Author: Geekmandem

Worlds 2026 Quarterfinals Predictions: Can LYON and KC Save the West?

Posted on by Geekmandem

Eight teams are left at Worlds 2026, and two of them are flying the flag for the West. LYON are the last LCS side standing, Karmine Corp are the last LEC side standing, and both have been handed the sort of quarterfinal draw that you’d rather avoid at this stage: Gen.G for LYON, T1 for KC.


The rest of the West didn’t make it. Day 7 of the Swiss stage was brutal, with LØS knocking out Team Liquid and Hanwha Life ending G2’s run on the same day. That left LYON and KC to scrap through on the final day, and both did, finishing 3-2.


So can either of them actually pull it off? Here’s how we see both series going.

Gen.G vs LYON prediction

Worlds 2026 quarterfinals predictions
Image Riot Games

Wednesday 4 November, 23:00 CET


LYON’s Swiss run was a proper rollercoaster. They opened 2-0 with wins over Team Secret Whales and Karmine Corp, then dropped two on the bounce to Gen.G and Invictus Gaming. That left them in a do-or-die series against LØS on the final day.


And it nearly went wrong. LØS took Game 1 comfortably, and LYON won Game 2 without holding a gold lead at any point, not even when the Nexus went down. Then in Game 3 they threw away a lead of almost 3K gold and still clawed it back late.


The problem is who’s waiting. Gen.G went through the Swiss stage undefeated, and one of their three wins was a 2-1 over LYON in Round 3. So this is a rematch, and LYON already know what losing it feels like.


The good news for NA is that 2-1 isn’t a stomp. LYON took a game off Gen.G in a Bo3, and a Bo5 gives them more room to find a draft that works. The bad news is that LYON’s best moments at this tournament have come from coming back, and Gen.G don’t usually give you much to come back from.


Our call: Gen.G 3-1. LYON nick a game, probably off a scrappy late-game fight, but Gen.G are too clean to let a series slip twice.

T1 vs KC prediction

Worlds 2026 quarterfinals predictions
Image Riot Games

Friday 6 November, 23:00 CET

KC took the long way round, and they’ve made it to the final stage. They dropped back-to-back series to LYON and Bilibili Gaming in the middle of the Swiss stage, which had the Blue Wall sweating. Then they flipped it, beating CTBC Flying Oyster and Movistar KOI 2-0 each to book their place.

The MKOI series was the one that showed what this team can do under pressure. Though the two sides have become somewhat of an LEC rivalry of late, and KC have been the better of the two overall.

T1 are T1. They went 3-1 through the Swiss stage, and their only loss came against Dplus KIA, who also went unbeaten. They’re the team nobody wants in a Bo5, and they’ve got a long history of making Western teams look silly on the big stage.

Still, this KC team has more upset potential than LYON. Caliste and Yike just won a must-win series between them, and a team that’s spent a week playing elimination games won’t be fazed by the stakes.


Our call: T1 3-2. KC take this further than most people expect, but T1 in a deciding game is still the scariest thing in League.

Worlds 2026 quarterfinals schedule

All four quarterfinals are best-of-five at the Credit Union of Texas Event Center in Allen, Texas, starting at 23:00 CET (17:00 ET).

DateMatch
Tuesday 3 NovemberTop Esports vs Invictus Gaming
Wednesday 4 NovemberGen.G vs LYON
Thursday 5 NovemberDplus KIA vs Bilibili Gaming
Friday 6 NovemberT1 vs Karmine Corp

The semifinals follow on 7 and 8 November in Allen, then the final moves to the Barclays Center in Brooklyn on 14 November.

Mel Rework: Every Big Shift Before the 26.22 Midscope

Posted on by Geekmandem

Mel’s W is about to lose the one thing everyone hates about it. Patch 26.22 lands on November 4, and Riot is ripping the projectile reflect off Rebuttal for good. After nearly two years of trying to make it work.

So how did we get here? Mel has been under the microscope since she was released, but this next change will be the most impactful yet.

