Chapter 239

As the game loaded, Guan Zeyuan mentioned the opening of this match.

"Viewers familiar with the LPL should know that this V5 composition is very mature in the LPL; it's the level-one Sion system!"

"Previously, this system caused both JDG and BLG to suffer heavy losses, but JDG did try to make a response back then—let's see how T1 handles it."

"It looks like they might have come prepared too!"

T1 naturally studied the opening design of Sion stealing their own jungle.

In fact, during that mid-season semi-final, they were all watching the whole process from inside their base.

JDG actually came up with a solution back then: having the top laner stand in the mid lane at the start, sacrificing a bit of early top-lane laning to protect the jungle—only that game was disrupted by V5's "Senna wall-phasing stealth," so it wasn't used at all.

"V5 is rushing toward the bottom jungle, and the ward T1 placed at the entrance of the bottom jungle has also detected their movement!"

"Clearly, T1 also believes the opponent is stronger than them at level one and has chosen not to engage!"

"Zeus is imitating 369 by standing in front of the first tower... Oh? It looks like they want to imitate the design from that JDG game!" Jide said with a mocking smile.

The heroes chosen by both mid-junglers this game are undoubtedly destined to be the focus of early-game firepower.

So for T1, the early-game jungle definitely cannot be lost.

And after T1 carefully studied this design, they indeed found that the solution JDG came up with back then was the most normal one—which is to "start stealing" too!

In fact, "mutual stealing" tactics and systems between the Chinese and Korean regions are not uncommon; it is by no means one-sided.

It's just that during the dark years when they didn't win the championship, even if LCK really learned something from the LPL, everyone at home and abroad would treat it as something they already knew, thinking, "Why would they need to learn from a region that hasn't won?"

In esports, whoever is the champion, everything they do is right!

So, well.

At this moment, the bullet comments are full of mocking remarks like "Stealing from Korea!", "We JDG are right!", "Don't smear them, good designs always have a meeting of minds!"

But if you think about it deeply, you will find that unless there is a problem with the draft, this is indeed the correct way to solve the problem.

The composition T1 built this game also leans toward early-game combat, and they are definitely not weak at level one.

Especially the bottom lane's Phoenix Legend combo, which is a rare combination with extremely strong level-one stand-and-fight capabilities; LeBlanc and Wukong are not too weak either.

The problem lies in the top lane!

As the core of this design, Sion's level-one combat power with "Glory in Death" is in a league of its own among top-lane heroes!

So even if the other four positions can pick equal matchups, the level-one combat power gap in the top lane cannot be solved; it's destined that there's no way to fight head-on at level one.

Of course, T1 also optimized this design.

"Oh," Guan Zeyuan said, looking at the positioning of the T1 members: "T1's positioning isn't directly entering the opponent's jungle; it's like they are waiting?"

The god's-eye view can always see the intentions of both sides more clearly.

The commentary desk also quickly showed a look of sudden realization.

"Oh, they should be worried about V5 pulling a 'return shot' (counter-ambush)!?"

"After all, the vision in their own jungle has been cleared, and they don't know the opponent's current movements!"

When it comes to "copying tactics," strong teams and weak teams have vastly different results.

Weak teams only know how to copy 1-to-1, just like copying a top student's homework in school, wishing they could even copy the name field.

But after strong teams copy it, they will further practice and expand on it themselves, thinking about whether this system has more possibilities or abilities that "haven't been shown yet."

For example, after T1 practiced, they discovered—this composition actually has a "second form" of the return shot!

JDG's defensive tactic back then just didn't materialize.

Even if it had materialized, it wouldn't necessarily have ended well.

Because the Sion side only needs to clear the vision at the jungle entrance and inside the camps, and the opponent would never dare to enter again after losing all vision.

And if they quietly B-recall at this time and go to their other jungle half together—they could catch the opponent who wants to swap jungles!

Regarding this move.

T1's solution is: they must be 100% sure of the opponent's jungle-starting half.

"LeBlanc W-jumps into the jungle, silently placing a ward near the Red buff camp through the wall, while the top, mid, and jungle continue to crouch near the river!"

"But here at V5..."

T1 chose to let LeBlanc learn W at level one to jump into the jungle, relying on the absolute safety of the second cast of Distortion to place a deep ward.

This vision is enough to detect whether the opponent has any "return shot" movements and can also see exactly how many people the opponent has brought.

Their own jungler only needs to stand guard at the river corner, and once the jungle refreshes and it's fully confirmed that no one is in the top jungle, they can re-enter and swap jungles without pressure!

