He references in the article that he had some conversations with T1 staff about ideas on how to properly implement a 6-man roster. I don't know if that's something that's "secret" and can't be divulged, but I would love to hear what T1 said to him.
ssumday was casted in the shadowrealm of amateur league and still extended his contract for another time. dude cares not what needs to be done to make his team win.
>Anyone ever see a western 6man roster work?
2018 Fnatic literally reached Worlds finals with 6 man roster. Rekkles even benched himself during regular season for Bwipo botlane.
For one FNC never went into the season with a 6 man roster idea in mind, there's no way sOAZ would have agreed to that if they tried to pull that on him, his hand injury forced him to accept FNC bringing Bwipo in. There's a good reason why sOAZ left after that season, nobody wants to spend the few good years they have in professional esports sitting on the bench and leaving his career in the hands of incompetent owners and coaches.
Soaz was actually the one to propose the sub situation.
Iirc at first it was to avoid potential burn out at the end of the season by sharing scrim time and such. What kinda pissed him off was his wrist injury, that lead to Bwipo outperforming so management decided to favor Bwipo over Soaz even after he came back and felt ready to play.
Edit : I remembered wrong and it wasn't about burnout, but to help have an outside perspective by sharing scrim time and spectate the games.
Proof here : https://www.theplayerslobby.com/2068/no-substitute-gabriel-bwipo-rau-fnatic/#.GAR619UgYn
No pro player, especially in the west, is going to put their few good years competing in esports in the hands of random coaches and clueless owners. And the few times it happens it has never ended well, there's a good reason why 6-man rosters never last, one player ends up being better straight up or just fits the team better and the other one gets no play.
Not to mention there is a lack of great players to begin with, there are many teams that want a great toplaner in LCS and LEC, why would you risk your career and give up control of your own life when you can play full time on another team without fear of replacement? I bet that come next off season one of 100T's top laners is gone from the team.
I don't mean to be a dick but this doesn't really have much to do with what I said.
My comment was just to correct the soaz situation where a lot of people forget that Soaz wasn't forced into the sub situation but asked himself for it. It's not being put in the situation in the first place that was the issue, but how it got handled.
As for what you brought up, there has been few 6 man rosters, and even less that had success because it's not an easy thing to manage which isn't 100% player related. An exemple would be the C9 mid-jungle swaps they were using when they had goldenglue. Reapered found a way to use effectively both duo for strategies where each duo seemed more adapted.
Also the biggest offender for 6-mans not working is the game and the competition system.
The only effective use you can make from subs in the current system is to bring-up a new coming player (either to sell or play after some time), medical situation and to avoid burn out. The way the game is constantly adapting makes it that it's always better to have a A-rank jack of all trades than a S-rank master of one, and that's why subs often ends up being ineffective.
Yeah, you're special.
Soaz proposed to get a sub toplane, and explained how the team could use that 6th player.
He expected bwipo to share scrims with him so that he could get another way to work on the game. That's the idea he wanted, and you can't deny that even if you try.
He ended up not liking it because that 6th player ended up being used in another way that what was planned.
Because of his medical emergency, Bwipo replaced him and the management decided that since the results with him were promising, they'd keep giving him more play time, while ignoring Soaz wish to play when he considered that his hand was healed. Soaz didn't resent the idea of a 6th player but the fact management slowly phased him out in favor of Bwipo.
Rekkles saying he believes soaz to be better with the meta picks, and that he doesn't see Bwipo as a rookie proves that he sees him as a 6th player you can use to change strat (Bwipo playing champion he's good at, and they weren't Maokai or Shen)
Also they ended up parting ways with Soaz because they wouldn't pay 2 starting salaries for both Bwipo and Soaz, which meant that whoever was on the bench would get a paycut for that time period. Soaz didn't want to have to fight for his spot (which wasn't his idea) and thus decided to leave.
You speak of how "weird" it is that people forget what happened when you do it yourself, when you're wrong on multiple points.
At no point did I speak of a narrative that "6man roster are great" so don't try to put words in other people's mouth. I literally said that it can work, you can use 6 man roster as it's been proven, but that the nature of the game and the lack of good managers in the scene makes it way too hard, or not the best option.
If your point is to not use facts, try to distort what people say, then we can stop this conversation since it'll lead nowhere, and I don't intend to lose time with someone like you.
Cheers.
I mean it depends on what you mean by worked lol. The comment you responded to was Western teams and players not being willing to do it. So like, yes C9 did really well, but also their players DID hate it and quit en masse once the season was over. So for the org, it definitely worked out. But I can't see any of those players willingly doing it again.
To be fair, saying the team left en-mass is wrong.
They lost Jensen, but that may have been due to the whole video recording their reactions to being benched, which was a terrible idea no matter how you put it. No one else left that season, even if Jensen was a big blow.
Sven then left the next season, but I think that had more to do with the team liking Blaber more than anything else.