Launch week: nerfed before she settled on the Rift

Mel arrived in Patch 25.S1.2 in January 2025, fresh from Arcane and someone fans couldn’t wait to get to play. Riot reckoned she was a bit too strong and hotfixed her on January 25. Three days after release, cutting the AP ratio on her Overwhelm passive from 25% to 10% and trimming her execute ult.

Patch 25.4 followed with shorter W uptime and a weaker E root, then 25.8 handed back some base health as a little apology.

Patch 26.22 Preview for League of

Most banned, rarely picked

Mel spent most of 2026 as one of the weakest mids in the game while sitting near the top of the ban list. Riot’s 26.3 rework in February sped up her autos and stopped her reflecting area spells that weren’t aimed at her. Patch 26.8 in April went again, cutting her Q’s first hit to a max of 160 and pushing W’s cooldown out to 38 to 26 seconds.


By Patch 26.17, u.gg had her as a D-tier mid with a 45.07% win rate, 56th of 57 mid laners, and still banned in 20.1% of games. That ban rate was pure spite, honestly. Nobody wanted their Jhin Q fired straight back into their own face.

What Patch 26.22 changes

The new W still deletes incoming projectiles. But now it pops a nova that shields Mel and nearby allies, gives them a burst of movement speed and pings attackers for a bit of damage. Riot is also moving power out of her laning phase and into her late game, and reckons ditching the reflect lets them balance her at a higher baseline.

Translation: less lane bully, more teamfight mage. Her win rate will wobble for the first few days while everyone works her out, so check the Mel build once 26.22 goes live. Still getting bullied by her? Her counters page has you covered, and the tier list will show whether the midscope actually drags her out of D tier.

Patch 26.22 Preview – League of Legends

Posted on by Geekmandem

The League of Legends Patch 26.22 Preview is here. With Worlds now fully underway, LoL continues to move on with buffs and nerfs. Riot Phroxzon on X with the Patch 26.22 Preview. The key focus of this patch is Mel, who will get the start of a rework in Patch 26.22.

Champions

Mel’s mini-update will be Live on Patch 26.22
When we released Mel, we intentionally went for a new ability that was pretty ambitious; we like to try to push the boundaries with new champions and mechanics to give players new puzzles to solve with each release.
After being on Live for a while, it’s clear that many players feel that Mel’s reflect was too frustrating to play against.
There are things in League that are allowed to be frustrating, as that can create a feeling of triumph when overcoming it and challenging players to grow, but there are some things that are too frustrating even given those upsides.
Realistically, every champion should have something that they do uniquely that other players might feel is frustrating.
So we’re reworking Mel’s W to keep the feeling of destroying projectiles, but not have it hard counter some subsets of the roster.
We tried many versions of Mel’s W that tried to retain the reflect, but we couldn’t find one that would hit the mark for Mel players and would be satisfactory for opponents.
We know this is disappointing for Mel players and we’re sorry we couldn’t uphold this end of the contract with you all.
That said, we hope this will allow Mel to be balanced at relatively higher resting power levels and be more effective for Mel players.
Viktor’s nerfs last patch overshot a bit, but we’re happy with the power redistribution to make his mobility (base movespeed) a bit worse.
This emphasizes his weakness of walking around the map unassisted, but in return, pays for the power budget of his strong laning and good scaling.
As a result, we’re not looking to revert either of his patches from last patch but give him power back in some of that scaling power.

Locke

We’ve been trying to fine tune Locke’s strengths and weaknesses post release and don’t think it’s too far off.
One place we think is a bit off though is how much damage he gets, especially early from his Q, so there’s a decently sized nerf here (keep in mind that this stacks up to 3x and is increased by 40% for 3 stacks to be ~30 dmg nerf at max).
The other place that we think is a bit off is Locke’s W Movespeed.
This nerf will make the spell a bit more windowed while trying to retain satisfaction while it’s active and making it a bit more costly to spam while running around the map.
Shen is decently strong in Top lane and Support, but we also think his jungle could be a bit stronger too.
It’s a playstyle that players have found fun, so we’re throwing it a bit of a bone.
Rumble has been one of the strongest champs in Pro Play, but now that Pro Play patches are done, we’re giving him a bit of power, as it’s not like he’s overly strong in Elite play either.
There are a few Aurelion Sol players who enjoy maxing W second, but most ASol players max E second, even though it’s weaker.
This is mostly the intuitive thing to do, but is quite a bit weaker than the alternative.
In an ideal world, these would be balanced against each other so both playstyles feel powerful.

