Finally, Something Worth Writing About...

Be prepared, this is a long one.


Since the beginning of December I started to get really bored with competitive HoN. Not because the scene is bad.. I think competitive HoN is the strongest it's ever been right now; instead I was bored with competitive HoN from a drama aspect. The predictability of well run tournaments with the same rosters and hero lineups doesn't make for a very dramatic time. This issue was ultimately what lead to my disinterest with continuing to update this blog. However, recently a forum post titled "New domain of pain?" caught my interest. Before I go into discussing it I was to preface by saying I have no personal issues with anyone I will mention in this post and hope that anyone who reads this will be as objective as I am attempting to be while writing it.

I knew that Insania was being removed from Trademark (tdM) and replaced by Fittske for awhile, not because Mynuts came to me and told me about it, but because there were obvious issues within Emperor's Domain of Pain (DoP) and always a little passive aggressiveness between certain tdM players and Insania. Anyone who was close to these two parties knew this was on the horizon, even if no one said anything. Following the announcement of Chessie's departure of Complexity (coL) to join Stay Green and the resulting removal of Skyzoe, it was clear to many forum goers and myself that a new Diamond level team was on the cusp of formation. So when Insania announced that he would be joined by Skyzoe, Kebap, LezzQQ and Pewe` (who was already replaced in favor of former coL 6th man Shamsz) I wasn't caught off guard in the least.

Likewise, once Fittske joined tdM I knew that DoP was running on life support. The announcement came a few days ago after DoP chose to forfeit their Sound Blaster Heroes League match on both Emperor's and Testie's streams, with Testie citing his lack of desire to give up a few hours of customer service as well as issuing the statement that he has already proven to himself and everyone else that he is one of HoN's all-time top players. The dissolution of DoP also came to little surprise, as it was apparently impossible for players to either find time to practice or wake up for matches. This saw Heimer and Jeppins make their way to Tt eSPORTS (TteS) to replace Riser who left to fill the gap Chessie left in Complexity; as well as Wytaliba who cited real life issues as a reason to step back to the role of 6th man. Although if you want my opinion, in addition to RL issues; wyt probably also saw this team has having little chance of success after losing the two best players on their team and wanted to go out as being remembered as part of one of the most dominating HoN teams of the 2011-2012 year. Emperor was kind of the odd man out here, but I expect him to join another team (maybe even coL (to support Riser's addiction to dodging LANs)) as a 6th man.

You might be wondering why I typed that third paragraph at all, but I needed to establish that DoP had disbanded. And even though everyone who is gonna read this post probably already knew everything about what I just said, I like to be thorough in my rants to avoid confusion... and because I talk like I type. You all know how much I like to talk. So now on to the discussion at hand:

The "New Domain of Pain"

So DoP is no more, leaving a vacant spot in Diamond Division. Normally this would mean that one team (tdM) gets a free trip to the Round of 8. Except what ended up happening is Insania's team was able to take DoP's slot in Diamond, even though they didn't have any DoP members actively on their roster. Let me be clear on exactly what happened and when (since I have seen some conflicting reports on the forums):

1. Emperor creates DoP during the initial signups with the following roster: Emperor, Fittske, AngryTestie, Ensoe, Jeppins, zeNap (Managers don't count to player add/removes)
2. Ensoe joins TteS after the Qualifiers, Emperor removes Ensoe and adds CHEESEHELMET and Parakletos (additions 1 and 2)
3. Fittske joins tdM after HT Cycle 3, Emperor removes Fittske
4. DoP disbands, CHEESEHELMET and Jeppins move to TteS roster, Parakletos leaves DoP, zeNap and AngryTestie remain on roster, Emperor adds Insania (DoP team is penalized 20% of its points for 3rd roster change)
5. Emperor gives Captain rights to Insania, Insania removes Emperor
6. Insania adds Skyzoe, Kebap, LezzQQ and Shamsz (DoP team is penalized 20% for each of the 4 additions)
7. Domain of Pain roster now reads Insania, LezzQQ, Skyzoe, Shamsz, Kebap and includes AngryTestie and zeNap who have yet to remove themselves

Now that everyone is clear that this is exactly as it happened (I confirmed this with Emperor by the way) we will continue.

