Third history/article/thing about owl teams and rosters, i decided to dedicate it to most achieved Korean roster - Lunatic-Hai
earlier parts:
EnVyUs: https://www.over.gg/5964/maybe-something-interesting-about-envyus#14
Misfits: https://www.over.gg/5987/misfits-unfulfilled-expectations#1
While currently Korean scene is one of the most covered one’s, when Overwatch’s esport was in its infancy there was hardly any interest in it from the western media . Because of this i would be unable to write about early history of one of the best teams in the world - Lunatic Hai if not for Frus who helped me find necessary information in Korean and whom i would like to thank a lot.
Lunatic Hai is a South Korean esports organization with a strong tradition in first person shooters, having teams in Counter Strike 1.6, Special Force, Special Force 2 and more. They entered Overwatch somewhat late, when teams like LWR, UW Artisan and AFB AFR were already well established.
For the roster consisting of tobi, Miro, dean, ryujehong, Leetaejun and EscA, thefirst tournament was the Afreeca TV BJ League in August of 2016. They were eventually signed by Lunatic-Hai later that same month. .The team made a name for themselves during Logitech G Championship, but it wasn’t until APAC 2016, in which they defeated likes of Afreeca Freecs Blue and NRG Esports to get to finals, , that they begun to be considered as Korea's best roster. But because they weren’t able to win any tournaments that year, they became known as the “uncrowned kings” of South korean Overwatch.
While APEX is the staple of overwatch’s esport, outside of it korean scene doesn’t have many tournaments and so Lunatic Hai after APAC has taken part in only 6 tournaments.
Next up for Lunatic-Hai was APEX Season 1 in the fall of 2016.. The team cruised through group stage, dropping only two maps and beating Team EnVyUs, one of the top Western teams present. But after a sudden change to the meta introduced buffs to D.Va, they were completely demolished in the quarterfinals by Kongdoo Uncia.
After their disappointing result, they hoped for redemption at the IEM Gyeonggi. Although they reached the finals in a convincing fashion, they couldn’t prevail to the trophy as they lost to LuxuryWatch Red in the finals.
With the new year ringing in and revamped roster after switching LEETAEJUN and dean for Whoru and zunba, Lunatic-Hai’s luck was about to turn around inAPEX Season 2. which might very well be one of the most storied tournaments in Overwatch. First great story is one of Meta Athena, team that no one expected much from but which came up with the most interesting and unusual strategies overwatch has seen and second being Runaway’s which nearly completed royal road but were denied trophy after one of the most memorable comebacks overwatch has ever witnessed.
Lunatic-Hai was placed in the round robin group stage in the nicknamed “Group of Death” , featuring LuxuryWatch Blue (who were previously known as LuxuryWatch Red), Afreeca Freecs Red, and Misfits.They advanced without problem, dropping only a single map in the process.
In the 2nd group stage, in where the top eight teams from the round robin competed in four team GSL groups, they unexpectedly finished 2nd losing to RunAway in an incredibly close 2-3 loss.
They were placed against Meta Athena, an unexpected Challenger team that came up with the most interesting and unusual strategies, in the semifinals. Despite their usage of elaborate strategies, they were unable to prevail, as Lunatic-Hai closed the series 3-2.
The grand finals began with RunAway taking Oasis and Hollywood, with the DPS duo of WhoRU and EscA looking underwhelming. Lunatic-Hai saw a little bit of resurgence on Volskaya which they took in convincing fashion butthe pink sweaters quickly replied by taking Route 66 and setting the score at 1-3. Nothing was going Lunatic-Hai’s way, and if they wanted to win, they needed to play perfectly from that point onward.
Luckily for Lunatic-Hai EscA and Whoru finally started to step up, On the 5th map they were able to quickly take both points and hold RunAway before 2nd on their defense. Dorado was more or less the same, with Lunatic Hai completing the map with a huge timebank and then not letting boys in pink shirts advance to 2nd point. With Runaway players looking tired and Lunatic Hai finally firing on all cylinders nothing could stop them as they took Eichenwald and finally lifted the trophy that eluded them for so long.
APEX season 3 developed similarly as Lunatic Hai placed at the top of their group but then lost to KongDoo Panthera in the 2nd group stage. Korea’s best completely demolished AF.Blue in semis and after one more 4:3 final this time against KongDoo Panthera lifted the trophy of OGN’s tournament once again.
With Lunatic Hai being considered the best team in the world and by far the most popular team in Korea it was no surprise that they were picked as the roster for Seoul spot and even after disappointing 5th-6th place finish in the latest APEX season they are still one of favourites for season 1 of Overwatch league.
Even though this is still kinda work in progress i decided to post it as it already took a lot of my time, snivy's time, who i'd like to thank a lot at this point.
I treat this threads a lot like practice of my writing skill and i appreciate great feedback from you snivy
And as i already said i also used frus's time at this point im not really sure how much its my thread and how much snivy's and frus's :P
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