LEGENDS (Season 9) by annah.bianchi

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Welcome to SEASON 9 Welcome back to the Rift Summoner (not quite a rift)! This year we decided to create something special and different for all our community and we hope to be able to do that again next year. So.. we’ve teamed up with a graphic design studio to help us create this book. Now you’ll ask, why would you want to create a book if you are a gaming company? The answer to that question is really easy: we wanted to give something back to you, but instead of doing it online we decided to put it on paper. League of Legends is an online game and you need an internet connection to be able to play the game. Of course we have a shop we all the products related to the game but those are gadgets. We created this book to give you something material to remember the year that you spent on the game playing with you friends and learning new champions (and maybe question if they were too strong at their release) but also all the memories you made with your friends watching your regional championship series! We hope you’ll enjoy our lasted project and that you’ll find it helpful as a guide to remember all the great stuff that happened in season 9!

Sincerely, Riot Games

INDEX Awaken 7 Sylas 9 Spring Split 13 Introducing LEC 15 Spring Split Teams 21 FNC and the fail of the yearly start 23 G2: The dominant 27 Kayle 33 Morgana 35 FNC from bottom to title contenders 37 Spring Split Finale 43 Spring Split MVP 49 All Pro Team Spring Split 51 Yuumi 53

MSI 57 One king to rule them all 59 G2 epic run 61 Mordekaiser 65

Summer Split 69 Summer Split Team 71 LEC Summer Start 73 Qiyana 77 4

Splyce to the top in summer 81 Rift Rivals 85 NA VS EU 87 Can anyone beat G2? 91 Teamfight Tactics 95 Teamfight Tactics: Introduction 97 Summer Split Finale 99 Summer Split MVP 107 All Pro Team Summer Split 109 Pantheon 111 League of Legends: 10 years celebration 115 Every game announced by Riot 117

World Championship 121 Luois Vuoittin joins Worlds 2019 123 World Championship Group Stage Teams 127 Phoenix 129 Europe makes history at Worlds 131 FNC: Contenders to the big spot 137 Giants 141 Worls Opening Ceremony 145 Worlds Finale 147 Senna 155

Preseason 159 Rise of the elements 161 Aphelios 165 5

SEASON 9 > SEASON START SONG

VALERIE BROUSSARD

AWAKEN Dear Summoners, Like every starts of the season we released a song with it’s own cinematic. This years we created something special for you all. We decided to include some of the lore events in the cinematic. Did you get them all? We hope you enjoyed the song and the cinematic and it gave you the energy to start you climb and to show your friend who is the best player. We don’t want to spend too many words, we thank you all for the continuos support thought this ten years, and we hope to see you again next year, we have a lot of suprises coming at you! So please, stick arount a little bit, you might be suprised! We hoped you liked the song and you’ll keep singing even the following year. Will you?

As always we want to thank you all for playing and sticking with us this year. As we will tell you multiple times you are the reason we are doing this with such passion. So thank you summoner, none of this will be possible without your contanst support and love you show towards the character and the game.

Regards, Riot Games

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SEASON SEASON 9 >9 REGIONAL > NEW CHAMPION ESPORT

SYLAS

THE UNSHACKLED

SEASON 9 > NEW CHAMPION

SYLAS THE UNSHACKLED PASSIVE: PETRICITE BURST After casting a spell, Sylas’ next basic attack whirls his chains around him, damaging nearby enemies.

Q: CHAIN LASH Sylas lashes out with his chains, damaging and slightly slowing enemies. After a brief delay, the intersection of the chains detonates, applying an increased slow and damaging enemies again.

W: KINGSLAYER Sylas lunges at a target with a powerful strike, damaging them and healing himself. If the enemy is at low health, the damage is increased; if Sylas is at low health, the heal is increased.

E: ABSCOND / ABDUCT Sylas dashes a short distance and shields himself. For a short time, he can recast the ability to whip out his chains, stunning, damaging, and pulling himself to the first enemy hit.

R: HIJACK Sylas hijacks an enemy’s ultimate for his own use. Enemies can still use their ultimates if Sylas takes them. Sylas can take an enemy’s ultimate whenever Hijack is off cooldown, but can’t hijack the same enemy for a while after.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I am no traitor. I am the true Demacia.â&#x20AC;?

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SPRING SPLIT 18-01-2019 / 16-03-2019

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Welcome to LEC Welcome back to the Rift Summoner! We have really incredible news this year regarding our reginal Esport competition! We have completely rebranded the EU LCS, it was time to have some fresh air and to make a big separtion between EU and NA, so we created the LEC (League of Legends European Championship). It was an amazing first year of LEC, We were able to do stuff we never tought we would be able to do and the competition fired up very quickly. Team had their ups and downs but in the end we had our first winner of the LEC Spring Split (donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t worry you wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t find any spoiler here about the winner).

Thank you all for following our first ever LEC Spring Split, we hoped you enjoyed as much as we did and we hope to bring back some good memories for all of you in the following pages! See you in Summer!

Sincerely, Riot Games and all the LEC team.

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NEW NAME & NEW MAKING MAGIC The LEC has a brand new stage and a new-look studio, but what goes into building a new attitude to go with it? Longtime viewers of European League of Legends will have noticed all the changes to the broadcast since the transition to the LEC. But how exactly has everything changed, and what goes into creating a brand new look – and feel – for fans? While the League of Legends European Championship might have a new name, it’s still hosted in the same Berlin location as the old European League of Legends Championship Series. However, you may have noticed with this season’s broadcasts that the studio doesn’t just look very different – there’s a new atmosphere too. That’s part of our new LEC ethos. We move the game forward, proudly united by our passion for world class competitive play and incredible spectacle. That’s what we do. And to do that we needed a new space, one not just meant to sit and watch others play, but for fans to as well, to meet pro players, chill out with friends over a board game or checkout the latest cosplay. We needed to create a home for LEC fans, and since home is where the heart is, we started there. So, what’s changed? On a physical level: a lot. No-one knows better than Esports Events Coordinator Alexandra LaPlante. Sacrifice from staff went into realising an environment in which players and fans alike could share their passion, all in time for the hardest of deadlines. “It was a long process that started with the exploration of the new LEC brand way back in mid 2018,” says Alex. “There were multiple iterations of the design, and the build lasted all the way through Christmas and New Year. The incredible team in charge of the build sacrificed a lot of their holiday time, to ensure we would have the new stage, analyst desk and front of house finished on time for the first attendees on January 18th.” Most longtime viewers will have noticed the brand new stage, which was designed from scratch for the new season, which Alex says has “tons of fancy LEDs and things to discover,” and it’s certainly different from how it used to be. “EU LCS went through a lot of iterations, from the metal design in Copenhagen to the watercolor style of Paris, but the studio, when I first joined, had a distinct ‘Berlin’ vibe to it, a lot of grey, industrial grey brick and kind of unpolished in some areas.”

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ATMOSPHERE IN THE LEC STUDIO

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CRUNCHING THE NUMBERS TO CHANGE THE MOOD

With the mood change came a face lift – a whole new aesthetic for the LEC. We knew that base materials would be our foundation. Perforated steel, concrete; these were our foundation building blocks. Bold lines with recessed pixel adjustable LED lighting. This mix of raw and bright and clean lines with base raw materials and bold colour treatments and moving graphics would help evoke something refreshing and new. If it’s not joie-de-vivre then it’s at least a whole lot of fun. Not everything is seen on the broadcast, and some of these details are only seen by our live audience. To be able to celebrate the LEC with in-house fans and allow them to share this with the world as we’ve done this past month feels good. We knew that with the new brand we needed more digital displays to truly tell our brand story. The sheer amount of screens and pixels is mindblowing, and has seen a huge increase since last year, going up from 57.8 million in 2018 to 117 million in 2019. Ours wasn’t a static world anymore. We required a dynamic set that could digitally change graphics, colors and messages as our LEC brand evolved, as teams progressed and the game and competitions unfolded. The capabilities of our screens and integrated scenic lighting was teased during the LEC opening ceremony. They can do so much more. Our Producer Kevin Bell, Director Jak Schneider, Lighting Director Arnold Serame and Lighting Board Operator Valetin really killed it with pulling out everything they could from the lights and studio. We’re marvelled at the amount of people and the teamwork that gets put in to bring the LEC to life. From players to backstage staff, there are about 120 people on any given matchday pulling the strings. It’s seen in every little detail. I can see each of our efforts in everything. All of the decisions and questions and pushing we did to do more than we thought we could do. But of course, the majority of our thanks go to the fans who keep coming out to the studio, after all these years. “For me, the most interesting thing has been the incredible passion that fans have embraced the LEC with,” says Alex. “Our shows are selling out very quickly and the waiting list to get tickets for any given day is longer than my solo queue loss streak.” “Having this very European style of having all the European teams in one spot, and having fans from all over Europe flock to this one centre, gives them a huge opportunity to meet each other. There is a lot of interaction between fans – a fan who comes here from France, Italy, or Spain; they’re never alone,” Alex explains. “Even if they make the trip alone, they’ll always make friends, and meet people, whether that’s through the team, or by sitting next to someone who gets just as excited as they do about something. So it’s a great experience for them to come in and meet a diverse group of friends and fans,” she says. Our fans are the extra element that brings this studio to life, and we hope the new studio and new attitude will keep them, you, coming back.

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SUMMONING THE MAGIC OF THE RIFT IN REAL LIFE

It’s changed on an emotional level too, however. This isn’t just a venue for elite competitive play. It’s an experience for fans, some who travel hours each week or more to watch their favourite teams play in person. “All of our regulars, they know each other, and for them, coming to the studio is like seeing family, and seeing close friends, so it’s a very emotional experience for them to come in and see these people,” Alex says. “Not all of them live close by, some of them travel from all across Germany or other countries to come and see the LEC, so when they reunite it’s really nice to see.” There’s now much more to the LEC studio than what you get to see on the stream, with parts that only the visiting fans get to experience. The large statue of Baron Nashor towers over everything, and is one of the first things fans see when they enter the arena, having followed special LED signs from the nearby train station so they don’t get lost in the urban jungle of outer Berlin. “It creates this home base where fans can live out their fandom; it’s a regular experience, it’s always in Berlin, it makes it easy for people to plan around, and it’s easy to see all of the teams, and it helps create more diverse fandom,” Alex says. “The studio is such a small space, so they can directly interact with fans of all teams, and the teams themselves. Fans might discover a new team that they didn’t like two Splits ago, and now, since they’ve had a chance to interact with the players, or meet the coach, or meet some of the fans in person, they might change their perspective.” We still do swag toss and fan meets, of course, but we also offer so much more now. The front of house area also features a merchandise shop and concession stand before fans go into the main arena. They may even spot the Rift Scuttler made by Corroder Cosplay Props roving the arena floor. The Scuttler has also recently found fame as StatsBot on LEC broadcasts. “Way back when we were still pretty new in the Berlin studio, the experience was very different than it is today,” Alex says. “Just like the branding, it went through a few different versions, before reaching the look and experience we have today.” Space and emotion are connected, of course. To change one, you tweak the other. Giving the fans more room to explore and enjoy meant improving the experience, so it’s what we did. “Before, the entrance was at our ‘graffiti wall’ (2015 - 2019 RIP). That’s now the back of our studio,” says Alex. “Everywhere except the bleachers it felt a little cramped for fans.” “When we made the switch to dual stream and best-of-three in 2016, massive changes were made to the studio, the original stage and the bleachers were turned 180 degrees and upgraded, and on top of that we built a second stage. The two stages were connected by our new and improved front of house area, located at the opposite side of the building, which served as the entrance for fans. It offered a lot more space for us to play with. “When we switched back to best-of-one and one stage and studio, we retired the original stage and moved the ‘new’ stage into the old studio space. The Analyst Desk received an awesome upgrade and was relocated to the now empty spot of the former new stage. Around the same time, Baron moved into the front of house area, where he now terrorises our guests.” Which was exactly our intention: to get you excited as soon as you arrive.

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SPRING LEC TEAM EXCEL ESPORTS Top: Daehan "Expect" Ki Jungle: Marc "Caedrel" Lamont Mid: Fabian "Exile" Schubert Bot: Jesper "Jeskla" Stromberg Support: Raymond "kaSing" Tsang HEAD COACH: JOSH "FURNDOG" FURNEAUX

MISFITS GAMING

FNATIC

Top: Paul "sOAZ" Boyer Jungle: Nubar "Maxlore" Sarafian Mid: Fabian "Febiven" Diepstraten Bot: Steven "Hans Sama" Liv Support: Beomhyun "Gorilla" Kang HEAD COACH: JESSE "JESIZ" LE

Top: Gabriël "Bwipo" Rau Jungle: Mads "Broxah" Brock-Pedersen Mid: Tim "Nemesis" Lipovšek Bot: Martin "Rekkles" Larsson Support: Zdravets "Hylissang" Iliev Galabov HEAD COACH: JOEY "YOUNGBUCK" STELTENPOOL

ORIGEN

G2 ESPORTS

Top: Barney "Alphari" Morris Jungle: Jonas "Kold" Andersen Mid: Erlend "Nukeduck" Holm Bot: Patrik "Patrik" Jiru Support: Alfonso "mithy" Aguirre Rodriguez HEAD COACH: ANDRÉ "GUILHOTO" GUILHOTO

Top: Martin "Wunder" Hansen Jungle: Marcin "Jankos" Jankowski Mid: Rasmus "Caps" Winther Bot: Luka "Perkz" Perkovic Support: Mihael "Mikyx" Mehle HEAD COACH: FABIAN "GRABBZ" LOHMANN

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ROSTERS 2019 SK GAMING ROGUE Top: Jun-Hyung "Profit" Kim Jungle: Mateusz "Kikis" Szkudlarek Mid: Chres "Sencux" Laursen Bot: Martin "HeaQ" Kordmaa Support: Bae-In "Wadid" Kim HEAD COACH: SIMON "FREDY122" PAYNE

Top: Jorge "Werlyb" Casanovas Moreno-Torres Jungle: Oskar "Selfmade" Boderek Mid: Junsik "Pirean" Choi Bot: Juš "Crownshot" Marušič Support: Minkook "Dreams" Han HEAD COACH: FABIAN "SHEEPY" MALLANT

SPLYCE SCHALKE 04 Top: Andrei "Odoamne" Pascu Jungle: Jonas "Memento" Elmarghichi Mid: Felix "Abbedagge" Braun Bot: Elias "Upset" Lipp Support: Donggeun "Ignar" Lee HEAD COACH: DYLAN FALCO

Top: Tamás "Vizicsacsi" Kiss Jungle: Andrei "Xerxe" Dragomir Mid: Marek "Humanoid" Brázda Bot: Kasper "Kobbe" Kobberup Support: Tore "Norskeren" Hoel Eilertsen HEAD COACH: HADRIEN "DUKE" FORESTIER

TEAM VITALITY Top: Lucas "Cabochard" Simon-Meslet Jungle: Jaeha "Mowgli" Lee Mid: Daniele "Jiizuke" di Mauro Bot: Amadeu "Attila" Carvalho Support: Jakub "Jactroll" Skurzynski HEAD COACH: JAKOB "YAMATOCANNON" MEBDI

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FNATIC AND THE FAIL OF THE EARLY START During the League of Legends split schedule, your team cannot afford the luxury of quitting. You can not quit when you are behind. You can not quit when you are ahead. You can not quit when the client repeatedly crashes and your top laner’s PC has to be switched out for the third time today. You can try to surrender a game – though this is rightfully frowned upon – but the season must go on. Given enough time, all things are possible, and League of Legends has afforded enough time for some pretty significant turnarounds to occur year in year out. So when people signal the death knell of one team or the advent of a new colossus based upon the first weeks of results, all too often they have inevitably been forced to eat their own words. Which brings us to Fnatic.

