PGL Reveals Direct Invitations To Wallachia Season 1 Tournament

Tournament organizers PGL recently announced their venture and commitment to the Dota 2 esports ecosystem until 2026. Their first planned tournament is PGL Wallachia Season 1, to which ten teams have been directly invited.

What Is PGL Wallachia Season 1?

PGL Wallachia Season 1 is a Dota 2 tournament organized by PGL. It will be held Offline in Bucharest, Romania, and will run from May 10 to May 19. The tournament features $1,000,000 in prize pools and will be held in an offline format.

PGL Wallachia Season 1 Teams

Of the sixteen participants, ten have received direct invitations from PGL to play in the million-dollar tournament. 

The ten invited teams are as follows:

• Team Liquid
• Gaimin Gladiators
• Team Falcons
• Team Secret
• BetBoom Team
• Team Spirit
• Xtreme Gaming
• Heroic
• Shopify Rebellion
• Team Aurora

Overall, the majority of invites are from the current best teams in the world, and it makes sense. However, teams like Heroic and Team Secret have yet to be too impressive and still have much to prove. It feels like PGL invited Team Secret for their brand and Heroic because no South American representatives have been included in the list so far.

Still, it feels like a well-thought-out list of teams from a commercial standpoint. Most of the participants are unquestionably the best of the best, and names like Team Secret, Xtreme Gaming, Heroic, and Team Aurora will attract fans from their respective regions, leading to increased viewership for PGL.

The remaining six slots will be claimed by teams through Open and Regional Qualifiers. One slot is available for each of the six regions:

• North America
• South America
• Southeast Asia
• Eastern Europe
• Western Europe
• China

One missing region is the MENA region, where notable competitors like Nigma Galaxy and PSG Quest reside. Though their region was excluded from the list, MENA teams can likely register to play in the Western European qualifiers since most of their players come from that region anyway.

PGL Wallachia Season 1 Format

The first season of PGL Wallachia will be divided into two stages:

• Swiss Group Stage
• Playoffs

Swiss Group Stage

Like every tournament, PGL Wallachia will start with a Group Stage. Most Dota 2 tournaments have followed the Round Robin format; however, this tournament will implement a new format, the Swiss format, which is commonly used in Counter-Strike esports. It will be interesting to see if this change will benefit Dota 2 competition.

Eight teams will immediately be sent home at the end of the Group Stage, meaning only eight participants will qualify for the Playoffs stage.

Playoffs

The Playoffs will feature the top eight teams in the tournament and follow a double-elimination bracket, as usual. 

All matches in the Playoffs are Best of 3, except for the Grand Final, which will be Best of 5.

PGL Wallachia Season 1 has a prize pool of $1,000,000 and will be held offline in Bucharest, Romania. The event is scheduled for May 10 to May 19. 

Header: PGL