Nobody Is Safe at Dota 2's The International 2016 After Wild Day 1

Entering Dota 2's The International 2016, everything felt straightforward.

OG were the favorites. No question. Easy. They won a number of major LAN tournaments—including both the Frankfurt and Manila Majors—and had all the momentum a team could have entering the tournament. Any debate about their elite status was seemingly squashed in the group stages, as they posted a strong 11-3 record, which included 2-0 series against former champions Natus Vincere and Alliance.

Again, OG were the clear-cut favorites heading into the TI6 main event, and there was little reason to believe that they wouldn't simply cruise into the grand finals. 

Then they lost to MVP Phoenix on Day 1 of the main event. Day 1. 

That doesn't eliminate them entirely, of course. They now sit in the lower bracket of the tournament, where they can still potentially work their way into the grand finals they seemed to be destined for. They'll just be working without a safety net, and they will have to work around the simple fact that MVP drove home; at TI6, nobody is safe.

Bracket	Winner	Loser	Record
Upper	MVP	OG	2-1
Upper	Wings	DC	2-1
Lower	TNC	VGR	1-0
Lower	LGD	Secret	1-0
Lower	Fnatic	Escape	1-0
Lower	Liquid	Na'Vi	1-0

Upsets aren't uncommon at The International, and neither are competitive fields. That said, there seemed to be a fairly rigid pro team hierarchy in Dota 2 exiting the Manila Major.

OG was the best, with Team Liquid hot on their heels. LGD Gaming, MVP Phoenix and Newbee were in the next tier, with each team possessing a fundamentally sound lineup that had the right chemistry to find success month after month. After that was, essentially, everyone else.

Evil Geniuses and Team Secret had the talent, but they just didn't seem to jell well enough to win major events. Other teams like Na'Vi and Wings Gaming had the tools, but they didn't have the consistency. Squads like Alliance and compLexity Gaming lacked the sheer potency to take over a game against top competition.

That changed a bit in the months between Manila and TI6 as Wings hit their stride, EG settled on a strong lineup and so on. But it only changed just that one bit. For the most part, that pecking order seemed to be set in stone entering TI6.

For whatever reason, when the teams came together to compete in Seattle, everything was thrown out the proverbial window.

Liquid, despite steady success throughout 2016, posted a poor 5-9 record in the group stages and were placed directly in the lower bracket. EG, which took last place at the Manila Major, came out as one of the favorites to win. Wild-card team EHOME looked absolutely unstoppable. Wings, Alliance and Digital Chaos all managed to earn upper-bracket spots. 

While that was "just" the group stages, MVP's win over OG shows that there will be no flukes at TI6 because there is no more certainty. There are 12 formidable teams in the hunt for the Aegis of Champions and the $8.8 million prize that awaits the winner.

Day 2 features no slam-dunk series, either. In the upper bracket, there will be two best-of-three series in Alliance vs. EHOME and EG vs. Newbee, followed by lower bracket best-of-threes in OG vs. TNC Gaming and DC vs. LGD. The losers of the upper-bracket games will face Fnatic and Liquid, respectively. No outcome is inconceivable with those matchups on deck, and the potential pairings that follow are no different.

It was clear coming into TI6 that the event would be special, and not just for its grandiosity and bloated prize pool. What wasn't expected was that it would result in pure, unadulterated, "we know nothing" chaos. 

But after 12 months of sure things in Dota 2, it feels pretty darn good to know nothing.