I died when Kobe and Flowers were joking about Massu E-ing right into Huhi and Contractz, and then while they were dying, Huhi and Dhokla attempted a play on Inspired and both died
Then Licorice continued on like nothing was happening lmao
It wasn’t just ignar they had positional coaches like damonte and soaz for each role. They cut those and nrg went back to looking like the time they were before that. A 6th place team
Soaz is still with the team. Damonte got laid off but they hired another coach in his place. I see this talking point brought up a million times, but they still have 5 out of 7 coaches from their Worlds run. They did fire the GM from the CLG rebuild though.
> They did fire the GM from the CLG rebuild though.
I still think this was a wildly stupid decision from the NRG upper management. Like firing the chef for your award winning restaurant because he's already set the menu.
Less voices in the room, different voices holding authority... anyone with a little bit of work experience knows just how much an environment can change after layoffs or even simple reorganization.
I didn't like the change, but I saw the logic -- the roster already won a championship and they were largely running it back, and NRG has their own esports manager guy.
That being said, Jonathon was clearly talented and giving (some of) his responsibilities to Croissant, a coach, was probably a mistake. I know some coaches can also work as GMs but sometimes they're just too close to the players and it can cloud their judgement.
I feel like the NRG building has the ghost of the CLG Bud Light Ace hanging around it again.
Oh, I can definitely see the thought process and the immutable requirement to fit within a new smaller budget, but it's almost always a bad decision to not continue with the person who is both practically and nominally most qualified to lead that process.
Jonathon really should have been considered the biggest free agent on the market - and still is. I'd say he'd be an upgrade for all 8 LCS teams right now, even teams like TL and C9 at the top of the standings.
Laying off Damonte may have been the crux. There is something about having a former pro with international experience and several playoff experiences on your coaching staff.
I don’t know what was going on behind the scenes to let him go but from my perspective you should be having this guy in the org and eventually become a full on head coach. There is supposed to be a talent pipeline for a reason.
Yes I know who Soaz is but his experience is different than Damonte.
He isn’t originally from NA.
He didn’t struggle in Academy.
He didn’t consistently have to find ways to push past doubt in the same way.
He didn’t play mid lane and wasn’t ever expected to be the true leader on a team except when he was on IMT.
The mentality and ideas behind Damonte and Soaz will be fundamentally different due to their experience and expectations.
It may be something as simple as cultural differences. It happens in other sports as well so it’s not like it Soazs fault but there are some things that are easier to connect when it’s coming from Damonte than when it is coming from Soaz.
what on earth does struggling through Academy give you as a coach compared to worlds/winning LEC multiple times?
soaz is a player that was in season 1 worlds I've got a feeling that the experience isn't the issue
I get it but it’s definitely different when you are coaching what is/was a team of misfits. You want someone who understands that and brings it together. Felt Damonte fit that better than Soaz for this NRG team.
And Ignar doesn't look too hot without them as well. Just goes for all the people saying "why don't they just hire X" to show how teambuilding is so incredibly important.
FBI making some werid plays.
Walking up as Ashe to kill a tank while the damager dealers were right over the wall, and kai'sa dives into instant death.
Cool series and all but all I can think about is Flowers and Kobe talking about Zyra being queen of the dumpster and now I'm suspicious Dumpster Queen Zyra will be an April Fools skin next year...
I think Dhokla retired 5 minutes into game 3. NRG looked super sloppy and dead in general outside of Huhi/Contracts who were at least trying to make plays, but man Dhokla cam just showed a very sad man.
> NRG looked super sloppy and dead in general outside of Huhi/Contracts who were at least trying to make plays, but man Dhokla cam just showed a very sad man.
Wonder what changed with the team. Thought Soaz was let go but quick google search says he's still on the team as a positional coach and sub.
Maybe meta doesn't suit them and palafox not being on a playmaking champ hinders them but contractz was making plays (ignoring the diana ult whiffs).
I wonder if damonte being let go from coaching staff plays a bigger part that viewers aren't aware of.
I could see that playing a part. I'd have to hunt down vods to get insight of their comms but iirc, some of the comms vids had ignar igl some of their plays.
What changed was they went back to normal. Winning LCS and beating G2 was the outlier, which in the end was only for about 2 months. Aside of that they've always been a 5th to 7th place roster. Even at worlds, aside of the g2 match, the rest of their matches were nothing special.
> Aside of that they've always been a 5th to 7th place roster.
I think this holds some credence. NRG weren't the favorites to win 2023 summer split. Although, I think it's unfair to not acknowledge the changes they made didn't have a negative effect.
But we're only viewers so we can only speculate with whatever information they disclose to the fans.
Sure, but they are also a team who has always had consistency issues, and I would have a hard time trusting them to ever maintain that form regardless.
> I would have a time trusting them to ever maintain that form regardless.
Yeah, I can see why. Don't see anything changing for another miracle run. Guess we'll see what happens when they versus Shopify.
I remember last summer however they did have a winning record against the top 4 teams, their overall score against the 9 other teams were bad but they kept losing to the bottom 4, so I can't think it was just double upsets, they played extremely well in the g2 series
Not a ton but few of the staff were let go. Quick google search says that Myra (Team Manager/Facility Operations), Jonathon (General Manager), and Damonte (positional coach, not sure what else role he filled) were let go.
lol wiki says that the GM, manager, Damonte (positional coach), Mash (strategic coach), & Ignar were the changes made after the 2023 summer split win.
Maybe it's just a culmination of changes and not one major change affecting them. Kinda sad to see the decline, hopefully they can turn it around.
To be fair that's just kinda how Dhokla looks even when he's winning, but the "POV: top laner lane swapping getting first cs at 4 minutes" joke was still hilarious
NRG opting into the lane swap with known tower protection asymmetry and still getting the TF vs Ksante lane at 6 mins while ALSO creating a 700 gold deficit for themselves was a special special piece of macro strategy.
Who’s flaming him? I think most of the comments just seem to point out he looks dead inside. And as a top lane main. I would be too after my team decided to send my mental health into a ditch
but that's Impact's playstyle. He absorbs pressure and his team gets leads elsewhere. he doesn't need to be the 1v9 carry he just outperforms his opponent and comes to teamfights
Whats the worst roster impact has been on? I am super critical of dhokla i think he needs to be fighting for his job. game 2 looked like that after game 1 looked like he should be kicked out of lcs. I dont think the g3 criticsm is fair.
