Newly sponsored Gaimin Gladiators came out swinging for their first match in the WEU DPC Regional Finals to crush Tundra Esports and send them packing to the lower bracket.
Gaimin Gladiators, the squad formerly known as Team Tickles had a lot to prove heading into the DPC Regional Finals, squaring up against Tundra in their first series after being picked up by an organisation.
Add in that this particular series was their first appearance in the WEU DPC Regional Finals with $50,000 and 250 DPC points on the line and the need to get off to a good start is intense - but the boys didn't disappoint.
"It's going to be way more even"...
The match got underway shortly after Team Liquid's very convincing 2-0 victory over OG, which kicked off the weekend's action on the WEU DPC Regional Finals.
Most people were expecting to see a much closer series to finish off the day - including the players.
In a player interview shown just before the match, Gaimin Gladiators' mid player, Miroslav "BOOM" Bičan, said: "Our [DPC] series against Tundra was actually one of our easier series, but I don’t think they were ready for us.
"This time it’s going to be way more even."
Tundra's Leon “Nine” Kirilin said they were done underestimating Gladiators, but it's hard to say the squad learnt their lesson.
Mother comes to ruin Tundra's day in game one of the Regional Finals
Marcus “Ace” Hoelgaard dominated game one with his Broodmother pick.
The Gaimin Gladiators offlane player moved from his spot as Hellbear Smashers’ carry last season alongside teammate Erik "tofu" Engel.
Ace completely controlled the map to give the squad’s carry, Anton “dyrachyo” Shkredov, space to farm on the Templar Assassin.
After a fairly even ten minutes, Gaimin Gladiators took the lead and ran, with Tundra calling GG at 31.59.
It didn’t get any better from there
Despite banning the Broodmother for game two, the series didn’t get much better for Tundra.
The team managed to hold their ground for most of the second game, before Gaimin Gladiators finally took the edge and snowballed their net worth advantage from around 2,000 gold up to 12,996 in the final five minutes.
This time it was dyrachyo that took the early lead, with his Razor sitting at top net worth for most of the game before giving up the top spot to Boom’s Storm Spirit.
The game was the closest match of the day in the WEU DPC Regional Finals, but Gaimin Gladiators were still so dominant Tundra called GG on the series.
Gaimin Gladiators were so unwavering in their domination that they finished the series with 19 deaths across the entire squad - a stark contrast to Tundra's 67, with captain Adrian "Fata" Trinks dying at their hands 24 times across both games.
Related articles
So, what happened in the Gladiators' first series in the Regional Finals?
With most people expecting a much more even series, the question of what went wrong for Tundra was on everyone's mind.
Shortly after Gaimin Gladiators' victory in the Regional Finals, Ace appeared for interview and host Jorien "Sheever" van der Heijden kicked off by asking just that.
However, even Ace couldn't quite put his finger on the reason for their success.
"I’m not sure, when we play Tundra it feels like their play style just doesn’t really suit well against ours for them. It’s weird. No flame or anything, but I just don’t think their play style is good against ours right now."
We just picked them up so we don’t really know each other that well yet but so far they seem really solid, taking good care of us, showing a lot of interest and just being really supportive and everything so I’m really looking forward to team up with them
So about that Broodmother...
It didn't take long for the panel to ask about Broodmother, with Niklas "Wagamama" Högström discussing the Aghanim's Scepter pick-up in game one of the Regional Finals.
The upgrade gives Broodmother a new ability called Spinner's Snare - which creates an invisible 900-width web trap in a line.
Enemy heroes that cross the line will spring the trap and:
- Make the trap visible to their allies
- Become rooted
- Be shown (even through fog or smoke) to all enemies
- Receive 100dps for four seconds
Ace added: "I think it’s really strong, especially when you’re doing good in the game; it just snowballs the game even harder. We already have the map, I’m already so fat, and it’s kinda like techies; you’re just putting mines and choking them.
"This is the funny thing, if you can put them well they cannot smoke through them so you’re not even scarred of smokes anymore if you have this and you know how to place the snares and stuff."
How can I do that?
Unfortunately, anyone hoping to replicate Ace's moves in the DPC Regional Finals might have hit a snare of their own, after the Danish player told new Broodmother players not to copy his moves.
"I used to play a lot of Brood and my Brood training was not going so well. The older brood used to farm more and be more carry. It seems like now it’s better to just play active and not farm so much. That’s why I go arcane boots, just try to play really active and gank a lot.
In general, unless you’re completely clueless, then just try to make your own playstyle instead of watching what everyone’s doing. That’s what helps me at least. I want to try to understand what I’m doing by myself and then I play better than just copying something. But if you’re completely clueless you probably need to copy something to begin with and find inspiration from it. "
Gladiators ready to battle it out in the rest of the Regional Finals
Ace revealed the squad were looking forward to playing Team Liquid in the Upper Bracket Final on February 12.
Ace said: "They’re definitely the strongest opponents we’ve played against in DPC.
"It’s going to be interesting to see because last time we were pretty close to beating them; it was a very close series."
Gaimin Gladiators will face Team Liquid in the WEU DPC Regional Finals at 2pm CET on February 12.
OG will then face Tundra in the first elimination series at 5pm CET.
Stay tuned to Esports.gg for more Dota 2 news and updates.
