DreamHack Winter 2014 was the fourth CS:GO Major, and Team LDLC.com won it by beating Ninjas in Pyjamas 2-1 in the final. The event is remembered at least as much for what happened around the matches: two French teams were disqualified a week before it started after VAC bans, and Fnatic forfeited a quarter-final after a boost on Overpass that became known as the "Olofboost". It also changed how Major stickers were sold.
The event
DreamHack organised the tournament with Valve's sponsorship at Elmia in Jönköping, Sweden, from November 27 to 29, 2014. The $250,000 prize pool was split as at earlier Majors, with $100,000 for the winner and $50,000 for the runner-up.
Valve's announcement invited the eight quarter-finalists from ESL One Cologne 2014, with qualifiers deciding the rest. The format and the seven-map pool were the same as at Cologne: four GSL groups of single maps, then a best-of-three single-elimination bracket.
Two teams removed a week before
Two of those eight invitations never reached the event. After Cologne, several French players swapped teams. Titan took over Team LDLC.com's Legends spot by signing three of its Cologne players, Maniac, KQLY and apEX, while a rebuilt LDLC lineup went through the European qualifier.
On November 20, 2014, Valve's latest wave of VAC bans hit Hovik "KQLY" Tovmassian of Titan and Gordon "Sf" Giry of Epsilon eSports. DreamHack confirmed that both teams were disqualified, as HLTV reported that day. Titan's statement the next day said KQLY had admitted to using third-party software for seven days in August, "outside of a competitive context and on another Steam account". The organisation removed him and criticised Valve for not letting the team replace him or enter the replacement qualifier.
That qualifier took place at Inferno Online in Stockholm on November 22, with four European teams flown in by Valve, and Copenhagen Wolves and FlipSid3 Tactics took the places. Our Katowice 2014 stickers guide explains why the episode still matters to Titan sticker collectors.
Group stage
HellRaisers, Team Dignitas, LDLC and Virtus.pro won their groups. Fnatic, the German team PENTA Sports, NiP and Natus Vincere took the second places. LDLC's 16-13 group win over NiP came on Overpass, the map that would decide the final.
The Olofboost: Fnatic against LDLC
LDLC and Fnatic met in the quarter-finals. LDLC took Dust II 16-10 and Fnatic took Cache 16-8. On the deciding map, Overpass, LDLC led 12-3 at half-time.
LDLC also won the second pistol round to go 13-3 up. For almost every round after that, HLTV's report says, Fnatic used a boost near the CT spawn that put Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer on an invisible ledge from which he could see most of the map. It took LDLC around ten rounds to work out where the kills were coming from, and Fnatic won every remaining round to take the map 16-13. LDLC then filed a complaint about "pixel-walking", the technique used to reach the spot.
DreamHack found no rule against pixel-walking in the event's rulebook, HLTV reported; it had last been forbidden at DreamHack Summer 2013. But the investigation, which took several hours, found that the boosted player could not be shot from most angles, and that in certain conditions the position could reveal a transparent texture, although HLTV noted Fnatic had not met those conditions. DreamHack first ordered the second half replayed. Fnatic then complained that LDLC had used a similar position in the first half, and DreamHack ordered the whole map replayed "due to texture transparency and immortal bug used by both teams".
Fnatic never played it. On November 29 DreamHack announced that Fnatic had forfeited, and the team's statement said the result had "caused a considerable distraction" from the Major. Their in-game leader, Markus "pronax" Wallstén, later wrote that the team had nothing to gain by replaying the map, in comments reported by HLTV. Fnatic finished 5th–8th.
Playoffs
Map scores are from the winner's side.
| Round | Winner | Series | Loser | Maps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quarter-final | Ninjas in Pyjamas | 2-0 | HellRaisers | Dust II 16-5, Inferno 16-6 |
| Quarter-final | Virtus.pro | 2-0 | PENTA Sports | Cache 16-9, Mirage 16-5 |
| Quarter-final | Team LDLC.com | 2-1 | Fnatic | Dust II 16-10, Cache 8-16, Overpass forfeit |
| Quarter-final | Natus Vincere | 2-0 | Team Dignitas | Cobblestone 16-3, Mirage 16-13 |
| Semi-final | Ninjas in Pyjamas | 2-1 | Virtus.pro | Nuke 22-20, Cache 10-16, Inferno 16-8 |
| Semi-final | Team LDLC.com | 2-0 | Natus Vincere | Both maps 16-11 |
| Final | Team LDLC.com | 2-1 | Ninjas in Pyjamas | Dust II 16-10, Inferno 4-16, Overpass 19-16 |
NiP had a new player, Mikail "Maikelele" Bill, after Robin "Fifflaren" Johansson left the team in early November, and still reached their fourth Major final out of four, opening the semi-final with a 22-20 double-overtime win on Nuke.
