Pro Play By Play - Misfits' Elder Comeback

In week 3 of the LEC, Misfits staged a miraculous comeback again MAD after getting decimated in the early game. Their victory was solidified with this Elder Drake fight, so let's break down how they did it.

The Play

State of the Game

Despite falling behind early, Misfits were able to stack drakes and eventually secured the Infernal Soul. This synergises excellently with their Zeri and Ahri picks, while MAD have a lot of CC between their Nautilus and Lissandra. While MSF have the majority of their summoners available, MAD are missing Flash on their Mid, ADC and Support.

Isolated Targets

With the Elder Drake at about 4k health, MSF turn from the Elder onto the MAD Lions. The play begins with Ornn (Irrelevant) ult on the isolated Gangplank (Armut):

Though Gangplank is able to get off his ult on the grouped up members of MSF, he is quickly blown up after using his oranges on the Ornn knock up instead of the incoming Ahri charm:

The Gangplank ult does force MSF to scatter, providing MAD an opportunity to turn onto the Ahri (Vetheo). They attempt to lock her down with the Nautilus ult, but she is able to escape using her ult:

With one key carry down, MAD turn to the Kalista (UNF0RGIVEN) considering this is the biggest threat to their team. Kalista is able to move away from the Ornn knock up, just as the Lee Sin is CCd by the Nautilus Q:

Considering how much attack speed she has at this point in the game, she continues to kite away from the Ornn just as the Renata Glasc ult comes in. Though the ult does hit the Viego, Nautilus and Kalista they are able to mitigate it; Kalista uses her QSS and ults Nautilus to break the Berserk.

Lissandra Flanks

While the the fight was ongoing in the river, Lissandra (Nisqy) was flanking around the dragon pit. By using the Blast Cone to jump over the wall, Lissandra pulls off the flank play and is able to get off a huge E+W engage onto multiple members of MSF:

This buys enough time for Kalista to finish off the Lee Sin, but in exchange for the Nautilus to make the fight a 4v3. Lissandra is able to buy more time using a self-ult while Kalista continues to ramp up spears. However, Ornn is able to knock up Kalista with his E; though Kalista has Cleanse available, it doesn't work on knock ups meaning she is blown up:

MAD now only have their Viego and Lissandra alive and are scrambling to win the fight. They desperately turn onto the Elder Drake which has stayed in combat throughout the fight and is on around 3k health. Although they attempt to rush it down using Viego's Smite, the drake resets at around 1.5k health and starts to regen. MSF then finish off the Lissandra and turn onto the Drake.

The Elder Steal

Misfits have the numbers advantage to finish off the Baron, but with their Jungler dead, they have no Smite. This allows Viego (Elyoya) to steal the Drake by using his Flash to hop over the wall and Smite the Drake:

By killing the Ornn using the Elder Drake buff and claiming his soul, Viego gets extremely close to using the resets and Elder Drake buff to win 1v4. However, this plan is thwarted thanks to some good kiting by Zeri (Neon).

After winning this fight, MSF head toward the Baron and win the next team fight to claim victory over MAD.

Summary

MSF secured a huge advantage early on in the fight by realising how Gangplank was completely alone and could be focused down quickly. Though the Lissandra flank could have been huge for MAD, it removed Lissandra from the fight for a while. This translated into a 5v3 numbers advantage for MSF, which they capitalised on to take the fight.