Plat Breakdown Week 7
Hello everyone and welcome once again to another week of BOL Plat Breakdown its CTRL ULT ELITE. This week had some series with huge playoff standings and I’m eager to get into it! But first a RIP to all the teams that can no longer make playoffs: Team Ambition Tropics, Literal Monkeys, Team Ambition Wild Side, CB Tsundere, Revolution Ice Age, Stunned Gaming Invictus and Hypnotic. I spent this weekend volunteering for some ungodly reason so I am tired and sore. Hope the rest of you had a relaxing weekend and are ready for the end of the regular season this week. I am personally really hyped to see if by some miracle my team can squeak into the playoffs(LET’S GO BASEMENT DWELLERS I'M NOT BIASED WHATSOEVER!)
Ta Wild Side VS Literal Monkeys
TA Wild side have left the league. F in chat
TA Tropics VS Elemental Maelstrom
EM won 2-0 so im just going to briefly cover this series
The most interesting picks of this series was Monix 11x played ekko mid in game 1 and in game 2 TheRealOogway played Mundo into a Maokai
This series was not very close between the 2 teams EM won game 1 in 17 minutes and the kills were 22 to 5 they did not let TAT get a single objective that game.
In game 2 I think TAT played more for fun swapping their jungle and top and ADC and support. Game 2 of the series was much more even but still a pretty dominant win for EM. The game was 26 minutes and was 26-14 in kills. TAT at least got some objectives thanks to their Ziggs pick getting 3 towers.
Deftly was the clear MVP in this series for the side of EM. They had 2 fantastic games on MF and Twitch. Game 2 they did almost 900 damage a minute as Twitch and had 84% KP. Thanks to this game they are now number 23 on the list and are listed on the front page.
DM for Scholarship is continuing to impress me a lot as well they are now number 4 in assists per game
Titan Gaming Atlas VS New World Esports Nebula
Titan Gaming Atlas won 2-0 so I’m going to briefly cover this series.
It appears that NwEN did not have their main jungler ready for game 1
In game 1 NWEN went for the classic Yummi plus unkillable things to attach yourself to with Aatrox and Sivir and Swain all on the same team
TGA simply went with an AOE wombo combo and had MF amumu Maokai and Kat game 1
Game 2 both teams elected to take more standard back to front team comps with tank top laners and a hyper scaling ADC.
Ragnar was finally banned away from Ornn in game 1 of this series and NEWN attempted to go after them in round 2 as well, banning 2 more of their champs. Rangar decided to take Maokai into Aatrox which is a rough matchup. He did go down a lot of CS(136 to 213) but only died twice. In game 2 they got Ornn again and dominated not dying and being involved in 60% of his teams kills
Cole the top laner for NWEN did not have the greatest series. They died in laning phase twice in both games.
HamSandw1ch played amazing this series and has brought another new counter pick this week in Katarina mid into swain as Sylas was banned game 1
Aclick was the MVP this series; they did the most damage in both games and even got a Penta in game 2. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/fNwuM_VDmeY
CB Tsundere VS GE Emerald
CB Tsudenere in game 1 of this series had an E sub for game 1 in the jungle unfortunately and they started on Blue side. GEE had their full roster together so let's get into the draft for game 1.
CBT used their only ban on Anivia. Anivia oddly enough is the 3rd most banned champion in BOL with a total of 34 bans. She has a very low pick rate in solo queue, I just find it odd we have so many players in BOL plat that are drawing bans on the pick. GEE ban Bel’Veth Zilean and Miss Fortune on red side. Zilean is a respect ban to Fonso who plays much more supportive mids, and Bel’Veth seems to be ShadyGecko’s best jungler this year in solo que. Miss Fortune is the standout best ADC this patch and I would expect that most teams will 1st pick her given the choice. MF brings a great early game and has awesome team fights, her only weakness is that she is immobile and can be dove rather easily. CBT 1st pick Hecraim who is one of the major winners of this patch shooting his win rate up over 2% and putting his pick and ban rate over 20% each. It feels really bad whenever Hecarim is strong he just kinda runs at you and stat checks you. He has great dive, good sustain and a reliable fast clear. He is fairly weak earlier in the game and struggles with early objectives but once you grab levels and finish components you are suddenly really strong for the rest of the game. GEE goes with Ashe and Vi for their 1st 2 picks on red side. Vi is good into Hecarim if you are able to out tempo him. Vi can go for more early ganks or invades and needs to make the most of her early game so that she can be ahead to burst down the reaper of the shadow isles. Ashe is a flex pick much to the disgust of every ADC player. Support Ashe is annoying more than anything else. It provides tons of utility and slows and even offers engage. However support Ashe does not provide nearly anything for the lane itself and often steals farm as she randomly fires volleys at the enemy. CBT seeing an Ashe go all in on dive and take Tristana and Amumu. If you are just aiming to kill your opposing laners I think that this is one of the highest kill threat lanes you can draft. With last pick GEE takes Xayah probably the best anti dive ADC showing it is Ashe support.
