Mythical gf favors European League of Legends team Fnatic. By proxy, I’ve become somewhat attuned to their standings, and it doesn’t hurt their favor with me when they field Korean players. Anyway, for the growing demographic of people who follow the competitive League scene, this is the time of the year in which the respective regions begin wrapping things up, and preparing for Worlds.
Regions in North America, Taiwan and to some degree China, have no parity whatsoever, so it’s basically the teams that were expected to make Worlds, pretty much locking things up, and jockeying for seeding, while everyone else is just playing for, well, paychecks. Korea to no surprise, is a nuclear warzone in itself, as there are no real surprises with the teams that will be making Worlds, but like the others, are duking it out for seeding, with the reigning champs, the two-time winning SK Telecom already getting upset and failing to secure the Korean #1 seed (but still going to Worlds).
If there’s any region that has any parity, and no real predictability, it would have to be Europe. Up until this year, it was pretty much a surefire bet that Fnatic would make Worlds, as they’ve made it to Worlds almost every single year of competitive play. However, due to the never-finalized, perpetually work-in-progress, always young-and-changing rules and format of the competitive scene, this is a year in which Fnatic is by no means a lock to even make it into Worlds.
In fact, if not for a questionable policy in the format, Fnatic should mathematically be eliminated from Worlds qualification. But because Rito prints so much money, they don’t seem to care that they could milk more games, which would mean more broadcasts, more ads to spam, and more money to make, but as stated, they make so much money that they would rather have a kind of lame policy, instead of creating some sport drama narrative that other, physical sport leagues would salivate at the idea of.
This is the kind of stuff that will always separate eSports from athletic sports.
So League seasons operate in “splits.” The Spring Split and the Summer Split. After every split, the worst teams in every league play against the strongest teams in each respective region’s essential minor league, AKA Challenger. Sometimes the incumbents survive and live another day in the big leagues, and sometimes some super teams are formed in Challenger and crush the incumbents and earn their passage into the big leagues and ultimately an opportunity to compete for entry into Worlds.
The way the splits work is that they’re basically two separate seasons. There are rewards for winning the Spring split, the teams reorganize based on Challenger challenges, and then the records are wiped clean and it’s done again for Summer. Worlds qualification is primarily done based on points; in the Spring all rewards are solely points, but in the Summer split, the winner of each region is guaranteed their #1 seed for Worlds. This is done presumably based solely on proximity to Worlds, and that the stronger Summer teams are the strongest teams going into the tournament, and to give the off-chance that a Challenger team has risen an opportunity to get in.
The #2 seed is earned based on cumulative point accrual, while the #3 seed is earned by a tournament between the middle-of-the-pack teams.
The auto-in for Summer versus Spring kind of invalidates the whole system IMO in the first place, but Rito is convinced that this is fair.
So because this is getting long-winded, let’s just go to explanation by example. Spring rewards are 90 points for 1st, 70 for 2nd, 50 for 3rd and a rapidly declining scale to tenth. Basically, if you’re not top-3, banking on getting into Worlds on points is a pipedream. Summer rewards are #1 seed for 1st, 90 for 2nd, 70 for 3rd, etc, etc.
G2 Gaming won the Spring split, and earned 90 points. G2 also placed first through the Summer, and in the playoffs can place no lower than 3rd place. They are a lock for at least 180 points, and are assured no lower than the #2 seed out of Europe.
Fnatic placed 3rd in the Spring split and banked 50 points. More recently, Fnatic was bounced in the first round of the Summer playoffs, but for solely qualifying, are awarded 20 points, bringing their total Worlds point total to 70. Mathematically, there’s no way they can get the #2 seed, and are guaranteed participation in the #3 seed tournament.
However, it’s the seeding of the #3 tournament that is dicey, and where I feel that Rito is being lazy and taking the easy way out.
In the Spring split, Origen placed second, banking 70 points. But their roster was poached heavily, and they shit the bed in the Summer, finishing 9th in standings and were forced to fight for their 2017 position against Challenger teams.
Instead of cumulatively totaling Origen’s season-end point total at 70 points, Origen is “punished” for sucking in Summer, and their 70 points are completely negated. Despite their success in the Spring, they are not even granted entry in the #3 seed tournament.
Origen should have 70 points. Fnatic has 70 points. H2K Gaming, if they place fourth in the Summer split tournament, will have 70 points. A three-way tie in any athletic league for playoff contention would result in the organizers of said leagues orgasming all over themselves at the potential for drama, narrative, and broadcast opportunity. Rito on the other hand, wants to reduce all of the above by simply removing one of the variables from the equation by virtue of lameduck format clause.
Basically, as it stands now, Fnatic (70) and Giants Gaming (20) are going to be participating in the #3 seed tournament. Barring upsets of the top two teams, H2K (100 or 70) and Unicorns of Love (80 or 50) will be the other two teams involved.
Origen and their 70 points won’t be allowed to participate while Giants Gaming will be allowed to try to qualify for Worlds with just 20.
I’m not really a fan of any particular team, but I just feel that this technicality is kind of lame, and kind of lazy. Imagine if there were a three-way tie between Fnatic, Origen and H2K? There could be a round robin of some sort between just them, for #3 seed tournament placement. Where the winner could avoid as many as potentially two best-of-five series, while the loser has to start at the bottom of the gauntlet.
This is the kind of shit that sports fans salivate at the idea of, especially if it starts a Cinderella story.
Basically, Rito is invalidating the Spring split outright with this kind of format, and denying the opportunity for competitive drama and Cinderella stories that all spectators love to get behind. By this logic, there’s almost no reason to bother with the Spring split, when the reward is ultimately geared at acquiring the #2 seed for the region.
