How a gap in Najin's Shield wall let the KT Arrows slip through.

Most people going into the first quarter final were predicting KT Arrows aggressive play style to run right through an underperforming Najin White Shield. It was quite the surprise then when Najin Shield after a slow start to game 1 out played KT strategically. For the first two games of the series every time the Arrows would try to make a move for picks Shield would heavily out position and win out. The superior movement, timing, and vision of Shield that allowed them to out position the Arrows carried them to an early 2-0 lead and early on in game 3 it looked as though it would turn predictions on their heads and 3-0 the Arrows.

About 27 minutes in Shield appears to have all but won the game, they’ve built a small but comfortable 2k gold lead as well as a significant tower and vision lead. Shield’s Save on Jax has hit the two item point that allows him to just maul towers and no one on Arrows can deal with his split push yet. Even after Shield’s support gets caught out warding the Baron pit Shield is still in a great spot. Not only do they have a lead and a two item Jax, but that Jax has a full wave of minions about to smash into the bottom lane inhibitor turret as the Arrows start the Baron.

At this point Montecristo, English caster for OGN, can actually be heard saying “Shield is okay giving up this Baron for the inhibitor.” He is of course exactly right. There is no one left behind to defend and a Jax with Trinity Force and Blade of the Ruined King will easily take the tower and inhibitor before Arrows get back. At the same time Shield has 3 people poking over the Baron wall and a 4^th running from base. If Jax needs an extra second or two to escape they could easily stop backs to buy time, and if they were feeling extra confident could even try to delay Arrows long enough for Save’s Jax to shred Nexus turrets.

With the inhibitor down and the fact that Baron will not even out the gold for Arrows it would leave Shield in an excellent spot. KT is forced to defend their base against super minions and the ever present threat of a Teleporting Jax back door. If the Arrows try to make one of their trade mark aggressive plays while wearing the Baron buff they run the risk of Jax, or super minions, or both destroying their base and finishing the game, and the inhibitor will not respawn till the Baron is gone. Meanwhile Shield will be free to take vision control and eliminate the 2 remaining towers outside of KT Arrows’ base, knowing that if the Arrows contest they will lose the game. Then once the Baron has respawned Shield can use their map control and split pushing Jax to force a no win decision from the Arrows. If KT contests the Baron with no inhibitor tower to stop him Najin’s Jax will take the game by himself. If KT instead send enough people to deal with Jax’s split push they will be forced to give up the Baron buff allowing Shield to safely siege and systematically close out the game.

Instead when Montecristo gives us his wonderful quote that shows how Najin Shield can secure the victory if they play right, Save’s Jax teleports away from the turret to the Baron pit. Shield then engage with their Jungler at half HP and their support still not in range as they run back from the base after respawning. Despite these disadvantages for Shield it is actually the fact that two of their most important champions, Jax and their ADC Ezreal, end up tanking the Baron for large portions of the fight that turns it against them. They lose the fight in a very close 3-5 but stop the Baron. Not long after a second Baron fight erupts this time going much worse for Shield who were stuck without Jax, because he’d teleported into the last fight where Mundo had not, and Arrows picked up the baron off the back of a fight that went 4-1 in kills.

While this was not the only chance for Najin Shield to win the series, it was definitely the pivotal moment in the best of five between the two teams. KT Arrows were granted a stay of execution by the mistake and they used the momentum of the first win to capitalize on further mistakes in game four, Ggoong’s failed Shockwave into a failed Flash, to force a game five. In the blind pick game five KT were able to get a horrendously strong pick comp that had been banned out the previous games and use it to insurmountably snowball the final victory and the series win over a tilting Shield. 

Lee Sin, the real King of the Jungle.

Image Credit: Riot Games

It's no secret that Lee Sin is a strong jungle pick. If I asked you to name a popular competitive jungle he'd easily be one of the first to come to mind, and Lee Sin is widely regarded as one of the 3 "S tier" or best jungle picks available. Lee Sin's kit gives a lot of potential to out play and that along with the relative strength of his numbers makes him so popular. What's not so obvious though is just how utterly oppressive Lee Sin is in the jungle.

Throughout season 4 Lee Sin has enjoyed a top spot in the jungle. In spring Lee Sin and Kha'Zix teamed up to force all but themselves Elise, and Evelynn out of viability in competitive play with their insane early damage capabilities. Other junglers like VI or Jarvan simply couldn't deal with with Kha or Lee who would walk into their jungles and fight them from level 3 on. Since then Kha'Zix ate a hefty nerf that dropped him from the equation and left Lee Sin alone at the top.

