SKT vs. RoX promises to be the matchup of the week. RoX vanquished the other two usurpers and now have to face the King before they can claim the throne for themselves.

Why the RoX Tigers Have to Win

Imagine if SK Telecom T1 had lost all their players in the same way that Samsung Galaxy did at the end of 2014. A frightening thought, I know; but let’s entertain what Korean LoL would’ve looked like if Faker, Bengi, Easyhoon, Bang, Wolf and MaRin had all departed to the LPL in the same way that Samsung’s players did. With a completely new roster comprised of rookies it’s ridiculous to believe that SKT would’ve had anything close to the level of success they had in 2015. I theorize they would’ve slightly outperformed Samsung Galaxy, but I have a hard time putting them above 5th.

So which team would most stand to profit and prosper in this dark parallel world? GE/KOO/RoX Tigers. The Tigers would’ve, at minimum, reached the LCK Spring and Summer Finals (which would’ve been far more entertaining than SKT’s one sided affairs) and qualified for Worlds as the 2nd seed. The RoX Tiger’s 2015 World Championship campaign would’ve found themselves in a final against either KT Rolster or Origen, both teams that you’d have to assume they were the odds on favourite. I know it sounds obvious, but if not for SK Telecom T1, then the RoX Tigers would’ve been the 2015 World Champions.

That’s precisely why this matchup is significant for the RoX Tigers; this is their redemption, their chance to prove beyond reasonable doubt that they’re the best team in Korea (and by extension, the World). Yes, a victory over SK Telecom T1 would cement their top spot in the standings and almost guarantee their spot at the top until at least week 9. But this matchup is also RoX’s only chance to thrust themselves firmly out of SKT’s shadow, to put their shameful 2015 defeats behind themselves RoX want to prove that they’re much stronger than they were in 2015 and a victory over the undoubtedly weakened SKT is vital to this. If SKT win this then RoX will likely be able to cling to first place for a while. But anytime a fan tries to claim that RoX are the best team in Korea they can be dismissed by referencing their loss to SKT, a matchup they won’t be able to repeat for at least 6 weeks.

Why SK Telecom T1 Have to Win

At the start of 2014 SK Telecom T1 K were undoubtedly the greatest team in the World. They’d won 2 seasons of OGN/LCK (one with a perfect record) and a World Championship. Fans were already celebrating their 2014 World Championship win, unsure of how SKT would ever fail. We now know that SKT experienced an extremely harsh drop off where they failed to top their group and get past the quarterfinals in both the Spring and Summer of 2014. Losing crucial best of fives to Samsung White, CJ Entus Frost and NaJin White Shield, they managed the unthinkable and failed to qualify for the 2014 World Championships.

SKT’s 2015 was objectively better than their 2014 as they won two LCK seasons and a second World Championship. The King of Korea had returned to reclaim his throne and all who got in his way were destroyed. SKT’s 2016 interviews all had a recurring message;

“We are working hard to ensure that we don’t repeat 2014.” Their loss of team captain and supposed shotcaller MaRin might’ve seemed devastating, but SKT quickly replaced him with former NaJin e-mFire toplaner Duke (the Spring Season MVP). Confident in Duke’s exceptionally powerful individual play, experts and fans alike believed that SKT could easily mould Duke into the toplaner SKT needed. But on the 16th of January 2016, something happened; SKT dropped a series to Jin Air Greenwings, a team that most struggled to predict was capable of finishing above 5-6th place.

SKT might’ve used the first game as a chance to showcase their new substitutes Scout and Blanc, but the second game saw their legacy starters Faker and Bengi dispatched by JAG’s extremely green roster. This loss has a clear asterix over it, but it was enough to worry the fans. There’s an identifiable and strong reason why the World Championship curse exists, why no World Championship winning team has even qualified for the next World Championship.

SKT’s series against Samsung wasn’t entirely convincing either, with the first game being extremely close and coming down to one miracle Elise Cocoon from Bengi onto an out of position Viktor from Crown. Whispers surround SKT with many saying that their fall from grace is inevitable and a loss to RoX only serves the whispers.

Roster Adjustments

Both RoX and SKT adjusted their roster in 2016. RoX replaced HoJin, a jungler who struggled to impact the map and often found himself outfarmed by his counterpart, with Peanut. Peanut is an extremely aggressive and mechanically outstanding jungler who has seemingly solved all of RoX’s weaknesses while losing none of their strengths. His highly distinctive use of Skirmisher’s Saber is an example of his playstyle, Peanut wants to fight everything and everyone. Peanut to RoX is so far proving to be one of the greatest roster changes of all time, up there with Dade to Samsung Blue or Piccaboo to KT Rolster.

