You Call This 'Steady'?

TES's JKL, WBG's Theshy, and their former team, IG.

Only after brutally crushing all three teams could Rookie truly be said to have succeeded in his "revenge."

"What else is there to say? I'll just find a way to climb over them." Rookie was open-minded about it and directly voiced his desire to step on them to Rank Up.

"Then how about applying to the coach for a roster built around you?"

"Forget it... Let's follow the arrangements. We're just joking around for fun. Any real decision still has to be up to the coach." After thinking it over, Rookie ultimately abandoned the suggestion.

After such a short time together, everyone had already been thoroughly convinced by Coach Homme's management. Besides, Rookie himself had a gentle temperament. Asking him to request that the coach change tactics for his own twisted amusement was simply impossible.

I'm fucking Rainer!

Xiang Zhangmen's story had come to an end. Was it time for Chicken Zhangmen's story to begin?

369 versus Shy. Wonder if V5 had hired a psychologist yet.

What a joke. What kind of treatment did 369 get at V5, and what kind of treatment did Theshy get at WBG? Are you sure TheShy wasn't the one who needed a psychologist?

Coming up next: the grand LPL 2022 emotional drama—Battle for the IG Traveling Red Banner.

Countless Amusement Seekers had long been waiting eagerly in front of their screens. On a side note, with the time being so close to the New Year, both the venue and the commentators had tacitly added a touch of holiday spirit to their outfits, decorations, and even the background music.

It couldn't be helped. The current LPL belonged to supreme EDG, Scattered IG, and Scattered FPX.

Before heading onstage, Coach Homme was still giving Luo Zhen and the others some final mental coaching. "Don't rush. You need to know that their composition isn't as good as ours. WBG is a team where top lane is responsible for Show Effect and Bullet Comments; jungle is responsible for manipulating the betting odds; mid lane plays strong against strong and weak against weak; bot lane has the normal person covering the bottom line, while support is responsible for flashing emotes. They're just a pure clown team. Don't put too much pressure on yourselves."

If he hadn't witnessed it himself, Luo Zhen would never have believed Coach Homme could be someone so down-to-earth in the way he spoke.

Of course, that was only because he had transmigrated too late.

Otherwise, if he had seen Coach Homme's livestream bit about adjusting the egg chute, perhaps he wouldn't have thought so.

But as things stood, his expression was no different from that of a professor grading papers and discovering that one of his students had submitted an essay with zero percent plagiarism—only to look at the topic and find it was titled, "The Effect of Adding Pedals to a Wheelchair on Lunar Gravity."

He was beyond shocked.

Naturally, they obediently nodded as well, signaling that they understood.

Finally—the board unfolded!

That year's junglers couldn't break each other's moves.

Very quickly, the First Ban Phase began:

WBG: LeBlanc, Lee Sin, Lucian

V5: Twisted Fate, Gwen, Jinx

The Ban Slots targeting V5 remained unchanged, but V5's BP against WBG was quite interesting. Coach Homme had directly figured out the other side. Trusting that Huan Feng couldn't carry in the late game, he left both Caitlyn and Moon Man open, only targeting Jinx, whom Huan Feng had been particularly hot on lately.

Before playing against a team, the first thing was to understand its style.

Theshy was definitely someone who dared to seize openings and dared to die for it, so V5's focus this game would certainly be on cashing in through top lane. Why? Because Sofm was generally busy farming the jungle and wouldn't keep Counter-Ganking top like Ning Wang did.

Since they were already going to play around the Upper Area, according to normal thinking, shouldn't bot lane pick some scum Utility Players?

Normally, yes—but not against WBG, because their jungler was Sofm.

Against Sofm, they had to target him the way they targeted Kanavi: directly give all Three Lanes Lane Control and press forward. Once they had Lane Control, the enemy laners would face greater pressure, and so would their Vision Pressure. If Sofm went to help his lanes under those circumstances, his greatest threat—his bandit-style play—would be directly crippled. But if he didn't support his lanes and chose to farm, then once the waves were pushed in, V5 could make a small encirclement in the jungle and Sofm would still immediately explode.

There was only one flaw in getting it started: could they suppress all Three Lanes at once?

Even if they couldn't suppress them, could bot lane, which the jungler couldn't easily look after, still threaten the enemy?

Coach Homme studied it. If they fully committed their own jungler to top lane, then their bot lane seemed to have a chance to create pressure. So they would try it!

Thus, the First Pick Phase:

WBG: Caitlyn (First Pick), Trundle, Corki

V5: Titan, Xin Zhao (First Two Picks), Samira

A word about the Caitlyn System: its strength wasn't just its tower-pushing ability. In terms of pushing towers alone, it definitely couldn't compare to Ziggs. Its real strength came from its pairing with Lux. When support hit someone with Q, Caitlyn could place a trap, and bot-support could use one combo to perfectly take out any enemy Bot Lane AD or support.

And where there was a setup, there had to be a counter.

Titan offered hard engage. Though Samira was somewhat behind the patch, her W skill could block Lux's Q skill. If the enemy stubbornly picked Lux, then with the support Q missing, a Level 6 Samira charging in had the potential to 1v2 them—not to mention Titan's Point Target Demolition ultimate.