In round 2 GEE bans Karma and Shen trying to limit the amount of shields and heals that can be put onto the dive that has been drafted. CBT go with top lane Juggernaut bans getting rid of Darius and Mordekiaser. I guess the idea here is to make sure Top lane stays even? I’m not sure why you did not go after more mid laners when I see what you drafted mid lane. With the blind pick GEE takes Ornn and with Darius and Morde gone I really respect that pick. CBT takes Gwen top and Soraka mid for the last picks on blue side. And uh I am concerned to say the least. The enemy team has Vi and Ashe already. How do you live in team fights as Soraka? Like your team is leaving you to dive and you have to run after them. Vi is just going to press R on you every fight you probably are going to have Ashe burning your flash with random ults all the time and GEE has not even picked their mid. Like if they pick anything with burst I do not see how these fights ever go long enough for you to do anything. GEE takes Viegar as the mid lane counter pick and that seems really strong here. So Veigar gets to free farm mid lane more or less. And you have the cage with Vi to kill soraka mid on repeat on you can shove out, or power farm the choice is yours. I mean as CBT you have 1 lane that is forced to push(trist E) and wants to fight and nothing to support them with that. If Vi and Hec both path bot I expect that GEE would win the 3v3.
For the actual game CBT gets off to an early lead. They are able to get 1st blood in a 2 for 1 trade bottom at 4 minutes. At 15 minutes into the game they are up 3k gold and have their money on the right people. Shifit on Tristana is really fed. But after a major teamfight win at 19 minutes for GEE, CBT just falls apart. After that team fight until the end of the game CBT only gets 4 kills and 1 tower. In comparison GE is able to get 22 kills, 8 towers, 2 dragons and a baron before the game ends at 33 minutes. Soprych ends the game with just 2 deaths on Xayah having a KDA of 11 and dealing the most damage in the game at 730 a minute. Puggler also does an insane amount of damage as well doing 600 dmg a minute as support. Gwen and Hecarim are never able to pop off in fights; both do less than 400 dmg a minute this game despite Soraka having out-healed the amount of damage done by Veigar.
For game 2 Jobey is back for CBT for the rest of the series so they regain their bans. In game 2 GEE on blue have very odd bans that I do not agree with in round 1. They ban Zilean Miss Fortune and Ashe. I mean it appears their ADC has a smaller champion pool and does not play MF so that's understable. I just do not get the Ashe ban. Coach Pizza plays it sure but that player has 41 support picks this year they are probably just picking what is best for the team not themselves. Like you guys lock in a comp idea in this draft why not ban counters to it? CBT goes with Veigar, Anivia and a Darius ban in round 1. I don’t see them taking Darius in the 1st round. Why not take away Hecarim istead? Anyway GEE take Hecarim 1st pick woah who could have guessed? CBT then goes with Udyr and Renata Glasc. Udyr is really really good love the pick is a top/jungle flex. Renata is one of the better supports into Hec, you can just grab him when he runs at you and throw him away. If Hec also fully commits on one person you can of course save them. Renata is really good at disengage. GEE decide that they are going for the speed comp and take Karma Sivir. Sivir has fallen from grace since the nerfs losing around 3% win rate going from the games best ADC to one not so great. Sivir is still kinda the same once you get 3-4 items you just win. She's just weaker getting to that point now. These 3 picks have incredibly high synergy with one another and have been played together and will continue to play together for a long time to come. CBT take Jinx as their own hyper carry answer. Jinx is strong against Sivir for the sole reason that you outrange her in Rocket form and you scale just as well.
