TS is caught in a waylay trap and Zeta will finally win something

All that beating the 12th means that you're in just 11th place.

I haven't watched all of WOL's games, do you guys think they can make it to at least one international this year?

As you probably know, when viva sword9 and other shitbags left the team, jdg was gonna change him as well. they were in contact with a couple of Pacific teams, but the deal fell through due to the high buyout. He will stay until the end of his contract. but I hope this team disband before then.

disgusting team

I said.

Nah trust the assholery of JDG.

fou clan players are weak against old NS, DK is always screwing up and changing rosters all the time, so it's pointless to talk about org.

plz get stew out of this jail

Fearx will be able to ascend, but im not as confident as SPG..

Even in the Shameful history of Dplus Shittest perfomance Ever

After watching recent matches, I noticed that almost every team that used Tejo instead of Sova on Ascent lost. Ridiculous upsets happened quite often.

The curse on DK cannot be lifted forever. Just disband.

RC always seems to pick the strongest squad on paper each season and then end up with nothing. Will this time be different?

More than half of them (especially SEA players with only one team per country) will earn the minimum income under the regulations (67,000,000 KRW = 45,723 USD).

East Asian players, especially Korean teams with an active comparative scene(LCK), will get more, while T1 pay NA level money. Saya received 300-400k for 2 years. Meteor will be the same.

APAC is the most divisive region due to language and nationality. The player market and competition for talent is almost non-existent as teams are tied to nationality. The only organization in SEA that was willing to do so (Bleed) was a total scammer. we'll continue to see big FA move only between korean teams.

https://youtu.be/nqwfDWczwkU?si=UFKpVEXDbOMXAcxA

Does this censorship mean he's about to be kicked out?

nooo He should play until 40

Korean server is independent has a much smaller number of users, so its easier. and the KR radiants are not used as a cutoff for professional teams. It's not worth much.
Pro oriented kids almost all play on asian servers, so they competing in the same environment(They usually prefer HK much more than Tokyo).
There is a bit of a mechanical disadvantage with a ping difference of 30+.

Demand that the company that plays two esports in one stadium with only 12 games per team per year to reduce costs : establish a huge Riot branch in Thailand, lease a new arena, hire bunch of staffs, and relocate the teams that found a permanent base camp(dude, even that scumbag org GE spent over $2 million on it.) in SK. It's not something I'm afraid of, it's just not going to happen.

In LoL esports, Hong Kong/Taiwan/Vietnam/Japan/OCE were combined this year, and the whole league consist of just eight teams.

Okay, I read it again, and I apologize for the rambling. I'm writing this at 3am while feverishly typing on my VLR with influenza, so my intelligence is at monkey level. I admit it.

Riot thinks of this business from the top down. Bundles for 2024 T1, a team that couldn't have been more of an asshole, a team that no one watched because it was too painful to watch, sold more than Zeta, simply because fakers exist. The difference in Korean viewership between the 2024 Shanghai finals and the 2025 Bangkok finals was more than 2x. viewerships can easily swings with dramas and other shit. Locally, yes.

but historical viewership ranking is madrid, champs 2022, lock//in, champs 2024, Bangkok, and it's not consistent and doesn't grow much.
Think about the tampering that has been done to the league in the meantime. Every year has been a mess, but overall, the scene hasn't gotten worse or better before or after the franchise. It's the #2 FPS and #3 overall esport, and has reached its growth ceiling.

So Riot is going to get more hands on and cut what they don't need, which is why I say cutting, not growth, is the priority. They don't care about regional viewers, they'll cut off a limb, and it won't matter for a long time, that's all. but it will be no a huge portion of the audience is going to disappear no matter what.

Of course, the fanless organizations will be cut first, but not necessarily because they are free riders. Faria will sincerely believe that they are for tier 2.