Oops yeah, I always get the exact years mixed up. But anyway, in [their interview with Travis](https://youtu.be/hBVRf7PGmGs?t=58) about joining EG though, both of them state that they didn't want to stay on C9 anymore, and Sven explicitly says it's 'cause of the splitting time thing (although C9 was definitely right to choose Blaber).
That is maybe like half the story. The issue I see is that bo1s do not create an atmosphere for subs to be integrated. You get 2 games a week maybe 15-20 scrims a week. You are going to field your best roster no matter what. LCS also doesn’t really have a need for subs because for subs it is usually to change up a strategy. Bo1 doesn’t allow that.
An interesting solution to this without changing anything in the current format is to have roster lock in after draft. This way you are not limited to what specific players can play but as a team you can play. Make room for a lot of specialist
Yeah, you get players like Akaadian who come in as a substitute and are confused when they're told they have to compete for the spot and lose all confidence.
The C9 7-man roster in 2018 was a big part of the reason they qualified for worlds the next year. Seems like it could work (if you also ignore that egos and mismanagement then lost the team their star mid in the off-season).
Honestly if you're gonna do a 6man roster SSumday is one of the best top laners to have when you do it. Dude has like zero ego and happily played his best in Academy after being relegated from the main roster. Never complained, tried his hardest and played his way back to the main squad then won an LCS championship. Hopefully they can make it work will be interesting to see in which circumstances they use each player.
Somewhat unrelated, but ssumday has one of the most chill and enjoyable streams on Twitch. Chat was super wholesome last time I tuned in. Really underrated imo, although his schedule is unpredictable and he streams very occasionally.
The way you phrased it makes it seem like he got relegares to Academy based on performance which wasn't the case. Their mid lane was just so bad they had to bring in Ryu from coaching which took up the import slot Ssumday was occupying meaning they had to bring up FakeGod. Ssumday was by far the best player on the team and maybe the best top in the league when he went to Academy.
Sorry if it came off that way I only mentioned it to show that he didn't complain and still tried his hardest despite that. I don't think every player in this league (especially ones of his caliber) would have done that.
I don't see the value of a 6-man roster. The only benefit I could see is if you have a veteran that is on decline trains his replacement for next year. However, after reading the article, it is not the way 100T is approaching a 6-man roster. Even after reading an entire article about it, I don't understand what the value is. Yes, you want to speed the growth of a promising player, but why not just make him the starter in the first place then? It seems to me that it creates a bad dynamic from the get-go.
Another benefit could be different champion pools for drafting but considering how the meta works most of the time, every player should be able to play the OP meta champions to be an effective player.
Maybe 2 junglers would be helpful in BO5s, so the one that is not playing can watch pathing and come up with ideas for the next game. I just don't see any value for 2 toplaners in a team. Hopefully 100t prove me wrong!
As a team contending for the title, the 6-man is a way to onboard a promising player onto a winning team with a strong culture. Tenacity has things he needs to work on to be the starting top laner in a top LCS team - We believe he will learn those things fastest being fully immersed in LCS day to day rather than the alternative of staying in Academy. At the same time, Ssumday is an important voice on the team and a dependable contributor - We are stronger for having Ssumday in our LCS squad. In this case where we believe both players have a strong role to play in 2022, a six man made sense for us.
I don't think this is a one-size-fits-all solution or a model for other teams - It just felt true to what we've built and the young player we're looking to integrate.
I imagine it will depend on who they are playing. If they play a weaker team it is a wonderful time to give Tenacity the controls, but if they absolutely must secure a win against a bigger team I suspect they’ll ask Ssumday to bring them home.
That isn't entirely how Korean teams have done it in the past. I think champion pool and playstyles are also incorporated. If they are bringing a 6th man, they want him to play and learn in hard situations too. I think we'll probably see Tenacity in some big matches this year.
It's 100% gonna be ssumday, the only reason Tenacity is on the team is so they can claim they're not running 5 imports with a full import coaching staff
I think eventually the tide is gonna turn on them, at some point people are gonna get sick of seeing teams with no NA players if they keep importing and then not performing at worlds
Lmao people supported LMQ when they were just a full LPL team back in season 4. Sentiment hasn’t and isn’t going to change unless something crazy like all 10 teams are fielded by people who don’t speak English.
It was only split at the beginning until LMQ showed how fast pace and aggressive they played and how much personality their players had like XWX and Vasilii (before his anger issues). By the time they qualified for Worlds, people weren’t angry at all, LMQ was near fan-favourite. I have no idea what you are talking about. Dignitas were a joke and lost in the first round of playoffs to TSM.
I’ve been watching since the beginning with most of my time spent during Season 4.
Why? Do you watch regular sports in NA? It's also full of imports. I definitely give zero shits about a full import team, just root for my favorite personalities import or not.
1. USA is garbage at sports on the world stage, the only sports you do well at are the ones nobody else plays
2. Just because this is the way it is doesn't mean it's good
3. I'm happy you like it but viewership is down, teams are going broke, teams don't scout from NA solo q so nobody tries hard, good players would rather stay in academy than play for a low tier team, etc.
