The Jungle Crossover
Riot·7/9/2014, 5:31:24 PM·0 votes·5,190 views
After OMG failed to take a game from SK Telecom T1 K at All-Stars 2014, some Chinese fans faulted jungler Ouyang “pomelo” WeiQi, calling for his retirement. This marked the second major international tournament within a year where the jungle role was pinpointed as a reason for a Chinese team’s struggle against SKT T1 K. In the Season 3 World Championship, Liu “Lucky” JunJie of Royal Club received the brunt of the backlash for his team’s struggles against SKT T1 K. After two massive failings against the Koreans, managers began to take notice.
As of last weekend, three of eight Chinese LoL Pro League teams have had their junglers replaced by Korean players: StarHorn Royal Club, World Elite, and World Elite Academy. These substitutions have been met by varying results from WE.A splitting even with a team they dominated in LSPL to SHRC climbing to second place. Regardless of team-level effects, the reality is that Korean junglers have affected the landscape of China’s Summoner’s Rift. While the teams themselves have yet to see world class returns, teams like OMG and Edward Gaming are benefiting from a larger amount of creativity in the jungle.
The two teams that sported Korean junglers for the majority of the split are World Elite with Yeon “Sin” Hyeongmo, previously called ActScene, in the jungle and StarHorn Royal Club, hosting the iconic Choi “inSec” Inseok. Both junglers play similar roles on their new teams. They favor champions with early play-making potential, most notably Lee Sin, and excel at setting up ganks and invading to start early fights over vision and buff camps. Yet their successes can be viewed in very different contexts.
In addition to inSec and Yun “Zero” Kyungsup, SHRC picked up two new Chinese players in their solo lanes, and though one might debate their overall skill level, they at least seem to perform significantly better than Royal Club’s solo laners in 2014 LPL Spring. From this perspective, It’s hard to attribute any strides the team has made through the rankings to inSec alone.
In fact, Zero, the team’s Korean acquisition in the support role, has seemed more impressive than inSec, which is reflected in his MVP standings. Zero is the only support player to rank in the top fifteen of the MVP point ladder, and he currently occupies the third place slot. His Nami and Thresh have both been game-changing, and his performance in lane is the deciding factor in whether his duo partner, Jian “Uzi” Zhihao, succeeds or fails.
Nami has become something of an essential pick for SHRC due to the overzealous natures of both inSec and Uzi. When they’re caught out of position behind enemy lines, Zero’s Tidal Waves provide a failsafe in the form of a teamfight reset. With a less skilled support player, inSec and Zero might look more like feeders than play-makers.
Arguably, neither SHRC nor WE needed new junglers. Though Royal Club’s level of talent is considerably higher overall now than last split, Wang “kmi” LongJie received several nods and quite a few bans for his play as Jarvan IV, and the team would have almost assuredly fallen to relegation without him.
TengYang “Ruo” TianXia’s synergy with Chen “sukiM” ZhiYuan was instrumental in WE’s victories, and they often stole the spotlight from WeiXiao and CaoMei. WE ran into hiccups last split after losing three of its four members, but they managed to develop a great deal of synergy toward the end of the Spring Split. Replacing the mid laner and jungler again after the team had just re-established its flow likely set back its development. Some of WE’s stumbles and their inability to succeed outside a single style of composition suggests that they still haven’t returned to the level of coordination they had manufactured by the time the Playoffs rolled around.
At a team level, it looks like neither SHRC nor WE made strides in the standings that they couldn’t have made by restricting their rosters to the Chinese talent pool. Yet both teams have developed strategies with pre-five minute dragons and vision as focal points. InSec will camp the mid lane until a kill can be made, and the team can go for dragon safely, while Sin looks for opportunities to secure early roams with pink wards. While these strategies are spreading throughout LPL, SHRC and WE have employed them with the most consistency - two of the three games where WE didn’t acquire the first dragon, the prize went to SHRC. By contrast, Chinese junglers appear as if they need to be reminded to buy wards at the stages of every game, and their inventories are occasionally bereft of these 75 gold aids.
Yet Sin and inSec aren’t the only factors contributing to improved map control. Lin “Drug” Ye has returned to the jungle, and with him, OMG’s aggressive warding. The frequency of Ming “Clearlove” Kai’s early ganks has been increasing since International Esports Tournament, and EDG has even been spotted placing pink wards to secure lane vision. Chen “illuSion” XinLin has favored the sweeper trinket start to make his jungle pathing more mysterious.
The Chinese meta game took severe hits when Season Four changes rolled out, and the teams and their junglers simply needed time to adjust. The influx of Korean junglers and support staff has seemingly forced this phenomenon into overdrive, which has resulted in strange new ward placement and unstable strategies that will likely improve over time. Teams without Korean junglers stand to benefit the most from these acquisitions, as they’ll have the opportunity to adapt to a different standard in the early game without suffering under a language barrier.