FNATIC’S FIRSTS

Fnatic are currently in the throes of their worst start yet (0-4), yet this time last year, they were also on a disappointing start at 2-2 – including a loss to the newly formed H2K roster. G2 are in the midst of quite the opposite, but as recently as last split, they were also looking at the potential for an undefeated run in the same time span. Yet only one of these two teams held the crown in Europe last season. A slow start is not new to Fnatic, nor indeed is it new to its recently appointed head coach Joey “Youngbuck” Steltenpool – who administered the strategic prowess that took the team all the way to the World Championship Finals last season. His final split with his former team G2 started similarly poor. After making it to the finals of the 2017 Mid Season Invitational, fatigue appeared to have finally claimed Youngbuck’s G2 Esports. They went 1-3 in their first four games of the 2017 Summer Split – their one victory came from a close match against ROCCAT, a team that would not even make it out of the bottom two in their group that split. G2 claimed their fourth consecutive title that year, despite significantly lagging behind Fnatic in their group.

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“These are teams preparing for a marathon, not a sprint.” 23

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BOOM AND BUST

In that same split, Misfits Gaming scraped along to the playoffs. A 6-7 regular record definitely didn’t spell out the rest of the then-new and ambitious organisation’s journey to the 2017 Summer Finals against the equally rejuvenated G2. Despite losing 3-0 in the Finals, Misfits had already qualified for the World Championships and went on to a legendary five game set against SK Telecom T1, a series many argue to this day should have ended in Misfits’ favour. It is with some irony, then, that the most obvious example of a strong start that didn’t quite transition into a finale comes from Misfits the following year. The Summer Split of 2018 saw them begin their run looking almost invincible. While G2 began 4-0 and extended to a 6-0 lead, Misfits racked up an astonishing nine game win streak and eventually saw themselves 10-1 before a crash and 1-8 record in the second half. Misfits eventually ended the regular split in fourth place without a bye in the Playoffs. Neither G2 nor Misfits with their strong starts in Summer took the title, and this in and of itself was not even an isolated event in 2018. The preceding Spring Split saw two unexpected titans rack up immediate victories. The recently qualified Team Vitality looked unstoppable, going 3-1 in their first two weeks (and arguably securing Daniele “Jiizuke” di Mauro the title of Rookie of the Split in just four games). They extended this record to an astonishing 7-1, almost unheard of for a rookie team in their debut run. The second team was arguably even more surprising. While rookie talent has often gone far in Europe, the world was not expecting a team with a roster like Giants Gaming to look like the only clear contenders to Vitality’s #1 spot. Giants went 3-1 and extended it to a 5-2 that included a loss to Vitality. The crash of Giants’ Gaming occured at the same time as another team, H2K, underwent an almost opposite journey. Starting 1-3 and hitting the depths of 1-7, H2K qualified for the 2018 Spring Playoffs while Giants Gaming found themselves absent. Neither Team Vitality nor Giants, both clear contenders in the initial weeks of the split, made it to the Finals.

FINDING A NICHE

It is clear that there have been some very notable discrepancies between early starts and finishes. The question is: Why? There is no one singular answer. It is certainly clear that some strong starts have come down to meta dependency. Misfits and G2 of Summer 2018 both found some clear points in the early meta that benefited them, albeit in different ways. Currently Schalke 04 are experiencing an incredibly strong start to their 2019 ambitions. I would argue that it is to be expected of a roster that has been formed with so distinct an identity in mind. Both Jonas “Memento” Elmarghichi

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and Donggeun “Ignar” Lee have an immensely strong grasp of the early game. As a team, Schalke have set their focus on unlocking their mid-jungle to work for their bot lane. Repeated visits have placed Elias “Upset” Lipp in a position to perform above the league’s usual superstars. In spite of this and their 3-1 start, however, Schalke have already demonstrated that a focus on their early-mid game win conditions are where things end, and their struggle with closing out games has left them with one of the highest average game times in the league. Cracks have appeared, but having strong direction in the set up of their roster has given them a powerful start. Vitality were a team performing similar feats in 2018, though their identity was somewhat different. Without fail, Erberk “Gilius” Demir would go for a level 2 gank to start with a pressure lead, and then once Jiizuke had his ultimate up, they would gank bot lane mercilessly together until the turret cracked. It seems simple, it reads simple, but if other teams are working on foundational elements while you are playing to a particular direction together, the advantage is firmly in your court.

NOT SO BAD

That is, until the foundational elements have been solved by the competition. The current disappointments of Fnatic and Origen have lacked a specific identity. Yet I would continue to back these two. Fnatic’s members themselves have cited that nobody on the team is willing to be played around. Despite this, the team has created multiple compositions that seem ideal for a mid-to-bot focused strategy in much the same vein as Schalke. Would anybody argue that the current iteration of Fnatic’s roster is incapable of following suit? Even from significant deficits, the team has worked incredibly well in grouped situations, accruing advantages and winning teamfights from behind. Origen are even easier to make a case for. Thus far, most of Origen’s games have been lost in transition. While the pathing taken by certain players has led to them being caught, the rotations intended were good ones. The question of Origen’s improvement becomes not one of fundamental theory, but of simple execution. In both cases, Fnatic and Origen are closer to figuring out League of Legends than many of the mid tier teams. Fnatic’s play once the laning phase has ended, I would argue, has more promise than Schalke’s. Luckily, the split doesn’t end in the first weeks, no matter how much some would want it to. Had it done so in the past, the landscape of the LEC would look vastly different than it does now. These are teams preparing for a marathon, not a sprint, and though we have identified with ease the strongest sprinters in LEC right now, we are far from learning who will win this particular race. Quitters never prosper.

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G2 ESPORTS: THE DOMINANT I have often talked about whether certain skill discrepancies ‘matter’. The most recent example of this would be the case of Fnatic vs Invictus Gaming in the Grand Finals of the Season 8 World Championships. Who was better, I would be asked, Gabriël "Bwipo" Rau or Kang "TheShy" Seunglok? It didn’t matter, I would reply, because it would not – particularly in the Worlds meta – turn a winning matchup into a losing matchup or not-winning-hard-enough. The champion matchups would matter across the board between these teams, and so the series (I imagined) would come down to red side. The same is true of team matchups in general. The question of whether certain laners are better than their counterparts on other teams oftentimes becomes irrelevant once the game begins. This can be down to matchups. This can be down to strategy. But very often as League of Legends progresses it comes down to the way in which the map is played on a broader context. This comes down to two people in particular: Jungle/Support. I would argue that it is within this difference, the way these two roles play, that the real dividing difference between Splyce and Vitality, Misfits and Schalke – and everybody in the LEC and G2. G2 have reigned dominant, but not quite in the way you might think.

A TALE OF TWO ROLES

Let’s get a few things out of the way. Yes, for the majority of G2 Esports’ games they have had two lanes that for all extents and purposes have won – very often a combination of mid + a sidelane. There have even been instances where all three lanes have won. G2 are not necessarily alone in this. Schalke 04, the current perceived competitor to G2 Esports (though having already suffered a loss at their hands) has had a similar run for a similar reason. Both Marcin “Jankos” Jankowski and Jonas “Memento” Elmarghichi are pathing appropriately to secure their lanes in the early game as well as play hard to tempo on their win conditions. In essence this means that should the botlane of Luka “Perkz” Perković and Mihael “Mikyx” Mehle be in a situation where their wave is pushing away from them no matter what, they can be sure that Jankos will find a way to keep them safe while they aggressively push to crash their wave into the enemy team’s tower. This creates a circumstance where they can then play for vision, recall, or simply play back as their minions bounce their way. As a result, they become gank immune. The difference is that while Schalke 04 will often play Memento to escort his top side and look to make hard accelerating plays around bot side, Jankos has displayed that he can do the opposite as well as the same. The difference, I would argue, comes from how this map control can be coordinated with Mikyx. When playing around botside, Mikyx participates in maintaining bot-mid control as most supports in the League will do. When playing around topside though, Mikyx becomes a different beast entirely. Very often Perkz has managed to stay ahead and maintain advantages even in rare post-death circumstances because Mikyx will use every available window to control the wave and the immediate botside.

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F O S O G R NU I K E

FE P O

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HAIL TO THE KING

While I do believe Origen and Schalke’s present playstyles and direction stand the best chance of defeating G2, those are challenges for another time. G2 met a worse version of Origen already, and Schalke found themselves unable to match up in their early meeting. The first round robin will tie up shortly and G2 Esports will have found themselves dominant at every single step. They are not the first team to appear so unstoppable this early on though, and they will not be the last. However, their dominance is not as simple as the win lane win game meta dependency of Summer 2018 Misfits, nor the level 2 cheesy antics of 2018 Spring Vitality. G2 Esports are not a team to be figured out, they are a team to be caught up to. To master G2 Esports is to master the fundamental aspects of early League of Legends, and in this they present a unique and very welcome challenge to an LEC that found itself one series away from Worlds dominance.

POWER FROM EVERYWHERE

G2’s solo lanes have really come to the fore from this. However, it should also be noted that in the few instances where G2’s botside has been called upon to carry the game, a large amount of this has come from Mikyx himself in mid-late playmaking scenarios. While Perkz himself has shown himself to be mechanically proficient, the de-facto pressure he generates from being ahead allows Mikyx to make some very significant map plays. Everybody remembers his brilliant performance against Splyce. The advantages gained from his somewhat overlooked pickup in the off-season have been worthy of the

limelight, as well as his consistent manipulation of the lane. I highlight the jungle and support control because it is in this understanding of the game that G2 can also be defeated. Teams like Schalke have pulled off very similar systems in the early game, and the one time Schalke have been fallen outside of their match against G2 was against an Origen whose jungler Jonas “Kold” Andersen was matching them in this very manner. Kold in that series was performing as both Jankos and Memento have been consistently doing so: securing his laners on a push so they may be secure for waves after on their own. If you play in these scenarios in this manner, the mechanical proficiency of your opponents theoretically ceases to matter. You are not forced to step up to contest a wave that will inevitably crash towards you, thus minimising the windows that opponents have to secure 1v1 or 2v2 kills. If the sheer mechanical prowess of G2 is to be nullified it will be through the jungle matchup, for which G2 already had one of the best – a large part of how their former roster with their former botlane could take on teams like RNG and come out victorious. This is additionally why most accelerating plays in high level games come from dives, but G2 has shown that when that option is not open to them they can trade in smarter ways. Against Vitality for example they responded to Vitality’s acceleration of the game through their bottom lane by dumping their Rift Herald mid, forcing Vitality’s unlocked 2v2 to abandon their sidelane tempo and match in mid lane while the resulting 1-3-1 setup favoured G2’s sidelanes. Their opponents would not do the same in a similar situation.

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KAYLE THE RIGHTEOUS

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MORGANA THE FALLEN

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“Only the guilty need fear me.” 32

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KAYLE THE RIGHTEOUS

PASSIVE: DIVINE ASCENT

E: STARFIRE SPELLBLADE

Kayle ascends through four forms before reaching her divine state.

Passive: Kayle’s basic attacks deal bonus damage which scales with both her ability power and attack damage.

Zealous (level 1): Kayle’s attacks grant stacking attack speed. At max stacks, Kayle becomes Exalted and gains movement speed towards enemies. Aflame (level 6): When Kayle is Exalted, her attacks launch flaming waves dealing bonus magic damage. Arisen (level 11): Kayle evolves into a fully ranged champion. Transcendent (level 16): Kayle takes on her final form becoming permanently Exalted. Her flaming waves deal true damage.

Active: Kayle’s next basic attack is ranged and deals a portion of the target’s missing health as bonus magic damage. After ascending to Aflame, this attack damages enemies next to the target as well.

R: DIVINE JUDGEMENT Kayle bestows invulnerability on herself or a target ally for a few seconds. While invulnerable, purifying swords fall in a circle around her target, damaging enemies in the area.

Q: RADIANT BLAST Kayle conjures a portal which shoots a flaming blade at an enemy, shredding armor and magic resist and slowing her target. This attack explodes to damage enemies next to the target as well.

W: CELESTIAL BLESSING Kayle heals herself and a target ally, giving both a significant burst of movement speed.

SEASON 9 > REWORK REGIONAL ESPORT

MORGANA THE FALLEN

MORGANA UPDATE Split between her mortal and Celestial self but wholly opposed to the unyielding ideology of her twin sister, the dark enchantress has been visually updated to match her divine origin. Morgana has bound her wings by choice, reflecting her connection to humanity and our shared suffering, but her ultimate reveals her birthright. In addition, the Fallen’s shadowy spells have new animations and visual vibrancy. Already a powerful pick in both mid and bot lane, Morgana’s abilities remain the same—save for her ultimate, which now grants movespeed towards enemies to ensure they can’t escape their share of torment.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

“Only those you love can break your heart.” 35

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

FROM BOTTOM TIER TO TITLE CONTENDERS After a terrible start, Fnatic had a phenomenal second half of the split to snatch the third place right before playoffs. What changed in such a short amount of time? With two weeks of Regular Season Play underway, Fnatic found themselves at the bottom of the standings with a 0-4 record. At the end of Week 4, things looked dire as the 2018 World Finalists had just been demolished by G2 Esports in 20 minutes, only one week after being dominated by Misfits Gaming. Fnatic were struggling, and much of it stemmed from their mediocre early game. It was rare to ever see them in the lead for the first couple of weeks. Kills were scarce and deaths were plenty, including instances where theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d straight up lose a 1v1 or 2v2. Week 6 marked the turning point for Fnaticâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s season, with wins over two (at the time) Top 4 teams in Vitality and Origen. A new team showed up on the Rift, one that actively looked for early game leads and their eight game win streak showed a very dominant early game team, one that first on a lot of metrics. So what started clicking for Fnatic?

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

HOW FNATIC TURNED THEIR SPLIT AROUND

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

FULL SCALING DRAFTS: GONE

For starters, Fnatic moved away from drafting so many scaling elements and weak laners into their compositions. Against Misfits in Week 3, the team had one of the worst 2v2 mid/jungle duos in the game with Zac and Kassadin. Kassadin has to hold onto his turret for dear life for the first few levels while Zac is a poor duelist that can’t ever step into river to fight for the Rift Scuttler without assistance. And when matched up against G2 Esports, they willingly picked Ornn into Jayce and Jinx into Braum and Lucian, giving G2 winning match ups in both side lanes. These drafting decisions resulted in granting their opposing teams too many options to get early game advantages. Fnatic would fall too far behind before their scaling elements could come online.

