The International is back, and the Dota 2 community is already picking sides, both on the scoreboard and in their fantasy lineups. With the group stage locked and the bracket set, fans are locking in captains, arguing over sleeper picks, and cracking open this year's supporter bundle to see what's inside.
Fantasy captains: the long shots getting love
Fantasy drafts for this year's tournament close before the opening match, and the community's captain picks are skewing riskier than usual. Support players are getting drafted as core options, a trend that's split fantasy circles down the middle. Mid laners with volatile hero pools are being stacked into lineups specifically for their ceiling in a best-of-three, where one hero-pool read can swing an entire bracket's worth of fantasy points.
The consensus safe pick, an offlaner known for a deep and disciplined hero pool, is being drafted in the overwhelming majority of top-ranked fantasy lineups. But it's the contrarian picks, the players sitting outside the meta's obvious top tier, that are generating the most discussion on fan forums this week. Fantasy scoring rewards kills, last hits, and objective participation, and with the group stage producing several unusually fast stomps, early scoring has already been volatile enough to reshuffle leaderboards more than once.
What's in the supporter bundle
This year's supporter bundle is the other half of the pre-tournament ritual, the purchase that funds the prize pool and unlocks a season's worth of cosmetic perks tied directly to how the tournament plays out. Owning the bundle grants access to the in-client predictions hub, the fantasy league itself, and a rotating set of profile terrain and loading screens that update as the event progresses.
The cosmetic centerpiece this year is a new set of couriers and wards themed around the tournament's host city, alongside an animated hero set that unlocks through a battle-pass-style level track rather than a flat purchase. Fans grinding levels ahead of the finals are chasing a particularly sought-after arcana-tier unlock that only becomes obtainable once a set level threshold is hit, which has turned the bundle's leveling economy into its own side conversation this week, almost as active as the fantasy drafts themselves.
Bragging rights on the line
Beyond the cosmetics, the bundle's prediction system carries its own social currency. Correctly calling series winners, map counts, and first-blood outcomes builds a running accuracy score visible on a player's profile, a leaderboard that fans have started treating as seriously as their competitive rank. With the bracket narrowing fast and fantasy scores swinging on every draft phase, the next few days of group-stage results are going to decide a lot more than just who advances.
Follow the original reporting as this develops.
