Dromos56 votesI think having circuit points is a great idea. It would allow for a higher caliber of competition in the spring since it actually matters. Right now summer split is the biggest emphasis because it leads to worlds but if the LCS system adds circuit points and functions like OGN, It should make the spring much more competitive since now every point counts.
I also feel like in B05 series, if the fifth game is necessary, it should be blind pick like OGN since it would provide much more excitement since teams don't know what they are picking into.
Kokos12 votesWhile I agree having game 5 blind pick will be more exciting and will add a next layer of strategy, I disagree that LCS should follow that format.
In LCS playoff, the teams that have higher seeding will be awarded the choice of side in Game 1, 3, 5. It is kinda like a home court advantage for teams that performed better in the regular season. By changing game 5 to blind pick, the higher seeding team is punished because they are not allowed to play the style they want (maybe they like to first pick the ops of the meta, or maybe they like use red side to counter pick ). OGN doesn't have that issue because they don't really have a regular season (they only play in a 4-team group), so seeding is not a big issue.
RiotMagus25 votesYeah I highly doubt we'll be implementing blind pick in a bo5 series. Teams earn side choice advantage during the regular season and we want that to be an incentive to finish higher in the standings.
Also the team has certain issues with the validity of the format in that it's a much different type of strategic planning that rarely is used during the season - doesn't seem like a great way to end an epic best-of series.
Saturdays23 votesBut doesn't this "side" picking choice means that it only strengthens the fact that the map is "unbalanced" and not fair in terms of side choice?
In all honesty we should have blind pick as the 5th match, how can a match be call the finale of a series of games, if BOTH of the teams aren't showing their best comp they have to prove against one another who truly is better with the champion comp and strats?
ReyKingRex2 votesI don't think the MAJOR red side/blue side differences in Pro play come down to the map, but rather the counter/first-pick/ban ability in champion select. That's why Dignitas chose red-side for their entire series, to counter pick TSM.
DPRK Rammus Ram2 votesOne of the problems with blind pick is that the lack of information during champion select removes strategic content from the game. At the professional level, knowing your opponent's team comp is critical not only for selecting what you would perform best on yourself, but also on your runes and masteries.
The one thing that a blind pick does do is put an emphasis on mechanical skill at the expense of strategic team building - a direction that I would not like to see riot take.
Zaz2 votesI think you're confused. The "side" picking advantage is not referred to having an advantage of the literal map side but during the picks/bans phase. Having the first pick can be huge.
Archigram1 votesI don't think this works because fundamentally i don't feel the regular season should be used as a way to negotiate playoff seeding (for advantages such as 1/3/5 side choices).
I do not believe i have seen much sports doing it this way as the advantages gained through a whole 3 months can be thrown away in a matter of hours if either sides make a wrong choice in their pick ban phase or having an off day. most sports rewards a team for playing well for a season and also rewards the team that comes out of elimination tournaments.
A BO5 is going head to head, where as season tests consistency, there is not necessarily a strong "bond" between the 2 elements as a team can prepare very well for a certain team but not others. though its been shown that people who finish higher in season tends to be overall better, but a top team could be defeated by cheese strats or just have an off day. its unfair a team who finished higher in the season gets knocked out by a team just beginning to get good as worlds start.
In elimination tournaments (whichever kind e.g playoffs), who plays who should be by chance (perhaps group seeding such as worlds as opposed to individual seeding) and be fair so therefore a blind pick game 5. side advantages gained by season placements just seems really.......off/weird/incorrect, the advantages/disadvantages gained are either too large or too small and its not balanced, especially if by chance teams only get to play one side.
DPRK Rammus Ram1 votesIf the regular season shouldn't be used for playoff seeding then what is the point of having a season in the first place?
Nephaelus11 votesI have to respectfully disagree.
A higher seeded team still retains their side advantage for the same number of games (1st, 3rd and 5th).
