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Power Rankings - 6/2/2015

Riot·6/3/2015, 6:13:44 PM·1 votes·93,805 views
After weeks of waiting, all five of the major leagues have begun. Asian leagues had a few weeks head start on the LCS regions, but the picture is still murky in China where substitutions, experimentation, and general unrest is preventing us from being able to analyze the region. Similarly, with only two games of data we can't make firm determinations on the LCS regions, but there's still plenty to discuss. One thing is constant in all regions however: new teams have proven they aren't to be taken for granted. Find out who moved up and down this week...

Korea

  1. ( - ) SKTelecom T1 (2-0) [4-0]
  2. ( - ) CJ Entus (3-0) [6-2]
  3. ( - ) KT Rolster (2-1) [5-2]
  4. (+2) Jin Air Green Wings (2-1) [4-2]
  5. (-1) Najin e-mFire (1-2) [3-5]
  6. (-1) KOO Tigers (1-1) [3-3]
  7. (+1) Samsung (1-2) [3-4]
  8. (+1) Incredible Miracle (1-1) [2-3]
  9. (-2) Anarchy (1-3) [4-7]
  10. ( - ) SBENU Sonicboom (0-3) [0-6]
(Match Score) [Game Score] The Jin Air Greenwings have begun to resume the form they held last season in the wake of their win over Anarchy. But KT Rolster remains a step ahead of them after defeating Jin Air 2-0. Meanwhile, nothing has happened to upset the balance of SKT and CJ's grasp on the region, with CJ winning a close series over KT Rolster and SKT coming out ahead against Najin. There is still potential for upsets later in the Split, but for now, it's still a two team race for best in Korea. Panel: Alex Manisier, Erik "DoA" Lonnquist, Christopher "MonteCristo" Mykles, and Mike "Noctt" Huh

China

  1. ( - ) Edward Gaming (2-0-1)
  2. ( - ) Invictus Gaming (3-1-0)
  3. (+1) Qiao Gu (2-0-1)
  4. (+1) Snake (2-1-1)
  5. (+2) OMG (1-0-3)
  6. (-3) Vici Gaming (0-1-3)
  7. (+1) LGD Gaming (0-1-3)
  8. (-2) Masters 3 (1-0-3)
  9. (+1) Royal Never Give Up (1-1-3)
  10. (-1) Unlimited Potential (0-1-4)
  11. (+1) Team WE (0-2-2)
  12. (-1) Team King (0-4-0)
Record format is (W-L-T) Edward Gaming and Invictus Gaming are not giving up their stranglehold on China. They are however letting the rest of the region maintain their crazy ways. In an inexplicable move, Vici Gaming shuffled its roster around in what should have been a marquee matchup against Invictus. Why? Zu-Jing "Carry" Wang was unable to play and they didn't want to use a sub. They get a bit of a pass, but not much of one by virtue of the 22-match regular season not letting this one have too much impact. Still, it would have been nice of them to try to win. Snake and Qiao Gu continue their improvement and their ascension up the rankings, giving LGD and Masters 3 the role of gatekeeper between the lower and upper tiers of the league.

Panel: Barento "Raz" Mohammed, Michale "Drexxin" Lalor, and Carlos "H0tsawce" Bravo.

North America

  1. ( - ) Team SoloMid (1-1)
  2. (+3) Counter Logic Gaming (2-0)
  3. ( - ) Team Liquid (2-0)
  4. (-2) Cloud9 (1-1)
  5. (-1) Team Impulse (1-1)
  6. (+2) Enemy Esports (1-1)
  7. (-1) Gravity (1-1)
  8. (+2) Team Dignitas (1-1)
  9. (-2) Team8 (0-2)
  10. (-1) Team Dragon Knights (0-2)
Before you crucify us for putting Counter Logic Gaming 2nd behind Team SoloMid, let us explain. It's too early in the season to really stack rank these teams, especially because Cloud9 out teamplayed TSM, but then inexcusably lost to Team Dignitas. CLG looked great against Team Impulse, but we think it was more CLG's strengths naturally exploiting TiP's flaws than a statement game. I would fully expect this to change in the coming weeks. If CLG is able to keep up their impressive performance, they will most assuredly be 1st Place. However, this isn't the standings, it's a Power Ranking. We have to wait and see if all the top teams are as consistent as we hope they will be. Enemy Esports is the big winner of the week. As one of the new teams in NA, it was unlikely they'd come out with much fire, but they managed to defeat Gravity in their debut. Look for them to continue improving as the Split continues.

