Rise

Lin Feng sat behind his computer in the soundproof booth. Over the bezel of his monitor he could see the crowd cheering. He smiled. It’s only a small tournament. The stage will grow. Time to give them a little taste of me! He looked back at his screen. His Zed was one minion away from reaching Level 6 and unlocking his ultimate skill. Fizz is at least three minions from a level up. This is my window! He stuck to his normal movement path and moved to last hit a caster minion. Just make it look like it’s nothing. He grinned and placed his finger on the Ctrl and R keys. The combination of the two buttons let him learn a new skill and pushing the R key again would activate his ultimate skill.

Zed cut through the caster minion’s health with his bladed gauntlet! Lin Feng pressed down on the keys, his fingers gliding over the keyboard in practiced motion. Death Mark! Four shadows dashed at Fizz and marked him! Any damage dealt to Fizz in the next three second would deal an additional burst of damage. Zed switched positions with one of the shadows! He then cast another Living Shadow, both of them imitating the skills the main body cast. Too easy! Lin Feng laughed as he used Zed’s two damaging abilities. Shadow Slash! All three versions of Zed slashed out around them, cutting into Fizz and hemorrhaging his health! He followed up with Razor Shuriken! The three Zeds all threw a razor sharp shuriken that sheared away at Fizz’s health bar! And finally, the mark triggered. A portion of all the damage Zed just dealt to Fizz was repeated!

《You have slain an enemy!》

“IT’S A SOLOKILL IN THE MID LANE!” Silent Reed cried out into her microphone. She stared at the screen with her eyes wide open. How did he get so good!? He’s way better than in the Shanghai 16 School Tournament! She shook her head and continued, “ZED KILLED FIZZ!”

“WOOOOOOOOO!”“OH MY SHIT! WHAT A PLAY!”“SNAP! That was fucking insane!”“Holy MOLY! What the pepperoni!”“I can’t believe this! He just… WOOOOO!”“SICK! FUCKING SICK!”

Rollfire glared at the LCD screen. Come on stupid Fuzhou Tech! Do something! ANYTHING! Start winning this game! He suddenly started smiling. He grabbed his microphone and said, “Don’t celebrate just yet! Look at what’s happening in the bot lane! They’re collapsing on the Gnar!”

Zhang Hao’s Gnar was struggling to keep his own in the lane swap. He had to fight against an Alistar who could land strong crowd control skills and a Kog’Maw who absolutely couldn’t be given any kills. Kog’Maw was a hyper-carry. It was almost impossible to stop him once he got a couple of kills under his belt. But he first had to get those kills, and against a Gnar that was incredibly difficult.

Gnar was partly a ranged Champion. This gave him a lot of wiggle room in a lane swap situation. He could sit behind his tower and Hop around if the opponent tried to engage him, throwing out auto attacks. And then there was Mega Gnar. When his rage meter filled up, Gnar transformed into a large monster with monstrous damage, health and crowd control skills! It was so difficult to play against this combination of skills all in one Champion that right after his initial release, Gnar had an almost 100% ban rate in professional League of Legends. It wasn’t until several months down the line that people learned how to play against him. Mini Gnar was slippery, but vulnerable. The trick became to bait out Mega Gnar, retreat and wait for Gnar to transform back to his original form, and then jump on him!

Fuzhou Tech employed this very tactic. Kog’Maw and Alistar harassed Zhang Hao’s Gnar and made him fight for every last hit on a minion. This filled up Gnar’s rage meter a little at a time. All the while, Fuzhou Tech’s Jungler had his Rek’Sai move through the Jungle in the direction of the bot lane. He cleared camps and knew roughly how many seconds he had until he had to arrive in the bot lane.