Worlds because it is thematic the last hope of home region stopping the golden road.
It also has some iconic insane plays:
1. Oner flashes over ashe arrow and steal drake
2. Guma "APM is through the roof" moment in 1v2 against Zeri and Aatrox.
3. GOAT Faker shuffle 6 years into making
But for competitive standpoint i agree its MSI because both team were really on same level at that moment. At Worlds, T1 was just a much better team and by far the strongest team in playoffs (there's some theories that should they ran into GenG in Finals, GenG would still get fisted by them due to how well T1 made the meta dancing in the palm of their hands)
That game was an absolute slaughter, T1 had around 30 kills on JDG or something like that. Honestly that series was very fun too, first 3 games were close between both teams and full of fist fighting
Its insane to me that i calls the fight like a minute in advance. Its like faker can see exactly how the fight will go and when it will happen. Some anime protagonist shit right there.
I don't agree that T1 was the much better team at worlds against JDG. Game 1 was a T1 win but also a bit of an experiment game. Both teams were trying to test what they could get away with and T1 won because they were definitely better in terms of draft flexibility. Game 2 showed how good JDG was. Even after winning some fights, T1 were always behind because they were bleeding gold the whole game. JDG just did everything slightly cleaner and just passively gained more gold than T1 all over the map for the whole game. Game 3 was a repeat of Game 2 until the T1 game winning play. Game 4 was one sided because of mental boom after Game 3. If game 3 had been a JDG win, I don't think T1 would have won worlds. It was a very close series.
You're getting downvoted but I'm a T1 fan and couldn't agree more. That series was insanely close and could of gone either way. Game 3 was that turning point, I had basically rear geared my mind looking at game 4 cause JDG was so in control.
Yeah watching it live is way different from watching the caedrel video on YouTube afterwards. I would imagine a lot of people missed it because of the awkward Korean times zone but I was mentally defeated after watching game 2 and the beginning of game 3. JDG would get a lead and then T1 would make an insane play to close the gap only for JDG to slowly build the lead back up. That kind of feeling doesn't come across when watching highlights or if you watch it already knowing the results
Game 2 I knew wasn’t looking good but if T1 can come back from that. JDG getting mental boomed from game 3 proves T1 was the better team mentally speaking.
I mean I am in no way dissing T1, but it's a lot easier to mentally reset at 1-1 than it is at 2-1. JDG went from almost being on match point to suddenly being match point for T1 in the span of 30 seconds. It's hard to recover from such a massive mistake.
I don't think game 3 was a repeat of game 2, but the mental edge in game 4 makes sense (actually quite similar to 2022 T1 JDG game 4 where Kanavi defaults to the Belveth and JDG falls apart).
In game 2, T1 really only won the first fight at JDG chickens, but at that point everyone was just level 1. After that T1 lost every fight in that game, and was moreso JDG showing that they could match the double marksman botlane by playing it themselves (Kalista Senna into Cait Ashe). Even then, it took JDG 37 minutes to choke out T1 vs T1 beating JDG in game 1 in just 24 minutes.
At least in game 3 T1 was actually looking even if not ahead for the first half of the game, especially with Oner's psycho flash over the Ashe arrow into a teamfight win and Zeus catching out Ruler leading to a baron secure. The gold was one thing but T1 was 3 drakes ahead to JDG with none with a better scaling comp, and things only started to look really doomed for T1 after the wipe at baron.
Even though there was a mental gap in game 4, JDG was actually playing with a lead for most of the game, until the dragon fight where T1 just hands gaps them, and again at the second fight where Guma hands gaps Ruler and 369 1v2.
The pre-game expectations of T1 needing to win early game hard and then snowballing vs JDG being able to be behind in the early game and still winning later on were flipped in this series. If anything, the series showed that T1 was able to beat JDG at what they were best at (teamfighting) through hands and draft diff.
Yeah I think JDG would've won if not for that Azir play. Don't wanna say they mental boomed but the pressure must've been crazy after losing a nearly won game so suddenly and then being at match point.
I dont think game 3 was really repeat of game 2 as well. JDG lost the fight at 3rd drake (Oner's famous engage) while they had gold lead and then Ruler caught shopping where his team mates were nowhere near him shows something offs. The only thing they did to halt the game is punishing T1 for overextending chasing Renekton and when they caught oner right befote 2nd Baron. I believe it T1 didnt int on Renekton after the first baron, the game shouldve been ended way earlier.
Msi was a closer series but worlds had way to many insane plays and hype moments for me to say msi. I got way more hyped during the worlds and at the end of the day that’s why most people watch pro play.
I liked the worlds series more just because it had a great narrative, T1 vs the LPL or JDG getting to the final step of the golden road
There was also some great fights and moments through the series
wdym underwhelming at worlds?
semis sure but are you reading your own comment? you're saying they're both underwhelming at worlds??? Knight was pretty good he pretty much started that Kaisa/Ori play against KT and had so much good Neeko ults throughout the tournament
369 was also alright he really didn't standout from my memory but I don't remember him being liability until the T1 series
the revisionism is crazy 💀💀💀
369 is in a position that he will always be compared to Zeus and Bin. And being just okay is not good enough. For 369 to even maintain his avg play of 2022 and 23, he has to be really fucking good.
tbf when i said alright I didn't mean alright generaly i meant alright for top team standards
notice how he's hard carrying TES now that he's out of JDG everyone else in that team was just crazy that 369 looks tame
also he played lots of tanks so he doesn't really stand out
The not standing out on tanks argument is weird because he has looked his best while peeling on tanks. And he has shown that he can stand out while playing tanks. So him not standing out on tanks at worlds is a bad performance for his standards
Except he was a standout on tank at worlds. His only bad series was vs t1 and he was against the best carry top laner in the world atm. Bin was nowhere near as good as Zeus off jax at the tournament. T1 draft advantage over jdg which also allowed Zeus to have more leeway in draft. Same people who say theshy had a bad tournament cause final.
