No Liquid.
No fnatic
No Nuturn
No X10
No Version1
And maybe not Vikings or Sharks
And all these teams were representing their regions at Reykjavik.
Fnatic overthought, eu teams saw them as clear top 3 and that they woild make it
Nuturn lost best sova in the world
X10 played with coach and got screwed by one round becausr of some shitty format
Version 1 had no time to adapt back with zellsis and meta gone back.
Also at rejkjavik u pretty much had the best teams expect MAYBE acend missing but they changed there rosrer after, there is def a reason for that. Every other region sent there best. Fnatic was and probably is still insane
Well how do you know how they will be at LA. Also there is 4 LCQ spots guranteeing very good xompetition. NA best 3 will probably be at LA. Acend and gambit almost guaranteed, vision strikers there aswell if they make top 8. The competition will be ariund the same
Also it doenst make sense to say competition is higher, its always the best teams expevted to make masters and champions so the competition is around the same expect champions is more likely to be higher due to LCQ and masters 3 winner going directly.
Its judt that the stakes are wayyyy higher and that there isnt gonma be a double elim bracket for sure. Every single game will be very important. Price money high, viewership super high, hype aswell and its the real deal. In 5 years u will look bsck at first champions winner and not care about masters winners thaz much.
Acend had koldamenta who was clearly the problem, zeek changed them so much in a positive way.
Blaze and new G2 didn't even exist at that point of time.
FPX and Guild - you see where they are now, it was the same back then, Shao&Zyppan vs world and Guild 4v5 every game.
You could make an argument of Gambit being better than Liquid during Stage 2, but Gambit lost to FPX once and Liquid smashed them 13-7 13-5, so...