Systems

Overlord’s Bloodmail

Overlord’s Bloodmail has been pretty weak overall and it’s pretty hard bound to Sett as currently tuned.
We’re looking to try to buff this for other users who should be interested in an item that converts Health to Damage (Mundo, Sion), but some aspects of the item make it too Sett skewed [eg. the missing HP portion].

Doran’s Bow

Doran’s Bow has been a bit too strong relative to Doran’s Blade, especially at higher levels of play.
So we’re looking to balance out the relative tradeoffs of the items a bit.
We’re overall happy wtih the direction of how the tradeoffs are playing out though! Just that the magnitude is a bit off.
Posted in LoL

How to get every Worlds 2026 Twitch chat badge

Posted on by Geekmandem

Heartsteel, True Damage, Pentakill and K/DA each have their own global chat badge up for grabs, plus there’s a Worlds Supporter badge and an in-game goodie for anyone willing to part with a sub.

Watch any channel streaming in the League of Legends category for 30 minutes during each band’s window, and the badge is yours. It doesn’t need to be an official broadcast either, so any official co-streamer counts, the Worlds Broadcast or someone trying to get out of Iron at 3am.

Band badge schedule

  • Heartsteel: 15 October to 27 October
  • True Damage: 28 October to 6 November
  • Pentakill: 7 November to 12 November
  • K/DA: 13 November to 14 November

Heartsteel has been live since 15 October, so if you’ve had League on in the background at any point this week while watching Worlds, you likely have it. K/DA is the one to watch out for. It’s a two-day window, so you have the least amount of time to claim it.

Worlds 2026 Supporter badge

Worlds 2026 Twitch badges

Grab a new recurring sub or gift sub on the official LoL Esports channels, or on any participating co-streamer or broadcast partner, between 15 October and 14 November, and you’ll get the Worlds 2026 Supporter badge. Prime subs don’t count, so you are going to need to actually throw money at the broadcast.

That same sub also unlocks the first Worlds sub drop, an emote called Flex On Em. You’ll need your Riot account connected to Twitch, so sort that out before you sub rather than after. It’s labelled Part 1 as well, which suggests Riot has more sub drops lined up for later in the event.

Drops only progress on one stream at a time, so opening five League streams in separate tabs won’t speed anything up. Badges claim automatically once you’ve hit the requirement, and you can check your progress on the Drops Inventory page. After that, head into your Twitch chat settings to equip whichever badge you fancy flexing.

LoL Worlds 2026 Pick’Ems: Our Swiss Stage Picks

Posted on by Geekmandem

The Play-Ins are done, Karmine Corp is through, and Worlds 2026 moves to Allen, Texas, for the Swiss Stage. That means it’s time to lock in another set of Pick’Ems before the first game on October 23rd.

If you missed our first round of picks, the short version is that we called the winner, but how we got there wasn’t paved in points.

We can’t promise you a perfect card, but if there’s a matchup you keep flip-flopping on, maybe our picks can help settle it.

Worlds 2026 Pick’Ems dates

  • October 18th: Swiss predictions start.
  • October 23rd: Swiss predictions end (before the first match, so don’t leave it until the evening).
  • October 31st: Knockout predictions start.
  • November 3rd: Knockout predictions end.
  • November 14th: Worlds ends at the Barclays Center, and rewards are given out.

How the Swiss Stage works

Sixteen teams, up to five rounds. Win three, and you’re into the Knockouts; lose three, and you’re on the flight home. Round 1 is all Bo1s, and once a team is one win from qualifying or one loss from elimination, it turns into a Bo3.

