It’s a sad day for North American Dota 2 as Nouns departs the scene and the region loses one of its biggest Esports organization to-date. Nouns Esports announced that they would depart from Dota 2 Esports on Nov. 1, ending their two-and-a-half year run with the game.
Nouns Esports leaves Dota 2 (Image credit: The International 2024)
Nouns Esports’ Dota 2 Division
First proposed back in May 2022, the Nouns DAO owners voted to pick up their first Dota 2 team. The Nouns DAO is a blockchain voting system that gave authority the Nouns token owners to propose and vote for ideas and investments that the majority deemed as worthwhile. Once agreed upon, an amount of Ethereum tokens (ETH) from the Nouns Treasury will be allocated for this proposal.
In Dota 2 team’s case, the proposal’s objective was to promote Nouns to the esports viewers. Given the tremendous stream viewership of Dota 2 players, tournaments, and the International Championship, the proposal received the consensus of many DAO members. The proposal used 35 ETH (or approximately $88,000 at the time) to sign an unsponsored North American squad, called 4 Zoomers in 2022.
Nouns Esports’ accomplishments
Looking back at organization’s performance throughout their tenure, it could be suggested that this proposal was very successful. Nouns Esports went on to participate and represent the NA region at two editions of The International, specifically The International 2023 and 2024. The exposure from viewership was tremendous in these two major events, and that’s not including the various third-party tournaments that they frequently competed in.
Nouns Esports collectively won $529,000 in prize winnings, which is decent considering recent TI’s having significantly lower prize pools than past.
Nouns’ Shortcomings
Although on the surface the Dota 2 team was a successful proposal that helped bolster Nouns’ brand in Esports and DAO communities, it wasn’t without its shortcomings.
Nouns Esports’ proposal had a unique policy on the distribution of prize pool winnings, where the organization would take none from the players. Ultimately, Nouns Esports is an esports organization – A business model which has historically had issues managing finances. One where funding traditionally comes almost solely from only sponsorships and prize pool winnings on top of any initial and outside investment
Since Nouns didn’t take any winnings from the players, that left only sponsorships as a source of revenue. Adidas sponsored Nouns at the International 2024 and a crypto exchange platform was also a frequent sponsor, but the org otherwise struggled. Notably, Nouns didn’t have any esports betting sponsors, something the majority of the big organizations in the scene now have.
Nouns Esports leaves Dota 2 (Image credit: Nouns Esports)
Unfortunately, the lack of returns vs. the cost of continuing seems to be the issue Nouns DAO is facing. In their announcement, where they bid farewell to their team roster, they did share that they would love to partner with sponsors to return to the Dota 2 Esports in the future.
As for the disbanded Nouns Esports Dota 2 roster, expect them to still compete in ongoing and upcoming tournaments, such as DreamLeague S24. They might play under a temporary, unsponsored name for some time, but a team of such calibre will definitely find a new org very soon.
Perhaps more alarmingly though, the departure of Nouns leaves North America with no major sponsors for its Dota 2 scene. Most major NA organizations either shy away from Dota 2 or operate rosters in other regions. Domestic Dota 2 seems thoroughly deceased in NA.