LtSpaceDucK

Well the same can be said for teams in the past that played similar to what G2 displayed versus SKT, Samsung Blue used to be masters of picking late game scaling comps and being able to minimize their losses until they were able to scale and win the game.

I might be wrong but I don't remember existing similar narratives for SSB despite them being behind in gold/turrets and pressure a lot until Dade and Deft were able to reach teamfights.

Even if the narratives make sense we all know if the roles were reversed (G2 losing and SKT winning) and the games happened exactly the same they did there wouldn't be this discussion at all and that annoys me.

If the exact opposite thing happened, I would be saying the same thing about G2. My issue with the current narrative is that fans seem to think that G2 played perfectly and it was all part of their plan.

In game 1, Caps was caught over extending in a sidelane while his team was nowhere near to support him. That cost his team a baron.

In game 2, the first 6 kills were G2 making a number of mistakes and handing this gold over to SKT.

In game 3, Wunder is the one to overextend bot lane and Caps TPs in to try and save him, giving up baron.

In game 4, when G2 are in a position to threaten and set up around Baron, Caps forces an engage onto mata, baiting his whole team into an awful fight which they then lose.

It's like everyone is just ignoring their mistakes, which were big ones and could have cost them games, because they won, which annoys me.

Now this doesn't just excuse SKT. They also did dumb stuff. Their ability to use baron was awful, they played so many teamfights really poo...

MoxZenyte

With the drafts they had, we have 4 close games, but if the teams swapped the drafts, then SKT would have smashed G2? That doesn't point to G2 being the better team, if I'm honest.

Also your point about G2 making the same early game mistakes with SKT's draft can also be flipped to a what-if about SKT making the same late game mistakes with G2's draft, at the end of the day it's a bunch of what if's. There's also a very low chance that G2 do make the same mistakes, there is a 0% chance Wunder gets solokilled under tower in the Renekton vs Camille matchup as Renekton

For the record, I think the games play out MUCH differently if G2 have SKT's drafts. For example, I think Faker playing a cleanseless Syndra into Qiyana and Elise would have punished MUCH harder than what SKT did in that game.

I think you're undervaluing the impact that SKT's drafts had on the early game. You mention how in game two SKT "only" had two points of pressure in Lee Sin + Leblanc, while ignoring the Renekton which was a huge priority pick, and then say that the Yasuo/Gragas bot somehow came out ahead even though Perkz/Miky were hard smashing that lane, and Teddy/Effort were bailed out by the rest of the team until Teddy could farm to relevancy

But this is the point right, what G2 showed this series was a weak early game, not the early game they showed against Damwon, which is why I make this statement. If they play a weak early game with SKT's comps that needed to get advantages early because they were outscaled, then they would lose. The thing that's different from my perspective and Reddit's apparent perspective was that SKT always had overwhelming early game drafts. From what I remember, G2 were often the team with 2 pushing lanes, actually giving them advantages early. In game 1, they actually mess up their laning in the bot 2v2 which costs them the early pressure they should have in that 2v2. And so we loop back, I don't think SKT had strong early game comps, I think they had comps that needed to get ahead early because they were going to get outscaled. Therefore, assuming G2 don't have a good early game and are in that situation, it's only logical to conclude they wouldn't be able to win right?

The problem with me ma...

Dzordzio

They made different mistakes at different points in the series, but I believe that if the comps were swapped and G2 made the same early game mistakes that they did, it would have been harder for them to make the comebacks that they did.

Khan said something simmilar at MSI and people memed him hard. This whole point is so ridiculus i can't even argue with that. Thats the point of this game. Pick sacaling comp -> wait for late, pick early -> win early and snowball. If g2 watned snowball early they would've pick more early game champs but they didn't. That's all, end of story. That's "what if" question about draft are so stupid.

I go a bit more indepth in another reply, but the basic idea is that I don't agree that SKT always drafted for early. My perspective was that G2 would often have 2 out of 3 pushing lanes, actually giving them more early pressure than SKT, but they miss-executed and had to rely on their scaling to turn the game around. If G2 had SKTs comp, and were in a position where they were going to get outscaled so they had to be more proactive in the early game, then they played like they did in a lot of these games, they would've lost in my opinion. Does that make sense?

HoloMonarch

I believe that if the comps were swapped and G2 made the same early game mistakes that they did, it would have been harder for them to make the comebacks that they did.

But this is stupid, 3 out of 4 SKT games they picked Rene the first peak, at the moment the strongest lane bully in the game, if we swap the comps, then Wunder will not die one on one under the tower, because now he is a RENE, now he will destroy Khan in lane, G2 cannot make the same mistake by default, because with comp,with all these changes the tactics for the match also change.

My question is more interesting, if G2 would be in the place of SKT, would they be able to finish the game with all these barons and advantage in gold that SKT had? Because my answer is yes, they could

I've answered this question in two other replies so I would encourage you to go read those replies to provide more context around why I said this.

