SEA has a lot to prove this year.

With SEA’s solo carry from last year’s Rift Rivals in the Gigabyte Marines no longer being part of the region, the other nations from South-East Asia will have to dig deep and fight hard if they want to find any success in Sydney during Rift Rivals 2018.

The SEA region has always been the oddball, with the old GPL being considered more as a Champions league-esque event, which the best of the best from a number of national leagues coming together to fight it out in a short, but packed tournament to determine who will be representing the region internationally. The SEA region has had two dominant national leagues, the Taiwanese/Hong Kong/Macau LMS, and more recently the Vietnamese VCS graduate out of the region and become their own fully fledged independent regional leagues which grant their own international spots.

The new SEA tour, replacing the GPL, has not yet started, with the qualifiers for the National qualifiers currently taking place. Ascension Gaming, Kuala Lumpur Hunters, and Mineski were automatically granted spots to their respective national qualifiers, which means Rift Rivals is the first time we have seen the three SEA representatives play this split.

Mineski (Philippines)

Mineski is a fan favourite in both the SEA region and around the world, most well known for their appearance in the group stage of the Season 3 World Championship. Mineski has been around South-East Asia and the Philippines throughout the years since, pumping out consistent highly rated results in the GPL, as well as 3 national titles in the Philippines.

The roster still retains a core of the Season 3 Worlds lineup in top laner Kaigu, mid laner Exosen and support Tgee, complemented with Korean jungler Jjun, as well as Korean bot laner Gari. they are also supported by their active 6th man in Hamezz. He is able to sub into every single role, and has brought change and thrown chaos into the game whenever he has been subbed  in.

Mineski had essentially a perfect split in the Philippines, with a 7-0 regular season, in which they only dropped three games They then steamrolled through the playoffs, achieving two 3-0s on their way to claiming the Filipino championship. In the GPL they started off strong, tieing for the top of the group with a 3-1 scoreline, but were set back in the semis with a 3-1 loss to the Kuala Lumpur Hunters. They were able to redeem themselves in the minor final however, defeating the Singaporean Champion’s Sovereign in a 3-0 to claim 3rd place and the last spot at Rift Rivals for South-East Asia. They will be hoping to support their region in their bid to win and become the champions of the ocean.

Kuala Lumpur Hunters (Malaysia)

The Kuala Lumpur Hunters have been a mainstay of both the GPL and the Malaysian league, having attended all 14 seasons of the GPL, as well as winning 6 Malaysian championships in a row. The Malay lineup consists of top laner Shiro, long standing jungler QaspieL, mid laner ArrHedge, bot laner OzoraVeki, and support SOUPerior, who has recently rejoined the team after an 18 month hiatus from league.

The team has struggled to find success in the GPL throughout the years, finding it impossible to break the barrier of 3rd/4th place until this last april, where they steamrolled Mineski 3-1 in the semis, before losing 1-3 to Ascension in the final. This will be the first time that the KL hunters have competed at a Riot international event, and will want to make a great first impressions to those outside the SEA region.

Ascension Gaming (Indonesia)

Ascension Gaming are the number one representative for SEA and the back to back to back champion of Thailand. Their roster has a core of former Bangkok Titan players (yes the very same Bangkok Titans that defeated The Chiefs 3-1 at the IWC Turkey Final in 2015 to claim a place at Worlds): including mid laner G4, and bot laner Lloyd, flanked by top laner Rockky, support Rich and newly acquired starting jungler Delpain.

This roster is by far one of the strongest in both Thailand as well as South-East Asia, dropping only 3 games, 1 in Thailand and 2 in the GPL on their way to claiming the last GPL title. After a relatively poor showing at MSI, being tied for last in Group A of the Play-In stages with a record of 2-4, Ascension want to prove they have what it takes to win big internationally.

The Pacific Rift Rivals tournament between South-East Asia’s SEA Tour, Japan’s LJL and Oceania’s OPL continues with the last day of group stages tonight!

One of these regions will be eliminated at the end of the night, and with the competition being tight, everyone is still in the firing line. You can catch the action over on Twitch.

Representing Oceania we have first seed the Dire Wolves, second seed The Chiefs and third seed Legacy Esports. These teams have been powerhouses in the league since its inception however this split has proved interesting to say the least. Being 4 weeks into the split Oceania has shown some interesting compositions and certainly not being afraid to try new strategies. Patches 8.11 and 8.12 have thrown a spanner in the works in the most entertaining way for audiences and it’s shaken up the region’s rankings.

