An Unexpected Mid-series Change
In a fairly unprecedented move, Complexity replaced carry, Justin with a stand-in during a BO5 series against NP.
It’s not clear at the moment if CoL captain Swindlemelonzz kicked Justin mid series or if Justin ragequit IRL. At any rate, they were together in the CoL teamhouse when it happened.
Here’s a link to the official statement from CoL: http://www.complexitygaming.com/articles/news/press/4741/a-complexity-dota-2-update
I’m not going to pretend like I know what the climate in the Complexity teamhouse was. But I suspect it was pretty unpleasant, as Complexity had lost a series 2-0 to NP literally just minutes earlier and like five times in the last 2 weeks.
NP defeated CoL pretty handily in Game 1 and Game 2 of the best of 5 series for ESL One Genting. There’s been a lot of discussion about Justin’s play recently. It just seems like he doesn’t fit well with the other players. CoL players Swindlemelonzz and Zfreek are real-life brothers who play support and generally work well together. Moo, who transferred to CoL recently (from DC), has been able to almost seamlessly integrate into CoL’s playstyle. CanceL hasn’t been a huge standout on CoL but his play has been fairly consistent. That leaves us with Justin.
Justin’s Slark in the first game of the earlier CoL-NP series [DotaPit] was topping the net worth chart, but CoL still lost the game in the end. Seriously, I thought it was over for NP as Slark was getting pretty fat. I got up and folded some laundry. Somewhere in that time CoL managed to throw it. The second game was a total route. Every time I looked up at the screen, at least 2 of CoL’s players had death timers ticking down.
That would be enough to tilt anyone, but CoL has a bit of a reputation for being salty tilt machines. They’re ex-HoN pros, that should tell you all you need to know.
I banned dark seer and enchantress because after studying all of LGD’s games at this event I couldn’t find any other heroes rotk played well.
There are certainly cultural differences between the West and the East, but the first rule of leadership is to accept more than your share of the blame and less than your share of the credit.
-CoL captain Swindlemelonzz on ROTK. Swindlezz is not one to shy away from public flaming.
CoL had to turn around and play NP all over again, this time in a best of five. Considering that they literally have not won a series against NP ever, I don’t think that there was any way to be positive about that matchup.
My 1k analysis is that while Justin farms fairly well (i.e. has that ‘basic’ mechanic down), he overextends and feeds a little too much. He’s died in 1v1 matchups that should have favored him. At the same time, CoL’s play looked like a scrim squad against a team that plays together regularly. NP might be throw-y, but they clearly communicate well to set up ganks and take map objectives.
Major Invite in Jeopardy for Complexity
Valve’s rules regarding locked team rosters indicate that invites are in jeopardy if a team changes players during the lock period. However, Valve recently updated the rules involving the use of substitute players. They’re now allowed to be invited to participate after the qualifiers are over.
The only way to keep the qualifier spot in the Boston Major is for CoL’s roster to stay intact. Fortunately, Justin agreed to switch to the sub role and CoL picked up Monkeysforever to play the starter position. This means that any money that CoL wins will have to be split with Justin too.
Shade has been thrown, though.
Ah yes. Still, Justin could have totally screwed CoL over, so there’s that, I guess.