LCS quarterfinals move on into the next bracket: imports arrive for both FlyQuest and Team Liquid as they face off against each other; while 1st seed Evil Geniuses face off against the rookie squad of Golden Guardians.

Captain

Santorin ($11,100)

Like it was yesterday, your choices are between jungle and top lane; would you prefer having both Impact and Alphari, or Svenskeren and Santorin? I’ll give you my reasoning for the latter: while Svenskeren hasn’t been the most impressive player on EG, I think FlyQuest’s Licorice may be a challenge he’s not expecting, and Josedeodo is a jungler who generally prefers to play to the top side. Furthermore, Impact as captain causes a few other issues, namely in the fact that he’s prone to being put on weak side. I don’t disagree with selecting Impact, but that decision is ultimately the one you’ll base your team around: jungle or top lane?

Alternatives to consider: Impact ($9,600)

Top Lane

Impact ($6,400)

To call Impact’s performances in the lock-in tournament so far “impressive” is an understatement. He’s the #2 in KDA of top laners on the day, and he’s facing a relatively easy match-up in Niles as opposed to Alphari’s Licorice. Impact has proven to be fantastic at warding off aggression in the top lane, which he’s likely to face in Niles and Iconic. All and all, Impact has a massive stylistic and skill advantage against Golden Guardians, and I strongly recommend him for top lane. All else, your other option is Alphari.

Alternatives to consider: Alphari ($6,200)

Jungle

Svenskeren ($6,600)

Svenskeren alongside the roaming squad of Jiizuke and IgNar presents the biggest challenge GGS as a squad have to face yet: legitimate 2v2 threat from both jungle and mid. To be honest, while Svenskeren hasn’t looked insane to me, I still think he is more than capable of outplaying the inexperienced Iconic. This is all said under the assumption that Santorin is your captain; if he’s not, I recommend you to pick him up now since he was playing insanely well on 2020’s FlyQuest and he should continue his great play into the new year, with the new jungle-centric meta.

Alternatives to consider: Santorin ($7,600)

Mid Lane

Jiizuke ($7,600)

Jiizuke versus Ablazeolive, or Jensen versus Palafox? I think the aggression exerted by Jiizuke, and by extension, EG lends the increased likelihood for Jiizuke himself to snowball kills, whereas Jensen is much more reserved, and prefers to play for mid and late game. While I think Jensen is the better player than Jiizuke; and the gap between Jensen and Palafox may be even greater than Jiizuke versus Ablazeolive, Jiizuke has a firm stylistic advantage over the rookie GGS: a rookie team getting ran over is unlikely to be capable of finding the willpower to reenter the game.

Alternatives to consider: Jensen ($7,000)

ADC

Deftly ($7,800)

Deftly > Tactical is usually a really weird take, but honestly I think Deftly hasn’t changed much at all from his first appearance in the LCS, although he may have improved to a degree: he’s a total KDA player. Furthermore, against opponent Stixxay and Golden Guardians, Deftly is basically on the path to racking up infinite points. Tactical is a great player, and the superior ADC, but Deftly has a point-winning temperament.

Alternatives to consider: Tactical ($7,600)

Support

CoreJJ ($5,400)

I don’t mind either one of these picks between IgNar and CoreJJ. The way I see it, is IgNar may have more kills and/or assists, but he’s more prone to getting picked off during roams and dying. CoreJJ is much more stable, and he’s less likely to lose the points he does have by dying. I think CoreJJ is the better choice since deaths disproportionately impact the support role, but if you want to gamble with IgNar, I wouldn’t think of it as a “bad decision”.

Alternatives to consider: IgNar ($5,600)

Team

Team Liquid ($5,200)

If you want to go deep down into the iceberg: FlyQuest technically hasn’t even lost a game since Josedeodo has arrived in North America, but at the same time, neither has Team Liquid since Santorin landed. That being said, Team Liquid is a super team; Tactical seems primed to be the inheritor of Doublelift’s throne, Jensen is likely the best mid laner in North America since Bjergsen retired, on and on. Evil Geniuses have the easier match-up, but those slots are better reserved for players, in my opinion.

Alternatives to consider: Evil Geniuses ($5,400)

 

Stacks

Deftly & IgNar

While I like CoreJJ, I can’t help but acknowledge that EG’s bottom lane as a unit presents its benefits: Deftly and IgNar operate independently for much of the game, due to IgNar’s roam favored style. By selecting both of them, you get the benefits from IgNar’s cross map plays, while also benefiting from Deftly’s conservative nature and farm-centric play style.

Jiizuke & Impact

On the other hand, I also like the solo laners for EG: they have great match-ups against Niles, who is known to be prone to over aggression which Impact is exemplary at punishing, and Jiizuke, a strong laner who is capable of outmuscling players in the laning phase; which isn’t a degree Ablazeolive particularly excels at. These two are strong players, and are capable of crushing GGS’ less experienced players.

Santorin & CoreJJ

These two in particular I enjoy from Team Liquid because they’re what I consider to be Liquid’s “smart” players. Santorin on FlyQuest was great at defending his lanes while out jungling the opposition, CoreJJ does a great job of reading the map without going overboard and forcing plays like IgNar or SwordArt. They keep their deaths very low, and their efficacy as players is remarkably high.

Top Picks: Santorin, Impact, Deftly

Each of these guys are insane for points: as mean as it is, Deftly has been a KDA player for much of his career and not much has changed from what I can see. Impact has been absolutely on fire in the Lock-in tournament and has been crushing his opposition. Santorin had a fantastic 2020 and was unparalleled domestically in North America, and not much seems to have changed.

Top Value: Tactical, Jensen, CoreJJ

Honestly, I just don’t think that any GGS or FlyQuest players are worth picking up. The cheaper Liquid players are alright, but I don’t think it’s worth picking up losing players in order to make Deftly captain, as an example. There’s little variety as far as players are concerned; pick what you want from between EG and TL.