The Player That Saved League of Legends

foreign finals at the League of Legends World Championship in Iceland teams one representing China the other South Korea are facing off in a heated series to determine who wins this year's title and their neck and neck although each team rosters five players each playing their heart out for this Championship everyone watching can't help but root for one [Music] the stakes cannot be higher this is the beginning of the end for Khan's Last Dance Khan is about to play his last ever game of professional League of Legends and he has one final chance to win a world championship people like Khan are difficult to find in the world of sport hell they're difficult to find in everyday life which is why it would be so cathartic for the league Community to see one of its most beloved Pros end his career in the best way possible but Khan's career was so poetic there was only one way it was ever going to end [Music] foreign before we talk about Khan we first have to talk about the game he conquered League of Legends is something people have strong feelings about oh my god dude and then and then I'm pinging them back [Music] in 1998 an American high schooler living on the island of Guam created a custom Starcraft map that he then shared on the internet this kicked off a series of events that 10 years later resulted in the release of League of Legends a game that could be incredibly fun and Incredibly frustrating what made league so intriguing was that on the one hand it was a game all about tactics there was so much depth and strategy it almost immediately became a great competitive sport but on the other hand League was also viscerally fun even more casual players could pick up the game and enjoy it because this game gave you something no other competitive experience did complete Freedom of Choice League might seem simple at first as playing a match just involves five players loading into a game and picking characters that are meant to fight on a battlefield to accomplish a simple goal but over the course of a game a player has to make millions of little choices in how they play with no right or wrong answers what role do you choose what Champion do you pick how do you build them with the hundreds of items available to you and how aggressively or passively do you approach the game in general you get to answer these questions however you won part of the fun of league is how there's no wrong way to play the game creating a weird personal strategy that you find uniquely fun and building an online identity through that personal expression is incredibly freeing but this freedom is also what makes the game so frustrating because League of Legends is a team game and everyone is free to play how they want it's entirely probable players on a team will disagree about how each other is playing the game league is quite Infamous for how frustrating it can be playing with teammates who lose their Minds ruining your games with poor attitudes or poor gameplay the huge number of players and roles in game just present loads of uncertainty and opportunity for things to go wrong but even so all those players and roles also give the game its incredible strategic depths there's so much to learn about the game you could spend your entire life studying it while never truly mastering everything leak has so much creative complexity it's essentially unsolvable or at least that's what we thought until 2013. this could be a 20-minute game for SK Telecom they will be the season three world champions at the end of season 3 the region of South Korea led by SK Telecom debuted a strategy to the competitive world that was genius in hindsight it was just four words minimize activity maximize Precision the idea was league is a game that naturally has a lot of chaos during all the phases of a match from early game laning to fighting opponents to taking major objectives all of these instances present opportunities where something can go wrong and making any major mistake during one moment could be enough to lose you again so Korean teams figured out the best way to play the game was by minimizing the overall amount of activity if you don't bother engaging 50 50 fights that you might lose and instead replace that with only going for plays that you know ahead of time you'll win you'll eliminate a lot of uncertainty from a match this means you'll be fighting a lot less overall so you have to spend a lot lot of time warning to get complete vision control and information for the plays you do end up making you also need really high Precision to make sure your team fights go off without a hitch but if you're good enough to play near flawlessly this puts loads of pressure on your opponents as there are always just one mistake away from you swinging the game into your favor rotate save over to the dragon ambition gets completely clawed and there's a tidal wave they want more they get the knock up on the Lost Boy but they're going to try to take out Daydream watch comes in there's another nice Aqua prison oh good play but it's not quite enough and lost boy is still getting chased Kenny flash over the wall he will but there's a gold card again a double kill for goon what was genius about this play style was there wasn't really any way to counter it if anyone ever tried to speed up Tempo against a Korean team with an early aggressive move having such precise gameplay normally meant they could Escape danger easily while also probably turning around to get some sort of kill themselves afterward if you you tried playing along with Korean Tempo though it was only a matter of time until they outmaneuvered you catching you out with a missed position and punishing it with flawless execution these skirmishes might only give them a small lead at first but Korean squads always knew how to snowball that into an insurmountable Advantage this they swept over to have seen winning all sorts of tournaments to a point where it didn't take long for the rest of the world to copy it and try using