IS NRG DOOMED?! BO3's, Aurora's Reveal & More! | The Dive Driven by Kia

Hello and welcome back to another episode of The Dive Driven by Kia! Kobe, Azael, and Meteos break down Week 1, debate the causes and effects of burnout, discuss Solo Queue’s effectiveness, and explore pro player practice regimens. Stay tuned until the end to hear Meteos break down Aurora’s kit reveal!
Week 2 of the #LCS Summer Split starts THIS SATURDAY at 1PM PT | 4PM ET. Thanks for watching!
Timestamps:
0:00 - Best of 3’s, Week 1 recap
6:28 - TL, MSI burnout
12:52 - Pros, Solo Queue, and Pro practice regimens
21:54 - Tomio, more TL game recap, and patch preview
26:10 - Thoughts on Quad & Jensen
34:31 - C9 vs DIG
39:16 - Skarner
42:54 - Thoughts on DIG
47:09 - NRG & 100T
56:09 - IMT & SR
1:02:06 - LCS Finals Announcement
1:07:18 - Aurora's kit reveal, Meteos gives break down
You can always learn more and view the full match schedule at lolesports.com/schedule?leagu...
Follow us:
/ lcsofficial
/ lcsofficial
/ lcsofficial
/ discord

[@AtomicPixel42]

For a few episodes now, the volume has varied a lot from one member to the next. It would be great if production could adjust the volume as it used to be on the older studio.

[@Zmargo702]

dude fr. azael is a mouse and kobe has a megaphone lmao. its tough listening on a speaker cuz i cant hear them so i turn it up, then someone else starts talking and it blows out my speaker lol.

[@SeeJade]

It's been the same with LCS for the past few splits. Production has not been doing a very good job over there and now it's finally come here

[@infinite_voids]

no issues with headphones i wonder if they fixed it post release

[@KingSMOrcthe9th]

It’s all those budget cuts my boys

[@107thFruit]

What production? They all gone little bro

[@schaakakon9473]

I want Kobe's jacket so much, looks sick as fuck!

[@projectpanda1996]

SAME! I tried immediately looking for it when i saw it but can't find it

[@sauceeee1]

@@projectpanda1996 it seems to be a les deux ballier bomber jacket with a floral pattern, but im not sure if its available anymore

[@user-wj2pt1oe3i]

Ladies ladies .... how may I be of assistance? you guys need a hobby or something.

[@attackonhumby]

azael spittin fire with the b07 +1 game take

[@GhostBeatboxFugu]

Agreed, great idea

[@biggerscomedy]

been in a tournament with this. was terrible.

[@phukhangnguyen9004]

1 game advantage is cooked, it's too much, plus no one has played a bo7 on stage so it might be messier gameplay

[@evanblaylock2750]

How is it too much? The true "fair" thing would be making the losers bracket team beat the winners side team I'm two bo5's

[@nathantheoretcatafard6364]

Yeah it's an interesting solution even though it might not be the best. But only having side selection isn't enough imo.

[@billyhardin7401]

The dive is such a nice way to start the work day. Excited for the games tomorrow now!

[@C9LoL]

It's a good thing it was a Bo3 😅

[@LBPHexagohn]

Lol

[@orionmilbury4817]

Feel that

[@mikereed4594]

I want to see more from NRG before I totally give up on them, since 100T both looked good, and has been their demon in the past, but I do get that week 1 from them was very worrying.

[@lawfulneptune14]

I LOVE THE LCS

[@Storm411z]

I’m with Meteos on the BO2 if it meant we got a double round robin. I get the hype about BO3s having a resolution, but we don’t get the rematch later in the season to feed to rivalries 😕

[@Zmargo702]

Azaels Bo7 World Finals is EXACTLY WHAT I WANT!! Put some more weight on it (shoutout giles corey)

[@NickUnown]

MORE WEIGHT

[@fullmetal929]

BO2 double round robin next year for sure.

[@TallDynamicFella]

I feel like one thing missing from the discussion about breaks is that it does have long term impacts. Grinding constantly has worn down plenty of pros already including the GOAT. I’m sure Faker can afford to get some of the best medical care/advice in the world, and he still was shaking his wrist (seemingly in pain) at msi. I’d love more pro games year round, but not at the expense of the players.

[@GamesAreForKids91]

Fakers wrists are probably messed up because he's been a pro player for MUCH longer than anybody else in the league. Pro players play for many hours EVERY day. More pro games shouldn't be causing any more injuries than practice.

