2013 has been a relatively successful year for Team Dignitas' Dota 2 squad so far. They have performed quite well and are regarded as one of the top teams in western Dota 2. This article will highlight some of the achievements our group of very talented individuals have managed to accomplish this year alone.

The Beginning

The year started out a bit shaky, as our mid laner Sneyking left the team on the 29th of December 2012. So the first thing we needed to do was to find a fifth member who fit in well with the team. One week after our squad was reduced to four people, we decided to complete it. From the 6th of January 2013, the off-lane of Team Dignitas would be occupied by none other than UNiVeRsE, a player of exceptional skill and considerable experience.

Sneyking: “It’s pretty hard to get in regular practice in when you come back home at 2 PM EST on the weekdays. Most teams are done scrimming at around 3 so I couldn't commit the time required to keep up.”

The initial tournament results were positive, which was a good sign of things to come. Team Dignitas' first tournament of the year was Season 3 of The Premier League, which would be the squad's first playoffs since the departing of Sneyking and recruitment of Universe.

The Round Robin' stage of this tournament was very close, with the top three teams all having a score of 7-2 and the following four teams all standing at 5-4. In the end, it was Virtus.pro who managed to secure the way into the Playoff Bracket due to head-to-head results with the remaining three teams.

Universe: “I don’t feel like the transition period for me was really that long. I had scrimmed and played with the guys a good amount before I officially joined the team and they’re all people I’m pretty comfortable with. It helped a lot that each game we had a clear idea of what we wanted to do each game.”

Team Dignitas' run in the Playoff Bracket was brief, as they fell down to the Lower Bracket after losing to the team which many considered to be one of the strongest team in Western Dota 2 at the time: Team Empire. While our squad was still able to advance to the Finals in that bracket through defeating Fnatic.EU, they found themselves knocked out of the tournament by Virtus.pro. Nevertheless, they had managed to secure the third place and 1,000 USD in prize money.

Aui_2000: “It’s really a shame what happened to Empire around when invites to TI3 came out. They were really scary with Funnik and Globak was really ahead of the other teams at the time. Our games versus VP were less than ideal for us. They were at really early times and Universe had an emergency and wasn’t able to play those games. It’s always hard playing a strong team when you’re not at your full strength.”

As the weeks passed, the team started getting more and more synergy. Universe's offlane were getting stronger and stronger, Aui_2000's farming abilities were being trimmed to perfection, Waytosexy and Tidesoftime's support plays were brilliant and Fogged's solo mid was simply amazing. Soon, the team would be put to the test.

The Second Trial

The second test came in the form of the Playoffs of Season 3 of The Defense, which started in the first week of February. In a quite tedious Group Stage lasting for 2 months consisting of 32 teams in 4 groups, Team Dignitas were among the 16 teams who made it to the Playoffs. They left their group tied first place alongside Team Empire, with both teams having a score of 6-1.

Fogged: “Man, The Defense was long. But other than the length, I kind of liked the format of the league. It let in a lot of teams you normally wouldn’t see and there were a lot of upsets and small runs for relatively unknowns in other groups. For the most part, during our groups we were only worried about Empire that still had our number at this time.”

This run would prove much more successful than the one in The Premier League. After defeating the all-German mousesports with 2-1 in the initial round in the Winner's Bracket, Team Dignitas moved on to face DreamHack Winter Champions No Tidehunter in the second round. Here, our squad came out on top after two very interesting games, with game one featuring a Warlock as well as a Spectre in a game which very much made the strength of Chaotic Offering apparent.

WaytoSexy: “We talked about Warlock and Spectre for a while before we ran it officially. I think Aui had thought about trying it out and he’s always been an innovator with stuff like armlet/maelstrom bear and manta broodmother. NTH wasn’t really ready for it and Fogged destroyed mid a couple games showcasing how strong Warlock can be when you don’t gank him.”

Then came the Winner's Finals, where Virtus.pro were waiting. Our squad decided to mix it up and picked a very uncommon pick in Ancient Apparition every single game of this Best of 3. However, while he did work nicely in game 2 alongside Clockwerk and Visage, it was not enough to take the series and Team Dignitas found themselves knocked down to the Lower Bracket.

WaytoSexy: “We messed up, those picks didn’t work LOL.”

There, Fnatic took the opportunity to repay the favor from The Premier League and knocked Team Dignitas out of the tournament, ending their run in The Defense's third Season at third place, winning the respectable sum of 3,500 USD. With another high-placing finish in their baggage, the team moved on towards future challenges.

