For many teams, this was the week of
truth - and on top of that, they were dealing with a new patch. Returning picks such as support
Irelia and new picks like Gragas jungle, Shyvana top and Bard even, made this quite the moving week.
by Michael "Tribble" Godani
Friday, April 3rd
OMG vs Energy Pacemaker
OMG's coach, citing the teams performance in other games, said he wanted to place his team on unconventional picks. Whether this was the case or not, it was still another show of disrespect levied towards the viewers
and fans of one of China’s top teams.
Losing Game 1 in a
true “we don’t care” fashion to the last seed in China does not mean EP didn't
have to do anything for it. AmazingJ, who brought out the Garen the last time he was on stage,
managed to 1v1 superstar Gogoing in lane. You could even see AmazingJ shout out
loud when he got the solo kill.
OMG did manage to
stay in gold range of EP early by
prioritizing turrets. Unfortunately, EP played
their teamfights a lot better and while OMG kept initiating fights, EP kept
cleaning them up.
Energy Pacemaker came
to play and they showed us just that with their new jungler and ADC. The last seed
in China took down OMG with a beautiful teamfight composition. A few Gnar! +
Glacial Prison combo’s completed the wombo combo and therefore most of the teamfights.
EP's comp was
built around getting those five drakes and they did. Having the fifth dragon
stolen away from them by Loveling was nothing more then a minor misstep for
this relatively new lineup. EP managed to pick up
the fifth drake followed up with the second baron of the game for them, and with
that they upset the LPL and its fans by destroying OMG in the first game.
To round up this
first game, OMG should really stop letting Cloud play Annie; his last two
performances were very poor and the only impact that he has had was feeding the
enemy team. We've seen that OMG cannot play these “lategame” team compositions well. Early/midgame is their forte, but who is going to tell
them that.
The second game was a
different story. Perhaps OMG realized that there were a lot of people around
the world not amused with their performance/draft.
Putting Gogoing on
the Gnar and Cloud again on a skillshot champion, Nautilus, they were ready to
go. The star midlaner from the all-Chinese line-up, Cool, was playing the
Anivia who picked up first blood sub 3 minutes into the game and from there went on to snowball, grabbing a few more kills around the map and a comfortable 30 cs
lead.
EP’s Captain57, the
jungler, did manage to get some aggressive warding down early-on in this game, same as he and the rest of his team did in the first game of the series.
Unfortunately for him, he wasn't able to countergank since all the ganks or, let’s say, most of the ganks, were focused on the botlane.
Early midgame OMG did
manage to rotate towards the toplane, giving both Cool and UZI a few more kills
so that they could grab some new fancy gear from the item shop to get ready for
the final siege.
A beautiful siege on
the toplane ended with a Crunch into the Gnar! to line the members of EP up for
the Anivia/Jinx combo who would quickly make fast work of the fresh meat that was
being presented to them.
As mentioned earlier,
Cloud was playing a skillshot champion. As the best mechanical support player
in the world right now, he showed off with incredible hooks, beautiful
peel and teamfight-deciding plays. The man is a monster on skillshot supports,
showing it every single game.
OMG did not manage to
end the game themselves. EP ended it for them by surrendering after 26 minutes
and splitting the series.
King vs LGD Gaming
Two teams who both
came out with their own unique compositions. The Ori/Kog’maw ball comp from LGD
against the five-tank army from LGD. Yes, five-tank army! Maokai, Vi, Cho’gath,
UrGOD and Nautilus. The most remarkable detail about King was that MLXG
actually build Cinderhulk on Vi.
The first ten minutes
of the game were quiet with a lot of farming, and right before the second
spawn of the drake (the first one being picked up by King) MLXG ulted PYL above
LGD’s red buff to secure a 4v5 advantage for the next drake. As King was not
sure yet if a 4v5 was sufficient enough, they managed to kill Acorn’s Rumble
and then went for their second drake of
the game. It seemed to be going okay for King as they were still down in gold due to the fact that LGD was
getting better farm and knocking down turrets.
The real switch in
the game was around the twenty minute mark when MLXG overextended and died for
free while the rest of the team tried to catch up and got picked off one by
one. A 3-1 trade in favor of LGD basically sealed the game.
