Showing posts with label esports. Show all posts
Showing posts with label esports. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 1, 2014
Friday, June 27, 2014
Reworked and Remastered - Nidalee Edition
Major reworks
everywhere! Rito has just released two major kit reworks for vastly different
champions: Nidalee, everyone's favorite spear chucking, slippery cat, and Skarner,
the long-forgotten scorpion king of the jungle. Up ahead, I'm going to go over
all of the changes that occurred and what they entail, as well as how well I
think the change will go over in game.
First up is Nidalee.
She's been an issue Riot has needed to address for a long time now. Her
playstyle was really against what the core components of the game were, and
this led to an unengaging experience. Her kit revolved completely around
staying as far back as she could to stay out of range and maximize spear
damage, which could have the possibility of one-shotting squishies late game.
If she was too close,
she transformed to cougar form and pounced back to that range. Rinse and
repeat. Add on to that, she had a large heal as well, meaning she could out-sustain
you in addition to being able to run away from almost anything. In other words,
if Nidalee was ahead, she had to misposition majorly to have a chance for the
other team to win.
Her enemies weren't the
only ones that suffered. Nidalee's kit was stronger the longer a siege took.
More time sieging = higher % of spears hitting = less safe for enemy to hold
towers without healing. Teammates were stuck sitting around in front of a tower
waiting for Nidalee to hit enough spears to make the enemy run off. They
couldn't leave her alone because she isn't enough of a threat by herself when
taking a tower. It was boring, and the only person having fun that whole time
was Nid. That goes for either side.
So how could Riot fix
this without gutting her and making a whole new kit? Let's look at each change
and compare the before and after.
(Note: I go pretty in-depth into changes to
her kit here and what they entail for playstyles. If you feel you understand
the new kit and what the changes mean, I've put a TL;DR that summarizes my
thoughts on her kit as a whole and where she lies in the meta.)
·
First Nidalee has access to her cougar form at level 1.
Actually I think the
important thing to note is that Nidalee will have access to her cougar form at
levels 3-4.
Nidalee has to have at
minimum two skills to use cougar, and three to be effective in most cases. This
wasn't an issue before because she would have at least a point in every ability
by level 6, but now she needs to level the human skill before she uses it in
cougar. Nidalee used to be an easy gank pre-6, and the ult change is a slight
buff to her early mobility, but nothing huge. Pounce doesn't cover a large
area, and it received its share of changes as well.
Prowl
·
MOVEMENT---Moving through brush increases Nidalee's
movement speed by 10% for 2 seconds, increased to 30% toward visible enemy
champions within a range of 5500.
·
HUNTED---Damaging champions with Javelin Toss or
Bushwhack marks them as 'Hunted' for 4 seconds, granting Nidalee vision of
them, 30% increased movement speed toward them (within a range of 5500) and
enhancing her next Takedown, Pounce, and Swipe against them.
I couldn't find any previous numbers but I believe Nidalee's base movespeed increase in brush was nerfed, while her bonus when chasing is higher than the static number in 4.9.
At her core, Nidalee is
a hunter. Her old kit was more sniper than hunter though. The major attempt to
fix this is through the passive change. It leaves some room to be overall
faster in the jungle, but gives a much larger reward through chasing the enemy
you've marked. A much more cohesive kit and theme.
In addition, Nidalee
players had almost no use in going to cougar form outside of wave clearing
alone and moving around the map. Why trade in someone's face when you can chuck
spears from far away?
Sure the cougar form
damage is more likely to hit, but even if you hit everything in cougar you
could still lose the trade. If you chuck a spear from far away, you would
either do just as much or more damage and, if you missed, it wasn't a problem
because you only lost a bit of mana and a cooldown as opposed to a bunch of
precious health.
The stall tactic needed
to be addressed, but rather than trying to pull Nidalee's human form in line
with cougar, Riot gave her more effects to tandem human form into cougar. Her
offensive human spells mark her enemy. If Nidalee hits cougar spells on a
hunted target, her cougar spells do additional effects. I'll explain the
effects as I go over the cougar spell.
Hitting a marked
opponent with a cougar spell does not consume the mark in any way, shape,
or form. In essence, if Nidalee marks a target, she has a much higher ability
to duel that person. If you're Nidalee, it means you should look to fight. If
you're marked, wait out the timer before you fight.
Ok, real skill time! I'm
going to split her human and cougar forms into different sections since they're
not related directly to each other and just share hot keys.
Nidalee's human spells
all enhance as you level that specific skill (Q, W, E). Cougar form spells, on
the other hand, are only enhanced by levels in her ultimate (R).
