Incarnation needs to go

xJLx MCHammer·Jun 28, 2015·5 votes·2,103 views

I'm not calling him bad. I just have never seen him win a lane, or go even. He always barely there, or behind. I don't think he is a good fit for c9.

36 Comments

ZhuganJun 28, 20158 votes

Incarnation, honestly, isn't the biggest part of the problem. The problem is that Meteos isn't even half the shotcaller that Hai was/is. A better midlaner would help, but a shotcaller with even a pale glimmer of Hai's skill would do a hell of a lot more for C9 than replacing Incarnation would.

Ale non è maleJun 28, 20155 votes

They should let Lemon do the calls for them. He has never been the most skilled mechanical player out there (heck, to be honest he has always been the weakest mechanical player in C9 team when comparing their members vs the members of the adversaries team), make him useful and let him prove that he can still be a top-team caliber player after all these season when he strats to look like he is completely outplayed Also, he was yet the secondary shotcaller when Hai was in, and he has a rather wide champ pool to accomodate the meta or try new stuff to try to make C9 the innovators in the NA meta, a thing that would put them back on the top of NA chart

JAGMAGJun 29, 20151 votes

lemon has said in interviews he does not want to shot call and does not think he would be good at it since he is not very decisive

Ale non è maleJun 29, 20151 votes

If this is the case, he is the one that must go then incarnatiOn at least has the mechanical skills to stay in a top team, if Lemon doesn't even have the shotcalling ability, then what remains to him that makes him a possible important piece for a top level team? i think though, that it is the team that should ask lemon to be the shotcaller, they have to realize they are not good enough and ask him to step up. If Lemon step up, he stays, and can lead the team to success, if he doesn't, he goes, and they can search a support with good shotcalling skills

JAGMAGJun 29, 20151 votes

lemon is a good support thou hes not the best mechanically but what makes him good is his theory he thought naut support would be really good way before it was ever played competitively but his team at the time shut him down i think he would be good at picks and bans and they should probably hand that over to him more then whoever is doing it atm but incarnation really needs to step up hes not that good yeah his azir is good but his champ pool is super small hes only looked good on azir and ok on kog so hes easy to ban out he also has no shot calling he either needs to really step his game up or learn to shot call also who would you replace lemon with? gleeb? lol at this point it would be super risky to mess up the bot lane synergy and trust me bot lane is not c9's problem

Ale non è maleJun 30, 20152 votes

{quoted}

lemon is a good support thou hes not the best mechanically but what makes him good is his theory he thought naut support would be really good way before it was ever played competitively but his team at the time shut him down i think he would be good at picks and bans and they should probably hand that over to him more then whoever is doing it atm but incarnation really needs to step up hes not that good yeah his azir is good but his champ pool is super small hes only looked good on azir and ok on kog so hes easy to ban out he also has no shot calling he either needs to really step his game up or learn to shot call also who would you replace lemon with? gleeb? lol at this point it would be super risky to mess up the bot lane synergy and trust me bot lane is not c9's problem

Sorry, but nowadays these skills - pick and ban selections, overthinking about effectiveness of new champs/builds in certain roles - is not anymore skills that belong exclusively to the players in the most structured organizations, these are the duties of the coach If what you are mentioning are the only things that lemon can provide, he would represent a great contributor for the team, but as a coach, not as a player. Of course, also some players must possess those skills, but they got to offer even something else more, otherwise they can step down and become more useful by providing these skills in a coaching role I am not saying Lemon must go now, because of course the skills you are mentioning are valuable, I said that those are not enough for a top level player alone, and they have to see if Lemon can provide that shotcalling role to stay useful also as a player and not only as a potential future coach, given that we all agree that mechanics aren't his main skills and they can't expect him to theorycraft something new every week to make up for everything else You can replace Lemon with almost every great EU/NA solo Q support with consistent shotcalling skills, given how good is Sneaky among C9 ADCs, he can probably adapt to almost any support out there, but C9 needs to improve shotcalling, and I do not see these great midlaners that are world class level both on a mechanical level and as shotcalling level with a big champion pool that is free agent. If incarnatiOn small champion pool remains a problem even when in the future with meta changes (he got famous on assassins that right now are slightly out of pro meta), then of course you kick him out too. But what/how Lemon can actually give to teh team is a structural problem that need to be tackled for the long term, and they better do it now that the losing situation is giving them reason to act rather than drag down the problem further down the line and then see in the future seasons that Lemon wasn't proper anymore as support

