You've only been playing for half a year, and you've already reached the finals?

Chapter 195: A Way to Break the Stalemate?

Seeing this, Ming Jing raised his head slightly, seemingly lost in thought.

Irelia? Is this why FPX dared to let Lee Sin through?
Irelia received a significant buff in patch 11.13, almost an all-around buff.

The passive stack limit has been reduced from five to four, making stacking easier.

Q skill deals increased damage to minions, and its cooldown is further reduced as the ultimate skill level increases.

The biggest buff goes to W. Both the damage reduction during charging and the subsequent damage have been greatly increased, and a new magic damage reduction attribute has been added, allowing Irelia to dominate the mid lane.

All the changes made Irelia a total stat monster, earning her the nickname "Female Darius".

"The enemy team is probably trying to use Irelia to counter your Lee Sin." Maokai asked in the voice chat, "Do you want to switch? We can move Lee Sin to the top lane."

Ming Jing thought for a moment, then said, "No need, we should be able to fight."

The matchup between Irelia and Lee Sin isn't really a counter.

While Irelia is undoubtedly more powerful, the key point is that Lee Sin can easily clear waves and roam once he gets Iron Spikes. The only way to counter mid-lane Lee Sin is to target this aspect.

Unless your Irelia has a way to keep up with Lee Sin's wave clear and roaming, you'll just be following in his footsteps and getting eaten shit.

"Then it's up to you." Maokai had complete faith in Mingjing and simply began to process the remaining BP.

After a few moves, the lineup was quickly finalized.

Blue side EDG: Top laner Gnar, jungler Lillia, mid laner Lee Sin, bot lane Ezreal and Karma.

FPX (Red Side): Top lane Kennen, Jungle Xin Zhao, Mid lane Irelia, Bot lane Ashe and Braum.

Mingjing's Lee Sin is a hero proven by countless victories, so Maokai was naturally quite at ease. He didn't even say much, just patted Mingjing on the shoulder, then went to the center of the stage, punched the opposing coach, and left.

During the loading phase, Ming Jing closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and adjusted his state.

The game had already begun when he opened his eyes!
Mingjing quickly bought a Doran's Blade and positioned himself in the jungle.

EDG wasn't particularly strong at level one, so they didn't have any specific plans for that.

In the voice chat, JieJie was still reminding Flandre to play it safe and try to preserve his health so he wouldn't get overtaken.

In order to ensure his own development, he chose to farm from top to bottom, relying on the lane priority of Ezreal and Karma in the bottom lane to take the river crab.

With Lee Sin in the mid lane and Ezreal in the bot lane, EDG had enough lane priority to establish a fast dragon advantage, which was the key to their victory.

Saint Gun nodded, indicating that he understood.

When the team focuses on the top lane to set the pace, he is cautious and feels like he is under immense pressure. But when the team puts him under pressure, he is all smiles and feels like a fish in water.

In the EDG team, he's there to contribute!
Ming Jing didn't think too much about it; he simply logged in with the melee soldiers.

As soon as he went online, Ming Jing pushed forward, ignoring Irelia's position, and directly hit six minions with his E, then used his auto-attacks on the ranged minions, starting his plan to reach level two first.

This patch brings a crucial buff to Irelia's laning phase: her passive stack cap has been reduced from five to four.

This allows Irelia to quickly stack her passive and start fighting at level one by Q'ing three melee minions and then Q'ing the enemy.

Many mages have no way to deal with Irelia's fully charged passive ability when she gets close, and they can easily lose a lot of health.

Doinb did exactly that. In the early laning phase, he prioritized stability, simply watching from the back and not giving Mingjing the opportunity to push the minion wave.

He waited until the melee minion's health dropped to near zero before quickly pressing forward and landing a basic attack on the Blind Monk.

But Ming Jing was not afraid at all. He stood in the middle of the minions, faced the Blade Girl and first returned a basic attack, then unleashed another [Heavenly Thunder Strike].

As long as you cast [Thunder Strike] as soon as you go online, the nine-second cooldown of the E skill is just enough to cast a second one when melee minions are low on health.

As long as you use basic attacks to lower the health of ranged minions during the nine-second cooldown, you can kill an entire wave of minions with a single E attack.

That's exactly what Mingjing did, so his E not only killed the Irelia, but also a whole wave of minions!
At level one, it only takes nine seconds to clear a wave of minions; only Lee Sin can do that.

