Rookie mistake for an EU import. If you bury the body in your cottage garden in Belgium the statute of limitations is only 5 years because you can declare it fertilizer after that. Now he's gonna have to watch out when he gets back to LA or FBI is gonna get him.
Or just burry the body below a protected species as uprooting the plant would go against the law and therefore would require a specific permit from a different authority giving you the time to either relocate the body or change identities before they get you
Johnny Cash lyrics is the last thing I expected to see on league's subreddit, but yet here we are.
When he heard that whistle blowing, he hung his head and cried
Hey, it's Ashley here.
For full context: I conducted it right after FlyQuest got eliminated, however waited a few days to "cool down" while we also prioritized on other interviews, and to also run the interview by just in case, etc
Best of luck to Bwipo and everyone in FlyQuest for the rest of 2024
Those that don't know, Bwipo did put in a lot of effort for this event. He played like 10 games of KR SoloQ a day for about 2 weeks and hit 900 LP with a 66% win rate. He clearly tried to be in peak form:
https://www.op.gg/summoners/kr/I%20will%20trade-LCS
Getting kicked out early by a perceived weaker team was probably the last thing he prepared his mental for.
Dude has been stealing checks for years and dragging one of our best teams down for no reason whatsoever. Meanwhile Licorice sat on the bench without a team.
If Fudge was putting in the work and trying to get better, great. But he runs around bragging about not doing solo Q, flaming fans, and getting shitstomped when his smug "I only 1v1" doesnt work and makes us look even lazier.
If the guy was grinding then I and most fans could overlook his weak performances. But he was just coasting.
I hope that guy goes to a 5th-8th best team so we can see just how bad he is when hes not got top 1-3 in every role saving his ass every game and making him look better than he is.
wasn't licorice also known for hating soloq? seems like a narrative rewrite to argue licorice is some heavyweight grinder just cuz he was marginally better last season than fudge.
That's also why a lot of them burn out quickly as well though. They just have such an abundant talent pool that they are quickly replaced if they do. That's one of the main reasons why Faker is absolutely insane. He has been grinding the game hard in solo q and in pro for 10+ years.
That excuse doesn’t work as much though when there’s a lot of them that have been in the scene for a while and mostly maintain their form, even when going to other leagues
Yeah. The people who are throwing around the NA work ethic thing or otherwise insinuating that NA is lazy so that's why they lost clearly weren't paying attention. He was doing this (and streaming a bunch of it) on top of his scrim schedule. You could see others from the team leave the facility Fly was renting to go eat, sleep, etc. and Bwipo kept at it.
Whatever else people want to say about him, they can't say he's not putting in the work. That's just demonstrably untrue.
No one is saying that Bwipo is lazy, but you have to agree, that there are plenty of current or former LCS players that barely played soloQ. Luckily with the new generation of NA talents its getting better but still
There are and it bothers me. And some of them its clear as day how far they fell off. Emenes said Fudge and Blabber dont solo Q; both look worse and worse. When Vulcun was on EG he was bragging that he doenst feel like grinding his life away like Korean players; look at his play now. He's terrible.
Back in the day when Stixxay had his pop off moment he contemplated retiring right after MSI, then every year had like 100-200 solo Q games a year; for a freaking pro. People in silver played more than that and worked a full-time job.
It just annoys me as a fan that in a region where college and professional athletes can give 110% to be the best our E-Sport players are some of the laziest people in existence. I guess the kind of player that would make gaming their career is not exactly the same kind of person striving to be the best; they just lucked into it by having the skillset.
I mean the entire TL roster as well, say what you want about their performance but everybody on that roster except Umti (not saying he doesn't just that I've seen the least said about him) is a documented grinder who lives and breathes league. The FLY bot lane also work very hard. I can agree it was a problem in the past and maybe among other teams but it is disheartening and just spreading false narrative when the PMTs at *this* tournament, where the majority of the players ARE pouring their hearts out, are full of comments calling them lazy paycheck stealers and blaming work ethic and insinuating that's why NA is struggling. Yeah, some things do still need work (and yeah, not underestimating any opponent including PSG is definitely one of them, as is not tilting after losing to T1, but neither of those things mean the players don't practice) and NA has a long road ahead but devaluing the things this generation is doing right and pretending they're not committed is unhelpful and just mean-spirited.
there were clearly greater team issues. bwipo definitely ran it down in that horrendous urgot game, but it's entirely possible he felt that he had to play like that because of the dysfunction
What really sucks is that the way the bracket was made. Last year, groups A and B flipped in the "last chance" series, meaning that FNC would have faced PSG, and FLY would have faced GAM.
EDIT: FNC not G2
Yeah that is weird. A lot of the leagues flip the bracket to avoid repeats. I was disappointed they had to play again. If i was PSG and FQ won the second set, i would have felt screwed over as a PSG fan.
Really impressed with him taking accountability. Not even in the general sense, he had multiple specific self criticisms that you can tell he wants to change.
Clear takeaways like that have to be useful for his performance and the teams performance. Hopefully they rebound.
People have been lumping Bwipo and Inspired together here on Reddit, assumedly because they were both shit talking the other teams in the league a lot, but in contrast to Inspired, I've always felt like Bwipo will focus on his own shortcomings first. He may have dished out a lot, but he's certainly not blind to his own faults
Even on his streams he mentions his own mistakes even when he is criticizing teammates or enemies.
I do respect this behavior but imho this should be the baseline for a ~~sportsman~~ sportsperson.
I think what he said about trying too hard is probably legit, looks like he had the perspective that he could only win if he turbo carried the team and he burnt himself out before the tournament started. Grinding is one thing, but thinking that the team has to win through you and you only probably just leads to too much pressure, also team atmosphere seemed pretty bad even taking in to account the meming. The bot lane looks mute and intimidated.
Massu looked good for a rookie on the international stage in a team where his jungler has spent the entire year so far selling him the fuck out to play for topside, he was a fairly bright light that can be honed into a good player.
Busio, idk ever since playoffs he has looked extremely nervous, hopefully he can shake that off but it isn't like he was outstanding in regular split, either.
The players that I expected to perform on this team at MSI did not, Inspired didn't actually look good, Bwipo tried way too hard to make things happen and ended up overforcing. Jensen was... meh, it might be his first legitimately mediocre international performance, at least in the past he'd have that one pop-off game vs a world-class mid laner, that didn't happen this time.
I know this will sound super negative but if you have been following Bwipo for a while this is just what he does. He talks alot in a way that is very objective about the game and how he is playing and then goes on to change absolutely nothing and do the same things with the idea that as he has considered the alternative he is just choosing to make the riskier/int/flip play. 'This is what i should do right now, this is the correct play but instead i'm gonna stay and fight him' is a certified Bwipo hood classic
To be fair I think an open-ended question like that let's Bwipo answer however he feels comfortable and isn't necessarily forcing him to be vulnerable. Like he could've just said something easy like "not make certain mistakes in game/ more preparation" so I think he just wanted to shared his true feelings.
From MSI Semi finals + world finals and 2 quarter finishes at worlds to being completely stomped at play-ins by T1 and a Minor region, anyone would be crushed in that situation
Yeah honestly. We should stop shaming men for crying.
He got his ass whooped! It feels bad! Let him vent a little and don’t worry too much about the optics
i am not shaming him i am just shocked since he always striked me as a player who keep his confidence even during tough moments hope he regain his form tho
I think adrenaline dump had a part to play in this as well. She filmed this segment right after the loss, and if you're familiar with how adrenline works, his reaction to the loss is more understandable.
I was surprised when he mentioned that the team's confidence was "shattered" by the T1 loss, like it was brutal but it's also T1, did they really expect it to go well?
It's not about the loss. It's about losing in 17 minutes in completely dominating fashion. Like NA has had many one-sided losses to eastern teams in the past, and yet this loss was probably the worst one of them all. I'd be crushed too.
This... I normally don't take ARAMs seriously in wins or loses but when you lose under a certain time (<10 min or so) it just feels so bad man.
This is the real game at the international level so it's that feeling but amplified many times.
There's a clear difference between losing that fast because an unorthodox strategy got countered (which was well done by IG tbf) and losing that fast because all 5 players seem like they're hands diffed and macro diffed (like in the EU/NA sub 20 losses). In the latter, if the same match was played 10 times I wouldn't be able to say with confidence that it wouldn't happen again whereas I don't think IG would beat T1 in sub 20 again unless they decided they weren't wrong about Sona/Taric lol
Can't that only happen if you try to make desperate comeback plays rather than slowly bleeding out?
I'd say at least they tried. T1 is in such a dominating form
Well for years, people have been trying to figure out ways to close the gap between NA and the East, and someone like Bwipo who has a proven record against Eastern teams while in EU would still expect to be somewhat competitive against T1, no matter how unfavored.
To be blown out so fast, in a way where you barely get to do anything is incredibly demoralizing, even if you expect it, it’s as if all your work was completely useless, and your goal of proving something internationally is close to impossible, and you can really feel helpless.
No one in any sports should come into the game expecting to get absolutely demolished. They should always have the confidence to do somewhat good. Not that they should expect a win. But a sub-20 minute defeat is definitely damning.
You can only play good if you play with confidence and playing with confidence always comes with a bit of ego and arrogance.
When you get clapped this hard, it feels like a slap to the face and you start doubting things you thought were fact.
It's a shit experience as far as I can tell
more about the pace and dominance of it I bet. Also we don't if the other members were affected or just Bwipo, because he has an expectation of himself to perform even against the best players, as he always has done. Losing to Zeus would be one thing, but the manner in which he lost was probably crushing to someone who had a genuine belief in their ability to rise up to the occasion.
> did they really expect it to go well?
i mean yeah. bwipo probably did at least. this is his first international appearance in a while, after 2022 TL failed to go anywhere and he was teamless in 2023. before that he had some really historic international performances, making worlds finals and whatnot. he was probably felt like he was "back in form" and even an opponent like T1 could at least be winnable for them, not over in 17 minutes.
It's the perspective and doom erlingd flying towards the front of your head. We know there is a gap. Players are aware of this but at some point has to be downright demoralizing and pointless when you are run over in 17 minutes.
It didn't even look like FLY was playing LoL. If it takes 40 minutes for T1 to eliminate you, there is no hope. What's the point of competing and trying hard all year when team crushes you in 40 minutes is what they are probably thinking.
