With just a week left until the start of The International 2015, alongside the prize money distributions, the style in which the tournament will be run has been revealed. Whilst no team has been given it’s proper draw and subsequently there is no proper bracket drawn up; information regarding the wildcard matches and match details have been detailed.
Starting off the tournament, the Wild Card placement matches will occur. According to the site, the matches will be best of three rounds, the four participants (Team Archon, CDEC gaming, Vega Squadron and MVP. Phoenix) will be split into two seperate brackets, grouped A and B. The winners of both groups will fight against each other to win their secured spot in the main group. The losers of each have one more chance to secure the second spot as they fight their way through the lower bracket.
From there, from the 27th of July to the 30th of July, the tournament enters the Group Stage phase. In these rounds, each of the 16 participant teams are split into two groups and will fight amongst each other in a best of two games. The four teams in each group who obtain the most points through defeating the competition, will head into the upper bracket for the Main Event whilst the other 8 teams are put into the lower bracket.
Finally, the Main Event will run from the 3rd to 8th of August where teams will finally compete for their standings in the tournament in a best of three battle. All participants in the lower bracket will only have the one shot to go all the way to the grand finals. The first match of the lower bracket will only be a best of one round whilst all others will be a best of three until the grand final match. The winner of the upper bracket will face the winner of the lower bracket (which includes the last team that faced the upper bracket winner) in the grand final and conclude the tournament in a best of five rounds.
The rules can be seen here in finer detail.
The clock is ticking for one of the most anticipated if not the most anticipated event for anyone following the Dota scene, spectators and participants alike. We’ll see some amazing matches and some cunning plays. We’ll see tears of joy and sorrows. At the end of it all, we’ll see an incredible community come together through this event.