TI 6 Team Preview: Wings Gaming

Wings Gaming burst onto the scene in April at ESL One Manila, which they won convincingly against all the odds. The team were created in August 2015 in order to try and compete in the first Major in Frankfurt. After just over a month together, they failed in this goal and it took another six weeks before Wings managed to qualify for their first international tournament – StarLadder i-League StarSeries Season 1.

Prior to playing for Wings Gaming, none of the players had played for a big team aside from pubstar Li “iceice” Peng, who was part of xiao8’s Big God outfit. Zhang “Faith_bian” Ruida, Zhou “bLink” Yang and Zhang “Innocence” Yiping had been playing together since 2014 when they were part of the Speed Gaming roster while the last piece of the puzzle was Chu “Shadow” Zeyu, who joined from Kefira United.

 

Roster:

Chu “Shadow” Zeyu – position 1
Zhou “bLink” Yang – position 2
Zhang “Faith_bian” Ruida – position 3
Zhang “Innocence” Yiping (c) – position 4
Li “iceice” Peng – position 5

 

2016 achievements:

ESL One Manila – 1^st

The Summit 5 – 1^st

Nanyang Dota 2 Championships Season 2 – 2^nd

 

Current form:

July – 68.75% win rate (11 wins, 4 draws, 1 loss)

 

Top 8 most picked heroes this month:

 

Top 5 most banned heroes this month:

 

Manila was where Wings rose and Manila was where Wings fell. After winning ESL One in April, Wings were invited to The Manila Major, but cited by both the community and experts as potential winners, they crumbled to a bottom four finish.

Wings Gaming have a number of strengths though. They are a team that can adapt to the enemy and are very good at learning how to play against their opponents through the course of a tournament. Wings are also renowned as one of the more unpredictable teams, both due to the wide hero pools of their players as well as the surprisingly unconventional picks and strategies they tend to deploy. Despite this, they do have some favourite heroes such as Drow Ranger and Keeper of the Light. They are also very well coordinated with a precise timing for their early gank rotations.

Shadow and bLinK are excellent farmers. As a Mid player, bLinK has more of a playmaking role. He is a phenomenal Invoker, whose Sunstrikes are nothing short of pinpoint precise coups de grace from the heavens. Most recently, however, he has been playing Juggernaut and Mirana, with whom he is equally impressive.

Faith_bian is their Offlaner and is a player who has the ability to predict enemy movement without having vision on the map. His bold moves often pay off and he was the driving force for Wings in The Summit 5 Grand Final win over OG. His Batrider and Beastmaster are particularly noteworthy.

Innocence plays the role of Support and excels when playing with roaming gankers such as Riki or Lion. His well-timed early rotations tilt the score in favour of Wings early in the game.

Wings Gaming will once again enter a major Valve tournament as one of the favourites, this time the most important one – The International. Their record so far is not something they can be proud of though – they failed to qualify for the Shanghai and Frankfurt Majors, while the 13-16^th spot in Manila in June was a major letdown.

Their performances can be unpredictable. Nevertheless, they are capable of completely obliterating the enemy opposition when playing their best and The Summit 5 win just befo7re TI 6 is solid proof of their quality.