Cliffteezy: Arteezy stuck on a cliff

Chongqing Major 2019: Vacuum and a Terrorblade on the hill

The Chongqing Major ran January 19–27, 2019. In game two of Team Secret vs. Evil Geniuses, zai on Dark Seer pulled Artour “Arteezy” Babaev's Terrorblade onto high ground in the final fight. EG lost the skirmish without their carry, and Secret took the series 2–0, as cybersport.ru reported on January 27.

GuruGamer adds details: Vacuum threw Arteezy onto the cliff near the Radiant tier-two tower, his teleport didn't save him because Black King Bar wasn't active, and his teammates died one by one. Dota 2 Wiki and Hotspawn name this match as the starting point of the meme.

The mechanics are simple: Vacuum pulls heroes to a single point and can carry them over terrain. If a carry lands on high ground with no quick way down, the team is effectively playing four-on-five in the deciding fight — which is exactly how EG lost that skirmish.

Ursa, Blinding Light, and a cliff in the Dire jungle

It didn't stay a one-off. In a match between EG and Keen Gaming, Arteezy on Ursa bought back and charged into a fight, but Keeper of the Light's Blinding Light knocked him onto a cliff in the Dire jungle. GuruGamer places it at the DreamLeague Major and dates it only as “in March,” while Dota 2 Wiki puts it at the Stockholm Major and adds that Arteezy spent most of the final fight on the cliff.

People also bring up the Disneyland Paris Major, where it wasn't Arteezy on the cliff but EG's mid player SumaiL: he blinked onto the high ground himself and got caught by Monkey King's ultimate. According to Dota 2 Wiki, the meme spread to other EG players as well. The same page lists more Arteezy episodes: at ESL One Birmingham, TNC's Phoenix sent him onto a cliff twice, and at the ONE Esports Dota 2 World Pro Invitational Singapore he was kicked onto high ground in the series against Gambit.

Sprouteezy: the 2016 predecessor

The meme had a predecessor. According to Dota 2 Wiki, at the 2016 Shanghai Major, Arteezy on Sven with two Divine Rapiers was trapped by Misery's Sprout in a match against Team Secret and missed the deciding fight, which gave rise to the word “Sprouteezy.” Later, in EG's first game against Liquid in the lower bracket final, Sprout cut Arteezy off from deciding fights twice more.

The word Cliffteezy itself is obvious — cliff plus Arteezy — though sources don't spell out the etymology. Over time the meaning widened: getting stuck, dropping out of a fight, being in the wrong place at the deciding moment.

Beyond Arteezy: Team Falcons in Kuala Lumpur

The joke outlived its original era. At ESL One Kuala Lumpur 2023, Hawk Live compared Team Falcons' ATF and Sneyking, whom Magnus had stuck on a cliff, to “the legendary Arteezy in his prime.”

In its roundup of top Dota 2 memes, Hawk Live describes Cliffteezy more broadly, as shorthand for any awkward or ridiculous situation a player ends up in.

Arteezy among the stone statues

The catalog image is an in-game shot of a cliff between two hooded stone statues. A cut-out figure of a person — Arteezy — has been pasted on top, sitting on the summit.

It's a collage, not a screenshot from a specific match.

Captions about a stranded carry

People use the word both in match talk and in real life, when someone misses the main event. These examples are made up for illustration:

“Fight at Roshan, and our carry is up on the hill again. Cliffteezy.” “Everyone's on the call, I'm stuck in an elevator with no signal — classic Cliffteezy.” “Bought BKB, didn't press it — hello, Chongqing.”