Every tournament sees a few new teams qualifying for the main event, but the TI 7 champions, Team Liquid are a constant entity and nearly always make it to the finals. This time, in the grand finals of the StarLadder Season 4 Invitational, they faced up against LGD Gaming. LGD recently underwent a roster change and the new roster seems to be working as they beat Newbee 2-0 in the semifinals to make it to the grand finals. The grand finals was a four game affair which Liquid won (surprise surprise). Let’s look at the drafts of the four games and try to analyze the thought process behind them.

Game 1 (LGD first pick)

Phase One

BANS

LGD: Lone Druid, Chen, Keeper of the Light

Liquid: Bounty Hunter, Naga, Tiny

Other than Lone Druid, pretty standard first phase bans coming out from both teams in game one. Lone Druid is a Matumbaman favorite and maybe something LGD as a team weren’t looking to play against. But it isn’t one of the typical first phase bans we see nowadays. Chen is a strong meta hero who excels in many things – lane control, team fight, pushing and Kuroky’s Chen is a level above others. Always safe to keep it out. KotL is a GH special and it was one of the heroes deployed ny Liquid when they beat LGD 2-0 in the group stages. The Bounty Hunter ban still confuses me a little, why he is being given so much priority this patch. Although fy does play a hell of a BH, so better to be on the safe side. Liquid had already been burnt by kaka’s Naga in the ESL One Genting grand finals and fy has displayed he can do it pretty well to, so they got her out of the way. Finally, Tiny, who was a hot pick a few weeks ago, went cold, is now coming back had a 66.67% win rate at StarLadder before the finals (6 out of 9 wins) which saw it fit to keep him out of the equation.

PICKS

LGD: Elder Titan, Witch Doctor

Liquid: Razor, Disruptor

LGD had first pick and they went for the ET, which was a bit surprising as that really isn’t the hero most teams run to in the first phase. But I guess they had a plan around it. Liquid went with Razor and Disruptor. Razor is not only a strong team fight hero, which is perfect for the meta, but he is also great against Omni Knight and Tidehunter. Getting the Razor sort of blocks the possibility for the opposition to get two strong meta heroes. You can repel or you can Anchor Smash, it makes no difference to Static Link. Razor will steal a ton of damage and take you down. LGD rounded it up with a Witch Doctor, which seems to be xNova’s go to hero. He did a heck of a job with it against Newbee in the semifinals when LGD came back from a 16k gold deficit in game two.

Phase Two

BANS

LGD: Earth Spirit, Pugna

Liquid: Queesn of Pain, Phantom Lancer

Earth Spirit was probably a respect ban considering how good GH is on that hero. The Pugna ban was looking at Liquid’s game in the semifinals against Mineski. Liquid do run these single core lineups where Miracle gets total farm priority and Matumbaman plays on an early game team fight hero. The QoP ban was more of a player ban than a strategy ban. Maybe is maybe the best QoP out there along with Sccc. Phantom Lancer was banned out as he is a decent counter to the Razor (not a lot of illusion clear and difficult to steal always Link and steal damage from the right PL) and maybe also as Ame’s PL annihilated Newbee even when on the backfoot.

PICKS

LGD: Enchantress, Lycan

Liquid: Night Stalker, Dragon Knight

The Enchantress offlane pick was something totally out of the blue. Maybe as much as a surprise to Liquid as to the viewers. The only thing I can think of is LGD wanted to push and end the game before Liquid had a chance to get online. And Enchantress with a couple of creeps can help with that. Basically, she’s a poor man’s Chen when it comes to pushing. Another reason might be her damage output is not affected by Static Link and depends only on the distance. The Lycan pick following Ench suggested that it would be a push strat. Liquid went for the Night Stalker, which works great with the Disruptor. The extra vision is great for a long Glimpse back. Dragon Knight was brought on as a sturdy, tanky frontliner, who doesn’t do down easily when barged upon by heroes and summons and has a way to deal with them.

Phase Three

BANS

LGD: Omni Knight

Liquid: Outworld Devourer

With neither Rubik nor Razor in LGD’s lineup, Omni would have been a decent pick for Liquid. LGD made sure that didn’t happen. The OD and Lycan pairing is something teams have been turning to. Lycan is in the limelight for the first 25 minutes or so, taking down towers and hopefully barracks. If that plan does not really work to perfection, OD makes sure he farms up and the team has a late game fighter. Liquid, having studied this, banned out the OD.

