Starting with Zaozi Ge, a dream lineup

Chapter 302 Fate is like a woven tapestry, yet it forms a solid rock.

The trash talk in the finals is different from that in regular matches, and even different from the finals of major leagues. It is recorded and then broadcast after the first game has ended. Sometimes, for the sake of the show, the director will even broadcast it again before the match point game.

On the big screen, as the narrator's voice faded...

On the same familiar edge of the high-rise building, Faker, wearing a SKT jersey, appeared in the frame, gazing into the distance, and calmly said:

"Everyone underestimated Skt's strength. In fact, our strength far exceeds your imagination. League of Legends has been our stage for so many years, and this time is no exception."

"RNG is a very strong team, but if you ask me exactly how strong they are? I can only say that we have defeated them in the finals, and we will do so again now."

After saying that, Faker leaped into the air, seemingly jumping into an abyss, or perhaps into the embrace of hope.

The cool special effects rekindled a glimmer of hope for the LCK fans who were already extremely disappointed, and they forced a smile.

Meanwhile, Li Luo, wearing an RNG team uniform, came out and said with a smile, "Faker is still living in the glory of the past. This time, RNG is definitely aiming to defend the championship, because it's our team's only goal for the past year."

"Skt? Didn't we beat Skt 3-0 at MSI? Do you think this time will be different?"

After the arrogant and confident words ended, the key figures from both sides appeared, and the fans in the audience once again stirred up a wave of excitement.

"The tension is palpable on both sides."

"However, Skt probably didn't expect to lose their first match so quickly during the recording."

"That's true, but as everyone can see, the key players on both teams are very confident. I'm a little curious about this clash between the two sides."

After saying that, the doll took over the conversation, her tone becoming even more enthusiastic:
"Now that the two strongest teams this year are ready, let's move on to the second game of today's Bo5 finals!"

As soon as the words were spoken, the director switched the camera, and the BP interface immediately appeared in front of everyone's eyes.

In this match, RNG was on the red side, while SKT was on the blue side.

As soon as the game started, kkoma seemed to realize that Kai'Sa was a monster. Without hesitation, he immediately banned Kai'Sa, even after suffering a huge loss.

Then they continued to block Xiaohu's Syndra to ensure Faker's lane control, and with Rakan in the first pick, they ensured that the Xayah-Rakan combo wouldn't appear.

RNG didn't come up with any new tricks, since SKT only had a few points to target. They still gave Faker's Ryze a ban, then banned Jarvan IV which Xiaohai might play, and finally gave Bang's Ezreal to the bot lane.

"Huh? RNG still isn't planning to give SKT's bot lane a chance to shine. That Ezreal ban was brilliant!" Wawa couldn't help but laugh. "Let's see what SKT will pick first!"

“Skt can’t do anything about it. After all, RNG’s champion pool is incredibly deep in all lanes. If they really had to ban, even ten champions wouldn’t be enough, right? It all depends on how the two sides strategize in the champion selection!” Miller said.

"So, should Skt pick Lissandra to ensure they aren't countered, while also having flexibility and suppressing RNG's second pick?"

Should we try to steal the Ice Maiden?
The answer is naturally self-evident.

SKT decisively picked Crystal Maiden, the key player who orchestrated Xiaohu's four-man gank in the previous game.

To be honest, this move was unexpected by RNG, but upon closer reflection, it's understandable.

Lissandra was initially introduced to counter Zed and LeBlanc, champions with extremely strong laning and solo kill capabilities. Her E combined with her R provides her with exceptional survivability.

Later, they invented Aftershock Crystal Maiden. In early small-scale team fights, EW triggers Aftershock, allowing her to initiate the fight while remaining unkillable. In late-game team fights, she can initiate with EW to trigger Aftershock. With her ultimate and Zhonya's Hourglass, she can deal enough damage to fully heal herself while giving her teammates at least 5 seconds to engage, allowing her to escape unscathed.

If your equipment is on par with the enemy mid laner, you can easily kill or severely damage the enemy carry with a single combo. You're incredibly tanky and deal high damage at the same time.

With strong survivability and high mobility, whether in the laning phase or in late-game team fights, strong survivability means a high margin for error.

In high-level competitions, the margin for error is a factor that every team must consider. The competition between teams is not about which team is stronger, but about which team makes fewer mistakes. High-level teams will use teamwork to force their opponents to make mistakes, thereby expanding their advantage or making a comeback. Crystal Maiden is a hero that is not easy to target.