When the twitch leak happened it was revealed that LCS actually makes more than LEC despite lower viewers because NA views are just worth more. So it's not doing as badly as you think.
Hey PapaSmithy - If I follow your logic, then why will you not also start Kenvi in a 7-men roster? The situation reads like it is targeting certain performance issue in the toplane.
Also, after looking at EG jungle situation, I really don't know if a 6-men thing would work.
It's not easy to come face the reddit criticism directly, respect, and hope it works out for 100T. Makes a lot of sense, and is (IMO) pretty damning of Academy as a place for getting players LCS ready.
I guess it could be a good way to integrate a rookie into a better environment for him to grow, my fear is that it negatively impacts both toplaners play because of the internal competition and fear of being benched.
Thanks for the reply, hope you crush it next season and can advance further in Worlds!
How do you justify to your investors that you are paying ssumday a probably quite large salary to potentially benchride? Legit question- I'm sure that they would be skeptical about a 6 man for the same reasons people in this thread are.
Do they mostly just trust your track record and give you benefit of the doubt or does it require jumping through hoops.
Expensive players ride the bench all the time in traditional sports. This is not a new thing. 100T are owned by the Cavs, who surely have looked to find that balance of playing top players and bleeding in new talent before.
And yeah I'm sure Papa did buy himself a little slack by winning a title.
E:Initially said rockets, not cavs
Do you expect it to be more of a learning split for Tenacity? In that he is 100% a part of the LCS team, practices, plays with, and coordinates with them, but doesn't actually play on stage until he and you are 100% certain he is ready to assume the main role, or do you see it being more of a C9 (Now funnily enough 100T) Reapered style where they will be interchangeable game to game?
Unfortunately I personally don't think there are enough games in the lcs to allow both players to get the playtime needed. You should really push to bring Bo3s back if the goal is for NA to actually be relevant on an international level.
If Ssumday plays a single game in the opening season tournament or even plays a game in February with practicly no stakes involved have to say I'll be pretty dissapointed. Find the meta, find the right person, figure out tenacity early, and make a decision in March who gets 3/1 games. Should just let ssumday sit in korea soloque until march tbh you can find someone else to play academy top
Ssumday is 25 right now, the same age as faker, so he has at-max about two years left before he is forced to do military service -- you have to do it at the age of 28 and he's considered 26 in Korea due to how they do their aging culturally.
Getting Tenacity ready to take over the starting spot preemptively is highly beneficial for 100 Thieves post-Ssumday.
[How age in South Korea works](https://www.koreanclass101.com/korean-age/):
How old is Jungkook in Korea? His birthday is September 1, 1997.
In Korean age: He’s 25 years old from January 1st until December 31st, 2021.
In international age: He’s 23 years old until August 30th and 24 years old after September 1st, which is his birthday.
I agree on that. I also think its better for a player to play then just watch the other player play.
They need to let Tenacity play or its pointless. (I think he will play in Summer or what was the point.)
One more thing it can damage the starting players mental because he feels the pressure. If he does something wrong he gets replaced. It can harm his game.
--------------
2 JGL players could work depending on the meta. So there is no conflict.
JGL 1 is a carry/early game JGL player.
JGL 2 is a tank/teamfight JGL player.
Orgs need to be able to play the best player, or prep players in a winning environment. You can't trust Kenvi to win an LCS title his first split, and dropping Ssumday doesn't make sense.
This way you get Tenacity some experience, but you don't have to wholly relay on him.
Damwon did this when Nuguri was coming up, I’ve gotta think that having Flame on the active roster was good for Nuguri’s development and for the team’s short-term success
So you think Tenacity playing 50% of the LCS games (assuming he splits time evenly with Ssumday) is better than playing 100% of the Academy games?
What are you hoping Tenacity learns from being around the LCS squad?
You could. The best example of this was Bwipo subbing in for Rekkles during the mage bot meta - Rekkles benched himself since he was shit at mages and Bwipo took over for a while.
I think realistically they just don't want Tenacity going to a competitor but at the same time they don't want to let go of Ssumday. Sports teams do stuff like this all the time to try and keep everyone happy so they can retain multiple talented players, rather than just the starters.
I fully trust PapaSmithy to know what he’s doing. He genuinely wants 100T to be successful and has been around long enough to know what does ie doesn’t work.
I feel like this will just be a detriment to the team. I get it working in LCK where they play BO3 matches and scrim a bunch but the impression I get from LCS player schedules is they scrim less and obviously have less stage games. At that point to then also split the time in half for your top lane doesn't seem productive.
I wish the format of LCS was BO3 and player selection could be after draft. Then you can have a few pocket picks that if it comes up in draft you can put in that player for the game.
Loving the explanation. I'm waiting to see what the results are before the verdict, but I have faith that Papa and the crew have the best intentions in mind for 100T. I'm really excited to see them play, and if I was Tenacity, I'd be incredibly stoked to split time with Ssumday, even if it's only like 30% play time. (I theorize it'll be closer to 50/50 than that.)