We1less was playing
the Orianna this game and he did so to perfection. A couple of beautiful
shockwaves, especially around the thirty minute mark. TBQ jumped into the
midlane, followed up by a Glacial Prison and Acorn’s Equalizer! Double kill
TBQ, no escaping this though, the Ori ball caught out any player trying to
escape this drive by the killer squad from LGD.
LGD destroyed King’s
idea of being unkillable with teamplay and individual play. TBQ and We1less
were looking very strong on their champions and secured a first game win by
forcing the surrender from King.
Bard and Amumu were
locked in for the LGD team and they got everyone hyped! The first time that
Bard was to be seen in competitive play, Pyl was the first one to do it. Just a
note on the side, Flame got swapped in for Game 2 to get some playtime.
Before the game even
started, TBQ managed to give Leym first blood which resulted into a boots pickup
for the Nautilus support. Leym used his mobility to scout out TBQ in his jungle
to get vision on his jungle pathing and with success. TBQ was not as successful
on Amumu as he was last game with the Sejuani. Dying too many times by making
bad plays, TBQ set not only him but his entire team back by a lot. Flame was
cursed to play 1v3 every couple of minutes and the bottom lane of LGD didn't
get a single decent gank from the sad mummy.
It was actually
We1less who once again was the shining light on the LGD team. Who would've
thought that an Anivia's ganks would be more successful than Amumu’s? Indeed!
King controlled the
game just fine, taking early drakes, collapsing on lanes knowing where TBQ was
by warding properly and extending their map pressure.
A 23-minute baron by
King didn't result in a total collapse on one of LGD’s turrets, but they used
the buff to slowly take away the outer turrets and get more control over the
map.
Pyl’s Bard didn't work
out as he might have hoped for but it is to be appreciated and respected that
he took it out, even if not to his own success. We have seen the potential of
Bard and perhaps with some better coordination, this could really be a strong
pick.
Skye might have been
one of the better performing players this game, single-handedly taking out Imp
in every teamfight and causing chaos.
TBQ did give LGD a
bit of hope by stealing the second baron, but King their lead was too big to
overcome with this buff.
King takes the fifth
drake and shortly after take down Game 2 as they split the series!
Star Horn Royal Club vs Vici
Gaming
This is it, the
moment of truth for the fans, the players and the organisation of Star Horn
Royal Club. With four games to go, this should game should be a great start for
a perhaps crazy playoff participation run, could it be?
No, it cannot! Vici
gaming showed off another Montecristo like game with a low but efficient
kill count and strong rotations to leave SHRC out in the cold.
Vici had 100% control over every single aspect of this
game. They ended the game with a 22k gold lead and dropping no towers to the
two-time runners-up at Worlds.
Calculated
tower dives with a ton of crowd control
coming out of Carry’s Hecarim, Dandy’s Definitely Not Udyr and Hetong’s TF,
caused them to multiple times come out of these dives with zero deaths.
The substitute
jungler for SHRC was not able to make his mark this game, perhaps that was a bit
too much to ask for.
So, a very strong
looking Vici Gaming with another objective-minded game which worked out
perfectly fine, just like the previous games that they have played.
Game 2 wasn't all
that different in terms of results. Vici Gaming took control over the game
after Blank was caught out in the dragon pit while Mata wanted to clear a
ward. He tunneled into the pit and when he tried to tunnel out, Mata flailed
him backwards and VG just collapsed on him. Instead of turn away from this
area, SHRC decided that a early lead for Vici might be a better option here.
After this point, Vici
took a big enough lead to start controlling the entire map again, as they did
in Game 1. With superior ward coverage, a fast clear of the outer turrets
basically sealed the deal for them. Vici showed incredible teamplay while the
only shining light on SHRC was Cola’s Jax, taking away the only two turrets of
the series in the botlane.
Dandy showed this
series that his champion pool is more like an ocean. Udyr and Sejuani were
picked up this set and especially with the Sejuani he showed off some
incredible ganks. His ultimates were on spot, hit them 100% with a 100% kill
follow up on them.
