Tharnder Gaming

17/12/2023

- M1 to M5 -

Philippines best in the world in MLBB for 4x consecutively. It is just in their blood and DNA to play MLBB and dominate. This game truly belongs to them.

Indonesia remains second place. I am not sure how long more before we crown a new region.

Indonesia and PH are and have always been at the top. These 2 regions are the only SEA regions that can boast and brag about their servers being strong.

The other SEA regions with MPL like Malaysia and Singapore unfortunately with their poor performance, cannot claim to be part of the superior SEA region. Singapore without EVOS never went past top 8. Malaysia keeps sinking further and further with each M series.

NA without Zane is rubbish, could not even go past group stages.

Myanmar has always been in top 8. They always have decent teams no matter who it is.

Cambodia has been yo-yo. Some decent and some poor performance.

Turkey is fairly okay with twice being in top 8.

Europe has been rubbish in early tournaments but recent groundbreaking performance as a top 3 region in M5.

Middle East has no impact in any M series tournament.

Brazil was okay throughout M series.

Japan sadly went missing after M2.

17/12/2023

Congrats to Bren!

Amazing game amazing grandfinals.

There’s a reason why Bren did not ban Claude even though they were getting destroyed in Game 6.

Why? because they had Faramis. They already plan a game vs Claude.

Khaleed pick countered Yve hard. The dive from Khaleed meant Yve cannot use the ult comfortably.

Kadita pick was very sus. I understand Kadita is a very flex pick but to take Kadita first without seeing enemy roam was a bad decision and a costly one.

17/12/2023

Game 7.

This is what I call a proper Grand Finals.

CW on Claude especially in this game is an absolute monster. His damage, itemisation, his reaction time was flawless. The phoveus pick was a genius. Only certain teams can make this phoveus pick work to its maximum potential.

Sanz’s ability to wait for the very last minute to use ultimate is superb as well.

It’s been a really long time since we last had Best of 7 Grand Finals.

17/12/2023

Best game so far?

Sanz on Novaria is just on a different level.

Entertainment level : 100%

16/12/2023

Game 1 changed this whole series.

Game 2 Onic completely wipe them off the floor. Game 3 was just the finishing blow.

Bren has to recover fast as they are up against Blacklist who just 3-0 Devu.

16/12/2023

You thought Bren was going to win?

Well ONIC managed to pull off one of the best comebacks.

This is not a matter of skills but mentality. ONIC was losing 0-12. The entire live chat was going wild, trashtalking Onic.

This victory is arguably 90% mentality 10% skills. Losing 0-12? No problem. Just be patient, trust in your teammates and wait for an opening.

Both teams played well. Bren played flawlessly until the 19th minute. The chain cc and sequence of attack was magnificent. However, a brilliant base defence by Onic and a 3 man-ult by Kiboy’s Tigreal = gg to Bren.

Keypoints
1. Mentality wins you losing games.
2. Base defence is a super vital aspect of the game.
3. Sequence of attack. Wait for specific enemies to exhaust their skills and then launch a counter-attack.

15/12/2023

Devu defeated SYS 3-2

Europe server officially top 3 strongest region in the world.

Players/coach : Russia, Norway, Germany, some have PH background.

Never expected this because normally representatives from Europe are from 1-2 countries. This time round, they really went all out to take in a Norway, German player and also a coach with PH background.

When the LORD BOMBA says it, he means it!

DeusVult pulls off the Reverse Sweep over See You Soon to continue their Dark Horse run in the M5!

12/12/2023

Bought a top explaner from PH. Didn’t play him. Forced him to be a content creator.

Who’s fault?

Definitely EVOS’s management. Look at where EVOS legends is now. Nowhere to be seen.

11/12/2023

Just a small observation

During turtle, both marksman will rotate to the opposite lane of turtle. The exp laner will then help take turtle. This is to allow mm to farm more in the early game and to not engage in any early teamfights.

10/12/2023

Odette in M5 by AP Bren.

Picks keep getting better and better. Odette has good damage, annoying crowd control with skill 2 and a dangerous ultimates that deals higher damage especially after you land the skill 2.