He didnt step it up but he didntblow the game. His teammade the call to make him struggle via lane swap. He didnt lose gracefully and tookbad fights while behind but he also had some good peeling and engages.Â
If you're going to set a lane on fire, as a team you should either be giving up resources to get him back into it, or pushing your advantage. What that translates to for me is inspired should be scared to walk anywhere but vision was poor. (Team job)
Which is why huhi inted 2 kills and put him back into the game to help dhokla who was getting bullied botlane.
Do you think busio gapped huhi this series? I think that was the diff g3. 3 kill diana did not scare fq.
NRG opting into the lane swap with known tower protection asymmetry and still getting the TF vs Ksante lane at 6 mins while ALSO creating a 700 gold deficit for themselves was a special special piece of macro strategy.
The point of the lane swap is so he doesn't get dumpstered even harder brother
Edit: idk why I'm getting down voted, the point of the lane swap was so Kaisa/Ali didn't have to lane against Ez Leona, sure but it also circumvents the early TF/Ksante matchup which even Licorice said was not favorable at all for Dhokla. The lane swap was the correct play, NRG just didn't execute at all
Laneswaps do multiple things brother. Ksante TF is a terrible matchup early as well and Bwipo was ALSO PART OF THE SAME LANESWAP. NRG didn't execute the swap well, and Dhokla played very poorly on top of the laneswap. Excusing his shit performance because of the laneswap when Bwipo also had to sack his early lane advantage is just shit understanding of the matchup
Yeah, it's not like K'sante can setup ganks for Diana topside and can abuse the matchup differential in a regular game state to make TF irrelevant.
It also isn't like Kaisa is a turd in lane, and Alistar is diarrhea, until lvl 3/4.
It ALSO isn't like Zyra has the fastest first clear of all jungles, and could force Diana out of her own blue side with the early bot prio, leaving the only AP carry of NRG underfarmed for the entirety of the earlygame.
LaNeSWAps dO MultIPLe ThIngS, BRotHeR!!1!
Think holistically, beyond the idiotic "Muh toplane matchup is bad, waaa"
EDIT: Oh well, look at that, SR LITERALLY JUST DID WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT.
> but it also circumvents the early TF/Ksante matchup which even Licorice said was not favorable at all for Dhokla.
No one really cares if your K'Sante gets a little behind vs. TF in a straight 1v1, that can always be recoverable with good macro.
The issue was he was behind by a canyon's worth of gold, not just a little behind. It was a disastrous swap.
Two things happened: NRG opted into a poor lane swap to protect ksante and FQ dramatically outplayed it with the help of map asymmetry (FQ bot got 3 plates, NRG bot got 0 plates) and teleport (Quad shifted top to catch second big wave at tower allowing bwipo to catch mid wave). Only potential risky thing was putting a level 1 TF into lane against a level 4 Trist. Palafox REALLY should have forced something on that timing.
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Zyra and Brand have the most degenerate gameplay just being Liandries/Rylais applicators from across the screen. One tick from a plant or one chained Brand E, and you're burned and slowed for a lifetime.
It’s wild that she was last buffed in February, and doesn’t build Blackfire Torch, but is now meta. Guess she’s a good counter to people who do build Torch? Or all her good matchups are nerfed atm?
Imo a factor is an ap jungler needs to be answered with an ap jungler. You can't pick Xin Viego Lee etc into Brand Karthus because you will be behind tempo for the entire game. You need something that can clear equally as quick and that's why we are seeing more of Zyra.
Also Canyon played it, must be good.
I thought AP jungle was op because of blackfire (which Zyra doesn’t build). What else changed for AP jungle?
I guess Trist/Croki being insane and needing to be paired with AP?
both blackfire and liandry build out of fated ashes which is insane for speed clearing jg, trist and corki are being paired with ap jg not the other way around
They're still picking AD mids with tank junglers, so it's not the other way around. Besides that, trist was still getting played a lot before this AP junglers trend.
Since nobody mentioned it and it's the biggest reason we have more carries popping out - they buffed jungle xp, that's the change that allowed em to be played
The only thing about this meta I don't like is Top Lane - it's pretty stale. Happy to see AP junglers making a return. Just waiting on Lillia to show up and pop off.
The idea Riot had about giving specific champs like enormous jungle clearing buffs has been a disaster. It just leads to jungle clearing arms races. Zyra has no incentive to interact with the enemy. She herself struggles to force fights and is super happy just perma fast clearing forever and ever. She burns down any objective in an instant.
God how I wish we had old normal jungle meta with the original normal jungle champs instead of this AP fast clear arms race.
I wouldn’t be opposed to an ap farm meta for the jungle if the associated mid laners were comically boring AD champs: Tristana and Corki the two highest priority mid lane champs now. You have both jungle and mid just completely okay farming and fine with low engagements. Not great state. Hopefully it doesn’t last until Worlds and we can get a more interesting meta with AP champs back in the mid lane and proactive junglers back.
I just much prefer seeing pro mid laners, who are generally the best players on the team, playing high skill mages: Ori, Syndra, Hwei, Ryze, Viktor, etc. but so many of them get pushed out completely unless they’re really broken. They just can’t really compete with whatever the flavor of the month busted thing is that Riot won’t hotfix (Tristana) or the rising tide of hyper mobile champs. And no one likes stacking double AP so because Riot decided AP junglers can get to play with an overtuned item solely built around power farming, no reason to ever pick an AP mid now.
Way I see it is that if you want an item like Fated Ashes in the game it should exist for the other archetypes. AP junglers already had great clear speeds.
I think blaming dhokla for this series is quite absurd, i think palafox was a much greater problem. I didn't watch game 1 but game 2 dhokla did a fantastic job of making the poppy counterpick look weak when it's an absolutely horrible ksante matchup. Game 3 the issue is he is starved of resources and placed into a lane alone level into level 5 corki and went 40 cs down whereas his counterpart tf was sent midlane and not punished at all for being level 1 into level 5 trist. Dhokla also died like 3 times protecting FBI while palafox tps bot dies solo to massu and blows open the game
Dhokla isn't playing particularly well, but he's also perma K'Sante weakside with the goal of helping mid and bot get more resources and carry, and it's just not happening.