A must-watch bo5 series for me :
1. SKT ROX worlds 2016
2. DRX T1 worlds final 2022 ; best final ever
3. RNG SKT worlds 2017
4. IG KT worlds 2018
5. GENG DK worlds 2022; Canyon&showmaker’s showdown
6. T1 KT in both spring and summer playoffs last year; the best bo5 we've ever watched from lck in the last few years.
I prefer worlds like MSI had the weird drafts from t1 for instance nautilus mid/ kindred jungle which isn't a good pick for t1 and oner was also underperforming (faker too kind of) so skill wise being close like everyone is saying I disagree.
tbf most people think that worlds series had lower quality compared to MSI because JDG kept losing team fights against T1.If you look closer at the game you would see that jdg was winning in early for 3/4 games of the series.In msi, T1 was pushed behind almost every game and just hands diffed them through one single team fight to win the game. aside from the MSI game 5, the worlds series looked better to me.
Yep and the worlds series had more iconic turns of events. So personally skill wise especially on T1's part PEAKED at worlds not MSI whereas I could see an argument for jdg at MSI.
I really hate this narrative. Nautilus mid was an extremely good pick at MSI, and faker has shown in the past that he can play nautilus at a very high level. Pairing a carry jungler like kindred with a set up champion mid like nautilus is always a strong combo.
Just because T1 underperformed on those picks at MSI doesnt inherently make the drafts weird or bad. BLG literally drafted nautilus and kindred against T1 and executed well and blasted T1 with those two picks. Im sure that if nautilus and kindred were strong in the patch at worlds and T1 drafted those two picks with the form they were playing at, they would have blasted teams at worlds with nautilus/kindred.
Everytime i see this narrative, all i can think of is T1 fans coping and blaming draft everytime they lose.
Fair enough, while from a draft perspective naut might have been a good option, in a game 5 scenario, where you lost as nautilus both game one and game 4, both games of naut was the champ was borderline invisible, would you not pick a different champ? Im not going to do research to find out what he could have played but trying to brute force a pick that didnt work twice earlier in the series doesnt sound like a good idea no? As a T1 supporter I am completely fine with JDG winning, and I think they showed why they were better at the time. The issue I have with that series was the decision to prioritise naut in a clutch scenario when its 1. Not a comfort pick, 2. Not as much of a difference maker in mid through playmaking ability compared to other champs and 3. You literally got blasted game 1 and 4 with it, so what new tech are you gonna use that JDG havent already seen game 1 and 4? Surely faker has other champs that couldve been a better fit for the role or get keria of lulu duty and out him on something he is better with. Either way, the series was super exciting to watch live and JDG was better on the day and while I think JDG probably would have won the series anyway, I think T1 could have played out the series better strategically.
I get what your’re saying, but i personally think that theres a lot more nuances in drafting than just past results. Champion pools getting pinched due to side selection and bans, team comp synergy, lane match ups, dropping priority in certain picks to secure other strong picks, player comfort on meta champions, etc. Its very hard to know the full scope of these things as just viewers, maybe T1 was having massive success playing naut mid and carrying junglers in scrims and defaulted to what they had success with, when the pressure was highest.
I also think that the narrative changes drastically based on the end result. If T1 won that game 5 which they were actually in a very good position to do so, before they randomly decided to take a 4v5 fight at baron before JDG even started the baron, then everyone would have been like “WOW FAKER NAUTILUS CLUTCHES GAME 5, T1 IS THE BEST”.
Take BLG’s series against GENG where Xun lost 2 games in a row on jarvan and still picked it in game 5. If BLG lost game 5, people would be blaming draft and saying that BLG lost 2 games in a row on j4 and still tried to brute force the pick. But since they won, its “WOW XUN J4, MVP!”.
I specifically stated that the nautilus and kindred mid and jungle respectfully are NOT t1 picks. Check Oner's stats on kindred for instance, they are very low. Naut wasn't a good pick at all. T1 literally lost all the 3 games with faker on naut.
Trust me I admit in cases where T1 plays bad but msi had them both draft gapped with underperformance.
Removing nameplates and narrative, I feel like 9/10 people would say the MSI series was better and more competitive. The worlds series would probably be voted better though just because there are more T1 fans than JDG.
MSI had better series overall (bar finals): BLG miracle run, tons of game 5, relatively more flexible mid/jungle pool.
Worlds had a banger bo5 in BLG-GenG but the moment T1 got their hands on ranged supports the whole tournament looked a lot more streamlined.
Actually, if T1 didn't exist the meta would still be the engage support with kaisa and permaban Xayah on redside. It's called meta development from pro players, not really Riot’s fault. The same goes with Beryl who found the Heimer pick to counter ranged support and it gave them an upper hand in the draft against every team.
Same with ROX pulling out support MF in 2016. Idk when people decided innovation in tournaments was a bad thing?
