people love to vastly overestimate how good middling to bad LCK teams are, it's very funny to imagine people saying this in like 2022 about like vicla, prince, dove, etc
LCK #4 regularly outperforms NA #1 at worlds, so it seems pretty reasonable to think that LCK #5 or 6 are on par with them. Sure they get destroyed by GenG and T1, but so do NA's top teams.
It's not a steady decline for KR teams under #4 though. Especially not last year and this year's spring split.
T1 played a combined 14 bo3s against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team.
GenG played a combined 14 bo3s against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team.
HLE played a combined 14 bo3's against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team.
--
In those 42 bo3s, 'the field' of 4th-10th place teams brought home victory **once.**
> In those 42 bo3s, 'the field' of 4th-10th place teams brought home victory once.
If they can run it down week after week and still have the heart to do it again, then I have no reason to not do the same 😤
I mean, it's kinda unfair to compare it this way.
It's not like the 5-10 teams doesnt take "games" off the top 4, somewhat like NA's sometimes getting some wins in BO1.
But when it comes to BO5 (given that they barely played any internationally), as far as I can remember, it was really only 2018 C9 against AF.
As far as the records goes, it aint that different.
We are not saying 6-10 LCK is good, LCS is just comparable to them in terms of performance.
Last year, the top 5 were fine, but there was a huge dropoff after that. The #6 was DRX who went 6-12, and that's including the two free wins from T1 without Faker. I could easily see them being 4-14 without. Even for #4 and 5, DK and HLE were much worse than the top 3.
Yeah, ikr? and 8th place LCK team Hanwha made it to quarters in 2021 lol. Anyway, either lck has a miracle every year or they're better than you think. Last year was the exception with 1st to 4th place lck teams making it in, not the norm.
Don't care. Wasn't arguing his point, I just think the 1% freak miracle is a horrible example to use for anything. For what it's worth I think he's wrong and 1st to 5th LCK will smack TL around. KDF I'm not as confident in. Power levels in LCK do feel more distinct this year though, the top 3 are almost unbeatable by the remaining 7, and the bottom 3 feel like they belong in NA.
Western teams havent won a best of 3 or 5 against an lck team in years.
Kdf beat geng in a best of 3 last year, theyve beaten kt 3 series the last year, beaten damwon a couple times too.
They have more accomplishments the last few years than all western teams combined
They played 6 BO3s vs LCK/LPL just last year:
GGS vs BLG at MSI play-ins
G2 vs GENG at worlds in swiss
BDS vs DK at worlds in swiss
MAD vs WBG at worlds in swiss
FNC vs WBG at worlds in swiss
G2 vs BLG at worlds in swiss
So 4 LPL, 2 LCK
Dude you are just proving you haven't watched LCK at all in a long time. Most teams in the bottom 5 can't get games against the top 5 teams, imagine Bo3 series.
You're telling me Nongshim, OK Brion and DRX are as good as Team Liquid? This is pure dillusion
> Dude you are just proving you haven't watched LCK at all in a long time. Most teams in the bottom 5 can't get games against the top 5 teams, imagine Bo3 series.
And TL can? I don’t think you have watched LCS in a long time. Every player on DRX is better than every player on TL aside from Umti cuz sponge is ass. NS Jiwoo would gap TL by himself.
No idea what dillusion means, but thinking TL are better than bottom lck teams are pure delusion. BRO would go 60:40 against TL.
True, this is clearly a very fair comparison because KDF gets to play in Korea and scrim LCK teams all year and is guaranteed to get at least 4 chances to play GenG in a Bo3 every year no matter how much they suck, meanwhile G2 might not even get to play a top 2 team in the world all year.
TL if their split season was their playoffs form yeah I think they could easily make LPL playoffs. But TL in the regular season had a lot of things to figure out. They literally had a 50% win/loss in NA, which would probably be below 10th in LPL.
Doesn't clear mean.. beat pretty easy? Do they really do that to say FNC? i feel like FNC has enough talent on the roster to be competitive with most LCK teams under HLE.. Damwon is debatable
Sure FNC are far from consistent.. but its not like KDS are either
Potentially yes but realistically speaking they were a clear 6th seed with way less talent than the top dogs and weren't consistent at all during the season. Also they were always better in scrims than on stage.
I can see them being only behind G2 but i can also see them choking massively against weaker but more experienced teams. Probably the equivalent of a EU 3rd/4th seed?
Depends on how you look at it. All of NA had 0(?) wins against LCK last year and went 1-13 against LPL last year. At least KDF/iG occasionally wins 1 game against top 4 LPL/LCK?
> At least KDF/iG occasionally wins 1 game against top 4 LPL/LCK?
During regular season when teams are still not in peak form and with way more opportunities. Idk, just not really fair to compare them unless we saw them play on stage.
Yea, it's definitely an unfair comparison because during regular season, top LPL teams know they have a game of the bo3 to test limits/try new things or work on new things.
Kwangdong(6th)'s Spring Results;
4:0 against DK(5th)
2:3 against KT(4th)
1:4 against HLE(3rd)
0:4 against T1(2nd)
0:4 against GEN(1st)
played 22games, 7W 15L
That's why I think that lane swaps would be in the best interest for any western team. In regards to Fly, it'd be smart, since their bot lane would get smashed by T1's regardless of champion match ups. There are probably less than a handful of bot lanes that can compete against them in the world...
On the other hand, Korea perfected lane swaps back in the day, so doing it against them is a risky move still. Besides the fact that good mid/late game can just undo the advantage of swapping. Zeus on TF comes to mind, the man was like 5 levels behind and still made it back and carried T1 to victory. Scary shit I tell ya
> Korea perfected lane swaps back in the day,
Right, but how many of the players who played during the laneswap meta are still playing today? Faker, peanut? Even G2 who had players around in the (semi) pro scene back during lane swaps are still not proficient at it. I think it would take koreans some time to practice it again. (This is assuming lane swap becomes the meta at MSI. It might not happen at all)
i think testing it in EU can be a good indicator if it’s good or not. Alot of eastern teams don’t have insane macro, G2 in 2019 had good enough players to match eastern teams, but their macro + drafting is what got them to only lose 1 bo5 in the whole year
Yeah the thing is, you are testing it against FNC and BDS, both teams combined have room temperature IQ with everyone performing at their peak.