This past weekend, World Elite Academy replaced He “Soist” ZhiHong with Korean solo queue player MickeyGod, and some might argue that this decision has taken the Korean jungle acquisition movement too far. Soist was considered the strongest rising jungle talent from LSPL, while MickeyGod has no competitive experience. Though the verdict is still out on how he will impact the team in the long run, his debut performance on Lee Sin boasted zero kills or assists at twenty minutes, and WE.A lost to Young Glory, a team they had consistently dominated in the past.
SHRC looks to their Korean players and coach as an example of attitude and work ethic, which could explain part of why these players seem like such an attractive investment. Chinese managers are willing to decrease the overall level of individual skill and team synergy, things the region has been known for in the past, to set an example for their players.
Ultimately, teams will have to find the right balance between work ethic and innovation, and synergy and individual skill, or they’ll sacrifice the strengths of Chinese LoL teams in favor of new strategies they’ve yet to perfect.
MOST POPULAR IMPORT
Of the four LPL teams that have signed Koreans, three have chosen to pick up Korean junglers - the position with the highest frequency of foreign players. LPL teams have also acquired two Korean top laners, and one mid lane and support. For all three teams with a Korean jungler, the team has picked up a second player from Korea, maxing out the two foreign player limit. Part of the strategy for these acquisitions seems to be in minimizing the impact of the language barrier, as being incapable of communicating effectively with any of his lanes could easily set a jungler behind. While dampening the impact of the language barrier may have been achieved to an extent, it’s clear that these teams are taking a hit to the high level of team coordination for which China’s LoL squads have garnered a reputation. The result isn’t the direct improvement of Chinese teams featuring Korean junglers, but rather an improvement of the overall level of jungle competition within LPL.
The two teams that sported Korean junglers for the majority of the split are World Elite with Yeon “Sin” Hyeongmo, previously called ActScene, in the jungle and StarHorn Royal Club, hosting the iconic Choi “inSec” Inseok. Both junglers play similar roles on their new teams. They favor champions with early play-making potential, most notably Lee Sin, and excel at setting up ganks and invading to start early fights over vision and buff camps. Yet their successes can be viewed in very different contexts.
Royal welcome for InSec and Zero
StarHorn Royal Club’s climb through LPL’s ranks from Spring Split to Summer Split seems to indicate that the team has gained more from their new jungler than World Elite. At the end of last split, SHRC narrowly avoided relegation in the final best of two they played against Energy Pacemaker. After four weeks this split, SHRC is tied for second place. World Elite, meanwhile, finished the regular season in third place last split, and though they only placed fourth in the playoffs, they took dominating victories from Edward Gaming and OMG. This split, WE is still just a top four team. SHRC’s strides aren’t completely down to inSec’s acquisition. InSec has accumulated the most deaths of any member of his team at 36 as a result of his propensity to throw himself into a play well before the rest of SHRC. Some might suggest that this is down to a communication disconnect, but a high death count is something that characterized inSec’s return to the jungle for the KT Bullets as well; he ended the latest season of Masters with the highest death count of any jungler participating. As a result, SHRC has garnered a reputation as a swing team. If the first play inSec attempts to make is successful, the team is all-in, and they snowball to a clean victory. If it results in inSec’s death and an objective for the opposition, all of SHRC goes down with the ship, racking up a death toll in continuously ill-advised engagements.
In addition to inSec and Yun “Zero” Kyungsup, SHRC picked up two new Chinese players in their solo lanes, and though one might debate their overall skill level, they at least seem to perform significantly better than Royal Club’s solo laners in 2014 LPL Spring. From this perspective, It’s hard to attribute any strides the team has made through the rankings to inSec alone.
In fact, Zero, the team’s Korean acquisition in the support role, has seemed more impressive than inSec, which is reflected in his MVP standings. Zero is the only support player to rank in the top fifteen of the MVP point ladder, and he currently occupies the third place slot. His Nami and Thresh have both been game-changing, and his performance in lane is the deciding factor in whether his duo partner, Jian “Uzi” Zhihao, succeeds or fails.
Nami has become something of an essential pick for SHRC due to the overzealous natures of both inSec and Uzi. When they’re caught out of position behind enemy lines, Zero’s Tidal Waves provide a failsafe in the form of a teamfight reset. With a less skilled support player, inSec and Zero might look more like feeders than play-makers.