No team plays the same opponent twice, and teams from the same region couldn’t meet in Round 1. After that, it’s anyone’s game.

Worlds 2026 Swiss Stage Round 1 matchups

  • Gen.G vs Invictus Gaming
  • Team Liquid vs CTBC Flying Oyster
  • Anyone’s Legend vs Karmine Corp
  • G2 Esports vs Dplus KIA
  • Hanwha Life Esports vs Top Esports
  • LOS vs T1
  • Team Secret Whales vs LYON
  • Bilibili Gaming vs Movistar KOI

Some interesting matches for sure, with the home region, North America, getting a nice start. For those in Europe, it was not so good. KC face AL, G2 Esports play Dplus Kia, and MKOI play Bilibili Gaming. So, any one of those winning in Round 1 would be a good look.

Our Swiss Stage picks

Worlds 2026 Swiss Pick’Ems

We have a few different picks to look for here. We need to select one side that will go through with a specific score (3-0, 3-1, 3-2); doing some correctly will net us bonus points. We then need to pick five other sides that will advance, regardless of score.

3-0 (Undefeated): Gen.G
3-1 (Comfy In): AL
3-2 (Close Call): G2 Esports

Also advancing:

  • T1
  • HLE
  • BLG
  • DK
  • Team Liquid

Matchups will be key for who goes through, but we think some wildcards could make it. Gen.G we think, are a good pick for 3-0, while AG.AL at 3-1 also feels safe. G2 at 3-2 is risky, but if they go through, that is the likely score, so why not.

Team Liquid, Lyon, KCorp, and MKOI could all make it, but it will come down to the literal luck of the draw. Invictus Gaming and Secrey Whales could also cause an upset. If we wanted to let our bias come forward, we would knock Liquid off and include KCorp. If there was ever a time for North America to do something, it would be on home soil. But, it would also be peak NA to totally collapse like Cloud9 already did.

Check back for the Knockout Stage pickems once the Swiss Stage concludes.

K/DA FIRESTARTER Release as Band Make Surprise Return Ahead of Schedule

Posted on by Geekmandem

We had a feeling K/DA would be making a return at Worlds 2026. But with even more leaks now starting to show up, Riot Games has had to bring forward the reveal ahead of a likely Grand Final showing.

Remember Watch Me, the track that tipped everyone off in the first place? Turns out it wasn’t the lead single after all, but the second track of the EP. So, the leaks were correct, but I guess Riot Games gets the last laugh by having it as the backup track.

K/DA FIRESTARTER

So, surprise, they are back. The band is back together, and the virtual League of Legends group has new music. The new track is a return with a bang, and certainly fits with the band’s other tracks. The video also debuts a new look (so look forward to buying those skins soon). Red is a prominent motif in the outfits alongside black, with the two contrasting well to make each of the four characters stand out. What’s always so impressive is that, even with the more grown-up, human-looking designs, you can still tell what League of Legends character they are.

As is the style with this genre of music, it mixes languages throughout, with each member of the group getting a dedicated solo section. The latter half of the video sees the characters change look, so that’s the prestige skins sorted.

K/DA Firestarter
Image Credit – Riot Games

Going by the leaks from earlier this year, Ahri is getting an Ultimate skin with four forms. Akali is down for a Legendary, Evelynn gets an Epic plus a Prestige, and Kai’Sa gets an Epic. Riot hasn’t confirmed any tiers or a release date yet, but reports point towards Patch 26.22 in early November. Start hoarding that Mythic Essence now. We’ll have more on that later.

The new track features returning vocalists Miyeon and Soyeon of i-dle, who previously provided the voices for K/DA characters Ahri and Akali, respectively. Canadian singer Sophie Powers is the new voice of Evelynn, and British singer Mimi Webb takes over as Kai’Sa. The music video was made in partnership with Fortiche, known for their work on the Arcane series.

K/DA Firestarter is the first track in six years by the band, with the EP set to be released on October 21st, featuring four tracks:

  • FIRESTARTER
  • WATCH ME
  • NEVER GOING BACK
  • GIRLS (with DJ Sona)

DJ Sona makes a return, having not been seen since the 2015 reveal of the skin. For those into physical media, CDs and vinyls of the EP will be released.