But if they didn't pick Lux, then their Caitlyn pick lost half its meaning.

Coach Homme's classic move: throwing the problem back at the enemy. As for the issue of AD range... to put it bluntly, after collecting WBG's historical match data and producing analytical charts, he simply hadn't taken their AD, Huan Feng, seriously.

Low damage conversion said a lot.

Second Ban Phase: Alistar, Braum, Azir, Viktor

One side banned defensive supports that could create entry opportunities for AD, while the other banned late-game Big Carries to indirectly improve their own late-game potential. Neither line of thinking was wrong.

With the Fourth Pick, V5 took Poppy Who Stayed Up Late.

What kind of Killing Intent hurt the deepest? Taking the all-offense composition you knew best in the past, using it to personally end your present and display my future. All that could be said was that Coach Homme had apparently heard some of the players' conversation when he arrived, and his twisted sense of humor had kicked in.

Four champions across mid, jungle, bot, and support could all charge straight into the enemy. Forget WBG—even the viewers and commentators were scared just looking at that composition.

And even more deadly, the enemy's fifth pick was still a top lane Counter Pick.

There was no choice. WBG locked Xin Zhao and Graves with their final two picks, trying to counter them. As for V5's final pick, it was the classic S11 World Championship scene: Kennen versus Graves. There was nothing to consider.

Thus:

WBG: Top Lane Graves, jungler Trundle, Mid Laner Corki, bot lane Caitlyn + Xin Zhao

V5: Top Laner Kennen, jungler Xin Zhao, Mid Laner Poppy Who Stayed Up Late, bot lane Samira + Titan

With the compositions locked in, the match began.

Since they were facing Sofm this game, forget Luo Zhen—even Karsa had some trouble pinning down the enemy's position.

The junglers who had survived since S7 couldn't break through each other's defenses, and each of them had their own famous meme.

For example: Don't touch Clearlove's F6; Xiang Guo was always in your face; Karsa always knew where you were; Condi was the Chosen One, Son of the Dragon; and with Sofm, everyone knew he was farming, but you could never tell who he had opened the odds on winning that game.

So they could only defend the jungle a little, then play out the opening normally.

There wasn't much to say about the opening. They just had to Resist Pressure.

Coach Homme only wanted bot lane to threaten the enemy bot lane after Level 6, while also breaking apart the enemy Caitlyn Lux combination. The moment the enemy support picked Xin Zhao, their task was already half complete.

Caitlyn paired with Xin Zhao could push their wave, but couldn't pressure their HP down, nor could it pose much threat to the plating on bot lane's tower.

So they would mindlessly Resist Pressure in the early game.

Five hundred range against six hundred and fifty. Unless the enemy had brain damage or had stayed up all night looking for a centipede's natural predator, they could Auto Attack Luo Zhen into oblivion every time he went for a Last Hit.

What should he do at a time like this?

He had to try to keep up with the enemy's CS Rhythm. If they Last Hit, he Last Hit too. That way, the enemy wouldn't have the spare time to poke him. Of course, their rhythms couldn't possibly match one hundred percent—otherwise they could just head next door to Pacific Rim and pilot Gundams. So whenever their rhythms didn't align, he obediently took the Auto Attacks and tried his best to use his W skill to avoid Caitlyn's Q skill poke.

What?

You were asking about Xin Zhao?

That short-legged thing—despite Samira being a short-range champion with only five hundred range, Xin Zhao still couldn't easily touch her without using Flash. He was completely outside Luo Zhen's consideration.

"Diao Shen, how come ever since we got paired together, bot lane has done nothing but Take a Beating? Every game you pick me a weak AD. Am I weaker than the enemy?"

Although rookie ADs who had just entered the LPL usually had to pay their dues, those dues were supposed to come from being outmatched in raw skill. What about him? He was paying dues purely because bot lane had become the Sacrifice Role. It was fucking depressing.

"You said the same thing during the Demacia Cup. Back then, you really couldn't beat them. As for now... I can't say."

Judging from the first few games of the season, Sea Whip Boy's performance had actually been fairly good. It looked like he was repaying the debt from that year's BO5, but "fairly good" had to be measured against reality.

The enemy was strong, but Luo Zhen's performance from the Demacia Cup until now hadn't been lacking in the slightest either, so it was difficult to find a standard by which to judge them.

But...

"I don't know about anything else, but at least your Last Hits are behind his right now. Where's your Basic Mastery?"

"Don't rush. Sure, I'm a few CS behind him right now, but that's only right now. In pro matches where the shared graduation target is three hundred CS, being behind him in Last Hits means I have more room to improve. This is late-game power, understand? Late-game power!"

"Zhuge knows the heavens easily. You're a Heaven-defying man, aren't you?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Since you know that, why aren't you hurrying up and supporting me?"

"Get lost!"

The enemy bot lane has four towers.

The early Laning Phase could basically be summed up with one lyric: At eighteen, I stood like a nobody.