Rarely seen in pro tournaments and rarely seen also in high rank games. The only way to stop the ultimate is either knock-up, transformation or suppression.

Overall, this was a relatively comfortable game for Bren, SeeYouSoon didn’t really pose much of a threat.

10/12/2023

What did you notice here?

Bans
1. Blacklist international have fixed 3 bans - F***y, Joy, Nolan. F***y and Nolan are mainly Kairi’s picks. Joy is a flex pick which can be played as both explaner or jungler.

2. ONIC esports bans Guin and Fredrinn. Again, Guin is a flex pick and will mess up your draft because you have to guess whether is this Guin tank, Guin jungler or even Guin explane. So to avoid such a scenario, ONIC’s coach just flat out ban Guin.

Picks
1. So many different picks. I want to focus on the roamers.

The roamers from both team were amazing. Both can play supports and hard tanks. Last time the criticism for blacklist was that V33nus can only use supports. We are now seeing Renejay taking up the support heroes and we know very well if he needs to play a hard tank, he can. Same with Kiboy, they are both equal and flexible with any roamers.

This flexibility allows you to adjust your team composition midway through the draft, a huge advantage to the team.

2. Junglers. Clearly Kairi can play any hero. For blacklist, they prefer to take a tanky hero like Fredrin, Akai or Baxia. I believe this was done to maximise the potential of UBE strategy.

It’s always good to pair up a tanky jungler and a healer. I expected a different team composition from blacklist but I believe they want to stick with the UBE identity.

3. Duration of each subsequent game gets shorter and shorter.

First game - 30 mins, second game - 22 mins, third game - 21 mins, fourth game - 14 mins, fifth game - 13mins.

As the time pass, each team were more confident and aggressive. The first game is usually the game where you are “testing the water” and playing safe.

Final note
Both teams were very equal to be honest. This was grand finals worthy best of 5. When two top teams fight, you can instantly notice the difference in draft and gameplay.

Drafting - I say 60/40. I know some will say floryn picks were questionable but at least now they know the Floryn doesn’t work as expected.

Gameplay - I have to say 50/50.

I believe this is not the full gear yet of both teams. It’s just the beginning of an epic playoff series.

A lot a lot of unexpected twists and turns ahead. Going to be an exciting tournament for us, audience.

09/12/2023

KidBomba’s interview after winning 3-1 vs Fire F*x.

His main reason for winning games = confidence. Confidence is something a lot of teams are lacking. This is his debut in the world stage but he’s confident.

DeVu is from Europe server that is widely regarded by many SEA players as a “lower server”. They are not totally wrong. However, with recent tournaments, I believe the only good SEA servers are PH and Indo. The rest are now officially lower ranking than Europe server based on tournament results. Basically ‘no MPL no problem’.

This guy is making a stamp in M5. He is not known before M5. Nobody really knew about him. Now, I believe almost everyone will know about KidBomba.

This is his first official M series tournament for the German and he’s outperforming MPL veterans.

Moonton, please consider an official tournament for Central/Western Europe (mainly Germany, Italy, France, Spain, UK).

08/12/2023

I kinda agree with the person who messaged Zekilled.

This may sound controversial but there are better European teams than the current Fire F*x and DeVu.

Firefux qualified through Turkey tournament.

DeVu qualified through CIS tournament which is open for mainly Ukraine, Russia.

The best players of Europe server (in my opinion) are from Germany, Italy, France, Spain, UK. However, there isn’t a tournament for these countries, so they cannot qualify for M5.

07/12/2023

A message 😅

07/12/2023

Both Malaysian Teams out of M5.

Wow.

I never expected this. Unfortunately, the standard of Malaysian teams in the biggest MLBB tournament has dropped, a lot.

Malaysia sadly is no longer a competitive region. I can’t believe the worst NA team can defeat the champions of Malaysia.

Even Europe server is better than Malaysia server? Shocking.

07/12/2023

DeVu has been really strong this tournament. I labeled them as a surprise factor.

So, what changed regarding this EU server team?

They imported non-Russian, non-Ukrainian players. As you know, Europe is made up of 44 countries.

