According to the ESL One official website, the Stockholm Major will have all the teams starting from the group stage. The format change was also announced during the official DreamLeague broadcast of the Spring Tour Western Europe regional league.
Despite not having a solution for the Eastern Europe league, which is indefinitely postponed due to the war in Ukraine, the Major is still planning to welcome a total of 18 teams to Sweden next month.
Regional slot allocation for ESL Stockholm Major:
- Western Europe: 4 slots
- China: 4 slots
- Eastern Europe: 3 slots
- Southeast Asia: 3 slots
- North America: 2 slots
- South America: 2 slots
All teams that will make it to the Stockholm Major will be split into two groups and will play in a round-robin, two-game series format with elimination on the line.
Top 4 teams from each group will advance to the playoffs upper bracket, 5th-6th placed teams from each group will advance to the playoffs lower bracket, while the bottom 3 teams will be eliminated.
Prize pool and DPC points distribution
Despite the format change and the disappearance of the wild card stage, the prize pool distribution and the DPC points allocation will not change and only the top 8 placed teams will be awarded for their run as follows:
- 1st place: $200,000 & 680 DPC points
- 2nd place: $100,000 & 610 DPC points
- 3rd place: $75,000 & 530 DPC points
- 4th place: $50,000 & 460 DPC points
- 5th - 6th place: $25,000 & 385 DPC points
- 7th - 8th place: $12,500 & 240 DPC points
ESL One Stockholm Major is set to unfold May 12-22 at Hovet Arena and is not just the first Major of the year, but also the first LAN tournament for Dota 2 that will welcome a live audience in more than two years.
Ticket sales have already started. Those interested in attending the Major in person can choose between Premium, Plus, Weekend or 1 days ticket passes and find full details on the official ESL One page HERE.