This can 100% guarantee a safe jungle swap!

And if they can detect Sion stealing their own Red, Wukong will even have an unexpected harvest!

At this moment.

V5 is also deploying troops; Ye Bo walks directly out of the mid-lane river to expose his vision, wanting to scout the opponent's positioning where no one has appeared.

Seeing Lee Sin's position, LeBlanc also immediately walks out from the river entrance to avoid exposing their own intentions.

But after Ye Bo sees the state of the opposing LeBlanc, he suddenly looks suspicious.

"Wait, Xun, don't enter the top half yet..."

Nidalee and Sion, who had already recalled, had just arrived at the edge of the top jungle and were preparing to grope their way in, but stopped immediately upon hearing the voice.

"What's wrong, Master Ye?" Xun asked suspiciously: "At this point, their bottom lane shouldn't be there anymore, right?"

At this time, there are only twenty seconds left before the jungle refreshes; even if the bottom duo was crouching here at the start, they must have returned to the bottom lane by now.

"LeBlanc lost mana, so she must have placed a ward in our jungle—a very deep ward."

Ye Bo didn't explain in detail, just gave the conclusion directly.

But why is he so sure?

Couldn't LeBlanc have just learned W to jump over the wall to scout for vision and see if anyone was there, without actually placing a ward?

This brings us to a buff LeBlanc received in the 13.5 version a while ago.

Due to the hero's extremely low error tolerance and the dilemma of being unable to coexist in terms of pressuring/pushing the lane, she was rarely used except by a few specialists.

So, the 13.5 version introduced a buff: "Killing any unit with Sigil of Malice restores 100% of the mana cost and 30% of the remaining cooldown of this skill, and deals 10-146 bonus damage to minions."

Simply put, she can use Q to last-hit for free.

This change has no impact on combat power; it's more of a "comfort" change.

But true LeBlanc specialists all understand the significance of this change.

Ye Bo puts himself in Li Li Xianghe's perspective—if he were the opponent, when using LeBlanc against a melee hero like Lee Sin, he would absolutely never point W at level one.

After all, if you point W and step on him, you will definitely be countered by Lee Sin, and there is no reason to make a profitable trade—which would lead to not daring to use W, destined to lose early-game lane priority for nothing!

And the Q skill now also has a certain amount of wave-clearing ability and can also consume Lee Sin without taking damage; it is a better choice from any angle.

If it were a worse LeBlanc player, they might not get this point.

But the one on the opposite side...

So Ye Bo concluded that the opponent couldn't have sacrificed early-game lane initiative just to "jump up and take a look"; that would be too worthless.

There must be a deeper purpose!

Thinking from the other side, what if the opponent thought they would play a "return shot"?

Then maybe this is a trap!

The Li Li Xianghe on the other side doesn't even know that he only lost a little mana, and with the Doran's Ring recovery, he's almost back to full mana—a tiny detail that you wouldn't even notice if you didn't look closely... yet it caused the opponent to have so many wild thoughts!

"Got it, Master Ye, then I'll do this..." Although there was no information to support it, Xun still quickly modified his strategy based on this information.

After listening, Beryl immediately pointed out where to fill the gaps.

But just at this moment.

The OB perspective, besides noticing the changing deployment of the V5 members, also noticed the actions of the T1 bottom duo.

"V5's overall movements have suddenly changed; the bottom duo, who were clearly ready to retreat, have walked back into the opponent's bottom jungle!"

"Wait, but what does the T1 bottom duo want to do!?"

"Is the T1 bottom lane trying to ambush someone? This is too bold!"

From T1's perspective, the entire map is pitch black at this moment.

The vision LeBlanc placed in the top jungle didn't detect any enemy activity, only a Lee Sin wandering in the mid lane.

And with less than ten seconds until the jungle refreshes, it's almost obvious that the opponent must be in their bottom jungle, otherwise Wukong could pick up a whole jungle for free!

But even knowing this...

The T1 duo, who are crouching in the bush in front of the Krugs, are still moving toward the tri-bush!

Keria didn't point a skill, just turned on the scanner to grope near the wall, confirming there was no vision in the tri-bush before calling the AD over.

They determined that Nidalee couldn't have just cleared one Red buff and retreated, and couldn't have gone to the lane with the bottom duo—so they could definitely try to ambush them!

Their reliance is on the level-one strength of the "Phoenix Legend" combo.

As long as Rakan can knock them up, this combo is a very rare existence in the bottom lane that has kill potential at level one!

