Play-in stage begins Oct 1.
Group stage begins Oct 10.

Group A
LMS Flash Wolves
LCK Afreeca Freecs
VCS Phong Vũ Buffalo
LPL Edward Gaming or EU G2 Esports*

Group B
LPL Royal Never Give Up
LCK Gen.G
EU Vitality
NA Cloud9*

Group C
LCK KT Rolster
LMS MAD Team
NA Team Liquid
LPL Edward Gaming or EU G2 Esports*

Group D
EU Fnatic
NA 100 Thieves
LPL Invictus Gaming
LMS G-Rex or Wildcard*

* The first 3 teams in each group are set, the 4th team in each group will qualify through the play-in stage. If EDG/G2/C9 advance as expected, C9 must go to Group B as there are already LPL/EU/NA representatives in Group D.

Initial thoughts on groups.

Group A - Afreeca should breeze through and Flash Wolves would be favored against G2. If they draw EDG it would be bad news as historically the LMS has not fared well against the LPL. I wouldn't sleep on the Buffalo given the Marines victories last year.

Group B - This is the group of death. Gen.G look scary as hell the way they smashed through Kingzone DragonX in the regional qualifier. RNG come in after a great year and are the LPL's great hope and clearly a top 4 team at the tournament. Cloud9 and Vitality are both good and aggressive enough to take games off the tournament favorites here.

Group C - KT Rolster should take the first seed so Team Liquid gets to contend with the play-in for the second seed. If it's EDG we get to see Ray vs Impact.

Group D - This is the group of life. Invictus Gaming and Fnatic should easily make it out of a group with the weakest NA team and likely the weakest play-in team. Whichever team finishes first will have a great shot at semifinals if they can dodge the Group B second seed.

hyped! anyone else going?

I'm pretty hyped. It's sorta pathetic but I'm happy TSM isn't going. I always get suckered in and get my hopes up, then feel like a fool when they get stomped again.

dw, you can just experience the same **** but with TL this year.

EU > KR

If anyone is watching this they should try watching it on the riot site. seeing the ingame stats is better than twitch chat imo

Standings would be so awesome if G2 and Vitality had won the games that they were actually supposed to win.

Saw dominate going off on NA players on twitter. Saying they don’t deserve sympathy because they don’t dedicate themselves. Saying a certain NA player logged 186 fortnight games a week during NA playoffs. And that’s what NA sucks because all the pro leaguers play almost more fortnight and other games than they play league.

So first round robin complete.

Group A - Thanks to lol LCK every team is still alive going into the second round robin. Still, I have faith in Korea so still think the Freecs get out, but now there's potentially at least one Korean second seed which is going to make the first seeds nervous. This group is playing out very much like the ROX/ANX/CLG/G2 Group A from two years ago.

Group B - RNG should feel pretty secure. A possibility exists where RNG throws a game vs C9 or VIT and Gen.G fails to reach a tiebreaker after going 1-2 on the day.

Group C - EDG looks to have the edge against Team Liquid, KT Rolster rolls to the first seed but might end up with a 66% chance of drawing a Korean team in the quarterfinals.

Group D - The group went as expected, Fnatic look like the best 2-1 team and are I think closer to 1st than 3rd.

worlds has been pretty fun so far

The group stage only lasting 8 days instead of 2 weeks makes it harder to adapt and I think we see a the first Korean team get knocked out of groups since Ozone in season 3

And it's done. Never in a million years would I have predicted C9 and VIT to 4-0 RNG and Gen.G in the first four games of the day. And everyone's pick'em are done, hard to predict Gen.G into fourth.

For all-time, TSM is 19-29 at Worlds. In the last two years Sneaky and Jensen are 23-11 at Worlds padding C9's record to 35-27. Sneaky's 35 wins puts him in the stratosphere, giving him more wins at Worlds than anyone not on SKT or Uzi (36-26).

.

Hoping for

FNC vs EDG
RNG vs G2
AF vs C9
KT vs IG

FNC vs EDG / AF vs C9
RNG vs G2 / KT vs IG


Perfect draw imo. Fnc favoured to make the final, C9 get the weakest 1st place team and G2 get imo the better matchup for them between RNG and KT.

FNC looked amazing today, the first Western team to 5-1 the group stage in this format, and then they won the tiebreaker too. They are rewarded hugely getting on the side of the bracket with AF/EDG/C9. Hard to believe just a year ago Longzhu was trolling this same team with dog champ Nasus.


FNC vs EDG - I think FNC has the edge in almost every position and should be reasonably large favorites in a five game series.

AF vs C9 - Good matchup for C9, but not betting on Svenskeren vs Spirit and it doesn't seem like they can play Blaber on red side because they can't trust him on Taliyah. Korea advances.

KT vs IG - I wouldn't sleep on IG. Rookie is a monster, I expect a close series that could go either way.

RNG vs G2 - They might let Hjarnan win a game on Heimer but that's it. Uzi advances.

Korea is boom

that was sick

Thanks Mr. Perkz

2 great Best of 5's

holy moly that was epic

make Korea a minor region

EUphoria

11(+2subs) European players in the semifinals
5 Danes
3(+1) NA
3(+1) Korea
3 China