it themselves soon everyone was emulating this low activity High Precision play style to a point where it almost got kind of boring Korea proved their strategy was best by winning League's World Championship back to back to back to back but at those worlds we saw the average kills per player each game drop year over year over year over a year everyone had started copying the Korean play style but that just meant everyone was playing with much lower activities so matches were having way less action even though every region was playing this way nobody could do it better than Korea who continued to dominate the international competitive scene maybe League could be solved after all this region might have just found the end of The Meta [Music] Kim Dong ha was born and raised on Jeju a small island just south of the Korean Peninsula sometimes called South Korea's Hawaii Jeju was also nicknamed the island of three lakhs and three abundances this moniker comes from the thought that the province supposedly lacks all thieves Beggars and Gates while being overly abundant in generosity nature and fruit fruit might seem like an odd thing to sink a while but it's actually what Jeju is most known for internationally as the island is famous for a unique species of orange called the halabong this special variety of Tangerine is famously sweet and sour and is shipped all over the world so when Kim first started playing online games as a kid wanting to represent his hometown he gave himself the username halabong he first ran into League of Legends in 2012 after some friends from school convinced him to play they taught him the basics and before long he was addicted just like the rest of us he found a particular affinity for playing the 80 carry role bot Lane with one of his favorite champions from the start being Graves as much as he liked the role though there was one issue he had with it one day while playing a game with friends hollabong was playing grave Spot Lane and couldn't stop dying with him he was playing with this proactive style that led him to continuously Tower diving always going for kills on Enemy laners No matter how dangerous a play might be after racking up an impressive death count and costing his team the game one of his friends remarked in the post game Lobby if you're going to play that aggressive you should play Top Lane Top Lane was a role uniquely suited for Han labong While most Lanes in a match of League are pretty straightforward in what a player is meant to provide the team either being a carry dealing damage or some sort of tank or support providing utility Top Lane is a bit of a wild card the role is isolated from the rest of the team meaning top laners are kind of free to do whatever they want if hanlabong insisted on being an over aggressive carry player top was the one role where he could do exactly that now normally a lot of league players don't like playing top because the role doesn't have that much impact on matches it's not uncommon for everyone else on a team to all but decide a game while the top laners are off dueling on their own if on labong plays Top Lane he won't exactly be deciding the outcomes of matches with his gameplay anymore additionally Top Lane is a role that has a lot that can go wrong in it the isolated nature of the lane means if you ever do get set behind you can't expect a teammate to come help you out of a jam the enemy top laner will likely just keep snowballing Elite against you for the rest of the match one versus one which is why many top laners compare the role to being on an island but Han labong was used to being on Islands after his rough Graves game Han labong took his friend's advice seriously and immediately made the switch to top the instant he did League became a million times more fun now he was free to pick some of the most aggressive champions in game as well as being free to play them however aggressively he wanted he began playing the role so much that he was starting to get pretty good with it soon rocketing up the Korean solo Q ladder until the start of season four when he had reached the Pinnacle playing against some of Korea's best Pros although Han labong's play style was enough to carry him this far this was the moment his aggression kind of started to hurt him Korea of course was in the midst of perfecting their Min activity Max Precision play style during this period of time which was perfect for exploiting overactive players going so aggressive for kills in Lane leaves you open to counter-attacks and The Talented precise pros of Korea were more than happy enough to exploit this kid who refused to conform to The Meta at this point hanlabong probably should have adjusted his style if he wanted to have a bit more success against Korea's top Pros but he didn't in fact at the start of season 4 Han labong joined the semi-pro team and competed on stage still with this aggressive style that just got him into more trouble the time he gets pushed back on the bond get some damage the cow comes in on the bong in trouble now ninja can't really do anything in this fight Holloman solo Sunday comes in they managed to get the kill onto Renekton it was as if his brake line was cut he was playing so proactive and over aggressive in every decision he made it was as if he wasn't on the same page with his teammates at all for teleport live yeah there's a little bit of trouble here that's not a good board no it's not where you want to be so they're going to give some kills back over Prime and trouble now Arrow grabs that one and this game remains close wow that teleport man uh it should have been canceled it was really weird to see Han labong was talented enough he probably could have made it in the Korean Pro scene if he just conformed to The Meta if he minimized his activity and stopped being so aggressive top teams would be happy to take him on and make him the next big star but for whatever reason hanlabong refused to play the game that way he probably just thought it wasn't fun he liked when League