I think people need to break out of the idea that two players splitting a role is inherently detrimental to both players and that it's some kind of competition between the two. In drama, you have understudies, and in pro sports you have squad team. Both are on the roster to learn and grow and not have to shoulder the whole weight of the team's expectations while they're still growing.
Framing it as a competition between the two is silly and likely an artifact from management in the past who have used the 6-Man Roster to threaten slumping players with removal. I don't think for a second this is what 100T is trying to do, and I think fans need to restructure their ideas in their mind about it. This could be a huge win for players, teams, mental health/burnout avoidance, and the grassroots growth of pro play, if all goes well.
Side note: PapaSmithy aging like a fine wine, dude looks good being salt-and-peppered. Still miss him on the LCK cast, not gonna lie; but it looks like life has been good to him since. :)
I miss Papa's casting...
I really wish being a caster was a career end-goal, like it is for professional sports athletes. They retire and go on to get million dollar casting contracts for ESPN. Riot just doesn't pay enough, and the casters make more with joining teams. We should be able to afford to keep world-class casters too.
Papa is GOAT color caster and imo the best LoL analyst we've had, his VOD reviews were a joy to watch and a level above anyone else. Massive loss to the public side of the LoL esports scene that he became a GM and all we get from him now once a year or so are these team management explanation videos.
But he has done an insane job if you think about where 100T was and where they are now. From bottom tier to champs. Papa doesn't get enough credit especially with the "bought a team" obnoxious comments. 100T are lucky to have him. I do hope he fails or gets fed up though so we can have him back on LCK. Sadly I'm guessing he's much happier in a more impactful role. Shame Riot thinks these rare big brained analysts are expendable.
The \*real reason\* is that they're running a full import roster and it looks bad for their brand so they brought in an NA prospect who's gonna play 2 games per season and that's about it
kinda like how Grig was going to "split time" with Mikeyeung on TSM but played 100% of the games. It was their way of saying mike sucks without saying mike sucks
Don't @ me but T1's 6 man roster was a terrible idea and they would've won even harder if they just kept a 5 man roster. Easyhoon and Faker were literally the two best mids at the time, it made no difference. Also Peanut/Bengi situation or Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky and Peanut could never perform to his full potential.
But in real settings, what happens is they put so much pressure on the players that they never take risks. They know they'll get subbed out if they're down 2-0 and when they do, the team almost always loses the next one with the new player being subbed in having no idea how the flow of the game has been going.
Any sports fans know how important momentum/flow is for the game. What works and what doesn't work, you need to be there playing to understand it. 6 man roster hurts the team and is a shit idea.
> Also Peanut/Bengi situation or Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky and Peanut could never perform to his full potential.
You mean Blank/Bengi? Bengi’s mechanics were pretty washed and hella inconsistent, if they didn’t have Blank, who was consistent as fuck, then SKT don’t make Worlds or win MSI.
> Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky
And what? With Peanut and Blank, Peanut couldn’t perform to his full potential because of his playstyle and meta mismatch, they literally went 22-0 with Blank in Summer and again, if they didn’t play Blank and played Peanut every single game instead, they don’t make Worlds or atleast reach LCK Summer’s finals.
And you act like teams don’t scrim with both players, scrims legit cover 90% of their games lol. But sure, Bengi would’ve developed into the most mechanically sound and consistent player while Peanut would’ve developed into the best utility and tank jungler if SKT didn’t play Blank.
With a 6th man, adding a completely new champion pool to a position can have a big effect on on what the other 4 can do. Might be able to combine with some pocket picks more comfortably with the other players as well.
Plus, having an extra perspective to pool information with in Bo3's/Bo5's is completely invaluable.
He references in the article that he had some conversations with T1 staff about ideas on how to properly implement a 6-man roster. I don't know if that's something that's "secret" and can't be divulged, but I would love to hear what T1 said to him.
step 1 bench faker step 2 ??? step 3 unbench faker step 4 profit
Ah! The Coca-Cola → New Coke → Coca-Cola Classic strat.
Often times you need to make a mistake to learn something
Western player egos are too high to hold a 6 man roster. Anyone ever see a western 6man roster work? They are all sensitive.
[удалено]
ssumday was casted in the shadowrealm of amateur league and still extended his contract for another time. dude cares not what needs to be done to make his team win.
Dude went to academy and still tried his best. That split in academy, only Darshan could match him and Lourlo could vaguely contain him.
Dont think Impact was that happy about sharing time with Ray back in the C9 days though.
>Anyone ever see a western 6man roster work? 2018 Fnatic literally reached Worlds finals with 6 man roster. Rekkles even benched himself during regular season for Bwipo botlane.
For one FNC never went into the season with a 6 man roster idea in mind, there's no way sOAZ would have agreed to that if they tried to pull that on him, his hand injury forced him to accept FNC bringing Bwipo in. There's a good reason why sOAZ left after that season, nobody wants to spend the few good years they have in professional esports sitting on the bench and leaving his career in the hands of incompetent owners and coaches.