Since Kha'Zix fell out of favor it has opened up junglers other than the S tier of Lee Sin, Elise, and Evelynn in competitive play but almost all of them require Lee Sin to be banned before they can safely be played. In OGN Lee has only slipped through against non S tier junglers a grand total of 6 times. While Lee does hold a 2-4 record in OGN it's all examples of skill disparity between teams, like in Samsung Blue's victory over IM#2, or heavy misplay like CJ Frost's loss to SKT T1 S. When we expand to include the LCS regions in our numbers Lee Sin's win rate grows to 12-10 over non S tier junglers this summer. A full seven of the 10 losses against non S tier junglers, including the four from OGN, are blatant examples of skill disparity or misplays.

The three losses for Lee Sin not easily explainable by blatant misplays, or by the fact it was a team that failed to advance facing a team favored by many to win OGN Summer, come at the hands of Nunu. Nunu's victory over Lee Sin shouldn't come as too much of a surprise though. The Yeti rider has always had a very binary nature in the jungle, either getting an early lead and playing flawlessly to win, or making a mistake to fall behind and lose in fantastic manner. It's why I continue to hate Nunu in the jungle when I see it picked, because few teams have the ability to play it as flawlessly as required to ensure victory.

Some might argue that Lee Sin alone is not that oppressive in the jungle considering that Evelynn and Elise hold a much more impressive 23-14 record against non S tier junglers. While those numbers are certainly more impressive it is important to notice the fact that almost universally in those games Lee Sin received a ban, usually from the team playing the non S tier jungler. What's more while they will allow Elise or Eve to make it through champ select, the teams with the best pick/ban phases almost never allow Lee to slip through when intending to play anything other than Elise, Eve, or Nunu. Samsung White, SKT K, Alliance, Fnatic, and C9 have never allowed Lee Sin through champion select when they picked any jungler other than Nunu, Eve, or Elise. Samsung Blue has only allowed it once against IM#2 who failed to escape groups, and CLG has only allowed it once but picked their non S tier jungler after seeing the enemy lock in Elise.

Lee Sin commands intense respect in champion select from top teams making him the target of dozens of picks and bans in the summer season alone. The best teams avoid the mistake of picking any jungler other than Eve, Elise, or Nunu without first guaranteeing Lee Sin is off the table. Those teams that have picked non S tier junglers into Lee rely mostly on out playing their opponents, which has worked for some like SHC and SGB, and exploded in the faces of others such as CRS and TSM. It is clear from looking at the way the best teams play champion select that this summer Lee Sin is the undisputed king of the jungle.

Ohmwrecker has a 100% win rate this season.

Yup, you read that title right, Ohmwrecker has a 100% win rate so far in Season 4. It has been picked up in two professional games, in the same week.

The first purchase of Ohmwrecker came out in Korea during the OGN Champions Spring qualifiers in the SKT T1 S vs Midas FIO match. The second barely over a day later in the European LCS during the Gambit vs ROCCAT game. There is some argument that it's a troll pick as SKT never used the item in their game, and Roccat were against Gambit's substitute squad, but I think the Roccat game shows it's potential viability.

Since the recipe change in 3.14 that dropped the price of Ohmwrecker by about 800g the item has been gold efficient on stats alone. It remains a mostly unused item though, and not for no reason. Items like the Talisman of Ascension, Sight Stone, and often Mikael's Crucible take priority for a support to aid in team fights. Ohmwrecker's turret disabling active is useless outside of tower sieging and while the AP and HP are nice they simply don't stack up to the benefits of the other aforementioned item's actives.

Ohmwrecker is definitely not useless though, and Roccat gave a perfect example of the situational viability of the item. When Roccat buy Ohmwrecker they're ahead and looking to siege on Gambit's inhibitor turrets, but they only have Ziggs and Lucian for ranged damage and Gambit has an incredible amount of wave clear. This is where Ohmwrecker shines, allowing Roccat to keep their siege champions under the turret longer in the face of heavy wave clear. It also comes in handy in more than one dive for them, disabling the turret long enough to win the fight without taking heavy casualties.

It's unlikely Ohmwrecker will ever be as popular a pick as the Talisman of Ascension, but in a season where games often turn during the inhibitor turret siege there's a niche for Ohmwrecker to fill. It's possible we wont see much more of it, but then again SKT and Roccat may have planted just enough of a seed for pro teams to value Ohmrecker's niche usage.