This post will be translating Yuan’s main points in his review of the first games between T1 and WBG (link here). As per usual, I will be writing in Yuan’s POV. At the moment, he only posted his review for game 1, though I am sure games 2 and 3 are on their way.

Once again, thank you for your kind words across the posts! I hope you will enjoy this review!

Foreword (00:00):

Greetings, this is Yuan. First of all, congratulations to T1 for beating WBG and claiming the championship in World’s Season 13. Faker got his fourth title and basically earned himself the title of GOD, claiming the highest honor in League of Legends once again after seven years.

Though I sort of knew this would happen, I still felt sad when it actually happened. Still, I would also be lying if I said I wasn’t even a bit happy that Faker was able to once again defeat the trials of time.

Overall, WBG fared slightly better against T1 than LNG. However, due to the difference in champion pool, strategy, and even synergy, their results were ultimately not much better. Across the BO5, I think they survived about 100 seconds longer than LNG. What can I say? After defeating JDG, T1’s road to victory was set in stone.

To be able to do so well, besides the laners having excellent performance, I feel the need to give a shout-out to Oner’s evolution across the tournament, which is why I will focus this review around Oner. I want to show how, despite Weiwei having a decent game, Oner was still able to secure all the neutral objectives and lead T1 to victory.

BP (00:51):

On one hand, I don’t think WBG’s BP in the first game was that good. After some thought, though, I don’t think they could have done it better realistically.

• Thus far in World’s, Faker’s champion pool consisted of Orianna, Sylas, and Azir. WBG decided to attack Faker’s champion pool in game one (by banning out Sylas and Azir) and test whether Faker had anything else in stock, which is understandable, IMO.
• One thing that was sort of sad is that were Xiaohu able to play Yone, they could have picked Yone on B2 to take away Zeus’ go-to Aatrox counter, and TheShy could have had a more comfortable landing phase. They could even force out the Gwen response a game earlier. But…we all know what happens when Xiaohu picks Yone…
• With Azir, Neeko, and Orianna banned away, Maokai-Jayce was a pretty good combo to get. They also got really good results when using Maokai-Jayce against NRG, so I think it is very understandable for WBG to pick this first rotation.
• The first rotation of WBG meant that their draft and game plan would be focusing on mid-game team fights. With how strong their front-to-back were, WBG was challenging Faker and Oner’s champion pool. As a response to this challenge, Faker picked Ahri on R4, which meant that the focus of T1 would be on Zeus.
• Kalista-Renata as a combo actually doesn’t work too well against this WBG; they served as the pillar to T1’s comp but not the winning condition (at least, this is how I interpreted it). Whether T1 could win was determined by whether Zeus could get fed and carried.
• With this understanding, WBG decided to pick Senna-Kench despite facing Kalista-Renata, signifying that they will be playing the weakside bot and letting their team focus on the top-side. Tahm-Kench also deterred T1 from picking the Ahri-Vi, a strong lockdown combo that counters Jayce. Maokai as a champion can’t really counter-gank during the laning phase. Ahri-Vi also would make team fights difficult for WBG, so using Tahm-Kench as a deter makes sense.

To sum it up, WBG’s game one comp tried to fish out how deep T1’s mid-jg champion pool was. Thus far, T1’s red side had a stable pattern. They would first pick blindable mid and jg champions that could work in most comps (Azir-Poppy, Orianna-J4, etc.) and then let Zeus and bot-lane counter-pick. WBG immediately attacked this pattern, forcing T1 to show what they would do if the old pattern were not available.

Execution aside, though Zeus’ late-game split push would be unstoppable, WBG’s comp did pack a punch in team fights. As long as the side lanes of WBG don’t fall too behind, WBG’s team fight from the first item would be rather potent.

Game (02:29):

In truth, nothing T1 showed in World’s was actually brand-new. Getting priority bot-lane into stacking early drakes, support getting experience from mid to get to level 6 in time for Herald, using mid-lane wave’s bounce back to create a window to get objectives, all stuff we have seen in pro-play, all standard stuff, really.