ADVANTAGES THROUGH INVADING

One aspect of their planning that has been more present in Fnatic’s second half of the split however has been their level 1 planning and more specifically, looking for invades. Combining the element of surprise alongside stronger level 1 champions to force Summoner Spells, get kills or even push the jungler out of their starting camp has allowed Fnatic to get leads from the get go. Usually, Fnatic spread out throughout the river in a classic line of scrimmage covering all jungle entrances either with trinket wards or with their champions sitting in brushes trying to spot enemy movement. If vision is placed by the opponent, Fnatic typically would have an Oracle Lens ready to sweep out vision before moving back to the fog of war. At 1:25 and with the first minion waves soon arriving at their lanes, they make a move for the enemy buff with multiple members. This isn’t something new to Fnatic’s early game, but something that they have perfected by better understanding when they meet the conditions to pull it off. In Week 2 versus Vitality and with strong level 1 elements in Lucian, Braum and Xin Zhao, Fnatic looked to surprise with a late invade onto red buff. Vitality were ready and saw them coming with defensive vision. Vitality stalled out the contest for the red buff and took it slow. Without priority in the mid lane it meant that Jiizuke on Irelia could look to collapse on the invade before Nemesis could which pressured Fnatic into forcing the issue and get out as soon as possible. After losing the contest, Fnatic were forced to expend two flashes and a heal and now, without control over mid or bot, Vitality’s jungler Mowgli was free to turn the invade on its head, moving into the enemy side of the jungle and forcing Broxah away to his top side. In Week 6 and against the same team, Fnatic go for the same move. They have the stronger level 1 as there is little Elise can contribute solely with W. This time around Fnatic have mid priority, Zoe can shove the first wave faster than Fizz and assist in the buff invade, making it a potential 3v2 fight, so Mowgli is pushed out of his own jungle. Fnatic repeated similar strategies when playing Karthus. While he is a scaling jungler, Karthus can add a lot of damage in an extended skirmish with Lay Waste. These late

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

invades allow Fnatic to do two things. First off, they allow their jungler to get more camps early and get an experience lead. While trading sides and isolating a part of the map can be valuable, in most occasions Fnatic’s goal is to have Broxah get three buffs and extra camps, allowing him to reach level 6 as early as possible. Secondly, forcing an opponent out of one of his own jungle quadrants also makes his jungle pathing very predictable due to the lack of options, and while Fnatic might not always have vision on their opposing jungler, they will have a good idea of where he is in the first few minutes of the game, lowering the risk of a potential gank.

ACHIEVING AND USING PRIORITY

When looking to move out of lane, the importance of Lane Priority (the ability for a champion to push a minion wave faster than their opponent) can not be understated. But what matters is how lane priority is used once the lane is pushed. Fnatic has been very good at using these windows in recent weeks to extend their advantages. Helping out a laner isn’t limited to ganking, Broxah will occasionally hover over his lane to allow him to push in a lane with more safety. If the enemy jungler shows up to gank, then Broxah is ready to respond. In their matches against Rogue and G2, Broxah sat close to Nemesis to allow him to push, once that was done he roamed with him to dive one of the side lanes. On the flip side, Fnatic’s laners actively started used lane priority to move and help Broxah more often. Moving from lane to help out on an invade to steal a buff, or simply move to the river to help secure the rift scuttler are just some examples that have been more present in Fnatic’s play and cement their reputation as a strong early game team.

REKKLES: THE NEW PRIMARY CARRY

With Caps leaving the lineup ahead of the 2019 season, Fnatic lost a big part of their identity and a player that they could rely on to be the main carry. With the help of the 9.3 Marksman Itemization changes, the team realized they could turn their attention to Rekkles to step up as their primary carry, and their recent focus has been around making sure he’s in a good spot going into mid game. This doesn’t mean that Broxah won’t dedicate any attention to his other lanes, but Fnatic have mainly played around their star bot laner. Against Splyce in their last match of the Split, Broxah went for a very surprising and uncommon level 2 gank on Skarner to shut down Splyce’s Draven lane that intended to punish a Vayne pick. When facing Origen, and after realizing his opposing jungler would be starting on the top side of the map during their level 1 set up, Broxah cleared his red and immediately moved to invade. This is done with the intention of isolating the bot lane, as Kold would have no reason to come bot with his camps taken. What happened after that was a consistent focus on Origen’s bot lane, getting Rekkles significantly ahead with consecutive ganks. From ganking to just showing himself around the bot lane to force the enemy lane away from the turret and allow his bot lane to grab turret plates, it’s clear most of Fnatic’s attention has been around their bot lane and so far, it has been working. Fnatic managed to turn around their split with an incredible performance over 4 weeks and enter playoffs as one of the title contenders. Their first test is against Team Vitality and all eyes are on Fnatic to see if they can continue showing their early game dominance in a best of 5 format.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SPRING FINALE

ROTTERDAM 2019

G2 esports are the first ever LEC Champions It all came down to this. G2 Esports versus Origen for the first ever LEC Spring Split title. The fans were hyped, the players were ready, and the brand new trophy was unveiled. All that remained was for the two best teams in Europe to go head to head once again to see who would win it all. Origen had just come off the back of a big win against Fnatic, while G2 had had a week to prepare. It turned out that the extra time paid dividends. G2 were the team to take control of the series, seemingly taking the week to reinvent professional League of Legends and leave Rotterdam miles ahead of their opponents. Next up is MSI, and their international opponents may be getting nervous. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s how it happened, game by game.

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GAME 1 The early game was all about skirmishes, with the junglers putting most of their attention into the top lane. It was Jankosâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Olaf who got the First Blood, managing to come out of the top lane 2v2 ahead. However, Origen quickly got a kill of their own thanks to a rare misstep from Caps. He was caught out of position in the river, and from there Origen went top side again to get another kill and a slight advantage. G2 capitalised on good ward placement to contest the first dragon and get a kill, keeping things very even in the match after ten minutes. The teams continued to trade kills as they gave the Rotterdam crowd exactly what they wanted: Close games and plenty of action. That action erupted around the dragon pit with the first big team fight. The extended engagement was evenly matched once again, but it was Origen who came out on top thanks to a well-placed Ryze ult to mop up.

Not content to simply trade kills, the teams then traded objectives. Origen grabbed the drake and bot tower, while G2 went for the Rift Herald and top. They then used that Rift Herald to make some good headway down the mid lane. Origen were ahead slightly, but it was G2 who were on the front foot, often forcing Origen to blow cooldowns defensively. With gold totals remaining even 25 minutes into the game, it eventually got to the point where a single fight could decide the game, and thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s exactly what happened. G2 forced Origen away from the Baron and picked it up themselves, getting a couple of kills in the process as Origen dove in in desperation. With this buff they pushed the first meaningful advantage of the game to take the mid lane inhibitor. G2 then destroyed Origen as they tried to defend their bot lane, and they were simply able to walk into the base and destroy the Nexus to go 1-0 up in the final.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

GAME 2 The funnel comp made a surprise return in one of the biggest games of the season, and it was G2 who raised eyebrows, with Caps picking Pyke in the mid lane, Jankos taking Morgana, and Perkz taking Smite on Xayah. Xayah and Rakan went mid against a confused Nukeduck, while Morgana went bottom with Pyke, making for a very interesting 2v2 against Patrik and Mithy. First Blood came early, as Kold tried to bail out his midlaner but fell to the power of Xayah and Rakan. G2 then pulled off a textbook dive in the top lane as Alphari died without many options for escape. After some early game confusion, Origen were able to equalise briefly, but were caught out again as G2 picked up a few more kills, including one very nice play from Capsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Pyke in the bot lane. From there, G2 started to snowball the game, finding another good fight in the top lane, and then in the middle. They already had a heavy lead just 15 minutes into the game after picking up Rift Herald and getting Perkz to a scary 5/0/5. You wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have thought having star man Caps on a support champion with no farm would be a good idea, but G2 have gone against the grain for the majority of the season to great effect. Baron fell soon after spawning (the quickest of the Spring Split), and although Origen seemed to get a good engagement, the item difference came back to bite them, as G2 cleaned up with plenty of kills. They then did a good job of baiting out a couple of ultimates as they sieged the base before rushing back in for the Ace, and a quick win in under 25 minutes.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

GAME 3 Desperation time for Origen, with the series on the line, they did manage to get First Blood 2v2 in the bot lane, but the advantage was immediately thrown away after a mistake from Mithy gave a kill back to G2. Meanwhile, Jankosâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Jarvan was blowing flashes all over the map, and a counter-gank in the top lane combined with a teleport from Perkz on Neeko gave G2 another lead. G2 managed to maintain their lead despite some aggression from Origen, and it seemed like they had control over most of the map. A fight in the bottom lane ended in disaster for Origen, losing four players without getting anything in return. Caps soon went up to the top lane to solo kill Alphari, who was a main target for G2 in this series. By 15 minutes, G2 already had 15 kills. Unbelievably, the game was already beyond hope. Origen looked to pick up a couple of kills on a retreating G2, but their opponents simply walked or teleported into their base. No team has ever won a game quicker in professional European League of Legends history. 18 minutes and 31 seconds was all it took for the dominant G2 to win the final game in the series.

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SPRING SPLIT MVP After an off-season where he moved from a team that made the World Finals, to their greatest rivals, our Spring Split MVP has continued to show why he is seen by some as the best western player currently playing league. Congratulations Caps! His second consecutive LEC MVP, much deserved, while acquiring more than double the amount of votes of the second place candidate. Caps was an integral part of the G2 lineup that went undefeated during the first half of the split, and locked first place with games to spare. He topped midlanes in damage per minute, out damaging his opponents by over 100 damage a minute on average. He also has the most kills of any player, 10 more than anyone else. Once again Caps has shown us that any team he is on is one to be feared, and that his reign in the midlane of Europe will continue for many splits to come.

G2 CAPS

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

ALL PRO 2019 TEAM

SPRING SPLIT “This split’s all-pro team was pretty clear cut to me. Starting in the top lane, cabochard was a dominant force throughout the split and the single most important piece to vitality’s regular season successes. In the jungle, jankos has been a constantly aggressive force for g2, leading to many impressive early game snowballs. Caps is.... Well he’s caps. For adc, kobbe really stepped up for splyce. There was no adc as consistent or as good as kobbe was throughout the season. Lastly, mikyx is the obvious choice for support. He manages to be a huge playmaker for g2 both in lane, getting 2v2 kills and engaging game-ending teamfights. These are our best players in the league and are all fighting for the chance to lift the first lec trophy in rotterdam.”

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LUCAS “CABOCHARD” SIMON-MESLET - TOP MARCIN “JANKOS” JANKOWSKI - JUNGLE RASMUS “CAPS” WINTHER - MID KASPER “KOBBE” KOBBERUP - ADC MIHAEL “MIKYX” MEHLE - SUPPORT

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SEASON 9 > NEW CHAMPION

YUUMI THE MAGICAL CAT

YUUMI SEASON 9 > NEW CHAMPION

THE MAGICAL CAT

PASSIVE: BOP ‘N’ BLOCK

E: ZOOMIES

Every so often, Yuumi’s next attack against an opponent restores mana and grants her a shield. If Yuumi is Attached, the shield protects her ally. The shield protects Yuumi or her ally until it’s broken.

Yuumi heals and gains a burst of movement speed. If Attached, her ally is targeted by the spell instead. This spell has two charges.

Q: PROWLING PROJECTILE Yuumi fires a missile that deals magic damage to the first enemy hit. If the missile is in flight long enough, it deals bonus damage and slows enemies. While Attached, Yuumi fires a missile from her ally’s position and can direct the missile’s flight path with her mouse.

W: YOU AND ME! Passive: While Attached, Yuumi and her ally gain a percent of each other’s AD or AP converted to Adaptive Force. Active: Yuumi starts with a point in her W. She dashes to an ally champion and attaches to them. While Attached, she follows her partner’s movement and is untargetable by everything except tower damage. Yuumi’s abilities fire from her ally’s location, and she can’t attack enemies. There’s no cooldown to jump among her teammates. However, if Yuumi un-attaches entirely, she’ll need to wait for the cooldown to partner up, which starts as soon as she’s attached.

R: FINAL CHAPTER Yuumi opens Book, launching waves of magic damage that root enemies after multiple hits. While using her ult, Yuumi can move, attach to ally champions, and heal.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

“You and me, we got this!”

SEASON 9 > MSI

MID

SEASON INVITATIONAL 01-05-2019 / 19-05-2019

SEASON 9 > MSI

Welcome to the MSI Welcome back to the Rift Summoner! We meet again and this time for the Mid Season Invitational. It was an incredible event and it put lots of ideas in our mind for the World Championship. Who took the trophy home? Who was our MSI winner?

Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s to the MSI that would not be possible without all of you, summoner! Without your support and your cheer, we wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be able to create this event and share this memory with you. We will see next year and 2020 will bring even more memories to share with your friends and favorite team and players!

Sincerely, Riot Games.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

ONE KING TO

rule them all The best region in the world. Unchallenged in Europe and now victorious in Taipei, G2 Esports makes history by winning the 2019 Mid-Season Invitational. It is Europe’s first MSI win and first major international win since Worlds Season 1. Since the dawn of time, NA and EU have been trading jabs at each other anywhere you turn — be it on social media or Twitch chat or in-game, they have relentlessly taunted each other. But the idea of them actually playing in a grand final seemed like the biggest joke of all. The international scene has been dominated by the LCK teams and more recently the LPL teams, but finally, as Kobe said at the start of Game 1, the paradigm has been shifted. They could settle the debate on the Summoner’s Rift. Game 1 showcased the difference in experience on the big stage between these two teams. G2 was a Worlds Semifinalist last year and their biggest roster addition, LEC MVP Caps, was in the Finals. Liquid, led by Doublelift, is in their first knockout stage, period. And though they managed to defeat Invictus Gaming, it seems they were still affected by nerves. G2 managed to blow a couple early flashes from TL, including CoreJJ’s after his bewildering decision to overstay in a forward position. Jankos, Europe’s first blood king, played Jarvan (the best early game jungler at MSI) and followed the Level 1 shenanigans with a successful gank onto bot lane. From there, the Liquid bot lane was repeatedly attacked and repeatedly killed. TL responded by pouring resources to help the lane, including from Impact, but those attempts were thwarted, which meant TL lost everywhere on the map. G2 converted the early wins into a 20 minute Baron and from there demolished Liquid. And, well, it never really got much better for TL. A combination of tilt and mismatch in skill meant that G2 would just run away with the series. Even though Game 2 featured TL in the lead for the majority of the match, it was G2 that still held initiative throughout the game, and it felt like TL was merely responding.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

Eventually a single bad teamfight for G2 completely swung the game wide open, and skirmish after skirmish fell in G2’s favor. Caps on Sylas in particular played maybe the single best of the tournament from anyone, and over and over he seemed to utilize the stolen ults from Kennen and Ashe better than they themselves did. Since the dawn of time, NA and EU have been trading jabs at each other anywhere you turn — be it on social media or Twitch chat or in-game, they have relentlessly taunted each other. But the idea of them actually playing in a grand final seemed like the biggest joke of all. The international scene has been dominated by the LCK teams and more recently the LPL teams, but finally, as Kobe said at the start of Game 1, the paradigm has been shifted. G2 managed to blow a couple early flashes from TL, including CoreJJ’s after his bewildering decision to overstay in a forward position. Jankos, Europe’s first blood king, played Jarvan (the best early game jungler at MSI) and followed the Level 1 shenanigans with a successful gank onto bot lane. From there, the Liquid bot lane was repeatedly attacked and repeatedly killed. TL responded by pouring resources to help the lane, including from Impact, but those attempts were thwarted, which meant TL lost everywhere on the map. G2 converted the early wins into a 20 minute Baron and from there demolished Liquid. And, well, it never really got much better for TL. A combination of tilt and mismatch in skill meant that G2 would just run away with the series. Even though Game 2 featured TL in the lead for the majority of the match, it was G2 that still held initiative throughout the game, and it felt like TL was merely responding. Eventually a single bad teamfight for G2 completely swung the game wide open, and skirmish after skirmish fell in G2’s favor. Caps on Sylas in particular played maybe the single best of the tournament from anyone, and over and over he seemed to utilize the stolen ults from Kennen and Ashe better than they themselves did.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

G2’S EPIC RUN HOW IT HAPPENED Europe shows its dominance with a triumphant MSI run, and a record breaking finals win by G2. Following their LEC Championship win in spring, G2 Esports went on to prove that not only are they the best in Europe, but that they’re the top team in the world. Here’s how they did it at MSI.