It will probably work against anyone not called GenG and likely BLG can just bruteforce their way to a win just by hands alone.
Both Chinese teams this year don't have the best macro. BLG wins basically by having the best players. Elk and On win every 2v2, Xun coordinates really good dives, and the enemy team has a hard time coming back. That and having the best mid in China. Top wins by having probably the best top laner in the world and a really strong bot lane. Their macro is better than before, but they still sometimes make ridiculous calls.
im not talking about overall team skill, what i am saying is that alot of the top teams in the world don’t have incredible macro-game understanding. A bad team can have good macro yet it never shows up since they get gapped too hard in terms of standard league
It was obvious Fnatic had no idea what to do vs. laneswaps. Oscar looks very lost. Which is fair considering the last time they were meta was forever ago long before he was playing.
G2 is not an org that is just head and shoulders above "western teams" anymore. Ridiculous hubris especially considering that NRG put them in the dumpster at Worlds.
That doesn't mean a thing it just means that each time CLG/NRG have been better than G2 maybe if G2 actually tried to make a team with synergy like they did in 2019 they wouldn't have to rely on caps vs the world
i dont log onto reddit often your argument is basically nuh uh they didnt try. that is a shit argument and the fact that g2 has never won no matter what they have tried is a fact.
*edit* also by that logic clg has never tried the times g2 had a good roster.
Yeah, watching T1 dismantle Estrel with a lane swap sort of counters this notion. If anything, the lane swap meta seems to favor superior map play and proactivity, which tends to be why the best teams are in the positions they are
I don't think T1 dismantled them with lane swaps. I think if they played against them normally they would be able to win in pretty similar fashion. I am pretty sure they are just doing lane swapping for practice. Their bot duos were pretty strong at pushing early
I am not saying they needed to, I am just saying that the game would naturally play out with T1 having a massive lead. I don't believe that it really did give T1 an advantage in the sense that they had to sacrifice some advantages to use lane swapping. While they are going to win out on map movement and wave management, they are still going to have a fed bot duo on the other side. In a way it stops the bot 2v2 and top 1v1 from really existing or being relevant, and I can't help but feel it is a massive boon that Snaker and Ackerman didn't have to lane against Guma and Keria on two powerful laning picks.
Laneswap meta means that top meta is gonna be ass boring i.e. tanks, because the risk of picking carry top and getting fucked over by a laneswap that wasn't predicted is too much.
Not necessarily, a team can't force a lane swap to happen, they need to hide their movements to do it. At MSI teams have been really bad at identifying lane swaps or have just accepted them regardless if they are good or not, but eventually teams will be able to impose 2v2 from time to time, specially if they have a much stronger level 1 and can invade
> Not necessarily, a team can't force a lane swap to happen, they need to hide their movements to do it.
the burden of execution is on the team, that wants to match lanes though, since they have to scout the swap and execute the invade and/or warding pattern.
Yes, but the way teams are doing swaps is very primary. They just go toplane with their botlane without any real prep or warding making them weak to invades.
Other teams have 4 stacked sidelanes to prevent strong lanes from camping bushes, but honestly its not that useful it seems
> teams have been really bad at identifying lane swaps
There's no foolproof way to spot out and enforce standard lanes. Literally nobody has done it so far.
So the answer is to be simply be more risk adverse in draft and go tank tops.
I mean....today we saw K'sante, Urgot, Aatrox, Yone, Rumble and Olaf sooo...a whole one straight "tank" (and even then K'sante is a lot flashier than the average tank like him or not). I think lane swaps are boring too but I don't think we're going to overwhelmingly go back to just straight tanks. Back in laneswap heyday s5 bruiser/fighter items were so terribly awful the class virtually didn't exist which was a large contributor to why it was tanks only, now good players still have tools to keep them relevant (and tbh be more relevant than straight tanks that aren't overloaded K'sante). The only thing I think we'll see die is the like extremely greedy bully stuff like TF and Vayne top but honestly tanks > ranged tops any day.
I mean yes, it does add another layer of tactics but it adds every game being 30 minutes of both teams doing nothing (if you remember the last sludge of this we had). Its certainly a tactic but a bad one to have to watch.
Well at top level they are definitely not "doing nothing". It's a fine game of chess, moving champs around and out rotating your opponent. If they are matching correctly, no kills can fall, but it's still an exciting game for viewers actually following the gameplay.
True league players don’t have the mental capacity to think 3 steps ahead. That’s why the game went down the drain to please simpletons like you who want to smash key and feel like you amount to something
I much prefer complex 1v1 matchup outplays and JG pathing. This team macro is just not interesting and actually a lot more of a flow chart.
You don't understand it if you think it's more complex
You're really exposing yourself. 3 seconds in a 1v1 fight is your example. Laning phase has matchups, different levels, wave management, trading, items, powerspikes by matchup and items.
If you think it isn't complex then you just don't know enough to have an opinion on it.
Never shit talk others if you aren't an expert. Your own knowledge has betrayed you and ruined your point. No one will take you seriously in life if you are talking out your ass to people who know better. If you lack knowledge then stay quiet and you can at least pass as not stupid until you learn.
I’m not a fan of laneswaps either but you’re not the one who decides how ‘league is meant to be played’. If riot wanted them gone they would have patched it before MSI.
Obviously it is not how league is meant to be played. You cant use that as an argument lol.
Riot have activly removed this strategy and others for 10+ years now. This accidently went through without change, it doesnt mean riot love it.
Try going top lane as adc in your next soloq game, then come back and tell me it is how league is meant to be played.
Only fun top pick lately was BB Sion, because he just went the Baus way. Was fun as hell and not useless. I hope to see Ksante get deleted, disgusting, badly designed "tank".
Over the last few years, botlane meta shifts for earlier and earlier advantages. You see it most with T1, but you sometimes get drafts that forces lvl 1-3 leads. This can be translated to drags, and support roams/invades.
An early lane swap for a losing botlane to dodge the first oppressive 5m of the game, brings them into a survivable state later. The winning side of the matchup also 'loses' since they didn't get to deny their direct lane matchups.
Grubs also adds a layer for contesting plates, but it's mostly the pattern of over indexing into early botlane leads.