Insania's new team The Fire Rises (TFR) replaces DoP in HoN Tour's Diamond Division. Already, this is kinda fucked up from an ethical standpoint, but I'm in favor of letting a team with so much potential go directly to Diamond instead of just stomping on shit teams in Bronze and Silver. That's not fun for anyone, especially not the teams in Bronze and Silver who belong there and are trying to get better by playing against evenly matches opponents. Then I look at the HoN Tour site and realize they are still sitting at 881 points...and this is where I have to draw the line. In typical Phil fashion, I start writing a post of the forums to express my confusion and lack of support for this decision, the post can be found here but I will copy and paste it as well to establish events:

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I don't have a problem with them moving straight to Diamond division. I do, however, have a huge problem with them getting to keep the points that DoP had already earned. If this stands, the current DoP will come in ranked at #15, which is a mere 4 positions away from #11; meaning they will have the opportunity to compete in the tournament to be the 4th team to Vegas. I don't think anyone would put it past a team like this to be able to reach 5th or 6th in the upcoming cycles, especially if they continue to practice like they have been.

4 None QsQ 357 Diamond 6,750 pts

5 None Tt eSPORTS TteS Diamond 4,900 pts

6 None Lions eSportsKlubb LION Diamond 4,650 pts

7 None One Trick Pony OTP Diamond 2,925 pts

8 5 We Are Spies oo7 Diamond 2,790 pts

9 None Absolute Legends aL Diamond 2,425 pts

10 None Team Mistral MlST Diamond 2,420 pts

11 None CutForBieber YoIo Diamond 2,400 pts

12 3 Pencils PNIS Diamond 2,375 pts

13 -5 Fack You Kurdi FYKU Gold 2,350 pts

14 -2 Call It Karma C1K Gold 2,200 pts


So I think it's fair to say that right now there's a real solid Top 4 with Stay Green, Trademark, Q Squad, and Complexity. Then you have Lions and possibly TteS (depending on the level of success they have with their new roster) at 5/6th. I can ABSOLUTELY see this team able defeat any other team in HoN Tour, and I could see them taking a few games off the top teams as well. Giving a team an 800 point headstart is unfair to all the current HoN Tour teams who have fought to earn their way to their current ranking; and even though I genuinely like and have a good relationship with every member of this team, it's a situation that needs to be addressed.
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This is met with some who agree and some who disagree, as well as some who care less about the topic but would like a chance to insult The Thrill (as is to be expected since people often times can't keep their personal distaste for me out of logical arguments.) And later in the day is discussed on the Honcast Podcast when Breaky brings up the topic of TFR replacing DoP in Diamond. Milkfat (the current Commissioner of eSports for S2 and HoN Tour Director) is given an opportunity to speak about why this happened. At this point he states the following (paraphrased for brevity:)

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"I think when we initially made the rules...when a team split, if 3 of that teams players wanted to stay together they could add 2 players and keep their points...I don't think it was an oversight but the players were able to find a loophole, congratulations to them...this is our first time doing a major event like HoN Tour...is this unfair? Maybe? I don't know...in the end what it comes down to is, sweet, someone pointed out a flaw and now I have something to fix."

Shortly after, Breaky brings up the arguement about having Diamond start at zero points, calling 800 points "minimum" and "not a lot in the broad spectrum" and that they will have to "do VERY well to get themselves into the top 11."

Beefpotpie thought it was "sweet and really cool of Emperor to donate his team to Insania." 

Then Zetpro drops this bomb on me: [8:50:04 PM] William "piratkuk/SweetPro" Näslund: i like boobies
[8:50:11 PM] William "piratkuk/SweetPro" Näslund: just wanted you gais to know
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I will address these comments from the last to the first:

Zetpro: Yes.

Beefpotpie: This should do.