G2 BRINGS THE “TOP REGION” TITLE TO EUROPE

The LEC’s finest came out in full force during MSI 2019, wanting to prove that they were the best team that not only Europe, but the world has to offer. The odds were definitely against them: no Western team had won a major since Fnatic won their World Championship back in 2011. While the Eastern teams had been taking World Championships ever since, the gap continued to close, especially after Fnatic made it to the finals in Worlds last year where they faced off against IG and proved that Europe was right on their heels. G2 and Team Liquid faced off in MSI finals in a match that European and North America fans had wanted for years: an old-fashioned Western showdown. G2 showed no signs of stopping as they took down Team Liquid 3-0 in the fastest ever League of Legends best-of-five on the world stage, giving Europe the claim to the top region on the planet.

BEATING THE EAST

G2 Esports made LEC history by hoisting the first ever Spring Split trophy, but their journey was only just beginning. Their win earned them a direct seeded place into the MSI group stage, and what a group stage it was: Invictus Gaming and SK Telecom T1, two of Asia’s most feared League of Legends teams, were amongst their competition, alongside Team Liquid, Flash Wolves and Phong Vũ Buffalo, who all fought their way into the groups. Clearly, a stacked group of competitors, though the LPL’s Invictus Gaming were perhaps the favourites to take home the MSI trophy. What resulted was an intense five days of competition, where G2 would win five and lose five games. G2 won twice against Flash Wolves, overpowered SK Telecom T1 in two games, won and lost against Team Liquid, and faltered to Invictus Gaming and Phong Vũ Buffalo, giving the latter their only two wins in the entire group stage. While Invictus were 9-1 and the favourites to take the competition, it looked like G2’s 5-5 score and third place position would cement them in the middle – but they had other plans entirely, and we’d see them defy expectations on their way to the finals.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

Luck would be on their side, as Invictus Gaming decided to take on Team Liquid – and in a twist of fate, the LCS side would end up taking down China’s fiercest competitors in a thrilling 3-1 finale, potentially setting the stage for an all-Western final. The only thing standing in G2’s way: Korea’s mighty SK Telecom T1. G2 had already beaten SKT in the group stage – could they perform under pressure to take down the LCK titans?

SEMIFINALS: G2 VS SK TELECOM T1

G2 had a tough set ahead of them as they needed to beat SK Telecom T1, easily regarded as one of the top teams in the world, filled with stars like Sanghyeok “Faker” Lee, whose name is always mentioned in any conversation about the best League of Legends player in the world. The team from Europe and the team from South Korea took turns trading blows. The first match went to SKT with a win in roughly 24 minutes. Match two went to G2 after a great performance by Caps on Akali. SKT struck back by taking match three, putting G2 one loss away from missing out on the finals. G2 came away with the match four win after another great performance by Caps on Ryze, going 8-3-5. With the series tied 2-2, everything came down to the final match.

G2 DOMINATES TEAM LIQUID 3-0 TO WIN MSI 2019

The stars seemed to align perfectly for G2 as they didn’t allow TL any breathing room. Match one was over in just roughly 25 minutes as TL couldn’t find a way to stop Perkz’ Xayah from dropping their health bars to zero and only managed to find a total of two kills. Match two only lasted a few minutes longer than the first as G2 took the win in roughly 28 minutes as Caps shined on Sylas. Match three came to an end just 18 minutes in as Team Liquid could do nothing to stop the European onslaught. In record setting fashion, G2 showed the world that they and Europe are a force to be reckoned with. The finals MVP award went to Caps, or as many refer to him, “Baby Faker”.

UPWARDS AND ONWARDS

With the Summer Split recently announced to start on June 7th, the Samurais look to continue their dominance starting in just a few short weeks. G2 looks to be continuously picking up momentum and another great split looks to be in the works. It will be interesting to see who can rise to the occasion and possibly put a stop to the powerhouse that is G2. Whether G2 or another team comes out on top of the LEC next split, it’s safe to say the rest of the world should worry about what’s going on in Europe as the focus now shifts to the road to Worlds.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SEASON 9 > REWORK

MORDEKAISER THE IRON REVENANT

SEASON 9 > REWORK

MORDEKAISER THE IRON REVENANT PASSIVE: DARKNESS RISE

E: DEATHâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S GRASP

Mordekaiser gains a powerful damage aura and movement speed after landing 3 attacks or spells against champions.

Mordekaiser pulls all enemies in an area.

Q: OBLITERATE Mordekaiser smashes the ground with his mace dealing damage to each enemy struck. Damage is increased when hitting a single enemy.

W: INDESTRUCTIBLE Mordekaiser stores damage he deals and takes to create a shield. He may consume the shield to heal.

R: REALM OF DEATH Mordekaiser drags his victim to a different dimension with him and steals a portion of their stats. If he kills them, he keeps the stats until the victim respawns.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

“None can escape me.” 67

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SUMMER

SPLIT 07-06-2019 / 17-08-2019

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

Back to the LEC Welcome back to the Rift Summoner! We had an incrediblr spring split and of course an even more exiting summer split! Do you remember all that happened? Will you cheer one again with your favorite team? Are you ready to re-live one of the greatest rivalry of all time? FNC vs G2. As always, thank you for making this event so special, without you summoner, LEC woudnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t exist!

Thank you all for following our first ever LEC split, we hoped you enjoyed as much as we did and we hope to bring back some good memories for all of you in the following pages! We will see you next year, hoping the 2020 split will bring to you even more memories to share with your friends.

Sincerely, Riot Games and all the LEC team.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SUMMER LEC TEAM EXCEL ESPORTS Top: Daehan "Expect" Ki Jungle: Marc "Caedrel" Lamont Mid: Fabian "Exile" Schubert Bot: Jesper "Jeskla" Stromberg Support: Raymond "kaSing" Tsang HEAD COACH: JOSH "FURNDOG" FURNEAUX

MISFITS GAMING

FNATIC

Top: Paul "sOAZ" Boyer Jungle: Nubar "Maxlore" Sarafian Mid: Fabian "Febiven" Diepstraten Bot: Steven "Hans Sama" Liv Support: Beomhyun "Gorilla" Kang HEAD COACH: JESSE "JESIZ" LE

ORIGEN

G2 ESPORTS

Top: Barney "Alphari" Morris Jungle: Jonas "Kold" Andersen Mid: Erlend "Nukeduck" Holm Bot: Patrik "Patrik" Jiru Support: Alfonso "mithy" Aguirre Rodriguez HEAD COACH: ANDRÉ "GUILHOTO" GUILHOTO

Top: Martin "Wunder" Hansen Jungle: Marcin "Jankos" Jankowski Mid: Rasmus "Caps" Winther Bot: Luka "Perkz" Perkovic Support: Mihael "Mikyx" Mehle HEAD COACH: FABIAN "GRABBZ" LOHMANN

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SPLYCE SCHALKE 04 Top: Andrei "Odoamne" Pascu Jungle: Jonas "Memento" Elmarghichi Mid: Felix "Abbedagge" Braun Bot: Elias "Upset" Lipp Support: Donggeun "Ignar" Lee HEAD COACH: DYLAN FALCO

Top: Tamás "Vizicsacsi" Kiss Jungle: Andrei "Xerxe" Dragomir Mid: Marek "Humanoid" Brázda Bot: Kasper "Kobbe" Kobberup Support: Tore "Norskeren" Hoel Eilertsen HEAD COACH: HADRIEN "DUKE" FORESTIER

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WEEK ONE WHO STARTS

The first week of the LEC Summer Split lived up to the hype but don’t worry if you missed any of the action, we’ve got everyone you need to get back up to speed. Welcome back to another Newsflash, your one-stop shop for everything happening in European League of Legends. The LEC studio opened its doors for the start of the Summer Split last week as the 10 teams looked to pick up some early momentum. Week One brought a sense of fresh hope, some new players and a new champion in Yuumi which all came together to create two exciting days of action. Here are the biggest talking points from the week.

G2 FLEXING IN AND OUT OF GAME

After becoming the first Western team to ever win MSI, G2 have been enjoying the finer things in life. A promotional video released by the team showed the players getting suited up for a limo ride and a nice meal before the LEC while both Martin “Wunder” Hansen and Luka “Perkz” Perkovic turned up to the studio in expensive robes designed by Versace. Some thought that after a gruelling set of international games that G2 may have returned in vacation mode but that was not the case as G2 continued their domination. Splyce may be the kings of the late game but that didn’t matter to G2 who solved that problem by simply finishing the game in just 23 minutes. However, the reigning European champions didn’t have it as easy on day two as they faced off against Origen in a rematch of the Spring final. Both teams were in fine form with ADCs Perkz and Patrik “Patrik” Jiru squaring off in a sensational battle. Patrik’s Ezreal was incredibly hard to take down but in the end even he couldn’t put a stop to Perkz’s Xayah as the Croatian finished the game with a KDA of 15-3-3. With Rift Rivals on the horizon, Perkz will surely be relishing the chance to take on Peter “Doublelift” Peng once again and has already began adding fuel to the fire. Last week, Perkz tweeted the Team Liquid star that he needs to improve his Xayah play and then backed it up on stage. Maybe Doublelift can get some tips by watching Perkz’s perspective with Pro View.

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SUMMER WITH A

BANG?

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GRUDGE MATCH

As if Misfits vs Fnatic was exciting enough, there was a lot of extra motivation for both teams going into the match-up. For starters, there was the rivalry of master vs protege with Paul “sOAZ” Boyer and Gabriel “Bwipo” Rau which played a huge role the last two times these teams met. This was definitely a personal match-up but the duel was interfered in by Mads “Broxah” Brock-Pedersen who had a point to prove of his own. After Fnatic were disappointed with their third-place finish last split, the organisation promoted academy jungler Daniel “Dan” Hockley to the starting team in order to offer the Dane a new perspective but more importantly, competition for his spot. That decision did not go down well with Broxah and you could see he was on a mission as he repeatedly ganked and killed sOAZ in the top lane. Though Bwipo returned the favour later as he stole Baron to swing the game in Fnatic’s favour. After struggling so much at the start of Spring, Fnatic fans will be breathing a sigh of relief that the team got off to a 2-0 start this time around. And things are looking up for Misfits too who despite losing looked much improved from Spring, they’re certainly a team to watch.

CATASTROPHE

This was the first time we could see Yuumi played professionally in Europe and we had to wait as she was perma-banned on day one. However, teams loosened up a bit as both Excel and Vitality played her on day two. Raymond “Kasing” Tsa was reunited with his former bot lane partner Petter “Hjarnan” Freyschuss and they managed to bag themselves a really strong duo of Ezreal and Yuumi against Rogue. Excel managed to accumulate an early lead but weren’t able to execute as Rogue picked up their first win of the Split.

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Meanwhile, Vitality were baited into picking Yuumi on red-side as Splyce had a clear plan of stopping her. Things looked like they were going well for Jakub “Jactroll” Skurzynski who picked up a few early kills as the magical cat though he had to use one of his nine lives when Tore “Noreskeren” Hoel Eilertsen engaged on him as Nautilus. However, Splyce’s true counter to the new champion was Poppy, a champion that Tamas “Vizicsacsi” Kiss has shown proficiency on before. The Hungarian repeatedly stopped Yuumi from dashing back to her team, giving Splyce an easy kill and helping them win a teamfight to push Vitality to the bottom of the standings along with Excel. Maybe Yuumi was a bad luck charm?

A FALSE START

Speaking of Team Vitality, this was not the start they were hoping for. Vitality impressed on the Worlds stage last year with wins over Samsung Galaxy and Royal Never Give Up but the team couldn’t recapture that form in the LEC – bottling a top two finish and performing poorly in the playoffs against Fnatic. Vitality’s style of always fighting is very reminiscent of what we see in the LPL so the team decided to bootcamp with RNG in China in hopes of turning their fortunes around. There was hope that Vitality would be able to bring something different to the league this split but that didn’t appear to be the case as the team lost to both Splyce and Origen.

SEASON 9 > NEW REGIONAL CHAMPION ESPORT

QIYANA

EMPRESS OF THE ELEMENTS

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SEASON 9 > NEW CHAMPION

“Line them up. I will bend their knees” 78

QIYANA

SEASON 9 > NEW CHAMPION

EMPRESS OF THE ELEMENTS PASSIVE: ROYAL PRIVILEGE

W: TERRASHAPE

The first attack or ability against an enemy champ deals bonus damage. This cooldown resets when she draws a new element.

Targeting an element, Qiyana dashes forward to gather its power. While enchanted, she gains movement speed near the element, attack speed, and bonus damage.

Q: EDGE OF IXTAL

E: AUDACITY

Qiyana slashes the area in front of her dealing damage. If her weapon is using an element, her weapon hurls forward as a projectile and explodes.

iyana dashes a fixed distance towards a target, dealing damage to them.

River - Roots opponents on hit. Wall - Deals bonus damage to units with low health. Brush - Leaves a stealth trail that gives movement speed.

R: SUPREME DISPLAY OF TALENT Qiyana creates a shockwave, knocking back enemies. Any River, Brush, or Wall hit by the shockwave then explodes dealing damage and briefly stunning enemies.

SEASON 9 > REGIONAL ESPORT

SPLYCE AIM TO THE TOP IN Splyce have a few new players on the team, but they had a good first split together. How are they meshing as a team, and how are they going to improve even further? Splyce secured a fourth place finish in the LEC Spring Split, ultimately a good result considering the team has brought in a number of new players for the season, including a rookie. Now that the dust has settled and we’re in the calm before the storm of the Summer Split, we asked how the squad has been meshing together so far. “Coaching this group of players has been a great experience so far,” Splyce strategic coach Hadrien “Duke” Forestier tells us. “Exciting on one hand because we knew that we had the potential to surpass all expectations that were made about us before the split which gave us a lot of motivation, and rewarding on the other hand because the players are very receptive to feedback while getting along well together.” Both Kasper “Kobbe” Kobberup and Andrei “Xerxe” Dragomir, the two Splyce veterans, back up their coach’s words and let us know how the new players are settling in. “I really like my teammates,” says Kobbe. “We needed some time in the beginning to mesh together, but since then it has been good. As for the new faces in the team there is Tamás ‘Vizicsacsi’ Kiss, who is probably the most polite and nicest guy I have met, never any bad vibes there. He brings a lot of experience and is the brain behind many of our plays. “Tore ‘Norskeren’ Hoel Eilertsen is a young energetic guy who spreads a good mood around him. He is not as experienced, yet he is a skilled player who is just trying to learn and get better every day so he is also really enjoyable to work with. Marek ‘Humanoid’ Brázda is the least experienced player, so he fits in as the young skilled ‘cocky’ player. But, how he plays the game and talks and how he has evolved already considering it’s his first year is really impressive. Also he has some hilarious comments pretty often.” “Vizicsacsi is the nicest guy I’ve ever met,” says Xerxe, echoing Kobbe’s sentiments. “He never gets angry, he never tilts, he’s always optimistic and positive regardless of how bad the situation looks. Norskeren is really funny, he trolls so hard that he decides not to buy items, even on stage.