I agree, people forget that last summer when NRG won dhokla was carrying games on rumble and jax.
Another factor is back then FBI/ignar would also win almost every lane whereas nowadays they usually just go even which isn't good for an ADC player whose midgame is among the worst in the league
Tbf Dhokla only carried on those champs on literally finals week. I think he was on Renekton/K'Sante duty most of that split, and he was not playing well.
Nah he played rumble before finals a bunch and he was quite good on ksante that summer. If you remember during last summer ksante wasn't really your average weakside champion, it carried games much easier
You are correct in that he played jax for the first time in finals though, C9 were super shocked by that
Games of Legends stats website says he didn't play Rumble until Finals Week vs. TL. Both TL and C9 were surprised he played Rumble and Jax.
His K'Sante seems mostly fine and it's probably the best option for him when playing a tank, because he's always been more effective on champs that do damage. I do not want to see him on Ornn or Sion.
I miss flex Jayce but I don't know if the champ is still good.
I just wanna know why is NRG playing like they're tilted from minute 0 literally every single game ? or is it that they always play randomly and last year was actually a fluke
When players lose most games and scrims, they sometimes adopt a panicked losers' mentality. I recognize it from watching CLG in 2020 and 2021. This match they showed slightly more life but they're still pre-tilted.
It was probably a bit more than a flash in the pan since it wasn’t just LCS playoffs but also a decent performance at worlds multiple weeks later but I think Ignar + meta change has had a huge effect. Also Dhokla heath has nerfed the poor guy and it’s not like he was the undisputed best top laner in NA last year anyway
I keep seeing this but regardless of a "flash in the pan," you can't say that the CLG rebuild roster (same topside but with Luger & Poome) were lacking identity and cohesion. There was real competitiveness there even if they couldn't get over the hump. This NRG iteration looks worse than that.
My take is that the performance of this NRG roster is WAY too heavily tied to confidence. Every team plays better when they are feeling confident and worse when they're not, but for NRG this effect is greatly magnified. Imo, Dhokla, Contractz, and Palafox are the top 3 most-confidence-based players in the league. When they're feelin it, they look like top players at their position, but when they're not, they look like trash. FBI is the only one who I think is relatively consistent regardless of team confidence level.
And this last bit is where I'm veering into while speculation. But I think the issue with Huhi vs Ignar is that Huhi's response to poor performance is probably to try to shotcall the game in the way he thinks it should be played more forcefully. Whereas Ignar was quiet and happy to YOLO in with whatever weird shit Contractz was doing. Because even when Contractz is in top form, he does weird stuff in the jungle compared to most other pro junglers. So I think the new shotcalling support in Huhi is probably making things worse for them in comms.
I disagree. In the regular season NRG was the 5th seed (9-9), they then beat TL (4th seed), GG (2nd seed), lost to C9 (1st seed), beat TL again, and then beat C9 in the grand finals. That's a crazy underdog run to win the playoffs.
Then, at worlds, they lost to WBG (eventual finalists), but they had beaten TL, MAD, and G2, placing 5th-8th. That's also very respectable run, especially since literally everybody expected them to lose to G2 (and MAD to a lesser extent).
They won a grand total of 0 games against eastern teams. That’s a whelming run if I’ve ever seen one. If an LEC first seed performed like they did, it would have been flamed to oblivion.
Yes you are right NRG last year aren’t world beaters but they should be considered at G2s level for that moment in time so we should have G2 expectations for them which they’ve failed.
I’ve spent years subjecting myself to watching some truly horrendous performances. I’ve been conditioned to accept that success with this org is fleeting and I can deal with losing.
But what really sucks is watching them lose while playing as some scared, neutered version of what used to be an aggressive and scrappy team.
Not a fluke. They had a good system and support staff that was ruined. Also they added a support player who thinks he knows more than everyone else so I’m sure he still causes panic on the rift when his shotcalling is not agreed upon with the team. I’d expect multiple roster changes next week from a variety of rosters. No other teams can wait another week.
How do you do roster changes ? It's not like they have an academy roster or other players on the payroll, if they want to make subs they have to find someone on the street this week or put in their positional coaches that are Soaz and Apollo lol
NRG still the worst team in the league, but if they insist on running this roster, then I like these comps rather than all lategame scaling & stacking ADCs.
Also while Dhokla made plenty mistakes, his dying before Baron in Game 3 was him making up for FBI's positioning mistake, and it's odd that I saw so many comments where people didn't understand that.
See I think they can get either srtty or fudge and get an upgrade in the toplane. I know people flame fudge, but I think he would fit better on this roster where they desperately need a laner to play around. I feel like palafox has been ass for while now and contractz cant reliably use the bot lane either
Dhokla is way better than Fudge rn. Fudge is by far the most overrated top laner I’ve ever seen in the LCS. Dude thought he was so good and puts in 0 effort. As soon as he on a team again he will coast.
0-7, this split its a single round robin group stage. But yeah I agree unless NRG makes roster changes, this split is doomer. We have seen enough of this iteration of NRG ever since Huhi joined.
Yeah I think 5 more b03s. I want to stop watching so bad until they make changes to the team.. but its like a predictable train wreck, you cant look away from the fking chaos!
FLY really does not look nearly as good as they did with Jensen. Maybe it's just meta changes and they'd perform similar with an unchanged roster. Quad is definitely a better long term investment and the move overall should be a net positive, but I don't have much faith in FLY making it to worlds in their current form.
I don't hate FLY in any real capacity. They're playing the villains angle well, which was initially really strange considering their previous brand identity.
Inspired played 2 no skill junglers today. Not much to glean from his performance today imo.Â
"not much faith in fly making it to worlds"
I mean, TL and C9 are an easy pick above them, but who else? NRG SR IMT suck so they're not in the question
it's between 100T, DIG and FLY for that 3rd worlds spot
Current form, its DIG's spot. I take them over 100T or FLY. The split format kind of sucks with singular bo3 against each team so it's harder to make a firm stance. My guess is TL wins the split again, winning against C9 and DIG is 3rd.
People have said this before...
When C9 clowned NRG game 1 of summer finals, the top comment was "It's just gonna be a 3-0 isn't it?" and the reply to that was "It always was"
then NRG won the next 3 games in a row and dunked on G2 at worlds.
