One of China’s greatest Dota 2 talents has found a new home.
Team Aster has announced the signing of star player Song “Sccc” Chun. This ends his three-year run as the top star of Newbee. The announcement was made by Aster on Weibo.
Sccc first joined Newbee in 2015 and competed for its developmental team, Newbee.Young. He was promoted to the main roster following Newbee’s disappointing ninth-place performance at The International 2016.
Though Newbee struggled at Valve-sponsored majors during his first season with the team, Newbee was exceptional elsewhere. The team took first place in DPL Season 2, as well as at live tournaments including ZOTAC Cup Masters and Galaxy Battles. They also posted strong showings in other tournaments such as MDL Autumn 2016, ESL One Genting, and Manila Masters.
Newbee’s season culminated with a grand finals showing at The International 2017, where it was defeated by Team Liquid.
While that was an excellent season for Newbee, the team has been in a steady decline ever since. The Chinese squad suffered from consistency issues in 2018, which led to a major roster shakeup following The International 2018.
The team changed on an almost monthly basis during the 2018-2019 Dota Pro Circuit season as the organization shuffled together players from Newbee and its developmental teams in hopes of finding a stronger combination. The team didn’t find any sort of success until the World Cyber Games 2019, by which point it had already failed to qualify for The International 2019.
The Newbee organization found a backdoor into the event by signing North American qualifier winners Forward Gaming who went on to show a respectable performance at TI9, but the fate of the organization’s Chinese players is now uncertain.
The 2018-2019 Dota Pro Circuit season was a transformative one for the Chinese region as a number of top organizations like Newbee and Invictus Gaming fell into the background behind Dota 2 newcomers. Team Aster initially looked to be one of the breakout teams from the region, qualifying for both the Kuala Lumpur Major and Chongqing Major.
The team made a number of changes to the roster in March that resulted in a decline over the following months. It settled on a roster in May and put on a better performance in the qualifiers to The International 2019, but ultimately fell short of reaching the event.
At the moment it is unclear where Sccc fits into Aster’s roster, as he could be used as either a mid or carry. Liu “Kamma” Chang and Kee Chyuan “ChYuan” Ng were both added on a trial basis in the spring and have not been officially released by the team as of this writing. Though both players are talented, Sccc would likely be an upgrade at either position.
The Chinese region is still set to undergo a major shuffle and Aster could have a wildly different roster by the time the new DPC season begins. Regardless, Sccc is exactly the kind of player to build a team around.
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