League of Legends: Reborn in Season 3, Tuning the Entire League

Chapter 279 Only JM and his new generation of NXG can defeat NXG!

The harshest reality of early esports was that no one paid attention to it.

In a society where even martial arts novels regard video games as "spiritual poison," video games are even more of a scourge—parents turn pale at the mention of them, outsiders avoid them like the plague, and regard them as ferocious tigers.

Although the root cause of most teenagers' internet addiction is not the games themselves, such explanations are weak and ineffective until the environment changes.

If no one pays attention, it has no commercial value;
Without funding, the team will perish.

The original PE team, backed by the two major guilds China and Royal Club, once won the LPL Spring Split and Summer Split championships. But what happened?
However, when the sponsors withdrew, this top team was unable to maintain its roster and was ultimately relegated!
In 2013, the annual operating cost of a club, including salaries, was approximately 200 million yuan.

But what about income? It almost entirely depends on tournament prize money; the champion of a major tournament only earns four or five hundred thousand yuan and a meager share of the live streaming revenue—the industry's ability to withstand risks is as fragile as paper.

JM's sudden emergence somewhat tore open this iron curtain.

The appeal of a "top streamer," the rare label of "a top student from Jinling University," and the identities of "entrepreneur" and "e-sports club owner" collided fiercely, creating a wonderful chemical reaction.

This not only attracted a massive influx of new viewers to League of Legends esports, but also reversed the public's "inherent aversion" to esports—it began to be seen as a phenomenon worth exploring, and even a possible career path.

Subsequently, Jinling University took the initiative to get involved and established e-sports research-related projects, which provided crucial academic endorsement and social recognition for this wave.

The development of an industry is like a snowball rolling downhill—if it goes well, it's unstoppable; if it goes badly, the damage becomes too great to reverse.

From the undefeated record in the LPL Spring Split to the stunning appearance at the All-Star event in Shanghai, and finally the epic showdown at the Staples Center in S3, everything seemed like the best gift from fate.

Jiang Ming's intervention, while ultimately failing to reverse the disbandment of the PE team, paved a far better path for the players than in their "previous life." This subtle change is a glimmer of hope for the industry's evolution towards standardization.

Previously, the domestic e-sports scene had a chaotic management structure, with clubs generally adopting a simple structure of "team leader-coach-player" without professional division of labor.

As WE's second team, PE was nominally independent but shared resources for a long time, which led to unclear management responsibilities. This explains why players were stuck with contracts that lasted for years after transferring, and why the league's popularity continued to decline, with some players still not retired even when they were close to leaving the scene. The main reason was the lack of supervision, with transfers relying entirely on personal connections.

One of the most profound achievements of Jiang Ming's reform of the LPL league's standardization is the strong regulation of this "lawless land" of player transfers.

During the previous meeting of the league to establish a secondary league and the commercial negotiations with major clubs, Jiang Ming's bottom line was to include the transparency and institutionalization of the transfer market in the core agenda.

This is not only about resolving the most acute conflict in the professional League of Legends scene, but more importantly, it concerns the long-term stability of the league.

Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The chronic problem of wage arrears, the lack of a youth training system, the absence of cultural education for players, and the lax management of professional image... these are just some of the problems that urgently need to be addressed throughout the league.

All of the above is NXG's answer sheet as a model student in the LOL esports scene. Whether they will copy it, and how well they will copy it, is up to fate.

Returning our attention to the arena, in the top lane, the vampire and the fox were locked in another fierce battle.

If Seeker's Lee Sin hadn't arrived in time, Vladimir would have had a real chance to secure a solo kill.

Oh my, my brother was really fierce today.

You've changed. You've changed so much, it's a pity. You've become so scary. You even dared to try and solo kill someone. (doge)

As expected before the competition, NXG's biggest transformation after experiencing the baptism of the world championship is undoubtedly the word "confidence".

The players shed their excessive concerns about talent gaps and physical limitations, becoming more decisive and aggressive in their actions and decisions. While this slightly reduced the team's stability, it also, as Song Yuan sensed, unlocked new possibilities for the team's overall potential.

For top professional players, when a path has reached its peak, a change in direction can sometimes bring about a qualitative leap, which is the opportunity to break through the bottleneck and reach a new peak.

The first match was full of twists and turns, with several shifts in the battle that kept the NEST audience on the edge of their seats.

When the Black Team secured First Blood with a precise mid-jungle synergy, everyone thought they would take control of the game. However, NXG's first team immediately responded with a textbook-perfect play – not only taking down the opponent's bottom lane tower and securing kills, but also taking control of the first dragon, instantly widening the gold difference to 1,500.

However, just when the audience thought that NXG would control the rhythm of the game with their usual strategy and had the victory in their grasp, a sudden collision in the top lane broke the balance: the Black team's mid and jungle caught NXG's Vladimir making a positioning mistake, and Lee Sin's precise Sonic Wave followed by Ahri's ultimate for three stages of damage to complete the kill, once again bringing suspense to the game.

At the event and in front of the live stream, countless professional players exclaimed: "It turns out that NXG is not invincible. We just couldn't find their weaknesses before, or even if we did, we couldn't exploit them."

When the camera panned across the NXG team's backstage lounge, and the image lingered on the face of the man with a calm, even somewhat languid, expression, people felt it was only natural. The classic line that had previously been criticized as "Versailles literature," "None of my NXG players are naturally gifted," now seemed to be the most authentic footnote.

Or perhaps, the fact that it is their own club's second team that is currently tearing apart NXG's defensive system step by step with almost frenzied attacks and confrontations is a major reason why people are unsettled.

The only thing that can defeat NXG is JM and NXG itself!

The two sides were in a rare state of stalemate: although the black team players on the purple side had some highlights in individual operation, the blue side NXG team was always able to bring the pace back to even with precise team coordination.

The most amazing part was the mid-lane offensive and defensive transition, which drew gasps from the audience!

Just as the Black team's jungler and mid laner secured a kill in the top lane, NXG's Jarvan IV immediately initiated, using EQ combo followed by his ultimate to slam into Zyra's face, creating a perfect combo with Annie's Tibbers. Zyra, who had just approached the mid lane bush to place a ward, was instantly melted.

More importantly, NXG's subsequent counter-gank by their jungler and support forced the Ahri, who came to provide support, to use her three ultimate abilities, completely thwarting any chance of Black Team gaining momentum.

At this moment, every inch of bush in Summoner's Rift holds hidden secrets, and every exchange of hero skills influences the course of the battle.

Despite being viewed from God's perspective, the two teams used almost mirror images of each other's actions and decisions to demonstrate to the audience the aesthetics of tactical competition between top teams.

(End of this chapter)