Aui_2000: “Fnatic really had their stuff together at this point. Their cohesion was really good and we were shown some of the weaknesses in our lineup and teamwork. Every game is hard against the top 10 or so teams in the west and you can’t have any weaknesses going up against them or those weaknesses are going to cost you games.”

Third Time's the Charm: The Return of the King

While they had performed very admirably during the first few months of 2013, Team Dignitas still lacked that crucial tournament win in order to really cement their place among the top teams in the Western Dota 2-scene. Luckily, that tournament was visible on the horizon, in the form of the Ritmix Russian Dota 2 League.

This tournament consisting of 8 invited teams featured many European and North American powerhouses such as No Tidehunter, Team Empire, Fnatic.EU and Team Liquid. The tournament featured a double-elimination bracket, as to ensure that no team would be out of the competition just by losing a single series.

Universe: “It was pretty unfortunate that the RDL was during a time where there were so many different cups going on at once. I actually really liked how it was done during a short period of time with a good prize pool. Going into it, I actually didn’t think about it too much since it got mixed up with the 10 other tournaments we were playing in at the time.”

Team Dignitas' first series was up against RoX.Kis, a series which they won by 2-0. In the Semifinals, they met Team Empire once again. Remembering their loss in The Premier League two months prior, our squad made sure to extract their revenge. When the dust had settled, there was only one team standing, and Team Dignitas moved on to the Winner's Finals with a 2-1 win.

Fogged: “It’s really too bad that Empire was having their transition issues during this time. Funnik had just left them and this wasn’t too far off from when Globak and Silent left. I would have loved play them with our final lineup.”

However, during this moment of triumph, the team was experiencing some complications. Tidesoftime announced that he was retiring from competitive Dota 2 the 29th of March. Those who followed the team at that time were not surprised by the news. Since he had been a member of Team Dignitas since the beginning, people were left pleading for a worthy replacement now that he was hanging up his Dignitas-jersey.

Monolith: “It’s no secret he wasn’t playing well near the end, he didn’t really have the motivation or the love of the game he had earlier. But he’s always going to be a part of us and we wouldn’t be where we are if he hadn’t studied the teams he did, studied us the way he did and netted black-holing enigma’s like he did.”

And the Real Sney Shady most certainly stood up. Although he had been playing as a standin in many series before, the official announcement came during the final day of the Ritmix RD2L. The very day before, Team Dignitas had managed to defeat the bears of Virtus.pro, the team which had stopped their onslaught in both The Premier League and The Defense.

Sneyking: “It wasn’t a huge transition back for me. I had stood in so many times and still played with them outside of official matches that I didn’t feel out of place. The hardest part for me was just getting used to playing against high level mid solos but it’ll come with time. The RDL was a good way back.”

However, the two teams were destined to meet on the field of battle once more, as Virtus.pro defeated No Tidehunter in the Lower Bracket's Finals. They once again met in glorious combat, this time in a Best of 5. When all was said and done, upon the piles of broken shields, swords and hordes of slain creeps, Dignitas could hold their heads high as the Ritmix Russian Dota 2 League champions!

Fogged: “It felt like a lot of things were going right again and we had the lineup that we were most confident and comfortable with. We still have a lot more work to do and kinks to smooth out but everything leading up to this has been progression and we’re a stronger team than we were last year.”

North American Battle Royale: Raidcall D2L

Next up on the list of tournaments for our squad was the Playoff Bracket of the Raidcall Dota 2 League, another tournament which had a very even Group Stage, as the teams that came in second to fourth in there all had a record of eight wins and three losses. With 10,000 USD in the prize pool, all of the four teams that had made it there; Fnatic.EU, Team Liquid, Team Empire and Team Dignitas, were looking to claim the first place.

Aui_2000: “The D2L’s probably my favorite of the long tournaments. They were always really flexible with the teams and promoted everything really well. Ayesee and Draskyl are a really good combo and the entire tournament ran really well. Charlie told me to say that the D2L also caused him the least headaches but I count that as a negative.”

Fnatic.EU was the first opponent for our squadron. The memory of elimination at their hands in Season 3 of The Defense was still fresh in our players' minds, so they had every intention of repaying Fnatic.EU in kind this particular Semifinals. They absolutely did that, as they managed to beat the European team by 2-0, the same map score as in The Defense.