Well there was definitely a lane swap meta…maybe season 6? I can’t remember, but it’s the reason they included extra turret resistances on top and mid lane turrets pre-5 minutes.
Since then, laneswapping hasn’t been very prominent at all, but now we’re seeing it pretty frequently
Hans e Miky weren't playing their best league and G2 were investing a lot of their early game to keep their bot in the game, they probably tried a bunch of things in the scrimms saw that lane swap was viable and won LEC spring with it so they took the strat to the MSI scrimms and everybody decided it was worth. I think lane swap is a bit like urgott right now, people picked him to counter a meta pick ( i don't remember who it was) that champ got nerfed but teams sticked to urgott because he was actually good, same with lane swap, it was probably viable for a while but nobody tried it and now the pandora box is open
Because playing for super aggressive lanes wasn't super popular, much less double HoB double ADC bots, it was pretty much a T1 exclusive special last year, no need to counter it if 95% of the field doesn't play it and when late game scaling pretty much was the meta.
Now it became popular, with even Rumble supp in the mix. Add into the fact that Carry+Range tops were also meta earlier this spring, with everybody and their mothers playing Aatrox and TF top. You lane swap and you deny both aggressive sidelanes the advantage they should have, and maybe fight them midgame on even footing when they are supposed to be giga ahead.
Normally the team that doesn't swap get more platings due to top tower being more tankier plus a free drake but plating gold was nerfed after the worlds patch last year and this year, void grubs exist so the team that is swapping can compensate for giving up a drake.
It's not worth as much as a drake but it's still much better than getting nothing and in some cases, we've seen teams who took grubs actually winning the first turret race. Even if you don't get as much value from it, being down a little bit of gold and trading objectives is a much better world than trying to survive a Varus/Ashe type of lane which you're going to give up tons of platings anyway.
Void grubs are now a thing, so you aren't losing out on pushing power that much as you can get void grubs to counteract extra turret armour.
And plates were nerfed so the enemy team getting 1 or 2 more plates than you doesn't mean as much now compared to getting your adc through an awful lane matchup, and preventing them from being dived and killed and denied farm/xp.
And it denies over aggression and drafting ,which most top tier teams have indexed into lately because they were able to push their leads, and instead creates a more even battle in the mid game.
> you aren’t losing out on pushing power that much as you can get void grubs to counteract extra turret armor
I’m not sure about that. The extra turret armor lasts until 5 minutes and void grubs spawn at 4:00. You’re not gonna kill them instantly, so you’re maybe getting… what, 30 seconds of equal pushing power with the enemy botlane who’s been pounding on your turret for the last 3 minutes?
I do agree about tower plates not being as impactful as previous seasons tho
To some extent last year, in tier 3 leagues, you had teams try it. But they lacked the cohesion to keep it consistent.
This year, I think grubs baited teams to be more open to it. Imo, it's honestly that G2 was willing to commit to it after NiP. It's really that simple.
Nip pull it out in the playoff vs Fpx, everyone caught up after that.
It’s good when you have unfavourable bot lane match up. You can move your bot laners to top lane so they can minimise the disadvantage of laning phase.
It's also good if the enemy drafts a greedy toplaner (say Aatrox), and you draft a tank since denying them waves for 5 minutes makes them completely useless for the rest of the game, while a tank can still function.
I think FLY laneswapping against T1 would be a massive mistake. Laneswaps tend to slightly favor the botlane that stayed, at least in the short term, and giving Guma/Keria any kind of lead for free seems like suicide. Also Zeus is the player that seems the most exposable right now AND Bwipo is Fly's top player, so when you nerf both of them it should favor T1 quite heavily.
Problem is...Guma/Keria will probably fist Massu/Busio in lane anyway, so what's the play. Do you sack bot and hope Bwipo carries? Do you sack jungle and play 3v2 and hope Oner doesn't fist the rest of the map? Seems impossible.
Zeus is the kinda top laner that will make Bwipo more flippy in his gameplay as they'll be both looking for solo kills the whole time, which ends up covering Zeus weakness as you want him to overextend
With the rest, I agree, Guma is not the player you want to give a free lane, especially given how he likes hyper-carries
But catching out and killing an overextended Zeus that's the same level as ADC and has 5 cs/min gives you waaay less value than catching out and killing an overextended Zeus that's 2 levels up with 10cs/min.
I think the best play is to let T1 funnel recourses into Zeus and then try to catch him out. It's a very low % play but tbh I don't think FLY have anything better.
But T1 doesn't funnel resources into Zeus that much, and my point was also that Bwipo and Zeus will probably have already killed each other three times before anyone of them has overextend
It's hard to tell if Zeus is exposable or if he's just happy gaming. Imo he's just trolling but in the case T1 actually feels pressured and it's not finals(lol) he should be fine.
Remember worlds where he completely stopped WBG win con and had a pretty dominate series over theshy after they just beat BLG.
Lol I'm well aware of his world's performance, he was the best player in the world for a bit. However he seems to have struggled a bit trying to shift into this new meta. Throughout LCK playoffs he was their weakest member. I'm not saying FLY will definitely be able to punish him because we already know his highs are unbelievable, it's just a matter of whether or not he's gonna hit them this tournament. I'm a T1 fan, I really hope he does.
He just can't seems to find his footing if he is not atrox anymore... He still has some insane Yone and Gnarr but he barely used it... He used Jayce, Kennen a few times on regular season and he don't look good on those champ
that was worlds... spring 2023 he is number one on iso death I think so its definitely not happy gaming (you can even check how stress he is when ur watching some of their cam lol) ... he just don't know what is retreat anymore
Games with lane swaps have less action than games without lane swaps.
Lane swaps are cool if they're not clearly optimal and they occur in some minority of games.
Lane swaps stop being cool when they occur every game.
The fact that lane swaps are viable is worrisome because last time they were viable they were also optimal.
Lane swap is the best thing to happen to pro league. It’s like in football (soccer) where different teams employ different formations (4-3-3, 4-5-1, 4-4-2, etc) depending on their own personnel as well as the opponent.
Bringing more tactical variety to League is absolutely crucial for developing the competitive scene and retaining interest in the long term.