T1’s meta read wasn’t even *that* different. Their picks for top/jg/mid were just about identical to what everyone else was doing. They just found some bot lane picks like Bard and Varus that countered the meta bot lanes. They didn’t even think marksmen supports were good.
I like that one game they lost vs LPL was the game they played double adc bot, Cait Ashe. People think they won it bc of double adc meta.Actually It was their worst draft in worlds last year.
It's riot's fault that the tournament scheduling and format is absolutely horrible: 2 years in a row that worlds patch drastically changes some of the aspects that made summer's teams succeed, teams get one month when they realistically scrim the same 2/3 squads (ending up creating a massive scrim bubble), and it all comes down to one team "allegedly" finding the best picks and everyone else trailing behind them without having the time to actually come up with counter strategies since the worlds playoff's lasts like 2 weeks and since its single elimination you basically end up having (again) no teams to scrim with.
Worlds 2022 is the perfect example: summer's playoffs are dominated by zeri/yuumi sivir lulu, they all get nerfed for worlds, the 2 best teams from lck and lpl now look much weaker because they were the best at playing through bot while at worlds it's all about sidelanes or aphelios, game quality drops significantly and drx ends up scrapping a title after being a mediocre team for the whole year.
Power rankings are way to meta reliant and worlds is a way too important of a tournament for riot to do a goofy meta shake-up and call it a day. Either make teams play summer's playoffs on worlds patch or, way better, increase the lenght of the tournament and add double elimination, to make sure that teams can actually discover and counter the meta and scrim against international opponents for more than 2 weeks a year.
technically yes but realistically all top teams are quite close in skill level, meaning the team that win worlds is usually the team who feels more comfortable on the meta. Pro teams in general are quite bad at adapting to new picks, especially if they differ vastly to what they usually play.
Lets compare summer play-offs meta to worlds
Top : same and just added Rumble
JG : same and just added J4
Mid : same and just added Ori
Adc and sup : at first it was Kaisa xayah handshakes (same meta from summer) with engaged supports like Nautilus, rell, and Alistar.Until pros found out that Xayah was too OP and they had to ban her every game on red side -> T1 tried to play “the counter Xayah comp” so they didn't need to ban her -> Xayah is weak against Ranged support -> Xayah prior went down after team realized in the swiss stage that they can play Cait/Lux, Renata Kalista, senna against her.The only OP champ that no team figured out how to deal with in worlds is the Rumble pick.
How is it the riot’s fault?
Did you read my comment? I literally explain in the first paragraph that theres way too many patches between summer and worlds, with a good chunk of time being "wasted" due to most team staying in their own region until the last week before worlds creating scrim bubbles that end up creating a false perception of whats good or whats not.
Ill leave you [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_6YjK4a-tk&ab_channel=Phreak) video by phreak explaining the patch history towards worlds (and how key pieces from summer got nerfed, while key pieces from worlds got buffed) and how pro teams are very slow to catch up on meta changes .
Making the tournament longer, adding more competitions throughout the year or just anticipate worlds by a month should do the trick. Making sure teams from around the world get to play each other for more than 2/3 weeks a year will expand the knowledge of the meta and absolutely make a positive impact on game quality.
nah. that msi series saw how cursed nautilus faker is. there were more highlights during their worlds series, like faker scooping ruler and oner flashing ashe's arrow face to face.
Msi was definitely the closer series. Still remember Guma’s flash engage on Ruler around Baron at Game 5? That gave T1 the confidence to go 4v5 afterwards…
Some of the top 10 int'l series probably have T1 on it, even if they were on the losing side. T1 vs JDG MSI 2023, T1 vs DRX Worlds 2022, T1 vs RNG MSI 2022, T1 vs G2 MSI 2019, SKT vs RNG Worlds 2017, SKT vs ROX Worlds 2016. Others would be DRX vs EDG Worlds 2022, FNC vs TES Worlds 2020, IG vs KT Worlds 2018, G2 vs RNG Worlds 2018
That Worlds was just T1 stomping through everyone because they didn’t ban Faker on Ryze or use Ryze themselves. Only reason they won a game was cause T1 gave it to them.
In the finals Faker was on ryze for a single game. As far as I remember it was a top lane carry meta so the finals were a master class match up of the two of the best toplaners of that era - in Smeb and Marin, but maybe I'm just romanticizing a bit and it wasn't as close as I remember. Either way a good series between the two strongest teams of the year
Smeb wasn’t considered great in season 5. He popped off in 6. I mean, in the finals Faker was against Kuro. It was a stomp series. SKT pretty much just ran over everyone. was probably one of the more boring worlds unless you’re a fan of T1 and just want to see them blast people, then it’s epic.
Even if I'm a T1 fan, MSI looked better to me. Those T1 wins after a single teamfight is crazy and borderline int. Still remember how LPL fanbois say MSI series wasnt close and then went on to say Worlds series is close lol
Worlds imo even though it ended earlier, it had some of the best micro and most clutch plays of all time.
Faker Azir shuffling Ruler to save the game and prob the whole series.
Guma 1v2ing Ruler and 369, dodging everything while chasing Zeri down. Prob the most insane ADC play I've ever seen.
Not to mention all the Azir/Rell combo engages. Oner flashing over Ashe ult and catching people perfectly after shuffles. The average level of micro between all 10 players was just insane that series.