Human Form
Javelin Toss
·
HUNTED---Applies the 'Hunted' debuff to champions for
4 seconds
·
RANGE----1500 units (damage caps out at 1300)
·
MINIMUM MAGIC
DAMAGE-----50/75/100/125/150 (+0.4 ability power)
·
MAXIMUM MAGIC
DAMAGE-----150/225/300/375/450 (+1.2 ability
power)
·
COST ----50/60/70/80/90
mana
·
COOLDOWN-----6 seconds
·
WIDTH----Missile width 60
⇒ 30
Big damage reduction overall on the spears, which was
necessary. Basically you can still sit back and siege, but it’s going to be
harder to chunk people and you’ll have to be more accurate. Oh, and about that
accuracy. Spears are half the size now. You get a Hunted debuff on them, though,
which is nice, but while you can still put a hurt on people, it’s harder.
You’re better off using them to set up a cougar follow up.
Bushwhack
·
HUNTED----Applies the 'Hunted' debuff to champions for
4 seconds
·
MAGIC DAMAGE-----20/40/60/80/100 + 12/14/16/18/20% current
health (+1% per 50 ability power) over the duration of 4 seconds
·
DURATION-----2 minutes
·
COST -----40/45/50/55/60
mana
·
COOLDOWN-----17/15/13/11/9 seconds
·
CLARITY-----Only affects one target per trap
The important change here is the debuff no longer shreds MR
and armor. This was probably the least known of Nidalee’s strengths. Hitting a
trap would not only let her know where you were but make you more susceptible
to all kinds of damage. A trap into spear was able to chunk out even the
bulkiest tanks. Now, they apply the same Hunted debuff as spears.
Riot still wanted to keep an aspect of
their tank shredding ability though. They did this by making the traps do %
current health. It’s a nice touch to take away a large portion of Nidalee’s
hidden power but still keep what her traps previously did in a sense. The traps
were also made a bit more visually noticeable in what area they covered.
Primal Surge
·
HEAL ---45/85/125/165/205
(+0.5 ability power)
·
ATTACK SPEED
BONUS----20/30/40/50/60% attack speed
·
COST ----60/80/100/120/140
mana
·
COOLDOWN----12 seconds
The
base heal and ratio got hit hard here. Nid’s ability to not only poke like
crazy, but shrug off any counter poke, solidified her as the top poke champ in
the game. If you had already decided to poke but weren’t able to get Nidalee,
it was GG, because even a whole team had trouble trying to counter her
abilities.
She can’t sustain
forever anymore, now, and because her heal was heavily decreased, the attack
speed is more prominent and useful in the skill but overall her heal was
straight-up nerfed.
Cougar Form
Takedown
·
HUNTED
BONUS---The first Takedown
targeting a 'Hunted' champion deals +33% increased damage
·
UTILITY-----Nidalee gains +75 attack range for the
Takedown attack
·
MINIMUM
MAGIC DAMAGE----4/20/50/90 (+0.24
ability power) (+1.0 attack damage)
·
MAXIMUM
MAGIC DAMAGE----10/50/125/225
(+0.6 ability power) (+2.5 attack damage)
·
COST ----No cost
·
COOLDOWN----5 seconds
And here is where a lot of new things come into play. Cougar
spells get a lot of extra effects if used on a target just hit by a human form
spell. This opens a lot of dueling/assassin play where Nidalee didn’t have that
option available before, despite it being part of her theme.
At its core, Takedown, and what the spell did, haven’t
changed. The two largest changes are the Hunted bonus and the ratio change.
Takedown still is best used as an execute, but it has to be set up.
This is the spell that bruiser AD Nid fans were most upset
about. This used to deal AD damage, but for the sake of simplicity, which some
people are disagreeing with, it was changed to deal magic damage. This pretty
much gutted the AD build. While it still has an AD ratio, the fact that it now
deals magic damage makes Nidalee a lot easier to itemize against and she no
longer gets anything out of building armor penetration. It wasn’t an overly
popular build path, but some people still did it.
The second and more widely affected change was the addition
of the hunted effect. Now if Nidalee uses Takedown on a hunted target, the
damage is increased by 1/3rd. This is done instead of doing more damage
based on missing health. It lowers her possible damage done, while still
retaining the idea that it’s meant to be followed up after hitting a spear or
trap.
Pounce
·
HUNTED
BONUS----The first Pounce
directly towards a 'Hunted' champions will have up to 700 range
·
UTILITY----Killing a unit in cougar form reduces the
cooldown of Pounce to 1 second
·
UTILITY-----Nidalee now pounces in the direction of the
player's cursor
·
MAGIC
DAMAGE----50/100/150/200
(+0.3 ability power)
·
COST ----No cost
·
COOLDOWN----5 seconds
Probably Nid’s most
annoying skill both for her and her opponent. The jump was a little bit faster
than just walking, so people spammed it anytime they moved anywhere and it only
added on to her frustrating slipperiness with her passive. I can confidently
say the only time that this was used for its damage was to clear waves or in
times of desperation. Not for its dueling potential.
So Riot raised the
cooldown of the skill unless you kill an enemy in cougar form. It means Nidalee
can still clear with pounce well and use it to jump in and kill, but you can no
longer fly around the map jumping everywhere. Still useful to run around, but
much less so.