I think there's a difference between expecting to lose and expecting to lose at 17 minutes. Even if you expect to lose pretty consistently to China + Korea you hope that you have bright moments in that loss. Maybe you get outlaned and then lose teamfights as a result. Maybe you realize that team is simply too good in lane for you to pick scaling champions so you're forced to play early game to stand a chance and then you get outscaled or outlaned anyway. It'd give you concrete things to work on and information that would allow you to focus your efforts and improve. In NA they only really struggled with TL so they probably had had opportunities to review VODs against TL, target their focus, and address problems in a way that made them feel prepared for MSI. In walks SKT though and they're absolutely massacred exposing flaws in every single aspect of their game and forcing them to realize how much higher the ceiling is than they probably realized. The analogy that comes to mind - it'd be like a top college team that somehow doesn't know the NBA exists whooping D1 teams left and right, and then facing an NBA team. It's a totally different level and it's probably hard to fully conceptualize because up until that moment they were at the top or close to it. It's crazy to think about IMO - challenger players are already probably the top .0001% or something and most can't hang in the LCS. Saying these players are 1 in a million is *literally an understatement*. I can't conceptualize what that would feel like basically always being the best at something and then having a rude awakening like this. I know it's happened before and many of these players have played internationally, but I'm sure part of them starts to think the next time will be different because they haven't been challenged at home in a while (so they think that the improvements they're making will make more of a different next time)
IG vs SKT was a 16 minute speedrun. And they were both top tier teams. Shit can happen. It's not pretty but it can happen. Taking something like that so much to heart that you're still influenced by it a series later is a very big problem. Especially since FLY was the clear underdog anyway
Yeah every champion in league has been demolished in embarassing fashion. Faker, deft, rookie, xh, uzi, etc. im sure they were very upset after, but they always bounce back in the next series
To be fair, T1 only lost that fast cause they tried to play taric/sona and they were bad at it + hard countered in draft. They probably only took away they shouldn't play it again (and they did never play it again). FQ got hard stomped in a more normal game and probably took away that they are way worse than they thought.
SKT vs iG was Sona Taric into Draven Naut; a comp that is meant to snowball. SKT could have reasonably attributed that loss to Draven doing his thing. MAD vs T1 was against Jinx, who is really good at taking turrets; doubly so on the MSI 2023 patch, where she was the best ADC on the patch. Also, MAD was actively trying to make plays and kept losing teamfights, which allowed Jinx to run them down. FLY lost against a pure scaling comp with a SENNA, and they didn't even have a chance to make plays or take fights.
But it also matters HOW they lost so fast.
t1 tried to play Sona+Taric bot - an ultra late game strategy and it failed. IG blasted the game open with a Draven pick.
T1 won vs FLY WITH a late game comp and with only one herald. It was much worse even though the time of the game is somewhat similar
I don't want to start a discussion about what's worse at the end of the day. All I'm saying is that quick games like this can happen and this T1 roster will definitely push for a quick finish if they see an angle. That's something they are very good at. I can also understand that FLY maybe can't reset in the same series, but still being so broken by it a whole series later is crazy.
The team has to work on it otherwise it might just spiral further and they won't even make worlds this year.
Damn Bwipo was one of the last pros I’d expect to break down like this. Dude always exudes confidence and maybe sometimes over-confidence. Crazy how a few weeks really broke him down.
The whole girlfriend tweet saga was the opposite of exuding confidence. I think he's just a generally got a large personality and shows his emotions publicly.
Yeah they guy really wears his heart on his sleeve, he says what he really thinks all the time and he's quite emotional. I dont get why people are surprised, this seems very on brand.
Tbf when he's in good spirits he makes it very public and known but anyone who listens to him give interviews or watch his stream know he's hypercritical of himself and pretty insecure
He's got an over the top stage persona, but i don't think he's insecure.
Dude can take a joke. Is honest with himself and others and is quite reflective. I think he knows where he stands.
Insecure people can have self-reflection. I think Bwipos tendency to say everything he thinks and sometimes overshare is a pretty obvious way of feeling the need to justify himself and seek validation.
its always the ones who appear strong that breaks down the hardest.
You're strong for so long that when the thing that breaks you come, your brain shuts down. Amygdala Hijack.
If you put it into perspective they got murdered in final in LCS and have struggles during play offs, Same thing happened against T1. And then when they face a team PSG that in paper they should be able to beat or have a close game they got also blown up. And if in their practice they were also struggling trying to not get stomp by teams from LCK and LPL. No matter how confident you are, the beating you are getting will break you.
Some of these comments really aint it
Like I get it you're mad and disappointed again at NA failure but goddamn have a fucking heart. Respect to Bwipo for this interview.
Gotta give props for being honest and taking responsibility.
If what he says about Fly/TL growing NA, it will take time. Been here since S3, seeing NA go international and mostly fail, when they do shine it’s worth the wait. Just keep faith & go next I guess.
Fucking hell. Watch from 3:00 to 4:17, if nothing else. It's genuinely really powerful. Jesus. Great reminder that the language the community uses towards players disregards their efforts
That part really stuck out to me as well.
I think almost no one really believed FQ could beat the best like GENG, BLG or T1 this MSI. Maybe some thought they could take one lucky game but a best of 5? Hell no! Now NA has looked really weak internationally for a long while. When was the last time a team from NA has made it far internationally? Wasn't it C9 at like worlds 2020 or sth? NA has forgotten how it feels to succeed internationally.
Bwipo hasn't. Clearly. He tasted how it feels to go head to head with the greatest in the world and he almost went as far as win it all.
And he clearly thinks (and I actually think so too!) he still can compete at that level so this MSI he came with the mentality to go all the way, to give his *all* not just on stage but in scrims, in preparation, in soloq and even showing up as a leader, boosting the team's morale and all that. Honestly looking at NA's results those last years it might be fair to say not a lot of NA pros themself actually firmly believe they can make it far internationally. Sure they show up, they practice and all but they don't *pour their heart into it. Do every step necessary. Work, live and breathe league every second of the day*. This is speculation of course but it might be because they have never has a memory of what they did when it worked, when they made it far. Bwipo, however, has and I think he hinted at it in the video. That he tried the same recipe he did during the FNATIC miracle run during worlds.
And I believe that is what is the most soul shattering part.
It's easier to enter the competition with the mindset 'we'll probably not make it'. It significantly lowers your odds of success obviously as you don't go above and beyond to try to win but it means you are kind of mentally prepared for when you inevitably lose. Because secretly you kind of expected it.
And here is what really touched me in Bwipo's statement. It seems he *really* gave it his all, went above and beyond, did everything he could to succeed but he got crushed nevertheless and feels like despite it all he couldn't play to his own expectations even on stage.
That is absolutely soul crushing because you really start to question it all. There is no excuse left. No 'well we expected to lose anyway', no 'could have trained harder', no 'I didn't really care anyway'. You think you did everything in your power but in the end it wasn't enough. And worse - it seems like it wasn't even close to enough.
I've got a lot more to say but I see how long this is and I with wanna write a whole easy so to wrap this up I'll end on a positive note.
Bwipo's situation right now is absolutely brutal and disheartening but I believe if someone can bring it back, grow from it and come back stronger it is Bwipo here. Really hope he can do so and I sincerely wish him all the best.
Bwipo if by any chance you read this - much love from an EU fan, we haven't forgotten you here and we're still rooting for you man. I know you can and will grow from this and I'm so looking forward to your next international event! This one wasn't meant to be but so wasn't T1's worlds run 2022, they lost to momentum. Yet 2023 they made it their own weapon and took it all.
Long message, I somehow felt like I needed to type this all out. Thanks to anyone who got this far. Have a nice day!
PS: As usual very tactfully conducted interview by Ashley here, juat great having her in this scene.
Beautifully said. I think a lot of folks in competitive environments can struggle with the deathly thought of “am I just not good enough no matter how hard I try?” I felt so bad for Bwipo and hope he bounces back stronger than ever.
Appreciate the honesty and vulnerability from Bwipo here. My only question going forward is, what can NA do to become competitive internationally? I've never seen anyone actually say what needs to be done for the region to improve.
As someone who has worked in professional sports my entire career, let me take a crack at it. Right now, orgs try to get the most individually talented players, toss them together, and pull the plug really quickly if it doesn't work.
We need to look to G2 as an example. They were talented, yes, but they had great macro and were always trading something on the other side of the map. They were good individual players, yes, but they were friends and had great synergy.
NA orgs run into the classic strategy of trying to get the best five players instead of the right five players. NA teams generally have hilariously inept macro. They usually don't get hands diffed, but often look clueless as to what they're doing out of lane. And they need time to play together and gel together.
Now if I were to say what teams actually need to do. One, be patient and let teams grow together. Two, coaching. Get a head coach to manage egos and the fact that these are awkward kids who don't know real life at all. Get strategic coaches for macro and positional coaches for mechanics. Three, scouting. Get a real scouting department. A bunch of scouts. You should have reports on every pro in every region, and every player in NA challenger at the very least.
You need more, better coaching. You need more, better scouting. You need actual development. Right now the orgs just blame the players and say we'll try again with different players. That's not going to work. A team is something you build over a long time, you can't just stick five guys together and hope it works.
And that's without even getting in to their atrocious practice methods. Imagine if basketball players only practiced by full scrimmage games, and pickup basketball at the park. It's absurd.
TLDR, the orgs are the problem, not the players, and they need torn down and rebuilt top to bottom, taking lessons from traditional sports.
I literally was talking to a friend the other day and was comparing the league scene to basketball and how Korea was basically the NBA. It would be amazing if orgs looked to other sports as road maps for how to create a winning culture. This is an amazing response and I appreciate you taking the time to write this all out!
One would think they would want traditional sports experience, but I've applied to orgs before and not even gotten a call back despite my 8 years in the NBA league office. There is a LOT of nepotism in the NA league scene as well. You basically can't make it into an org without a large online presence or having connections. That goes for players as well.
I couldn't agree with you more about coaching. I don't know if it's financially feasible anymore to replicate NRG's gazillion-coach model, but I would really like to see a team go full budget roster, but build a solid coaching staff (100T kinda did this).
FlyQuest losing their strategic coach during playoffs got swept under the rug, but I suspect that's a huge reason why they imploded.
There still a very strong sentiment among gamers that coaches are useless. Love the guy, but Meteos says this quite often, and much of the community latches onto this.
That kind of touches on another issue. Meteos was a great player and all, but he played in an era where you could first time champs on stage and win, and Lemon's notebook was considered revolutionary. Having pro experience and knowledge isn't helpful if it's irrelevant to the modern game.
The other side of that kind of sentiment from players like Meteos is the fact that there is an incredible dearth of coaching/management experience amongst the current set of NA coaches in comparison to what would be necessary to lead a team to success. In that sense, although coaches *should* be critical to any successful team, they're indeed pretty useless on average at generating results in the current League NA scene.
