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Written by Justin Robey
on November 20, 2018

For esports fans, October was, simply, a weird month. Why? Because what was essentially one of the BIGGEST events in esports became the pinnacle of insanity when the calendar moved over from October into November.

If you’re asking why I am writing my recap for October in the middle of November, the answer is simply this: I’m still recovering from the insanity that was the League of Legends World Championship.

So, let’s go on a journey to review all things League of Legends for the month of October (and early November). For the first time in a very, very long time, the League of Legends World Championships are a story worth telling!

Setting the Stage For Worlds 2018

back to back with trophyTo understand why this Worlds was so interesting, we need to talk about how things got to this point.

This past year, like any world competition, teams from different regions competed for spots that would allow them to play in the larger championship taking place in Korea in early November. These championship spots usually go to teams from North America, Europe, and Asia. Given how long people have been playing League of Legends, and how long its championship series has been going on (since 2011), there are almost always the same organizations that make it from those specific regions every year.

Teams like SKT from Korea and TSM from North America seem to create the same narrative year after year, which may not surprise anyone given how good these teams have been in their respective regions. For years, we’ve heard the same stories: We all kept hearing that SKT, having won three of the last five championships, would take the championship again. Even though TSM was amazing in the NALCS—the North American League Championship Series—speculation ran rampant as to whether they would ever get out of the group stage in Worlds. For years, we all heard the same stories told over again. Frankly, it was getting old.

This year, however, the craziness happened when, for the first time, the two formerly championship-level teams weren’t a part of the championship. But SKT and TSM not making the championships was only the beginning of the madness that was Worlds 2018!

Group Stages

Worlds 2018 TrophyThis brings us to the beginning of October, and though the social universe around competitive League of Legends was already abuzz about the lack of SKT and TSM in the championships, there was still no doubt in people’s minds that the winner would more than likely come from Korea and an NALCS team wouldn’t make it out of the group stages. But then, the group stages began, and that’s when, to everyone’s surprise, things started to change.

Now there are a lot of teams who compete in the group stages, 16 in total as a matter of fact, and they are all broken into four different groups. Now the interesting thing is that two of the teams that were most likely to win the overall championship—RNG and Gen.G—ended up being in the same group (Group B). Now normally this is okay given that two teams make it out of each group to go onto to compete in further stages. These groups (with amazing teams like Gen.G and RNG) are usually given a special moniker, and are called the “groups of death,” given the chance of any other team that happened to be placed in this group with top tier teams would almost definitely be eliminated.

Except, when things didn’t go as expected because of one little North American team that surprised the entire world.

Enter Cloud 9.

Now to be clear, Cloud 9 is not a small team, and not a little-known esports entity. Cloud 9 has had more than a few NALCS championships under its belt and is a well-respected and well-established brand within the League of Legends community. That being said, Cloud 9 did not have a stellar year and only barely qualified to even make it to Worlds in the first place. Now, here we are at the end of the group stages, the most favored team, Gen.G eliminated by Cloud 9 and RNG, and to everyone delight for the first time in a VERY long time we also now have a NA team in the quarter finals!

The Road to the Finals

The group stages were done! If Riot wanted a better narrative going into the most-watched esports event of the year, it couldn’t have gotten much better than this. Not only did they have a reason for North American audiences to tune in, but with European Leagues starting soon, there were also numerous powerhouse EU teams competing for the title as well. If anything was going to change the repetitive results of the past Worlds championship stories, this, we all thought, could be the year.

Then… suddenly, and almost impossible to imagine it, there were no Korean teams. Quarterfinals now completed, and RNG, the second most favored team in the tournament, and the last hope for another Korean champion, were eliminated by G2 Esports. To top it all off, we saw C9 continue its Cinderella story and take down Afreeca Freecs and push their way into the semi-finals. For once we had a chance to either crown a North American, European, or Chinese team as the League of Legends World Champion. For the folks at Riot, I don’t think it could get any better than this.

Unfortunately for North America, this was the end of the road as Fnatic handily took down Cloud 9 in a 3-0 sweep. Similarly, Chinese team Invictus Gaming eliminated European Team G2 Esports in a similarly lopsided sweep of 3-0 as well. The Finals were set and we had the chance of either a first-time EU repeat with Fnatic (who won the first-ever world championship in 2011), or a first-ever Chinese team to take the title of World Champion.

The Finals

The battle of ages was set, a great narrative was about to unfold, and what looked to be an awesome finals was on the cusp of happening. Unfortunately, the finals themselves were completely lackluster as the competition between Fnatic and IG was a showcase for IG’s dominance across the 3-0 sweep. Ultimately to crown a first ever Chinese team was incredible, and congratulations to IG for taking the title. Just having a 3-0 sweep in the finals is never all that great, and especially when one team was just clearly outplaying the other the entire time.

What does this mean though, now that we are reflecting on the past and what was ultimately a very exciting finish to Season 8 in League of Legends? For me, it shows the promise of what can be in upcoming seasons.

That promise is that Worlds may not be a Korean-dominated event, and what with all regions making it into the finals this year, we will start to see more diversity, hopefully, in future League of Legends World Championships. This outcome could be the shot in the arm that Riot needs, given the 21 percent revenue drop they reported earlier in the year. So, to me, this is a renewed hope that we will eventually see a North American world champion, and hopefully sooner rather than later. Because with Cloud 9 making it to the semifinals, for what feels like the first time in LCS history, anything could be possible!

Invictus with trophy

All photos courtesy of Riot Games. 

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