[@bobzozz]

I think you're right but there will always be people who are willing to grind despite potential long term impacts. There's a reason why the west was never really close to winning worlds because asian pros are willing to play way more than them. The concept of burning out is such a funny concept when we look at asian pro players where they are practicing way more and then streaming after that as well. While we have some of the west who never stream and don't even play solo queue either complaining about burn out. There's is definitely a middle ground but you can't really stop people from grinding so it would be impossible to have a real rule in place.

[@CreepyMisfit7]

Where the petition for Meteos' Bo2 format. I want to sign it.

[@acatwithwiskers9273]

Trust me as someone who watches LLA and LCO, Bo2 is not fun to watch.

[@mwbwyatt]

Id love to see teams utilize elise again with the mega ap jungle buffs

[@justinquilapio8006]

Hearing about Quid having Ez mid as a good pocket pick reminds me of Bjerg having Zilean

[@ac8598]

I think most Pros do have pocket picks, shame that coaches don't make the most of those in their draft

[@_OldGrandpa]

Another great episode. No volume problems here

[@F00Lsmack]

A round robin best of 1 for seeding, then best of 2s to finish it out. Total game score is the determinant, no ties, consistent game time and we get the best of both worlds.

[@thecanadiankiwibirb4512]

🗣️

[@GGLumberjack]

So if the higher seeded team wins game 1, the second game doesn't matter? More holes in this format than Swiss cheese.

[@taylornelly2705]

Last weekend for me was the BEST argument for BO3’s. If it’s a boring lame series then it ends the exact same as a double header. If it’s exciting and close then you get an extra game of awesome. No extra time spent on crap, up to 50% more awesome

[@CossacksLoL]

Side selection is really important

[@IronCobraTD]

For the winners' bracket advantage, I'd like to see what they do in the LPL, where the winner side gets side select in 3 games guaranteed, and they pick, for example, "blue side in games 1,3,5"

[@dps0610]

that's still not enough for being able to lose a whole series and play for the final.

[@vexar7575]

best show since sliced bread ngl keep going

[@wvbn710]

thank you for not adding clips from the end at the begining. nice to not have to fast forward at the start

[@swayarrow]

i love the best of 7 idea and who was the team complaining about their teammate not playing solo queue that part was hilarious

[@swayarrow]

i feel exactly like kobe about nrg as a fan

[@narfidy444]

100T is gonna win the split

[@Kurioms]

I almost felt bad thinking of the solo queue situation and hoping it wasn't happening to a particular team right before Kobe brought it up.

[@SpitfireOCE]

AZAEL COMING OUT THE GATE WITH MY BEST OF SEVEN IDEA I'VE BEEN SAYING FOR AGES MY GOAT SO TRUE SO BASED SO REAL

[@matthewong8677]

Kobe's jacket looks good. how much does that thing cost ?

[@PokeRedstone]

Didn’t watch yesterday, but I saw the new thumbnail today when I went to watch and I’m wondering what happened to the piece of art that originally here.

[@peachyhue]

i love the dive

[@cedrichofstetter4057]

banger episode

[@jacksmith6517]

next level poker faces from azael and kobe while meteos was talking about getting pounded

[@treybrasseale8901]

You talked a lot about good vs bad practice in solo q. I'd love a followup conversation on how to better define the difference. What are the biggest factors that come into play on stage? Bjergsen could slam lane with Zed, but chooses to play Victor again. I understand team coordination is on a much higher level on stage, but is that the only factor? Why do some picks never see play om stage, despite having so much success in ranked?

[@nightwing09x]

I LOVE METEOS HE IS SO SMART AND HANDSOME

[@RainWolve-fn7nj]

my personal favourite mirror 1v1 is aatrox, it takes a while back its pretty skill expressive

[@parkerhannah3953]

Azaels reaction to Aurora: "hahaha", *in head* fml.

[@LahJoshy]

How wide can bwipo get by the end of the split?

[@jrfox18]

Based content, great for listening in the shower, eating breakfast, or getting ready for work. 13/10 +3 for each host.

[@dps0610]

I agree with Azael's comment on the finals advantage. I hate that losing teams get more chances at winning than a team that is undefeated to that point. It makes no damn sense.

[@Tecmaster96]

This is why I hate loser brackets. If you lost a single set then your run is tainted by failure, how can you be the winner? You lost? Oh but you lost in semis, and the other guy lost in finals. 5-3 against a team and they’re the champs. Not at all a fraud format.

[@dps0610]

@@Tecmaster96 yep. And I don’t get how esports is the only one that gets away with this. It’s like the viewership is so important that you’re ok to have a completely unfair format.