Panel: Cameron Gilbert, Mattias "Gentleman Gustaf" Lehman, Taylor "Riot RoboTayCo" Cocke, Jason "Riot Jayway" Wai, Joshua "Riot Jatt" Leesman, and Frank "Riot Mirhi" Fields.

Europe

  1. ( - ) Fnatic (2-0)
  2. (+2) Origen (2-0)
  3. ( - ) Unicorns of Love (1-1)
  4. (-2) H2K (1-1)
  5. (+1) Elements (1-1)
  6. (+2) Copenhagen Wolves (1-1)
  7. ( - ) SK Gaming (0-2)
  8. (+1) ROCCAT (1-1)
  9. (+1) Giants Gaming (1-1)
  10. (-5) Gambit Gaming (0-2)
Martin "Rekkles" Larsson isn't cursed after all! We didn't expect Fnatic to have any chemistry problems considering that the AD carry and Bora "YellOwStaR" Kim played a full year together, but it was still a possibility. They managed to close out Unicorns of Love and SK Gaming pretty convincingly in Week 1, leading us to believe Fnatic will be a better team in the long term than they are now. However, Origen also showed to be a contender with an impressive win over H2K -- a team many thought to be No. 2 in Europe. Elements seems to have recovered from their hangover from last Split as well. They completely dismantled Gambit and then lost a close game to Unicorns of Love. You can only penalize the top teams for playing each other so much, so even though the records don't align with rankings too heavily, we do expect things to level out in the coming weeks.

Panel: Devin "PiraTechnics" Young, Mattias "Gentleman Gustaf" Lehman, Taylor "Riot RoboTayCo" Cocke, Jason "Riot Jayway" Wai, and Frank "Riot Mirhi" Fields.

Taiwan

  1. ( - ) ahq e-Sports Club (3-0-0)
  2. ( - ) yoe Flash Wolves (2-0-1)
  3. (+4) Machi Esports (1-1-1)
  4. ( - ) Taipei Assassins (1-1-1)
  5. (+1) Midnight Sun (0-1-2)
  6. (-2) Hong Kong Esports (0-1-2)
  7. (+1) Logitech Snipers (0-1-2)
  8. (-3) Assassin Sniper (0-2-1)
Unfortunately for fans of the LMS, there seem to only be two contenders in LMS. The region still appears to be very deep, but more top heavy lately. Machi Esports has been on the rise, but the Taipei Assassins, Assassin Sniper, and Hong Kong Esports have not looked as solid as they once did. The teams have all had troubles adapting, and anemic play in the past week lead us to believe this may be a Flash Wolves vs. ahq race once again.

Panel: James "Obscurica" Chen and Chia "Reazony" Yu.

Brazil

  1. ( - ) Keyd Stars (2-0-0)
  2. ( - ) paIN Gaming (1-0-1)
  3. ( - ) INTZ e-Sports (1-1-0)
  4. ( - ) CNB e-Sports Club (0-1-1)
  5. ( - ) g3nerationX (1-0-1)
  6. (+2) KaBuM! Orange (1-0-1)
  7. (-1) INTZ e-Sports Red (0-1-1)
  8. (-1) KaBuM! Black (0-1-1)
Record format is (W-L-T) Order was somewhat restored in Brazil this past week, although ranking teams past the top two is still fairly difficult. Returning to form this week was paiN Gaming, who swept CNB e-Sports Club in a hard-fought set that was far closer than the final 2-0 score suggests. Top team Keyd Stars swept g3nerationx -- formerly their sister team, Keyd Warriors -- but looked shaky in the second game as g3nerationx was a few mistakes away from the upset. INTZ's coordination was much improved in Week 2, and Gabriel "Tockers" Claumann overcame six consecutive mid lane bans to boast an impressive combined 30 KDA in their 2-0 victory over INTZ Red. Lastly, KaBuM! Orange was the more focused of the two KaBuM! teams this week, as Black played surprisingly passively throughout their mid game, giving Orange the 2-0.

