For many seasons, from 2018 to now, LPL has almost completely dominated the League of Legends scene. At MSI, the LPL representatives have won 3 times out of the 4 times this tournament has been held. The same goes for Worlds, as out of the 4 times this tournament has been held since 2018, only the 2020 Worlds saw a champion from the LCK region (Damwon Gaming). Notably, even in that year’s final, the opponent of the LCK representative was also a team from LPL – Suning.
However, it seems that LPL’s dominance in the future, specifically from the 2023 season, may be affected. Everyone knows that for a player, alongside competing and training, climbing the rank is an essential part. The rank benchmark for professional players may not be that important, but it’s a way for them to access new champions and experiment with matchups they’ve never picked in professional play. Additionally, since the Korean rank is currently considered the standard, many players participate in ranked matches here to understand the trending meta strategies in the LCK and find ways to counter them.
However, according to Doinb’s recent revelation, in the 2023 season, it is very likely that Riot will no longer provide Korean rank accounts to LPL players. For those who may not know, players climbing the Korean rank usually receive several accounts. These accounts have high elo to ensure that players can rank up as quickly and effectively as possible. Additionally, there are other privileges. For example, if a toxic or game-breaking situation occurs, reports from these accounts will be prioritized for processing by Riot.
It can be said that Riot fully manages the ranked accounts provided to players, and this publisher also has full authority to withdraw or ban those accounts. Therefore, if Doinb’s revelation is true, this could be seen as a move by Riot to “assist” LCK in breaking LPL’s dominance. As some Chinese players have revealed, the rank in the LPL region, even in the super server, is hard to compare in quality with the Korean rank. If they are unable to play in the Korean rank, it would be a significant disadvantage for LPL players.
But for now, this is just a revelation from Doinb. LPL is the largest market for League of Legends in the world. Therefore, every action by Riot here needs to be carefully considered to avoid long-term consequences.