In round 2 CBT ban Shen and Camille trying to keep 1 icecreamguy 1 on something not as lane dominant. GEE ban Vex and Ornn. Vex has quietly been sitting at the top of the Solo que tier list for quite a while and is finally starting to gain some popularity. I'll be honest I like Vex just cause at one point I was that moody teenanger listening to Likin Park and calling people normies wishing that I developed shadow powers. She is a fantastic pick into almost everything that does not out range her. Anyways CBT take Mordekaiser here. I guess this is also technically a flex between Udyr and Morde if one has a better matchup than the other? So let's see what you got 1 icecreamguy 1 has got into this. They elect to take Kled into the morde top and blind Annie. So Kled is a really interesting champ to say the least. The playstyle of Kled is go in that's it. You just keep fighting until you randomly live on like 14hp and remount and win the fight. But uh morde is pretty strong at just sitting there and bonking each other to death as well. At least as Kled you have an innate heal cut(1 of 4 champs). Uh I know last week I talked about how much I respect Annie but listen she is really bad blind especially in our setting. Annie is countered by things that outrange her like control mages or things that can dodge her stun(like Fizz). CBT take Viktor(I wish GEE took this) and this is one of Annie's hardest counters. Viktor outranges you and can trade with his shield Q towards you. Annie does better in solo que due to the fact that things are not getting communicated as often. Its much easier to ignore 2 missing pings then your mid laner going”annie has left my lane towards bot on a roam timer”. I mean the game plan is as simple as it gets for GEE. If you get ahead you jam your gold lead down CBT’s throat until they choke on it. If you're behind in gold fight anyways try to get shutdowns. Every pick on this team just forms a deathball and follows the Kled to kill them. As CBT the plan is also simple just peel back. Throw down Gravity well and Flame chompers and Hostile Takeover whenever GEE commits.
So this game does not really go as you want it to for GEE. at 15 minutes the game is dead even. And once everyone on CBT gets items this game is done. At 21 minutes CBT gets Baron and Dragon and closes the game out. Both junglers were the respective MVPS for their team. Jobey does not even die as Udyr this game and ends the game with the highest CS in the game as Udyr tends to do when ahead. Platypus Killer on Hecraim was the only player on their team with a positive KDA and also had the most CS and dmg on their team this game. Annie was rough in this game; they did about half the damage of Viktor.
So as game 3 starts you gotta feel the CBT have to be feeling good about their chances. Game 1 you lost but you had a bad draft and GEE were on comfort picks. You just got your main jungler back and they popped off. So draft starts and CBT are back on blue. They keep their bans from game 2 getting rid of control mages and Darius. GEE decide to ban Zilean. Udyr and Hecarim trying to get Jobey onto something less carry orientated. CBT take MF again with the 1st pick. I think this is probably the best 1st pick here. GEE goes once again with the Ashe and Vi setting up really good pick tools. CBT then take Renata Glasc yet again and Mordekiaser. I’m not crazy about Renata here Ashe does best vs shield focus enchanters as it's hard to react to her poke. Heal or engage is generally the answer you want to take. Morde is again a flex so it's fine to take blind. I think Morde is strong top side in general once you get rid of Darius vs most of GEE’s top pool. GEE then take Xayah again. I mean Xayah was really good in game 1 and is a comfort pick.
For round 2 GEE bans Vex and Viktor. Both of these are great bans you have fairly imbobile squishy champions on your team burst like Viktor or Vex is going to ruin your day. CBT bans Ornn and Camille limiting the top lane picks. I’m not certain about either of these bans TBH. Like Mordekiaser wins both these matchups. I think you should have gone with more mid lane bans like you know they are probably taking mid for counter why not ban some of the more annoying counter picks I would think you have a blind pick mid in mind. GEE takes Tahm Kench semi blind. I do not like this pick very much into morde. Its one of those go for short trades whittle them down picks. The major problem of this matchup is that Morde can just save his e for your W always so you more or less lose an ability and whenever you eat his passive stays on in your belly. CBT then go with Swain and Viego to round out their draft. I am not a fan of this so Viego needs burst to be useful. He needs to reset off people and your team has like no burst whatsoever. And if your team dog piles and commits onto someone to get you that reset TK can just eat them. I honestly think that if you want to just commit to the drain tank thing you have going with Morde, Swain and Renata just take Kayn here. If you needed something more proactive early I mean Volibear and Trundle are both up. GEE for the last pick of the draft takes Xerath and man that pick seems good here. CBT has no real go button and you have Ashe Xerath and Xayah to just kinda sit there to poke at them.