JAGMAGJun 30, 20151 votes

lol they should probably give that over to lemon jack obviously has no idea how to pick and ban
hes mechanically good enough to be in challenger
watch sneaky duo with lemon in solo que sometimes hes actually pretty good at keeping sneaky from dying allot
C9 COULD HAVE HAD POLBELTER BUT TOOK INCARNATION so they could have had a guy who's a proven mid laner with a deep pool who may not be world class but is definitely one of the best in NA
i dont really know of any team that's super successful with a support shot caller supports may shot call for bot lane but overall shot calling has almost always been a mid/jungle job

ZhuganJun 30, 20151 votes

Charlie is doing pick/ban, not Jack. Charlie is the coach, Jack is the owner.
True
Lemon is mechanically good enough to be a support. I wouldn't want him in any other role, but he is good at that.
Honestly, Pobelter isn't that good, and I can 100% understand why C9 didn't want him. CLG is just as tilty and good at choking as always (Pobelter didn't help that at all). That said, Incarnation wasn't the right choice either. They needed someone with shotcalling experience AND something approaching Hai's skill and champ diversity midlane. They picked into one of those things, not both.
There have been teams with successful support shotcallers. Arguably as a role that is often less mechanically demanding its easy for them to be the mid/late game shotcaller with the jungler running things early.
In my dream world, Charlie would be fired and replaced by Lemon and Hai would take over as support and be the shotcaller again. But Hai has said that won't happen, and if I was Lemon I wouldn't stick around to coach when I had a Masters in Computer Science.

JAGMAGJun 30, 20151 votes

got mixed up on the who's who
c9's problem is not polbelter thou there problem si mainly team comp they put xmithe on eve....he feeds so what do they do the next day? put xmithe on eve he feeds again so thats a pick problem also lemon even said in an interview that they crushed scrims with polbelter but not with incarnation they mainly wanted incarnation thou because of his lack of team experience so that they could mold him into a c9 player and like i said polbelter is not world class but hes is one of the top in NA he has a very deep champ pool and its diverse everything from passive control mages to ad assassins he has shown he has mechanics in solo que (hes even made it to top 50 in Korea) i dont think hes the best but i would rather have him then say incarnation
that's a nice dream but like you said probably not going to happen

Ale non è maleJul 1, 20151 votes

{quoted}

hes mechanically good enough to be in challenger

watch sneaky duo with lemon in solo que sometimes hes actually pretty good at keeping sneaky from dying allot

i dont really know of any team that's super successful with a support shot caller supports may shot call for bot lane but overall shot calling has almost always been a mid/jungle job

Lemon did not reach challìenger by playing the champs he is actually using in LCS, though. he reached challenger using mainly Janna, Blitz, Lulu and Soraka: He added Thresh and Morgana on his champ pool down the line on which he is really inferior to almost all LCS and CS players, and he has a decent to good Karma he doesn't use much. In competitive he uses Annie, Braum and Nautilus too, but it is more as strategic picks than picks on which he shines from a mechanic point of view

TL;DR say that he is good mechanically to be in challenger doesn't say really much when we look at his mechanical skills in comparison with the competitive scene, especially when he is not using in LCS the champs on which he is better from a mechanical point of view (the 4 champs on which he get challenger + probably Karma). Heck, I don't know why he isn't usnig much much more Janna that I'm sure he would be great with in this meta as Janna is the perfect champ to use in teamfights

Lemon being good at keeping Sneaky alive isn't strange, no one says that he is a terrible support, but that he is not top level, and I'm sure that a lot of other good supports can keep Sneaky alive given that this IS their main job (keep ADC alive) as well, if this is the supposed reason why he should stay

