FLY are having a rough summer split. They are having different issues pop up each week and they are turning to V1per to carry them out of their mess. The only issue is they don’t know how to utilize V1per’s pressure well enough on top of their team not understanding how to support this playstyle. Lets go over the game to understand the good and bad things showed by FLY.

In the beginning FLY’s initial game plan is to let top lane pull while Santorin clears downward. Viktor will struggle getting priority till lvl 7 and E upgrade. Santorin would then most likely ward top river and look once for Camille to either cover or gank.

FLY’s duo is able to get priority, leading to Santorin taking bot scuttle. Amazing showed with only one secondary camp and two buffs, meaning Santorin knew Amazing had more to clear or miss out to go for top scuttle.

Santorin gets both scuttles, followed by an easy gank top. This is a great start for FLY.

FLY’s next game plan is letting V1per solo push top while Santorin again clears top to bot, assuming V1per can evade any gank with flash and hookshot (Kennen no flash helps too).

FLY had Wadid base early, Wildturtle waits for 100T’s duo to base, and then teleport back leading to dragon contest. Everything again looks good for FLY, except it begins the first mistake of the game. Turtle never rotates over to assist dragon. He believes his team is fine. The dragon lives for too long, giving 100T’s the chance to collapse. FLY make a split decision on attacking Viktor leading to Wadid’s death. At the same time, V1per is moving down. He ends up wasting time letting Fakegod even out the minion lead.

Turtle does not register the danger he is in with Wadid dead and Santorin not opting to finish his clear bot. 100T dive bot. They kill Turtle, which starts 100T’s main win condition, snowballing bot lane. Why is this important? If 100T can control mid lane, it help deny Tahm Kench voyage plays. Additionally, 100T can now collapse on V1per to reduce his kill pressure on Fakegod.

FLY make the reasonable herald play in response to Turtle dying. The most obvious choice for FLY to make after taking herald is figuring out a time to use it top. If they use it top, then Turtle once again will be forced off the wave. The bot lane deficit will grow. The play both helps and hurts FLY. There are other options though.

FLY could look to pinch mid with Sejuani and Tahm Kench voyage. Viktor has no cleanse. Assuming 100T will keep their duo bot to finish off the last two plates, this puts FLY in a man advantage. Killing Viktor leads to the entire mid tower. Chunking him could lead to the whole tower (may take too long to fully kill tower leading to 100T’s duo walking up to save it).

FLY could also look into using Camille to pinch mid with Sejuani offering more lock down. Either bot swaps early to try to grab one or two plates top before 100T’s duo arrives, or they give up some minions top to assist in the mid play.

Lastly, FLY could use voyage without moving Turtle, only Wadid moves. Turtle will wait for his wave at his tier 2.

The reason taking mid tower is such a big deal for FLY’s composition is it allows for FLY to pressure mid flanks with Sejuani and Camille, along with allowing FLY to push deeper opening up for better voyage opportunities. Team Liquid has shown you can win games purely through flanking mid.

Neither of these things happen though. FLY do not look towards attacking Viktor, but take the more obvious choice. The small problem with their play is having Turtle rotate mid. He gives up minions bot. While it may not be an insane amount it still adds up to his deficit. FLY most likely were thinking about how Turtle has no job bot, however did not think about how little their duo lane has to offer without Camille or Sejuani involved in the play.

Continuing with FLY’s V1per game plan, FLY must deal with the next onslaught from 100T’s duo lane by defending top tower. Santorin opted to hand off blue before 100T showed up, then clear two camps bot. The time spent here puts pressure on FLY’s duo and helps 100T establish their top river vision.

Once Santorin finishes FLY are now able to start taking back some of the vision. Viktor and Rakan get chipped. V1per is rotating up from bot. FLY should be able to clean the vision at the cost of Kennen getting to push out his wave. FLY don’t fully commit to erase the vision.

FLY do not want Fakegod having the chance to push out his wave, leading to FLY only cleaning half of 100T’s top river vision.

Without clearing the vision 100T move up to take top tower. Even worse, while Amazing cleared his blue camps, Santorin did not because only his blue buff is up at the time. Amazing gets to close the gold gap.

First, go back to the image where FLY starts moving to clear 100T’s top river vision. Notice 100T have their blue buff up along with both secondary camps. FLY can contest this side of the map. If it pulls 100T’s duo then it buys Turtle time. If 100T opt to push top tower down then at least Santorin and V1per increase their lead.

Looking at the above image, Turtle has no job and Santorin is moving away from his blue camps. FLY have voyage to move Turtle to mid for a possible pinch with Santorin. Fakegod will feel invisible pressure from Santorin since his team is forcing top tower. If he stays bot he either has vision on FLY or wants to buy time. In most cases, the player will back off.