The reason why T1 is better than other teams and gets even better as time goes on is rather simple: they have better synergy, and they have a terrifyingly deep champion pool, which allows them to still be able to identify the turning points of a game even if it has an odd, unfamiliar tempo. In short, their fundamentals are way too good. We could even see this difference from the jungle’s choice of pathing from the get-go.

• Thus far, whenever T1 was on the red side, they would always invade their opponent’s bot-side camps immediately, interrupting their opponent’s jg tempo. WBG knew this, so they rushed to defend their bot side before T1 could begin their invade. The moment T1 saw Kench’s location, they gave up their invade.
• Since WBG’s comp was top half focused, chances were Maokai would begin bot side and path top to cover for TheShy. Xiaohu also helped Weiwei’s pathing by warding the top side pixel bush early on in case Oner invaded Weiwei’s blue buff, as well as preventing Oner from early ganking mid at level 3. As a Jayce against an Ahri, if Maokai wanted to fully clear his first camps, Jayce had to ward out Lee Sin’s location to prevent his flash from getting forced out prematurely.
• T1 read the above perfectly. Oner began his clear from Raptors and pathed towards his Krugs. This pathing completely evaded Xiaohu’s defensive ward. This pathing also signified Oner’s intention to do something at level 3 (or else he would lag in tempo by a lot). When Oner finished his Krugs, since Zeus had the push, TheShy couldn’t ward river, meaning Oner had free access to WBG’s top side. Even if TheShy tried to push out a bit and ward out the river, all he would get is death from Oner’s gank, so there wasn’t much he could have done here.
• The moment Oner was able to evade WBG’s defenses, Weiwei was already set behind by a lot, as he lost his chance to respond to Oner’s invade by counter-jungling his bot-side and split the map in half as a response. From wave management to predicting Weiwei’s pathing, T1 scored a 10/10.
• Due to Weiwei warding his Raptors earlier, he was unable to leave without losing information about Oner’s pathing. The most important task of Maokai in the early game is to get to six. The effects of getting invaded in his first clear could not be overstated. His subsequent clears would be very awkward.
• Oner could choose to waste time with Weiwei and get all his top side camps, but since Faker was really successful in trading with Xiaohu early on, they decided to dive Xiaohu. It was fortunate that Xiaohu still had the concentration to flash away from Ahri’s charm, though this dive also gave Oner a very natural path back to both sides. There weren’t any kills traded in the first few minutes, but T1 came out on top, hard.
• Following this play, Zeus warded Weiwei’s blue while Faker warded Weiwei’s Raptors, meaning they effectively had vision hacks on Weiwei in the subsequent minutes during his clear. Furthermore, Zeus warded after he shoved his lane, meaning that the wave would bounce back toward him, preventing Maokai from ganking him.
• With nothing else left to do, Weiwei made the correct decision to gank Faker, or else he would have zero tempo for the rest of the game. Unfortunately, Faker already shoved in. He was going to base anyway. Though he gave the first blood to Xiaohu, this death didn’t cost Faker any tempo in terms of wave state. With Xiaohu being half-health (and lacking TP), T1 still had lane priority in mid.
• The other problem that WBG still had to face was Weiwei’s pathing. He had to return to his top side to finish his clears. WBG also knew that T1 had the full vision of where Weiwei was as long as he was in his jungle, so Light had to defend Weiwei’s Raptors from getting stolen by Oner. This, in turn, caused Light to not hit six during the first Herald, as he had to sacrifice some tempo and, thus, experience. This invade under the sunlight also gave Xiaohu a lot of pressure. Ideally, he would be slow pushing with his canon wave. With Lee Sin around, however, he couldn’t do that. Even though Crisp teleported back to bot without priority in mid and Senna late to bot, WBG didn’t have the priority to contest the first drake. Though WBG got the first blood, T1 was nonetheless able to dictate the early game’s tempo.