You might have noticed I
said that this skill was annoying to both the enemy and Nidalee. Since
Nidalee was released pretty early in comparison to other champs, her kit was a
bit dated. That’s putting it nicely. The way Pounce was programmed, Nidalee
jumped towards wherever she was moving. This is a much different thought
process than most champs who have smartcasted movement abilities.
Riven, for example,
dashes towards the players cursor when she uses her shield. Nid could jump
through a lot of walls with Pounce, but the way that it worked meant you had to
maneuver awkwardly so that you could move to the wall and face it
in a way to jump head on. Now, Nid just jumps towards the players cursor. It’s
a bit strange to pick up on after getting used to having to aim the jump, but
it will be easy enough after some adjusting.
As you can see there’s an indicator showing how close you
need to be to get the activation on the passive. It’s really useful and feels
awesome to jump in and start wrecking people with cougar form now.
Swipe
·
HUNTED BONUS----The first Swipe that damages a 'Hunted'
champion reduces the cooldown of Pounce to 1 second
·
UTILITY----Nidalee now swipes in the direction of the
player's cursor
·
MAGIC DAMAGE----70/130/190/250 (+0.45 ability power)
·
COST ----No
cost
·
COOLDOWN----5 seconds
Swipe didn't see much of a change. If anything,
it got a small buff through the new passive. Nidalee's main form of wave clear
is to Pounce into Swipe on as many minions as you can. She now has access to
that pre-6. Swipe had two things changed this patch and both are small, but one
has a large impact.
I'll touch on the less important one first.
Swipe got the same treatment that Pounce did. Instead of doing damage in front
of Nidalee's current position, she now swipes toward the player's cursor. Most
people already had her facing towards the cursor 95% of the time, but gone are
the days where you would Pounce too far and miss Swipe as well, now she'll turn
around if you aim correctly. Once again, it'll take a little to adjust to, but
it's a quality of life adjustment that's been asked for.
Next, the one that should actually buff some
cougar damage. If Nidalee Swipes a Hunted enemy champion, her Swipe cooldown
decreases by 1 second. I'll reiterate that Riot really wanted to pull back some
human form damage in favor of cougar, and this was the correct way to do it.
Not by straight up damage buffs, but rewarding what they want her kit to do.
Conclusion--also TL;DR
How has Nidalee been changed since the rework?
Can you still sit back and poke people out to win?
Well....yes and no. Her poke damage and sustain
both got hit pretty hard. You can still do it for sure, but you get less out of
it. In addition to less reward, it's also harder to do because of less MR shred
on traps and smaller spears.
Her old strength is still there, but to get the
most out of her kit, you have to follow up that poke with cougar form. Straight
AP Nidalee still works since she has an easy way to dive deep in cougar, but AP
bruiser could be a strat as well.
In short her damage has been funneled to be more
reliant on cougar follow up than poke. Making a mastery of both forms more
important than before and increasing her versatility in duelist ways while
lowering it in safety.
The initial reaction I've had and others have
told me is she's still a strong pick, and more fun to play as and against.
However, in a meta that is increasingly moving towards wave control/AoE mages
over assassins she'll most likely see a slow drop off from competitive play in
favor of Ziggs.
Her win rate has taken a steep drop this past
week, lowest in the game actually...Urgot pls. (Last week her new kit hit live.)
Although, don't expect it to stay there long. A lot of people have to relearn
how to play her, because the subtleties have all been tweaked.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
EU LCS Thursday Preview:
by Silje
Copenhagen
Wolves vs Fnatic
The
Wolves showed off some good plays to an appreciative audience at Wembley last
week. YoungBuck led his team to one of their best games
vs Alliance , and ended up generating an impressive 12/3/5 on Irelia. Unfortunately, the game turned into a loss for the Wolves
after Airwaks stepped on one of Froggen's Nidalee traps on the way to baron.
Fnatic, on the other hand, won their first game against Gambit's substitutes.
It was a well-played match from Fnatic's side, and as veterans within the LCS,
they had an advantage over Gambit the entire game. Not a surprising win - but a
good one. Fnatic's game on Day 2 was entertaining and tense. Millenium, with
their gank-comp, set the pace of the game and took the early lead. Fnatic's
Cyanide did a good job kicking Millenium out of position in team fights, and when
Millenium got a bit overconfident, Fnatic punished them for it. Millenium still
won, though, thanks to their map awareness and control, plus strong late game
performances by Twitch and LeBlanc. But all in all, Fnatic showed some good
plays despite the loss.
Based
on last week's performances, this game should be intense and entertaining.
Personally, my featured match-up will be SoaZ and YoungBuck in the top lane.
SoaZ has shown that he can play a huge variety of top laners, from Renekton to
Lulu to Shyvana and Trundle. Nothing seems to stop that guy from picking any
champion. He knows how to play them all. YoungBuck on the other hand, leans towards tanky/bruiser top laners. He's
had some games on Vladimir , but without much luck.