At the same time, Doinb also made a quick move, using his Q skill to swiftly take down three melee minions, stacking his passive while using his Q skill to heal, and then quickly Q'd into Lee Sin's face.

With a single basic attack, Conqueror stacks to six.

With her passive fully activated and Conqueror's continued growth, Irelia becomes stronger and stronger in battle, making her a dominant force at level one!
But Ming Jing was not afraid at all. He stood still and fought with Dao Mei, throwing punch after punch!
A level 1 Lee Sin is indeed no match for a fully passive Irelia, but what if you add three ranged minions?
Because Mingjing had cleared FPX's minion wave, EDG's three ranged minions followed closely behind Lee Sin, relentlessly attacking Irelia.

The damage output of the three ranged minions far exceeds the extra damage from a level 1 Irelia with her passive fully active.

Doinb and Mingjing swapped hands a few times, realized something was wrong, and quickly made their escape!
He needs to put those three ranged units into the tower.

As long as he can push the minion wave into the tower, he can use the tower's power to quickly catch up with the gap between the three minions. And because the minions that go under the tower will briefly block the second wave of minions, the subsequent minions will be blocked in front of his tower!
Doinb's plan is to use the three ranged minions to stack his passive, leave the tower with three stacks of passive, and take advantage of the minion wave's push to kill the first melee minion of the second wave, thus securing level two first!
With his passive fully activated and level 2 completed first, he will have complete control of the laning phase!

Although they lost in the first exchange of blows, Doinb's understanding of minion waves is undoubtedly top-notch, as a roaming mid-laner.

With just a little trickery, he could easily reverse this slightly unfavorable situation.

Of course, Doinb's little scheme could not escape Mingjing's discerning eye.

Moreover, Mingjing also knew that Doinb couldn't do it.

These three ranged minions will not go into the tower, but will instead block the enemy tower.

He unleashed his second E skill, [Bone Breaker], slowing down Irelia, and then continued to chase and attack her!

With Irelia slowed down, the ranged minions didn't follow Doinb's plan to be lured all the way into the tower. Instead, they moved in fits and starts, attacking Irelia twice!

These two rounds of attacks wasted time, causing the second wave of minions to slowly spawn and keep the ranged minions outside the tower by the time they reached FPX's mid tower.

This one step alone made Doinb extremely anxious!
Xiba!

Although the position where the minion waves meet is still advantageous to him, the main problem is that he can't catch up with the gap between these three ranged minions.

The Blind Monk only needs to kill one melee minion to easily reach level two, while he needs to painstakingly kill three full-health ranged minions before even considering reaching level two!
If he can't secure the second spot, it means he's completely out of the running for lane control!
Ming Jing did just that. As soon as the minion waves met, he punched the melee minion, then used his E skill to easily level up to level two.

Moreover, Ming Jing was quite bold and confident. He didn't learn Q at level two, but directly learned W [Golden Bell Shield] and used it immediately.

Lee Sin's strength in lane stems not only from his E skill's fast wave clear, but also from the crucially overpowered W mechanic.

The shield ensures that you won't take damage when exchanging blows, while lifesteal provides sustain.

If the pressure is too great, you can even level up W a few more times to deplete the enemy mage's mana bar!

But it's definitely unnecessary in this game; level 1 W is enough.

Doinb watched as Lee Sin slowly healed himself with his W and occasionally used his E to slap the minion wave, and felt bitter inside.

It can only be said that he was a bit careless and didn't handle the first level well.

If he could do it all over again, the situation would definitely not be like this.

With no other option, Doinb had to push the minion wave into the tower first, and then start the second round of fighting after the tower reset the minion wave.

Once he levels up, the advantage will naturally return to him!
However, this wave of trouble can't be overcome by simply playing defensively under the tower.

Every mistake he makes pushes the team further away from victory.

On EDG's side, JieJie saw that the mid laner had taken control of the lane so quickly. He was impressed by Ming Jing's skill and quickly changed his laning strategy.

Having just cleared out the top jungle, he was originally planning to farm the bottom jungle, but then he turned around and rushed straight to FPX's top jungle.

Logically speaking, it's impossible for JieJie's Lillia to go against Zhao Xin's jungle.

After all, Zhao Shenwang was known for his bravery in the first three levels, so it would be a success if Lilia was not countered.

