Introduction

Another one bites the dust..

Last week on RGL-HL Z Kai, Swift Inc beat B&H 2-1 on Ashville and Lakeside. Thankfully, due to my god-gifted prediction-making ability, I was able to perfectly guess this result. Rest in peace, B&H (at least, for this season).

In other news, IBKC has come into play to attempt to knock Swift down a peg--the maps being played are Ashville, Borneo, and Upward.

Power Rankings

Rankings haven’t changed much since last week, but I’m keeping it in for the sake of continuity.

#1 - Gotta Blast

#2 - Forty-Two Pence

#3 - Swift Inc.

#4 - Itty Bitty Kitty Committee

Match Prediction - Swift vs IBKC

Swift vs B&H was a pretty good game--but can Swift vs IBKC live up to it? Yeah, probably. I think all three of those teams are super close in skill level, so really any matchup will end up with some interesting results. That said, let's get into the actual prediction.

Roster

Swift: asher / panther / nucket / Brick / Burtilian / Soleil / GreenAndGold / egwat / Dave

IBKC: saucy / Brandini / kitty / kjr / Rayman5000 / Salad Snek / GeneralNick / dailydoseofmelon / Steaklington

Flank

asher / panther (Swift) vs saucy / Brandini (IBKC)

As much as I love IBKC, I really think Swift’s flank (for the most part) completely outclasses their own. Not that saucy (Scout) or Brandini (Soldier) are COMPLETE GARBAGE BAG PLAYERS or anything, but asher and panther are both exceptional flank players who have had the chance over the last couple weeks to work on coordinating better together--on flank-heavy maps, this could make a huge difference in Swift’s favor.

Combo

Brick / Burtilian / GreenAndGold (Swift) vs kjr / Rayman5000 / GeneralNick (IBKC)

Now, the combo classes are a different story. IBKC’s power classes in their combo of kjr (Demo) and Rayman (Heavy) have been playing together for god knows how long, and they’ve only been getting better and better. Brick (Demo) and Burtilian (Heavy) are good players, but for this match IBKC absolutely has an advantage. As for the Medicinal Men on both teams--okay, seriously. I’m an engineer player. Do you honestly think I comprehend at all what makes a medic player any better than another? The answer is no.

Pick Classes

egwat / Dave (Swift) vs dailydoseofmelon / Steaklington (IBKC)

Like with the flank classes (but a little less so), I think Swift has a slight advantage in the pick class department. From just playing against both teams often, egwat / Dave always seemed to have a larger impact than their Kitty Committee counterparts. That, or Home Depot eSports just really sucked at dealing with them. Either or.

Maps

Ashville

Ashville (along with Borneo, the next map) were actually played last week in playoffs, so I have that much more to go off of for these predictions. That said--Swift. I have a pretty weak theory that Swift is going to take this map quite handily. Hear me out--They won on Ashville last week, they won Week 3 Ashville (well, so did IBKC, but that doesn’t count since they were playing Home Depot eSports--huh, I wonder how many times I can bully my own team in this article), and their flank is quite strong in general. Any joking aside, I do think Swift will take this map. I may be wrong, but Ashville genuinely seems like one of their stronger maps, and asher (Scout) + panther (Soldier) might have quite a bit of space to do some work.

Prediction: 4-2 Swift

Borneo

Borneo has led to quite a lot of interesting games this season (mostly with B&H beating teams)--will this hold true this week in Playoffs? Well, we’ll just have to see… or, we don’t just have to see, and I can use my unmeasurable aptitude in the field of TF2 Highlander predictions like some sort of fancy science person, and tell you the result right here right now. Ahem. As mentioned before, I believe IBKC’s combo to actually be very strong in the context of the entire division--not to mention Swift’s poor (sorry) performances on Borneo in general as well as the possibility that their stronger flank may be hard-pressed for instances to make game-changing (that’s right, gamechangers) plays. All of this combined makes me pretty confident that IBKC should be able to squeeze out a well-deserved victory on Borneo--not that it won’t be close or anything, though.

Prediction: 2-1 IBKC

Upward

Upward may be a different story. Simply judging by past performances, Swift seems pretty strong on the map--beating out B&H 2-1 on Week 4, while it seems IBKC hasn’t had any practice at all on the map (bye week), besides maybe the preseason and scrims this weekend. Although intuition would tell me that IBKC should be overall better on a Payload map like Upward, I think Swift will be able to close out the victory and the entire match with Upward.

Prediction: 2-1 Swift

Summary

So--that’s how everything adds up. I hate to predict in favor of a team three weeks in a row, but we live in a society and that’s just how it be sometimes. Of course, this prediction doesn’t necessarily mean I wouldn’t be excited to see an upset with IBKC taking the W instead, but..


Prediction: 2-1 Swift

Links

Week XX Matches
Main Division League Table