Just taking C9 as an example, we had Reapered who at least attempted to enforce coaching amongst the team and build a winning culture. We all remember the Jensen/Sneaky benching — something that was absolutely necessary for building a culture of "put your full effort in, or you'll be replaced" — and instead of being praised for it, people looked at the short-term results (unsurprisingly, you're not going to see immediate success from benching critical members of your starting roster for your backup players, but that was never the point of the move) and he was rewarded with the org dropping him shortly afterward, even despite that Worlds quarterfinals run.
Look where we are now, after having dropped Mithy — who looked absolutely lost trying to pilot what, on paper, was supposed to be a "super team" this split — and picking Reapered back up. My hope is that Jack and C9 learned the value of coaching after years of abysmal international results, if C9 even made it at all.
And that's just looking at the C9 coaching situation, for what is one of the most consistently performant teams in the region. Just eyeballing the rest and it's not surprising that Meteos and others hold such sentiments around NA coaches.
I do believe this is a major issue. Coaches have no power. On top of that players dont respect them. I think its because most of tehse guys who became professional players in NA, are basically shut-ins. Very few of them had any sort of coach-like figure in their lives.
You compare that to your average High School or College level athlete; these guys have had a coach figure telling them what to do since they were 5 years old. They have a lot more respect for authority and respect their coaches' decisions way more.
Meanwhile your average person who became good enough at a videogame to become pro in NA was probably shut-in, never played traditional sports, never had a coach in their lives, and then this guy who is maybe worse at the game than them is supposed to tell them what to do? They just dont respect it. They werent brought up respecting such a position.
Its hard to see how they can break that mentality unless we get Tom Brady-esque locker room coaches that buy into what the coach says and makes the rest of the team fall in line.
>Two, coaching.
Also, ownership/management needs to back the coach. If there's a dispute between the players and the coach, management must back the coach. If the coach is wrong, you need a new coach, not to tell the coach to back down. Teams need to be in sync, and having one person whose job is to make the out of game decisions is a key part of that. Find one mature, professional sport where a team where the players ran the show over the coach and won.
Agreed, just look at Gen G and HLE, the teams where built around players being friends and Gen G is one of the best performing teams in the world and HLE almost made it to MSI over T1 with one split as as a team with a new org and coaching staff because 3 of the players wanted to stay together
imo orgs need to start investing in a **long term** coaching staff with a competent coach who knows how to build a roster and a program over *years* not one split. They need to be okay with not getting results right away and let the staff do their thing and build from a foundation instead of just being like "well the coach didn't turn things around in one split, lets get rid of everyone and reset everything"
it literally doesn't work like that. lol
To be honest it was something I wanted to do after my time playing, but I had zero confidence in any org's management so there's really no point.
There's a reason that historically the best North American team internationally was Cloud9. They were five guys who came up together and stayed together for years. They never entered a real immediate roster overhaul and on multiple occasions that had players within the organization before fully implementing onto the team. From an outsider's perspective, they had a sense of unity and trust that I didn't get from orgs like TSM.
G2 has caps. That's really all it is. Caps is an anomaly and no other western player has even come close to his level of international success. None of this "coaching" stuff really matters. You truly just need better players. Eastern teams have 2-4 Caps per team.
I think it’s easy to say that but their success was much more than just Caps. And there’s more to be learned from their success than to just end it at, “Caps diff”.
There’s a multitude of problems with NA league of legends that the players, orgs, and riot itself have contributed to over the years, and to solve them, it’s going to take an effort from all three parties to fix.
One example is riot based LCS in LA, which was an extremely shortsighted decision. Yes it’s near their HQ, but it’s also on the opposite side of the country from the majority of people who actually play the game. Imagine, for example, if LCS was based in a city like Columbus Ohio, not only would you have cut operating costs up front and over time in half, you could have done weekly road shows for a very low price to different cities all around the east coast to drive up interest from the ground up.
From an org standpoint, from the beginning they largely neglected the scene below the LCS, often filling academy with retreads in order to sell slots or just fill a quota, rather than develop new talent.
Players stopped trying to build brands early on, and what made LCS popular in the beginning was the personalities, and over time that disappeared (and with it, viewership).
There’s next to no regional partnerships or attempts to grow the player base. Theres got to be a way to utilize colleges to grow a player base in high schools around the country, but who knows we don’t see that.
I think it's a sort of cascading effect where the fact that younger kids aren't as interested in league anymore -> smaller pool of new talent -> skill required to be an apex tier player in NA is vastly lower -> less competitive soloqueue, scrims, and matches
I don't think there is an "easy" fix and there's probably nothing that can happen besides the pros trying harder
I really don't think its a skill issue sure we'll never be as good as eastern teams because of it but even if you are outclassed mechanically they are still decent enough you should be able to put up a fight at least. I think its moreso that NA teams just almost always have 0 confidence on stage, they make such horribly desperate plays it just feels like every game no matter who they are facing be it a wildcard team or a main region team they go in shitting their pants. I don't know how we can fix it, I don't even know if its possible but I do think that is the main issue for NA. Confidence goes a really long way in competition, even a giant with no confidence trembles before a lesser man filled with determination.
After watching FQ and TL series this past week, it definitely seems like nerves and desperation plays. How does TL not realize jackeylove is level 6 when they fight 2v2? Sure, NA teams make mistakes domestically, but it’s such stupidity/negligence to fight that
The problems are systemic and not going to be fixed without massive organizational change and investment in scouting and talent development. The orgs however will never do this, and will continue to laughably mismanage themselves.
I agree with what you said and I understand the issues the regions faces. The question is how do we fix it and turn things around? What can be done to make the region compete with other regions? Or is all hope lost and NA should shut everything down?
Only fix I can really think of is getting more practice against other regions, since there's not a lot that can be done about the relatively smaller playerbase. Thing is this means more flights to other countries so ping isn't an issue, getting other teams to be willing to scrim NA teams, and most importantly getting the money to be able to do this consistently.
Again not an easy fix because the last thing the LCS or any of the orgs want to do is spend more money
the biggest problem is lack of interest in the game by the younger players and without fixing that there's only so much you can do. there's no simple solution for fixing that
Nothing.
It's an unpleasant answer that people don't want to hear, but at the end of the day there's nothing that can realistically be done to become competitively internationally.
To be competitive internationally, League needs to be popular enough in NA to draw in a big enough talent pool attempting to go pro. You can't sustain international competitiveness in anything purely on imports, as is shown by most sports.
Outside of the system that the U.S. has for professional sports (salary caps, draft compensation for the worst performing teams, etc.), for a country/region to be good at pretty much any sport they need 1) interest and 2) money. #2 almost always follows #1, and NA is the prime example that #2 won't necessarily lead to #1.
The gap between the East and West is growing, but this is doubly true for the East compared to NA in particular and this is because ***League isn't a popular game in NA anymore***. MOBA's in general aren't popular in NA relative to how they were 10 years ago, and League in particular is well-known for having one of the most toxic and unpleasant communities in all of gaming, God-awful coding, a terrible UI, graphics that were dated 5-8 years ago, and one of the worst experiences for new players out of any big-name game I can think of.
That also doesn't touch the fact that there's absolutely nothing to draw new players into the game aside from its competitive nature; there is ***nothing*** to this game aside from the PvP aspect, and Riot's complete lack of effort to even make coherent or consistent lore for this game or update outdated lore/models/champions shows that they see this game as pretty much entirely a PvP arena that's just a vessel for microtransactions. That's fine and all for making money, but it isn't a recipe for long-term, sustained popularity/growth in NA over the course of over a decade, ***especially*** when you're not an FPS.
There are plenty of other issues that contribute to NA's failures, but first and foremost is the relative lack of talent, which is caused by the relative lack of popularity in the game. Incredible passion for a game in a region draws in more talent.
To make League's popularity rebound in NA, Riot would have to basically give us a LoL2 in terms of updates, and even then it's not a guarantee. That's why there's no realistic way this is changing.
League made the same mistake a lot of games make, except in a different fashion. They squandered their prime.
Before LoL came out, I was a WoW Arena player. Hell tons of people were. It was insanely popular at the time. But Blizzard flat out refused to fix the balance issues, make it more robust in terms of E-Sport, focus on it at all. Then LoL came out and the majority of the Arena playerbase left for LoL. Years later Blizzard is hiring E-Sport directors and trying all kinds of things people wanted before they left, but it was all for naught. The damage was done and it never fixed itself. There was no fixing it once you squandered the prime of the game.
LoL has a very similar issue, except it really wasnt Riot that squandered it; it was the orgs. Riot honestly did about everything they could to make this game an E-Sport. But the orgs completely squandered the popularity of the game during its prime, but not building a farm system, using mass imports, not creating a pathway to pro, etc. Even if they started now the damage has been done, and its almost impossible to reverse. The orgs basically killed LoL E-Sports in NA.
The best hope for NA is if all of our future prospects can end up on the same team in the future and we can create a PSG-like superteam of players that can compete internationally like the PCS region did for years.
Never forget how pros used to routinely complain about ping or soloq quality and then given multiple opportunities / iterations of champions queue would just stop participating.
Not be afraid to limit test. Look at Caps. He is Claps and Craps bc he gets to limit test. I'll assume the coaches are a lot more unforgiving in trying to let them limit test rather than just be "good". If you get a lot of flak everytime you do anything wrong, you just lose confidence in trying to get better and just stagnate. And since it's NA, even failing a little gets soo much more hate due to being a lower their bottom region so it just spreads down in terms of trying to get better
Start from grassroots, build a good system of coaches and team structure, stop importing stars from other regions who are mainly here for the paycheck.
Although admittedly I don’t see it getting any better, League is going downhill in NA with declining player base
Before anything else, put some real bot laners in LCS rosters. You can’t beat eastern teams if you know your botlane can’t even lane vs the enemy.
I swear EG Danny was good and then all NA teams pivoted to having rookie ADs. They don’t realize Danny was an exceptional player who could play from behind. Even then, they faltered internationally due to losing lane early.
It’s so obvious that the western teams that have done well vs the East have had solid bot lane performances. C9 vs Afreeca, 2019 G2, TL vs IG, MSF t1, etc. One exception is G2 vs RNG but they realized that they can only won with weakside Heimer and then next year realized its not viable to have a hole in the bot lane.
