As the end of Stage 1 draws to a close and the playoff window closes, every play these teams make have implications for their Stage 1 Playoff hopes. This led some teams to run riskier compositions and make some of the bolder hero-plays of the season.
But, of all these big plays, which were most impressive in their ability to help their team and in the individual skill required to make the play? Will it be the nano-boosted Rocket Barrage of Hong-joon “HOTBA” Choi, the dancing D.Va of Kang-jae “envy” Lee or one of the hilarious back-caps of the week? To help sort it out, The Game Haus has analyzed and collected the best plays of the week and produced the top 10 plays of Week 4.
Hasn’t anyone learned to check their corners by now? Pan-seung “Fate” Koo and the Valiant certainly didn’t expect the Fusion to on Route 66, and they were correct. This lack of diligence allowed for the Valiant to net a quick team fight and get ever so close to their first match victory. Yet, despite this nice play, the Valiant remain 0-7.
Despite an overall rough series for the Eternal, this play almost singlehandedly allowed them to take Dorado and walk away with their heads held high. Doing his own impersonation of a Poko-bomb, Finnbjörn “Finnsi” Jónasson lobs D.Va’s mech through the air at just the right time. Without this play, the Shock may have been able to gain enough momentum to move farther through Dorado, and very well could have swept the Eternal.
The Guangzhou Charge elected to run a very strange composition on Nepal, which netted them their sole map win of the series. In this fight, in particular, the Charge see that the Gladiators have committed a couple of ultimates and were grouped up. This allowed for Hong-joon “HOTBA” Choi to drop down as Pharah just as he is nano-boosted by Jin-seo “Shu” Kim. This combo, paired with an EMP for good measure, made for an impactful and fun play to watch.
In the same series, on the very next map, the Gladiators began to shift the momentum in their favor. After the Charge had several players tied up in a Graviton Surge, Chang-hoon “rOar” Gye countered with a devastating Earthshatter. This led to a team fight win for the Charge off of only a single ultimate, which was made possible through r0ar’s ability to build an Earthshatter very quickly. After this fight, the Gladiators never looked back and took the series, 3-1.
This is no ordinary top 10 play because this play, in part, has to be credited to the OWL replay and observing team. In what was an unbelievable sequence of fights on Illios: Well between London and Shanghai, the observing team managed to give us something beautiful in this sequence.
No single move in this fight deserves to stand alone on the top 10, but together, this fight is simply too impressive to leave off the list. Not to mention the added impact of the map five and the serious playoff implications involved in this match. All things considered, this was one of the more entertaining maps of the OWL season so far.
In a classic GOATS vs GOATS fight, we see each team preparing to commit several ultimates on Volskaya. Toronto, striking first, have to hit their combo or face a guaranteed team fight loss. The D.Va bomb is thrown in from Kang-jae “envy” Lee and paired with an excellent charge from Gyeong-mu “Yakpung” Jo to remove the enemy Reinhardt shield from the fight and leave the Spark helpless. Combos like these are getting harder and harder to pull off as teams continue to get more nuanced in GOATS, so Toronto’s ability to make this happen shouldn’t be brushed over.
If Week 3 was the week of C9’s, Week 4 was the week of back-capping and Harrison “Kruise” Pond and the Paris Eternal may have had the best of them all. In the midst of a brutal team fight, Kruise manages to slip by the Titans and move the payload to the second point on Rialto, drawing out an enemy Transcendence in the process. Both the amount of time spent on the payload and the ultimates that were drawn out from this play make it a top 10 play for Week 4.
Although this play happened on the tail end of a fight and mainly served as clean-up, it displays incredible mechanical skill from Yi “JinMu” Hu on Hanzo. Hitting Lucio and Tracer, two incredibly shifty characters, back-to-back is so difficult, especially when you have to flex as much as JinMu does for the Hunters. JinMu continues to be a player landing toward the top of the list every week, and it’s becoming more clear why that is the case.
Gui-un “Decay” Jang has taken a few games to warm up to the OWL stage, but now he may have caught fire. This impressive sequence follows a Dragonblade that pulled a lot of resources and attention from the Reign, giving Decay an opportunity to slip into the backline and wreak havoc. Comboing his dash and right-click allowed for some quick movement that viewers have missed out on in light of Genji’s reduced play time in the OWL. This play was refreshing for viewers and should be especially refreshing for Gladiators fans who have been waiting anxiously for Decay to pop off.
Any play that leaves the Blizzard Arena crowd chanting “Bacon! Bacon! Bacon!” is sure to be on the top 10. Combine that with a nano-boosted tank mode Bastion and, voilà, you’ve got yourself a top play of Week 4. In this, the top play of Week 4, Lo “Baconjack” Tzu-Heng sees that he’s being pressured and uses Bastion’s ultimate to reposition himself quickly. Seeing this, teammate, Kong “Kyo” Chunting feeds him the Nano Boost from Ana. Baconjack utilizes this and channels some of his PUBG aiming skills sending the Defiant defenses running. A smart move in the face of such a Goliath-like foe.
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