TI8: 2 new heroes released/teased as finals day approaches

The finals are almost upon us. Five days of heart-wrenching games and many upsets have all been adding up to the finals day. The stage is soon to be set, and the three monsters of Dota 2 will be battling each other: OG, PSG.LGD, and Evil Geniuses. Every region has a chance to win. But the only thing that matters is who will be the winner.

Day 5 of TI8 has been quite hard to digest. Evil Geniuses, the team that struggled throughout the year, have proven themselves. Finally, EG has whitewashed a series against Team Liquid. Team Liquid took the loss right after their series with Team Secret. Although Team Liquid 2-0’ed Team Secret, they couldn’t do the same to Evil Geniuses.

Final Three. #TI8 pic.twitter.com/nwZJHMTKP7

— Wykrhm Reddy (@wykrhm) August 25, 2018

The two new heroes launched and teased in TI8

As per the tradition, we get some awesome new heroes too! You have probably seen the name Mars go around a lot lately. And that is the hero that was teased on day 5.

Furthermore, we also get another hero that is available right now! Grimstroke, a massive nuker, was released in Dota 2 yesterday. From just a first look, Grimstroke looks like he’s a great position 4 or 2. It depends on how you want to play him of course. And let’s not forget, as per tradition, the hero is quite broken. So it’s a great time to spam him and get your win rate up a bit before he’s nerfed!

For Mars, there isn’t much information available. But from the promotional video, it seems like he has a summoning ability, much like with Wraith King’s skeletons. We’ll see when it’s released though.

A brief look At Grimstroke

Grimstroke, a hero who is seeking revenge, it seems, is a very strong nuker and disabler. Not only that, his ultimate can yield great results and he has a very useful save as well.

If you need some pro opinion, here’s something from EGM:

new hero very annoying so op that even @SexyBamboe thinks he good

— Jerry Lundkvist (@FollowEGM) August 25, 2018

Skilled at manipulating battle from the outskirts, Grimstroke studies every movement and assesses each line, deciding when to emerge from inky darkness to disable his victims and bind them together with a swipe of his brush. He delights in unleashing phantom thralls to vex opponents, as he carefully considers how to dispatch multiple enemies with one final stroke.

Here’s a description of his abilities, taken directly from the game:

Stroke of Fate

Grimstroke winds up and paints a path of ink with his brush, damaging and slowing enemies in its wake. The damage increases with each enemy the ink strikes.

This ability has a 5-second cooldown at level 4 and can clear an entire wave. Not to mention, it has one long range. It will work great with magic-amplifying items.

Phantom’s Embrace

Grimstroke commands a phantom to latch onto his enemy, damaging and silencing it. If the phantom survives the latch duration, it rends the victim for heavy damage and refreshes Phantom Embrace’s cooldown.

This is basically a weaver bug, but silences the enemy and deals a ton of damage when it returns. It will be a great skill to cause some chaos in fights.

Ink Swell

Grimstroke covers himself or an ally in ink, silencing the target while granting bonus speed and immunity to attacks. The ink damages nearby enemies over time before bursting, damaging and stunning in the area based on how much harm it caused along the way.

Ink Swell is a great skill to use with your Blink Dagger. It’s an area-of-effect stun that deals damage. Furthermore, it is also a great tool to save your allies. But be careful though — it does silence your allies or you, whoever you use it on.

Soulbind

Grimstroke binds an enemy hero to its nearest allied hero in range, preventing each from moving away from the other. Unit-targeted spells that hit either hero affect both. If the bind is broken before it expires, the initial target will again be bound to its nearest allied hero in range.

This skill is insane. You can tether two enemies, and whatever you target onto one enemy will be applied to the tethered enemy as well. Hex, allied target spells, Atos, anything!

Finals day: three regions to battle it out

The monsters from each of the strongest regions in Dota 2 will be fighting tooth and nail for the Aegis of the Champions today.

Following the brackets, it will be Evil Geniuses facing off against PSG.LGD in a bo3 game. PSG.LGD was knocked down to the lower bracket finals by OG yesterday after an intense 3-game series.

Will EG continue their lower bracket run and knock the Chinese powerhouse into third place, or will LGD show that the myth of the Chinese year is true after all? It’s gonna be one action-packed series to watch.

The winner of the EG vs PSG.LGD series will move on to the grand finals of TI8. OG is currently waiting in the grand finals for the winner after their surprising upper bracket runs through TI8.

No one expected OG to come this far, but one thing is for sure. Notail is great at scouting new players, as Topson is delivering top-tier plays in TI8. Well, that might’ve been a lie. It appears one person predicted the brackets correctly and expected OG to come marching right into the grand finals.

There is currently only one fan with the correct bracket prediction. We are bringing that fan over to TI9 next year.

— DOTA 2 (@DOTA2) August 24, 2018

Sadly for Team Liquid, their run ends as they place fourth in TI8. They were one of the hopefuls this year. Many of us believed that they could be the ones to win two Internationals. However, Matumbaman and Miracle have expressed that they were quite happy with what they’ve achieved this year. They are the only team that has managed to stay on top for an entire year after winning an International.

Some final words for TI8

As for the finals day, make sure you’re following the TI8 stream on Twitch, or wherever else you’re gonna watch. Support your teams, make up your fantasy teams, and gear up for the amazing finals day of TI8. Maybe we’ll get some more surprises as well!

This tournament has been beyond great. TI8 will surely be on my mind forever, and we hope you had a great time watching it as well.