Website: Official Page (contains stream, games schedules, group stage score and bracket)
SPOILERLESS VODS WILL BE PLACED HERE
Reddit Thread (use popout version for sound) | Official euLoL Thread (check which one updates faster)
SemiFinals: Reddit
Boken's RECOMMENDED MATCHES
AZF v iG | SKG v CLG | SAJ v Dig
Quarters:
M5 v iG all games | TPA v Najin-Sword g2 | TSM v AZF all games | CLGeu v WE g2
TPA v M5 g3 (a clinic on TPA's answer to m5) | CLG.eu v Azubu Frost g3 | but really, every game was a good watch
M5 v iG | TSM v Azubu Frost | WE v CLGeu | TPA v Najin Sword
TPA v M5 | CLG.eu v WE
TPA v AZF
WATCHING PRIMER (and shameless OT plug: official lol thread here)
League of Legends is a 5 vs. 5 game where each player control a hero unit (a champion) that has 4 different abilities and the only win trigger is to destroy the opposing core building (the Nexus: [Click]) which sits in the heart of enemy territory. The Nexus is protected by the opposing champions, towers and minions and these must be dealt with before destroying the Nexus. Killing enemy champions, towers and minions all provide champions with gold and experience that allows them to obtain better items and level up. Early parts of the game will see teams sit in their "lanes" in order to strengthen themselves through gold and items.
The "Metagame"
The current metagame is to send a bruiser champion into top lane, an AP carry into middle lane, a gank heavy jungler into the jungle and an AD carry and a support to the bottom lane. Teams have begun aggressively sending their carry and support against the lone top laner in order to starve him of gold and levels, an influence that has flowed from the different metagame played in the Asian regions. Given that the group stage is best of one, expect a few new and unexpected strategies.
Roles
-Bruisers-
Often top lane or in the jungle, they are a balance between damage and toughness. The role of the bruiser is either to scare off carries, deal damage and to be a secondary damage soak.
-Tanks-
Often top lane or in the jungle, tanks have a large amount of crowd control or incredible toughness. The tank will usually be the one initiating fights, protecting his AD carry and soaking up damage.
-Mages-
Often seen in middle lane, AP carries deal magic damage and often feature high magical damage and/or crowd control. They can initiate team fights and deal tons of damage, however often cannot take a large amount of damage.
-Assassins-
Another staple of the middle lane, Assassins excel at deal large amounts of damage in a short amount of time, combined with mobility that allows them to threaten the back lines and escape.
-AD Carry-
Usually sent bottom lane with a support, AD carries deal a most of their damage through their ranged basic attacks and so offer a high amount of constant damage. They can be seen dealing tons of damage from a back line, protected by their team.
-Support-
Usually sent bottom lane with an AD carry, the support is responsible for most of the aggression bottom lane, securing kills for their carry or helping to deprive the other carry of farm and allowing their carry to farm. Their offerings range from shielding an ally, healing, improving the damage of an ally and crowd control. They can be seen initiating fights, protecting their team or buffing their team.
-Bruisers-
Often top lane or in the jungle, they are a balance between damage and toughness. The role of the bruiser is either to scare off carries, deal damage and to be a secondary damage soak.
-Tanks-
Often top lane or in the jungle, tanks have a large amount of crowd control or incredible toughness. The tank will usually be the one initiating fights, protecting his AD carry and soaking up damage.
-Mages-
Often seen in middle lane, AP carries deal magic damage and often feature high magical damage and/or crowd control. They can initiate team fights and deal tons of damage, however often cannot take a large amount of damage.
-Assassins-
Another staple of the middle lane, Assassins excel at deal large amounts of damage in a short amount of time, combined with mobility that allows them to threaten the back lines and escape.
-AD Carry-
Usually sent bottom lane with a support, AD carries deal a most of their damage through their ranged basic attacks and so offer a high amount of constant damage. They can be seen dealing tons of damage from a back line, protected by their team.
