As the first professional game at the end of the winter transfer period, the Demacia Cup has been seen by clubs as an opportunity to test the strength of their squads. In the first round of the group stage that just ended today, the WBG team played against BLI, who did not taste a victory today, and in the case of WBG's huge advantage in the first 10 minutes, it made huge mistakes in a row because it was eager to end the game, and finally it was overturned, so that the OMG of the same group changed from "theoretical promotion" to "actual promotion".
The first LPL team to lose to the anchor team was born
Before the final match between BLI and WBG, because only one team can qualify, there is still suspense in the promotion situation of this group, if WBG loses to BLI, then OMG directly advances, if WBG wins BLI within 15 minutes, then WBG advances, if WBG beats BLI after 15 minutes, then V5 advances. Because BLI had been beaten by professional teams in the previous few games, everyone assumed that WBG would win BLI no matter what, and OMG had been eliminated early.
WBG selected the ultimate preliminary lineup in this crucial game, and achieved a huge competitive advantage in the first 10 minutes of the game, because of the eagerness to win, WBG forced to end the game, but the opposite tower was obviously not so easy to dismantle. BLI turned on defensive mode, repeatedly blocking WBG pushing home, in the 24 minutes of the game, WBG demolished the base with only 1099 health left, but was successfully defended by BLI. The dominant WBG decided to take the dragon again, but was successfully robbed by the BLI. In the end, WBG this side because of too forced to push home, gave BLI a lot of heads and development, in the later WBG is still trying to give eye TP stealing home, BLI began to control the dragon group and the economy began to overtake, and finally won the first victory in the German Cup.
As soon as this game full of program effects ended, it caused an explosive public opinion. "Another Galactic Battleship Crashed" "Theshy Ran All Night". To say that the outrageous degree of professional players losing to anchors can be analogous to the snake team losing to the TGA team, the boss directly deducted a month's salary of the coaching team, and also printed out the news in the training room to warn the players.
WBG official Bo also gave an explanation in the controversy, saying that in BP, the players chose All In in order to win for 15 minutes, but in the end they failed to do so, so the German Cup tour ended here.
The first year of the LPL double-defeat format, the fire refining real gold
WBG's upset defeat to BLI has caused many spectators to wonder whether the Format of the German Cup's "Race against Time" is reasonable and fair. Even for professional players, the desire to win a game in 15 minutes is slightly exaggerated in the current version, and if the overtime is set, the decision of the coaching staff will naturally change, and the outcome of the game will most likely be different.
In fact, controversies over the format have also appeared in the LPL league.
Beginning in 2021, the LPL playoffs follow a lose-double format after the Final Four. The so-called double-loss system means that the four teams that enter the final four can have two "lives", and the teams that advance to the top four will not be directly eliminated after losing the game, but will enter the loser group to decide the winner or loser, and the final winning team of the loser group will also enter the final.
The advantages of the double-loss format are obvious, one more round of competition can prevent the "upset" situation, select the team with the strongest comprehensive strength, and contribute more exciting late matches and fairer rankings to the audience. However, after the official announcement of the change of the format, it still triggered a debate about whether the format was reasonable or not.
Similar to the situation when the LPL Spring Tournament announced the format, this time the audience still questioned the disadvantages of the winner group, believing that the winner group champion lost only once and did not win the championship, and the previous winning streak did not give the team an advantage. And there is too much rest time left for the winners of the loser group in the schedule, which many spectators think is not fair.
Of course, with RNG winning the MSI title and EDG winning the S championship, the controversy became less intense. After all, the first year of the double-elimination system did select the best team for the LPL division at the time, and won back two titles for the LPL division in the world.
At the League of Legends S11 Finals media conference, John Needham, global esports director of Fist, also said that the LPL division's double-defeat format has achieved good results and may be adopted in the global finals later.
The format of e-sports events needs to be tested by time and continuously improved
Although the double-loss format has achieved good results this year, it is still not perfect. The author believes that a relatively fair double-loss format should adhere to two points, the first is that each team in the double-loss format has a chance to readjust the state, and the second is to ensure the advantage of the winner group in the schedule - if the loser group can maintain the feel of more games while still having enough rest time, then what is the significance of the winner group? Will teams take advantage of the loopholes in the format in order to fall into the group of losers who have a better comparative advantage?
How to better balance the double-loss format is a problem that event practitioners need to consider carefully. What kind of format is the fairest may take a long time to verify, or it may never be possible to come up with the most correct answer, but without changing, it is impossible to improve.
The double-loss format still needs to be perfected, not to mention the Demacia Cup, which adopts a "race against time" format to accommodate the urgent schedule. The scene of "life and death speed" will appear on the German Cup field because there are many teams competing in the German Cup and the time is short, so the team that chooses to advance is determined by the length of the game in the case that the winner cannot be determined by the win-loss field and the relationship between victory and defeat. The rule, which at first glance seems fair, does not stand up to scrutiny. Teams have different styles and styles of play, and different ways of winning games. By suppressing the fight online, the early snowball gets the advantage and through the early operation development, the later group can win the game. Therefore, the time it takes for different teams to win the game may vary greatly.
The charm of MOBA e-sports is that different lineups can apply different tactics at different times, and the format of judging the final victory or defeat by the length of time will reduce the probability of the late lineup on the field of play, the tactics that the team can present tend to be single, the team that is good at the late lineup is also difficult to move, and the ornamentation and fairness of the game are weakened at the same time. Although the gold content of the cup has always been controversial, from the results of the competition and the feedback of the audience, the format of the German Cup does have obvious deficiencies.
Although the story of "upset" is inspirational and touching, if it leaves a reasonable and fair format, it will feel boring, and in the end, it is just a faint "program effect" on the hot search.
If the format is not perfect, the competition is meaningless. As an e-sports practitioner, we should continue to learn the lessons of major events, respect players and spectators, and strive to formulate reasonable event rules and present fair and wonderful e-sports events, so as to eliminate the misunderstanding and prejudice of the outside world about e-sports - obviously, there is still a longer way to go.