The Nexon Starter League is Korean Dota 2 distributor Nexon's first step into Dota 2. With more than $20,000 to be won in their first attempt, winning teams will also gain offline experience, playing in one of the most decorated Esports studio in Korea. Besides that, a lot of Korean sponsors are also scouting for a potential Dota 2 team in this tournament.
Considering the tournament is local and not much is known about the event, we have obtained exclusive information about Nexon Starter League. We dropped all our knowledge about NSL into this article and cap it off with an interview with Tae-Won 'March' Park from FXOpen.
Table of Contents
1. Bracket and schedule
2. What is at stake?
3. Participating teams
3. GOMTV Gangnam Studio
4. Casters
5. Interview with FXO|March
Bracket and schedule
What is at stake?
| Nexon Starter League prize distribution | |
|---|---|
| Placings | Prizes |
| 1st place | 10 Mio Won (~$8,600) + TI3 tickets as spectators |
| 2nd place | 5 Mio Won (~$4,300) |
| 3rd-4th place | 2 Mio Won (~$1,700) |
| 5th-8th place | 1 Mio Won (~$865) |
Apart from the cash prize listed above, Korean Esports powerhouse MVP and StarTale have also been reported to be scouting for a Dota 2 team judging from their performance in this tournament.
Participating teams
Bird Gang
Team roster:
Jeffrey 'tb' Yi
Ik-Jae 'Furious' Song
Min-Jun 'Hellsymphony' Park
Sang-Hi 'BigBird' Kim
Noah 'mp' Pyo
Team thoughts and determination:
> We are glad that the game we like and enjoy finally gets attention in Korea, and look forward to the league.
> We should be able to reach at least 2nd place in the main tournament.
> We love DOTA 2, and have dreamt about DOTA 2 league within Korea.
Best Magic Skill (BMS)
Team roster:
Jun-Won 'sanbon' Lee
Sung-Il 'meg@box' Shim
Sang-Wook 'Doofgod' Park
Sung-Il 'K' Jung
Chang-Sung 'Wakku' Jang
Team thoughts and determination:
> As captain, I shall do my best to practice with my teammates diligently with what time remains.
> We will prove the skill of old users in the league.
> As this is first time league in Korea, gamers should repay the viewers both in Korea and oversea with their skill. Even though we are not an organized team like professional team, we will do our best.
> Our goal is first place.
DesertEagle
Team roster:
Sang-Gil 'DesertEagle' Lee
Sung-Hoon 'keepingon' Lee
Ui-Jin 'MoreYourAss' Hong
Young-Seok 'Gurungda' Lee
Jin-Woong 'Shabell' Kim
Team thoughts and determination:
> We were lucky to make it through the qualifier.
> Had we played at home we would have lost, but it seems our opponents were nervous and everything went well strangely.
> With some effort we can aim for semi-final.
> Our initial goal was receiving souvenir at qualifier, but we are glad that now we can also win prize money.
Eye of the Tiger (EoT)
Team roster:
Tae-Young 'WANGJYU' Kang
Byung-Hoon 'Mafia' Kim
Deok-Soo 'BanHwa' Yoon
Jun-Yeong 'Reisen' Lee
Dae-Young 'Guardia' Jung
Team thoughts and determination:
> We shall practice 1st place as goal and want to learn many things when we go to Seattle.
> Going to Seattle has higher priority than prize money.
> We have great expectation as this is first time in Korea.
> We want to avoid FXO in the main tournament.
DCrux
Team roster:
Han-Ju 'Hwak in' Lee
Sang-Hyun 'Rex Sicarii' Lee
Jong-Seob 'Buen Camino' Choi
Yu-Jin '123' Jeon
Hyun-Woo 'I.C.U-Wantsrw' Choi
Team thoughts and determination:
> It was difficult when practicing but we are satisfied with the result.
> We don’t know yet how the main tournament will unravel, but we will do our best to show awesome games.
> Until now we just played games, but now we can also earn prize money so we participated.
Symphony
Team roster:
Jae-Yong 'cml11' Shim
Jun-Hwan 'chocolate' Kim
Yeon-Wun 'arTisTic' Chu
Chang-Eun 'Prodoak' Park
Jae-Sheob 'Earth' Shin
Team thoughts and determination:
> We didn’t really expect to qualify, but the games went much better than anticipated.
> More than being glad, we are worried. Other qualified teams are skilled and have been working together since All Star. Since we lack in skill and experience compared to other teams, we are worried that we need to put in more effort.
> It is an honor to be able to compete with best DOTA2 teams in Korea, and even though we may lack in skill we shall do our best in all games.
FXOpen
Team roster:
Tae-Won 'March' Park
Yong-Min 'Febby' Kim
Seon-Yeob 'QO' Kim
Jae-Ho 'Anarchy' HwangBo
Kyung-Min 'Sagun' Lee
Team thoughts and determination:
> The goal is to win all tournaments in Korea.
> We have begun our first step in qualifier and feel excited and look forward to the main tournament.
> We are eager to show lot of things to Korean viewers.
