Inside Division 3 NA: Round 5

Round 5 of Heroes Lounge North America has just finished being played, and it's had some really close and intense matchups. Now that we're halfway through the season, teams are really starting to show their stuff, so let's see how it's going for our teams so far! As this is the halfway point, I will also be going a lot more in-depth with some of the statistics, so you'll have more to look at there for this article as well.

Round 5 Recap

Let's start by looking at all the matchups we had for Round 5:

Can't Counterpick Stupid vs. Team Rainbow Strike Go!: This was easily the most anticipated matchup of the round (and even the season so far) for me, as we see the 2 undefeated teams thus far facing off to decide who will continue with their undefeated season. Continue to the Deep Dive section to find out who will retain the crown, and who will not!

Ban Cho vs. BEHOLD... ragaros: Each of these teams come into the matchup with 3 wins out of the past 4 rounds, and the battle was extremely close! The first two maps were close until the last minute, leaving each team with a map, but when it came to the third map, BEHOLD... ragaros dominated the map and teamfights, taking the series 2-1.

TriggeredBySalad vs. Please Clap: Another matchup between two teams with 3 wins, this match was casted by Mochrie, and can be seen here. In the end, Please Clap managed to take the series 2-0 in 2 very close maps, pulling out a spicy Hammer composition in game 1.

Blood Bath & Beyond vs. FAT Aquaman: One of the 3-mappers of this week, FAT Aquaman showed their strength as they dominated game 1 of the series, and made a strong showing in games 2 and 3, managing to claim a 2-1 win over Blood Bath & Beyond.

Blackheart's Booty vs. Annie Oak League: The series between these two teams was an intense and well-matched one, with both sides showing great strength throughout, but despite Blackheart's Booty taking the first map to 30 minutes, Annie Oak League managed to close out the series 2-0.

Snow Storm vs. Bazzzzinga: This matchup was a fun one, and was casted by Svenla, which you can see here. Bazzzzinga started off strong, seemingly always stomping during the early-game, but Snow Storm managed to come online during the mid-game and take the series 2-0.

Deep Fried Pizzas vs. Always E In: This series saw solid play from both teams, but Deep Fried Pizzas managed to consistently hold their lead and win the match 2-0.

Deep Dive

This week had tons of great series, but there's no way I could pass up on covering this match, and it was almost definitely the closest of the week as well.

Can't Counterpick Stupid (CCS) vs. Team Rainbow Strike Go! (TRS)

This series sees CCS and TRS, the two teams entering round 5 undefeated (each team only dropping 2 maps, but winning all their series), facing off to decide who will retain the crown and sit at the top of Division 3. This series was streamed by Valkamer of CCS, and can be viewed here.

Game 1 - Dragon Shire: To start the series off, CCS took it to Dragon Shire, a map only played once before in Division 3. For the map, they drafted Johanna, Jaina, Qhira, Tyrande, and Uther, while TRS answered with Rexxar, Lunara, Stukov, Arthas, and Greymane. TRS started off the game quickly, rotating to their siege camp quickly and even getting out their bruiser camp before CCS got their own siege out, thanks largely to the excellent clear of Greymane. They expertly used this to pressure top, and with a pick on Qhira managed to push the fort of CCS down to half health, securing them a strong presence over the top shrine, and leading to the first Dragon Knight of the game. This was used mainly to finish the top fort, while the rest of TRS pushed in to weaken the remaining forts. Things looked good for TRS, but as the next altar phase began, a well-timed pick while Rexxar was forced back from the top lane allowed CCS to get a Dragon Knight of their own, seemingly out of nowhere. With the aggressive composition of TRS, though, CCS needed to be careful not to over-push, and doing so with the Dragon Knight resulted in 4 quick kills and a downed keep wall in favor of TRS.
As the game continued, both teams traded, with TRS repeatedly punishing CCS for their over-extending, but when larger fights came CCS seemed to be the team winning fights with the combination of Divine Storm and Blessed Shield. As the 4th set of shrines spawned, both teams had a open keep, and it came down to the last fight. Said fight went down over the neutral bottom bruisers, and, exploiting the choke point TRS needed to enter through, Jaina and Qhira handily won the fight for CCS. Despite seeming behind in map presence all game, even with 2 Dragon Knights, CCS now was pushing through the bottom lane with multiple camps and the Dragon Knight, holding on long enough to take the keep and the game.