But who can argue with Lilia having a father?

As soon as the little genius entered the Ueno area, he saw the deer groping his big bird, and the Fist of God Lee Sin following behind the deer.

Xiao Tian looked at the scene before him, his face turning slightly dark.

You, Lillia, dare to rebel against my Zhao Xin?
But Xiaotian switched screens again, glanced at the Irelia fighting a whole wave of minions under the tower, and then sighed. There really wasn't much he could do.

He certainly couldn't let the mid laner lose an entire wave of minions just for a group of six birds, so he could only try to fight for the kill from the sidelines.

But JieJie didn't give him a chance. He used W Smite to secure the big bird with a high kill threshold.

The little angel used W [Wind Slash and Lightning Strike], hoping to take back a few birds, but unexpectedly, the Lee Sin was faster, using [Heavenly Thunder Strike] to take down all the birds, thus getting a share of the spoils.

After clearing the jungle camps, Mingjing and Jiejie knew that the mid and jungle were no match for each other in a 2v2, so they didn't give Irelia a chance to provide support and left!

Having gained a small advantage, Jie Jie was grinning from ear to ear, extremely happy.

After all, he was at a huge disadvantage in the jungle matchup this game, so he specifically farmed from top to bottom to avoid Xin Zhao.

He actually managed to steal a group of enemy jungle camps, which was a dream start!

Advantages are built up little by little, one by one.

On the other side, Xiaotian wasn't so happy and was asking about the situation in the mid lane via voice chat.

With players like Khan, Doinb, and Lin Weixiang bringing joy to the team, the atmosphere within FPX is naturally quite good.

FPX's mid and jungle players have a good relationship now, so they can speak their minds directly.

"My bad, my bad~" Doinb didn't deny it and immediately apologized: "Xiaofei was too strong in lane, I couldn't beat him!"

Noticing that the jungler's expression was off, Doinb continued to reassure him: "It's okay, it's just a wave of jungle monsters. We still have the initiative in the early game. I'll come help you when I reach level six."

Hearing this, Xiao Tian's expression softened considerably, and he continued to deal with the red buff.

As early as half a month ago, when version 13.13 was updated, Doinb noticed a new playstyle in the changes to Irelia and quickly put it into practice.

And it must be said, the results are remarkable!
This is a playstyle that will dominate the mid lane and could even change the entire game like Lee Sin.

FPX has been preparing for this for a long time, just waiting for the day when this version will officially be available on the field!
And coincidentally, on the day the game was updated, FPX encountered their biggest rival in the regular season, EDG.

It can only be said that they had the perfect combination of timing and location. Given their initial advantage, FPX believed that even EDG could be defeated by them!
Next, we just need to wait for Irelia to level up, and then prepare to start our roaming strategy!
Ming Jing had no idea what FPX had prepared for this match. He simply continued laning and was already thinking about the next move in a coordinated attack.

If Doinb's Irelia is only at this level, then this game probably won't be too difficult; he has countless ways to create momentum.

But soon, he discovered something was wrong.

Four minutes later, both mid laners had reached level four.

Mingjing leveled up his E skill twice and, as usual, went up to push the lane with an E. This time, Doinb seemed to give him a good chance, as Irelia didn't even create distance but stood within the range of her E skill.

But just as Lee Sin's E [Thunder Strike] landed, Irelia also unleashed her W [Dance of the Fall], entering a defensive stance.

Although Lee Sin's E deals magic damage, Irelia's W has also been buffed in this patch, granting 20%-40% magic damage reduction based on champion level, thus mitigating some of the damage from [Thunderstrike].

And it's not over yet.

After Irelia fully charged her W, she retaliated by attacking Lee Sin and the minions in return.

But at this moment, it is obvious that the minions on EDG's side are losing significantly more health!
Seeing this, Ming Jing frowned, noticing something was amiss.

Lee Sin's level 2 E damage is already quite good, dealing a total of 140 + 100% bonus attack damage. At level 4 with only a Doran's Blade as a base item, the damage is around 160.

On the other hand, Irelia's W hit a minion and dealt a whopping 200+ points of damage!

The minions in the first few rounds all have 0 resistances, so the damage is quite obvious.

"207," Ming Jing calculated briefly, then quickly understood the answer, "Two levels of W?"

It has to be said that Irelia's W has indeed been significantly buffed in this version.

