TL;DW – LTA North Edition: C9 Dog Walk TL in Game 1
Week 6, Day 1 of LTA North Split 2. C9 vs TL. C9 is on Blue, TL is on Red. C9’s roster is Thanatos (top), Blaber (jungle), Loki (mid), Zven (bot), and Vulcan (support). TL roster is Impact (top), UmTi(jungle), APA (mid), Yeon (bot), and CoreJJ (support). C9 is 2-0, TL is 2-0. For more information on what early, mid, and late game means, see Terms at the bottom of the article.
Champion Selection: Global Conquest
First ban phase removes the usual rogues’ gallery of Neeko, Yone, Varus, Gwen, Xin Zhao, and Vi.
C9 first pick Naafiri. TL lock in Azir and Ezreal. C9 counter with Taliyah and Miss Fortune. TL ends the first pick phase by grabbing Pantheon.
In second ban phase, the top lane is heavily targeted, with Ambessa, Sion, Jayce, and Braum removed.
Start back on champion selection, TL grabs Rumble. C9 closes out their team with Galio and Alistar, while TL finishes up with Poppy. Both teams have drafted comps with strong team fighting capabilities and good map mobility.
Team comps are: C9 – Galio (top), Naafiri (jungle), Taliyah (mid), Ezreal (bot), Alistar (support) vs TL – Rumble (top), Pantheon (jungle), Azir (mid), Yeon (bot), CoreJJ(support).
Early Game Highlights: It’s Farming Time in the LTA North
Game starts with warding and a little bit of poking.
While most lanes are content to farm, Loki is constantly pressuring APA in mid lane. Loki manages to land enough hits on APA that he has to recall.
UmTi starts up the first Drake (Mountain). He takes it without issue because Blaber is topside. The change to Voidgrubs’ timer means that there is no trade-off of objectives, and both junglers start to position themselves around the Baron Pit as the Grubs spawn.
Blaber starts the Voidgrubs. 3 members of TL hover around but don’t go in, so Blaber secures all 3 Grubs.
Early game ends due to time. C9 lead in gold (300) and farm.
Mid Game Highlights: C9 Starts to Take Control
The farming continues.
CoreJJ almost gets caught out near Dragon Pit but manages to Flash to safety. Immediately after, TL dives Zven in bot lane, but he manages to survive. 3 members of C9 come down to help and manage to kill UmTi as he retreats for First Blood. Loki gets the kill.
Vulcan walks into the lower mid lane bush and gets jumped on by TL. He dies to CoreJJ.
TL starts up the second Drake (Hextech), but CoreJJ gets caught out and killed. TL abandons the objective to C9, who secure it.
Both teams position themselves around Rift Herald as it spawns. C9 tries to kill UmTi but only manages to push him away from the objective momentarily. Blaber starts the Herald. TL hover around, looking for an engage. CoreJJ uses Keeper’s Verdict, but it whiffs.
C9 manages to keep UmTi away from the objective so that Blaber can take it. Vulcan takes too much damage while distracting TL. He tries to Flash away into Baron Pit, but Yeon Arcane Shifts in and kills him.
As C9 starts retreating, TL pursues. UmTi dives at them with his ultimate, but gets jumped on when he lands and is killed by Thanathos. TL continues to chase after C9, with APA sliding forward and killing Zven. However, doing so leaves him vulnerable to being jumped on in return, and he is killed by Blaber. After APA dies, TL backs off. Fight ends 2-2.
Thanatos and Blaber gank Impact in the top lane and kill him under his tower. Blaber drops the Herald in mid lane. It takes a large chunk out of the tower but doesn’t take it.
C9 starts up the third Drake (Infernal). TL tries to intervene, but they are too late. C9 secures the objective and then turns onto TL. Blaber kills APA, Loki takes out Impact, and Blaber chases down and kills CoreJJ. The fight goes 3-0 for C9.
Mid-game ends due to time. C9 has the lead in gold (4.3k) and farm.
Late Game Highlights: Early Game Investments Pay Off
Yeon gets jumped on in mid lane. Killed by Blaber. C9 then takes the outer mid turret for the First Turret of the game.
C9 takes the Thornbound Atakhan uncontested.
C9 takes the four Drake without contest. They are now at Soul Point.
UmTi gets caught out in bot river. Chased by Thanatos and Zven. Thanatos eventually gets the kill.
With UmTi down, Blaber starts Baron. TL hover around. Yeon tries to steal with an Arcane Barrage, but Blaber secures the objective with a Smite.
C9 tries to catch out APA in top lane. It turns into a full-out team fight. Vulcan kills CoreJJ, Loki Seismic Shoves UmTi backwards so that Zven can take him out.
Yeon tries to take down Blaber, but he turns it around and kills him instead. At the same time, Thanatos chases down APA (the original target) and drops him. Impact tries to run, but Loki surfs over and takes him out. 5-0 for C9.
Following this fight, C9 takes out the inner top turret, inner bot turret, and base top turret. TL no longer have any non-base turrets.
While waiting for the fifth Drake to spawn, C9 takes out the base mid turret. After they do that, they rotate down the Drake and take it uncontested. They now have Infernal Soul.
C9 rotate top and take out the inhibitor while poking at TL. They manage to get CoreJJ low enough that they dive onto him, with Blaber getting the kill. They then jump onto UmTi. Zven takes him out. Yeon gets jumped on by Blaber. 3-0 for C9.
After a slight delay as they wait for minions, C9 starts attacking the Nexus turrets. Vulcan moves around the Nexus to Headbutt Impact towards his team, but gets Emperor’s Divided into the fountain. Loki kills Impact, but Vulcan dies to APA because of the fountain laser. The rest of C9 continue to attack the Nexus turret, breaking it and then the Nexus.
Post Game Analysis: Good Warding Wins the Day
C9 ends the game at 31:17 with a gold lead of 17.8k. The final score is 19-4 for C9. Blaber led his team to victory. He had a 73% kill participation, meaning he was in the right place at the right time to help his team out.
TL should have been more aggressive in the early game since C9’s comp was more scaling. They should have taken advantage of C9’s early game weakness. C9’s warding made this difficult, but if you just let a scaling team scale, you’re probably going to lose. It should also be noted that Loki’s Seismic Shoves were on point this game.
Terms
Early Game: Any time before 10 minutes, first outer tower down, or first level 10 (whichever comes first).
Mid Game: Between early game and either 20 minutes, 2 inner towns down, half the players are level 16, or 3rd dragon killed.
Late Game: Any time after mid-game.
