Note: This is not a list of players that I believe to be the absolute best individually in their roles. This is a list of who I believe to be most valuable in their role. This is based on their individual split performance, but also on how much their team relies on them to perform at a high level. How much “value” one player brings to a team is very subjective, but I’ll try to explain in-depth for every player listed. Please visit http://www.oracleselixir.com/ for all stats used in this article.

Top Lane – Kim “ssumday” Chan-ho

While I wouldn’t characterize Ssumday as the absolute best top laner in Korea, that right is reserved for Duke, Ssumday was one of the biggest beneficiaries of the top lane meta shift that put a lot of weight on his shoulders in a team dynamic sense. KT Rolster adapted to this meta shift with a more carry oriented top lane really, really well and as such Ssumday is seeing success he has never seen before. Playing in a team that doesn’t have any other true star carries, Ssumday was the one and only big name on this roster for the first half of this split prior to Piccaboo being picked up. Being given extremely high priority both in the draft phase where he is often allowed counter picks and in-game where he is given a very large amount of resources, KT Rolster as a team lives and dies based on Ssumday’s performances. This top lane heavy focus landed KT Rolster as the second place team going into playoffs, a vast improvement from their fifth place finish in Spring. His performance during the second half of the split was particularly notable, leading KT Rolster to a 17-6 match record and shooting up the standings from sixth place in week six all the way to where they are now in second place.

Kills – 131

Deaths – 82

Assists – 297

K+A/D – 5.2

Average Kill Participation – 66.8%

Death Percentage – 20.7%

Damage Percentage – 19.8%

Gold Percentage – 23.4%

Earned Gold Per Minute – 243.3

While he was widely regarded as a mediocre top laner prior to the exodus, and for much of this year, he has hit a new level of play this split and much of it has to do with how KT plays around him. With a massive champ pool and a wide variety of play styles, KT’s focus on getting him ahead and putting him in strong positions to carry has helped elevate his play. He has returned the favor by giving his team very good reasons to support him in-game. As such, Ssumday is my most valuable top laner. It’s very hard to imagine many other top laners doing what he’s able to do, producing the results he is producing, with the fairly sub-par supporting cast around him.

Jungle – Lee “Chaser” Sang-hyun

Despite performing on a team that narrowly missed out on the Summer playoffs, Chaser was the best performing jungler in the entire league by an immense margin. I really can’t think of another jungler that deserved this spot due to the overall mediocrity that fills the jungle role in Korea. Being the only jungler left in the league that performed well in the year prior to the exodus, Chaser has been one of the main carries for Jin Air during both Spring and Summer. Jin Air is actually one of the very few teams in the world that places a lot of resources and tangible importance into their jungle position. Much like Ssumday, Chaser garners more resources than any other jungler. While I do feel Jin Air as a team played the Summer meta horribly, never truly adapting where their resources should be going as the season progressed, I can’t take that away from Chaser, whose individual play was phenomenal for the most part. His game knowledge and adaptability during this split, something he horribly lacked in Spring, were two stand out traits. In nearly every win Jin Air garnered, it was off the back of Chaser stepping up to the plate and dragging his two solo laners along for the ride, both of whom showed little carry ability for one reason or another.

Kills – 89

Deaths – 76

Assists – 285

K+A/D – 4.9

Average Kill Participation – 78.1%

Death Percentage – 19.8%

Gold Differential at 10 – +83.4

Damage Percentage – 14.4%

Gold Percentage – 18.9%

Earned Gold Per Minute – 189.3

It’s a shame to see him looking in from the outside of the playoff hunt, but he still has the Regional gauntlet to show off his skill and attempt to carry the inept Jin Air management to Worlds for the first time in their existence. I’m of the belief that a good portion of the failures of Jin Air were the result of utter mismanagement and a player of his caliber definitely deserved a better, more consistent roster around him.

Mid Lane – Shin “CoCo” Jin-yeong

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t consider Coco the best mid laner in the region. That title is all Faker and I don’t think it’s a debate. However, I do very much consider Coco the second best in the region and one of the absolute best in the world. He is a phenomenal talent and what places him over Faker on this list is watching him drag the near-lifeless corpse of Summer 2014 CJ Frost all the way to a third place finish here in Summer 2015. I am also of the belief that Faker’s importance to his team is greatly lessened by the current meta in mid lane. There is zero doubt Faker had an astounding Summer split and is the best mid, however what he had to work with is miles ahead of what Coco had to work with. I believe Coco brings more overall to the corpse of CJ Frost than what Faker does to SK Telecom.

