Rise

The first match in Group C was the game to watch! It was a clash between two titans, a game that guaranteed edge-of-your-seat-almost-shit-your-pants moments! Team Season versus Team Meteor! A battle between North America and Europe. Two of the teams most likely to make it through to the next round. The winner of this game could very well cement their position as number one in the group! The crowd in the Wembley Arena was cheering. The casters were hyping up the game! And Su Xue tried to do the same with her viewers. “This is a super hype game, bois! A Midlaner who’s a King up against an Emperor Support! I really wonder how this game will go!”

Su Xue’s pathetic attempts at building hype fell flat. The viewers on the stream just ignored her. Besides, they weren’t here in this particular stream to listen to her. They were here for Lin Feng. His insights, his breakdown of the game. They knew he saw more in the game than they did. So they waited until he decided to chime in. Lin Feng shook his head, disagreeing with Su Xue’s assessment. “I don’t think we should see this game as one between a King and an Emperor. The roles that each of them are playing, they’re too different to compare directly. I think. But… uh, let’s see what happens in champion select first, yeah? We can learn a lot from that. Then we’ll talk about who’ll win this game!”

Kings and Emperors weren’t only given the title for sheer mechanical skills. There were many other variables taken into consideration, such as showmanship both in domestic and international games and their ability to build plays that substantially impact the team’s performance. Spoon from Team Meteor was a Midlaner and a flashy-sort of King. People watched games with Team Meteor just to see him and his outstanding game mechanics! Autumn, on the other hand, was a completely different type of player. It really made no sense comparing the two. Autumn was much more of a team player. He wasn’t really flashy, nor did he ever do anything that focused the spotlight on him. What made him great was his ability to ward the map to maximize vision just where it was needed, the calculations he did to create opportunities for his team, and the plays that he called for his team. His presence alone made his team far better than they could be without him, all while he stood in the background. This skillset is what earned him the nickname of God Support and the title of Emperor.

For this first game of the day, Su Xue and the casters all focused on the idea of a titanic clash between a King and an Emperor, the rest of the players on both teams were afterthoughts. People there to round out the numbers. But Lin Feng thought this was ridiculous. This game was Season versus Meteor. Two strong teams, both talented in their own way. It was a fight for dominance between raw individual skill and perfect teamplay. Of course, this wasn’t to say one had no teamplay and the other no individual skill. They were both among the best teams in the world, skilled in all aspects of the game. It was simply a matter of what they excelled most at.

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The two teams entered into Champion Select. It was Season on the Blue team and Meteor on the Red team. Season banned Mordekaiser, a strong Champion in the current meta. There were other meta champions that were generally banned out in every game, like Gangplank, Azir, Darius, and Lulu. These Champions were too strong right now. However, instead of taking one of those Champions off the board, Meteor banned Thresh. Thresh wasn’t especially strong in this patch, but he was a frightening Champion in the hands of Autumn! Meteor showed their respect. They weren’t going to try and compete against the world's best Support on his best Champion.

The Champion Select ended without any surprises or shocking twists. The teams loaded into the game while the fans and analysts were discussing the picks. More specifically, they were honing in on the King versus Emperor perspective. They couldn’t let this go. Spoon had picked Yasuo in the mid lane, while Autumn went with a support Morgana. One of Yasuo’s skills was a Windwall that could block Morgana’s skillshots. So the analysts argued that Meteor had come out with the advantage in the draft.

“Meteor is farming minions. Season is farming minions. Man, why are these European and American teams always so boring in the early game? All they do is farm and farm and farm even more. I wanna see them fight!” Su Xue complained. To which her viewers were quick to point out that this was just how Europe and North America played the game. They prefered to scale up into the late game and then win it through one big teamfight.

The Jarvan IV from Meteor did try to force a fight at bot lane. Several times, in fact. But the first two times failed miserably. Autumn had warded correctly and spotted the Jarvan IV before he was even close to lane. They backed away to their tower and didn’t even try to fight. That changed during the third gank. Autumn had his Morgana retreat a little, but not completely back to his own tower. There was just enough room to bait the Jarvan IV into jumping at him.