Game 2 - Alterac Pass: Going into the second map, picked by TRS, we saw a draft of Lunara, Muradin, Kael'thas, Rehgar, and Xul for CCS and Johanna, Li-Ming, Lucio, Greymane, and Chen for TRS. This game started similarly to the last, but with both teams making quick camp rotations TRS was not able to obtain quite as much of an early lead for the map. Both teams seemed willing at first to ignore the objective, knowing that with short death timers it was unlikely to get the objective anyway, and aside from a few skirmishes left it completely untouched until CCS managed to get level 10 first, by a small window. This gave them a small lead for the objective, but it wouldn't be until they returned to cap it a second time that a fight broke out, where the backline pressure provided by Chen, Greymane, and Lucio allowed for TRS to take 3 kills, allowing an easy clear of the objective, losing only one fort. Coming off the defense, TRS looked for a boss while CCS looked to take a fort, each on opposite ends of the map. Ultimately, this ended better off for CCS, as the early boss was not able to quite take the fort. Teams continued to soak until objective, but the fight that ensued over the camps once again proved better for TRS, and despite only getting one kill, they were able to claim the second objective. This gesture not only equalized the map, but secured all 3 forts for TRS, and it seemed their more teamfight oriented playstyle may have been finally paying off.
The trends of the mid-game continued as both teams focused on soaking and playing neutrally until the third objective appeared, and once again the combination of Chen and Greymane was too strong for the immobile backline on the side of CCS. Further picks ensued as CCS tried to keep their lanes pushed out, which only allowed TRS to get a bigger push as they captured a boss with their numbers advantage. Pushing with a boss and objective, as well as finding 3 kills, TRS looked confident to end the game, but unfortunately the two armor shields still on the core of CCS gave enough bulk to shrug off the boss and members of TRS, giving CCS their first kills of the game and a final bit of hope. For the first time since the opening of the game, CCS started the channel over objective first, but the insane pressure on the backline and the resets from Li-Ming allowed for TRS to ultimately win yet another objective, and with a final team wipe, take down CCS's core.

Game 3 - Volskaya Foundry: With the series tied up, CCS took first pick and TRS took the final game to Volskaya. CCS drafted a team of Johanna, Jaina, Qhira, Anduin, and Zagara while TRS went with Lunara, Lucio, Stitches, Alarak, and Gazlowe. With the final draft, CCS seemed set up to establish a dominance in siege and waveclear, while TRS planned to find picks and use the sadism gained to snowball fights, and it showed as much. Johanna from CCS rotated aggressively, interrupting TRS's rotations, while CCS fell into a defensive stance and looked for hooks and pulls when not clearing waves or camps. Realizing this, CCS elected for an aggressive turret camp invade, which ended successfully with 2 kills, although the turret was dropped in the fight. Thanks to their outstanding waveclear, CCS continued to be able to soak while leaving members free to stand on the objective point and even make rotations to gank, leading to a half level lead as they took the objective, showing their understanding not only of their win condition but of how to shut down that of TRS in the early game. Typical protector rotations followed, with CCS taking the front wall mid, as well as the fountain and some of the wall top lane. As the teams went to continue taking camps and clearing, though, TRS was ready for another invade, and managed to punish CCS with a kill on Qhira, who had scouted out the rotation.
The game continued, but a level lead and earlier ultimates still allowed CCS to control the map, as well as numerous items, leading to more of TRS following their lead. TRS was back to being the ones looking for isolated enemies, and used these picks to take a fort before the objective even came down in their favor, and denying TRS a full 5v5 fight which they had been lacking for the entire game. Interestingly, CCS elected to weaken keep walls in the top and middle lane while letting Zagara split push against Gazlowe, ultimately not getting the fountain in that lane. Rotations continued, but CCS soon turned their eyes to that bottom lane, and in pushing for the fort nearly lost multiple members, needing to use both healing beacon items in order to secure the fort without losses, meaning that TRS might finally have opportunity for a more even fight item-wise. Once again, though, the reliance on Stitches hook and a pick-based playstyle was punished by CCS, as what seemed like a good hook turned into a Qhira mass-stun and additional kills for CCS, leaving a 2.5 level lead in the game going into the third objective. The full 5v5 fight that TRS did happen, but with a 20 talent tier CCS was still able to trade 4 kills for 2 in their favor and take the third and final protector directly to the core, winning the series 2-1.