[@MiiniMes2987]

I hear what meteos was saying about burnout and breaks. BUT it wasnt just one split? It was summer, worlds, spring, msi and then now where theyve been grinding

[@DBasedAlex]

People talking about the volume but I compared to old episodes and it’s basically the same lol

[@theprimewolf096]

For grandfinals i think we shoulddo what fighting games do. If the loser beats the winners finalist 3 games in a row the bracket resets. So you get 10 games sure its alot but it gives them an advantage so the winner just needs to win 1 best of 5

[@SuperInferno777]

Cod when I watched competitive.. When they had a losers bracket they had to win two best of series to win a tourney which is kinda crazy but honestly yes there needs to be a bigger advantage for the winners bracket

[@acatwithwiskers9273]

It's hard to pull off in a fair way.

[@QCmaxthebeast]

It's extremely common in fighting games; it's called a grand final reset

[@SuperInferno777]

@@acatwithwiskers9273hard to pull off in league with such a long game to play. Maybe a best of 3 then a best of 5?

[@jonart8433]

All the best teams in the world don't take that many long breaks. Meteos is right. If they can't do that then don't be a pro player.

[@phukhangnguyen9004]

I think for worlds it should be double elim bracket with fearless draft, and the team in the upper bracket gets like 2 bans as an advantage.

[@mwbwyatt]

If fearless draft was worldwide id agree with this but going into worlds with multiple major regions not utilizing it would likely bring the overall level of competition down quite a bit.

[@Gordy.Shumway]

IF A LCS FINALS HAPPEN IN TORONTO IM BUYING OUT THE FRONT ROW AND INVITING THE ENTIRE RAPTORS ROSTER PAST AND PRESENT! HOW ELSE CAN JOJO WIN WORLDS!?!?

[@user-wj2pt1oe3i]

Every one should have savings to show for it

[@ac8598]

Another new champ I am dreading to play against. Thank god I don't grind ranked anymore because There is only so many champs I can ban in my SoloQ

[@purplekey9330]

Meteos saying that burnout isn't a real thing and they should take away breaks for the players is definitely the most wild thing I've heard from him so far

[@L0nkk]

i waited all day for this

[@PlasticCobra]

The volume is all over the place

[@ruthanatos]

So Aurora's R is Dota's Mars R, as I understand.

[@candraft24]

The volume is pretty low

[@ovs4744]

Production gone and they’re recording in a closet. LCS looking great

[@MrCatKit]

To me, the volume was just going up and down, depending on who is talking and at what moment of the video i was

[@SeeJade]

Production is literally unable to do their job half the time, so it's not surprising

[@SuperInferno777]

Yo the cold open made me turn my volume up to max (I’m deaf already) but Azael does tend to be quiet at times

[@acatwithwiskers9273]

I prefer the way we have grand finals now. Having it all on the line, one series, even game score, winner takes all is very entertaining.

[@Uhhhrandomna]

where do i get kobe's jacket

[@SmoochChess]

It's better to burn out than to fade away

[@acatwithwiskers9273]

I get burned out from league if I play more than 3 games in a row.

[@BobBob-wo1hp]

Respect, 2 is usually my limit. I don’t know how people play 4+ games a day. Genuinely couldn’t imagine it.

[@acatwithwiskers9273]

​@@BobBob-wo1hp exactly

[@nicvorano1363]

is it just me or has Azaels Mic been off the last 2 episodes? Either that or the volume needs to be turned up on it

[@alextintyrn291]

On the topic of NA hosting international, a lot of it got fucked up by COVID and Riot shoving things around to have the 10 year anniversary in China. Had 2020 not happened we probably would have had worlds in 2020 or 2021 and an MSI by now. Really hoping we get MSI next year though, we haven't hosted since 2015 where TSM stood for Tilted Since MSI

[@MrRizzle311]

LET KOBE SPEAK

[@flame-fl3yy]

I agree with Meteos, people getting burnt out after a split is fake. If you can’t handle playing a video game for 4 months without getting tired then why are you a pro player?

[@KevinSlawinski]

To the @LCS production team: This episode was pretty quiet, especially Azael's microphone.

[@fool9]

NRG is boomed

[@scottrhoads4172]

You wonder why LCK and LPL are so good bc they don’t even think about the “burnout” theory and they just grind non stop that’s the right mindset for these lol professionals to have

[@scottrhoads4172]

You have to be a machine it sucks but it is what it is if you want to beat the best

[@ac8598]

But they do burnout. Look at LPL and see how good player such Angel, Ming, Breathe have fallen off due to burnout

[@rktect941]

yo are meteos and kobe long-lost brothers?

[@lackslink]

I love the Bo3s, and I don't care if anyone else does.

[@stfueg0]

ITO EN sponsorship when?!