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SLINGSHOT TO SUMMER “Humanoid is really talented, he has really good mechanics and knows when to be aggressive. I was really surprised by this quality, usually rookies need some time to adjust, but not him, he goes on stage and he plays without a worry.” From an outside perspective, it appears Splyce has a happy atmosphere, even on the rare occasion where things don’t go according to plan. Coach Duke had a lot of positive things to say about all of the players he works with every day as well. “Norskeren is always positive, even when things are going bad in trainings. He was very raw coming into the team but has been very receptive to any types of feedback. “Despite being the veteran of the team, Kobbe is still very hard working and eager to improve every day. He meshed really well with Norskeren which I think changed his approach towards training. Kobbe knows he has what it takes to be the best AD in Europe and does everything to reach that status. “Humanoid was a bit hard to work with at the beginning as he had to adapt to being a top professional players without much preparation. We quickly noticed that the effort we put in him should be rewarded in the end after witnessing how good he can be individually. His ceiling might be one of the highest if not the highest I have ever witnessed. “We have a lot of trust in Xerxe, who had to take a more important role in shotcalling this split. He impressed us by growing a lot as a player and as a person, endorsing responsibilities and always being open to criticism considering his role is always the one receiving the most feedback. He still has a lot of room to improve but he is on the right path while already one of the best junglers in the league. “Csacsi is a special player who works a lot on confidence and also relies on the confidence he feels from his teammates towards him. Despite having a rough early split because of health issues leading to him being sent to hospital, we worked a lot together to bring him back to his top level for playoffs. “Csacsi might be the easiest player to work with as a coach, always open to any discussion and happy to go into details all the time. After a few weeks he established himself as a calm leader of a really young team, which is exactly what we need from him. The other players started to respect him more and more which I think gave him confidence to push himself even more, while also making him happier in general which is a big factor for us as a group.” While Splyce has been a team known for picking scal-

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ing champions and looking to their AD Carry to lead them to victory, new players on the team mean a new Splyce style is emerging. Both Kobbe and Xerxe are proud of the way they have been able to evolve and experiment with the way they play the game. Xerxe in particular has been impressed by how his strong solo lanes have relieved some of the pressure and his role, and given him something to play around. Of course, the season wasn’t perfect. Duke knows that after a good early game Splyce could often be indecisive in the mid-game.“In summer we just have to continue our growth and work on all aspects of our gameplay,” says Duke. “Of course mid-game should be our primary focus, but there is a lot to work on basically everywhere. Player-wise nothing needs to change, but we might implement new coaching approaches depending on the issues we face as we have been doing during the Spring Split.” That all comes down to practice. Splyce has a six day work week during the regular season, with Sunday as the rest day. From Monday to Thursday, the team will come together at the office to scrim, usually in two blocks of around three games, with a gap in between and after where they’ll do tactical analysis and review. Outside of that, the players will be in solo queue, getting ready for game days on Friday and Saturday. Everyone has a different routine for matchday. Some will be warming up by playing a few games, while others prefer to not play at all in order to stay fresh. Right now though, the team is gearing up for the next split, and the road to the World Championship. Kobbe and Norskeren are headed to South Korea for a bootcamp, while everyone else is putting their own hard work in to get ready. “We just have to keep working on what we already established and make sure to find more consistency in our play as a team, while trying to develop new strategies and see how we can play the game more optimally,” Kobbe tells us. “That’s pretty much what you have to do, just try to work harder than the others, and in the end it might pay off. I think for Spring Split we weren’t far off the other teams, except G2 who were miles ahead of everyone. But Summer Split should be more competitive if teams like Misfits and Schalke live up to their potential, with the calibre of players they have.” “What we really lacked in Spring was experience and direction,” says Xerxe. “But after the split ended, all of us realised how far we’ve gotten and how much we’ve improved since the beginning.

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“So for next split, all we have to do is practice even better and put in more effort. Easy.” 83

SEASON 9 > WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

SEASON 9 > RIFT RIVALS

NA VS EU RIFT RIV This year's Rift Rivals has been fairly lopsided so far, with EU dominating day one but NA making some upsets on day two. Today, the teams fought in a best-of-five relay race series. Essentially, each team will play at least one game in the series, and the first region with three wins takes home the trophy. Because the EU representative won more group stage games, NA had to blindly declare who would play the first three games. EU, in turn, was able to counter pick and match their teams in whatever matchups they favored. But in game four both teams were blind picked. The games had some crazy compositions and certainly delivered the excitement fans wanted in the end!

ROUND 1: FNATIC VS CLOUD9

Fnatic ("FNC") chose to play against Cloud9 ("C9") in the first match of the day. It worked out very well for them as they devastated the C9 roster without their main ADC player. Broxah, as he is known to do, dominated the early game to get his solo lanes far ahead of their opponents. He first ganked for Nemesis mid, picking himself up First Blood in the process. Soon after, Bwipo solo killed Licorice's Jax in the top lane, and though he paid his life for it, a Broxah gank got him a second kill. From here, FNC took the Rift Herald, the First Tower bonus and two skirmish victories. C9 showed a couple of glimmers of hope in the mid-game though. They turned around a mid lane play to get two kills and found two more from a bottom lane play. It was good to see them fight back, but FNC shut them back down. Bwipo solo killed Nisqy in the top lane, then won a big team fight at 23 minutes. After winning the fight, FNC went to Baron and claimed the buff. FNC, empowered with the Baron, first sieged the bottom lane. They knocked down the Inhibitor Tower then engaged onto C9. A long fight resulted in an Ace for FNC, a Nexus kill and the first win in the series for EU.

ROUND 2: TEAM SOLOMID VS ORIGEN

Origen ("OG") decided to play Team SoloMid ("TSM") in the second match of the day. They achieved success too, defeating the NA representatives rather handily. TSM practically donated First Blood over to Patrik when they invaded at level one and were collapsed on. This game wasn't explosive, but OG was able to take towers and neutral objectives to build a lead. Through

SEASON 9 > RIFT RIVALS

ALS 2019

rift rivals 2019

SEASON 9 > RIFT RIVALS

pressure, they took the First Tower bonus in the bottom lane, stole a Rift Herald and killed a few dragons. There were a few kills for both teams, but not too many overall. This was until 17 minutes. At this point, TSM tried to make a play in the bottom lane but OG was ready. OG killed three and lost none of their own, and took two towers and a Mountain Dragon. TSM managed to play defensively in the proceeding minutes, but eventually OG picked off Grig and took the Baron buff. This Baron was used very effectively by OG and they knocked down multiple towers and even some Inhibitors. TSM tried to defend with spread out fights but they couldn't stop EU from claiming their second Nexus and bringing NA to match point.

ROUND 3: G2 ESPORTS VS TEAM LIQUID

This third match was a rematch of the MSI Finals, but unlike that series Team Liquid ("TL") took the win over G2 Esports ("G2"). They did so by repeatedly attacking the middle lane and utilizing the synergy between Gragas and Yasuo. Jensen did die twice in the first few minutes due to Jankos ganks, but then Xmithie decided to gank mid. It was a great decision. He made a ton of plays around Jensen and got him very fed. While this was happening, Impact was winning his lane against Wunder and even solo killed him at one point. TL's bottom lane was scaling and was in a strong spot in the mid-game. At 25 minutes TL furthered their lead by killing the bottom lane of G2. This allowed them to secure the Baron for themselves, which they used to take the middle Inhibitor in the next few minutes. After the buff expired there was a bit of a lull as TL sieged and G2 defended their base. TL used their advantageous position to put a good deal of pressure on G2's base and jungle, which they used to take another Baron buff. This time TL focused on the top lane. Soon a team fight erupted and TL absolutely smashed G2. They killed four members before retaking the middle Inhibitor and claiming the first Nexus for NA in the series.

ROUND 4: TEAM SOLOMID VS FNATIC

FNC defeated TSM to win this series, and the entire Rift Rivals tournament, for EU. It was a convincing win and started in the middle lane. A 2v2 mid resulted in First Blood for Nemesis' Veigar and he applied a decent amount of pressure from that. There were a couple more skirmishes that were quite close, but FNC pulled ahead most of the time. Though Broken Blade was commanding the top lane, Bwipo solo killed him at 12 minutes and instantly became a menace. FNC furthered their lead with a Dragon take and the First Tower bonus as well. The game was desperate for TSM moving into the mid-game. It showed how doomed they were at 15 minutes, as Bwipo killed Grig in a 1v2, though he did still fall to Broken Blade in the end. There were a couple more objectives takes before FNC seriously started looking for Baron. At 22 minutes FNC engaged onto TSM and killed three members and this gave them access to the buff. After backing and regrouping FNC pushed down mid. They destroyed multiple TSM members as they rampaged through their base and finally blasted their Nexus to win bragging rights for EU. So, with that, EU >NA.

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CAN ANYONE BEAT G2 have proven themselves as the best team in the world and sets the tone for a very competitive LEC summer split. They’ve taken the Spring LEC title, the MSI title, and look to continue their run in the summer. Who, if anyone, can step up and stop G2?

THE TEAM TO BEAT

It took a trip halfway around the world to prove but, make no mistake, G2 are definitely the team to beat this year. After coming away with the Championship in the Spring Split against Origen, the boys in black and white continued to show their dominance at MSI. They managed to take down many of the top teams in the world prior to facing off against Team Liquid in the finals, where they won in record-setting fashion. As if the competition wasn’t fierce enough in Europe, every other team will be wanting to take down the team that not only sits at the top of their region, but at the top of the world. Excel Esports, FC Schalke 04, Fnatic, Misfits Gaming, Origen, Rogue, SK Gaming, Splyce, and Team Vitality all have their eyes set on taking down the World Champions and claiming their spot at the top of the LEC.

A TEAM OF ALL-STARS; INDIVIDUALLY AND AS A GROUP

CEO Carlos ‘ocelote’ Rodriguez and the rest of the G2 staff have without-adoubt, put together one of the best League of Legends teams in the history of the game. G2 are no strangers to being at the top. They’ve taken numerous Premier championships in years past, led by team veteran Luka ‘Perkz’ Perković. Perkz has been with the team since 2015 and has been one of the staples in what makes the team so great. The midlaner gone ADC has proven that he is one of the best players in the game and is continuously improving his gameplay and leadership abilities. Over two years of roster moves came and went before the next current G2 members came aboard. In December of 2017, Wunder and Jankos came over in the top and jungle roles. Caps (or “Baby Faker”) came over from Fnatic and Mikyx joined from Misfits. Caps coming aboard meant that Perkz had to switch over to the ADC role, which in hindsight proved an inspired decision. Caps became the first player to win back to back MVP awards for two different teams and added another MVP award to that list recently at MSI. While it’s not always a guarantee that a roster full of top tier players will produce a top tier team, the boys of G2 have an incredible chemistry amongst every single member. As a relatively young team, the only way to go is up. The other teams of the LEC better have put a lot of work in during the offseason to have a chance at putting a stop to the well-oiled machine that is G2.

G2?

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WHO CAN TAKE G2 DOWN?

Fnatic – One of the oldest and most recognizable teams in League of Legends looks to bounce back after an impressive spring showing. With a final record of 11-7, they were only finally stopped by Origen in the semi-finals, losing 1-3. In a recent interview, Fnatic toplaner Bwipo told us about the issues the team had during the split. Time will tell if those issues were worked on during the offseason. Splyce – After an 11-7 season, their playoff run came to an end in a 1-3 loss against Fnatic, placing them in fourth. With a relatively new team composition, it was definitely an impressive showing. With a whole split of experience now under their belt and an offseason to prepare, Splyce are looking to come back even stronger. Misfits – While the team didn’t have the performance they hoped for and expected in the Spring Split, there’s no doubt they will be coming back strong. A coaching change and team delegation issues were a couple notable contributing factors to the team’s performance. Coach Moose plans to work on team synergy and implement an aggressive roster substitution system to keep roster spots competitive. Rogue – Rogue ended up in last place during spring, which means they above all teams want to come back the strongest. With the recent departure of Wadid and the addition of Selfie, it’ll be exciting to see how the roster change will affect their summer performance. Team Vitality – After an impressive split performance, their playoff run was cut off early by Fnatic. Team Vitality were looking like a potential top three team during the early weeks of spring. They look to bounce back under their great roster, including the promising jungler Mowgli who was brought over from Afreeca Freecs of the LCK.

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SK Gaming – The roster announced just last year came out with a strong showing in the inaugural LEC split, finishing at 10-9. A recent roster change saw Sacre coming up from SK’s academy team, replacing Werlyb. Perhaps this is the change that the team needs to push them into summer playoffs. Origen – The team that had a shot at taking the Championship title instead of G2. Origen are planning on coming back with the same roster for summer as they believe working with the same group is the best choice, rather than looking into frequent roster moves. Can the second place team take that first place spot this split? Schalke 04 – The team out of Germany had an impressive 9-10 performance during the spring split. A few close matches were the difference in missing out on their shot at playoffs. A team that definitely had top three potential in the spring has recently brought on a new performance manager, Emilie Farnir, as an extra measure in preparing for the next split. Excel – With a final record of 5-13 in the Spring Split, a lack of experience and visa issues were some things that attributed to the team’s missed chance at making playoffs. The team’s rookies have a full split under their belt and the team is now settled in their new house and training facility, which should prove for some great League play from them during the Summer Split.

SEASON 9 > TEAMFIGHT TACTICS

TEAMFIGHT TACTICS TFT is a round-based strategy game that pits you against seven opponents in a free-for-all race to build a powerful team that fights on your behalf. Your goal: Be the last person standing.

HOW IT WORKS

You’ll spend gold in the store before each round to recruit League champions to your team. Throughout the game, your team will become more powerful as you draft champions that share origins and classes to unlock trait bonuses. Additionally, you can combine three duplicates of the same champ to upgrade them into a super version of themselves, and combine three supers to create the ultimate version. Your team will then travel to an opponent’s board (or they will come to you) and a battle will unfold. During combat, your champions will move, attack, and cast spells automatically. Just like in League, you’ll need to choose a team comp and position your champs wisely to unlock their full potential. At the end of each round you’ll earn gold to spend in future rounds. Occasionally, everyone will gather for a special event and draft from a single line-up of champions of varying strengths. Players will pick in the reverse order of their current standing, giving the players falling behind the chance to make a comeback. Win teamfights consistently to avoid losing health and deal damage to your opponents. Outlast everyone else to win, and don’t forget to spam your emotes along the way.

INTRODUCING LITTLE LEGENDS

With the introduction of Teamfight Tactics, we’re excited to bring a whole new personalization option to League: Little Legends. These critters will be your avatar in TFT, dancing, emoting, animating, and generally showing off. After your first few games, you’ll unlock your first LL just by playing. If you’re not yet smitten with these Little Legends, expect more varieties with each patch, just like skins. Additionally, for those of you who want your to really pop we’ll feature Rare LL Eggs, purchasable for 490 RP. Rare Eggs contain special variants of those same species, with an added twist: hatching a variant you’ve already found will make them star up just like the champions in TFT, powering up their models and effects. Once a variant has reached its third level, it will not drop from future Rare Eggs you open.

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SUMMER FINALE

ATHENS 2019

G2 ESPORTS CROWNED LEC SUMMER CHAMPIONS Everywhere you look in the Greek capital, there are signs of Athens’ rich history. However, the city witnessed a new era born as the LEC’s first Summer Split champion was crowned live in front of over 7,500 screaming fans. It was a battle between Europe’s most decorated teams, G2 Esports and Fnatic. Both have already qualified for this year’s League of Legends World Championship, both have tasted success on the international stage but both still have something to prove. Last year’s Worlds finalists versus this year’s MSI champions: this series was purely about proving who is the best. Last week’s dress rehearsal was a phenomenal five game series which ended with a G2 reverse sweep and the grand finale was no less dramatic. Here’s how it all went down.

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GAME 1 It did not take long for the action to start, there were sevens kills in the first three minutes with an extended fight in the bot-lane and finished with multiple teleports with Fnatic taking First Blood and an extra kill. There was more blood shed before 10 minutes; most impressive was a 1v1 between Martin “Wunder” Hansen and Gabriël “Bwipo” Rau which went down to the wire, but it was the Fnatic pro who came out on top, much to the delight of the majority of fans in the Nikos Galis Olympic Indoor Hall. The Fnatic chants during the opening ceremony were deafening and the team appeared to ride that wave of adrenaline to secure a small early lead. That advantage was extended when Rasmus “Caps” Winther was caught out by his former teammates which allowed Fnatic to pick up the Baron buff without any trouble. G2 had locked in Pyke first as the support was hotly contested between both teams, but it turned out Zdravets “Hylissang” Galabov already had an answer with a surprise Leona pick and he was controlling the game. A flash away denied Mihael “Mikyx” Mehle’s reset and won Fnatic a big skirmish, before the Bulgarian returned from base just in time to save Martin “Rekkles” Larsson from Caps. Rekkles picked up multiple kills while Fnatic stormed the base and destroyed G2’s Nexus as the roof of the arena almost came unhinged. Game one: Fnatic.