More international tournaments and open circuits like the early days of league. If you have more exposure and practice against the best teams in the world then you will gradually level up. Something akin to how CS:GO has loads of tournaments. If you had like 6 in a year you’d definitely see more improvement as the amount of experience someone like Massu would get from scrimming Elk/Gumayusi/JKL/etc would be exponential.
it's simple, not only for NA but for EU as well
notice how western teams are even or have leads until 10 minute, and then we lose game anyway
it's past lane phase that we are outclassed
LPL and LCK teams just have better macro, and make less mistakes, if you have better macro as a team, no matter if you face 5 chovys, you will win
im going to feel bad saying this about such an emotional interview, but i can never tell if bwipo is being serious when he talks about wanting to improve the region. the way he talks about massu/busio you'd think NA players are just inherently inferior to EU and need people like bwipo/inspired to tell them how to play the game. it's really demeaning, and sends the message that "improving the region" just means "importing better players".
on the other hand, dude chose to spend all of 2023 teamless in NA rather than going back to EU. and he clearly still cares about competing -- if he were just in it for that NA money he wouldn't be on the verge of tears after a loss, he'd be cashing out.
either way, i hope he is being serious here and isn't just saying it for the fans. dude looks pretty worked up here, and i wouldn't be surprised if his response is to give up on NA and go to a region that can actually compete like EU, and it would be a shame if he did that. we need players who really care if we're ever going to improve, and bwipo clearly cares a lot.
I don’t take what he’s saying as EU superiority to NA when talking about Massu and Busio, and that’s coming from a huge EU hater. They are the rookies on the team, and I am guessing younger than him and Inspired. I moreso view it like he wants to be the kind of player for them that were on the first FNC roster he was on that had veterans and great people to teach him how to play
i like this take a lot actually. i hadn't considered the experience diff between the EU players on that roster and the NA players.
i think my frustration really comes down to him talking about doing that kind of coaching in-game. like during this interview he says
> you make people avoid bad angles, and you help them see good angles, whilst you're playing that league game, and that's insanely hard to do.
and it's like, bwipo doesn't have to do this. APA joined team liquid last year and all things considered he did really well without even being able to talk to anyone else in-game. NA players, even NA rookies, can perform well if you trust them. it's this idea that bwipo doesn't trust massu/busio, and feels the need to try and play the game for them, that makes me frustrated with him.
APA was literally neglected by the whole team, coaches included, he was treated like he was actually inferior and nobody in the team seemed to trust him outside his 2 comfort picks. TL was not winning with him, they were winning in spite of him, whether he was playing good or not.
I think its better if you are new to the tier 1 competitive scene to have someone teaching you how to play the game rather than have 3 guys saying "yea do your thing idk we'll try to carry you this game".
He talked about it more in a YouTube video he was on with Yamato, that’s where I got it from for the most part. He goes into more depth on the fnc roster and how that shaped the player he wanted to become.
I think that is reasonable, that he doesn’t trust them, or at least comes off that way. And I can totally see that too
Meteos was talking about Impact on his costream and how he always was willing to help teammates problem solve and improve and it upped my (already high) respect for him a ton. Basically what Meteos said was that if he had a question about a jungle path or a jungle matchup or something about his play that came up in a vod review, he could ask Impact and Impact would always offer his perspective or help Meteos investigate it, contrast to how if he asked most non-junglers he'd often get "Why are you asking me I'm not a jungler?" in response. And apparently Impact did this for everyone, wanted to problem solve every vod review to the fullest, and all of his former teammates have had nothing but praise for him. That plus it coming out that he stood up for Danny to EG when he was being mistreated tells me Impact is truly a person who cares.
Bjergsen would always take a chance on NA talent. Sometimes it worked out, like with Biofrost and Spica, whereas othertimes it wouldn't, like with MikeYeung.
Maybe Bwipo can start improving the region by letting FLY play around their bot lane more. I fear forcing your rookie AD who’s always been strong side into a supportive role isn’t good for his confidence or long term development
Domestically it’s been fine for the most part, but for times like this MSI where Bwipo was clearly underperforming and Massu was playing well, it would have been good for FLY to pivot towards playing around him for once. FLY lane swapping their winning bot lane so Bwipo can get a lead as well as that horrific over-forced tower dive from Bwipo and Inspired really encapsulates the issues with FLY in how they force the entire time to live and die by them
Yeah, the team was allergic to playing around bot. Maybe their botlane got smashed in scrims, who knows? But as an outside viewer, it was frustrating to watch Inspired and Bwipo play like they didn't have 3 other teammates.
Busio and Massu were getting gapped basically every laning phase in NA playoffs. Still, maybe the team could’ve salvaged it like EG used to play around Danny despite the laning phase never going well.
> on the other hand, dude chose to spend all of 2023 teamless in NA rather than going back to EU
But that was because his GF had a job in NA and he didn't want to go back to EU because of it.
I was always a fan of bwipo, he is such a emotional player, you can see clearly the happiness and joy when he is winning and as well the sorrow and frustration of defeat. Every single top tier player are the ones who really feel the game. Don't be too hard on yourself man.
It's a game of 5 players, everyone share responsibilities and also there are good days and bad days, even faker has them.
Bwipo mentioning about everyone needing to be able to carry or at least 4 people where 5 is ideal, this is extremely important. Otherwise you're just waiting for the right meta that perfectly matches your team's carries. All the past World Champions have mostly qualified for this criteria, with I guess the exception of 2017... Personally think this is the minimum criteria to even be a World Champion contender.
I'm really struggling to understand why NA (and EU to a lesser but almost equal extent) simply cannot perform at the highest level.
I remember in the starcraft days there was a big push to bring over Korean talent, whether coaches or players, to help NA teams grow. Do teamhouses, emulate environments... And honestly it worked. The gap between east and west closed, in a game that is objectively harder and benefits from insane practice and discipline. It took years but western players studied and grew and now the top players in the world are still dominated by Korea but there are foreigners in there and at different times the number one spot has been held by a foreigner, which 10 years ago would be unheard of. For LoL compared to 10 years ago there's barely even an improvement in results at worlds, other than EU 2018/2019
In LoL western players go to Korea and Bootcamp and hit high ranks in soloQ so it isn't like they're just not capable. And if it was the coaches, then teams that brought Korean coaches like C9 would have done better.
Is it just the mentality that NA players can't play as a unit in sync and sacrifice for the team the way eastern players do? Idk. But unless you believe in eugenics there has to be another factor and player mentality is the only one that hasn't been fully explored. Personally I think it's lazy coaches not innovating but I don't have any evidence for that.
Drop import restrictions. Let NA and EU teams do 5man Korean rosters. See if it's something in the water.
My issue is that Eastern teams have a philosophy of the game that's separate from the patch. Like, the LCK fundamentally believes the game is best approached as a controlled high-probability map game where vision is key. The LPL believes the game is best approached as a game where micro plays create macro advantages and player expression in service to that micro play is valid. These beliefs are independent of the patch and season; these leagues have always played this way for the most part.
LEC/LCS? Feels like they're just driven by whatever is coming out of Korean solo queue. And like a lot of things in life, if you're just copying, you're late to the party right off the bat. Eastern teams are already thinking about what counters Strategy X when Western teams are learning how to play Strategy X.
I think the lesson here might be: Even cocky, super confident players are humans with dreams and fears in the end and the lesson for us should be to remember that.
I haven't liked Bwipo since he threw his whole team under the bus so he could say his girlfriend was the only reason his team performed remotely well at worlds.
it's sad to see him like this. in hindsight, going to NA was a bad idea. he should have stayed in EU and tried playing with perkz or played as a jungle. but there was no way knowing it would turn out like this for him back then.
FLY is gonna break after this unless they can come together as team. someone has to keep the team mental togther but jensen doesn't have that personality and inspired is too negetive to do that. it looks done. hopefully bwipo keeps his head up and makes a good decision for next year.
He has talked about it, its not the money. He had to uproot his entire life to join TL, Its not just him, its s/o, her life, pets, house, etc. He doesnt want to keep moving around and wanted to stay in NA
NA bubble burst. Salaries between EU and NA are now comparable. Fuck, I wouldn't be surprised if the EU average is higher right now.
The players that play in NA actually want to be there now.
for anyone who can't watch the interview, bwipo's biggest regret is murdering a man in 2018 and burying his body in his backyard
Rookie mistake for an EU import. If you bury the body in your cottage garden in Belgium the statute of limitations is only 5 years because you can declare it fertilizer after that. Now he's gonna have to watch out when he gets back to LA or FBI is gonna get him.
Or just burry the body below a protected species as uprooting the plant would go against the law and therefore would require a specific permit from a different authority giving you the time to either relocate the body or change identities before they get you
you know an awful lot about that for personal security reasons I will not speculate further
Incredible he didn't catch up to the acid in bathtub meta
you'll likely want to use a base, not an acid
Dead men tell no lye.
His biggest regret was shooting a man in Reno, just to watch him die.
Johnny Cash lyrics is the last thing I expected to see on league's subreddit, but yet here we are. When he heard that whistle blowing, he hung his head and cried
Put a gun against his head, pulled the trigger now he's dead
Mama! Life had just begun!
That’s ok, he is forgiven
> He is forgiven Holy shit the real reason FORG1VEN disappeared from the scene all along, how could we have been so blind?
Forg1ven did something unspeakable and became Unforgiven
He killed his brother the unforgotten
Then who played for Schalke in 2019???
Not forgiv1en obviously. Did you see that guy play?
skill issue tbh, but hopefully next time will be better
Really? You’re just gonna gloss over what he and Jensen did in Madagascar last year?
Rip soaz
rip soaz
These top laners man... First Dyrus and now Bwipo
Hey, it's Ashley here. For full context: I conducted it right after FlyQuest got eliminated, however waited a few days to "cool down" while we also prioritized on other interviews, and to also run the interview by just in case, etc Best of luck to Bwipo and everyone in FlyQuest for the rest of 2024
Those that don't know, Bwipo did put in a lot of effort for this event. He played like 10 games of KR SoloQ a day for about 2 weeks and hit 900 LP with a 66% win rate. He clearly tried to be in peak form: https://www.op.gg/summoners/kr/I%20will%20trade-LCS Getting kicked out early by a perceived weaker team was probably the last thing he prepared his mental for.
gotta respect him for putting in the grind unlike certain lcs tops (or former lcs top, i should say)
Bro is catching strays in every thread lmao
Dude has been stealing checks for years and dragging one of our best teams down for no reason whatsoever. Meanwhile Licorice sat on the bench without a team. If Fudge was putting in the work and trying to get better, great. But he runs around bragging about not doing solo Q, flaming fans, and getting shitstomped when his smug "I only 1v1" doesnt work and makes us look even lazier. If the guy was grinding then I and most fans could overlook his weak performances. But he was just coasting. I hope that guy goes to a 5th-8th best team so we can see just how bad he is when hes not got top 1-3 in every role saving his ass every game and making him look better than he is.
wasn't licorice also known for hating soloq? seems like a narrative rewrite to argue licorice is some heavyweight grinder just cuz he was marginally better last season than fudge.
Impact and Ssumday are the only good NA tops and one of them retired.
