At the G-League LAN final, LGD dismantled CDEC in a best of 5 to claim the first prize of $32,000. CDEC on the other hand, takes home the $8,000 second prize after failing to take the extremely close game four. Photos from the event can be found at the bottom.
Contrary to the score of 3-1, the LGD vs CDEC final was by no means a one sided stomp. Most of the games stretched beyond the 45 minute mark as both teams struggled to gain a lead to overwhelm their opponents with, most highly evident in game two and three.
From their result performance, LGD Gaming, a team of highly skilled and experienced players, still seems to be a long way away from their expected performance. But with this victory, they proved that they have been making steady progress after the TI4 reshuffle.
CDEC, a team of new but highly skilled players, have shown once again that they are not a team to be taken lightly; most of the games lost to LGD were via uncharacteristic mistakes by themself, probably due to their inexperience of playing in a LAN setting. Although CDEC lost, they still gain valuable experience and can now anticipate what the D2L lan finals will be like.
Prize Pool Distrubution:
1st: 200,000RMB (~$32,000) - LGD Gaming
2nd: 50,000RMB (~$8,000) - CDEC
3rd: 10,000RMB (~$1,600) - Invictus Gaming
4th: 10,000RMB (~$1,600) - Speed Gaming.cn
Game 1:
This game featured a standard all rounded draft from CDEC and a surprise Axe pick by LGD. Running a dual Axe Wisp offlane, LGD managed to shut down Maybe on his Morphling and secure Axe an early blink. With the blink, Axe left his lane and started looking for ganks but to his dismay, CDEC were always farming in pairs and ensuring that no one gets caught out. Due Axe no longer pressuring the Morphling, he slowly found his farm and carried his team to victory.
Game 2:
Yet another Axe pick by LGD Gaming, this time played by Injuly. Maybe's Storm Spirit got off to an extremely good start, managing to first blood the enemy Ember Spirit after a failed gank attempt on him by MMY on his wisp. With this, Maybe was able to effectively control the farm of the Ember Spirit and get himself free farm at mid. With the snowball rolling, Maybe tried to get a few ganks going but failed. Having failed the ganks, most notably the multiple failed ganks on the Medusa, Maybe decided to farm his Orchid instead before looking for ganks. Upon recieving his Orchid, CDEC grouped up for smoke ganks with great success, picking off multiple core heroes and proceeding to take objectives. However, at this point the Medusa was too farmed and CDEC lacked the damage to take her down. With their farmed Medusa, LGD went on the offensive but due to a few mistakes, Medusa was left 1v5 against CDEC; Slark gained 34 stacks of essences shift taking her down. After respawning, LGD sat back and allowed their Medusa to farm a Raiper which finally allowed them to push down mid and overwhelm CDEC.
Game 3:
Capitalizing on the lack of lock down on CDEC, LGD drafted an Antimage. Needless to say, the Antimage received free farm and had Treads Battlefury at around the 13 minute mark. In addition to this, MMY also performed spectacularly on his Lion, making an abundance of space for his team in the early and mid game, constantly finding pick offs. Victory seemed assured for LGD, but as they grouped up to push high ground, LGD quickly came to realize that they over estimated the power of the Tiny Wisp combo and double midas on Slark and Ancient Apparition. Their Antimage could not even come close to winning a fight against Tiny Wisp and the rest of the team could not hold themselves against the Slark and AA ulti. LGD then proceeded to split push and slow siege CDEC's base, managing to take one set of rax before making a mistake which resulted in a lost team fight without buyback. CDEC rushed to LGD's base and took two set of rax.
The experienced players on LGD kept their cool and kept playing; split pushing and slowly managing to take a second set of rax off CDEC. With this, both sides moved around the map, trying to predict the actions of each other and catch someone out. What followed was a series of back and forth teams fights, from four man Ravage Ice Path Macropyre combos to Tiny taking out half the health of three enemy heroes in one hit. After a thrilling 20 minutes of back and forth action, CDEC made a major mistake, relocating a Tiny who just bought back into a lost team fight in hopes to wipe the enemy team. LGD killed the Tiny and took the throne resulting in a very happy LGD team and a fatigued CDEC; LGD were joking around with each other as they emerged from the playing booth for a break whereas CDEC sat slumped in their chair.
Game 4:
The early game looked grim for LGD as they lost a majority of their lanes and failed multiple ganks which often resulted in a loss team fight. But when all seemed lost, CDEC made a series of uncharacteristically bad play in a team fight at the Dire offlane, resulting in a near teamwipe of CDEC. This much needed xp gained by the LGD team was not wasted as the Ember Spirit started snowballing and the support Zeus started outputting tons of magical damage in team fights, riding this momentum, LGD won team fight after team fight and inched closer to the 200,000RMB prize. When LGD finally broke high ground and took a set of rax, CDEC admitted defeat.
Photos by Ben Tan, GosuGamers 2014
Source: gleague