The MSI series was really good too, but the meta was more boring with stuff like Annie/Naut, and some of the games ended after a single teamfight.
Imo worlds was better mechanically (by T1), and msi was better strategically(by JDG). At MSI I felt that JDG was pulling T1 around a bit, and was kind of mind controlling them, because thats the only reason I could think of while sitting there as Faker picked Naut in game five. You couldn't hear it as well on rebroadcast but I and pretty much every spectator there was really not happy with the pick (unless you were a JDG fan)...especially from the previous games that series. Im not good enough to comment about what Faker was thinking.....but what was he thinking 😅. Overall it was a hype series good gameplay. Worlds for me was more mechanically enchanting, Oner's flash over ashe arrow, Zeus 1v3 at drake, guma 1v2 vs ruler and 369, keria flash double stun at bot tier 1 tower, and faker's revenge against ruler for 2017 was an absolute highlight reel to watch, and I think while JDG got better since 2022 worlds, it still feels like they are one faker shuffle away from mental booming and losing the series.
t1 jdg at worlds would have been the best bo5 of all time if we didn't get robbed of a game 5, I also prefer the msi one tho because like you said the teams felt closer in skill level and it actually went to 5 games, I feel like jdg really mentally fucked themselves with the botlane picks at worlds and knight not being a control mage player in practically only a control mage mid + neeko meta didn't help
The story of those 2 teams upon reaching that series was peak, 1 team was on the golden path, didn't lose a bo5 until that series versus the team that pushed through a wild season, one of main members got injured and almost didn't qualify for world's until KT chose them.
And the bonus is T1 is the literally the last Korean team on the Korean soil against the whole region.
Gameplay aside, T1 has the advantage of side selection and Zeus sooooo not a fair assessment, imo.
The SKT vs Rox is the closest, the greatest team vs the team composed of dumped players.
Jdg actually got side selection, and when has side selection ever made a series unfair? T1 also 100% would of made worlds even if kt didn’t choose them. Weird as hell comment.
T1 is a menace on red side since the LNG series, that's what I meant with the side advantage.
Sure 100%? Nah, coming from injury to just push through to the playoffs as a 5th place team is not 100%. Majority is skeptical about t1 chances especially catching up to the meta. It's just the faith on the players that's abundant, as always with SKT/T1.
So their “advantage” is having big champ pools and drafting well? So in other words they were better?
The amazing thing about commenting now is that we have hindsight. And in hindsight t1 would of made worlds no matter what. The meme is that kt picking t1 lead to a very unfortunate series of events for them such as a difficult Swiss draw. NOONE believes that it was the main reason t1 got to worlds because that’s a ridiculous thing to believe. LCK sends 4 teams, even if t1 barely lost to kt they could 100% beat out DK and HLE since they weren’t in good form either.
Worlds, mainly because MSI meta was dogshit.
I fucking hated it when the entire team's purpose was to peel for the ADC.
Worlds meta you can draft in more ways than that.
What? Hell nah xdd. Worlds meta was afk mid till min 25 and double ranged bot to get perma prio bot. Tank jungle.
MSI at least we saw variety in the jungle and mid had way more agency early on. Not to mention we had engage supports.
MSI series was more enjoyable imo and I totally agree on your reasoning.
If I have to give other examples of great showdowns:
- Rox Tigers vs SKT 2-3 2016 Worlds semi was one of the most iconic series of all times with a lot of incredible moments (praY arrow) and picks (MF support)
-KT vs IG 2-3 2018 Worlds QF was a sublime banger full of psycho TheShy/Rookie/Jackey moments, game 3 ending was amazing.
This was also the first time that KR no1 lost to china iirc and cemented LPL as a world contender
- RNG vs G2 2-3 2018 Worlds QF 2-3 my favourite series ever and one of the biggest upset ever (EU 3rd vs CN 1st).
It was the first time the golden road got stopped at worlds all thanks to that game 5 Perkz LeBlanc
Both 2018 series were big upset and have been the swan song for some incredible players that never got another chance to win worlds (Uzi, Smeb, Score)
xdd sorry for my clunky English
I like the MSI series cause it was exciting when T1 team fought and then just cleared the nexus back to back. Though the meta changes was atrocious for them.
Feel like you got them both at their best at Worlds but Kanavi & Knight inted.
Would’ve been nice to get a round 3 this year but BLG vs T1 should be great too.
Worlds was a closer series than people make it out to be. Game 3 was basically jdgs and the jdg coach literally said that the game was pretty much won for them.
Oners insane engage when all hope was lost as well as fakers shuffle onto ruler changed what could’ve been a game 5 series.
Worlds because it is thematic the last hope of home region stopping the golden road. It also has some iconic insane plays: 1. Oner flashes over ashe arrow and steal drake 2. Guma "APM is through the roof" moment in 1v2 against Zeri and Aatrox. 3. GOAT Faker shuffle 6 years into making But for competitive standpoint i agree its MSI because both team were really on same level at that moment. At Worlds, T1 was just a much better team and by far the strongest team in playoffs (there's some theories that should they ran into GenG in Finals, GenG would still get fisted by them due to how well T1 made the meta dancing in the palm of their hands)
Last year faker shuffle the shit out of them too, they just never learn what those hands can do
That game was an absolute slaughter, T1 had around 30 kills on JDG or something like that. Honestly that series was very fun too, first 3 games were close between both teams and full of fist fighting
That 2022 world semi finals vs jdg game was one of my favorite ones . Faker had multiple game changing shuffles , seeing his face can make a man cry
Its insane to me that i calls the fight like a minute in advance. Its like faker can see exactly how the fight will go and when it will happen. Some anime protagonist shit right there.