Written by Emily Rand

Panel: Emily Rand

Latin America

  1. KLG (0-0)
  2. Lyon Gaming (1-0)
  3. Last Kings (0-0)
  4. Dash9 Gaming (0-1)
  5. Furious Gaming (0-0)
  6. Gaming Gaming (1-0)
  7. Havoks Gaming (1-0)
  8. Isurus Gaming (0-0)
The 2015 Latin American Cup’s closing Split has officially started and while we are still waiting for LAS to play their games later today, yesterday we were able to watch all six LAN teams in action. Regional champion Lyon Gaming was able to defeat their arch rivals Dash9 Gaming in a convincing display of authority against a team that has three new players. The boys from Gaming Gaming were in charge of welcoming MYM to the LATAM region in a very close fight that had the audience comparing it to a basketball game. Finally Havoks Gaming made their Latin American Cup debut by defeating Peru’s Revenge eSports in another back and forth match. Later today we get to see LAS in action when Latin American champions KLG face off against Furious Gaming, Last Kings vs. Bencheados, and Rebirth vs. Isurus Gaming. Written by Erick “Skyshock” Gonzalez Panel: Erick "Skyshock" Gonzalez

Japan

  1. ( - ) DetonatioN FocusMe (1-1)
  2. ( - ) 7th Heaven (1-1)
  3. (+1) RabbitFive (1-1)
  4. (-1) Ozone Rampage (2-0)
  5. ( - ) Rascal Jester (1-1)
  6. ( - ) ApeX R Gaming (0-2)
You might be surprised to see the only 2-0 team ranked 4th, but the games Ozone Rampage played have left something to be desired: close, unpolished wins over equally unpolished teams. Meanwhile, the team they barely edged out a victory over last week, Rabbit Five, took out the reigning champs DetonatioN FocusMe while playing with a sub. FM seemed to lack all the decisiveness that made them so scary last week, and Rabbit Five -- led by a spectacular Gnar performance from Yuta "Yutorimoyashi" Noguchi – took full advantage, leading them on a merry chase all over the map. It's close, but the all-Japanese Rabbit Five moves up to No. 3 this week. On the other hand, 7th Heaven finally showed off their best stuff against ApeX. Their lane dominance and effective followup showed that their loss last week may have been more to FocusMe's credit than their own weakness, leading the top two to stay as is. It'll be this weekend, in 7th Heaven's match against Rabbit Five, where we see how much credit they truly deserve.

Written by Cameron Gilbert

Panel: Cameron Gilbert

Turkey

  1. ( - ) Beşiktaş (6-0)
  2. ( - ) HWA.Gamesatış (4-2)
  3. ( - ) Oyun Hizmetleri (4-2)
  4. ( - ) Dark Passage (3-3)
  5. (+3) Team Turquality (2-4)
  6. (-1) NumberOne eSports Club (2-4)
  7. ( - ) Atlas (2-4)
  8. (-2) CREW (1-5)
In the third week of the Turkish Championship League, teams continued to tinker with rosters. Most notably, ex-Giants support Fernando "Rydle" Soria joined up with Dark Passage, and arguably the best Turkish ADC Anıl "HolyPhoenix" Işık teamed up with HWA.Gamesatış. Beşiktaş on the other hand is still performing below their peak, though they won a crucial match against HWA after falling behind 8-1 in kills. HWA enjoyed success with their new ADC -- HolyPhoenix managed to record a KDA of 10.3 throughout the week. Even though Oyun Hizmetleri lost their first game against TT, they managed to bounce back and beat DP to retain 3rd Place. Team Turquality, who weren’t able to get a victory yet, had an outstanding third-week performance as they beat both Atlas and Dark Passage. New jungle addition Robin "Rawbin" Eggenberger worked together perfectly with top laner Gustav "Xyraz" Blomkvist. The synergy between the Swedes combined with the mid and bot lane big plays will surely make them a threat for the remaining weeks.

Written by Kursad Demirer

Panel: Kursad Demirer, Christopher Willekens

CIS

  1. Hard Random (3-0)
  2. Team Just.MSI (2-0)
  3. Tornado RoX (2-0)
  4. Dolphins of Wall Street (1-1)
  5. Dragon (1-2)
  6. Solar Wind (1-2)
  7. Carpe Diem (0-2)
  8. Your Exit (0-3)
First week of StarSeries gave the fans more questions than answers. On the one hand, last Split champions Hard Random continue to show the rotational play that keeps everyone else way behind, but their problem has been sustaining their form throughout the season and Playoffs. Just.MSI continued playing well, but were relatively untested this week. RoX at last acquired an AD Carry they needed to diversify their passive playstyle -- they look like they could be a serious threat to the leaders. In case of three other teams, all of whom who made roster changes, it's really hard to say whether substitutions helped or not. Dolphins are trying to find a way around their careful carries and Lasagna's all-in aggressive initiations. Dragon are still trying to build synergy with their new botlane and Carpe Diem has expressed a lack of motivation, not playing with their main roster. Newcomers Solar Wind and Your Exit are showing some potential but they have a long road to playoffs in front of them and the main goal is not to get relegated. Written by Michael "Olsior" Zverev Panel: Michael "Olsior" Zverev

