Elements vs Unicorns of Love: By the Numbers

What does it take to get around Sion and Maokai?

Elements actually had a better laning phase than usual.  In the first 10 minutes they traded two kills back and forth, and managed to establish the gold lead over Unicorns of Love that they would maintain the rest of the game.  However, despite the gold lead, it was clear to anyone watching: the Unicorns of Love were in charge of the game.

Let Tibbers take the turret.

Despite clear the clear CS leads Elements had throughout the game, Unicorns of Love controlled the map like it was theirs.  There was just no effective way of getting past the Unicorn's front line--whenever Elements managed to pick off a member of UOL, UOL responded with a few kills of their own.  Likewise, whenever Elements came to knock on inhibitor turrets, the UOL front line proved absolutely unbreakable--and when UOL went knocking, there was nothing Elements could do.

Vizicsacsi alone discourages Elements from taking dragon.

1.  Apparently, gold isn't everything.  UOL had a gold lead for about six minutes of the game--between 3-9 minutes.  Throughout the rest of the game, Elements had a pretty consistent 2k gold lead over UOL.  In fact, Froggen (on Zed) had a 66 CS lead over PowerOfEvil (on Ahri), and nearly 3.3k more gold; likewise, Rekkles (on Corki) had a 106 CS lead over Vardags (on Graves), and 1.9k more gold.  However, the gold lead did not align with the game that we saw.  Even when they came out worse for wear in an encounter (there was one, around 32 minutes, right before Unicorns took their third dragon), the Unicorns were in charge of the map.

Wickd goes down for First Blood.

2.  Welcome back Wickd!  A lot of UOL's victory could be placed solidly on Vizicsacsi's (on Maokai) lead over Wickd (on Lulu), and his ability to turn into a massive tank.  To do this effectively, Kikis (on Sion) worked diligently to keep Wickd down throughout the game.  Wickd accounted for half of all Elements' deaths.  With Wickd down in nearly every team fight, Elements had very little else for a good initiation on the Unicorn's back line--and with a Quicksilver Sash and Zhonya's Hourglass, what little Elements had proved ineffective.

Dragon 5 beats Baron.  Positioning helps too.

3.  Dragon is the better investment.  The Unicorns did very little to contest baron.  When Kikis went down that the first baron encounter, they walked away and let Elements take the baron and a tower besides.  Elements' second baron attempt went completely uncontested while the Unicorns took Dragon 5 for themselves and proceeded to storm into Elements' base.  Despite having the advantage of the baron buff and empowered minions, Dragon 5 proved to be a truly unstoppable force.

Froggen jumps from target to target.

4.  Froggen is back.  However, his team must still be loading.  Until PowerOfEvil picked up his Zhonya's Hourglass and Vardags got his hands on a Quicksilver Sash, Froggen proved to be the only one to circumvent Vizicsacsi and Kikis and dive into UOL's back line.  In fact, of PowerOfEvil's and Vardags' combined 5 deaths, 4 were at the hands of Froggen.  If the rest of Elements had stepped up to the game Froggen was playing, things might have worked out differently.

How do you get around those beasts?

5.  The unbreakable front line.  There's a multiplicity of reasons why this front line proved to be Elements' undoing.  The zoning capabilities of Maokai's Vengeful Maelstorm and Sion's Decimating Smash meant the only effective way to engage was a flank.  However, with all the wards dropped by every member of UOL (in total, UOL set out 189 wards and lost 47 of them), a flank typically turned into a stun from Hylissang that gave the Unicorns enough time to readjust the line and force out Elements.  So, to answer our initial question, how what does it take to get around Sion and Maokai?  Apparently more than Elements is able to do.

Other interesting statistics:

• Vizicsacsi and Kikis took a combined total damage of 93.3k.  On the other hand, Vardags and PowerOfEvil took the least amount of damage--17.1k and 17.2k respectively.

• Even though Rekkles did the most amount of damage to champions (41.2k--around 2.3 times more damage than Vardags and 2.6 times more than Kikis), he only secured 2 kills.

• UOL was extremely effective at neutralizing whatever threat Wickd posed.  In the end, he took 27.6k damage (2nd most on Elements) and died 9 times, an average of 3.1k damage per death.

• Hylissang's role in making this composition work shouldn't be underestimated.  With 94% KP, Hylissang made openings and gave UOL the time they needed to readjust.