'//,

I don't know myself because I'm not really watching any of their games. From what I've been hearing, though, the issue's probably burnout—which I can understand somewhat, given they played four offseason tournaments in the two months leading up to Kickoff, but I feel there's more to it than that personally. Again, though, I shouldn't be a judge of this

He was the assistant coach, though, so I wouldn't count it as a qualification for Champs curse

Champs curse is that the team that wins dissolves, no? EDG kept the same 5 players and the same coach as well

Bro made two of these posts in 4 minutes

It also means your team can literally only have one smoke that round (at a time)

I'm also assuming I'm not getting any because I play Illinois. They'd probably be queuing San Francisco, no?

Put nataNk on Raze and your odds of winning Kickoff instantly go up by 20%

I got reset to bronze 2 so no

KOI Demon1

rhixcal only comes up with very good and also completely original ideas

Not really, no

This less-than-2-minute video sums it up pretty nicely: https://youtu.be/GY2a075Qrd8

FNC didn't win Champions either way though sooo ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

This second point especially. The best possible scenario for Riot is if a group of reliable, trustworthy organizations are willing to invest into the esport. That's what's most beneficial to Riot from both an engagement standpoint (orgs have followings, and those followings mean more attention is brought into tier 2) as well as a monetary/longevity standpoint (like I said, orgs will continue to invest into the game). This is the ideal scenario for Riot, and it's the exact same reasoning as to why franchising is a thing.

I felt he was pretty good in Stage 2 last year, actually. OXY was far and away the best performing C9 player then, but you could make a very solid argument for moose in 2nd

I don't care WHO you're playing against... 36 assists in two maps is ABSURD. The series wasn't even 36 rounds...

I'm a firm believer in that a team like this can win international titles

Duelist: good enough
Initiator: good enough
Controller: good enough
Flex: good enough
Sentinel: good enough

it isn't just any team that loses to LOUD... it's the team that loses to LOUD most embarrassingly

2023: EG brought in Demon1 and then promptly got 13-0'd by LOUD
2024: EDG get run over by LOUD 26-5, knocking them out of the first Masters of the year

?

TE beat EDG
TE beat DRG
DRG beat NOVA

^^ this

I think the meta has changed drastically enough that double sentinel is more viable now than no sentinel, depending on the map. I also do believe teams have had more time to learn and create ideas around the newer sentinels (Deadlock/Vyse) and as such, their pickrates and winrates will both rise.

In addition to this, as much as I think there's a ton of talent in tier 2, Split 3 isn't really the best source of data when it comes to data and that kinda thing. Teams don't have the top analysts and coaches in the world; rather they're trying to innovate themselves, and obviously the average quality of comps and ideas is going to be a tad lower than that of tier 1

The P in FPX and the R in DRG are designed so similarly, now that I think about it

We've gotten to that point in the history of VALORANT esports where some of the teams, orgs, etc. we used to support are no longer around—at least not under the name or image we once knew them as.

I've been drafting this concept in my head for a little while, and now that updates are being made to big sections of flairs we're able to use, I think now's a decent opportunity to present it.

The concept is simple: Legacy flairs. Old flairs that have fallen out of use but people still want to use... we don't want people to not be able to rep those teams, because that's just not fun, but we also don't want to cluster older inactive teams with active ones, because that just doesn't make sense. This would include old names of current teams (e.g. Giants Gaming, Sin Prisa Gaming), orgs that have left the scene (e.g. OpTic Gaming, Gambit Esports, Acend), and maybe even some old logos of current teams (e.g. KRÜ Esports, M80, 2Game Esports).

https://i.imgur.com/WlKKezt.png

What are your thoughts on this concept? Do you think VLR should implement this, or at least something similar?

Fair enough

Broooo I remember this

KOI throwing an 11-3 lead against FNC was so funny to watch 😭

Nice Lotus comp

MITH is gone :(

Sure, I'll bite

My problem with it is that Gentle Mates have the most unique colour palette in EMEA and possibly even all of VCT and instead of leaning into that in their branding they decide to take a random .jpeg off of Google Images and slap M8 in the middle of it in literal hecking italicized Arial Black and call it a day

kfcfan would slap

You should've truncated the username to remove the numbers so it would've just been kfan... then you'd match with n1cf :D

https://i.imgur.com/2U1odbb.png

What if they made it so that Dizzy doesn't fall to the ground until it tags someone... so that if you throw it into the air and there's no one there it just kinda sits there midair and you can't get it back

That would make Gekko a sentinel now that I think about it

What's cool about n1cf is it means "number1_cNed_fan" but it also can mean "no one cares fam"

I'm sorry bro every time I see kfan I think it says kfc

You're welcome

Eh. Agree to disagree, I guess

What's wrong with it?

https://www.vlr.gg/user/groomer

Military service in the UAE is usually a bit less than a year. I think it was something like 11 months

Haven't heard if he has plans to return or not (he might've said something; I just haven't heard anything)

Mine is 30 sec

Oop, there ya go

Damn... respect the dedication (I agree ftr but it's just bizarre seeing you this passionate about someone who was never on XSET)

He's trying to jinx it

He's British

Why aren't they just JDG Esports like they were last year? Anyone know the reason/context behind the new name?

Is there at least a story behind the username?

Underrated shout

Fair point

Hi Aayan!