Vici Gaming is
looking like the second best team in China at this point while Star Horn is in
need of some serious help! The team looks completely broken, clueless and is
really in need of someone to get these guys back on track.
Edward Gaming vs Team World
Elite
To keep the playoff
dream alive, Team World Elite must at least take a point off EDG in this series.
After this first game, that is still possible, though highly unlikely.
Where teams such as
OMG and LGD have been trying certain champions/strategies out, EDG is not much
into that and just does whatever they want and how they want it together with
winning.
Swapping out Pawn for
U hasn't changed a thing for this match as EDG still dominated every aspect of
the game.
The game started off
quite well for Team WE by going even in the early game, picking up the drake
and only being down in gold by some cs advantage created in the bot and top
lane.
Until the second
drake spawned, the game was quite even but EDG shifted into their second gear
and took a 3-0 fight and the drake. All three kills went to the super toplaner, Koro1, who was playing Jarvan IV, building a brutalizer into a hydra into the
last whisper and before he could complete his ghostblade the game was already
over.
Several
fights occurred across the map, especially in the midlane, and every single time, EDG
came out on top. Even if only by a little, the No.1 in the world managed to
grab the advantage out of every single confrontation.
Did TWE play bad? I
don’t think you can say that they actually played bad, they were just up
against a much better team.
Game 2 started a
bit similar to Game 1, although with less kills yet there were some ganks
from both junglers who could’ve lead to a few deaths across the board. While
the game seemed to be going even, EDG was once again coming out on top after a
few fights, ending with a 4-2 and a 4-1.
Looking at the
trades, it looked good, but none of the kills were going onto EDG’s carry Deft.
He was not having a good game, some might discuss his item build as an issue
for this game while others might argue that EDG was a bit too cocky coming into
this game.
Mystic on the UrGOD
made quick work of Deft and made sure that he was the one coming out on top
with his standard build (FH,LW,MM,BC) while Deft went for a unorthodox build with
the Infinity Edge as his first item.
The game slowly
turned as more teamfights started to ramp up and Aluka’s Sion was becoming more
and more an issue for the players from EDG. As soon as the Undead Juggernaut
got his Thornmail, he was dishing out more damage to Deft without even
targeting him.
Team World Elite
sought out more fights and got them, everywhere, within seconds of each other, almost fight after fight, extending their gold lead with each fight. All this
fighting lead to destroying the bot inhibitor from EDG and a Nexus turret but,
by overstaying a bit, EDG managed to kill two members from TWE and answer with
the Baron.
Could it be? I mean,
if there would be one team to come back after this(EDG being behind in the
meantime in turrets 8-2), it would be EDG.
No, it couldn't. Some
questionable engages came through from Meiko and even U all of a sudden was
found in the middle of this “Melee range” formation which sealed the deal and
gave the IEM finalists the win.
Team World Elite beat
Edward Gaming and was added to the list of OMG, Snake and King of teams who
managed to pull this off this split.
A split between a
cocky EDG and a motivated and 'all-to-play-for' Team World Elite, keeping playoff
dreams alive!
OMG vs Energy Pacemaker 1-1
King vs LGD Gaming
Star Horn Royal Club vs Vici Gaming 2-0
Edward Gaming vs Team World Elite 1-1
April 4th
Star Horn Royal Club vs Energy
Pacemaker
Crazy performance
from the struggling members of the Star Horn Royal Club, forcing a 21 minute
surrender from Energy Pacemaker after an amazing game!
Destroy AmazingJ,
that was the early mission for SHRC, EP who initiated the laneswap placed
Maokai in the botlane who got bullied by Zero’s Thresh and Namei’s Jinx. After
poking him with the hook/chomper combo a few times, he had to give up first
blood and gave SHRC more control on the bottom lane.
Star Horn turned up
the heat and didn't stop, taking a turret in the bot lane, the drake and then
collapsing with four people onto AmazingJ’s Maokai followed up by a toplane
gank on the tree really sealed the deal.
They did not only
break the confidence of the man who managed to kill Gogoing yesterday inlane
1v1, but the entire team.
Zero’s Thresh
combined with the chompers from Namei was an effective way to take out a single
member while the Gnarjuani combo took out the rest of the team.