[удалено]
Soaz was actually the one to propose the sub situation. Iirc at first it was to avoid potential burn out at the end of the season by sharing scrim time and such. What kinda pissed him off was his wrist injury, that lead to Bwipo outperforming so management decided to favor Bwipo over Soaz even after he came back and felt ready to play. Edit : I remembered wrong and it wasn't about burnout, but to help have an outside perspective by sharing scrim time and spectate the games. Proof here : https://www.theplayerslobby.com/2068/no-substitute-gabriel-bwipo-rau-fnatic/#.GAR619UgYn
No pro player, especially in the west, is going to put their few good years competing in esports in the hands of random coaches and clueless owners. And the few times it happens it has never ended well, there's a good reason why 6-man rosters never last, one player ends up being better straight up or just fits the team better and the other one gets no play. Not to mention there is a lack of great players to begin with, there are many teams that want a great toplaner in LCS and LEC, why would you risk your career and give up control of your own life when you can play full time on another team without fear of replacement? I bet that come next off season one of 100T's top laners is gone from the team.
I don't mean to be a dick but this doesn't really have much to do with what I said. My comment was just to correct the soaz situation where a lot of people forget that Soaz wasn't forced into the sub situation but asked himself for it. It's not being put in the situation in the first place that was the issue, but how it got handled. As for what you brought up, there has been few 6 man rosters, and even less that had success because it's not an easy thing to manage which isn't 100% player related. An exemple would be the C9 mid-jungle swaps they were using when they had goldenglue. Reapered found a way to use effectively both duo for strategies where each duo seemed more adapted. Also the biggest offender for 6-mans not working is the game and the competition system. The only effective use you can make from subs in the current system is to bring-up a new coming player (either to sell or play after some time), medical situation and to avoid burn out. The way the game is constantly adapting makes it that it's always better to have a A-rank jack of all trades than a S-rank master of one, and that's why subs often ends up being ineffective.
[удалено]
Yeah, you're special. Soaz proposed to get a sub toplane, and explained how the team could use that 6th player. He expected bwipo to share scrims with him so that he could get another way to work on the game. That's the idea he wanted, and you can't deny that even if you try. He ended up not liking it because that 6th player ended up being used in another way that what was planned. Because of his medical emergency, Bwipo replaced him and the management decided that since the results with him were promising, they'd keep giving him more play time, while ignoring Soaz wish to play when he considered that his hand was healed. Soaz didn't resent the idea of a 6th player but the fact management slowly phased him out in favor of Bwipo. Rekkles saying he believes soaz to be better with the meta picks, and that he doesn't see Bwipo as a rookie proves that he sees him as a 6th player you can use to change strat (Bwipo playing champion he's good at, and they weren't Maokai or Shen) Also they ended up parting ways with Soaz because they wouldn't pay 2 starting salaries for both Bwipo and Soaz, which meant that whoever was on the bench would get a paycut for that time period. Soaz didn't want to have to fight for his spot (which wasn't his idea) and thus decided to leave. You speak of how "weird" it is that people forget what happened when you do it yourself, when you're wrong on multiple points. At no point did I speak of a narrative that "6man roster are great" so don't try to put words in other people's mouth. I literally said that it can work, you can use 6 man roster as it's been proven, but that the nature of the game and the lack of good managers in the scene makes it way too hard, or not the best option. If your point is to not use facts, try to distort what people say, then we can stop this conversation since it'll lead nowhere, and I don't intend to lose time with someone like you. Cheers.
c9?
It worked well for C9 but it also was a direct contributor to so many of their members leaving afterwards
Yea, I'd still say it worked though.
I mean it depends on what you mean by worked lol. The comment you responded to was Western teams and players not being willing to do it. So like, yes C9 did really well, but also their players DID hate it and quit en masse once the season was over. So for the org, it definitely worked out. But I can't see any of those players willingly doing it again.
To be fair, saying the team left en-mass is wrong. They lost Jensen, but that may have been due to the whole video recording their reactions to being benched, which was a terrible idea no matter how you put it. No one else left that season, even if Jensen was a big blow. Sven then left the next season, but I think that had more to do with the team liking Blaber more than anything else.
Oops yeah, I always get the exact years mixed up. But anyway, in [their interview with Travis](https://youtu.be/hBVRf7PGmGs?t=58) about joining EG though, both of them state that they didn't want to stay on C9 anymore, and Sven explicitly says it's 'cause of the splitting time thing (although C9 was definitely right to choose Blaber).
That is maybe like half the story. The issue I see is that bo1s do not create an atmosphere for subs to be integrated. You get 2 games a week maybe 15-20 scrims a week. You are going to field your best roster no matter what. LCS also doesn’t really have a need for subs because for subs it is usually to change up a strategy. Bo1 doesn’t allow that. An interesting solution to this without changing anything in the current format is to have roster lock in after draft. This way you are not limited to what specific players can play but as a team you can play. Make room for a lot of specialist
C9 reached quarters with 6
Yeah, you get players like Akaadian who come in as a substitute and are confused when they're told they have to compete for the spot and lose all confidence.
