Paper Rex reclaims Pacific throne at the Radiant Asia Invitational

Paper Rex Paper Rex Asia-Pacific Rank #3 mindfreak Aaron Leonhart Jinggg Wang Jing Jie f0rsakeN Jason Susanto d4v41 Khalish Rusyaidee something Ilya Petrov has won the Radiant Asia Invitational tournament, emerging victorious over DetonatioN FocusMe DetonatioN FocusMe Japan Rank #3 Meiy Ibuki Seki Art Jinboong Kim Jin-won (김진원) Akame Yu Gwang-hui (유광희) gyen in the grand finals. They took the final series 3-1 to crown themselves the champions.

The two teams faced off in the previous round of the tournament in the upper finals, where DFM won in 2-0 fashion. Paper Rex quickly rebounded in the lower final, where they swept Trace Esports Trace Esports China Rank #4 LuoK1ng Zhang Zhanpeng (张展鹏) Kai Lu Zhinan (卢智楠) FengF Song Xuefeng (宋学锋) heybay Ho Shun Hei Biank Zhong Jianfei (钟剑飞) in dominant fashion to earn themselves a rematch against DFM.

Coming from the upper bracket, DFM dictated the map pool of the series, choosing to ban Bind and Split. The map pool consisted of Ascent, Haven, Abyss, Pearl, and Sunset. The teams traded each other's map picks, with Paper Rex winning Ascent 13-10 and DFM winning Haven 13-6. Paper Rex then took the next two maps, winning Abyss 13-2, and Pearl 13-7.

DFM took Paper Rex to Ascent first, a map they had won comfortably in their previous match. After their loss, Paper Rex abandoned their off meta agent compositions they were so known for and finally leaned into the established meta. They utilized the map's default comp to great success against Trace Esports, where they dominated with a 13-4 scoreline.

DFM seemed unfazed by Paper Rex's changeup as they opened up the map with five rounds in a row. It took heroics from Paper Rex to find any rounds, as DFM remained firmly in control all half to end with a 9-3 lead.

Paper Rex opened up their attack side with a pistol win, before narrowly converting their bonus round off of a vintage mindfreak clutch. From there, the momentum was in their hands and DFM's lead quickly crumbled. They went on to win 10 out of the 11 rounds in the second half and secured the comeback with a 13-10 win.

Moving to Paper Rex's map pick of Haven, DFM decided they needed an even bigger lead than on Ascent. This time, it was nine unanswered rounds and a 10-2 lead on their attack half. The combination of Meiy 's Neon and Art 's Odin proved to be too oppressive for Paper Rex to handle.

It was once again up to Paper Rex to pull off the comeback on their attack. They started off with a pistol round, but could not convert the bonus round this time. They would find two more rounds, but it was once again the Odin play from Art that would help DFM secure the final two rounds, winning the map 13-6.

Shaking off the results of Haven, Paper Rex responded with their own 10-2 half on Abyss. They quickly closed it out with three quick rounds in the second half for a 13-2 stomp of a map. Throughout the map, mindfreak was electric, putting up a 19-3 kill-death ratio, bringing his team to a 2-1 lead in the series.

Map four, for the fourth time of the series, started off with a 5-0 lead for the attacking team. This time it was DFM taking the lead on Pearl, a map which is historically one of Paper Rex's best. After DFM's hot start, however, Paper Rex found their footing and brought their way back up to a more even 7-5 scoreline at the half.

In a similar story to Ascent, Paper Rex's attack was unstoppable. Once again winning the pistol and bonus round, they proceeded to sweep the rest of the map. Paper Rex won all eight rounds of the second half to close out the series and hoist themself a trophy.

While DFM fell short in the grand finals, they have proven that they can compete with some of the best teams from Pacific and China. After two years at the bottom of the Pacific league, they can enter 2025 with some promise of success.

For Paper Rex, this tournament win places them back atop the Pacific league after slipping down the rungs towards the end of the 2024 VCT season.