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On October 10 2016 22:27 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2016 18:38 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 20:07 skykh wrote:On October 09 2016 18:38 Kinie wrote:On October 09 2016 13:20 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 12:41 dsyxelic wrote:On October 09 2016 12:34 cLutZ wrote:On October 09 2016 10:31 GrandInquisitor wrote:
The same fucking thing happened as last year. NA does well week 1 but disappoints in week 2. It's like the entire region just goes on vacation in between the two weeks and doesn't prepare like the other teams do.
This game was lost starting from pick/ban. You know RNG is going to funnel everything they have into Uzi. You can't let their mid pick Aurelion Sol and protect him. And when he picks Ezreal/Nami you need a gameplan to shut him down. They had no plan. They instead first picked Jayce - has any Jayce been impactful so far in Worlds?
Jayce top is a classic Scrim Hero champ. He gets massive CS leads because he forces backs with ranged W and can't get engaged on 1v1 by melees because of his knock away. However, he is basically a poke champion at heart, which makes him a stupid TP carrier. This TSM vs. RNG game demonstrates the problem to a T. On the first baron Haunter was pushing botlane and ended up taking 2 towers without TPing as RNG gets baron. But what if he did TP? He has to TP 15 seconds before the fight because you want to get off at least 2 QEs before you fight. Edit: Also RiotPls delete Aurelion Sol. Nothing worse than a noskill champ being must ban. perhaps next year. its a slight improvement on mordekaiser from last year. darius was quite stupid as well in terms of no skill. edit: on another note, this is the weakest #1 seed teams have looked at worlds rox - closed out strong but their group stage was far from stable g2 - no explanation needed fw - currently 1-2, not looking too good for them tsm - eliminated To be fair, this is also a year where the #1 and #2 seeds aren't that far away in skill. The last two years gave us SSW who could only lose to themselves and SSB and the super contender SKT. There hasn't been a super dominant team in Korea; SKT was strong but in decline and Rox kept falling off towards end of season. KT was the best team end of summer but lost to Rox and SSG but a hair. In EU and NA the #1/#2 difference hasn't been what the records have suggested. I haven't followed Taiwan/China this year to talk about those differences reasonably, but coming into worlds there were obvious flaws for each team. Then NA has this tendency to do random and terrible P/B that put them super behind. In terms of China it was pretty clear that #1 was EDG right from the start of summer split, and it was a 3 man competition between RNG, Snake, and WE for who would be #2 and the supposed #3. I-May just spiked hard core at the end in the gauntlet and upset Snake and WE for the last slot, while RNG got in on circuit points thanks to two solid finishes in spring and summer splits. SKT, KT, SSG, and ROX were all top 4 teams in Korea, with a pretty decent drop-off after those four. EU was just G2 stomping fools because of literal 0 competition, and NA had a similar problem of once the top 3 teams were decided (TSM, CLG, C9) the drop-off to the last 7 teams was so massive that the top 3 could only get better by scrimming each other, which can only get you so far. Right now I'd argue that, in terms of overall league strength, it's Korea > China = NA > EU, with LMS and LCL probably in the nebulous area of, "better than EU but worse than NA." And sure, you might think me crazy for thinking that China's top teams are about as equal as the top NA teams, but this group stage so far makes me think that - in an ideal world where both regions have their teams in good health, good cooperation, good pick/ban and a good read on the meta (all things that can vary WILDLY) - the skill level of the players is about equal and we would probably see a lot of trading of games back and forth. That sounds harsh, but in prior years it used to be Korea >>>>> China >>> NA = EU, with LMS and LCL also in that nebulous area of, "about as equal to NA and EU." The gap has closed, but now we have to see if the infrastructure put into place in TSM, C9, and CLG holds in the off-season, and if other teams start to pick it up and have it's players focus more on scrim/practice schedule and less on streaming. Its TSM Gap IMT/CLG/C9 Gap The rest I don't want to said it but RNG get stomped 3 times by Samsung twice and splyce, at least tsm has close games. The gap between TSM and C9/CLG/IMT isn't as big as perceived. TSM's flaws weren't in any way tested or targeted in NA. Taking nothing away from TSM, they are a good team. It's just still not Korean level; the fact they were heavily limited by the level of opponent they could scrim with throughout summer limited growth. Plus, coach/analyst failures in P/B; Jayce isn't a great pick unless going with other strong poke. Zilean is very bad in current meta. TSM is best playing towards a pick comp but even play towards their strength. I think all of TSMs major flaws of this tournament are much more fixable than CLG or C9 s. They really need a OGN winter invite where they can get in a ton of matches that crisp up the P&B and get Bio into the form of properly managing double's positioning. If not they will need luck, or will continue to lose even to teams that looked, IMO, 5% or so worse than them (RNG) overall.
