League Analysis — Fnatic vs SK Gaming — LEC Week 4
13 FEBRUARY 2021 — by League Analyst
Another big ol’ patch
Week four is coming up in the LEC and with it comes patch 11.3. For pro play, the big changes to look at are happening in the jungle with Olaf, Pantheon, Taliyah and Udyr all getting hit to some extent.
Alongside the direct nerfs, many bruiser items are getting hit as well; Ravenous Hydra, Sterak’s Gage, Dead Man’s Plate and most importantly, Goredrinker.
So what does this actually mean? To keep it somewhat concise; Pantheon and Olaf will most likely drop heavily in priority and junglers like Udyr and Taliyah will most likely replace the two as the strongest picks available.
Another pick that we expect to see a lot less of is Renekton as two out of his core items are getting hit with heavy nerfs. Remaining in the toplane we have powerpicks picks like Camille and Gangplank.
The last pick that I’d like to touch on is Graves, mainly because of the buffs to Immortal Shieldbow, which can be combined with Bloodthirster or The Collector depending on the game. This buff might be enough to push Graves back into the meta as a jungle/top flexpick.
To end of this patch highlight I thought I’d be fun to make a mock draft to highlight what I personally think is strong going into the week. We’ll then be able to compare the mock draft to the LEC drafts.
Fnatic vs SK Gaming
Now we’ll head back to today’s match. It’s week four and Fnatic is currently in a 3 way tie for for 4th place. Going into the match against SK, we’ll be looking a bit extra at the draft and how the team’s priority changes on the new patch.
Many strong engagers were hit in 11.3 and it’ll be very interesting to see how that affects a team like Fnatic who has been playing a very aggressive and engage heavy style in the opening weeks.
Draft breakdown
Finished draft shown at the bottom of the breakdown.
Blue Bans:
Ban 1 — Udyr
The stat check machine is banned away straight away. I’m a bit surprised to see it banned from blue side but besides that it’s all good.
Ban 2 — Thresh
Thresh is still a very logical ban from blue side to deny the Aphelios or even a Jinx pick since they rely on the lantern to stay safe.
Ban 3 — Renekton
The Renekton ban comes in despite the item nerfs. I’m not expecting it to require a ban going forward but it’s still early on in the patch and it will take some time to adjust.
Red Bans:
Ban 1 — Twisted Fate
Twisted Fate is still OP and was not hit what so ever in 11.3, should be 100% banned on red side.
Ban 2 — Kalista
Kalista is an interesting ban that Jezu found some success on last week. It’s not something that I expect to be banned every game but I don’t mind it at all. Her early game still insanely strong and she has some interesting lane setups with different supports.
Ban 3 — Olaf
Olaf is also banned away but just like with Renekton, I doubt that it will remain a must ban going forward.
Picks:
B1 Pick — Kai’Sa
The power pick ADC comes in yet again as the first pick of the draft. It’s just good all around and a solid first pick.
R1 Pick — Rell
In my opinion the strongest support at the moment. It also fits Fnatic’s playstyle and gives Hylissang a lot of playmaking tools.
R2 Pick — Samira
Samira is a bold pick that gives even more playmaking to the Fnatic bot lane. It has a very early power spike and synergizes well with the Rell, but she also lacks reliable sustain damage and relies a lot on getting early advantages to not fall of.
B2 Pick — Azir
Just like in the mock draft, Azir comes in early as a blind midlaner. In terms of reliable blind picks I’d say it’s one of the best picks at the moment. It does have counters that can come in but those picks are very niche and can be abused outside of laning phase.
B3 Pick — Alistar
The go to engage support, safe and reliable.
R3 Pick — Lillia
Lillia is one of those champs that I just cannot wrap my head around. She is pretty much the Zoe of the jungle, works with almost anything and can set up plays for the team without having to commit herself to the fight. It sounds way to simple, but she is just good at what she does and is pretty hard to counter in the current meta.
Blue bans:
Ban 4 — Ryze
I don’t understand the Ryze ban here at all, Azir has so many soft counters so banning out one of them really doesn’t change anything.
Ban 5 — Cho’gath
Random Cho ban? It is what it is.
Red bans:
Ban 4 — Hecarim
So Fnatic is looking to ban out junglers here so Hecarim is fine in that sense. It’s not a super strong champ in my personal opinion but I don’t know what could be banned instead with all the nerfs that has come in this patch. With so many junglers dropping in priority, Hecarim might return to the pro meta.
Ban 5 — Taliyah
Taliyah is to be expected here as one of the premium junglers. The nerfs were very small so I expect her to remain as a high priority pick this patch.
Picks:
R4 Pick — Seraphine
Now this is very interesting! Seraphine is not exactly a lane counter to Azir but she can definitely lane against him and provides insane value in skirmishes and teamfights with her heals and long range charm. If paired with a damage heavy toplaner that can dive alongside Rell and Samira, Seraphine is a great supportive pick.
B4 Pick — Vladimir
Okay, this is probably the most greif pick I’ve seen so far this split. This is the reason for the earlier Cho’gath ban but it’s still not good. Vladimir is NOT blindable and it also leaves SK with close to zero frontline. Despite the buffs in 11.3, this is not allowed and should be punished heavily by Fnatic.
B5 Pick — Graves
They need an AD jungler so Graves makes sense, but this draft is just over after the Vlad pick. Only Alistar can engage, only Azir can disengage, no reliable frontline, it’s just doomed.
R5 Pick — Riven
I love it so much, this is 100% a riven angle. She has the Rell and Seraphine to set up plays with, the enemies lacks CC and she absolutely destroys Vladimir in lane if played correctly. I’m very impressed that they are ready and willing to pull out the counter on stage, massive respect to Bwipo for this one. Ironically, she also received a huge E buff this patch so it makes even more sense here.
Pre-game prediction
As much as I love the Fnatic draft, this really was SK just completely greifing the toplane pick. Nonetheless, Fnatic’s draft really fits their playstyle and has a very clear path to victory, should be an easy win for the boys in orange.
Key moments
The Riven pays of huge for Fnatic as Bwipo runs over the entire SK roster. SK tried to contest an early drake despite playing the heavy scaling teamcomp and Fnatic punished appropriately. The Riven got 2 early kills and took that lead into the toplane where she abused the Vladimir. That lead essentiality meant that every teamfight was 4v5 as the Vladimir was miles behind everyone else in the game. There was simply nothing SK could do and as we easily could predict, the Vladimir was the big reason for that. It was what we in soloq would refer to as “top diff”.
Post game takeaways
The question that we had going into the game has been answered, Fnatic will play aggressive and they have the picks to do so. The fact that they are willing to slam the Riven and dominate the game like this is just amazing. In terms of overall quality, this game doesn’t really show much though. Fnatic outdrafted and stomped SK, but on paper this should be an easy game, even more so with a draft like this. Don’t get me wrong, it was a good game but it’s not the game that makes me think that Fnatic is the best team in the world.
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