World class jungling
In the case of WE’s jungler, sin has seemed like a larger contributing factor to his team’s successes. Gao “WeiXiao” Xuecheng and Wei “CaoMei” Handong have stepped up as true carry forces for WE, and sin’s early map movements have given them the seed gold they need to take off. WE has acquired the first dragon in seven of their ten games, and Ke “Conan” Yi’s heavy roaming has made him seem more like sin’s support than WeiXiao’s. Conan’s Leona will often accompany Sin to mid lane where Noh “Ninja” Geonwoo has been struggling. Proactive ganks prevent Ninja from falling too far behind so he can serve as an adequate source of utility in the late game. WE succeeds the most when Ninja plays a supportive mid laner like Lulu or Soraka, but falters when pressure is placed upon him to carry. As a result, Sin looks for early opportunities to give Ninja an advantage before going about his business in the jungle of the opposition. There, he can occupy the enemy jungler and leave WeiXiao and CaoMei to man-handle the opposition in the side lanes. WE relies on the strong early advantages Sin secures for the team to bolster their late game, as they have struggled to close out even with more than ample gold leads. Compared to SHRC, WE’s strategical arsenal is somewhat limited by their mid laner, but Sin has found ways to work around it and help turn the team into an efficient machine currently among LPL’s top four. Still, WE’s coordination is a pale imitation of what it once was not only at IPL5, but also in the 2014 LPL Spring Playoffs. It’s hard to determine whether WE would better improved with a more versatile mid laner or a higher degree of decisiveness in their late game shot-calling, but Sin has done his part to compensate for the team’s weaknesses.JUNGLE TALENT IN FLUX
Arguably, neither SHRC nor WE needed new junglers. Though Royal Club’s level of talent is considerably higher overall now than last split, Wang “kmi” LongJie received several nods and quite a few bans for his play as Jarvan IV, and the team would have almost assuredly fallen to relegation without him.
TengYang “Ruo” TianXia’s synergy with Chen “sukiM” ZhiYuan was instrumental in WE’s victories, and they often stole the spotlight from WeiXiao and CaoMei. WE ran into hiccups last split after losing three of its four members, but they managed to develop a great deal of synergy toward the end of the Spring Split. Replacing the mid laner and jungler again after the team had just re-established its flow likely set back its development. Some of WE’s stumbles and their inability to succeed outside a single style of composition suggests that they still haven’t returned to the level of coordination they had manufactured by the time the Playoffs rolled around.
At a team level, it looks like neither SHRC nor WE made strides in the standings that they couldn’t have made by restricting their rosters to the Chinese talent pool. Yet both teams have developed strategies with pre-five minute dragons and vision as focal points. InSec will camp the mid lane until a kill can be made, and the team can go for dragon safely, while Sin looks for opportunities to secure early roams with pink wards. While these strategies are spreading throughout LPL, SHRC and WE have employed them with the most consistency - two of the three games where WE didn’t acquire the first dragon, the prize went to SHRC. By contrast, Chinese junglers appear as if they need to be reminded to buy wards at the stages of every game, and their inventories are occasionally bereft of these 75 gold aids.
Yet Sin and inSec aren’t the only factors contributing to improved map control. Lin “Drug” Ye has returned to the jungle, and with him, OMG’s aggressive warding. The frequency of Ming “Clearlove” Kai’s early ganks has been increasing since International Esports Tournament, and EDG has even been spotted placing pink wards to secure lane vision. Chen “illuSion” XinLin has favored the sweeper trinket start to make his jungle pathing more mysterious.
The Chinese meta game took severe hits when Season Four changes rolled out, and the teams and their junglers simply needed time to adjust. The influx of Korean junglers and support staff has seemingly forced this phenomenon into overdrive, which has resulted in strange new ward placement and unstable strategies that will likely improve over time. Teams without Korean junglers stand to benefit the most from these acquisitions, as they’ll have the opportunity to adapt to a different standard in the early game without suffering under a language barrier.
OVER INVESTING
This past weekend, World Elite Academy replaced He “Soist” ZhiHong with Korean solo queue player MickeyGod, and some might argue that this decision has taken the Korean jungle acquisition movement too far. Soist was considered the strongest rising jungle talent from LSPL, while MickeyGod has no competitive experience. Though the verdict is still out on how he will impact the team in the long run, his debut performance on Lee Sin boasted zero kills or assists at twenty minutes, and WE.A lost to Young Glory, a team they had consistently dominated in the past.
SHRC looks to their Korean players and coach as an example of attitude and work ethic, which could explain part of why these players seem like such an attractive investment. Chinese managers are willing to decrease the overall level of individual skill and team synergy, things the region has been known for in the past, to set an example for their players.
Ultimately, teams will have to find the right balance between work ethic and innovation, and synergy and individual skill, or they’ll sacrifice the strengths of Chinese LoL teams in favor of new strategies they’ve yet to perfect.