[@eVillGaming-eng]

People need to stop acting like Corki is a passive laner, Corki is now a super aggressive lanebully that falls off lategame

[@robertrhoades6830]

Gen g is the only team who should play nid XD

[@AlermoGhost]

GG

[@bricfa]

Metros is right Best of 2s ftw

[@acem7597]

Brother Azael taking as an example Aphromoo as an argument playing less solo Q might be viable, bruh...

[@kirinvision1583]

When are we gonna get winner's side grand finals has a set to play with? Big cope I know.

[@doing63]

cool

[@HoodieOfLegends]

TALK YO SLIT METEOS 8:13

[@normancraytor6749]

game advantage in grands ruins hype. To be a champion you have to win the grands straight up.

[@GGLumberjack]

Korea and China collectively laughing at Azaels "burnout" and diminishing returns on practice theory.

[@ac8598]

Korea and China collectively proves exactly Azeals point. Out of 100s pros only handful do have lengthy and successful career,

[@GGLumberjack]

​@@ac8598remind me the last time NA even got to world finals?

[@ac8598]

@@GGLumberjack more times than Uzi, Ming and Teddy

[@rhytmikdrow8125]

I thought dive was on wednesday so i was freaking out why it was taking so long to be uploaded

[@ElReyDeNoche]

FlyQuest is getting flack because the reasons they lost their series weren't his fault and Inspired and Bwipo took zero accountability. And especially in the case of Inspired, he straight up lied about how one of the plays went wrong. He claimed that Jenses stutter stepped and it straight up didn't happen. So people are harder on them for effectively letting him lie on one of the players to absolve himself while Bwipo died aFKing which was also more harmful than anything Jensen did. And the staff letting him lie is also not a good look tbh.

[@stuartgoodlad1481]

WHY DOES METEOS LOOK BLURRY?

[@SporadicCereal]

Bo3 is so much better than Bo2. Lame is hell when youre watching a series and it ends in a 1-1.

[@diegoolivas3175]

c2 meteos

[@SevTST]

We need an SSR graphic for Game 3s.

[@CB38096]

all my homies hate Fly

[@cloudenvier2260]

GGGGGG

[@tealover7058]

Nah NRG is just doing the classic lose a bunch look like shit then win when nobody expects it

[@grantshope3783]

No disrespect to any of the casters, as there's a ton of changes and content to keep up with from week to week, but when I hear stuff like Azael and other casters being like "Show me some of Quad's best games so I can see what he's like" it really doesn't give me a lot of encouragement for the future of a Tier 2 system that feeds into pros. If even the people we pay to talk about the game don't have the time/take the time to go back and watch NACL, that's tough.

[@ac8598]

Yeah, Quad have been the best midlaner in NACL and the fact that there were 0 discussion of that made the whole discussion feel biased and uninformed

[@grantshope3783]

@@ac8598 It's a big issue I've noticed on the Dive and casts in particular with casters--I remember last split we had casters shocked and surprised at the tank azir pick that was picked several times in LPL and LCK earlier that week. Again, I get it's hard to keep up with it all, but if the people we pay to keep up with it can't keep up with it, T2 and League in the West as a whole seem to have a poor outlook.

[@user-gr5os8rd7j]

I completely agree with Azael's best of 7 suggestion. Even more I think every team who has better seed from regular season should have it in any best of 5. Right now seeding is not important at all. It makes good teams fool around half split ( G2 in EU are perfect example for that) than ramp up for playoffs. It'll increase the quality of the games and it'll be way more entertaing.

[@distrez]

B07 is not it. It turns into an endurance of a final, by the time game 5-6 roll around the gameplay quality is terrible. And what if the they tie 3-3 and now the winner bracket team gets to win even though it was a tie?

[@Turbovolver]

The winner bracket team won more series to get there, and that's why such a system would reward them with a win in the 3-3 scenario. It makes a lot of sense from a competitive integrity standpoint. As for how it feels for viewers or indeed even players on the day, that's much more subjective and I do think there are arguments against it.

[@Zero-vm6ij]

really surprised at the quad talk here since he nearly hard carried on A Sol against the best mid in the league as a rookie in his first LCS game. not even a little bit of hype for him? going 8-3 in a super back and forth game against the best team in the league?

[@lachlanhudson7404]

the mixing on this episode is wack. Music is so loud and voices so low

[@LilFloof50]

doing well at msi losT every bo5 except to FNC. got stomped by the weakest eastern team there. and lost 3-1 against the shittiest T1 has looked since the poby games

[@Ciubelinus]

Burnout is a western excuse. Just stop it, get some help.

[@ucandoit69]

Canyon walked out of the jungle at 3 mins and instantly ganked on Zyra. It was insane.