Breaky: 881 points is "minimal?" Actually zero points is minimal, that's the definition of minimal. 881 points places them in 38th place in HoN Tour according to Milkfat (even though they are listed at 15 on Hontour.com) and they are competing in the division where they receive the highest amount of points. The one caveat to them having basically an assured spot in the Top 11 is that winning Gold Division is worth 1,000 points, meaning that a team who is worse than them can possible get more points due to winning a lower division match (this needs to be addressed for HoN Tour Season 2.) Assuming that they placed 5-6 (which is completely conceivable) in every cycle from now till the end they would have 4,881 points. That's not taking into consideration that this team could very well have a Top 3/4 finish. So next, I'll use Mistral as an example because I don't think they'll drop down to Gold nor place higher than 9-12 in Diamond. If Mistral places 9-12 in the next 4 cycles they will go from 2,420 to 4,420: this places them below TFR in the rankings and could lead to them being completely knocked out of the Top 11. This stands true for We Are Spies, Absolute Legends and Afraid as well. Given One Trick Pony's somewhat consistent results I think they are already a lock, but even they could be at risk. I just want you all to realize that 881 points is not "minimal," it is a gigantic head start for a powerhouse potential team who is forming half way through a season. If FnaticRaidCall decided to come back to HoN, would you give them an 800 point head start? Food for though.

Milkfat: No. No, no, no, no, no. This should have never been an issue. When you took over the rules were already written for HoN Tour, and granted the rules needed to be updated, there was a clause in the rules that SPECIFICALLY STATED that a team needed to maintain a CORE ROSTER to inherit the points. The core roster was defined as 4 of the original players, and even if you wanted to take that down to 3 players, that would have been fine. But you just straight up OMITTED it. There's on congratulations to be had for Insania, you should feel embarrassed about this situation because it should have been avoided from the very beginning. You know, I believe that as a "Director" you probably will do a better job than I did. I think you have great ability when it comes to planning and coordinating events with partners. But when it comes to running and hosting a league, I gotta be honest when I say I don't see the merit. I wrote over twelve pages of rules for HoN Tour, and the thing is, none of it was fluff. I know how players are. I know how they play pocket lawyer. I know they look for any way to get an edge in on the competition by exploiting administration and other errors. This wasn't an oversight, this was ignorance.

One thing that disappointed me is what has been said officially from S2/Honcast however, is that it's all just a giant cop-out. The truth of the matter is, you control what happens and what doesn't happen. Do you think that in real sports if a player is found to have abused an illegal substance after the fact that they just say, "HAH, YOU GOT US! CONGRATS BUT IT WONT HAPPEN AGAIN!!!!" Or do you think the Olympics would allow a player to argue semantics like "you just said steroids were banned, you never said anything about HGH!????" No. They strip your titles, your medals, your awards. Just recently Lance Armstrong was stripped of his gold medal after admitting to using steroids, and thats basically what happened here. A new team, The Fire Rises, used steroids and got 881 points to start off with.

The thing that disappointed me the most however, is how these guys all claim to be lovers of eSports, yet do nothing to protect it. eSports doesn't exist to serve you guy, you guys exist to promote eSports. Oversights like this can't happen. You're letting a team walk over you because of your personal relationships with the players, saying otherwise is a lie. You wanna be an admin? You wanna be in charge? You gotta be able to make tough decisions. When I took over as Director of eSports back in January 2012 and my shit was getting pushed in on the forums I just stomached it. When I found out Pika used Nir as a "dirty ringer" I penalized Buch and his team, and that was hard because he's one of the closest friends I have in HoN. You wan't people to take eSports seriously? You want it to last long enough for you to have a job in it 5 years from now? You gotta treat it seriously and with respect. There was nothing "right" about what happened here, nothing was "ok" or "acceptable." What happened is morally wrong, and more importantly it undermines the legitimacy of HoN Tour as a respectable eSport event.

I won't comment on what I'm reading on the forums now about the FIT situation, as I don't have that much information, but I sincerely hope that what I do understand of it isn't true. Otherwise, be ashamed.

Coming back in the New Year

Hey Guys,

Yes, again it's been a lengthy hiatus since my last post. Ya know, between the Holidays and the consistency of HoN Tour it's been kinda hard to be mad at S2 or any of the players.

I've got a few leads on a story about Tralfamadore supposedly abusing his powers and Limmp and some other people trolling Swindlemelonzz, but frankly none of it has really been that interesting.

I'm sure a lot of you have seen me streaming a lot more often, you can visit me @ www.twitch.tv/s2phil if you want. But you've also seen me trolling a lot of streams as well.

