SK Gaming struggles to ward off defeat
Riot·2/26/2015, 2:31:37 AM·0 votes·11,929 views
What makes a team good? Laning, objective control, rotations, teamfights, and more. But what makes a team great? Warding. Constant warding allows you to scout out the right lanes, contest objectives, start rotations early, and gain teamfight advantages.
At Worlds 2014, Samsung White's warding helped them control the map and as a result their team controlled the game. SK Gaming has shown that they are a good team by dominating Europe in an 8-0 start. However, their last two games -- both losses -- have exposed crucial weaknesses in their play and call into question whether they are a great team.
Fnatic struck at SK Gaming’s lack of warding early and often in Week 5. In the clip below, you can see Yeu Jin “Reignover” Kim was basically free to walk straight through the unwarded river to pick up a kill on Simon “Fredy122” Payne, who was pushed up with no ward down, despite having his trinket ward available.
Christoph “nRated” Seitz and Konstantinos “Forg1venGRE” Tzortziou Napoleon cut off Reignover’s ganks with well-placed deep wards which scouted out two potential ganks into the 2v2 lane. However, Reignover cleared out SK’s pink near mid and used the blind spot in SK’s vision to force a play: when Svenskeren returned to re-establish vision, Fnatic went hard. Seung-Hoon “Huni” Heo teleported in to help, and without the wards to scout his destination, SK ran backwards straight into his Equalizer, helping Fnatic pick up two kills and a 1k gold lead.
No play made clear the warding differential between the two teams more than Fnatic’s five man gank in top lane. With better ward coverage, SK Gaming could have responded by Fnatic’s focus on top lane by calling for Fox and Forg1venGRE to push their lanes. However, they did not spot the five-man play until it was underway, and Fox and Forg1ven were only able to push reactively for one tower.
Their continued lack of warding would only hurt them more and more as the game went on, even costing them an uncontested Baron just 21 minutes into the game.
Ultimately, Fnatic was able to keep up the pressure and hand SK Gaming their first loss, almost entirely on the back of superior warding presence, especially from their jungler Reignover, who outwarded Svenskeren a whopping 50 to 11.
Yet, SK Gaming’s warding is not slacking on all fronts. Forg1venGRE places the second most wards of any ADC, and nRated comes in at fourth place for supports. Svenskeren and Fox place the fewest wards of any players at their position.
While most teams employ their jungler as their secondary ward placer behind support, SK Gaming relies almost entirely on nRated to keep the map lit up.
SK Gaming’s lack of warding has gone unaddressed thanks to the near perfection of every other aspect of their gameplay, combined with the utter dominance of Forg1venGRE. Their mechanical skills were on full display in their game vs Fnatic, including a 2 vs. 2 bot lane outplay and a come-from-behind teamfight victory. SK Gaming has shown itself to be the strongest team in Europe over the first half of the split. However, they have one strong point of improvement to make, and it only costs 75 gold.
The Blind Leading the Sighted
SK Gaming is not only behind Fnatic in warding -- they are the worst warding EU LCS team by far, with 2.12 wpm (wards per minute).
Yet, SK Gaming’s warding is not slacking on all fronts. Forg1venGRE places the second most wards of any ADC, and nRated comes in at fourth place for supports. Svenskeren and Fox place the fewest wards of any players at their position.
While most teams employ their jungler as their secondary ward placer behind support, SK Gaming relies almost entirely on nRated to keep the map lit up.
SK Gaming’s lack of warding has gone unaddressed thanks to the near perfection of every other aspect of their gameplay, combined with the utter dominance of Forg1venGRE. Their mechanical skills were on full display in their game vs Fnatic, including a 2 vs. 2 bot lane outplay and a come-from-behind teamfight victory. SK Gaming has shown itself to be the strongest team in Europe over the first half of the split. However, they have one strong point of improvement to make, and it only costs 75 gold.
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