Views: 805 What we learned from Day 1 of Worlds
|
Report
September 15th marked the first day of Worlds, and it was a pretty good showing by all regions. I'm actually much more excited to watch the rest of worlds knowing that this should be a pretty competitive tournament and not just domination by Korean and Chinese teams (although it could turn out to be like that). So what did we learn?
TSM - TSM had a pretty dominant performance against GamingGear.eu but that's to be expected. You're not going to impress anyone by smashing GamingGear. Even with a huge win, I don't think it was as dominant as they need to be. They looked fantastic in the NA playoffs, but with the way they played yesterday I don't think they're strong enough to get out of Group A, especially considering how competitive Group A looks. OMG beat TSM pretty handidly, although it looked like TSM had a chance to get back in the game with OMG seemingly throwing. I will say TSM's team fighting looked nearly as impressive as OMG, and we got all this hype from Doublelift and Montecristo about OMG being some team fighting God of a team, I really didn't see it, nor did I think they were on such a totally different level than TSM.
Fizz is just not Reginald's champion.
SK Telecom 1 - I guess you could say the most surprising thing about SKT1 is that they actually looked mortal, with a slow start against LemonDogs and a loss to OMG. I actually felt like LemonDogs was much more impressive in terms of showing, but they're team comp was what held them back. For all this talk about how Koreans are mechanical Gods, SKT1 didn't necessarily impress by dominating LemonDogs in the laning phase. Even the team fighting points of the game didn't look that dominant. The game was pretty much up for grabs until a Baron fight at 35 minutes in. As far as the OMG game, DDoS pausing OP, no just kidding, I felt like SKT1 just lost out early slightly, and never was able to get back in the game. I would say this was a pretty disappointing day for SKT1, but a bright spot was Faker looked pretty good, maybe not as good as advertised, but still pretty good.
LemonDogs - I don't know if it was a bad day for LemonDogs, but I wouldn't call it a great day. Their game against SKT1 looked pretty good, they should be fairly confident in how they played. However, the picks were just horrendous. Swain?, Malphite? with a Vi? I don't get it. I don't think Swain is a Nukeduck champion, no matter how much he has been practicing it and I don't really understand the Vi pick when you have a mid and top lane with very little burst damage, and mostly sustained damage, especially against elusive champions like Ahri and Elise. Didn't really understand what they were trying to go for, but none-the-less they played well minus a Baron fight that pretty much lost them the gmae. Their second game against GamingGear.eu was, well, it's GamingGear.eu, what can you expect? It was a pretty dominant win, there's really not much to say because LemonDogs is the significantly better team.
OMG - Well I guess that's one way to introduce yourself on day 1. Great start for the Chinese team, I don't think anyone doubted their skill, but people just had other picks before them. Their in Group A which is pretty competitive so I can understand why, but they pretty much controlled the game against SKT1 the entire time, and never really let them back in. They had a really good game against TSM but it got a little sloppy near the end. They weren't the team fight Gods I expected and started to throw a little to TSM, but as I said earlier, TSM's team fight was pretty good. None-the-less I'd be pretty happy with the results. Huge win against SKT1
GamingGear.eu - The results weren't really that surprising, they lost badly to both TSM and LemonDogs. As Jatt said, they main thing they're going to get out of this is tournament experience and to try and take a game off one team. I'd love to do a happy-go-lucky brightspot of the day, but there weren't really any, they got dominated.
Mineski - very similar to GamingGear.eu, but I don't think anyone expected them to be this bad. I mean, my god did they look like a Bronze 5 team. Tgee, their support, had horrendous performances. Granted, Gambit and Fnatic are probably the two strongest teams from Europe, but you have to show up better than Mineski did. I guess at this point when you realize there's like a 99% chance you don't make it out of groups, just try and have fun and pick off a game or two. Play the spoiler, but I don't suspect that happening, I'd be legitimately shocked if Mineski won a game period.
