Dota 2 Arlington Major: How Team Aster overcame Entity to reach the Top 4
Chinese powerhouse Team Aster and rising Western European squad Entity clashed in the lower bracket quarterfinals of the Dota 2 PGL Arlington Major.
The winner of the series would secure at minimum fourth place while the loser would go home.
The first two games of the series were one-sided affairs, as both teams traded wins. It all came down to an explosive third game, where Aster mounted one of the biggest comebacks of the tournament so far and took the series in one of the longest games of the tournament.
Here's how Aster overcame Entity in their series decider:
SabeRLight- gave Aster a hint on how to draft against Entity
After defeating BOOM Esports earlier in the day, Entity's stand-in Jonáš "SabeRLight-" Volek volunteered for a winner's interview and suggested that the best way to beat his team is to ban as many offlaners as possible.
"Honestly, I don't know how people are not just banning offlaners, we have two offlaners, come on guys. Just ban offlaners," said SabeRLight.
One team was certainly paying close attention to that interview and it was Aster, as they used six of their seven bans on offlane heroes.
In the deciding game of their match versus Entity, the Chinese squad took Dazzle and Bristleback in their opening picks for Yu "皮球" Yajun and Du "Monet" Peng.
This gave them a strong frontline core with Dazzle keeping him alive.
Entity's opening picks were a mid Tiny for Daniel "Stormstormer" Schoetzau and support Zeus on Vladislav "Kataomi`" Semenov.
Zeus' ability to provide global vision and incredible percentage-based magic damage would be the key factor in several team fight victories for Entity.
Since their first two picks had no stuns, Aster remedied that by taking Earthshaker for Ye "BoBoKa" Zhibiao. Zeng "Ori" Jiaoyang picked Death Prophet for the mid lane, a great counter as the hero can use Spirit Siphon to negate the damage coming out of Tiny.
Entity also realised they needed more lockdown and got the best hero for the job, Bane for Dzmitry "Fishman" Palishchuk.
An odd offlane pick for the team was Venomancer for Tobias "Tobi" Buchner, as that hero has had a bad tournament showing, winning four of his 11 appearances, due to his weak early laning stage.
The last pick for Aster was a Brewmaster for Lin "Xxs" Jing to buff up their teamfight, while Entity needed a carry and picked Doom for SabeRLight-, as he is primarily an offlane player and the team's playstyle revolves around a fast dual offlane combo rather than the standard playmaking offlaner and late-game carry.
Entity started the game strong but Aster made an incredible comeback
Aster had an interesting approach to the laning stage, as they ditched Xxs to play alone while putting three people in the bottom lane in order to shut down Tobi and Kataomi.
It was a good adjustment, as Tobi didn't get a single creep kill in the first four minutes of the laning stage, greatly hindering his early game impact.
It wasn't all bad for Entity, as SabeRLight- secured the second fastest Hand of Midas of the patch, due to the complete free farm provided for him.
While Xxs didn't suffer at the top lane as badly as Tobi did, his hero was still heavily countered by Doom later on. In the end, both teams sacked their offlaner to secure farm for their carry.
After securing the first Roshan of the game, Aster felt confident to push into the enemy's side of the map. That confidence quickly turned to regret as Entity landed a devastating blow to Aster, bringing down four members of their squad.
Fishman's fantastic use of Fiend's Grip along with the vision provided by Kataomi`was a big problem for the Chinese team.
SabeRLight had a fascinating approach to the game, as his Devoured creep was a Hill Troll Berserker, which provides a three-second Break to his auto attack every 10 seconds. This made the normally durable Bristleback fairly easy to bring down in team fights.
Kataomi proved his worth on Zeus again 13 minutes later when he used his ultimate to find Xxs and interrupted his ultimate transformation long enough with Nimbus for Doom to land and disable him. Without Brewmaster, Aster simply couldn't fight and lost four people in the retreat.
Despite the sizable advantage Entity had, they decided to play it safe and wait for the third Roshan of the game before going for a high ground push. A flaw in Entity's draft was the lack of structural damage on their heroes apart from Tiny.
It was the last chance for Aster to come back in the game, as their near 20,000 gold advantage would have been impossible to overcome if Entity got their hands on Aegis of the Immortal as well.
The dual offlane combo for Entity couldn't scale as well as Aster's more standard lineup and in the end, it was the Chinese squad that won the most important fight of the series and forced Entity to use three buybacks while gaining nothing in return.
Aster's high durability lineup with Dazzle's sustain proved its worth in the late game, as Entity only brought down the two supports in the last 15 minutes of the game.
It was a valiant effort by the Western European squad but their lineup wasn't built to go ultra-late game against Aster.
In the end, Entity was sent home in 5th-6th place and with US$25,000 and 515 Dota Pro Circuit (DPC) points in consolation.
Meanwhile, Aster secured at least a Top 4 finish as well as US$50,000 and 590 DPC points in winnings.
Aster are one of the dark horses of the tournament, as the Chinese squad are known for their regional dominance while floundering on the international stage, placing last in their previous two Majors.
Now the team move to the lower bracket semi-finals, where they await the winner of the other lower bracket quarterfinal match between Beastcoast and OG.
The PGL Arlington Major will take place from 4 to 14 August and features 17 of the best Dota 2 teams in the world fighting for their slice of the US$500,000 prize pool and 4,570 DPC point pool.
For everything you need to know about the Arlington Major, check here.
Team Aster roster:
Du "Monet" Peng
Zeng "Ori" Jiaoyang
Lin "Xxs" Jing
Ye "BoBoKa" Zhibiao
Yu "皮球" Yajun
Entity roster:
Jonáš "SabeRLight-" Volek (Stand-in)
Daniel "Stormstormer" Schoetzau
Tobias "Tobi" Buchner
Vladislav "Kataomi`" Semenov
Dzmitry "Fishman" Palishchuk
Otomo is a long-time gaming enthusiast and caster. He has been playing games since he was 10 and is the biggest Dota 2 fan.
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