FLY do not have to use voyage for mid, but being in range offers a play option if it looks good. One thing you will notice good teams doing is giving up one lane to control two. This game is one of those scenarios where doing so will push your game plan forward. Sitting on Camille without utilizing or helping Turtle only puts 100T in a better position to do what they want to do.

Again, Santorin is covering V1per’s side vs assisting to cover Pobelter’s push (he is never able to get a deep push compared to Ryu due to this) or defensive vision for FLY’s duo. 100T are able to brute force mid since they aren’t worried about Santorin.

FLY will fail a fight due to some mechanics and timing. V1per’s hookshot was on cooldown so Rakan does not get locked down. FLY end up giving over V1per’s shutdown, which only benefits 100T. This marks FLY’s first main usage of V1per’s strength in mid game.

To make matters worse, all the time Santorin placed on V1per side, bot, resulted in FLY never having any baron vision. Without helping Turtle or Pobelter, 100T realize baron is wide open. An early baron on a team fight composition vs a 4–1 is not good. Turtle is also still an entire item behind Xayah. While V1per can attempt to one shot someone, he does not have the tankiness to dive into 100T’s composition. The team also lacks AOE compared to 100T, who have Viktor and Kennen.

100T end up helping FLY with how they approached their initial baron power play. 100T staggered their waves vs timing them to crash at the same time. FLY were able to rotate back and forth to defend. 100T correct this mistake after their bases, but it wasted too much of their baron.

By the end of 100T’s first baron, FLY will have lost all their tier 2 towers. Not a complete loss since they didn’t lose an inhibitor. Turtle was given enough time to hit his three item power spike, helping equalize his power vs Bang. Second baron is now the next decider. FLY find themselves in an awkward situation. 100T start the baron. V1per is split pushing. FLY have to be at a knife’s edge without putting themselves in danger of an engage. It’s their only play. Unfortunately, the second Fakegod spots Pobelter using his R should be the start of Fakegod’s engage. Worst case scenario for 100T is losing bot inhibitor, but securing kills and baron. Not a bad situation for 100T. They would be able to push out the super wave and look to even out the inhibitors at the worst.

End game time. Without losing the second baron and having supers push bot, FLY are in the driver seat. FLY have three plays open to them.

Option one is not having V1per bot. If Fakegod was playing a top laner who could quickly clear the super wave then V1per must stay bot. However, Kennen has a lot of issues clearing the wave. Sending V1per top will allow FLY to pressure top tier 2, makes getting any immediate picks easier, and can bait baron to pull Fakegod off the super wave.

Option two is keeping their setup, but looking to do a bait and switch. The bait is baron. Make 100T come to baron, then look for a Tahm voyage play on Kennen. Camille’s ultimate will keep Kennen from running while forcing an end game scenario for 100T. Zoe is very good at stopping backs. It’s a riskier option with bigger upside.

Option three is simply having Camille rotate from bot to mid. Force an engage and get one kill. This would be the more standard approach. The downside is if 100T keep their right flank warded they can most likely avoid the play, delaying the game instead.

FLY went with option three resulting in the game drawing out. Eventually dragon spawns. 100T go for the dragon and FLY’s first idea is starting baron. They have full control.

One problem with this play was FLY never use Sivir’s ultimate or voyage to arrive at baron faster. Another is FLY never look to turn. You could say, if FLY turn they may all die, in which case they lose the game. If their call is to burn and run, then one of FLY’s players needs to buy time by zoning. Zoe’s bubble works. Wadid attacking works, though not as effective. Anything to reduce their losses.

Unfortunately, 100T are able to take mid inhibitor off their kills. FLY then go on to dying one by one due to extending too far. First it was V1per top, then Santorin and Wadid mid, and finally V1per mid.

Take-Aways

This is only one of FLY’s games, but in their current state the dependency of V1per’s play is hurting them. FLY do not care on giving up one lane to propel the other two. They aren’t thinking about what resources their other pieces of their composition require in order to support V1per and what resources the enemy composition needs for their win condition, like having the ability to control mid lane in mid game. Whether it be from rotating Camille out to buy Sivir some time for items, relieving pressure to enable a voyage play, or buying time for Zoe to get chip damage down. There are options laid out for FLY, they just either aren’t confident enough to take them or know of them. Of these options FLY made two main plays in mid/late game.

The first was the collapse play by Santorin and V1per, where the conditions were slightly in their favor. They traded one for one. The second play did have the conditions stacked in their favor, bot inhibitor down and control of baron, and still came away with a rushed play that didn’t heavily favor them.

It really felt like the game was too easy for 100T. Once they got the bot lead, it was all they focused on. The only big play they made was the first baron sneak. A lack of understanding, with a complicated composition, and without top tier talent will lose to a simple game plan. Either FLY needs to change their dependency on V1per or the team needs to push forward with V1per, hoping this will turn the team around before gauntlet.

Most images are from the VOD while the first picture is taken from RiotGames’ flickr, https://www.flickr.com/photos/lolesports/48122996592/.