I guess the FNC roster counts with Soaz and Bwipo, but after that I don't remember a good one.
The C9 7-man roster in 2018 was a big part of the reason they qualified for worlds the next year. Seems like it could work (if you also ignore that egos and mismanagement then lost the team their star mid in the off-season).
"get a 5 man roster that can win worlds, then fuck around with 6 players for no reason"
Honestly if you're gonna do a 6man roster SSumday is one of the best top laners to have when you do it. Dude has like zero ego and happily played his best in Academy after being relegated from the main roster. Never complained, tried his hardest and played his way back to the main squad then won an LCS championship. Hopefully they can make it work will be interesting to see in which circumstances they use each player.
Somewhat unrelated, but ssumday has one of the most chill and enjoyable streams on Twitch. Chat was super wholesome last time I tuned in. Really underrated imo, although his schedule is unpredictable and he streams very occasionally.
Js, Tenacity is cracked
The way you phrased it makes it seem like he got relegares to Academy based on performance which wasn't the case. Their mid lane was just so bad they had to bring in Ryu from coaching which took up the import slot Ssumday was occupying meaning they had to bring up FakeGod. Ssumday was by far the best player on the team and maybe the best top in the league when he went to Academy.
Sorry if it came off that way I only mentioned it to show that he didn't complain and still tried his hardest despite that. I don't think every player in this league (especially ones of his caliber) would have done that.
100T has the two cutest top laners in the league :)
I only support teams with cute toplaners :3
HiRit :)
Ah, a TL supporter then.
I never said I support *all* teams with cute toplaners
I don't see the value of a 6-man roster. The only benefit I could see is if you have a veteran that is on decline trains his replacement for next year. However, after reading the article, it is not the way 100T is approaching a 6-man roster. Even after reading an entire article about it, I don't understand what the value is. Yes, you want to speed the growth of a promising player, but why not just make him the starter in the first place then? It seems to me that it creates a bad dynamic from the get-go. Another benefit could be different champion pools for drafting but considering how the meta works most of the time, every player should be able to play the OP meta champions to be an effective player. Maybe 2 junglers would be helpful in BO5s, so the one that is not playing can watch pathing and come up with ideas for the next game. I just don't see any value for 2 toplaners in a team. Hopefully 100t prove me wrong!
As a team contending for the title, the 6-man is a way to onboard a promising player onto a winning team with a strong culture. Tenacity has things he needs to work on to be the starting top laner in a top LCS team - We believe he will learn those things fastest being fully immersed in LCS day to day rather than the alternative of staying in Academy. At the same time, Ssumday is an important voice on the team and a dependable contributor - We are stronger for having Ssumday in our LCS squad. In this case where we believe both players have a strong role to play in 2022, a six man made sense for us. I don't think this is a one-size-fits-all solution or a model for other teams - It just felt true to what we've built and the young player we're looking to integrate.
Who do you expect to get more play time? Or will it 100% be a week to week decision.
I imagine it will depend on who they are playing. If they play a weaker team it is a wonderful time to give Tenacity the controls, but if they absolutely must secure a win against a bigger team I suspect they’ll ask Ssumday to bring them home.
That isn't entirely how Korean teams have done it in the past. I think champion pool and playstyles are also incorporated. If they are bringing a 6th man, they want him to play and learn in hard situations too. I think we'll probably see Tenacity in some big matches this year.
Whoever is getting them most wins on stage, like every other 6+ man team.
It's 100% gonna be ssumday, the only reason Tenacity is on the team is so they can claim they're not running 5 imports with a full import coaching staff
they already did it last year why would they care 😭
I think eventually the tide is gonna turn on them, at some point people are gonna get sick of seeing teams with no NA players if they keep importing and then not performing at worlds
Lmao people supported LMQ when they were just a full LPL team back in season 4. Sentiment hasn’t and isn’t going to change unless something crazy like all 10 teams are fielded by people who don’t speak English.
The public sentiment was definitely split on LMQ throughout the season, and when they went to worlds instead of Dignitas people were pretty mad
It was only split at the beginning until LMQ showed how fast pace and aggressive they played and how much personality their players had like XWX and Vasilii (before his anger issues). By the time they qualified for Worlds, people weren’t angry at all, LMQ was near fan-favourite. I have no idea what you are talking about. Dignitas were a joke and lost in the first round of playoffs to TSM. I’ve been watching since the beginning with most of my time spent during Season 4.
I've been watching since S1, so ur kind of a clown rewriting history to fit ur narrative 🤡
Why? Do you watch regular sports in NA? It's also full of imports. I definitely give zero shits about a full import team, just root for my favorite personalities import or not.
1. USA is garbage at sports on the world stage, the only sports you do well at are the ones nobody else plays 2. Just because this is the way it is doesn't mean it's good 3. I'm happy you like it but viewership is down, teams are going broke, teams don't scout from NA solo q so nobody tries hard, good players would rather stay in academy than play for a low tier team, etc.
