What should be changed in Dota Pro Circuit?

After thinking for a while, I want to write my thoughts down, they are not very original because I have already read comments and ideas from lots of people.

First of all, why do we changed from multiple majors and minors to reginal leagues? There are multiple reasons:

1. We are putting money to help the Tier 2 scene, DPC give them a chance to play and be watched in a pro level regularly, this will help to raise new pro players as well.

2. Regular tournaments also helps teams to be more stable, and the stability helps a lot on getting sponsors, gathering fans and giving actual chance for teams to develop instead of just switching roaster.

3. Although we like dark horses, but we still want teams with consistent performance are rewarded. We will need to find a balance point for it.

The 2021 DPC looks bad because of Covid and there are only 2 leagues and 2 Majors, where the whole system is designed for 4 majors, we will consider it as if we have 4 majors.

So here is what I think that needs to be changed.

1. We need consistent tournament rules throughout all regions, it is pure laziness to not force basic ruling, and it is obviously unfair to other region.
2. If leagues are going to be played online, we will need to add rules to avoid cheating, just like CS:GO. Team communication needs to be monitored, players should be seen by web cams, etc. We should always hold high standard of integrity.
3. Last 2 team of upper division and First 2 team of second division should take serious group tournament to fight for upper division spots, make it a serious thing and we will get enough viewers for it.
4. This is from Aui_2000, we don’t have enough matches to develop the meta, we should double the matches in each season, running 2 matches of the same division in each timeslot.
5. League should give Prize money but no DPC points. It is easy for the Prize money part, it is for team and player survival. But definitely a NO for DPC points, even we want to reward consistent performance, regional performance should not be counted, let the teams fight for DPC points at Majors.
6. Since regional qualifier already serve the purpose that ensures every region having at least a team to participate, we don’t need a similar mechanism.
7. Majors should give DPC points to all teams, it is a change to accommodate the previous point, it gives a better reason to fight. A lower amount of prize pool should also be given to every team to compensate for the cost, it is like a minimum income.
8. First place of league should not go to elimination stage directly, it is hurting other teams’ chance to win and these teams are harder to prepare for the tournament. It also make the meta harder to develop throughout the tournament. Swiss-system will help reduce the number of matches, it worked before.
9. We need new ways for fans to fund the whole DPC, if we are relying on prize money instead of going for deeper franchise league. Would be great if we have more things to buy in each league. We should also split some of the TI prize money to DPC, big prize pool does not help advertising the game anymore. Finally, leagues and majors needs to get more sponsors that can inject some of those money to prize pool.

OK now we try to simulate of league does not give DPC points and points of Majors are adjusted. Considering:

• 4 Majors
• 18 teams like AniMajor
• Points will be so much closer to encourage consistency
• Point used are just for simulation of idea, not the points that I want to suggest

Reward a little more for #1, but it is not unbeatable if they only play good in 1 of 4 Major

• Current rankings of TI 2021

• Current slots of TI 2021

• Simulated Rankings according to 2021 DPC
  Since we are rewarding consistent performance, China will get the most slots, EU almost get 2 more slots due to lackluster performance in LAN. And Team Nigma is rewarded for the hard work in 2nd Major.

• Region slots for TI, it does not change a lot, but SEA got a slot from SA. because OB Esport Neon did great in the first Major and beastcoast did nothing in LAN.

• If we extend it to full DPC without regional qualifier, it doesn’t look bad at all, these region does have good teams that lack some luck, but we also want to give a chance for dark horses, and it hurts weak region, so it is not likely to happen.

Lastly we are also trying to use TI 2019 DPC as a comparison, it is not accurate because it was a totally different system, and we are not counting Minors.

• Current rankings of TI 2019

• Current slots of TI 2019

• Ranking of TI 2019 in new system, OG will get the last spot considering Forward Gaming lose a lot of points due to roaster changes. Not a big difference after all, only J.Storm will take the slot of Keen Gaming, because Keen was more inconsistent and only spiked at 1 major.

• Reginal slots of TI 2019 in new system, China lose a spot to NA, simply China being punished for a bad year, and NA is not actually that bad.

As a conclusion, the current system is not as bad as everyone says, it can still represent the regional power, but it underestimated the results of international LAN events, best example is Team Nigma did much better in Majors than Team Liquid or Alliance, and they deserve a spot.

The revised system worked like the old DPC system, but it rewards consistency more and eliminates teams that cannot perform in LAN.