The introduction of Patch 7.16 in competitive play coincided with the the start of the 2017 League Championship Series summer playoffs. Based on seeding, teams could choose their preferred side for different matches of the game. With the introduction of the new patch, teams have so far been split on whether they prefer blue or red side.
In North America, three of four teams chose red side at every opportunity (Cloud9, Team Dignitas and Team Envy), while Counter Logic Gaming chose blue side in two of its three side choice games. Meanwhile, both Unicorns of Love and Misfits in Europe chose red side while G2 Esports and Splyce opted for blue side. In North America, red side won two out of three games, while in Europe, the results were evenly split, culminating in a 58 percent red side win rate across 17 games.
Historically, blue side has had an incredibly high win rate in League of Legends. At the 2016 World Championship Group Stage with no seeding or side selection at play, blue side still averaged a 60 percent win rate. Teams chose blue side in part because of the terrain advantages in ganking or diving bottom lane that come with not having to circumvent the krugs camp divider. The shorter lane and easy access to blue buff also allowed teams to more easily deny the enemy mid laner an ability to constantly spam spells if they managed to get ahead on blue side in the bottom lane.
While the recent red side results aren't significant enough to crown it the new favored side, the split in preference is enough to signify a rise in red side popularity. With many champions receiving nerfs and more play against previously perceived over-powered champions, fewer "must ban" champions on red side and the overall greater flexibility of drafting have left teams more open to enjoying the benefits of drafting on red side. The games last weekend showcased a few reasons why.
The preference started as far back as before the 2016 summer playoffs when teams like Splyce in the EU LCS chose red side to counterpick support, jungle or mid lane. The option for counter-picking roles for lane matchups more easily has always existed on red side, and the move to the 10-ban system only increased the counter-picking potential.
In the first game of 2017 NA LCS summer playoffs between Cloud9 and Team Dignitas, Caster Sam "Kobe" Hartman-Kenzler said the value in choosing red comes from a now classic strategy. Teams can choose their mid laner in the third pick and then immediately ban two mids that counter it.
"I think red side should be inherently advantaged," Joshua "Jatt" Leesman said during the Cloud and and Team Dignitas cast. "You get the first counterpick on the third pick. You get the first pick of the second phase. You get the last pick of the entire draft. But what usually happens is there's a really OP champ that you're then forced to ban on red side, and you can't first pick it."
Inherent blue side advantages still exist, which may have prompted Riot to come up with a 10-ban system that favored red side. Envy showed off the counter pick strengths of red especially in its playoff series against Counter Logic Gaming.
In the second game, when Envy chose red side, it opted to ban Kalista, which often gives easy bottom lane control, and two mid laners that give push priority and utility. Meanwhile, CLG had to ban two strong early junglers because teams have often started using red side's first rotation as a means for choosing a strong jungler and then a champion that works well with this jungler in a combination rotation.
NV did just that. With CLG going for a priority pick in Zac, NV went for Gragas, whose cooldowns, disengage potential, and early viability allow him to counter Zac. They comboed this pick with Thresh, a pick that often brings strong laning threat and combos well with a powerful jungle matchup in roaming and pressuring the mid lane. When NV picked Tristana, they chose Varus and strong laning potential.
Following this, NV went into banning Corki and Gnar, two extremely safe blind picks for solo lanes, trying to force CLG into a position where they had to have uncomfortable matchups. Then they went for Galio and Rumble, two solo laners who get easy pushes. As a result, Nam "LirA" Taeyoo could invade whatever lane he wanted for an easy lead.
By the end of the series, CLG switched their preference to red side.
In CLG's red side game, they opted to ban out strong laning mids in the second ban phase so they could more safely blind Corki. They prioritized having a strong support for skirmishing in Alistar and being able to pick a top lane counter like Camille into Gnar. Crucially, they also went for a powerful disengage combination in Tristana and Gragas after seeing Gnar picked early for Envy.
Red side first rotation combinations have a habit of catching teams off guard. The ability to choose a strong jungler out of a small pool of the preferred Jarvan IV, Gragas and Elise when one or two are often banned early, and then combine it with a pushing laner, can prove game-winning.
Though Splyce nor G2 Esports opted into choosing red side in their series, Coach Joey "YoungBuck" Steltenpool explained that the first game made their team realize they had underestimated the impact of a strong jungle matchup on a specific mid lane 1v1.
In the G2 and Splyce series, Splyce chose the Galio and Jarvan IV combination on first rotation red side. This duo provides a great deal of teamfight engage with Cataclysm and Hero's Entrance, and Cassiopeia has difficulty getting into fights around Jarvan's created terrain. In addition, the strength of Jarvan IV as an early jungler can tip the scale in a mid lane matchup that usually wins.
"Going into the series," YoungBuck explained, "we had certain expectations of matchups and where you can and can't pick champions. The first game, they broke all the rules by picking Jarvan-Galio the first rotation. We said if the enemies do that, and we pick Cassiopeia and Thresh, then that comp is nullified."
Jarvan IV made it difficult for Cassiopeia to pressure Galio early, and then the combination of these two champions kept her out of teamfights later. She couldn't break up the powerful Morgana and Camille combination when Camille ulted on top of Tristana to isolate her, and Morgana's Black Shield prevented anyone but Cassiopeia from freeing her.
"What we concluded after the game was that the mistake that we made was banning Gragas and picking Zac [which was not an early game jungler]," YoungBuck said. "We said if we had Rek'Sai here or Gragas, we would have had a much stronger early to mid game, and we would have actually been able to control the mid lane."
G2 had to account for the threatening lane combinations that a strong jungler can bring. Other really strong jungle combinations include Thresh and Elise, also used by Team Envy against CLG in North America.
But why the sudden comfort with choosing red side? In the past, teams perceived blue side as more advantageous in draft because red side would have to ban three over-powered or must-ban champions. Some of the more terrifying ones have either been nerfed (like Zac), or teams have found counter combinations that work well into them (like the common Maokai and Alistar answer to lockdown Kalista).
Blue side still enjoys the benefits of the super leash strategy where both mid and bot lane can give their jungler a huge tempo advantage and easy bottom ganks in a meta where bottom reigns supreme. Yet with the recent Patch 7.16 leveling off some of the edges in the patch, teams have finally felt safer to start experimenting with the drafting innovations that 10-ban red side brings.