Yes and no. Hauntzer, while useful, would still be significantly better as Impact; Hauntzer is a good serviceable player but nothing more. Doublelift still has his default problems that we saw on CLG; aka split pushing too far and valuing win lane-win game too much. He's still the best or second best NA ADC, but he looks less than stellar on Ezreal, Sivir and Jhin while lacking strong out of meta side options. Biofrost's champion pool and depth looks crucially lacking. They lack the ability to play a wide range of comps and suffer because the Jhin ban seriously hampers their ability to win. Other than Svenskaren's Lee Sin, there are no player specific bans required allowing teams to target core team comp components.
If I were the coach, Biofrost would need to add Nami, Alistar, Brand, Zyra and Kennen. Bjerg and DL need to add Varus. Hauntzer needs to add Ryze and Trundle. Everyone needs to assess summoners (cleanse mid) and build paths (especially in response to game situation).
In the long run, I don't think Hauntzer and DL are fixable; Hauntzer is the more likely of the two to be though I think. All that said, this world's meta was not very good for TSM; it's far from the worst possible, but it's also in no way up TSM's alley. IMO, the real failure at this worlds is China. This meta should be perfect for them, but their teams have managed to look really bad.
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GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
On October 10 2016 22:10 Letmelose wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2016 21:07 Gahlo wrote:On October 10 2016 19:36 kongoline wrote:On October 10 2016 12:11 Gahlo wrote:
H2K lucking so hard this tourney. they got 1st seed there was 0% chance they get any kr team or edg Yeah, but to have they have possibly the weakest #2 seed(I don't believe in ANX in a BoX yet) in their quarter finals matchup and the weakest semi final opponent possibilities. There is no easier road to the finals in that draw except maybe swapping C9 and ANX. It was bound to happen sooner or later. The top seed from the group that has zero Korean teams historically has always gone far since the tournament format change to four groups in Season 4. With the way Riot Games allocates the groups, and the number of Korean teams attending, the first placed team in the group with zero Korean teams is almost guaranteed a safe passage to the semi-finals, assuming all Korean teams finish first in their group (which is not a wild assumption to make since every single Korean team has managed that since the format change in Season 4, with the sole exception of KOO Tigers). They had a one in three chance of drawing ANX. With the paucity of truly meaningful international competition, and Riot's avoidance of double elimination formats, it is near impossible for one single tournament with its current format to truly reflect the standings of all the teams around the world. Perhaps H2k lucked out more so than others, but it was within the realms of possibility with the way things are set up. When was the last time you thought the top four standings at the World Championship (the placement I think H2k is most likey to achieve) accurately portrayed the top four teams of the world? I'm all for tournament placings being designed in order to most accurately reflect the strengths of various teams, but the international competitive landscape would need a complete overhaul to match that specific need. It's a pipe dream with the way things are.
Your argument is circular. If you start by assuming that all first seeds will beat all second seeds in QFs, and then also assume that Koreans claim 3 of the 4 first seeds, then no shit, the semifinals will be made up of 3 Korean teams and one first seed that came from a group without Koreans.
The point of Worlds isn't to crown second place, third place, or fourth place. A single elimination tournament will only ever guarantee a worthy first place team. Even a double elimination tournament only guarantees the correctness of first and second place. And both of those are only true if you assume transitivity, which is obviously not the case in League. So unless you want Worlds to be a Bo8 quadruple round robin between all 16 teams, you're always going to run into this scenario of some teams having luckier draws than others. That's life. If you want to be champ, you gotta beat everyone in your path. TSM drew the single toughest group out of any other team in the tournament and have to go home, even though they looked far stronger than H2k.
