With the North American and European Challenger split coming to a close, we enter an off-season of silence. Teams below the top 3 in every LCS region don’t have anything to play for and generally take a break or compete at smaller lans. This is a perfect time to recap on what happened in the last two splits. This article will mainly focus on EUCS but also go into NACS occasionally.

1. Splitpushing is the way to beat favourites

One absolutely amazing storyline in the spring split has been the rise of the team LowLandLions, later known as Copenhagen Wolves Academy. An underdog is always exciting but LLL’s rise to fame is easily the biggest one in the history of the EUCS. Most people didn’t predict the strictly Dutch team to even make it into the CS split and lose to arguably the strongest team EUNE had produced that split: Different Dimension. However, here were a few things people underestimated. LLL wasn’t just a random Dutch team, it proved to be a gold mine for up and coming talent. Morsu, CozQ, Hybrid and Kirei are now all highly praised and leading talents in their respective roles; but that wasn’t how they won against Gamers 2 2:0 and were the only team able to take a game off Origen in the regular split.

LowLandLions and later Copenhagen Wolves Academy were incredibly potent in a splitpush scenario by getting their toplaner on a squishy high damage threat like Fizz, Fiora, Yasuo or Jax. Their disciplined splitpush was so unusual for the typical “play lane safe, then teamfight” style most teams followed that they caught other teams by surprise. Teams like Gamers 2 or Origen, while heavily being favored to win against them, weren’t prepared for LLL’s heavy splitpush, resulting in huge amounts of free gold and sometimes even inhibitors for them. After the incredibly quick series against Gamers 2, the former LLL roster rebranded to Copenhagen Wolves Academy and fell to Origen in a convincing 3:0 defeat. Origen was prepared for their one-dimensional playstyle and reacted accordingly to it. Properly drafting, denying Morsu his best picks and abusing CWA’s topside play heavily with Rek’Sai in game 1 and 3 of the series.

That shouldn’t be the only time we see an upset with the use of splitpush, however. Ironically the again heavily favorited Gamers 2 got beat by a similar method in the Summer Split Playoffs by the team Mousesports and their splitpushing Rek’Sai once more.

It was shown on multiple occasions that a correctly executed splitpush can be the underdog's

strongest weapon and incredibly powerful in the strategically inept Challenger Series.

2. More money doesn’t mean more success

There has been a growing interest from rich private investors to get into League of Legends. From the gigantic sum of money offered to NME Esports for their LCS team to more and more teams being picked up by new organizations funded out of one singular pocket, the evidence is overwhelming.

Important financial figures like Martin Shkreli are entering the scene and bringing money with them.

More money is being invested into Riot’s second league and currently it’s being done wrong in many ways. While many rich organisations are building or acquiring rosters, often with ex-LCS players, most of them missed out on the LCS dream. Teams like Odyssey, Maelstrom, Ex Nihilo or Vortex fell short with very potent rosters and enough individual talent. Money can definitely help a team, but the new orgs being built up seem to lack structure and the teamplay to make it through. The individual talent on these rosters is undisputable and still nothing seemed to work out for them.

The two exceptions seem to be Imagine and Renegades; the latter even made LCS through autopromotion. Renegades seem to have pulled any strings possible to make their organization as solid as possible, adding the heavily experienced Montecristo as their Co-Owner and assembling a team that seems to mesh well in and out of game.

The scene needs more good organizations with a solid structure and not just money pumped into it. There is a chance of the new teams forming into solid organizations but for now they need more time.

3. Strategic play becomes more and more important

While this is obviously a longer standing trend on the highest level of play, the EU Challenger Series was highly based on mechanical skill last season. Upsets through smart draft phases were happening back then, but the overall play of the teams has become way less dependent on individual skill.

Teams like Reason Gaming in the Spring split and Mousesports in the Summer split were definitely not stacked rosters, but they managed to defeat much more prominent rosters like Gamers 2, and it wasn’t a fluke performance, it was smart drafting and pre-game planning that lead to victory.

In North America, teams like Coast have proven that the trend continues across the Pacific Ocean. Teams in the second league invest more into coaching, opening more opportunities for and developing new talent in coaching positions.

This trend is great to observe as it bring the level of Challenger Series and LCS closer together and helps making the CS more than just a showcase for up and coming talent, it is developing more into a second league with a more comparable level of teamplay to the LCS then last year.

