Pro Play and Celebrity Gossip

[Teleku]

North America's Everybody not Asia's inability to play video games is legendary.

Or at least thats how it always seemed to be when ever I bother glancing at competitive video game stats.

[MediumHigh]

As it goes Asian > European >>> America....

[Rasix]

From way downtown! BANG.

[Azuredream]

From way downtown! BANG.

I love the caster's enthusiasm, it's infectious. The 'OH GOD NO' as the bullet is in the air then the explosion of shouting as he kills him. Just great.

CLG has now handed the top team their only loss, and (one of) the bottom teams their only win. They are so inconsistent. One of the pro players tweeted that 'CLG is like the blue shell in Mario Kart.'

I think TSM is going to win the split again.

[ezrast]

CLG vs TSM spoiler - the shittiest way to lose:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-YbDt3IrW8

[Rasix]

TSM just locked in an Annie (support)/Xin Zhao bot lane. Zil mid.  

I have a feeling this is going to go very poorly.  If they get into late game, it's an auto-lose.

edit: Yah, it's over already.  This is kind of sad.

[HaemishM]

TSM just locked in an Annie (support)/Xin Zhao bot lane. Zil mid.  

Not really being up on pro strategies, is there any way that is a good idea by any stretch of the imagination?

[Ashamanchill]

You know, if they were facing Velocity E Sport, or Coast, or Curse (lol) that might have worked. But against an ascending Vulcan, yeah no.  Fucking A for effort though, that is the first bit of creative champ picking I have seen in a long, long, goddamn long time.

[Rasix]

Curse 

[Ashamanchill]

Seriously. The old giants of TSM, Dignitas, and especially Curse are just looking like fossils out there right now.

[ezrast]

I just heard a few days ago about some Korean team doing well with Annie support (standard ADC though). I'll see if I can dig up the game but I think it's behind an OGN paywall.

Haemish - Annie/Xin bottom isn't a terrible idea for a kill lane. If Annie could get a stun onto Caitlyn, that would guarantee Xin his three-hit popup especially if they could pull it off before Sona hit 6. Their combined burst has the potential to shut down the enemy AD hard early on, which makes sense here because Zuna tends to get really crazy late game. We saw TSM perform some successful tower dives with 3-4 members; if Xin had snowballed like they needed they could have been doing it with just him and Annie, over and over, all game.

I can't fathom the Zilean pick though.

[ezrast]

Zuna is breaking my heart right now.

[Rasix]

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAMN. C9 just wins games.

edit: I need to watch all of that.  I just really caught the start and the end.  Was it an epic throw beyond what I saw in the 5-6k overcome?

[Ashamanchill]

That shizz was epic.

[ezrast]

Jesus. That was painful to watch.

edit: because I like Vulcun, I mean. It was a great game.

[Ashamanchill]

It's not like they threw or anything, they just got outplayed, and outpicked. Them, CLG, and obviously C9 are doing what I previously thought impossible, and that is make NA look competitive. The rest, well, I suppose you need sheep to feed wolves right?

[Margalis]

Annie / Jarvan gets busted out from time to time in Korea. I like that better than Annie/Xin, since Jarvan can knock up multiple targets and lock people in place in his ring for a tibbers.

Watching this game now TSM is not playing it well. Annie has good auto attacks but she isn't using them at all, she also doesn't have stun primed. Basically you either need to blow people up or threaten to blow them up enough that they get zoned, and they are doing neither. They are also pushing the lane a lot instead of letting it push to them.

[Goumindong]

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAMN. C9 just wins games.

edit: I need to watch all of that.  I just really caught the start and the end.  Was it an epic throw beyond what I saw in the 5-6k overcome?

Kinda. Vulcan miscalculated. They thought "we have a Tristana and are farming better so we're winning we can wait and get a pick and then push objectives". Which is kinda true. Except that Ashe+Nunu does more DPS than Tristana and Tristana + snowball does way less DPS than Ashe+Nunu. So while they thought they were farming well and getting ahead, it was actually C9 who had the better late game team fight composition and slowly but surely Vulcan was getting behind.

The game turned when C9 caught Eve because without Eve, Vulcan had no assassinate and without that they had no way to stop Ashe's superior DPS (even with fewer items), kite, and utility. At that point they knew that in order to win they had to play safe and farm, if they kept ashe from getting picked they would win. All those TF ults that went nowhere were looking to see if they could catch ashe out.

The thing that really did it though was Ashe's positioning. Take the last fight at baron, notice how trist is in the pit shooting and then Ashe is able to turn onto trist before trist can turn onto Ashe. Its because Ashe had the river bush to hide her moving into that position. (she was actually ducking in and out of the bush between shots before going for trist). Trist needed to be on the other side of the pit or shooting ashe. The fact that Ashe got that first attack off in the trade meant that even if Trist turned to fight it she would have lost.

[MediumHigh]

So this tournament seems its worth watching. Is there a way to watch previous matches or am I shit out of luck?

[Goumindong]

So this tournament seems its worth watching. Is there a way to watch previous matches or am I shit out of luck?

There are VOD's for all of the LCS matches. Go here:

http://na.lolesports.com/season3/split2/matches

Click "match details". Try not to see who won(its in the middle of the bottom or off your screen, but its AFTER the button that says "watch game" which is right under the "VS"

[Rasix]

There's also the event vod subreddit.  Here's the direct link for season 3.   Gives you more options of where to start and spoiler free.

And.. another Saint smite fail.  FFS.

edit: Ohhh shit.  Well, that was a quite a finish.