• Due to all the invade and also securing the second scuttle on the top side, Oner was able to get to six earlier. At (07:44), we see that, besides Zeus, all members from T1 were resetting simultaneously. After the reset, Keria immediately started soaking experience in mid-lane to get to six ASAP, while Guma went straight to the Herald with Oner. T1 didn’t even care about clearing out vision before doing this Herald since their bot lane moved first, meaning they started with a number’s advantage. Plus, with everything that happened thus far, T1 knew that there was absolutely no way Maokai and Senna were six, meaning this Herald was free as long as did it in time.
• T1 fought with a far superior insight regarding the game state. They didn’t begin Herald after seeing Maokai, and Senna wasn’t six. They knew that since they executed their early game plan well, there was no way Maokai and Senna were six when they began Herald, allowing them to start it without the need for clear vision. This is a demonstration of their ability to read the game.
• After the Herald was secured by T1, Weiwei got a successful gank on the top side. This was another classic, “Zeus being over-confident”. Looking at the minimap, we see that T1 already pinged Zeus that Weiwei was top side. But Zeus refused to go back, thinking he was safe with his ult. I also have to give props to Weiwei’s mechanics. After flash-rooting Zeus, he immediately stood in front of Zeus, preventing him from ulting away. As a result, even if Zeus flashed, he would still die. TheShy was able to catch up in terms of gold and experience off of this gank.
• Still, T1 was still in the driver seat, with Oner having Mythics first and T1 Heralding mid to secure priority. This earned T1 their second drake.
• That said, WBG was beginning to scale. At (12:46), due to Senna’s ult, WBG was able to turn Oner’s gank around. It really did feel like WBG was starting to take back control of the game.
• After the Herald was secured by T1, Weiwei got a successful gank on the top side. This was another classic, “Zeus being over-confident”. Looking at the minimap, we see that T1 already pinged Zeus that Weiwei was top side. But Zeus refused to go back, thinking he was safe with his ult. I also have to give props to Weiwei’s mechanics. After flash-rooting Zeus, he immediately stood in front of Zeus, preventing him from ulting away. As a result, even if Zeus flashed, he would still die. TheShy were able to catch up in terms of gold and experience off of this gank. Though Senna would be down in ult, with Aatrox, Maokai, and Jayce all on the first item and Aatrox being one level ahead of Yone, WBG had a pretty good chance of winning the next Herald fight.
• Unfortunately, TheShy’s discipline problem resurfaced. WBG was starting to group up around drake in hopes of securing vision while T1 was on reset, allowing them better prep for the Herald team fight. Here, TheShy needed to play safe. Trading in the manner he did broke the half-map rule (I need to look up but IIRC it had something to do with when your team is grouping on the other side, you should not extend beyond your half of the lane). It was pretty obvious that WBG was planning a full-on team fight here. Level eleven Jayce and Aatrox are very strong against a tank-less comp like T1’s. To die immediately after teleporting back to the lane completely halts WBG’s momentum and tempo. WBG could have immediately transitioned to Herald after securing mid push; Now they had to wait for TheShy to respawn as well.
• Here, Weiwei once again made a beautiful play that scored them a kill onto Oner, but with their number’s disadvantage, they were afraid of prolonging this skirmish further. WBG got a kill at the cost of tempo, as Lee Sin would get back to the map quicker, and his ult would come up before Maokai’s. Using this difference in tempo and the fact that Yone was still able to leave lane first, T1 was able to secure second Herald without the team fight WBG was looking for. WBG had to stop T1’s tempo, or else Yone would 1v5 on side lanes.
• When the third drake fight spawned, WBG still had to deal with the aftermath of the previous Herald fight. With a poke comp like Jayce-Maokai, it wouldn’t be good to trade their outer mid turret for this drake, meaning they had to clear the mid-wave first. Here, Keria already comedically gave WBG a huge chance by missing a zero-distance Q and doing a “FUCK YOU” content flash-ult. Xiaohu also got Kalista’s flash out, which showed how strong Jayce was at this point in the game. Aatrox was also able to trade ults with Ahri, which made everyone think T1 was going to give up this drake.