Fnatic - Yikes, not the way you want to start off day 1. Vulcun pretty much smashed Fnatic and they made it look easy doing it. I don't think Fnatic played their A game against Vulcun, but they got so much hype, maybe they're just not that impressive? The win against Mineski was pretty much a given, they came very close to ending in record time, but then threw for the next 10 minutes before recollecting themselves to win. People could take positives out of the Mineski game, but I wouldn't, they were very sloppy at the end and extremely uncoordinated, that should have been a 17-18 minute game that turned into a 25-26 minute game. A win is a win right? No, especially after the loss to Vulcun, Fnatic needed to gain some momentum with a win, I don't think they're going to get it off a poor ending to Mineski. I had said Fnatic was overhyped, but they didn't just looked overhyped, they looked bad.
Vulcun - Vulcun looked good, I mean really really good. They're certainly not out of groups yet, but they have a really good chance. I had said that Vulcun is a darkhorse (probably because Im a fanboy), but I didn't think they would perform THAT well. They dismantled Fnatic and looked really good in a close loss to Ozone. Ozone may be a bit overhyped, but you can't take that away from Vulcun, that's a huge step in the fight direction for them. MandatoryCloud is looking like a monster, I would say I'm not that surprised, but given the amount of success he has had against international teams, I mean he just annihilated xPeke and Dade. Zuna looked surprisingly good as well. I would have said he was among the weakest ADC's going into worlds, but I'm not so sure.
Samsung Galaxy Ozone - That is not how you want to start off day 1. Struggling against Vulcun and then getting crushed by Gambit is not how you want to start your Day 1 of worlds, especially when you're considered a favorite to come out of groups. I'm not so sure they should be a favorite anymore. Dade looked bad, he got crushed by both MandatoryCloud and AlexIch. Looper on the other hand looked pretty good, especially for his first tournament game ever. What a stage to do it on, granted it was with Singed, but still impressive. Everyone really hyped up Imp and Mata, sure they showed up against Vulcun and got huge, but they got destroyed against Voidle and Genja. I was actually surprised how poorly they did against Gambit's bot lane, especially since it's considered a weak point in Gambit. Ozone looking like its on the hot seat, perhaps in for a major collapse, but it's hard to tell off the first two games. They didn't impress anyone with day 1, if they come back the next couple of days and prove they deserve to make it out of groups then we can have a different discussion.
Gambit - I don't really want to waste time talking about the Mineski/Gambit game. I've already talked about how abysmal Mineski is, but that performance against Ozone blew me away. I had written Gambit off, because I thought Voidle wasn't going to be able to synergize with Genja well enough and I felt that they had lost a crucial element to their team when Edward left, but I was dead wrong. Gambit destroyed Ozone, perhaps more than the score or game would indicated. Every lane for gambit won with exception of maybe Darien. Alex Ich put on a clinic against Dade, Diamondprox looked like the best jungler in the world compared to DanDy, and Gambit's bot lane man-handled Imp/Mata from start to finish. Darien didn't win his lane, but he also didn't lose it against singed, which is pretty impressive. But it was more than just the laning phase, the team fighting was incredible. We were told how well Imp plays Vayne, but Genja's positioning was far superior to that of Imp's. Just the way Gambit played in general, it's like they grabbed the balls of the game and just rode with them. It felt like Ozone was out of the game from that first double kill on Alex. They never got back in it, That Russian bootcamp is looking impressive, a team I had written off to not make it out of groups now makes me think they might be the best team in Group B.
Tell me what you think
TSM - TSM had a pretty dominant performance against GamingGear.eu but that's to be expected. You're not going to impress anyone by smashing GamingGear. Even with a huge win, I don't think it was as dominant as they need to be. They looked fantastic in the NA playoffs, but with the way they played yesterday I don't think they're strong enough to get out of Group A, especially considering how competitive Group A looks. OMG beat TSM pretty handidly, although it looked like TSM had a chance to get back in the game with OMG seemingly throwing. I will say TSM's team fighting looked nearly as impressive as OMG, and we got all this hype from Doublelift and Montecristo about OMG being some team fighting God of a team, I really didn't see it, nor did I think they were on such a totally different level than TSM.
