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LoR Competitive Week in Review for 4/18 - 4/25

                                                      LoR Competitive Week in Review for 4/18 - 4/25 by @CasterBoulevard

It’s patch day! Patch 3.6 has brought with it a myriad of changes to both underplayed champions and the rules of the game itself, but with the Seasonal right around the corner, the wild experimentation period may be a little short. Since there were only a few nerfs, many of the decks from patch 3.4 remain just as relevant. So let’s take a look at that final weekend to see what’s carrying the crown into the new meta.

Fight Night: Legends

BR

1st Iannogueira - Yordles in Arms P&Z / Tri-Beam Control / Viktor/Vi Stance Swap

2nd FNX Paimera - Scouts / Sentinel Control / Feel The Rush

EU

1st Broken Ball - Yordles in Arms P&Z / Viktor/Vi Atrocity / Zilean/Ekko

2nd Talpinator - Yordles in Arms P&Z / Viktor/Ziggs Burn / Bandle Pirates

Online League Series #42

1st NNT Maitri - Darkness / Aphelios/Lux / Viego/Kindred 

2nd Mati24mayo - Tri-Beam Control / Apehlios/Lux / Sivir/Akshan

Top 4 Rogio - Viego /  Rubin Pile / Viktor/Lee Sin

Top 4 NNT Eluwardhayk -  Darkness / Feel The Rush / Viego/Kindred

Top 8 NNT Nikejo04 - Ziggs/Taliyah / Sun Disc / Sivir/Akshan

Top 8 HDR Lazyguga - Scouts / Sun Disc / Bandle Tree

Top 8 OTK Camilari - Pirates / Yordles in Arms P&Z / Pantheon/Yuumi

Top 8 MonteXristo - Ziggs/Taliyah / Fizz/Nami / Zilean/Ekko

With only 2 Fight Nights and an OLS Top 8 to look at, I wasn’t expecting much in terms of a concise meta picture, but we got a little of everything. 21 unique decks managed to spread themselves among only 12 competitors, with plenty of original ideas spiking out the final days of an otherwise solved format. Yordles in Arms P&Z was fittingly the most popular deck, winning both Fight Nights but only managing to put one person in the top 8 of the OLS. 

For a quick refresher, I’ve often described this meta as a pseudo triangle meta as it seems impossible to get a ‘true’ triangle in a 3 deck 1 ban format, with Control, Shurima, and Yordles in Arms + other being the 3 corners. It’s flimsy I know, but I have to try and keep track of things somehow. 2 weeks ago at the last OLS, we got to see control come out full force as NNT Maitri won the event with Darkness, Viego, and Feel the Rush. The next week Shurima was expectedly more heavy handed, with Sun Disc completely taking over Twitter as well as high ladder. While we didn’t have a tournament to confirm Shurima’s takeover of the weekend, the stats from that week of Aegis Esports supported Shurima in both play and win rate. Now, with another large open tournament, players skipped the third part of the triangle and simply returned to Control as NNT Maitri picked up another win with triple control, the first back-to-back OLS champion since OLS #14. 

Two of Maitri’s decks from this weekend's success are known factors but haven’t had much discussion thrown around them; Aphelios/Lux and Viego/Kindred. After Feel the Rush had its dominating run 2 weeks ago I was wondering what was going to take its place as the top dog of control as it was likely too susceptible to Deny and Rite of Negation to remain the #1 control deck for the rest of the format, and Viego/Kindred seemed to be the next in line in the context of the meta. It doesn’t care much about Deny effects or Quicksand as it’s rather content to sit back and let Viego and his mists grow to infinity and doesn’t need to concern itself with a quick finish, and Kindred sneaks a lot of removal through Deny as they snipe your cheapest unit with a Vile Feast. 

Aphelios/Lux runs in a similar vein - it’s a control deck centered on backline champions. It has arguably the most removal in the game out of any deck since Aphelios and Lux can feed off of each other, constantly terrorizing your opponent's board with Callibrums and Final Sparks. While your champions don’t grow to infinity and beyond, you can go into the Great Beyond to find a win condition that will at least require 2 Quicksand out of your opponent if they want to stop you from elusively stealing the win. Aphelios/Lux only topped twice this weekend, but both of those pilots met in the finals of the Online League Series. With the rules change giving a large benefit to Lux as she now gets her Final Spark as soon as you cast a spell instead of when it resolves, Aphelios/Lux and Viego/Kindred might continue to be viable threats heading into the new patch and the Seasonal.

Speaking of winners from the rules change, Tri-Beam Control also picked up a win and 2nd place finish at BR Fight Night and the OLS respectively. With targeting now applying on cast instead of resolution, there’s no way for opponents to slow down Ezreal’s level up by killing their own units. Additionally, level 2 Ezreal will send damage to the nexus as soon as the spells are committed to the stack, meaning you can cast 3 Ravenous Flock on the same unit for an instant 6 damage. The deck was already well-positioned, and fans of the deck will need to keep a finger on the pulse of any major shifts to the deck that come about as a result of this rules change. 

And that’s a wrap on our little in-between meta of patch 3.4. There are a lot of changes getting implemented today and only 2 weeks to prepare for the next 1000-person Seasonal tournament to try and earn a spot at the World Championship. Given how many significant buffs and potential new archetypes are popping up it’s not a lot of time, but at the end of the day, a winner is going to be crowned regardless of how ill-prepared everyone feels. The only thing you can do is everything in your power to make sure that person is you. If you’re not playing and prefer to watch everyone else duke it out, stay tuned for broadcast details closer to the event.

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