"I'm definitely thinking about doing another season" - Exclusive interview with Topson

At The International 2026, we were able to talk with mid-laner Topias Topson Taavitsainen about returning to the professional scene, playing in LGD Gaming, modern Dota 2 and possible continuation of his career. The two-time TI champion also talked about unusual heroes for the central lane, attitude towards the Battle Pass, life after the professional scene, and why he needs another Aegis.

Hello Topias! How are you?

Hello! Everything is fine.

Let's start with the essentials. How did you react when LGD Gaming invited you? Were you surprised when they wrote to you?

Well, I was a little surprised. I didn't expect to play at all. I thought I would just stream matches and do watch parties. And somehow it happened.

Over the weekend, it was Saturday, I received a message that they needed a standin. And I was like, “Okay.” And then... It turned out that my passport was expiring, and I thought: “Okay, this is bad, I need to go and get a new passport.” And it was the weekend.

Then I had to get a new passport, fortunately it arrived on time. And then I arrived literally the night before the matches. That is, I arrived here about 16 hours before our match. Not perfect, but ok.

Have you had any jetlag?

Yes, I was. I'm still a little... Well, I'm feeling better, but yeah, I had a lot of jet lag.

What did your wife say when she found out you were going to TI?

Well, now she is in Malaysia, and I was in Finland. But she was happy for me, yes.

You haven't performed on the professional stage for almost two years. How does it feel to be here again? And did you ever worry that you might not live up to the fans' expectations?

I think it's still the same. This is exciting, this TI is exciting. Even though I knew we shouldn't get our hopes up too high, it still feels bad to lose. Especially when, in my opinion, we had a good chance to win, or at least reach the final.

Losing is just as terrible as before. I was surprised how much I wanted to win and how much I hated losing.

We didn't play against PARIVISION or Team Liquid, so I don't have any opinion about these teams. But it seems like all the teams are still pretty much the same.

So they haven't gotten better?

I'm not impressed.

Did you rate them higher?

Of course they are good. It's just that before I joined LGD, I probably had a feeling that they would just destroy us. Because I haven't played on the professional stage for two years. However, now, it seems to me that any team can be defeated.

So that was a nice thought for me.

Maybe you're just too good!

May be.

You joined the team right before the main tournament of the season. How difficult was it to understand your teammates and how easy was it to fit into the team in a short time?

Yeah, I think this team is very... Well, pretty standard. The whole theory and everything is very standard Dota. At least this is how it has been for the last few years. Even when I played Tundra in 2024, the meta itself was pretty much the same.

So the team... Everything was fine. I think it just took us a few games to get comfortable with each other and then we were like a team.

This is great. You've been to many TIs. How do you feel about the atmosphere at this tournament after such a break?

Well, TI is always special. Usually when they take place in Asian countries like China or Singapore, they are especially cool compared to other places. So it was very, very nice.

Unfortunately, I didn't make it to the playoffs, so I couldn't really get a feel for the arena and everything. But it was great.

At this tournament you probably have the largest pool in terms of unique heroes. LGD Gaming were the first to give you Dragon Knight for mid, then Gyrocopter and other unusual characters. Why do you think players still rate your unconventional ideas highly? For example, Larl also started taking DK, but he couldn’t implement it properly.

Ideas just come from matchmaking and trying to come up with new answers to specific heroes.

Obviously these are not all my ideas. I can see some player playing these heroes and just think, “What did he do well and what can I change to make it actually work?”

Of course, there is nothing special about DK. People play DK all the time. I don’t know, I saw some pub, I don’t remember who played it, and then I thought: “Okay, this hero could be good. He just played it wrong, bought the wrong items.”

And I started thinking about how I could actually make this actually work. This is how I get new heroes.

And there are heroes that I’ve been playing for a very long time. For example, this Troll Warlord. He is still the same as he was 7-8 years ago. I played it at TI 2019, I think it's still the same. He still counters certain heroes and can be a mid carry.

When you have a lot of experience and a lot of games, there are many answers and many options.

I mean, in the Spirit meta, seeing DK, Gyrocopter, or Riki in the mid lane is pretty unusual. It feels like you don’t really care which hero is considered the best, you just have your own vision of the game, and it works.

Yes, I don't really care what others think is best. If I have experience playing a certain hero, I don’t care. I'll just play it if I think it's good.

Is there any peak that you have long wanted to show on stage, but you haven’t had the right opportunity yet?

It's probably a bit of a shame that I couldn't play Pugna in this tournament, because I played this hero a lot in pubs.