SKT’s toplane transition from MaRin to Duke has been less than stellar. That’s not that Duke has been individually weak, Duke is undisputedly a world class toplaner capable of becoming an integral asset to SKT. But right now, Duke has not synergized well with SKT; his teleports being extremely suspect in particular. SKT also use Duke in a different way to how they used MaRin. MaRin took a higher percentage of gold and had more of a draft priority, with 2016 SKT choosing to allocate these spare resources to Bang and Faker.

SKT will need to demonstrate that their synergy with Duke has drastically improved or they will lose. Duke also needs to step up his individual play and not lose duels with his counterpart toplaner, because Smeb is the kind of player who can snowball an entire game off of the smallest advantage.

Bengi Raised to CR Threatened Status

The reason that SKT dropped the second game to Jin Air Greenwings was in large part due to Bengi’s Evelynn pick. With Rek’Sai and Elise both off the table, Bengi defaulted to Evelynn and proceeded to become a nothing more than walking ward. Falling victim to an early invade by Winged and TrAce, Bengi then continued to donate multiple resources to JAG throughout and allowed Winged to perform multiple turret dives against SKT’s sololanes. In SKT’s subsequent series, Samsung Galaxy disappointingly didn’t choose to attack Bengi’s champion pool, so it still remains a large question mark for SKT.

Peanut is a carry jungler through and through. His Kindred play showcases his impeccable mechanics and decision making and his use of Elise’s Rappel to cancel Lissandra’s ultimate animation was a particular treat. Bengi has shown a weakness to jungle invades and Peanut is the jungler best poised to exploit this. Bengi was a candidate for the best jungler of 2015 and he’ll need to regain this form for SKT to seize the win over RoX.

The Faker Factor

Faker is still the best player in the world and if SKT want to win against RoX they will need to depend on the only Bonjwa of competitive LoL. Faker’s ability to take over and completely dominate a game are without equal, the Faker factor has defeated many great teams. Provided Faker doesn’t play Gangplank, his ability to dominate the lane and push the advantage is SKT’s best win condition.

Kuro is not a bad player and necessary for the way RoX plays the game. Part of the supportive wave of midlaners we saw come about in late 2014, Kuro remains an serviceable player on a team of elite world beaters. Historically, Kuro has not matched up well to Faker at all, a trend that Kuro needs to buck in order to guarantee RoX the win. Expect SKT to deny Kuro’s Viktor and try to get Faker a favourable matchup.

Botlane

LCK botlanes are in a weird place right now. With the collapse of NaJin, LCK lost its strongest laning ADC and overall botlane. LZ and PureFury is an exciting botlane, but Fury is still suspended and Cpt Jack’s strengths lie elsewhere. The other Korean botlanes aren’t really known for their botlane strength, preferring to go even and try to outmaneuver or outperform in map movements and teamfights. Yes, Korea has a lot of strong ADCs, but no botlane really stands out at the moment. What connects these two botlanes is the similarities in how they operate and the fact that they’re all ex-NaJin e-mFire players.

Pray is the classic Korean ADC in the same way that Madlife is the classic Korean support. Objectively the greatest Twitch player to ever live, right now, Pray’s strengths lie in skillshot based ADCs like Ezreal and Corki. Once called the most talented ADC by 2014 World Champion Imp, Pray is one of the longest standing veteran ADCs that looks to skirt the edge of a teamfight. Like Doublelift and WeiXiao, Pray is the original elite ADC of his region.

Bang is the most calculated ADC in the world. His safe and calculated playstyle allows him to perform in almost any game whilst remaining a major damage and late game threat. Multiple times we’ve seen Bang’s Lucian (supported by Faker’s Lulu) dig SKT out of some almost unwinnable games. Bang is comfortable in both playing second fiddle to his solo lanes and taking all the resources and hard carrying.

The main issue for me with Bang is that I’ve yet to see him hard carry a game without Lucian as hard as he does with Lucian. When RoX played NaJin at the end of Summer they showed their willingness to put Pray on Lucian purely to deny Ohq, look for RoX to employ a similar strategy this time.

The primary point of difference between the botlanes of SKT and RoX is their supports. Wolf was the weak link of SKT throughout 2015, whereas Gorilla was RoX’s biggest strength. I believe the difference between Gorilla and Wolf is comparable to the difference between Faker and Kuro. Gorilla’s map movements are so flawless it almost seems as if he has the ability to look into the future. Employing a massive champion pool, Gorilla has that rare quality to play anything at a flawless level. Alistar will be the biggest contested pick between these two, especially with Alistar’s status as a massive power pick in Korea right now.

Prediction: 2 - 1 to RoX Tigers

I believe the individual mismatch in toplane, jungle and support is simply too large. SKT would need to fix too many team issues and individually step up in order to close out this series. I believe SKT can recover from these issues but I think it will take more time than they have. RoX are the best team in the World right now and provided there’s no Gangplank shenanigans, I’m confident that RoX will take the series. I really want to say that RoX will win 2 - 0 but I can’t discount Faker just going mental and carrying a game.

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