We’ve had to wait a year for DreamHack Winter but now it’s back and on November 30, eight teams will compete at the Elmia Convention Center in Sweden for a share of $100,000. Could there be an upset among the top contenders? Has anything changed since Dreamhack Atlanta? Read on for our preview of the event.
It has been a year since the last Dreamhack Winter 2017 and it starts on the 30 November, where eight teams will compete for their share of $100,000. Could there be an upset among the top contenders? Has anything changed since Dreamhack Atlanta? Read on for our preview of the event.
What is the Dreamhack Winter 2018?
Off of the back of DreamHack Atlanta, DreamHack Winter has arrived at the Elmia Convention Center in Sweden. They will be hosting some of the best CS:GO teams in the world with six invited teams and one qualifier from Europe and one from North America. The tournament is split into two stages: Group Stage and Playoffs.
The Group Stage will be a Bo1 (best of one) and a Bo3 (best of three). The Bo3 will only be used for eliminations and decider matches, while the Playoffs (semi-finals and Grand Final) will be Bo3. The winning team will take home $50,000 and the runner-up will take home $20,000.
DreamHack Winter 2018 odds
We will add special boards once they have gone live.
Learn more about the top contenders
Bettors will need to keep in mind that not all of these teams have had the opportunity to play in the recent weeks and months. Whilst some of them performed well at the FACEIT Major and at the CS Summit 3, some of the teams haven’t done much since or prior to these events.
We will be recapping the teams' recent adventures and breaking down how they have performed.
Potential favourites OpTic Gaming are attending DreamHack Winter and should be feeling fairly confident given their recent success at the CS Summit 3. Already defeating the likely second favourite’s compLexity twice in the upper bracket 2:0 and in the lower bracket again 2:0 only losing out the finals to NRG.
It has been a fairly consistent year for OpTic, with the team now having what seems like a stable roster and with the recent addition of NiKo as well. The biggest threat for OpTic in this competition should come from the not so new kids on the block, Team LDLC.
Team LDLC have been causing quite the stir amongst the top end teams. Having lost to FaZe early on in the Group Stage at IEM Chicago 2018, they managed to fight their way through the lower bracket and get through to the Playoff stage.
LDLC should be considered strong outsiders to win the competition, they have had a consistent line-up for the last six months and have gone from strength to strength, having played a total of 162 maps, winning 103 and losing 59 - giving them a percentage win of 63% on all maps they’ve played.
compLexity have come back into CS:GO this year after a fair while away from the scene. Having not had much joy previously up until 2010, they won the Americas Minor Championship – London 2018 which secured their spot to the FACEIT Major: London 2018.
OpTic defeated the likely second favourite’s compLexity twice in the upper bracket 2:0 and in the lower bracket again 2:0 at CS Summit 3
CS Summit 3 was their strong point where they dropped to the lower bracket early on and defeated fellow contenders G2 and Heroic, eventually getting knocked out of the competition to OpTic.
Since the arrival of former Team Liquid player mertz to Heroic, the team has since some interesting results. Losing out to NiP at the Dreamhack Master Stockholm 2018, going 2:0, to then winning the Games Clash Master 2018.
Team performance hasn’t been great as of the last six months and the team is now in the negative Win/Loss ratio, winning 49 of the matches by losing 60 and also adopting a negative K/D ratio as well of 0.96.
Analysing others in the Dreamhack Winter 2018 odds
Bravado is South Africa's own favourites. Last year was a good year for Bravado, showing region domination by winning the strong majority of their matches. The main factor that could hold Bravado back is their lack of international experience and performances on key maps such as Nuke (42% win rate), Overpass (46%).
LDLC should be considered strong outsiders to win this competition, having played a total of 162 maps, winning 103 and losing 59.
It’s been a bumpy year for G2 Esports. Their most recent win was in 2017 at Dreamhack Master Malmo 2017 and they did perform well at Epicenter 2017 where they claimed third place, losing out to Astralis.
The recent departure of enkay J and NBK along with apEX being bought out by Team Vitality means it’s hard to tell exactly which direction the team will go in.
In a nice change of pace, the Finnish team ENCE eSports have put themselves back together after disbanding last year and they have changed up the pace of the Minor scene. The impressive statistic about ENCE comes from their Win/Loss ratio, playing 161 maps, having won 107 and only losing 54 (66.5% win rate) with an average team K/D Ratio of 1.10.
Not much is known about x6tence Galaxy apart from the fact that they are Sweden’s own team. The entire roster was signed up in September, including the coach. Being the home side team, they might be able to show the other contenders that the home side advantage is real.
