Image: Valve Software
The most striking trend of the TI 2024 metagame so far has been the dominance of the Radiant side, but what caused this advantage?
A total of 72 games were played during The International 2024 (TI 2024) Group Stage and Seeding Decider, which now gives us a clear picture of the tournament's metagame heading into the Playoffs.
But beyond all the most popular hero picks and bans (which we do cover here), there has been one very noticeable trend in the tournament's metagame: the Radiant side has been winning a lot more games than Dire. This is something that isn't exclusive to professional Dota 2 either, go ahead and check your most recent played games and you're most likely to find that you have been winning more often when you're on the Radiant.
Read on as we try to break down the reasons why Radiant has been so dominant in TI 2024:
Why Radiant reigns supreme
The Radiant has been the winning side of the map over the course of TI's long history, with the Radiant side boasting the higher win rate over the Dire in seven of the past 12 iterations of TI. Last year's tournament was thoroughly dominated by the Radiant, which had a 58.67% win rate in 150 games.
Radiant is looking to once again reign supreme this year as it dominated the Dire during the Group Stage and Seeding Decider to the tune of a 55.56% win rate in 72 games, according to Liquipedia. Such a large win rate disparity begs the question: why is the Radiant side so dominant?
Radiant's win rate advantage is caused by a wide variety of factors too many to list down, but most of them were notably caused by its placement on the lower left side of the map as well as the allocation of resources and objectives that come with it.
One of the most important map objectives that Radiant has been controlling better than Dire is Roshan. This is because in most games, the first Roshan attempt often takes place during the game's third-day cycle between 20 to 25 minutes. Since Roshan stays in the Radiant Roshan Pit during the daytime, then the Radiant have the advantage when claiming the first Roshan due to closer and safer teleportation points.
Not only that, Radiant can keep their control over the Roshan Pit indefinitely due to the fact that Roshan respawns at a random time between 8 to 11 minutes after he was slain. Because of that, the first Roshan being slain during the day guarantees he will not respawn in the next night and will instead do so in the next day cycle – which plays right into the hands of the Radiant.
Aside from favourable Roshan control, Radiant also have a noticeable advantage in the mid-lane. For one, the Radiant mid-lane is closer to their base compared to their Dire, often letting the Radiant mid-laner place their wards earlier and sometimes even see where their Dire counterpart placed theirs to deward it.
Moreover, the Radiant mid-lane is also much more protected. For one, they have a Watcher on their hill that the Dire doesn't have while also having a nearby cliff that makes ganks coming from that direction more difficult – a stark contrast to Dire's much more open mid tier one tower area that is more susceptible to ganks from all directions.
Finally, there's that unique quirk that comes with playing on Radiant due to its placement on the map. When playing as the Radiant, you're always moving “upwards” as you advance through the map while the Dire have to move “downwards”. Depending on who you ask, Radiant's placement gives it small advantages like faster screen panning speed or even a subconscious psychological edge.
These may seem miniscule in the grand scheme of a professional Dota 2 tournament, but Dota 2 is a game of inches where every small advantage matters and builds up to a decisive factor in determining the victor.
The International 2024 Playoffs
TI 2024 is this year's iteration of Dota 2's annual world championship tournament and features 16 of the best teams in the world fighting for their cut of the growing $2.36 million prize pool and the Aegis of Champions.
The event is being hosted from September 4 to 15 in Copenhagen, Denmark, and is split into two distinct phases: the Group stage (September 4 to 5) and the Seeding Deciders (September 6 to 7). The first two rounds of the Playoffs (September 8 to 10) are branded as part of The Road to The International, while the remaining portion of the Playoffs for the remaining eight teams (September 13 to 15) are branded as The International itself.
For more of everything you need to know about TI 2024, check here.
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