Of course, there are definitely risks. But this is the characteristic playstyle of the T1 bottom duo; compared to creating advantages, "stability" is not the first element for either of them.

This can actually be seen from Keria's hero pool that he enjoys researching, as well as Gumayusi's positioning in team fights.

It is more because Varus is not a big-carry type AD; in terms of output, he is not as good as the "Three Musketeers" (Jinx, Aphelios, Jhin), and he has no displacement and is very easy to die suddenly, which does not fit the trend of the current version.

The two crouched in the bush for a few seconds before seeing Thresh and Kalista, who hadn't lost mana but had lost a bit of health, walking over one after another.

Rakan didn't rush to use W; waiting until the two were about to walk into the bush, he cast W "Grand Entrance" at his feet half a second early!

"Knocked them up!!" the Roaring Emperor shouted, clenching his fists with joy: "Guma and Keria successfully ambushed the opponent! They must have realized it! As expected of T1!"

"Kalista, kill Kalista!"

And as a hero for whom V5 has a mature system, it is naturally reasonable for T1 to snatch Kindred.

Xayah and Rakan, this official couple, have various synergies between their skills; the strength of them being played together is worlds apart from being played alone.

For example, Rakan's E "Battle Dance" has double the distance when used on Xayah, so even if they run into an enemy at level one, Rakan can force a long-distance E to escape easily.

And Xayah's W "Deadly Plumage" not only grants high attack speed but also 25% bonus auto-attack damage and 30% attack movement speed—if Rakan is also nearby, he will also receive the same effect.

With Deadly Plumage applied by both, even recognized level-one strong heroes like Draven or Kalista could never win a stand-and-fight!

"What the...?"

Beryl and Deft didn't expect the opposing bottom lane to dare to ambush here without knowing the movements of their jungler.

But looking at Kalista, whose health was dropping sharply from being focused, Beryl didn't immediately point the E skill, trying to use "Flay" to trigger "Glacial Augment" to save her.

After all, the lost health could no longer be recovered...

He suddenly had a flash of inspiration, thinking of a point that could be used in reverse.

Thresh instantly pointed the W skill... throwing it far in the direction behind him!

This action.

Seen from the god's-eye view without the fog of war, it was simply inexplicable!

But in the eyes of the T1 bottom duo, it was something that made both of them feel a bit horrified for a moment.

"It's okay, it's okay!"

"It's fine, he learned W and can't keep us, retreat, retreat, retreat!"

Stripping Kalista of nearly half her health is definitely a huge win for the T1 bottom lane.

And Kalista also seemed to suddenly start being incredibly fierce, chasing them for two more hits and following up with a Rend, barely recovering some health.

But compared to the T1 bottom duo, who were overjoyed that their scheme had succeeded.

The LCK commentary desk was screaming.

"So they didn't find out!? Don't retreat! You've been tricked, Keria!!"

"This wave could have been a kill!"

"Thresh threw a lantern into thin air, and it actually scared them off..." The Roaring Emperor was anxious to death, but immediately realized something: "Wait!"

"In that case, won't it pass on the wrong information!?"

He guessed right.

The T1 bottom duo, who had successfully pulled away, were reporting the information that "Nidalee is at Red."

And at this moment, Wukong was still completely unaware...

The mid-lane laning phase is in progress.

Because she pointed W at level one, LeBlanc has no recovery; if she steps on him with W, she will be slapped by Lee Sin's E, and the trade will definitely be a loss for LeBlanc.

So Li Li Xianghe didn't intend to fight for lane priority at level one.

But he gradually discovered something unusual.

This Lee Sin on the opposite side, not only has he not used his skills, but isn't his positioning a bit too arrogant?

Lee Sin's E skill is 9 seconds, LeBlanc's W skill is 15 seconds, and the former's damage is one-third higher, while the latter also consumes mana.

Even if Lee Sin let LeBlanc step on him for free, he could rely on the cooldown difference to forcibly grab the lane priority, and then rely on his recovery ability to easily pull his state back!

Not to mention that with the range of Lee Sin's E skill and Ye Bo's control, he could completely cast it at the edge of the E skill's range.

Li Li Xianghe had already sensed something was wrong and suddenly had a bad feeling.

He decisively chose to take the initiative with W, stepping on his face to test him!

And just as he raised his hand—Lee Sin also countered by instantly kicking out a "Sonic Wave"!

LeBlanc turned back, and Lee Sin followed up with Q2 to pursue.

