In a Press Release, Riot Games has announced that Scouting Grounds are officially coming back with some new parts added or being brought back. They will be partnering with Honda, thus rebranding it to the Honda Scouting Grounds. This was part of an announcement back in August that did not include the new branding. The event will be held at the LCS studios on November 11-16.

Along with the news of the rebranding is that the Draft is coming back and Riot will be working with Mobalytics as the stats and data partners for the event. They will, “provide stats-based profiles of every competitor at the Honda Scouting Grounds, including results from solo queue and the FACEIT circuit (if applicable).” Some of these profiles will be on the website so that fans can compare the players.

They will be drawing the players from the top of solo queue as they have normally done. Riot will also be bringing in players from the new FACEIT circuit. This was announced in early June where the partnership would also extend to four of the top amateur tournament and league organizers. Player One Esports, Upsurge Esports, Dark Star Gaming and Paleo Gaming all held qualifiers for the FACEIT circuit this summer. These qualifiers saw the best two teams from each make it to a bracket where the top two teams from that qualified for the Honda Scouting Grounds.

Draft Details

The Draft will take place after the first-place match on November 16. Riot has changed up some of the details:

How It Works When a team chooses a player, they’re drafting exclusive negotiating rights with the player. The rights will last for 10 days, from Nov 17-26. Players are not required to sign with teams who have drafted them. Each LCS team is granted 1 pick. Teams are allowed to trade and sell picks. The pick order for teams is the reverse order of LCS standings from Summer Split. This allows teams who are potentially the most interested in top new talent to benefit the most from the event. The order will be as follows: 1st – Evil Geniuses 2nd – FlyQuest 3rd – 100 Thieves 4th – Golden Guardians 5th – Immortals 6th – TSM 7th – Counter Logic Gaming 8th – Dignitas (formerly Clutch Gaming) 9th – Cloud 9 10th – Team Liquid



With the LCS struggling at Worlds, there have been discussions that NA talent should get more attention. This is definitely a step in the right direction as there were some questions about the purpose of last year’s Scouting Grounds. With the changes being made, this year’s Honda Scouting Grounds should not only have some fun games but, should hopefully reveal some previously unseen talent.

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