I’ve never played in a fantasy league, mainly because there isn’t a single league that I follow, in any sport. But the strategy, planning and backroom deals that go on in these things is almost intoxicating, making me wish I gave more of a damn.
There’s hope for me yet, though, because the Dota 2 fantasy league system, Fantasy Dota, has kicked off. It sounds more up my street. You’ll need a tournament ticket to get involved, and it’s starting with the ASUS ROG DreamLeague Season #1 tournament.
Tickets for the tournament went live yesterday, and you can pick one up for £5.99. Starting on March 3rd, teams will battle through 84 league matches, fighting for a shot at the $100,000 prize pool. The playoffs will be at DreamHack Summer 2014 taking place between June 14th and 17th.
With a ticket purchased, you can start up a fantasy league or join any fantasy leagues created by your chums. Each league is connected to a specific tournament, and you can only score in matches that are part of said tournament. A tournament ticket entitles you to make one league, but you can join as many as you like. There are six people to a league, each picking eight pro Dota players to fill their team with during the live draft.
Each player is attached to a single team and is assigned a role based on how they play in real matches. Players that play mid, off-lane, or carry are grouped under “Core”. Players that take more of a support role are classified as “Support”. You can check the stats of a player in the Fantasy section of the Community tab, where the average statistics for pro-players across the last 100 league matches they’ve played in is displayed.
In your team of eight, you’ll have five active players and three on the bench. During the day, you can fiddle around with your active roster, but it will be locked by midnight in the timezone the tournament is taking place in.
When the draft’s complete (you’ll need to do this before March 3rd, when the tournament begins), the league will automatically put together round-robin weekly head-to-head matches and the earning of points begins. Points are earned as follows:
- 0.3 points per kill
- -0.3 points per death
- 0.15 points per assist
- 0.003 points per last hit
- 0.002 points per gold per minute
- 0.002 points per XP per minute
- 0.07 points per seconds of enemy stuns
- 0.0004 points per allied healing done
- 1 point tower kill
- 1 point per Roshan kill
It’s these points that are important, and it doesn’t matter if the players win or lose their tournament match.
Crikey, that’s a lot to take in. Good luck with your fantasy shenanigans!
Cheers, OnGamers.