Renekton, Shyvana, Irelia and Trundle are all champions he is capable of
playing. His last week's Irelia was huge.
Millenium
beat Fnatic, and lost to ROCCAT last week. That was, for me, somehow a surprise.
I was expecting Fnatic to keep up their good play and win against Millenium.
This game just shows how even the EU region is. Every team can beat each other.
Their win against Fnatic was thanks to their gank/pick comp and their good
late-game map control. LeBlanc and Twitch are also so strong late game that
they can molest any opponents in their way. Kottenx proved that he is a good
Evelynn and should not be underrated as a jungler. Alliance , on the
other hand, won both of their games last week. They secured a convincing win
against SK, who is known for their weaker early game. The match against the
Copenhagen Wolves didn't turn out to be as one-sided as you would expect,
looking at the standings. The Wolves put
up a good fight - and one of their best
games so far this split. Alliance had trouble with Youngbuck's impressive performance, and (with a
little help from that Nid trap) they were fortunate to take the win.
Supa
Hot Crew vs Gambit
In Supa
Hot Crew's game vs the Copenhagen Wolves, they suffered in the early-mid stages
of the game. It seemed like the Wolves might win when they managed to push SHC
into their base, but Mimer, with his 13/2/5 Kayle, kept that from happening. Mimer scored
a triple on the Wolves as they attempted to take SHC's middle inhibitor,
successfully stopping their advance. Woolite tried to backdoor them, but Mimer
went back to save the base, allowing SHC to secure the win. Supa Hot Crew vs SK Gaming was a funny match.
SHC's Selfie tried to play Nocturne mid against Jesiz's Kassadin and it didn't
work out the way they intended. With solid play from SK Gaming, SHC suffered a
loss. Gambit's core roster could not participate in London due to visa
issues, and yet NiQ and the team's last minute substitutes did a decent job. NiQ's
Nidalee was simply Godlike. I think that is a champion you should keep away
from him in the future. Gambit lost both their games, but with a team that
consisted mainly of solo-queue players, they weren't bad at all. They made some
amazing plays.
I think
this game will depend on how much of a positive impact the junglers can make on
the game. Both Diamond and Impaler possess good mechanics and gank-capabilities,
and both are capable of helping their teams win, depending on who does it best.
That's why my featured match-up will be in the jungle. Diamond can pull out
some unconventional junglers at times, such as Xin Zhao and Udyr, but usually
without much luck. Impaler has been sticking to the traditional junglers. He is
doing very well with Lee Sin and Elise.
SK
Gaming vs ROCCAT
SK
lost last week to Alliance and beat SHC. In their game vs Alliance , their
early game was a bit shaky and they didn't seem like the SK team we are used to
seeing being super decisive in their play style. In their game vs SHC, on the
other hand, SK showed what happens if you give them the freedom to do things at
their pace. We knew it was going to be an unusual game right from the picks and
bans phase. Why would SK first pick Morgana when there were so many other
strong picks open? When SHC locked in the Nocturne and Jarvan IV, first picking
Morgana started to make sense, and also the pick of Caitlyn instead of a Lucian
or Twitch. ROCCAT won their game against Gambit's substitutes, but it wasn't a convincing win. Their win against
Millenium looked stronger. They made good plays, and it looks like they're
slowly growing stronger again.
My
featured match-up in this game will be in the bottom lane, as the duo of
CandyPanda and nRated take on ROCCAT's VandeR and Celaver. CandyPanda's Caitlyn
scored a triple kill last week against Supa Hot Crew, showing that he is able
to handle a variety of champions, considering the last week's favorite picks
have been mainly Twitch, Kog or Lucian. In Week 5, Celaver had the highest KDA
among the ADCs, while CandyPanda had the third highest. On support, VandeR had
the second highest KDA and nRated the fourth highest KDA. nRated has shown that
he is a total beast on Morgana, while VandeR has proven himself as the Thresh
King multiple times. Both CandyPanda and Celaver can play the likes of
Twitch/Lucian/Kog, but are also able to handle other ad carries such as Cait.
Written By Silje
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Who’s on Track for Season 4 Worlds?
by Reece "Sabrewolf" Dos-Santos
This season is shaping up to be the first
season of NA where the three spots for worlds are not completely predictable.
The NA LCS, by the half-way point, has already seen a good share of upsets,
turnarounds, and explosive matches. By week six, the usually dominant Cloud 9
have already picked up their most losses in a split and appear to mirroring
their European counterparts, Fnatic, in putting up inconsistent showings that
vary from world class dominance to frighteningly average slumps. When looking at the NA LCS with an objective
view of only this split, it’s hard to deny that the three teams currently in
pole position look to be the ones that push for the three NA spots.