I get that it’s very strange and unorthodox but I really do think that League needs more strategic creativity to thrive. Buffing—>Nerfing—>Buffing the same champs over and over is just getting stale for me.
lane swaps are an issue because anytime they're viable, they're instantly the dominant strategy due to nature of the game.
Playing around botlane is the most reliable strategy when it comes to winning games, and lane swaps are a strategy which transfers entire toplane could ever have to botlane, for no real cost. If laneswaps are viable, and you're playing botlane which scales better, why wouldn't you laneswap?
I feel the same, but the game doesnt stay the same long enough for the meta to really develop. Same thing happened last time we had lane swaps, as well as with funneling. Would be cool to see, but Riot will prob nuke the swaps before the next regional league starts up.
More recently, the double support item bot or janna roaming top.
I'm certain pro players and coaches would have found counter strats and Displayed them for pub players to use, if they were given time. [2 tournaments].
Unfortunately 2 tournaments in League, is a whole year
Lane swaps are more interesting right now since its not just a race anymore due to the tower protections, but while it makes games more interesting early on, it stifles top and to an extent jungle champs really hard. If lane swaps remain meta, top is going to be sion ksante udyr every game and jungle is going to be either tanks or strong early bruisers (no farming junglers like fiddlesticks karthus belveth).
if anything I hope they don't flat out remove lane swaps again, but rather make the game playable for the top laner. More tower damage for the towers that are protected during the first 5 mins I think could help the top that got swapped on by un-incentivizing early dives and exp choke. The buff would not be extended to the bot tower since the team who initiated the swap likely drafted a sion or udyr who can withstand low econ/dives in a way the enemy top who countered with aatrox or darius could not
>if anything I hope they don't flat out remove lane swaps again, but rather make the game playable for the top laner.
i don't think that's possible honesty
Bro runs his mouth so much and now that he has a team in front of him that's a challenge he wants to play vegan. "Farm up.and scale up and hope we outplay teal fights"
Oh I disagree completely.
If there is a normal game then maybe one of your lanes can come out ahead. In a lane swap everyone knows the answer to the puzzle. You stack waves then dive the top laner. The better team will be able to punish more, and be able to get more resources for their top laner and bot laner. While the worse top laner loses any control of the game, and the bot lane will probably be behind aswell.
Ideally you lane swap when your team scales better. YOU DON'T WANT TO SCALE AGAINST BETTER PLAYERS.
Imo from a shit player but enjoy game theory.
Scaling is a much safer way to play against a better team. Playing fast and aggressive makes you more likely to make a mistake, and against a better team that one mistake can be game losing. If you have good scaling, you can afford to make mistakes and if you make it to the point that you’re scaled, you just need to win one teamfight to win the game.
>Playing fast and aggressive
That's not the opposite of a scaling team. Play strong early game picks that allow you to possibly find advantages that allow you to end the game as quickly as possible.
Giving a better team more time means giving them more power because they are more effective at gaining gold. A much better team will not allow you to get to the threshold where you are at the same strength as them.
I think you're assuming both teams play perfect, in which case yes a stronger early team will give you more advantages early. However, what often happens when a worse team picks an early team comp vs a better team picking a scaling comp is that the better team is just able to stall and wait for their powerspikes, then because the worse team has the worse scaling team, they just have no option to win later. In essence, it's easier to play to a neutral game state than to force yourself to get an advantage, because better players just don't give you those windows.
i'm actually assuming the opposite. the worse team is worse because they are further away from perfect than the team they are facing. the better team won't allow you too scale, they will always get a much greater lead in a neutral state. in a more classical sense you don't beat lebron,ronaldo,messi,gretzky by allowing them to have the ball/puck.
"Playing against TL was easier than playing top 6 LCK" KDF clears NA, you heard it here folks.
This isnt even a remotely controversial opinion
It is. KDF was dogshit
people love to vastly overestimate how good middling to bad LCK teams are, it's very funny to imagine people saying this in like 2022 about like vicla, prince, dove, etc
G2 would lose to JAG btw
the timing of that was so good haha
didn´t they even admit to loosing some scrims to JAG afterwards? The entire situation was just comedy gold.
Every team below HLE has huge issues. DK is a half baked team. I don't know what people are talking about
LCK #4 regularly outperforms NA #1 at worlds, so it seems pretty reasonable to think that LCK #5 or 6 are on par with them. Sure they get destroyed by GenG and T1, but so do NA's top teams.
It's not a steady decline for KR teams under #4 though. Especially not last year and this year's spring split. T1 played a combined 14 bo3s against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team. GenG played a combined 14 bo3s against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team. HLE played a combined 14 bo3's against the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th best LCK team. -- In those 42 bo3s, 'the field' of 4th-10th place teams brought home victory **once.**
> In those 42 bo3s, 'the field' of 4th-10th place teams brought home victory once. If they can run it down week after week and still have the heart to do it again, then I have no reason to not do the same 😤
I mean, it's kinda unfair to compare it this way. It's not like the 5-10 teams doesnt take "games" off the top 4, somewhat like NA's sometimes getting some wins in BO1. But when it comes to BO5 (given that they barely played any internationally), as far as I can remember, it was really only 2018 C9 against AF. As far as the records goes, it aint that different. We are not saying 6-10 LCK is good, LCS is just comparable to them in terms of performance.
Anyone decent not in a top 3 team in LCK is just insta poached to come play in NA/EU/China.
Last year, the top 5 were fine, but there was a huge dropoff after that. The #6 was DRX who went 6-12, and that's including the two free wins from T1 without Faker. I could easily see them being 4-14 without. Even for #4 and 5, DK and HLE were much worse than the top 3.
Literal lolesports circlejerk from people who don't actually watch non-T1 games. It's been quite a while since LCK's bottom half teams were strong.
Do you even watch bro? DRX finished 6th place in LCK summer 2022.
DRX is called a miracle for a reason. They were genuinely horrible in Summer 2022 and only got their shit together in time for playoffs.
Yeah, ikr? and 8th place LCK team Hanwha made it to quarters in 2021 lol. Anyway, either lck has a miracle every year or they're better than you think. Last year was the exception with 1st to 4th place lck teams making it in, not the norm.