Our world’s finalists
blew our mind by taking the bottom inhibitor sub 19 minutes and forcing a 21
minute surrender after baiting the baron which lead to two kills.
Are they back? Is the
playoff dream still real and alive for Star Horn, or was this a one time show?
Clearly, this wasn’t
a one time show! Game two continued where Star Horn left off in game one. I do
have to mention that giving away Sejuani and Gnar was quite the awkward
decision, but it worked out for them.
Blank’s early gank
pressure lead to several kills and Zero once again came out big with the hooks,
this time out of the Nautilus.
Zero single-handedly
dominated the early game for Star Horn and slowly but surely Cola joined the
snowball.
SHRC looked very good
and EP looked terribly bad! Although Star Horn didn't clear the game as fast as
they did in the first game, the game was never really in danger of being lost.
Especially after Cola’s baron steal, yes, the Leblanc baron steal got brought
to you by Star Horn Royal Club’s Cola with a bitter taste for Energy
Pacemaker’s Drizzle who failed to smite.
Star Horn cleans up
this set and takes the three points home, being alive still to make the
playoffs!
Gamtee vs Snake
Snake should be the
big winner of the 5.6 patch, the tank meta would suit their champion pools and
improve their peel for Kryst4l.
What Snake did today
in their first game against Gamtee was something new, new for the entire league
of legends meta, Shyvana top with Teleport Smite.
How does this work
though? Well, in lane swaps, Flandre managed to pick up the Gromp which is a
juicy 60 gold and add 30 gold to it once he had his cinderhulk. Flandre kept
picking up the Gromps in either his bot or the enemy’s top side to keep him
ahead of his laner LetMe.
His quick cinderhulk
was the key to the domination that Snake managed to show off later in this
game.
Gamtee did try to
fight Snake off, but the newcomers kept their gold lead by contributing to
kills as a team and not as a single or duo.
Flandre was ahead
enough to tank up the baron together with Beast who picked up LPL’s first
Gragas jungle and Baka was hitting it from outside the pit. They got caught
out, but managed to pick up the baron, a 3-2 exchange in favor of Snake with
Kryst4l picking up the three kills which got him going as well.
A fed Draven with a
huge dragon in the front line that seemed to have a limitless health pool.
Snake did it again as
most of the watchers would say. The only question is, shouldn't Snake just have
played this safe instead of showing off these kind of shenanigans right before
playoffs?
Gamtee’s LetMe was
impressed enough by the Teleport Smite combo that he tried it out himself on
the Rengar top building full tank. Snake came onto the rift with two new picks
in the likes of Trundle and Volibear (jungle). Early on, LetMe was benefiting from the laneswap initiated by his team by being far ahead of
Flandre’s Trundle. The small advantage became a bit better when Xiaohu managed
to 1v1 Baka inlane and take first blood.
Snake answered back
with a couple of early drakes, good vision control and taking the outer turrets
down before the 15 minute mark.
The entire game was
going back and forth, while Snake was in the lead most of the time, Tale’s
positioning on the Kog’maw lead his team to even the gold and outplay Snake in
the teamfights.
Gamtee made a
questionable decision going for a baron which they did manage to get,
unfortunately for them, Kryst4l was quick enough to come all the way to the
baron pit after taking the bot tier 2 turret. Kryst4l then cleaned up the pit
by taking three kills and Baka took the last one as Sinkdream managed to get
away as the slippery fish that he was.
Snake’s limited
engage from the Volibear was what should’ve lost them the game, Volibear is a
pretty one dimensional champion who cannot reach the backline without flanking.
If he does manage to reach it, he is either too low health to do something or
his passive is popped already.
Gamtee exploited this
and was on their way to split the series, but the bad positioning from Tale on
the final teamfight at the dragonpit lead his team to defeat against a shaky
Snake.
Invictus Gaming vs Master3
Both teams had
something to play for and after looking good the last few weeks, this might be
one of the most interesting games of the day.
Interesting it was,
when we look at the first game. Z1tai playing the Eye of the twilight in the
toplane, Shen while Kakao picked up the Gragas.
Also worth mentioning
is that M3 switched out Candy to play with Smlz, who is a known UrGOD player
and therefor locked in the UrGod.