Previous EU server teams are either Russian or Ukrainian.

The new coach, the new explaner, the new marksman are non-Russian, non-Ukrainian. Coach and marksman is basically PH. Explaner is from Germany.

If you look at the previous Navi team, all of them were either Russian or Ukrainian.

This time it is different.

If you play long enough in Europe server, you realise there are a lot of strong players and they are usually from UK, Italy, Germany, France, Spain. The stronger players are from central/Western Europe. The weaker players are usually from Eastern Europe.

I dare say that DeVu is not Europe server’s best team. I believe there are a few (maybe 1 or 2) teams better than DeVu but they cannot join CIS tournament to represent EU server in M5.

Right now, this group is very unpredictable. Will there be a tiebreaker? If yes, who will advance?

05/12/2023

I know we are not done with group stages but I can say for certain TOB will be out of M5.

Total lack of confidence, inability to keep up with the other teams, poor synergy, not good enough individually.

NA teams without MobaZane is just different. Mobazane may have a smaller heropool than Bestplayer but MobaZane brings confidence and aggression. MobaZane lost with his BTK as he was rebuilding his team and Fwydchicken had to change his role to roamer.

Zane without the original BTK = cannot win NA tournaments.

Other NA teammates without Zane = cannot perform well in international tournaments.

So what’s the solution?

I really think the top NA players have to unite and really think what’s the best for their region. It’s better to establish one super star team rather than have multiple teams that aren’t good enough for international tournaments.

For me, BTK during M3 was the best NA team. The Vallry during M4 wasn’t too bad. Other than these 2 teams, the rest are not good enough.

03/12/2023

Team Flash were winning in towers and minion waves.

There were 3 opportunities for Team Flash to take Lord. Arlott was clearing bot lane several times. During such moments, it’s imperative you take advantage of a 5 vs 4 situation and grab Lord asap. However teamflash kept on delaying unnecessarily.

Chou somehow decided to pick-off. Pick-off fail and they lost a 5 vs 4 teamfight, if you lose a 5 vs 4 teamfight

Poor decisions which resulted in an instant wiped-out.

03/12/2023

TOB’s mistakes were costly.

1. Hoon’s Gord was building 40% CDR (equipments + emblems). I believe he should have his ult more often especially when you are building CDR. He should keep poking Diggie instead. However what we saw was that diggie was poking everyone at TOB. Your role as Gord is to poke as well given your skill 1 has range and skill 2 can hurt.

Late game, I believe Athena would be a nice pick to at least absorb some diggie’s bomb or valentina’s bombs. You cannot keep rely on the rest to pick up the diggie’s bomb. Sometimes you have to absorb some yourself so that your tank’s or explaner’s health doesn’t fall too low.

Early game, he used the ultimate on “Natalia” in the bush. I don’t think he is that comfortable with Gord.

2. DeusVult’s plan was to use Valentina and Diggie full mage build just to poke TOB. This is a really good example of how to poke your enemies. You don’t have to kill them, you just have to lower their health and when at their most vulnerable, you go on the offensive.

3. Bestplayer’s retri game was 👎🏻.

4. Diggie pick countered 2 of TOB heroes. If you look at game 1, DeusVult banned diggie when they took Minotaur. The drafting of TOB still needs improvement but I am unsure how much improvements can be done in the next few days.

5. Poor minion wave management by TOB. They had to ask one of their teammates to recall just to clear minions when contesting Lord. So what happened was a 4 vs 5 teamfight.

Sigh so many mistakes from TOB.

Gg EU server team 1 - 0 NA team.

03/12/2023

Mielow’s Terizla ult + Bestplayer’s F***y killed Bruno in an instant. No time for Bruno to react.

DeusVult banned Claude and Ixia. DeusVult were trying hard in the draft phase to ban all the meta marksman. Zia has no choice but to pick up the Brody, which is the last meta mm. Zia’s Brody was 6-0-5 MVP.

TOB realised that the Bruno last game was relatively untouched and no one could reach the backline of DeusVult, so they picked up the F***y kinda early in the draft phase. The military precision of F***y+ Terizla to kill off Bruno was perfect.

