Super Teams - The Necessity for Stronger Rosters

With each passing split, the caliber of players in the LCS continues to grow and the skill gap between teams shrinks. Predicting which teams will come out ahead has become more and more difficult, and not because we lack insight, but because the teams continue to hone their skills, strategies, and rosters. That last one in particular has become more obvious than ever in the run-up and early weeks of the 2014 Summer Split. Professional LoL teams know better than anyone just how high the stakes are and what it takes to win. That increase in the competition has forced many teams to make unpopular or even risky roster changes in order to survive. However, as we look over the history of the LCS, we realize the teams who have made those changes were the teams who survived. And as competitive as the Rift has become, a strong roster has never been more necessary. Even if it means replacing old friends and teammates. Changing of the Guard North American fans have always seen Team SoloMid and Counter Logic Gaming as titans of the region, regardless of whether they rooted for the team or not. With such followings, every single roster change brings about controversy. Often times, fans will dispute the roster changes and lay out an entire list of reasons why the old player exceeded the new one in every conceivable way. But those sometimes unpopular changes are the very reason these teams have remained in the LCS. TSM have never made a complete roster overhaul all at once, but instead have conducted slow, methodical adjustments that have strengthened the team over time. When Marcus “Dyrus” Hill took over in the top lane, the team’s top laner at the time, Christian “The Rain Man” Kahmann, was one of the most popular players in the region. And yet Dyrus has grown into a solo lane pillar that TSM can almost always lean on given his ability to weather almost any storm, something they lacked with The Rain Man. TSM’s mid lane received a boost, as well, when team captain and owner Andy “Reginald” Dinh stepped down from the active roster and recruited Søren “Bjergsen” Bjerg. There were also less tangible benefits as Reginald began focus more of his efforts behind the scenes. Fellow North American team Counter Logic Gaming have worked in a similar manner over the years. CLG began every bit as strong as TSM and were their biggest rivals in the early NA scene. They haven’t seen the same success in the LCS as TSM has, but that all started to change with the 2014 Summer Split. CLG began strengthening its bottom lane as far back the start of Season 2 when they recruited Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng as AD carry. Doublelift was a mechanical upgrade over Steve “Chauster” Chau, who moved to the support position. Yet the bottom lane still lacked something, and the lane didn’t truly develop into a powerhouse until Zaqueri “Aphromoo” Black returned to CLG as the team’s support. Aphromoo had previously played as an AD Carry on other teams and admitted he disliked support during his first stint with CLG. He changed his support style to draw on his skills honed as an AD carry, developing a uniquely technical and aggressive support play style - exactly what Doublelift needed. CLG’s bottom lane are now a respected and feared force in the LCS. Steady tweaks and adjustments to the lane allowed CLG to stay consistent in the placings while slowly gaining strength, and they are now off to their best start to an LCS split yet. These changings of the guard for TSM and CLG have enabled both teams to adapt to new conditions and shore up weaknesses, but they’ve also retained the teams’ identities by not changing too quickly. Some teams, though, decide it’s better to shake things up all at once.

Rise of the “Super Team”

