This Year's Worlds = Biggest NA/EU Dream. [Spoilers]

Every year I would butt-clench for NA/EU teams at worlds. Other than C9/FNC moving past QF and take a game off of the KR teams, I waved another year goodbye with tears. ;_;

However, this year got me excited like never before~!

I'm just sharing my thoughts and predictions on the S6 Worlds Championship. If you don't agree, you're more than welcome to share your opinion!

NA/EU top seed have shown great results so far this season.

CLG quickly recovered from what appears to be their routinely mid-late season stroke, and proceed to go 6-0 in the playoffs. Particularly 3-0'ing their long time rivals TSM. Their triple threat as a result of highly mechanical laners, their vastly improved coaching staff and most importantly, unwavering confidence in one another gave them the tools to be #1 in NA.

Fnatic is just Fnatic. Arguably the top achieving team in the West for a very long time. With the biggest roster shakeup in over 3 seasons, Fnatic shocked the world. A completely new lineup made up of rising stars and rookies, they secured 1st place in their debut split, took SKT to game 5 at MSI, and proceed to smash their way through summer split 18-0. In less than a year, every member on Fnatic has become an esports sensation. Huni's holoholoholo, Febiven the Faker-slayer, the strongest bot lane in Europe.. Their 3-2 finish over OG at playoffs made them look a bit shaky, but that's only because OG showed really good form as well.

Surprisingly, this year's third seeds are superb underdogs. (C9/OG).

C9 had always given their region bragging rights at international events, and they seemed to have fully recovered from their early slump this season, and perhaps even evolved over the course of the gauntlet. Hai's return as a shotcaller finally gave C9 the secret ingredient they had been missing since their 2013-2014 domination. Incarnati0n has finally shown his mechanical prowess. Sneaky is convincingly proved himself to be neck to neck with Doubelift as the premier ADC in NA. He carried so many games in the gauntlet with sheer mechanical outplays over his opponents.

Origen dealt the first loss to Fnatic since the Spring split in Game 1 of the BO5 series. They outplayed FNC in drafting, and virtually suffocated Fnatic from objectives/resources. They still fell short by a small margin and lost Game 5, but they went well above and beyond expectations against Fnatic. Xpeke have being criticized as being passive and inconsistent, but he always show up big at worlds. Soaz outplayed Huni with his Gangplank with the sheer knowledge of what the champion can and cannot do, so we can expect that to be taken away from him. Former TSM member Amazing as well as their formidable bot lane will provide great games for us to watch.

Unfortunately, with the extraordinary teams heading into Worlds this year from all around the globe, I won't be surprised when they leave the stage earlier than they'd like. But I'd cheer for them anyways - and if they put up a good fight, I'll be proud of them :)

CLG and FNC should make it past Groups easily having shown their form this year. I was a bit worried for CLG given that we have yet to see their international performance, but that's until I saw their dream group

##notevenRNGcanescapefaithage

They got a mid-tier KR team, a IWC team, and 2nd seed from LMS. Most importantly, no LPL teams (all 3 seeds were considered serious contenders). It still won't be easy, but that group is really as easy as it gets for any team at this level.

Quite frankly, I'm too enthusiastic about the second seeds of EU/NA - H2K and TSM. Given the difficulty of their groups, as well as watching all of their games in the split/playoffs, I have to say that they don't stand a chance making it out of group stages. This has to do with both teams' playstyles as well as their inconsistencies.

For H2k, there is no way they can pair up against SKT/EDG - two of the strongest team at Worlds. They'll probably go 2-4 with both wins over Bangkok Titans. They are literally outclassed in every role by SKT/EDG. There are times where H2K look super strong, and then I see them losing to bottom tier EU teams all willy-nilly.

TSM might be able to challenge OG to avoid the embarrassing 4th place 0-6, and even that is assuming they have improved significantly since the playoffs. The 'play-reactionary-and-let-Bjergson-carry' scenario will only work in NA, not here. Especially not here against LGD and KT. I think they'll take a game off of OG, and go 1-5. There are rumors right now that CJ refuse to scrim TSM because of how bad they are right now. Hopefully that is just rumor.

The 3rd seeds from NA/EU are indeed stronger than the 2nd seeds. That's looking at from both their head-to-head record and how their overall state of form will go up against international teams.

OG beat H2K 3-1 in the semi before losing to FNC in the finals. Even though they did better than H2K, they weren't in the spring split therefore they didn't have enough Championship points for the 2nd seed - which allowed H2K to autoqualify before the Gauntlets.

C9's journey is the most extraordinary one I've ever witnessed in Esports. From relegation zone, to 7th place, to 6th place tie breaker, to back-to-back reverse sweeps, to a convincing win over #1 summer split place TL. It's just a great story. Surprisingly, C9 went 2-0 against TSM in the Summer Split, despite them struggling against even low-tier teams. That leaves me wondering. Had Hai came back sooner as the shotcaller, and they adapt faster to the new lineup, they could've very possibly become the 2nd or even 1st seed! But there's no what-ifs in LoL, so that's irrelevant at this point. What matters is that their initiative, strong game sense and proactive map movements make them a more formidable opponent than the passive team TSM is. When you make the first move in a League of Legends, you have the game in your hands. Whether or not you can hold onto it is a another story.

The winner will probably still be between the likes LGD/EDG/SKT. Only Western team that can realistically challenge that is FNC. But I'm just so excited because for the first time in a long time, Western teams (M5 anyone?) have a good chance of toppling Asian teams.

TL;DR: C'mon you get a cookie if you read it :)