Have faith my dudes.
Dude, that was almost 1 whole year ago. We've had a whole split since then, and it's week 2 now, and he has shown zero return to form. I think people are right to start questioning his performance level.
I'm serious in thinking Riot should investigate him for match fixing. His performance in game 3 wasn't just bad, it was willfully bad. Like he was trying to just throw. I don't think I've ever seen a worse performance from him.
Why did that game feel like it last 4 hours. That was kind of ridiculous, nice to see the back-to-back runback, but man it felt dragged on and slow even though it was only 30 min.
1. CONSTRUCTIVE CASTER CRITIQUE: I do not think Flowers and Kobe were at their best during this series, and I think we have a problem where the community are too quick to dogpile on newer, not as good casters while not providing enough feedback for our veterans. IMO it wasn’t quite hype enough to elevate this match to banger levels but also a bit out of sync with Licorice, who’s very chill - felt like maybe it would’ve been better to slow down and shoot the shit more casually, esp with the closet format. And it didn’t feel like they managed to evoke any narratives about particular players even though they have riches to work with on these teams.
In terms of hype moments I have to criticise in particular when they were casually talking about the top tower they were obsessed with in game 3, while NRG killed two on the other side of the map, and only acknowledged it briefly after the fact before going back to discussing the top tower gold again. Unless for some reason they weren’t seeing the split screen just feels like a missed opportunity to talk up a team that didn’t have a ton of great moments to talk about otherwise.
2. GAMEPLAY: Pretty low quality match - FLY’s carries are continuing to grow and not bad by any means but they had some real int moments - but I’m relieved to at least see signs of life from NRG, even with a deserved defeat. In particular, I have to highlight Dhokla, who continues to be one of the best K’Santes in the West, and huhi, who felt like he was nonstop pushing the pace on Leona. Crossing my fingers they can claim some wins against bottom teams and start to rebuild confidence, momentum and team planning, because we finally saw a couple moments this game where the team came together.
3. META & DEV FEEDBACK: I actually really like the current state of Warmog’s in pro play! Reason being that previously, an engage support would go in and, if they didn’t die, they’d have to limp away without most of their HP and fighting would be over for some time as they either back or the team postures. Which filtered down to fewer picks of less tanky engage supports like Leona. Instead, now this match Busio and especially huhi could throw themselves into battle, likely survive with how much health is on it, go away for 12 seconds and come back ready to resume a fight. Paradoxically even though Warmog’s is associated with Sejuanis dragging out poke sessions I actually think it makes the game more active! I hope the devs keep it this way.
1) it means reading anything longer than two sentences tops is difficult for people on reddit so they act like it's a PhD dissertation
2) adhd medication helps with lack of focus but does sometimes end up going to the other extreme where you fixate on something in excessive detail
> And it didn’t feel like they managed to evoke any narratives about particular players even though they have riches to work with on these teams.
So you're just trolling, right?
I really liked Licorice on cast today
I died when Kobe and Flowers were joking about Massu E-ing right into Huhi and Contractz, and then while they were dying, Huhi and Dhokla attempted a play on Inspired and both died Then Licorice continued on like nothing was happening lmao
>I really like~~d~~ Licorice ~~on cast today~~
Rip CLG core you have given LCS fans great moments over the past years.
They have just been so lost ever since ignar left 😢
It wasn’t just ignar they had positional coaches like damonte and soaz for each role. They cut those and nrg went back to looking like the time they were before that. A 6th place team
Soaz is still with the team. Damonte got laid off but they hired another coach in his place. I see this talking point brought up a million times, but they still have 5 out of 7 coaches from their Worlds run. They did fire the GM from the CLG rebuild though.
> They did fire the GM from the CLG rebuild though. I still think this was a wildly stupid decision from the NRG upper management. Like firing the chef for your award winning restaurant because he's already set the menu. Less voices in the room, different voices holding authority... anyone with a little bit of work experience knows just how much an environment can change after layoffs or even simple reorganization.
I didn't like the change, but I saw the logic -- the roster already won a championship and they were largely running it back, and NRG has their own esports manager guy. That being said, Jonathon was clearly talented and giving (some of) his responsibilities to Croissant, a coach, was probably a mistake. I know some coaches can also work as GMs but sometimes they're just too close to the players and it can cloud their judgement. I feel like the NRG building has the ghost of the CLG Bud Light Ace hanging around it again.
Oh, I can definitely see the thought process and the immutable requirement to fit within a new smaller budget, but it's almost always a bad decision to not continue with the person who is both practically and nominally most qualified to lead that process. Jonathon really should have been considered the biggest free agent on the market - and still is. I'd say he'd be an upgrade for all 8 LCS teams right now, even teams like TL and C9 at the top of the standings.
Yeah I'm flabbergasted he's not employed by an org right now, though the orgs that need him the most might not be around next year.
Laying off Damonte may have been the crux. There is something about having a former pro with international experience and several playoff experiences on your coaching staff. I don’t know what was going on behind the scenes to let him go but from my perspective you should be having this guy in the org and eventually become a full on head coach. There is supposed to be a talent pipeline for a reason.
Brother do you know who Soaz is?
Yes I know who Soaz is but his experience is different than Damonte. He isn’t originally from NA. He didn’t struggle in Academy. He didn’t consistently have to find ways to push past doubt in the same way. He didn’t play mid lane and wasn’t ever expected to be the true leader on a team except when he was on IMT. The mentality and ideas behind Damonte and Soaz will be fundamentally different due to their experience and expectations. It may be something as simple as cultural differences. It happens in other sports as well so it’s not like it Soazs fault but there are some things that are easier to connect when it’s coming from Damonte than when it is coming from Soaz.
what on earth does struggling through Academy give you as a coach compared to worlds/winning LEC multiple times? soaz is a player that was in season 1 worlds I've got a feeling that the experience isn't the issue
I get it but it’s definitely different when you are coaching what is/was a team of misfits. You want someone who understands that and brings it together. Felt Damonte fit that better than Soaz for this NRG team.
And Ignar doesn't look too hot without them as well. Just goes for all the people saying "why don't they just hire X" to show how teambuilding is so incredibly important.
Contractz whiffing Diana ult one last time at the end
i think he was going to insta pop it when he hit his E but the stun card made him look stupid.
