League Of Legends

S3: didn't c9 just get a bye out of initial groups with how they did the tournament that year?

TSM really doesn't have anything to show for this split. yes, they improved. and i suppose that will carryover.
and yes, they were probably 5th-7th best team, but they got fucked with grouping/choked vs rng. so a year from now, it will just be remembered that they failed to get out of groups and of being overhyped

unless other NA teams also start practicing as much tsm did this split, it won't matter how much tsm practices, they need to have their mistakes punished to know what they can/cannot do vs. good teams. (C9 apparently did start at the end of the year)

can't believe CLG failed so hard against ANX.
next week h2k goes 0-3. maybe 1-3.

at this point, i miss the laneswap meta. yeah, pve for 15 minutes was kind of boring, but not every game was lane swapped. seeing the exact same thing everygame gets a bit dull.

Lasch said:

S3: didn't c9 just get a bye out of initial groups with how they did the tournament that year?

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In season 3? Yea maybe, I don't recall exactly but they used to do something like that, but if so then my point still stands. It's the first time an NA team has actually fought their way out of groups into quarterfinals, I believe. I could be wrong. TSM also got very close, and it's almost impossible for any NA team to go from where they've been, to a favorite to win Worlds immediately. We have to put teams into the quarters/semifinals first, then we have a chance at actually winning the title. Like you said, all the NA teams have to step their game up a bit, but hopefully TSM started a trend this year that continues. If CLG/C9/etc.. want to compete with them, they are also going to keep improving. The increased revenue from Riot sales may give more teams the financial breathing room to focus on korean practice regimens. That's my hope, anyway.

I just caught up on the h2k/anx match. I'm really hoping we don't get a korea vs korea finals again, especially not with SKT. So, I'm definitely rooting for ROX to win, and for SSG to lose against their opponent (don't want to spoil h2k/anx match if anyone hasn't seen yet).

It's pretty obvious that the SKT/ROX match is most likely the 'real' finals match. I think either team is decently favored against the remaining opponents, but I'll still be rooting for whoever plays against them. I'm really hoping that ends up being ROX, because they are a little more fun to watch now then SKT, and I'm tired of SKT winning each year. They need to take a year off to keep things interesting. 3 years in a row is just too much for an esport, where the careers are much shorter overall then in physical sports.

My dream scenario is H2K/ANX winner makes it to finals and wins, but it seems like a long shot to say the least. I could see the h2k/anx winner beating SSG, but it'd be an upset imo, and to go back to back upsets seems highly improbable. Especially when the 2nd one is against SKT/ROX.

Sidian said:

H2K vs ANX

Spoiler

Not sure if H2K just looked completely godlike or if ANX just looked like your normal typical wildcard team...

Either way, Oda on Jayce was amazing. Jankos on Lee was amazing. I hope they can bring that type of gameplay with them to Samsung. I still don't get why ANX didn't try banning/first picking the jayce or the lee to actually make H2K try something else. Or why after 2 games, ANX wouldn't just switch it up and try some different champions instead of the same old same old.

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How does your point stand, when c9 didn't play in groups?

This isnt season 3? They went 3-3 in groups this year.

I said this was the first year a NA team made it out of groups, by actually playing their way out. I thought you were making a comment about c9 making it to quarterfinals back in season 3 or so, when they had a bye through groups.

"It's the first time an NA team has actually fought their way out of groups into quarterfinals, I believe"

? i admit to being completely confused about your point then if you're talking about this year. when s4 both tsm and c9 made it to quarters.

Enzee said:

Spoiler

Well, what ban does ANX change to ban jayce/lee sin? Odo looked great on Jayce, but they felt that wasn't even his best champion, so if they ban Jayce he might get something even worse. Same for Jankos on Lee, or Forg1ven on caitlyn (that they kept picking away from him). They thought those picks/bans gave them the best shot at hindering h2k while giving them a decent comp, they just got outplayed/unlucky in early game in each game which snowballed into a bigger lead. If the first kills go there way instead each time, they could have easily won any one of those games.

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Yeah, I get it that they thought they were banning out and picking scarier champions but after losing 2 games in a row to the same stuff, why not at least force H2K to try their hand at something else. I could see if the first two games were somewhat close but they were both complete stomps by H2K with both Oda & Jankos crushing kids on Jayce/Lee. It felt like the only lane that wasn't spectacular for H2K was bot, but even they were far ahead and getting kills themself.

Either way, SKT vs Rox is going to be amazing. Honestly, I'd rather root for SKT but am happy with either or since Rox is a ton of fun to watch as well. Hoping H2K takes out Samsung and honestly would love to see H2K take it all the way but I'm not sure if they can. I feel like the winner of SKT/ROX is going to win it all but who knows.

Lasch said:

"It's the first time an NA team has actually fought their way out of groups into quarterfinals, I believe"

? i admit to being completely confused about your point then if you're talking about this year. when s4 both tsm and c9 made it to quarters.

