A busy first day of play at the BLAST Slam VI on Tuesday saw one team already pull away from the pack to grab the top spot in the standings.
With each team playing three or four matches to open the event, only OG finished the day unbeaten, winning two maps on green and two more on red to sit at 4-0.
BLAST Slam VI is a 12-team Dota 2 event that pays $300,000 to the winner and $1 million overall. The event opens with three days (Tuesday through Thursday) of group play — a round-robin, best-of-1 format in which each team will play one another once. The top two teams in the standings will advance to the semifinals of the playoffs.
Teams finishing third through eighth in the standings advance to the play-in round — four best-of-3 matches in which the winners advance to the playoffs and the losers are eliminated. The teams finishing ninth through 12th in group play will move to the last-chance playoff, another best-of-3 format where the winners advance to the play-in round and the losers go home.
The play-in and last-chance rounds will be played Friday through Sunday. The four remaining teams will play in the quarterfinals Feb. 13. The semis will be Feb. 14 and the grand final on Feb. 15.
On Tuesday, OG topped Team Liquid, Team Yandex, MOUZ and GamerLegion. Of those four teams, Liquid and GL went 2-1 in their other matches to finish the day at 2-2 while Yandex and MOUZ finished the day 1-2.
REKONIX had the roughest day of the competitors, finishing at 0-4.
BLAST Slam VI standings
1. OG (4-0)
T2. Natus Vincere (3-1)
T2. Xtreme Gaming (3-1)
4. Tundra Esports (2-1)
T5. GamerLegion (2-2)
T5. Team Falcons (2-2)
T5. Team Liquid (2-2)
T8. MOUZ (1-2)
T8. Team Spirit (1-2)
T8. Team Yandex (1-2)
11. HEROIC (1-3)
12. REKONIX (0-4)
BLAST Slam VI payouts
1. $300,000 (plus $100,000 in team earnings)
2. $150,000 (plus $50,000)
3-4. $60,000 (plus $29,000)
5-6. $35,000 (plus $15,000)
7-10. $22,500 (plus $6.250)
11-12. $10,000 (plus $2,500)
–Field Level Media
