Last year, Riot Games introduced the
LoL Esports Global Power Rankings, a system where Tier 1 teams are ranked by a model that assesses each team’s “Power Score.” Now that
the Mid-Season Invitational has just finished with Gen.G’s spectacular finals win, the system’s gotten its
latest update.
Factoring in all the results from MSI,
Gen.G, who were already ranked #1 in the world, of course
maintained that top spot. Other strong performers at the tournament, like
Anyone’s Legend and
T1, jumped from fifth to third and fourth to second, respectively.
One huge rising star in these rankings, and in the eyes of anyone tuning in to the last few internationals, is
CTBC Flying Oyster. Just a few months ago, CFO was ranked #29. After First Stand, they had their first spike in the rankings, jumping to #18 after
shock upset victories over Team Liquid and
Top Esports. Now, they’ve solidified their position even closer to the top: An MSI that saw them
handily take down the LEC’s Movistar KOI, and bring T1 to five games, has brought them up to the #9 spot.
Another major change comes in the interrelations between Western regions, as seen by the Global Power Rankings. It’s not just individual teams, but regional leagues too, that are given scores. And while the LTA South continues to clearly stand out as the worst performing Tier 1 region, a shift has occurred between EMEA’s LEC and North America’s LTA North. After both
G2 Esports and
MKOI had a rough MSI, the former eliminated 3-0 by
FlyQuest and the latter 3-1 by CFO, the LEC has suffered in the rankings and is now absent from the top 10. Before, they held a slight lead over the LTAN in the “Regional Strength Score,” about 50 points ahead. Now, they’re 200 points behind, and the #9 G2 has dropped down to #13, while the LEC’s champion and first seed, MKOI, are ranked all the way down in #21.
A Flawed System
While the Global Power Rankings does serve as a cool new toy for fans of international
LoL,
its real use as a tool to determine team-to-team strength seems limited. Though it’s powered by an algorithm Riot hyped up, it seems to miss certain aspects of team strengths and weaknesses, especially near the bottom of its standings. For example, the LTA North’s
Disguised, which has struggled to pick up just about any wins all year, is now ranked six points ahead of the LPL’s Royal Never Give Up. Sure, RNG has certainly had challenges of their own recently, but one team went
1-1 with AL this last split, and the other was
crushed by Dignitas.
Many other irregularities exist throughout the standings. As mentioned, MKOI, which won the LEC in a 3-1 stomp over G2, is ranked ten places below them. This is likely due to the system’s factoring-in of G2’s standout performances over previous years. But to many fans, the fierce G2 of yesteryear, with a different
jungler and
support, should have nothing to do with the rank of this year’s title-less team.
Finally, despite CFO’s impressive and consistent international performances this year, the LCP as a whole is still ranked as the second weakest region. All this and more seems to suggest the calculations are missing certain aspects of the data that perhaps another algorithm, or a simple “eye test,” could provide. Going forward, it certainly will be interesting to follow the Global Power Rankings, and see if they can progress to a point of greater accuracy on team strength. At the end of the day, with the unpredictability of League on a game-to-game basis, the potential for upsets that defy all algorithmic team-strength predictions may always exist.
Header Photo Credit: Riot Games
