Like Season 11 begins, here is a sneak peak at just what champions might be played in the LEC 2021 Spring Winter. A new year, a new season, and a new meta. Domestic league of Legends is moving into its second decade, as well as outlook of the competitive scene could be turned on its travel by the recent Season 11 changes.
The complete overhaul of your item shop has had a drastic impact on the meta along with the introduction of powerful Mythic items, such as the new variant of Duskblade of Draktharr, which now grants a burst of invisibility after every takedown.
And with the next winter of the LEC imminent, pro players will be busy modernizing their builds and figuring out the strongest picks in advance of they can finally return to competing.
The game hasn’t stopped improving during the preseason – there has been an abundance of interesting new practices, as well as a competitive revival for a lot of older champions. Based on precisely what we've seen from solo queue performances in Platinum rank and above on Patch 11.4, it has fair to say that Season 11 is going to look varies greatly to what we saw at last year’s World Championship.
Innovative challengers approach
While many will be excited to see the latest sort of EU talent make their LEC debuts, fans should look forward to seeing four new champions in competitive enjoy for the first time in the region, two of which were released before Worlds, yet weren’t eligible to be played.
Samira has made quite often the splash in the bot lane, as the combo-heavy marksman have been taking over games in the preseason. Despite a flurry about nerfs, Samira still sported the highest ban rate on Spot 10. 25 at 51. 9 percent – while that was a significant decrease from the 73. 9 percent ban-rate in the patch prior.
The other champion that released pre-Worlds is Yasuo’s brother Yone Guide, who has proven to be popular with top-tier play due to his extremely high skill limit. A walking highlight reel, the Unforgotten One could appropriately provide us with plenty of memorable plays this year.
Seraphine Guide has already made a splash as part of K/DA, but now it could her turn to shine on the Rift. And soon it’ll be time for K/DA’s newest member, Seraphine, to take the exact LEC stage for the first time. The Starry-Eyed Songstress was usually are front and centre in the mid lane, and while recently available buffs have moved that closer to the realms of possibility, the mage is still primarily being played as the support and is excelling at the role.
There’s also one other support in Rell Guide. The tanky champion has struggled around solo queue so far, but she hasn’t been outside for long. With yet another intricate kit, we may never see the best of Rell until her competitive debut.
Shouldn't call it a comeback
But what about champions who were already playable last season? One champion that designed a big impact at Worlds last year was Pantheon, who been effective surprisingly well as a support champion.
In the last patch, your dog received a lot of changes in order to push him back to his or her intended home of the top lane while not removing the viability as a support altogether. Those changes have worked, nevertheless perhaps a bit too well.
Pantheon has become the ultimate flex champion, as he boasted the highest win rates in both the superior lane (52. 9 percent) and the mid lane (53. 8 percent), while also performing well as a jungler and a support.
Pantheon Guide has been one of the strongest champions on preseason and can be played in almost every role. And though Pantheon has become dominating, the highest win rate in the last patch surprisingly were from Ivern. The jungle was struggling in the meta by using just a 0. 5 percent play rate and a seventy two percent win rate on 10. 24, but after a very few buffs, Ivern shot up in popularity with a 52. couple of percent win rate and a 4. 2 percent pick-rate on 10. 25. With support items much cheaper these days, there is a good chance Ivern will return to pro participate in.
While it’s hard to say for sure, the farm-focused transport jungler meta we saw at Worlds last year likely will continue in 2021. Controlling Dragons is still crucial, together with fast jungle clears are more important than ever before to ensure junglers can reach the power spike from their Mythic item right away.
As for the mid lane, there is still a diverse pool associated with viable champions, but one who has had a major resurgence can be Anivia Guide. After multiple buffs to modernise her system, Anivia’s win rate has shot up from 48. around eight percent to 52. 7 percent, which means we should to view mage make more than the two appearances she achieved for major regions last year.
Role by role
Moving into the very bot lane, there have been a lot of changes to get ADC merchandise in the right place, and now a few marksmen are thriving.
Around Samira, Jhin has been performing exceptionally well in solo wait patiently. Maintaining his momentum from Worlds 2021, Jhin Guide has remained among the list of strongest botlaners in the game with a 51. 8 percent win-rate. His new build is headlined by the Mythic thing Galeforce, which gives Jhin some much-needed mobility thanks to the main item’s active dash ability.
Otherwise, the bot becker will look relatively different to last year, as both Aphelios and Senna – who dominated for the majority of 2020 : are sporting relatively low win-rates below the 50 percent level.
And in the support role, there has been an unexpected improvement during the off-meta pick of Maokai support. The tanky champ sports the strongest win rate in the role during 52. 7 percent thanks to the new Mythic item Majestuoso Mandate, which causes ally champions to deal bonus trouble for any target immobilised by the user. With Maokai’s equipment full of crowd control, it’s no wonder the help item has made him so strong.
Maokai Guide isn't your individual typical support champion, but the shifting meta has made them a strong pick. It’s also worth bringing up the new assist item, Vigilant Wardstone. Previously, supports would only build up five items, and would save the sixth piece slot for control wards in order to continue fighting pertaining to vision control. But that issue has been fixed, like Wardstone offers stats as well as room for three control wards, while also increasing that champion’s stealth ward as well as control ward by one.
While solo queue online games are currently ending quite quickly, which is typical of pre-season, we could see Wardstone have a major impact on pro game titles should any bouts reach the late game. By using easier access to vision control than ever before, we could see the 100 % return of a slow and controlled meta that witnessed South Korean teams win Worlds 2021 five years within the row. Yet, the power of Elemental Drakes means there will as well still be a necessity to fight.