What Can We Learn from NA, SA and Europe Qualifiers?
Second part of our qualifiers meta recap will be focused on the remaining three regions: North America, South America and Europe. These three regions had drastically different results throughout the DPC season, but their representatives all deserve the attention—with how quickly the game has been developing the last couple of years some surprises are inevitable.
Newbee / 
Newbee
North American Qualifiers weren’t as diverse as qualifiers in other regions with a total of 93 contested heroes. Ex-Forward Gaming, now Newbee, however, had some pretty unique heroes in their pool. They really favored Beastmaster and, similar to CIS winners, had a lot of respect for Axe in the current meta.
They are also the team that fully embraces objective-oriented approach to drafting. Unlike most teams in the region, however, they are not content with cores being the only source of tower damage and their drafts involved pushing supports such as Jakiro.
Coming into TI, Newbee is definitely a team that will require a certain degree of preparation. They have really strong individual players in both Quinn and
QCY.YS and they are also more than capable and willing to try out atypical for the region hyper-aggressive strategies that involve a more equal spread of farm and responsibilities between positions.
NoPing Esports
South America is considered to be the weakest Dota region, but their regional qualifiers were both very diverse and unique. It is the region that highly values brawling heroes, such as Wraith King and Lifestealer and this off-meta approach might allow Infamous to secure several unexpected victories against more experienced opponents.
Lifestealer is definitely their trump card with a 100% winrate across seven games. Their second and third most popular picks are Queen of Pain and Silencer and while both these heroes are viable, they are certainly far from being the meta staples.
As is the case with the region as a whole, Infamous is a team of brawlers. They draft for teamfights and aggression, with less emphasis on objective-taking. That makes them one of the most entertaining teams to watch, but it also puts them at a disadvantage when it comes to finding win conditions and we hope the squad will be able to find ways to diversify their strategies or will improve enough to dominate the game through constant teamfights even against more experienced teams.
Chaos EC
Europe really showed up this DPC season. Six representatives of the region are going to TI and Chaos, despite not getting to TI directly, doesn’t look like an underdog at all. Especially after the addition of Liquid.MATUMBAMAN, who solidified the squad and made it slightly less chaotic in their gameplans.
It doesn’t mean Chaos isn’t full of surprises, however. Instead of the typical for the meta Ember Spirits, Centaur Warrunners etc., Chaos prefers unconventional Dark Willow and Dazzle. From drafts alone, they are easily the most unpredictable team going to TI.
This unpredictability is further bolstered by a, who is attending TI for the first time in his career. On one hand the lack of big LAN experience might be a detriment, but we all remember the story of Topson and how his unconventional builds would catch the enemy off-guard. vtFaded is a player of similar caliber and mindset and we are sure he will be as entertaining and as unpredictable as Topson was last year.
first blood
2nd blood :)
I hope chaos win. It would be awesome for Matu to be a 2 times TI winner and defeat his former brothers.
^yep. Knocking liquid in grand finals
I was really concerned about vtFaded. Watching Chaos’s qualifier matches, he seemed shaky. I’ll guess we’ll have to see come TI9 proper. Good luck to him
the guy in the middle reminds me of Elijah Wood's character in Sin City. He should really use this edge to his advantage and say really creepy disturbing things to his opponents before the games so they fear for their lives if they won the game. That's Forward Gaming's best chance tbh they are so indescribably garbage.
Я тоже ценю героев для драк, мне в самый слабый регион бы, ибо проигрываю зачастую условным лесным оверфармерам, that just happened
Another great article kawaiisocks!