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.

 Alliance built their team around picking people off when they tried to rotate. While Kayle was a nice flex pick, I don’t really think she fit well with this composition. Kayle is a constant damage mage who can make a hyper carry invulnerable for a short amount of time. No one on her team can make a lot of use out of her ult other than herself. Lucian should be able to kite effectively with The Culling and Relentless Pursuit, and Froggen is all about bursting people and leaving immediately. Invulnerability is never a bad thing to have, but it’s value on this team is lacking compared to what some other top laners may have been able to bring. The rest of the team, however, can grab someone and burst them down before the enemy knows what happened to them.

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.

Alliance had a team made of people who were strong laners/dueling champs. If Fnatic had forced a lane swap and given free farm to Twitch and later on let Shyvana get some after lanes had pushed, they would have been able to avoid most fights until they hit their mid to late game spike. Alliance would have had to force picks and make themselves vulnerable.

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.

16:00 in,  Alliance take the second dragon. At this point Fnatic have improved their lead, but only to 2k gold. Considering the amount of pressure they’ve been flaunting and control they had, most people would have assumed they were far ahead, but Alliance’s dragons and CS on Lucian were keeping them in the game.

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

4:00 in Helios ganks top and First Bloods Ackerman’s Shyvana with a quick tower dive, but Shyvana gets a kill in response. The kill went over to Jax though, which is exactly what they wanted to get out of that. If Jax can split, EG will win.

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.

            

Visa Issues Screw Gambit For Wembley

by Jodi "PunkLit" McClure

Due to visa issues, four core members of Gambit will be unable to attend this weekend's EU LCS in Great Britain. Three to six weeks are required for Russian citizens to acquire that visa, and players cannot be abroad during that time, as they have to leave their passports in a consulate.

Gambit learned about the London trip on May 22nd, and could not even apply for an emergency visa without missing two weeks in Cologne. The team stated in a Gambit press release that they are the innocent victims of "organizer's careless actions." Had they been notified in a timely manner, they could have acquired the visas during the off-season without any obstacles.

Riot declined the team's request to reschedule their games and Gambit is reasonably upset about the situation, as it puts them at a great disadvantage. Organizers did try to remedy the problem, but it was too late to find a solution, so now, Gambit can only express condolences to their disappointed fans. 

Their make-shift line-up for the Wembley event will be:

Top - Cabochard 

Jungle - Loulex 

Mid - NiQ

ADC - Fury III

Support - Hiiva 

The temporary members have been added to Riot's Fantasy LCS Website with estimated points.   

Patch 4.10: What does it mean for the LCS Midlane?

by Reece "Sabrewolf" Dos-Santos

One thing it certainly means is that Nidalee’s 7/0 record in the NA LCS will either stay frozen or begin to pick up some losses. Nidalee’s human form numbers were hit across the board to provide some kind of counterplay and a bit more attractiveness to the cougar form.

The “keep throwing spears from the fog of war and one will hit eventually” gameplay was incredibly frustrating to watch and even more frustrating to play against. Where big damage should usually have some kind of drawback, spears were a guaranteed health bar eater with no positional setback. In the off chance that you were caught, all you needed was a few helpful teammates to wall you off and allow you to pounce away, heal yourself with Primal Surge’s unreasonably high healing output and throw some more.  But Riot were holding nothing back against the Bestial Huntress as her main source of sustain got hit as well. The changes to Athene’s Unholy Grail means it’s not always going to be a must have rushed item for AP mid laners anymore. With the magic resist levels halved and the mana regen lowered it will no longer heavily snowball the mid laner that buys it first, and opens the door to other items like Morellonomicon returning to the meta - especially with the added 5 AP bringing its AP up to 80.

But the Athene’s nerf and the nerfs to mana regen items also opens the door for a new breed of mid laners to reign supreme. Abyssal Sceptre’s 70 AP and 45 MR is now unrivaled if you are looking to pick up AP and MR, especially when factoring in that it lowers enemy MR by 20, meaning if the enemy mid laner decides to pick up Athene’s, you need only get close to them and it’s like they never even had it. The gap closing burst-assassin mid laners like Fizz, Kassadin, Katarina and Lissandra will benefit greatly from this and should look to disturb the current-meta mid laners like Ziggs, Nidalee and Orianna. I predict that Kayle, however, shall remain a highly-contested pick, as the indirect rise of Abyssal Scepter favours her already MR shredding style. With a Wit's End and an Abyssal Scepter under her belt, I don't see how any champion could withstand the huge amounts of MR shred she can dish out without simply bursting her before she gets to you.

But AP items aren’t the only things to change in patch 4.10.

The changes to the BF Sword line of items is a move to ensure that they are all just as equally viable as each other and that will have a huge baring on AD mid laners like Yasuo - who is already a highly-contested pick. With Mercurial Scimitar now providing 80 AD, it cannot be overlooked as a pickup that could benefit any ADC or AD mid laner who is up against a CC-heavy team comp. On top of this, while the loss of stacking upon Bloodthirster will be greatly missed, I believe the overheal shield will be a huge asset to champions like Yasuo, Zed and Talon who look to get into the middle of teamfights, chunk out damage, and live in the process. Yasuo in particular will undoubtedly benefit greatly from the Bloodthirster shield on top of his own passive shield which could only then be enhanced further by a Hexdrinker/Maw of the Malmortius shield, bringing Yasuo’s potential shield count up to three.