> We will also show some strategies that has not been seen in previous leagues.
> We will show the viewers how attractive DOTA 2 is.
Kellogg Tiger Power (KT)
Team roster:
Dae-Hwan 'yPie' Kim
Hee-Sung 'Frusciante' Shin
Min-Woo 'TeacherLee' Lee
Gap-Yeol 'Park' Park
Yoon-Soo 'JesusStick' Park
Team thoughts and determination:
> We did our best to advance to main tournament, and even though we have long way to go, if we work little harder, we are one same level as pro teams.
> We did not know there would be so many participants at qualifier and learned that there are many people who love DOTA in Korea.
> Our goal is 1st place and will do our best to achieve it.
GOMTV Gangnam Studio
The matches of Nexon Starter League will be played at GOMTV's Gangnam Studio in Seoul, Korea. Judging from picture, there should be space for spectators to watch although we do not know if it will be open for all. The Gangnam Studio is a new studio GOMTV opened and it has all the technology and toys needed to topple production value records.
GOMTV Gangnam Studio address: 2nd Floor, Mirae Asset Life Insurance Building, 997-4 Daechi-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.
Casters
Sang-Hyun Park
Mr. Park started his career as a caster for MBC, Korean gaming channel, and has recently shifted to GOMTV, hosting the Dota2gether to educate and introduce the game to new Korean players. While most of us have not experienced any of the cast by Sang-Hyun Park, he has a propensity to scream off his lungs at the smallest detail and has an incredible stamina to keep it up for a long time.
Lysander
According to BeyondTheSummit, Lysander will be casting the Nexon Starter League on their behalf, meaning that the cast will not be coming from their own studio.
joinDOTA
The face of joinDOTA Toby 'TobiWan' Dawson tweeted last week that they will be introducing a new caster in joinDOTA tomorrow and he or she will debut by casting the Nexon Starter League. TobiWan is currently in Kiev casting Star Series VI.
K3NT
Kent, one of DOTA2's earliest Chinese commentator, currently LGD-Gaming's official caster. Once the second most popular Chinese stream during The International 2012, with a record of continuous 40 hours non-stop streaming throughout the three play days. Appointed as official Chinese caster for several major tournaments, including GEST, Dreamhack, The Asia 2012 and many more. With his humorous comments and appropriate analysis, Kent is considered one of the more skilled and active commentators in China.
Interview with FXO|March
Hello March, it has been a long time since we have heard from you. How have you been?
Great!, I finished my university last year and went back to Korea. Later on, I found this opportunity to join FXO and so here I am!
While you guys were battling it out at Intel Sindorim e-Stadium, most of the world couldn’t feel the intensity off-site. Were there a lot of spectators at the event?
There were no spectators allowed but approximately 300 people were there playing and organizing the event.
Who was your biggest challenger during the qualifier and who are you most excited to play against in the main event?
There was not much challenge at the event but we are excited to play on the main stage.
Tell us further about your team. Who do you guys normally train with?
We train with many SEA teams. Lately we been training a lot with First Departure, Royal, and Flash.
Are the team members currently staying at the same place? What sort of training regime does your team go through on a daily basis
We are all staying at same gaming house, We wake up and play a few pubs or watch replays before going into team practice. We play from 5 in the afternoon to 3 in the morning. we do theory crafting and drop knowledge bombs while we chill.
When I visited some gaming houses in China, they told me that the teams train about 12-14 hours a day in order to stay at the highest level. Is there such thing in Korea or do you incorporate a more healthy lifestyle as part of the training.
It depends, we do spend a lot of time practicing but we do go out and enjoy healthy life.
What is the difference, playing Dota in Korea and America?
I miss American Dota, America is where I learned Dota.. I like both but I just take games more seriously in Korea.
How is Dota 2 progressing in Korea?
It is getting big really fast, I can feel it. More and more people are starting to play the game.
Many are comparing the Korean Dota 2 scene against the rest of the world. Do you think your team has what it takes to challenge the top tier teams outside of Korea now?
We will. Soon....
If not, how long do you think the Korean scene needs to continue developing before being able to play at such a level?
It is really hard to tell but I know for a fact that more tourny will shorten the time Koreans need to reach that level.
Does gaming net you a lot of chicks in Korea?
I hope so.
Many thinks that Dota 2 is a very hard game to learn and that is the reason why it isn’t as big as League of Legends (at the moment). Nexon is definitely trying to educate players on the mechanics of the game, what other actions do you think Nexon should do to bring in a bigger crowd?
An all-girls Dota 2 league.
#Roadtoti4. Is that a hashtag FXO will use as motivation from now on?
YES
We are reaching the end of the interview March but before that, let’s do some quickfire questions shall we?
SNSD - My favourite girl group
Bugolgi - Food
Meepo - Don't play
Alliance - Febby's ex-team
North America - My 2nd country
Jaedong - Lee Young Ho
China - BEAST AT AOS
Gabe Newell - Thank you for the great game!
IceFrog - Never replies me on Skype