So in game 3 GEE have a lead for the entire game. GEE starts an early dragon stack thanks to their bot lanes domination. Despite trading dragon for Hearld CBT are never ever able to get the gold lead back. They are down 4k at 15 minutes but at 25 minutes right before soul CBT get a 4 for 1 fight. Despite that they are still down 3k gold. At the next dragon fight its really messy with both teams going 3 for 3 but Soprych gets the dragon and with Infernal Soul the games over. Soprych once again showcases the power of Xayah. They do almost double the damage of everyone else this entire game. Platypus Killer has another amazing game as well on Vi. Sadly neither Rindo or Jobey are able to get kills and end the game with almost triple the damage taken compared to that they deal.
So with this win GE Emerald have eliminated CB Tsundere from the playoffs. They are now all set for the showdown next week vs a surging CB White to determine the last playoff spot in Shurima.
Crustacean Nation VS New World Esports Titan
This game was rescheduled to monday night before my article goes up so I am covering this in brief:
Game 1 is probably the most kills game I have seen this entire season. It was 2 kills a minute for 27 minutes so 54 kills In game 1 both top laners run ignite and just try their best to kill each other I guess. 1st blood is at 2 minutes for Elsa just as the 1st waves die. At 15 minutes NWET are ahead by 2k. At 18 minutes Kayn gets a triple kill and the game very quickly spirals into udder madness. There are 4 more major teamfights in the next 8 minutes.
Game 2 is also a complete slugfest with 46 kills in 33 minutes. In game 2 we have a Sion jungle brought out by TehSplash against an Amumu Jungle for Trigger(Amumu is worthless they do 200 dmg a minute). Game 2 is all about the mid and ADCS.
Shoutout to Protomorph as Cait in game 1 for doing 900 dmg a minute on the losing side, they were only eclipsed by TehSplash in this category.
LadyLight had a pretty quiet game 1 as Seraphine but hey you only died twice and had the most CS in the game by a long shot. In game 2 LadyLight has over 10 cs a minute as Orianna and does not die once. They played out of their mind this series.
CB White vs Senesi Squad Susanoo
CB White need to continue with their momentum in order to claim a spot in the postseason. This week they are up against Sensei Squad Susanoo, a team in the playoff picture who currently have only lost to CN, the undisputed best team in Shurima that also 2-0d CBW in their 1st week.
Draft for this series starts with CBW on blue and SSS on red. CBW bans Wukong Zeri and Ahri going after the high win rate solo que picks that SSS has. I don’t always agree with spreading out your bans but it is warranted vs this team. SSS has some crazy win rates and near 1 trick levels of dedication on these 3 champions so it's pretty common to see them banned vs them. SSS go with bans towards Graves, Hecarim and Viktor trying to make sure that lonely me and Eazy are not on comfort as well. CBW start draft off with everyone's famous homeless man Udyr. Flex top/jungle that's really strong at both yeah take it especially with these other jungle bans I would want it over MF or Seraphine. Speaking of those picks SSS take MF and Searphine effectively trading OP picks for this 1st round of draft. This is a really strong bot lane combo all SSS needs is some front line and they are golden. CBW goes with Senna and Liliia to finish blue side of game 1. Lilia is an interesting pick here again it's a top/jungle flex but it kind of forces you to go towards an AD mid laner you already have tons of magic damage. Senna is also kinda strange if you are not taking something to farm with it like TK or Seraphine. I'm curious to see what they do with the pick. SSS go with Vex as the last pick for round 1. Vex offers your team some really high burst potential and some CC letting you try and set up more for this wombo combo you have drafted. This is probably the best pick for lava lizard left open so I respect it. I mean as long as SSS takes some sort of frontline in the rest of the draft I like their comp a lot.