The NA LCS:
CLG have consistently shown superiority in
rotations, and mid to late game clarity in their game play. They know what they’re working towards in
almost every game and cleanly achieve their goals. The only team CLG cannot
seem to overcome at this moment is Cloud 9, who delivered two of their four overall losses. LMQ got off to an electrifying start in the
NA LCS, and while there were concerns about their ability to hold it up, they
have been addressing the critics with particularly strong performances from
Vasilii and three time "MVP of the Week," XiaoWeiXiao. Performances
that are being backed up more and more by an improving Ackerman. Meanwhile,
Dignitas have shown that they mean business with their additions of ZionSpartan
and Shiphtur, and they have honestly shocked many watchers with their
overpowering form in the first half of the split. However, like the other two
front runners, Dignitas show signs of cracks. These cracks were clearly evident
in their complete decimation at the hands of compLexity. Dignitas, out of the
three, has had the best showings, but also put out one of the worst. The key to
securing the Worlds' spot for them is simply consistency.
Despite being the favorites and the
biggest NA names, Cloud 9 and TSM have had some substandard performances and only recently began
clawing their way back. TSM , in particular, have begun to find some sort of form since the
addition of Locodoco as a coach, but their main problem as a team is their
inability to take games from the top teams in NA. They have a clean 6-0 record
against the bottom three but are 0-5 against the top three. If TSM can work out how to
challenge the top teams, they can push their way in for one of the spots at
worlds, but unfortunately, a perfect record against EG, COL , and CRS won’t get TSM anything more than a
mid-table finish. In almost a complete opposite regard, Cloud 9 are 2-0 against
CLG, yet they haven’t been able to pick a win against the two bottom teams in
the NA LCS. Whether it’s an issue with underestimating the lower tier
competition or simply a bad clash of match-ups, Cloud 9 are sitting in fourth
place solely because of their inability to take games from the lower tier
competition. Both Cloud 9 and TSM can make it to Worlds, but only if they look at each other’s
weaknesses and learn from them. The NA LCS is no longer their playground - it’s
a battleground.
NA
LCS Dark Horse: Evil Geniuses
The Evil Geniuses were mediocre at best
last split and looked to repeat that form this split until they swapped out
Snoopeh and Yellowpete, who honestly were well past their prime. The additions
of Altec and Helios have completely revitalized the team and seem to have
brought out the best in Pobelter, Krepo and Innox. Their performances have
suddenly become fluid, calculated and hard-fought, and they only look to get
better and better as they become more adjusted to each other - which is a scary
thought when considering how good they looked in Helios’s first week. EG may
sneak their way into playoffs and could be the team to upset the war between
the Top Five.
The EU LCS:
EU, however, isn't as much of a tight
contest compared to NA. Alliance are
already an almost guaranteed spot with a completely dominant 10-2 record, with
losses against SHC and GMB which honestly seemed like they had simply removed
their foot from the gas pedal. Alliance was a team created by Froggen to go Worlds, and honestly it seemed
shaky at the start of the Spring Split, but then the team grew used to each
other and almost perfectly synergized. We have to give it to Froggen, he knows
how to create a top tier team. At this point, the only plausible way Alliance could not
make it to Worlds is through a monumental internal explosion between them, the
chances of that are highly unlikely. But EU have shown that any team can slump
their way out of first place in the blink of an eye. Alliance ’s test now
is merely breaking that stereotype, which shouldn't be hard for them.
The other team that looks jet set for Worlds
is SK gaming who, like Alliance , completely shot out from the bottom of the table into complete
bliss in the second half of spring. SK has shown complete dominance in their
team-based game play and map rotations, and clarity in ending games where they
are comfortably ahead. Jesiz, in particular, has blossomed into a hero that SK
Gaming can rely on in almost every game, along with consistent performances
from CandyPanda and Nrated, with Freddy and Sven rarely making mistakes
themselves. Two of SK’s four losses are against Alliance and that's perfectly understandable considering
the depth of Alliance ’s dominance in the first few weeks of summer.
The third EU spot for worlds is where
things heat up as there is no clear team that looks set to take it. The main
battle seems to be between Supa Hot Crew, Fnatic, and Millenium, all of whom
have put up good performances but still have consistency issues that hold them
back. The one thing that unites all three teams is the talent of their mid
lane: Kerp, Selfie, and xPeke are all world class mid laners who can easily
carry their teams on a good day, but have also shown that they are not exempt
from being shut down. Similarly, all three teams also have standout ADC ’s in Creaton, Mr
RalleZ, and Rekkles, who are complete monsters when left unchecked. The battle
between these three teams is where EU playoffs will become interesting, as SHC
and MIL have mirrored Alliance and SK’s resurgence from the bottom two teams into top of the table
powers, but Fnatic are three split champions for a reason. They always find a
way to weasel themselves into pole position when it matters, but this split
will be their hardest test yet.
EU
LCS Dark Horse: Roccat
Roccat are undeniably talented. They are
one of many teams to deny NiP a space in the LCS and showed overpowering form
in spring that led them to finish third place overall. They, however, inherited
the “first place slump” that so greatly affected Fnatic, and have only recently
begun to recover with two back to back 2-0 weeks (partly due to one of the
matches being a forfeit). Roccat’s point to work on is simply closing out games
and playing with more of a passion rather than playing not to lose. Their
overly passive game play was the main catalyst of the ward chanting and Mexican
waves from the London LCS crowd that sought entertainment.