TSM and Fnatic have been the most successful team from an historic point of view in the West scene, and I don't think you can really say that Xpecial and then Lustboy for TSM and Yellowstar from Fnatic have not acted as very important shot callers for them

JAGMAGJul 1, 20151 votes

lustboy does not shot call for tsm he shares shot calling with turtle for the bot lane lane phase only not sure about yellow star

for lemons champs well again that's a pick/ban problem why would you not put lemon on jana? or even lulu tsm even uses lulu support on occasion also yes he doesn't play much thresh but neither does lust boy (even thou hes insanely good at him) and yes im not saying lemon is one of the best supports even in NA but really who are you going to replace him with that is so much better to justify a player switch when your bot lane is not the problem and your team is already struggling to not have to play regulation matches

DracidJun 29, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Incarnation, honestly, isn't the biggest part of the problem. The problem is that Meteos isn't even half the shotcaller that Hai was/is. A better midlaner would help, but a shotcaller with even a pale glimmer of Hai's skill would do a hell of a lot more for C9 than replacing Incarnation would.

^ this. Individual skill is down on this team overall but its not the main problem. C9 have come out of laning phase ok in a lot of these games but then they crumble so fast during the mid game and get rolled. It's 95% to do with shotcalling at this point. Changing to a new mid laner is not going to help at this point if the shotcalling keeps being as bad as it has been

LintheJun 29, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Incarnation, honestly, isn't the biggest part of the problem. The problem is that Meteos isn't even half the shotcaller that Hai was/is. A better midlaner would help, but a shotcaller with even a pale glimmer of Hai's skill would do a hell of a lot more for C9 than replacing Incarnation would.

I 100% agree with this. I also think the shot calling is affecting his jungling. It almost seems like he isn't in the game at all.

Uva9x6gDhCJun 28, 20153 votes

They are all playing like crap.

I Shota Aizawa IJun 28, 20152 votes

I agree with Meteos being not as good of a shot caller as Hai is, and also for Incarnati0n as well. As the page on him says, "On February 4th 2013, he was permanently banned from playing League of Legends due to his "long history of DDOS activity, abusive behaviour and poor sportsmanship across multiple accounts." Unsure if he is still like this at all or not, but I hope not. Where a lot of people would blame Hai for their losses, he really was quite useful.

xJLx MCHammerJun 28, 20152 votes

Guys I'm not saying that incarnation is the problem. I'm saying he is not the fix. C9 did well with a good shot caller; they didn't replace a shot caller in the mid lane; the gave it to meteos who wasn't ready.

Incarnation hasn't done anything this split even in their wins. He isn't dominant, nor is he a shot caller. So what does he do? See if you lack shot calling you should be good in team fights or in lane; he doesn't do either well. Sneaky, balls and meteos have proven that they are good mechanically with the right shot caller

Get rid of incarnation please

MultivariateJun 29, 20152 votes

I almost wonder if they should bring Link in. They played fine at All Stars with him as a sub, he often had better stats than Hai, and has shot calling skill. He's probably not the guy to win NA with, but he would be enough to get them out of the relegation range.

Earl EulrichJun 29, 20151 votes

they have LOD in their challenger team - if you´ve ever seen that guy play, he´s sure one of the most talented carry-midlaners in NA (even though currently he plays adc). It´s just a waste not to use his talent appropriate. though yea, link also could be worth a try...i just don´t understand why they go for the random soloq hero to replace their most important player when they have quite some more established/experienced options.

DracidJun 29, 20151 votes

{quoted}

I almost wonder if they should bring Link in. They played fine at All Stars with him as a sub, he often had better stats than Hai, and has shot calling skill. He's probably not the guy to win NA with, but he would be enough to get them out of the relegation range.

I don't even think Link could fix this right now. Sure they played ok with him before but this is a whole new can of worms now compared to then.

