CDEC Gaming Dota 2 Team Profile

CDEC Gaming is a professional eSports team specializing in Dota 2 and hailing from Shanghai, China. Their most notable success since the team’s inception was when they finished runner-ups at the 2015 The International. This happened although they had previously qualified for that tournament as a wildcard draft and ultimately proved deserving of their status. This accomplishment was generally seen as a significant upset. Most teams and organizations did not feel threatened by such a young team like CDEC Gaming.

Along with taking over $2.9 million in prize money at The International 2015, as well as many sympathies, CDEC also managed to clean out their group. They continued their stellar performance at TI5 beating LGD Gaming in Round 2 of the Upper Bracket. Consequently, they demolished the eventual winners of TI5, Evil Geniuses, squaring off in the Upper Bracket finals. The name CDEC is short for ‘Chinese Dota Elite Community’.

CDEC Gaming History

On April 25th, 2014, LGD Gaming had announced they were forming a new and young team, naming it LGD.CDEC. CDEC was supposed to stand for ‘Chinese Dota Elite Community’. It was supposed to be an internal league. The new team consisted mostly of young players from that particular league. In October 2014, LGD.CDEC decided to leave the LGD Gaming organization to establish themselves as an independent brand. That brand would go by the name CDEC Gaming.

The original team roster consisted of 333, Agressif, Garder, Maybe, and Q. Very early on, CDEC Gaming showed signs of a great talent. One of the players, Maybe, the team’s mid-laner, was particularly promising. However, 333 would decide to eventually leave the team after they had a disappointing performance in the Season 5 of D2L LAN finals. CDEC only came in 4^th place here. Mikasa, the coach of the team and a player that had previously been part of the Vici Gaming and TyLoos, replaced him for the time being until a substitute could be found.

Due to the team not receiving a direct invitation for the 2015 Dota 2 Asian Championships, CDEC Gaming had to fight for the spot and earn their place via Asian Qualifiers. Here, they ended up placing in the very respectable 2^nd place. The team’s inexperience proved to be a hindrance at this tournament, as they had only minor success in the group stage, regardless of their previous results that promised much.

The team was eliminated early on in the tournament, and only took 14^th place, having to share their $15,288 in prize money with such teams as TongFu.WanZhou, Newbee, MVP Phoenix and Wings Gaming. As each The International is followed by a series of roster changes, so CDEC had to undergo their fair share in lineup changes. Mikasa decided to leave the team for good to coach the LGD Gaming team, and the promising young talent Maybe also decided to leave CDEC to join LGD Gaming as well.

In early May 2015, CDEC received an invitation to play in the Chinese qualifiers for The International 2015. CDEC was on a successful run, dominating their competition in the group stage, but ultimately they didn’t manage to directly qualify for The International 2015 and, once more, had to endure the wildcard process that previously secured them a spot in the DAC. CDEC then managed to win one of the available two wild cards that would take them to the main event of TI5 when they handily beat Vega Squadron and MVP Phoenix.

At TI5, CDEC was probably the biggest surprise in the group phase, where they easily managed to secure the 2^nd place in the group, with the eventual winners, Evil Geniuses, taking the 1^st place. They were widely regarded as the tournament’s underdogs, and this role served them well, with most teams not taking them as a serious contender and competition that could rank highly at the end of the tournament.

However, when the team entered the tournament’s main stage, they showed everyone they were a strong force to be reckoned with. They were dominant when they dominated the Upper Bracket and did not lose any games in the three series they got to play. This helped them secure their spot in the grand finals, where they met up with Evil Geniuses, a team they already played in the group stage of the tournament.

And, despite decisively beating Evil Geniuses in the group stage 2-0, they did not manage to repeat their success in the finals and lost 1-3. However, they still managed to pocket almost $3 million in prize money and make a name for themselves with such a promising performance at the sports’ most important annual event.

With 2016 came another year where other teams vied for CDEC’s best players. In March 2016, LGD Gaming would finally announce that they had previously tried and finally successfully acquired Agressif from CDEC. This eventually prompted the team to change their roster lineup. After the TI5 roster shuffle and with Agressif leaving to join LGD Gaming, the new Spring/Summer team roster consisted of Rabbit, Super, Yao, garder, and Q as the team captain.

However, only after several month with the team, Yao decided to leave the team on August 28, and on September 17, garder decided to leave as well and join the EHOME team. This ultimately led to several other players leaving the team and joining other franchises. Thus, Super left as well and joined LGD.Forever Young. It did not take too long before CDEC had a new steady lineup, which was comprised of Demons, Flyby, June, September and Shade. This would be the team’s final major lineup change.

In 2017, the team had He ‘Inflame’ Yongzheng join CDEC Gaming from their sister team CDEC Youth while they were preparing for the Kiev Major in April 2017, and Shade was moved to sub. Shortly after the Kiev Major Inflame would part ways with CDEC and would join LGD.Forever Young.