Friday, June 20, 2014
The Anatomy of a Base Race
by Jerrod "Thousand Eyes" Steis
The Weakness of the Split Push
LCS Week Four brought two intense base-race games. Victory
came before a lot of people even realized the game was ending. The games were
split, ironically, between NA and EU. Fnatic vs. Alliance and EG vs. LMQ. In both
games the advantage seemed to be going in favor of the eventual loser. Fnatic
had a strong kill lead and they were in control of the speed of the game. EG
had been ahead in gold even after the game was over. Both Alliance and LMQ made critical
choices to swing the momentum of the game in their favor and force the enemy
into a hard decision.
First up, Fnatic against Alliance . Everyone was looking
forward to this game as a close match-up. Fnatic were the winners of the Spring Split but were looking lackluster and sloppy in their first few games this
summer. Alliance were the front-runners and despite their few losses, they looked like a powerhouse. I’d like to take
a moment to look at the lineup for each team.
Fnatic in my opinion had
the better pick/ban phase here. Banning out the popular Lee Sin jungle is
always good because he’s far and away the best right now. Jax was nice as well
because Fnatic’s comp just isn't built to handle a late game Jax (No one could
stop his split push) and Wickd has been known to pull it out.
Fnatic first-picked
Braum as soon as they saw he was left open. This was particularly surprising to
me and I’m sure Fnatic as well. What was more surprising was after Alliance made their two picks,
Twitch was still open. Rekkles had an outstandingly scary game on Twitch the
day before against SK and to leave the rat open and not pick him away from
Rekkles is either a slap in the face or stupid. To be fair though, Alliance did pick away Lucian
because of the synergy that Braum and Lucian’s passive have. Cyanide also
picked up Evelynn at the same time to go with the stealth theme. Then they
rounded it all up with a Twisted Fate and Shyvana pick-up. All around, Fnatic
built a solid team that not only was full of champs that are strong in the
meta, but also work pretty well together.
If you look closely,
Fnatic’s team is really focused on controlling the map and forcing mid game
team fights. Twisted Fate, Evelynn and Twitch can all show up on someone
without them realizing how out of position they are. Once the fight starts,
Shyvana can come flying in if needs be and Braum can protect the possibly
slightly out of position Twitch. Laning would be the weakness for Fnatic if one
would guess. Especially if you look at their match-ups.
I feel Alliance really fell behind
right from the start with their picks and bans. First of all, letting Braum
though was a bit of a mistake. It literally forced them to pick up Lucian and
let Twitch through to Rekkles. Ziggs was a nice ban, however, as was Morgana
since Nyph picked up Thresh. The early Kayle pick was actually very well-played.
Kayle has the amazing versatility of going almost anywhere (of course her
professional viability has been top and mid). This left Wickd and Froggen the
ability to trade Kayle off into whatever lane they felt would be better. She
ended up going top to handle Shyvana, with Froggen taking Leblanc with the
final pick to bully Twisted Fate early on and make sure his Level 6 ganks would
be forced with either low health or after backing to base. Elise was a pretty
standard pick, considering Evelynn and Lee Sin were off the board as of that
time, leaving her as the only standard left.
Game
Now into the game. Shook on Elise starts with a pink ward
over extra pots. This is a very smart pick up from Shook. He knew he could use
the spiderlings to tank jungle minions and used the extra gold to try and track
down Evelynn. Both teams set up and protect their buffs, a much different
strategy than what had been occurring that day. In fact, we ended up with
standard lane match-ups. It’s important to note this because this is a huge win
for Alliance .
When I saw the composition and how the lanes had worked out
to be standard, I had expected Shook to try and make an early gank and play off
the advantage all of the laners had. Shook never even attempted a gank until
late in the game, and even then he wasn't successful. At the 5:00 mark, there had been almost no immediate action in the game.
Alliance ’s passiveness was making them lose
before they even fought. Even worse, Soaz’s Shyvana was outfarming Wickd on
Kayle. It was only a slight lead, but the fact that Kayle hadn't dominated that
lane was a bad sign.
Thirty seconds later, Cyanide made the first gank at
bottom lane. YellOwStaR jumped forward on Braum and got a quick start on his
passive onto Thresh. Twitch followed up and Evelynn showed herself right after.
Nyph flashed backwards to try and escape, but the sudden pressure was too
unexpected. He went down and Tabzz escaped. Rekkles was already 1/0/0. A minute
afterwards, Evelynn goes bot one more time in the same fashion. Still no pinks
bought by Nyph and there’s a similar outcome. This time Wickd on Kayle tries to
turn things around with a teleport to a ward, but they get nothing from it and
run off. Twitch gets another kill.