4. The system is fundamentally flawed and needs change

The Challenger Series still has a long way to go before turning into the fully fledged second league that it strives to become. The individual talent and teamplay are coming close to the level they need to be, but the real issue is in the system itself.

The Challenger Series system is fairly new and has a lot of issues only Riot can fix, the most prominent probably being the LAN issue. Every single game before the final Bo5 is played online and broadcasted very poorly in a studio sporting nothing more than a desk and 2 casters. Besides the issue of the broadcast quality being poor and turning many casual viewers away, the real issue comes from the danger of DDoS. In online play, the chance of becoming targeted by DDoS during an important playoff match is ridiculously high.

DDOSing is easy -- every person with an hour of time and a few instructions can perform it, given they somehow have acquired a player’s IP address.

This year the heavily praised team Denial got DDoSed during the deciding match in the semifinals against Dignitas EU, forcing them to forfeit the series and a spot in the promotion tournament. Making the playoffs played on LAN would not only increase the broadcast quality but also lower the chance of DDoS significantly.

That’s not the only flaw; the whole qualification system has come under massive criticism this season, with lackluster teams being able to camp high ladder spots early before the ladder lock and newer stronger teams not being able to climb. Prime examples have been Origen and Denial when they were known as “team brun sovs”, both of them having to spend a lot of time to climb because they started later than the other teams. The system is easily abusable and for something as important as CS qualification a system this flawed is unacceptable. Qualifying becomes more about smart timing then being the strongest team.

Open tournament circuits for a spot in the CS would be way more competitive and also less tedious, skipping the ladder grind.

5. Europe’s talent pool just keeps giving

A very interesting development has been the amount of imports in this season. The NA Challenger series only had 1 team without an import in the Summer Split, the EU Challenger Series had not a single import on the other hand while still having a higher level of play. It has been proven once again that Europe’s talentpool is rich and full of new players.

Both of the newly qualified LCS teams are completely without imports and 7 out of 10 newly qualified players have never played in the LCS, compared to NA where it was only 4 out of 10 players that qualified in the promotion tournament that were new to the stage.

Players like Perkz or Sencux are expected to perform very well in the next LCS split and maybe become the future of EU talent on a world level later in their career.

Incidents like SK wanting to buy the entire Gamers 2 lineup show that the LCS organisations realise how strong the Challenger Series talent pool is. If it keeps refilling like it is right now Europe will not be short of talent in the future.

It has been shown that in a time of heavy importing in every region, Europe can prevail as one of the strongest talent pools without them. With the increase of strategical play, coaching staff, money in the scene and the strong individual talent, the Challenger Series in Europe is looking towards a bright future. The only thing we can hope for is Riot to improve the system and set the CS up to become a proper second league worth competing in.

With the north-american and european Challenger split coming to a close we enter an offseason of silence. Teams below the top 3 in every LCS region don’t have anything to play for and generally take a break or compete at smaller lans. This is a perfect time to recap on what happened in the last two splits. This article will mainly focus on EUCS but also go into NACS occasionally.

1. Splitpushing is the way to beat favourites

One absolutely amazing storyline in the spring split has been the rise of the team LowLandLions, later known as Copenhagen Wolves Academy. An underdog is always exciting but LLL’s rise to fame is easily the biggest one in the history of the EUCS. Most people didn’t predict the strictly dutch team to even make it into the CS split and lose to arguably the strongest team EUNE had produced that split: Different Dimension. But here were a few things people underestimated. LLL wasn’t just a random dutch team, it proved to be a gold mine for up and coming talent. Morsu, CozQ, Hybrid and Kirei are now all highly praised and leading talents in their respective roles. But that wasn’t how they won against Gamers2 2:0 and were the only team able to take a game off Origen in the regular split.

LowLandLions and later Copenhagen Wolves Academy were incredible potent in a splitpush scenario by getting their toplaner on a squishy high damage threat like Fizz, Fiora, Yasuo or Jax. Their disciplined splitpush was so unusual for the typical “play lane safe, then teamfight” style most teams followed, that they caught other teams by surprise. Teams like Gamers2 or Origen, while heavily being favored to win against them, weren’t prepared for LLL’s heavy splitpush, resulting in huge amounts of free gold and sometimes even inhibitors for them. After the incredibly quick series against Gamers2 the former LLL roster rebranded to Copenhagen Wolves Academy and falls to Origen in a convincing 3:0 defeat. Origen was prepared for their one-dimensional playstyle and reacted accordingly to it. Properly drafting, denying Morsu his best picks and abusing CWA’s topside play heavily with Rek’Sai in game 1 and 3 of the series.