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GAME 2 With the crowd firmly behind Fnatic, it felt like G2 needed to put a quick stop to Fnatic’s momentum. The Spring champions decided top was the weakness they could target: Bwipo’s overaggressive Flash meant he could not escape Summer MVP Marcin “Jankos” Jankowski’s gank before Wunder then picked up yet another kill on his top-lane opponent just minutes later. The arena is used to seeing slam dunks from the Panathinaikos Basketball team, but this time it was Jankos with the impressive alley oop as Caps’ Sylas managed to steal Mads “Broxah” Brock-Pedersen’s Gragas ultimate to fling Tim “Nemesis” Lipovšek into tower, setting up Jankos for the double kill en-route to his 1000th LEC kill. However, the Polish jungler’s hard work was undone when all of his accumulated bounty gold was donated over to Rekkles’ fearsome Xayah, giving Fnatic a lifeline. It looked like Fnatic would come back into the game when fancy footwork kept Nemesis alive and baited Caps to his death. Yet, G2 miraculously managed to find an ace in the resulting 4v5 teamfight which eventually snowballed into their victory. Game two: G2.

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GAME 3 After a very one-sided defeat in Game 2, Fnatic decided a level one invade was the answer they needed to bounce back. However, the attempted red steal ended in disaster as the buff went on to Luka “Perkz” Perković which then helped Jankos kill his jungle opponent Broxah for First Blood. On his signature Tristana pick, Rekkles masterfully jumped deep into G2’s arms before hopping away to safety. Fnatic began rolling once again as Nemesis and Broxah were stepping up. The latter was monstrous on Jax once again and proved to be a menace in a team fight around Drake, picking up a double kill while tanking most of G2’s damage to give his team a huge gold lead. Fnatic had the lead but were struggling to finish the game. But the breaking point was the following dance around Elder Dragon as Fnatic found an engage from the Fog of War to pick up a couple of kills, the Dragon and Baron to take one step closer to match point. G2 defended their base valiantly but could not save their Nexus. Game three: Fnatic.

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GAME 4 GAME 4 It was do or die time for G2, but they got off to an awful start. Broxah managed to sneak out of Jankos’ vision to set-up Bwipo for First Blood on Wunder, while Rekkles simultaneously found a kill onto Mikyx in the bot-lane. All eyes were on Caps, who had not quite performed to his extremely high standards so far this series, but his teammates managed to set him up for success with a beautifully orchestrated dive on Bwipo in the top-lane. The Danish midlaner appeared to be the missing link for the reigning MSI champions, as Caps was finally online. During a duel with Nemesis, Mikyx offered his lantern but there was no way the G2 superstar was backing out of the fight; he dived even deeper instead and secured the kill. There was immense pressure on G2’s shoulders but they showed no sign of crumbling. Instead, it was Fnatic who fell apart as Rekkles made a rare mistake. The black and orange botlaner appeared to have caught out Wunder, but Rekkles miscalculated and jumped away assuming the toplaner would die to Ignite. The Swedish ADC shortly fell to the rest of G2 who then had advantage over Baron, which was just five seconds away from spawning. G2 were setting the tempo for the game and were expertly finding kills around objectives, though Fnatic made them work extremely hard to earn Baron buff. Caps and Perkz were both sat on massive bounties as G2 decisively charged Fnatic’s base, and obliterated the Nexus as the crowd broke out into G2 chants for the first time. Just like the previous week, Silver Scrapes was queued up and this series was going to five games. Game four: G2.

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GAME 5 This was the first time a European final had gone to five games since Fnatic vs Origen in Summer 2015 – a series that is largely considered by many as the greatest in European history. The last time G2 were pushed this far in a bestof-five was at MSI against Korean powerhouses SK Telecom T1. And it paid off as the chained crowd control with Mikyx’s Thresh set-up Perkz for First Blood. Bwipo found an impressive solo-kill of his own in the top-lane and Rekkles managed to survive a 3v1 tower dive and kill Jankos. G2 still had a 1,000 gold lead, but once again Athens was being treated to yet another back and forth match. When a double teleport from Fnatic resulted in three kills for G2, the scales seemed to be tipping in their favour. Yet, Fnatic held on and found a perfect teamfight in the top-lane and earned two kills just as Baron spawned. It looked like Fnatic had found their perfect opportunity as Bwipo and Hylissang caught Jankos trying to solo Infernal Drake with little health. However, the black and orange team took too long waiting for Jankos to spawn from his Guardian Angel and that allowed G2 to collapse and find a huge fight which resulted in a lot of damage to Fnatic’s base. The Syndra pick by Perkz was proving to be a crucial component of the entire game. He found multiple picks to secure Baron, to secure Fnatic’s base – and to secure G2 a monumental victory. Jankos fell to the ground in celebration while Rekkles could not hold back the tears. This outstanding final took everything out of all 10 players: it was a miracle that G2 had enough energy to lift the trophy. Game five, and Summer champion: G2 Esports.

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SUMMER SPLIT MVP He’s won two splits, Rift Rivals and the Mid-Season Invitational. He was named 2019 LEC Summer MVP. He’s even reached the semi-finals of Worlds three times (and with two different teams no less), a feat matched only by two other European players in competitive League of Legends (xPeke and sOAZ). He’s only the second player in European history to reach 1,000 kills after Martin ‘Rekkles’ Larsson. The jungler, known for his risky, aggressive play, first made his mark in the EU LCS with a freshly arrived ROCCAT squad in 2014, making the playoffs at the first attempt. A two year stint with H2k Gaming followed before he was scouted for the jungle berth on G2 at the end of 2017. Signing for G2 at the same time as top-laner Martin ‘Wunder’ Hansen, the pair have for the last two years formed the core of a squad that, after 12 months playing second fiddle in Europe to Fnatic, were resurgent at the start of 2019, with successive Spring and Summer split wins as well as that MSI title. Is there any more space on the trophy shelf?

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ALL PRO SUMMER

This LEC Summer Split, the best team was made simply made up of the best players. The panel of players, on-air talent, coaches, and media members submitted their votes for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd All-LEC teams, and the results for first-team are pretty spectacular. Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s most impressive about this G2 lockdown is the difference in votes, as a couple of players doubled the number of voting points that their positional piers in the second team got, and all five G2 players received top honors by a landslide. According to the records, this first team domination has only happened once before, back in 2015 when the LEC was known as EU LCS. That summer, the entirety of Fnatic locked down the first all-Pro team, as part of their historic 18-0 split that led to a championship.

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TEAM 2019 SPLIT

MARTIN “WUNDER” HANSEN - TOP MARCIN “JANKOS” JONKOWSKI - JUNGLE RASMUS “CAPS” WINTHER - MID LUKA “PERKZ” PERKOVIC - ADC MIHAEL “MIKYX” MEHLE - SUPPORT

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PANTHEON THE UNBREAKABLE SPEAR

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PANTHEON THE UNBREAKABLE SPEAR PASSIVE: MORTAL WILL

R: GRAND STARFALL

After five basic attacks or ability casts, Pantheonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s next basic ability (Q, W, or E) is empowered.

Pantheon leaps into the air and then hurtles back toward a target location, damaging enemies as he passes through. Mortal Will activates immediately when he lands.

Q: COMET SPEAR Tap: Pantheon strikes in a direction, damaging all enemies in a line. Hold: Pantheon throws his spear in a line. Empowered: Enemies take extra damage and are slowed.

W: SHIELD VAUL Pantheon leaps to a target enemy, dealing damage and stunning them. Empowered: Pantheonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s next basic attack hits three times, each at reduced damage.

E: AEGIS ASSAULT Pantheon sets his shield in a direction, gaining invulnerability to damage from enemies in that direction and dealing damage continuously. The last hit is extra powerful and still activates if E is canceled early. Empowered: Aegis Assault lasts longer.

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“My name is Soldier. By my spear they will know war.” 113

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LEAGUE OF LEGENDS

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10 Years Celebration

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EVERY GAME ANNO 10TH ANNIVERSARY In the span of a one-hour livestream Riot Games went from a one-trick pony to a Marvel Cinematic Universe. Celebrating League of Legends tenth anniversary, Riot came in swinging with a special edition of its Riot Pls show where it revealed what's coming not only to League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics, but also unveiled a fighting game, a tactical FPS, a card game, a esports management simulator, an animated TV series, and what looks like an action RPG set in the LoL universe. Oh, and mobile versions for both League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics.

RIOT IS MAKING A LEAGUE OF LEGENDS FIGHTING GAME?

We all knew this one was coming ever since Riot bought up EVO cofounder Tom Cannon's indie studio and their cool prototype Rising Thunder a few years ago. Earlier this year, Tom Cannon said he was still working on a fighting game with Riot, but during the livestreamed celebration Riot finally confirmed what we wall wanted to know: Would it be set in the same universe as League of Legends? The answer is yes. All we know right now is that it’s codenamed Project L and that Tom Cannon and the team making it will be “going dark” and that players shouldn’t expect “anything soon.” But the brief footage we did see showed Ahri and Darius battling it out in a desert—not exactly indicative of what’s to come but cool nonetheless. With 140 champions in LoL, I can’t imagine all of them are going to make it into Project L, but I certainly hope the innovative combat of Rising Thunder will still be there. That game was great.

AND RIOT IS ALSO MAKING A TACTICAL MULTIPLAYER FPS?

This we did not see coming. Codenamed Project A (VALORANT), this FPS sounds a lot like a more cartoony version of Rainbow Six Siege thanks, in part, to its emphasis on character abilities and highly lethal gunplay. During the livestream, executive producer Anna Donlon made a big show about how Project A (VALORANT) was going to solve long-standing issues with FPSes like lag and cheating and that Riot was building Project A (VALORANT) to push the technical boundaries of FPSes forward. It all sounded very ambitious. What’s wild, though, is that Project A (VALORANT) isn’t set in the League of Legends universe but will be a whole new setting based on a “near-future Earth.” Like the fighting game, there wasn’t too much to show and the team will be going dark after this reveal to continue working on it. So don’t expect Project A (VALORANT) anytime soon.

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UNCED AT RIOTâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S LIVESTREAM

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AND A CARD GAME?

Yup. A mother-flippin' card game. I mean, at this point Riot's hit pretty much every other genre—why should it leave out the one where ill-fated spin-offs go to die? I might sound cynical, but Legends of Runeterra is actually really appealing. Instead of going for mind-numbing complexity like Artifact, Legends of Runeterra wants to be even more accessible than Hearthstone, and it's ditching all those nasty microtransactions to boot. Instead of gambling on expensive booster packs, you can just buy cards directly for either real money or in-game currency earned through playing. And after reading through our hands-on preview, it sounds like Legends of Runeterra has some interesting ideas up its sleeve too. Plus it's also set in the League of Legends universe. Talk about brand synergy!

OKAY THAT’S SERIOUSLY IT, THOUGH, RIGHT?

Ha, you wish. If you kept a close eye on the stream and didn’t blink, there was one other game that Riot teased but didn’t talk about directly. A press release sent after the show says this little game is called Project F and it’s a “project that explores the possibilities of traversing the world of Runeterra with your friends.” What that looks like from the short clip we saw was a multiplayer action RPG. Considering how alike games like Diablo are to MOBAs, that makes perfect sense. Aside from the gameplay clip, we know nothing—but I hope this is Riot taking a swing at something akin to a Marvel Ultimate Alliance meets League of Legends. Punching bad guys with four friends as our favorite champions sounds rad.

OH GOD, DON’T TELL ME THERE’S STILL MORE…

There is, but that covers all of the new game announcements. In addition to all of that, Riot also revealed a gorgeous trailer for its upcoming animated TV series called Arcane. It’s also set in the League of Legends universe but will shed light on the backstory of a few of its most iconic champions like Jinx. Its set in the utopian city of Piltover and Zaun, the seedy underbelly that exists below it. Again, we don’t know much beyond what was shown in the trailer, but Arcane looks awesome. Riot’s new champion trailers have always been a treat and this entire series is being developed inhouse instead of being outsourced to a different studio. I’m excited to see how it all comes together.

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WHAT ABOUT THE MOBILE VERSIONS OF LOL AND TFT?

Those are both coming in 2020 but you can pre-register now. For Teamfight Tactics, its mobile version will have cross-play with the PC and be mostly the same game except for, y’know, on a phone. League of Legends, however, is getting an entirely new game called Wild Rift that’s the classic MOBA reimagined for phones and consoles. Though it’ll look and feel mostly the same, there are some key differences to consider. Matches will be considerably shorter, for example, lasting only around 15 to 20 minutes and there will be a smaller selection of cosmetics at first. It probably goes without saying but Wild Rift will not have any cross-play with the PC version of League of Legends since they’re basically two different games. Sadly, your account won’t transfer over either so you’ll need to rebuy skins and characters if you want to play both versions.

TEAMFIGHT TACTICS AND LEAGUE OF LEGENDS ?

Aside from the mobile version, TFT is getting a complete refresh with a new set of champions, items, synergies, and abilities. Summoners and Mystics will be joining as new classes, and champions like Lux, Annie, and Olaf will be in the fray. What’s cool is that Riot has committed to releasing these new sets every few months, so TFT’s best strategies will always be changing and evolving. Regarding League of Legends a new chamption will released soon: Senna! We can’t wait to see what other champions come to life in the near future, maybe some of them will already be known by the players (who knows?)

SEASON 9 > WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

2019

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP 02-10-2019 / 10-11-2019

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Welcome to WORLDS Welcome back to the Rift Summoner! Like every year we hold the global competition for the title of “League of Legends World Champion“ also this year we organized the the World Championship and it was held in EUROPE! Are you exited to join us in another important part of our 2019 and remember all the great plays done by your favorite players? Are you ready to see again every win and defeat and remember the emotion you felt? Are you ready to cheer again for your favorite team and remember how great they were on the big stage? If the answer to these question are yes, then come, turn the page and see what happened in this great event. Here’s to the World Championship that would not be possible without all of you, summoner! Without your support and your cheer, we wouldn’t be able to create this event and share this memory with you.

Sincerely, Riot Games.

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LOUIS VUITTON JOINS WORLDS

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For the 2019 World Championship, Louis Vuitton is creating, in collaboration with Riot, an unprecedented, one-of-a-kind Trophy Travel Case to hold the Summoner’s Cup, the trophy awarded to the world champions and considered the most prestigious prize in esports. Louis Vuitton has previously created similar trunks to support the FIFA World Cup, the Rugby World Cup, and sailing’s America’s Cup. The bespoke trunk, the first of its kind for an esports championship, will feature both traditional Louis Vuitton savoir-faire along with cutting-edge, high-tech elements inspired by the League of Legends universe. Louis Vuitton and Riot Games also will soon announce unique champion skins and a capsule collection designed by Nicolas Ghesquière, Louis Vuitton’s Artistic Director of Women’s collections, along with other League of Legend digital assets. Since 1854, Louis Vuitton has brought unique designs to the world, combining innovation with style, always aiming for the finest quality. Today, the House remains faithful to the spirit of its founder, Louis Vuitton, who invented a genuine “Art of Travel” through luggage, bags and accessories which were as creative as they were elegant and practical. Since then, audacity has shaped the story of Louis Vuitton. Faithful to its heritage, Louis Vuitton has opened its doors to architects, artists and designers across the years, all the while developing disciplines such as ready-to-wear, shoes, accessories, watches, jewellery, and fragrance. These

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carefully created products are testament to Louis Vuitton’s commitment to fine craftsmanship. “We are honored to have Louis Vuitton as an official partner with designs to impact the look, feel, and prestige of our most prominent League of Legends event,” says Naz Aletaha, Head of Global Esports Partnerships at Riot Games. “This is a historic partnership that speaks to the impact Riot Games and League of Legends has had on the industry over the past nine esports seasons. We welcome the LV brand to our sport and we

are eager to share the entire scope of the partnership in the months ahead, in particular on November 10 when the Summoner’s Cup is awarded in Paris.” “The League of Legends World Championship is not only the climax of the tournament: it’s where the world of sports and entertainment come together in celebration of new legends to be born”, says Michael Burke, Chairman and CEO of Louis Vuitton. “Louis Vuitton has long been associated with the world’s most coveted trophies, and here we are today, alongside the Summoner’s Cup. We are thrilled to be part of such an iconic event.”