At a quick glance you’d say Rekkles is already way ahead,
but if you would look at CS at this time, Tabzz’s Lucian was up 25 creeps. So
if we assume a 400 gold first blood plus a second kill at 300, Rekkles has 700
gold extra. However, take an average of 22 gold per CS and Lucian makes up 550
of that gold, putting Rekkles up only 150 - not even enough for a
non-consumable item. The fact that Lucian was that far ahead in CS was huge in
keeping him in the game. If they had been even, Rekkles most likely would have
run away with the game.
There’s a lull in the action until 9:00 . Fnatic coordinates a
tower dive on Kayle in top. The combination of Evelynn, TF's ult, and Shyvana
is enough to overpower Wickd’s ult and they take a clean kill with Soaz’s
Dragon’s Descent being used to escape the tower aggro. This was a well-played gank
which led to Fnatic taking the first tower. However, Alliance realized how many
members were in the top lane, and took dragon right afterwards, unknown to
Fnatic. Despite Fnatic completely controlling the game and making all of the
early moves, they’re only ahead by 1k gold.
At 12:15 , Fnatic make a bold
move and pull a 5-man gank bottom using both TF's ult and Shyvana teleport. The
gank is successful in gaining a kill on Thresh for Shyvana, but with all of the
resources used, Kayle is able to free farm top. Fnatic split up afterwards, and
while sitting in the bottom mid brush, Evelynn is caught out. After a small tussle,
Shook’s Elise takes the kill. He is chased down by Xpeke directly afterwards,
making it an even trade. Of course, an even trade is better for a team that is
behind. It seemed like Fnatic wanted to take the dragon, but they didn’t
realize Alliance already took it.
While trying to siege mid around the 14:40 mark, Nyph tosses out a hook and hits Shyvana. At first it
seems Alliance just wants to poke at
her for a bit, but they keep poking into a full engage. After spending so
much time and energy on Shyvana they have no abilities to use on anyone else
when Fnatic tower dives. Cyanide gets a revenge kill on Elise, and Lucian is
chased out through the jungle by Braum and Twitch. With a quick flash, Rekkles
takes the kill. Alliance did, however, keep
their tower up through all of this.
Finally, Fnatic get the mid tower they had been sieging at 17:15 . However, after all of this time Alliance has taken Fnatic’s mid
tower low as well. Fast-forward to 21:08 . Xpeke TF ults down
into bottom. A critical thing to notice here is this is 45 seconds before the
next dragon spawn. Fnatic had no timer and if they did, I doubt they would have
used TF’s ult so soon. They get no immediate kills out of it. At the same time,
right at dragon, Leblanc and Kayle get split by Braum and Evelynn. Braum
ults onto Froggen and Evelynn pops her ult on Kayle. At first, it seemed like
they were going to split targets, but right after the Braum ult, YellOwStaR
turns right around and jumps onto Cyanide. Wickd ults himself, moves over to
the red side wall and flashes over. Fnatic have control for the third dragon, but
head to bottom in order to siege the tower first. Remember, Fnatic don’t have
the timer for dragon..
This was a mistake as once again, Alliance move forward and start
dragon at 22:00 . Nyph zones out Fnatic once they realize
and make their way over with a well-placed box. Kayle and Leblanc poke while
Elise and Lucian take the dragon with their better sustained damage. Alliance takes the third dragon
and as Fnatic attempts to back off, YellOwStaR moves late and is caught by a
Thresh hook. He’s low health from the small engage before and is quickly taken
out.
Here is where the magic happens. Because Alliance made a good pick and
had kept themselves in the game as far as gold is concerned, they rush mid to
take the low turret. As most of the team takes mid, Leblanc runs interference
in the jungle by wraiths, forcing Soaz and Cyanide to take a much longer route
into their base. Note that it’s only Shyvana and Evelynn though. Rekkles and
Xpeke have gone back to bottom to try and counter push.
With all five mid, Alliance are able to out shove
the strong pushers of TF and Twitch. As they take down the inhibitor tower,
Soaz sits back and Braum moves up to try and stall, but he is hooked when the
tower gets low. Once the tower is down completely, they go all in and kill
YellOwStaR once again, following up on Shyvana right after. Evelynn finally
comes in behind Alliance as they close in on the
nexus. This whole time Twitch was pushing continuously. Xpeke, on the other
hand, had second thoughts and started walking back to base. However, as Soaz
went down he changed his mind again and popped his ult to go back to push with
Twitch.
Xpeke and Rekkles back as their nexus turrets go down, but
at this point it’s too late. Alliance closed it out and won
the game with some great strategical play that set themselves up to capitalize
on Fnatic’s positioning. While this was definitely some great play by Alliance , Fnatic really
mispositioned and had split their calls in what they wanted to do. Alliance made a great play in not
only starting the dragon, but starting it from the side where they could easily
transition into the mid tower that was about to die. The fact that they kept
going was purely because of Fnatic’s misplay from there.