Oceania

  1. Chiefs eSports Club (3-0)
  2. Legacy eSports (3-0)
  3. Dire Wolves (2-1)
  4. Avant Gaming (1-1)
  5. Sin Gaming (1-1)
  6. Absolute (1-2)
  7. Team Immunity (0-3)
  8. Sudden Fear (0-3)
We're one and a half weeks into the Oceanic Pro League, and there have been a few shuffles around the middle bracket as some teams have come out stronger than expected, while others still suffer from roster issues. Chiefs and Legacy lead the pack, and the stronger of the two is likely to be decided in their upcoming clash -- in which one undefeated record will be put to an end. Dire Wolves and Avant Garde still need time to build familiarity with their new rosters, but we've already seen glimpses of their potential strengths in their wins. Meanwhile, Team Immunity are seriously struggling, plagued by availability issues in the jungle position. There is no doubt that they have a higher upside than Absolute, but as long as they remain winless, Immunity will have to earn a higher ranking. Written by Alex Manisier Panel: Alex Manisier

International

  1. ( - ) Edward Gaming (2-0-1)
  2. ( - ) SKTelecom T1 (2-0)
  3. ( - ) Invictus Gaming (3-1-0)
  4. ( - ) CJ Entus (3-0)
  5. (+2) KT Rolster (2-1)
  6. (+3) Qiao Gu (2-0-1)
  7. (-2) ahq e-Sports Club (3-0-0)
  8. (-2) Fnatic (2-0)
  9. ( - ) yoe Flash Wolves (2-0-1)
  10. (+8) Jin Air Green Wings (2-1)
  11. (+3) Snake (2-1-1)
  12. (-1) Najin e-mFire (1-2)
  13. (NEW) Origen (2-0)
  14. (-1) KOO Tigers (1-1)
  15. (NEW) OMG (1-0-3)
  16. (-8) Vici Gaming (0-1-3)
  17. (NEW) LGD (0-1-3)
  18. (-5) Team SoloMid (1-1)
  19. (-2) Unicorns of Love (1-1)
  20. (NEW) Samsung (1-2)
First off, we all believe that China and Korea are still the best two regions -- it's just hard to figure out where teams go. Try not to get too caught up on the exact positions in the top 8 teams -- it's all pretty close, and they all seem to be improving. However, the teams that seem to be improving fastest are KT and QG, who have gone from mediocre to great very quickly. I wouldn't expect too much to change in the top 10 without a massive improvement from many of the climbing teams elsewhere in the rankings There are many new and returning teams to the rankings, but most notably is Origen, who looked like a veteran team after only a week. That's probably because they basically are a veteran team, with Jesper "Niels" Svenningsen being the only player without World Championship experience. This is a potentially scary team to the rest of Europe and even internationally. OMG, LGD, and Samsung have shown marked improvement in the past week, and it's possible that they may be able to start turning things around. Meanwhile, North America leaves us unsure what to make of them as a region. This early in the season I'd expect even more upheaval in coming weeks. Let us know your thoughts on the Power Rankings on Twitter or in the comments below.

Images courtesy of Inven, Garena, SANKO, and paiN Gaming

Frank Fields is a Senior Editor for Riot Games' Esports Web Content team. You'll find him rewinding time in Zaun or on Twitter where he'd love to talk to you about esports.

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155 Comments

ˆayy6/3/2015, 8:36:23 PM16 votes

"North America leaves us unsure what to make of them as a region." Well then.

ModJikker6/3/2015, 8:49:42 PM14 votes

C9 in 4th simply because they lost to Dig yet TSM is still first despite losing to C9? Get new analysts that aren't TSM fanboys -- C9 just got a new mid laner who replaced their primary shot caller and they took down the top team of NA. They deserve to be higher up and I'm sure they will prove it next week.