Now that the prefacing of why I believe Coco was more valuable than Faker this split is out-of-the-way, let’s talk about just how great Coco is. The one and only carry for CJ Entus, no one else on the roster is as good or as important to the success of the team. Watching him largely grow as a player after the IEM Katowice event, he came back to Korea and expanded every single aspect of his game. Champ pool woes that plagued him in the past? Gone. Wariness to force aggressive moves in-game? Gone. Fearfulness to take up a hard carry mentality? Gone. Returning to Korea from Katowice he just took off as a player. Renewed, he was going to carry the incredibly weak team around him to relevance. If you told me the CJ Frost roster of Summer 2014, the team that didn’t even make round of eight, was going to replace its star jungler with a washed up mid laner and improve, I would have told you that you were out of your mind. That improvement is entirely on the back of this young man. This CJ Entus squad that is filled with legacy players would be lost in the depths of Korea without Coco to carry them back to relevance. Being a solid laner and a flawless team fighter, he bucks the trend that a mid laner can’t be the sole carry of a team and still be successful. The only other comparable teams in Korea to CJ Entus in regards to the mid lane importance are Incredible Miracle and Rebels Anarchy, both teams sitting far down in the bottom of the standings. That is what makes Coco great and that is what makes him the most valuable mid laner in Korea.

Kills – 199

Deaths – 109

Assists – 274

K+A/D – 4.3

Average Kill Participation – 70.6%

CS Differential at 10 – +0.4

Gold Percentage – 26.3%

Damage Percentage – 32.5%

Death Percentage – 18.0%

Damage Per Minute – 674

Entering playoffs, he’ll have yet another chance to push for a Champions finals spot. He came within one game of it last split when he nearly took out SK Telecom. With a Regional gauntlet spot on lock, making it to Worlds and redeeming the poor Katowice performance appears to be top priority.

AD Carry – Oh “Ohq” Gyu-min

The only Najin e-mFire player on this list, Ohq stood out far more than any other marksman in Korea this split. His exceptionally aggressive and punishing style is abnormal to see in the current meta where marksmen are typically very weak and independent from the rest of the team. Extremely lane dominant with the mechanical skill to match, Ohq is widely regarded as the main carry of Najin. He is told to carry, given the resources to carry, and frequently follows through to victory. While I disagree with this philosophy given the current meta, at least Najin finally settled on something. Much like Jin Air’s meta incompetency, Najin was also struggling to find a successful identity through the split. Frequently splitting attention between Duke, Ggoong, and Ohq in terms of who was going to garner the most attention, eventually the team settled on putting Ohq on a pedestal and it paid off for the team in spades as they reeled off four straight set victories on their way to stealing the fifth and final playoff spot. Ohq’s standard laning is some of the absolute strongest in the world and this split he really shored up one of his major weaknesses which was his late game team fighting. Last split you would frequently see him make a mistake in the late game or just do something outright stupid. He has cut down on that this split and has had a much more focused style of play. No other marksman in Korea matches the impact Ohq has on a game or on his team.

Kills – 195

Deaths – 76

Assists – 227

K+A/D – 5.6

Average Kill Participation – 66.2%

Death Percentage – 14.6%

Damage Percentage – 30.1%

Gold Percentage – 26.9%

Earned Gold Per Minute – 275.1

Damage Per Minute – 537

Ohq will be performing in playoffs for the second time in his four split long career. After a very disappointing sixth place finish and being left out of the playoffs, Najin will have to rely on Ohq to bring them to a point where they can either compete in the playoffs or try to make a Regional gauntlet run like they did last year. Seeing how Ohq matches up on the world stage would be quite interesting.

Support – Lee “Piccaboo” Jong-beom

The only player on this list to only play half of the split, Piccaboo showed that he’s one of the most impactful players in Korea. Prior to bringing in Piccaboo, KT Rolster were sitting at a paltry 11-10 in overall matches. It was a sight better than how they performed all of Spring split, but it still wasn’t particularly strong. During the break between the first and second round robin, they went out and acquired the former SK Telecom support. Showing immediate improvement, KT Rolster won eight of their first ten matches, encompassing four set wins. Entering the famous telecom battle, KT Rolster would even knock giants SK Telecom off their 17 match win streak by taking the first match of the set. Despite the close losses, improvement for KT was very apparent. While his predecessor, Fixer, was solid, Piccaboo was on another level and brought a brand new style of play to the team. Syncing up immediately with jungler Score, their duo work allowed them to make plays around the map where Fixer just couldn’t. KT looked so much better as a team with Piccaboo and during the second half of the split they sprinted up the rankings, going 17-6 in matches, eventually taking a second place finish and being placed one best of five set away from facing off against their telecom rival in the Champions finals. With incredible play making skill and a very strong ward game alongside his roaming duo, Piccaboo has helped jump-start a team that was still floundering in the middle of the pack.

Kills – 15

Deaths – 50

Assists – 206

K+A/D – 4.4

Average Kill Participation – 72.1%

Wards Per Minute – 1.45

Wards Cleared Per Minute – 0.37

Looking like serious Champions playoff contenders, this might be the very first time that KT Rolster will send a team to Worlds. After a very poor Spring split they’re going to need a strong playoff or gauntlet performance to get them there. Their current roster is not near as talented as their past teams, but with players like Ssumday and Piccaboo leading it very well could be a possibility.

As stated at the very top, these are the players I believe are most valuable within their roles in Champions. Please check out www.oracleselixir.com for all things stat related and you may find me at https://twitter.com/stilwell__.