While some teams have chosen to embrace the meta quickly choosing unconventional picks and strategies like funneling methods and almost waving goodbye to traditional ADC’s, other teams have lagged behind. The roster changes across the OPL between splits and the new patch has resulted in teams that previously sat at the bottom of the ladder rising up and taking matches off the best teams in the region showing that this is truly anyone’s meta.

Due to region proximity this is a rare occasion for the OPL teams to compete against international teams outside boot camps during the off-season. The other regions are in proximity to other servers like the Korean and Chinese servers which affords a luxury that the geographically isolated region of the OPL cannot experience. Let’s look at the three teams hoping to take home the trophy for OPL’s first victory in Rift Rivals history.

Legacy Esports

Legacy Esports has been the trunk of Oceania since its inception in 2014. Recently, the organisation was acquired by AFL club the Adelaide Crows, which was the first major move into esports from the traditional sporting world in Australia. Throughout the history of the OPL, Legacy have been a consistent Top 5 team, although they are finding it hard in this new meta to get series wins in the OPL.

Carbon’s prodigy Only will look to pop off this tournament as he has shown some promise in the jungle for Legacy so far this split. Claire is their remaining branch from the days of ex-players Carbon and Tally, and is truly a force to be reckoned with. He has experience and a wide champion pool. Raid and Decoy are an efficient and interesting bot lane duo who aren’t afraid of spicing it up with new picks like Vladimir. However they tend to stay more traditional with Decoy well known for hard engage supports like Braum and Alistair.

The Chiefs

The Chiefs Esports Club are the legends of Oceania. Although they lost their mid laner and jungler at the beginning of the year to ORDER, as well as EGym to casting, their new and seemingly improved line up has shown progress in keeping the Chiefs firmly in the top 2 of the leaderboard. They brought in rookie jungler Babip, former Sin mid laner Ry0ma, and veteran support Destiny. Babip is showing to be the key pick up here, his ability and skills are phenomenal in the jungle, making him a true terror on the rift.

Though in the last week they suffered an unfortunate loss to Tectonic, the team that has in the last few weeks come out of nowhere from the bottom of the standings to take series from some of the strongest teams.  They have the rock in the top lane Swip3rR to keep the traditional Chiefs mentality alive and hopefully this roster will see Chiefs finally seeing success on the world stage.

Dire Wolves

The Wolf Pack have been on fire since acquiring Shernfire at the beginning of 2017. They’ve taken all 3 national titles since and have represented the OPL at Worlds as well as 2 Mid Season Invitationals. With a minor roster shake up between the splits, replacing top laner Chippys after an underwhelming MSI performance, they have started off Split 2 strong, currently topping the OPL standings.

Shernfire has been the heart and soul of the team since entering, showing consistent performances and being a strong in game leader. In the top lane, they have the rookie BioPanther, who entered the OPL with a bang after shining in the OCS. Triple in the mid lane has also shown strength, being a rock for Oceania at MSI when the rest of the team crumbled, but Shernfire takes his solo laners to the next level. The traditionalist bot lane has ADC  K1ng and support Cupcake to round out this unstoppable composition.

Oceania’s representatives are looking like firm favourites to hoist the Rift Rivals trophy and it will be great for the region to finally take a win on the world stage in front of a home crowd. With some strong contenders and fierce competition, it is likely to be 4 days amazing games between these regions and some entertaining and chaotic team compositions to watch as we’ve already seen.

Rift Rivals continues tonight for day 2 of the Group Stage, with OPL’s Legacy Esports facing up against the LJL’s Unsold Stuff Gaming at 5pm AEST on Twitch.

Japan have a lot on the line at this year’s Rift Rivals.

Returning as defending champions, they bring the exact same teams from last year’s competition to Sydney this year. Unsold Stuff Gaming, DetonatioN FocusMe and Pentagram all qualified from the LJL, with all 3 teams bringing massive amounts of domestic and international pedigree to the table.

The League of Legends Japan League (LJL) is Japan’s Premier LoL competition. 6 teams play against each other in a double round robin to determine the best team in the land of the rising sun. While there have been some wacky compositions – as we’ve seen from League globally recently – USG and Pentagram like to stick to the traditional stuff, often running marksmen to play through their team’s strong point in bot lane. DetonatioN FocusMe have been a lot more experimental in their team comps however, running Ryze, Morde and Vlad bot instead of traditional AD Carries. With Rift Rivals being played on the 8.13 patch with the reworked Aatrox enabled, something not seen anywhere else yet this year, we might see some more adaptation from the defending champions.