In round 2 SSS ban TK and Veigar. Veigar is a Vex Counter so I get that ban. TK enables TK senna as well as the fact that TK can save people from Vex Burst and protect Senna if you both get caught in a MF ult. CBW bans Darius and Kayn. I get the Darius ban your team looks like it wants really long fights and you do not have that much peel. It's also one of the few things that just straight up beats Udyr top along with Mordekiaser and WW. I guess you ban Kayn for the same reason as Darius: long fights with a drain tank are not good for you. Red Kayn would probably have a field day vs this team. CBW decide to go with Camille for their next pick giving jungle counter pick? I have like no idea why you did not take Jungle here does saving jungle for last pick really open any picks up? IDK maybe Vaulter has a Kindred or Karthus or something they wanted to see if they could pull out after looking at the entire draft and chose not to. Back to Camille this pick vs Udyr is one that's kinda rough? Udyr does outpush and also has a shield and sustain so you cannot win early. If you build completely for split going for Ravenous or Death’s Dance and Sunderer you can win. But like it has to be super short Cho ult trades. If you try and lock him in the cage with you he will spank you. After 3 items you start to win hard as Camille kinda does with almost every matchup. CBW goes with some crazy spice at this point and take Zed mid and Janna support, revealing that it is ADC senna. So Zed is one of the flashiest champions in league and arguably one of the harder champions to play. Zed is unfair when ahead and useless when behind you know an assassin. Zed has plenty of squishy people to try and combo this game I think this pick is super good here. Janna is also really good just in general. Denying enemy team engage is almost always good and as Janna you just need to keep Senna alive and don’t worry about whatever the hell else your team is doing. SSS ends draft with Xin which is disappointing. I mean Xin is fine they give you some sort of frontline. But man this game looks rough for SSS. I have no idea how you deal with Zed and Lilia.
So game 1 is a pretty domianint win for the side of CBW. They are able to take every dragon and only lose 2 towers. Both Eazy and Denali the King play incredibly well doing over 800 dmg a minute. Guardian Wakka somehow is able to place get a ward score of 67 by 26 minutes placing 31 wards and clearing 9. For the side of SSS Water bear probably plays the best, dying only 3 times when there is a fed Zed is an accomplishment.
So as SSS you gotta shake off game 1. Game 2 starts with SSS on blue. They ban Lilia, Graves and Viktor trying to make sure that Eazy does not get his best control mage and that Lonely Me is not a comfort pick as well. CBW are forced more or less to ban Wukong, Zeri and Ahri again. It worked game 1 probably best to just keep these bans locked for the series. SSS take Hecarim as their 1st pick, probably the strongest jungle champion of the patch. I think Hecarim fits into just about any comp you can think of and his losing matchups are all things that are early game focused. CBW for their 1st 2 picks go with Seraphine Senna. This is a really strong bot lane that gives your team some absolutely insane scaling. As a bonus it denies both picks away from SSS who took Seraphine game 1. The two are very squishy so they can be burst if you are able to draft more dive on the side of SSS. SSS then goes with Maokai and Miss fortune. I like the MF pick here a lot it gives you something early that is aggressive and can look to punish the duo for CBW. Maokai I’m not sure about this pick is more or less top lane only now and is not really the type of thing that Orphic excels on. Maokai is a tank. He does not have that much outplay he just kinda knocks things away and does not have the damage to win teamfights. He does bring CC and dive threat however to try and get to the squishy center of Senna Seraphine. CBW takes Udyr for last pick of round 1. Udyr is a flex top/jungle pick but its probably going top lane here. Udyr and maokai both try and drain tank each other but Udyr is just better at it in the isolated 1v1.
