Valorant: I Am Still the World's Best

"Congratulations to EDG for advancing to the upper bracket finals! They have achieved their best result in team history and have entered the top three in the world."

The passionate voices of the live commentators echoed throughout the Los Angeles stadium.

"Their next opponent will be either PRX or EG!"

Su Ming took off his headphones, and the enthusiastic shouts of the audience reached his ears. He and his teammates exchanged glances, and joyful smiles appeared on their faces.

Winning the game is definitely a happy thing.

This time, however, everyone was not as overjoyed as before; the mood was relatively calm.

The reason is simple: having come this far, there is only one goal left.

--champion.

All the effort, passion, and tears... will only remain until then.

The EDG players high-fived each other and started chatting.

"Well done, brothers, I'm really comfortable lying here."

Qiuqiu raised her hand and stretched.

"You guys are really good at inflating data, you're so amazing."

Nobody looked down at the data panel on the screen and suddenly laughed: "Wow, Xiaoming, your BO3 head-to-head data against Mako is 13:1? No wonder my teacher Mako's crosshair was shaking when he saw you."

Only after hearing what he said did Su Ming belatedly realize what was going on.

He remembered that the only time he was killed by Mako was when Ya Hai Xuan Cheng in the first map was killed by Mako with a sliver of health.

Whenever he faced a gun head-on, he felt as if the other person's head was a magnet, attracting his crosshair.

No matter how you hit it, you'll get it.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Zheng Yongkang clapped his hands, reminding them, "Time to bump fists with your opponent!"

Several people stepped forward and took turns giving each other high-fives.

When it was Su Ming's and Mako's turn, the other person's expression was complicated. After giving him a high five, he turned around to look at him several times.

This scene was captured by many netizens and photoshopped into a famous scene from the anime "Your Name".

This post-match interview was given to Smoggy, who had a standout performance in the second picture. Su Ming and the other team members went down from the stage to sign autographs and take photos with the audience and fans.

-----------------

Backstage at the venue.

The players from PRX and EG were already waiting in their respective rest rooms, warming up while watching the match.

"EDG is such a powerful force in the game." Demon1 crossed his arms. "Deepsea is the same. Their Night Dew system and the current mainstream lineup are completely different things. The rhythm and content are completely different."

They have been studying a lot of EDG's videos recently.

The tactics used in today's mainstream systems are actually quite similar to those in turn-based games.

The core skills of the "Vanguard" position serve as the engine for the team's rhythm.

Within the standard 1.40-second timeframe of a single round, there are three key points in the offensive and defensive rhythm: when the light curtain just falls, when there is 1 minute left in the round, and when there are 20 seconds left.

In actual matches, there may be a few seconds of error due to mistakes in execution or strategic maneuvering, but it is generally within this range.

However, the night dew system is completely different.

All team rhythm points and resources are arranged around the 'tp' that lasts for 30 seconds during the night dew.

Furthermore, Yoru can take on some of the responsibilities of the forward position and the sideline.

In the match between EDG and DRX, a common scene was that Nightlu would force the enemy's Herald to use all their abilities or use a dummy to deplete the enemy's sentry items, while her team would save their items and launch a tempo-based counter-attack between 20 and 30 seconds.

"A single Vanguard is no match for Nightfall," Ethan whispered. "Only two Vanguards with a sufficient supply of items can counter it."

"That's right." Commander Boostio chuckled. "That's why EDG only plays Night and Luna on Genji and Abyssal. These two maps are perfect for Night and Luna, and there are very few double Vanguard builds in the meta!"

Even with the strongest lineups and systems, given a sufficient sample size, other top teams in the world will naturally conduct research and develop strategies to counter them.

...You can't have a team sticking to the same lineup and tactics for an entire year, can you?

EDG's two games against Originium allowed EG to glimpse the underlying logic of the Night Dew system.

This put their minds at ease.

EG's coach Potter was watching the game while taking notes in his notebook. Hearing the players chatting, he finally looked up.

She adjusted her glasses and concluded:

"EDG played Skypiea and Hermit very poorly."

"Lotus is banned. Although Neon Town is a strong map for EDG, it's a contest of individual player skill. There's nothing particularly special about it, so it's not a big deal. We can let it be released."

"Deep-sea and source engineering are difficult to handle. At most, we can only release one image, and we will study it and target it accordingly."

"The only question is, what level is their Fission Canyon?"

-----------------

"Holy crap, our viral marketing is a complete garbage!"

Backstage, Wang Senxu watched the EG vs. PRX match on Map 1, Fission Rift, and suddenly uttered this exclamation.

On the screen, EG won the first map with a score of 13:9.

"EG's map is just too damn strong. No wonder they're the world's best Fission team with a perfect 5-0 record at the Tokyo Masters." Nobody praised, then asked, somewhat puzzled, "What's Rundong thinking? Why isn't he banning Fission?"

Both PRX and EG's permanent ban maps are hermitages.

When encountering a situation where the ban list clashes, the most common approach is to release the ban in the first round; otherwise, it's equivalent to losing a ban slot.

However, PRX banned Hermit in the first round, allowing EG to use Fission.

"It's probably because of us..."

Su Ming pondered for a moment and offered a guess: "PRX released the Hermit when we attacked, trying to outdo each other in being bad, thus revealing their weaknesses. They're afraid EG has done their research, so they don't dare release the Hermit at all."

He learned from his recollections that, on another trajectory, EG and PRX were supposed to meet in the upper bracket finals.

In their first encounter, PRX won.

They didn't release the fission.

EG fought their way back from the lower bracket, overcoming the disadvantage of their opponents' "two bans and one pick," and avenged their defeat to win the 2023 Los Angeles Championship.

"So, you're saying we indirectly helped EG? And tricked PRX?"

Zheng Yongkang scratched his head.

At this time, EDG and PRX had a really good relationship, and the outside world called them "brother teams".

"It seems so." Su Ming, who was the culprit and not very familiar with PRX, calmly nodded and analyzed, "Map two is deep sea, map three is sky island... Why do I have a feeling EG is going to win?"

His words proved prophetic.

An hour and a half later.

EG defeated PRX 2-1 to advance to the winners' bracket final.

"The next opponent is EG...we'll be playing Demon1."

Zhang Zhao lay back in his chair, his hands behind his head. "This guy has a shallow skill pool, and his sniping is only average, but his frontal firepower with rifles is truly exceptional."

Before the championship started, many people in China compared Smoggy to Demon1 because the two had very similar shooting styles, both only played the Madman and not the Phantom, and both were experts at using the Information Gun.

Of course, this comparison was met with skepticism before EDG achieved any results.

For this reason, Zhang Zhao had been following Demon1 for a long time and watched many of his first-person perspective (POV) videos.

Perhaps his form will decline in the future, and other players will improve, but in Zhang Zhao's mind, Demon1 is the "world's number one rifleman" for 23 years.

"Here's the problem..."

Qiuqiu was also lying on the gaming chair, swinging her legs and kicking the air.

"Should we practice fission?"