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GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
Also, I commented on this in NALCS, but Cloud 9 has got to fix their Impact teamfighting problems. His teleports are never very good and always come at the worst timings. As Gnar he never teleports in with an appropriate rage bar; as Rumble he teleported in and immediately overheated with W (????). He's so concerned about preserving his KDA that he isn't being the big man up front that he needs to be, and there are definitely fights that he can teleport into that he chooses not to instead. He's playing like a third carry even when he's on a tank.
And it doesn't help that Reddit + casters have a huge hard-on for Impact and think he's some kind of top lane god. He's a beast 1v1, but you're at a level now where that doesn't mean much any more. Cuvee is not going to hard feed and go 0-5 in lane like some Dignitas top laner. So Impact's greatest strength is largely neutered, while his greatest weakness is becoming more and more apparent.
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FIx meteos and smoothie while they're at it.
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I'm a fan of the bracket 
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They need to fix their confidence before anything, this is for NA in general. Sven having been the only one who seemed to have balls have been a NA issue for the most part in my opinion, where's the Stixxay flashing forward to get a Jhin 4th auto? Doublelift charging headless ahead with Sivir ult to delete a team? I dont really get it. The NA players are good but if you dont utilize your full ability you're putting youself behind before the game even start.
Look at Pray and Deft's Ezreal where they E into a fight to add a metric ton of more DPS than lingering far away and throw out Qs and getting the odd auto.
If you're not ready to go for big plays you're never going to get them. Sven has looked so much better than everyone else from the region since he just go for it. As in any other sports confidence regardless of opponent is of extreme importance when you play at the highest level.
Just look at ANX, they give no fucks and honestly are not individually better than the teams they beat. Their willingness to go for big plays and take risks have thrown off even ROX.
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On October 11 2016 00:36 Jek wrote:
They need to fix their confidence before anything, this is for NA in general. Sven having been the only one who seemed to have balls have been a NA issue for the most part in my opinion, where's the Stixxay flashing forward to get a Jhin 4th auto? Doublelift charging headless ahead with Sivir ult to delete a team? I dont really get it. The NA players are good but if you dont utilize your full ability you're putting youself behind before the game even start.
Look at Pray and Deft's Ezreal where they E into a fight to add a metric ton of more DPS than lingering far away and throw out Qs and getting the odd auto.
If you're not ready to go for big plays you're never going to get them. Sven has looked so much better than everyone else from the region since he just go for it. As in any other sports confidence regardless of opponent is of extreme importance when you play at the highest level.
Just look at ANX, they give no fucks and honestly are not individually better than the teams they beat. Their willingness to go for big plays and take risks have thrown off even ROX.
ANX is also playing with 0 pressure because they came in to the tournament prepared to go 0-6.
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On October 10 2016 23:05 geript wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2016 22:27 cLutZ wrote:On October 10 2016 18:38 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 20:07 skykh wrote:On October 09 2016 18:38 Kinie wrote:On October 09 2016 13:20 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 12:41 dsyxelic wrote:On October 09 2016 12:34 cLutZ wrote:On October 09 2016 10:31 GrandInquisitor wrote:
The same fucking thing happened as last year. NA does well week 1 but disappoints in week 2. It's like the entire region just goes on vacation in between the two weeks and doesn't prepare like the other teams do.
This game was lost starting from pick/ban. You know RNG is going to funnel everything they have into Uzi. You can't let their mid pick Aurelion Sol and protect him. And when he picks Ezreal/Nami you need a gameplan to shut him down. They had no plan. They instead first picked Jayce - has any Jayce been impactful so far in Worlds?