With good crowd control and strong synergy with the jungler, the current version emphasizes junglers doing more in the early game, and aggressive junglers are commonly used, such as Olaf, Lee Sin, Kha'Zix, and Nocturne.

These types of heroes are characterized by high damage but unreliable control. Especially since the mid lane is short, a single Flash can send them back to the tower, making it difficult to kill them with sheer damage like in the top lane. Therefore, Crystal Maiden's initiation control is particularly important.

Furthermore, her jungle fighting ability is outrageously strong, and in the mid-to-late game, her ability to gank single targets with the help of teammates is also second to none.

Unstoppable team fight initiation: Ever since Wei Shen discovered the strategy of using E while blocking the wall, various tricky angles for entering the fray have been developed to create elaborate team fight initiations, making it virtually impossible to defend against.

Especially in professional matches, where vision and awareness are top-notch, Lissandra's E ability ensures she can enter from the opponent's blind spot, increasing the success rate of initiating team fights and catching the opponent off guard.

This forces the opponent to make forced mistakes. Moreover, due to its high survivability, if it can perform two EWs in a team fight—one to initiate and one to disrupt—it will basically win the team fight. It also has the ability to divide the battlefield.

After the rework, the Ice Maiden's passive ability was changed to "Death by a Vengeful Spirit". At max level, it deals 520 + 0.3 AP damage. Are you scared yet? If a teammate is killed in a team fight, the Death by a Vengeful Spirit will chase after the teammate, at best forcing them to use Flash, and at worst for them to die.

The most annoying thing is that it slows you down. In professional matches, slowing down is a very deadly control skill. At max level, it reduces speed by 75%, which basically leaves most warriors and AD carries with no room to maneuver and leaves them at the mercy of others. Even if they are not hit by the explosion, it will still have a significant impact on the positioning and formation of teammates who are eager to rush into their teammates' arms.

8.19是一个注重前中期游戏节奏的版本，甚至可以说没有后期（发育拖后期的基本八强回家）。丽桑卓是一个非常优秀的节奏法师。（甚至这么说，所有的世界赛版本乃至于未来9.19 10.19甚至15.19 20.19都是前中期的版本。

The reason is simple: nobody likes watching boring and lengthy matches. If every game is like the LCK, it will affect viewership. Everyone likes to watch matches where life and death are taken lightly and everyone fights fiercely. Otherwise, why would they remove the Sightstone ability?

Therefore, even IG, who won the world championship in S8, picked Lissandra for Rookie in many games.

With the shift in picks, the pressure has shifted to RNG. The appearance of Lissandra means that heroes laning against her not only need excellent anti-gank abilities, but also the same speed of support as Lissandra.

"They really wanted to go head-to-head with us; it was all expected."

Chris, who had been tense for a long time, immediately relaxed when he saw SKT pick the first pick.

With a smile, Chris flipped through his tactics board, asking in the voice chat, "Should we go for a laning phase or a team fight?"

"Let's stick to laning. Engaging in macro-management team fights with SKT is risky; it's safer to focus on laning."

Xiangguo was the first to express his opinion: in such a competition, winning the game in the safest way is always the best solution.

"Okay, let's lock it then."

Upon hearing the sound, RNG's first and second floors immediately located the hero and locked them in instantly. "Fate is woven like a tapestry, yet we stand firm as a rock."

"To die at my feet is a blessing from heaven."

Pantheon and Taliyah's images appeared in the selection box one after the other, eliciting cheers from the audience.

"Locked out! Taliyah and Pantheon, as expected, RNG isn't going to back down from you, directly picking a mid-jungle duo that's terrifying even in ranked games."

"As the originator of Taliyah jungle, Mlxg's Taliyah has started a trend, and now it's finally being unleashed."

"In that case, SKT needs to rethink their jungler selection. Otherwise, with the strength of Taliyah and Pantheon, relying solely on Lissandra won't be enough."

On the other side, the Skt members didn't show any surprise when they saw RNG's picks.

Of course, besides Skt's jungler Blank
"The enemy team picked Taliyah, should I pick Gragas?"

When Gragas was mentioned, Blank hesitated for a moment, seemingly a little reluctant to continue playing this champion.

In the last game, his Gragas not only failed to catch anyone, but was also completely useless, giving Kai'Sa a pentakill. To be honest, he doesn't want to play any more champions this game.

However, when Pantheon and Taliyah enter the fray, Gragas is still the most restrained.

"The jungler isn't in a hurry, since RNG has already secured it. Let's choose either bot or top lane."