In the Winner's Finals, Team Dignitas went up against Team Liquid, another North American Dota 2 powerhouse. While still a relatively new team to the scene, having only been active for about two months, Team Liquid had shown the world that they were a team to fear and respect, capable of taking games off of any other team. However, here, they were stopped by Team Dignitas, who sent them down to the Lower Bracket Finals with a 2-0 win.

Team Liquid were once again our squad's opponent in the Grand Finals. They had dismantled Team Empire with a 2-0 victory and were hungry for revenge. Since they came from the Winner's Bracket, our squad had a one-game advantage. However, in the end, Team Liquid managed to clinch the win with a 3-2 score in the Best of 5 and with that take the title of Raidcall Dota 2 League champions.

Universe: “Liquid’s come a long way since their rough start earlier in the year. We usually end up trading a lot of games with them and a lot of it depends on which team is doing well that week or month. We could have taken the series but a few mistakes in execution and communication cost us games where we were ahead. They ended up doing better that day to take their first big tournament win.”

Recuperating: DreamHack Invitational

Although they were the runner-ups of the Raidcall D2L, our squad did not let that discourage them. For the very next day, the Playoffs of another tournament commenced. It was of the DreamHack Invitational. Earlier on, Team Dignitas had secured themselves a spot in the Round of 6 by coming in second in their group, just barely below No Tidehunter.

The first game was up against Team Empire, once again. Our squad's opponents seemed to be very much wanting to pay them back for previous encounters, as they took game one. However, our squad immediately bounced back with a surprise pick in Earthshaker in game 2, which also featured our very deadly Wisp-Tiny combo as well as Sneyking's Queen of Pain. Despite Sneyking not being able to play in Game 3, Team Dignitas still managed to win two games in a row and moved on to go up against a very familiar face.

Sneyking: “Finals suck, but I was super happy to see that we managed to win without me. Empire showed that there’s still a lot of talent on that team in game 1.”

Once again, Team Liquid would be their opponents in a Semifinals. Since this game was played a mere three days after Team Dignitas' defeat at the hands of Liquid in the D2L Grand Finals, they were eager to prove their worth against the North American Squad once again. After the series was over, the map score was the exact same as in the D2L Semifinals, which is 2-0 in the favor of Dignitas. Game 2 of the series was an exceptionally active game, with as many as 52 kills on the side of Dignitas. However, in contrast to the D2L, there was no double-elimination bracket in the DreamHack Invitational, and Team Liquid was subsequently knocked out.

WaytoSexy: “Big thanks to MojoStormStout and KZZ for standing in for the last match. MSS has really proven himself as a reliable stand-in in the last two months for both Liquid and us. The right environments can make great players.”

The match-up of the Grand Finals was Team Dignitas vs No Tidehunter, now known as Alliance after their mystery sponsor had been revealed. Two of the most entertaining teams in the Western Dota 2-scene were up against each other. The stakes were high, as whoever won would win not only loads of money, but also a direct invite to DreamHack Summer 2012. Therefore, both teams made sure to bring their absolute A-game to this series.

Since Alliance had beaten Team Dignitas by 2-0 in the Group Stages, some people expected the Grand Finals to go roughly the same way. However, that was absolutely not the case. The games were all filled with action, with no team letting up or showing signs of slowing down at any point. Many interesting picks such as Ogre Magi and Spectre were shown. It all boiled down to game 5, which featured an insane base race where Team Dignitas, despite having a Gyrocopter wielding a Divine Rapier, were forced to concede to the Lone Druid of Alliance, winning them the tournament. This series consisted of some epic games, and is well worth a watch.

Sneyking: “I messed up the base race team :( ”

Aftermath

Luckily, due to Alliance already being invited to DreamHack Summer 2013, Team Dignitas found themselves the happy owners of an invite to the main tournament, a spot well deserved considering their recent success. This summer they will be arriving in Sweden in order to try and add yet another title to their belt.

As April was drawing to a close, Team Dignitas' hard work was finally recognized by Valve, as they were granted a direct invite to The International's third iteration where the best teams from both the Western and the Eastern scene will meet in glorious combat in the beginning of August. With the invite secured, the squad will make sure to do their absolute best in order to prove that they are made to be champions!

Aui_2000: “I’m looking forward to see how the Chinese deal with Wisp. It’s the only hero that exists in one scene but not in another. G-1 will be a really interesting tournament when we see Alliance and Liquid clash with the play style of the eastern scene. There’s not as big of a difference between the west and the east now as there was during TI2. All the teams are stronger."