The International Dota 2 Championships results: Newbee level series with Game 2 win

Three games remain in The International Grand Final and it's going to be dramatic.

The International Dota 2 Championships Grand Final is now a familiar best of three series following Newbee returning to form in Game 2 and leveling the series. It was a mirror performance from both teams with the draft really winning the early and mid game for Newbee, which proved to be too much.

Hero selection

Newbee: Alchemist, Ancient Apparition, Bewmaster, Weaver, Earthshaker

ViCi Gaming: Nature's Prophet, Viper, Skywrath Mage, Sand King, Morphling

Early game

The second game of the series was the polar opposite of the first. It felt like Newbee shook off the cobwebs and took a more aggressive approach to the game. Their draft was more forward-thinking, striking a balance between team fights and pickoff potential with Weaver.

Newbee's switch was rewarded early with a two minute first blood on Nature's Prophet, who missed the incoming gank despite having full ward vision of the dire jungle. It was an unfortunate lack in concentration that helped set up several more kills, which were vitally important against a team that boasted a Morphling and Nature's Prophet.

At the 10 minute mark the score was 8-2 in favor of Newbee and they had a stranglehold on the farm.

Mid game

As the game slowly transitioned to the mid game it felt like ViCi could be closing the gap. A fantastic Skywrath ultimate set up a team fight win, but Newbee quickly flipped the fight on the back on a huge Ancient Apparition ultimate that caught three heroes.

Each fight and initiation from ViCi was quickly countered. A TP initiation on Alchemist was flipped thanks to a perfect Weaver Time Lapse and at the 17 minute mark the score snowballed into a 18-8 lead for Newbee.

It was all Newbee from here. There was too much farm on key heroes and ViCi were forced to invest everything to try and kill Brewmaster while Hao was simply too big on Weaver. Essentially Newbee had multiple lives in every fight between Weaver and Brewmaster's ultimate, which couldn't be overcome by a lack of reliable AOE damage outside of Skywrath Mage and Epicenter.

Late game

The game had barely entered its late staged when there was too much pressure and too many kills to come back. Before the base was broken ViCi called gg just after 30 minutes and decided to turn The International Grand Final into a best of three series.

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