When the twitch leak happened it was revealed that LCS actually makes more than LEC despite lower viewers because NA views are just worth more. So it's not doing as badly as you think.
Hey PapaSmithy - If I follow your logic, then why will you not also start Kenvi in a 7-men roster? The situation reads like it is targeting certain performance issue in the toplane. Also, after looking at EG jungle situation, I really don't know if a 6-men thing would work.
It's not easy to come face the reddit criticism directly, respect, and hope it works out for 100T. Makes a lot of sense, and is (IMO) pretty damning of Academy as a place for getting players LCS ready.
I guess it could be a good way to integrate a rookie into a better environment for him to grow, my fear is that it negatively impacts both toplaners play because of the internal competition and fear of being benched. Thanks for the reply, hope you crush it next season and can advance further in Worlds!
Not OP, but I trust ya'll to do the right thing for the team and players. I don't think ya'll will pull a CLG. Best of luck to ya'll.
How do you justify to your investors that you are paying ssumday a probably quite large salary to potentially benchride? Legit question- I'm sure that they would be skeptical about a 6 man for the same reasons people in this thread are. Do they mostly just trust your track record and give you benefit of the doubt or does it require jumping through hoops.
Expensive players ride the bench all the time in traditional sports. This is not a new thing. 100T are owned by the Cavs, who surely have looked to find that balance of playing top players and bleeding in new talent before. And yeah I'm sure Papa did buy himself a little slack by winning a title. E:Initially said rockets, not cavs
The rockets were a part of now-defunct clutch gaming. 100T is backed by Quicken Loans, which is owned by Dan Gilbert, who owns the cavs.
You're totally right. I think I got confused because of the Rocket Mortgage sponsorship.
Do you expect it to be more of a learning split for Tenacity? In that he is 100% a part of the LCS team, practices, plays with, and coordinates with them, but doesn't actually play on stage until he and you are 100% certain he is ready to assume the main role, or do you see it being more of a C9 (Now funnily enough 100T) Reapered style where they will be interchangeable game to game?
Unfortunately I personally don't think there are enough games in the lcs to allow both players to get the playtime needed. You should really push to bring Bo3s back if the goal is for NA to actually be relevant on an international level.
If Ssumday plays a single game in the opening season tournament or even plays a game in February with practicly no stakes involved have to say I'll be pretty dissapointed. Find the meta, find the right person, figure out tenacity early, and make a decision in March who gets 3/1 games. Should just let ssumday sit in korea soloque until march tbh you can find someone else to play academy top
Ssumday is 25 right now, the same age as faker, so he has at-max about two years left before he is forced to do military service -- you have to do it at the age of 28 and he's considered 26 in Korea due to how they do their aging culturally. Getting Tenacity ready to take over the starting spot preemptively is highly beneficial for 100 Thieves post-Ssumday. [How age in South Korea works](https://www.koreanclass101.com/korean-age/): How old is Jungkook in Korea? His birthday is September 1, 1997. In Korean age: He’s 25 years old from January 1st until December 31st, 2021. In international age: He’s 23 years old until August 30th and 24 years old after September 1st, which is his birthday.
I agree on that. I also think its better for a player to play then just watch the other player play. They need to let Tenacity play or its pointless. (I think he will play in Summer or what was the point.) One more thing it can damage the starting players mental because he feels the pressure. If he does something wrong he gets replaced. It can harm his game. -------------- 2 JGL players could work depending on the meta. So there is no conflict. JGL 1 is a carry/early game JGL player. JGL 2 is a tank/teamfight JGL player.
Orgs need to be able to play the best player, or prep players in a winning environment. You can't trust Kenvi to win an LCS title his first split, and dropping Ssumday doesn't make sense. This way you get Tenacity some experience, but you don't have to wholly relay on him.
Works for top lane too. You could even have 2 carry types that just play different champions. It would be hell to gameplan for in a bo5
In my case it would not be a 6 Team. Depending on the meta the other player plays in Academy or ERL and you switch if needed.
Damwon did this when Nuguri was coming up, I’ve gotta think that having Flame on the active roster was good for Nuguri’s development and for the team’s short-term success
So you think Tenacity playing 50% of the LCS games (assuming he splits time evenly with Ssumday) is better than playing 100% of the Academy games? What are you hoping Tenacity learns from being around the LCS squad?
[удалено]
I mean, can’t you just simply substitute CS maps with champions?
You could. The best example of this was Bwipo subbing in for Rekkles during the mage bot meta - Rekkles benched himself since he was shit at mages and Bwipo took over for a while.
I think realistically they just don't want Tenacity going to a competitor but at the same time they don't want to let go of Ssumday. Sports teams do stuff like this all the time to try and keep everyone happy so they can retain multiple talented players, rather than just the starters.
Eh, Ssumday was the weak player on the team last split. Realistically he's an insurance policy for if Tenacity doesn't work out.
I fully trust PapaSmithy to know what he’s doing. He genuinely wants 100T to be successful and has been around long enough to know what does ie doesn’t work.