-Support-
Usually sent bottom lane with an AD carry, the support is responsible for most of the aggression bottom lane, securing kills for their carry or helping to deprive the other carry of farm and allowing their carry to farm. Their offerings range from shielding an ally, healing, improving the damage of an ally and crowd control. They can be seen initiating fights, protecting their team or buffing their team.
The Map
-Top Lane- (green)
Top lane is furthest away from the dragon (early game objective) and so commonly feature tough champions with the ability to escape from ganks from the enemy jungler. Purple side has more jungle gank paths and so faces more pressure.
Sample top laners:
Irelia , 
Vladimir, 
Jayce
-Middle Lane- (red)
Middle lane is in the centre of the map and so has the greatest access to jungle farm and lanes to gank. The middle laner must make a decision between ganking other lanes and maximising their access to jungle camps. Since the middle lane is also the middle of the jungle, middle laners often experience high pressure from the enemy jungler.
Sample mid laners:
Ahri, 
Karthus, 
Diana
-Bottom Lane- (yellow)
Bottom lane is crucial for dragon control as they must assist in fights for the dragon and controling the area with wards. Currently in favour are high burst damage AD carries which means that fights in bottom lane can be quite short. With two jungle entrances to bot lane for blue side, blue bottom lane experiences more pressure than purple, mostly from the enemy middle.
Sample AD carries:
Corki, 
Ezreal, 
Graves
Sample supports:
Leona, 
Soraka, 
Sona
-The Jungle-
The jungle houses multiple neutral monsters that do not attack unless attacked. Most importantly, each jungle contains two different buffs that have powerful effects for the person who deals the killing blow. These buffs can be contested by the opposing team, stealing away valuable resources. The jungle style currently in favour are gank heavy junglers who move around the map, sacrificing their own farm and putting a lot of pressure on all the lanes. Other styles favour farming their own jungle heavily in order to become stronger than the opposing jungler or stealing from the opposing jungler.
Sample Junglers:
Shyvana, 
Alistar, 
Maokai
Top lane is furthest away from the dragon (early game objective) and so commonly feature tough champions with the ability to escape from ganks from the enemy jungler. Purple side has more jungle gank paths and so faces more pressure.
Sample top laners:
Irelia , Vladimir, Jayce-Middle Lane- (red)
Middle lane is in the centre of the map and so has the greatest access to jungle farm and lanes to gank. The middle laner must make a decision between ganking other lanes and maximising their access to jungle camps. Since the middle lane is also the middle of the jungle, middle laners often experience high pressure from the enemy jungler.
Sample mid laners:
Ahri, Karthus, Diana-Bottom Lane- (yellow)
Bottom lane is crucial for dragon control as they must assist in fights for the dragon and controling the area with wards. Currently in favour are high burst damage AD carries which means that fights in bottom lane can be quite short. With two jungle entrances to bot lane for blue side, blue bottom lane experiences more pressure than purple, mostly from the enemy middle.
Sample AD carries:
Corki, Ezreal, GravesSample supports:
Leona, Soraka, Sona-The Jungle-
The jungle houses multiple neutral monsters that do not attack unless attacked. Most importantly, each jungle contains two different buffs that have powerful effects for the person who deals the killing blow. These buffs can be contested by the opposing team, stealing away valuable resources. The jungle style currently in favour are gank heavy junglers who move around the map, sacrificing their own farm and putting a lot of pressure on all the lanes. Other styles favour farming their own jungle heavily in order to become stronger than the opposing jungler or stealing from the opposing jungler.
Sample Junglers:
Shyvana, Alistar, MaokaiFull Champion List: Leaguepedia link
Phases of the Game
-Pre-Game-
Teams will either group up to make risky manuevers or they will spread out to guard all of their own jungle. Grouped up teams can invade the enemy jungle to catch them off guard, to disrupt and/or steal from the enemy jungler or simply to ward it.