It was quite the farm
game although Kid and Kitties managed to push Smlz into his turret early with
some good harass and forcing the heal as a result of eating a death sentence.
M3 decided to make a
dragon play and with succes, just the follow up on ganking the botlane didn't
share the same success. At least, not for M3, a gank with the Glacial Prison got
turned from a possible 2-0 gank into a 1-3 advantage for M3. A great countergank
by Kakao didn't only lead secure his own bot duo, but also lead to killing the
enemy botlane in exchange for his own Kitties.
The Kalista from Kid
being up by two levels, two kills and a gigantic cs lead, meant that the
botlane was secured, time to focus on the other lanes.
Rookie was doing a
great job already against Dade’s Vladimir who lost his turret early and falling
behind in CS which meant that the Batman & Robin duo from IG focused on
helping their toplaner out.
All this happened
without any form of real pressure by Master3, who just let IG do whatever they
wanted and when they did try to interfere, they simply got smoked!
Yes, IG showed off
their mechanical skills, especially Rookie who had some beautiful Azir plays
and Kitties max range Death Sentences were one not to forget.
A 21 minute surrender
was the result that IG was looking for. They take game one.
The second game of
this series was a lot more interesting to watch when it comes to close games.
Looper locked in one of his favorite champions in the toplane, Singed, as
Invictus Gaming came onto the rift again with the Shen & Gragas.
M3 was looking good
early in the game, coming out on top in the little skrims that occurred across
the map but not quite as lucky on the dragon attempt that got stolen by Kid
with the Ezreal ult.
IG traded the next
two drakes for a mid outer turret and the top tier 2 turret and continued to
expand their lead in forms of farming and turrets.
We do have to mention
though, that M3’s jungler, Condi, is just looking terribly bad! Yes, he did
have a decent debut, but after showing off his facechecking ability for the
last few weeks, our friend managed to single-handedly lose teamfights by
misusing his Glacial Prison. Not once, not twice, every single time!
IG’s composition had
again a lot of utility and they used this to bait the baron multiple times so
that Zz1tai, who had a double teleport on the Shen, could splitpush and take
down the bottom inhibitor which eventually lead to a baron for Invictus Gaming.
M3 wasn't playing
better or less than IG in the teamfights, but when you have a jungler who wastes his aoe stun
ultimate on a single target or in the open, you’re chances are pretty much done
for.
Kid managed to punish
Condi’s lack of insight with cleaning up fights due to the ability he had to
burst down champions and chase them to finish them off.
A great performance
from Invictus Gaming who secure the three points and push M3 really close to
relegating.
Team World Elite vs King
Perhaps one of the
most important games this week in terms of playoff seats. As both teams still
have control over who is going to the playoffs, this promised to be a
interesting match with two teams going all out.
Assassin, the decent
performing midlaner from King, came onto the rift with the Karthus while LeyM
obviously thought that Zero’s Irelia support pick was good enough to pick it
himself(and also in the second game).
King started very
strong, Assassin was using his ultimate almost to perfection as the team seemed
to communicate very well. The pressure that MLXG applied on the botlane got
followed up by the pressure that Assassin put onto Team WE with his ultimate.
The roams from the
King midlaner lead to full control for the promising team who according to the
critics would be somewhere in the top of the LPL based on their pre-season
performance. King continued to
pressure WE and eventually pushed their lead towards the 9k gold mark which
didn’t even help King that much. A teamfight that occurred at that point went
even, 4-4.
Despite the gold
lead, this game seemed to be even in terms of fighting, as TWE tried to stall
the game to farm up as much as they could. King couldn't close out the game, a
common issue that we've seen quite a few times before this split and with that
they kept TWE their hopes high. Teamfights were still going even until around
the 40 minute mark. A teamfight that barely went in favor of King, as their
team started to scale better and TWE their damage was falling off, lead them to
the baron and eventually to close out the first game.
King was lucky that
TWE is not a good teamfighting team, otherwise this might have turned out
otherwise.
Perhaps the most
important game for Team World Elite was the second game against King for them
this split. For some reason, Spirit and Xiye were allowed on Nidalee and
Leblanc which lead TWE to victory in the second game of this set.
