Chapter 355: I can solve this problem

The match uses the 7.1 version that launched on the Chinese server this mid‑month; in this version, there are six heroes that are either banned or picked on the battlefield.

Top lane: Green Steel Shadow and Jayce.

Jungle: Lion Dog.

Mid lane: Enchantress, Syndra, Malzahar, and Jayce.

Jayce is a flex pick.

According to priority, these six heroes can also be divided into two tiers.

T0‑tier super meta picks: Green Steel Shadow, Lion Dog, Enchantress.

T0.5‑tier version children: Syndra, Grasshopper, Jayce.

This is the situation in the LPL; other regions are largely the same, only with minor differences in priority.

For example, in the LCK, Green Steel Shadow and Enchantress have higher priority than Lion Dog; so far, over the three‑day schedule, the ban rates for Green Steel Shadow and Enchantress are both 90% (in fact they were each only left open once), while Lion Dog is around 70%.

Moreover, Malzahar's ban rate in the LCK is also over 60%, Syndra is around 50%, and the pick‑ban rates for both are close to 100%.

This is naturally because the LCK produces many strong mid laners.

Faker, Crown Brother (Crown), Kuro, and the Fat General who just left EDG and teamed up with Deft to join KT……the veteran strongmen hold firm positions, promising newcomers keep appearing, the LCK's strong mid laners—you can literally grab a handful at random.

Moreover, in the understanding of most LCK coaches, mid lane's influence is also the highest among the five positions.

This is the main reason the LCK region prefers to ban or pick mid‑lane champions.

Also, Jayce's priority in the LCK is lower than in the LPL; its current ban rate ranks seventh, with sixth place taken by Varus.

In the LPL, however, the priority of the Ice‑bow Archer is higher than that of Varus, which is related to how the top teams were beaten by VG in their pre‑season scrims, because VG's strongest aspect is its jungle, and the Ice‑bow Archer has some ability to limit the jungle's actions.

You see, it's actually the same everywhere: the LCK's style was set by a group of mid laners, while the LPL's environment was changed by a single person.

However, the Ice‑bow Archer's pick rate in the LCK is not low either; it's just not as high as in the LPL.

Usually, the ownership of T0 and T0.5‑tier heroes—whether they are banned or picked—gets settled in the first round of bans and picks; by the second round, however, a new batch of strong heroes needs to be dealt with.

For example, the long‑range supports and AD carries that have continued since last year's World Championship—Karma, after being nerfed on a shield in 7.1, is now inferior to Janna.

In short, the version environment combined with the launch of the 10‑ban mode has raised the demands on coaches' in‑game adaptability.

Returning to this match's ban‑pick phase, EDG's strategy is clearly to fish: they deliberately refrain from banning T0 heroes in the first two slots, just to dangle VG and hope to force a mistake under huge pressure.

This is just like a market maker repeatedly shaking out a position; the newly appointed coach Long Ge, who just took office, is like a small retail investor trapped at a high price, watching the intraday line swing back and forth, his emotions tormented, suffering endless agony between cutting losses and holding on.

On such a cold day, the shirt beneath Long Ge's suit jacket is already soaked through—showing just how much pressure he's under.

Fortunately, he is not fighting alone.

Liang Yan couldn't bear to see Long Ge continue to be tormented, so he spoke up:

"Long Ge, what should we ban?"

"Ah, oh, I... I'm still thinking, wait a sec."

"I think we can just do this however we want."

"Huh?"

"Do whatever?!"

Long Ge was startled by the words and asked:

"How so?"

Liang Yan's train of thought was smooth, his speech rapid yet clear:

"Actually, we don't need to consider the second‑round mind games right now; first we should figure out how to handle the three toughest opponents—Green Steel Shadow, Lion Dog, and Enchantress.

"This round we still have three ban slots left; they get one, we get two.

"If we ban one of them now and they don't ban, we won't need to ban on our last pick; the remaining two will be contested one each; if they do ban, we'll follow suit and ban all three, so nobody gets them and we don't lose out.

"If we don't ban, it's also simple: they ban one, we don't, leaving two to be split one each; if they don't ban and we ban one, we still have two left.

"So this move can be made arbitrarily; there's always room to change tactics."

Everyone listened and nodded repeatedly.

Easyhoon turned his head, glanced at Liang Yan, and said sincerely:

"Liang Yan, you're amazing—Long Ge is Liu Bei, you're Zhuge Liang!"

"Uh, thanks."

Liang Yan then remembered that the Marquis is a Three Kingdoms fan……

Long Ge also snapped out of his panic.

Actually it's quite simple logic; Long Ge just panicked under the huge pressure, his thinking slowed, and he couldn't think of it for a moment—but when Liang Yan spoke, Long Ge let out a startled "ah", followed by a chorus:

"Exactly, exactly, let's play it safe—let's ban one first!"

VG's second ban took out Enchantress.

Behind the EDG player bench, Nofe saw that VG wasn't taking the bait; he felt a bit regretful, but it was just a casual trap—if VG didn't fall for it, he wouldn't lose anything—so he decisively had Scout ban Lion Dog.

Then VG's third ban removed Green Steel Shadow.

All three T0 heroes went into the Small Black Room, and Long Ge let out a big sigh of relief.

Before, when he watched coaches do bans and picks from the sidelines or the player bench, he'd also think about it in his head and feel it wasn't that hard; but now that he's doing it himself, he realizes coaching really isn't easy.

"All right, both sides ultimately chose to ban the three strongest heroes, so the subsequent picks become very diverse; EDG still seems to have some World Championship aftermath, first snatching Fire's signature champion, the Blind Monk!"

The voice was a bit sharp, but at this point his throat hadn't been ruined by cigarette smoke, so it didn't sound unpleasant; it carried a light motorbike vibe and was pretty cool.

Long Hair was slacking off, saying nothing.

Su Xiao Yan hesitated, then replied:

"Uh……EDG's move of picking instead of banning is pretty good, but……uh……Changzhang's Blind Monk……uh……"

Su Xiao Yan hemmed and hawed, not daring to be too blunt.

But down below there was a bold guy who raised his hand and shouted:

I can solve this problem! 4396!

The countless EDG fans around immediately glared angrily.

But that guy was really fierce; not only was he not panicking at all, he instead stared back at them one by one, and even lifted his own shirt to show it off all around.

On the chest of that shirt was printed a chibi Mang Seng kicking a soccer ball, and on the ball was printed a chibi Faker's headshot……

Besides, there was another line of text below:

【Faker, your footwork is not bad!】

The EDG fans around fell silent instantly, timidly averting their gaze.