The MVP of the series would have to go to WitsEnd from Can't Counterpick Stupid. The Divine Storms from Uther and Lightbombs from Anduin were key parts of every teamfight won in the first and third maps, and were essential in CCS being able to win those maps. Coming close would be Robear from Team Rainbow Strike Go!, whose Lunara and Greymane play was excellent in all 3 maps.

Statistics

Week 5 marks the middle point of the season, let's see what the first half has had to offer stat-wise.

Map Statistics - Now that we're halfway through the season, let's look at the numbers for all the maps in the pool, plus some other map-based statistics:

• As far as popularity goes, there isn't much new, but let's look at the exact stats for picks and bans on maps so far in the season:
  • Alterac Pass: 7 picks (#5 most picked) and 17 bans (#4 most banned)
  • Battlefield of Eternity: 13 picks (#3) and 9 bans (#8)
  • Cursed Hollow: 1 pick (#9) and 11 bans (#6)
  • Dragon Shire: 2 picks (#8) and 20 bans (#1)
  • Garden of Terror: 3 picks (#7) and 7 bans (#9)
  • Infernal Shrines: 22 picks (#1) and 7 bans (#9)
  • Sky Temple: 0 picks (#10) and 12 bans (#5)
  • Tomb of the Spider Queen: 8 picks (#4) and 19 bans (#3)
  • Towers of Doom: 5 picks (#6) and 20 bans (#1)
  • Volskaya Foundry: 18 picks (#2) and 10 bans (#7)
• Over the past few weeks I've been covering the winrate difference between first pick and map pick, and this week brought it even closer, with map pick only being favored by 1 game (MP - 40, FP - 39)
• Games halfway through the season are averaging at about 19:16 long, ending with teams sitting in the zone of level 16-23 most of the time.
  • Only one game thus far in the season has ended before either team hit level 16.

Hero Statistics - Over the course of 79 maps, we've seen 790 picks and 474 bans so far in the season. Let's dig into the meta of heroes in Division 3 once more:

• Just as expected if you've been keeping up with these articles, Johanna is the hero to beat when it comes to popularity, still only having missed being picked or banned on 1 map this season, and enjoying a 62.7% winrate.
  • The next most picked heroes are Jaina, and Raynor (63.3% and 43% popularity respectively), while Kael'thas and Diablo are the 2nd and 3rd most popular thanks to having the most bans (70.9% and 64.6% popularity).
• Let's delve into the individual roles to see which heroes are having a big impact in the division:
  • Tanks: Tanks are generally focused on a select few, but a few others like Muradin have been showing up through the season too.

    Hero	Number of Picks	Number of Bans	Overall Popularity	Winrate
    Johanna	59	19	98.7%	62.7%
    E.T.C.	24	11	44.3%	50%
    Diablo	16	35	64.6%	43.8%
    Muradin	16	2	22.8%	68.8%
    Anub'arak	15	18	41.8%	40%

  • Offlaners: Definitely one of the more diverse roles, but these 4 have been the most common, with Thrall and Blaze performing exceptionally well.

    Hero	Number of Picks	Number of Bans	Overall Popularity	Winrate
    Thrall	26	6	40.5%	65.4%
    Blaze	22	4	32.9%	59.1%
    Varian	15	2	21.5%	53.3%
    Leoric	14	6	25.3%	50%

  • Sustained DPS: There are a ton of strong sustained damage picks right now, but some such as Greymane and Valla have really brought power into the division.

    Hero	Number of Picks	Number of Bans	Overall Popularity	Winrate
    Raynor	26	8	43%	38.5%
    Greymane	20	14	43%	65%
    Sylvanas	19	20	49.4%	52.6%
    Hanzo	18	11	36.7%	44.4%
    Valla	16	5	26.6%	68.8%

  • Mage:On the other side of the damage package, mages such as Li-Ming have been showing their strengths in the Nexus as well.

    Hero	Number of Picks	Number of Bans	Overall Popularity	Winrate
    Jaina	31	19	63.3%	51.6%
    Li-Ming	22	4	32.9%	63.6%
    Gul'dan	21	14	44.3%	42.9%
    Kael'thas	18	38	70.9%	61.1%

  • Healers:And last, but not least, to fill out our statistics-based tour through draft, the healers of Division 3 including some big players such as Anduin and Stukov.

