LPL: A History of Doinb and his Dark Technologies

Kled

Kled is far from Doinb’s most played champion, but it is perhaps his most famous pick. He has an impressive 84.6% win rate on the champion after 11 career games.

The first time Doinb broke out his signature pick was on March 24, 2017 (LPL Spring Split Week 11) where he debuted the pick against Li “Xiaohu” Yuan-Hao and RNG. In this game, the Korean showcased his aggressive tendencies on the pick but the Rogue Warriors were ultimately outclassed and Doinb accomplished little. This was one of only two losses that Doinb has suffered on Kled throughout the course of his career.

We would have to wait over a year to see the pick again. On June 16, 2018, Doinb broke out his Kled once more against OMG during the league’s opening week and the Rogue Warriors emerged victorious thanks in large part due to the Kled. Doinb would go on to play the champion five more times that split, winning every game.

After a successful regular season, the Rogue Warriors qualified straight to the semi-finals of the playoffs. In the opening game of the semi-final series against RNG, Doinb picked Kled into Xiaohu, the only player to beat him on the pick so far. In that game, “Super Carry” Doinb propelled Rogue Warriors to victory, orchestrating numerous aggressive engages with his Kled pick. Unfortunately, this was their only win in the series and they fell to RNG 3-1.

The only other instance of Doinb losing on Kled came in the team’s next series where they were shut-out 3-0 by JinDong Gaming in the third-place playoff. Doinb picked Kled in the third and final game of the series where, despite a 7 KDA for the Korean, the Rogue Warriors were unable to pick up the win landing them in fourth place for the split.

Perhaps the most famous instance of Doinb picking Kled was the aforementioned game against Kingzone DragonX in the 2018 Asian Rift Rivals finals. This victory entered Doinb and his Kled into Chinese League of Legends folklore.

2019 would see Doinb moving from the Rogue Warriors to FunPlus Phoenix, the team with which he would later become a world champion. During 2019, he would only play his famous pick once, in the opening series of the 2019 LPL Spring Split against his former team Rogue Warriors where he handily dispatched his replacement Tian “HuaTian” Mai.

Surprisingly, Doinb did not get to play the pick during the team’s successful World Championship run. He had it banned against him several times and even allowed his top laner Kim “GimGoon” Han-saem to play it instead of him in one game.

However, Doinb seems to have favored the pick once more during the 2020 LPL Spring Split, playing it twice so far in two victories. As long as Doinb plays League of Legends, no matter the metagame, those who don’t respect his Kled pick will likely rue their mistake.

Nautilus

While Doinb may not have played Kled during his 2019 World Championship run, a pick that was very much at the forefront of this historic victory was Nautilus. Though Doinb didn’t begin regularly picking the champion until the LPL 2019 Summer split, his first game on the pick was actually four years prior in 2015.

He considered the pick a strong Yasuo counter, first picking it during week eight of the Summer Split against King’s Lei “Corn” Wen for this very purpose. He was victorious in that game but when attempting the same counter-pick in the regional qualifier against legendary Rookie, the pick was less successful.

Fast forward four years and we see Doinb’s Nautilus emerge once more, this time during the second week of the 2019 LPL Summer split, when Doinb would re-debut the pick in game one against Billbilli Gaming. Nautilus would go on to become his most played champion of the Summer Split regular season, going 4-2 overall. Though he wasn’t able to get his hands on the Titan of the Depths during that split’s playoffs, this drought did not extend to the 2019 World Championships.

Nautilus was picked once more by Doinb during game two of the semi-finals against fInvictus Gaming. Not only had Rookie defeated this pick four years earlier, but he also bested it during the Summer regular season where he and IG inflicted FPX’s only series defeat of the entire split. Doinb lost the first game, Rookie had now beaten his Nautilus three times, but believing in the pick, he played it in games three and four as well. These games were both victories as Doinb’s Nautilus rampaged through teamfights and inflicted misery on his opponents.

Having bested the current world champions, Doinb and FPX marched forward to the finals and their destiny. Standing in their way were the European and Mid-Season Invitational champions G2 Esports. Picking up right where he left off a week prior, Doinb locked in Nautilus during the opening game. G2 would prove no match for the Chinese giants and were eventually swept aside 3-0 in an uncompetitive affair. Every time someone casts their mind back to FPX’s 2019 World Championship run, Doinb’s Nautilus mid will be front and center in their thoughts.