Yet another organization has decided to take a long hiatus from Dota 2 until The International 10 ends, as Team Empire deactivated its entire roster earlier today.
Empire is one of the oldest CIS teams in Dota, but after losing their qualifying for TI10, the organization is weighing their options for the next competitive phase.
Over the past nine months of competition, Empire have been a stable team, hitting the top eight in nearly every competition since January. This included finishing second in the Eastern European Qualifiers for TI10; where they lost a heartbreaking match to Team Spirit and missed a ticket to Dota's biggest event. They were recently relegated to B2 in the Dota 2021 Champions League 8 Third Season, but finished in fourth place after a strong show in the group stage.
After last week's loss, the organization decided to step back and make roster decisions for a post-TI Dota world, making their roster inactive.
“Recently, there have been a lot of rumors about Team Empire's Dota 2 team composition,” said Alexander “StrangeR” Solomonov, Director of Esports at Empire. “Regarding Depressing kid, I've said it before and I'll repeat, it's currently staying in Team Empire. For the rest, there will be changes in the squad and I can say it will be global, but for now, the squad is inactive due to the absence of tournaments.”
More details on the future of Empire's Dota team and their roster moves will be shared after TI7, which runs October 17-10. This may be because the team is not in a rush to make a decision and the players want to see what will happen.