Fizz is just not Reginald's champion.SK Telecom 1 - I guess you could say the most surprising thing about SKT1 is that they actually looked mortal, with a slow start against LemonDogs and a loss to OMG. I actually felt like LemonDogs was much more impressive in terms of showing, but they're team comp was what held them back. For all this talk about how Koreans are mechanical Gods, SKT1 didn't necessarily impress by dominating LemonDogs in the laning phase. Even the team fighting points of the game didn't look that dominant. The game was pretty much up for grabs until a Baron fight at 35 minutes in. As far as the OMG game, DDoS pausing OP, no just kidding, I felt like SKT1 just lost out early slightly, and never was able to get back in the game. I would say this was a pretty disappointing day for SKT1, but a bright spot was Faker looked pretty good, maybe not as good as advertised, but still pretty good.
LemonDogs - I don't know if it was a bad day for LemonDogs, but I wouldn't call it a great day. Their game against SKT1 looked pretty good, they should be fairly confident in how they played. However, the picks were just horrendous.
Swain?, Malphite? with a Vi? I don't get it. I don't think Swain is a Nukeduck champion, no matter how much he has been practicing it and I don't really understand the Vi pick when you have a mid and top lane with very little burst damage, and mostly sustained damage, especially against elusive champions like Ahri and Elise. Didn't really understand what they were trying to go for, but none-the-less they played well minus a Baron fight that pretty much lost them the gmae. Their second game against GamingGear.eu was, well, it's GamingGear.eu, what can you expect? It was a pretty dominant win, there's really not much to say because LemonDogs is the significantly better team.OMG - Well I guess that's one way to introduce yourself on day 1. Great start for the Chinese team, I don't think anyone doubted their skill, but people just had other picks before them. Their in Group A which is pretty competitive so I can understand why, but they pretty much controlled the game against SKT1 the entire time, and never really let them back in. They had a really good game against TSM but it got a little sloppy near the end. They weren't the team fight Gods I expected and started to throw a little to TSM, but as I said earlier, TSM's team fight was pretty good. None-the-less I'd be pretty happy with the results. Huge win against SKT1
GamingGear.eu - The results weren't really that surprising, they lost badly to both TSM and LemonDogs. As Jatt said, they main thing they're going to get out of this is tournament experience and to try and take a game off one team. I'd love to do a happy-go-lucky brightspot of the day, but there weren't really any, they got dominated.
Mineski - very similar to GamingGear.eu, but I don't think anyone expected them to be this bad. I mean, my god did they look like a Bronze 5 team. Tgee, their support, had horrendous performances. Granted, Gambit and Fnatic are probably the two strongest teams from Europe, but you have to show up better than Mineski did. I guess at this point when you realize there's like a 99% chance you don't make it out of groups, just try and have fun and pick off a game or two. Play the spoiler, but I don't suspect that happening, I'd be legitimately shocked if Mineski won a game period.
Fnatic - Yikes, not the way you want to start off day 1. Vulcun pretty much smashed Fnatic and they made it look easy doing it. I don't think Fnatic played their A game against Vulcun, but they got so much hype, maybe they're just not that impressive? The win against Mineski was pretty much a given, they came very close to ending in record time, but then threw for the next 10 minutes before recollecting themselves to win. People could take positives out of the Mineski game, but I wouldn't, they were very sloppy at the end and extremely uncoordinated, that should have been a 17-18 minute game that turned into a 25-26 minute game. A win is a win right? No, especially after the loss to Vulcun, Fnatic needed to gain some momentum with a win, I don't think they're going to get it off a poor ending to Mineski. I had said Fnatic was overhyped, but they didn't just looked overhyped, they looked bad.
Vulcun - Vulcun looked good, I mean really really good. They're certainly not out of groups yet, but they have a really good chance. I had said that Vulcun is a darkhorse (probably because Im a fanboy), but I didn't think they would perform THAT well. They dismantled Fnatic and looked really good in a close loss to Ozone. Ozone may be a bit overhyped, but you can't take that away from Vulcun, that's a huge step in the fight direction for them. MandatoryCloud is looking like a monster, I would say I'm not that surprised, but given the amount of success he has had against international teams, I mean he just annihilated xPeke and Dade. Zuna looked surprisingly good as well. I would have said he was among the weakest ADC's going into worlds, but I'm not so sure.