But that shouldn’t be the only time we see an upset with the use of splitpush. Ironically the again heavily favorited Gamers2 got beat again by a similar method in the Summer Split Playoffs by the team Mousesports and their splitpushing Rek’Sai.  

It was shown on multiple occasion that a correctly executed splitpush can be the underdogs

strongest weapon and incredibly powerful in the strategically inept Challenger Series.

2. More money doesn’t mean more success

There has been a growing interest from rich private investors to get into League of Legends. From the gigantic sum of money offered to NME Esports for their LCS team to more and more teams being picked up by new orgs funded out of one singular pocket, the evidence is overwhelming.

Important financial figures like Martin Shrekli are entering the scene and bringing money with them.

More money is being invested into Riot’s second league and currently it’s being done wrong in many ways. While many rich organisations are building or acquiring rosters, often with ex-LCS players, most of them missed out on the LCS dream. Teams like Odyssey, Maelstrom, Ex Nihilo or Vortex fell short with very potent rosters and enough individual talent. Money can definitely help a team, but the new orgs being built up seem to lack structure and the teamplay to make it through. The individual talent on these rosters is undisputable and still nothing seemed to work out for them.

The 2 exceptions seem to be Imagine and Renegades, the later even made LCS through autopromotion. Renegades seems to have pulled any strings possible to make their organisation as solid as possible, adding the heavily experienced Montecristo as their Co-Owner and assembling a team that seems to mesh well in and out of game.

The scene needs more good organisations with a solid structure and not just money pumped into it. There is a chance of the new teams forming into solid Organisations but for now they need more time.

3. Strategic play becomes more and more important

While this is obviously a longer standing trend on the highest level of play, the EU Challenger Series was highly based on mechanical skill last season. While upsets through smart draft phases were happening back then, the overall play of the teams has become way less dependent on individual skill.

Teams like Reason Gaming in the Springsplit and Mousesports in the Summersplit were definitely not stacked rosters, but they managed to defeat much more prominent rosters like Gamers2, and it wasn’t a fluke performance, it was smart drafting and pre-game planning that lead to victory.

In North America teams like Coast have proven that the trend continues across the pacific ocean.Teams in the second league invest more into coaching, opening more opportunities for and developing new talent in coaching positions.

This trend is great to observe as it bring the level of Challenger Series and LCS closer together and helps making the CS more than just a showcase for up and coming talent, it is developing more into a second league with a more comparable level of teamplay to the LCS then last year.

4. The system is fundamentally flawed and needs change

The Challenger Series still has a long way to go before turning into a fully fledged second league that it strives to become. The individual talent and teamplay are coming close to the level they need to be, but the real issue is in the system itself.

The Challenger Series system is fairly new and has a lot of issues only Riot can fix, the most prominent probably being the Lan issue. Every single game before the Final Bo5 is played online and broadcasted very poorly in a studio sporting nothing more than a desk and 2 casters. Besides the issue of the broadcast quality being poor and turning many casual viewers away, the real issue comes from the danger of DDOS. In online play the chance of becoming targeted by DDOS during an important playoff match is ridiculously high.

DDOSing is easy, every person with an hour of time and a few instructions can perform it, given they somehow acquired a player’s IP address.This year the heavily praised team Denial got DDOSed during the deciding match in the semifinals against Dignitas EU, forcing them to forfeit the series and a spot in the promotion tournament. Making the Playoffs played on Lan would not only increase the broadcast quality but also lower the chance of DDOS significantly.But that’s not the only flaw, the whole qualification system has come under massive criticism this season, with lackluster teams being able to camp high ladder spots early before the ladder lock and newer stronger teams not being able to climb. Prime examples have been Origen and Denial when they were known as “team brun sovs”, both of them having to spend a lot of time to climb because they started later than the other teams. The system is easily abusable and for something as important as CS qualification a system this flawed is unacceptable, qualifying becomes more about smart timing then being the strongest team.Open tournament circuits for a spot in the CS would be way more competitive and also less tedious, skipping the ladder grind.

5. Europe’s talent pool just keeps giving

A very interesting development has been the amount of imports in this season. The NA Challenger series only had 1 team without an import in the Summer Split, the EU Challenger Series had not a single import on the other hand while still having a higher level of play.It has been proven once again that Europe’s talentpool is rich and full of new players.