Sawo’s Mino was trying to defend bot lane and he just let Bruno out of his sight for a mere second.

03/12/2023

TOB’s lack of healer lost to DeusVult’s UBE strat

I was watching the English cast. Laphel mentioned that Zia needs to be careful as he used up his purify. I agree 100%.

This purify was absolutely crucial. DeusVult and TOB clashed a few seconds later. Faramis’s ultimate was well-timed, using it after a member with immortality died. Faramis was really saving it for the very very last minute.

Right away, Sawo’s Minotaur knocked up Zia’s Claude. Lance then killed off Zia. No marksman was left from TOB. Bruno was still alive to cause as much damage as possible to TOB.

Would the purify saved Zia’s Claude from Mino’s knock-up?
Yes.

The moment the marksman died, I knew it was game over. DeusVult has a healer, Mino and also Faramis that could rescue anyone.

Overall, it was 35-65 game. TOB was at a disadvantage as they had no healer and could not sustain long in teamfights.

02/12/2023

Day 1 of M5 :
Joy vs Nolan for almost every game

02/12/2023

Poor base defence from Geek Fam

I believe Geek Fam could at least defended this attack from Homebois. They were busy going after Valentina, they forgotten about the top minion waves and Bruno.

Homebois 2 - 0 Geek Fam

02/12/2023

Understanding your winning conditions.

Geek Fam vs Homebois M5 Day 1

When Luke’s terizla used the ultimate on Raizel, all 4 Hoembois players rushed to protect him.

Homebois was at a disadvantage in terms of towers and minion waves. They know that this Lord is a do or die. They also know their marksman which is Ixia can win them the game.

1) Taking Lord and 2)Ensuring the safety of marksman = winning conditions of Homebois in this late game.

There’s also Xorn’s Grock who was busy outzoning the rest. So Terizla was isolated and eventually died 2 vs 5. Baloyskie’s Ruby didn’t have flicker so not much can be done to help Terizla.

Homebois successfully achieved both of these objectives. They won the game after this huge teamfight. Chibi’s retri kept them alive and played a huge role in this victory.

01/12/2023

This is my very simplistic prediction on who will advance after group stage in M5

I would like to say that I would be wrong because I have no background knowledge on the results of scrims or any leaks from pro players. I am just a spectator from the outside that is writing this based on previous tournaments performance and other factors.

Okay so let’s begin.

Group A
Expected to advance : ONIC Indonesia 🇮🇩 .

Why?
- because they are the best team, if not the among the top 3 best teams of M5. Their jungler is the most feared jungler in the world, able to play almost every hero known. You need utility jungler? He can do it. You need a deadly assassin? He can do it better than most of the top jungler. Most teams will already struggle with the draft pick vs ONIC Indonesia because they have to allocate 3/5 bans for just Kairi alone. The draft pick itself is already an advantage to ONIC Indonesia.

I am unsure of the rest of the teams for Group A. So no comments regarding them.

Group B
Expected to advance : Blacklist International 🇵🇭 and Team SMG 🇲🇾

Why Blacklist 🇵🇭 ?
Because blacklist international has been the M3 champions and M4 runner-ups. You don’t just lose your quality after months. They will be without the iconic Vee-Wise but the rest of backlist have tons of experience under their belt. Let’s be honest. MPL PH is just on another level above other MPLs. Take a look at MPLI, 4th placed MPL PH can be the champions of the tournament. Can any other MPL regions says the same?

Why Team SMG 🇲🇾 ?
They are known as a strong team in MPL Malaysia. To get a slot from wild card isn’t easy. They had to face many unknown teams and their performance was near-perfect.

Group C
Expected to advance : AP Bren 🇵🇭 and Burmese Ghouls 🇲🇲

Why AP Bren 🇵🇭 ?
Champions of the best MLBB region in the world, Champions of SEA games. Coach of their team is a previous M2 winner coach. This team has an amazing record of winning tournaments in the last year. These 2 reasons are self-explanatory on why they would not only advance but are also tournament favourites.

