Valve has published an update detailing the event activities and item bundles attached to this year's edition of The International, the Dota 2 world championship, which the company said is being held in Shanghai. Sixteen teams have qualified, and Team Falcons enter as the reigning champions after winning last year's event in Hamburg.
Where supporter bundle money goes
Supporter bundles are available for all sixteen competing teams and for more than a hundred pieces of event talent. Valve said 50% of sales from team, talent and community broadcast bundles goes directly to the team or individual, with a further 30% routed to the tournament prize pool. Alongside the four primary event languages, the company is offering community bundles for WXC Co. in Filipino, NS_ART in Brazilian Portuguese and Maincast in Ukrainian.
Team bundles carry the cosmetic rewards the format has used in past years — custom sprays, a health bar badge, team emoticons and chat wheel lines. New this year at the Gold tier is a global effigy, a building that replaces a player's standard effigy through the end of September. Additional supporter levels change the effigy's appearance, including custom effects.
Predictions and a reworked fantasy mode
Predictions return for both the Swiss stage and the bracket. Valve noted that no player has ever recorded a fully correct set of Swiss stage results. Entries must be submitted before the first match, which the company gave as 10am CST on Thursday, August 13.
Fantasy has been changed more substantially. Valve said players now act as their team's coach and can assign custom modifiers that affect the whole roster, and that prefixes, suffixes and the drafting rules have been revised. Drafting now works largely in pairs: both supports from one team, the safelaner and offlaner from another, and then a midlaner.
Rewards are again distributed by relative performance. The Tyrian Regalia treasure returns with five refashioned Immortal items for top-performing players, joined by a new Terrain Token that lets winners select one of six returning custom terrains, among them Reef's Edge and Immortal Gardens. Valve said reward tiers and further detail sit in the rewards section of the Dota 2 main menu. The company also shipped a gameplay patch and a set of content fixes under the Summer Scrub 2026 banner.
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