For round 2 CBW bans Darius and Lissandra. Darius is a ban in case its Maokai support and one of Orphics great top lane picks. Lissandra is a bit of an odd ban to me. I guess its more dive and CC lockdown for your squishy backline but I cannot see Liss ever really getting onto them. SSS go after Eazy in round 2 and ban Yone and Zed trying to make sure that they will be playing something less lane dominant and snowbally. Zed popped off last game I get the ban. CBW with their blind pick take Trundle. This is a really good pick here for lots of reasons. 1 you now have a long range way to stop MF ult, 2 you can ult Hecarim if they dive in and easily burst them. If Hecarim does not commit you can simply ult maokai and gain an absolute ton of stats. You are also stronger than Hecarim early; you can outduel Hecarim and can look to contest him for early scuttles and try to set him behind. SSS in response goes with Vex for their blind pick mid and take Zilean support. Zilean is really good against Serpahine and Senna as you simply provide the most utility out of every champion in the game I feel. Double bombs and then slow gives gank setup and you generally don’t die this lane. Zilean is great with Hecarim as well; you can speed him up and ult him if he gets focused down. Vex is just a solid mid pick TBH. CBW go with Veigar to round out their draft. This pick again is crazy good into all the engage that SSS have drafted. The baby cage just separates the divers from their backline. If anyone gets zilean ulted you can just throw a W on them as they spawn and nuke them again. Support Zilean is not getting enough AP to put someone back at full HP.
Game 2 is another dominant win for CBW they are looking really strong for their upcoming series against GEE. Udyr top this game has some insane damage numbers because they get to beat up on a Maokai. Denali the King is living up to their name and has another exceptional game. I think teams are going to need to start looking into committing a lot of bans to this player and Eazy if they want a shot at taking them down.
CB RUSH VS XFlow Blue
Cb Rush won this series 2-0 So I am just going to go over any points of interest
CB Rush are continuing to look dominant in their wins
CBR played Seraphine & Senna bot in game 1 as part of a deathball comp. X Flow had a plan they played MF Blitz looking to kill the duo on repeat, playing a much more AOE teamfight style team. This did not work as well as they wanted and they chose to ban the Seraphine in game 2.
For game 2 CBR played split push with a waveclear mage mid in Anivia paired with an Ezreal and Galio to dissuade dives with a Camille and Nocturne to act on the side lanes. XFW chose to play a very tanky deathball style team with Udyr, Maokai Swain.
Game 2 Gl4cial for CBR absolutely popped off going 15-0-6 on ezreal doing over 1100 dmg a minute
We saw a rare anivia pick this series for Rutledge in game 2. This champion has been on the most banned list for a long time and this is one of the 1st games I can remember seeing it played.
Pipp for CBR played very well both games in top lane one was Tank duty in Sejuani and the other was on a split push threat in Camille.
SG Invictus VS Basement Dwellers
This series was do or die for both teams. Both teams simply need to win out to secure themselves a spot in playoffs. For round 1 SGI is on blue and the BD are on red. SGI go with the Anivia ban(NakNak has had this banned against them every game of BOL) and also ban Yummi and Lulu against Amandalin. I’m not sure that banning supports from the enemy team is the wisest move but then again Amandalin is the highest rated player on this team. I just find it most curious that they elected to leave Nami open, who has been this player's most played pick both in BOL and in solo que. The BD chose to go after Aplhnexus, banning 3 jungle picks in Udyr, Trundle and Pantheon. It’s strange to go after a jungler and to leave Hecarim up. I think this was a blunder, maybe they could have dropped the Trundle ban. SGI 1st picks Hercarim like they should securing themselves a great pick. BD for their 1st 2 pick on red side go with Janna and Nocturne. Nocturne vs Hecraim is a strange matchup. Nocturne is just looking to power farm as hard as possible like he does in most matchups and Hecarim kinda does the same. The idea is that when team fights start Hecarim will try to dive and Nocturne will counter dive with the darkness making communication much harder. Janna is picked here by the BD for the simple reason that ShaquilleNoPeel plays only engage and Janna is probably the best pick into engage supports. SGI then goes with MF and Amumu to finish the blue side for themselves in game 1. This is a crazy AOE wombo combo teamfight that is being set up currently on the side of SGI and it looks like BD are just looking to play disengage. BD then go with Jihn as their last pick trying to make sure that they can protect their solo laners in round 2 of bans. Jihn is probably the best standard ADC pick into MF just due to the fact you generally outrange her and are able to teamfight away from the bullet time while still contributing damage and utility.