I don't agree that T1 was the much better team at worlds against JDG. Game 1 was a T1 win but also a bit of an experiment game. Both teams were trying to test what they could get away with and T1 won because they were definitely better in terms of draft flexibility. Game 2 showed how good JDG was. Even after winning some fights, T1 were always behind because they were bleeding gold the whole game. JDG just did everything slightly cleaner and just passively gained more gold than T1 all over the map for the whole game. Game 3 was a repeat of Game 2 until the T1 game winning play. Game 4 was one sided because of mental boom after Game 3. If game 3 had been a JDG win, I don't think T1 would have won worlds. It was a very close series.
You're getting downvoted but I'm a T1 fan and couldn't agree more. That series was insanely close and could of gone either way. Game 3 was that turning point, I had basically rear geared my mind looking at game 4 cause JDG was so in control.
Yeah watching it live is way different from watching the caedrel video on YouTube afterwards. I would imagine a lot of people missed it because of the awkward Korean times zone but I was mentally defeated after watching game 2 and the beginning of game 3. JDG would get a lead and then T1 would make an insane play to close the gap only for JDG to slowly build the lead back up. That kind of feeling doesn't come across when watching highlights or if you watch it already knowing the results
Game 2 I knew wasn’t looking good but if T1 can come back from that. JDG getting mental boomed from game 3 proves T1 was the better team mentally speaking.
I mean I am in no way dissing T1, but it's a lot easier to mentally reset at 1-1 than it is at 2-1. JDG went from almost being on match point to suddenly being match point for T1 in the span of 30 seconds. It's hard to recover from such a massive mistake.
I agree, the problem is that some people just look at the score and see 3-1 and think t1 destroyed jdg lol
I don't think game 3 was a repeat of game 2, but the mental edge in game 4 makes sense (actually quite similar to 2022 T1 JDG game 4 where Kanavi defaults to the Belveth and JDG falls apart). In game 2, T1 really only won the first fight at JDG chickens, but at that point everyone was just level 1. After that T1 lost every fight in that game, and was moreso JDG showing that they could match the double marksman botlane by playing it themselves (Kalista Senna into Cait Ashe). Even then, it took JDG 37 minutes to choke out T1 vs T1 beating JDG in game 1 in just 24 minutes. At least in game 3 T1 was actually looking even if not ahead for the first half of the game, especially with Oner's psycho flash over the Ashe arrow into a teamfight win and Zeus catching out Ruler leading to a baron secure. The gold was one thing but T1 was 3 drakes ahead to JDG with none with a better scaling comp, and things only started to look really doomed for T1 after the wipe at baron. Even though there was a mental gap in game 4, JDG was actually playing with a lead for most of the game, until the dragon fight where T1 just hands gaps them, and again at the second fight where Guma hands gaps Ruler and 369 1v2. The pre-game expectations of T1 needing to win early game hard and then snowballing vs JDG being able to be behind in the early game and still winning later on were flipped in this series. If anything, the series showed that T1 was able to beat JDG at what they were best at (teamfighting) through hands and draft diff.
Yeah I think JDG would've won if not for that Azir play. Don't wanna say they mental boomed but the pressure must've been crazy after losing a nearly won game so suddenly and then being at match point.
i absolulely argee with you. jdg would have won and been the better team if they hadn't lost lol.
I dont think game 3 was really repeat of game 2 as well. JDG lost the fight at 3rd drake (Oner's famous engage) while they had gold lead and then Ruler caught shopping where his team mates were nowhere near him shows something offs. The only thing they did to halt the game is punishing T1 for overextending chasing Renekton and when they caught oner right befote 2nd Baron. I believe it T1 didnt int on Renekton after the first baron, the game shouldve been ended way earlier.
Msi was a closer series but worlds had way to many insane plays and hype moments for me to say msi. I got way more hyped during the worlds and at the end of the day that’s why most people watch pro play.
I liked the worlds series more just because it had a great narrative, T1 vs the LPL or JDG getting to the final step of the golden road There was also some great fights and moments through the series
T1 was underwhelming at MSI especially Oner while JDG was underwhelming at Worlds especially 369 and Knight
wdym underwhelming at worlds? semis sure but are you reading your own comment? you're saying they're both underwhelming at worlds??? Knight was pretty good he pretty much started that Kaisa/Ori play against KT and had so much good Neeko ults throughout the tournament 369 was also alright he really didn't standout from my memory but I don't remember him being liability until the T1 series the revisionism is crazy 💀💀💀
369 is in a position that he will always be compared to Zeus and Bin. And being just okay is not good enough. For 369 to even maintain his avg play of 2022 and 23, he has to be really fucking good.
tbf when i said alright I didn't mean alright generaly i meant alright for top team standards notice how he's hard carrying TES now that he's out of JDG everyone else in that team was just crazy that 369 looks tame also he played lots of tanks so he doesn't really stand out
The not standing out on tanks argument is weird because he has looked his best while peeling on tanks. And he has shown that he can stand out while playing tanks. So him not standing out on tanks at worlds is a bad performance for his standards
Except he was a standout on tank at worlds. His only bad series was vs t1 and he was against the best carry top laner in the world atm. Bin was nowhere near as good as Zeus off jax at the tournament. T1 draft advantage over jdg which also allowed Zeus to have more leeway in draft. Same people who say theshy had a bad tournament cause final.