PICKS

LGD: Shadow Fiend

Liquid: Storm Spirit

SF has received a slight nerf in 7.08, but nothing good old Maybe can’t handle. It’s only till you get to level seven, after which the hero is pretty much the same. Strong meta hero, who like the OD, scales well into the late game and you don’t end up putting all eggs into the same basket (which here, is push). Liquid took a good look at LGD’s lineup and seeing there was not reliable catch, went for the Storm Spirit. The Dragon Knight, who seemed to be the mid laner, actually turned out to be Mind_Control’s hero so he would actually be used as the tanky frontliner to soak up damage, stun and reduce enemy damage. Both teams needed to get ahead by having a good laning stage. Liquid’s two supports, Disruptor and NS are quite bad when playing from behind and LGD because they did not have the tools to deal with the Storm Spirit late in the game.

Game 2 (Liquid first pick)

Phase One

BANS

LGD: Chen, Tiny, Razor

Liquid: Bounty Hunter, Elder Titan, Naga Siren

LGD decided to ban out the Razor come game two, having had to pay the price of not doing so in game one. Liquid made a few changes of their own, banning the ET, though not too sure why. The were able to deal with it pretty well in game one.

PICKS

LGD: Witch Doctor, Lycan

Liquid: Omni Knight, Disruptor

I don’t get why Disruptor is hardly ever banned off. Maybe because if you run at a lane with Disruptor support, there’s not much he can do. But still, the guy has a decent win rate (54.4 % from 182 games in 2018). Razor being out of the picture, Liquid took Omni for themselves. This is where it gets a bit confusin. LGD picked WD, which is fair is xNova is good on it. But there Rubik wasn’t picked up, even though he is good against Omni and fy is definitely one of the best Rubik players out there. But the reason for that was revealed later in the draft. They took the Lycan instead and Liquid went for the Disruptor. A note on the Lycan-Disruptor interaction: Lycan is good in a way against Disruptor alone as even though Disruptor can Glimpse him, the Wolves and summons are more than enough to get the kill on the Disruptor. But in case of a team fight, when Lycan comes running from yonder hills, a Glimpse back can send him quite a distance away from the fight location and possibly waste Shapeshift.

Phase Two

BANS

LGD: Night Stalker, Earth Spirit

Liquid: Rubik, Queen of Pain

If you see the plays GH makes, it will seem appropriate why teams ban out his heroes so much. LGD took out two of his heroes and Liquid, seeing Rubik had been ignored in the first phase, made sure LGD wouldn’t come back for it.

PICKS

LGD: Keeper of the Light, Beast Master

Liquid: Sand King, Storm Spirit

The second phase picks shed light on why LDG did not go for a Rubik. KotL and Beast Master picks indicated a push strat again, but this time they intended to go all in. KotL is great at not only clearing out creep waves, but mainly constantly healing his troops with Scepter Illuminates as they siege high ground. The pick also made sense of the NS ban. Beast Master and Lycan compliment each other very well with the attack speed aura and Howl making animals stronger! Sand King and Storm Spirit came out for Liquid, but this time LGD atleast had Primal Roar to deal with him. I believe SK, though quite good in crowd control situations, is still a lot better in the hands of Mind_Control than GH.

Phase Three

BANS

LGD: Gyrocopter

Liquid: Outworld Devourer

Gyrocopter is a great de-push hero. Call Down and Flack Cannon combined can get rid of all units quite comfortably. OD was again banned out by Liquid to prevent the Lycan-OD combination, but I have a feeling LGD never meant to go there.

PICKS

LGD: Dragon Knight

Liquid: Lone Druid

Matumbaman was thrust onto the Lone Druid and LGD got the DK for Maybe. Storm and Lone Druid both need some time to come online. In game one, Liquid had a Razor who can fight early but the game two lineup didn’t really have anyone like that. The clock was set for LGD and they had to try and run over Liquid early. The Dragon Knight’s tower taking abilities suited their cause perfectly and three strength cores would mean they weren’t easy to get rid of.

Game 3 (LGD first pick)

Phase One

BANS

LGD: Razor, Bounty Hunter, Keeper of the Light

Liquid: Razor, Tiny, Bounty Hunter

The Bounty Hunter bans are really baffling me here. The hero doesn’t even have a very good win rate. Since the turn of the year, BH has been involved in 79 professional games with a win rate of 48.10% (38 games). Why are teams wasting a ban on him? Get some dust and deal with it! You will realize why I had this outbreak in the next section.

