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CS:GO’s top five aces from DreamHack Winter 2014
After days of gripping Counter-Strike drama we check out the most clutch plays of the tournament.
Counter-Strike:Global Offensive
© Valve
What a week of Counter-Strike it's been: the action, the tears, the twists of fate! Who could have predicted it all? Eventually, Team LDLC came away victors of the DreamHack Winter 2014 CS:GO championship, but that was only after judges intervened in their quarter-final knockout.
After what appeared to be an illegal boost on Overpass from Fnatic, competition admins decided to replay the final match only for Fnatic to then forfeit the replay, putting LDLC through to the semis. From there it was only a matter of the semis against Na'Vi, and then forcing overtime in the final against NiP to eventually take the title.
Dreamhack 2014 CSGO
© Adela Sznajder/DreamHack
But before all that team-based excitement, the early stages played host to several feats of the individual skill that make CS:GO so great. Here we've collected the best examples from the tournament, those rare moments when a single player carries their comrades and wipes out the enemy team. The ace.
f0rest (NiP) vs HellRaisers
Our first is an eco-round pistol ace from runner-ups Ninjas in Pyjamas. Patrik 'f0rest' Lindberg storms through Inferno, setting the tone for NiP's performance in the tournament. Finding head after head in increasingly close encounter, f0rest rounds out the display with a long-range kill on a last ditch defusal.
Snax (Virtus.Pro) vs myXMG
Again, on the favoured Inferno, Janusz 'Snax' Pogorzelski finds a perfect ace practically handed to him by myXMG to put VP through to the playoffs. Sometimes to get that teamwipe, all you need is a few molotovs and a headstrong enemy.
s1mple (HellRaisers) vs Cloud9
Setting the scene early on for this match-up, Aleksandr 's1mple' Kostyliev wipes out all of Cloud9 in the third round of their group stage tangle. After this round on Inferno, everything fell apart for C9, and HellRaisers advanced to the playoffs.
kUcheR (HellRaisers) vs Cloud9
Later in the same match, HellRaisers' Emil 'kUcheR' Akhundov manages to wipe out all five members of Cloud9 again, despite catching a face full of flashbang in the tight corridors of Inferno (what is it about this map?). Staying smart lets him cross the map to join his team for a B-site push, and then keeping his head down until the right time gives him the edge as C9 push in to defuse.
Pronax (Fnatic) vs HellRaisers
Probably ace of the tournament here, if not of the year. Markus 'Pronax' Wallsten pulls out a last-second round winner against HellRaisers as the score is tied up on 13 rounds apiece. The tension as he awaits his only surviving team member to escort him to the B site is punctured by a frantic final 15-seconds and a forced plant to keep the game alive. Gripping.
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