Prior to EHOME’s amazing run to the top of the MarsTV Dota 2 League just a little over 12 hours ago, the last time a Chinese team won an international LAN was all the way back in April 2015, when Vici gaming absolutely tore through the competition, beating compatriots Invictus Gaming in the finals. Since then, the West has dominated the international scene, with both The International 2015 and The Fankfurt Major, the two biggest tournaments since SL12, being claimed by teams from North America and Europe, respectively.

While newer fans to the game may have been spoiled by the West’s recent domination, those that have been around longer will understand just why this is peculiar. Since the ancient days of WC3 DotA, China has dominated the scene, not unlike how South Korea was (is?) to StarCraft:Brood War, and to an extent, StarCraft II.

This domination proved crucial in the formation of the global competitive environment we know and love today. China’s complete domination had provided the rest of the world a banner to unite against, the Chinese Dota empire that each had sought to take down, which it eventually did when Dota 2 rolled around, and teams like Na’vi, Alliance, and EG won the biggest tournaments of their respective eras, against the best teams that China could throw their way.

The inter-regional rivalry is one thing that, for the longest time, Dota 2 did better over other esports titles. Korea has consistently dominated SC and League of Legends, Europe in Counter-Strike. Meanwhile, Europe has won the same amount of Aegis as China, with North America having claimed the most recent one. What this results in is a reinvigorated passion for the games, brought about by a sense of rationalistic pride: association with the best team in the world as of that moment a new champion is crowned.

A PROUD TRADITION

The Chinese Dota community is a proud community. From our side of the language barrier, we only get glimpses of this community whose memes and shitpots have lores, and how quick its members are to jump on the flame bandwagon should one of their representatives fall short in an international campaign. Not even the likes of Emperor BurNing is saved from the ire of the Sgamer people.

Having historically been perched atop the international Dota rankings, the proud CN Dota community is quick to pull the trigger on conclusions that would somehow excuse/explain their champions’ poor performance — prone to kneejerk reactions, just like any other region, except more so.

When Dendi, Artstyle, LightOfHeaven, Puppey, and XBOCT trounced the competition in the very first The International back in 2011, the giants from the East responded by claiming that none of them paid Dota 2 any attention, under the belief that TI, with its unprecedented 1.6 Million USD prize pool, a hoax.

China retaliated the following year, claiming three of the top four finishers, including champions Invictus Gaming, it was as if (proper) order had returned to the Dota world, with China yet again on top, as if saying “See what we can do with proper practice?”

When TI3 turned out to be an all-EU affair, it was once more the CN Dota community that was quick to react, pointing their fingers towards ACE, or the Association of China E-Sports, blaming the organization’s rigid rules that prevented the top tier teams from competing in more tournaments as the main reason for China’s poor showing in Seattle.

For them, the all-Chinese finals in The International’s KeyArena debut the following year was nothing but the natural result of teams such as Vici Gaming and Newbee finally being freed from the bureaucratic shackles that had prevented them from living up to their potential.

But in the post-TI4 age of Dota, a new world order had begun to shape. With the growing emphasis on in-game analytics and mathematical efficiency, it was western giants like Evil Geniuses and Team Secret that prevailed, splitting most of the tournaments in 2015.

For nine months, the once might empire of the east failed to claim a single crown overseas, with even the previous MDL seeing the top three places claimed by teams from the other side of the Wall. In fact, the three biggest tournaments of the year, the DAC, TI5, and The Frankfurt Major were all bagged by western teams, with PPD’s EG crew taking home the first two, against Chinese teams, no less, while OG secured the Eaglesong last November in Frankfurt, where no Chinese team even reached the podium.

HOME IN TROUBLE

No longer the undisputed strongest region in the world, its children grew discontent once more. So what was to be blamed this time?

It didn’t take long before the rigid ecosystem of local Dota was cited as the problem, with the tier one teams still fielding mostly the same old veterans from the WC3 DotA era. Of the Chinese teams that were considered elite, Vici Gaming was considered to be the most fresh, with their support duo Fenrir and Fy only making themselves known to the world in 2013. Yet outside the pair, the team fielded players with established careers from before Dota 2.

Meanwhile, the West was continuing to evolve. From EternaLEnVy to Arteezy, from Aui to PPD and Zai, more and more fresh faces were breaking into the scene.

This problem was further emphasized in the last TI, where EG’s wunderkind Suma1L tore through the more experienced midlaners that China threw at him. At that time only Maybe and Cty, two players that were considered to be green as spring when compared to the seasoned veterans they played alongside with, were able to put up much of a fight.

It is not a coincidence, then, that the best performing Chinese team in that tournament was CDEC, a team that had only recently broken out of China’s competitive purgatory. And when China failed to break the top three in the very first Valve-sponsored Major just three months after TI, while a (then) hardly-tested 8000 MMR superstar known as Miracle proved to be the MVP for his team’s championship run, the need to inject new blood into the “stagnating” Chinese scene was merely reinforced.