Both of the newly qualified LCS teams are completely without imports and 7 out of 10 newly qualified players have never played in the LCS, compared to NA where it was only 4 out of 10 players that qualified in the promotion tournament that were new to the stage.

Players like Perkz or Sencux are expected to perform very well in the next LCS split and maybe become the future of EU talent on a world level later in their career.

Incidents like SK wanting to buy the entire Gamers2 lineup show that the LCS organisations realise how strong the Challenger Series talentpool is. If it keeps refilling like it is right now Europe will not be short of talent in the future.

It has been shown that in a time of heavy importing in every region Europe can prevail as one of the strongest talent pools without them. With the increase of strategical play, coaching staff, money in the scene and the strong individual talent, the Challenger Series in Europe is looking towards a bright future. The only thing we can hope for is Riot to improve the system and set the CS up to become a proper second league worth competing in.

With the north-american and european Challenger split coming to a close we enter an offseason of silence. Teams below the top 3 in every LCS region don’t have anything to play for and generally take a break or compete at smaller lans. This is a perfect time to recap on what happened in the last two splits. This article will mainly focus on EUCS but also go into NACS occasionally.

1. Splitpushing is the way to beat favourites

One absolutely amazing storyline in the spring split has been the rise of the team LowLandLions, later known as Copenhagen Wolves Academy. An underdog is always exciting but LLL’s rise to fame is easily the biggest one in the history of the EUCS. Most people didn’t predict the strictly dutch team to even make it into the CS split and lose to arguably the strongest team EUNE had produced that split: Different Dimension. But here were a few things people underestimated. LLL wasn’t just a random dutch team, it proved to be a gold mine for up and coming talent. Morsu, CozQ, Hybrid and Kirei are now all highly praised and leading talents in their respective roles. But that wasn’t how they won against Gamers2 2:0 and were the only team able to take a game off Origen in the regular split.

LowLandLions and later Copenhagen Wolves Academy were incredible potent in a splitpush scenario by getting their toplaner on a squishy high damage threat like Fizz, Fiora, Yasuo or Jax. Their disciplined splitpush was so unusual for the typical “play lane safe, then teamfight” style most teams followed, that they caught other teams by surprise. Teams like Gamers2 or Origen, while heavily being favored to win against them, weren’t prepared for LLL’s heavy splitpush, resulting in huge amounts of free gold and sometimes even inhibitors for them. After the incredibly quick series against Gamers2 the former LLL roster rebranded to Copenhagen Wolves Academy and falls to Origen in a convincing 3:0 defeat. Origen was prepared for their one-dimensional playstyle and reacted accordingly to it. Properly drafting, denying Morsu his best picks and abusing CWA’s topside play heavily with Rek’Sai in game 1 and 3 of the series.

But that shouldn’t be the only time we see an upset with the use of splitpush. Ironically the again heavily favorited Gamers2 got beat again by a similar method in the Summer Split Playoffs by the team Mousesports and their splitpushing Rek’Sai.  

It was shown on multiple occasion that a correctly executed splitpush can be the underdogs

strongest weapon and incredibly powerful in the strategically inept Challenger Series.

2. More money doesn’t mean more success

There has been a growing interest from rich private investors to get into League of Legends. From the gigantic sum of money offered to NME Esports for their LCS team to more and more teams being picked up by new orgs funded out of one singular pocket, the evidence is overwhelming.

Important financial figures like Martin Shrekli are entering the scene and bringing money with them.

More money is being invested into Riot’s second league and currently it’s being done wrong in many ways. While many rich organisations are building or acquiring rosters, often with ex-LCS players, most of them missed out on the LCS dream. Teams like Odyssey, Maelstrom, Ex Nihilo or Vortex fell short with very potent rosters and enough individual talent. Money can definitely help a team, but the new orgs being built up seem to lack structure and the teamplay to make it through. The individual talent on these rosters is undisputable and still nothing seemed to work out for them.

The 2 exceptions seem to be Imagine and Renegades, the later even made LCS through autopromotion. Renegades seems to have pulled any strings possible to make their organisation as solid as possible, adding the heavily experienced Montecristo as their Co-Owner and assembling a team that seems to mesh well in and out of game.

The scene needs more good organisations with a solid structure and not just money pumped into it. There is a chance of the new teams forming into solid Organisations but for now they need more time.