was chaotic and when he had the freedom to be as aggressive as he wanted so he was going to play that way no matter the cost at the end of 2014 Han labong's Semi-Pro team failed to qualify for the lck leaving him teamless without many options for where he could go next no other teams in Korea were willing to sign such a hyper aggressive and mistake-prone top laner so he was considering retiring and going back to Jeju to study but before he did an old friend approached him with an offer one of his former teammates had just been given an opportunity to go off to China and join an Academy team with the condition that he brought a top laner along with him after a series of discussions together his friend eventually convinced Han labong to join and the two were headed off to the LDL since Kim was moving away from home he wanted to re-emphasize his connection to his hometown changing his username to Korean Han labong but that name broke the League of Legends character limit so he shortened it to Khan [Music] Khan took to the Chinese scene like a fish to water the aggressive region was happy to make use of his specialized skill set and he was happy getting to play Carrie top laners the slower pace of the academy League also made it easier for Khan to begin ironing out some of his mistakes in his gameplay soon he was performing as one of the best top laners in the region but unfortunately this was also the moment that Khan was reminded of one of the most frustrating things about League of Legends sometimes you play well but you can't carry a bad team Khan spent nearly three years in total developing in the Chinese Academy league and although he was performing Like a Star by the end of it he would never win a single competition looking at his tournament history it's almost depressing as his four-year career as a pro hadn't ever yielded a single first place trophy sometimes he was actually just getting stuck with bad teammates and couldn't do much about it like in the 2016 spring split although he did get to play with a future pro-kore Korean jungler in Clyde every other player on his team was a perennial amateur journeyman some of them were just months away from retiring without ever playing significant time in a top pro league not to be rude to these guys or anything being a league Pro is hard but you would think that a team with the best top laner in the league and a future pro-korean jungler could do better than barely breaking 500. in other circumstances it almost felt like the universe itself colluded against Khan's success like in the 2015 spring season here Khan managed to carry his Academy team to qualifying for LPL promotion with an actually talented roster but what should have been an exciting step onto the pro stage turned into disappointment once again as we sold this LPL spot to another organization before sending Khan back down to a new amateur team with another new roster full of strangers how well Khan was playing didn't do anything to stop the universe from breaking his heart time and time again in circumstances that just felt more and more cruel with each subsequent event like when he first moved to China the friend he came along beside ended up having a falling out with him as he'd leave just a few months after arriving returning back home to Korea this meant Khan was abandoned in a foreign country without any friends or family additionally when Khan first signed on to his original team he also signed a three-year contract meaning he was stuck here getting paid nothing more than an academy salary for a huge stretch of his career later on Khan would eventually develop into the star player that he became and got to sign a new deal with a new roster to finally get paid a bit more but unfortunately the team he signed on with ended up having a pretty full roster so the coaches decided to list him as a substitute rather than a starter later on management approached him and said that they wanted to deduct his salary because he wasn't starting for the team even though this went against the original contract he signed Khan thought it would be fine at first as they just mentioned deducting 10 percent but then Khan realized that they weren't taking 10 off his salary they were reducing his pay to 10 percent of what they originally agreed the world of League of Legends and its competitive scene is famously unjust at times but normally a player isn't subjected to so much heartbreak at such a vulnerable stage of their career thankfully for Khan his luck was about to change [Music] meanwhile back in Korea a war had broken out between organizations South Korea had established themselves as the best region in the world bar none but the gates were always open for who the best team in Korea would be for now it was SK Telecom and Samsung Galaxy two orgs that had already 31 World Championships backed by Mega corporations but in 2016 new names wanted to contend for a title one of those competitors was a team who went by the name incredible Miracle this was an organization who originally started as a professional Starcraft team but had also been competing in League of Legends for a number of years they always had middling to poor performances for the most part but suddenly had a new opportunity at the start of season six at the end of 2015 a rich Chinese company bought ownership out suddenly leaving them flush with cash shortly after the team rebranded themselves to longju gaming and looked to compete with all the other Big Spenders in Korea this started in season six when they created a super team roster of 10 players some of which were the most expensive free agents on the market people were excited as long Zhu was suddenly touted as the next up and coming Squad to conquer Korea and win Worlds but the results couldn't be more disappointing [Music] they can you're going in with a big engaged flame right there but there's just not a lot of damage with Coco and Chaser down they take up the second Nexus threat and that is it kg will secure the 2-0 nail biting finish but