Three big issues we can all agree on this season:
- Not enough games
- Scheduling was too tight
- Single elim matches in playoffs(lol)
How do we make this better?
In my opinion, season should look more like this:
-League Stage 1(play all other 11 teams)- BEGINS IN JANUARY/FEBRUARY
-Masters 1(3 qualify from each region, same format as Shanghai with Swiss Stage and top seed picking teams in playoffs, finalists each earn an extra slot for their region at Champions)-
-League Stage 2(play all other 11 teams again)-
-Masters 2(exact same as Masters 1)
-Last Chance Qualifiers(Only for regions that earned extra slots at Champions)-
-Champions(the 3 teams that qualified to Masters 2 qualify here, in addition to the LCQ winners/runners up/third place teams even if needed)- ENDS IN OCTOBER, AS CONFIRMED BY LF
Important detail about league play:
For playoffs, since 12 teams will be in the league this year, top EIGHT qualify to playoffs, but there's a catch:
Top 2 get a bye to second round, like this season
7th and 8th place teams go DIRECTLY to lower bracket to play the losers of the 3-6 and 4-5 game instead of these two games being single elimination
Qualification for Stage 2 playoffs combines results from Stage 1 and 2 to determine qualification + seeding
Every team should play every 4-5 days or so rather than a full week, thus speeding up league play to compensate for the twofold increase in matches
Starting the season much earlier in the year and condensing the length of league play will help give more time in between tournaments for rest/visas/prep, re-introducing the double elim buffer so NAVI doesn't get fucked by Team Heretics twice and then cut their coach causing them to bomb the second stage, bringing back the LCQ thus giving even more time for teams to prepare for Champions(whilst inherently making LCQ even more difficult to find value from by filling the 4th/5th teams' schedule to further weed out weaker teams from getting lucky), and doubling the amount of league games ensures that T1 doesn't get screwed over by poor scheduling and the best teams actually make playoffs and international tournaments, while also giving fans more games to watch.
Let me know your thoughts(even though Riot has assuredly already determined their format for next year, and it will certainly be worse than this)
Discord