3. Strategic play becomes more and more important

While this is obviously a longer standing trend on the highest level of play, the EU Challenger Series was highly based on mechanical skill last season. While upsets through smart draft phases were happening back then, the overall play of the teams has become way less dependent on individual skill.

Teams like Reason Gaming in the Springsplit and Mousesports in the Summersplit were definitely not stacked rosters, but they managed to defeat much more prominent rosters like Gamers2, and it wasn’t a fluke performance, it was smart drafting and pre-game planning that lead to victory.

In North America teams like Coast have proven that the trend continues across the pacific ocean.Teams in the second league invest more into coaching, opening more opportunities for and developing new talent in coaching positions.

This trend is great to observe as it bring the level of Challenger Series and LCS closer together and helps making the CS more than just a showcase for up and coming talent, it is developing more into a second league with a more comparable level of teamplay to the LCS then last year.

4. The system is fundamentally flawed and needs change

The Challenger Series still has a long way to go before turning into a fully fledged second league that it strives to become. The individual talent and teamplay are coming close to the level they need to be, but the real issue is in the system itself.

The Challenger Series system is fairly new and has a lot of issues only Riot can fix, the most prominent probably being the Lan issue. Every single game before the Final Bo5 is played online and broadcasted very poorly in a studio sporting nothing more than a desk and 2 casters. Besides the issue of the broadcast quality being poor and turning many casual viewers away, the real issue comes from the danger of DDOS. In online play the chance of becoming targeted by DDOS during an important playoff match is ridiculously high.

DDOSing is easy, every person with an hour of time and a few instructions can perform it, given they somehow acquired a player’s IP address.This year the heavily praised team Denial got DDOSed during the deciding match in the semifinals against Dignitas EU, forcing them to forfeit the series and a spot in the promotion tournament. Making the Playoffs played on Lan would not only increase the broadcast quality but also lower the chance of DDOS significantly.But that’s not the only flaw, the whole qualification system has come under massive criticism this season, with lackluster teams being able to camp high ladder spots early before the ladder lock and newer stronger teams not being able to climb. Prime examples have been Origen and Denial when they were known as “team brun sovs”, both of them having to spend a lot of time to climb because they started later than the other teams. The system is easily abusable and for something as important as CS qualification a system this flawed is unacceptable, qualifying becomes more about smart timing then being the strongest team.Open tournament circuits for a spot in the CS would be way more competitive and also less tedious, skipping the ladder grind.

5. Europe’s talent pool just keeps giving

A very interesting development has been the amount of imports in this season. The NA Challenger series only had 1 team without an import in the Summer Split, the EU Challenger Series had not a single import on the other hand while still having a higher level of play.It has been proven once again that Europe’s talentpool is rich and full of new players.

Both of the newly qualified LCS teams are completely without imports and 7 out of 10 newly qualified players have never played in the LCS, compared to NA where it was only 4 out of 10 players that qualified in the promotion tournament that were new to the stage.

Players like Perkz or Sencux are expected to perform very well in the next LCS split and maybe become the future of EU talent on a world level later in their career.

Incidents like SK wanting to buy the entire Gamers2 lineup show that the LCS organisations realise how strong the Challenger Series talentpool is. If it keeps refilling like it is right now Europe will not be short of talent in the future.

It has been shown that in a time of heavy importing in every region Europe can prevail as one of the strongest talent pools without them. With the increase of strategical play, coaching staff, money in the scene and the strong individual talent, the Challenger Series in Europe is looking towards a bright future. The only thing we can hope for is Riot to improve the system and set the CS up to become a proper second league worth competing in.

With the north-american and european Challenger split coming to a close we enter an offseason of silence. Teams below the top 3 in every LCS region don’t have anything to play for and generally take a break or compete at smaller lans. This is a perfect time to recap on what happened in the last two splits. This article will mainly focus on EUCS but also go into NACS occasionally.

1. Splitpushing is the way to beat favourites

One absolutely amazing storyline in the spring split has been the rise of the team LowLandLions, later known as Copenhagen Wolves Academy. An underdog is always exciting but LLL’s rise to fame is easily the biggest one in the history of the EUCS. Most people didn’t predict the strictly dutch team to even make it into the CS split and lose to arguably the strongest team EUNE had produced that split: Different Dimension. But here were a few things people underestimated. LLL wasn’t just a random dutch team, it proved to be a gold mine for up and coming talent. Morsu, CozQ, Hybrid and Kirei are now all highly praised and leading talents in their respective roles. But that wasn’t how they won against Gamers2 2:0 and were the only team able to take a game off Origen in the regular split.