KT takes it they secure their third place spot in the league and logs you languishing in the middle of the pack there ESPN would describe it with a metaphor as the most expensive garbage pile imaginable as the spring season ended with longju finishing below 500 and missing out on even qualifying for playoffs the summer season went even worse as the team almost got relegated following their rough season six long Zhu tried trimming down their roster to a smaller talented squad for the start of season seven but in the 2017 spring split they still found themselves overpaying for stars who couldn't win more games than they lost it turned out League of Legends was a game where money could buy 10 talent but it couldn't buy wins so in the middle of the 2017 season the organization blew everything up they kept their veteran bot Lane Duo of prey and gorilla who were some really talented Stars performing The Best of anyone on the team but they got rid of everyone else their mid laner was replaced with a new signee from the recently relegated CJ entice and their jungler was swapped out for a substitute player who hadn't been doing anything but riding the bench so far these were two young rookies the organization hoped maybe could learn from some of the veterans and eventually develop into Stars years down the line longshu didn't really have any idea who they could sign for Top Lane though since it was the middle of the Season no big name free agents were available nor any exciting rookies so in a desperate move to find something longju signed two amateur players that had been playing in foreign markets up until this point they picked up Rascal who was a Korean top laner that was finding a bit of success recently in the Japan Japanese professional League they also signed Khan when Khan arrived in Korea he brought his aggressive play style with him and it turned out nobody knew how to deal with it normal game states that players were used to like 2V1 situations where one team is clearly ahead and should pick up an easy kill were suddenly flipped upside down by a kid who refused to stop fighting Zio was exposed prey actually dies with his ultimate up the Featherstone wasn't even used in the fight with no peel for him as Khan wants to turn around to kill Yep looks for it actually does a decent job there on the back of the Flash oh my God finds the weak point now Wolff he's in trouble the double kill be gone it was honestly insane no matter how outmatched Khan might be in a situation he would not back down he wants more kills jumping around the side there's the heroic entrance just to make sure that this is not a fight the conquered winning less he takes down makes it out with the dog pass message this wasn't supposed to happen Korea was the region that perfected Lee their Min activity Max Precision style should allow them to punish over aggressive players who try to make the game more chaotic with the mistakes that naturally came in their style of play but Khan wasn't making mistakes anymore he was playing flawlessly it took a mountain of men to bring him down and even then he wouldn't go down and now Khan is all alone 1v2 trying to hop on over with that Blaster with the flow he made it away but here comes Pawn they're looking for the dive three members trying to go under this turret there's the flash stun there's the burst whoa he gets kill the returns away what the hell how did he just win 1v3 Korea had tamed league for so long they forgot what a crazy mess of frustrating fun the game could be until this monkey wrench was thrown in their system although long Zhu signed two top laners for the 2017 Summer exploit Rascal only started one game all year they hit gold with the other this new team of full aggro rookies led by Khan finished the season on top of the standings in first place the Korean professional league has a unique playoff structure where the best performing teams in the regular season are granted buys based on where they finish the best performing team getting seeded directly into the playoff finals that meant long Zhu with their direct seed into the lck championship would only need to win a single best of Five series to become Champions but that task would still be difficult because of who they were facing SK Telecom stood on the other side of the rift who are the greatest team in League of Legends history SKT had won three titles rostered the greatest player ever and up until now had never lost an lck final naturally most fans expected SKT to win the series Pretty handily it would take a bit of a miracle for these rookies to beat the greatest team ever in about best of five top side here for Longview wanted to make sure that no sneaky little Baron's gonna be taken by SKT as Faker once again in trouble oh the counter stun comes and is there so lead strike and the one versus one Khan proving himself versus Faker John needs to go and do some Japanese action of his own because he knows the rest of SEC are coming back [Music] [Applause] won the series three games to one and Khan carried them to Victory winning MVP in the process toppling was the story of this series as it was symbolic of the direction League was about to go for the first few games Khan faced off against skt's top laner untara who was the polar opposite of him in every way untara was a player that embodied minimum activity maximum Precision his approach to toppling was to always play tanks never look for any action instead just focusing on Farming and surviving until later on in a match when he could help out his allies in team fights he stuck to the tried and true Korean formula and Khan humiliated him in front of a national audience and he pops a locket he turns around and engages this is what happens when you build three items that say screw you Shen on the uh handles there's nothing Shen can do Shen is not set up to deal with every potential item to kill him Khan showed the world that this min max style wasn't perfect if a team or player played proactively against an opponent that was