Evil Geniuses were among the first 16 teams to ever join the LCS. The team consisted of Mike “Wickd” Peterson (Top), Stephen “Snoopeh” Ellis (Jungle), Henrik “Froggen” Hansen (Mid), Peter “yellowpete” Wüppen (AD carry), and Mitch “Krepo” Voorspoels (Support). When Evil Geniuses joined the LCS, they already had one of the oldest rosters in the game, stretching back to 2011 when CLG signed its first EU team, and behind them followed a large fanbase. While other teams constantly shifted their rosters, EG chose to stay the course, and they kept safely afloat throughout Season 3. Unfortunately, the team made little headway with back-to-back 15-13 performances in the Spring and Summer Splits and found themselves sitting right in the middle of the standings more often than they’d have liked. At the same time, other teams began dropping out of the LCS around Evil Geniuses. After a full season without making any headway, Evil Geniuses feared that they could be the next team on the way out. After multiple seasons together, the team decided that the time for a change had finally come. Unlike TSM’s slow rotation of players, Evil Geniuses instead opted for a major overhaul. The team split and went in two different directions. While the Snoopeh, yellowpete, and Krepo took the Evil Geniuses name to the NA LCS, Froggen and Wickd remained in the EU LCS, apart from their consistent-yet-underwhelming roster, and formed Alliance. People consider Alliance a “super team.” This doesn’t mean that Alliance are “super” compared to everyone else; rather, it describe how the team came together, comprised entirely of veterans from other established teams. The duo united with three experienced and proven players: Ilyas “Shook” Hartsema from Copenhagen Wolves, Enrik “Tabzz” van Helvert of Lemondogs, and Patrick “Nyph” Funke of SK Gaming. Long-time fans expressed disappointment that the familiar players of CLG.eu-turned-Evil Geniuses no longer competed together, but the move seems to have been the right one for Alliance. In the 2014 Spring Split, Alliance ended with a slightly improved record compared to their previous two records with the old EG roster (16-12), but since then, Alliance has only grown stronger and currently stands atop the EU LCS with an impressive 7-1 record. This split, North America got its own super team: Dignitas, who likewise loom at the top of the standings. This second super team came about as a result of Team Coast’s departure from the LCS after the 2014 Spring Split. Unlike EG, Coast tried to weather their storm and never conducted a major roster overhaul despite their slipping success. They made a single change to the AD carry role leading into the 2014 Spring Promotion tournament, where they narrowly defended their LCS spot against Cloud9 Tempest. With Coast’s unwillingness to adjust their roster, they returned to relegation one split later and were eliminated from the LCS. For Dignitas, this created an opportunity. The team had visited relegation once before, and chose to follow Alliance’s lead in order to avoid visiting it a second time. Dignitas immediately swooped in after Team Coast’s Darshan “ZionSpartan” Upadhyasha (Top) and Danny “Shiphtur” Le (Mid). William “Scarra” Li, the team’s former captain and mid laner, was one of the most popular players in the LCS, and no one was demanding his retirement, but Dignitas knew that changes needed to happen. Both Alliance and Dignitas now lead their respective regions, and they each owe their success in large part to a daring and significant roster overhaul. If these teams had instead chosen not to adapt, they could have easily gone the way of so many other teams and found themselves looking at the LCS from the outside.

Foreign Imports

Teams have demonstrated how important it is to have the right player filling every single role on a team by showing us how far they’ll go to find that player. The NA LCS currently boasts six foreign players - four on traditional NA teams (TSM & CLG) and two on a European-North American hybrid (EG) - and that’s not even counting the entire LMQ roster. That number vastly overshadows the one foreign player in the Season 3 Summer Split, Edward “Edward” Abgargyan, who just one year ago became the first player to compete in both the NA LCS and EU LCS when Curse reached across the Atlantic in an attempt to strengthen their bottom lane. At the time, Edward was the only foreign player in North America. That massive uptick in foreign players means that teams’ searches for new members no longer includes their just their region; it now encompasses the entire planet. Shin “Seraph” Woo-yeong, the first Korean-born player to join the LCS, has made that all too evident with his arrival in North America.

The Exception to the Rule

In the end, people will always seek exceptions to the rule, and they certainly exist here. SK Telecom T1 K have remained one of the most dominant teams across any league for more than a year, and they’ve done so with a consistent roster. True, Lee “PoohManDu” Jeong-hyeon voluntarily stepped down to a substitute position for a brief stint, but that lasted less than three months, was due to personal reasons outside the game, and actually marked a decline in SKT’s performance. Once able, he returned to the starting lineup, and SKT T1 K have been on the upswing ever since. One day, though, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok may no longer be the mid laner he is currently. One day, his reflexes will slow, and his decision making may falter. When that day comes, SKT T1 K will discover no team is immune to change. They will face the same choice every other team must: Adapt its roster or face becoming irrelevant. After SKT Telecom T1’s recent sweep at the hands of Samsung Galaxy, perhaps that time is closer than anticipated? Gilean split his time between feeding bot, writing about esports, and feeding mid. If you’d like tips on how to feed harder, you can follow him @HHGilean

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