Frankly, when I first started this blog I never thought it would really take off, but the amount of hits it still gets even with no updates is a definite sign that people want to hear not only what I think, but what topics are hot in Heroes of Newerth. So I have decided the following:

I will return hongossip.blogspot.com to what it once was: a place for users to submit content they feel needs to be talked about. I will not censor it, I will only edit it for grammar and post it in my own words. I want to do that because some of you couldn't write your way out of a 5th grade English class and one thing I will not compromise on is correct grammar!

Please, submit any and all gossip/drama/whatever! to hongossip@hotmail.com

Happy Holidays and let's get it HoN!

Real Talkin Episode 2 Feedback

Hey guys,

So it's been awhile since I posted anything at all on this blog, and frankly it's because there is very little worth being passionate about in HoN at the moment. I feel like we're at the point where S2 isn't really doing anything worth being upset about (other than maybe the Australian thing but Aussies need to realize they make up about 7% of the population in HoN Tour, and S2 needs to cater to the vast majority in this instance) and the teams in HoN are pretty stable.

So I figured the best thing to do until we get something worth talking about is to leave a place here for people to post uncensored feedback and comments for the Real Talkin Podcast I am a member of with Swindlemelonzz and mynuts. Similar to how the old Honcast podcast let you post your feedback in the comments section, except here you can be completely anonymous.

The VOD can be found here:

http://www.twitch.tv/melonzz/b/345771494

It's nearly 2 hours long but has some solid discussion from everyone. Special guests this week are Breakycpk from S2/Honcast and DawZ from Trademark eSports' Administration team.

Enjoy!

coL vs ORGE - 1-1 Series knocks out V0TE

No one would be saying anything if it weren't due to the extremely well documented amount of hatred between players on these teams. I didn't watch the games so I won't comment on whether or not I believe coL threw; but I will say that V0TE had every opportunity to not drop games against Complexity, or more importantly in this situation, Orange eSports.

I'm not gonna lie though. After I saw that Complexity was going to be the team that decided who moved on in Group A, I told myself - "Well, that's the end for Gary Johnson."

Team Spotlight and Breakdown: Vitriolic Gaming

Vitriolic Gaming (vtL)

Vitriolic is a team who has been around in some way shape or form for basically the last year. They really started to come together in late January/February and have gone through many many roster changes. Miikeys has always been at the help of the project, but aside from that I think Zaxirok is the longest standing members. Of course most people will remember vtL for two things: their first round loss to Fun in the Sun Gaming (former HoN/DOTA 2 pros like Tarano, PaintitGold and Korok) in the DreamHoN Summer NA Qualifiers, and their more recent success in the DreamHoN Online Summer Championships which landed them a Top 8 finish. Their current starting lineup consists of Miikeys, Zaxirok, Parakletos, Bitchzlapped and FearTheZap. Vitriolic Gaming has attained much success thus far in the tournament having already secured a spot in the Diamond Division of HoN Tour Season One Cycle One. I have been keeping an eye on this team for a few months because of the affiliation of some of their members with the SBT (Super Beta Testers) of Heroes of Newerth, namely Parakletos and Bitchzlapped. The SBT guys are always talking about strategy stuff with S2 employees, namely wza, and run interesting lineups compared to what people are used to seeing.

Key Heroes: Sand Wraith, Chipper, Kinesis, Bubbles, Empath, Tempest, Glacius

I'm not exactly sure what the deal is with Chipper and Sand Wraith and why it's been so successful. I'm not sure if it's a situation of them not really playing vs anyone good or just that there is some secret combination between the heroes. Being the diligent researcher I am, I went into their past few games to try and uncover the secret this team is hiding. I guess it helps that Sand Wraith has always been considered the hardest of hard carries, offering very little in the early game to get to that late game stage. The thing is, with the psuedo-trilane meta, there is always one carry getting nothing but free farm. While many teams choose heroes like Silhouette and The Dark Lady to assist them come late game, Vitriolic has chosen to utilize Sand Wraith. In each game that I watched of theirs with Sand Wraith picked, Parakletos was able to get his Mock of Brilliance at around the 20 minute mark or earlier (depending on his assists and kills after getting his ult.) He maxes Desert's Curse and Deserted first, then maxes out Dissipate after. Pretty standard overall.