[Ashamanchill]

At Curse have some life left in them lol.

[Rasix]

CLG's team fights were fucking awful.   They didn't look like they knew what to do once those mid/late fights broke out.  Nien kinda wandered around taunting random people.

[Ashamanchill]

You're not wrong.

[Margalis]

CLG loses a ton of games by getting ahead, taking it to late game, having one player split push, then that player either gets caught and enemy team takes Baron and inhibs or they lose a team fight or inhibs because the split pusher doesn't help team. They have been doing that for years now. Especially when they run Cait.

They don't respect death timers late game and will trade a death for "progress" even if it means the enemy team can make that progress and more right back, and they often go into  tunnel vision mode where one or more people are so focused on getting an enemy inhib they will lose the game trying to do it.

[Rasix]

I kind of wish VES hadn't made it in.  They had close games early and a couple upsets, but they've been a free win for a while now.

[Goumindong]

CLG's team fights were fucking awful.   They didn't look like they knew what to do once those mid/late fights broke out.  Nien kinda wandered around taunting random people.

CLG vs C9?

Yea, they played an all physical damage team and didn't have a single character with Black Cleaver. As they did not have stacking armor pen they consequently did no deeps.

[Ashamanchill]

So, just as a show of hands, am I the only one in here that also follows the European scene?

If not, then just a few points to share:

1. The Rise, And Fall of Team Alternate. They started out really fucking well, mirroring C9 in fact. It looked like ForellenLord could do no wrong. Then came one little burp, losing to GG (which in my mind, is significant. I say this to my friends who only watch Esports, and not the regular kind; I don't care that you can beat up on shitster teams, it's what you do vs the big teams that counts.). Now, the wheels are falling off.

2. Lemondogs and Ninjas in Pajamas. They both started the season of doing their best VES impressions. But in their play, I saw glimmers of hope. And now, they are rising through the packs. I know, it's only 5 weeks in the books, but good for them.

3. EG and SK, the basement dwellers. To be perfectly honest, I never fucking liked SK. They don't team fight well, their top hasn't been a force since the Irelia days, and their bot lane is cringe worthy. EG, however, being this low, is a surprise to me. I mean, they beat World Elite at the last worlds, which was as good as any non Asian team managed to accomplish. Now, they remind me of the Team Curse of Europe (as a comparison, not the team defunct team of the same name), as old relics who just have not adjusted properly to the current meta. Save for Froggen, who should be poached by a better team.

I kind of wish VES hadn't made it in.  They had close games early and a couple upsets, but they've been a free win for a while now.

Seriously. They play about as good as they look. Now I know, this sport isn't exactly swimming in handsome extroverts, but come on guys. try a little.

[Rasix]

I watch the EU LCS a little, but I don't follow it as much.  Their games are mostly during the weekend and that's when I pretty much can't watch.  I was sick this weekend so, I had a bit more time to tune in.  Game's weren't bad.

EG suffers from a few things.  Wickd isn't one, he's solid (doesn't exactly crush his lane, however). Yellowpete, while not great, isn't the problem either.  Froggen's talent isn't in question, but he hasn't really adjusted well to current meta and his champ pool is S2 levels of stale.  Their team comps seem to make no sense, they can't seem to make them work even if they draft something coherent.  The difficult thing to say is that, while a being a really pleasant person, Snoopeh is fucking terrible.  EG has realized this and they've brought in an analyst (also sub support) and a replacement tryout for Snoopeh.

NIP did great in bringing in Freeze.  They also took a while to get going last split as well.

Lemondogs are fun to watch.   Tabzz is one of my favorite players.  Too bad he can't play Fizz bot.  

Overall, outside of C9, there really hasn't been an outstanding team on either side of the pond.  It's all been just a bit above average or a bit below average.  Except dumpster VES, who in a stroke of pure madness, replaced their ugly mid with a small champ pool with a mid that looks like he's at death's door and has an even worse champ pool that he plays half as well.  

[Margalis]

EG plays average-at-best at every position. Wickd and Froggen are probably not average players but they play like it, maybe because the rest of their team is ignorable and they get focused, or because they feel the need to press too hard.

Their bot lane has never been a threat at all, nor has their jungle, and now that their general approach to the game doesn't really work it makes that more obvious. A winning strategy can paper over individual play issues, but a losing strategy only accentuates them.

[Ashamanchill]

I would say both your assessments on EG are pretty damn spot on.

[ezrast]

After the spring season I vowed to be done following NA and just watch EU games. It hasn't worked out great because goddamn does EU produce some boring games, while seeing Vulcun and C9 shit on the NA old guard has a lovely schadenfreude to it. I'll try to stick with it though.

[Margalis]

EU doesn't do a lot strategically and EU bot lanes are weak across the board. Mid lane is the only position where EU is really notable. I find EU games almost unwatchable these days.

I mostly watch OGN now. Korean teams are strong at every position and employ a lot of different strategies, team comps and picks. Korean top lane play is insanely ahead of other regions.

[Ashamanchill]

I tried watching OGN consistently, I really did. The format you have to watch it it just turned me off, coupled with the fact that, well, I just kind of expected them to be using different champions frequently, not just occasionally. I understand that the champions currently being used are because of them, but there it is.

[Rasix]

It took SK 43 minute to snag a single kill.  

edit:  What the hell is Gambit's drafting strategy?  Let's give them everything they'd possibly want! Interested to see how this goes.

Gambit playing like good Gambit today.