SKT1 Faker LeBlanc

Lee Faker Sang-hyeok

Mid Laner for SK Telecom T1

Intro

Faker really needs no introduction, he has been a dominate mid laner back in Korea and proved himself as most likely the best player at the season 3 World Championships. Faker is an incredibly flashy player, he will always look to outplay his mid lane opponent. The scary part is that he will most likely succeed. He is also very adaptable and has a deep champion pool, from assassins to hardcore farmers he can play them all. One of his claim to fame champions was his LeBlanc. He brought it out in the OGN spring championship against MVP Blue (Now Samsung Galaxy Blue) and went 10-0-1 within 18mins forcing MVP to surrender at 20mins. During the season 3 World Championships he was destroying the NA solo Q ladder with his Riven (guide coming soon) and LeBlanc. Lets dive into the desk and analyze what he did that made every high elo player quake in their seats.

Cheat Sheet

The Desk

Mid laners will love this part, do not leash for your Jungler when you play LeBlanc. You need to get ahead of your opponent otherwise LeBlanc won't be able to perform to her full potential. She is an incredible snowballing champion and when she gets ahead it is very hard to stop her, you have to do everything you can to gain an advantage. It would be an understatement to say that Faker's play on LeBlanc is aggressive. He looks to harass as much as possible with his Q at level 1, usually landing about 2-3 Q's before level 2. At level 2 he will combo his Q with his W and looks for a kill, you actually get massive damage off your W and Q at level 2. If you land your W on the enemy champion you have the ability to go for a kill, you will need to auto attack and pop your ignite on him to get the kill. Even if you don't get the kill you should be able to push out the opposing player. This is your chance to get ahead, concentrating on farming and pushing the wave so your opponent misses as much farm and experience as possible. Try and not use your spells when farming as you need the mana for kills early. When your opponent comes back to lane immediately burst him with your full combo, pressure him constantly. This will most likely draw the attention of the Jungler so you want to buy wards to anticipate the Junglers movement. Where you place your wards is very important, I see many players in solo queue ward in location which aren't optimal. 

You want to ward where the green circles are. 
One ward should go towards the enemy wraith camp, while the other covers the banana bush. Most solo queue players will ward the side bushes this isn't optimal as it won't give you enough time to react. In addition the wraith ward allows you to keep eyes on your mid laner as well if he decides to roam. Once your set up with wards you should be close to hitting 6. Around level 4 you want to harass heavily, at level 5 you need to stop attacking and focus on Csing. This is because you want to have enough mana at level 6 to fully combo your opponent. Once you hit 6 go all out keep comboing the opponent. Force him to back as much as you can and don't let up keep on pressuring him. You also don't really want to roam until you get your Death Fire Grasp. Once you get your DFG you should be in full control of the game and should be able to 1v1 anyone. When you get later into the game and teamfights break out, you want to assassinate one of their carries. After your full combo you should back out and play in the back lines where your ADC is. LeBlanc is very mobile so you want to keep moving in and out of fights. After you get your deathcap you want to also buy a blue pot for the CDR and AP, keep buying it after this point as it reduces your ultimate's cool down significantly. There are also 2 combos which you should master, the first one is the standard combo. Using your W to get in range of the enemy, use your DFG, Q, R, E and then press W again to teleport back to the pad. It doesn't matter if your E doesn't root the opponent this combo is simply for the damage. The next combo looks to kill enemy champions that are far away or playing safe. Using W again to get in range then DFG, use R into the champion your trying to kill, Q, E and then W out. You have to be able to do these combo's fast otherwise you will get cc'ed and die very fast. Using one of these combos will allow you to kill either of the carries instantly.

Applying to Solo Queue

In solo queue LeBlanc can be a very deadly champion, if allowed she can destroy a game on her own. You want to keep looking for kills in your own lane first, only start roaming if your ahead and think you have kill potential. Another thing that people don't focus on when playing LeBlanc is farm. It is hard I agree, but Faker is able to maintain the 150 minion at 20 mins, I have seen many LeBlanc's get ahead with kills but fail to cs, this doesn't allow your lead to increase fully. You also have to be able to pull of both the combo's I mentioned above and they have to be done quick. You don't want to get cc'ed half way through the combo and be forced to escape. LeBlanc is a very creative champion however there are many different combo you can do for different situations. For example if your get chased you can use your W and then use your R for another W. You can even teleport to either of the pads and try and juke your opponents (watch SivHD on LeBlanc). However say your getting chased but you see your team is about to come to your aide. You might want to use your E and then R for another E to slow down the enemy's and bait them for your team. Thus adapting to different situations is key and you must be able to judge the situation for yourself. The key is to not hesitate and make a decision whether it be right or wrong you can decide later, but make one. Even if  you get it wrong you can reflect on it for next time and improve your play. Hesitating will cost you a whole lot more as you won't learn from it. If you are unsucessful in one of your combos, try and get out do not wait to see if you can do something else. Faker won't even wait to see his E land on the enemy he will throw it out and W back immediately. This is because LeBlanc is an assassin she has a lot of damage in a couple seconds but can't do much after until her cooldowns come back.

