Patriotism, pride, and sodium levels. It’s that time of the year again where these three elements hit critical mass as the 2018 League of Legends Mid-Season Invitational rounds the corner. This year, expect the competition to be even more fierce as the gap between teams not named Kingzone DragonX narrows as the battle for first to lose to the Koreans is underway. Without further ado, starting from the top, here are the 2018 MSI Power Rankings:

1. Kingzone DragonX

What a bold prediction. Kingzone DragonX took first place in the League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) with little resistance, and the argument could be made that teams like Afreeca and KT alone could win this tournament. Not only is this team better than both aforementioned teams, but they absolutely crushed both teams in the regular season and playoffs. That being said, while they’re quite obviously the strongest team on paper, we’ve seen plenty 1st seed Korean teams get upset in international competition (GE Tigers at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice 2015, SKT at MSI 2015, Samsung Ozone Season 3 worlds). The biggest weakness the LCK has shown was the reactive nature of teams like KZ while teams outside of the region have shown they’re more than comfortable being aggressive. So between that and a natural disaster, a lot can happen to make Kingzone not win this tournament.

2. Royal Never Give Up

China has continuously impressed the world with the absolute talent within the region. But in a region with the likes of iBoy, Jackeylove, and smlz, the king reigns supreme as Uzi remains undoubtedly the best ADC in China (and some argue the world). Moreover, the team around Uzi are some of the best players to come out of the region. Xiaohu remains in the top 3 best mid-laners in the Tencent League of Legends Pro League (LPL), MLXG has been on a tear, and Ming is also notably the player with the most assists per game in the LPL playoffs. RNG’s only weak spot is that both their toplaners aren’t star players who could go toe-to-toe with the likes of Khan, but they still fulfill their roles adequately.

3. Fnatic

Fnatic look fantastic. Losing a total of 5 games through the regular season and playoffs of the EU LoL Championship Series (EU LCS), the games have looked convincing. Even with their substitute top-laner, Fnatic only lost one game in the playoffs. Individually, this might be one of the best teams Europe has ever produced without the help of imports, as Rekkles and Broxah boast some of the best stats ever seen in the EU LCS (both of them only dying twice throughout both their playoff series). This and the fact that EU tends to perform quite well internationally allow Fnatic to snag the third spot.

4. Team Liquid

The meme continues. While Liquid are 4th on this list, there’s very little standing in between them and Fnatic. Like Fnatic, Liquid seemed comfortable throughout the playoffs and ended up with only one game loss with one more series played than Fnatic. If you thought Rekkles was the KDA master, Doublelift ended playoffs with a 39 KDA. The rest of the team are no slouches either. As Olleh continues making a name for himself being the undisputed best support in North America, Impact remains a rock in the top lane. Pobelter is still the best true NA mid-laner, and Xmithie still continues to create space for his stars to go at it.

5. Flashwolves

Flashwolves are an unpredictable entity that always performs predictably. On some days, Flashwolves can destroy the top Korean team with their superior skirmishing and individual players. On other days, Flashwolves look sub-par and don’t have fundamentals or macro knowledge to fall back on. The other big issue is the fact that they’ve won the Taiwanese League Master Series (LMS) 5 times in a row only to continue to fall short internationally. Add on the fact that they’ve lost their superstar jungler, Karsa, and you’ve got a team that seems better than the other play-in teams, but have a lot of work to do if they want to be top 4.

6. SuperMassive

Past the top 5, placing the rest of the teams is an incredibly difficult task due to the fact that there’s little precedent to how these teams would play outside of their region. SuperMassive takes 6th off of the fact that Turkey looks to be the best wildcard region in League of Legends. With imported Koreans on every team in the region, the level of competition has stepped up massively and the top of that region is SuperMassive. This region continues to impress, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they become a major spoiler for this tournament.

7. EVOS Esports

Last year, a relatively unknown Vietnamese team named Gigabyte Marines gained themselves a plethora of new fans with their performance against the likes of Team Solomid, World Elite, and Gamers2. Unfortunately, the team wont be making MSI as they lost in a tight 5 game series to EVOS Esports.

While not much is known about EVOS, their 12-2 record in a region that was the best wildcard region just last year shows a lot of promise. Players to look out for are Warzone an ex-Saigon Joker mid-laner who was dominant throughout the season and Slay the best ADC in the region, and in my opinion, the series MVP for their final vs GAM.

8. Rainbow 7

Previously Lyon Gaming, the team is no stranger to the international stage. Domestically, this team has won Latin America North since the region was established, totaling up to 9 titles. While this domestic dominance is impressive, there remains a lot of question marks especially around their star ADC WhiteLotus who sat out the whole season due to toxic behavior. He’ll be back for MSI, but after not playing for a whole split, there’s reasonable doubt to how this team will actually perform.

9. Kabum!

While the organization is a familiar face, this roster is one of the more inexperienced ones on the list. Their road to MSI was rocky to begin with as they barely beat Vivo Keyd in a 5 game series, and that’s the final in a region that has remained fairly weak. They rank this highly because they made it to the top of a relatively competitive region and have a lot of potential being as new as they are.

10. Gambit

An even more familiar face this time with familiar players alongside it, Gambit have their place in LoL history set in stone as one of the best teams in Europe. Unfortunately, the CIS powerhouse has been having a rough time reclaiming their old flame as Intel Extreme Masters Cologne, their last tournament win, was almost 5 years ago. They rank 10th because, while they haven’t achieved anything as of late, this team has some history behind it. Not to mention they dominated their regional playoffs.

11. Dire Wolves

With all the teams at MSI, Dire Wolves are probably the least talked about. Last MSI they managed to avoid getting bottom 2 winning two games in the play-in. This unfortunately results in them being good enough to not be joked about, but nowhere near good enough to be even considered for getting out of play-ins.

12. Pentagram

When it comes to less favored play-in teams, the ability to boil down who would win gets less and less analytical the lower you go. So Pentagram gets 12th place because they have Koreans. No seriously. Well to be fair to Pentagram and Japan as a whole, their best players are YutoriMoyasi and Ramune. If anything, the Korean imports around them are the weaker links. Overall, the region’s lack of presence and the fact that the last time we saw them, they went 0-4 at worlds leads me to believe that, while there are no weak teams at worlds, we’re starting to hit the teams who are tiers behind the rest of the competition.

13. Ascension

In a region that used to boast the likes of Taipei Assassins, AHQ-esports, GAM, and Saigon Jokers, it had to take two powerhouse countries leaving the league for Ascension to win it. Without the likes of Taiwan and Vietnam, the region’s competitiveness is seemingly non-existent. Coupled with the fact that this team has never been on the international stage due to being blocked constantly by the likes of GAM, the only reason they’re not last is because Garena was at one point a hard league, and Ascension were always doing well domestically.

14. Kaos Latin Gamers

The only thing this team really has going for it is the fact that they won a game last season at worlds play-in against a team that was on the upper end of the wildcards. With nothing to show from both the region and the experience, this team is most likely not do very well at MSI.