PICKS

LGD: Elder Titan, Dragon Knight

Liquid: Io, Beast Master

You can ban BH, but you let the Io through. And you don’t want to let the Io through against Liquid, even though Tiny maybe banned out. Along with Io, Liquid got Beast master which had worked wonders for LGD in game two. LGD got ET and DK. DK had come out on the winning side in the first two games and LGD hoped the streak would continue.

Phase Two

BANS

LGD: Lone Druid, Lycan

Liquid: Phantom Lancer, Outworld Devourer

Liquid did end up going for the Sven and they probably had that in mind from before as Sven pairs very well with Io. Still, they did decide in banning out the PL. Ame’s PL really made short work of Moogy’s Sven in the semifinals and Liquid did not want to be the second victims of that.

PICKS

LGD: Witch Doctor, Night Stalker

Liquid: Rubik, Pugna

The WD pick the Chinese team always goes for seems to work perfectly here. WD’s stun is not only good against Beast Master as it bounces amongst him and his summons, it’s also a good against Io who stays close to his tethered target. Liquid managed to get their hands onto the Pugna, which was an indication they would be going the four-protect-one route again and that would be the Miracle hero.

Phase Three

BANS

LGD: Gyrocopter

Liquid: Terrorblade

Not too many heroes go well with Io. Some that do are Gyro, Chaos Knight, Sven and Tiny. LGD had one ban and that used it on the Gyro, considering he’s the in meta hero. Liquid banned out TB, thinking DK was the mid hero (who later turned out to be the safelane carry).

PICKS

LGD: Queen of Pain

Liquid: Sven

LGD had first pick in the last phase and went for Maybe’s QoP, a talismanic hero for him. Liquid thought Sven would be the best option, as QoP isn’t the tankiest of heroes and a Storm Hammer with a few God’s Strength swipes would take care of her. More than that, Sven is that strong hero that pairs well with the Wisp and has the solo core potential. LGD, like game one and two, went for a draft that would need them to win the lanes and take an early lead before the Rogue Knight got huge.

Game 4 (Liquid first pick)

Phase One

BANS

LGD: Tiny, Razor, Chen

Liquid: Naga Siren, Bounty Hunter, Beast Master

Hopefully something new here in the next tournament.

PICKS

LGD: Lycan, Disruptor

Liquid: Io, Brewmaster

Liquid went for the Io. LGD followed it up with a Lycan and Disruptor. Brewmaster was the choice for Mind_Control’s hero. Not a hero that’s picked up a lot this meta, but could fare well against Lycan, putting him in the air during Shapeshift.

Phase Two

BANS

LGD: Sven, Pugna

Liquid: Dragon Knight, Omni Knight

Sven and Pugna ban. LGD were not going to get sucker punched by the same combos again.

PICKS

LGD: Ogre Magi, Puck

Liquid: Bane, Gyrocopter

Liquid picked Bane, a support that hasn’t seen a lot of success as of late but is picked in the odd game. LGD followed it up by two very strange picks. Ogre? Feels like I’m back in 6.88. And Puck, who has been largely disregarded since the change to Dream Coil. He was picked three times before the grand finals and lost all three games. Surely this would be an offlane Puck and there would be some hero like Sniper, OD or Medusa that would benefit hugely from the Bloodlust. Liquid picked Gyro, another hero that goes well with Wisp.

Phase Three

BANS

LGD: Templar Assassin

Liquid: Sniper

Liquid banned the Sniper, fearing a snowball with Bloodlust as the drug. If Sniper gets to a critical mass and you have no way of getting to him, it is a very big problem. LGD banned the TA, although no specific reason springs to mind.

PICKS

LGD: Doom

Liquid: Outworld Devourer

Liquid rounded their draft up with OD, which also proved to be a block pick for LGD as Bloodlusted OD can really gather up the intelligence in a fight and unleash the Sanity’s Eclipse. LGD played Liquid’s game of ‘guess the position’ and went for a Doom! This meant that the Puck was going mid, but it made no sense. The only right clicker in the game to really benefit from the Ogre was Lycan. Additionally, Doom is not the best pick against a Wisp. You Doom someone and Wisp can just relocate the hero to safety. You Doom the Wisp, well, that’s not the target you want to disable with a 140 second cooldown ultimate. LGD sort of out drafted themselves in this last game.

headline image courtesy of StarLadder