The final: LDLC 2-1 NiP
NiP led Dust II 9-6 at half-time, but LDLC won the second half 10-1 to take it 16-10, according to HLTV's statistics. NiP answered with a 16-4 win on Inferno.
Overpass decided the title. NiP led 11-4 at the break and were still ahead 13-8 and 15-13, one round from back-to-back Major wins. LDLC won the last two rounds of regulation to force overtime, then took the extra period 4-1 for a 19-16 win. It was the first Major final for a French team.
| Player | Name |
|---|---|
| NBK- | Nathan Schmitt |
| shox | Richard Papillon |
| kioShiMa | Fabien Fiey |
| SmithZz | Edouard Dubourdeaux |
| Happy | Vincent Schopenhauer |
| MoMaN (coach) | Emmanuel Marquez |
HLTV lists Vincent "Happy" Schopenhauer as the event's MVP.
Stickers: single stickers and one capsule
DreamHack 2014 broke the two-capsule pattern. Valve's November 21 post said you could "purchase individual team stickers directly", or buy the Legends capsule for "a special holographic or foil sticker", with a portion of proceeds going to the teams. The stickers were again Pick'Em game pieces.
- Single stickers: paper stickers for all 16 teams, plus a DreamHack Winter 2014 sticker, sold individually for a limited time.
- DreamHack 2014 Legends (Holo-Foil): the only capsule, with holo and foil versions of the six remaining Legends (Cloud9, Fnatic, Natus Vincere, Ninjas in Pyjamas, Team Dignitas and Virtus.Pro) plus a DreamHack Winter 2014 foil.
- Gold: gold team stickers, found only on souvenirs.
That leaves an oddity. LDLC entered as Challengers, so the champions' DreamHack 2014 sticker exists only in paper and in the Souvenir-only gold. Liquipedia lists the Titan sticker as never used and the Epsilon sticker as removed, so neither team has a tradable DreamHack 2014 sticker.
Souvenirs
Packages again dropped to viewers on GOTV or linked Twitch accounts, one per map, so there are seven DreamHack 2014 packages. According to the Counter-Strike Wiki, each Souvenir carries gold stickers of the two teams in the match plus a foil DreamHack 2014 sticker, and packages also dropped during the last-chance qualifier in Stockholm.
The wiki's match list for the Overpass package includes the original Fnatic against LDLC map, so Souvenirs exist from a result that was later voided. The Cobblestone package is one of the ten that could contain a Souvenir AWP | Dragon Lore, covered in our Dragon Lore history.
Collecting DreamHack 2014 items today
- Read the match on a Souvenir. The description tells you whether it came from a group game, the qualifier, the voided Overpass map or the final.
- Read the full name. DreamHack's 2015 Major stickers end in "Cluj-Napoca 2015", not "DreamHack 2014".
- Check scrapes. Gold Souvenir stickers can be scraped like any other. The sticker filter on Buy finds guns carrying a specific DreamHack 2014 sticker.
The next Major, ESL One Katowice 2015, ended with Fnatic as the first two-time champions. Our Katowice 2015 Major article covers it.
Sources
- DreamHack Winter 2014 — Liquipedia
- LDLC beat NiP to win DH Winter — HLTV.org
- DH: "Overpass will be replayed" — HLTV.org
- Fnatic forfeit LDLC match — HLTV.org
- Titan, Epsilon disqualified from DHW — HLTV.org
- KQLY removed; Titan criticize Valve — HLTV.org
- DreamHack Winter Is Coming — Counter-Strike blog (Valve)
- DreamHack 2014 Souvenir Packages — Counter-Strike Wiki
