The Chinese Dota 2 scene is seeing the first of what could be several massive changes to some of its top rosters as Team Aster brought on Royal Never Give Up’s Du “Monet” Peng and Liu “白学家” Yuhao.
Many people in the community felt Aster was going to make a move after news broke early this morning that Song “Sccc” Chun would not be renewing his contract with the team when it expires on Sept. 1.
Shortly after, legendary Dota 2 player and Aster co-founder Xu “BurNIng” Zhilei revealed the team’s new roster on one of his streams, showing that not only was Sccc not returning, but team captain Pan “Fade” Yi would also be leaving the organization.
Jiang “天命” An will complete the team, replacing Fade for the team’s position four spot as Kee “ChYuan” Ng also departs the roster. ChYuan was the team’s second longest-tenured player behind Lin “Xxs” Jing, having signed with the organization last April.
Sccc and Fade both joined Aster following The International 2019, with Fade coming out of a short-lived retirement to join the team. Sccc will become an unrestricted free agent on Sept. 1, but it is unclear what the contract status of the other two players currently is.
Related: Fade comes out of retirement to join Team Aster
BurNIng also announced fellow Chinese legend Zhang “LaNm” Zhicheng would be joining the team as a coach, leaving Team Sirius to take up the role.
Aster started off the year as one of the top five Chinese teams, with hopes of competing for a spot at TI10, but amid the new online tournament scene brought on by the coronavirus, the roster has fallen well behind several other rosters.
With this move, RNG is losing out on its two core players, with Monet being a stand-out performer for the team in most events. This was also likely the main reason RNG pulled out of competing at ESL One Thailand 2020: Asia.
It is still not known when this new Aster roster will make its debut, but the team’s developmental roster, Aster.Aries, is competing at ESL One Thailand, which is currently underway.