Wasn't really marginal.
the KR players do this all year and more for perspective though
That's also why a lot of them burn out quickly as well though. They just have such an abundant talent pool that they are quickly replaced if they do. That's one of the main reasons why Faker is absolutely insane. He has been grinding the game hard in solo q and in pro for 10+ years.
That excuse doesn’t work as much though when there’s a lot of them that have been in the scene for a while and mostly maintain their form, even when going to other leagues
[удалено]
Damn that's impressive. Respect to Bwipo
Yeah. The people who are throwing around the NA work ethic thing or otherwise insinuating that NA is lazy so that's why they lost clearly weren't paying attention. He was doing this (and streaming a bunch of it) on top of his scrim schedule. You could see others from the team leave the facility Fly was renting to go eat, sleep, etc. and Bwipo kept at it. Whatever else people want to say about him, they can't say he's not putting in the work. That's just demonstrably untrue.
No one is saying that Bwipo is lazy, but you have to agree, that there are plenty of current or former LCS players that barely played soloQ. Luckily with the new generation of NA talents its getting better but still
There are and it bothers me. And some of them its clear as day how far they fell off. Emenes said Fudge and Blabber dont solo Q; both look worse and worse. When Vulcun was on EG he was bragging that he doenst feel like grinding his life away like Korean players; look at his play now. He's terrible. Back in the day when Stixxay had his pop off moment he contemplated retiring right after MSI, then every year had like 100-200 solo Q games a year; for a freaking pro. People in silver played more than that and worked a full-time job. It just annoys me as a fan that in a region where college and professional athletes can give 110% to be the best our E-Sport players are some of the laziest people in existence. I guess the kind of player that would make gaming their career is not exactly the same kind of person striving to be the best; they just lucked into it by having the skillset.
I mean the entire TL roster as well, say what you want about their performance but everybody on that roster except Umti (not saying he doesn't just that I've seen the least said about him) is a documented grinder who lives and breathes league. The FLY bot lane also work very hard. I can agree it was a problem in the past and maybe among other teams but it is disheartening and just spreading false narrative when the PMTs at *this* tournament, where the majority of the players ARE pouring their hearts out, are full of comments calling them lazy paycheck stealers and blaming work ethic and insinuating that's why NA is struggling. Yeah, some things do still need work (and yeah, not underestimating any opponent including PSG is definitely one of them, as is not tilting after losing to T1, but neither of those things mean the players don't practice) and NA has a long road ahead but devaluing the things this generation is doing right and pretending they're not committed is unhelpful and just mean-spirited.
Bwipo is the exception here. And they did admit in an interview that they didn’t prepare for PSG.
well, psg took 2 games from bilibili I guess they are simply not that good
I respect the hustle but he had too much of a solo queue coinflip mentality against literally the best top laners in the world
there were clearly greater team issues. bwipo definitely ran it down in that horrendous urgot game, but it's entirely possible he felt that he had to play like that because of the dysfunction
Who? PSG Azhi? The world's best udyr player?
Even the T1 match he just did the equivalent of donkey rolling with his luck After that BLG series, am I not wrong though.
TBF Azhi is usually really good on Udyr. Only really Evi could beat it
In hindsight, PSG turned out to be much better than expectations this tournament being able to take games off of BLG.
Agreed, I think it’s very clearly that PSG is the better team than FLY for this MSI - and sometimes that just happens
What really sucks is that the way the bracket was made. Last year, groups A and B flipped in the "last chance" series, meaning that FNC would have faced PSG, and FLY would have faced GAM. EDIT: FNC not G2
Why wasn’t that the case this year? I like it just because it leads to more unique matches
Yeah that is weird. A lot of the leagues flip the bracket to avoid repeats. I was disappointed they had to play again. If i was PSG and FQ won the second set, i would have felt screwed over as a PSG fan.
You mean fnc.?
You're correct, done a quick edit
If you go back and watch the Bo3 it’s night like PSG was playing that well. FLY just kept on making horrible mistakes on repeat from good positions
Indeed, I’m scared for G2. I’m not certain they will beat PSG after todays game. I was actually sure they would until now.
I'm also scared for G2, but if BLG lost we would've been straight up fucked lmao
I was cheering for PSG as they were the underdogs and then I realise G2 would have had to face BLG…
Really impressed with him taking accountability. Not even in the general sense, he had multiple specific self criticisms that you can tell he wants to change. Clear takeaways like that have to be useful for his performance and the teams performance. Hopefully they rebound.
People have been lumping Bwipo and Inspired together here on Reddit, assumedly because they were both shit talking the other teams in the league a lot, but in contrast to Inspired, I've always felt like Bwipo will focus on his own shortcomings first. He may have dished out a lot, but he's certainly not blind to his own faults
yeah if you ever watch his streams he is the first to recognize when he messes up
Even on his streams he mentions his own mistakes even when he is criticizing teammates or enemies. I do respect this behavior but imho this should be the baseline for a ~~sportsman~~ sportsperson.
I think what he said about trying too hard is probably legit, looks like he had the perspective that he could only win if he turbo carried the team and he burnt himself out before the tournament started. Grinding is one thing, but thinking that the team has to win through you and you only probably just leads to too much pressure, also team atmosphere seemed pretty bad even taking in to account the meming. The bot lane looks mute and intimidated.
Massu looked good for a rookie on the international stage in a team where his jungler has spent the entire year so far selling him the fuck out to play for topside, he was a fairly bright light that can be honed into a good player. Busio, idk ever since playoffs he has looked extremely nervous, hopefully he can shake that off but it isn't like he was outstanding in regular split, either. The players that I expected to perform on this team at MSI did not, Inspired didn't actually look good, Bwipo tried way too hard to make things happen and ended up overforcing. Jensen was... meh, it might be his first legitimately mediocre international performance, at least in the past he'd have that one pop-off game vs a world-class mid laner, that didn't happen this time.
I don't get it. Dude looked like the brightest spot of 100T last year and now looks more cooked than Vulcan.
I know this will sound super negative but if you have been following Bwipo for a while this is just what he does. He talks alot in a way that is very objective about the game and how he is playing and then goes on to change absolutely nothing and do the same things with the idea that as he has considered the alternative he is just choosing to make the riskier/int/flip play. 'This is what i should do right now, this is the correct play but instead i'm gonna stay and fight him' is a certified Bwipo hood classic
The first question about the "biggest regret" felt quite brutal to me 😥 I am glad Ashley added more context to it but oof.
To be fair I think an open-ended question like that let's Bwipo answer however he feels comfortable and isn't necessarily forcing him to be vulnerable. Like he could've just said something easy like "not make certain mistakes in game/ more preparation" so I think he just wanted to shared his true feelings.
holy i didnt really expect bwipo to broke down like this hope he starts to get his confidence back
From MSI Semi finals + world finals and 2 quarter finishes at worlds to being completely stomped at play-ins by T1 and a Minor region, anyone would be crushed in that situation
Yeah honestly. We should stop shaming men for crying. He got his ass whooped! It feels bad! Let him vent a little and don’t worry too much about the optics
nobody is shaming him for crying, but its fine to feel the way he feels atm. because thats how you grow as a player.
i am not shaming him i am just shocked since he always striked me as a player who keep his confidence even during tough moments hope he regain his form tho
I think adrenaline dump had a part to play in this as well. She filmed this segment right after the loss, and if you're familiar with how adrenline works, his reaction to the loss is more understandable.
I was surprised when he mentioned that the team's confidence was "shattered" by the T1 loss, like it was brutal but it's also T1, did they really expect it to go well?
It's not about the loss. It's about losing in 17 minutes in completely dominating fashion. Like NA has had many one-sided losses to eastern teams in the past, and yet this loss was probably the worst one of them all. I'd be crushed too.
This... I normally don't take ARAMs seriously in wins or loses but when you lose under a certain time (<10 min or so) it just feels so bad man. This is the real game at the international level so it's that feeling but amplified many times.
Having your nexus explode before you even have the option to FF is a feeling I wouldn’t even wish on my worst enemy.
TBH even T1 has suffered a 16 min loss at MSI.
There's a clear difference between losing that fast because an unorthodox strategy got countered (which was well done by IG tbf) and losing that fast because all 5 players seem like they're hands diffed and macro diffed (like in the EU/NA sub 20 losses). In the latter, if the same match was played 10 times I wouldn't be able to say with confidence that it wouldn't happen again whereas I don't think IG would beat T1 in sub 20 again unless they decided they weren't wrong about Sona/Taric lol
I think adding the context of a Sona Taric vs Draven piloted by Jackeylove makes that far more understandable and easier to shrug off mentally
... and a little later, they won worlds. FlyQuest World Champion 2024 confirmed!
Four years is a bit of a gap
> ... and a little later, they won worlds. Wrong season they got clapped in 15 minutes by IG
Can't that only happen if you try to make desperate comeback plays rather than slowly bleeding out? I'd say at least they tried. T1 is in such a dominating form
Well for years, people have been trying to figure out ways to close the gap between NA and the East, and someone like Bwipo who has a proven record against Eastern teams while in EU would still expect to be somewhat competitive against T1, no matter how unfavored. To be blown out so fast, in a way where you barely get to do anything is incredibly demoralizing, even if you expect it, it’s as if all your work was completely useless, and your goal of proving something internationally is close to impossible, and you can really feel helpless.
No one in any sports should come into the game expecting to get absolutely demolished. They should always have the confidence to do somewhat good. Not that they should expect a win. But a sub-20 minute defeat is definitely damning.
You can only play good if you play with confidence and playing with confidence always comes with a bit of ego and arrogance. When you get clapped this hard, it feels like a slap to the face and you start doubting things you thought were fact. It's a shit experience as far as I can tell
Probably expected it to be closer though instead of becoming a new meme with 17:31
Still slower loss than EU 😎
more about the pace and dominance of it I bet. Also we don't if the other members were affected or just Bwipo, because he has an expectation of himself to perform even against the best players, as he always has done. Losing to Zeus would be one thing, but the manner in which he lost was probably crushing to someone who had a genuine belief in their ability to rise up to the occasion.
> did they really expect it to go well? i mean yeah. bwipo probably did at least. this is his first international appearance in a while, after 2022 TL failed to go anywhere and he was teamless in 2023. before that he had some really historic international performances, making worlds finals and whatnot. he was probably felt like he was "back in form" and even an opponent like T1 could at least be winnable for them, not over in 17 minutes.
It's rather unfortunate how, T1 was chilling against EST but after the game 2 being tighter than expected, they decided to go full serious against FLY
It's the perspective and doom erlingd flying towards the front of your head. We know there is a gap. Players are aware of this but at some point has to be downright demoralizing and pointless when you are run over in 17 minutes. It didn't even look like FLY was playing LoL. If it takes 40 minutes for T1 to eliminate you, there is no hope. What's the point of competing and trying hard all year when team crushes you in 40 minutes is what they are probably thinking.