LowLandLions and later Copenhagen Wolves Academy were incredible potent in a splitpush scenario by getting their toplaner on a squishy high damage threat like Fizz, Fiora, Yasuo or Jax. Their disciplined splitpush was so unusual for the typical “play lane safe, then teamfight” style most teams followed, that they caught other teams by surprise. Teams like Gamers2 or Origen, while heavily being favored to win against them, weren’t prepared for LLL’s heavy splitpush, resulting in huge amounts of free gold and sometimes even inhibitors for them. After the incredibly quick series against Gamers2 the former LLL roster rebranded to Copenhagen Wolves Academy and falls to Origen in a convincing 3:0 defeat. Origen was prepared for their one-dimensional playstyle and reacted accordingly to it. Properly drafting, denying Morsu his best picks and abusing CWA’s topside play heavily with Rek’Sai in game 1 and 3 of the series.

But that shouldn’t be the only time we see an upset with the use of splitpush. Ironically the again heavily favorited Gamers2 got beat again by a similar method in the Summer Split Playoffs by the team Mousesports and their splitpushing Rek’Sai.  

It was shown on multiple occasion that a correctly executed splitpush can be the underdogs

strongest weapon and incredibly powerful in the strategically inept Challenger Series.

2. More money doesn’t mean more success

There has been a growing interest from rich private investors to get into League of Legends. From the gigantic sum of money offered to NME Esports for their LCS team to more and more teams being picked up by new orgs funded out of one singular pocket, the evidence is overwhelming.

Important financial figures like Martin Shrekli are entering the scene and bringing money with them.

More money is being invested into Riot’s second league and currently it’s being done wrong in many ways. While many rich organisations are building or acquiring rosters, often with ex-LCS players, most of them missed out on the LCS dream. Teams like Odyssey, Maelstrom, Ex Nihilo or Vortex fell short with very potent rosters and enough individual talent. Money can definitely help a team, but the new orgs being built up seem to lack structure and the teamplay to make it through. The individual talent on these rosters is undisputable and still nothing seemed to work out for them.

The 2 exceptions seem to be Imagine and Renegades, the later even made LCS through autopromotion. Renegades seems to have pulled any strings possible to make their organisation as solid as possible, adding the heavily experienced Montecristo as their Co-Owner and assembling a team that seems to mesh well in and out of game.

The scene needs more good organisations with a solid structure and not just money pumped into it. There is a chance of the new teams forming into solid Organisations but for now they need more time.

3. Strategic play becomes more and more important

While this is obviously a longer standing trend on the highest level of play, the EU Challenger Series was highly based on mechanical skill last season. While upsets through smart draft phases were happening back then, the overall play of the teams has become way less dependent on individual skill.

Teams like Reason Gaming in the Springsplit and Mousesports in the Summersplit were definitely not stacked rosters, but they managed to defeat much more prominent rosters like Gamers2, and it wasn’t a fluke performance, it was smart drafting and pre-game planning that lead to victory.

In North America teams like Coast have proven that the trend continues across the pacific ocean.Teams in the second league invest more into coaching, opening more opportunities for and developing new talent in coaching positions.

This trend is great to observe as it bring the level of Challenger Series and LCS closer together and helps making the CS more than just a showcase for up and coming talent, it is developing more into a second league with a more comparable level of teamplay to the LCS then last year.

4. The system is fundamentally flawed and needs change

The Challenger Series still has a long way to go before turning into a fully fledged second league that it strives to become. The individual talent and teamplay are coming close to the level they need to be, but the real issue is in the system itself.

The Challenger Series system is fairly new and has a lot of issues only Riot can fix, the most prominent probably being the Lan issue. Every single game before the Final Bo5 is played online and broadcasted very poorly in a studio sporting nothing more than a desk and 2 casters. Besides the issue of the broadcast quality being poor and turning many casual viewers away, the real issue comes from the danger of DDOS. In online play the chance of becoming targeted by DDOS during an important playoff match is ridiculously high.