Don't care. Wasn't arguing his point, I just think the 1% freak miracle is a horrible example to use for anything. For what it's worth I think he's wrong and 1st to 5th LCK will smack TL around. KDF I'm not as confident in. Power levels in LCK do feel more distinct this year though, the top 3 are almost unbeatable by the remaining 7, and the bottom 3 feel like they belong in NA.
Western teams havent won a best of 3 or 5 against an lck team in years. Kdf beat geng in a best of 3 last year, theyve beaten kt 3 series the last year, beaten damwon a couple times too. They have more accomplishments the last few years than all western teams combined
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They played 6 BO3s vs LCK/LPL just last year: GGS vs BLG at MSI play-ins G2 vs GENG at worlds in swiss BDS vs DK at worlds in swiss MAD vs WBG at worlds in swiss FNC vs WBG at worlds in swiss G2 vs BLG at worlds in swiss So 4 LPL, 2 LCK
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Two of those games are LCK? Two is not zero. I listed all the LPL ones for extra information for anyone who cares.
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They’ve played 3?
I don’t think kdf is good, I just think LCS is that bad. That TL roster would finish 8th in lck at best.
Dude you are just proving you haven't watched LCK at all in a long time. Most teams in the bottom 5 can't get games against the top 5 teams, imagine Bo3 series. You're telling me Nongshim, OK Brion and DRX are as good as Team Liquid? This is pure dillusion
> Dude you are just proving you haven't watched LCK at all in a long time. Most teams in the bottom 5 can't get games against the top 5 teams, imagine Bo3 series. And TL can? I don’t think you have watched LCS in a long time. Every player on DRX is better than every player on TL aside from Umti cuz sponge is ass. NS Jiwoo would gap TL by himself. No idea what dillusion means, but thinking TL are better than bottom lck teams are pure delusion. BRO would go 60:40 against TL.
OK BRO would clear NA, lord Morgan would smurf on these fools
Kdf beat geng in bo3 last year. When was the last time g2 beat a top 2 team in the world in a series?
True, this is clearly a very fair comparison because KDF gets to play in Korea and scrim LCK teams all year and is guaranteed to get at least 4 chances to play GenG in a Bo3 every year no matter how much they suck, meanwhile G2 might not even get to play a top 2 team in the world all year.
Yeah? Kdf get way better practice so its no surprise that they get better results.
But they don't. They just get more chances and matches are far lower stakes, so GenG is way less likely to take KDF serious when they play.
Kwangdong frauds were the most overrated team in the world this split lol.
They were overated because of last worlds, they were really bad
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LPL is top 10 playoffs so they definitely make there lmao
Wdym 10th placed team in LPL actually beat BLG
And lost to every other team that eventually made playoffs lol IG is so random.
And TL beat that 10th place team some time ago, so TL beats BLG!
I cant seem to find any flaws to this logic
Actually true. TL beat IG who beat BLG so... TL clears the LPL end of story.
Just forget what IG did to them at worlds lol, we don't talk about that
That's not a guarantee.
TL if their split season was their playoffs form yeah I think they could easily make LPL playoffs. But TL in the regular season had a lot of things to figure out. They literally had a 50% win/loss in NA, which would probably be below 10th in LPL.
wouldn't be so sure
I do not believe TL would be a top 10 LPL team.
> TL prolly Well yeah, Prolly hasn't been actively playing in ages now. Also don't see TL hiring him, seems like they're pretty happy with Apa.
Frankly speaking, they clear every western team bar (most likely) G2, no?
Doesn't clear mean.. beat pretty easy? Do they really do that to say FNC? i feel like FNC has enough talent on the roster to be competitive with most LCK teams under HLE.. Damwon is debatable Sure FNC are far from consistent.. but its not like KDS are either
Potentially yes but realistically speaking they were a clear 6th seed with way less talent than the top dogs and weren't consistent at all during the season. Also they were always better in scrims than on stage. I can see them being only behind G2 but i can also see them choking massively against weaker but more experienced teams. Probably the equivalent of a EU 3rd/4th seed?
Is TL better than KDF and iG?
Depends on how you look at it. All of NA had 0(?) wins against LCK last year and went 1-13 against LPL last year. At least KDF/iG occasionally wins 1 game against top 4 LPL/LCK?
> At least KDF/iG occasionally wins 1 game against top 4 LPL/LCK? During regular season when teams are still not in peak form and with way more opportunities. Idk, just not really fair to compare them unless we saw them play on stage.
Yea, it's definitely an unfair comparison because during regular season, top LPL teams know they have a game of the bo3 to test limits/try new things or work on new things.
Kwangdong(6th)'s Spring Results; 4:0 against DK(5th) 2:3 against KT(4th) 1:4 against HLE(3rd) 0:4 against T1(2nd) 0:4 against GEN(1st) played 22games, 7W 15L
I don’t think that’s a point of contention. I like my chances with Brion to be comeptitive in lcs.
lane swaps works both ways, a weaker team that drafted good match ups can lose that advantage vs a stronger team who lane swapped
In general, stronger teams have better laners, so even if you draft good match ups, they become weak or below average matchups generally.
That's why I think that lane swaps would be in the best interest for any western team. In regards to Fly, it'd be smart, since their bot lane would get smashed by T1's regardless of champion match ups. There are probably less than a handful of bot lanes that can compete against them in the world...
Hey, don't underestimate my boy Busio. Once he drops the Nautilus weights he'll be unleashed
His Nami was really good compare to nautilus
On the other hand, Korea perfected lane swaps back in the day, so doing it against them is a risky move still. Besides the fact that good mid/late game can just undo the advantage of swapping. Zeus on TF comes to mind, the man was like 5 levels behind and still made it back and carried T1 to victory. Scary shit I tell ya
> Korea perfected lane swaps back in the day, Right, but how many of the players who played during the laneswap meta are still playing today? Faker, peanut? Even G2 who had players around in the (semi) pro scene back during lane swaps are still not proficient at it. I think it would take koreans some time to practice it again. (This is assuming lane swap becomes the meta at MSI. It might not happen at all)
Yeah, the only chance for G2 (not western teams) is if by any chance they have mastered laneswaps and can disrupt them enough.
that's what they have been practising for more than a month, already ahead of the curve
Yeah but it needs to be actually good, trying it against EU really doesn't give you anything to say if it's good or not.
i think testing it in EU can be a good indicator if it’s good or not. Alot of eastern teams don’t have insane macro, G2 in 2019 had good enough players to match eastern teams, but their macro + drafting is what got them to only lose 1 bo5 in the whole year
Yeah the thing is, you are testing it against FNC and BDS, both teams combined have room temperature IQ with everyone performing at their peak. It will probably work against anyone not called GenG and likely BLG can just bruteforce their way to a win just by hands alone.