But because Ye Bo pressed S to stop the "automatic auto-attack" after landing Q2, he didn't attract minion aggro, only being chased by LeBlanc and hit with Electrocute; the trade was at most a draw.

{Resonating Strike is a locked-on skill, but it doesn't count as a "targeted" skill that attracts aggro}

But the strangeness in Li Li Xianghe's heart grew stronger!

Learned Q?

Lee Sin against LeBlanc, no matter what, has no reason to learn Q!

The damage of the Q skill mainly comes from the second-stage execute and AD bonus; at level one against a full-health LeBlanc, the two stages of Q combined don't deal as much damage as an E, not to mention the risk of missing Q!

Why would he learn Q?

Li Li Xianghe couldn't figure it out.

While last-hitting, he glanced at the mini-map to scan.

After scanning for a few seconds, when he saw Wukong hitting the F6... he suddenly thought of something!

"Xuanjun, your position might be a bit dangerous!"

Oner didn't stop his hands and didn't quite understand: "What? Is it dangerous here?"

But just as he was puzzled, a figure appeared on the left side—Nidalee, who had no buff but had already reached level two!

Only then did Lee Sin show his true colors.

The second wave of minions in the mid lane won't arrive until 1 minute and 58 seconds.

That is to say, no matter how fast both mid laners push the lane, they must both be level one at this 1 minute and 45 seconds mark.

So the question arises.

If a level-one Lee Sin wants to support the jungle, what skill is most useful to point?

"T1 is completely unaware! They ambushed V5's bottom lane, but it actually became a foreshadowing! This wave is a battle of wits in the dark between both sides!"

"Xun actually chose to start at Three Wolves!"

"This wave is Nidalee's strongest level-two jungle invasion... and it's an unexpected invasion of 'their own' jungle!"

For the hero Nidalee, the strongest point in the entire game is level two!

In the entire League of Legends, she is absolutely the one who has the final say; don't even think about comparing her to Kha'Zix or anyone else.

It's just because this hero can possess 95% of her combat power at level two, has four short-cooldown skills, can repeatedly refresh damage skills, and has ridiculously high mobility.

T1's level-one design did indeed crack V5's Sion design.

But due to the slight intention exposed by LeBlanc, it also brought them a new side effect—Wukong's jungle-starting position was locked!

Coupled with the stroke of genius that appeared in the bottom lane.

This made T1 convinced that Nidalee, at level two, would definitely find them and come to their territory!

"Because Wukong started the buff alone, his jungle-clearing speed is already a bit slow, and now he's been caught red-handed!"

"Both mid laners are rushing here!"

Wukong starting Red buff alone at level one and Nidalee starting Three Wolves alone at level one, there will obviously be a difference in their states.

Oner didn't think about running at all, only wanting to rely on the Red buff to try to operate and kite while waiting for mid-lane support—but inside the jungle, facing a Nidalee with passive acceleration, it's impossible to pull away!

But at this moment, a "Sonic Wave" with a tricky angle flew in from below and successfully hit!

In V5's strategic definition, mid-lane Lee Sin is the ultimate "mid-jungle double-invasion" combo.

Lee Sin has been able to roam the jungle for ten years because of his excellent hero mechanics.

The Q skill has a displacement distance of 1200 yards, and the W skill has a displacement distance of 700 yards, allowing him to roam across the jungle; his mobility and support capabilities far exceed most junglers.

And mid-lane Lee Sin can also bring this characteristic into play.

"Lee Sin's maximum-distance Q hit accurately! Master Ye is so accurate!"

"LeBlanc is still on the lower side of the river wall, and even if she follows with W, it's actually of no use; if he uses W for displacement, he has no damage at all!"

"Wukong is already in a dead end!"

"First blood taken by Nidalee... After all this, the jungle outcome hasn't changed! Oner is simply losing even more than if he had been stolen by Sion!"

【This cunning villain! How did he become so insidious after going to the LPL! Too hateful!!!】

【Xun is exerting his power! You liked invading my jungle last game, right? Let's see if I invade you to death this game!】

【I want to ask, why is the mid lane a beat slow again? Is LeBlanc's support always this slow, Da Fei!】

【Damn it, Lee Sin's Q flew over from a thousand yards away, longer than LeBlanc's R+W combined, how can you compare?】

【If you ask me, Xun still doesn't know how to behave; why not give this kill to the mid laner? If you give it to the mid laner, the game is over!】

【Not giving it is the right choice! If he gave it, the Tadpoles would have something to say again, waiting for a fair fight in the mid lane!】

(End of chapter)