DDOSing is easy, every person with an hour of time and a few instructions can perform it, given they somehow acquired a player’s IP address.This year the heavily praised team Denial got DDOSed during the deciding match in the semifinals against Dignitas EU, forcing them to forfeit the series and a spot in the promotion tournament. Making the Playoffs played on Lan would not only increase the broadcast quality but also lower the chance of DDOS significantly.But that’s not the only flaw, the whole qualification system has come under massive criticism this season, with lackluster teams being able to camp high ladder spots early before the ladder lock and newer stronger teams not being able to climb. Prime examples have been Origen and Denial when they were known as “team brun sovs”, both of them having to spend a lot of time to climb because they started later than the other teams. The system is easily abusable and for something as important as CS qualification a system this flawed is unacceptable, qualifying becomes more about smart timing then being the strongest team.Open tournament circuits for a spot in the CS would be way more competitive and also less tedious, skipping the ladder grind.

5. Europe’s talent pool just keeps giving

A very interesting development has been the amount of imports in this season. The NA Challenger series only had 1 team without an import in the Summer Split, the EU Challenger Series had not a single import on the other hand while still having a higher level of play.It has been proven once again that Europe’s talentpool is rich and full of new players.

Both of the newly qualified LCS teams are completely without imports and 7 out of 10 newly qualified players have never played in the LCS, compared to NA where it was only 4 out of 10 players that qualified in the promotion tournament that were new to the stage.

Players like Perkz or Sencux are expected to perform very well in the next LCS split and maybe become the future of EU talent on a world level later in their career.

Incidents like SK wanting to buy the entire Gamers2 lineup show that the LCS organisations realise how strong the Challenger Series talentpool is. If it keeps refilling like it is right now Europe will not be short of talent in the future.

It has been shown that in a time of heavy importing in every region Europe can prevail as one of the strongest talent pools without them. With the increase of strategical play, coaching staff, money in the scene and the strong individual talent, the Challenger Series in Europe is looking towards a bright future. The only thing we can hope for is Riot to improve the system and set the CS up to become a proper second league worth competing in.

With the north-american and european Challenger split coming to a close we enter an offseason of silence. Teams below the top 3 in every LCS region don’t have anything to play for and generally take a break or compete at smaller lans. This is a perfect time to recap on what happened in the last two splits. This article will mainly focus on EUCS but also go into NACS occasionally.

1. Splitpushing is the way to beat favourites

One absolutely amazing storyline in the spring split has been the rise of the team LowLandLions, later known as Copenhagen Wolves Academy. An underdog is always exciting but LLL’s rise to fame is easily the biggest one in the history of the EUCS. Most people didn’t predict the strictly dutch team to even make it into the CS split and lose to arguably the strongest team EUNE had produced that split: Different Dimension. But here were a few things people underestimated. LLL wasn’t just a random dutch team, it proved to be a gold mine for up and coming talent. Morsu, CozQ, Hybrid and Kirei are now all highly praised and leading talents in their respective roles. But that wasn’t how they won against Gamers2 2:0 and were the only team able to take a game off Origen in the regular split.

LowLandLions and later Copenhagen Wolves Academy were incredible potent in a splitpush scenario by getting their toplaner on a squishy high damage threat like Fizz, Fiora, Yasuo or Jax. Their disciplined splitpush was so unusual for the typical “play lane safe, then teamfight” style most teams followed, that they caught other teams by surprise. Teams like Gamers2 or Origen, while heavily being favored to win against them, weren’t prepared for LLL’s heavy splitpush, resulting in huge amounts of free gold and sometimes even inhibitors for them. After the incredibly quick series against Gamers2 the former LLL roster rebranded to Copenhagen Wolves Academy and falls to Origen in a convincing 3:0 defeat. Origen was prepared for their one-dimensional playstyle and reacted accordingly to it. Properly drafting, denying Morsu his best picks and abusing CWA’s topside play heavily with Rek’Sai in game 1 and 3 of the series.

But that shouldn’t be the only time we see an upset with the use of splitpush. Ironically the again heavily favorited Gamers2 got beat again by a similar method in the Summer Split Playoffs by the team Mousesports and their splitpushing Rek’Sai.  

https://youtu.be/2MLuF5kaxzs

It was shown on multiple occasion that a correctly executed splitpush can be the underdogs

strongest weapon and incredibly powerful in the strategically inept Challenger Series.

2. More money doesn’t mean more success

There has been a growing interest from rich private investors to get into League of Legends. From the gigantic sum of money offered to NME Esports for their LCS team to more and more teams being picked up by new orgs funded out of one singular pocket, the evidence is overwhelming.

Important financial figures like Martin Shrekli are entering the scene and bringing money with them.

