Everything you need to know about the 2021 Dota Pro Circuit

Teams in the DPC all aim to get to The International Dota 2 World Championships at the end of the season. (Photo by Hu Chengwei/Getty Images)

The 2021 Dota Pro Circuit (DPC) is finally about to begin. After last year’s DPC was put on a nine-month hiatus due to the coronavirus pandemic, Dota fans will soon be able to watch the game’s highest-level of competition in a new regional league format starting on Monday (18 January).

Ahead of its long-awaited return, here’s everything you need to know about the 2021 DPC.

Format

The regional leagues

This year’s DPC has been split into two seasons leading up to The International 10 (TI10), which was announced in 2019 be held in Stockholm, Sweden, in August.

Each season consists of two parts, the first being a six-week regional league for the five major regions in the world competitive of Dota — Europe, China, Southeast Asia, CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States), North America, and South America.

The regional leagues are also split into two divisions of eight teams each. The teams in the Upper Division will be fighting for DPC points and a spot in the Major at the end of each season’s league, while the teams in the Lower Division will be fighting to get into the Upper Division.

The bottom two teams of the Upper Division in each region will be relegated to the Lower Division, while the top two teams of the Lower Division will be promoted. Meanwhile, the bottom two teams of the lower division will be eliminated from the league and open qualifiers will decide their replacements for the next season.

Each regional league will be hosted by a different organiser, DreamHack (Europe), Perfect World (China), PGL (Southeast Asia), ESL (CIS), Beyond the Summit (North America), and DotaPit (South America).

The Majors

The regional leagues will be followed by a Major, which will gather the 18 best teams from the different regional leagues. Each regional league has been assigned a specific number of slots in the Major, which is determined by the level of competition in the region.

Europe and China both get four slots, Southeast Asia and CIS both get three slots, while North America and South America both get two slots.

The top team from each regional league will automatically qualify to the playoffs of the Major, the second-placed team will start in the group stage, while the third-placed team (for all regions except for North America and South America) will have to go through the Major’s Wildcard stage.

After the two seasons of regional leagues and their respective Majors have concluded, the teams that earned the most DPC points will receive direct invites to TI10. The remaining slots will be determined through regional qualifiers.

Schedule

The regional league for the first season of this year’s DPC will run from 18 January to 28 February for all regions except China. The Chinese regional league will run until 14 March, as it will have a break in the middle to accommodate the Chinese New Year on 12 February.

Meanwhile, the Major for the first season is set for 25 March to 4 April.

The regional league for the second season is slated to run from 13 April to 23 May, with all regions now following the same schedule. Its Major is planned for 2-13 June.

While Valve has not yet released the schedule for TI10, it is expected to start in mid-August. TI10 was originally planned to hold its main event from 18-23 August last year before the coronavirus pandemic grounded the DPC to a halt.

Dota 24/7

Once the regional leagues kick off, Dota fans can expect to watch pro-level Dota at any time of any day for every week they will be running. The schedule has been designed so as to ensure that each regional league will have its own time slot for both the Upper and Lower Division.

Here’s the weekly schedule with all times in Pacific Time (PT):

Screenshot from official Dota 2 blog

Screenshot from official Dota 2 blog

List of teams

Each division of every regional league is comprised of eight teams. For the Upper Divisions, four teams received direct invites due to their performance over the past year while the remaining teams were determined through qualifiers.

Meanwhile, the Lower Division teams are comprised of teams that failed to qualify for their region’s Upper Division and the winners of open qualifiers, except for the Southeast Asian regional league, which filled its Lower Division solely with teams that didn’t make the cut for the Upper Division.

See below for the list of all teams competing in both divisions for each regional league:

Europe

Upper Division

• Team Secret (Direct Invite)

• OG (Direct Invite)

• Team Nigma (Direct Invite)

• Team Liquid (Direct Invite)

• Alliance (Qualified)

• Vikin.gg (Qualified)

• mudgolems (Qualified)

• Chicken Fighters (Qualified)

Lower Division

• Hippomaniacs

• Hellbear Smashers

• Spider Pigzs

• Brame

• Creepwave

• Burjui

• No Bounty Hunter

• Meta4Pro

China

Upper Division

• PSG.LGD (Direct Invite)

• Elephant (Direct Invite)

• EHOME (Direct Invite)

• Vici Gaming (Direct Invite)

• Invictus Gaming (Qualified)

• Team Aster (Qualified)

• Team MagMa (Qualified)

• LBZS (Qualified)

Lower Division

• Royal Never Give Up

• Sparking Arrow Gaming

• Phoenix Gaming

• Dalanjing Gaming

• CDEC Gaming

• Xtreme Gaming

• Dragon

• Dynasty

Southeast Asia

Upper Division

• TNC Predator (Direct Invite)

• Fnatic (Direct Invite)

• T1 (Direct Invite)

• BOOM Esports (Direct Invite)

• Neon Esports (Qualified)

• Execration (Qualified)

• Vice Esports (Qualified)

• 496 Gaming (Qualified)

Lower Division

• Galaxy Racer

• Omega Esports

• HOYO

• Assault

• Cignal Ultra

• Yangon Galacticos

• ZeroTwo

• Lilgun

CIS

Upper Division

• Virtus.pro (Direct Invite)

• Natus Vincere (Direct Invite)

• Team Spirit (Direct Invite)

• Live to Win (Direct Invite)

• Team Empire (Qualified)

• NoTechies (Qualified)

• EXTREMUM (Qualified)

• NoPangolier (Qualified)

Lower Division

• B8

• Winstrike

• HellRaisers

• Gambit Esports

• PuckChamp

• Imperial Pro Gaming

• Virtus.pro Prodigy

• XactJlepbI

North America

Upper Division

• Evil Geniuses (Direct Invite)

• SADBOYS (Direct Invite)

• Quincy Crew (Direct Invite)

• 4Zoomers (Direct Invite)

• Undying (Qualified)

• Black N Yellow (Qualified)

• A-Team (Qualified)

• 5ManMidas (Qualified)

Lower Division

• Team DogChamp

• Felt

• Electronic Boys

• Byzantine Raiders

• Arkosh Gaming

• Simply TOOBASED

• Jiang Hu

• The Cut

South America

Upper Division

• Beastcoast (Direct Invite)

• Thunder Predator (Direct Invite)

• SG Esports (Direct Invite)

• Infamous (Direct Invite)

• Omega Gaming (Qualified)

• Team Unknown (Qualified)

• EgoBoys (Qualified)

• Latam Defenders (Qualified)

Lower Division

• Incubus Club

• Infinity Esports

• Hokori

• Crewmates

• 0-900

• Inverse

• Gorillaz-Pride

• Blood for Blood

Where to watch

Europe stream: https://www.twitch.tv/dreamleague

China stream: https://www.douyu.com/6829849

Southeast Asia stream: https://www.twitch.tv/pgl

CIS stream: https://www.twitch.tv/esl_dota2

North America stream: https://www.twitch.tv/beyondthesummit

South America stream: https://www.twitch.tv/ogadotapit

Yahoo Esports Southeast Asia will also bring you all the updates in a weekly round up of the DPC.

For more esports news updates, visit https://yhoo.it/YahooEsportsSEA and check out Yahoo Esports Southeast Asia’s Facebook page.