being too passive they could build up gold leads through Outlast hitting and finding opportunities for kills that nobody had been taking advantage of before once you had any sort of Advantage if you kept your foot down on the gas pedal and continued pressing your opponent they won't know what to do if all they know is to sit back give up objectives and not engage fights that they won't win all of this meant that being an aggressive carry top laner wasn't just fun but now it turned out it was the perfect way to break the old meta which even SKT realized mid-series in game 3 SK substituted untara out of the game for huni who was their own carry top laner that specialized in aggressive gameplay game three was the one and only match SKT was able to win in the series emphasizing you could only Fight Fire with Fire but even huni couldn't play as well as Khan who took control game four and helped to lead long Zhu to their first title they left the turret up so they could [Music] get beaten to a pole oh my God Khan doesn't miss a shot glass and we'll just wander his way out Baker and blank say in his first ever split of play in the lck Khan just carried his team to a championship established himself as one of the best top laners in the game and was now headed to Worlds foreign [Music] strategy in League of Legends that I haven't mentioned thus far is the in-game patches because a game with so many characters and strategies for players to choose from some will always naturally be better than others at times certain characters or tactics may be incredibly overpowered While others are essentially unplayable so the game's developers Riot try to balance out the game with an update patch every few weeks these patches usually contain new characters major updates and Stat changes to try and get the game a bit more balanced usually leading up to a world championship though patches are meant to be much smaller in scope after all Ryan doesn't want to make a major update that forces all the pro teams to change tactics right before the most important Tournament of the year but at 2017 worlds that's exactly what happened throughout season 7 one item had been dominating The Meta called Ardent sensor Arden was an early game support item usually built bot Lane where once it was finished it would give its user an ability where every time they shielded an ally that Ally would be given a series of Buffs bonus attack speed damage and life steal on every Auto attack Arden had been a bit too strong all year as this single item was enough to give Allied carries extra damage while also giving them extra survivability that much utility in a single relatively cheap purchase was kind of taking over the game leading to many complaints for Arden to be nerfed going into the world championship on patch 7.17 released right after the summer split Riot did give the item a small change going into Worlds they said they were decreasing the attack speed buff and health drain to try and balance it out to make Ardent more fair but they didn't actually do that train uh Health train buff decreased let's see how they decrease the attack speed buff 22-30 uh uh [Applause] about all I have to say on the change to Ardent sensor what Ryan had done was adjust the item the attack speed buff and health drain were changed so rather than scale over the course of a game they were given flat numbers although these numbers did Nerf the late game cap on the bonuses it actually buffed Ardent to be even stronger in the early game and this single change completely ruined League we do get our defense here from RNG Arden sensor better and still have the Artisans Around The Shield's Arden sensor because when you have art they have still found an artist sensors there are other ways double Relic Shield names but that's also the very interesting thing about the meta coming into Worlds where we have four of these art since a late game comps 2017 worlds came to be known as the worlds of Art and sensor it didn't matter how you qualified for it the winner of this event would be the one who could play most passively who could play around bot Lane and who could build Ardent sensor the best there was so little else to discuss it became a meme in the league Community what is my purpose Rush the art sensor as fast as possible oh my God the meta had been completely broken meaning everyone from solo queue to the pro scene were now forced to play around this one item and this was entirely unfair to longshu gaming they had just come off innovating one of the most exciting proactive styles of play league had seen in years Max activity Max aggression which had toppled some of the greatest teams in the game's history but everything they had learned had now been made entirely irrelevant just like everyone else if they wanted to win Worlds they would have to use passive Ardent sensor play although that could still end up working longshu's bot Lane were a legendary Duo who had the talent to stack up against any other bot Lane out there if top tier 80 carry and support gameplay would be what it took to win a world championship they certainly had the skill to do so the question was whether or not the rest of their team could successfully play around them Khan in particular had the toughest job of anyone as his past year was just spent perfecting hyper carry top laners with a lane dominant style that he was basically not allowed to play anymore instead he would have to pick up some new characters being forced into playing off tanks and other supportive bruisers that could help out the Ardent bot Lane he figured out a few ways to still make things work and have fun doing so at least in the group stage finding some fun Oddball picks that could get the best of both worlds this led long Zhu to a 6-0 start looking strong but then the rest of the team ready to push through the bot Lane the wave already pushed the inhibitor easy to drop Samsung Galaxy defying expectations 3-0 was a likely result but not in the way you expect here Samsung Galaxy eliminated