Emerwyn6/3/2015, 8:46:42 PM8 votes

Fnatic simply plays another level, they would have to go to Korea or China to find some challenge. Although I'm quite excited about Origen, if they consolidate their performance, they can be some serious contenders. For now they're the best of the mortals. US seems quite decadent and mediocre these days. Except for CLG, every game was a snooze fest. Here's hoping they step up their games, or they'll just look bad in the international stage just as TSM did in MSI.

Troll Pool6/3/2015, 7:41:59 PM5 votes

Placing C9, a team that has never placed worse then second at 4th place after beating TSM.. Gambit at 10th place ?

Being a bit overdramatic don't you think?

ThatAfr06/4/2015, 2:32:24 PM5 votes

EU>NA Rito confirmed^^

Pofol PRO6/3/2015, 11:16:32 PM4 votes

I think c9 is fine where they are in these power rankings. They lost to DIG without taking a turret and that just brought them down alone knowing they're one of the best NA. TSM did lose but it was a close game and they beat their opponents, while CLG hasn't lost yet and DIG isn't even higher than C9 considering the pounding they gave C9. Just my opinion.

sKz Aaron D6/3/2015, 10:29:41 PM4 votes

Riot, please start taking NA seriously. With the exception of MSI, NA has consistently done as well as or better than EU and LMS in Seasons 4 and 5. S4, not a single LMS or EU team made it to the knock-out stage. 2 NA teams did, taking games from the 2 best LCK teams as well. IEM San Jose - C9 won, beating both EU teams. IEM Cologne - Gambit won, beating Team Dignitas and CLG (who beat Roccat). TSM beat CJ Entus and Yoe Flash Wolves at IEM Katowice, two teams above them on this list that didn't even qualify for MSI. When a top team in the LPL, LMS, or LCK loses it's because the region is, "Deeper than we thought," but when the same happens in NA, it supposedly shows that the region as a whole just isn't as good as anyone else? That doesn't make any sense at all. Stop with the unflinching bias, please.

ZeroAnarchy6/4/2015, 1:08:00 AM3 votes

So Yoe Flash wolves are ranked 9th best team in the world...yeah this ranking system is flawed beyond belief.

AFK Sam6/3/2015, 11:18:50 PM3 votes

Team WE dropped back to 2nd last places again in this split. So I guess it is safe to say they were on bottom part for a reason.. However, it is still a fact they won 2 Korean team and they took 1 game from TSM in IEM. One win is a upset, 2 wins are not.. So for a power ranking without WE but with so many Korean teams, you know they are simply wrong.

CrazyIvan6/7/2015, 8:32:05 PM3 votes

All these comments talking about bias opinions and claiming that NA is being hated on as a region by this ranking clearly haven't actually taken the time to understand what these rankings are even based on.

First off, the table lists rankings of specific teams and not regions as a whole and therefore saying things like 'NA had two teams in the QFs at Worlds' isn't a reason to automatically promote every NA team up a few rankings. The Power Rankings are an approximate list of where specific teams line up against each other at this moment in time based partly on past performance, but mainly on recent results.

In terms of NA teams, if we first consider the teams that went to Worlds, there was TSM, C9 and LMQ. As we know LMQ basically doesn't exist anymore with the only remaining member (XiaoWeiXiao) now playing for TIP, who we can currently only judge based on their spring split and start to the summer split. They finished 4th in the in the regular season of the spring split and were then beaten by 6th place team, Team Liquid, to make them remain in 4th during the playoffs. In week 1 of the summer split they beat Team 8, a team that most would agree to be somewhat average in terms of NA teams, and lost to CLG. This can only leave us to conclude that they are only currently a mid-table NA team at this point in time.

Let's move on to C9. At Worlds last year, sure they made it to the top 8, however they also had one of the easiest groups and the team that should have really dominated the group, Alliance, ended up putting up a pretty poor showing when they could have quite easily won 5 or maybe even all 6 games if they'd brought their A game. Regardless, C9 did actually make it to the QFs and therefore deserved some claim to being a Top 8 team in the world. However, that was at the end of worlds. Since then they won IEM San Jose, beating UoL who themselves had previously beaten TSM. Both of these teams rank in the top 20 when C9 doesn't, but at the time UoL was still a rookie team, yet to even play in the LCS and I'll get to TSM later.

At IEM Katowice C9 lost both their games eliminating them from the tournament making them finish in joint last place in a tournament that most people agree was generally filled with very watered down competition. Despite a few struggles at the start of the 2015 spring season they still managed to pull their way up to another second place finish in the split. In week 1 of the summer split they have again performed shaky, with a new mid laner who we can't really tell much about yet and losing a game to Dignitas, a team who have basically only just been managing to keep themselves in the LCS these past few splits. The fact that this C9 team can still beat TSM, who up to the end of the spring split were clearly the best team in NA is an obvious reason to doubt the capability of any of the NA teams at this point in time in terms of international competitiveness.

