EU LCS Week 6 Analysis: Who's Our Favorite Little Void Puppy?

The sixth week of the League of Legends EU LCS held surprise picks, complete turnaround games and some incredible mechanics from individual players. I was glad to see that players immediately reacted to the changes in Patch 6.3 and responded with some completely unexpected picks.

A few serious buffs to Gragas- namely the slow on his Q ability and making the damage on his W ability area-of-effect- meant that he drew a great many picks as well as a few bans this week. Varus was seen, as well as Lux and Rumble in the jungle position! However, the real star of the show this week has to be Kog’Maw. This little void puppy exploded in every game he saw (and not just due to his passive). His DPS was insane and teams that failed to combat him with hard CC and single-target lock down seriously suffered. But without further ado, here is the game-by-game round-up of this week’s EU LCS;

Day 1

Day 1 kicked off with Elements facing Origen in one of the most exciting games (and most tragic mistakes by a team) we have seen. After Origen’s easy First Blood, not much action was seen apart from Elements focusing their efforts around taking the Dragon. This was a mistake in my opinion as the scaling of Origen’s power should have been dealt with early by pressure and kills, not by prioritizing the Dragon buff, which is not as important as it used to be. Because of this, the big team fight that Elements did commit to eventually went the way of Origen. In the end, Elements’ lack of map awareness and foresight cost them their Nexus to sOAZ on his hyper-carry Fiora split push.

Next Roccat battled Splyce. Gragas was seen again in this game as well as Soraka, which seemed a rather strange pick but later proved to be anything but. Roccat’s early lead was quickly “wombo-comboed” by Splyce and the score was evened out at 5 kills to 5. At this point a team fight broke out around the mid lane and seemed even (perhaps even leaning the way of Splyce) until everyone realized that Tabzz, on Kog’Maw AD Carry, simply wasn’t dying. The Soraka pick found its place joined with Kog’Maw by extending his incredible damage output over the course of an entire fight. This gave Roccat the Baron and an Ace, which led to them to break their 9 game losing streak.

Unicorns of Love matched Giants in Game 3, seeing Gragas, Lux, Viktor and Thresh take to the Rift. UOL’s fantastic composition- based around picking off single targets- outclassed Giants almost throughout the entire game. On Giant’s side, Betonglocke’s decision to build Runic Echoes on his jungle Gragas came back to bite him when he reached the late to mid game being far too squishy. Baron went to UOL as well as the win of a big fight. Despite showing a few cracks in communication here and there, they came back on top. Steelback ended the game in style, taking a Double Kill and a Nexus turret on Lucian.

Game 4 saw Fnatic and G2 lock horns in another display of Kog’Maw’s potential as a hyper-carry. Several massive tanks were picked up this game- namely Maokai, Nautilus and Trundle support. The Runic Echoes item also paved the way for Rumble in the jungle, however, this didn’t seem to work out. The game began with Emperor pulling off a huge outplay in the first minutes and scoring three kills for G2. Throughout the early to mid game, G2 showed fantastic coordination and personal mechanics across the board, and they followed their great start with an Ace at 12 minutes! However after extending their huge lead even further, Rekkles took a Triple Kill for Fnatic on Kog’Maw. G2’s effectiveness began to fall off as Fnatic built Magic Resist and Rekkles continued to snowball. Yet another Triple Kill for Rekkles and an Ace off the back of it spelled Victory for Fnatic!

Finally, on Day 1, Vitality matched H2K. In champ select Vitality opted for quite a peel-orientated composition (picking Bard and Zilean), and seemed to be already afraid of H2K’s threat. Comparatively, H2K picked up confident engage on Malphite and Thresh. Vitality actually began the game very well, taking First Blood as well as a solo kill by Nukeduck against Ryu in the mid lane! H2K responded with two kills of their own, but Vitality made several great calls around the map taking Dragons as well as a Baron. Vitality even narrowly secured the heavily coveted fifth Dragon by giving Baron over to H2K. H2K began to claw their way back until Cabochard somehow pulled out a Triple Kill leading to a victory for Vitality!