After exchanging a few words, Skt ultimately secured a fairly strong bot lane duo of Lucian and Alistar in their second and third picks.

Both of these are SKT's signature bot lane champions, and picking them as the second or third pick is also to prevent RNG from removing or banning them.

As for the rather sneaky Braum combo, Braum is ruled out first because Lissandra's damage is insufficient.

Titans also suffered from insufficient protection, which ultimately led to them getting the Minotaur as the solution.

Many South Korean viewers, seeing Skt finally stand up for themselves in this game, started waving their national flags and screaming, as if Skt had already won the game.

“SKT’s first three picks were all very strong lane combinations. Should RNG avoid them and try not to decide the outcome in the early game?” Wawa frowned.

"There's nothing we can do about it. The blue side still has a bigger advantage in this version. With everyone picking the strong heroes of the current version, the red side's last counter pick doesn't really have much use. Considering RNG's team composition, it would be best to give this counter pick to Xiangguo, but now that they've picked Taliyah, emmm, let's see how RNG chooses."

In ordinary matches, the commentators can roughly guess the direction of the hero selection, but in major tournaments of this level, the heroes that are picked are basically unexpected.

While the others were analyzing, RNG's third pick was also confirmed: Letme's Ornn!
With the first round of champion selection over, both sides began the second round of bans. This time, Skt gave both ban slots to the bot lane, completely shutting down Bounty Hunter, who could go toe-to-toe with Lucian, as well as Yasuo, who had shone in G2's matches.

RNG then banned top laner Khan, further limiting Khan's champion pool.

For their fourth pick, RNG once again chose a strange champion, the Noxian Grand Marshal, also known as Swain, who was very popular in the Summer Split.

This left not only the commentators and viewers confused, but even kkoma, who was banning characters, momentarily speechless.

"Aish, is this crow a support class?"

Since being nerfed, Raven has become a rare pick in the mid lane, and is more often used as a counter in specific team compositions.

As a counter, Raven's most prominent counter hero is none other than the Frost Witch Lissandra.

The win rate between these two heroes can even reach an absurd 37:1. Raven vs. Crystal Maiden, it's a matchup that anyone can easily beat.

Moreover, given Swain's tankiness and teamfight damage in this version, if Skt activates Unkillable Swain immediately, Swain can use his ultimate followed by Zhonya's Hourglass and he can fully recover in three to five seconds.

However, if you choose not to use Raven, then given how annoying Raven is in team fights, its damage output is almost explosive.

However, if you send Swain to the bottom lane to support, it's practically suicide. If Swain gets knocked up by Alistar, he's almost guaranteed to die.

After RNG made their four picks, a stir broke out in the audience, and the commentators from various regions immediately began to brainstorm and speak freely.

SKT's fourth and fifth picks were made without much hesitation, ultimately choosing the Kennen + Lee Sin combination.

In an instant, Skt's intentions were revealed.

Kennen, Lee Sin, and Lissandra form a classic top-mid-jungle synergy. This is a lineup that KT, an LCK team, loves to use, and they picked it almost every time they could throughout the Summer Split.

Kennen and Lissandra's entry is devastating, while Lee Sin ensures the team's strength in the early to mid-game.

SKT wants to go head-to-head with RNG!
"It seems like Skt isn't going to back down this game either. They've picked a lineup that's all about going head-to-head in the early to mid-game, and it's a perfect lineup. Kkoma's got some skills," Miller commented.

"Let's see what counter pick RNG leaves for Uzi. It feels like in the current situation, nothing seems quite right. With Kai'Sa banned, it's hard for other ADCs to gain an early advantage against the Alistar-Lucian combo."

"Right now, we don't lack initiation, but we lack an ADC who can deal explosive damage in the early to mid-game and is relatively difficult to catch. Hm, in Uzi's champion pool, Varus or Xayah would probably be good choices."

After that, RNG made their fifth decision in the position selection.

"Locked, Kindred???"

"???"

"RNG swapped heroes, my god, this draft is making me dizzy!"

Skt (blue side) vs Rng (red side)

Top Lane: Kennen vs Ornn
Jungle: Lee Sin vs Kindred
Mid Lane: Crystal Maiden vs. Swain
ADC: Lucian vs Taliyah
Support: Alistar vs Pantheon
"RNG's bot lane duo is Taliyah and Pantheon?"

Looking at the lineups that had already been switched on the field, the three commentators looked at each other, not knowing what to say for a moment.

(End of this chapter)