Coupe des Étoiles: The Conclusion of the WNB Season

This Tuesday evening, the playoffs of the Coupe des Étoiles, the French tournament aiming to provide women a dedicated competition, will start. It will take place throughout October, ending the 22nd with a LAN Final in Paris. These playoffs will see eight teams battling it out in a single-elimination bracket : G2 Hel, Solary Academy, Gameward Astrals, GO Aurora, Vitality Rising Bees, Debiles Girlies, NORD Polaris and BDS Valkyries. Tonight, the first two BO3, broadcasted on OTP_LoL, will feature Debiles Girlies vs Solary and Gameward against BDS. To get you prepared to follow the last major tournament of the year for the WNB scene, Sheep Esports will go over teams’ previews and players to watch.

Not part of the French circuit in 2023 due to not fielding two french players in their roster, G2 Hel had made the decision for this season to participate in the Coupe des Étoiles, recruiting Manon "Sha" Legaignoux in the midlane from BDS Valkyries. The rest of the roster remained unchanged from 2023, with G2H forming a stacked roster from top to bottom. So far, the team has earned one title this year with a victory in the Storm Takeover 2024, but with a 2nd place finish in the Equal Esports cup, G2H are eager to finish their WNB season as strongly as they started it.

The beginning of the season saw G2’s botlane shining with Maya "Caltys" Henckel and Ève "Colomblbl" Monvoisin establishing themselves as the strongest botlane among all WNB teams. As competition in the botside grew, Olivia "Lizia" Calistus assumed the carry role, especially in the playoffs phase of the EEC. The last CDE Open Qualifier however saw Marta "Shiina" Mesas Garrido putting up a statement alongside her midlaner whose prowess on mage picks hasn’t gone unnoticed. Since G2H have earned the most qualification points during the 4 qualifiers (even though they missed the 2nd one), and with the team’s experience, they show up in the playoffs as the favourites to win it all.

Nevertheless, their last tournament run had very little margin with two very close best-of-three matches against SLY and BDS, and most notably a defeat against GWA in the group stage. While G2H’s early game and laning phase are solidified strengths, the team has also shown numerous strange midgame wanderings with many tempo issues as well as pure macro blunders that resulted in major throws, especially against NNOwO in the EEC finals.

Despite winning the tournament last year over BDS, GO Aurora have only kept their botlane Charlotte "Cosmïc" Tranquillin and Eva "Kyanna" Murn. This decision allowed GOA to build around a very consistent botlane that kept progressing throughout the season, with a topside that had more room for creative play. Alice "Wiosna" Mossé’s arrival during the season is a perfect example of this playstyle, since the young French toplaner has been known for playing heavily for her toplane duel with a disruptive gameplay and a very wide champion pool (Yone, Aurora, Vladimir and more traditional picks such as K’sante or Camille).

The mid-jungle, composed of Luna "Lilith" Benzerara-Arnoux in mid and Georgia "Trez" Wheeler has been at the centre of GOA’s evolution this year as both players’ champion pool has changed in the last months as well as their gameplay tendencies. GOA is thus an overall very complete team that aims to play a simple League of Legends structured around a strong laning phase and Kyanna’s excellent macro movement. This year’s results for Aurora are a demonstration of the solidity that GOA have shown with no lower placement than top 4 and a win in the second CDE qualifier. If GOA aims to win the CDE once again, they will need to dive a bit more into the unknown and take more risks.

Solary’s 2024 season for their academy team has been nothing but a roller-coaster. After a top 4 in the 2023 Coupe des Étoiles, Solary were expected to figure among the strongest teams of the WNB scene for this year. However, with a winless run in the Storm Takeover, the roster was initially set for a harsh season. The CDE Open Qualifiers offered SLY a little relief with four top 4 placements, including a victory in the third qualifier against G2H, but in the middle of these successful French journeys, the Equal Esports Cup was close to being an absolute fiasco, as Solary finished 9th with a 3-6 record that could have been a 1-7 if changes weren’t made during the season.

Solary indeed made two changes in the middle of the EEC, replacing their midlaner Lilly "Lilium" Katarina Cintosun with Venezuelan prodigy Rym "rym" Salloum, meanwhile, Jessica Lucy "Shirayuki" Domínguez Puerta re-roleswapped to AD Carry to form a botlane with Sophia "Aos Si". Raphaëlle "Yukiko" in the toplane and Iulia "Yushia" Boldor in the jungle complete the current roster of Solary. Solary’s issues in the beginning of the season were largely linked to a huge identity crisis and erratic drafting that saw SLY’s players often being put on non-comfort picks and not really knowing what to do in-game.

As of now, SLY have shifted to a much more direct teamfight-oriented team with Yushia and Aos Si composing the two set ups of the team while rym and Shirayuki play traditional carries. Although Solary “only” finished top 4 in the last qualifier, it was after a very tense BO3 against G2H that could have gone either way. In fact, Solary Academy’s ceiling looks very high ahead of this tournament, Solary can thus hope to get their first League title since the DH Tours of 2019.

The seventh ranked team on the CDE qualifier points after two top 8 appearances in the qualifiers, DBG, arrives in the playoffs with little pressure but a clear potential for performance. This is a relatively young roster, as it’s been formed only for the second qualifier and has not participated in any other tournament this season. Initially full French, a mid-season replacement in support seeing Chelsea departing for Honey to take her place saw the team go international.