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I said that I thought that C9, in this current year's worlds, making it out of the group stage, was the first time an NA based team had done so since the koreans rose to power. I.e. ignoring the first season when it was all NA/EU teams, and s2 when they still hadn't solidly become the reigning powerhouse region yet (azubu was good, but not ALL korean teams at worlds were good yet).

I had overlooked the 2014 season, but in researching it to refresh my memory, there was not a korean team in TSM's group that year and it was clearly the weakest group by far. Granted, C9 did split their initial matches with the korean team in their group, before losing the tiebreaker, at least. But, they (Najin White) were pretty easily the worst of the korean teams qualified that year. The other two being Samsung White and Blue, who absolutely crushed it that year. If they hadn't met in the semis, it would have likely been both teams in finals, much like SKT/ROX this year.

The point being that TSM almost making it this year, and C9 actually doing so, is a sign of improvement of NA as a region. TSM was in the toughest group overall. I'd say coming within 1 game this year is tougher then getting out of their group in 2014 was. An 'ok' EU team, a garbage TW team, and the weakest KR team in their group was a cakewalk compared to their group this year. I'm not saying they got robbed or making excuses, if they were good enough it wouldn't matter which group they were in, just that their change in practice regimen DID have an effect. The hope being that this is slowly rubbing off on the other NA teams as well to start closing the skill gap.

Preseason info is up:

2017 Season Update - League of Legends

So why are all the series in Worlds such blow outs? It seems like it only takes 1 or 2 team fights for a game to be over.

Penance said:

So why are all the series in Worlds such blow outs? It seems like it only takes 1 or 2 team fights for a game to be over.

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Once they get to a certain point in the game, if they win a teamfight they can push down a lot of towers/inhibs before the enemy spawns too. The only way to change that would be to massively the defenses of structures or lower respawn times. Both of which would lead to long, stalled out games, which are not good for the spectators. The occasional 60 min game is fine, but quick, exciting matches are more popular overall. If every other game was an hour long farm fest, it'd turn away a lot of people.

So, on top of everything else, it only takes one bad teamfight for a team to lose once it's beyond the 15-20min mark. Also, specifically at worlds so far, there hasn't been many even matches. The skill disparity between SKT/ROX and someone like splyce/INTZ is almost the same as splyce/intz/etc.. and a challenger team, unfortunately.
The SKT/ROX and H2K/SSG matches both should be more even then the quarterfinals were. There may still be blowouts, as all of those teams are great at snowballing small edges, but there may be some nice comebacks too.

Penance said:

So why are all the series in Worlds such blow outs? It seems like it only takes 1 or 2 team fights for a game to be over.

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There have been games where comebacks have happened, but as others have said, gaining map control, managing vision, and proper rotations will generally steer the game towards a victory. But in the end, gold generally wins. Teams that fall behind in objectives can still farm their way back into the game and take advantage of players who over extend, get out of position, etc..

The thing with Worlds are these players are the best, and tend to punish even the slightest mistakes. Missing just a few CS has big implications.

yeah. the game is built on gaining power from gold.
after the power is gained, tactics mean less, and raw power often wins out.

And late game, even a few deaths usually is not enough to turn the tide back, and even things out. So, even outplaying a team, and killing them, probably won't turn it around.

What can turn it around is, death timers, and baron steals/kills. baron is a massive temp damage boost, so taking that engages a "power play" giving game ending power, or flipping the tables often, for a losing team. Death timers as well, are the major game winner that can be used by a losing team, to make a comeback.

You guys are all totally right, but I would mention that gold has diminishing returns on game time - if the game goes long enough, even a 15k gold differential will mean nothing once each team has gotten to items 5 and 6. This is important because we've seen a few teams in groups and quarters that weren't able to close out games, and thus allowed the other team to stall to regain power parity.

Few things are specific to League. Items in LoL are more gold efficient as the game goes on. This is an advantage to the team that is ahead. League rewards winning the game off of one or two fights because once death timers become a certain length kills become fatal to holding the base. Without a way to bypass late game death timers (like dota buyback), and limited ways to come from behind, there is little the team behind can do other than stick together and try to capitalize on a mistakes. This seems extremely hard to do at high level disciplined League. I have a hard time enjoying games with so few total kills myself. Watching whatever Chinese team just teamfight into SKT while down 20k gold, was pretty anticlimactic.

Zajeer said:

You guys are all totally right, but I would mention that gold has diminishing returns on game time - if the game goes long enough, even a 15k gold differential will mean nothing once each team has gotten to items 5 and 6. This is important because we've seen a few teams in groups and quarters that weren't able to close out games, and thus allowed the other team to stall to regain power parity.

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oh yeah. good call. Full item builds. Capping gold use is another option for comebacks. so 3.

doombots of doom is live.

No spoilers - Game 2 just ended for SKT vs ROX and this might be the most entertaining series I've seen in a long time. Good lord. I hope you guys are all watching this series it's fucking nuts.