longju in quarterfinals as they would be the ones to steamroll their way to winning the World Championship although Samsung were the number three seed from Korea considered to be less talented than longju or SKT on paper no other team could challenge their run for the title because this meta fit their play style perfectly they were the best at the minactivity max Precision attitude which had been made even more potent because of Art and sensor Samsung had a shockingly easy time slowing down the pace of their games to a complete crawl dragging out matches until they could rotate into finding the perfect team fights guaranteeing wins this took a lot of talent of course they had spent all year perfecting this style of play and executed flawlessly but this combined with the prevalence of Arden ended up giving us some of the most boring games League fans had ever seen matches dragged on for ages while little to no action occurred in series that didn't even end up being particularly close this year's worlds we even saw fewer kills per player than ever before it was shocking for fans to see one single outlier update make the game so passive but it was even more of a disappointment to see that update have such a huge effect on an event as important as the world championship I think in retrospect a lot of people would probably look back and say that it all felt pretty unfair but then again league is a game plenty would call unfair how did they think that was okay to even put it in the game company Riot realized their mistake after worlds and reverted art and sensor in the following off season better late than never with this change the league got back to where it was before and long Zhu were able to return to their Max activity Max aggression play style they rebranded once again in the following off season changing their team name to King Zone dragon X but how talented this roster was stayed the same in the 2018 spring split Khan LED his Squad to a near perfect season finishing on top of the standings with a 16-2 record this once again gave them a spot in the grand finals of playoffs although this time they would have to face a team of unfamiliar faces instead of their opponents being SKT or Samsung Galaxy or another Korean Powerhouse kingzone would have to go through a rookie Squad the Africa freaks led by another hyper carry top laner it turned out although longshu didn't win worlds in 2017 the rest of the world recognized what they had done everyone saw how they built a team out of hyper aggressive solo Lane stars and how that constant aggression allowed them to topple some of the greatest teams of all time so in the following offseason everyone copied them all across the world teams from every region had begun retooling their rosters around aggressive carry players who played with a fiery fun Spirit King's own may have trailblazed their way to the top but now the rest of the world could follow in their footsteps even so Khan was still the best top laner in Korea which he proved as he led KDX to beat Africa in the 2018 spring split Grand finals showing off that Kaiser saying oh there is this sniped the combo that is huge this gave the team their second straight lck championship and sent them to another International competition the mid-season Invitational but at MSI KDX finally cracked their aggressive style was now being challenged by so many other aggressive teams they couldn't stay Flawless forever although they played well enough to make it to Grand finals Katie X would lose to the Chinese organization RNG being denied another International Championship Upon returning to Korea Khan and KDX found a very different region than the one they had left in the following summer split the Korean server fully embraced Max activity Max aggression and they tipped the standings Upside Down With The Changing of the Guard Superstar teams like SK Telecom were left in the dust not even making playoffs as rookie squads with no name players found themselves on top of the table all sorts of solo laners and proactive rosters were being given a chance they had never seen before in part due to kdx's Innovations Khan still stood ahead of the pack when it came to individual player Talent as he won the regular season MVP award showing just how great he was but KDX as a team only ended up finishing third in the standings the following playoff series would end with more disappointment as they ended the year a distant fourth and failed to qualify for worlds for neutral fans this was one of of the most exciting times to follow League of Legends not only were games filled with the loads of crazy plays but Max activity Max aggression was also allowing new teams to come out of nowhere and make a name for themselves this year we even saw a new region win worlds for the first time in half a decade as the Chinese team Invictus gaming used a hyper carry Korean top laner to lead them to Glory it was a fun time for spectators but it also meant even the most talented players in the world had a more difficult scene than ever before to try and carve out a legacy for what it's worth though I don't think Khan cared that much about anything like a legacy even though he was one of the best players in the world Khan approached the pro scene like he was just a regular League player he sort of became the people's top laner saying the kinds of things that every top laner says from bronze to Diamond um his attitude and demeanor was endearing in how relatable he was I think a lot of average League fans could look at Khan and see a lot of themselves in him even the ugly side that this game can bring out in all of us at the start of the 2018 season Khan was involved in an incident when grinding out practice in solo queue during one of his games he was paired up with three Chinese players and one Taiwanese player in Champion Select and that game didn't end up going too well in a moment of heated frustration when the team was behind mind Khan typed in all chat for Chinese can't win although he was probably just