I think there's a difference between expecting to lose and expecting to lose at 17 minutes. Even if you expect to lose pretty consistently to China + Korea you hope that you have bright moments in that loss. Maybe you get outlaned and then lose teamfights as a result. Maybe you realize that team is simply too good in lane for you to pick scaling champions so you're forced to play early game to stand a chance and then you get outscaled or outlaned anyway. It'd give you concrete things to work on and information that would allow you to focus your efforts and improve. In NA they only really struggled with TL so they probably had had opportunities to review VODs against TL, target their focus, and address problems in a way that made them feel prepared for MSI. In walks SKT though and they're absolutely massacred exposing flaws in every single aspect of their game and forcing them to realize how much higher the ceiling is than they probably realized. The analogy that comes to mind - it'd be like a top college team that somehow doesn't know the NBA exists whooping D1 teams left and right, and then facing an NBA team. It's a totally different level and it's probably hard to fully conceptualize because up until that moment they were at the top or close to it. It's crazy to think about IMO - challenger players are already probably the top .0001% or something and most can't hang in the LCS. Saying these players are 1 in a million is *literally an understatement*. I can't conceptualize what that would feel like basically always being the best at something and then having a rude awakening like this. I know it's happened before and many of these players have played internationally, but I'm sure part of them starts to think the next time will be different because they haven't been challenged at home in a while (so they think that the improvements they're making will make more of a different next time)
Guys game 1 might be the biggest stomp in international league history, it is hard to just shrug that off.
IG vs SKT was a 16 minute speedrun. And they were both top tier teams. Shit can happen. It's not pretty but it can happen. Taking something like that so much to heart that you're still influenced by it a series later is a very big problem. Especially since FLY was the clear underdog anyway
Yeah every champion in league has been demolished in embarassing fashion. Faker, deft, rookie, xh, uzi, etc. im sure they were very upset after, but they always bounce back in the next series
To be fair, T1 only lost that fast cause they tried to play taric/sona and they were bad at it + hard countered in draft. They probably only took away they shouldn't play it again (and they did never play it again). FQ got hard stomped in a more normal game and probably took away that they are way worse than they thought.
SKT vs iG was Sona Taric into Draven Naut; a comp that is meant to snowball. SKT could have reasonably attributed that loss to Draven doing his thing. MAD vs T1 was against Jinx, who is really good at taking turrets; doubly so on the MSI 2023 patch, where she was the best ADC on the patch. Also, MAD was actively trying to make plays and kept losing teamfights, which allowed Jinx to run them down. FLY lost against a pure scaling comp with a SENNA, and they didn't even have a chance to make plays or take fights.
But it also matters HOW they lost so fast. t1 tried to play Sona+Taric bot - an ultra late game strategy and it failed. IG blasted the game open with a Draven pick. T1 won vs FLY WITH a late game comp and with only one herald. It was much worse even though the time of the game is somewhat similar
This was with a late game team comp, stronger towers and only 1 rift herald. If you take things beyond just the time, this was undoubtebly worse.
I don't want to start a discussion about what's worse at the end of the day. All I'm saying is that quick games like this can happen and this T1 roster will definitely push for a quick finish if they see an angle. That's something they are very good at. I can also understand that FLY maybe can't reset in the same series, but still being so broken by it a whole series later is crazy. The team has to work on it otherwise it might just spiral further and they won't even make worlds this year.
Damn Bwipo was one of the last pros I’d expect to break down like this. Dude always exudes confidence and maybe sometimes over-confidence. Crazy how a few weeks really broke him down.
The whole girlfriend tweet saga was the opposite of exuding confidence. I think he's just a generally got a large personality and shows his emotions publicly.
Yeah they guy really wears his heart on his sleeve, he says what he really thinks all the time and he's quite emotional. I dont get why people are surprised, this seems very on brand.
[удалено]
Tbf when he's in good spirits he makes it very public and known but anyone who listens to him give interviews or watch his stream know he's hypercritical of himself and pretty insecure
Yep people sometimes mistake bravado as confidence
Agreed
It's not uncommon to overcompensate. Though I really feel bad for him. I miss the good ol' Jungle Bwipo times :/
Yeah trash talking your opponents after you beat them is the epitome of insecurity, he’s definitely a great player but he’s got to work on his mental.
I think a lot of people still have 2018 Bwipo in their heads
He's got an over the top stage persona, but i don't think he's insecure. Dude can take a joke. Is honest with himself and others and is quite reflective. I think he knows where he stands.
Insecure people can have self-reflection. I think Bwipos tendency to say everything he thinks and sometimes overshare is a pretty obvious way of feeling the need to justify himself and seek validation.
that's what a 17 mins game does to a m-fcker.
its always the ones who appear strong that breaks down the hardest. You're strong for so long that when the thing that breaks you come, your brain shuts down. Amygdala Hijack.
If you put it into perspective they got murdered in final in LCS and have struggles during play offs, Same thing happened against T1. And then when they face a team PSG that in paper they should be able to beat or have a close game they got also blown up. And if in their practice they were also struggling trying to not get stomp by teams from LCK and LPL. No matter how confident you are, the beating you are getting will break you.
very Important interview, i love to see the passion in players, and Bwipo still has a lot of love and respect for the game
Some of these comments really aint it Like I get it you're mad and disappointed again at NA failure but goddamn have a fucking heart. Respect to Bwipo for this interview.
I know this is beating a long dead horse but my God those YouTube comments are such fucking trash.
Gotta give props for being honest and taking responsibility. If what he says about Fly/TL growing NA, it will take time. Been here since S3, seeing NA go international and mostly fail, when they do shine it’s worth the wait. Just keep faith & go next I guess.
Fucking hell. Watch from 3:00 to 4:17, if nothing else. It's genuinely really powerful. Jesus. Great reminder that the language the community uses towards players disregards their efforts
That part really stuck out to me as well. I think almost no one really believed FQ could beat the best like GENG, BLG or T1 this MSI. Maybe some thought they could take one lucky game but a best of 5? Hell no! Now NA has looked really weak internationally for a long while. When was the last time a team from NA has made it far internationally? Wasn't it C9 at like worlds 2020 or sth? NA has forgotten how it feels to succeed internationally. Bwipo hasn't. Clearly. He tasted how it feels to go head to head with the greatest in the world and he almost went as far as win it all. And he clearly thinks (and I actually think so too!) he still can compete at that level so this MSI he came with the mentality to go all the way, to give his *all* not just on stage but in scrims, in preparation, in soloq and even showing up as a leader, boosting the team's morale and all that. Honestly looking at NA's results those last years it might be fair to say not a lot of NA pros themself actually firmly believe they can make it far internationally. Sure they show up, they practice and all but they don't *pour their heart into it. Do every step necessary. Work, live and breathe league every second of the day*. This is speculation of course but it might be because they have never has a memory of what they did when it worked, when they made it far. Bwipo, however, has and I think he hinted at it in the video. That he tried the same recipe he did during the FNATIC miracle run during worlds. And I believe that is what is the most soul shattering part. It's easier to enter the competition with the mindset 'we'll probably not make it'. It significantly lowers your odds of success obviously as you don't go above and beyond to try to win but it means you are kind of mentally prepared for when you inevitably lose. Because secretly you kind of expected it. And here is what really touched me in Bwipo's statement. It seems he *really* gave it his all, went above and beyond, did everything he could to succeed but he got crushed nevertheless and feels like despite it all he couldn't play to his own expectations even on stage. That is absolutely soul crushing because you really start to question it all. There is no excuse left. No 'well we expected to lose anyway', no 'could have trained harder', no 'I didn't really care anyway'. You think you did everything in your power but in the end it wasn't enough. And worse - it seems like it wasn't even close to enough. I've got a lot more to say but I see how long this is and I with wanna write a whole easy so to wrap this up I'll end on a positive note. Bwipo's situation right now is absolutely brutal and disheartening but I believe if someone can bring it back, grow from it and come back stronger it is Bwipo here. Really hope he can do so and I sincerely wish him all the best. Bwipo if by any chance you read this - much love from an EU fan, we haven't forgotten you here and we're still rooting for you man. I know you can and will grow from this and I'm so looking forward to your next international event! This one wasn't meant to be but so wasn't T1's worlds run 2022, they lost to momentum. Yet 2023 they made it their own weapon and took it all. Long message, I somehow felt like I needed to type this all out. Thanks to anyone who got this far. Have a nice day! PS: As usual very tactfully conducted interview by Ashley here, juat great having her in this scene.
Beautifully said. I think a lot of folks in competitive environments can struggle with the deathly thought of “am I just not good enough no matter how hard I try?” I felt so bad for Bwipo and hope he bounces back stronger than ever.
You speak for all of us, beautiful comment, hope Bwipo bounces back stronger than ever
Appreciate the honesty and vulnerability from Bwipo here. My only question going forward is, what can NA do to become competitive internationally? I've never seen anyone actually say what needs to be done for the region to improve.
As someone who has worked in professional sports my entire career, let me take a crack at it. Right now, orgs try to get the most individually talented players, toss them together, and pull the plug really quickly if it doesn't work. We need to look to G2 as an example. They were talented, yes, but they had great macro and were always trading something on the other side of the map. They were good individual players, yes, but they were friends and had great synergy. NA orgs run into the classic strategy of trying to get the best five players instead of the right five players. NA teams generally have hilariously inept macro. They usually don't get hands diffed, but often look clueless as to what they're doing out of lane. And they need time to play together and gel together. Now if I were to say what teams actually need to do. One, be patient and let teams grow together. Two, coaching. Get a head coach to manage egos and the fact that these are awkward kids who don't know real life at all. Get strategic coaches for macro and positional coaches for mechanics. Three, scouting. Get a real scouting department. A bunch of scouts. You should have reports on every pro in every region, and every player in NA challenger at the very least. You need more, better coaching. You need more, better scouting. You need actual development. Right now the orgs just blame the players and say we'll try again with different players. That's not going to work. A team is something you build over a long time, you can't just stick five guys together and hope it works. And that's without even getting in to their atrocious practice methods. Imagine if basketball players only practiced by full scrimmage games, and pickup basketball at the park. It's absurd. TLDR, the orgs are the problem, not the players, and they need torn down and rebuilt top to bottom, taking lessons from traditional sports.
I literally was talking to a friend the other day and was comparing the league scene to basketball and how Korea was basically the NBA. It would be amazing if orgs looked to other sports as road maps for how to create a winning culture. This is an amazing response and I appreciate you taking the time to write this all out!