As we started out
even, with great ganking pressure from MLXG on the midlane, TWE managed to come
out on top early in the midgame. As both Aluka and Skye farmed up, Aluka got a
little bit ahead after Spirit started to give his lane some more attention.
Xiye in the meantime
had been toying around with Assassin’s Lissandra, who didn’t stand a chance 1v1
against the Korean midlaner.
The first teamfight
seemed to be happening around the second dragon spawn, but TWE managed to poke
and scare King away from it, giving them another free drake which would help
them significantly to close the game out earlier than King did the last game.
Creating the fights
that lead to turrets and eventually the baron, strangly enough didn’t come from
Spirit or Xiye, but from Yuzhe, who showed why we are all such a fan of LPL
supports playing Thresh.
Death Sentences, to
the fullest meaning of the name, were thrown out to sentence the poor looking
King players to a 1-1 in the series, which would keep the hopes for the
playoffs for TWE alive.
Team World Elite
didn’t hesitate pressuring King while having a gold lead, they searched for
fights, created fights, took objectives and forced a sub 30 minute game win
over their competitors for that playoff seed.
Results Day 2:
Star Horn Royal Club vs Energy Pacemaker 2-0
Gamtee vs Snake 0-2
Invictus Gaming vs Master3 2-0
Team World Elite vs King 1-1
April 5th
Snake vs Master3
A beautiful game to
start your Sunday off with. Snake came onto the rift with the troll in the
toplane and the fat drunk man in the jungle while Baka picked up a new
champion, Karthus.
A game that shortly
after M3 picked up the first blood on their ADC, got turned into favor of Snake
with some unfortunate teamfights for M3. You don’t want to be in early skrims
around the map with a Karthus on the enemy team.
Baka picked up three
early kills and the likes of snake took the rule of three into three early
drakes and turrets.
There was nothing
much that M3 could do except hope for mistakes from Snake’s side. After picking
up the baron early in the game, pick got turned into a teamfight and turned
into favor of M3. Bad positioning from the likes of Kryst4l and Flandre, but
well executed skillshots from Dade and zone work from Lovecd.
This only extended
the torture that Snake had lined up for M3 who had no answer to their strategy
of the Trundle splitpushing to get rid of the outer turrets.
Snake ended the game
9-0 in turrets and took a perfect game. M3 their chances for playoffs is now
looking very grim with King picking up points and all they can and must do is
turn it up for game two against Snake!
So it appears that
someone told Dade that if they wouldn't win this game, playoffs would be close
to impossible.
The former Samsung
Blue superstar came onto the rift with a digusting performance in terms of KDA
and skills to show off together with LoveCD. Dade’s Leblanc, Lovecd’s Thresh
was a recipe for abuse and disgusting punishment.
Snake started off
decent by taking the early dragon again but M3 wouldn't have it. Flandre who
locked in the Shyvana again with the teleport smite got camped and taken out of
the game with some 3-4 men ganks.
M3 showed a
completely different approach to the game than they had shown in the first one.
More aggressive and above all wanting to win and destroy the opponent. We
mentioned Lovecd, who is just one of those players why you would watch M3,
especially on his Thresh. Every Chinese support is a great Thresh player and
the use of his kit this game was tremendous, beautiful flails into the box and DeathSentences that literally caused death.
As you can see in our
Top 5 of this week, Dade’s dancing skills were tremendous and his ability to
delete Baka was quite entertaining also.
M3 kept pressuring
Snake and left them no chance to even have hope to get back into the game.
A well deserved
split.
Team World Elite vs Energy
Pacemaker
All that Spirit and
his ducklings need right here is a 2-0 victory to have a bit of hope of making
the playoffs.
Spirit was once again
the man of the match, the uncontested MVP for Team World Elite. His early
ganks, annoying Nunu invades(which causes nothing but stress and frustration
for the enemy) applied enough pressure for his team to capitalize on the
already relegated Energy Pacemakers.
Spirit got his ADC
Mystic a head with some beautiful Thresh lantern ganks got him ahead too in
gold to work on his support items.