League Classic is going back in the box in January 2027

Posted on by Geekmandem

Bad news for everyone who’s spent the last few months reliving their Season 1 glory days. League Classic has an end date, and it’s a lot sooner than many expected. Riot’s Meddler and Pabro dropped a fresh /dev post today confirming the mode will stick around until the end of Season 3. After that, it wraps up its current run in January 2027.

Riot wants to bring Classic back down the line, most likely as an event mode with some tweaks and new bits added on top. But it does feel like Riot has done Classic as a test of “Classic LoL was better”, and they’ve proven it isn’t. It’s basically their “You think you do, but you don’t”.

Why is League Classic ending?

Put simply, most people have wandered back to modern League and the modes associated with it. Classic had a massive honeymoon period when it launched in the summer, but Riot says the bulk of players have since drifted off to other modes. In some regions, that’s left Classic queues painfully long, and when you do get a game, the MMR gaps can be pretty brutal. Nobody wants to wait 10 minutes to get matched with someone three ranks above them.

Riot also teased a deeper breakdown later on, covering what they nailed, where they reckon they could have gone even more old school, and where sticking too closely to the past actually held the mode back. That last one should be a fun read.

Queue windows are coming to some regions

If you’re in a region where Classic’s population has dipped hard, you’re getting windowed queues. That means you can only queue up during set hours (server time):

RegionsWhen you can queue
Korea, LAN, LAS, Taiwan, Vietnam, Turkey, SEA, Oceania, RussiaMon to Fri: 4 pm to midnight. Sat to Sun: 10 am to 1 am
Japan (JP1), MENA (ME1)Custom matches only from patch 26.21

Custom games stay open around the clock in every region, so if you’ve got nine mates willing to relive 2011 with you at 3 am, go for it. Riot says to keep an eye on the patch notes for any changes to the windows.

What’s happening with the Battle Pass and store?

The Act II Classic Battle Pass lands in patch 26.21, and it’s a single free track. No premium version this time around.

From 26.21 onwards, the Classic store gets trimmed down to just champions, runes and rune pages. Riot is also refunding any Classic-specific content you bought that won’t be usable anymore, with the details on Riot’s support site.

New (old) champions are still on the way

Riot isn’t just letting Classic quietly fade out; they’re still pumping champions into it right up until the end.

Patch 26.20 already brought in Irelia, Karma, Quinn, Aatrox and Caitlyn. Then 26.21 adds Mordekaiser, Yorick, Hecarim and Lucian. Riot will keep adding champs every patch through 26.23, and that includes Volibear, Urgot and Udyr, the top three picks from the most recent Council vote. So if you were one of the people spamming votes for OG Udyr, your time has come.

Riot also gave a shoutout to everyone who’s been playing, voting and leashing for their junglers like it’s 2011 again, which is a nice touch. Get your Classic games in while you can, because come January, it’s back to the present.

Patch 26.21 Preview – League of Legends

Posted on by Geekmandem

The League of Legends Patch 26.21 Preview is here. While we’ve not even started Worlds yet, this is the first “post-Worlds patch”. Riot Phroxzon on X with the Patch 26.21 Preview.