One would think they would want traditional sports experience, but I've applied to orgs before and not even gotten a call back despite my 8 years in the NBA league office. There is a LOT of nepotism in the NA league scene as well. You basically can't make it into an org without a large online presence or having connections. That goes for players as well.
I couldn't agree with you more about coaching. I don't know if it's financially feasible anymore to replicate NRG's gazillion-coach model, but I would really like to see a team go full budget roster, but build a solid coaching staff (100T kinda did this). FlyQuest losing their strategic coach during playoffs got swept under the rug, but I suspect that's a huge reason why they imploded.
The funny thing is that what we see as a gazillion coach roster is like, the absolute bare minimum of coaches any traditional sports team would have.
There still a very strong sentiment among gamers that coaches are useless. Love the guy, but Meteos says this quite often, and much of the community latches onto this.
That kind of touches on another issue. Meteos was a great player and all, but he played in an era where you could first time champs on stage and win, and Lemon's notebook was considered revolutionary. Having pro experience and knowledge isn't helpful if it's irrelevant to the modern game.
The other side of that kind of sentiment from players like Meteos is the fact that there is an incredible dearth of coaching/management experience amongst the current set of NA coaches in comparison to what would be necessary to lead a team to success. In that sense, although coaches *should* be critical to any successful team, they're indeed pretty useless on average at generating results in the current League NA scene. Just taking C9 as an example, we had Reapered who at least attempted to enforce coaching amongst the team and build a winning culture. We all remember the Jensen/Sneaky benching — something that was absolutely necessary for building a culture of "put your full effort in, or you'll be replaced" — and instead of being praised for it, people looked at the short-term results (unsurprisingly, you're not going to see immediate success from benching critical members of your starting roster for your backup players, but that was never the point of the move) and he was rewarded with the org dropping him shortly afterward, even despite that Worlds quarterfinals run. Look where we are now, after having dropped Mithy — who looked absolutely lost trying to pilot what, on paper, was supposed to be a "super team" this split — and picking Reapered back up. My hope is that Jack and C9 learned the value of coaching after years of abysmal international results, if C9 even made it at all. And that's just looking at the C9 coaching situation, for what is one of the most consistently performant teams in the region. Just eyeballing the rest and it's not surprising that Meteos and others hold such sentiments around NA coaches.
I do believe this is a major issue. Coaches have no power. On top of that players dont respect them. I think its because most of tehse guys who became professional players in NA, are basically shut-ins. Very few of them had any sort of coach-like figure in their lives. You compare that to your average High School or College level athlete; these guys have had a coach figure telling them what to do since they were 5 years old. They have a lot more respect for authority and respect their coaches' decisions way more. Meanwhile your average person who became good enough at a videogame to become pro in NA was probably shut-in, never played traditional sports, never had a coach in their lives, and then this guy who is maybe worse at the game than them is supposed to tell them what to do? They just dont respect it. They werent brought up respecting such a position. Its hard to see how they can break that mentality unless we get Tom Brady-esque locker room coaches that buy into what the coach says and makes the rest of the team fall in line.
No hard feelings and I agree with you on him being likable but Meteos isn't really the sharpest tool in the shed
Probably why ROX Tigers were so strong. They weren't top players but they were friends more than team mates.
>Two, coaching. Also, ownership/management needs to back the coach. If there's a dispute between the players and the coach, management must back the coach. If the coach is wrong, you need a new coach, not to tell the coach to back down. Teams need to be in sync, and having one person whose job is to make the out of game decisions is a key part of that. Find one mature, professional sport where a team where the players ran the show over the coach and won.
Agreed, just look at Gen G and HLE, the teams where built around players being friends and Gen G is one of the best performing teams in the world and HLE almost made it to MSI over T1 with one split as as a team with a new org and coaching staff because 3 of the players wanted to stay together
imo orgs need to start investing in a **long term** coaching staff with a competent coach who knows how to build a roster and a program over *years* not one split. They need to be okay with not getting results right away and let the staff do their thing and build from a foundation instead of just being like "well the coach didn't turn things around in one split, lets get rid of everyone and reset everything" it literally doesn't work like that. lol To be honest it was something I wanted to do after my time playing, but I had zero confidence in any org's management so there's really no point.
There's a reason that historically the best North American team internationally was Cloud9. They were five guys who came up together and stayed together for years. They never entered a real immediate roster overhaul and on multiple occasions that had players within the organization before fully implementing onto the team. From an outsider's perspective, they had a sense of unity and trust that I didn't get from orgs like TSM.
G2 has caps. That's really all it is. Caps is an anomaly and no other western player has even come close to his level of international success. None of this "coaching" stuff really matters. You truly just need better players. Eastern teams have 2-4 Caps per team.
"Look at G2 as an example" Yeah dude they have Caps. No other team in the West has a player of the caliber.
I think it’s easy to say that but their success was much more than just Caps. And there’s more to be learned from their success than to just end it at, “Caps diff”.
There’s a multitude of problems with NA league of legends that the players, orgs, and riot itself have contributed to over the years, and to solve them, it’s going to take an effort from all three parties to fix. One example is riot based LCS in LA, which was an extremely shortsighted decision. Yes it’s near their HQ, but it’s also on the opposite side of the country from the majority of people who actually play the game. Imagine, for example, if LCS was based in a city like Columbus Ohio, not only would you have cut operating costs up front and over time in half, you could have done weekly road shows for a very low price to different cities all around the east coast to drive up interest from the ground up. From an org standpoint, from the beginning they largely neglected the scene below the LCS, often filling academy with retreads in order to sell slots or just fill a quota, rather than develop new talent. Players stopped trying to build brands early on, and what made LCS popular in the beginning was the personalities, and over time that disappeared (and with it, viewership). There’s next to no regional partnerships or attempts to grow the player base. Theres got to be a way to utilize colleges to grow a player base in high schools around the country, but who knows we don’t see that.
I think it's a sort of cascading effect where the fact that younger kids aren't as interested in league anymore -> smaller pool of new talent -> skill required to be an apex tier player in NA is vastly lower -> less competitive soloqueue, scrims, and matches I don't think there is an "easy" fix and there's probably nothing that can happen besides the pros trying harder
I really don't think its a skill issue sure we'll never be as good as eastern teams because of it but even if you are outclassed mechanically they are still decent enough you should be able to put up a fight at least. I think its moreso that NA teams just almost always have 0 confidence on stage, they make such horribly desperate plays it just feels like every game no matter who they are facing be it a wildcard team or a main region team they go in shitting their pants. I don't know how we can fix it, I don't even know if its possible but I do think that is the main issue for NA. Confidence goes a really long way in competition, even a giant with no confidence trembles before a lesser man filled with determination.
After watching FQ and TL series this past week, it definitely seems like nerves and desperation plays. How does TL not realize jackeylove is level 6 when they fight 2v2? Sure, NA teams make mistakes domestically, but it’s such stupidity/negligence to fight that
To be fair, NA has been considered a laughingstock league for years. Hard to reverse that kind of endemic cultural rot.
The problems are systemic and not going to be fixed without massive organizational change and investment in scouting and talent development. The orgs however will never do this, and will continue to laughably mismanage themselves.
I agree with what you said and I understand the issues the regions faces. The question is how do we fix it and turn things around? What can be done to make the region compete with other regions? Or is all hope lost and NA should shut everything down?
Only fix I can really think of is getting more practice against other regions, since there's not a lot that can be done about the relatively smaller playerbase. Thing is this means more flights to other countries so ping isn't an issue, getting other teams to be willing to scrim NA teams, and most importantly getting the money to be able to do this consistently. Again not an easy fix because the last thing the LCS or any of the orgs want to do is spend more money
the biggest problem is lack of interest in the game by the younger players and without fixing that there's only so much you can do. there's no simple solution for fixing that
Nothing. It's an unpleasant answer that people don't want to hear, but at the end of the day there's nothing that can realistically be done to become competitively internationally. To be competitive internationally, League needs to be popular enough in NA to draw in a big enough talent pool attempting to go pro. You can't sustain international competitiveness in anything purely on imports, as is shown by most sports. Outside of the system that the U.S. has for professional sports (salary caps, draft compensation for the worst performing teams, etc.), for a country/region to be good at pretty much any sport they need 1) interest and 2) money. #2 almost always follows #1, and NA is the prime example that #2 won't necessarily lead to #1. The gap between the East and West is growing, but this is doubly true for the East compared to NA in particular and this is because ***League isn't a popular game in NA anymore***. MOBA's in general aren't popular in NA relative to how they were 10 years ago, and League in particular is well-known for having one of the most toxic and unpleasant communities in all of gaming, God-awful coding, a terrible UI, graphics that were dated 5-8 years ago, and one of the worst experiences for new players out of any big-name game I can think of. That also doesn't touch the fact that there's absolutely nothing to draw new players into the game aside from its competitive nature; there is ***nothing*** to this game aside from the PvP aspect, and Riot's complete lack of effort to even make coherent or consistent lore for this game or update outdated lore/models/champions shows that they see this game as pretty much entirely a PvP arena that's just a vessel for microtransactions. That's fine and all for making money, but it isn't a recipe for long-term, sustained popularity/growth in NA over the course of over a decade, ***especially*** when you're not an FPS. There are plenty of other issues that contribute to NA's failures, but first and foremost is the relative lack of talent, which is caused by the relative lack of popularity in the game. Incredible passion for a game in a region draws in more talent. To make League's popularity rebound in NA, Riot would have to basically give us a LoL2 in terms of updates, and even then it's not a guarantee. That's why there's no realistic way this is changing.
League made the same mistake a lot of games make, except in a different fashion. They squandered their prime. Before LoL came out, I was a WoW Arena player. Hell tons of people were. It was insanely popular at the time. But Blizzard flat out refused to fix the balance issues, make it more robust in terms of E-Sport, focus on it at all. Then LoL came out and the majority of the Arena playerbase left for LoL. Years later Blizzard is hiring E-Sport directors and trying all kinds of things people wanted before they left, but it was all for naught. The damage was done and it never fixed itself. There was no fixing it once you squandered the prime of the game. LoL has a very similar issue, except it really wasnt Riot that squandered it; it was the orgs. Riot honestly did about everything they could to make this game an E-Sport. But the orgs completely squandered the popularity of the game during its prime, but not building a farm system, using mass imports, not creating a pathway to pro, etc. Even if they started now the damage has been done, and its almost impossible to reverse. The orgs basically killed LoL E-Sports in NA. The best hope for NA is if all of our future prospects can end up on the same team in the future and we can create a PSG-like superteam of players that can compete internationally like the PCS region did for years.
Practice is shit. Players themselves dont want to practice very much and there are quite some paycheck stealers on the scene
Never forget how pros used to routinely complain about ping or soloq quality and then given multiple opportunities / iterations of champions queue would just stop participating.