Why Burmese Ghouls 🇲🇲 ?
I know in rank games, there are stereotypes. However, when it comes to MLBB tournaments? Myanmar has not let us down. Burmese Ghouls of M2 and Falcons of M4 have shown that they are a dangerous region even without MPL. I am not sure how many of you have been here for M2, but BG during M2 Grand Finals was peak MLBB. The draft pick, counter pick, secret ace cards, end score of 4-3. That was an amazing time to be able to witness an amazing rollercoaster tournament. The current BG have different roster of players, however they have a legacy to protect.

Surprise factors : Both Team Flash 🇸🇬 and Lilgun 🇲🇳

Why Team Flash 🇸🇬 ?
If you watched MPL SG Grand Finals, you will appreciate that Team Flash have the quality to pull off an upset. They were one basic attack from losing but thanks to a ‘Bray moment’, they managed to launch a comeback and finally broke RSG PH’s MPL winning streak. Teams that can launch such comebacks are very unpredictable.

Why Lil Gun 🇲🇳?
Their performance in M5 wild card was solid. Mongolia has a reputation of being a solid team, not easily defeated and able to pull off some upsets. Definitely a team to watch.

Group D
This is the most unpredictable group in my opinion.
Expected to advance : Homebois 🇲🇾 and Geek Fam ID 🇮🇩
Surprise factors : TOB 🇺🇸 and DeusVult 🇷🇺

Why Homebois 🇲🇾?
MPL MY champions. They have done well in MPLI except the shocking 0-25 performance. If they can keep their head focused and avoid unnecessary recalls/taunts, I believe they can go far. It’s been a long time since a last Malaysian team delivered a good performance in M-series.

Why Geek Fam 🇮🇩?
They were able to go against ONIC in the grand finals of MPL ID. They look like a team that would be pull off interesting gameplays and have top players in their roster. They had a shocking performance in MPLI. I do think it’s a rare poor performance which do not reflect their actual quality.

Surprise factors : TOB 🇺🇸 and DeusVult 🇷🇺

Why TOB 🇺🇸 ?
NA teams have performed poorly without MobaZane. That’s a fact. However, TOB has some players with M-series experience like Shark, Zia. I am not yet convinced by Mielow’s quality. Is he the weak link? Probably. So far TOB has been performing okay in MPLI but not convincing enough for me to expect them to advance.

Why DeusVult 🇷🇺 ?
DeusVult has been a team that is ever-present in M-series. This time round, they brought in new players that are not Russian. Will they perform well? Not sure. They do have some surprise factor in them given that a lot Asian teams do not really pay attention to Europe server as EU server is not known to introduce any groundbreaking META.

28/11/2023

What are your thoughts on the theme song for M5?

I personally think M5 theme song is awful.

27/11/2023

Another slot of M5 goes to Malaysia.

Team SMG have a near-perfect performance for their M5 wild card, defeating every team except for Falcon (MENA).

There are 2 very strong representatives from Malaysia.

My expectations is to secure top 5. The last few M series have been disappointing and I think to secure top 5 this time will be a good achievement.

M5 is next week, which is very soon. If there’s time after my work, I would love to provide my thoughts on the games.

24/11/2023

UBE strat helped to win vs imbalance matchmaking.

Imbalance due to :
1. Enemy has a trio, we had duos. Basically they are trio mid.
2. Enemy has 4 immortals, we have 0 immortals.

If anyone has contacts with developers, tell them their matchmaking is absolute crap.

Brody early game told us that enemy Gusion was 200 stars and we were like, yeah we are probably going to get smashed for this game.

I built Xborg tank : immortality, Athena shield, brute force breastplate, queen’s wings, ice queen wand and replaced my boots with rose gold meteor. Enemy literally could not kill me and at the same time I could not inflict much damage on them. I had Queen’s wings to save me during critical times. I also had rose gold meteor as an extra layer of shield in case Gusion broke my shield. Like my build is designed just to sustain. I could walk into enemy without much problems. In fact, my enemies retreated when they saw me approaching.