-Early Game-
Early game, each champion moves to their lane and faces off against their opponents. During this stage, junglers have incredible control over the flow of the game as potential ganks can occur either top or mid before they have an opportunity to ward. Near the end of early game, teams might call for dragon contests as the top laner moves towards dragon to secure their teams dominance in that area.
-Mid Game-
Teams will start to group up as towers and dragons become major objectives. There will be more team fighting as lost map vision due to destroyed towers forces teams to stick together.
-Late Game-
Baron becomes a viable objective and teams start to control the area with wards and oracles. The constant threat of a baron fight means teams will most likely stick to the Baron side of the map, eschewing bottom unless there is a large number of minions. Death timers become very long and as a result, mistakes become much more costly.
Teams will either group up to make risky manuevers or they will spread out to guard all of their own jungle. Grouped up teams can invade the enemy jungle to catch them off guard, to disrupt and/or steal from the enemy jungler or simply to ward it.
-Early Game-
Early game, each champion moves to their lane and faces off against their opponents. During this stage, junglers have incredible control over the flow of the game as potential ganks can occur either top or mid before they have an opportunity to ward. Near the end of early game, teams might call for dragon contests as the top laner moves towards dragon to secure their teams dominance in that area.
-Mid Game-
Teams will start to group up as towers and dragons become major objectives. There will be more team fighting as lost map vision due to destroyed towers forces teams to stick together.
-Late Game-
Baron becomes a viable objective and teams start to control the area with wards and oracles. The constant threat of a baron fight means teams will most likely stick to the Baron side of the map, eschewing bottom unless there is a large number of minions. Death timers become very long and as a result, mistakes become much more costly.
Brush
Brush is a unique League of Legends mechanic that makes units inside the brush not visible to units outside of it - unless the unit inside the brush uses a basic attack (not abilities). Teams may take advantage of this fact to set traps and ambushes or to control space during early game.
Summoner Spells
Summoner spells are a set of abilities that are available to every player, however, only two may be selected at the start of the game and are locked in for the entire duration. Here are the most common summoner spells that will be selected:
FlashThis spell moves your champion a small distance to the desired location instantly. The fast speed makes this spell invaluable for catching opponents or running away from them and their abilities - this versatility makes it one of the most commonly used summoner spell. However, it has a very large cooldown (~250s) and many fights or objectives are forced when the opposing team knows that a flash is down.
IgniteIgnite causes a strong damage over time effect on the target and halves their effective healing. This is often used to ensure kills and provide extra damage on important targets. Its medium cooldown (~180s) allows it to be used aggressively more often.
ExhaustExhaust reduces the damage of the affected enemy champion, making it a valuable spell on supports. It also has the bonus effect of slowing the target, and so is taken on some junglers also.
SmiteDeals a large amount of damage to target monster at instant speed. Smite's high damage and fast speed makes it ideal for getting the last hit on key monsters like red/blue buff, dragon and baron. At times it can be used to steal those monsters from the opposing team as they do it.
HealHeal provides an instant speed moderate heal the player's champion and a 50% effectiveness heal to everybody else. Its long cooldown makes it weak to ignite which also halves its effectiveness.
CleanseCleanse removes all crowd control (except supression) and summoner spell effects from the player's unit - this is effective on champions such as the AD carry as CC often means their death.
TeleportThis spell is used to teleport to a friendly unit, including wards. A common strategy is to teleport to a ward and turn a 2v2 fight into a 3v2 fight. However, it has a very large cooldown of ~300s.
GhostAllows the champion to move through units and move faster for 10s.
Objectives
The game features multiple objectives, each of which can benefit the team in different ways. These are - the jungle buffs, dragon, towers, ward control, inhibitors, and baron. Experienced teams will properly balance contesting and securing objectives in order to gain the advantage over their opponents. Every respawning objective has a predictable respawn timer and teams must plan which or when to secure objectives lest they become out manuevered by a more forward thinking team.