trying to blow off some steam this comment was seen as a bit insensitive particularly to the Taiwanese player so right Korea stepped in Banning Khan for a match if professional play and served him with a fine Khan responded himself by apologizing publicly on the team's Facebook page and shaved his head in Penance this is part of what made Khan such a lovable character much of Esports in the past had been very focused on being as slick and cool and professional as possible but here we had one of the best players in the world just acting like a goofball just a moment please are you okay Khan always approached the league like he cared more about building a highlight Montage on YouTube than he actually cared about winning games even the few mistakes he made in game were the sort of thing you would normally just see in solo queue apostle possibly someone as well if they're in melee Ridge wow cool when he did that still might be out of kill someone jumps over with the broken wing splashes out Abyssal Voyage to make sure Khan doesn't die Khan basically played League of Legends the way we all do for fun that's just the kind of personality he has the fact he was able to win so much with it though was astonishing everybody loved watching him play and loved the personality that came along with it really the only sad thing about his career was that it couldn't last forever South Korea had been the best region in the world at producing League of Legends stars for a while but there was always a cruel twist that came along with that leak Pros have short careers compared to any other sport or traditional job While most players debut on stage around 18 they're normally lucky if they can hold a roster spot for a decade with most players retiring by the time they turn 28. this leaves a pretty short window where someone can compete at their best which is even shorter for Korean players in South Korea all able-bodied men have to complete at least two years of compulsory military service in one of the branches of the Armed Forces beginning when you turn 18 years old you don't have to do it right away as you can defer through a process of delays at least for a little while but you do have to enlist by the time you turn 28. this is obviously unfortunate for League of Legends Pros Khan was in an extra sucky situation since his career didn't really kick off for a while he had spent just as much time trapped in the Academy scene as he did in top leagues not making his lck debut until he was already 22. of course there were a ton of accomplishments he had already racked up in his first few splits of play but whatever else he wanted to do would have to get done within the next few years not wanting to put off military service forever Khan decided he would likely retire from league and enlist in the military around when he turned 26. that meant he had just a few more years to accomplish whatever he still wanted to do before moving on from the game obviously only Khan himself could know for certain what his goals were but there's two things I'm sure were on the Forefront of his mind the first was probably to make as much money as he could most of Khan's career was spent getting screwed over by crummy contracts getting paid minimum wage at times even though he was one of the best players in the world I'm sure he wanted to use his time in the spotlight to get paid for his talents with whatever time he had left the other thing I'm sure he wanted was to win an international title League of Legends is a game that famously has many of its greatest players never come close to winning worlds all the unpredictability that makes League such a frustrating and infuriating experience on a casual level also extends to the pro scene as great individual talent doesn't guarantee wins even for the best of us this unfortunately is magnified even more with the randomness of tournament structures and single elimination on top of things like patches that might hit the server to make your strategies entirely irrelevant which all comes together to cause some of the game's biggest and craziest innovators to never see trophies in recognition for their skill it's one of the greatest tragedies of this game and the infrequent International tournaments but if there was any player out there who was good enough to force his way to a championship if there was anyone who the game itself owed him a title it was Khan now he had three years to do it [Music] [Music] [Music] eliminates SK Telecom foreign foreign [Music] Europe has ever produced fbx get ready G2 's heading to Paris [Music] although 2020 ended up being disappointing as fbx's roster could never quite gel together during a turbulent covid year Khan still had a wonderful time going back to China was like a homecoming where he got to play alongside fun players and a fun team putting to rest all the frustrations he had to deal with the last time he was in the region everything lined up so perfectly for a great career Arc Khan considered retiring then and there that is until the 2020 world champions came knocking at his door foreign [Music] [Music] comes out from peria but God is doing such insane damage and the Flash has come through for the double kill of Khan oh they didn't know about this TP I guess Teddy had no idea and oh man and now this TP is coming in Faker tries to kill Canyon was down to like what one else all right well congratulations for your Series MVP Canyon the Nexus falls down and someone here get the 3-0 over Genji and will be your spring lck Champions After winning the 2021 spring Korean splint getting his fifth domestic title Khan came closer than ever to winning it internationally at MSI that year he made it to Grand finals and only fell by a single game to RNG once again he was so close to being over that hump so the top side that is a fantastic beer but you can see the con still looking for it the paranoia coming down turdu really wants this but he's not gonna find it because that was oh my goodness actually survives in such a long time