TheHobbitsJun 28, 20151 votes

He does not meet the requirements of #LC$bigplayz

JimmyNtheKudosJun 28, 20151 votes

He's barely the problem though... Sneak got caught out, Meteos went in for kills when he shouldn't have, Balls and LemonNation's presence was barely felt. They are not playing well as a team.

xJLx MCHammerJun 29, 20151 votes

They are not in relegation range guys. You have to be bottom and not with TDK playing like that.

TangsooyookJun 29, 20153 votes

except tdk has ninja and emperor now

DracidJun 29, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=xJLx MCHammer,realm=NA,application-id=9hBQwnEU,discussion-id=tbRbMf2K,comment-id=0007,timestamp=2015-06-29T00:11:23.350+0000)

They are not in relegation range guys. You have to be bottom and not with TDK playing like that.

TDK also has their full roster now and they just rolled Dig. I don't expect them to be relegated. Be Team 8 or Enemy most likely. Who knows though. If Cloud 9 keep playing like they have, good chance they could to. They've lost games to a lot of the weaker teams

LintheJun 29, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=xJLx MCHammer,realm=NA,application-id=9hBQwnEU,discussion-id=tbRbMf2K,comment-id=0007,timestamp=2015-06-29T00:11:23.350+0000)

They are not in relegation range guys. You have to be bottom and not with TDK playing like that.

They absolutely ARE in relegation range. Maybe not auto-relegation. But remember that teams 8 and 9 have to play their way back into the LCS. Look what happened to Winterfox.

TangsooyookJun 29, 20151 votes

Tbh hes pretty good in solo queue, its just that in the LCS you need to be able to play as a team. He just needs to fit better into the team and then I think he'll start to do better.

JAGMAGJun 29, 20151 votes

his champ pool is very small when he was climbing solo que it was with like zed and fizz

endtime00Jun 29, 20151 votes

Nah, you guys are all wrong about Incarnation holding the team down. C9 just needs to import some Koreans into their roster.

bluekhezzyJun 29, 20151 votes

I think its more like since other teams know he is knew and "the weak link" they focus more on shutting down bot lane. It shows in many of the games where sneaky and lemon are focused. As for the shot calling....I think jg is maybe the most demanding position so that demand plus the new demand of shot calling may be to much for meteos so maybe someone else should be calling shots but thats an adjustment they have to decide to make. Either way its a tough time to me be C9 fine.

Drunk RummateJun 29, 20151 votes

Hai pretty much never won lane either.

A lot of teams give tons of jungle attention to mid. C9 does not. It hurts incarnation because even if he isn't dying to gank, he's blowing summoners and he can't really afford to play aggressive to gain an advantage ever.

That's why his best performances are on safe scaling champions like AP kog maw, because he can just clear waves and become a threat after 2 items and level 11.

Honestly he'd probably be best if he just played Lulu and Orianna and played a second support to Sneaky, who's an ADC god and could probably get C9 to the top 4 alone with a little attention.

The LexerJul 1, 20151 votes

Charlie has to go. Then I'll talk

xJLx MCHammerJul 1, 20151 votes

guys, the only person who hasn't prove anything is incarnation. lemon, sneaky, meteos, and balls all have proven that with right shot calling, they can win. They are PROVEN mechanical skilled players.

Incarnation isn't proven. He was brought in with the idea that meteos would take shot calling; he can't. Get rid of incarnation and get a player who is mechanically good and can shot call as well.

Ale non è maleJul 2, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=xJLx MCHammer,realm=NA,application-id=9hBQwnEU,discussion-id=tbRbMf2K,comment-id=000d,timestamp=2015-07-01T23:49:45.516+0000)

guys, the only person who hasn't prove anything is incarnation. lemon, sneaky, meteos, and balls all have proven that with right shot calling, they can win. They are PROVEN mechanical skilled players.

Incarnation isn't proven. He was brought in with the idea that meteos would take shot calling; he can't. Get rid of incarnation and get a player who is mechanically good and can shot call as well.