I don't know if people really paid attention when the hero was buffed in the past when S2 added the Bonus True Damage to Heroes under the affect of Desert's Curse. The change in this ability means he can be more influential in early team fights and helping to set up ganks with additional damage output. 45 True Damage + Standard Damage means that most Sand Wraith players at Level 9 are putting out about 115-130 Damage per hit. This will shred most supports, and because of the increased assist gold you get, it means your already stellar free farm from the safe lane is getting larger.

Vitriolic runs Chipper mid, this has good parts and bad parts. The bad part is that you're in a 2v1 lane typically, meaning that the other team likely has a ranged hero who is going to try and keep you out of experience range while their mid gets the farm. Most of the time this hero is someone like Pebbles or Magmus looking to get that fast Portal Key. The good part about this is that Chipper can CS pretty well with Rocket Barrage. Level 1 Rockets only cost 40 mana and have 80 damage, allowing you the ability to CS from a safe position while also not pushing the lane like Thunderbringer's Chain Lightning would. His E ability "Focus Buffer" also allows for massive Magic Damage absorption, up to 500 at Level 4. This is typically what vtL will max out along with Rocket Barrage. This actually meshes very well with Sand Wraith's E ability "Dissipate" as he's already getting additional Damage Reduction. The slow affected of Desert's Curse helps Chipper land Rockets as well as keeping enemies on Sawblade Showdown for a bit longer allowing for massive damage at pretty much all stages of the game.

Almost all of this teams strategies are based on AOE teamfight and initiation. FearTheZap plays a lot of Tempest and Keeper and is known to land some decent sized ults when need be. Kinesis is another favored hero of this Vitriolic, typically played by Bitchzlapped and let me say, this guy on Kinesis makes Jeppin's Kinesis look like AMXZaku's Chipper. Again, because this team plays with AOE heroes, Kinesis is able to really show his effectiveness when paired with heroes like Tempest, Keeper of the Forest and Bubbles, all of which Vitriolic can and will use when allowed to.

ZaxiroK wins a majority of his suicide lanes when he plays Bubbles as well, often times getting the Bloodlust kill, even against heroes like Silhouette. He also does the early warding for Vitriolic and typically wards the same two places in every game. One inside the pull camp trees, as mentioned earlier, and the other depends on what faction he's playing. If he's playing Legion, typically he will ward the top Rune near the Hellbourne ramp to the mid lane. A small side note: I noticed that he takes a path through the Observatory then up the ramp nearest the mid lane, then to the left towards the jungle entrance and then up next to the easy camp and will ward from the right of the pull camp instead of beneath it. If he's playing Hellbourne, it will depend on whether or not he is playing vs a jungler. If he is, he will ward the top medium camp to get Rune vision as well as block the spawn, however he places the rune in such a way so as not to have vision of the jungle beneath him. This leaves that side lane open to ganks from jungle heroes as well as roaming supports. Basically early game this is one team you won't be worrying about not being able to buy counters until 1:30 if your goal is to roam and gank.

Vitriolic's warding in mid-game is usually defensive even when their team is doing well. Miikeys tends to ward along the river throughout the mid-game, making sure that their hard carry can see everything that's going on. He also tends to ward spots "in the moment" instead of warding with a future plan. So if they are going to attempt a tower dive on the Legion's bottom tower, even if the goal is to kill people there and immediately take the tower, they will probably ward prior to. It's not always in the lane however, Miikeys will ward in the jungle as well to keep vision on the pull camp as well as possible players waiting for Vitriolic to take the bait. One thing that is very consistent is that they will ward the opposing teams suicide lane to watch for incoming TP's to help take the lane back. Vitriolic has done this upwards into the 20 minute mark in some games. Another thing I've noticed is that Vitriolic doesn't usually upgrade the chicken if they are running a jungle hero. Even when Miikeys gets 200 Gold, there is typically some delay before he will upgrade. A well time jungle gank could lead to an early courier kill. 

