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Article looks good, but I wanted to comment on your first segment: "Summer of Fire."
The start probably needs to be re-written, as the sequence of events is out of order. GSG started out in Champions Winter, they didn't win NLB to enter champions. It's important to note that GSG went 2-10 during Champions winter, and they were competing against the now critically-acclaimed CJ squad that almost upset a top-seed in bracket stage. They cheesed out of necessity and managed to get the win over CJ leading GSG to get a guaranteed spot in Champions Spring.
On the other hand, MVP Blue was not a good team. They also went 2-10 in Champions and lost in the Seed Challenge (which if I recall would have given them a spot in Champions Spring) before losing in NLB which was their last chance to secure a spot for Champions Spring. Their two best players (NoFe and Hermes) jet for greener pastures which left MVP without a team. They released their entire roster and picked up GSG largely due to the fact that GSG needed a sponsor and had a free spot in Champions.
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As a side note I often wonder how different the following seasons of Champions would have been if MVP Blue had simply beat KT Arrows, their opponent on the last week that everyone expected them to 2-0. That outcome would have put the season points difference between SKT (Group A 1 seed) and MVP (Group A 4th seed) at 3 points! Blue could have beat that Frost team any day of the week... Would Easyhoon have stayed with Blue if they had finished top 4? Would Frost and Sword have made sweeping roster changes at that point? Some fun story lines around that season of Champions.
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United States23455 Posts
On January 09 2015 16:43 Endless Tyler wrote: Article looks good, but I wanted to comment on your first segment: "Summer of Fire."
The start probably needs to be re-written, as the sequence of events is out of order. GSG started out in Champions Winter, they didn't win NLB to enter champions. It's important to note that GSG went 2-10 during Champions winter, and they were competing against the now critically-acclaimed CJ squad that almost upset a top-seed in bracket stage. They cheesed out of necessity and managed to get the win over CJ leading GSG to get a guaranteed spot in Champions Spring.
On the other hand, MVP Blue was not a good team. They also went 2-10 in Champions and lost in the Seed Challenge (which if I recall would have given them a spot in Champions Spring) before losing in NLB which was their last chance to secure a spot for Champions Spring. Their two best players (NoFe and Hermes) jet for greener pastures which left MVP without a team. They released their entire roster and picked up GSG largely due to the fact that GSG needed a sponsor and had a free spot in Champions.
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As a side note I often wonder how different the following seasons of Champions would have been if MVP Blue had simply beat KT Arrows, their opponent on the last week that everyone expected them to 2-0. That outcome would have put the season points difference between SKT (Group A 1 seed) and MVP (Group A 4th seed) at 3 points! Blue could have beat that Frost team any day of the week... Would Easyhoon have stayed with Blue if they had finished top 4? Would Frost and Sword have made sweeping roster changes at that point? Some fun story lines around that season of Champions.
Thanks, man! Rewrote it. Yeah, I remember but got my facts messed up. I really appreciate your Korean history and understanding. Would love to discuss past Korean events with you sometime. I totally put GSG winning NLB as the season before when it was after they got stomped. Seeing as NLB Winter was in Feb of 2013, I believe. Right after Winter and before Spring season.
Also I really loved the old MVP Blue team. I thought Flahm was going to become one of the star supports in Korea. I liked Deft, but thought Flahm was what Gorilla is today -- a Thresh master who is getting stronger on other pocket picks. Too bad he didn't live up to my own silly expectations.
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This was quality content, its a good insight into the characteristics of Korean stars. Good article!
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United States23455 Posts
I'd love to do a Faker character piece, but I feel like people already know his story.
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Great work Fionn. Great story as well, and as someone who only recently started watching OGN (OGN summer final was the first match I watched live), I really appreciate you helping familiarize people like me with the storylines involved in Korean League of Legends.
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Great article ! Looking forward to seeing how alternating between Easyhoon and Faker will work for SKT this season.
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Great read, I wonder if Easyhoon's presence on the SKT team is to/will motivate Faker to stay on top of his game.
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On January 09 2015 17:45 Fionn wrote: I'd love to do a Faker character piece, but I feel like people already know his story.
I will love to read it.. even if most people know the story. It will be refreshing to see and remember how far Faker has come.
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Wow, excellent article Fionn. Thanks for taking the time to write this up, it's great quality and it was a pleasure to read.
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On January 09 2015 14:16 Fionn wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2015 14:14 Zess wrote: Who's ambition? I've never heard of that guy. He is the star jungler of CJ Entus. Thank you for anyone who reads this piece. We want to bring more character/story building articles to the League of Legends community. I hope you enjoy it! Thanks for writing it! I did enjoy reading the article. Helps me to keep in the loop.
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Cool article, enjoyed the read!
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while i can't say i'm a fan of his style of play, i think it's fair to say that easyhoon is one of the most underrated players in the scene. while he's not a particularly flashy play maker, he's always been consistent. he could be a starter on almost any other team in the world.
i enjoyed the article. i look forward to reading more like it in the future.
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I think they will let Easyhoon play some games in the reagular season, but I don't think they trust him enough to let him play in playoffs. I mean, if SKT lose a game with Easyhoon everyone is going to blame the coaches, even if he is not the reason why they lose. Faker is the star of the team and the best player in the world, it's kinda crazy to bench him.
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Pre-Impact leaving SKT, I always thought it would have been interesting to have different members specialize heavily in certain champions/compositions. Would be really hard for anyone to prep again SKT when you know your going up against a team that could swap Marin/Impact and Faker/Easy at any time and dramatically change the team.
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I really enjoyed the article. Still puzzled about Easyhoon staying on SKT though!
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The idea of teams having subs that differ in style from their main roster has always been intriguing to me. With how often the meta falls in and out for certain players, I always believed it would be extremely valuable for teams to have extra options in the event of a long lasting meta that doesn't fit their current playstyle. Similar to how baseball uses relief pitchers for different scenarios as the games go later, these subs would be invaluable to teams as they would help patch a weakness.
Last year was a good example of the shifts, as there were three prominent metas that existed in the mid lane. It started with a free for all, where anything was basically viable, then shifted to the farm heavy style of Ori/Ziggs/Xerath/Yasuo, then once again shifted late in the year back towards assassins. As someone who admittedly only watched LCS, it was clear to see Bjergsen and Hai's level of play drop when the meta shifted away from their comfort assassin picks to farm heavy style mids. I think that TSM and C9 would be very hesitant to go away from these players, but I could 100% see other teams doing something similar.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
easyhoon is very very good. he's best at zone control and defensive plays, but he's not incapable of playing assassins. it's just that in stage matches he is very conservative and doesn't have the aggressive sense required to play assassins.
his laning is okay, not that strong, but he's very good at smelling out ganks so he doesn't tend to die at all in lane.
as a scrimmage partner vs faker i don't think easyhoon is a good choice though. faker's problem is he's too greedy/arrogant sometimes and you need another aggressive, high mechanical guy there to punish his carelessness and force him to play smarter and study tendencies. faker is as good as anyone mechanically but with the decline of bengi he actually should be playing conservative vs some of the better mid-jungle pairs, but he is still all out kill pressuring and whatnot.
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honestly easyhoon is very solid. just think of their performances last year vs. k before k (arguably) slumped. and after faker messed up in the first game vs najin on wed. he easyhoon played a very good xer... it's a bit like fabregas at barca- when you have xavi and iniesta on your team it's hard to ger recgnition as a midfielder. now that he's with chelsea he carries hard and works well with hazard...
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Man, Fionn was on point with this. Good job, dude.
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