Well, you say that like this would be easy...some name other than LiNK(which future has still yet to be decided after all the things he went through during his CLG experience, but from his document looked more like he was done as pro player than not) of these supposedly available guys who are both good/great in both mechanics and shotcalling at LCS level?

And, tbh, this argumentation could also be overtuned. IncarnatiOn IS proven, he has proven in soloQ that he is mechanically better than any other player on C9 roster, barring maybe Sneaky. Why shouldn't C9 get rid of one of Meteos, Balls or Lemon who are mechanically inferior to IncarnatiOn and get in their roles a guy who is mechanically good and can shot call as well?

Earl EulrichJul 2, 20151 votes

And, tbh, this argumentation could also be overtuned. IncarnatiOn IS proven, he has proven in soloQ that he is mechanically better than any other player on C9 roster, barring maybe Sneaky.

though success in SoloQ does in no way gurantee that these players also can have success in 5v5s, ultimately proving nothing short of putting some time into the game and at least some mechanical skill... On the LCS-stage he really has accomplished nothing so far - if he would have truly better mechanics, he would at least asort some kind of lane-pressure. But as it is, even an ill Hai had a lot more controll over his lane and the surrounding areas than Incarnation showed so far.

Ale non è maleJul 2, 20151 votes

No one in C9 team is accompshing anything so far this season, so again, why should IncarnatiOn the one that should be automatically kicked? And if IncarnatiOn is the one that deserved to be kicked, than who is this supposedly available player who is good to great both mechanically and as shot caller at mid lane?

I'm not saying incarnatiOn isn't the problem, but even C9 management knew that he wasn't a shotcaller, and asked Meteos to embrace that role, in which he clearly failed, which ultimately is the rmain eason why C9 is faltering So, the question is not who is actually the problem, but how can C9 fix the situation? Do they have to return to the previous set-up with the mid laner as the main shotcaller kicking IncarnatiOn? It is a solution, but you got to find that midlaner good mechanically and as shotcaller, and it's not really easy, imho Do they have instead to distribute in a different way shotcalling duties inside the actual roster? it could be a solution, if Lemon could step up on this role as he seems the guy with the best game knowledge Do they have instead to replace some of the other guy in the roster and get in their role a good shotcaller? It could be a solution, as anyone of the other guy barring Sneaky is repleaceable as no one of them can be labelled as one of the best players around when looking at international level when C9 has never shined Do they have to just get better coaching, better preparation to the game and better pick/ban phases? it could be a solution, as some of their pick/bans have been really questionable and fix this could just bring better results keeping the same actual roster

C9 can go in various way to fix the problems, even some of the ones mentioned above together, what I'm saying is that kick IncarnatiOn is not automatically the best way to act just because of C9 past with Hai. It could be the best thing to do kick incarnatiOn, for sure, but C9 has to take a picture of the bigger context before to decide for the move, because there could be potentially various things to fix that are instead not related to incarnatiOn's game instead

StreakLightJul 2, 20151 votes

When Link left CLG, he said something along the lines of C9 players being better than CLG players. Just in terms of independence and general map awareness, and if CLG and C9 fought without Hai, C9 would still win. I guess not, huh!?

When Hai was captain, it rarely seemed like C9 won because of their laners. It felt like they won DESPITE their laning. Hai was very very good at choosing fights. He danced around dragon, back and forth with the enemy, just an invisible push and pull, until he felt like everyone was in a suitable position. Then C9 destroyed them. Then they took an objective. No hesitation.

Now, when we see C9 games, you can feel the doubt in Meteos. In fights, he jumps in haphazardly at the earliest chance. And he just performs poorly in general. There's no finesse, there's just forced fights.

Meteos' shotcalling isn't just poor on a macro level (we got a kill? let's steal their blue), it's also poor in the micro level (I don't like our position in this fight). I bet on voice, Hai was like: No, no, not yet... Now. Baron Baron Baron. And Meteos seems like: Uh... I can jump on Sivir... NOW! Let's take their blue. No, wait, Baron.

I like Incarnation, but I agree: C9 isn't the fit. C9 needs to teamfight better, it's the only way they've ever performed well.