With regards to your other question, yes, I believe G2 would have won if they were in the late game positions that SKT were in because I think SKT used baron poorly and struggled to play well around weak side of the map.

JENSENJENSENYENSEN

it's just confusing when there's many interpretations of 'better' floating around, and yeah, it's hard to be specific and clarify them all. SKT played better but wasn't the better team.

show a team can play better and still lose

here, better means in control for a longer duration of time, which is reasonable and i agree SKT was better.

I also called G2 the better team

here, you must be referring to the important clutch plays later in the game. or maybe the good drafts, but it's kind of weird to call g2 a great team because their coach has a good notebook. with all due respect to grabbz, i think most people care way more about the 5 man team than the coach.

You're 100% right, it is confusing and that's why I'm annoyed the clickbait title was taken in the first place. I said it trying to summarise my thoughts after VOD reviewing for hours. The lesson I've learnt is to go away and think more about what conclusions I want to draw, because with more time to think about it I probably wouldn't over simplify it as much.

G2 is a great team because they're flexible, they're smart, their players are great and their mental fortitude is incredibly strong. Their early game and a couple of their decisions in the mid to late game were questionable but when it mattered most they played extremely well. They have the ability to win the whole thing.

Merkiv

What's your take on how SKT utilized baron? Loco has been saying this for a while, and they also discussed it in detail on yesterday's SI (I'm sure you've seen clips at the very least). Taking baron is one part, but using it is another one. If someone from G2 dies on one side of the map which gives SKT control of the baron, and then G2 decides to pressure the other side of the map instead of going for teamfight that they are likely to lose, in result taking a turret or 2, putting pressure on that side of the map, which causes SKT to split when they actually have baron. And then G2 capitalizes on it again, forcing a skirmish or teamfight and killing a couple members with a buff, which completely halts SKT's push and allows G2 to once again pressure the map somewhere, isn't that entire passage of play in favour of G2, meaning that they played those few minutes better (especially since they constantly were able to take more on the map without baron, than SKT with it)?

To me SKT often played the way NA team would play - get a pick or 2 when roaming as 5, convert that into objective (still grouped as 5) but after that get pulled in all directions around the map, simply because enemy team understands the map better and knows where to pressure it.

You said how SKT would get 4 Jatt Bucks, and G2 would take 2 Jatt Bucks somewhere else on the map, but to me it looked like G2 would take 2 Jatt Bucks and then mug an SKT member of another Jatt Buck he was holding onto, sometimes 2. Just curious what's your take on that is.

I think SKT were overall pretty bad at using Baron. Even before the tournament, I didn't think they were very good at pushing or snowballing a lead, but I attributed that more to them not setting up proper deep vision.

Anyway, the two best examples are from game 1, where they actually secure the baron off of Caps overextending bot but then prioritize a Cloud drake over using the fact they have 3 waves pushing towards G2s base. There was a huge window here where they could've really created a lot of pressure, but didn't. The second example was in game 3, when they tried to force a tower dive mid, at least that's what it looked like to me anyway, and their whole set up and theory behind even trying to dive this turret actually made no sense. So yeah, I don't think their baron usage was good.

shurimalonelybird

SKT was never even close to having a 8k gold advantage over G2, I don't know why even compare this series to the TSM vs TL series. and didn't both teams expand around 80% in close gold proximity according to the stats team? how does that make SKT have control over the series to be in a position to throw? SKT did not play better.

edit. Vedius saying SKT would smash G2 if they had better draft. I can't

The point of that comparison was to show a team can play better and still lose. The other important thing to note is how I defined what playing better league was, which is fine to debate. Kobe made a great argument which is the gravity of decisions at different points weigh more, and the problem with my initial statement was that it was an over simplification of what I actually meant.

Whether you want to agree with me or not is up to you, but G2 made a lot of mistakes alongside SKT making a bunch of mistakes. They made different mistakes at different points in the series, but I believe that if the comps were swapped and G2 made the same early game mistakes that they did, it would have been harder for them to make the comebacks that they did.

I also called G2 the better team. I also gave them a lot of credit for all the amazing things they did. I also said Miky should've been the MVP because he was the best player in the whole series. I'd like to think that one perspective on what "p...

FordFred

I’m imagining you opening reddit, seeing this title and going „WOAH WOAH WOAH“ as you hastily type the comment

Accurate

I'm gonna try jump in before this balloons. This was a 30 second clip from a 6 and a half hour stream VOD reviewing the 4 games. There's a huge amount of context that isn't here and I'm summarising for the sake of brevity.