Jayce top is a classic Scrim Hero champ. He gets massive CS leads because he forces backs with ranged W and can't get engaged on 1v1 by melees because of his knock away. However, he is basically a poke champion at heart, which makes him a stupid TP carrier. This TSM vs. RNG game demonstrates the problem to a T. On the first baron Haunter was pushing botlane and ended up taking 2 towers without TPing as RNG gets baron. But what if he did TP? He has to TP 15 seconds before the fight because you want to get off at least 2 QEs before you fight. Edit: Also RiotPls delete Aurelion Sol. Nothing worse than a noskill champ being must ban. perhaps next year. its a slight improvement on mordekaiser from last year. darius was quite stupid as well in terms of no skill. edit: on another note, this is the weakest #1 seed teams have looked at worlds rox - closed out strong but their group stage was far from stable g2 - no explanation needed fw - currently 1-2, not looking too good for them tsm - eliminated To be fair, this is also a year where the #1 and #2 seeds aren't that far away in skill. The last two years gave us SSW who could only lose to themselves and SSB and the super contender SKT. There hasn't been a super dominant team in Korea; SKT was strong but in decline and Rox kept falling off towards end of season. KT was the best team end of summer but lost to Rox and SSG but a hair. In EU and NA the #1/#2 difference hasn't been what the records have suggested. I haven't followed Taiwan/China this year to talk about those differences reasonably, but coming into worlds there were obvious flaws for each team. Then NA has this tendency to do random and terrible P/B that put them super behind. In terms of China it was pretty clear that #1 was EDG right from the start of summer split, and it was a 3 man competition between RNG, Snake, and WE for who would be #2 and the supposed #3. I-May just spiked hard core at the end in the gauntlet and upset Snake and WE for the last slot, while RNG got in on circuit points thanks to two solid finishes in spring and summer splits. SKT, KT, SSG, and ROX were all top 4 teams in Korea, with a pretty decent drop-off after those four. EU was just G2 stomping fools because of literal 0 competition, and NA had a similar problem of once the top 3 teams were decided (TSM, CLG, C9) the drop-off to the last 7 teams was so massive that the top 3 could only get better by scrimming each other, which can only get you so far. Right now I'd argue that, in terms of overall league strength, it's Korea > China = NA > EU, with LMS and LCL probably in the nebulous area of, "better than EU but worse than NA." And sure, you might think me crazy for thinking that China's top teams are about as equal as the top NA teams, but this group stage so far makes me think that - in an ideal world where both regions have their teams in good health, good cooperation, good pick/ban and a good read on the meta (all things that can vary WILDLY) - the skill level of the players is about equal and we would probably see a lot of trading of games back and forth. That sounds harsh, but in prior years it used to be Korea >>>>> China >>> NA = EU, with LMS and LCL also in that nebulous area of, "about as equal to NA and EU." The gap has closed, but now we have to see if the infrastructure put into place in TSM, C9, and CLG holds in the off-season, and if other teams start to pick it up and have it's players focus more on scrim/practice schedule and less on streaming. Its TSM Gap IMT/CLG/C9 Gap The rest I don't want to said it but RNG get stomped 3 times by Samsung twice and splyce, at least tsm has close games. The gap between TSM and C9/CLG/IMT isn't as big as perceived. TSM's flaws weren't in any way tested or targeted in NA. Taking nothing away from TSM, they are a good team. It's just still not Korean level; the fact they were heavily limited by the level of opponent they could scrim with throughout summer limited growth. Plus, coach/analyst failures in P/B; Jayce isn't a great pick unless going with other strong poke. Zilean is very bad in current meta. TSM is best playing towards a pick comp but even play towards their strength. I think all of TSMs major flaws of this tournament are much more fixable than CLG or C9 s. They really need a OGN winter invite where they can get in a ton of matches that crisp up the P&B and get Bio into the form of properly managing double's positioning. If not they will need luck, or will continue to lose even to teams that looked, IMO, 5% or so worse than them (RNG) overall. Yes and no. Hauntzer, while useful, would still be significantly better as Impact; Hauntzer is a good serviceable player but nothing more. Doublelift still has his default problems that we saw on CLG; aka split pushing too far and valuing win lane-win game too much. He's still the best or second best NA ADC, but he looks less than stellar on Ezreal, Sivir and Jhin while lacking strong out of meta side options. Biofrost's champion pool and depth looks crucially lacking. They lack the ability to play a wide range of comps and suffer because the Jhin ban seriously hampers their ability to win. Other than Svenskaren's Lee Sin, there are no player specific bans required allowing teams to target core team comp components. If I were the coach, Biofrost would need to add Nami, Alistar, Brand, Zyra and Kennen. Bjerg and DL need to add Varus. Hauntzer needs to add Ryze and Trundle. Everyone needs to assess summoners (cleanse mid) and build paths (especially in response to game situation). In the long run, I don't think Hauntzer and DL are fixable; Hauntzer is the more likely of the two to be though I think. All that said, this world's meta was not very good for TSM; it's far from the worst possible, but it's also in no way up TSM's alley. IMO, the real failure at this worlds is China. This meta should be perfect for them, but their teams have managed to look really bad.