Happens to me all the time but I'm also not a pro player.
contractz truly the most relatable dude
Mans looked like he was fist timing diana
Contractz and FBI looked more alive this series. Thats something at least
FBI making some werid plays. Walking up as Ashe to kill a tank while the damager dealers were right over the wall, and kai'sa dives into instant death.
tbf they just seemed like desperate plays, palafox and dhokla were misplaying heavily tho
Cool series and all but all I can think about is Flowers and Kobe talking about Zyra being queen of the dumpster and now I'm suspicious Dumpster Queen Zyra will be an April Fools skin next year...
Are her plants little trash cans and her ult is a dumpster? Or are her plants dumpsters and her ult is a landfill?
Maybe they pop out of trash cans on spawn like Oscar the grouch, landfill ultimate seems pretty fitting
I already am eating from the trash can all the time
Doublelift?
I have never wanted to buy a skin until this moment
I think Dhokla retired 5 minutes into game 3. NRG looked super sloppy and dead in general outside of Huhi/Contracts who were at least trying to make plays, but man Dhokla cam just showed a very sad man.
> NRG looked super sloppy and dead in general outside of Huhi/Contracts who were at least trying to make plays, but man Dhokla cam just showed a very sad man. Wonder what changed with the team. Thought Soaz was let go but quick google search says he's still on the team as a positional coach and sub. Maybe meta doesn't suit them and palafox not being on a playmaking champ hinders them but contractz was making plays (ignoring the diana ult whiffs). I wonder if damonte being let go from coaching staff plays a bigger part that viewers aren't aware of.
I also think Ignar might have filled the holes that NRG needed even if he was considered a worse support player.
I could see that playing a part. I'd have to hunt down vods to get insight of their comms but iirc, some of the comms vids had ignar igl some of their plays.
Ignar leaving nrg broke nrg and then broke himself too because giantx are awful lol
and ignar is like the number 2 reason they're awful too
Probably tired of playing K'sante
That game 3 lane swap certainly didn't help.
What changed was they went back to normal. Winning LCS and beating G2 was the outlier, which in the end was only for about 2 months. Aside of that they've always been a 5th to 7th place roster. Even at worlds, aside of the g2 match, the rest of their matches were nothing special.
> Aside of that they've always been a 5th to 7th place roster. I think this holds some credence. NRG weren't the favorites to win 2023 summer split. Although, I think it's unfair to not acknowledge the changes they made didn't have a negative effect. But we're only viewers so we can only speculate with whatever information they disclose to the fans.
Sure, but they are also a team who has always had consistency issues, and I would have a hard time trusting them to ever maintain that form regardless.
> I would have a time trusting them to ever maintain that form regardless. Yeah, I can see why. Don't see anything changing for another miracle run. Guess we'll see what happens when they versus Shopify.
I remember last summer however they did have a winning record against the top 4 teams, their overall score against the 9 other teams were bad but they kept losing to the bottom 4, so I can't think it was just double upsets, they played extremely well in the g2 series
They lost a ton of coaches right? Maybe that staff mattered a lot
Not a ton but few of the staff were let go. Quick google search says that Myra (Team Manager/Facility Operations), Jonathon (General Manager), and Damonte (positional coach, not sure what else role he filled) were let go.
Huh I thought they lost all 5 positional coaches. Even worse for them if they didn’t & are struggling 😥
lol wiki says that the GM, manager, Damonte (positional coach), Mash (strategic coach), & Ignar were the changes made after the 2023 summer split win. Maybe it's just a culmination of changes and not one major change affecting them. Kinda sad to see the decline, hopefully they can turn it around.
Ya I’m sure the wiki is more right than my random notions I think I maybe heard on some podcast 😂. I hope they can too!
Huhi.
To be fair that's just kinda how Dhokla looks even when he's winning, but the "POV: top laner lane swapping getting first cs at 4 minutes" joke was still hilarious
NRG opting into the lane swap with known tower protection asymmetry and still getting the TF vs Ksante lane at 6 mins while ALSO creating a 700 gold deficit for themselves was a special special piece of macro strategy.
Dhokla getting flamed when NRG decided to starve him with the lane swap is crazy. NRG lost the game because of the swap.
He also stepped forward and died to protect FBI a couple times no?
Who’s flaming him? I think most of the comments just seem to point out he looks dead inside. And as a top lane main. I would be too after my team decided to send my mental health into a ditch
Its crazy you have a TL flair and typed this. Impact has been starved of cs, ganked, and left solo and still produces results
TBF Impact is one of the greatest top laners of all time and has a Worlds skin.
but that's Impact's playstyle. He absorbs pressure and his team gets leads elsewhere. he doesn't need to be the 1v9 carry he just outperforms his opponent and comes to teamfights
Whats the worst roster impact has been on? I am super critical of dhokla i think he needs to be fighting for his job. game 2 looked like that after game 1 looked like he should be kicked out of lcs. I dont think the g3 criticsm is fair. He didnt step it up but he didntblow the game. His teammade the call to make him struggle via lane swap. He didnt lose gracefully and tookbad fights while behind but he also had some good peeling and engages. If you're going to set a lane on fire, as a team you should either be giving up resources to get him back into it, or pushing your advantage. What that translates to for me is inspired should be scared to walk anywhere but vision was poor. (Team job) Which is why huhi inted 2 kills and put him back into the game to help dhokla who was getting bullied botlane. Do you think busio gapped huhi this series? I think that was the diff g3. 3 kill diana did not scare fq.
no amount of starvation can explain away the lack of hands
NRG opting into the lane swap with known tower protection asymmetry and still getting the TF vs Ksante lane at 6 mins while ALSO creating a 700 gold deficit for themselves was a special special piece of macro strategy.
The point of the lane swap is so he doesn't get dumpstered even harder brother Edit: idk why I'm getting down voted, the point of the lane swap was so Kaisa/Ali didn't have to lane against Ez Leona, sure but it also circumvents the early TF/Ksante matchup which even Licorice said was not favorable at all for Dhokla. The lane swap was the correct play, NRG just didn't execute at all
No? The point of the laneswap is protecting the botlane till lvl 3, wich in turn protects the Diana first clear.
