Ahead of the DreamLeague season 22 tournament, we spoke to Ivan “MinD_ContRoL” Ivanov about joining Tundra Esports and mid-tournament patches.

Sophie McCarthy: So you only really joined Tundra pretty recently in the last month or so.

How did that come about?

MinD_ContRoL: I joined them end of December, like two months ago. I had to think about this a lot after the International ended. I was thinking my decision. Should I at stay Nigma? Should I join a new team? Blah, blah, blah. Then I thought I would stay in Nigma.

Then after one month of overthinking just decided I would join another team and join Tundra. But I’m not sure I would have joined Tundra if we had something big. But usually there is nothing in December or November. So it was three months that made the decision easier. There was nothing.

So was it a case of you reaching out to them?

MinD_ContRoL: I mean, not exactly. So I played an online cup with 9Class. It was like a tier two tournament, amateur tournament, but there was Falcons in it, so they destroyed us in the final. Stupid Falcons – just joking! And then I really liked 9Class throughout the whole tournament. He had a good attitude, a good skill set. Everything was ready from him. So I was like, okay, I’ll ask him, does he want to play with me? He was like, yeah, I want to play with you. I like your offlane blah, blah, blah, things like this.

And we had few options. It was not only Tundra, but in Tundra, we knew that Topson was already on the roster. That convinced us more because we really like Topson. We respect him, both of us, and we joined Tundra. Now we are three. And then we needed pos five and pos one, the roles to fit in.

So the way it came with Whitemon was, I think it was more of Topson’s idea because Topson already had interaction with him, if I’m not mistaken, and he knows him and he recommended him. And I had experience in my rank with games against Whitemon. I was destroyed too many times by these guys, especially his Pudge. And, yeah, instead of being hooked by enemies, can be hooked by allies. It’s good.

Sophie: If you can’t beat them, join them, right?

MinD_ContRoL: Yeah. Or just take him. So that’s how Whitemon came to play. And then Pure was more like a very casual discussion. I just casually asked him, are you interested in playing position one? And he told me, okay, I need some time. And then in one week, he is like, okay, let’s try out. Maybe it’s good, maybe it’s not. And it seems like it’s working out well for him. I’m happy for this because he is taking a risk, actually. And I have responsibility for this because I approached him and I want to make it work for him.

Sophie: Well, you’re going to be playing your first S tier tournament as this roster in just a couple of days at DreamLeague Season 22. I think you guys have got Team Spirit and Xtreme on your very first day.

If you could pick one to play first, who would you pick and why?

MinD_ContRoL: I would pick Xtreme first because I feel like they’re a little bit weaker than Spirit in terms of team skill, in a way to warm up for Spirit. That’s the only reason. But I just want to play Spirit more, actually. I just want to be more ready for them because for them, you need to be ready for everything against Spirit. You need to be ready for laning, team fights, execution of spells, every single thing, or you’re not going to win against Spirit. They’re not going to let you win.

Sophie: Very true.

Do you have a specific way to prepare for different series or do you just do the same process each time?

MinD_ContRoL: The only difference is the team we’re playing against. So each team is different. Preparation in terms of heroes, terms of strategy against them and the plan. Like the plan, when are we going to destroy them? At what point?

Sophie: You’ve had a little bit of time to prepare for this tournament. So have you guys been boot camping? Just scrimming?

What does that preparation look like?

MinD_ContRoL: So we are doing the best we can under the situation – we are having some issues travelling, some of us. Not me. Not my fault. We cannot travel right now to Europe, some of the players. So that’s why we can’t boot camp. But otherwise we would have boot camped. So the best we can do is just scrim, right? And do all we can during online.
It’s harder, but who cares? It’s an online tournament, so online should be enough.

Sophie: Yeah, that’s true. And if you’ve already got these relationships, then it’s easier to adapt to playstyles, right?

MinD_ContRoL: Yeah, we’re still building them. It’s not a complete friendship yet, but soon enough.

Sophie: We had a pretty small patch drop just either yesterday or the day before, I think.

Do you prefer patches dropping like before a tournament, or do you like it dropping mid tournament?

MinD_ContRoL: Okay. Depends on the situation. If we’re losing, it’s better during the tournament. But if the tournament didn’t start yet, for me, it’s good that it dropped, actually, because why not something new? Why not? But also, I would be also happy if it didn’t. So for me, it doesn’t matter, but maybe for some guy who is limited in hero pool or something like this, and it suddenly changes his whole hero pool and destroys his brain cells. Oh, what can I do now? Today is no time. So, yeah, this way it could be bad for you, but I don’t think there’s many players like that anymore. So everyone is flexible. But the one during the tournament, if you’re winning and suddenly there’s a patch drop, like a big one, then it might be annoying because you’re like 4-0 in the groups and you found the biggest imbalance, strategy or heroes, and then suddenly, oh, it’s not there. Or something is more imbalanced, and now you need to work again for it. That could be a little bit annoying. Sophie: Yeah, I bet it is. So I guess there’s not going to be that much of a change in meta. This is a pretty small patch.

Do you think we’re going to be seeing the same drafts, the same strategies that we saw at the Dacha?

MinD_ContRoL: Oh, actually, I think there will be some because they buffed the Helm of the Overlord, like the item. So I think there might be some Lycan coming or some Beastmaster. I can see the series easily coming because it’s actually a big buff. Maybe on the outside it looks like, okay, it doesn’t matter. It’s just 500 gold, but actually 500 gold, it can matter in the pro dota games. Sophie: Absolutely. We actually saw a bit of a nerf to Mage Slayer as well? MinD_ContRoL: I think so. Maybe a bit different. It is different, you will see much less Mage Slayer just because of this 200 gold. Even though it looks like an innocent nerf. But it’s not innocent. The pro players, they feel it.