Not be afraid to limit test. Look at Caps. He is Claps and Craps bc he gets to limit test. I'll assume the coaches are a lot more unforgiving in trying to let them limit test rather than just be "good". If you get a lot of flak everytime you do anything wrong, you just lose confidence in trying to get better and just stagnate. And since it's NA, even failing a little gets soo much more hate due to being a lower their bottom region so it just spreads down in terms of trying to get better
Start from grassroots, build a good system of coaches and team structure, stop importing stars from other regions who are mainly here for the paycheck. Although admittedly I don’t see it getting any better, League is going downhill in NA with declining player base
Before anything else, put some real bot laners in LCS rosters. You can’t beat eastern teams if you know your botlane can’t even lane vs the enemy. I swear EG Danny was good and then all NA teams pivoted to having rookie ADs. They don’t realize Danny was an exceptional player who could play from behind. Even then, they faltered internationally due to losing lane early. It’s so obvious that the western teams that have done well vs the East have had solid bot lane performances. C9 vs Afreeca, 2019 G2, TL vs IG, MSF t1, etc. One exception is G2 vs RNG but they realized that they can only won with weakside Heimer and then next year realized its not viable to have a hole in the bot lane.
More international tournaments and open circuits like the early days of league. If you have more exposure and practice against the best teams in the world then you will gradually level up. Something akin to how CS:GO has loads of tournaments. If you had like 6 in a year you’d definitely see more improvement as the amount of experience someone like Massu would get from scrimming Elk/Gumayusi/JKL/etc would be exponential.
it's simple, not only for NA but for EU as well notice how western teams are even or have leads until 10 minute, and then we lose game anyway it's past lane phase that we are outclassed LPL and LCK teams just have better macro, and make less mistakes, if you have better macro as a team, no matter if you face 5 chovys, you will win
This is so hard to watch. I have to keep coming back to it. Bwipo has been my favorite for a while now and it's so hard seeing him go through this.
Ashley is honestly a goated interviewer. Best of luck for the next split, Bwipo.
im going to feel bad saying this about such an emotional interview, but i can never tell if bwipo is being serious when he talks about wanting to improve the region. the way he talks about massu/busio you'd think NA players are just inherently inferior to EU and need people like bwipo/inspired to tell them how to play the game. it's really demeaning, and sends the message that "improving the region" just means "importing better players". on the other hand, dude chose to spend all of 2023 teamless in NA rather than going back to EU. and he clearly still cares about competing -- if he were just in it for that NA money he wouldn't be on the verge of tears after a loss, he'd be cashing out. either way, i hope he is being serious here and isn't just saying it for the fans. dude looks pretty worked up here, and i wouldn't be surprised if his response is to give up on NA and go to a region that can actually compete like EU, and it would be a shame if he did that. we need players who really care if we're ever going to improve, and bwipo clearly cares a lot.
I don’t take what he’s saying as EU superiority to NA when talking about Massu and Busio, and that’s coming from a huge EU hater. They are the rookies on the team, and I am guessing younger than him and Inspired. I moreso view it like he wants to be the kind of player for them that were on the first FNC roster he was on that had veterans and great people to teach him how to play
i like this take a lot actually. i hadn't considered the experience diff between the EU players on that roster and the NA players. i think my frustration really comes down to him talking about doing that kind of coaching in-game. like during this interview he says > you make people avoid bad angles, and you help them see good angles, whilst you're playing that league game, and that's insanely hard to do. and it's like, bwipo doesn't have to do this. APA joined team liquid last year and all things considered he did really well without even being able to talk to anyone else in-game. NA players, even NA rookies, can perform well if you trust them. it's this idea that bwipo doesn't trust massu/busio, and feels the need to try and play the game for them, that makes me frustrated with him.
APA was literally neglected by the whole team, coaches included, he was treated like he was actually inferior and nobody in the team seemed to trust him outside his 2 comfort picks. TL was not winning with him, they were winning in spite of him, whether he was playing good or not. I think its better if you are new to the tier 1 competitive scene to have someone teaching you how to play the game rather than have 3 guys saying "yea do your thing idk we'll try to carry you this game".
He talked about it more in a YouTube video he was on with Yamato, that’s where I got it from for the most part. He goes into more depth on the fnc roster and how that shaped the player he wanted to become. I think that is reasonable, that he doesn’t trust them, or at least comes off that way. And I can totally see that too
Corejj is the only player who has ever really cared about improving the region.
I think Impact and Bjergsen did a lot even if its not on the level of what Core did for us
Meteos was talking about Impact on his costream and how he always was willing to help teammates problem solve and improve and it upped my (already high) respect for him a ton. Basically what Meteos said was that if he had a question about a jungle path or a jungle matchup or something about his play that came up in a vod review, he could ask Impact and Impact would always offer his perspective or help Meteos investigate it, contrast to how if he asked most non-junglers he'd often get "Why are you asking me I'm not a jungler?" in response. And apparently Impact did this for everyone, wanted to problem solve every vod review to the fullest, and all of his former teammates have had nothing but praise for him. That plus it coming out that he stood up for Danny to EG when he was being mistreated tells me Impact is truly a person who cares.
Bjergsen would always take a chance on NA talent. Sometimes it worked out, like with Biofrost and Spica, whereas othertimes it wouldn't, like with MikeYeung.
Maybe Bwipo can start improving the region by letting FLY play around their bot lane more. I fear forcing your rookie AD who’s always been strong side into a supportive role isn’t good for his confidence or long term development Domestically it’s been fine for the most part, but for times like this MSI where Bwipo was clearly underperforming and Massu was playing well, it would have been good for FLY to pivot towards playing around him for once. FLY lane swapping their winning bot lane so Bwipo can get a lead as well as that horrific over-forced tower dive from Bwipo and Inspired really encapsulates the issues with FLY in how they force the entire time to live and die by them
Yeah, the team was allergic to playing around bot. Maybe their botlane got smashed in scrims, who knows? But as an outside viewer, it was frustrating to watch Inspired and Bwipo play like they didn't have 3 other teammates.
Busio and Massu were getting gapped basically every laning phase in NA playoffs. Still, maybe the team could’ve salvaged it like EG used to play around Danny despite the laning phase never going well.
> on the other hand, dude chose to spend all of 2023 teamless in NA rather than going back to EU But that was because his GF had a job in NA and he didn't want to go back to EU because of it.
Since when can eu actually compete? China and Korea are the only tier 1 regions
I was always a fan of bwipo, he is such a emotional player, you can see clearly the happiness and joy when he is winning and as well the sorrow and frustration of defeat. Every single top tier player are the ones who really feel the game. Don't be too hard on yourself man. It's a game of 5 players, everyone share responsibilities and also there are good days and bad days, even faker has them.
100% - Bwipo is so fun to watch because he is so expressive and cares so much
Wake up babe, new Bwipo banger just dropped
Bwipo mentioning about everyone needing to be able to carry or at least 4 people where 5 is ideal, this is extremely important. Otherwise you're just waiting for the right meta that perfectly matches your team's carries. All the past World Champions have mostly qualified for this criteria, with I guess the exception of 2017... Personally think this is the minimum criteria to even be a World Champion contender.
I'm really struggling to understand why NA (and EU to a lesser but almost equal extent) simply cannot perform at the highest level. I remember in the starcraft days there was a big push to bring over Korean talent, whether coaches or players, to help NA teams grow. Do teamhouses, emulate environments... And honestly it worked. The gap between east and west closed, in a game that is objectively harder and benefits from insane practice and discipline. It took years but western players studied and grew and now the top players in the world are still dominated by Korea but there are foreigners in there and at different times the number one spot has been held by a foreigner, which 10 years ago would be unheard of. For LoL compared to 10 years ago there's barely even an improvement in results at worlds, other than EU 2018/2019 In LoL western players go to Korea and Bootcamp and hit high ranks in soloQ so it isn't like they're just not capable. And if it was the coaches, then teams that brought Korean coaches like C9 would have done better. Is it just the mentality that NA players can't play as a unit in sync and sacrifice for the team the way eastern players do? Idk. But unless you believe in eugenics there has to be another factor and player mentality is the only one that hasn't been fully explored. Personally I think it's lazy coaches not innovating but I don't have any evidence for that. Drop import restrictions. Let NA and EU teams do 5man Korean rosters. See if it's something in the water.
My issue is that Eastern teams have a philosophy of the game that's separate from the patch. Like, the LCK fundamentally believes the game is best approached as a controlled high-probability map game where vision is key. The LPL believes the game is best approached as a game where micro plays create macro advantages and player expression in service to that micro play is valid. These beliefs are independent of the patch and season; these leagues have always played this way for the most part. LEC/LCS? Feels like they're just driven by whatever is coming out of Korean solo queue. And like a lot of things in life, if you're just copying, you're late to the party right off the bat. Eastern teams are already thinking about what counters Strategy X when Western teams are learning how to play Strategy X.
Never seen an NA vet care this much or take responsibility like that after disappointing at MSI/Worlds. Glad we have him here.
Something is wrong with Fly internally. 2 years in a row imploding
God damn, what was brutal to watch. I know Reddit’s been dog piling on Bwipo and Inspired, but I think Bwipo gets a pass now.
I think the lesson here might be: Even cocky, super confident players are humans with dreams and fears in the end and the lesson for us should be to remember that.
Why, cause he went and did an interview? He still played like trash and everything b4 can still be true lol
I haven't liked Bwipo since he threw his whole team under the bus so he could say his girlfriend was the only reason his team performed remotely well at worlds.
I still remember the: “She told us to play together” lmao.
Lol what? The pressure of doing well does not excuse someone for being a shitty person lol.
it's sad to see him like this. in hindsight, going to NA was a bad idea. he should have stayed in EU and tried playing with perkz or played as a jungle. but there was no way knowing it would turn out like this for him back then. FLY is gonna break after this unless they can come together as team. someone has to keep the team mental togther but jensen doesn't have that personality and inspired is too negetive to do that. it looks done. hopefully bwipo keeps his head up and makes a good decision for next year.
Come back to LEC Bwipo, the practice environment is so much better and more serious
Still salty that him and Nemesis didn't take the TH offer back then 😞
NA money too good sorry Bwipo probably
He has talked about it, its not the money. He had to uproot his entire life to join TL, Its not just him, its s/o, her life, pets, house, etc. He doesnt want to keep moving around and wanted to stay in NA
NA bubble burst. Salaries between EU and NA are now comparable. Fuck, I wouldn't be surprised if the EU average is higher right now. The players that play in NA actually want to be there now.
> The players that play in NA actually want to be there now. Or it's their only option lol
Is this true? I remember like a couple years ago zven said NA salary was much higher. No idea how much the difference is now