Ahq's Revenge – Westdoor & Albis head to MSI
Riot·5/4/2015, 5:52:22 PM·0 votes·7,444 views
Ahq's 2014 World Championship debut was their first international appearance, and was the last time that Taiwan represented the Southeast Asia region instead of the more localized Master Series. It was also the first time in two years that the region seemed to have any cross-regional respect. The Taipei Assassins had disappointed local fans with their performance, eliminated quickly despite their prestigious performance in the Garena Premier League -- it was on ahq to salvage something resembling respect for the beleaguered island.
Ahq's success came at NaMei's detriment. China's EDG was given a world-class scare as the clanking of support player Tsai "GreenTea" Shang-Ching's Death Sentences forced a desperate tie-breaker set in the group stages. Though ahq failed to make it past groups, they won hard-earned respect for their individual mechanics and tenacity.
Subsequently, ahq’s failure to perform in the LMS came as something of a surprise. By the end of the regular spring split, they were at an underwhelming fourth place, and were the first of the veteran teams to drop a game to the rookies. Their situation highlighted the often overlooked role of a team's support staff.
"We had trouble with jungle and support communication, and how they played the lanes," said Liu "Westdoor" Shu-Wei, the team's mid lane ace. "Our analyst, Prydz [Chen Kuang-Feng], left the team and there was only Backstairs [Coach Chen Yan-Fu] doing it. He could help us, but he wasn't accustomed to it."
The solution was obvious: fill the gap left by Prydz and re-establish ahq's support structure. But finding a sufficiently skilled analyst they could trust was no easy feat -- and it seemed as if GreenTea's burnout was going to exacerbate things for the team. Instead, it proved a vital opportunity.
Ahq destroyed them 3-0.
Next was second-place Taipei Assassins, ahq's oldest rivals since 2012. TPA had struggled a bit with patch changes, but Singaporean mid laner Chawy was increasingly respected for his map control and top laner Morning had repeatedly proven a force to be reckoned with, especially with access to Gnar.
Ahq destroyed them 3-0.
Finally, the Yoe Flash Wolves. Standing at a prestigious No. 1, the Wolves were largely considered Taiwan's best hopes for this year. They've been dominant throughout the spring split, with rookie jungler Hung "Karsa" Hau-Hsuan blazing a trail to the top of the standings with indomitable Rek'sai play. And they even brought hope to the region with a fourth-place finish at IEM Katowice, coming within a game of upsetting eventual champions Taipei Assassins. They were expected by most to be in attendance at the Mid-Season Invitational, especially with two best-of-five sets from ahq to study.
Ahq rose triumphantly to the challenge, securing a 3-1 victory to win the Spring Split.
Westdoor claims that their current styles and metagame adaptations had made them particularly strong against the Wolves. ahq had coalesced around their AD carry, who showed up suitably impressively in the final match. "Yoe Flash Wolves took a lot of care in getting NL and Maple fed," said Westdoor. "But when we're playing to protect AN, they didn't really have an assassin to target our AD carry." And with AN playing Jinx, in particular, that left ahq a tremendous late-game potential that Yoe Flash Wolves lacked the burst potential to handle.
It also helped that Westdoor was among the first and few to play Cho'gath mid lane, picking it up from Korean solo queue as a pre-5.6 answer to LeBlanc and other burst casters. Just the threat of its conical silence meant that assassins-based strategies, heavily reliant on mid-lane presence, were mitigated before the start of the game. In fact, that regional spillover, unique to Eastern hemisphere esports, has informed a lot of their play. “We practice against Chinese and Korean teams,” acknowledged Albis. He and Westdoor confirms that LPL teams are regular scrim partners -- mentioning EDG, Star Horn Royal Club and M3 in particular.
The cross-regional partnership isn’t particularly unique to ahq, with Yoe Flash Wolves previously confirming experience with both GE Tigers and EDG as well. It has, however, been tough goings for the Taiwanese teams. "The Korean and Chinese teams are still stronger," said Westdoor. "Our chances against them are 30-70."
But the team they most want to face come the MSI, is not any of their eastern hemisphere peers. Instead, their ire is drawn towards North America.
"Myself, I want to face TSM. Taiwan lost last time," said Westdoor, referring to Yoe Flash Wolves’ playoffs defeat at IEM Katowice
"And I will have our revenge against them."
Subsequently, ahq’s failure to perform in the LMS came as something of a surprise. By the end of the regular spring split, they were at an underwhelming fourth place, and were the first of the veteran teams to drop a game to the rookies. Their situation highlighted the often overlooked role of a team's support staff.
