Consistent, good practice.

If you practice your mechanics routine regularly and mindfully with optimal form, then it’ll become ingrained. It’s not about how much you do it but about the quality of the practice itself. While some high level skills like animation prediction (movement reading), optimized pathing, and agent mastery only come with more hours played, mechanics are about minimizing server time when you’re in bad form to keep yourself from building bad habits.

All those top pros run drills and scrims to apply proper theory from their coaches but often individually limit-test in comp where stakes are low. Comp tends to be a very low stress environment relative to their actual jobs and is often an opportunity to test out new ideas or attempt plays without any pressure.

Edit: added “movement reading” as it’s the more commonly used term

The core beat Optic for Stage 1 in 2022 for 1st seed going into Reykjavik. They also took the ascension trophy in 2023. This is their first franchised Regional though. Jawgemo of course has the 2023 Champs.

It’s not gonna happen because NA is gonna win all their matches and EMEA will be the first ones eliminated rip.

G2 dominate from here on out right?

I don’t have exact stats but it’s well known that it’s much easier for teams to have successful attack halves because of prepped site executes and post-plant utility. This is especially the case now with the introduction of Tejo and Vyse who are great at disruption and anti-flood utility.

The map pool reflects this too with Lotus, Haven, Fracture, Abyss, and Pearl all being attack sided. Split is the only exception and Bind is a bit more even.

That VIT vs. TH Haven map gave me this initial inkling and the current SEN vs. MIBR match is the same. Momentum swings to whoever is attacking.

My take is that whichever team has the strongest defense halves will likely take Bangkok.

They’ve banned different maps for all their matches.

G2 vs C9
Haven | Fracture | Lotus | Abyss | Bind | Pearl | Split

G2 vs Lev
Haven | Bind | Pearl | Fracture | Lotus | Split | Abyss

G2 vs SEN
Lotus | Split | Abyss | Pearl | Haven | Bind | Fracture

They don’t have a Permaban but they definitely have map preferences. Personally, I’m surprised they’ve banned Lotus twice now when they looked so good against C9 with it. Below is my extrapolated list for their map confidence.

1. Abyss
2. Pearl/Split (depending on team they face)
3. Bind
4. Fracture
5. Lotus/Haven (prioritized ban depending on team)

I would but they 2-0’d Furia and could have potentially taken LOUD to map 3 had that first OT went their way.

G2 are so good that they’re making every other Americas’ team look bad. It’s like throwing a top Champs seed into kickoff where everyone else has to integrate new players and adapt to the meta.

They were already the most coordinated team but now they’re all on form and have Jawgemo as their spearhead. Their read on the meta, with heavy Yoru, Tejo/Sova+Breach, Vyse, and Chamber usage is also super suffocating to play against. It’s some combination of disruptive utility chains and proactive re-clears that make them disgusting on defense — the harder half for most teams. Their attack side on the other hand, heavily prioritizes strong defaults with exhaustive mixups and unstoppable executes. Expect them to average 8 rounds on attack this meta.

I would say only VIT/TH and EDG could possibly match them for firepower but they’ve all looked far more shaky and inconsistent against weaker regional opponents. They undoubtably rely more on pure mechanics with numbers instead of utility abuse and map manipulation. The macro seems lacking compared to when you watch G2’s approach.

G2

— Tier Break —

SEN | MIBR | KRU | LOUD | 100T | LEV | C9 | NRG | EG

— Tier Break —

Furia | 2G

Need to see more of their respective map pools but G2 look far more coordinated and have zero firepower deficiencies across their roles. It’ll probably be closer toward later internationals but I think G2 right now is just way too developed with their protocols and strats.

SEN got the same number of rounds as LEV and C9. There’s no tier gap between you frauds and the rest.

Looking forward to crushing TH, VIT, EDG, and whoever crawls out of APAC.

But 2024 G2 played 4v5 + a human drone and still placed 2nd in Americas both splits and 3rd at Shanghai. This year is so free with Dawgemo

Looks like G2 win without losing a single match.

That’s fair, their match against LEV was rather close and they lost to 100T though I initially attributed that to nerves. I’ll move them down.

Doesn’t make sense to do a 1-12 ranking without a round robin or full split.

G2

—Tier Break—

SEN | KRU

—Tier Break—

LOUD | NRG | 100T | MIBR | LEV | C9 | EG

—Tier Break—

FUR | 2G

Edit: moved MIBR down because of their loss to 100T and how close their match was with LEV

So excited for G2 vs. SEN but those current stats really reflect why they seem so favored.

Your percentages are legit. I do think VIT/TH is gonna be super close though since the latter has had time to work their maps and role switches more while the former was shaky against KC.

You’re not gonna be getting anyone anything lmao.

Definitely Heretics cuz at least PRX won regionals

I don’t know about winning Champs twice but I’d wager G2 has a chance at a golden road run if not at least collecting two trophies this year.

The difference is pacing. This G2 looks incredible at reclearing and site executes because Jawgemo is that good of an entry player. He’s able to do the “miniboo” and still get his frags in their system. Plus you can see that Trent and Leaf both excel at playing at this tempo given how aggressive they are.

G2 2-0
“Did you see the way they played today”
— Leaf

I never stressed about them wdym?

Compared to G2 they’re both bad.

Edit: crazy that I caught 5 downvotes despite that Lotus showing. Neither team can call a good attack side.