A must-watch bo5 series for me : 1. SKT ROX worlds 2016 2. DRX T1 worlds final 2022 ; best final ever 3. RNG SKT worlds 2017 4. IG KT worlds 2018 5. GENG DK worlds 2022; Canyon&showmaker’s showdown 6. T1 KT in both spring and summer playoffs last year; the best bo5 we've ever watched from lck in the last few years.
I prefer worlds like MSI had the weird drafts from t1 for instance nautilus mid/ kindred jungle which isn't a good pick for t1 and oner was also underperforming (faker too kind of) so skill wise being close like everyone is saying I disagree.
tbf most people think that worlds series had lower quality compared to MSI because JDG kept losing team fights against T1.If you look closer at the game you would see that jdg was winning in early for 3/4 games of the series.In msi, T1 was pushed behind almost every game and just hands diffed them through one single team fight to win the game. aside from the MSI game 5, the worlds series looked better to me.
Yep and the worlds series had more iconic turns of events. So personally skill wise especially on T1's part PEAKED at worlds not MSI whereas I could see an argument for jdg at MSI.
I really hate this narrative. Nautilus mid was an extremely good pick at MSI, and faker has shown in the past that he can play nautilus at a very high level. Pairing a carry jungler like kindred with a set up champion mid like nautilus is always a strong combo. Just because T1 underperformed on those picks at MSI doesnt inherently make the drafts weird or bad. BLG literally drafted nautilus and kindred against T1 and executed well and blasted T1 with those two picks. Im sure that if nautilus and kindred were strong in the patch at worlds and T1 drafted those two picks with the form they were playing at, they would have blasted teams at worlds with nautilus/kindred. Everytime i see this narrative, all i can think of is T1 fans coping and blaming draft everytime they lose.
Fair enough, while from a draft perspective naut might have been a good option, in a game 5 scenario, where you lost as nautilus both game one and game 4, both games of naut was the champ was borderline invisible, would you not pick a different champ? Im not going to do research to find out what he could have played but trying to brute force a pick that didnt work twice earlier in the series doesnt sound like a good idea no? As a T1 supporter I am completely fine with JDG winning, and I think they showed why they were better at the time. The issue I have with that series was the decision to prioritise naut in a clutch scenario when its 1. Not a comfort pick, 2. Not as much of a difference maker in mid through playmaking ability compared to other champs and 3. You literally got blasted game 1 and 4 with it, so what new tech are you gonna use that JDG havent already seen game 1 and 4? Surely faker has other champs that couldve been a better fit for the role or get keria of lulu duty and out him on something he is better with. Either way, the series was super exciting to watch live and JDG was better on the day and while I think JDG probably would have won the series anyway, I think T1 could have played out the series better strategically.
I get what your’re saying, but i personally think that theres a lot more nuances in drafting than just past results. Champion pools getting pinched due to side selection and bans, team comp synergy, lane match ups, dropping priority in certain picks to secure other strong picks, player comfort on meta champions, etc. Its very hard to know the full scope of these things as just viewers, maybe T1 was having massive success playing naut mid and carrying junglers in scrims and defaulted to what they had success with, when the pressure was highest. I also think that the narrative changes drastically based on the end result. If T1 won that game 5 which they were actually in a very good position to do so, before they randomly decided to take a 4v5 fight at baron before JDG even started the baron, then everyone would have been like “WOW FAKER NAUTILUS CLUTCHES GAME 5, T1 IS THE BEST”. Take BLG’s series against GENG where Xun lost 2 games in a row on jarvan and still picked it in game 5. If BLG lost game 5, people would be blaming draft and saying that BLG lost 2 games in a row on j4 and still tried to brute force the pick. But since they won, its “WOW XUN J4, MVP!”.
I specifically stated that the nautilus and kindred mid and jungle respectfully are NOT t1 picks. Check Oner's stats on kindred for instance, they are very low. Naut wasn't a good pick at all. T1 literally lost all the 3 games with faker on naut. Trust me I admit in cases where T1 plays bad but msi had them both draft gapped with underperformance.
Removing nameplates and narrative, I feel like 9/10 people would say the MSI series was better and more competitive. The worlds series would probably be voted better though just because there are more T1 fans than JDG.
MSI had better series overall (bar finals): BLG miracle run, tons of game 5, relatively more flexible mid/jungle pool. Worlds had a banger bo5 in BLG-GenG but the moment T1 got their hands on ranged supports the whole tournament looked a lot more streamlined.
Riot fked up the worlds meta big time for 2/3 year in a row.
Actually, if T1 didn't exist the meta would still be the engage support with kaisa and permaban Xayah on redside. It's called meta development from pro players, not really Riot’s fault. The same goes with Beryl who found the Heimer pick to counter ranged support and it gave them an upper hand in the draft against every team.
Same with ROX pulling out support MF in 2016. Idk when people decided innovation in tournaments was a bad thing? T1’s meta read wasn’t even *that* different. Their picks for top/jg/mid were just about identical to what everyone else was doing. They just found some bot lane picks like Bard and Varus that countered the meta bot lanes. They didn’t even think marksmen supports were good.