More money is being invested into Riot’s second league and currently it’s being done wrong in many ways. While many rich organisations are building or acquiring rosters, often with ex-LCS players, most of them missed out on the LCS dream. Teams like Odyssey, Maelstrom, Ex Nihilo or Vortex fell short with very potent rosters and enough individual talent. Money can definitely help a team, but the new orgs being built up seem to lack structure and the teamplay to make it through. The individual talent on these rosters is undisputable and still nothing seemed to work out for them.

The 2 exceptions seem to be Imagine and Renegades, the later even made LCS through autopromotion. Renegades seems to have pulled any strings possible to make their organisation as solid as possible, adding the heavily experienced Montecristo as their Co-Owner and assembling a team that seems to mesh well in and out of game.

The scene needs more good organisations with a solid structure and not just money pumped into it. There is a chance of the new teams forming into solid Organisations but for now they need more time.

3. Strategic play becomes more and more important

While this is obviously a longer standing trend on the highest level of play, the EU Challenger Series was highly based on mechanical skill last season. While upsets through smart draft phases were happening back then, the overall play of the teams has become way less dependent on individual skill.

Teams like Reason Gaming in the Springsplit and Mousesports in the Summersplit were definitely not stacked rosters, but they managed to defeat much more prominent rosters like Gamers2, and it wasn’t a fluke performance, it was smart drafting and pre-game planning that lead to victory.

In North America teams like Coast have proven that the trend continues across the pacific ocean.Teams in the second league invest more into coaching, opening more opportunities for and developing new talent in coaching positions.

This trend is great to observe as it bring the level of Challenger Series and LCS closer together and helps making the CS more than just a showcase for up and coming talent, it is developing more into a second league with a more comparable level of teamplay to the LCS then last year.

4. The system is fundamentally flawed and needs change

The Challenger Series still has a long way to go before turning into a fully fledged second league that it strives to become. The individual talent and teamplay are coming close to the level they need to be, but the real issue is in the system itself.

The Challenger Series system is fairly new and has a lot of issues only Riot can fix, the most prominent probably being the Lan issue. Every single game before the Final Bo5 is played online and broadcasted very poorly in a studio sporting nothing more than a desk and 2 casters. Besides the issue of the broadcast quality being poor and turning many casual viewers away, the real issue comes from the danger of DDOS. In online play the chance of becoming targeted by DDOS during an important playoff match is ridiculously high.

DDOSing is easy, every person with an hour of time and a few instructions can perform it, given they somehow acquired a player’s IP address.This year the heavily praised team Denial got DDOSed during the deciding match in the semifinals against Dignitas EU, forcing them to forfeit the series and a spot in the promotion tournament. Making the Playoffs played on Lan would not only increase the broadcast quality but also lower the chance of DDOS significantly.But that’s not the only flaw, the whole qualification system has come under massive criticism this season, with lackluster teams being able to camp high ladder spots early before the ladder lock and newer stronger teams not being able to climb. Prime examples have been Origen and Denial when they were known as “team brun sovs”, both of them having to spend a lot of time to climb because they started later than the other teams. The system is easily abusable and for something as important as CS qualification a system this flawed is unacceptable, qualifying becomes more about smart timing then being the strongest team.Open tournament circuits for a spot in the CS would be way more competitive and also less tedious, skipping the ladder grind.

5. Europe’s talent pool just keeps giving

A very interesting development has been the amount of imports in this season. The NA Challenger series only had 1 team without an import in the Summer Split, the EU Challenger Series had not a single import on the other hand while still having a higher level of play.It has been proven once again that Europe’s talentpool is rich and full of new players.

Both of the newly qualified LCS teams are completely without imports and 7 out of 10 newly qualified players have never played in the LCS, compared to NA where it was only 4 out of 10 players that qualified in the promotion tournament that were new to the stage.

Players like Perkz or Sencux are expected to perform very well in the next LCS split and maybe become the future of EU talent on a world level later in their career.

Incidents like SK wanting to buy the entire Gamers2 lineup show that the LCS organisations realise how strong the Challenger Series talentpool is. If it keeps refilling like it is right now Europe will not be short of talent in the future.

It has been shown that in a time of heavy importing in every region Europe can prevail as one of the strongest talent pools without them. With the increase of strategical play, coaching staff, money in the scene and the strong individual talent, the Challenger Series in Europe is looking towards a bright future. The only thing we can hope for is Riot to improve the system and set the CS up to become a proper second league worth competing in.