If I higher seeded team fails to close out the series in the first four games then it only stands to reason that both teams should be put on even playing terms. The better seeded team deserves to lose some advantage because clearly the lower seeded team is a match for them.
The blind pick puts both teams on equal, if not uncomfortable, ground. It would be unfamiliar, unpractised (maybe) and unpredictable.
The LCS is a spectator sport. Best of 5 is entertaining. It's exciting. Not only are the games explosive (Faker vs Dade Zed anyone?) but with both teams on relatively equal footing (outside of red/blue side) the better team will win.
It's stressful for both players and spectators alike!
Ferelwing2 votesRespectfully, I disagree.
If you do the blind pick it no longer becomes about who has the best strategy it becomes about luck. Skill shots mean nothing if you end up in a blind pick with the wrong starting runes and the worst possible match-up. Luck in a strategy game is not a skill it just happens.
Add in that we'd likely see both sides playing the exact same champions based on the meta and not only would that be boring and irritating it would also remove the entire reason to watch.
Seeing how someone builds something, what they bring into it and the runes/masteries used as a counter to different style team comps is part of the reason to watch. Removing that and basing it on luck? Why even watch? Just go watch Normal games and you'll see exactly what you're wanting.
I watch for the strategies and to get an idea why someone builds something. I have no interest in "luck".
Rhlax2 votesMr, Rozelle, I hope you will change your mind one day. I don't feel your 2 points are very strong at all. Here are 2 counter arguments to your points:
Regards
ploki1222 votesThe only sports with "shootout" like this that I know of are Hockey and Soccer, because they decided they didn't want tp deal with 2 hours-long game. Also, comparing the blind pick to overtime is pretty skewed, since overtime follows roughly the same rules, while shoutouts clearly not. LCS 5th match follows the same rules, while OGN's does not.
Rhlax1 votesploki1223 votesI know that LPL/OGN uses 5th blind pick... that the exact thing I said.
I also know that you said you prefered to watch blind picks... what I said is that both of his statements still stands true. First of all, it mitigates the advantage that they like ot give to the highest ranked team (to make early wins more valuable), then it also makes matches preparations a lot more chaotic since you have to review what you're gonna do in case you fall into a blind pick. No matter how similar it looks to you, a blind pick and a draft pick, in term of analysis and strategies, is as similar as european footbal amd american football.
Khane Exel3 votesShootouts are not used in a best-of series making that argument invalid. You play continuous overtimes until there is a winner. This is not some regular season match. These are playoff matches.
Dromos3 votesOGN also has a bracket stage after the round robin. The top 2 teams in each group adavance
Isilduur3 votesI really don't like the blind pick the way it is done in OGN, for three reasons.
JOSSCRYSTAL11 votesAnd the blind pick at Best of 5??? please!
SheldorMcConquer10 votesCan we ditch Bo1 and go to either Bo3 or Bo2?
Like each weak instead of each team playing both days, have 1/2 the teams do best of 2 (or 3) for one of the days, and the other 1/2 on the other day.
You give each team a chance on blue/red and to give them a chance to meta game from game to game
Qwertaz1 votesA BO2 is the same thing as a BO1.... It only works for odd numbers.
KimTheNukeJongUn15 votesWhen people say Bo2, they really just mean a set of 2 games where both games are played and points are awarded depending on how many times you win in that set. For example, 2-0 would award 3 points to the winning team, 1-1 would award 1 point each.
MrMartinWg2 votesEver see how China works?
Archigram9 votesBO5 game 5 blind pick is the best way to "finish off" a game. e.g in football(soccer), there will be the element of surprise terms of penalties if the teams draw in normal time. It is very sudden death and very engrossing way to finish something. The idea is to have the last game as EQUAL as possible, just as penalties are not necessarily affected by team tactics etc. therefore blind pick provides that opportunity, especially considering a normal game 5 would be advantageous to the blue/red side such as if one team picks blue 1/3/5 they get the blue side strats for game 5 that involves first picking important characters that can potentially win the game. without blind pick game 5 seems very unfair.
