Newbee Announces Star-Studded, Mixed-Gender 'Boss' Dota 2 Team

Newbee was already one of the biggest Dota 2 organizations on the planet. It already owns one of the best squads in the game. Heck, it already has a solid feeder team in Newbee Young. 

Newbee was already sitting pretty for 2017. But on Tuesday, it blew fans away with the unveiling of a new team, Newbee Boss. The announcement was made on Twitter:

A quick look over the names will get most Dota 2 fans shaking with excitement. 

Zhang "xiao8" Ning, Wong "ChuaN" Hock Chuan and Luo "Ferrari_430" Feichi are three of the most iconic and all-time greatest players in the history of Chinese Dota. What really turns heads, however, is the presence of Bi "Axx" Xia, the first woman to be on a major Dota 2 team. 

Axx wasn't an especially well-known name to western Dota 2 fans, but she has been on the Chinese scene for a while now, competing in the CDEC Master League, per Dotablast.com. She owns a 7180 MMR as of this writing according to her Dotabuff.com profile, and primarily plays core. Her role on the team is unclear, but her most likely landing spot is the offlane.

"

@NahazDota pic.twitter.com/bGvMsOe9dH

— Newbee (@NewbeeCN) January 10, 2017"

Of course, Axx's presence aside, the team is packed with stars.

Xiao8, who is ending a remarkably brief retirement, has long been regarded as one of the best in-game leaders in Dota 2, working the helm for LGD Gaming for much of his career, but also captaining the original Newbee squad to victory at The International 4. ChuaN and Ferrari, meanwhile, took the Aegis of Champions at The International 2 and went on to become the longstanding faces of Invictus Gaming before leaving the team in 2015 and 2016, respectively. 

The final player on the lineup, Zei9, is reportedly the owner of the team, per Dotablast.com and Liquipedia. Little is known about him as a person or player, and it is unclear if he is indeed a full-time member of the team or if he is acting as a stand-in while the roster is finalized. According to Newbee Dota 2 caster Chen "Jophy" Ya, the team was founded by the owner "for fun," but of course, one doesn't simply pull together three TI champions for the sheer fun of it.

It's worth noting that Newbee Boss is not listed on the Dota 2 Majors Registration website. As such, the team will not be eligible for invites to the Kiev Major or its regional qualifiers and will have to work its way through open qualifiers in order to make it to the tournament. 

If this lineup can mesh, however, there's no reason to believe it can't make a run.