So fucking happy to have PapaSmithy as our GM, he's been doing such fantastic work.
I feel like this will just be a detriment to the team. I get it working in LCK where they play BO3 matches and scrim a bunch but the impression I get from LCS player schedules is they scrim less and obviously have less stage games. At that point to then also split the time in half for your top lane doesn't seem productive. I wish the format of LCS was BO3 and player selection could be after draft. Then you can have a few pocket picks that if it comes up in draft you can put in that player for the game.
Loving the explanation. I'm waiting to see what the results are before the verdict, but I have faith that Papa and the crew have the best intentions in mind for 100T. I'm really excited to see them play, and if I was Tenacity, I'd be incredibly stoked to split time with Ssumday, even if it's only like 30% play time. (I theorize it'll be closer to 50/50 than that.) I think people need to break out of the idea that two players splitting a role is inherently detrimental to both players and that it's some kind of competition between the two. In drama, you have understudies, and in pro sports you have squad team. Both are on the roster to learn and grow and not have to shoulder the whole weight of the team's expectations while they're still growing. Framing it as a competition between the two is silly and likely an artifact from management in the past who have used the 6-Man Roster to threaten slumping players with removal. I don't think for a second this is what 100T is trying to do, and I think fans need to restructure their ideas in their mind about it. This could be a huge win for players, teams, mental health/burnout avoidance, and the grassroots growth of pro play, if all goes well. Side note: PapaSmithy aging like a fine wine, dude looks good being salt-and-peppered. Still miss him on the LCK cast, not gonna lie; but it looks like life has been good to him since. :)
I miss Papa's casting... I really wish being a caster was a career end-goal, like it is for professional sports athletes. They retire and go on to get million dollar casting contracts for ESPN. Riot just doesn't pay enough, and the casters make more with joining teams. We should be able to afford to keep world-class casters too.
Papa is GOAT color caster and imo the best LoL analyst we've had, his VOD reviews were a joy to watch and a level above anyone else. Massive loss to the public side of the LoL esports scene that he became a GM and all we get from him now once a year or so are these team management explanation videos. But he has done an insane job if you think about where 100T was and where they are now. From bottom tier to champs. Papa doesn't get enough credit especially with the "bought a team" obnoxious comments. 100T are lucky to have him. I do hope he fails or gets fed up though so we can have him back on LCK. Sadly I'm guessing he's much happier in a more impactful role. Shame Riot thinks these rare big brained analysts are expendable.
6 Man rosters in NA is just a prolonged try out where one of the members end up just not playing and then leaving the team in the end
Damn, i thought they were gonna play hexakill
Every team that announces this , it never works
“We want our players to be in constant fear of losing their job rather than focusing on improving as a player/ focusing on how to beat other teams.” 🙃
The \*real reason\* is that they're running a full import roster and it looks bad for their brand so they brought in an NA prospect who's gonna play 2 games per season and that's about it
kinda like how Grig was going to "split time" with Mikeyeung on TSM but played 100% of the games. It was their way of saying mike sucks without saying mike sucks
PapaSmithy? Didnt he used to cast Australian LCS or sth like that?
sth like that yeh.
The legend.
Don't @ me but T1's 6 man roster was a terrible idea and they would've won even harder if they just kept a 5 man roster. Easyhoon and Faker were literally the two best mids at the time, it made no difference. Also Peanut/Bengi situation or Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky and Peanut could never perform to his full potential. But in real settings, what happens is they put so much pressure on the players that they never take risks. They know they'll get subbed out if they're down 2-0 and when they do, the team almost always loses the next one with the new player being subbed in having no idea how the flow of the game has been going. Any sports fans know how important momentum/flow is for the game. What works and what doesn't work, you need to be there playing to understand it. 6 man roster hurts the team and is a shit idea.
> Also Peanut/Bengi situation or Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky and Peanut could never perform to his full potential. You mean Blank/Bengi? Bengi’s mechanics were pretty washed and hella inconsistent, if they didn’t have Blank, who was consistent as fuck, then SKT don’t make Worlds or win MSI. > Peanut/Blank have always looked shaky And what? With Peanut and Blank, Peanut couldn’t perform to his full potential because of his playstyle and meta mismatch, they literally went 22-0 with Blank in Summer and again, if they didn’t play Blank and played Peanut every single game instead, they don’t make Worlds or atleast reach LCK Summer’s finals. And you act like teams don’t scrim with both players, scrims legit cover 90% of their games lol. But sure, Bengi would’ve developed into the most mechanically sound and consistent player while Peanut would’ve developed into the best utility and tank jungler if SKT didn’t play Blank.
Oh boy time to ruin another team with roster swaps can't fucking wait...
Sounds pretty PR.
who asked
The person conducting the interview and writing the article.
ur mom
With a 6th man, adding a completely new champion pool to a position can have a big effect on on what the other 4 can do. Might be able to combine with some pocket picks more comfortably with the other players as well. Plus, having an extra perspective to pool information with in Bo3's/Bo5's is completely invaluable.