Enemy Karrie, Yu Zhong, Akai were all building tank. We had a Rafaela to heal us. So our one teamfight last minutes. Yes, one of our teamfights actually lasted 2 minutes straight because enemy floryn was healing and our Rafaela was healing. It was continuous back and forth. We fought from our blue buff to lord pit to enemy’s red buff.

So our teamfight was basically tank build heroes + healer vs tank build heroes + healers. Healing all the way and sustaining damage from each other. Most team fight last like seconds. Ours lasted minutes.

Enemy karrie also had oracle, vengeance, brave smite emblem. Basically Karrie is a walking spellvamp/healing machine. A lot of Karrie/claude lately have been using Vengeance + Brave Smite emblem.

Have a look at the matchmaking in mythical glory Europe server. Again, another day another match of mythical glories vs mythical immortal. If this was points system, it would be +18/19 but with star system, it was only + 1 star. This should have been +2 stars for the underdogs.

22/11/2023

This is why I love Europe server’s matchmaking

Enemy has 3 mythical immortal, 830 stars and 530 stars.

Our team has 0 mythical immortal but oh well, matchmaking decided it was fair to match us vs against these players.

How they expect us to defeat a player who is 830 stars currently and has played 1.5k rank games this season?

Each season last 90 days, currently 30 days left. So that means it has been 60 days since new season. 1.5k games over 60 days.

1500/60 = 25 games per day. If each game is 15 mins average including draft pick, that means 25x15 mins = 375 minutes = approximately 6 hours per day.

Sorry, I cannot defeat a player who plays MLBB 6 hours per day average and I don’t get why matchmaking thinks it’s even logical to match me up against them.

Rant over. Gg Europe server’s matchmaking.

19/11/2023

This interview from RSG PH on Homebois is brutal.

1. RSG PH knew about Homebois’s playing style and figured out a strategy to counter it

RSG PH knew that Homebois always wanted to initiate a team fight during first turtle. Due to this, RSG PH was prepared for it. So the coach told the players to initiate first instead of Homebois.

2. Light (roamer for RSH PH) questioned Xorn’s chou decision making

Light was perplexed by why Xorn choose to use ultimate on Aqua (mage) who had purify. Due to this, 3 players from Homebois lost.

3. Demonkite said that Homebois were too aggressive and initiate team fight without calculating risk and outcome

Demonkite mentioned that the decision-making from Homebois did not take into account the outcome of their actions.

4. RSG PH coach mentioned that game 2, they won based on the draft.

Due to this, they were able to execute their gameplay. Coach also mentioned that Chou countered by Kaja, Faramis.

5. Reason why PH is still stop 1 based on the coach is discipline and META.

Coach mentioned META suits PH team. He mentioned PH teams know how to execute and clash in team fight.

This is the type of interview that we want to watch because it provides us with the insight of the team and coach itself. This interview gives you more information than any analyst or caster.

Source : https://youtu.be/vblFHRnWVf0?si=zGeg-RnUdcoTkwQE

19/11/2023

Too focused on playing emote, trash talk and recall.

25-0.

Malaysia’s best team could not even get 1 kill against PH’s 4th team in 15 minutes.

I think more respect should be given to your enemy. Focus on the basics and keep the gameplay simple, reduce your mistakes.

The PH teams are ruthless.

18/11/2023

Thoughts on MPLI Day 2

1. Is ONIC the actual proper Indonesian team in Indonesia?

A lot of people were referring to ONIC esports as Kairi Esports.

After watching MPLI when 6 out of the 6 Indonesian teams are not in the tournament anymore, I do think the only proper decent team that is capable of bringing glory to Indonesia is ONIC. This is definitely a premature judgement but it is very worrying to see this pattern from Indonesia. Geek Fam had a very poor performance in MPLI, not sure what’s happening behind the scenes but ending up last in group stage is very worrying.

There has been a change in recent META, I believe ONIC are now resting their players and also keeping their ace cards.

2. Malaysia’s best team could not defeat PH’s 3rd place team

Teamfights wise, Malaysia can go neck to neck but will always lose the last teamfight. I think playing recall is okay but towards the late game, more focused should be paid towards actually playing rather than recalling. The last teamfight when Chou kicked Akai but Homebois failed to kill Alai, that is when the team needs to retreat because the roamer have already used the ult. However, they continued to be in the teamfight and ultimately lost. It was a tight game and there’s still another chance at glory for Homebois.