• Due to, again, not wanting to give up the outer mid turret after forcing out so many spells on the side of T1, Xiaohu and Crisp decided to go back to mid to catch the wave and prevent T1 from Heralding mid. I don’t think WBG predicted T1 to still have the courage to start a fight, which gave O-god the gap to Q-ward-hop-R-flash engage on Xiaohu. Unless Xiaohu was able to flash immediately, this team fight was already won by T1 there since WBG’s position was just too messy at that point. Xiaohu escaped with a slither of health, but with him and Crisp having no condition to fight, T1 was able to pincer the remaining WBG members easily with Zeus on the other side. It wasn’t like T1 had a mechanically complicated team fight plan to overcome WBG’s team fight comp; They were just able to catch out that moment of weakness created by their superior wave management. WBG may have got the drake, but they lost their outer mid turret and gave over three kills.
• Yone was able to finish his Hullbreaker off of this team fight, making him invincible in side lanes.
• With T1 already having two drakes, they were able to not get dragged into any more team fights and instead kill WBG in side lanes. Neither Jayce nor Aatrox could defend Yone’s split push, especially one with Ahri and Lee Sin as his backup. Though Xiaohu was able to escape the dive around twenty minutes with Kench’s TP and Ult, that was all he could do - escape. The opportunities for WBG to get back in control were slipping away more and more. The two team fights that could have allowed WBG to come back to the game, WBG was unable to get it going.
• Another cool thing you could see here was how T1 was moving around the lanes. After the dive, when Oner was pathing back to his camps, T1 immediately had Keria to cover for Zeus, with Guma also leaning bot. These movements were why, after T1 got the outer mid turret, they were able to exert immense pressure on WBG. After the dive, even though TheShy was left alone, he was unwilling to push the wave any further due to a complete lack of vision in their jungle. WBG was unable to determine where T1’s members were. WBG may have only been behind 3K in gold, but the pressure they felt was way worse than that.
• At (20:55), WBG decided to all-in onto a flashless Kalista in mid in a do-or-die manner. I mean, it really wasn’t that bad of an opportunity! Still, due to all the pressure T1 exerted from the first minute, you could see some decision errors already here. First, after Guma created some space with his Q, since WBG was all-in in this decision to catch out Guma, Crisp should have begun with his flash-Q and not his W. I mean, it is understandable to want to play safe, but this play cannot last long, or else T1 will be able to respond. Maokai immediately ulted after Guma traded his cleanse with Kench’s Q. Unfortunately, because it was wind soul, the boost in movement speed allowed Guma to escape from Maokai’s ult. If only Maokai aimed his ult just a few degrees more to the right, maybe WBG could win this team fight. But then, on the stage between the bests of the world, that few degrees count.
• T1 was also able to respond to this all-in pretty well. Obviously, there was Renata’s ult, but the ones who saved this team fight for T1, IMO, were Faker and Oner. First, there was Faker’s Ahri for immediately getting Senna’s health bars low, which meant no one could follow up on Aatrox. Under normal situations, WBG would be happy to trade Senna with Kalista. Had this happened, with Aatrox that began his reset and a Kench that still had his ult, this team fight could have been won by WBG. Oner and Faker’s assassination made it so that WBG didn’t have enough damage to actually kill Kalista, stopping all the above from happening. This decisiveness of T1 made it so that, despite being ahead four flashes, WBG was still unable to win this all-in.
• In this same team fight, we also saw how easy it was for Yone to kill Jayce.

To sum it up, WBG’s plan of banning out Faker’s champion pool and contest mid-push with Maokai-Jayce completely flopped. BP and game plan aside, we also see that both teams were still prone to some mistakes. The difference was that the mechanical and decision-making mistakes T1 made didn’t affect their tempo and game plan around objectives whatsoever.

Perhaps, the moment WBG could only bet on an all-in to win against T1, they have already lost this game.

(P.S. the Bilibili video had a lot of ads that are interwoven with praises of Oner…should I translate that in comments?)