Remembering quarter finals at Worlds and realizing why BO1 > BO3 for regular season.

Johr Dinh·Aug 29, 2017·1 votes·774 views

Group stages at Worlds is always so much fun regardless of who's playing. You get 1 game at a time so even the lower tier teams have a chance to upset, higher chance of crazy clown fiesta games and backdoors, etc. With quarter finals at Worlds tho you can usually call who's gonna win almost every time, and it ends up being kind of a grindy experience since teams can play slower and just pace themselves for the easy 3-0 if they're that much better. It almost leaves people not wanting to tune into certain series at all, or checking out early after a game or two.

I feel like this is basically the same experience I get from BO1 vs BO3 in NALCS regular season now. BO1 I always watched all the games from any teams cuz even the worst case scenarios could lead to something exciting happening, whereas BO3 I watch my favorite teams but a lot of the series the outcome is pretty expected since as they say, "BO3 and BO5 is a better indicator of who the better team is in the end" which is great for competitive integrity but horrible for viewership and excitement.

I think regular season should go back to BO1s but just have 3-5 games against each team instead of 2 BO3s. The better team should still win more games but it'd make those games a lot less dull than a 2-0 blowout or a worse team winning 1 game and having it feel like it means less when they lose the series. At least if they win 1 they can enjoy it more in that moment, as can their fans. Plus I can watch and keep up more with the bottom teams since it's less difficult watching them get rekt for 1 game instead of 2 in a row lol.

Plus, idk I remember some pretty crazy BO1 games from back in the day but I couldn't tell you one regular season BO3 that stands out for me besides the TSM vs P1 game last summer, and that was just cuz the crazy rengar pick and TSM being undefeated with all that hype on the line.

7 Comments

BigBellBruteAug 29, 20171 votes

How bout instead of a best of three we just play two games and count by games rather than matches? Also for each set, a team must play the red side once and the blue side once. We're not counting matches so there would be no ties. Baseball does it that way. They don't count series wins. They only count games.

III BAKURYU III Aug 29, 20171 votes

That's really the point, NA/Western teams/regions but mainly NA, are trying to catch up to LCK's level. Can't do that with " crazy clown fiestas" or "luck". If NA want's to get on LCK level, they need more games at the competitive level and less about fiestas and more about grinding, as LCK players play around 50% more games than any NA player in solo Q. So in a way, the LCS is NA's solo Q to some degree. I will agree the group stage is really the best part about Worlds, so is in any sport, as it does involve the " unexpected" by say the NBA with 16 total teams #4 vs #5 seeds and NFL with the "Wildcard" teams/1st round, but after those games for the most part it goes back in favor to the better teams.

I understand the argument but looking at it on the other side of the fence, players asked for the "best of" not Riot themselves, the players saw LCK doing it for like 3 more years and figured "hmm, well LCK have been doing the "best of" should we" ?

Johr DinhAug 31, 20171 votes

Well that's why it'd have to be an across the board change, even LCK I guess. But either way we've had BO3 for like 2 years now and NAs best showing was still from BO1 Season 4, EU still makes it out like they almost always do, LPL is about as good or worse. idk not much has changed with BO3 anyways unless it takes 2-3 years to kick in. Most analysts would say everyones pretty even now and Korea is just 10x better than everyone else still. At the end of the day I still see practice hours and efficiency as the biggest factor, and coaching, but just on stage games doesn't seem to have changed much besides being more exhausting to the spectator experience imo.

III BAKURYU III Sep 1, 20171 votes

NA did in fact make it out of groups in Season 4 no doubt about that however, NA has improved greatly since then. TSM failed S6 but overall, no NA or any spectator should feel like NA hasn't improved since the format went to a Best Of because at the end of the day, past Groups it's a best of anyways.
Teams scrim more now than they did in the past because in a best of 1, teams could just cheese and pick champions and comfort picks to win games, can't do that anymore and because of it, teams have gotten stronger because of it.
Best of 3, Scrim, solo Q is still better than Best of 1, scrim, solo Q because again, if a game on stage is only a best of 1 teams wouldn't/didn't actually watch and review their opponents, instead of looking and finding 3-4 bans, now teams have to look deeper into their opponents champion pools and look to find even more possible bans, strategies.
The LCK will most likely always be stronger than other regions because not only did they do the best of for longer(3 more years than NA) they play more solo Q, they actually have real coaches that the players don't back talk to(Dardoch) and they actually review and prepare for their opponents.

" exhausting to the spectator experience" - Pace yourself friend, no one is making you watch 3-X possible games, watch what you can handle at any given time.

I don't know what "imo" means

ChompyWulfAug 30, 20171 votes

While I don't exactly think the Best of 3 is the greatest format, it is far better than best of 1.

What might be best is to keep a Best of 3, but alter the results to a point based system to have a lot more flex. Lost a series but won a game? You got some points. A team wins 2-0, but three of the ten champs played were used both games. There's a small penalty for that. Finish in under 25 minutes, you got a bonus. Game drags past 45 minutes, losing team gets a bonus for hanging in there so long. A player or organization violates rules or conduct? Not just a cash fine anymore, points lost too.

It might sound a bit messy, but could make games and series far more interesting.

Johr DinhAug 31, 20171 votes

I don't like this because it dictates gameplay too much. It'd be like those old Halo Reach things where it says, "Throw 200 nades today" and matchmaking was just bombs going off all day no shooting at all lol. If you have perks for under 25 mins, every team in every region would probably just run early game comps and run at each other 24/7. Probably fun for a little bit but would get old and take tons of champs and strats out of the game.

Plus playing BO3 still doesn't solve the problem of so many games people can't watch other regions or teams as easily. Just from personal experience I thought I used to watch too much League before, but now I don't even have time to watch half the stuff I used to watch cuz there's just an insane amount. Not only does it keep me from watching other teams and regions as much, but I can't keep up with storylines. Watching more games and regions gives way more first hand context to players/teams journeys thruout the year, now i'm just taking casters word on stuff usually which isn't as fun imo.

And it's just regular season, Idk personally i've never felt anymore joy watching BO3 over BO1 at all. Stats and wins don't mean half as much, it's just make it to playoffs thats about the only meaning to regular season.

ChompyWulfSep 1, 20171 votes

The first problem is you are thinking only of yourself and how you want to view EVERY LCS and pro game. That's ridiculous and selfish reason to suggest a change from Best of 3 to Best of 1.

Secondly, you are totally missing the point of more games. Have the last two years been sad outings for NA in worlds? Yep. But will going to Bo1 help other teams besides the permanent flopping three improve? No, it will not. Furthermore, Worlds format has been in flux almost every year with Riot trying to find the best compelling format. This year with a play in round before groups, it will help build hype and give some time to enjoy without Korea curb stomping wildcards or teams in the past that were in Groups that may not have deserved to be there.

Third, you may not like some of my point reward and penalty ideas, but I think you vastly overestimate that pro teams would prioritize those goals to the same level as brainless scrub shooters in HALO. Would teams possibly try risky early game comps? Maybe, but gambling big Win or Loss point amounts on small bonus chance points is unlikely to be common. Also remember that teams would have to be careful in champ select or risk tipping their strategy and being punished if they lay greedy. Overall, a point system would give a lot more chances of games late in a split meaning more, when for much of the last three weeks everyone knew what teams would never make playoffs, while with a point system a couple may have still had a long shot.