This is kind of late but I wanted to post this because it tilted me so much.

If Talon is playing next season, they need to consider firing their current coach. Seriously, his draft strategies are so bad that you can put a clown like me in there and they'd probably end up with better drafts. I'm not even kidding, I was watching the draft live and I was just like wtf are they doing. It's sad to see because TLN is so talented, but it's ruined by what seems like retarded drafting. Now idk if Veres jungle is some RPL secret strategy (it's not), all I know is that it didn't work... at all.

Now let's go over the draft in this do-or-die game 6 to see what I mean - first let's take a look at the heroes available to both teams.

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Heroes Available for TLN

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Heroes Available for FW

First thing I'll mention is that TLN again chose the red side. This is usually 70% preference and 30% strategy. Teams like to choose the red side earlier on so they can get their hands on 2 OP heroes or some kind of synergy between two heroes. Teams generally gravitate to the blue side as the series goes on and the # of OP heroes decreases so they can get that first OP pick. In this case, I don't think it was wrong for TLN to pick the red side simply because FW still had a bunch of good heroes available to them. Just wanted to mention in case people were wondering why.

Ban phase:

FW - Zip, Ignis

Zip ban is a no brainer, and Ignis is very strong in competitive play. Very standard bans.

TLN - Laville, Roxie

Laville ban was a no brainer, Roxie ban was just stupid when heroes like Alice/Riktor/Maloch were still available to FW. The reason behind the Roxie ban was that they wanted to pick Omen, but there was no reason to ban Roxie there because TLN had the last pick of the first pick phase, they could’ve banned a better hero like Alice and then banned Roxie in the 2nd ban phase. For FW to pick Roxie, they’d have to pick Roxie BEFORE TLN’s Omen pick which they most likely won’t do since Roxie isn’t a great hero by herself. FW most likely would’ve picked Riktor, which you’d be very comfortable picking Omen into. Instead, they let out the Alice & Maloch combo…. In game 6 lmao.

FW Pick:

Alice – No brainer pick, she’s the best hero available at this point and guarantees the Alice & Maloch combo since TLN has already used both heroes and banned none of them.

TLN Pick:

Omen – This is what they wanted, this is what they got. They still could’ve waited until their 3rd pick to get him, but I guess they wanted to see what FW picked first. I would've preferred picking Omen with the third pick, but nothing wrong with this pick here.

Veres – This is just a horrible pick. There are better heroes to put at mid (Dirak/Marja still available), and DEFINITELY better heroes to put in the jungle. Maybe they wanted this to be a flex pick since Veres can go to the Dragon lane for a double ADC comp but that's just dumb because FW still has Hayate available. Not only that, if they're putting her mid this means they HAVE to pick their jungler with the next pick otherwise they’re going to have zero magic damage in this lineup. Keep in mind they’ve already used Paine & Zill at this point, so they only have Darcy and Keera left as traditional magic damage junglers. If they don’t pick Darcy/Keera with their 3rd pick, they will be banned 100%.

I know Dirak is scared of the Alice/Maloch combo, but still. You have one of the best mids in the world, he’ll make it work. Marja would’ve been better here as well.

FW Pick:

Maloch – No brainer pick to combo with Alice

Hayate – Best MM available, no brainer. He counters Veres if TLN puts her in the Dragon lane as well so this effectively eliminates any jungle ADC picks from TLN as well.

TLN Pick:

Anette – She’s not a horrible pick by herself because she has good wave clear along with Veres, and can reposition Hayate ult with her ult. But this is not really a good pick caused by the previous Veres pick, because now you’re going to have zero magic damage against a VERY tanky Maloch meaning he can go full physical defense.

TLN Ban:

Kriknak – Not sure why because Annette is a counter to Kriknak, not to mention none of their heroes are particularly scared of Krik. I would’ve doubled down on Riktor/Yena bans here to limit the options on the DS lane to make sure th

Riktor – IMO they should’ve just double downed on one role and severely limit the options on that role. I would’ve preferred Riktor/Yena bans personally but Krik/Zephys ban isn’t bad either. Instead they let out one of each…

FW Ban:

Darcy/Keera – No brainer bans, taking out all of the traditional magic damage junglers

TLN Pick:

Joker – Good pick against the Hayate, really worried about their late game damage though. I thought they’d go for a Fennik/Violet jungle

Laurel - I really like this pick, because Laurel is good against Yena/Maloch even Hayate but NOT at the cost of putting Veres in the jungle. As good and exciting this Laurel pick is, I was really expecting a Tulen jungle pick here and allowing Veres to play mid where she’s infinitely better. Is Veres Anette as good as Alice Maloch? No, but you can’t pull shit like Veres jungle in a must win game 6, it just doesn’t work.

Just terrible overall drafting by Talon. Idk how well/bad they were drafting in the RPL games, but I wouldn't be surprised if TLN could be on the same level as BRU had they employed a better coach, that's how talented the players are. Like the games are like 40 minutes to an hour in between, and you come up with Veres jungle in a pivotal game 6? Jesus.

Now I know Happy apparently doesn't have the deepest hero pool, but you can't use that excuse and pull out Veres jungle. And to be super honest, pro players having "shallow" hero pools are partly the coach's fault as well. As the coach, you're supposed to devise strategies for your team and practice those strategies in scrims.

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TL;DR

- Banned Roxie instead of Alice and allowed the Alice/Maloch combo in an elimination game

- Went through all that for an Omen first pick, when they could've picked him with the third pick instead and secured Dirak.

- Picked Veres instead of Dirak/Marja with no plan in mind, and ended up slotting her into the jungle because they ran out of AP junglers