Worlds 2015 – Group A Analysis & Predictions

This took me longer than expected. While I am of course an unabashed fan of CLG, there are a lot of other factors involved in Group A that tells me that things may not go as expected.

Before we get into the meat and potatoes, we have to address the elephant in the room: CLG may not be playing with their starting jungler, Jake “Xmithie” Puchero. While their replacement HuHi  is a fine player, Xmithie’s sacrifice all season has been integral to the team’s success, missed Sejuani ultimates notwithstanding.

Should they proceed into Worlds without Xmithie, I believe that they may potential drop games to paiN Gaming or Flash Wolves. Should they play with Xmithie, however, I believe that CLG and KOO Tigers will proceed through Group A virtually unimpeded.

Let’s break it down:

paiN Gaming

The winner of the South American split dominated their last two tournaments, going undefeated through the South American playoffs and the International Wild Card tournament. What paiN Gaming has for them is that they are a wonderful late-game team. Their team compositions and play style really benefits from a strong macro transition once they start grouping up. They are often behind in the laning phase but come to life after the core items on their Top and Bottom lane carries are completed.

But this same strength is why I think they are in trouble of faltering in Group A. Against the likes of KOO Tigers, a team with an even better late-game ability than they do, they may get outclassed in the team fights. Against CLG, whose laning phases are among the best in the American regions, they might not even get to critical mass before they fold to the Rush Hour Bottom lane.

All told, the key to paiN Gaming’s success would be to leverage the World’s patch and make sure that their Top lane snowballs out of control as early as they can while also shoring up their early game. While they did dominate their last two tournaments, their victories weren’t as clean as they should have been — and that’s not going to cut it for Worlds.

yoe Flash Wolves

Oh Flash Wolves. It’s a bad time to not have a carry Top laner. Just ask TSM. Chou “Steak” Lu-Hsi is not a bad player by any metric but he does lack the raw carry potential when compared to Song “Smeb” Kyung Ho from KOO Tigers, Matheus “Mylon” Borges from paiN and Darshan “ZionSpartan” Upadhyaha from CLG. In a metagame that really incentivizes juggernauts, Flash Wolves would need to address the northern part of the map or fall victim to superior initiation and team fight abilities from the rest of the competitors in Group A.

But there is a ray of hope for Flash Wolves. This is a team that has had traditionally strong Mid laner presence. If they can leverage their Viktor picks (or turn it into a full-on Assassin a la Diana) and support it with their comfortable tanky Support picks in the group stages, Flash Wolves look like a team who can at least get to a tie-breaker situation.

KOO Tigers

Rounding out the group are what I believe to be the strongest teams in Group A. KOO Tigers is every bit what makes paiN Gaming, but polished to a whole new level of sheen. Smeb is an amazing Top lane carry that revels in the team’s late-game style of play. KOO is most comfortable in dragging the game to the later stages where they can group up and outfight most anyone.

The difference is that they also have a strong laning phase to help them get to their win conditions. Kim “PraY” Jong-in is a very safe AD Carry player, preferring to use utility champions such as Ashe and Sivir to help shore up the team’s mid game abilities. Lee “kurO” Seo-haeng is also adept at splitting the map open from the Mid lane to create space for the team’s inevitable five-person engages.

KOO looks like it’s going to get out of Group A scott-free, especially given CLG’s plight.

Counter Logic Gaming

Which brings us to CLG. Choi “HuHi” Jae-hyun is a fine substitute Mid lane player but as he is transitioning into the Jungler role given Xmithie’s current dilemma, it looks like CLG has the most unstable set of factors coming into Worlds. While I believe that HuHi will fill the role quite fine, CLG will have to look into their other strengths to get out of the group stages alive.

For this, CLG will need to take advantage of their strengths: securing the laning phase. The Rush Hour bottom lane between Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng and Zaqueri “Aphromoo” Black really does contribute a lot to their early game stability. Aphromoo’s positioning and scouting skills, particularly on champion picks like Bard and Alistar, give a lot of room for both their Jungler and Midlane players to play at a comfortable pace. Since a lot of effort is placed by their opponents in shutting down the AD Carry, Eugene “Pobelter” Park usually has a lot of time and space to get huge.

But the real kicker? ZionSpartan. At the end of the day, the World’s metagame will most likely be a tale of the Top Laners and in this world, ZionSpartan is royalty. With all things being equal; With HuHi bringing the same off-tank performance from the Jungle in Xmithie’s style, CLG looks like it’s going to be the second team to make it out of Group A — but it will be a bloody battle on the way out.

Predictions: KOO Tigers, CLG make it out. Possible Tie-Breaker placing for Flash Wolves.

Must See Match: paiN vs. CLG. 

The battle of the damage-oriented Mylon versus the tank (and stun) oriented ZionSpartan should make watching Top lane — dare I say it — exciting, for a change.

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