Understanding Damwon Gaming and Ways to Approach Them
Damwon Gaming come in as the 3rd seed of Korea. Damwon lost to SKT in LCK playoffs and required them to defeat KZ to make worlds, taking them five games. To understand Damwon, you need to know who their lead players are, what led to them losing to SKT in playoffs, and the ideal identity they showed vs KZ.
Damwon’s Player Strengths
Damwon’s lead players are their solo laners, Nuguri and ShowMaker. These two are excellent laners and are consistent players for showing up in games. Coming into worlds, they should be expected to be two of the best solo laners. Nuguri mostly plays carry tops while ShowMaker plays whatever is typically meta. Nuclear and BeryL are essentially Damwon’s weakest players. They can struggle in lane and Nuclear usually needs champions which make positioning easier like Ezreal, Xayah, and Kai’sa. Canyon is left as the main initiator for the team while BeryL acts as secondary initiation. BeryL is not a heavy roaming support. He is commonly tied up in lane with Nuclear. When he can move, he will assist Canyon with vision on right side of mid or assist taking herald.
Play Leading Up to Playoffs, Weeks 8–10
In week 8, Damwon attempted to play through their bot lane, even in the games where they ran Leblanc and Ezreal bot lane. None of these games went their way. Both HLE and AFS found success in bullying Nuguri and gaining control of mid. There wasn’t much synergy in Damwon’s mid and jungle. It never occurred to Canyon to group up with ShowMaker to assist Nuguri. Canyon attempted defending top on his own, only to get pushed over by the opposition. With top lost, Canyon puts his focus back on bot. The main issue here is HLE and AFS were ready for this as well. With Damwon’s new focus on their weakest link, they slowly lost the game.
Week 9, we see Damwon finally grab better meshing mid and jungle picks. They excel vs KT, still running their top carries and what is their currently best bot lane picks, Kai’sa and Alistar. Kai’sa not only offers great scaling, she allows Nuclear to reposition easily. These are ideal compositions.
Going into week 10, Damwon change their priorities by grabbing Xayah away from SKT and Akali priority pick. Damwon play much slower in these games, mostly only focused on keeping lanes in even states until they can make fights with their higher threat composition (SKT are running Karma, on-hit Kennen game 1, not much threat). SKT underestimate ShowMaker’s Akali flanks, leading to several team fight wins for Damwon. There was nothing fancy done by Damwon nor did it feel like they were much better than SKT. The drafts were more lenient on Damwon’s side. SKT learned from this though and Damwon tricked themselves into thinking this was the way to beat SKT going into playoffs.
SKT Playoffs, Losing Control
Game 1, Damwon took a draft which seemed on point to what they normally want to do. Elise would have been better than Taliayh, but regardless the pick can still work as follow up burst to Renekton or Qiyana crowd control setup. Damwon found success in diving top, getting one of their lead players ahead in a matchup where Khan being behind should make him relatively useless.
Unfortunately, Damwon were unable to get anything going in mid. ShowMaker was locked up with Faker’s Leblanc. Canyon seemed a bit lost. He would knowingly show himself on wards and not consider if SKT will make an attack plan based on his route. This is similar to week 8 issues he had. Also, he never really relieved mid in the SKT series since ShowMaker was playing Akali vs Karma. They traded waves and didn’t have to worry about freeing up Akali.
The one-time Damwon make a mid and jungle play, it fails leading to SKT taking mid tower. A lack of agency in mid greatly cost Damwon, while SKT realized from their loss vs Damwon in week 10 how important being able to keep ShowMaker preoccupied is. There was also one big decision by SKT that led to Damwon’s fall. SKT gave up 2nd mountain dragon. They took a reset to place vision in top jungle and setup for picks. Damwon rarely gives up dragons to the enemy team without fighting. They took the dragon and did not think what SKT could do with their time. With top/jungle and baron completely covered in fog of war, Damwon try to force in without proper numbers or trying to fish SKT through mid lane push. SKT punish and grab baron.
The next two games, Damwon continue struggling to control mid on top of Canyon ignoring the information he is giving SKT. SKT are having greater success in moving with their jungle and mid, along with helping Khan in his matchups vs Nuguri. Of course, SKT’s bot lane is doing perfectly fine vs Damwon’s bot. The bad things that were happening in weeks 8 come back. The good things that were happening in week 10 no longer mattered with equal amount of threats on SKT’s side. SKT figured out what needed to be done while Damwon assumed they were safe.
This playoff series made Damwon realize how important ShowMaker is to their early game operating effectively and what makes them good. The KZ series was a much better picture of what Damwon can be and if Damwon were just a bit more consistent, they would have swept KZ.
KZ Series, Canyon and ShowMaker Takeover
Damwon’s biggest success came from getting Nuguri setup to succeed in lane through attention at levels 3 to 4. Bot lane is usually pulling the wave level 1 to ensure they are safe until the enemy duo bases. Nuclear can now base himself or push the wave out so it bounces back to Damwon. Once Canyon comes back from base, he would then look to focus vision on right side of mid and begin utilizing ShowMaker’s priority in lane to move with Canyon towards bot lane and the enemy’s bot jungle. If BeryL can, he will time his first reset with Canyon to assist in the vision. This starts putting pressure on their opponent’s bot lane, helping out Nuclear. If dragon can be taken with said priority then Damwon will look towards it.
It’s important to note Canyon is not the type of jungler who actively looks for efficient routes. He will skip camps and entire jungle sections to move with ShowMaker or to be present for a play. Sometimes this hurts him like in the SKT playoff series (can see him do full red — blue — look towards top — scuttle — base — go bot side).