In round 2 BD ban Swain and Camille. Swain would be a huge problem for this BD team as they have very little burst currently and Swain would probably be able to drain tank them. BD are probably going to blind pick a tank next pick and Camille would be a problem on the side lane and can effectively 1 shot most of the characters currently locked in. SGI go with mid lane bans getting rid of Cassiopeia and Viktor. This makes sense as they are banning some of the counters to the mid lane that SGI wants to take. BD the go with Maokai as a blind pick top. Maokai ult with Nocturne is a fairly potent combo as it can lead to some devastating flanks. The tree however struggles heavily into other laners with sustain Maokai wins lanes by utilizing his passive and winning as he whittles you down. SGI counter top with Aatrox and take Vlad blind for mid. Aatrox is an amazing top laner right now his lethality build that is slowly gaining popularity still makes him plenty durable and lets him really 1 shot opposing players in his threat range. Vlad blind mid is really interesting here. Your team is all about the combo and Vlad is excellent at that but your team has very poor wave clear now. You have 2 characters that need to side lane until they hit their power spikes. The BD needs to take some sort of actual threat in mid as their team is fairly low damage so far. They decide to go with Sylas mid there are some incredible ultimates to steal on the enemy team and Sylas further reinforces the disengage setup.
Game 1 is the longest game of the series and has plenty of gold swings. At 15 minutes the game is more or less dead even with SGI up 1300 gold. BD choose to stack dragons, getting the 1st of the game at 9 minutes. At 25 minutes SGI get a massive teamfight win and are able to secure baron but are down 3 dragons to none. BD are able to get a pick onto Hecarim before the next dragon fight starts and secure ocean soul for themselves. Thanks to the power of their dragon they are able to siege and win teamfights eventually securing the elder dragon and pushing for the end. Jayel on Jihn is the MVP for game 1 going 11-1-9 only dying once at 5 minutes into the game and still pumping out over 1000 dmg per minute. Amandalin on Janna was also a key part to this BD citroy with only 3 deaths and 21 assists. STN e dash trade was able to bully CTRL ULT ELITE top lane really hard and ended the game with a 70 CS lead.
Draft for game 2 has BD on blue with 1st pick and SGI on red with counter pick. BD continue with their jungle bans taking away Trundle and Udyr but chose to leave the Pantheon up and ban Swain instead. SGI decided that focusing Amandalin with bans was not the answer and go with bans towards Battle Gnome instead going with Nocturne and Hecarim bans as well as keeping the Anivia ban. BD then go with Pantheon Jungle 1st pick looking to get aggressive early and denying it from SGI. SGI goes with MF and Aatrox yet again from the last game. Aatrox was a huge problem time to see what CTRL ULT ELITE can bring out on the counter pick. BD decide to take Janna and Jihn once again thinking that disengage is the name of the game. SGI go with J4 as their jungle of choice before bans come through wanting to make sure that they have a jungler who can match Pantheons early game aggression and tempo.
In round 2 SGI ban Viktor and Sylas trying to make sure that NakNak will not be playing a comfort pick. BD decide to also ban mid laners and ban Orianna and Talyiah trying to limit the amount of AOE that SGI can pull off. SGI goes with Amumu leaving mid lane for counter pick. Again Amumu is not good into Janna but you need engage for the rest of this team comp to work. BD go with Sejunai as their Aatrox counter pick. It's not a particularly good matchup but it opens up camping top lane and getting your pantheon ahead. BD with their blind pick decide to go with Leblanc. Leblanc is always a trash tier solo que champion but excels in competitive play. When you can communicate with your team and go after chunked targets and have vision properly set up for you assassins can be useful but they are very feast or famine. If you do not win the game as Leblanc you are probably the reason your team has lost. But Leblanc gives you another lane to play for and if you get fed this game becomes a cake walk. For last pick SGI goes with Malzahar as their mid lane counter. Without intervention this lane is very difficult for LB. Malz has the superior push poteitonal to deny your roams and can follow easily to ult you. You also have your spell shield to avoid the 1 shot.