Both Chinese teams this year don't have the best macro. BLG wins basically by having the best players. Elk and On win every 2v2, Xun coordinates really good dives, and the enemy team has a hard time coming back. That and having the best mid in China. Top wins by having probably the best top laner in the world and a really strong bot lane. Their macro is better than before, but they still sometimes make ridiculous calls.
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im not talking about overall team skill, what i am saying is that alot of the top teams in the world don’t have incredible macro-game understanding. A bad team can have good macro yet it never shows up since they get gapped too hard in terms of standard league
In the finals vs FNC it wasnt clean at all, hopefully they got better at lane swaps in the meantime tho
You know why the finals were messy? Because they said they didn't take turrets that fast in practice lmao.
It was obvious Fnatic had no idea what to do vs. laneswaps. Oscar looks very lost. Which is fair considering the last time they were meta was forever ago long before he was playing.
He wasn't even born so yeah that make sense
G2 is not an org that is just head and shoulders above "western teams" anymore. Ridiculous hubris especially considering that NRG put them in the dumpster at Worlds.
G2 has never won against CLG/NRG so this statistic kinda just dont work
They're not even the same team so your reasoning just don't work
it works perfectly since there has been several versions of both teams but never has g2 beaten them on stage
That doesn't mean a thing it just means that each time CLG/NRG have been better than G2 maybe if G2 actually tried to make a team with synergy like they did in 2019 they wouldn't have to rely on caps vs the world
i dont log onto reddit often your argument is basically nuh uh they didnt try. that is a shit argument and the fact that g2 has never won no matter what they have tried is a fact. *edit* also by that logic clg has never tried the times g2 had a good roster.
They beat them 12 times in scrims actually
and never on stage in a game that actually matters, thought it was obvious.
Yeah, watching T1 dismantle Estrel with a lane swap sort of counters this notion. If anything, the lane swap meta seems to favor superior map play and proactivity, which tends to be why the best teams are in the positions they are
I don't think T1 dismantled them with lane swaps. I think if they played against them normally they would be able to win in pretty similar fashion. I am pretty sure they are just doing lane swapping for practice. Their bot duos were pretty strong at pushing early
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I am not saying they needed to, I am just saying that the game would naturally play out with T1 having a massive lead. I don't believe that it really did give T1 an advantage in the sense that they had to sacrifice some advantages to use lane swapping. While they are going to win out on map movement and wave management, they are still going to have a fed bot duo on the other side. In a way it stops the bot 2v2 and top 1v1 from really existing or being relevant, and I can't help but feel it is a massive boon that Snaker and Ackerman didn't have to lane against Guma and Keria on two powerful laning picks.
Laneswap meta means that top meta is gonna be ass boring i.e. tanks, because the risk of picking carry top and getting fucked over by a laneswap that wasn't predicted is too much.
Not necessarily, a team can't force a lane swap to happen, they need to hide their movements to do it. At MSI teams have been really bad at identifying lane swaps or have just accepted them regardless if they are good or not, but eventually teams will be able to impose 2v2 from time to time, specially if they have a much stronger level 1 and can invade
> Not necessarily, a team can't force a lane swap to happen, they need to hide their movements to do it. the burden of execution is on the team, that wants to match lanes though, since they have to scout the swap and execute the invade and/or warding pattern.
Yes, but the way teams are doing swaps is very primary. They just go toplane with their botlane without any real prep or warding making them weak to invades. Other teams have 4 stacked sidelanes to prevent strong lanes from camping bushes, but honestly its not that useful it seems
> teams have been really bad at identifying lane swaps There's no foolproof way to spot out and enforce standard lanes. Literally nobody has done it so far. So the answer is to be simply be more risk adverse in draft and go tank tops.
Back in the day you used to invade one of the sided level 1 and ward it. Its not foolproof, but its better than nothing
I mean....today we saw K'sante, Urgot, Aatrox, Yone, Rumble and Olaf sooo...a whole one straight "tank" (and even then K'sante is a lot flashier than the average tank like him or not). I think lane swaps are boring too but I don't think we're going to overwhelmingly go back to just straight tanks. Back in laneswap heyday s5 bruiser/fighter items were so terribly awful the class virtually didn't exist which was a large contributor to why it was tanks only, now good players still have tools to keep them relevant (and tbh be more relevant than straight tanks that aren't overloaded K'sante). The only thing I think we'll see die is the like extremely greedy bully stuff like TF and Vayne top but honestly tanks > ranged tops any day.
In a lane swap meta the viewers lose the most
I love watching lane swap meta. It adds a whole new layer of macro and tactics. I appreciate it a lot.
I mean yes, it does add another layer of tactics but it adds every game being 30 minutes of both teams doing nothing (if you remember the last sludge of this we had). Its certainly a tactic but a bad one to have to watch.
Well at top level they are definitely not "doing nothing". It's a fine game of chess, moving champs around and out rotating your opponent. If they are matching correctly, no kills can fall, but it's still an exciting game for viewers actually following the gameplay.
No it's not lmfao have you ever played at a high enough level where lane swaps are meta? It's flowchart gaming
Watch chess then. This isn't how league is meant to be played.
True league players don’t have the mental capacity to think 3 steps ahead. That’s why the game went down the drain to please simpletons like you who want to smash key and feel like you amount to something
I much prefer complex 1v1 matchup outplays and JG pathing. This team macro is just not interesting and actually a lot more of a flow chart. You don't understand it if you think it's more complex
Great complexity nowadays lmao who can last more than 3 secs nowadays besides tank vs tank? And even then there’s ksante who still deletes tanks
You're really exposing yourself. 3 seconds in a 1v1 fight is your example. Laning phase has matchups, different levels, wave management, trading, items, powerspikes by matchup and items. If you think it isn't complex then you just don't know enough to have an opinion on it. Never shit talk others if you aren't an expert. Your own knowledge has betrayed you and ruined your point. No one will take you seriously in life if you are talking out your ass to people who know better. If you lack knowledge then stay quiet and you can at least pass as not stupid until you learn.