DL I definitely agree on, his derping is just part of who he is. I need to see a lot more haunter to say he is a lost cause. IMO he is much better at the role (which is pretty much the same) than mouse or trace.. I could see him (if there was an international invitational that was season-long) being a looper level consistent, but not carry, toplaner. But he will never really get that chance because he literally just faces Impact.
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On October 11 2016 01:19 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2016 23:05 geript wrote:On October 10 2016 22:27 cLutZ wrote:On October 10 2016 18:38 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 20:07 skykh wrote:On October 09 2016 18:38 Kinie wrote:On October 09 2016 13:20 geript wrote:On October 09 2016 12:41 dsyxelic wrote:On October 09 2016 12:34 cLutZ wrote:On October 09 2016 10:31 GrandInquisitor wrote:
The same fucking thing happened as last year. NA does well week 1 but disappoints in week 2. It's like the entire region just goes on vacation in between the two weeks and doesn't prepare like the other teams do.
This game was lost starting from pick/ban. You know RNG is going to funnel everything they have into Uzi. You can't let their mid pick Aurelion Sol and protect him. And when he picks Ezreal/Nami you need a gameplan to shut him down. They had no plan. They instead first picked Jayce - has any Jayce been impactful so far in Worlds?
Jayce top is a classic Scrim Hero champ. He gets massive CS leads because he forces backs with ranged W and can't get engaged on 1v1 by melees because of his knock away. However, he is basically a poke champion at heart, which makes him a stupid TP carrier. This TSM vs. RNG game demonstrates the problem to a T. On the first baron Haunter was pushing botlane and ended up taking 2 towers without TPing as RNG gets baron. But what if he did TP? He has to TP 15 seconds before the fight because you want to get off at least 2 QEs before you fight. Edit: Also RiotPls delete Aurelion Sol. Nothing worse than a noskill champ being must ban. perhaps next year. its a slight improvement on mordekaiser from last year. darius was quite stupid as well in terms of no skill. edit: on another note, this is the weakest #1 seed teams have looked at worlds rox - closed out strong but their group stage was far from stable g2 - no explanation needed fw - currently 1-2, not looking too good for them tsm - eliminated To be fair, this is also a year where the #1 and #2 seeds aren't that far away in skill. The last two years gave us SSW who could only lose to themselves and SSB and the super contender SKT. There hasn't been a super dominant team in Korea; SKT was strong but in decline and Rox kept falling off towards end of season. KT was the best team end of summer but lost to Rox and SSG but a hair. In EU and NA the #1/#2 difference hasn't been what the records have suggested. I haven't followed Taiwan/China this year to talk about those differences reasonably, but coming into worlds there were obvious flaws for each team. Then NA has this tendency to do random and terrible P/B that put them super behind. In terms of China it was pretty clear that #1 was EDG right from the start of summer split, and it was a 3 man competition between RNG, Snake, and WE for who would be #2 and the supposed #3. I-May just spiked hard core at the end in the gauntlet and upset Snake and WE for the last slot, while RNG got in on circuit points thanks to two solid finishes in spring and summer splits. SKT, KT, SSG, and ROX were all top 4 teams in Korea, with a pretty decent drop-off after those four. EU was just G2 stomping fools because of literal 0 competition, and NA had a similar problem of once the top 3 teams were decided (TSM, CLG, C9) the drop-off to the last 7 teams was so massive that the top 3 could only get better by scrimming each other, which can only get you so far. Right now I'd argue that, in terms of overall league strength, it's Korea > China = NA > EU, with LMS and LCL probably in the nebulous area of, "better than EU but worse than NA." And sure, you might think me crazy for thinking that China's top teams are about as equal as the top NA teams, but this group stage so far makes me think that - in an ideal world where both regions have their teams in good health, good cooperation, good pick/ban and a good read on the meta (all things that can vary WILDLY) - the skill level of the players is about equal and we would probably see a lot of trading of games back and forth. That sounds harsh, but in prior years it used to be Korea >>>>> China >>> NA = EU, with LMS and LCL also in that nebulous area of, "about as equal to NA and EU." The gap has closed, but now we have to see if the infrastructure put into place in TSM, C9, and CLG holds in the off-season, and if other teams start to pick it up and have it's players focus more on scrim/practice schedule and less on streaming. Its TSM Gap IMT/CLG/C9 Gap The rest I don't want to said it but RNG get stomped 3 times by Samsung twice and splyce, at least tsm has close games. The gap between TSM and C9/CLG/IMT isn't as big as perceived. TSM's flaws weren't in any way tested or targeted in NA. Taking nothing away from TSM, they are a good team. It's just still not Korean level; the fact they were heavily limited by the level of opponent they could scrim with throughout summer limited growth. Plus, coach/analyst failures in P/B; Jayce isn't a great pick unless going with other strong poke. Zilean is very bad in current meta. TSM is best playing towards a pick comp but even play towards their strength. I think all of TSMs major flaws of this tournament are much more fixable than CLG or C9 s. They really need a OGN winter invite where they can get in a ton of matches that crisp up the P&B and get Bio into the form of properly managing double's positioning. If not they will need luck, or will continue to lose even to teams that looked, IMO, 5% or so worse than them (RNG) overall. Yes and no. Hauntzer, while useful, would still be significantly better as Impact; Hauntzer is a good serviceable player but nothing more. Doublelift still has his default problems that we saw on CLG; aka split pushing too far and valuing win lane-win game too much. He's still the best or second best NA ADC, but he looks less than stellar on Ezreal, Sivir and Jhin while lacking strong out of meta side options. Biofrost's champion pool and depth looks crucially lacking. They lack the ability to play a wide range of comps and suffer because the Jhin ban seriously hampers their ability to win. Other than Svenskaren's Lee Sin, there are no player specific bans required allowing teams to target core team comp components. If I were the coach, Biofrost would need to add Nami, Alistar, Brand, Zyra and Kennen. Bjerg and DL need to add Varus. Hauntzer needs to add Ryze and Trundle. Everyone needs to assess summoners (cleanse mid) and build paths (especially in response to game situation). In the long run, I don't think Hauntzer and DL are fixable; Hauntzer is the more likely of the two to be though I think. All that said, this world's meta was not very good for TSM; it's far from the worst possible, but it's also in no way up TSM's alley. IMO, the real failure at this worlds is China. This meta should be perfect for them, but their teams have managed to look really bad. DL I definitely agree on, his derping is just part of who he is. I need to see a lot more haunter to say he is a lost cause. IMO he is much better at the role (which is pretty much the same) than mouse or trace.. I could see him (if there was an international invitational that was season-long) being a looper level consistent, but not carry, toplaner. But he will never really get that chance because he literally just faces Impact.
Not to mention that with the current roster, if there was any chance of him developing into an international level carry top the team would have to prioritize that over players the likes of Bjerg and Double.
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On October 11 2016 00:05 Yorbon wrote:
FIx meteos and smoothie while they're at it.
I'm literally just praying for Sneaky to carry and get at least 1 win on the board. I have tickets for that day and while I'm happy to see the NA team, I also don't want to see a 3-0 blowout.
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wow Samsung got a sick bracket, I don't expect them to drop a single game before the final
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On October 11 2016 07:09 Sent. wrote:
wow Samsung got a sick bracket, I don't expect them to drop a single game before the final
So did SKT, they ended up with teams that weren't themselves so I don't see them dropping a single game period.