League of Legends Patch Preview 26.21

Champions

Lee and Qiyana have been 2 of the strongest junglers, especially in higher levels of play and especially in certain regions.
We’re nerfing here, but also (especially in Qiyana’s case) being mindful of not double nerfing too hard with the Bastionbreaker nerfs also in the patch.
Yasuo and Yone have been picking up Shieldbow first a lot more and it’s been looking pretty strong on them.
Overall, we’re pretty supportive of this as feeling like their passive can kick in early feels great for their fantasy.
Secondly, having access to early lifesteal in lane, (eg. with vamp scepter for bork) makes their lane play lower quality.
Finally, it’s good to open up structural weaknesses for them before they complete first item, but allow them to be quite strong when they get there (and have power in durability vs straight up “kill you power”).
Taric is getting back the ability to have Q and R apply to untargetable allies.
TF ult now reveals untargeable units (eg. Yuumi W, Master Yi Q, Hexgate, etc.).
Overall, we don’t really think Viktor needs a major nerf here and the pattern of his long range hard to dodge poke is always going to be frustrating.
We think that’s a pattern that’s worth preserving for Viktor and something that his players really enjoy about him.
We think making his weakness more apparent (his inability to move around the map and weakness to ganks), while preserving his strengths is an appropriate way to keep players holistically happy without reducing Viktor’s satisfaction overall.
We’re opting to nerf Yone this patch, but not Yasuo, as while Yasuo rates highly on banrate, Yone is showing up significantly higher on our frustration surveys.
Players are also more likely to play against a competent Yone than a Yasuo, so that factors into the overall perception of how powerful he is.

Locke

Locke has overall landed pretty well
One area we think is a bit off is his mana costs and how little consequences there are when he messes up.
We do like his ability to have pop off moments and really high burst when he can meet his success conditions, but it should feel more risky when he messes up (eg. poor usage of W’s and spells in general).
We’re intending this to be an relatively power neutral adjustment and incentivizing Locke to rank up E second and have a higher amount of power in landing E1 (his W second is more powerful in many cases).
Posted in LoL

LoL Worlds 2026 Pick’Ems: Predictions and Crystal Ball

Posted on by Geekmandem

LoL Worlds 2026 Pick’Ems are here ahead of Worlds 2026. This time, the Crystal Ball adds another layer to the event, with even more rewards.

As always with Worlds, we, as players, get the chance to make our Pick’Ems for a selection of rewards. This year, a perfect set of Pick’Ems will even net you every single Ultimate Skin as a reward.

To help you on that adventure, we’ve picked our Pick’Ems, to help you judge your calls. We’re not going to guarantee a win here, but if there is a choice you’re not too sure about, maybe we can help guide it.

Worlds 2026 Pick’Ems

World 2026 teams
Image Credit – Riot Games

Pick’Ems are broken down into three sets. Play-Ins, Swiss, and Knockouts. The Play-Ins stage ends on October 15th, so make sure to get those picks in soon. Here is the breakdown of the dates.

  • October 10th: Pick’Ems and Crystal Ball start.
  • October 15th: Crystal Ball and Play-In predictions end.
  • October 18th: Swiss predictions start.
  • October 23rd: Swiss predictions end.
  • October 31st: Knockout predictions start.
  • November 3rd: Knockout predictions end.
  • November 14th: Worlds ends, and rewards are given out.

Here are our Play-ins picks.

UB – Semifinals – FUR vs MVK – FUR and C9 vs KC – C9

UB – Finals – C9

LB – Semifinals – KC

LB – Finals – KC

Finals – KC

Overall, we think KC will take it. Looking at the data and what other people are suggesting, this is likely the result. C9 will have the home crowd buff, which is why we think they beat KC the first time, but KC will come into the Grand Final off the back of two wins, and then get revenge on C9.

Here are our Swiss Stage picks.

We’ll update these on October 18th.

World 2026 Anthem Released Featuring True Damage and Faker

Posted on by Geekmandem

Riot Games has dropped “Know My Name”, performed by True Damage, alongside the official Worlds music video on the League of Legends YouTube channel. The track is also out now on all the major streaming platforms.

It’s True Damage’s first release since “GIANTS” back in 2019, and it’s a first for Worlds too. “Know My Name” is the 13th Worlds anthem, but it’s the first time Riot has handed the job to one of its own virtual artists.

Worlds 2026 Anthem

The video follows Faker on the road to T1’s historic three-peat. It isn’t just a highlight reel of trophy lifts either, with Riot promising a look at the setbacks he had to battle through to get there.

True Damage will perform “Know My Name” at the Worlds 2026 Final Opening Ceremony at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on 14 November. Before that, Worlds gets underway with the Play-In Stage in Los Angeles on 15 October.