Both base damage and AD scaling have been increased by a whopping 50%!

If Mingjing remembers correctly, the buffed level 2 W of Irelia can deal a total attack damage bonus of 75 + 150%.

With Irelia's level 4 attack damage of 88, the damage can reach as high as 207!
From this perspective, the data matches.

As a skill with a similarly large area of ​​effect (AOE), Irelia's W skill almost completely overwhelms Lee Sin's [Thunderbolt]!
Seeing this, Mingjing finally understood why Doinb chose Irelia.

So that's why?
Moreover, he quickly realized how terrifying Irelia's W ability was.

It's important to know that the designers of League of Legends have very strict control over the damage of AOE skills.

Simple and portable damage skills like Lee Sin's E, Twisted Fate's Q, and Ahri's Q are almost all designed with a precise limit, ensuring that under normal development conditions, these skills cannot instantly kill ranged minions.

To quickly eliminate ranged minions, you either need to be ahead of the game and have higher attack damage or ability power, or add other AoE abilities, such as Iron Spike or Luden's Echo, or increase damage through minion dematerializers.

However, the damage from Irelia's W skill far exceeds this limit.

Simply put, as an AOE skill, [Dance of the Distance] is overpowered.

Ming Jing could foresee that once Irelia had a level 4 or 5 W, she would be able to instantly kill ranged minions with a fully charged W and also bring melee minions to low health!

With her Q ability, which can quickly finish off low-health minions, Irelia can almost instantly kill a wave of minions in a second and stack up three passive stacks!
This wave clearing efficiency is unmatched, even by Lee Sin.

Moreover, with Irelia's powerful sustained damage output, Lee Sin has no chance to go up and clear the wave.

He had just used his E skill when Irelia cleared the entire wave and her full passive was on his face!
Thinking of this, Mingjing couldn't help but marvel at the ingenuity of the idea, but at the same time felt guilty for his own laziness.

If he had carefully reviewed the detailed data of the version changes, he should have been able to discover this.

He ultimately followed the crowd, his imagination limited by the inertia of maxing Q, which caused him to suffer a great loss in the laning phase!

If you lose in the early laning phase, then in the mid-game...
Ming Jing put away the boundless imagination that had been wandering in his mind into the mid-game and refocused his attention on the mid-lane laning phase.

At this moment, both mid laners are still only level four. The power spike for the W-maxed Irelia hasn't truly arrived yet, so Mingjing still needs to try his hand at it.

But in the end, it was still a failure.

Although Doinb hasn't reached his peak yet, if he's focused on playing it safe, reaching his peak will be incredibly easy.

He finally returned to the city after saving up 1100 gold coins, and immediately bought the Iron Spike Whip.

Bloodthirsty Irelia is actually quite rare, and this is a special change that Doinb made based on the skill point allocation of maxing W.

Iron Whip's AOE ability allows him to quickly wipe out a wave of minions at level 5 with W + Iron Whip + QQQ.

From this moment on, Mingjing completely lost control of the line.

At this moment, even Guan Daxiao in the commentary booth realized something was wrong and started shouting, exclaiming that Doinb's Irelia was something else!

Doinb didn't waste this hard-won lane control and decisively initiated a mid-jungle synergy.

Their target this time is the bottom lane.

After pushing the lane, Irelia immediately coordinated with Xin Zhao to initiate a four-man gank on the bottom lane.

Fortunately, EDG's bot lane is a combination of EZ and Karma. Although they are in a pushing state, they can run fast. Karma used her RE combo to speed up the entire team and they ran to the second tower together!

Doinb wasn't in a hurry, but instead teamed up with the bottom lane to go to the dragon pit and secure the fire dragon.

"The Red Legion killed the Infernal Dragon!"

Seeing the dragon secured, smiles appeared on the faces of all the FPX members.

Although they didn't manage to secure a kill, controlling a small dragon was already a significant achievement, considering that EDG's jungler was farming bot lane all game, and with a bot lane duo like EZ and Karma, it was clear they were aiming for a fast dragon.

Now that the dragon is under control, it's like they've strangled EDG!
Moreover, Irelia's power spike has only just begun, and there will be plenty of opportunities for her to roam in the future!

On the other side, Ming Jing looked at the news of Xiao Long's death on the screen, a trace of solemnity flashing in his eyes.

He had already figured out a way to break the deadlock.

(End of this chapter)