The International 2014

I never doubted wether DotA2 is 100% free to play or not, what I wasng't sure about was if, among the cosmetic items players were buying there were actual game updates equivalent to map graphic upgrades, hero updates, game balancing and stuff that normally come in regular patches. Going by Malthe's explanation the only thing of the sort are the new game modes which to be honest I find a bit cheap to put them among the stretch goals and not simply add them for free but but well.

This year the International makes the league of legends championship look like a mere convention tournament. I hope Riot is planning something to step up their game aswell.

So yeah we got pretty much all the teams!
Now the thing is who will win the play-in series?
I'll go with CIS.
Liquid is just.. meh
MVP well IT'S MVP.. no offense.
Virtus.pro.. well they can be my 2nd team of choice but we already saw how they crumble under the pressure of importante matches.

I never doubted wether DotA2 is 100% free to play or not, what I wasng't sure about was if, among the cosmetic items players were buying there were actual game updates equivalent to map graphic upgrades, hero updates, game balancing and stuff that normally come in regular patches. Going by Malthe's explanation the only thing of the sort are the new game modes which to be honest I find a bit cheap to put them among the stretch goals and not simply add them for free but but well.

This year the International makes the league of legends championship look like a mere convention tournament. I hope Riot is planning something to step up their game aswell.

See i wasn't sure about what you were asking about because you mentioned maplestory so i was wondering if you thought maybe something like compendium owners getting an advantage

And i don't see how it's cheap to add it to the stretch-goals tbh(Obviously i might be biased since i am so happy with my compendium even disregarding the stretch-goals that anything else is just a cherry ontop), you could argue that most of the strecth-goals are things that would be added sooner or later with regular patches.
For example, techies is a hero that people have been wanting to have ported for ages but valve haven't released him and now he has finally been unlocked through the compendium, sure he would've been added sooner or later regardless, but now the community knows that it's coming and they know that valve have to and will focus on delivering just that


Also [MENTION=9742]Chew[/MENTION]; I think CIS is a pretty clear favourite, not that VP couldn't make an upset. But CIS is scrimming with the better teams imho and have a lot of fresh blood + Black's experience to help them.

Apparently I can't use steam funds for a week because I'm using a new payment method. Meh at least there's still more than enough time to level it up and unlock the loading screens I'm missing and some of the other cool stuff. Oh, check after writing and I was able , can't buy keys in the market though

Got Windranger cape in my first chest which made me very happy. CM and Lion also look cool, the other two I got Puck and Storm Spirit do look cool but I never play them :/
I hope I get a couple chests more, I want Tinker's boots and Death Prophet's Skirt or whatever it was Got to do some math and see if I can afford another 2400 points and still have enough for when I can buy keys.

Also, my predictions went horribly wrong, 44 points only

Update: the hell? Launched dota again after eating and got an extra treasure out of nowhere with the DK item which I also wanted but thought I wouldn't get because it said it was rare or something:o

You got the DK thing because it was disabled from dropping in the start was a mistake so you were rewarded it afterwards.

I got everything but the warlock staff atm ^^
and the prizepool spiked massively as expected 7.5 almost now

Also i got 45 points, EU qualis followed zero patterns

And that's 8 million, new voice and a new model for the heroes the community chooses.
10 million actually looks like it might just be reached around TI.

Love the immortal treasures so far, especially sniper's. I just need to level up since, but getting a consistent set of points isn't working, I might buy more zzz.

Fear wont be playing for EG
Sad but expected, also:
Compendium
- Compendium Reward Released: Daily Hero Challenge
- Compendium Reward Released: Alternate Voice Vote
- Compendium Reward Released: Model Update Vote

Btw does southperry have a team or people who would like to form a team, I wouldn't mind organizing my other bajan friends for a 5v5 (bajans vs southperrians ) game every now and then.

Getting those damn player cards is hard. I'm playing around 4 games per day but I've been rewarded two packs only. So basically 1 pack of cards every 6 games... so I'd need around 54 games more to get enough cards to get them all or trade repeated ones. There should be enough time but considering I already got repeated PieLieDie it'll take more time to find and trade whatever I might be missing after getting at least 55 cards.

Getting those damn player cards is hard. I'm playing around 4 games per day but I've been rewarded two packs only. So basically 1 pack of cards every 6 games... so I'd need around 54 games more to get enough cards to get them all or trade repeated ones. There should be enough time but considering I already got repeated PieLieDie it'll take more time to find and trade whatever I might be missing after getting at least 55 cards.

Don't worry, last year we had a website where you could trade cards you had too many of for cards you were lacking.
There will probably be another site like that soon.

There's a thread in reddit complaining that it seems like the drop rate is too low too, which is what worries me more than getting to trade them. I also read that qualified teams will also get cards and that wasn't in my calculations. I hope they improve the drop rate or do something about it because it'd be fun to collect as many as possible just by playing.

Cyborgmatt did some math, we're almost 100% sure to hit 10 million prizepool.
Fucking crazy. We'll finally get "in the bag" taunts

You now get a Player Card Pack along with 25 Compendium points when you finish your Daily Hero Challenge.

They also give 10 cards instead of 5 now. Not worried about not being able to get all player cards now
I just hope I keep getting heroes I can play more often than not.

Finally got home!
Updated the first post, we're very close to 10 million, holy hell.

Collecting these cards has kept me entertained... browsing through the endless rip offs in d2l until I finally find a decent offer with stuff I need takes forever but 9/19 teams completed as of now. I need to open more packs because I ran out of cards earlier. Thing is drops are rare and f'ucking daily hero challenge keeps giving me stuff I can't play at all, I got Chen for 2nd time today and I'm not even gonna try. Why can't I get Weaver or Jakiro or Dazzle or something I know how to play decently?

pineapple this, now I got Invoker.

Not home so can't do proper update but:

After a lot of trading I'm almost done getting 1 set of player cards Only missing Yao and Xiangzaiii that apparently are "rare".
I hope I get those two fast and then I can focus on getting Gold gems for Empire, DK, VG, Na'vi and maybe EG.

A new set of compendium rewards have been rolled out: http://blog.dota2.com/2014/06/overflowin...um-update/
Really loving the weather effects, missed them from wc3 dota.

I think 11 million is a realitistic final prizepool.