3. North America without MobaZane struggles.

When you talk about NA, you cannot exclude MobaZane. The newly assembled TOB still have not produced a convincing performance outside of their NA tournaments. Defeating DEWA was a good start but it was a best of 1, so it’s kinda hard to evaluate. To be swept 0-2 to Cambodia’s SeeYouSoon is certainly going to know their confidence.

17/11/2023

Homebois picked up the Gord vs Echo.

I believed Gord could have been played differently. I will focus on two aspects - spell and build.

Spell wise, I believe sprint will be much better. Sprint allows you to run away from fast backline-diving heroes like Benedetta or Yu Zhong. These 2 heroes can chase you and flicker will not help much. Sprint is much better in the sense you can really run as the speed effect of sprint last for 6 seconds instead of just one instant moment like flicker.

Build wise, I prefer cool-down reduction build for Gord. Main reason is that your primary function as a mage is mainly to support the damage dealers by throwing out as much skills as possible. Gord can function similar to Selena with the skill 1 by always checking bushes with this skill. The skill 2 even without damage items is painful because of true damage from its passive. Knowing how to use the passive to its maximum advantage is really important because that’s how you deal additional damage to your enemies who are building magic defence. So for me, I will personally use cooldown reduction and annoy enemies as much as possible with my skills.

My definition of mage is different compared to others. Some believe mage is there to deal damage but for me, mage is there to use as much crowd control skills to provide a good opportunity for my damage dealers to finish enemy. Crowd control the enemy with my skills is my main priority and damage dealing comes second. It’s the same in football, the playmaker usually focuses on providing assists/key passes rather than taking a shot and scoring.

Finally, could Gord work in this game?

Against Fredrinn, Minotaur, yes due to distance alone.

Against Faramis’s ultimate, it will be difficult because Faramis’s ult will just give everyone another HP bar.

Against Karrie? Yes provided you keep your distance.

Against Benedetta, you have to be very careful. The moment you are in a teamfight and don’t see Benedetta, you MUST always suspect that Bene is near you and will target you.

15/11/2023

China’s debut in Mobile Legends competitive scene

Swept away by Dewa United 18-2 in 11 minutes.

Was it expected? In a way, yes. The Chinese team is still inexperienced in mobile legends high level tournament. During teamfights, they lacked aggression and confidence. They were mainly playing passive if you noticed. They allowed Dewa to invade their jungle, steal all their resources, could not defend any of their safe jungling space. Dewa just snowballed and completely wipe them out in each teamfight.

Teamfights, ability to defend jungle, objective contest were all one-sided.

Still lots of work to be done for a first timer. Only very few non-MPL teams do well in their first tournament. Hence, expectations should be realistic.

29/10/2023

New HyperCarry version in Game 3 MPL PH Grand Finals?

3 supports, 1 fighter, 1 mm

What’s the plan ?
- A new version of hypercarry being played by Blacklist.

Oheb was 11-0-2. Almost all of Blacklist’s kills were from Oheb, the marksman. He was well protected by Faramis, if he needs to be moved to a defensive/offensive position, there’s Mathilda. There’s also Mathilda and Terizla as initiators. Kaja is there for protection as well if needed. This is very similar to the old 2019/2020 hyoercarry where they rely on marksman for majority of damage output. Oheb basically had 4 bodyguards for maximum protection .Oheb didn’t even have boots, he just bought immortality and the rest were damage items.

If the damage dealer dies even once, the plan collapses immediately. PH is truly a region for high level META innovation. I don’t think Coach Ducky was expecting this from Blacklist. I suspect support bans from Coach Ducky in the next game.

Update : Coach Ducky identified Mathilda as the main culprit for the loss, hence he picked up Mathilda instead. The Angela pick for the next game didn’t work out for Blacklist.

So from here, there are 3 ways to stop your opponent from playing their power picks :
1. Ban them
2. Take it away from them
3. Use a strategy to counter it