The International MSI League of Legends 2025 tournament check in!
Hi everyone - we're closing in on the end of the tournament with only 4 games left. Questions for discussion:
- Did you make a bracket with Riot's Pick'Em?
- If you did, how's your bracket looking?
- What games have you watched?
- Which games have surprised you most?
- Are you enjoying the Fearless Drafts? (For those curious, Riot updated how teams draft during each Best of 5. After a champ has been played, it's banned for the remaining Bo5.)
- What team(s) are you cheering for?
Tonight is
Spoiler: Teams playing tonight, July 9.
T1 vs Gen.GIf you haven't been keeping up, now is the perfect time to jump in if you enjoy watching pro-play League of Legends. The vods from previous games are available on Youtube (and I assume Twitch but I haven't checked). I don't really play much league, but watching is very fun with friends and we've been having nightly hang-outs on Discord to watch together.
Spoiler: Results from last night's series, July 8, FlyQuest vs BiliBili Gaming.
3-2 in favor of BLG. Game 2 was particularly heartbreaking for Fly especially when they were so close to winning. I think the entire series showed that they have lots of potential for growth. They had two rookies and they still took a team that came close to winning both MSI and Worlds 2024 to game 5! I hope they feel very proud of themselves and the games they played.Other random thoughts: The "Kalista Curse" has yet to be broken and I wish that Fly hadn't tempted fate by drafting it. One of my friends remarked that she [Kalista] must be performing really well in scrims for these teams to keep picking her even though it keeps failing :') Honestly, I really hope we don't see it again in the remaining games because it's such an instant "Oh no..." feeling.
This tournament has also made me realize that I miss the hyper-carry ADC/enchanter support meta A LOT. Don't get me wrong, pro play is exciting just because of the high skill ceiling but the drafts have been a little boring especially in bot lane. I want to see Zeri, Aphelios, maybe even Samira! I am keeping my fingers crossed that the upcoming patches will let them shine in Worlds.
I'd fallen behind on watching LCS, or I guess LTA, so I finally binged the playoffs and caught up, just in time to see a spoiler about how yesterday's match went lol.
Still, that's a better performance than I was expecting, game 1 especially was impressive.
As a C9 fan I think it's a shame that LTA North lost it's second seed spot, especially given how close the second two FY v C9 Bo5's were (and how poorly the two LEC teams performed).
I won't watch the EWC, but it'll be interesting to see how this C9 squad performs internationally
I only sorta watch League. My brother watches and plays League, so I've watched most of Worlds with him the last few years. But still have no clue what's going on, since I don't play.
That said. I put all my chips on T1. Even though T1 hasn't been doing so hot lately, I don't think.
That's okay - I barely know what's going on most of the time too. I'm just a casual LoL player in general but my friends have all been playing and watching for yeaaaars. So I get caught up on the old lore of players and they're generally pretty good about explaining the things that I miss while watching. As far as e-sports go I think that League is one of the more fun ones to watch even when you don't what's happening. Riot has also done a great job at hiring announcers that make things feel exciting.
T1 is my favorite team! They're 3rd overall in the rankings (behind Gen.G. and Hanwha, whom they beat 3-0 to secure their MSI spot) so things have been going pretty well so far. As far as the tournament goes for T1
Spoiler: T1 MSI 2025 Results So Far
They beat both CFO and BLG. Their first set against CFO was a bit shakey but they beat BLG 3-0 which was an incredible set of games. I really hope things go well for them tonight!I don't play League but I randomly stumbled on the stream and watched for a bit. I have to disagree. League is way too complex to really enjoy without a good understanding of the game. It has, what, 170 characters or something? I watched a game and I could understand the basic flow of which team was winning based on the commentary and watching health bars tick down or gold leads tick up, but beyond that, I didn't understand anything, and that becomes very alienating very quickly.
There are some games that somewhat work as spectator sports even if you don't play the game. I used to watch Starcraft 2 but never played it. I also think Counter-Strike is probably one of the easiest FPS titles to understand because it's so simple. But a game like Dota or League with 100+ characters with multiple unique abilities? It's way too complex to really appreciate beyond "ooh" and "ahh". Like, I can get hyped at a caster's hype, but that only goes so far when I can't appreciate even the basic mechanics of how someone is winning or losing.
Anyway, not to piss on anybody's parade. I'm sure if you do understand it, it's really fun and engaging, and League has such a large player base that they don't necessarily need to attract people outside the player base to have a thriving esport. Just a perspective from someone who doesn't play MOBA games, but enjoys esports and occasionally tries to get into them as a spectator, but usually just bounces off due to the complexity involved.
Ayyy 3rd overall ain't bad. I mean, for T1 that might be bad, but hey.
I was watching some LCK matches earlier in the year and T1 was not looking good. I can't remember which ones competition and matches but I was like "This is T1? Tf happened?"
T1 had a pretty rough regular split and had to go through the gauntlet to even get a spot at MSI.
I don't follow LCK too closely, but IIRC they were switching between Gumayusi and another ADC (Smash?) fairly regularly which seemed to be causing some issues with training. There was lots of drama in the fanbase about management overruling coaches from memory.
I think it also might've taken Doran some time to gel with the team.
T1 at internationals is always a contender, though I think it's been a pretty long time since they beat GenG in a series at this point?
Flyquest has been rather impressive this tournament and I'm happy with how my home region held their ground this MSI. I haven't watched any LPL this season so I don't fully know what to expect, but BLG's performance thus far has been much shakier than I would have anticipated. I'd put my money on them exiting the tournament in tomorrow's civil war matchup against AL. Speaking of which, today's match is also an intra-region one. Although GENG is a higher seed than T1, statistics go out the window more often than not in international tournaments. It goes without saying that we're in for a very intense series. Good luck to both teams!
I didn't do Pick'ems and have mostly been watching the last game of series / reading post game results.
I don't play league anymore, but still watch most C9 games (either live or VODs), and pay attention to MSI / Worlds.
Fearless has been a great change I think, especially in Bo5s that go the distance. Usually by this stage in an international tournament the meta has become a lot more "solved", and you'd often see the same matchup multiple times per series which became pretty tiresome, especially during certain periods where there were overly dominant picks with close to 100% pick/ban presence.