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WORLDS 2019

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GROUP STAGE

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PHOENIX

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CAILIN RUSSO & CHRISSY COSTANZA

PHOENIX Dear Summoners, We heard you and we know you loved last year’s song. We teamed up with other great artist to bring you another great song to remember this event. We hope you liked it as we did making it. We love to bring you new song and as for last year we have had an incredible surprise we wanted to share with you. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to relieve it in this magazine and hopefully it will bring back all the emotions you felt by seeing it and listening to it (we don’t want to spoil anything!)

We hoped you enjoyd the video and the song, Phoenix and who knew in the end the phoenix rised from their ashes! What an incredible ride it has been, don’t you agree? We can say this! We hope next year world will be even more incredible and we have a lot we are working on just for you, we want to bring an experience you will never forget!

Hoping you will still be with us, enjoying the songs and the events, we hope to see you in the next year pages, remembering another great song!

Sincerely, Riot Games.

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EUROPE MAKES HISTORY IN THE GROUP STAGES There was plenty for the European crowd to be proud of as all three of the LEC seeds impressed in the Group Stage. To the delight of the European fans in attendance, League of Legends Worlds history was made in Berlin’s Verti Music Hall. For the first time ever, all three of Europe’s seeds have made it through to the knockout stage as G2 Esports, Fnatic and Splyce all secured second-seed finishes in their respective groups. The best-of-ones phase of the tournament did not disappoint with breathtaking matches, incredible plays and a handful of surprise results. Before we move on to Madrid, let’s relive the thrilling last two weeks of games which had leaping fans out of their seats.

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GROUP A: G2ND SEED

As the Mid-Season Invitational and LEC champions, G2 Esports came into Worlds as one of the favourites to lift the Summoner’s Cup. Yet, European fans were holding their breath during the Group Stage as G2 historically have struggled in the early stage. G2 were far from their best, however, as the players seemingly took it in turns in making individual mistakes. Yet, G2’s players turned it around, and whoever was struggling was easily covered by the other four, and that helped them cruise to a 5-1 finish overall, with only losses to Griffin. There were similar questions over the LCK side, however, who topped the regular season of both LCK Splits this year but managed to choke in the Spring and Summer Playoff finals. But Griffin’s performances in the second half of the Groups has removed any doubt over the LCK second-seeds: this is a team that can win Worlds. The way Griffin easily disposed of Cloud9 and G2 was terrifying, and at their peak, there may not be a team in the world who can stop Griffin. With the quality of the top two in Group A, you have to feel for Cloud9 who simply didn’t have enough to progress. The organisation are usually North America’s saviours at Worlds but couldn’t help this year, failing to progress through the Group Stage for the first time since 2015. Coincidently, both times C9 were eliminated Worlds was held in Europe.

GROUP B: GROUP OF SPLYCE

In perhaps the most open group in Worlds history, Group B was dubbed the ‘Group of Life’ by fans, as Splyce were offered a fantastic chance to reach the knockout stages for the first time in the organisation’s history. After a shaky journey through the Play-Ins, nobody could have predicted just how hot Splyce would get heading into Week 2. The LEC team were flying with wins over J Team, GAM Esports, and most impressively, China’s first-seeds, FunPlus Phoenix. Tamás “Vizicsacsi” Kiss had to wait 1,696 days and 335 pro games to finally step onto the Worlds stage and he made his chance count with a remarkable performance on Cho’Gath to take down the LPL champions. Splyce survived a tricky tie with Vietnam’s GAM to secure their place in the quarterfinals, but there was work still to be done. They had to face Phoenix one more time in a tiebreaker to decide who would secure the all-import first-seed finish. Superstar mid-laner Kim “Doinb” Tae-sang was also at his first World Championship and as the face of FunPlus, you can only keep him down for so long. Playing the unorthodox pick of Renekton mid, Doinb absolutely crushed Splyce. The Korean mid-laner is the key to FunPlus’ success, and when he’s rolling there’s very little you can do to stop him. Still, with Splyce locking in their place in the knockouts, it was down to Fnatic to prove that they can live up to expectations and join their LEC brethren in the knockouts.

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GROUP C: LEGACIES CLASH

Fnatic, Royal Never Give Up and SK Telecom T1 – three of the strongest and most successful teams in League of Legends history clashed in one of the most exhilarating groups we’ve ever seen. After missing out on the World Championship altogether last year, record threetime Worlds winners SKT finally look like their former selves again. Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok was in spectacular form and throughout the Groups pulled off multiple miraculous escapes, living up to his moniker of The Unkillable Demon King. RNG and Jian “Uzi” Zi-Hao were also in fine form and didn’t appear to be too far behind SKT’s level. That put Fnatic under immense pressure who struggled in the opening week. Going into Week 2, Fnatic needed a good start with their match-up against NA’s Clutch Gaming, with that game being an easy win in theory. Though the LEC second-seeds stumbled, Fnatic marginally won after a messy game which lasted just shy of 50 minutes as both teams made large errors. With their very next match being against an undefeated SKT side, Fnatic’s hopes of reaching the knockouts looked slim. But as we’ve seen year after year, Fnatic are at their best when the stakes are high. Tim “Nemesis” Lipovšek is still in his first year as a pro player, but you can tell he’s going to be something special. The Slovenian wasn’t fazed by the big stage and even managed to solokill Faker as Fnatic picked up an astonishing win. That meant it was RNG vs Fnatic, with the loser going home. Martin “Rekkles” Larsson has seemingly had a mental block for years when facing Uzi, but this time as the two legends faced-off, the Swede came out on top with help from an incredible Pyke performance by Zdravets “Hylissang” Galabov. But for RNG, it was more heartbreak as the iconic organisation is still searching for its first World Championship. They’ll have to take the “Never Give Up” in their name literally.

GROUP D: LIQUID TEARS

Team Liquid were NA’s last hope and had every chance following an important win over Damwon Gaming in the first week. And in a rematch of that game, TL got off to a superb start with a clever laneswap and Sion cheese at level one. They were clearly well-prepared, but all of that work went to waste after an ill-advised fight for an Ocean Drake. The main event was between Damwon and reigning World Champions Invictus Gaming as the two teams competed in an instant-classic with a shot at first-seed on the line. The individual quality in the game was immense with a highlight being the top-lane battle between Jang “Nuguri” Ha-gwon and Kang “TheShy” Seung-lok. Damwon ended up securing first-seed and looked extremely strong before Invictus Gaming dominated Liquid to get revenge for the MSI semifinals. We saw last year that IG were able to step up another level when they reached the knockouts, and will have to if they want to take down Griffin in the next round. Meanwhile, Damwon and G2 will clash in an extremely exciting encounter while Fnatic will have to go through another top LPL team with a best-of-five against FunPlus. And finally, Splyce have an incredibly tough tie with SKT.

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FNATIC DEFINITELY ARE CONTENDERS Incredibly, Fnatic pulled it off and made it out of the ‘group of death’ and head into the knockouts after a tense final day. Now, Hylissang thinks they’re capable of making a deep run. How good is Fnatic really? How good is Europe? These questions were raised often by fans and analysts during the first half of the Worlds Group Stage. On Saturday, however, Fnatic silenced those who doubted them by going 3-0 in one of the hardest groups of Worlds, ever, booking their place in the knockout stage of the World Championship, and joining the other two LEC teams in the process. With a gruelling schedule ahead of them, Fnatic’s first game was not the kind of game that they hoped for. The 48-minute slugfest could have gone either way, and Hylissang admits that Clutch won the draft, saying, “I was last pick but I didn’t have any idea what I should play into their Heimerdinger and Gangplank. We had a dive composition and that diving into Heimerdinger turrets and a Gangplank ultimate doesn’t really work that well. I think they didn’t play their best game, so we somehow outfought them even though it was difficult.” Next up, Fnatic faced the titanic SKT. Despite losing to them in the first week of Groups, Fnatic were able to turn things around, as Tim “Nemesis” Lipovšek’s Veigar, together with Hylissang’s Leona, were able to run a brilliant zoning strategy. SKT couldn’t get the engages that they wanted, and Fnatic was able to pick them off one-by-one. Nemesis was even able to pick up a solo kill against one of the most renowned mid laners in the World, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok. Winning against Clutch Gaming and SKT meant that beating Royal Never Give Up would secure Fnatic’s spot in Madrid as the

second seed in the group. The pressure was high, and yet Fnatic opted in to play through the bot lane, a strategy that RNG is known for. Hylissang says it was about making a statement: “You can’t do the exact same thing that you just did on blue side and run the strategy again on red side. We had a kill lane and they had a poke lane,” he says. “We’ll win this match-up every time as long as we are blue side”. Hylissang’s very well known for his Pyke-play back in Europe. He decided to bring it out because “they target banned me. I felt like it was going to be a good Pyke game regardless,” he says. “I’m comfortable on the champion, and there wasn’t really anything left other than Thresh, which they should have picked. I think Lulu is fine but not on red side”. Winning all three games was unexpected for Fnatic’s support. “I’m really surprised that we bounced back and somehow managed to sweep the big teams in this tournament,” he says. “It feels really amazing and I’m really happy for my team and how my teammates played.” When Hyllisang woke up, he wasn’t really all that optimistic, but he also knew that going 3-0 was always

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possible. “We worked hard to fix our problems. I think we figured out our issues a lot faster than before. We lost games against RNG and SKT that we could have won easily in the first part of the Group Stage. We just didn’t know how to break their turrets.” In the first part of the Group Stage, both Gabriël “Bwipo” Rau and Mads “Broxah” Brock-Pedersen were very sick. They both had throat infections and could barely talk. Hylissang is happy to say that they are doing a lot better now. “Every time they talked, it hurt a bit, so they couldn’t talk as much during practice and stage games which hurt the communication of the team.” Despite having the odds stacked high in Group C, Hyllisang really enjoyed the pressure of the group, adding, ”If you get past this group, you have the skills to make it to the final. I don’t want to say that we’ll make it there, but we are definitely contenders for the big spots in the tournament.” For the quarterfinals, Fnatic’s support feels he wants to play against a Chinese team explaining, “I think they fight a lot and we fight a lot as a European team. I’d like to fight them, it would be a fun show.” And Hyllisang will get his wish: Fnatic face off against FunPlus Phoenix in their first knockouts game, who have shown they’re not to be underestimated. But more importantly, with Fnatic making it through, for the first time in Worlds history, every European team has made it to the quarterfinals.

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ed that we bounced back and somehow p the big teams xin this tournament.â&#x20AC;? 139

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PHOENIX

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TRUE DAMAGE

GIANTS Dear Summoners, Last year the response you gave us after the KDA skin line and song, was incredible and we decided to take it back this year with, of course, a little twist. We heard you LOVED giants and the Worlds Opening Ceremony (we love making those) and we decided to give you some insight on how we create them. Hopefully you’ll enjoy thoughtout the year this skins and we can’t wait to show you what Worlds 2020 we have prepared for you. Enjoy once again Worlds, hopefully you’ll relieve all those incredible moments in Paris you saw on the screen or live! As you know next year we will be headed to China, we can’t wait, can you?

Once again we wish to thank you, for being part of this amazing journey we are building together, for the opportunity you give us. You summoner are the reason we love creating shows like this, without your love and support we wouldn’t do this with such passion. Thanks again for sticking around another year.

Sincerely, Riot Games.

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DESIGNING LEAGUE WORLDS OPENING In 2017, Adam Mackasek helped summon a dragon in Beijing. During the annual League of Legends World Championships at the Beijing National Stadium Mackasek and the rest of Riot Games’ e-sports events team created an augmented reality spectacle when a virtual dragon modeled after an in-game monster flew around the stadium. Mackasek wasn’t able to enjoy the moment for long: just a few minutes after the event ended, his boss came up to him and asked “‘How are you going to do that bigger next year?” “It was a tongue-in-cheek question, but we got together soon after that ceremony and we talked really seriously about that,” Mackasek says. “And what we came up with was, we don’t want to think about it that way. We don’t want to think of it just being bigger. At some point that’s going to give you diminishing returns. We’re going to think of what is the best show that we can create for this year.” Last year, the team followed the dragon with an AR K-pop group that became a viral hit. This past weekend in Paris, they did something similar with a lengthy, three-song ceremony that included a virtual hip-hop group. The difference was technology. This time the performance was powered by holograms that helped further blur the line between the real world and the virtual realm of League of Legends. “Everyone always asks, ever since Beijing in 2017, ‘Oh, what augmented reality is Riot going to do this year?’” Mackasek says. “And we wanted to do something that’s even more of a surprise.” The Paris event was powered by a technology called 3D Holonet, created by a company called Kaleida. Essentially, it’s high-tech metal gauze, which can be stretched out in a translucent screen where you can project holograms and other 3D effects. “The Holonet allows us to do different types of effects that weren’t necessarily possible with augmented reality,” explains Mackasek. In between the first two songs, for instance, a giant holographic bub-

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OF LEGENDS’ CEREMONY ble appeared, masking the performers going on and offstage. And when the hip-hop group True Damage performed, the real-world performers were accompanied by their in-game counterparts. (Like K/DA before it, True Damage is a group that includes five real-world performers, who each represent an in-game character that has all been redesigned with a new streetwear-inspired look.) Using some clever choreography and technical wizardry, it was sometimes hard to tell which was real, as both the human and holographic performers warped across the stage in impossible ways. This process also involves wrangling together multiple teams. Even Louis Vuitton helped out. The fashion house designed a case to house the Worlds championship trophy, and it featured five LCD panels that reflected what was happening during the opening ceremonies. It was featured prominently in the center of the stage for much of the event. There’s also a narrative element to the event, which ties it together to the 2018 opening ceremony. In the game’s fiction, Akali — one of League’s most popular heroes — left her K-pop group K/DA to find new collaborators, which led to her forming the hip-hop collective True Damage. “What you’re seeing is the continuation of this universe that we’re building around music,” says Toa Dunn, head of Riot’s music group. It’s one that fans are clearly interested in; the music video for K/DA’s song “Pop/Stars” has more than 280 million views on YouTube to date, while True Damage’s “Giants” was viewed more than 5 million times in its first day. For many fans, the Worlds opening ceremony is akin to the Super Bowl half-time show. Even if they don’t necessarily care about the competition — for those interested, Chinese club FunPlus Phoenix dominated Europe’s G2 to take home the Summoner’s Cup this year — they’ll still tune in to watch the spectacle. In fact, the Super Bowl is one of the biggest inspirations for Riot. Mackasek says that whenever there is a big event like the Super Bowl or an awards show, Riot’s events team will hold a viewing party where they analyze every detail in hopes of finding new ideas. Throughout the year, they attend plenty of concerts and are constantly sharing clips with each other. “It’s not just us eating popcorn and hanging out,” Mackasek says. “It’s work. We sit down and we break it down. We talk about it and think about it all year round.”

