BetBoom Team are going to The International 2023 after a year filled to the brim with unfortunate events tied to their name.
But, despite all the setbacks that they encountered at almost every tournament that they attended through the 2023 competitive year, BetBoom are definitely one of the teams to look out for in Seattle in less than a week, when TI12 kicks off.
Ahead of DreamLeague Season 21, which was the very last tournament before TI12 and where they have finally been able to have a smooth run, we were able to talk to BetBoom Team’s captain Vitalie "Save-" Melnic and learn from him how they managed to overcome all the issues, what are his thoughts on the 7.34 patch and what TI12 means for the team.
Hi Save-, I'd like to start this interview by asking how you guys coped with all the bad luck that followed you this year. When this roster was announced, at the beginning of the season, everyone put BetBoom as the strongest team on paper, but then you guys fell sick at the Lima Major. At the Berlin Major you had to play with a stand-in and at the Bali Major you had the Pure stream incident that got him disqualified. How do you reset mentally after so many setbacks?
For sure we had a lot of bad luck this year and, of course, we got tilted by it many times throughout the year, but we found enough power within ourselves to keep going without making any changes to our roster.
At Bali Major, when we got disqualified, we knew that we were going to have Riyadh Masters coming up next, so it wasn't that bad knowing that we had another big tournament coming. So, everyone was still very motivated even after that huge setback.
You finished second at DreamLeague Season 20. How do you look at Season 21, which is the very last big tournament before TI12, are you going to take it easy and take it as practice ground or would you like to make a statement before going to the most important tournament of the year?
It's for sure a practice ground for us, but at the same time, we will try very hard. It's the last tournament before TI, so we want to go as high as possible. We want to get to the top 3 to be confident heading into TI.
One of the biggest changes of the 7.34 patch is the drafting formula. How do you like having so many bans in the first phase, have you adapted it to the new draft order?
We didn't really play that many official matches on this new drafting system, so right now I don't think I really like this new drafting formula. But, I think it's just a matter of time until we figure out how to draft. Right now I feel like I liked the previous system more.
There are a lot of support heroes that came back to the meta since 7.34 was launched. How does the position 4 feel now for you?
It definitely got better for pos 4 players. You can play different heroes now. Heroes that were dead before, like Dark Willow for example. Valve reworked some heroes, and gave them some new spells and this Dark Willow is actually playable again. Nature's Prophet got his Sprout reworked and it's actually a broken hero now, the same as with other heroes like Venge, and Invoker. I feel like before the patch you could play only three heroes and everyone was spamming Techies.
We've seen a 1v1 tournament aside from the main competition at BetBoom Datcha. The tiebreakers there were also solved with 1v1 matches and your mid laner, gpk~ seemed to have a lot of fun there. Would you like this format to be used more often?
Definitely. I think the 1v1 mid is really fun. We actually thought of having more people from the team to play in the 1v1 bracket. We would have liked to have me and TORONTOTOKYO also playing, but they told us that they need only one player from the team, so what can you do? But, for sure it's a ton of fun to play 1v1.
This year was pretty stacked with tournaments, LANs and online. How did you like the schedule, was it too much?
I always like the formats where there are a lot of tournaments. I don't really need a lot of time to cool off. Two weeks of chilling at home is more than enough for me.
Do you play any other games besides Dota 2 in your spare time, during times off or vacations?
Yes, for example, I recently had a rest for a month and I played some CS:GO and even League of Legends a bit. We also played PUBG with the whole team, and that was a lot of fun.
What's one thing that League has and you would like to see it in Dota 2 also?
The jungler role.
We had it several years ago, but yeah, that would require a full change on neutral camps and perhaps the map.
Yes, I even tried recently to play a jungle Huskar, but it didn’t work. I have some ideas of how to play jungle even in the current meta, but it's very hard to execute it.
You made your TI debut in 2021 when it was held without a crowd. TI is returning home this year, in Seattle, in the Climate Pledge Arena, formerly known as Key Arena. Are you excited to go there, is this like a dream come true, to play TI in Seattle?
The first TI I watched was TI5 which was in Seattle, at Key Arena and that was pretty much the tournament that made me want all that for myself. It's the event that inspired me to work hard to get where I am today.
I really wanted to be like the guys I was watching from home, to be in Seattle and play there. I was watching Sumail and stuff, and I was at 4K MMR back then. TI5 was the moment when I decided to go for a pro career and having the possibility of going to TI in Seattle is a dream come true and I'm extremely excited.
Is it more exciting than TI10?
Of course. I mean, TI10 was a good tournament, but it was without a crowd. Now it's going to be different.
We are looking at a much smaller prize pool compared to any of the recent years. Does it bother you in any way that it will be considerably smaller, does the money at TI matter for you personally?
I don't really care about the money overall in life. I think that I have enough money to live for the rest of my life.
But, regarding the TI prize pool, it's a bit sad that that's it's gonna be lower because the idea that every next TI would beat the previous edition in terms of prize pool was building so much hype around the Dota 2 community and esports in general. I guess the hype is kind of gone, even from last year. I'm still fine with how it is now, but of course, I would love for TI to have the highest prize pool in all esports and continue to be the very prestigious tournament that we all love.