    Hero	Number of Picks	Number of Bans	Overall Popularity	Winrate
    Anduin	24	15	49.4%	50%
    Rehgar	22	3	31.6%	36.4%
    Deckard	17	5	27.8%	47.1%
    Stukov	14	6	41.8%	71.4%
    Ana	11	24	44.3%	54.5%

• Of these highly-picked heroes, Stukov, Valla, and Muradin boast the strongest winrates, teams could look to prepare for some of these alongside other popular heroes.
• This week saw the division's overall hero pool increase by 4 heroes: Gazlowe, Mal'ganis, Sgt. Hammer, and Tracer. This means 78 of the 86 heroes have now been played, only 8 more to be played over the remaining season.

Team Stats and Rankings

Now that we've gotten at least a few matches for every team, I've decided to split off team stats and start a separate section where I talk about my personal ranking of the teams, and how I think the matches of the week might shift the standings. Remember, you can always view the current standings here.

The Top 5 - To start, I'd like to look at the top 5 teams in the standings as of the end of the round (ignoring any round 6+ matches which have already been played) and talk about their success so far, as well as what their further matchups look like.

1. Can't Counterpick Stupid (5-0, 10 Map Wins) - Can't Counterpick Stupid has been on a tear through the division so far, going undefeated and beating the only other (previously) undefeated team this week. You can look out for solid drafting, teamfight, and map understanding from this team in their games. Don't count them out until the game is over, as they've consistently been able to turn around rough starts as well. They've still got some tough opponents they haven't faced, including the current (tied for) second, fourth, and fifth place teams, but for now Can't Counterpick Stupid is definitely the team to look out for.
2. Team Rainbow Strike Go! (4-1, 9 Map Wins) - Tied for second place is Team Rainbow Strike Go!, who just suffered their first loss at the hands of Can't Counterpick Stupid this week. Don't let that fool you, though, this team is a force to be reckoned with, and enjoys snowballing teamfights with team compositions based around heavy aggression. In the next two weeks they'll face off against teams such as TriggeredBySalad and BEHOLD... ragaros, where they'll be looking to continue to show that they are a force to be reckoned with.
3. Please Clap (4-1, 9 Map Wins) - The other team fighting for second is Please Clap, who after their 2-1 loss in week 1 has gone on a winning streak, taking the least map losses so far in the season, despite their first week loss. The team plays around a strong macro focus, using every lead to their advantage, but still be prepared for compositions that can take a teamfight. They'll be looking to continue their streak as they face Ban Cho and Can't Counterpick Stupid in the next rounds, but it'll be a tough task.
4. BEHOLD... ragaros (4-1, 8 Map Wins) - Currently sitting in fourth by one map, BEHOLD... ragaros is a new team that has been showing up so far this season. This team has seen some great success by drafting around the enemy team as well as the map, even showing some traditionally "off-meta" heroes, leading to them having the biggest hero pool of a team sitting at 33. They have a rough few weeks ahead of them as they'll face Can't Counterpick Stupid and Team Rainbow Strike Go!, where their drafting and coordination will be put to the test.
5. Ban Cho (3-2, 8 Map Wins) - In the fifth and final slot we have Ban Cho, who, despite their two losses, have been taking maps off of every team they've faced. They, too, like to use a large hero pool to play around the map, proving to be one of the more flexible teams. They'll still have some tough teams to face like the rest in upcoming weeks, though.

Teams to Look Out For - While these teams are looking extremely strong, it's important to remember that all the teams in the Division are very much still in the competition. Here's a few I would keep my eyes on in upcoming weeks to see if they make a run for the top in the second half of the season:

• F.A.T. Aquaman - This team had a rough start of the season suffering back-to-back losses against the strong teams of Team Rainbow Strike Go! and TriggeredBySalad, but have turned that around in the past few weeks. They currently hold the highest KDA of every team, so watch to see if their teamfight prowess can push them to the top in upcoming weeks.
• Annie Oak League - Annie Oak League has had some mixed results so far in the season, beating strong teams such as BEHOLD... ragaros, but also suffering losses from teams such as Ban Cho. If the team can perform at their highest level, they'll be certain to make some upsets in upcoming weeks, so watch out for that.

Thanks again to everyone who read! I had a lot of fun doing some ranking of teams this week, and look forward to seeing some of the intense matches and surprising upsets that happen over the next half of the season between all these amazing teams. If you've been enjoying the articles or have any suggestions, feel free to reach out to me on Discord, I can be found in the Heroes Lounge server pretty frequently. See you next week for the round 6 recap!