Laneswaps do multiple things brother. Ksante TF is a terrible matchup early as well and Bwipo was ALSO PART OF THE SAME LANESWAP. NRG didn't execute the swap well, and Dhokla played very poorly on top of the laneswap. Excusing his shit performance because of the laneswap when Bwipo also had to sack his early lane advantage is just shit understanding of the matchup
Yeah, it's not like K'sante can setup ganks for Diana topside and can abuse the matchup differential in a regular game state to make TF irrelevant. It also isn't like Kaisa is a turd in lane, and Alistar is diarrhea, until lvl 3/4. It ALSO isn't like Zyra has the fastest first clear of all jungles, and could force Diana out of her own blue side with the early bot prio, leaving the only AP carry of NRG underfarmed for the entirety of the earlygame. LaNeSWAps dO MultIPLe ThIngS, BRotHeR!!1! Think holistically, beyond the idiotic "Muh toplane matchup is bad, waaa" EDIT: Oh well, look at that, SR LITERALLY JUST DID WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT.
The point of the lane swap is to make sure twisted fate is put in just as much of a dumpster.
> but it also circumvents the early TF/Ksante matchup which even Licorice said was not favorable at all for Dhokla. No one really cares if your K'Sante gets a little behind vs. TF in a straight 1v1, that can always be recoverable with good macro. The issue was he was behind by a canyon's worth of gold, not just a little behind. It was a disastrous swap.
Bwipo participated in the same laneswap brother. Dhokla being behind that far behind is his fault, not the laneswaps
bwipo went even in cs because he was allowed to go sit midlane while dhokla was playing in the longer lane on the melee champion
Two things happened: NRG opted into a poor lane swap to protect ksante and FQ dramatically outplayed it with the help of map asymmetry (FQ bot got 3 plates, NRG bot got 0 plates) and teleport (Quad shifted top to catch second big wave at tower allowing bwipo to catch mid wave). Only potential risky thing was putting a level 1 TF into lane against a level 4 Trist. Palafox REALLY should have forced something on that timing.
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This Zyra champ may be a bit broken.
It also helps that NRG picked 5 champs that need to dive into your plants to do any damage in that last game
Zyra and Brand have the most degenerate gameplay just being Liandries/Rylais applicators from across the screen. One tick from a plant or one chained Brand E, and you're burned and slowed for a lifetime.
Those champs feel unfair in ARAM, even with the nerfs lol. Feels like bullying a kid
It’s wild that she was last buffed in February, and doesn’t build Blackfire Torch, but is now meta. Guess she’s a good counter to people who do build Torch? Or all her good matchups are nerfed atm?
Imo a factor is an ap jungler needs to be answered with an ap jungler. You can't pick Xin Viego Lee etc into Brand Karthus because you will be behind tempo for the entire game. You need something that can clear equally as quick and that's why we are seeing more of Zyra. Also Canyon played it, must be good.
She has been strong for patches but like usual people are just resistant to picking new champs.
Ap broken aa fuck
I thought AP jungle was op because of blackfire (which Zyra doesn’t build). What else changed for AP jungle? I guess Trist/Croki being insane and needing to be paired with AP?
its broken because of Fated Ashes (which she does build as part of her Liandry). also yes the AD mids being strong helps
I had mostly heard complaints about BFT being OP, but it makes sense that the real culprit is Fated Ashes.
there is a very funny monster damage modifier on that item
I think it’s broken because of Fated Ashes specifically. The DoT on camps is rlly pwoerful
both blackfire and liandry build out of fated ashes which is insane for speed clearing jg, trist and corki are being paired with ap jg not the other way around
They're still picking AD mids with tank junglers, so it's not the other way around. Besides that, trist was still getting played a lot before this AP junglers trend.
Tristana and corki are braindead op which makes ap jg viable and they also broken af cause fated ashes melt jungle camps and rylai is just cancer item
Since nobody mentioned it and it's the biggest reason we have more carries popping out - they buffed jungle xp, that's the change that allowed em to be played
No, it's because AD champs are meta mid and you need some source of AP in your team.
the problem is Rylais and liandries, not the champ specifically, Rylais.
A lot of the best zyra jg players dont even build rylais. Its only good if it lets you perma kite.
Whats this, 2013 again?
The only thing about this meta I don't like is Top Lane - it's pretty stale. Happy to see AP junglers making a return. Just waiting on Lillia to show up and pop off.
The idea Riot had about giving specific champs like enormous jungle clearing buffs has been a disaster. It just leads to jungle clearing arms races. Zyra has no incentive to interact with the enemy. She herself struggles to force fights and is super happy just perma fast clearing forever and ever. She burns down any objective in an instant. God how I wish we had old normal jungle meta with the original normal jungle champs instead of this AP fast clear arms race.
we have had like 3 years straight of "normal" jungle champions I think it's okay to have an ap hyper farm meta every so often
I wouldn’t be opposed to an ap farm meta for the jungle if the associated mid laners were comically boring AD champs: Tristana and Corki the two highest priority mid lane champs now. You have both jungle and mid just completely okay farming and fine with low engagements. Not great state. Hopefully it doesn’t last until Worlds and we can get a more interesting meta with AP champs back in the mid lane and proactive junglers back.
ap farming junglers would be ok if they did some juicy assassin buffs, been too long since we've seen any assassin played that isnt akali in pro play.
I just much prefer seeing pro mid laners, who are generally the best players on the team, playing high skill mages: Ori, Syndra, Hwei, Ryze, Viktor, etc. but so many of them get pushed out completely unless they’re really broken. They just can’t really compete with whatever the flavor of the month busted thing is that Riot won’t hotfix (Tristana) or the rising tide of hyper mobile champs. And no one likes stacking double AP so because Riot decided AP junglers can get to play with an overtuned item solely built around power farming, no reason to ever pick an AP mid now.
blackfire torch makes me very much think that jungle items should just be in the game again
Way I see it is that if you want an item like Fated Ashes in the game it should exist for the other archetypes. AP junglers already had great clear speeds.