The V5 Duo huddled beneath their tower, staring at the wave WBG had slowly built up not far away. They didn't dare step forward, but they couldn't leave either. And because Luo Zhen had only recently spun around once during the match against RA two series ago, and his ban time hadn't expired yet, he couldn't shoulder his luggage, pull out a speaker, and play "The Me You See" at a time like this. Otherwise, how could those two enemies possibly be a match for him in his "Big Brother form"?

Samira was a fairly simple Hero. The main thing was speeding up the rating needed for her ultimate, then finding windows to enter fights.

Before Level 6, there was basically nothing special to her gameplay.

Luo Zhen still remembered how, when this Hero had first released, she had given him a strange sense of familiarity. Two guns, stronger melee damage than ranged damage, the ability to briefly stop herself from taking damage, and an ultimate that made her two guns fire wildly around her... Samira, did you play Overwatch too???

Then he looked closer. Oh, so she was a Templar Assassin.

V5's main early-game tempo still depended on that Level 6 Poppy Who Stayed Up Late play. After all, the enemy mid laner was a renowned Earthbound Spirit. Rookie's roaming would definitely be ten or twenty steps faster than the enemy mid laner's, especially in the early game.

WBG bot lane had Lane Control early, Xin Zhao was melee and couldn't beat the more aggressive early-game Trundle head-on, while top lane Graves was also hard to gank because the enemy had Kennen. Thus, before Level 6, both junglers focused more on farming. And if they were focusing on farming, they absolutely couldn't let Sofm invade their jungle.

Therefore, before the enemy had fully pushed the wave under tower, support had to go into the jungle to place vision and help out.

Now Luo Zhen was truly doing Jail Time under the tower alone.

"Relax. I'm just going to ward. They can't Tower dive you." Seemingly wanting to give his AD some courage, PPGOD didn't forget to comfort Luo Zhen before leaving. It couldn't be helped. With the enemy support being Xin Zhao, even if you gave him ten times the courage, he wouldn't dare Q in aggressively.

Since someone in bot lane was destined to do Jail Time, why couldn't it be just one person? So PPGOD shamelessly ran off.

What could Luo Zhen say to that?

The divine Titan passed on light beneath the setting sun.

The human knight rebelled against fate amid torrential rain.

The united Warrior carried hope onward through raging fire.

The proud swordsman inherited heroic spirits beneath the full moon.

And a noble house needed no teammates during the Laning Phase.

Right. It was only because League of Legends, unlike CrossFire, didn't allow friendly fire. Otherwise, once he got fed, he would spin around and mow every last one of them down.

As for now... he would just Resist Pressure first.

"Xiao Zhen's ability to Resist Pressure seems to be getting stronger and stronger. Coach, was this part of your plan too?" XLB glanced at Samira doing Jail Time beneath the tower on the screen, and couldn't help admiring her. Under such heavy Caitlyn pressure, she had somehow maintained over half her HP, while only falling about ten CS behind. That was already a terrifying performance in the early Laning Phase.

"Actually, I never thought of it that way. It was simply because the patch's focus wasn't on bot lane, so I made him take the Sacrifice Role." Coach Homme only dealt in truth and directly told him the facts. "But his improvement really has become so great that I can't understand it."

Back in S10, he had thought that an anomaly like Genshin Bro was already the limit of what a Talent Monster could be.

But in S12, after seeing Luo Zhen, he changed his mind once again.

It wasn't about strength. Strength was something that only needed to be sufficient. Aside from top lane, professional players didn't differ that greatly in skill. Even in top lane, it was because top lane was the easiest place to snowball. And as long as the BP was handled well and the player didn't throw, even peak Theshy would find it difficult to kill a scum fused with his tower.

What surprised him was Luo Zhen's mentality.

Despite being only eighteen, Luo Zhen often displayed the mindset of an office worker who had been beaten down by society. He retained a young man's chuunibyou spirit and passion, yet also possessed an office worker's tactfulness and tolerance. It was truly baffling.

Although he couldn't understand it, it was still a good thing for the team.

"So your reason for letting him play Samira this game was purely to make him the sacrifice?"

"Not entirely." Coach Homme studied the situation on the field and suddenly smiled. "While it's true that I intended for bot lane to take the Sacrifice Role, I also genuinely believe that this bot lane pick can threaten the enemy bot lane."

"Huh!?"

Overall, not much major tempo happened before Level 6. Since Luo Zhen had sent PPGOD early to protect Karsa in the jungle, Sofm had no way to invade V5's jungle no matter how many methods he had.

It couldn't be helped. V5 had more people.

Sure, your bot lane had Lane Control, but this was my jungle. And my AD's HP beneath the tower was in good condition, with both Summoner Skills available, so I didn't need to worry about being Tower dived at all. I could support faster instead.

This was where Samira's advantage showed.

If a fight truly broke out, Samira could switch to her blades in melee form and quickly clear the wave. Her area coverage was huge, and in actual combat it was far more useful than Caitlyn's Q skill. Pressured by this, WBG didn't dare invade too wildly in the early game, and both sides maintained a certain degree of restraint.

Yet it was precisely because of that that Huan Feng felt more and more stifled as the game went on.