Sometimes it is really very good, sometimes it is very bad, so you need to catch a very good moment to peak. Unfortunately, we did not have such a moment.

Sometimes modern Dota 2 can feel a little boring because you have to spend so much time farming. Do you personally like the current state of the game?

Yes, I think the game is quite slow. It feels the same as it did in 2024 when I was in the Tundra. It's like I'm playing on the same patch, but maybe other heroes have become stronger.

Yes, the gameplay, strategy and everything else is almost exactly the same. So in that sense, yes, it's a little boring.

But I'm just playing a game. I don't really want to give too many opinions about whether we need some radical changes or anything because I don't have that good of ideas myself.

I would just say, “Make the map smaller again, bring back one courier.” That's what I would do. But I don't know if this is a good idea, so I'll just keep quiet.

Do you think the game is fairly well balanced right now or should Valve reduce the value of farming and put more emphasis on killing and aggression?

Maybe, maybe. I can't say for sure.

Of course, I like the way the game worked before because that's when I won tournaments. So obviously I'm biased in this regard. I liked that meta or whatever it was then. I liked it when we only had one courier.

But I know it'll never come back, so I'll just be old and sad about it.

Are there any teams you're particularly enjoying watching right now?

I think Liquid. I always enjoy watching Liquid. I think this is really the last European team in Dota 2.

OG is now a C-tier team, so Liquid is last. Maybe the Falcons partly, but not entirely. Liquid is the last European team, so it's fun.

Have you already made your prediction for the final stage of TI?

Yes, I did.

Who do you think we'll see in the grand final?

I bet on PARIVISION and Liquid.

Fair, fair. Me too. Who are your top three strongest mid laners right now?

No[o]ne should be first, that's for sure.

It's a pity that I couldn't play against No[o]ne and Nisha, but I would put them in the top 2.

Who's the third? Malr1ne maybe?

No, Malr1ne, come on. This guy? He just plays too much.

Okay, Malr1ne was pretty good, but he lost to me in his Huskar, so I can't put him in the top 3. How could you lose...

I arrived here less than a day before the tournament, and he takes Huskar against me and loses. No, no, no. Are you losing to an old pensioner while playing your best hero? You won't make it into my top 3.

• 40m 46s Falcons LGD 28894 0:1 22:36

Only two?

Who else is there? BETBOOM Team with gpK~, there is Chira JUNIOR, there is Nigma... Oh, Lorenoff. Yes, exactly - Lorenoff. Let him be the third.

Is there a player that you yourself are particularly interested in playing against?

No, not really. I'm not that interested in anyone at all.

You've said more than once that you'd like the Battle Pass to return. Why do you think Valve is abandoning this idea, despite numerous requests from the community?

Well, they've been saying for a long time that they just don't want to put the effort and time into making this Battle Pass because it requires too many sacrifices.

So I respect their decision. Of course, I would like them to do this for my own benefit. Then the tournament prize pool would be larger and we would receive more rewards for playing.

But I respect that they don't want to do it, so I'm okay with it.

So you're mainly interested in the prize fund?

Of course, I like clothes too. I would always buy them until the very end. I'd spend enough to have it all.

But, of course, the most important thing for me as a professional player is for the prize fund to be larger. So it's a selfish thing.

So I don't really want to argue or tell Valve that they should do this because I'm just being selfish.

My impression is that at some point, for very successful players, money doesn't matter as much because they've earned everything they can and are just enjoying competitive play. How does this work for you?

Both factors are important here.

When the prize pool is higher, it always adds hype and makes the game even more special.

And of course, at the end of the day, you have a family. I want to be sure that everything will be fine with us, that we are provided for, that I can support everyone in my family. So, of course, more money never hurts.

Yes, sure. By the way, speaking of family, your daughter is already old enough, right? How do you explain to her what you do? Does she understand that her dad is a professional eSports player?

She understands that I earn money for us by sitting and playing Dota 2. That’s what she understands. She understands that acting is my job. So, yeah, probably like that.

And in 2024, she watched me play on the professional stage. It was great.

Has family changed the way you look at professional Dota 2?

Yes. I mean, it's hard to balance because when you're a professional gamer, you usually have to give at least 95% of your attention to the game. Therefore, it is very difficult to maintain balance in your life.

But at the same time, sometimes it gave me the motivation to continue for their sake. Maybe I want... I don't know. Just to have some kind of legacy and show your family, “Your dad is special,” or something like that.

It turns out that you find this balance where you can pay attention to both your family and your career?

