The 2021 League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) spring started with great attention and expectations around the world. Damwon Gaming won the World Championship last year, and this is a meaningful season when franchise is introduced to LCK.
The first round of the 2021 LCK Spring, which was held until the 19th, was fierce and exciting than ever. The ranking competition for which the results are unknown continued every week, and unlike last year, when the results were unclear, various victory formulas appeared for each team. With the start of the franchise system, the rise in popularity of the league has become more urgent.
Fierce ranking competition with no undefeated team or all-out team
The biggest feature of the first round of the 2021 LCK Spring is the fierce competition from start to finish, contrary to the early expectations. In particular, the upsets that the lower-ranking teams took over the upper-ranking took place very often. Proof of that, there is no team that has been bored to see for several seasons in a row, and there are no undefeated teams. Even in many cases, multipliers are similar, so management of set gains and losses has become very important. Genji, Hanwha Life Insurance, DRX 6 wins, T1, KT 4 wins each, Africa Prix, Nongshim Red Force, and Freddit Breon win 3 wins side by side, so it is difficult to predict who will advance to the postseason.
The representative upset match of this tournament was the match between Damwon Kia and Freddit Breon, the 14th match. In the match, Brion defeated Damwon 2-0. Almost no fans expected an upset because he was actually Freddit Breon composed only of new players, but he overturned that expectation and shut out Damwon nicely. Considering that Damwon hasn’t given up a single game since this game, Brion’s performance in the game was out of specification. In fact, Brion showed ample potential by defeating KT and Liv Sandbox.
In addition, DRX, which was expected to struggle with major departures, and Hanwha, which had been hovering in the lower ranks of the past ten thousand years, are clearly active in the upper ranks. The back is also a part where you can see how unexpectedly this first round went. In addition to Brion, the low-ranking Liv Sandbox, Nongshim Red Force, and Africa Prix are winning over teams such as Hanwha and T1 if they can forget, and the situation continues to be vigilant as the top ranks. It is natural that the fun to watch has doubled because the sense of immersion in each game has increased and the number of turns has increased.
Joker Pick’s feast, the importance of returning operation
One of the reasons why this round is particularly interesting is that the ban-pick composition and meta are changing every week. First, from Week 1, new champions, Yone, Samira, Seraphine, and Lell, who were not available last year, all began to appear, showing a very different aspect. In particular, Samira achieved an unofficial pentakill from the 1st week as he became a major one deal pick with Kaisa. Afterwards, various characters such as Aphelios, Jaya, Gallio, Orn Scion, and Gragas gradually appeared, and aroused interest in different aspects every week.
Not only meta-pics, but also joker pics such as Udyr and Jarvan appeared and were useful. In the case of Udyr, based on the tremendous initiating ability of the turbo chemical tank, a newly created item, it has become a mainstream pick rather than a joker pick from the third week. Even in overseas leagues, he received a lot of attention to the extent that he was in the ban-pick window. Jarvan appeared in the support line with Congkong Rune, and whenever Genji’Life’ Kim Jung-min who handled it well appeared, the opposing team always showed a good enough figure to sniper ban.
In addition to these two champions, Dr. Mundo, Kane, and Trundle also appeared in the jungle, and Heimerdinger came out as a supporter and recorded the first victory in the LCK. Not all joker picks have played a big role in the game, but it can be interpreted that players and teams are constantly trying to find new picks. Naturally, these efforts make the LCK more fun and at the same time serve as a means of providing a competitive downside to the Hwangbu League.
If you are a fan of the game deeply, it can be said that the importance of operation has increased since this season, which adds to the fun of the game. Until last year and two years ago, there was a tendency that Hanta was more important than the operation, and no matter how well the operation was, there were many cases where it turned into a fight. However, in this season, even if the team loses a large hit, it is often overturned by operation, and the stronger the team is, the more they are aware of the importance of operation. Operation has been a merit of LCK for a long time, so it can be said to be a welcome change for old fans.
I hope this momentum can continue until autumn
What I said above also means that the quality of the game has improved beyond just’fun’ to see. This is because it is a result naturally derived from the process of consistently striving for all teams and players to find new winning formulas. The same reason is that there is one team that maintains the top, but no one team can have enough power to lose power.
This year, LCK is in desperate need for a box office. This is because more capital was invested than usual to introduce the franchise, and if this change cannot be linked to the improvement of the overall quality of the league, there is no choice but to come up with an opinion that’why did you introduce the franchise?’ In that sense, the appearance of LCK in the first round is very positive. We look forward to continuing this atmosphere to the next 2nd round, as well as the Summer and World Cups, to show our spirit as an e-sports successor and a roll champion.