You're all pissed off. So what has Riot actually done with Tier 2? Nothing. They're just leaving it alone. They even said they're giving it another chance.
I didn't say anything about your tiny little dicky vcj. I have no interest in your parroting.
You said this thread was about franchising. So when I said “regional” I meant all tier 1 pacific only. Look at my first comment. I said Riot is reducing the number of franchises purely for the sake of tier 2. I didn't discuss whether or not that actually helps them.
As for “regional distribution”, I'm talking about having more than one T1 team per region, not some kind of VCL diversity, please.
I kept stating the argument that Riot doesn't really care about the lower tier 1 teams. it's not a good thing, but they're going to keep doing it.
that it's because they're not contributing to international cinema, not because they're just fanless shit orgs.

This happens every time I have an argument with you about tier 1. Why are you mad at me for tier 2 shit? If you want to call me names, just say what's on your mind.

It's rather interesting that Mr.IonlywatchvcjXD discusses PR risk. How much do you care about the drama and stories in other regions?

If you shine on the biggest stage, people will praise you for the path you've taken.
They'll act like they've always known.

And this game doesn't have an infinite lifespan, and Riot knows that. Riot doesn't own any real estate outside of LA. It's all leased.

The 'minimal care' is already happening.
The bottom teams play only 12 fucking games a year, does that make sense?
Look at the structure of stages 1 and 2. In 2025, you don't even have to play a single match against every team in the league to be the regional champion!
They already treat their franchise sub-teams as worthless garbage. Now they want to cut those team's own reason to exist.
I'm not talking about Riot's direction, I'm talking about what's already happened.

All the sneers, prejudice, and dirty words.... In VLR, you don't have to play for racism. “You don't have any players in tier 1 and you lose all the time.” At least that's not a lie.

Yeah, It is what you say it is.
Considering this issue, before APAC, imagine how many of the North American giants Riot would give up. 0. Why wouldn't the same thing happen in APAC?

I don't think that would be good, which is why I'm arguing for the status quo. LCQ is at least okay.

Why do you take regional distribution for granted when discussing this? Riot is not going to do that. Your 'no choice' will be a strong choice.

If there is a world where they split the league, that universe will collapse and time will go backwards.

About the APAC split.

On franchising, I think the best approach is status quo. If they cut even one team, there is a 100.0% chance it will not be an east asian team.
But it would be the same with four teams, which would be pretty bad.

More games, more cost
More teams, more fucking money
More leagues, more fucking insane motherfucking shitty costs.

Did you know that all Riot venues except LA Arena (Riot Arena Berlin, LOL Park, Sangam Coliseum) are leased?
NA and EMEA play midweek games with no spectators. they share the arena with League because those only have one main hall. Wow, the stadium must be really big, right? Fuck. It's 300 and 200 seats.

Look at the recent cost-cutting trend in League esports: they experimented with a “small enough” esports scene with Valo and then ruthlessly cut it down to size.

You're talking about doing the opposite. The likelihood of Riot doing it is the same as entropy of universe reducing itself.

So Riot considered a 4+ LCK org during the franchise planning phase, and it was canceled due to backlash from other countries and some “disqualifying reasons”.
Regional distribution is like a lottery: even if there is only one team in your region, people cheer for them anyway. If you have 2 teams, it's 2x that, if you have 50, it's 50x that? No.
If you scratch your ticket and win, it will be good for Riot. But if you get blank forever, Riot won't care. That's ancillary income.
All good things come to international events.
It's ok Long term gain trumps over short term gain. But long term means 'small enough' and sustainable. They want you alive, but they don't really care if you're healthy or crippled.

Dude, he's completely Korean, enough to make Solo and the entire Gen team feel nepo. That's some really bad racism.

The essence of franchising is to reduce and control costs. More teams and more games = more costs, which grow faster than the growth of active players, who are a finite number.
So Riot reduces the number of matches, deemphasizes regional leagues, and puts the spotlight on the big events, which is why we have a stupid league that doesn't play a single round robin all year.
Viewership? If you have enough viewership for international matches, it doesn't matter, as long as you can create some big moments, some stories, some stars, and some cool tiktok clip craps at the biggest events.
What Riot cares about is cost-effectiveness, not the absolute growth of the sport. Faria likely told it like it is when he talked about rethinking franchising. He said Riot chose to franchise because the open circuit was too costly. and they wanted to give it a little more of a chance because the gap between tier 1 and tier 2 was so much wider than they expected. That's it.

actually we have a historical sample.