The key to Vitriolic is mostly Parakletos, as the drafter and play-caller for the team as well as the hard carry. Bitchzlapped plays carry as well from time to time, but he typically fills the solo mid role on heroes like Chipper and Kinesis. ZaxiroK as already mentioned is just a super solid suicide player and FearTheZap does well on initiation style junglers. The weakest part of the team is actually the "captain" Miikeys, who fills the support role. Teams scheduled to play vs Vitriolic would best be served by looking for opportunities to try and keep Parakletos down and capitalizing on Miikeys often poor positioning and defensive mid-game warding. Play aggressive vs Vitriolic to put them on tilt, as they are the one of the least experienced Top 10 teams and are susceptible to teams who force them to play at a different pace than they are used to.

Tt eSPORTS Continues to Depress

No, I'm not talking about Tt eSports being an unimpressive team. I'm talking about this being the 3rd Dreamhack event in a row where the leader of this long standing team are forced to make a last minute substitute. Before getting into the current events, lets have a little history lessson.


Dreamhack Winter 2011: MSI Beat IT! Tournament

The MSI Beat IT tournament was one of the largest HoN tournaments at the time, with an impressive prize pool of nearly $35,000 and the first time online qualifiers dictated the invitational teams. In Beat IT Qualifier 5, budding Australian powerhouse Frenetic Array was able to snag the final spot to Dreamhack Winter. Here is a VOD from Honcast back when I was a caster (special guest appearance from Sn3yking) and it's worth checking out if you would like to see how far this team really has come. Shortly before they were to attend Dreamhack they were forced to find a substitute player for BoBo, at which point they hit up DirgeSnoopy who was in the middle of transitioning to DOTA 2. They ended up coming in 2nd place at Dreamhack Winter 2011.

Dreamhack Summer 2012: DreamHoN Summer

The DreamHoN Summer tournament was the largest HoN LAN tournament to date. In the DreamHoN Summer Regional Qualifier, Frenetic Array once again showed their dominance as not only a top team in Australia, but one of the best teams in the world. They easily dispatched every team in the Oceanic qualifier and was one of three teams who were a lock to finish in the money. Around this time, many people thought they were the #1 team in the world with Fnatic transitioning to DOTA 2; the only real contest to them were Trademark eSports. Due to the nature of the Regional lock-out, Fray (who became TteS shortly after securing their spot at DHS) was forced to make a choice between LeonBlack` and Riser_ and bring BoBo_ as their 6th man. Already facing stiff competition and now being forced to use a player they hadn't used in quite some time, TteS was still a force to be reckoned with. TteS was then met with a near crippling loss when dabeliuteef was no longer able to travel to Dreamhack, something they found out literally at the airport on his way to Dreamhack. TteS once again found a last minute sub in Mynuts, and aided the team in reaching the Grand Finals once again; and once again finishing in 2nd place.


So that brings us current with Dreamhack Winter 2012 a mere 3 weeks away. And once again, in what seems to be a recurring trend with this team, roster changes are being made. Riser_ who was unable to attend DHS 2012 due to the regional lockout will no longer be attending Dreamhack Winter 2012 and will instead be replaced by Domain of Pain (formerly known as The Returners) utility/suicide player Jeppins. While Jeppins is a great player, TteS is going to have to be extremely active in the scrim scene to ensure their success at Dreamhack Winter. The only tournament still going on at the moment is HoN Tour, in which Jeppins cannot participate with TteS. While many people, including myself, believe that there is a much shorter time to assimilate a top level player to a top tier teams culture, this is Dreamhack Winter; the biggest international HoN LAN event ever conceptualized. I think a lot of people were thinking this was the year for Tt eSPORTS to finally take home the gold, but with the loss of Riser_ is it still possible?

I think not. As much as I love Tt eSPORTS, they face the loss of a key player, the addition of a new player and the inexperience of Moiravus in a LAN setting. The redeeming factor is of course the abilities of SLiCKz and Wyt` on LAN. With this setback, I don't put TteS in the Grand Finals game, falling for the first time in their history at Dreamhack to the 3 spot.

REAL TALK Podcast with Phil Haller, Kyle Freedman and Liv Vesterheim

Hey all! Just a short little post about an upcoming podcast that I will be co-hosting that will take place on Saturday, November 3rd and most likely each Saturday after that. The time hasn't been 100% confirmed yet but I will update this post with it as soon as I know. The podcast will feature topics about Heroes of Newerth, eSports in general as well as some real life discussions.