Execration eSports Team Profile

The Filipino Dota 2 scene has been on the rise in the last several years. However, during all that time, only one team has managed to achieve success in the international tournaments and that team is TnC Pro Team. However, things started to change in the last year when another Filipino team appeared in the Dota 2 international scene. Team Execration has been showing the great game during the last year which culminated in them finishing this Dota 2 season by participating in The International 7.

TnC Pro Team has been very successful in the international Dota 2 scene and it seems that Execration might be following their countrymen in Dota 2 competition. Execration is not new Dota 2 team because they have been competing for several years but they have only now come to the main spotlight in the Dota 2 competitions.

Execration History

Execration was established on June 1st, 2014 when Kimuel ‘Kim0’ Rodis got together with Jeffrey ‘Foxx’ Fortunato, Ralph Richard ‘RR’ Penano, Earlwin ‘Ewe’ Libre, and Abeng ‘Abeng’ Jersy and decided to launch their own Dota 2 team. Two months after the team was established in 2014, it was decided that Abeng would be leaving the team while Ryan ‘Bimbo’ Jay Qui but he would only stay in the team for a couple of months as well.

When Bimbo revealed that he was leaving the team, their fans were expecting this development as there were some indications this might be happening. However, when RR announced that he, too, would be leaving the team, their fans were shocked with the news as they did not see that coming at all. With that, Execration ended 2014 and they were hoping for much better but at the very beginning of 2015, Execration faced another player leaving the team.

Ewe decided that he would be retiring from the active play which forced Execration to look for another player to replace him. However, that was not the end of troubles for Execration because Doc announced that he would be leaving the team as well. In that kind of a situation, Execration added Yaj and Jed to the team as the replacements for the players that left.

In 2015, Execration finally became a registered team which enabled them to participate in the Major Dota 2 tournaments or rather the qualifiers for those Major tournaments and at that time they also announced that Ewe would be returning to the team in order to replace Abeng who had left just a couple of days before that.

In November 2015, Execration would go through a big change in the team and it would feature three new players coming to the team and three players leaving the team. The players that left were Foxx, Primo, and Sirc while the players that joined were RR, BYB, as well as Shanks. During the following year, Execration also made a lot of changes in their roster which affected their results which was expected.

The last time when Execration made changes in their Dota 2 roster was in January of this year when Nando joined the team. Since the beginning of their campaign, they were not able to hold stable roster. In many cases, teams that make a lot of changes in their lineups are not performing well and that was the case with Execration.

After almost four years, it seems that Execration has finally found the right roster for their team which was reflected in the tournaments that they played during the first eight months of the new Dota 2 season. With a stable roster, Execration was able to achieve some great results like never before and that is all coming from the fact that players have finally established good connections among themselves which enabled them to be aware of their teammates’ style of play.  

Achievements so Far

During the first year of their participation in Dota 2 competitions, Execration did not have a lot of success and their best result from 2014 was the 7-8th place in the StarLadder StarSeries Season 10. Besides that, that year they also played several minor tournaments and they finished in the 7-8th place at the Datbet Championship, in the 3-4th at The Inaugural, and in the 5-10th place at the joinDOTA League Season 1 Asia.

In 2015, Execration played a lot more tournaments but the results were similar to those they had a year before. They did win one title in 2015 and it was at the minor tournament called BTS Southeast Asia #2. Besides that, they finished in the 9-16th place at the BTS Southeast Asia #1 and Corsair Gaming Arena #6. Besides that, they finished in the 5-6th place at the Asia Arena Cup and at the SEA Dragon Battle Season 2. Other results from that year are not even worth mentioning.

The following year will be a bit more successful than any before. In 2016, Execration managed to win the title at the ASUS ROG SEA Cup which was their biggest prize pool win up to that date. After that tournament, Execration will participate in a ROG Masters 2016 Major tournament and they would reach the grand finals but they were eventually defeated by Team Secret in the grand finals. That year, they also won their first big title in Dota 2 competitions. In September 2016, Execration reached the grand finals of the MPGL Southeast Asia Championship where they took down MVP Phoenix for the title.

Besides that, 2016 also saw them winning second place at several minor tournaments including MSI Battle of Pride, ProDotA Cup Southeast Asia #1, and joinDOTA League Season 10 Asia. That year, Execration managed to reach the Wild Card stage of the competition at The International 6 and they finished that stage in the third place which was not enough for them to play at the main event of the biggest and most important Dota 2 tournament in the world.

2017 started on a good note for Execration as they were able to grab the 5-6th place at the Premier Dota 2 tournament ESL One Genting as well as at the Mr. Cat Invitational Season 2. Besides that, Execration also won the fourth place at the SEA Kappa Invitational Season 4 and at the ProDotA Cup Southeast Asia #6. This year, Execration had an amazing run in the regional qualifiers for The International 7 and because of that, they finished in the first place in their region. In order to achieve that, Execration needed to take down Filipino Dota 2 giants such as Team Faceless or Clutch Gamers which they eventually did.

Once they reached the group stage of The International 7, Execration was able to avoid finishing in the last place in the group stage which propelled them in the lower brackets of the main event. However, in the first round of the playoffs, they would face Team Secret and they would be defeated in that match which meant that they finished the tournament in the 13-15th place, which brought them more than $120,000 from the prize pool.

Current Roster

The fact that Execration, a team not so well-known to many people, managed to reach the playoffs of The International was surprising to everyone. However, the fact that this team had a stable roster without any problems for a longer period of time enabled them to claim their rightful place in the tournament.

The players that achieved those results are Kim ‘Gabbi’ Villafuerte, Ryan Jay ‘Bimbo’ Qui, James ‘CartMaN’ Palatolon John, Kimuel ‘Kim0’ Borromeo Rodis who stayed with the team since the team’s beginnings in 2014 and Ralph Richard ‘RR’ Penano. Execration has not announced whether or not they will be making any changes in their team so far. Considering that the post-TI period is usually reserved for Shuffle it might happen that some players leave the team while some might be coming in.