The team has qualified through a simple and direct teamfighting playstyle, with Sona in the midlane and Lunaphine in AD Carry often being put on backline carries while jungler Diane and support Honey bring in the melee champions to compensate. Lastly, rookie toplaner Akyhysa has attempted to follow in the footsteps of Adam’s GODS picks, playing a lot of Olaf and Darius in recent matches. In spite of their 7th seed, DBG can pose a threat; they will face Solary in the first game of the playoffs this evening at 6 PM.

GWA’s 6th seed is nothing but a mirage, with four consecutive top 8 appearances in the CDE qualifiers, GWA have always been very close to breaking into the top 4. Similarly to DBG, GWA is a young team that has only participated in the Coupe des Étoiles circuit, reaching the quarter finals in each Open Qualifier.

The team’s composition has all the qualities of a dark horse with every player having huge carry potential but a tendency to create absolute chaos that prevents consistent performance, pretty much anyone in this team can be an absolute psychopath. GWA have formed around former Solary duo Kamilla "Hao" Djamalov - Aurore "KoyaSka" Baïsse, two players with signature aggressive playstyle in their respective roles (jungle and AD Carry). In the toplane, Vildan "Telch" Soylu has mostly been seen on splitpushers while support Célia "Shimesama" Frappa has been the perfect match with her ADC’s penchant for violence. Young midlaner Héloïse "Torlaine" Klaine is the “most calm” player of the roster, although calm isn’t a very good word to describe her close-to-limit gameplay and tank-like positioning on mages such as Hwei or Taliyah.

In the last qualifier, GWA were the only ones to beat G2H after a cliffhanger game where it all ended in a double-tp backdoor, however, they crumbled against BDSV in the QF. As much as they are capable of clutching through very tough situations (the victory over G2H was a comeback), GWA are also very dependent on a fearless gameplay that tolerates very little individual inting. The Astrals will have to overcome the same BDSV that they lost to if they want to advance into semis, a victory could be the beginning of an unstoppable momentum.

Being the last seed of the Coupe des Étoiles, NORD Polaris are however far from being a young or inexperienced team, with players coming from various rosters including Chester Gaming, which finished in the top 4 of the EEC. NORD’s botlane Ana "IanaTheAlpha" Ioana Popp (support) and Evie "Pivotless" Pullen (ADC who played top for the EEC) as well as midlaner and mid Tahm Kench enthusiast Flora "Fey" Grote were part of the crazy underdog run of Chester in the Equal Esports cup. NORD’s French core lies in the topside with Lexa "Lexa" Grellier and Coline "Chouby" Reiter, who arrived during the season to replace Wiosna, who has been recruited by GOA.

NORD’s last results in the Coupe des Étoiles have been an early exit in the group stage after a defeat against Debiles Girlies. However, like DBG, NORD have nothing to lose in these playoffs and have all the experience and individual skill needed to be able to take on any team that doesn’t come fully prepared, as it often happens in the first BO3 of this kind of playoffs.

VRB’s season has seen the Hive mostly staying in the shadow of other teams with placements that couldn’t see them reach the top after initial promising tournaments. VRB indeed started their season with a solid top 4 in the first CDE qualifier losing to BDSV in a close semi-final, with a top 3 in Storm Takeover and top 2 in the second qualifier then, everything was set for a good season for Vitality. But the EEC sparked a tendency that hasn’t left VRB since then: VRB are consistent enough to always overcome lower tier teams with little struggle, but are unable to elevate their level to beat the top teams.

On paper, VRB could apply for the most experienced roster of the league, with sololaners Madison "CrowMac" Coutelet and Alena "TIFA" Maurer having competitive experiences dating from 2015, carry-main jungler Agnė "Karina" Ivaškevičiūtė and the botlane duo of Velouria "Viki" Baty Victoria "Indifferent" de la Torre Serna also have several years of

competition behind them.

VRB’s main issue hasn’t been about consistency or even individual level, it has mostly been issues of team chemistry that prevented the team from using their players to their maximum potential. This meant that while other teams stepped up, VRB stagnated, which was largely sufficient for a top 8 finish in the qualifiers and a qualification for the playoffs in the EEC, but is currently not enough for title contention. Nevertheless, such issues can often be resolved with the right catalyst, VRB’s shape ahead of these playoffs is thus tough to predict. With a strong roster on paper and an ambition to fight for the first place, the team has everything to prove, their journey will start against GOA next week, on October 8th.

BDSV’s time in the Coupe des Étoiles has been synonymous with the 2nd place many times, the Valkyries are indeed the current runner-ups of the CDE with a 2nd place last year. They have also reached the finals of Open Qualifiers twice (for the 1st and the 4th one). In contrast with a 6th place in the Storm Takeover and an 8th place in the EEC, BDSV have been performing at their best on the french circuit, and can hope for a win in these playoffs.

Compared to 2023, the team has changed a lot, with two players remaining: Nova “Sea” Jenčáková in the toplane and Eva “Evalunna” Fest, along with three role changes. Sasha "Sashy" Barrault indeed was part of the team last year, but as a jungler, and role-swapped to mid to cover up Sha’s pick up by G2H, former Vitality Alina "Aly" Müller then took the jungler role while Alessandra "Nenris" Schmalfuß replaced Stratospanda in the ADC role.

BDSV’s season has on the outside been a bit strange, with results that seemingly place them in the lower tier of the EEC, despite being in the middle of strong tournament runs. BDSV indeed rely on individual outperformance to thrive with Sashy and Nenris usually being placed in carry roles, anyone on this BDSV roster can look much better than usual on a good day and in that case, whoever is performing well takes the lead of the team, with the gameplay centred around her. Their first game against GWA will be a test of their consistency, as despite some poor results, BDSV’s “worst” level has never been really low.

Header Photo Credit: Elliott Le Corre/PGW