4/5 Nationality International Winning Teams - Sen (US/CAD), Loud (BR/ARG), EDG (CN/TW)

Single Nationality International Winning Teams - Gambit (RU), EG (US), Gen.G (KR), T1 (KR)

Why aren't these people saying let's kick the US out of the Americas? SK's PAC dominance is less entrenched than US's.

1.DRX 19 matches 13 wins 6 losses 68.42%

2.PRX 29 matches 17 wins 12 losses 58.62%

3.GEN 19 matches 9 wins 10 losses 47.37%

4.TS 14 matches 6 wins 8 losses 42.86%

5.T1 15 matches 5 wins 10 losses 33.33%

6.TLN 19 matches 5 wins 14 losses 26.32%

7.GE 8 matches 2 wins 6 losses 25%

8.ZETA 19 matches 4 wins 15 losses 21.05%

9.BOOM 7 matches 1 win 6 losses 14.29%

9.RRQ 14 matches 2 wins 12 losses 14.29%

11.DFM 9 matches 1 win 8 losses 11.11%

12.NS 1 match 0 win 1 loss 0%

btw rrq new uniforms look good

Wow, what a bloodbath...

"nt bang pls dont blame urself u did well we proud of u kub🫂🫂 rest well after this see u kub
nt jj~ 🥺🥺 get lots of rest for now and we'll wait for u guys in stage 1~!! you come back stronger. we believe!!! 💪🏻❤️
ggnt kub 🥺🫳🏻🐹 no worries naa, ask p'kla to buy ticket for u nong jing and im always proud of you ♥♥♥
NT KUB NONG JING , take care of yourself , thanks for your hard-working for all the times and comeback stronger kub see ya in split 1 ♡♡♡ we lose today but didn't mean we lose forever and always be by your side until you get the trophy kub ♡♡♡
ggnt jj, we are always here to support you so don't be too hard on yourself okay ❤️
ggnt nong, you’re doing good so far, rest well and comeback stornger nong 🫂"

Sorry. I got duped by an asshole Korean streamer. There was discussion about it, but it's not going to happen.

t3xture said his team had recently won 32 straight scrims recently, It's going to be a bloodbath.

The “infrastructure and talent pipeline” is a bit of a myth. If your game is more skillful and technical, maybe this can play a big role.
But 80-90% of this game is about hovering over images on the screen and clicking faster. And there is a certain percentage of babies born everywhere in the world with innately good eye-hand coordination.

Whether your region is complete with factories that turn those babies into actual killing machines or just a bunch of empty lots, there are enough to fill five members of a tier one team.
And it doesn't take that much money to raise a video game addicted kid. CIS/SEA has bad infrastructure and is the most financially vulnerable of all regions, but the levels in those regions are quite solid.

It's a great revenue model to pay a team to experience the life of a professional player!

VLR is basically where extreme nationalists cope. But how much of an undeniable truth is this kind of reaction?

holy cabeza

Exactly yes, we also rigged it to make it impossible for any indian to play in Tier 1.

Rushindra has nothing to do with indian players being the worst in the world. He still cared about shitty indians like botssi to some extent, but he's now relieved of that useless duty.

Do Zeta academy players pay their club to play?

I can give you the ending (murder).

BFX has no strat....

That's what makes it truly different from before. Zero Indian is a reason for hope to exist. ge org actually has a passion for winning.

idk who but it will definitely happen. Confirmed.

I wasn't overly impressed, but I think I've seen a little bit of what the vlr japanese are coping about absol. He's the only japanese with buzz/jawgemo style. there hasn't been one until now.