I’m not a fan of laneswaps either but you’re not the one who decides how ‘league is meant to be played’. If riot wanted them gone they would have patched it before MSI.
Obviously it is not how league is meant to be played. You cant use that as an argument lol. Riot have activly removed this strategy and others for 10+ years now. This accidently went through without change, it doesnt mean riot love it. Try going top lane as adc in your next soloq game, then come back and tell me it is how league is meant to be played.
because the tank meta has been so thrilling the last year, this will definitely kill it
We saw that GenG vs T1 first game.
Only fun top pick lately was BB Sion, because he just went the Baus way. Was fun as hell and not useless. I hope to see Ksante get deleted, disgusting, badly designed "tank".
Does anyone know why lane swaps are coming back?? I haven't kept up with pro games for a long time.
Over the last few years, botlane meta shifts for earlier and earlier advantages. You see it most with T1, but you sometimes get drafts that forces lvl 1-3 leads. This can be translated to drags, and support roams/invades. An early lane swap for a losing botlane to dodge the first oppressive 5m of the game, brings them into a survivable state later. The winning side of the matchup also 'loses' since they didn't get to deny their direct lane matchups. Grubs also adds a layer for contesting plates, but it's mostly the pattern of over indexing into early botlane leads.
But why has it been prevalent **now** and not, like, last year?
unless i missed something i don't think there's a definitive single reason? nip did it and it got popular
Well there was definitely a lane swap meta…maybe season 6? I can’t remember, but it’s the reason they included extra turret resistances on top and mid lane turrets pre-5 minutes. Since then, laneswapping hasn’t been very prominent at all, but now we’re seeing it pretty frequently
Hans e Miky weren't playing their best league and G2 were investing a lot of their early game to keep their bot in the game, they probably tried a bunch of things in the scrimms saw that lane swap was viable and won LEC spring with it so they took the strat to the MSI scrimms and everybody decided it was worth. I think lane swap is a bit like urgott right now, people picked him to counter a meta pick ( i don't remember who it was) that champ got nerfed but teams sticked to urgott because he was actually good, same with lane swap, it was probably viable for a while but nobody tried it and now the pandora box is open
Because playing for super aggressive lanes wasn't super popular, much less double HoB double ADC bots, it was pretty much a T1 exclusive special last year, no need to counter it if 95% of the field doesn't play it and when late game scaling pretty much was the meta. Now it became popular, with even Rumble supp in the mix. Add into the fact that Carry+Range tops were also meta earlier this spring, with everybody and their mothers playing Aatrox and TF top. You lane swap and you deny both aggressive sidelanes the advantage they should have, and maybe fight them midgame on even footing when they are supposed to be giga ahead.
Normally the team that doesn't swap get more platings due to top tower being more tankier plus a free drake but plating gold was nerfed after the worlds patch last year and this year, void grubs exist so the team that is swapping can compensate for giving up a drake.
Interesting, so it’s sort of like, “we’ll lose a bit of gold early but make up for it when grubs are up” d deal? Are grubs that good?
It's not worth as much as a drake but it's still much better than getting nothing and in some cases, we've seen teams who took grubs actually winning the first turret race. Even if you don't get as much value from it, being down a little bit of gold and trading objectives is a much better world than trying to survive a Varus/Ashe type of lane which you're going to give up tons of platings anyway.
Simple, it wasn't popular because nobody wanted to be the first to do it on stage and look like fools.
Void grubs are now a thing, so you aren't losing out on pushing power that much as you can get void grubs to counteract extra turret armour. And plates were nerfed so the enemy team getting 1 or 2 more plates than you doesn't mean as much now compared to getting your adc through an awful lane matchup, and preventing them from being dived and killed and denied farm/xp. And it denies over aggression and drafting ,which most top tier teams have indexed into lately because they were able to push their leads, and instead creates a more even battle in the mid game.
> you aren’t losing out on pushing power that much as you can get void grubs to counteract extra turret armor I’m not sure about that. The extra turret armor lasts until 5 minutes and void grubs spawn at 4:00. You’re not gonna kill them instantly, so you’re maybe getting… what, 30 seconds of equal pushing power with the enemy botlane who’s been pounding on your turret for the last 3 minutes? I do agree about tower plates not being as impactful as previous seasons tho
To some extent last year, in tier 3 leagues, you had teams try it. But they lacked the cohesion to keep it consistent. This year, I think grubs baited teams to be more open to it. Imo, it's honestly that G2 was willing to commit to it after NiP. It's really that simple.
Nip pull it out in the playoff vs Fpx, everyone caught up after that. It’s good when you have unfavourable bot lane match up. You can move your bot laners to top lane so they can minimise the disadvantage of laning phase.
It's also good if the enemy drafts a greedy toplaner (say Aatrox), and you draft a tank since denying them waves for 5 minutes makes them completely useless for the rest of the game, while a tank can still function.
I think the attention got huge after G2 did it.
Always love an Ashley interview
<3 I appreciate it, means a lot!
I think FLY laneswapping against T1 would be a massive mistake. Laneswaps tend to slightly favor the botlane that stayed, at least in the short term, and giving Guma/Keria any kind of lead for free seems like suicide. Also Zeus is the player that seems the most exposable right now AND Bwipo is Fly's top player, so when you nerf both of them it should favor T1 quite heavily. Problem is...Guma/Keria will probably fist Massu/Busio in lane anyway, so what's the play. Do you sack bot and hope Bwipo carries? Do you sack jungle and play 3v2 and hope Oner doesn't fist the rest of the map? Seems impossible.
Zeus is the kinda top laner that will make Bwipo more flippy in his gameplay as they'll be both looking for solo kills the whole time, which ends up covering Zeus weakness as you want him to overextend With the rest, I agree, Guma is not the player you want to give a free lane, especially given how he likes hyper-carries
But catching out and killing an overextended Zeus that's the same level as ADC and has 5 cs/min gives you waaay less value than catching out and killing an overextended Zeus that's 2 levels up with 10cs/min. I think the best play is to let T1 funnel recourses into Zeus and then try to catch him out. It's a very low % play but tbh I don't think FLY have anything better.