And with Tencent’s continued campaign to bring League of Legends to the top of the Chinese esports hierarchy slowing down the influx of new Dota players, many had begun to cry prophecies of doom: the empire was about to completely collapse in on itself.

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

EHOME’s 3-0 drubbing of Evil Geniuses to claim the MDL Battlefury trophy as their own is the best thing that has happened to Dota so far this year–and this is not just because they ended China’s 9-month championship drought, although that certainly helps.

First and foremost, China’s savior comes in the form of a team playing under perhaps the most prestigious banner to have ever graced their country’s esports landscape: EHOME.

In the international competitive landscape of WC3 DotA, the West had only a rough idea of just how strong the Chinese were prior to 2010, with the little amount of cross-region tournaments having left China shrouded in mystery. It wasn’t until 2010 when the rest of the world got a full glimpse of just how far ahead Chinese Dota was when the legendary 2010 EHOME squad went undefeated through the Electronic Sports World Championship, which included western staples such as DTS (feat. Dendi), Nirvana.Int (feat. Fear), and even MYM.

As untouchable as EHOME were in that title run, the ESWC gold was ultimately just one of ten titles they claimed that year, becoming one of the most dominant teams in the history of esports. The team collapsed at the start of 2011 when BurNing and KingJ jumped ship to what would eventually be a failed project with DK.

EHOME would struggle to perform well in local Chinese tournaments for the rest of that year, not quite making it to the level of the post-3 Kingdoms Era teams such as CCM, post-2009 LGD, and eventually the iG squads. They would proceed to fizzle out in the next two years, but not before carrying the burden of Chinese Dota in the very first The International, where they would place second, showing final glimpses of their imperial Dota bloodline.

The organization returned to activity early last year. After a failed EHOME.my stint with Mushi where they failed to make it to the playoffs of the DAC, the team returned to its all Chinese roots by focusing on EHOME.cn (or simply known as EHOME), composed of a completely different set of players from their previous glory days.

China’s most prestigious esports organization would come roaring back to the spotlight in the biggest Dota 2 event in history thus far, placing 5th in TI5, but not before kicking tournament favorites Team Secret to the lower bracket. Since then, the team, now under the guidance of LaNm, continued its steady rise to the top of the Chinese scene, slowly creeping its way back to the throne that it once undisputedly called its own.

EHOME’s victory at MDL just a few days ago, then, is no less than a (re)coronation, a return to power: Chinese Dota’s once mightiest army revived to give the crumbling empire a new lease on life. The story’s practically begging to write itself.

Yet beyond this imperial narrative is the much more important truth that the EHOME players themselves provide: that the much needed new blood has arrived. Outside their captain LaNm, the team is composed of players whose careers have seen limited success. Prior to joining EHOME, ELeVeN and old chicken’s most successful teams were Immortal Magneto Gaming and Energy Pacemaker, teams that, at best, were tier two in an already weakened China. For most of his career, Kaka was part of the ZSMJ-led HyperGloryTeam which, despite the hype it received for fielding one of China’s most legendary carries, never made it to a premier LAN.

And then there’s Cty. Once prophesized the future of Chinese Dota (is Cty the Rtz of the East, or Rtz the Cty of the West?), he severely disappointed in during the early days of his career, earning the moniker 6-minute God as he played midlane for Vici Gaming. He eventually left Dota to try his hand out at LoL, but returned in 2015, where he was eventually picked up by EHOME for their TI5 run. Now, he is more than ready to play his part in the prophecy (but not without the occasional glimpses of regression from CTGod to Ctwhyyyyyy that makes him the Cty that we now know and love).

WELCOME TO THE FUTURE

Association to the most dominant team in Chinese Dota’s history. A group of up and comers ready to leave their mark in history, led by one of the most skilled and likable veterans in the scene today. And recently, an end to one of the longest periods of drought this Dota Kingdom founded by the Yangtze has seen. EHOME provides all of these.

But more than just this, EHOME provides the proud community they represent hope, a rallying point against the terrors caused by the Western titans. They didn’t only beat EG, a team that has forever been the bane of Chinese teams ever since PPD took up the group’s leadership mantle, but swept them — on home soil no less!

And just like that, with not just a team that they can root for, but a team that they can reasonably expect to go all the way to the top, the Chinese Dota community looks a little bit more livelier. They proceed to the Shanghai Major with all the momentum they might need. Can you imagine what would happen if they win the Shanghai Major? A North American team won TI in Seattle, a European squad in Frankfurt. A Chinese team winning at Shanghai will make it 3 for 3 the hometown heroes in Majors, making for perhaps the most healthily competitive international esports landscape in history.

(Not to pressure SEA for when the Manila Major rolls around or anything).

Thank goodness EHOME accepted their invite to ESL One Manila, amirite?