Afterwards, Damwon can either take another look top or continue their mid and jungle movement towards bot lane to again relieve pressure on Nuclear until herald comes into play. Damwon, unlike many LCS teams, does not rotate their duo lane for herald. They are fine with the idea of letting bot lane get sacked for herald. Damwon won’t even swap their duo in cases where their duo is behind and Nuguri is already ahead. Most of the time the herald will be used for Nuguri, pushing him further ahead.
Once bot or top tower falls, Damwon look to sit their duo lane mid. ShowMaker will push out top wave, with Damwon’s primary focus on covering ShowMaker and giving him assistance on taking top tower. Nuguri typically does not receive much help in the bot lane, but also is rarely targeted. He is able to farm out and thanks to his lead he is confident pushing out alone. If no progress can be made in the last side lane tower or it’s taken down, Damwon rotate their solo laners into mid after their pushes to pressure dives mid.
In cases where mid tower is too difficult, Damwon may attempt to pull their opponents to defending top lane vs Showmaker and then quickly rotate back mid, cutting anyone off to take mid tower.
Finally, Damwon enter their baron phase and looking for dragon fights. Damwon usually don’t like giving up dragons, regardless if it doesn’t mean much. They want the fight. Damwon prefer approaching the dragon as a 5 squad from mid vs having a member flanking around.
Also, Damwon are a very decisive baron team. Once vision is setup, they will push out waves and instantly go onto the baron. Two members will sit on it, while the remaining three take their posts, eventually collapsing in to finish the baron. No team can think Damwon will hesitate on this objective.
With Damwon’s general plan laid out, how does one go about dealing with this? Here are some ways to attack them.
Ideas vs Damwon
The first idea would be for teams who lane lead is their bot lane like Team Liquid. As mentioned before, Damwon’s greatest weakness is their bot lane. Not only do they not receive much resources directly from Canyon, they also do not have the skillset to playout all matchups effectively. The first thought that comes to mind is drafting a heavy pushing bot who can slowly take bot tower plates. LCK and LPL rarely played Caitlyn. LCS, on the other hand, were fine playing lanes like Caitlyn/Morgana. These types of lanes will naturally pull Canyon towards bot, away from Nuguri.
However, this wouldn’t be the first time Damwon would have to deal with a stronger bot lane. If the opposition doesn’t wish to grab a heavy pushing bot, at the very least they need to pick a mid who can lock ShowMaker down. Mid does not have to win vs ShowMaker. Denying Damwon the ability to safely assist their bot lane is enough to cause issues for them. Xiaohu found success on RNG playing a similar style.
If given the opportunity, swapping the bot lane after gaining a lead for herald pre-14 minutes will offer three positives outcomes. One, since Damwon rarely rotate Nuclear for herald it means it will most likely not be prepared for it. Two, making this swap play makes having a safe tower staller top very useful, like Gangplank or Rumble (think how CG or FPX plays swaps). Three, Nuguri will be denied farm, giving some gold over to Nuclear is not a big deal. SKT show how effective their swap can be in game 1 of week 10, https://youtu.be/fEwadmJxT2U?t=630.
Another idea would be doing something similar to AFS in week 8, drafting a strong roaming support who can assist jungler with taking over vision around mid and making pinch plays mid. Again, assuming the team has confidence in their duo lane they can most likely find roam opportunities for their support. A team like FNC would find several opportunities here. BeryL also is not known for roaming. The pacing of the game can change in the oppositions favor.
As for general early game plans, most likely Canyon will path towards top in the beginning. The team can draft a strong 2v2 like KZ attempted with Camille and Sejuani to force fights there or simply have the top laner not take bad trades as he pulls the wave. Jungler can path top to bot with small focus on mid on the off chance that Damwon looks for a 3 man lvl 3 dive top. Always look at Canyon’s CS to know how much he skipped to move for his team. Create plans to move onto his predicted path like SKT did in game 2.
What is particularly useful about this path is it leaves Nuguri open between 4:00 to 5:30 mark. Canyon will be looking on bot side. LCK teams have found success attacking him around this time.
Going into mid game, targeting Nuguri would be an ideal choice before baron setup becomes a priority. Damwon like hovering around ShowMaker’s lane. If tier one towers are up at this moment, don’t be afraid to let your mid laner sack his lane while the team attacks Nuguri. Having a mid laner who isn’t gold reliant while still being able to affect fights with flanks and bringing AOE is fine. Xiaohu does this like I said before. Continue targeting Nuguri until Damwon start defending him.
Now the team’s mid laner can push out top more freely, offering a roam opportunity while Damwon return from defending Nuguri. This is a good example done by AFS, https://youtu.be/VAZjzrsq-WM?t=1082.
Lastly, should always be wary of what is going around baron when Damwon have control. Seeing three members is not enough confidence to say baron is not being done. Ensure the champions that are missing can’t do it.
Having good reset timings before dragon spawns is also important. Damwon, even though they have opportunities to hold a split push, will look for team fights. Having positioning over them will make Damwon group as 5 in mid for approaching dragon. This will lead towards flank opportunities for your team.
Final Thoughts
There are of course other ways to deal with Damwon based on whichever team gets them, but locking mid down will be a high priority no matter what. Damwon having to go through play ins will hopefully give a tell on what direction they chose to move towards in terms of playstyle. Do they stick towards what worked vs KZ and KT? Or do they regress back to week 8 and playoffs with more bot focus.