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WORLDS FINALE

PARIS 2019

FUN PLUS PHOENIX CROWNED CHAMPION Paris is a city rich in culture and history, its eventful past evident in every corner. On Sunday, November 10 in the AccorHotels Arena, G2 Esports and FunPlus Phoenix left a permanent mark on the French capital as they took to the stage in a bid to be crowned this year’s World Champions. The opening ceremony and debut of True Damage was dazzling, yet the action on the Summoner’s Rift was perhaps even more stunning. G2 and FPX made a name for themselves as two of the most unique teams to ever play the game – but only one of those names is now etched onto the Summoner’s Cup. Here’s how it all went down.

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GAME 1 It didn’t take long for the series to explode into action: Both teams went for level one invades, which resulted in an early dive top by FPX’s Gao “Tian” Tian-Liang, from which even Rasmus “Caps” Winther couldn’t save Martin “Wunder” Hansen. Minutes later, Wunder was killed top once again, but that didn’t stop him from pushing his lane and forcing Kim “GimGoon” Han-saem back. The action was non-stop, and while FPX were coming out on top in the fights, G2’s phenomenal map play was beginning to show. The LPL champions sent four down bot, but they couldn’t outpush Luka “Perkz” Perković and the Rift Herald – as he picked up first turret bonus, as well as a lot of damage on FPX’s inhibitor tower. FPX were still out for blood however, and Caps’ defensive teleport to save Wunder once again seemed likely to backfire; but he flashed into the very edge of Ryze’s Real Warp at the last possible second. The game was incredibly back and forth but came to a head at the Infernal Drake as G2 committed all five members to securing the objective. FPX quickly collapsed into the river, but weren’t satisfied with Mihael “Mikyx” Mehle as the only sacrificial lamb. Marcin “Jankos” Jankowski tried to body block for Perkz to complete his teleport, but Tian just kicked the two into each other to ensure neither escaped. With that, FPX secured the Baron despite some interference from Caps and Wunder. It looked like the first game was theirs for the taking, but G2 remained defiant and pushed all five members into their opponent’s previously damaged Inhibitor Turret. An epic team fight played out, and somehow was going in G2’s favour, but FPX turned it around though Wunder’s Real Warp once again spared some of the damage. G2 were fighting with everything they had, but there are some deficits that even they can’t overcome. Wunder was caught out once again, and that allowed all of FPX to march into the base and secure the first advantage. Game one, FunPlus Phoenix.

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GAME 2 Game two was a much slower start and not much happened until G2 again committed heavily for the Infernal Drake. They secured the buff but were completely pincered by FPX, who picked up three kills in the process. Things went from bad to worse for the European team as they lost the Rift Herald and were repeatedly outplayed in fights – and they weren’t even taking much in return, which usually was a strong point of the team. FPX were in full control of the game and growing increasingly comfortable. G2 couldn’t even get close enough to contest Baron, and had to burn a few flashes in order to get out. It was absolutely disastrous for the LEC champions. There was a long pause which lasted longer than G2’s hopes of staging a comeback, as they were quickly aced as the game continued. G2 seemed to accept their fate and individually went in for ill-advised fights, accepting that their only route to the Summoner’s Cup would be a reverse sweep.

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GAME 3 Things were looking bleak for G2 but the spectacular crowd in Paris was still firmly behind them and made sure the players on stage knew that. But with everything on the line, it was clearly hard for G2 to be their usual aggressive selves. G2 were extremely quiet in the opening of the match, as FPX took the fastest first tower of the entire tournament. The game needed something to ignite the home crowd for G2 and that moment came in the 14th minute as Mikyx caught out Tian to give Jankos first blood. Though, having only taken two tower plates to FPX’s 11, there was still a lot to do for the LEC side. There were small, perhaps even miniscule, hints that the tides were turning. G2 committed heavily for an

Infernal Drake once again and Jankos won the Smite fight before Wunder prevented most casualties. G2 had sprung back to life and for the first time in a while, were controlling the pace of the game. At the next Baron, Jankos couldn’t even get close to the pit. Perkz and Wunder were the only G2 members alive and though they could find some kills, they couldn’t stop the Nexus exploding. History repeated itself once again as a Europen team lost 3-0 to Chinese team for the second year running. This is now the LPL’s reign, they are the dominant region and FPX are the 2019 World Champions.

GG G2

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SENNA

THE REDEEMER

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SENNA THE REDEEMER PASSIVE: ABSOLUTION

E: CURSE OF THE BLACK MIST

When units die near Senna, their souls are periodically trapped by the Black Mist. Senna can attack these souls to free them, absorbing the Mist that held them in death. Mist fuels her Relic Cannon’s power with increased Attack Damage, Attack Range, and Critical Strike Chance. Attacks from Senna’s Relic Cannon take longer to fire, deals bonus damage , and briefly grant her a portion of her target’s Movement Speed.

Senna draws the Mist she has stored in her weapon into a storm around her, embracing darkness and becoming a wraith within. Allies who enter the area are camouflaged and also appear as wraiths as the Mist shrouds them. Wraiths gain increased movement speed, are unselectable, and hide their identities.

Q: PIERCING DARKNESS From the twin barrels of her Relic Cannon, Senna fires a unified beam of light and shadow through a target, healing allies and damaging enemies.

W: LAST EMBRACE Senna sends forth a wave of Black Mist. If it hits an enemy it latches onto them hungrily, rooting them and everything nearby after a brief delay.

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R: DAWNING SHADOW Senna calls upon the relic stones of fallen Sentinels, splitting her relic cannon into a holy array of shadow and light. She then fires a global beam that shields allies from harm, while damaging enemies caught in the center.

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LEAGUE OF LEGENDS

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Preseason 2020

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PRESEASON 2020 RISE OF THE ELEMENTS Welcome to Preseason 2020: Rise of the Elements! In our high-level goals blog, we revealed that this year’s preseason would be transformative but left the details hiding in the fog of war. Then we shared a video preview during the 10th Anniversary Edition of Riot Pls. And now, the full reveal is here.

ELEMENTAL RIFTS

Rise of the Elements will bring SR to life as the primal magic of the Elemental Drakes changes the landscape each game. The third drake transforms the Rift before it spawns and after that, its element will be the only one to spawn for the remainder of the game. We wanted to make sure the Elemental Rifts are fair to both teams regardless of whether one team is ahead on drakes. Keeping your head in the game if you fall behind early can be hard enough as-is; we didn’t want to make it feel like the map itself was trying to make you lose, too. When creating new layouts for the Rifts, we wanted to make sure each of them would be as exciting and fair as the base SR map. Both teams have the opportunity to exploit and master the new terrain equally, so the outcomes are still in players’ hands regardless of which Elemental Rift takes shape. Additionally, we wanted to ensure the Rifts feel intuitive, even in your first game. We avoided creating new gameplay mechanics in favor of expanding the SR elements you’re already familiar with. We also made sure the changes always occur in the jungle near buff camps and dragon pit so that no matter which element you get, you’ll interact with the layout changes around the same areas.

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OCEAN RIFT The Ocean Drake brings new life to the Rift, causing existing brush to expand, fresh patches of brush to grow around the dragon pit, and the environment to flood with pools of water. In addition, Honeyfruit plants sprout up in each jungle quadrant. Sneak around the jungle or look for a new ambush opportunity.

CLOUD RIFT The Cloud Drake’s power spawns air currents flowing through the jungle and dragon pit, speeding up champions in the vicinity. Dodge skillshots or make a swift collapse on your enemies trying to sneak a far away objective.

INFERNAL RIFT The Infernal Drake sunders the Rift, creating new pathways through buff camps and burning away their brush. In addition, the dragon pit itself becomes the Infernal Drake’s molten domain, crumbling the walls at the mouth of the pit. New paths make opportunities for a quick flank or sidestep.

MOUNTAINOUS RIFT The Mountain Drake triggers a seismic shift throughout the Rift. Bluffs of rock erupt from the earth, making for some scary new choke points and ambush locations, most notably across the mouth of the dragon pit itself. Extra tight spaces give opportunities for big AOE wombos and create some interesting new hiding spots with fog of war.

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ELEMENTAL BUFFS & DRAGON SOULS OCEAN DRAGON SOUL: Dealing any damage triggers strong health and resource regeneration for 3 seconds. Damage to minions provides less regeneration.

CLOUD DRAGON SOUL: Hitting enemies with abilities or attacks lowers the cooldowns of your base abilities.

INFERNAL DRAGON SOUL: Every 3 seconds, your next attack or damaging spell creates a small AoE explosion, dealing adaptive damage that scales with bonus attack damage, ability power, and bonus health.

MOUNTAIN DRAGON SOUL: After not taking damage for 5 seconds, gain a shield that lasts until destroyed. The shield’s magnitude scales with bonus attack damage, ability power, and bonus health.

The Elemental Drakes themselves still grant different flavors of permanent, stacking buffs to your team when killed, but some buffs are different. When a team kills their fourth Elemental Drake, instead of stacking their elemental buff, they’ll gain a powerful Dragon Soul from the dominant dragon. Dragon Souls persist through death and last the remainder of the game. Once one team has claimed a Dragon Soul, it becomes the Elder Dragon’s turn to defend the pit— this means only one team can have a Dragon Soul.

ELDER DRAGON

Elder Dragon still grants a powerful, short-term combat buff, and we’re retooling it to offer teams who failed to claim a Dragon Soul a teamfight-focused hope of getting back into the game. To achieve this, we’re removing Elder Dragon’s scaling with Elemental Drake buffs (which favors the team that’s ahead) and replacing it with a new execution component. If Elder’s burn damage affects a low-health enemy champion, they’ll be consumed by a searing Elder Immolation—killing them instantly! Enemies affected by the Elder burn have a small marker on their health bar, indicating the execution threshold. The execution has a brief wind-up, so with quick reactions, Immolation victims can avoid imminent execution with the usual suite of clutch save abilities or spells (Zhonya’s Hourglass, Kindred’s Ultimate, etc). The threat of Immolation will still be there when they become vulnerable again, so if the Elder buff burn is applied a second time, it’s back to the fountain!

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JUNGLE PATH DIVERSITY

Early jungling currently revolves around Krugs due to their high gold/XP tuning, resulting in pretty one-dimensional pathing and a heavy blue-side advantage due to bot lane’s proximity to Krugs. We’re making XP and gold changes in order to open up more diverse pathing options and jungle strategies—most significantly, reducing Krugs’ value and buffing Gromp’s so junglers can hit level 3 off any combination of outer camp (Gromp or Krugs), buff camp, and any third camp. We’ve also added respawn timer icons (like you see on red and blue buff) to the minimap for every camp to help all junglers plan their next moves.

TOP LANE INFLUENCE

For a high-stakes solo lane, top hasn’t been able to translate a lane win into an effective mid and late game carry for their team—particularly in higher levels of play. Combined with this preseason’s increased focus on Elemental Drakes drawing fights to the bot lane, we’re shifting power around to give top laners better opportunities to translate their wins in lane into game wins. We’re increasing base minion XP slightly so solo laners level a bit faster, and we’re reducing the amount of bonus XP generated when allies share XP so bot lane levels a bit more slowly. We’re also slightly decreasing jungle XP. Additionally, to balance out the map objectives a bit, we’re spawning Rift Herald earlier in the game and allowing her to respawn once if she is killed early.

SUPPORT ITEMS

We’re refreshing support choices in the shop. They’ll be less poachable and have an expanded quest system that should be more satisfying overall. We’re also reducing the current complexity and rules bloat of the lineup. Towards the goal of creating more satisfying items, supports will no longer have to upgrade these starter items in the shop. Instead, the quest system now automatically upgrades items to their second and third tiers when milestones are reached, with the Warding passive baked into those upgrades:

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LETHALITY ITEMS

Lethality items are core for a pretty big group of AD assassins and fighters, but with only Duskblade and Ghostblade commonly used, choices feel limited. We want to make Edge of Night a more attractive option and add a fourth choice to the lineup: • Duskblade is mostly the same. • Ghostblade is also mostly the same. • Edge of Night’s spellshield now works like Banshee’s Veil, which is a more straightforward effect that avoids the learning curve of an active item while also allowing for clearer counterplay opportunities for opponents. • Sanguine Blade is a new Lethality item that enables split pushing. Its unique passive grants a huge attack speed buff when no allies are nearby. • We’re also exploring a few other potential lethality item options that you may see on PBE. Doubling the number of attractive Lethality items significantly increases assassins’ ability to tailor their early builds to their matchup or game state, but we don’t want to kill their later build variety by letting full-Lethality become optimal in every game. Individual items grant fewer stats but now feature a one- and two-piece bonus which preserves the power spikes of assassins’ first big purchases. Since this set bonus stops at two, assassins should generally branch into raw-AD items like Guardian Angel or Black Cleaver after their two-item spike. Full Lethality should still feel like a strong option against exceptionally squishy comps, though.

OTHER ITEMS

We’re removing Spear of Shojin. Its unique passive when used by the most synergistic champions is lowering the downtime of some CC, mobility, and immunity spells beyond what we think leaves healthy room for counterplay.

KEYSTONE RUNE CHANGES

Conqueror has been too effective at allowing sustained damage fighters to deal with tanks. Kleptomancy has been commonly used as a way to generate lots of gold in an uneven matchup, like ranged vs melee top lane. Aftershock continues to attract squishy champs looking to negate their intended fragility.

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APHELIOS THE WEAPON OF THE FAITHFUL

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APHELIOS THE WEAPON OF THE FAITHFUL PASSIVE: THE HITMAN AND THE SEER

E: WEAPON QUEUE SYSTEM

Aphelios wields 5 Lunari Weapons made by his sister Alune. He has access to two at a time: one main-hand and one off-hand. Each weapon has a unique Basic Attack and Activated Ability. Attacks and abilities consume a weapon’s ammo. When out of ammo, Aphelios discards the weapon and Alune summons the next of the 5.

Aphelios has no third ability. This slot shows the next weapon Alune will give him. Weapon order begins fixed but may change over game time -- when a weapon is out of ammo it goes to the end of the order.

Q: WEAPON ABILITES Aphelios has 5 different activated abilities, based on his main-hand weapon: Calibrum (Rifle): Long range shot that marks its target for a long-range follow-up attack. Severum (Scythe Pistol): Run fast while attacking nearby enemies with both weapons. Gravitum (Cannon): Root all enemies slowed by this weapon. Infernum (Flamethrower): Blast enemies in a cone and attack them with your off-hand weapon. Crescendum (Chakram): Deploy a sentry that shoots your off-hand weapon.

R: MOONLIGHT VIGIL Fire a concentrated blast of moonlight that explodes on enemy champions. Applies the unique effect of Aphelios’ main-hand gun.

W: PHASE Aphelios swaps his main-hand gun with his off-hand gun, replacing his basic attack and activated ability.

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Season nine has been full of changes to make the game even more creative and innovative. Changes regarding ranked divided into 3 splits, new ranks (Iron and Grandmaster) and new “money”: prestige points to obtain prestige skins. Tons of new champion with incredibile new mechanics were introduced (like stealing others champ’s ultimate ability) as well as some oldest champion reworks (Kayle, Morgana, Pantheon and Mordekaiser) making them more viable options for solo queue games but also for competitive ones. New and old games mode have returned to the summoner’s rift like Arurf, classic Urf and the new Nexus Blitz. Moreover Riot Games started a collaboration with Marvel Comics to release comics about some of the champions. In the end, a new game mode has been released: Teamfight Tactics, a strategic autochess where people fight creating synergy with some of their most loved champions.

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LEGENDS CHAMPIONSHIP RYZE

SEASON 9