Day 2

Day 2 began with Giants facing Elements, and if any game was an example of why Gangplank has been pretty much perma-banned this year, it was this one. Giants showed some of their first absolutely brilliant planning and strategy of this year, combining Gangplan mid for xPepii with Rammus in the top lane. Several times the Rammus taunt into Gangplank ultimate demolished members of Elements. In fact xPepii (who is a great mid laner on any champion), carried this game to a resounding victory for Giants through some very well-timed ultimates and general power.

Next Vitality took on Unicorns of Love. Lee Sin is beginning to come out more for teams in search of early game control, and this Blind Monk, along with Quinn mid lane and Lulu top, came out for Vitality. These picks, combined with Kog’Maw and Tahm Kench in the bot lane, made this composition my personal favorite of the EU LCS so far. The Lulu shield and ultimate, the Tahm Kench devour, the Lee Sin target-delivery kick and the back up support damage from Quinn made a sweet, sweet smoothie of peel, engage and protection to support Hjarnan on Kog’Maw. Every team fight seemed to go the way of Vitality, and Baron went to them as well. Nukeduck showed some great mechanics on Quinn- keep an eye on this guy he is proving to be a match for almost anyone he faces. Despite finally managing to pick off Hjarnan, UOL eventually lost too many damage dealers and give up the game to Vitality.

Origen vs H2K was the third game of Day 2, and H2K seemed to have brushed themselves off after their crushing defeat to Vitality. They put together an extremely versatile comp- Lucian, Alistar, Nautilus, Lee Sin and LeBlanc. They covered all exits with great early game pressure as well as some insane late game scaling. Kog’Maw was banned in this game. Early kills went to H2K, and they followed this with pick after pick off the back of great team coordination. Far too much heavy CC and some carrying by Ryu and Jankos seemed too much for Origen. Despite yet another failed Baron attempt by H2K, and a resulting three kills to Origen, H2K continued to extend their lead until they battered their way through Origen’s base in a simple show of force.

Next Splyce went up against Fnatic. This game was a masterclass in League of Legends play by Splyce. In fact there isn’t much to say about it except that Kobbe got a Triple Kill, Splyce accelerated their lead extremely well and Wunderwear performed excellently on Nautilus. Oh and Splyce won the game with 13 kills to 0 with no response from Fnatic.

To end it all, Roccat battled G2 in a game that, although not quite as one-sided as the previous one, would still be categorized as a “stomp.” Again, Rumble jungle proved not to be all that successful for Roccat, and Lee Sin, Alistar as well as Nautilus for G2 simply gave them too much CC and hard engage to deal with. Early kills went to G2, and even when Roccat made a few good moves around the map, they got greedy and gave up several more. The double knock-back and knock-up combos for G2 carried them to a decisive win at 26 minutes, with kills 14-2 on the scoreboard.

The bans of Lulu, Gangplank, Kalista, Fiora, Poppy as well as Kog’maw have been fairly standard this week, and any time these champions have seen the light of day they have shown us why. The buffs to Kog’maw’s W allowed him to creep up to the very high power tiers of other ADCs. His obvious weakness in a lack of mobility was combated by teams with heavy peel and protection for him, and many opposing teams were caught surprised by his potential damage output. I do hope that he begins to see yet more play in the coming weeks, and I think his success this week- coupled with the rapidly expanding pool of essential bans- will make this happen. On top of this, the new item “Duskblade of Drakthur” will pave the way for more AD assassins, either in the jungle or mid lane. We may see Zed make the cut, or Yasuo (to synergize with the current Meta, which is full of champions with knock-ups). Even Kha’Zix may make a return to the jungle!

This week has shown that every match needs to be taken seriously- some teams that had been performing extremely poorly have proven their worth with displays of strategical genius and planning. Vitality has topped this pile and their successful exploitation of balance changes showed that they will be able to adapt well to future patches.

Above all, however, this week has taught us that sometimes the champions you simply have to ban are just too numerous and you are forced into letting someone slip through the net. When this happens hang tight, camp their lane, and DO NOT FEED them or you will pay the price. This year’s overall damage is going through the roof, and even one little void puppy can melt your whole team if given the opportunity.

Return next week for more round-up, analysis and predictions on Week 7 of the EU LCS!