Unsold Stuff Gaming

This name should be at least a little bit familiar to Oceania fans. Legacy brought Mimic over from USG to play in 2018, while Mammoth’s mid laner REMIND played for USG at Rift Rivals 2017. Unsold Stuff Gaming has been around since 2015, having qualified for the LJL through the Challenger Tournament. While the team has no LJL titles to their name, they were part of the 2017 Rift Rivals squad, and have secured 3 LJL 3rd places over their history.

USG have a bit of international experience on their lineup. Bot laner Gango played for China’s Vici Gaming and Unlimited Potential in the past, being a part of their LSPL and LPL campaigns from 2015 to 2017. Gango is also arguably the best ADC in the region, performing outstandingly in Spring Split. apaMEN and Enty were both selected for Japan’s Asian Games team, and while the team didn’t qualify for the major tournament (after all, they had China and Korea in their group), having the experience representing your country internationally is big.

Jungler Tussle was a part of the Rampage squad who represented Japan in 2017 at MSI and Worlds. He also has 4 LJL titles under his belt from his time on Rampage. Mid laner Gariaru rounds out the USG lineup, who is a quiet performer on the team just starting to find his stride in the LJL after replacing veteran REMIND late last year.

USG finished the LJL Spring Split with a 6-4 record, falling to Rampage in playoffs. They have started their Summer Split campaign 1-1, but have yet to play against either DetonatioN FocusMe or Pentagram in the tournament. The rival matchup between Mimic and his old team will be one to watch on Tuesday, when USG take on Legacy in what is sure to be a grudge match. Although USG might not pack as much fire power as the other two representatives, you cannot discount them. After all, they are the defending champions of Rift Rivals.

DetonatioN FocusMe

DetonatioN FocusMe is a long standing name in Japanese Esports. The organisation has been around since 2013, before the LJL existed. When the LJL was incepted in 2014, they quickly rose to the most dominant force in Japanese League, having won 5 LJL Grand Finals, and 7 LJL Minor Premierships.

DFM boasts arguably the most experienced roster at this year’s Rift Rivals. Mid laner Ceros and Bot laner Yutapon have been a part of the organisation since 2013, with the latter having played Top and Bot for the team at various times. Steal has previous LCK experience, jungling for KT Rolster in the 2016 Kespa Cup and Pathos during their Champions Korea campaign.

Top laner Evi was part of Japan’s Asian Games team for this year, as well as Rampage’s (now Pentagram) successful LJL campaigns last year which saw the team qualify for Worlds. Support viviD played in Champions Korea back in 2015, as well as having international experience with DFM at the 2016 IWCI.

They’ve been on the same dominating form in 2018 heading into Rift Rivals. During Spring Split this year, they went 10-0 in their series, only dropping 3 games along the way. While they got swept in Pentagram in the playoffs and missed out on a MSI spot, they have bounced back. Currently, they are undefeated in the current Summer Split, beating Pentagram and Crest Gaming in swift 2-0’s. With all this talent and form, SEA and OCE must be very wary of the Japanese super stars, who aren’t even the LJL’s first seed.

Pentagram

That title of LJL’s first seed goes to Pentagram. Fans might know Pentagram from the Mid Season Invitational, or by their previous name Rampage. Their last international performance was against Dire Wolves, where they took down the Oceania Champions in decisive fashion in their final game. The organisation has been around since 2013 under various names, taking out 3 LJL Grand Finals and 2 Minor Premierships.

YutoriMoyashi is the team’s most respected player, having played a part in Japan’s Asian Games campaign as their Bot laner. Paz, the team’s top laner, has played 3 different roles in competitive League over his 3 year career, and has titles under his belt as a jungler and top laner. Ramune is also a playoffs genius, having won every final he’s been a part of (3 LJL finals and 2017 Rift Rivals).

Support player Gaeng is relatively new to the scene, having an LSPL campaign under his belt from 2016, before returning to competitive League for Spring Split this year for Pentagram. Jungler Once also has international experience, playing for BPZ in their Champions Korea campaign in 2017, falling just short of qualifying. He also played for Hong Kong Attitude in the LMS last year, substituting in for 2 games.

Back home in the LJL, their 2018 season got off to a rough start. They were forced to surrender 5 games in the Spring Split due to the organisation withholding ex-players Dara and Tussle’s residency cards. However, they bounced back, coming 2nd with a 6-4 record and sweeping DFM in the finals to qualify for MSI. DFM have beaten them so far in the Summer Split, with the team sitting 4th with a 1-1 record so far. However, with their current roster coming off the back of 3 international tournaments in a row, their experience will be crucial in Japan’s title defending hopes.

The Pacific Rift Rivals Tournament between South East Asia’s GPL, Japan’s LJL and Oceania’s OPL starts today! You can catch the action over on Twitch.