As always it is both
amazing and satisfying to see a player of world class being able to solo-carry
games in the professional gaming scene, Spirit always delivers!
A perfect game for
Team World Elite that didn't drop a single turret forced the surrender right
before Mystic could’ve gotten his first penta of this split.
Energy Pacemaker got
their bans back this game after being punished for not obeying the
rules for showing up with the proper lineup.
The weird fact about
this pick and ban phase is that Aluka got to play his Sion again as Spirit got
his Nidalee and Xiye his Leblanc.
It was another
one-sided match. Team World Elite dominated thanks to the likes of Spirit who
in the early game was not even needed in the bottom and midlane. Xiye got
himself ahead as Mystic picked up a early double kill inlane.
Spirit kept applying
pressure after delivering Aluka his first blood and destroyed the morale of EP.
Contesting buffs, showing up constantly in the enemy jungle and even scaring EP
away from a dragon while being outnumbered 1v3.
Spirit showed off as
if he was making a “How to carry” video live on stage.
Spirit got himself so
far ahead and therefor also his teammates that they could capitalize on every
teamfight, the one in the bottom lane ended with a massive chain of CC by Aluka
and cleanup from the likes of Spirit and the one in the toplane ended with a
quadra kill for Xiye.
Another perfect game
by not giving up any turret and Team World Elite take a well deserved and
needed 2-0 in their last game of this week!
King vs Invictus Gaming
King starting off by
giving Skye the red buff for his laningphase against Zz1tai’s Trundle. Mainly
to sustain his health and to be able to come out on top in trades. In the
meantime in the toplane Wuxxian was destroying Kid thanks to great play from
both Wuxxian and Leym but also due to a slacky performance from Kitties.
Failing to peel properly for his ADC by not using the proper spells in the
proper moments caused them to fall behind, getting poked out in lane and then
giving up first blood to MLXG’s Rek’Sai.
To make matters
worse, Skye teleported top and ended up giving his ADC a double kill, just to
snowball his lane and getting him ready for the upcoming teamfights.
Despite the early
kills on MLXG and Wuxxian, the gold stayed even as Rookie and Zz1tai were
winning their lane in farm, but King was winning the battle in dragons. As we
will see later on they managed to pick up 5-0 dragons in this game which
eventually caused IG to lose the game.
We can’t blame
everything on the dragon control, Kakao was just not able to make his presence
known in the first 10-15 minutes of the game while Rookie farmed up mid.
The first teamfight
that occurred in the toplane went in favor of King, who gave a great show in
terms of “How to peel for your ADC” while Rookie did not manage to pull off a
proper flank with the Azir.
Losing this teamfight
caused IG the baron and the fourth drake for IG. As IG did manage to pick up
the baron later on in the game after Assassins got caught out, they couldn't
translate it into anything big like a inhibitor. King continued their wonderful
way of teamfighting for which the team has been praised so many times this
split and took the first game after MLXG and Assassin collapsed onto the
backline after Skye splitting up the team.
A very much deserved
victory for King who controlled objectives and fought their fights carefully
and properly.
There isn't a single
person that stood out on King, all players put filled in their roles and
managed to win thanks to their teamwork.
Game two was a total
different game than the first one, as King decided to turn on the heat quite
early by MLXG counterganking his botlane, grabbing the first blood on Kakao’s
Nidalee. Not much later he caught the jungle cat in the river and turned her
into a dead kitty while Rookie was taken out by Assassin.
From this point on,
there were appearing little skrims everywhere on the map, King came out on top
of every single one of them. Assassin impressing a lot again on his Karthus,
timed ults, beautiful teleports to assists his teammates.
Perhaps MLXG and Assassin
impressed me the most this game, they were very eager to choke IG and try and
take the three much needed points to keep the playoff dream alive, or should we
say secure it?
Also this game, King
controlled the dragon, grabbing all dragons in this set is perhaps a detail for
Invictus Gaming to think about.
Then again, perhaps
Invictus gaming is aiming fort hat 6th spot and didn’t bother too much with
this game? Who knows, anyway the three points go to King who have their seventh
spot almost as good as secured!
