The 2015 League of Legends World Championship was an esports tournament for the multiplayer online battle arena video game League of Legends. It was the fifth iteration of the League of Legends World Championship, an annual international tournament organized by the game's developer, Riot Games. It was held from October 1 to 31 in various cities across Europe: the group stages in Le Dock Pullman, in Paris, France; the quarterfinals at the Wembley Arena in London, England, United Kingdom; the semifinals in the Brussels Expo in Brussels, Belgium; and the finals at Mercedes-Benz Arena in Berlin, Germany. The 16 teams qualified by either winning a professional league or a regional qualifying tournament.[2] There was a 16 team round-robin group stage followed by an 8 team single elimination bracket. The games were officially streamed on Twitch, YouTube and Azubu in several languages. The BBC also streamed the tournament online on BBC Three but for British IP addresses only. A peak of around 14 million concurrent viewers watched the finals, according to official sources.
| 2015 | |
 | |
| Tournament information | |
|---|---|
| Location | France England Belgium Germany |
| Dates | October 1–October 31 |
| Administrator | Riot Games |
Tournament format(s) | 16 team round-robin group stage 8 team single-elimination bracket |
| Venue(s) | 4 (in 4 host cities)
|
| Teams | 16 |
| Purse | $2,130,000 USD (€1,907,194.31) |
| Final positions | |
| Champion | SK Telecom T1 |
| Runner-up | KOO Tigers |
| Tournament statistics | |
| Matches played | 73 |
| MVP | Jang "MaRin" Gyeong-hwan (SK Telecom T1)[1] |
Teams edit
The following teams qualified to participate in the tournament's group stage:[3]
| Region | League | Path | Team | ID | Pool | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Europe | EU LCS | Summer Champion |  Fnatic
|
FNC | 1 | ||
| Most Championship Points | H2k-Gaming
|
H2K | 2 | ||||
| Regional Finals Winner | Origen
|
OG | 3 | ||||
| China | LPL | Most Championship Points |  LGD Gaming
|
LGD | 1 | ||
| Regional Finals 1st-place | EDward Gaming
|
EDG | 2 | ||||
| Regional Finals 2nd-place | Invictus Gaming
|
IG | |||||
| North America | NA LCS | Summer Champion |  Counter Logic Gaming
|
CLG | 1 | ||
| Most Championship Points | Team SoloMid
|
TSM | 2 | ||||
| Regional Finals Winner | Cloud9
|
C9 | 3 | ||||
| South Korea | LCK | Summer Champion |  SK Telecom T1
|
SKT | 1 | ||
| Most Championship Points | KOO Tigers
|
KOO | 2 | ||||
| Regional Finals Winner | KT Rolster
|
KT | |||||
| TW/HK/MO | LMS | Summer Champion |  ahq e-Sports Club
|
AHQ | 2 | ||
| Regional Finals Winner | Flash Wolves
|
FW | |||||
| Wildcard | Brazil | CBLOL | IWCT | CBLOL Winter Champion ►IWCT Chile Winner |
 paiN Gaming
|
PNG | 3 |
| Southeast Asia | GPL | GPL Regional Finals Winner ►IWCT Turkey Winner |
 Bangkok Titans
|
BKT | 3 | ||
Venues edit
Paris, London, Brussels, Berlin were the four cities chosen to host the competition.
 Paris, France
|
  London, England, UK
|
 Brussels, Belgium
|
 Berlin, Germany
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Group Stage | Quarterfinals | Semifinals | Final |
| Le Dock Pullman | Wembley Arena | Brussels Expo | Mercedes-Benz Arena |
| Capacity: 3,500 | Capacity: 12,500 | Capacity: 15,000 | Capacity: 17,000 |
|
|
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|
|
Group stage edit
The group stage was played in a best of one double round-robin format, with the top two teams from each of the four groups advancing to the knockout stage, for a total of eight teams. The group stage started on October 1 in Le Dock Pullman, Paris and concluded on October 11.[3] In Group B, ahq e-Sports Club and Cloud9 both ended in a 3–3 tie, resulting in a tiebreaker won by ahq e-Sports Club to win second place in the group.
- Group A
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | L | PCT | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Flash Wolves | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0.667 | Advance to knockouts |
| 2 | KOO Tigers | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0.667 | |
| 3 | Counter Logic Gaming | 6 | 2 | 4 | 0.333 | |
| 4 | paiN Gaming | 6 | 2 | 4 | 0.333 |
- Group B
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | L | PCT | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Fnatic | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0.667 | Advance to knockouts |
| 2 | ahq e-Sports Club | 7 | 4 | 3 | 0.571 | |
| 3 | Cloud9 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 0.429 | |
| 4 | Invictus Gaming | 6 | 2 | 4 | 0.333 |
- Group C
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | L | PCT | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SK Telecom T1 | 6 | 6 | 0 | 1.000 | Advance to knockouts |
| 2 | Edward Gaming | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0.667 | |
| 3 | H2k-Gaming | 6 | 2 | 4 | 0.333 | |
| 4 | Bangkok Titans | 6 | 0 | 6 | 0.000 |
- Group D
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | L | PCT | Qualification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | KT Rolster | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0.833 | Advance to knockouts |
| 2 | Origen | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0.667 | |
| 3 | LGD Gaming | 6 | 2 | 4 | 0.333 | |
| 4 | Team SoloMid | 6 | 1 | 5 | 0.167 |
Knockout stage edit
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The bracket stage started on October 15 in Wembley Arena in London, continued to Brussels Expo in Brussels, and concluded on October 31 with the grand finals hosted in Mercedes-Benz Arena in Berlin.[4] The knockout stage has been streamed on BBC Three,[5] while the final will be streamed on ESPN3.[6] The bracket stage is played in a best of 5 format. In the grand final, SK Telecom T1 beat KOO Tigers 3 to 1, dropping their only game of the whole tournament.