Final Thoughts

LeBlanc is a solo queue hero, she can destroy the enemy team just by herself if played well and to her full potential. The key things to remember are:

1.  Be aggressive your playing an assassin, look for kills all the time and push people out of lane. 
2. Learnt he combo and make sure you can do it smoothly and quickly, you have to avoid getting cc'ed.
3. Focus on cs'ing as well, it is hard to cs on LeBlanc but you have to practice it as it allows you to snowball even harder.

Faker OGN Spring 2013

SKT1 Bengi Jungle Vi

Bae Bengi Seong-Ung

Jungler for SK Telecom T1

Intro

SKT1's jungler Bae Bengi Seong-ung while not being as flashy as other Korean junglers is known for his consistent play. He focuses on pairing with SKT1's mid laner Faker in an effort to get him ahead. Currently he has been favoring Vi in the League of Legends World Championships as well as previously in OGN Summer. Lets take Bengi's Vi to the desk and take a look at his play style.

Cheat Sheet

The Desk

Bengi typical jungle path would start with taking his red then moving to blue, which is now standard for most junglers. This is true if you are on the Blue side, however if your on the purple or red side you would want to start with your blue buff and progress to red. This is because you want your jungle path to allow you to gank mid or top instantly after clearing the 2 buffs. For example if you started with blue buff on the red side this would be your jungle path:

If your first gank is mid this wouldn't be too bad, but ideally you want to gank top lane early on. Due to the current nature of top lane most of the champions played get incredibly tanky as the game progresses making ganks harder and harder. Also top lane is the longest lane so it gives you have a high chance of grabbing a kill early. When you reach top you will be level 3 while the top laner will be level 2 and with red buff you should be able to run him down even if he flashes. Don't be afraid to blow your own flash for the kill. Top lane can be prone to snowballing in favor of the laner that gets the first kill. However don't make the mistake of diving tower this early as you might give a turn around kill to the enemy laner. Which would also mean he will have double buffs and dominate lane.
If Bengi is healthy enough he will complete Wolf, Wraith and Golem camps before backing, but always try to complete as many camps you can after a gank as this keeps you ahead of the enemy jungler. Also it ensures enough money for spirit stone, pots and wards. Critically Bengi will always buy 1 pink ward before returning to the jungle. This is typical of the Korean meta game and allows jungler's more options for ganking as you can eliminate enemy vision with your pink ward. Bengi will always choose vision control for the team instead of buying items for himself. Bengi will place the pink in the top lane river bush unless there is no kill potential top lane. If he does take out an enemy ward he will go back to the jungle and complete around 2 jungle camps. After this he will return to the pinked lane to gank. This is important as it keeps the enemy guessing as to where and when the jungler will appear. At lvl 6 he will generally look for a gank either mid or bot as you have guarantied cc with Vi's ult, this also allows his lanes to combo abilities to chain cc the enemy to death. Usually this will result in a kill or force the enemy very low. After the gank Bengi will look to dragon usually around 10 mins. Vi is very good at taking down dragon due to her W doing percentage of maximum health. After dragon Bengi continues on the same path going red, blue and looking for ganks. However if the other jungler is spotted somewhere Bengi will take the opportunity to counter jungle. Moving into the mid game Bengi will always gank when his ult is up, it allows for an easy kill providing your team follows up with their cc. Late game Bengi will dive through with SKT1's top lane Impact to kill the enemy carries which is completely possible with full tank Vi due to her % max hp damage on her W. Vi puts out a large amount of burst dmg and is best paired with burst casters such as ahri or zed.

My Experience

After looking through replays of OGN and only observing Bengi, I camp up with this short guide and applied it into solo queue. Yes it did cause my gameplay to increase and my ganks were more effecting. There are 2 reasons for this improvement. The first one being is that I bought a pink ward every time I went to shop (sometimes even 2-3) this not only allowed vision control but increased the success of my ganks. If the enemy lacks vision it is very hard for them to keep track of the jungler in the early game, this little change to my playstyle made my ganks much more efficient. The other reason was the sheer amount of farm I was getting. If you follow the jungle path and consistently return to the jungle after ganks instead of just backing you can almost out farm your solo laners. You also want to cover for your laners when they back, this increase of money allowed me to buy more items and get tanky for the team (as well as wards of course). The focus on increased farming also makes up for the early money put into buying pinks. 

Final Thoughts

Vi's kit is very strong for shutting down carries, it allows for an easy set up for your team mates. She has very high damage due to her W % max hp damage, this makes a full tank Vi very hard to deal with.  in addition her ultimate allows for easy set ups for kills in the mid game. Bengi's play style exploits all of Vi's benefits and allows his team to get ahead through efficient ganking and farming.