Decent take! It’s a shame Pacific is unlikely to win a trophy this year though.

Their off-season was only a net upgrade and their first game was the most impressive of any matches that we’ve seen thus far. They’re min-maxing the small details that we usually see teams do toward Split 2 and Champions while everyone else is either rebuilding their rosters or trying to fix glaring holes in their roles or map pool.

This take has been reiterated by Sliggy and he even picked G2 when asked who he’d rate between them and VIT after the game against FUT today.

Their playstyle and protocols give them the highest floor while they have the firepower and macro to win trophies. It’s just a matter of whether they’ll peak higher than other teams when it matters most.

Yeah, you’re right that it caught 3. Mb, I replayed on the YouTube stream and it’s vertically formatted for some reason and missed the other two stuns. It still doesn’t make sense to save the Sova ult when it’s a buy round and you’ve already burned steel garden.

EXACTLY. 3v5 with bad money so do everything you can to win it. The stun only caught one person because it was passed the choke instead of in it. BBL had them boxed and didn’t take advantage of it. Stop coping.

This is pure cope. They double swung to fight street because they heard most of the footsteps there and enough time had passed that TH would have their rifles back.

When time is that low and you have stall util — not using it makes zero sense.

KK, Trexx, Leaf, Hyunmin

You’re in utter denial if you don’t think BBL can’t convert round 22 with 14 seconds on the clock with the first spike tap. They have a hunter’s fury and a grav well for stall and don’t even have to full rotate to site, just get in range.

Round 23 is even more egregious with all of Heretics stuck in street — BBL pops Steel Garden to stall but don’t use the hunter’s fury when there’s only 18 seconds left and they have info of the majority there. Profek even pops a stun when he could have used grav well for stall in tandem. Instead they double swing dry and get destroyed.

BBL choked this map hard.

Nah, Jampii had his ult to secure multiple rounds near the end given how low time was. They straight choked that.

Looks like straight slop out of EMEA’s top teams.

Bangkok: G2
Toronto: VIT
Paris: G2

You can’t pretend like using ChatGPT constitutes as more work.

Quality over Quantity is the most important standard in delivering constructive criticism much less a full fledged guide. It’s alright to have more research but you need to condense it down to the most important key points for players to be able to actually digest it.

Cauanzin has proven more consistent but I think Trent still hasn’t reached his ceiling. He’ll look a lot better this year with a faster paced G2.

So far, we’ve seen the emergence of double stall and disruption comps in the form of Vyse+Deadlock on Bind in China/KC and a lot of Tejo+Breach in Americas.

It seems like info sentinels are practically out of the meta and it’s likely Viper will find a place again given how well she counters re-clears.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see G2’s lotus comp on more maps (Yoru, Breach, Tejo, Omen, Viper) or some variant but I’m also curious if triple initiator would be viable as well.

What other comp archetypes do you think will further emerge once the Harbor buffs come in?

There are no S tier teams in EMEA rn. TH’s role swaps and map pool do not give me any confidence (though their illness during that M8 game could be to blame) — nor does the fact that VIT struggled so heavily against KC. We also need to see more from FUT.

Put them all top A for now. Only G2 and Trace look like trophy contenders right now.

I’m just not feeling it man. None of these teams have a chance of winning Bangkok. VIT’s macro needs work, KC lack firepower, and TH need to flesh out their map pool.

I would not be surprised if the GF is G2 vs. TE at this point.

Ay what’s wrong with their players? They’re some of the most dedicated, hard-working yet humble guys in the scene. Betting on your bros to get you back into T1 when you could have all gone your separate ways for money is pretty admirable too. At the same time, Jawgemo is also probably the most entertaining duelist you could watch while Leaf is insanely cerebral.

Unless you’re a diehard neT/Icy fan I don’t really get it.

I think in the current scene, a team with a “good enough” player will not win a trophy.

It’s proven with EG, SEN, GENG, and EDG that supportive initiators and flexes don’t have to necessarily be that mechanically dominant as long as their utility is consistently impactful. On the other hand, the entry, smokes, and anchors must be heavy hitters to minimize gaps across every aspect of map control. Fnatic is the only team to break this model.

Edit:

Standard formula for an International Winning Team
Duelist: Top 2
Initiator: Top 8 (Playoffs)
Flex: Top 6
Smokes: Top 2
Sentinel: Top 3
IGL: Best

The only teams I think have a strong chance of continual dominance are G2 and VIT (assuming Sayf’s IGL doesn’t wreck his form).

PRX have zero chance given G2 are attending every international.

3 of the top 5 duelists are American no?

Aspas, Derke, Zekken, Jawgemo, KK

They’re all cracked but I don’t have any faith in them on the international stage other than T3xture.

I would put G2 in their own tier but you do you. Everything else makes sense to me.

G2 Bundle :D

Jawgemo definitely has better movement and utility while Zekken has better risk assessment. I don’t think their aim is that different.

I would take Jawgemo though because he’s the definition of a selfless entry.

It’s definitely a clash between Jawgemo and Zekken but they’ve got different play styles. I personally think Jawgemo is more explosive though.

If C9 win then Americas is cooked and if G2 win then neT gets shit for no reason. Feelsbadman

Kickoff is volatile man. Nothing is guaranteed and unless your team is a proven powerhouse internationally, it’s quite probably that you could get upset.

Bro is what Scream wanted to be.