To avoid redundancy, I’m going to look at the pick ban phase
and only the shift for EG/LMQ.
All in all EG have a
solid team fight team, right off the bat you can tell their plan is to let Jax
get big and just sustain under tower while he split pushes. Ziggs and Lucian
have all the abilities necessary to keep their towers alive and just hold out.
I believe the Lee Sin pick was partially because of Helios’ ability to make
plays with him and to get Jax rolling early. The bans that EG focused on were
things that would either shut down Jax in top lane or basically anything that
they felt would let LMQ get a lead early. LMQ have a great ability to snowball
a lead when ahead.
LMQ built a composition based on poking out EG. It’s an
interesting concept and late game one would think EG would have the advantage,
barring some great Caitlyn Peacemakers and Nidalee spears. Braum is great for disengaging
and Shyvana is just going to tank out the Ziggs and Lucian damage, since
Shyvana can’t handle Jax late game. LMQ’s bans were similar to EG’s in that
they were attempting to ban out the strong/known champions that EG plays. Also,
Lulu and Corki would be able to clear waves, and while they did let Ziggs
through, that’s about it.
Game
At 6:45 Helios is caught out
trying to snowball Pobelter’s lead in mid. NoName and Mor had roamed to help
Nidalee, who was getting poked out. After some dancing and Pobelter being zoned
out, XiaoWeiXiao tosses a spear from the distance to get the kill. The fact
that Mor was able to roam came from how Vasilii had dominated with his Caitlyn
in lane, gaining 52 CS at this time over Altec’s 36 on Lucian.
Once we hit 10:00 , we see Helios and NoName, who had been mirroring each
other all game, connect by LMQ’s red buff. While taking a pink, Helios gets
cocooned, but Pobelter was quicker on the draw - following up and as soon as
he’s free. He combos with Pobelter’s bombs to kick NoName back for the kill.
While all of this is happening, Innox and Ackerman were having a brawl, with
Innox about to die. Pobelter and Helios made the smart roam up after their kill
and gave Jax a jump out, and Ziggs cleaned up the kill on Shyvana afterwards.
At this point, EG was still down in gold from lost dragons. They had traded
this off in order to get Jax fed, which was working well.
After Jax gets a solo kill on Shyvana, EG made rotations and
took all three outer towers, pulling themselves up to a 6k gold lead. Jax,
having a Blade of the Ruined King and a Phage at this point, was becoming a late
game terror, compared to Ackerman - who had no complete items at this point. At
around 19:00 , EG decides to pressure LMQ’s blue buff.
Nidalee is caught with a binding after LMQ laid down some poke. Mor jumps to
protect his mid laner and is successful, but a clutch teleport nets Jax a kill
as they disengage. Meanwhile, Helios takes down Elise back further in the
jungle. EG, up until this point, had been pressuring their lead well, and
getting their Jax fed enough to split.
And once again we come to the base race. At a whopping 46:20
total time, LMQ had taken Baron and were sieging mid lane as five. As Jax split
pushes the bottom, Lucian drops The Culling to deter LMQ off of the mid
inhibitor tower. Ziggs drops the Mega Inferno Bomb as well. Mor shields The
Culling, and the Mega Inferno Bomb does not hit many targets. This prompts LMQ
to engage, knowing they had an ultimate advantage in fight, as well as the fact
that they were baroned-up and able to tank tower because they were at late game
status. As the tower went down and the Culling ended, Braum uses his ultimate
and knocks up Pobelter. Krepo makes a mistake here and shields Altec’s Lucian (who
had a Banshee’s Veil spell shield) and not Pobelter, who receives all of the
knock up and is immediately deleted.
Altec and Krepo focus their damage on the tanky Elise, and
Helios uses his kick on Shyvana on the side of the fight and achieves nothing
with it. LMQ lost Braum in exchange for Ziggs, and is still strong enough to
win a 4v3 fight. Innox and LMQ both take inhibitors and move on to nexus
turrets. However, the crucial fact here is that Ziggs is down for EG. They have
no way to keep all of LMQ off the tower. All of their damage left is single
target. That, in addition to all of LMQ having a way to speed up their attack
speed. Jax had no way of matching their speed. He makes the mistake of trying
to teleport back to a dying tower, wasting any possibility of winning the game.
Closing Thoughts
So what has been learned? If you’re planning on split pushing,
you have to be able to stall while your fed duelist takes towers as soon as it
turns into a base race. Even the most fed split pusher will lose out to more
bodies on the opposing team. Fnatic couldn't agree on what they wanted to do.
They floundered and let Alliance walk right into their
base. And when Fnatic called their bluff, Alliance went deep in and took
the game in the confusion. EG’s mistakes came from not pressuring with their
top laner enough. They got Jax ahead and did nothing with it while LMQ slowly
poked their way back into the game. The fact that LMQ ran a poke team was what
really won them the game, because it became a fight of who could hit
skillshots, and the last fight especially showed that LMQ was on top of that.