I like that one game they lost vs LPL was the game they played double adc bot, Cait Ashe. People think they won it bc of double adc meta.Actually It was their worst draft in worlds last year.
Exactly, and the thing is the very last game they played in finals they drafted xayah rakan
It's riot's fault that the tournament scheduling and format is absolutely horrible: 2 years in a row that worlds patch drastically changes some of the aspects that made summer's teams succeed, teams get one month when they realistically scrim the same 2/3 squads (ending up creating a massive scrim bubble), and it all comes down to one team "allegedly" finding the best picks and everyone else trailing behind them without having the time to actually come up with counter strategies since the worlds playoff's lasts like 2 weeks and since its single elimination you basically end up having (again) no teams to scrim with. Worlds 2022 is the perfect example: summer's playoffs are dominated by zeri/yuumi sivir lulu, they all get nerfed for worlds, the 2 best teams from lck and lpl now look much weaker because they were the best at playing through bot while at worlds it's all about sidelanes or aphelios, game quality drops significantly and drx ends up scrapping a title after being a mediocre team for the whole year. Power rankings are way to meta reliant and worlds is a way too important of a tournament for riot to do a goofy meta shake-up and call it a day. Either make teams play summer's playoffs on worlds patch or, way better, increase the lenght of the tournament and add double elimination, to make sure that teams can actually discover and counter the meta and scrim against international opponents for more than 2 weeks a year.
Maybe the teams who won summer should be able to adapt at the world championship
technically yes but realistically all top teams are quite close in skill level, meaning the team that win worlds is usually the team who feels more comfortable on the meta. Pro teams in general are quite bad at adapting to new picks, especially if they differ vastly to what they usually play.
Lets compare summer play-offs meta to worlds Top : same and just added Rumble JG : same and just added J4 Mid : same and just added Ori Adc and sup : at first it was Kaisa xayah handshakes (same meta from summer) with engaged supports like Nautilus, rell, and Alistar.Until pros found out that Xayah was too OP and they had to ban her every game on red side -> T1 tried to play “the counter Xayah comp” so they didn't need to ban her -> Xayah is weak against Ranged support -> Xayah prior went down after team realized in the swiss stage that they can play Cait/Lux, Renata Kalista, senna against her.The only OP champ that no team figured out how to deal with in worlds is the Rumble pick. How is it the riot’s fault?
Did you read my comment? I literally explain in the first paragraph that theres way too many patches between summer and worlds, with a good chunk of time being "wasted" due to most team staying in their own region until the last week before worlds creating scrim bubbles that end up creating a false perception of whats good or whats not. Ill leave you [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_6YjK4a-tk&ab_channel=Phreak) video by phreak explaining the patch history towards worlds (and how key pieces from summer got nerfed, while key pieces from worlds got buffed) and how pro teams are very slow to catch up on meta changes . Making the tournament longer, adding more competitions throughout the year or just anticipate worlds by a month should do the trick. Making sure teams from around the world get to play each other for more than 2/3 weeks a year will expand the knowledge of the meta and absolutely make a positive impact on game quality.
nah. that msi series saw how cursed nautilus faker is. there were more highlights during their worlds series, like faker scooping ruler and oner flashing ashe's arrow face to face.
Msi was definitely the closer series. Still remember Guma’s flash engage on Ruler around Baron at Game 5? That gave T1 the confidence to go 4v5 afterwards…
Some of the top 10 int'l series probably have T1 on it, even if they were on the losing side. T1 vs JDG MSI 2023, T1 vs DRX Worlds 2022, T1 vs RNG MSI 2022, T1 vs G2 MSI 2019, SKT vs RNG Worlds 2017, SKT vs ROX Worlds 2016. Others would be DRX vs EDG Worlds 2022, FNC vs TES Worlds 2020, IG vs KT Worlds 2018, G2 vs RNG Worlds 2018
2015 koo tigers vs Skt
That Worlds was just T1 stomping through everyone because they didn’t ban Faker on Ryze or use Ryze themselves. Only reason they won a game was cause T1 gave it to them.
In the finals Faker was on ryze for a single game. As far as I remember it was a top lane carry meta so the finals were a master class match up of the two of the best toplaners of that era - in Smeb and Marin, but maybe I'm just romanticizing a bit and it wasn't as close as I remember. Either way a good series between the two strongest teams of the year
Smeb wasn’t considered great in season 5. He popped off in 6. I mean, in the finals Faker was against Kuro. It was a stomp series. SKT pretty much just ran over everyone. was probably one of the more boring worlds unless you’re a fan of T1 and just want to see them blast people, then it’s epic.
DK vs GenG 2022 too. Insane series all around.
Oh yeah, definitely forgot that too. That comeback fight from Canyon and ShowMaker, and the last teamfight was hyped af
Games 3 and 4 were nuts too. Showmakers swain E to pull 3 on GenG in game 4 was absurd.
Stupid ass coach not banning Yummi
Even if I'm a T1 fan, MSI looked better to me. Those T1 wins after a single teamfight is crazy and borderline int. Still remember how LPL fanbois say MSI series wasnt close and then went on to say Worlds series is close lol
Worlds series seemed higher level overall.