When I say "played better" I mean as a team they made better decisions more often than G2 did. In many ways, their drafts made it harder for them to win but not impossible. But if we take game 2 as an example, the first 6 kills that SKT got were actually just G2 making terrible decisions or they were getting punished by SKT. In game 4, Caps just ran into 4 members of SKT to try and kill mata, which baited his whole team into a horrendous teamfight. They made greedy plays, they forced plays that didn't make sense WHILE ALSO doing incredible things. That's why I say overall. Some of the decisions these players made to compensate for some of the mistakes of their teammates was incredible. This team constantly thinks outside the box and constantly finds new ways to so...

SKT_Peanut_Fan

He was in a really win-win situation here if you think about it:

1. He made a super obvious claim- *SKT has holes that can be exploited by good teams.* Guess what, Vedius? Every single team has holes that can be exploited by the right team. Would FPX or iG have exploited holes the same way that G2 did with SKT? I don't know. It was clear that SPY couldn't. But anyway, he made a claim that, as you said, could only be proven wrong *if SKT win worlds*. So, while SKT were definitely favorites, only one team can actually win Worlds and there are a lot of strong teams that could have potentially knocked out SKT.
2. He doesn't actually tell us what the holes on SKT are. He can't be wrong about how teams will exploit SKT if he never actually says what the holes are. *taps head*

If SKT lost, which they did, he was going to look really smart to the average person because a team that loses generally has their issues and mistakes preyed upon by a better team. But again, he never put his neck out there to say *which* issues they were to prove that he could actually analyze SKT and how they matched up at Worlds.

Also, friendly reminder that he predicted SKT would finish third in groups.

Hi there, wanted to challenge a couple things you mentioned.

1. It was a hilariously vague tweet that many people interpreted in a variety of different ways. The tweet was also made well before worlds. The original context behind it was i had a number of fans telling me SKT was the best team in the world, and I wasn't bought in. I never expected the tweet to balloon the way it did.
2. I made a 50 minute video talking about teams in the LCK. You can check it out here, where I provide examples and my whole thought process that gives context behind everything I believed.

SKT didn't even lose in the way that I expected, they had a cleaner early game than G2 and lost to teamfights, which was the exact opposite of what I expected. So this is what i could be called out on tbh.

I made it very clear that my pick ems were based on bias, not actual analysis. My power rankings before the tournament had SKT at 3, behind G2 (1) and FPX (2). I also expected Faker to be the best performing player at t...

frosthowler

Vedius is absolutely second best, but even Vedius said Ender is amazing, and one of the reasons he was brought to the LEC broadcast is because he's just so smart about the game.

It's true, he's actually a living genius. I love the guy.

Hope you're all ready to get hydrated tomorrow

onords

Medi Vedi skydive entrence u/Ovedius

Faker knows

bvbfan102

Im really happy for G2 and looking forward too the Rematch with SKT but we really need to take a Minute and talk about the great Cast that Vedius just had. He genuinely knows his Stuff and put so much Prep in too make the Cast the best it can be. He always knew what the Teams should and will do next, took the right Talking Points and knew how these crazy P&B will play out. Thanks for making the Cast this great /u/Ovedius

Thank you so much! This means a lot to me. I'm glad you enjoyed it!

bvbfan102

Im really happy for G2 and looking forward too the Rematch with SKT but we really need to take a Minute and talk about the great Cast that Vedius just had. He genuinely knows his Stuff and put so much Prep in too make the Cast the best it can be. He always knew what the Teams should and will do next, took the right Talking Points and knew how these crazy P&B will play out. Thanks for making the Cast this great /u/Ovedius

Thank you so much! I really appreciate it. I did so much prep for this series and I'm glad I was able to get a lot of it out there.

My biggest gripe was I had this point for when Damwon were on blue side. Nuguri always sits in the same bush at lvl 1 next to top lane and I theorized G2 had a level 1 plan to exploit it, but they never went blue so I never got to find out :(

Kestrel21

Can't wait for next year where casters will mention how Nemesis solo killed Faker every time they can. :P

This is a great idea. I will remember this ty

MonsterHunterJustin

I disagree. I don't think Vedius is very good at his job at all. Much rather watch Papa.

I agree.

Reconco15

At least your stereotype exists, the Spanish costume isn't even remotely similar to anything traditional here (but I understand it's hard to find something like that in Berlin).

It's the outfit of a flamenco dancer, hence the castañuelas

isleofavaloneuw

Holy shit ! Of course if you have œil, jetons or apparaître They are so hard to pronounce for non French speakers

I tried :(

ZennyOne

Hello,

I'm so ready for Worlds! Did you know Paris is a city and not a country?! So you can say our European class is going great, my European is getting so fluent! Vedius is the best EU teacher, now we know SO many things about Europe. Worlds is gonna be lit af. So hype for the finals.

-- Rioter of Comic Sans

It's true. I know many European things. Like what a croissant is. And what side of the road to drive on. And Welsh. :)