Nizagi8 votesCircuit points and blind pick for game 5 in Bo5.
Please.
Thank you.
Sailor Mint7 votesCircuit Points: So Spring Split actually matters. Regular season placement should award points.
Game 5 Blind Pick: Makes for more exciting , and skillful, ultimate games.
Bo2 regular season sets: Bo1 can be cheesed, teams need experience in longer series.
Alternating sides during Bo5: The higher seed should choose sides for game 1/3/5, not the entire series.
Regional Qualifier There should be a regional qualifier to give teams who didn't win playoffs but performed well an extra shot at Worlds.
Challenger Series: It should feel like an extension of LCS.
International Tournaments: All Stars should be an actual international invitational.
Rectangulore2 votesIn regards to your statement about Alternating side choice in Bo5, this is already a thing. The higher seeded team gets side choice in games 1/3/5 and the lower seed gets 2/4. I can see where some people might get the misconception that the higher seed gets side choice in all of the games (for some reason both CLG and DIG both wanted to have red side in all of the playoff games they played over the weekend) but they chose that side for the even numbered games to my knowledge.
Juxx6 votesi like this. they should slowly expand til they hit 30 teams and just run it like a pro sports league
rkawesome5 votesThere isn't really enough talent in NA or EU to have a 30 team league. I feel like if they went with a 30 team league, it'd have to be NA and EU combined, or just the top from all the regions, and do it like Futbol leagues in Europe where OGN/LCS/LPL/GPL are the "Championship" league, and the top 30 teams from all regions play in a "Premier" league of sorts, and then there would be no relegation matches, as the top three from the "championship" league replace the bottom three of this "Premier" league
DPRK Rammus Ram1 votesI think that's why he said to "slowly expand" it ^^
A Broken Dong3 votesSo BIG thing to consider: Booths please?
Soundproof booths are a HUGE deal due to crowd noise being a source of distraction/unnecessary audience involvement, in a game where fog of war is such an important factor.
Rito pls. No more crowds getting too excited during lvl 1 invades and completely giving it away. You can't stop people cheering, so add soundproof booths please.
BrownDynamite5003 votesWhen will we be able to create our league in fantasy lcs?
IIIIZANGETSUIIII2 votesThis is great guys, you are doing a terrific job, circuit points is the way to go, now we just need booths and that 5th game blind pick and we are good to go, pls make it happen.
Euler2 votesI think circuit points are a great idea. One question is, what happens to challenger teams that enter in the summer split? They shouldn't be completely handicapped for not having played in the spring split.
How about when challenger teams enter the LCS they steal the circuit points of the teams they kick out of the LCS? Perhaps it is more useful to let them collect circuit points in the challenger league.
Istar2 votesJust an idea, but would it not be possible to actually increase the number of teams to 16 and have groups of four teams each and have three splits same as in Korea with the tournament model mirroring Champions league in football? This way top teams from last split would be automatically seeded for next season. With this many teams the requirement for travel would be less and maybe every week would be super-week. And as to where can we get the extra teams - for EU it would be from Turkey and Russia and this way we could get extra spot in worlds.
For NA I would suggest a conference system similar to NHL with one studio being in NY and one in LA ? and once again if you have 16 teams one conference would be playing only once every two weeks, but each week would be "super week".
