TI9 Fantasy Guide Day 5; The Play-offs!   You also stand a chance to win up to $5, 000, 000 in our official coverage partner -- Estars' Free to Play contests! So hurry up and check out their website for more info. The group stages for TI9 has concluded and the stage is set for the PLAYOFFS! For group stages, I ended up scoring 1996.89 points thus surpassing all my friends! Things should get a bit easier as the choices are cut down for the first day of the playoffs since only four teams will be playing in a best-of-three series. PSG.LGD takes on Virtus Pro and Vici Gaming goes up against TNC. Both these series I expect to go three games as the competition is close between the two. That being said, let's take a look at the averages of each player that'll be competing on the first day of the playoffs: Virtus Pro: Ramzes (15.2) No[o]ne (13.3) 9pasha (10.3) RodjER (13.6) Solo (15.7)             Vici Gaming: Paparazi (17.2) Ori (17.1) Yang (12.6) Fade (12.5) Dy (19.8)   PSG.LGD: Ame (16.4) Somnus (18) Chalice (11.6) xNova (17.3)   TNC: Gabbi (17.2) Armel (16.7) Kuku (13.5) Tims (18.4) Eyyou (17)             For an even more updated view visit here. It'll give you a more in depth look at how each player is doing that day in terms of fantasy points.   MY PICKS FOR DAY FIVE!   The first day of playoffs is rather easier to pick from as there are only four teams competing from the upper bracket. For me, it ultimately comes down to the players who have performed consistently throughout the course of the group stages. I also believe that both series will go to three games and it'll be a well fought out series for both. That being said my picks should be a bit obvious and will include players from three different teams. This isn’t really an action of keeping it diverse but has more to do with all the top earners in fantasy in whom I have complete faith when it comes to earning us enough points. I'll be going with Gabbi and Paparazi as my cores. Both these cores have been putting up some serious points and their averages are towards the top. I do think the series ends up going in favor of Vici Gaming 2-1 but this gives a lot of time to both players to rack up great GPM and Creep Score number. Throughout TI, Gabbi has garnered 274.6 total points while Paparazi has grabbed 275.3! These two combined should leave us with a great outlook from our core slots. I'll be going with Somnus as my fantasy pick for the mid role who is trailing behind Sumail at the second position. Somnus is behind SumaiL by only 5.7 points and with the latter not playing on the first day of the playoffs, it makes the former as an easy selection. Somnus has been an easy pick for me every time he has been playing as he and LGD play consistent and crisp Dota. I do think they are also going to win their series 2-1 over VP so that should give time to Somnus to get us some sweet points. I'll end up my line-up with Dy and Tims. DY is by far the best support player for fantasy (reminds me of SVG from the previous year at TI8) and the best support player overall at TI. He averages more than the second highest support Pielidie. In the meantime, is placed in the third position right behind DY and Pieliedie. Ultimately, the five players mentioned above are the best fantasy points churners on the first day of playoffs. Reason for not picking any VP players is solely based on their shaky performances throughout the group stage as well as their lower fantasy points. My line-up is: Paparazi Gabbi Somnus Dy Tims If you are looking for some alternatives I would suggest going for either Ori or xNova.

---

If you would like to know more about my work, you can follow me at KarY. You can head over to our Dota 2 hub for more content regarding TI9 in terms of interviews, stats, guides, etc!