How did 100 Thieves fail at Worlds 2021?

Nicholas James Published 24/10/2021

Freshly crowned LCS champions 100 Thieves bested its North American competitors in the LCS summer playoffs. This meant taking home prime seeding to the 2021 World Championship and being North America’s strongest competitor on paper. But after falling out in the group stage, what went wrong for 100 Thieves?

100 Thieves had a dominant summer playoffs performance, demolishing Team Liquid 3-0 in the finals. The aggressive and proactive style that the team boasted gave many fans hope for the side at international competitions.

Kim “Ssumday” Chan-ho is the veteran in the top lane, having seen several iterations of the team over his years on the roster. It was the acquisition of the Golden Guardians’ bot lane and jungler that enabled Ssumday to consistently showcase his talent again.

Ssumday was a bright spot for 100 Thieves this year, with a KDA of 3.1 and participating in about half of his team’s kills. With a quarter of his team’s damage and six unique champions played across the six games of the group stage, Ssumday’s performance gives hope for the domestic season, but it wasn’t enough to carry the roster through Worlds.

Closer has trouble conquering abroad

Can “Closer” Çelik in particular had a lackluster tournament, unable to replicate his solo carry performances from the LCS. That’s not to say the Turkish import performed poorly, as with 72% KP he was heavily involved in enabling his team to find advantages. His damage share, however, was lacking, nearly tied with support Choi “huhi” Jae-hyun.

In mid, Felix “Abedagge” Braun had a passable performance, sticking to burst and control mages in his usual style. Victor “FBI” Huang and Huhi had a standout performance in the bottom lane, with FBI topping out 100 Thieves’ damage share while playing half of his games on Lucian. Huhi was the key playmaker for the team this tournament, with 82% kill participation. Lucian and Nami emerged as one of the team’s most comfortable duo lanes.

Overall, 100 Thieves wasn’t able to find the same mistakes in its opponents’ play when facing LCK and LPL teams that it had in the LCS. 100 Thieves tried a variety of strategies to find its fit in this meta but was unable to nail down key picks to play around. When faced with teams who were able to check them across the map, the 100 Thieves roster struggled to stay coordinated through the mid-game.

100 Thieves wild ride on Fandex

For those investing in 100 Thieves’ chances on the Fandex exchange, these weeks were a rollercoaster fluctuating above and below the $10 starting price as hopes rose and fell with the team’s inconsistent showing.

Late in week one, the share price dropped all the way to $4.84 for a brief moment. Anybody able to scoop up shares during this time would have been able to turn them into more than double that price during week two. Early in the second week 100 Thieves’ hovered steadily above $10 until mid-week, where it dropped to $8 before settling at $9.

The opportunities presented by 100 Thieves’ run prove that you don’t need to only pick teams who make it out of the group stage to rake in some serious interest off of smart Fandex acquisitions. Fandex continues to run through playoffs, so get in while you can and showcase your predictive powers.

Nicholas James

About Nicholas James

Nicholas James is a gaming writer with a passion for all things geekdom, as well as live theater. Nicholas is best known for covering League of Legends and other top MOBA titles, but his expertise covers numerous games across multiple genres. When not watching the LCS or playing the latest new release, Nicholas can be found doing some tabletop gaming and painting his favorite miniatures. Nicholas has also published with Hotspawn, TheGamer, Dexerto, Esports.gg and other industry outlets.

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