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RISING TIDES: YOE FLASH WOLVES GIVE HOPE TO TAIWAN

Fourth place is not usually a placement of particular honor. Yet, for
Taiwan's yoe Flash Wolves, their IEM Katowice placement belies its
significance. Their home region might be one of the prestigious few to boast
of owning a World Championship title, but the Taipei Assassins' miraculous
run through 2012 was -- for esports -- a very long time ago. In the
intervening years, the region has fallen into increasing obscurity on the
international stage.



All of the teams at Katowice were playing for their home region as much as
for themselves. But the Wolves bore an additional burden -- to prove to their
own fans that they belonged there at all.

在Katowice比賽的所有隊伍都不只為了自己，也為了他們的區域而奮鬥。但閃電狼背負了
更多額外的負擔--向他們的粉絲們證明，他們所生長的地方。

OLD GLORY
"Since Season 2, a lot of [LoL Master Series] fans only love TPA and AHQ,"
said Wang "MrRemember" Chi-Te, head caster for the LMS and former analyst for
the Flash Wolves. In fact, the regional community's expectations for the
Wolves was extremely low: Wang admits that much of the audience thought that
the Taiwanese region just wasn't that good anymore. In his words, there was
"no hope, no power to compete with others."

過去的榮耀


The internal assessment, among players and coaches, was similarly grim. "In
the past two years, our region was really bad," said Shih "Fluidwind" Yi-Hao,
Flash Wolves analyst, citing a particular weakness among Taiwanese teams when
put under high pressure matches. From his prior work as Taipei Assassin’s
analyst, he claims that their scrim results were far in excess of what was
demonstrated before the cameras, yet the Assassins were quickly demoralized
upon their first defeat.



Even in Katowice, the threat of that fragility loomed. "After losing to SK,
even Fluidwind thought, 'Maybe our region isn't that good,'" said MrRemember.
"On the second day, even winning versus Cloud9 -- it was more like C9 didn't
know how to close the game."



MrRemember recalls that the last two years had been a gradual step-down in
expectations. "Because we beat down the Korean and Chinese teams in Season 2,
lots of people thought, 'TPA is good!' But Season 3, we lost all of our
international matches. People thought, 'We're not that good, but we're still
better than the LCS regions.' Then last year, we saw TPA lose to SK and TSM,
and SK even without Svenskeren in the jungle. And only AHQ won against EDG --
a miracle. After last year, I think the audience thought our region's really
weak -- no difference from the GPL or International Wildcards."



CONTENDERS
Yet, in contrast to the pessimism of the community both globally and at home,
"we expected to hit the semifinals," claimed both Fluidwind and top laner
Chou "Steak" Lu-Hsi. "Our opponents weren't that bad," said Fluidwind. "We
thought GE Tigers would be the best team in the tournament, but they weren't.
We think, to fight against SK, it was a 50% chance—they're a really good
team. Every team in every region was really strong, not that easy to defeat,
but also with their own disadvantages."

競爭者


The Flash Wolves had managed to practice versus both TSM and WE, the Katowice
finalists, during their time in the city. Said Fluidwind, "We scrimmed versus
TSM and thought we were really close -- but they're stronger than us in
strategy. They use hard-engage comps like Sivir/Annie -- we usually play
Janna or Morgana to secure our AD carry's damage and use long-range champions
to defeat them in team fights, and aren't 100% confident with their team
comp. Their team members have very good skill -- I think Bjergsen was the
best mid laner of that tournament."



"Especially in the mid game, we think our team knows how to win this game—
even when competing with the LCK or LCS teams," said MrRemember. Fluidwind
and Steak confirmed that top LMS teams spend most of their scrim time against
their Korean and Chinese peers. Top LMS players practice primarily on Korean
servers too.



LESSONS LEARNED
So what changed between their failures in 2013, 2014, and now? Humility,
hard-earned twice over, was the greatest contributing factor for the Flash
Wolves’ recent successes. "Before Season 3, I know the Bears didn't scrim
and practice that hard," said Fluidwind, referring to the team’s former
Gamania Bears sponsors. "They've been a little cocky, and thought they could
easily defeat the teams at Worlds, then learned that every team was really
strong. They saw their VODs and thought 'they're really bad,' but couldn't
defeat them in a single match -- the team was in shock."

學到的教訓


>From there on out, the team spiraled downward. Not only did their old
sponsors close shop, but the new age restrictions for Season 4 threw a wrench
into their team synergy. Mid laner Maple, then 16, was shuffled off to the
Wolves’ junior team, and the main team’s subsequent performance in the
expanded Southeast Asia Garena Premier League circuit hammered in their
inadequacies. "After they got out of the GPL, they finally had to think about
why they lost. 'We're good players, but we can't even stay in the GPL. How
did that happen? That's really awkward.' They had to think about what
disadvantages they hadn't conquered, and finally improved their strategy and
techniques."



What might have ultimately saved the region was Taiwan/Hong Kong/Macau's
departure from the GPL entirely -- paradoxically, because it was now even
harder for the teams. "In the GPL, there are only two or three strong teams.
Only TPA and AHQ are strong, but you could only face them two times in groups
and in semifinals every four months," explained Fluidwind. "Most of the time,
you're facing teams you can never lose against—now they have to practice
hard, and I think this makes a big difference." The intensive focus, and Maple
’s return to mid lane, has put the yoe Flash Wolves at the forefront of the
Master Series, where they are expected to win the spring split title outright.



But victory in the LMS isn’t enough to whet their appetites. They still have
farther to go, and more growing to do, and have a very concrete idea of what
it takes thanks to the pan-Asian networking between the LPL and LCK circuits.
Said Fluidwind, "We think [top LMS teams] are almost the same as LCS NA and
EU's best teams -- not that easy to defeat them, but not easy to defeat us
either. But I think LPL and Korea are still stronger. EDG is stronger than GE
Tigers—we scrimmed with EDG and they're really hard to play against. The LCK
teams aren't at the same level."



"I don't think we'd have a chance to win versus EDG in a Best of 5," admitted
Steak, at least for now. He expects EDG to have a significant advantage come
the Mid Season Invitational. But he's confident that the Wolves -- and
everybody else -- will reach parity by October.



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看到沒人翻就嘗試翻了一下

第一次翻這種長文請多指正

有些小不懂意思的後面會加問號(?)

有一句整句看不懂的我有在後面附註QQ

原文和圖片連結:

http://goo.gl/WYfDMJ

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