finds the knock-up with the queue he buys time but wants it more it's so that the rest of darwance here can destroy harmful lives oh they're just trying to get the slight down on time and when they're coming in but showmaker has the damage and he takes out two but the infernal soul will go the way of T1 can owner and Connor Salvage it no someone wins the fight and they're teleporting to try to end the game he's gonna go away of Tom one they just have to hit the Nexus and Dom wakia will be your champions of lck Summer 2021. at the end of the 2021 summer split Khan won his last ever lck season and cemented an unbelievable Legacy although his career was shorter than the average players by a wide margin he now had more championships than any other top laner in l CK history winning six titles with four different teams you won every lck split he entered except for one during the 2018 summer season when he still won MVP leading a revolution of aggressive gameplay that changed how everyone across the world approached the game he had multiple All-Pro accolades MVPs plenty of things decorating his trophy cabinet along with the respect and admiration of every Pro all around the world literally the only thing he had left to do was win a world championship but that's about to change foreign [Applause] different comps and you know really are able to play a lot of different styles we are potentially fighting a kill on top side mama going in with the Cyclone's Gonna Knock him back on the flashes he will watch and die a damn want here clean up the fight someone are just way too good at in the pursuit of perfection they are found worthy once again and they will fight T1 in savings bet on this on this Smite now stepping forward 3K getting lower who's gonna get it no in the end it is Canyon when it matters most people find this fight magumiyushi standing strong on the backside it does not matter in the face of the Elder darwakia will wipe T1 off the map they're gonna tip it up as well they have the Elder Dragon they have a wave day on everything they need to go to the World Finals which only leaves us with grand finals it's game five all Khan needs to do is win this one match of League of Legends to finish his career off perfectly he picks Graves Top Lane in Champion Select a perfect aggressive laner and one of his first ever favorite Champions the match starts off well Khan's being aggressive right from the get-go zoning the enemy top laner from CS building an impressive gold lead everything's lined up so perfectly it almost feels like a moment that's too good to be true oh there's the Flash Forward conestant funneled onto fandre on this Cannon and with him reaching very close to level 11 and having his jungler here this is a problem he's decided to commit but he throws away the ultimate Nordstrom comes in and now Khan trying he gets it done and he's not done yet JJ taking a lot of damage can't win this side of Dom Juan Kia but the dragon resets oh The Flash doesn't work out there for comedy still trying to get this one done it does not work and the dragon will be one key are limping and EDG at the man Advantage the Nexus will go down and Against All Odds EDG will be your 2021 world champion in game five Dom One gaming lost Khan's career was over his last ever match would be a loss in Grand finals of Worlds to date he is the only player in the history of League of Legends to make three international Grand finals and lose them all how did this happen well the match looked good at first Khan got a lane bully champion and made the most of him being aggressive with his classic style of play building an impressive gold lead through denying last hits but the enemy top laner was playing Kennen a team fight Champion later on in the first team fight of the game Kennen picked up first blood and the gold he got from that kill basically made up for the entire lead Con Ed bill right after that fight Khan had to recall and heal up where Upon returning the lane he was Lane ganked by the enemy jungler there was no vision he could have used to see this gank coming this wasn't really a mistake if you were being picky you could say Khan should have been playing Ultra passively since nobody knew where the enemy jungler was but Khan wasn't the type of guy to play Ultra passively from that moment onward the match just kind of snowballed out of control there's a lot of things that could have gone differently in retrospect Khan could have played more passively and potentially made a comeback happen his teammates could have done more and carried him through a rough early game everyone could have been better prepared or performed better in team fights but at the end of the day this is just League of Legends sometimes everything goes wrong and it doesn't feel Fair [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] me oh [Music] yes [Music] it's weirdly poetic that the man who found so much joy in a game known for being so cruel to us had the game respond by being so cruel to him league is frustrating and brutal and gets under your skin in a way nothing else does we're all along for a ride we don't remember signing up for we care about it so much and we work so hard towards success it makes sense there's days we lose our cool but even so there's good days too they'll pass by too quickly and feel all too short but if you approach everything with a smile and keep good company and you work hard to insist the world make a place for you in it you'll find moments that make it all feel worthwhile just keep a grin on your face be kind to others don't take things too seriously make your hometown proud [Music] Khan grew up on a small island off the coast of the Korean Peninsula but I think it's safe to say he taught every region across the world just how great life can be you never stop having fun [Music] foreign

Channel: Gbay99

Views: 1,643,531

Keywords: League of Legends, Esports, Khan, Gbay99

Id: BzdO7jjrA4s

Length: 57min 56sec (3476 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 23 2022