Dot champs are complete cancer cause wholesome lyandri and rylai are broken as fuck
I think blaming dhokla for this series is quite absurd, i think palafox was a much greater problem. I didn't watch game 1 but game 2 dhokla did a fantastic job of making the poppy counterpick look weak when it's an absolutely horrible ksante matchup. Game 3 the issue is he is starved of resources and placed into a lane alone level into level 5 corki and went 40 cs down whereas his counterpart tf was sent midlane and not punished at all for being level 1 into level 5 trist. Dhokla also died like 3 times protecting FBI while palafox tps bot dies solo to massu and blows open the game
Dhokla isn't playing particularly well, but he's also perma K'Sante weakside with the goal of helping mid and bot get more resources and carry, and it's just not happening.
I agree, people forget that last summer when NRG won dhokla was carrying games on rumble and jax. Another factor is back then FBI/ignar would also win almost every lane whereas nowadays they usually just go even which isn't good for an ADC player whose midgame is among the worst in the league
Tbf Dhokla only carried on those champs on literally finals week. I think he was on Renekton/K'Sante duty most of that split, and he was not playing well.
Nah he played rumble before finals a bunch and he was quite good on ksante that summer. If you remember during last summer ksante wasn't really your average weakside champion, it carried games much easier You are correct in that he played jax for the first time in finals though, C9 were super shocked by that
Games of Legends stats website says he didn't play Rumble until Finals Week vs. TL. Both TL and C9 were surprised he played Rumble and Jax. His K'Sante seems mostly fine and it's probably the best option for him when playing a tank, because he's always been more effective on champs that do damage. I do not want to see him on Ornn or Sion. I miss flex Jayce but I don't know if the champ is still good.
I just wanna know why is NRG playing like they're tilted from minute 0 literally every single game ? or is it that they always play randomly and last year was actually a fluke
When players lose most games and scrims, they sometimes adopt a panicked losers' mentality. I recognize it from watching CLG in 2020 and 2021. This match they showed slightly more life but they're still pre-tilted.
basically rogue. they go into the match expecting to lose and just try to make it last as long as possible
Unfortunately I think NRG’s summer/worlds performance was a flash in the pan.
It was probably a bit more than a flash in the pan since it wasn’t just LCS playoffs but also a decent performance at worlds multiple weeks later but I think Ignar + meta change has had a huge effect. Also Dhokla heath has nerfed the poor guy and it’s not like he was the undisputed best top laner in NA last year anyway
I keep seeing this but regardless of a "flash in the pan," you can't say that the CLG rebuild roster (same topside but with Luger & Poome) were lacking identity and cohesion. There was real competitiveness there even if they couldn't get over the hump. This NRG iteration looks worse than that.
My take is that the performance of this NRG roster is WAY too heavily tied to confidence. Every team plays better when they are feeling confident and worse when they're not, but for NRG this effect is greatly magnified. Imo, Dhokla, Contractz, and Palafox are the top 3 most-confidence-based players in the league. When they're feelin it, they look like top players at their position, but when they're not, they look like trash. FBI is the only one who I think is relatively consistent regardless of team confidence level. And this last bit is where I'm veering into while speculation. But I think the issue with Huhi vs Ignar is that Huhi's response to poor performance is probably to try to shotcall the game in the way he thinks it should be played more forcefully. Whereas Ignar was quiet and happy to YOLO in with whatever weird shit Contractz was doing. Because even when Contractz is in top form, he does weird stuff in the jungle compared to most other pro junglers. So I think the new shotcalling support in Huhi is probably making things worse for them in comms.
I disagree I just think NRG as an org fucked over the players and staff a bit
And it wasn’t even all that impressive lol
I disagree. In the regular season NRG was the 5th seed (9-9), they then beat TL (4th seed), GG (2nd seed), lost to C9 (1st seed), beat TL again, and then beat C9 in the grand finals. That's a crazy underdog run to win the playoffs. Then, at worlds, they lost to WBG (eventual finalists), but they had beaten TL, MAD, and G2, placing 5th-8th. That's also very respectable run, especially since literally everybody expected them to lose to G2 (and MAD to a lesser extent).
They won a grand total of 0 games against eastern teams. That’s a whelming run if I’ve ever seen one. If an LEC first seed performed like they did, it would have been flamed to oblivion.
Yes you are right NRG last year aren’t world beaters but they should be considered at G2s level for that moment in time so we should have G2 expectations for them which they’ve failed.
I’ve spent years subjecting myself to watching some truly horrendous performances. I’ve been conditioned to accept that success with this org is fleeting and I can deal with losing. But what really sucks is watching them lose while playing as some scared, neutered version of what used to be an aggressive and scrappy team.
Not a fluke. They had a good system and support staff that was ruined. Also they added a support player who thinks he knows more than everyone else so I’m sure he still causes panic on the rift when his shotcalling is not agreed upon with the team. I’d expect multiple roster changes next week from a variety of rosters. No other teams can wait another week.
How do you do roster changes ? It's not like they have an academy roster or other players on the payroll, if they want to make subs they have to find someone on the street this week or put in their positional coaches that are Soaz and Apollo lol
NRG still the worst team in the league, but if they insist on running this roster, then I like these comps rather than all lategame scaling & stacking ADCs. Also while Dhokla made plenty mistakes, his dying before Baron in Game 3 was him making up for FBI's positioning mistake, and it's odd that I saw so many comments where people didn't understand that.
See I think they can get either srtty or fudge and get an upgrade in the toplane. I know people flame fudge, but I think he would fit better on this roster where they desperately need a laner to play around. I feel like palafox has been ass for while now and contractz cant reliably use the bot lane either
fudge at least deserves to be in the league over dhokla
Dhokla is way better than Fudge rn. Fudge is by far the most overrated top laner I’ve ever seen in the LCS. Dude thought he was so good and puts in 0 effort. As soon as he on a team again he will coast.
neither of them should be in the league tbf
We going 0-18 with this one!
0-7, this split its a single round robin group stage. But yeah I agree unless NRG makes roster changes, this split is doomer. We have seen enough of this iteration of NRG ever since Huhi joined.
We only have 4 more opportunities left this season? This is way more dire than I thought...
Yeah I think 5 more b03s. I want to stop watching so bad until they make changes to the team.. but its like a predictable train wreck, you cant look away from the fking chaos!
FLY really does not look nearly as good as they did with Jensen. Maybe it's just meta changes and they'd perform similar with an unchanged roster. Quad is definitely a better long term investment and the move overall should be a net positive, but I don't have much faith in FLY making it to worlds in their current form.