LGD Gaming vs Vici Gaming
The best set of the
night on this final day of week 10. We got served some bloodthirsty first half
of the game with picks such as Imp’s Ashe, Acorn’s Galio and Mata’s Kennen.
Oh yes, it was on!
Dandy tried to capitalize on TBQ’s predictable and weak early jungle by
invading and placing traps all around. He managed to find at his blue buff
after PyL had to wait in the fountain to revive after giving up a kill. This
“capture” by Dandy, turned into a incredible fight with teleports being used
and ults being thrown out. A wonderful play by We1less and teamfighting from
LGD turned this skrim into a 6-2 win for LGD.
TBQ was active this
early in the game, ganking here and there and even killing Dandy solo in his
own jungle. LGD was playing this early game with succes, as Vici was not
allowed and able to play their dominating rotation game as they did the
previous games.
Unfortunately for
LGD, at the dragon pit, Carry got a triple kill on the big tree which turned
him into a vicious animal at this part of the game and Vici jumped on his back.
The tree was carrying the teamfights with his AOE damage reduction and throwing
the damage back like the boss that he was!
Vici Gaming was
perhaps not able to show off their objective minded gameplay, but they did
outsmart LGD, baiting TBQ’s ult kill him and Pyl shortly after to take the
dragon and more map pressure.
VG’s comp seemed to
be stronger than LGD’s comp, or they were just playing it better. Who knows,
anyway Vici Gaming was going to take game one after LGD was throwing their
early lead that they grabbed from TBQ’s aggressive play.
VG takes the baron,
two inhibitors and then die to LGD in a teamfight…yes, they died.
The gold got put into
good use as the gap closed to only 3k gold and LGD seemed to be able to stay
alive a little bit longer.
As the next baron
spawned, Vici was looking to take the two inhibitors down again so that they
could just recall, sit out the baron that LGD took as they moved in for the
inhibitors.
On the contrary….LGD
came out of their fountains after the empowered recalls with FURY AND RACED AS
HARD AS THEY COULD FOR LGD’S BASE!
A game, a game of
throws some might call it, got thrown towards the likes of LGD who managed to
pick up game one to disbelieve of VG’s Dandy.
As the second game
went into the draft, it was quite clear that Vici Gaming was here to take the
win for the second game, LGD on the other hand were trying out some other
picks. Riven mid, Khazix Jungle and Miss Fortune ADC.
TBQ applied a bit of
pressure early after We1less got ganked mid at level 2 by four people and
managed to pick up a kill on Hetong. This was pretty much the highlight for LGD
until Flame managed to pick up a triple kill with his Shyvana in dragon form.
Vici was not going to
let LGD style on them and started to slowly turn up the heat which came to a
real explosion when they found a dragon fight. That fight went in favor of VG
with 5-0 since We1less was not yet aware of how to enter a fight as Riven. The
triple kill in that fight that got onto the God of Vasilii helped him to get
far ahead of Imp’s MF and to apply more pressure inlane.
As soon as Vici took
the outer turrets from LGD it was the same ol’ story as the games before, apply
pressure, obtain vision control and suffocate the opponent. In contrast to
other games, their opponent was not that much troubled with it, perhaps only
Flame(who has been trolled by LGD in both games he played this week). LGD was
getting their asses kicked but on the player cams it didn’t seem to bother
them.
Right before the 20
minute mark Vici managed to ace LGD again and slowly entered their base.
A clean game from
Vici Gaming who ended the game with a 38-5 score to split the series.
Results Day 3:
Master3 vs Snake 1-1
Team World Elite vs Energy Pacemaker 2-0
King vs Invictus Gaming 2-0
Vici Gaming vs LGD Gaming 1-1
Standings after week 10:
Roster for Week 11:
Day 1:
LGD Gaming vs Gamtee
Master3 vs Energy Pacemaker
Star Horn Royal Club vs Invictus Gaming
Edward Gaming vs Vici Gaming
Day 2:
King vs Gamtee
Star Horn Royal Club vs Snake
OMG vs LGD Gaming
Edward Gaming vs Energy Pacemaker
Day 3:
LGD Gaming vs Invictus Gaming
Team WE vs Gamtee
Edward Gaming vs OMG
Vici Gaming vs Master3