"We had trouble with jungle and support communication, and how they played the lanes," said Liu "Westdoor" Shu-Wei, the team's mid lane ace. "Our analyst, Prydz [Chen Kuang-Feng], left the team and there was only Backstairs [Coach Chen Yan-Fu] doing it. He could help us, but he wasn't accustomed to it."
The solution was obvious: fill the gap left by Prydz and re-establish ahq's support structure. But finding a sufficiently skilled analyst they could trust was no easy feat -- and it seemed as if GreenTea's burnout was going to exacerbate things for the team. Instead, it proved a vital opportunity.
A different kind of support
"When GreenTea volunteered to step down, he filled in as analyst and could point out the team's mistakes from the back," said Westdoor. "Communication between jungle and support hasn't changed that much, but having a sixth person's helped a lot." GreenTea's retirement may be more patch-dependent than absolute. Rather, it's just a matter of what the bot lane preference is at the moment. "Right now, [Kang “Albis” Chia-Wei] is better on champions that can protect [AD carry Chou “AN” Chun-An]'s development, but GreenTea's better on hard engage champions. So if the meta changes back, we might put GreenTea back." Albis was previously ahq's jungler and primary shotcaller, but relinquished his old job to former ahq Sniper jungler Xue "Mountain" Zhao-Hong in the wake of GreenTea's step-back. But the role transition, for Albis, has been undramatic. "Jungle and support's a lot alike," he said, with the differences being more on emphasis than mechanics. "The jungle helps more with the lanes, while the support focuses more on map vision."Gauntlets Thrown
Ahq's reorganization was a profound and inarguable success—and it took very little time to kick into gear. "We practiced [with the new roster] for about two weeks," said Westdoor. "And started using this roster after the last [regular season] game of the LMS." The LMS playoffs was a gauntlet series, where the lowest-seeded teams had to play advancing five-game sets to challenge the ones above them. At the time, third-ranked Hong Kong Esports was considered the second-strongest team, pulling themselves together in latter weeks with convincing displays of team-fighting cohesion. They were the first team to face ahq in the gauntlet.
Ahq destroyed them 3-0.
Next was second-place Taipei Assassins, ahq's oldest rivals since 2012. TPA had struggled a bit with patch changes, but Singaporean mid laner Chawy was increasingly respected for his map control and top laner Morning had repeatedly proven a force to be reckoned with, especially with access to Gnar.
Ahq destroyed them 3-0.
Finally, the Yoe Flash Wolves. Standing at a prestigious No. 1, the Wolves were largely considered Taiwan's best hopes for this year. They've been dominant throughout the spring split, with rookie jungler Hung "Karsa" Hau-Hsuan blazing a trail to the top of the standings with indomitable Rek'sai play. And they even brought hope to the region with a fourth-place finish at IEM Katowice, coming within a game of upsetting eventual champions Taipei Assassins. They were expected by most to be in attendance at the Mid-Season Invitational, especially with two best-of-five sets from ahq to study.
Ahq rose triumphantly to the challenge, securing a 3-1 victory to win the Spring Split.
Westdoor claims that their current styles and metagame adaptations had made them particularly strong against the Wolves. ahq had coalesced around their AD carry, who showed up suitably impressively in the final match. "Yoe Flash Wolves took a lot of care in getting NL and Maple fed," said Westdoor. "But when we're playing to protect AN, they didn't really have an assassin to target our AD carry." And with AN playing Jinx, in particular, that left ahq a tremendous late-game potential that Yoe Flash Wolves lacked the burst potential to handle.
It also helped that Westdoor was among the first and few to play Cho'gath mid lane, picking it up from Korean solo queue as a pre-5.6 answer to LeBlanc and other burst casters. Just the threat of its conical silence meant that assassins-based strategies, heavily reliant on mid-lane presence, were mitigated before the start of the game. In fact, that regional spillover, unique to Eastern hemisphere esports, has informed a lot of their play. “We practice against Chinese and Korean teams,” acknowledged Albis. He and Westdoor confirms that LPL teams are regular scrim partners -- mentioning EDG, Star Horn Royal Club and M3 in particular.
The cross-regional partnership isn’t particularly unique to ahq, with Yoe Flash Wolves previously confirming experience with both GE Tigers and EDG as well. It has, however, been tough goings for the Taiwanese teams. "The Korean and Chinese teams are still stronger," said Westdoor. "Our chances against them are 30-70."
But the team they most want to face come the MSI, is not any of their eastern hemisphere peers. Instead, their ire is drawn towards North America.
"Myself, I want to face TSM. Taiwan lost last time," said Westdoor, referring to Yoe Flash Wolves’ playoffs defeat at IEM Katowice
"And I will have our revenge against them."