| Quarterfinals | Semifinals | Final | |||||||||||
| 15 October – Wembley Arena | |||||||||||||
| Flash Wolves | 1 | ||||||||||||
| 24 October – Brussels Expo | |||||||||||||
| Origen | 3 | ||||||||||||
| Origen | 0 | ||||||||||||
| 16 October – Wembley Arena | |||||||||||||
| SK Telecom T1 | 3 | ||||||||||||
| SK Telecom T1 | 3 | ||||||||||||
| 31 October – Mercedes-Benz Arena | |||||||||||||
| ahq e-Sports Club | 0 | ||||||||||||
| SK Telecom T1 | 3 | ||||||||||||
| 17 October – Wembley Arena | |||||||||||||
| KOO Tigers | 1 | ||||||||||||
| Fnatic | 3 | ||||||||||||
| 25 October – Brussels Expo | |||||||||||||
| EDward Gaming | 0 | ||||||||||||
| Fnatic | 0 | ||||||||||||
| 18 October – Wembley Arena | |||||||||||||
| KOO Tigers | 3 | ||||||||||||
| KT Rolster | 1 | ||||||||||||
| KOO Tigers | 3 | ||||||||||||
Final standings edit
| Place | Team | Prize money[7] |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | SK Telecom T1
|
$1,000,000 |
| 2nd | KOO Tigers
|
$250,000 |
| 3rd–4th | Fnatic
|
$150,000 |
| Origen
| ||
| 5–8th | ahq e-Sports Club
|
$75,000 |
| EDward Gaming
| ||
| Flash Wolves
| ||
| KT Rolster
| ||
| 9–11th | Cloud9
|
$45,000 |
| H2k-Gaming
| ||
| LGD Gaming
| ||
| 12–13th | paiN Gaming
|
$35,000 |
| Counter Logic Gaming
| ||
| 14–16th | Bangkok Titans
|
$25,000 |
| Invictus Gaming
| ||
| Team SoloMid
|
Viewership numbers edit
The final was expected to have over 30 million people streaming it online.[8] The finals were watched by 36 million people, with a peak concurrent viewership of 14 million viewers.[9]
Controversies edit
Obscenity incident edit
During the final day of the group stage in Paris, Cloud9's Hai "Hai" Lam made an obscene gesture towards an opponent while on stage. Hai was fined €500.[10]
Technical issues edit
In game 2 of the quarterfinals between Fnatic and EDward Gaming, an in-game bug occurred to Fnatic's Kim "Reignover" Ui-Jin which prevented the game from continuing, forcing the game to be remade from scratch. EDG lost 0–3 to FNC, but because the remade of game 2, in which FNC had an advantage over EDG, EDG was taunted "lost 0–4 in a BO5" in China. After investigating the issue, Riot Games chose to disable Gragas, the champion Reignover was playing, for the rest of the tournament, along with Lux and Ziggs, champions who were deemed susceptible to the same issue.[11]
References edit
- ^ Magrino, Tom (October 31, 2015). "SKT rises above KOO Tigers 3–1 to become the 2015 World Champion". LoL Esports. Riot Games. Archived from the original on November 9, 2015. Retrieved November 11, 2015.
- ^ "League of Legends World Championships: What you need to know". BBC. October 15, 2015. Retrieved October 18, 2015.
- ^ a b Fields, Frank (September 7, 2015). "Everything you need to know about the 2015 World Championship". Retrieved September 15, 2015.
- ^ "2015 World Championship Venues | LoL Esports". Retrieved April 9, 2015.
- ^ Ward, Mark (October 16, 2015). "League of Legends makes global gains". BBC. Retrieved November 11, 2015.
- ^ "Team CLG Gets Focused - League of Legends Finals - ESPN".
- ^ "2015 World Championship Rules" (PDF). Riot Games. July 7, 2015. pp. 5–6. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 15, 2016. Retrieved November 11, 2015.
- ^ Ramgobin, Ryan (October 30, 2015). "SKT rises above KOO Tigers 3–1 to become the 2015 World Champion". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2022-05-01. Retrieved November 11, 2015.
- ^ "League of Legends 2015 ChampionShip Saw 334 million Unique Impressions | SegmentNext". 10 December 2015. Retrieved 2015-12-10.
- ^ Leigh, Hunter (October 21, 2015). "Competitive Ruling: C9 Hai". LoL Esports. Riot Games. Archived from the original on November 9, 2015. Retrieved October 25, 2015.
- ^ Leigh, Hunter (October 18, 2015). "Gragas Disabled for Rest of Worlds 2015". LoL Esports. Riot Games. Archived from the original on October 19, 2015. Retrieved October 25, 2015.
External links edit
Media related to 2015 League of Legends World Championship at Wikimedia Commons