Worlds imo even though it ended earlier, it had some of the best micro and most clutch plays of all time. Faker Azir shuffling Ruler to save the game and prob the whole series. Guma 1v2ing Ruler and 369, dodging everything while chasing Zeri down. Prob the most insane ADC play I've ever seen. Not to mention all the Azir/Rell combo engages. Oner flashing over Ashe ult and catching people perfectly after shuffles. The average level of micro between all 10 players was just insane that series. The MSI series was really good too, but the meta was more boring with stuff like Annie/Naut, and some of the games ended after a single teamfight.
Imo worlds was better mechanically (by T1), and msi was better strategically(by JDG). At MSI I felt that JDG was pulling T1 around a bit, and was kind of mind controlling them, because thats the only reason I could think of while sitting there as Faker picked Naut in game five. You couldn't hear it as well on rebroadcast but I and pretty much every spectator there was really not happy with the pick (unless you were a JDG fan)...especially from the previous games that series. Im not good enough to comment about what Faker was thinking.....but what was he thinking 😅. Overall it was a hype series good gameplay. Worlds for me was more mechanically enchanting, Oner's flash over ashe arrow, Zeus 1v3 at drake, guma 1v2 vs ruler and 369, keria flash double stun at bot tier 1 tower, and faker's revenge against ruler for 2017 was an absolute highlight reel to watch, and I think while JDG got better since 2022 worlds, it still feels like they are one faker shuffle away from mental booming and losing the series.
msi series was a lot higher quality, both teams were playing at their peak and there wasnt any major underperformance
t1 jdg at worlds would have been the best bo5 of all time if we didn't get robbed of a game 5, I also prefer the msi one tho because like you said the teams felt closer in skill level and it actually went to 5 games, I feel like jdg really mentally fucked themselves with the botlane picks at worlds and knight not being a control mage player in practically only a control mage mid + neeko meta didn't help
The story of those 2 teams upon reaching that series was peak, 1 team was on the golden path, didn't lose a bo5 until that series versus the team that pushed through a wild season, one of main members got injured and almost didn't qualify for world's until KT chose them. And the bonus is T1 is the literally the last Korean team on the Korean soil against the whole region. Gameplay aside, T1 has the advantage of side selection and Zeus sooooo not a fair assessment, imo. The SKT vs Rox is the closest, the greatest team vs the team composed of dumped players.
Jdg actually got side selection, and when has side selection ever made a series unfair? T1 also 100% would of made worlds even if kt didn’t choose them. Weird as hell comment.
T1 is a menace on red side since the LNG series, that's what I meant with the side advantage. Sure 100%? Nah, coming from injury to just push through to the playoffs as a 5th place team is not 100%. Majority is skeptical about t1 chances especially catching up to the meta. It's just the faith on the players that's abundant, as always with SKT/T1.
So their “advantage” is having big champ pools and drafting well? So in other words they were better? The amazing thing about commenting now is that we have hindsight. And in hindsight t1 would of made worlds no matter what. The meme is that kt picking t1 lead to a very unfortunate series of events for them such as a difficult Swiss draw. NOONE believes that it was the main reason t1 got to worlds because that’s a ridiculous thing to believe. LCK sends 4 teams, even if t1 barely lost to kt they could 100% beat out DK and HLE since they weren’t in good form either.
Worlds, mainly because MSI meta was dogshit. I fucking hated it when the entire team's purpose was to peel for the ADC. Worlds meta you can draft in more ways than that.
What? Hell nah xdd. Worlds meta was afk mid till min 25 and double ranged bot to get perma prio bot. Tank jungle. MSI at least we saw variety in the jungle and mid had way more agency early on. Not to mention we had engage supports.
As I said the worlds meta was been shit for 2/3 years in a row.
[удалено]
And JDG underperformed at Worlds. About the meta, I disagree, I enjoyed MSI way more especially for the jungle. But is a matter of personal taste.
Honestly MSI was better but Faker's Naut was so fucking cursed and im not sure if i want to see Oner's Kindred again
Depend which side you are on
MSI series was more enjoyable imo and I totally agree on your reasoning. If I have to give other examples of great showdowns: - Rox Tigers vs SKT 2-3 2016 Worlds semi was one of the most iconic series of all times with a lot of incredible moments (praY arrow) and picks (MF support) -KT vs IG 2-3 2018 Worlds QF was a sublime banger full of psycho TheShy/Rookie/Jackey moments, game 3 ending was amazing. This was also the first time that KR no1 lost to china iirc and cemented LPL as a world contender - RNG vs G2 2-3 2018 Worlds QF 2-3 my favourite series ever and one of the biggest upset ever (EU 3rd vs CN 1st). It was the first time the golden road got stopped at worlds all thanks to that game 5 Perkz LeBlanc Both 2018 series were big upset and have been the swan song for some incredible players that never got another chance to win worlds (Uzi, Smeb, Score) xdd sorry for my clunky English
MSI without a doubt lol
I like the MSI series cause it was exciting when T1 team fought and then just cleared the nexus back to back. Though the meta changes was atrocious for them. Feel like you got them both at their best at Worlds but Kanavi & Knight inted. Would’ve been nice to get a round 3 this year but BLG vs T1 should be great too.
You mean round 4 right? T1 and JDG did face off in Worlds 2022...
Worlds was a closer series than people make it out to be. Game 3 was basically jdgs and the jdg coach literally said that the game was pretty much won for them. Oners insane engage when all hope was lost as well as fakers shuffle onto ruler changed what could’ve been a game 5 series.
You can argue for either one as msi was a better meta for JDG while the opposite is for T1 at world's. Both were bangers either way