Chapter 69

The historical origin of LPL’s “bottom-lane core” tactical system and its strategic dilemma stems from these past two years.

During S2, the pace was generally slow, and the mid and top jungle ecosystems were dominated by support-oriented champions; after Cassiopeia was nerfed into a void wriggler, there was no effective way to instantly kill squishies, so by teamfight time, ADCs almost always completed their three core items: attack damage, attack speed, and armor penetration.

Then WE, as the pioneer, won the IPL5 world championship with a bottom-lane-centric strategy, and the visual shock of Smiler’s vastly superior ADC understanding during the wild early days of esports naturally led successors to imitate him.

This tactical understanding continuously seeped from the professional scene down to the grassroots level; countless beginner tutorials universally recommended ADCs as the easiest entry point, and 70% of ranked matches adopted a bottom-lane resource priority strategy.

Then, when Royal Club unveiled the ultimate “four-protect-one” system at the S3 World Finals, it marked LPL’s tactical dependence on the bottom lane reaching its peak.

When the entire region’s competitive focus centered on the lower half of the map, players unconsciously fell into a “dark forest” game theory dilemma—

Ask yourself: in a region like this, where every bottom lane is a monster, and the enemy keeps ganking your bottom lane from mid, top, and jungle—what’s the best solution?

The answer is simple—join the magic duel and be done with it.

So for a long time, whether an LPL team was strong depended entirely on how good their bottom lane was!

But with the arrival of S3, assassins ran rampant, delivering a dimensional strike that shattered LPL’s tactical foundation.

With the ADC’s status plummeting, LPL’s competitiveness naturally suffered greatly; even as patches changed, the bottom lane remained stuck at the kids’ table, its strategic mismatch making it fantasy to expect a championship from the bottom lane alone.

Now, Jiang Ming pulled out Jayce as top lane precisely to change the region’s habits and one-sided style.

He wanted to tell these teams: there are many ways to win a game—it’s not just mindlessly protecting the bottom lane and waiting for teamfights.

“Hecarim, Kha’Zix!”

Lao Gandie’s tactical plan was instantly exposed by Jiang Ming: after realizing his top, mid, and jungle couldn’t win the lane fight, he hoped to rely on the bottom lane’s Twitch to carry late.

Since you all love playing ADCs, let me show you how to withdraw cash from an ADC in style.

The best support for Twitch, Lulu, was taken by the enemy; now they’re stuck with a Sona, and Hecarim plus Kha’Zix in mid and jungle can make Twitch dare not even last-hit a single minion.

Lao Gandie’s final two picks were Rumble and Ryz.

“Oh, Firebrand Poppy!”

Jiang Ming slapped his forehead—he’d still overestimated the drafting skill of these pro teams.

When he saw Twitch and Sona, he assumed Lao Gandie wanted a four-protect-one composition, but had to abandon Lulu because his team took it, and needed a bit of engage, so he settled for Sona instead.

Now that Firebrand Poppy was picked, Jiang Ming could no longer hold back.

This isn’t four-protect-one at all!

Ryz needs farm, Twitch needs farm, Rumble needs farm—who the hell should the jungler help?

Most critically, LGD’s composition has zero synergy: no protection, no engage.

“ADC, take Graves.”

“Shitou, focus on ganks—both top and bottom lanes are easy to break.”

“Got it, Ming-ge.”

Jiang Ming didn’t dwell on it—he added Graves to the team as a final pick to supplement burst damage.

Team compositions confirmed:

Blue side LGD: Top Rumble, Jungle Hecarim, Mid Ryz, Bottom Twitch + Sona.

Red side NXG: Top Jayce, Jungle Hecarim, Mid Kha’Zix, Bottom Graves + Lulu.

When the champion matchups appeared on the big screen, the live audience and viewers online began a new round of discussion.

【Ah, why did NXG pick Jayce, such a useless champion?】

【Left side is a melee team—how are you supposed to fight when Hecarim gets tanky later?】

【Graves has been nerfed to hell and they still pick him? Why are people online praising this team?】

【Clearly blue side wins—Hecarim tanks in front, Sona and Rumble have ultimates that can destroy everything, Ryz and Twitch behind them just slaughter.】

Slaughter?

You’re dreaming.

Players with slightly higher game understanding scoffed.

NXG’s composition wasn’t fully clear yet, but it was definitely stronger than the right side’s team that relied entirely on Flash for engage.

“Ji, write it down fast—JM’s come up with so many game strategies, Jayce as top might be another ladder-breaking godpick.”

…

While LPL audiences and commentators were still debating whether the compositions made sense,

In the OGN region, CJ Team’s base.

As one of Korea’s leading teams, CJ’s training room lacked the cramped feeling of other squads.

MadLife, the team’s support and commander, sat solemnly at his computer, the live stream on screen clearly showing the ongoing LPL preseason match.

“Jayce has long-range damage, and if Kha’Zix evolves his W, he gets something similar… oh right, Graves’ ultimate counts too.”

As his thoughts became clearer, MadLife’s brow tightened further: “Blue side lacks engage—once their state drops enough, Hecarim can immediately charge in, and Kha’Zix finishes the cleanup.”

It clicked!

Now it made sense!

“So that’s how it works!”

“What’s that?” Shy, sitting nearby, removed his headphones and asked curiously: “Minqi, you’ve been muttering to yourself since earlier—what are you watching?”

“Don’t tell me you’re watching some porn video.”

“Of course not!”

“Shangmian, take a look at this.” MadLife pointed at the screen; they were nearly the same age and had no senior-junior barriers between them.

“NXG?”

“That name sounds familiar.” Shy strained his memory. “Is this an LPL match?”

“Yeah, we talked about this team earlier—its mid laner—or rather, its owner—defeated WE’s entire team in solo queue and climbed to #1 on LPL’s ranked ladder.”

“I remember now.”

Mentioning other things might bore the young man, but add “WE” to the topic, and he instantly perked up.

He still vividly recalled last year’s Dragon-Tiger Cup, when WE’s bottom lane crushed them with a 1v3 highlight.

Oh, and those idiots from KT—who pushed an enemy nexus while offline and got slaughtered in a comeback.

Unlike the later LCK region’s general disdain for LPL teams, at this point, many OGN squads treated WE as their primary hypothetical rival.

“So JM is playing professionally now?”

Shy’s eyes lit up—he’d heard rumors of this gaming monster who dominated solo queue and crushed LPL pros.

“Not exactly—he formed his own team and’s playing in the LPL.”

“Oh my, he’s his own boss? That’s impressive.”

MadLife sighed, annoyed they’d drifted off-topic: “I need you to look at NXG’s champion picks—you’re a professional top laner. Without considering teamfights, how effective do you think Jayce on top would be?”

“Jayce?”

“Playing Jayce top against melee is totally fine—hey, that’s actually a great idea.”

“Long-range poke, close-range duel… there aren’t many top laners with high burst.”

Shy’s eyes brightened—he pulled over a chair and sat beside MadLife.