-Red Buff-
Red Buff causes its owner to apply a slow and a small damage over time effect on their auto attacks. Early game, junglers use red buff to stage more powerful ganks. Later on, red buff is given to AD carries to increase their potency in team fights. Red buff respawns every 5 minutes.
-Blue Buff-
Blue buff lowers the cooldown of abilities and provides a high amount of mana regen to the person who has it. It is commonly given to AP middles as they can deal lots of damage with their abilities. Stealing blue buff from the opponent can really cripple the opposing middle champion as they are without the benefits of the buff when your middle champion will get their blue buff. Blue buff respawns every 5 minutes.
-Dragon-
Dragon provides 190gold to everybody on the team that lands the killing blow to it and respawns every 6 minutes. The high amount of global gold means that teams will often fight over dragon early in the game. Timing dragons respawn allows teams to get into position before the opposing team can react.
-Towers-
Towers do not regenerate health (however, the nexus towers do) and provide the enemy team 150 gold and some experience each when they destroy them. They do a moderate amount of damage, but become less threatening as the game progresses. Destroying towers not only provides global benefits, but robs the enemy team of vision in that area.
-Ward Control-
Wards are a relatively low cost item that can be bought unlimitedly. They provide vision in an area for 3 minutes when placed. The vision is incredibly important for securing objectives and for preventing jungler ganks. The counter item is the "oracle" which allows the owner to see invisible objects, such as wards. It however, is relatively expensive and disappears upon death. Late game, securing objectives becomes a dance between creating map control with wards and denying map control with oracles.
-Inhibitors-
Inhibitors are the first non tower building inside the enemy base. Destroying them allows your nexus to create stronger minions to attack and push towards the enemy base. The pushing effect of inhibitor destruction causes opponents to lose map control, making taking other objectives easy. Inhibitors respawn every 5 minutes.
-Baron Nashor-
Baron Nashor is the late game objective that often requires a team to defeat. He is a dangerous mob does large amounts of damage to his assailants and debuffing them also, making them take increased damage. The rewards of killing baron however, are great and is a common focal point for teams to meet. Teams can hide near baron to trick the enemy team into a trap, once the wards have been destroyed or they can start baron and provide an ultimatum to the enemy team to fight or lose it. Landing the killing blow on baron provides the entire team with 300gold and the "Baron Buff", which is a circling purple aura. Baron buff provides a large amount of stats, including regeneration, which strengthens the team and allows them to siege the enemy base. Baron respawns every 7 minutes.
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Streams: Own3d.tv | Twitch.tv | Twitch Portal - foreign language broadcasts | Riot Streaming page with Language select for Twitch and Own3d
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Live Stat Tracking: lolking.net | Comprehensive Info Coverage: Leaguepedia (contains live stats, results, schedules, brackets) | Stat tracking: Elobuff
Time
- [*]Grand Finals: Oct 13, 7pm (GMT-7) [World Time]
[*]Showmatch: 2 hours before GrandFinals 5pm (GMT-7): [World time]
Introduction
The Season 2 World Championship will be held on October 4, in Los Angeles, California with a $2 million USD prizepool. It marks the end of a year long journey for many teams and it will be the first time powerhouses from around the world will face each other in a single event. Teams have played in many events throughout season 2, securing circuit points and qualifying for the World Championship in their regionals. The regions represented are: North America, Europe, China, Korea and South East Asia and the top qualifying team from each region has been awarded a bye (with the exception of Azubu Frost, who must play in the group stage by random draw).
The "western" regions, North America and Europe have been exposed to League of Legends for the longest time out of all the regions, with the lions share of publicity and tournaments afforded to them. The 2 million dollar question is how well will "eastern" teams from Korea and China do? Is Korea so far ahead of most of the world like many people hinted? Can iG snatch the world title in another Moba game? Many people forget South East Asia's representatives who may be dark horses of the event.
All tournament games will be played on the [World Championship Hotfix Patch], with Rengar, Syndra and Kha'zix disabled.
Will be the culmination of a long season of great League of Legends action.
