Clarity League | Season 10 Team Reviews & Power Rankings — Division 1

I’ll lead with the usual set of disclaimers: I’m almost certainly doing only Div 1, these reviews are purely my own takes, ones based purely on vibes and no research whatsoever. We good? Alright, here’s a cat, in keeping with the last iteration of power rankings.

I enjoyed what I did last time for one of these, which was leading with team reviews and leaving the ranking for the end, so I’ll stick to that. I’ll add that I kinda don’t feel like bothering with figuring out roles, so I’m bound to get the role setup of some teams wrong.

Ri

Glitch — Ri — Frozen — Shift — bhorgc

This feels like a solid stack to me, albeit with some caveats. Shift is amazing, Ri has been pretty great from what I’ve seen, Glitch holds his own; the question marks then become Frozen, presumably playing off-role, and newcomer bhorgc, whom I’m opting to assume good things about based on the fact that he’s high enough MMR and is also friends with people on the team, despite the high ping. Altogether this allows me to expect decent individual performances, with the worry being how much of the communication obligations will fall solely on Shift, given the timid and quiet nature of the cores. Still, from playing with and watching the core players of this team, I get the impression that they see openings and naturally make plays, which inevitably alleviates some part of that pressure. Whether that’s enough remains to be seen.

Crispy Bacon

Gabe — wooo — Blackjack — olluem — Crispy Bacon

Pre-draft, Chris messaged me to discuss the possibility of picking me up after he has to spend his entire coin budget on wooo, olluem and Shift. While Shift did indeed turn out to be too pricey, he nabbed the wooo & X-Ray combo for a mere 39 coins, after already having snatched a bargain with Gabe for 34. While this is all essentially best-case, it did leave him with the choice of getting an actual 5 player to fill out the team, or get someone he likes more and dealing with the role conundrum later. Opting for the latter option, he grabbed Blackjack, who presumably will start the season on 3 with Chris on 5, with the possibility of reevaluating this setup after a couple of matches.

Overall, this team strikes me as the favorite. Great individual players — proven winners at that — with significant veteral experience, good vibes, and a low likelihood of leadership issues. Just solid as can be.

Jemobulas

Jemobulas — AGucciAl — Staxxy — Kidaro — Benji

A stack that, minus the DPC-playing-11k, wouldn’t be out of place in Div 2, and thus one that is infinitely hard to evaluate.

Should Kidaro be put on a core role, the math becomes a bit different, but given the last round pickup of a 6k flat core, it appears the unironic pro player will indeed end up supporting 6ks. In general, my expectations there aren’t particularly high; I have 0 doubt in Kidaro’s ability, but I think being able to get mileage out of low MMR players is wholly separate from generally shotcalling and making things happen (I’ve talked about the difference at length in prior diatribes about Ekken’s performances). In that respect, there’s potential to this team, but it’s potential that I think won’t surface until at least midway through the group stage, if at all.

MFZ

Nova — Flame — MFZ — Bonjwa — Snufkin

A bit of an odd team, with much of the MMR being concentrated in the offlane duo featuring two newcomers, and then taking dips on the 1 & 2. Admittedly, said 1 & 2 are Hazel and Flame, both of whom have been known to perform above what their MMR might imply against top of the line competition, and I wouldn’t be particularly shocked to see that happen again, even if said competition is better than it ever has been.

Being able to say very little of substance about MFZ and Bonjwa means that it’s hard to predict how this team’s matches end up looking. It’s something I fall back on a lot when discussing teams, but in my estimation the comms of a roster dictate much of their performance, and here that might come to depend on their high MMR offlane duo. In total, a bit of a mystery squad that at first glance I’d put below average, but with the ability to make a deep run.

Dunkin

Tino — Koros — Cory — Dunkin — Buzda

An immensely scary stack, if purely due to Koros’ presence, compounded further by a hungry Cory seeking a third consecutive Div 1 victory and a free 7.5k carry, bound together by an American who’s happy to yap away and a 5 happy to be backpacked by a capable team.

The roles end up looking a bit weird, largely as a result of Dunkin sleeping through the draft; if he was the one to make the call to pick Tino rather than another support, it’d be easier to say for sure this is what the roles will end up being, but given a replacement drafter put the stack together, the lineup may end up looking different. Regardless, on paper, this ought to be an immensely scary stack.

Drunken Sailor

Szajtek — Drunken Sailor — 7emistor — Zaop — Debowy

The season’s highest MMR stack also doubles as the highest MMR stack ever assembled in Clarity League history, which on paper sets them up for a bright future. Evaluating how well that might transition into practice, unfortunately, is much harder. Drunken Sailor and 7emistor, being first timers, are immensely difficult to predict, but a pair of signup statements insisting on no toxicity and a total of 15k MMR between the two of them is promising, especially considering they’re paired with a couple of veterans.

This all makes for a team that seems predisposed to being somewhat feast or famine; this could very, very easily turn out to be a top 2–3 team, yet equally I wouldn’t be very shocked to see them bomb out. A non-committal review, I know, but I’d lean towards the former.

Atikin

Vanilla — bunny — Atikin — kapten — Murakkin

An immense amount of Dota talent undercut horrendously by a shocking lack of consistent communication. I struggle for anything else to say about this team past that: they’ll get as far as individual ability will take them. How far is that? My guess, not to a set of golden names.

f mega

Madsen — f — jihadi — polarize — eisi

Our stack is going to be very fun to play in, with a complete set of veterans and amateur league stalwarts, tied together by familiarity, enthusiasm and good vibes.

But we won’t win too many games. F mega went, “what’s better than having the lowest MMR offlaner in the division? Having the lowest MMR offlaner AND carry in the division!” — and that’s kinda based.

Rankings

So — based on these reviews, the tiers shake out as follows:

Tier 3

8 | Jemobulas

7 | f mega

Tier 2

6 | Atikin

5 | MFZ

4 | Drunken Sailor

3 | Ri

Tier 1

2 | Dunkin

1 | Crispy Bacon

The places that I’d perhaps be open to shuffling around are 2 v 3, where I’m opting to put my faith into Koros, 3 v 4, where I don’t have to struggle much to imagine Drunken Sailor’s stack outperforming Ri, and the eternal enigma that is this Atikin team, which on a given day I might move a tier down.

In any case, I hope everyone has a pleasant season regardless. It’s an interesting set of teams, so I might consider doing an update to the rankings after a couple weeks.