It's been a while since the last scene update and the teams made sure I'd have plenty to write about. A lot of changes have been going on: teams joining new organisations, line-ups reformed and new teams entering the scene. To end I'll give my unbiased opinion about the new patch and give a small overview of some interesting articles or interviews.



a. SK Gaming

This is the SK Gaming site so it's only fitting to mention our new line-up first. Alexander 'CalculuS' Rathcke has left the team to make place for a legend who goes by the name of Brian 'MaNia' Strandby. A lot of speculations have been made prior to the addition and it didn't take a genius to put two and two together and thus the line-up change did not come with much surprise. However, this does mean that Brian 'MaNia' Strandby will not be doing anything with Jacob 'Maelk' Toft-Anderssen, something a lot of you thought would happen. The latter has been seen playing a lot with Evil Geniuses .



b. AEONSports

Changes happened in the Asian scene as well, unfortunately my knowledge about these guys is rather lacking but they did win the League of Cyber Games in Malaysia where they've beaten Orange Esports in the finals.



c. DTS

Everyone knows The Retry by now as the team that defeated Natus Vincere in the final of the Dota 2 Star Championship in Kiev. DTS is a known organisation in the Dota community having players such as Ivan 'ArtStyle' Antonov and Daniil 'Dendi' Ishutin defending their banner in the past. All-time legend Ivan 'Vigoss' Shinkarev will be joining the team as well.



d. Storm Games Clan (Epidemic)

After being eliminated in The Defense, Storm Games Clan decided to blow up their roster and only stick with Jan 'son1' Svajg and Petr 'craNich' Meluzín. They decided to add Mathias 'bonzajajaj' Andersson who was the captain of youBoat which meant the end the Swedish team.



e. Western Wolves

The French Team Shakira finally found a place to call home by joining the Western Wolves organisation. The team placed 4th at the recent Dreamhack tournament and is currently playing the second group stage in The Defense after ending the first group stage with 4-1 in group C.



f. Mousesports

While everyone thought Wehsing 'SingSing' Yuen was leaving the team, a rumour that was started by Kalle 'Trixi' Saarinen, no one is leaving the team. Visar 'twiSta' Zymberi is now an inactive player for the team and is making room for Alaan 'SexyBamboe' Faraj which is an obvious set-back for LowLandLions .





If you want to know more about the Chinese community, joinDOTA made an interesting interview with Zou '820' Yitian, EHOME 's former leader. Yi Tian is now a professional shoutcaster and currently World Elite 's coach. Interesting to note is that IceFrog dedicated the Vengeful Spirit to Yi Tian as 820 was added as one of the fun names of Vengeful Spirit. He got known for his build by maxing out Terror first and changing things up by not maxing out Missile first. There's no need to say he was very successful at it. Check out the interview here where he gives his view on the current state of the Chinese scene.

In another interview, was interviewed by Razer. Seaking is the carry player for Nirvana . You can read it here but you'll have to wait until the 19th of January to read it as the American websites are currently protesting against SOPA and PIPA.

Family man and long-time legend Kim 'Drayich' Larsson was interviewed by his team where he talks about Dota 2, streaming and e-sports in general. Check it out here.

GosuGamers recently started with a new feature where professional Dota 2 players are interviewed and asked to give tips about how to become a better player. Sebastian 'Matrim' Sundström had the honour to start off, check out the article here.

Ivan 'ArtStyle' Antonov announced his return in a very lengthy interview in Russian. Thankfully, joinDOTA translated it into proper English so anyone interested can take a read. Go take a look here. The rivalry between him and Troels 'syndereN' Nielsen about being the best Night Stalker will be something to look forward to.

Today, Tobi-Wan was interviewed by GamersBook where he talks about getting into shoutcasting and how he keeps his passion high in even the most boring games. Check it out here.



Last week one we received the biggest update ever released for Dota 2. Two new heroes were added: Silencer and Spiritbreaker. Spiritbreaker is one of the best pubstomp heroes and is a great counter to all the annoying Anti-Mage players. A more competitive and interesting addition is Silencer. While the old Viper vs Silencer era is clearly over, the return of Silencer could be big in the competitive scene. A lot of teams like to go for a very caster-oriented line-up, with one press on the button Silencer takes care of all those troubles and is able to annihilate even the strongest opponents. I'm sure teams will pick him up in competitive games as he has a lot to bring to the table.

Anti-Mage received a nerve, seeing his armour reduced by 1 and the 6.72 Base Attack Time (BAT) improvement reversed from 1.35 to 1.45. A hero who received a lot of improvements was Axe, making him a very serious option to consider in competitive games. Another hero that was greatly improved goes by the name of Kunkka being able to output a lot more damage. Skeleton King saw his Reincarnation cooldown decreased from 300/220/140 to 260/160/60. Check out the full change-log here.

Five new items have been introduced as well: Rod of Atos, Heaven’s Halberd, Ring of Aquila, Abyssal Blade and Tranquil Boots. I haven't tested them all, but Ring of Aquila seem a nice addition for agility heroes but I do have my doubts about Tranquil Boots. While the idea is awesome and it will work very well on certain heroes, the Arcane Boots will remain the first option for team fights. There's one item I really fear and that is the Abyssal Blade: finally making the Cranium Basher upgradeable in a very terrifying way. An ideal choice for Anti-Mage when facing void to return the bashes. It stuns the target for 1.4 seconds and has a 2 second cooldown. It does not function with other Abyssal Blades, Skull Basher, Slardar's Bash, Troll Warlord's Bash, Spirit Breaker's Greater Bash or Faceless Void's Time Lock. Besides the random stun, Abyssal Blade comes with an Overwhelm ability. Imagine an Anti-mage that can stun targets for 2 seconds. It goes through Magic Immunity and has a cast range of 140 units, a cooldown of 60 seconds, and a mana cost of 150. You will fear this item that's for sure.

Time to wrap this article up, hope you've enjoyed the update and until next time!

Resources:
AEONSports
prodota
joindota
Western Wolves
Mousesports