Samsung Galaxy Ozone - That is not how you want to start off day 1. Struggling against Vulcun and then getting crushed by Gambit is not how you want to start your Day 1 of worlds, especially when you're considered a favorite to come out of groups. I'm not so sure they should be a favorite anymore. Dade looked bad, he got crushed by both MandatoryCloud and AlexIch. Looper on the other hand looked pretty good, especially for his first tournament game ever. What a stage to do it on, granted it was with
Singed, but still impressive. Everyone really hyped up Imp and Mata, sure they showed up against Vulcun and got huge, but they got destroyed against Voidle and Genja. I was actually surprised how poorly they did against Gambit's bot lane, especially since it's considered a weak point in Gambit. Ozone looking like its on the hot seat, perhaps in for a major collapse, but it's hard to tell off the first two games. They didn't impress anyone with day 1, if they come back the next couple of days and prove they deserve to make it out of groups then we can have a different discussion.Gambit - I don't really want to waste time talking about the Mineski/Gambit game. I've already talked about how abysmal Mineski is, but that performance against Ozone blew me away. I had written Gambit off, because I thought Voidle wasn't going to be able to synergize with Genja well enough and I felt that they had lost a crucial element to their team when Edward left, but I was dead wrong. Gambit destroyed Ozone, perhaps more than the score or game would indicated. Every lane for gambit won with exception of maybe Darien. Alex Ich put on a clinic against Dade, Diamondprox looked like the best jungler in the world compared to DanDy, and Gambit's bot lane man-handled Imp/Mata from start to finish. Darien didn't win his lane, but he also didn't lose it against singed, which is pretty impressive. But it was more than just the laning phase, the team fighting was incredible. We were told how well Imp plays
Vayne, but Genja's positioning was far superior to that of Imp's. Just the way Gambit played in general, it's like they grabbed the balls of the game and just rode with them. It felt like Ozone was out of the game from that first double kill on Alex. They never got back in it, That Russian bootcamp is looking impressive, a team I had written off to not make it out of groups now makes me think they might be the best team in Group B.
Things to take away
- Koreans and Chinese teams looked mortal, struggled a bit against European/NA teams
- Ozone disappoints
- Gambit and Vulcun look really good
- OMG might be best team in group A
- Mineski is worse than we thought possible
- Fnatic looks really shaky, possibly worst team out of EU?
- This is just day 1 and things can change dramatically
Tell me what you think
Voidle is still yet to perfectly sync his flow with Genja's, but their bot lane was good enough this time. I fear better performance may be needed against next games with Koreans.
A little (read: deeply) disappointed with Fnatic's performance.
Does anyone else think that
Both the Korean teams were actually surprisingly disappointing. Khazem said the same thing. I don't know if it's just because they're not playing on home turf, if they're overconfident since Allstars or if the other regions have just stepped up their game, but the difference in levels of teams we saw in comparison to the Koreans today was nowhere near as wide as it was during Allstars. In fact, the teams they played looked practically on par with them at parts in the game. In all four games, the Korean lose their early game and twice it is fatal for them.
The spotlighted Ozone botlane were going relatively even with Gambit's botlane up until the moment where Mata threw himself to be killed, chasing an extremely risky kill that had a low chance of succeeding. Looper held his top lane well and took the tower before Darien, but Darien responded with Looper's top tower a few minutes later. Dade gets crunched by Alex and Diamond and DanDy is pretty much nowhere to be seen. Teamfights were all over the place - Imp never got enough support to successfully snowball teamfights, Dade couldn't contain Alex from blowing people up... All in all, a pretty bad showing considering what we expected from them. But that
The Vulcan game wasn't AS bad for Ozone, but they still weren't as dominant as we expected them to be. Dade still getting blown up in mid early, but DanDy and Looper had a pretty strong impact early in the game. The hooks and flays from Mata were also quite consistent and Imp looked quite comfortable on
The Lemondogs comp against SKT T1 wasn't actually that bad.
I was surprised Fnatic did so badly. It was a poor team comp in a weak effort, I have nothing to add that the analyst desk hasn't said already. Quite frankly, a poor showing from xPeke.
You're right about Reginald not being a
I really hope SKT and Ozone step up their game otherwise they might not be able to challenge the seeded C9 or Royal if they have trouble in the group stages. GG + OMG looking really good right now, but anything can happen.