Omnipherious2 votes(1) Regular match played as Bo2 Assuming 4 head-to-head matches with every team, 3 are in this format 2 wins for 3 points, 1 win 1 loss for 1 point, 0 points for 2 losses
(2) Super match played as Bo5 Assuming 4 head-to-head matches with every team, 1 match is in this format Game 5 of series is blind draft 1 point per win; 2 points for a clean sweep (3-0)
Example 1: CLG Brazil vs Team Solo Bot goes 3-1 for TSB TSB earns 3 points, CLG.BR earns 1 point
Example 2: Cloud 911 vs So Low Queue foes 3-0 for C911 C911 earn 5 points, SLQ earn 0 points
a) Each match matters, closer series deny points to opposing teams b) Clean sweep extra as motivation to play the best every match c) Potential 5 point score enable circuit point comebacks
Dudermen2 votesThose teams doe
Souli G2 votesAs much as I think the LCS format lacks in certain areas it does produce the right results and I like that. I don't think anyone can argue that so far the best 3 teams from NA/EU have gone to worlds and that is what's most important so I hope that you keep that aspect. However, the format lacks in that teams/players aren't motivated enough and that the repetitiveness of it can get boring for viewers (usually midseason). That's why I think circuit points are a good idea but that the summer split should grant more circuit point to ensure the strongest team at that point goes to worlds and at the same time give the prior spring champion a good shot.
BTW I think it's also important to shorten the seasons/splits to have international tournaments. It's really sad to think that we will never see how certain teams would do against teams from other regions. Even if there's the occasional international play, it's nearly not as much because you only get to see 1 out of the 100 possible matchups. For example: I've allways wanted to see bjergsen vs faker or lemondogs vs c9 but that might never happen because only 6 westen teams go to worlds and it's a 1 year thing.
xayahs bich2 votesI don't really see how circuit points could work if there are some teams that aren't in the spring split. It would put them at a disadvantage and if they loose out because other teams got points from the spring split, it just would feel wrong
DEN15 5121 votesI feel like the Challenger Series would also have to give circuit points, but less of them, similar to NLB in Korea.
ZenShade1 votesFuck Nick Allen.
Kahro1 votesWell, to make the spring split matter you could just keep the wins as is when moving to the summer split.
As this would make it really hard to catch up if a team messes up the spring split you could lessen the impact of the wins a bit by carrying over only some percentage of them.
For example SK 2014 spring split was: 18-10
For example Millenium 2014 spring split was: 9-19
Lets say that we carry over 50% of the wins (rounding down) as a starting point then
SK would start summer split from: 9 points
Millenium would start summer split from: 4 points
Hi Klipik Im Dan1 votesWhat if a challenger team makes it in?
Hi Klipik Im Dan1 votesSince t seems everyone's just posting their opinions, I'll say mine. IMO they should get rid of the splits entirely, and just have one big season like every other sport. Maybe to compensate, there could be either 5 relegation spots (6th place plus everyone not in the playoffs) or 7 spots (everyone who doesn't go to worlds).
Presul1 votesHave you considered making weekly matches more than just a BO1? It would require teams to do more planning each week, but it would also help showcase a teams ability to adapt.
Spoo1 votesI don't mind circuit points. Just bear in mind that circuit points should encapsulate more than just the split playoff performance but also that splits season performance. Regardless of what you do automatic qualifiers for playoff winners to allow new teams to accomplish more.
Regardless of the action I would like the top 6 to make the playoffs and the bottom 4 to do the relegation tournament.
Currently it seems like a terrible idea to have a potential 3rd place team have to defend their spot if they had an exceptional year and just had a terrible playoff performance. Not to mention playoff teams can deal with a little bit less stress and focus on winning the playoffs instead of defending their jobs. In the end I think the quality of the split tournament matches will improve.
huffmuffin91 votesI really hope the fifth game of Bo5 does not ever change to blind pick. It just takes away so much of these players skill. Being a professional league player is not just about mechanics. It's about strategy, lane match ups, team compositions, knowing your opponent, etc. Blind pick just seems to throw all of this out the window. I watch ~90% of the games during splits, and champion select is always one of the most important parts to me. It's awesome to see teams come out with a new strategy or an oddball champion and see how quickly the other team can adapt their strategy to match it. Without that, everything would just seem silly and random. It wouldn't feel important or planned for, it would just be luck.
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