Last but not least, another change that will be greatly overlooked is the change to Leblanc’s Q, which will no longer silence, meaning that there is finally counter-play to Leblanc’s high damage output. This change is the best thing for her balance as she still retains her damage like Kassadin but doesn’t leave enemies completely helpless to reply. This leaves Malzahar, Talon and Viktor as the last three mid champs with the ability to silence. 

Runic Tournament: Summer Open

Registration:http://goo.gl/UbvZ95 
Rules: http://goo.gl/1QTTfm
Facebook

July 4th Weekend!

The Runic Summer Open is open to teams of all skill levels. There will be a maximum of 16 teams participating in this tournament. The tournament will have 5 best-of-two qualification rounds played across Friday and Saturday. At the conclusion of qualification round 5, the top 8 teams will advance to the quarter finals. The quarter and semi-finals will be best-of-three starting on Saturday night. Finals will be played in a best-of-five format on Sunday night.

Prizing will be the standard Riot prizing.

• 1st place team will be awarded 3200 RP and Triumphant Ryze
• 2nd place team will be awarded 2400 RP
• 3rd place team will be awarded 1600 RP
• 4th place team will be awarded 800 RP

Starts July 4 at 3pm eastern (8pm GMT)

If you have any questions or concerns, please email Runic Tournaments. 

Esports Memorabilia : The HOT Collectible of the Future.

by Jodi "PunkLit" McClure

Collectors love to imagine a magical scenario where they can go back in time and buy some incredibly rare piece of memorabilia. Baseball card enthusiasts might seek out an original Honus Wagner card. Football fans might purchase an original team jersey or a banner. Star Wars fans would ransack toy stores, buying out Luke Skywalker figures, mint and still in the box. And then, all these collectors would do something extremely important with those items, but I'll get to that in a minute. 

First, let's jump forward in time instead.

It's 2054, and a gray-haired man is sitting in a rocking chair outside his nursing home. Between his stiff, gnarled fingers, he clutches the gilded edges of a framed poster. To his side, his great grandchild stares through the glass in wonder. "It was signed by Reginald," the child says, his voice filled with the kind of reverence we reserve for uttering names like Ruth and DiMaggio. 

"I got that a week before he announced his retirement." The old man smiles at the memory. "It's worth half a million now, and I'm giving it to you." 

Lucky kid. 

Some people buy collectibles as an investment while others buy them for the pleasure of displaying them in their homes. Their value is based purely on what someone else is willing to pay for them, but generally, the rarer and more sought after the item is, the more it is worth. So what makes me think eSports memorabilia will grow in value? Let's take a look at some facts:

1. eSports' popularity is growing at a fantastic rate, and the more fans there are, the more demand there will be for fan items. When eSports explodes into the mainstream, demand for certain items (like early signed posters) will multiply tenfold. Also, the more popular pros become, the less interactive they can be with their fans, which will further limit supply.   

2. Right now, teams are small and there's not many of them. Rosters frequently change and evolve, making many team-signed items extremely unique. Seasons and splits further break up items (Like...Is it signed by the S3 Dignitas or the S4 Dignitas?) Because of player turnovers, oddities like a TSM poster showing Xpecial - but signed by Gleeb - are exactly the kinds of things that collectors love.

3. People wanting memorabilia of the most popular players will look to acquire their signatures on anything they can get. Players signed a TON of stuff the past four years, between the LCS, tournaments, conventions and personal appearances, so fans will believe these items to be obtainable and actively seek them out. Just like in other sports, a collector might want items from different points in a player's career. Perhaps a rookie card or a stand-out year.   

4. We already know the demographic that follows eSports has money to burn, and they are highly passionate about their teams. When eSports hits the mainstream, they're exactly the kind of guys who'll spend big bucks on these items JUST to have something to show off to their friends. It's not enough to tell all these new fans that you've been a long time CLG supporter. You've got to prove your devotion.

5. Sports memorabilia is the Number One most commonly traded collectible.  

The most important factor, though, is that human fault will be in play, and it's the reason certain items will become ridiculously valuable. Yes, players signed tons of stuff. But what will the average person do with that stuff? They'll take that poster home and stick it up on the wall in their computer room with a  push pin in each corner. And that poster will sit up there for years. Slowly, the paper will grow brittle and crack. Perhaps one corner will tear. The poster will be exposed to dust, smoke, and moisture, and over time it will yellow slightly. It may become creased. It may be folded. It may...eventually...be stowed away in a box and eaten up by mildew. Only a sparse few of those posters will be put in a frame under glass. And those are the ones that will be truly worth the big bucks. 

That Honus Wagner card our collectors went back in time for? That football jersey and the Star Wars figures? They're gonna treat those with kid gloves, ensuring that they are kept in immaculate condition until the future comes. They'll be framed or kept in dust free mylar bags, and they will never see a push pin or a damp basement.

So take care of your eSports memorabilia if you're lucky enough to get it. Time and interest will do the rest. Even now you can do a search on ebay and find people selling signed posters and other eSports items, which is a very good indicator that the interest is already there. Keep it in mint condition for a few dozen years and who knows...maybe someday you'll be that wealthy gray-haired old man!