Game 2 SGI plays a superior macro game then the BD do in game 2. Game 2 starts with the BD getting an early game gold lead they are up 3k at 10 minutes. But as the game continues SGI start to get more out of every play. Whenever the BD commits to someone on the side lane to secure a kill SGI are able to get a tower. BD again stack drakes and even claim souls as they lose the game. The bot lane for BD continue to play super well for game 2 but BD lose to many towers too quickly and once they lose the fight at 30 minutes the game is over.
Game 3 for draft has the BD back on red and SGI on blue. Both teams have now won a game and its all up to game 3. For game 3 SGI ban Anivia, Nocturne and Lulu spreading out the bans this game. Nocturne was a mjoar issue in game 1 so I’m glad to see that gone but I am curious as to why Lulu was the ban choice. Nami is still up and heal enchanters are generally good into the shield style enchanters. BD decide to enough is enough and ban Aatrox CTRL has been having a really tough time top lane vs this pick. The other 2 bans are jungle bans with Udyr and Pantheon. SGI decide to switch it up and take Janna themselves with 1st pick. Playing engage has not been working for them so why not let the rest of the team commit and make sure that you can keep your ADC safe in these 5v5 brawls. BD go with Nami as their answer just as much for comfort as it is for lane. For jungle Battle Gnome goes with Elise something that is really strong early and leads to some devastating picks and dives. Elise needs to be ahead to be effective similar to Pantheon. SGI go with Sivir and Sejuani here trying to make sure that they have late game scaling, giving themselves engage, a tank and a late game carry. BD for the last pick on red side take Trundle to deny some of Sejuani’s stats and to have sometime top side that can look to fight early.
In round 2 BD ban Hecarim and J4 thinking that it is Sejuani top. SGI go with mid bans in round 2 for the 3rd game in a row. They ban Viktor and Sylas the same as game 2. Again you have some really good ults to steal here so Sylas make sense to ban. Viktor is still really strong and one of Naknak’s better picks in BOL so I can see that ban as well. BD go with Jihn for the 3rd game in a row as their ADC of choice. The risk of picking Jihn here is that Jihn is really bad into tanks like Sejauni. At least with Trundle you can steal some of those stats so that the rest of your team can kill them. SGI for their last 2 picks go with Veigar and Wukong. Wukong is top lane into the Trundle and is an interesting skill matchup. Wukong wants to go for shorter trades utilizing his passive and his clone to create short windows where he is stronger. Trundle top normally takes lethal tempo and looks for elongated fights where his passive AD steal can really allow him to bonk you. Getting behind in this matchup can lead to you getting solo killed over and over but STN e dash trade has proven that they have been the better top laner so far. Viegar as a blind pick is not generally seen. Viegar has lots of troubles dealing with aggressive mids as well as things that outrange him. But if the game gets to the point where you have 3 items I would take Viegar over just about any other mage he offers so much burst and CC. I would argue that Viegar E is a top 5 non ultimate ability in the game. BD take Swain as their counter pick and the last pick for this draft. Swain gives some incredible gank setup for Elise and has a really good trading pattern with Veigar. You eventually stack enough health in this lane to be an effective team fighter. So for BDE you have a really effective pick comp if people are not in the right spot you can absolutely blow them up and prevent their escape. SGI have a traditional teamfight comp you have engage with Sejuani and Wukong Veigar can look to follow up. Sivir and Janna just need to stay alive and provide utility to their teammates.
Game 3 of this series is incredibly close. At 15 minutes the teams are just 78 gold apart. Moogly and the rest of BD continue to stack dragons getting the 1st 2 dragons and Rift Hearld. STN e dash trade continues to get the better of CTRL ULT ELITE getting 2 solo kills off of botched dives. At 20 minutes the game is still very close its now a 1k lead for SGI as they are able to win a dragon fight against the BD. at 25 minutes after a won teamfight SGI is able to claim baron and get up all the way up to an 8k gold lead. The BD are curically able to keep their inhibitor towers all up at this point. But just as the game is looking lost the BD set up el clasico the death bush. After sweeping the area and placing a pink ward SGI pushed past them without Wukong. After instantly blowing up Janna in an Elise combo the BD are also able to get Veigar and Sivir. Sejuani falls after and with 50 second death timers the BD simply walk down mid and end the game. Here is what the miracle looks like from our mids point of view: https://outplayed.tv/media/JW3nxB With that win the BD playoff dream lives on.