Nigma Esports are going on another Lower Bracket rampage at WePlay! Tug of War: Mad Moon, as they eliminate Gambit Esports in style to advance to the Lower Bracket Finals of the tournament.
Nigma had a one-game advantage in the series when they threw a curveball at their opponents by suddenly swapping roles among their players in game two.
Star carry player Amer “Miracle-” Al-Barkawi was put on a position 5 Snapfire as team captain Kuro “Kuroky” Salehi Takhasomi took up a core role as Leshrac, while offlaner Ivan “MinD_ControL” Ivanov switched to position 1 with Naga Siren.
Midlaner Aliwi “w33” Omar and position 4 support Maroun “GH” Merhej retained their normal roles.
Nigma didn’t miss a beat despite the unconventional strategy. In a crucial teamfight at the 14-minute mark, MinD_ControL caught the entire Gambit lineup with Song of the Siren. This set up a beautiful Echo Slam and Mortimer’s Kisses combo for an impressive teamwipe.
- MinD_ContRoL’s Snapfire absolutely deletes NiP
- MATUMBAMAN counters B8’s smoke gank and gets a ridiculous double-kill
Nigma continued to dominate Gambit with their crisp teamfight execution, which eventually forced Gambit to call GG after 30 minutes.
With their win, Nigma move on to the Lower Bracket Finals, where they will be facing Virtus.pro (VP) to see who will go up against Team Secret in the Grand Finals. Meanwhile, Gambit bow out at 4th place with US$20,000 in consolation.
It will be interesting to see if Nigma will pull off more of their role switch shenanigans against VP when they get another one-game cushion in their matchup. So far, they have won and lost a game apiece with this strategy, with the loss coming in their previous series against Aggressive Mode.
READ MORE: OG.N0tail: ‘I really wanna play Secret’