Finally, the last NA team that went to worlds, TSM. Again they managed to make it the QFs, however TSM too had a somewhat lucky break when SK's Svenskeren was banned from playing in their first 3 games. At the time, despite finishing third in the EU playoffs, SK were considered the second best team in EU and had only come third as their semifinal match was reasonably close encounter with Alliance. Fnatic somewhat struggling their way to the final over a full five games against ROCCAT. Svenskeren probably was (and still is) SK's best player and their's no doubt that his ban heavily impacted SK's performance as they managed to beat both TSM and Taipei Assassins when he returned to the team. If Svenskeren had played in the first game against TSM and SK had won, both teams would have finished 3 for 3 and SK would have gone through from winning both their games against TSM. We'll never know, but TSM was potentially that one game away from not getting out of groups. However, as with C9, they did in fact make it to the top 8, again staking a claim for an equal position in terms of world ranking.

Moving on, as already mentioned TSM lost to rookie wildcard team, UoL in IEM San Jose, but later went on to win IEM Katowice. From the teams that competed in the latter, three of them are placed above TSM in these Power Rankings. The yoe Flash Wolves, CJ Entus and GE Tigers (now KOO Tigers). There was some controversy about Korean teams not taking the tournament seriously and not preparing which led to their loss. True or not, TSM did personally beat the Flash Wolves and CJ Entus. They didn't get to play against TIgers. TSM then managed to win the NA spring split for the second time in a row qualifying them for MSI. However at MSI they would only win one of their 5 games against wildcard team, Beşiktaş e-Sports. In week 1 of the summer split in NA they then lost to C9 a team who is currently themselves on shaky ground in terms of relevance to the international scene, leaving it uncertain as to where NA currently sits on the Power Ranking list as the writer of the article says.

The yoe Flash Wolves finished 2nd in their region in the spring split, losing out to ahq e-Sports who performed pretty well when put against the World's best teams at MSI and a decent start to the summer season by the Flash Wolves spells good things for them placing them 9th on the power rankings. Likewise, the KOO Tigers and CJ Entus finished 2nd and 3rd in Korea, bested by SKT. A somewhat underwhelming start to their summer split then ends up leaving the Tigers 14th (4 places above TSM), with CJ Entus looking on top form leaving them a high flying 4th.

Based on all these facts the Power Rankings are actually quite reasonable, when bearing in mind that they rank specific teams at specific points in time. I don't watch a huge amount of league outside of the NA and EU LCS and internationals, so I can't say for all the other teams regions, but as far the NA and EU teams go it seems entirely fair to me. The only two EU teams above TSM are Fnatic, a team that only seems to get stronger the more they play and who also beat TSM at MSI, and Oregen, a team that's already looked highly competitive with a roster of players who collectively have a large amount of international experience. Alliance (Elements) and SK (the other EU teams that went to worlds) don't even feature in the top 20, which is entirely fair because their recent performance doesn't warrant it.

As of week one it seems that CLG has potential to take over as the best team in NA, but since they have an even worse track record when it comes to international competition in recent times (ie. it doesn't even exist) that puts NA in an even tougher spot to rank them any higher than they currently are in these rankings. As soon as we get some more clear results for NA I'm sure a couple of their teams will start climbing back up the ladder again, but as of right now these Power Rankings are pretty much as accurate as it can get.

TL;DR - Power Rankings only try to relate the ability of specific teams at specific times, not regions as a whole.

Darkest Laugh6/4/2015, 10:42:40 PM2 votes

While people are trash talking NA, can we take a moment to remember the world series last year? You know, the one where no EU teams made it to the quarter finals, while 2 NA teams did? And the only team to win a match against Samsung White besides Royal Club in the finals was in fact TSM? Oh yeah, and one of the analysts had mentioned that in all seriousness NA and EU aren't that far behind China and Korea. They were pretty spot on with that. If you don't count for that one powerhouse team that Korea somehow manages to produce every year, they're not that special.

The way I see it, had Royal Club stuck to having a tank in the top lane and someone tanky or at least hard to gank in the mid lane (like they did in the match they won) against SSW, they would have been the champions of S4.