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On October 10 2016 23:13 GrandInquisitor wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2016 22:10 Letmelose wrote:On October 10 2016 21:07 Gahlo wrote:On October 10 2016 19:36 kongoline wrote:On October 10 2016 12:11 Gahlo wrote:
H2K lucking so hard this tourney. they got 1st seed there was 0% chance they get any kr team or edg Yeah, but to have they have possibly the weakest #2 seed(I don't believe in ANX in a BoX yet) in their quarter finals matchup and the weakest semi final opponent possibilities. There is no easier road to the finals in that draw except maybe swapping C9 and ANX. It was bound to happen sooner or later. The top seed from the group that has zero Korean teams historically has always gone far since the tournament format change to four groups in Season 4. With the way Riot Games allocates the groups, and the number of Korean teams attending, the first placed team in the group with zero Korean teams is almost guaranteed a safe passage to the semi-finals, assuming all Korean teams finish first in their group (which is not a wild assumption to make since every single Korean team has managed that since the format change in Season 4, with the sole exception of KOO Tigers). They had a one in three chance of drawing ANX. With the paucity of truly meaningful international competition, and Riot's avoidance of double elimination formats, it is near impossible for one single tournament with its current format to truly reflect the standings of all the teams around the world. Perhaps H2k lucked out more so than others, but it was within the realms of possibility with the way things are set up. When was the last time you thought the top four standings at the World Championship (the placement I think H2k is most likey to achieve) accurately portrayed the top four teams of the world? I'm all for tournament placings being designed in order to most accurately reflect the strengths of various teams, but the international competitive landscape would need a complete overhaul to match that specific need. It's a pipe dream with the way things are. Your argument is circular. If you start by assuming that all first seeds will beat all second seeds in QFs, and then also assume that Koreans claim 3 of the 4 first seeds, then no shit, the semifinals will be made up of 3 Korean teams and one first seed that came from a group without Koreans. The point of Worlds isn't to crown second place, third place, or fourth place. A single elimination tournament will only ever guarantee a worthy first place team. Even a double elimination tournament only guarantees the correctness of first and second place. And both of those are only true if you assume transitivity, which is obviously not the case in League. So unless you want Worlds to be a Bo8 quadruple round robin between all 16 teams, you're always going to run into this scenario of some teams having luckier draws than others. That's life. If you want to be champ, you gotta beat everyone in your path. TSM drew the single toughest group out of any other team in the tournament and have to go home, even though they looked far stronger than H2k.
My argument stems from history. SHRC from Season 4. Fnatic from Season 5. H2k from Season 6. These are all teams that got placed in the group without Korean teams, and were good enough to place first in it. Only Fnatic had a one in three chance of drawing KOO Tigers due to their under performance during the group stages, and even if beating the second placed team in groups is not a given, it's a path that has reaped rewards for teams good enough to benefit from it.
Luck of the draw comes with tournament formats. Yes, double elimination doesn't single handidly remove that luck, but it helps. Is it worth the hassle? Personally speaking, I always felt double elimination rewards excellence more so than single elimination, but it's all about compromise. I don't want Riot Games to clog up the international schedule with extensive round robin between all the international teams in existence, but we don't have to go that far. Don't ridicule my statement by taking it to the most extreme measure. We've seen ways implemented that lessen the luck of the draw in other e-Sports titles, whether it's by having more major international tournaments (you can't roll the dice the way you want multiple times), or having double elimination formats. Are these perfect solutions that resolve all these issues? No. Will they help paint a better picture of the relative strengths of international teams so that these discussion involving TSM, or H2k have more substance behind them? I think so.
You may think the current status quo may be fine, and it's quicker to accept the reality of the situation rather than wanting improvements, but that's where you and I differ. Please don't bother answering unless you want to see how these improvements (in my eyes) can be implemented, or how these solutions cause more problem than they fix (such as scheduling problems, but there's always a middle ground), but if you are just going to say, yeah things could be better, but things are fine the way they are, and cliches such as that's life, suck it up, just don't.
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Its funny to see people cry about groups when groups are fairer than ever. Famous "Chokers" were 5-3 (0-1 Tiebreak) with semi-finalist Fnatic and notoriously clutch Gambit (admittedly with shitter Voidle who probably cost them a semi with SKTT1).
Since then no team over .500 has failed to make it through, including 4 teams .500 making it (only 2 required tiebreakers!).
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EPT