Yes. Now our whole life is something like this. Sometimes I am very busy with Dota, and they are used to it. They are in Malaysia, so luckily we are used to this lifestyle.

We're often apart for long periods of time and then we get back together for holidays and stuff.

This year the Nation Cup was announced and you are listed as a stand-in for Finland. If you get the chance to play, would you be interested? Maybe you could consider the role of a coach?

My younger brother plays in this tournament. Of course, they really wanted me to perform, but at the moment they asked me, I had no intentions of even returning to acting. And I didn't like the idea of ​​traveling.

So I said I could do some random coaching sessions for them sometimes, which I did, and be a stand-in if anything happened to any of them. So it's something like this...

Do you like coaching?

No, not really. I just wanted to help them out a little bit because they are not that experienced in competitive Dota 2.

Have you taught your brother to play Dota?

Well, he... He actually lives with me in Finland from time to time, so we sometimes talk about Dota.

I try to help him as much as I can. But he plays carry, I'm not that good at that role, so it's hard for me to teach him much. I think he himself needs to improve himself if he wants to become a professional.

What do you think about the Immortal player ranking reset? In your opinion, was this good for the game?

I think it was good for European pubs. But now, being here [in China], I realized that it is simply impossible to find games.

So it may have spoiled the situation in other regions. After all, if you have 8.5k MMR, you should be playing Immortal Draft. And if you're in Immortal Draft and everyone else is below that ranking, you can never find a game, you know? So maybe they didn't think this through.

But in Europe everything is fine. You have about 400 or 500 players on this rating, so finding a match in general is not difficult. Although sometimes, when I search in the morning, I still wait about an hour.

So maybe they need to do something about it.

Have you noticed any changes in the pubs since the reset?

Yes, sure. Games have become more balanced

What do you think of the current ranking system in general? Do you feel like it really shows how strong the players are?

Well, sometimes I get the feeling that there are a lot of... some raging players. But maybe it's just me going crazy.

Some of these players are, for example, in 10th place, and then suddenly they are in 100th place. And I was like, “Did they push you to 10th place or what? How did you suddenly end up at 100th?”

But... I think overall the system is pretty good. There are some questionable players who are in the top 50 or top 100, and I think they play like a top 500 player. But basically I think that the rating fairly accurately reflects the strength of the players.

Last year you served in the Finnish army. How did you like this experience in general? What was the most difficult?

I think the hardest thing was at the very beginning - just getting used to the lifestyle there, the first few weeks. Because this is a very big change. I have lived almost my entire adult life in such a way that I was my own boss.

I woke up when I thought it was necessary to wake up. He went to bed when he thought it necessary to go to bed. I slept in my room. And there you sleep with eight other guys in one room. You go to bed exactly at a certain time, go brush your teeth at the scheduled time, then you need to wake up at the scheduled time. And at first it was quite difficult.

You sit on these bunk beds... and you just don't get enough sleep. The first few weeks you feel like you're dying. But then you get used to it pretty quickly and it becomes your new normal, I think.

And, of course, my body wasn't really used to that much exercise or anything like that either. So it was quite hard at first, but very quickly you adapt and everything becomes quite calm.

Did the army teach you anything that helped you in Dota 2? For example, discipline?

I don't think she really helped me in Dota 2. I think she just made me realize that there is a life outside of the game.

It was a pleasant experience. I barely played Dota at all at that time. We were sometimes given days off so we could go home, and even then I didn't play much.

So it was kind of... a refreshing experience. It seems to me that the brain fog that comes from Dota 2 just disappears at some point. When you play Dota 2, you just sit, play and think only about Dota. And when you're out of the game long enough, you start to appreciate other things in life. It was a very pleasant feeling.

It seems to me that when I finish my career, I will have the feeling that after Dota 2 there is happiness. Because I actually felt pretty happy even during the hard times.

So it was a positive experience for you?

Yes, it was a very pleasant experience.

Fine. Last question I guess. Now you're back at TI and this tournament is coming to an end. Do you feel like you want to continue your career longer? Like, two more years?

Yes. I wouldn't want to finish my career in 12th place. It's an unpleasant feeling. I'm definitely thinking about doing another season and then seeing how it goes.

Let's see if any good team even wants me. This is the first. The offer would have to be very good for me to consider playing because I have a very stable life as a streamer.

So in order to leave this life and start competing again, the offer must be very lucrative.

Third Aegis and finally retire?

Yes, we need to win another one.

Thanks for the interview. It was nice to chat.

Me too.