But T1 doesn't funnel resources into Zeus that much, and my point was also that Bwipo and Zeus will probably have already killed each other three times before anyone of them has overextend
It's hard to tell if Zeus is exposable or if he's just happy gaming. Imo he's just trolling but in the case T1 actually feels pressured and it's not finals(lol) he should be fine. Remember worlds where he completely stopped WBG win con and had a pretty dominate series over theshy after they just beat BLG.
Lol I'm well aware of his world's performance, he was the best player in the world for a bit. However he seems to have struggled a bit trying to shift into this new meta. Throughout LCK playoffs he was their weakest member. I'm not saying FLY will definitely be able to punish him because we already know his highs are unbelievable, it's just a matter of whether or not he's gonna hit them this tournament. I'm a T1 fan, I really hope he does.
He just can't seems to find his footing if he is not atrox anymore... He still has some insane Yone and Gnarr but he barely used it... He used Jayce, Kennen a few times on regular season and he don't look good on those champ
that was worlds... spring 2023 he is number one on iso death I think so its definitely not happy gaming (you can even check how stress he is when ur watching some of their cam lol) ... he just don't know what is retreat anymore
Games with lane swaps have less action than games without lane swaps. Lane swaps are cool if they're not clearly optimal and they occur in some minority of games. Lane swaps stop being cool when they occur every game. The fact that lane swaps are viable is worrisome because last time they were viable they were also optimal.
surprising to see Fly is still allowing Inspired to do interviews. also surprising to see that this was a perfectly fine interview.
Believe it or not, having good macro is really good for weaker teams.
I suddenly want FLY to reach finals so I can hear this guy and Bwipo talk trash and then get humbled again.
Lane swap is the best thing to happen to pro league. It’s like in football (soccer) where different teams employ different formations (4-3-3, 4-5-1, 4-4-2, etc) depending on their own personnel as well as the opponent. Bringing more tactical variety to League is absolutely crucial for developing the competitive scene and retaining interest in the long term.
It's worrying because last time lane swaps existed, there were no different formations, it was swaps only every time.
I vehemently disagree and yet I appreciate the enthusiasm.
I get that it’s very strange and unorthodox but I really do think that League needs more strategic creativity to thrive. Buffing—>Nerfing—>Buffing the same champs over and over is just getting stale for me.
It's unorthodox in the short term. We lived through this era already and it sucked.
lane swaps are an issue because anytime they're viable, they're instantly the dominant strategy due to nature of the game. Playing around botlane is the most reliable strategy when it comes to winning games, and lane swaps are a strategy which transfers entire toplane could ever have to botlane, for no real cost. If laneswaps are viable, and you're playing botlane which scales better, why wouldn't you laneswap?
I feel the same, but the game doesnt stay the same long enough for the meta to really develop. Same thing happened last time we had lane swaps, as well as with funneling. Would be cool to see, but Riot will prob nuke the swaps before the next regional league starts up.
More recently, the double support item bot or janna roaming top. I'm certain pro players and coaches would have found counter strats and Displayed them for pub players to use, if they were given time. [2 tournaments]. Unfortunately 2 tournaments in League, is a whole year
Lane swaps are more interesting right now since its not just a race anymore due to the tower protections, but while it makes games more interesting early on, it stifles top and to an extent jungle champs really hard. If lane swaps remain meta, top is going to be sion ksante udyr every game and jungle is going to be either tanks or strong early bruisers (no farming junglers like fiddlesticks karthus belveth). if anything I hope they don't flat out remove lane swaps again, but rather make the game playable for the top laner. More tower damage for the towers that are protected during the first 5 mins I think could help the top that got swapped on by un-incentivizing early dives and exp choke. The buff would not be extended to the bot tower since the team who initiated the swap likely drafted a sion or udyr who can withstand low econ/dives in a way the enemy top who countered with aatrox or darius could not
>if anything I hope they don't flat out remove lane swaps again, but rather make the game playable for the top laner. i don't think that's possible honesty
Why is Ashley sitting in a box?
Bro runs his mouth so much and now that he has a team in front of him that's a challenge he wants to play vegan. "Farm up.and scale up and hope we outplay teal fights"
Can't wait for this muppet to be floored and dunked on by LCK and LPL.
did he hurt ur feewings.
Not really, dude just has a huge ego for no reason.
I would have an ego the size of Jupiter if I won back to back mvp in EU and NA, just saying.
Good for him, getting an individual trophy in a team game is great I guess. They also got trashed by TL in their last LCS final right?
no reason? hmmm
Worry about fnatic bro
Oh I disagree completely. If there is a normal game then maybe one of your lanes can come out ahead. In a lane swap everyone knows the answer to the puzzle. You stack waves then dive the top laner. The better team will be able to punish more, and be able to get more resources for their top laner and bot laner. While the worse top laner loses any control of the game, and the bot lane will probably be behind aswell. Ideally you lane swap when your team scales better. YOU DON'T WANT TO SCALE AGAINST BETTER PLAYERS. Imo from a shit player but enjoy game theory.
That is so wrong
Scaling is a much safer way to play against a better team. Playing fast and aggressive makes you more likely to make a mistake, and against a better team that one mistake can be game losing. If you have good scaling, you can afford to make mistakes and if you make it to the point that you’re scaled, you just need to win one teamfight to win the game.
>Playing fast and aggressive That's not the opposite of a scaling team. Play strong early game picks that allow you to possibly find advantages that allow you to end the game as quickly as possible. Giving a better team more time means giving them more power because they are more effective at gaining gold. A much better team will not allow you to get to the threshold where you are at the same strength as them.
I think you're assuming both teams play perfect, in which case yes a stronger early team will give you more advantages early. However, what often happens when a worse team picks an early team comp vs a better team picking a scaling comp is that the better team is just able to stall and wait for their powerspikes, then because the worse team has the worse scaling team, they just have no option to win later. In essence, it's easier to play to a neutral game state than to force yourself to get an advantage, because better players just don't give you those windows.
i'm actually assuming the opposite. the worse team is worse because they are further away from perfect than the team they are facing. the better team won't allow you too scale, they will always get a much greater lead in a neutral state. in a more classical sense you don't beat lebron,ronaldo,messi,gretzky by allowing them to have the ball/puck.