Zeus’s Playstyle at T1
For those who have followed T1 since Zeus made his debut in 2022, it is clear: this player can play both pure tank roles, engage fighters, or deal damage for the team. However, Zeus is strongest when he is utilized with champions that can “carry the team,” such as Camille, Aatrox, or Jayce in the damage dealer role. This playstyle has a characteristic: to maximize Zeus’s development, the Mid Lane and possibly the AD must accept a weak side role, even playing support.
When Zeus played for T1, his playstyle reached maximum effectiveness when Faker consistently made plays while Gumayusi was willing to take weaker champions against opponents, not needing to hoard resources, while Keria and Oner frequently camped the top lane. Thus, as long as Zeus performed well, T1’s playstyle was very easy to execute. Of course, there were opponents who figured out T1’s strategies, but to truly defeat this team, especially at Worlds, was nearly impossible.
HLE’s Playstyle
HLE is a “superstar” collective, led by Zeka and Viper. This is the decisive factor for HLE’s playstyle since the current roster was formed. In Zeus’s Top Lane position, Doran is the player who will accept a support role for the playstyle of his two teammates. Doran’s champion pool for 2024 includes the four most frequently used champions: K’Sante, Gnar, Aatrox, and Jax.
Among these four names, only Gnar has any sort of laning advantage, but towards the end of the game, only Aatrox and Jax can scale up their power sufficiently to become the main damage dealers. In fact, Jax can easily be bullied in the weak side during the early game as he is a short-range champion, lacking durability like K’Sante or Gnar, and does not have a healing kit like Aatrox. In summary, Doran will have to “survive on his own” to ensure resources are funneled to Viper and Zeka.
Zeus May Not Be Suitable for HLE
Zeus is still a very skilled and outstanding player. It is not an exaggeration to say that in HLE’s losses to T1, Zeus was the brightest player on HLE. Even when he had to play support, he still contributed significantly to HLE nearly winning against T1. However, it is clear that HLE’s playstyle is not very compatible with Zeus.
Zeus can play support under the condition that Zeka must win against opponents like Chovy or Faker, and Viper must always win his lane against Ruler or Gumayusi. Zeka still has not shown that he can make plays or support as well as Faker and Chovy. Meanwhile, Viper, when playing a stronger champion, still cannot outplay Gumayusi. Not to mention Delight and Peanut are significantly weaker than players like Oner, Keria, Canyon, and Duro.
More importantly, at HLE, there are up to three core players that need resources, which is too many. Peanut and Delight cannot “serve” them all, especially when these core players are showing to be inferior compared to their opponents. As a result, Zeus himself also gets lost when his teammates fail to funnel resources and cannot finish off opponents even when Zeus has made outstanding plays.
Perhaps in the future, HLE will need to improve significantly in terms of playstyle. But for now, they and Zeus may not yet be the “match made in heaven” that HLE fans hoped for at the outset.