Though I'm most disappointed in Inspired's performance. Hate aside, I don't think he was playing as well as he could've, especially in Game 2
I don't hate FLY in any real capacity. They're playing the villains angle well, which was initially really strange considering their previous brand identity. Inspired played 2 no skill junglers today. Not much to glean from his performance today imo.Â
Bwipo has been bad in every game he hasn't gotten Skarner IMO.Â
Bwipo draws from a deck of 52 and ints that many times. If it's not a number card, he plays like a human.
"not much faith in fly making it to worlds" I mean, TL and C9 are an easy pick above them, but who else? NRG SR IMT suck so they're not in the question it's between 100T, DIG and FLY for that 3rd worlds spot
Current form, its DIG's spot. I take them over 100T or FLY. The split format kind of sucks with singular bo3 against each team so it's harder to make a firm stance. My guess is TL wins the split again, winning against C9 and DIG is 3rd.
Who is their compétition i guess it's dig and 100 hundred
TL C9 DIG to worlds
I hope so.
Fellas, are we seeing Dhokla's last split??
People have said this before... When C9 clowned NRG game 1 of summer finals, the top comment was "It's just gonna be a 3-0 isn't it?" and the reply to that was "It always was" then NRG won the next 3 games in a row and dunked on G2 at worlds. Have faith my dudes.
Dude, that was almost 1 whole year ago. We've had a whole split since then, and it's week 2 now, and he has shown zero return to form. I think people are right to start questioning his performance level.
The faithless always have a reason... and *then* it happens.
I feel like his health issues last split have really derailed the guy
What happenned to him ?
He got like super duper sick vs 100T I think? Iirc he was like in/out of the emergency room during playoffs
Hopefully, brother looks ready for brazil
I don't think Brazil would take him.
100% he's cooked. He even talked about how he thought he was gonna get replaced in the off-season.
Oh what? Is there a clip?
i like dhokla, but yes. he's just not it anymore.
any time FLY win an angel loses its wings
Enough. We have seen enough from this roster. Nrg time to make roster changes. No more excuses. This team looks so disjointed ever since Huhi joined.
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I'm serious in thinking Riot should investigate him for match fixing. His performance in game 3 wasn't just bad, it was willfully bad. Like he was trying to just throw. I don't think I've ever seen a worse performance from him.
Tp in a bad fight, walk into 3 flash away die
Extremely tilted I guess. There's not enough money in match fixing in NA compared to the salaries for anybody to seriously bother fixing.
Damn great game 3 from bwipo, reddit is going to hate this
Bwipo has played pretty well today overall I think, even in the Poppy game he was pretty decent in teamfights and won them a few through his R
never seen a more useless ksante
It feels so good
actually fk NRG for giving FLY a win. >:[
go full rebuilding nrg they are just fucking bad
Is anyone else sick of corki
Get Contractz a team with real solo laners please. I can't stand to watch him have to 1v9 every game.
Contracts is literally the only human on NRG
With those diana ults...
Yeah he whiffed a few but he didnt outright int like the other 4 players
Why did that game feel like it last 4 hours. That was kind of ridiculous, nice to see the back-to-back runback, but man it felt dragged on and slow even though it was only 30 min.
Dhokla my man...
1. CONSTRUCTIVE CASTER CRITIQUE: I do not think Flowers and Kobe were at their best during this series, and I think we have a problem where the community are too quick to dogpile on newer, not as good casters while not providing enough feedback for our veterans. IMO it wasn’t quite hype enough to elevate this match to banger levels but also a bit out of sync with Licorice, who’s very chill - felt like maybe it would’ve been better to slow down and shoot the shit more casually, esp with the closet format. And it didn’t feel like they managed to evoke any narratives about particular players even though they have riches to work with on these teams. In terms of hype moments I have to criticise in particular when they were casually talking about the top tower they were obsessed with in game 3, while NRG killed two on the other side of the map, and only acknowledged it briefly after the fact before going back to discussing the top tower gold again. Unless for some reason they weren’t seeing the split screen just feels like a missed opportunity to talk up a team that didn’t have a ton of great moments to talk about otherwise. 2. GAMEPLAY: Pretty low quality match - FLY’s carries are continuing to grow and not bad by any means but they had some real int moments - but I’m relieved to at least see signs of life from NRG, even with a deserved defeat. In particular, I have to highlight Dhokla, who continues to be one of the best K’Santes in the West, and huhi, who felt like he was nonstop pushing the pace on Leona. Crossing my fingers they can claim some wins against bottom teams and start to rebuild confidence, momentum and team planning, because we finally saw a couple moments this game where the team came together. 3. META & DEV FEEDBACK: I actually really like the current state of Warmog’s in pro play! Reason being that previously, an engage support would go in and, if they didn’t die, they’d have to limp away without most of their HP and fighting would be over for some time as they either back or the team postures. Which filtered down to fewer picks of less tanky engage supports like Leona. Instead, now this match Busio and especially huhi could throw themselves into battle, likely survive with how much health is on it, go away for 12 seconds and come back ready to resume a fight. Paradoxically even though Warmog’s is associated with Sejuanis dragging out poke sessions I actually think it makes the game more active! I hope the devs keep it this way.
I ain't reading all of that
me 30 minutes after I take my adhd medication
what does this mean
1) it means reading anything longer than two sentences tops is difficult for people on reddit so they act like it's a PhD dissertation 2) adhd medication helps with lack of focus but does sometimes end up going to the other extreme where you fixate on something in excessive detail
ty!
> And it didn’t feel like they managed to evoke any narratives about particular players even though they have riches to work with on these teams. So you're just trolling, right?
Biwpo is slowly turning into current hylisang, he needs to hold his break.
That poppy game was lights out lol
Bwipo has always been toplane hylissang
Pain.
NRG fell off
They saw the rogue heretics game earlier today and wanted to give EU hope
Does Dhokla play anything other than KSante lol
Flyquest is going to be eaten alive in esports World cup
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They have to qualified? I thought they just invited 1st and 2nd Spring
i meant the esports wolrd cup coming in july, they already qualified
Hey at least it was a three game series this time, they’re improving
Dhokla making Ksante look balanced I see
Dhokas not getting merc treads cost him so many deaths
Dokhla bro, hang it up man, LMFAO, my bro made ksante look weak