Neslyn A. October 22, 2018
Mineski did not drop a single game through a championship run at Red Bull Guardians.
After paiN Gaming lost to Mineski, they successfully eliminated Team Lithium in the lower bracket and secure a rematch versus Mineski in the grand finals of the tournament. Mineski had won each series played with a clean sweep, a trend the team was eager to continue.
Red Bull Guardians put an exciting twist on standard Dota 2 gameplay. Although the basic mechanics stayed the same, the custom game played brought in several new features for professional teams to consider.
Each team was given an additional drafting phase for them to choose three substitute heroes. Players could swap their current heroes for benched substitutes, but the incoming heroes would use the current level and items of the outgoing character. A three-minute cooldown was also implemented for switch.
In the first game, Mineski picked Invoker, Necrophos, and Spectre as their substitute heroes while paiN Gaming chose Visage, Brewmaster, and Phoenix. Mineski dominated the game, maximizing their abilities with Spectre building a diffusal blade and switching to Phantom Lancer during team fights. Mineski ended the game with a 15-kill advantage over paiN Gaming.
The second game was longer as paiN Gaming proved that they can square up with Mineski. But it still wasn’t enough to deal with the pushing power of Mineski’s Terrorblade and Lina.
The third game was again lopsided, and this was what Mineski needed to close the series. Mineski had Ursa, Faceless Void, and Templar Assassin as their substitute heroes, and once again Mineski executed their strategies to perfection with hero swaps keeping paiN on the back foot.
Mineski won a total of $20,000 for their efforts, while paiN Gaming goes home with $10,000.