Is Ryu “Keria” Min-seok the best support in the world?
He should be, for he didn’t just make support Kalista work for the first time in League of Legends history — he made her look good in a deciding game three against Dplus KIA in LCK Spring 2023.
In game one, T1 drafted a standard team composition using bot lane duo Lucian and Nami to go up against Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu’s Zeri and Kim “Kellin” Hyeong-gyu’s Yuumi. Both teams were neck and neck, until Deft stole Baron in the late game and wrecked the entire team.
T1 went with the same bot lane draft in game two, but changed things up in the jungle and top lane. Stacking dragons, they eventually won a late game Baron team fight to even out the series.
In game three, T1 decided that stacking dragons will indeed be their chosen path to victory. Just after pulling out support Caitlyn the week before, Keria stunned everyone by last picking Kalista on red side.
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T1 Keria shocks everyone with support Kalista paired with bot lane Draven
Unlike support Caitlyn, it wasn’t a straightforward win lane win game formula for Keria and Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong at bot.
Zeri, Draven, and Kalista are all short ranged marksmen, so no one had any real range advantage over the other.
Instead, the game was decided off 3v3 ganks at bot and objective security. Six minutes in, Dplus KIA looked like they were winning the skirmish involving both junglers, but T1 intentionally pulled them in deeper and deeper into their half of the map.
This opened up an opportunity for Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok’s Kassadin to storm DK’s backline, cleaning up for a double kill.
Two minutes later, Keria and Gumayusi took advantage of their double AD carry mid game spike. Even though Deft had more items, enchanter support Lulu deals no damage in a 2v2 trade against Kalista and Draven.
Perhaps lucky, or perhaps planned, the very second Deft casted Zeri’s Lightning Crash ultimate, Keria had used Fate’s Call to pull Draven in, rendering him invulnerable, taking no damage.
He then zoned Lulu out of the fight while Gumayusi battled his foe, completely turning the trade around by flashing out of Burst Fire’s range before delivering a Whirling Death blow.
Besides out-trading traditional supports in the bot lane, Kalista is also useful to secure objectives by spear-stacking into Rend. T1 collected all four dragons in the game for Ocean Soul, and were about 7,000 gold ahead when they secured Baron buff in the late game.
Riding on the back of a fed Kassadin, who was one item ahead of his counterpart, coupled with a damage-dealing top laner and support as opposed to a tank and enchanter, T1 rolled over Dplus KIA with an unconventional draft for a convincing 2-1 win.
Support Kalita build
- Spectral Sickle into Black Mist Scythe
- Boots of Lucidity
- Umbral Glaive
- Axiom Arc
While Keria didn’t finish the fourth item, he did have Serrated Dirk and Caulfield’s Warhammer in his inventory, so it’s highly likely the intention was to complete Axiom Arc to lower the cooldown of his ultimate, the sole saving grace for his AD carry.
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READ MORE: How to play Lucian and Nami bot lane: A masterclass by JD Gaming
