The past week has seen more reveals about Samuel than we’d have ever expected along with a couple new skins which are sure to get you instalocking heroes just to stare in awe at your beautiful new skins.
samuel; abilities, in game, lore; Vainglory 1.21 patch notes released.
No, the sub heading didn’t mention one too many details of the new hero. We have pretty much all the details we need to get a pretty clear idea of what to expect from our new dark mage. Check out the in-game footage here,and his Lore, “The Nightmare“. His abilities can be checked out along with the rest of the patch notes.
skins:
The special Summer Skin for update 1.21 has been announced and is a stunning rendition of Kestrel on the beach. 
The skin features:
- Snorkel and flippers for nautical sniping
- Sushi-hunting spear gun
- Basic attack fires a harpoon that sprays water and bubbles on impact
- All-new aqua-missile Glimmershots
- Active Camo releases a sea mine into a pool of water, bursting and soaking enemies when detonated
- One Shot, One Soaked enemy!
- Dolphin-kick sprint animation
For a full sneak-peak and the alternate fates lore, check in here.
SEMC has also revealed new ways we can unlock Summer Party Phinn, mainly consisting of giveaways for the time being. The full list can be read on the official site.
gamescon:
The folks over at SEMC are going to be travelling to Germany to attend GamesCon in Cologne. They will be available at the Twitch and Amazon booths. The full details are available here.
community contributions:
Fresh from the Vainglory community is a hilarious song about Tension Bow Taka. You can check it out here.
Below we have some fan art by the amazing community.
(Done by @hallu_salato on twitter)
esports (spoilers.. duh.)
This week in Vainglory eSports saw the challenger battles between EVIL 8 teams and the Challengers for a spot in the EVIL 8. These high stake matches were pretty exciting and had huge potential for upsets.
EU:
Series 1: SK Gaming vs Team Elysium
Much to my liking, corteZ on the side of Team Elysium brought out a CP Taka. The first match seemed to be going in the favor of SK with some spot on Quibbles from Raph and an early 3 kill lead. That lead diminished rather quickly though, as corteZ began to scale up on Taka. Elysium got two kills during the 16th minute and were able to release Kraken. MEDIC got jumped on and died during the push, but SK only lost two turrets from it. Elysium got another clean ace at the 20th minute and won the game with it.
The second game saw a slow early game with corteZ switching over to Skye and MEDIC going to CP Ringo. iloH4uK started to do some work at about the 5th minute with a strong WP Lance. SK got another 2 kills right under Elysium’s turret at the 8th minute, then were able to take that same turret. Again, though, Elysium returned with 4 kills of their own and nearly evened out the gold. They really couldn’t do much past that and conceded a 9 kill lead by the 15th minute, a huge factor being how split they were, not working as a team. SK won the game.
For the third game, corteZ went back to Taka, pulling out a WP Taka this time–a good choice considering the heal from Adagio on SK’s side. The third game was pretty slow with only one kill going over to SK until the 11th minute when Elysium got a kill to answer. This kicked off the action and Elysium went on the get an ace and two turrets. They picked up another two kills in the 16th minute and were able to get Kraken from it. Helga and Elysium finished the game after getting two kills on carries during the push.
The fourth game saw another CP Taka from corteZ and a Glaive from Aeroniac. SK? They had Reim. Yeah. Not the best news for a triple melee comp. Even had a Lance to keep them away from their carries. All this spelled out a dominant win for SK winning in 15 minutes conceding only 3 kills to Elysium.
The fifth and final game started out pretty quickly with two quick kills going to either side. Elysium started to push forward, slowly but surely. The got a clean ace in the 15th minute with an amazing Solar Storm from corteZ giving them the Kraken with 4 turrets to go through. Did they pull a TSM special? No. They could only get two turrets from it after which they were aced, allowing SK to take a turret themselves. In the following fight, probably the most controversial thing was corteZ not using his ultimate, which could possibly have gotten them the ace. Elysium ended up giving away another ace and two turrets. Elysium had no vision near the gold mine area which allowed SK to pull a sneaky one and unleash Kraken. In the next fight, corteZ used his ultimate pretty late. During the delay in releasing it, the SK team was able to get pretty far and this distance allowed both IloH4uK and MEDIC to dodge the ult and only Phinn died to it. Kraken brought all but one turret down. SK were able to use one final Ace to win the game in an extremely close series.
Series 2: Snow Tsunami vs Angry Pandas Black.
The start of the first game went hugely in favor of Snow Tsunami. They had Lookatme on Saw who put enormous pressure on the Lane. It took only 4 minutes for the first turret to go down. 7 minutes for the second turret (they had a 5 kill lead by this point). Tsunami even got a gold mine and opened a 4k gold lead. They got another 2 kills and were going on a rampage, destroying the 4th turret in just the 10th minute. They got two kills and immediately went to the final turret to finish the game in an astonishingly dominant 12 minutes.
Tsunami pulled out the same Saw, Skye comp again for the second match with the only change being Roam Phinn instead of Roam Lyra. Much like last time, Tsunami got a large early game lead of 6 kills and 3k gold. It did, however take them a full 9 minutes for the first turret. They got an Ace and the second turret in the 13th minute. Tsunami had a 11 kill and 8k gold lead by the 15th minute. Not talked about much was Araxi who had an amazing Skye. His 11 kill streak made him a nightmare for Angry Pandas. Following two kills, Tsunami were able to get the Kraken. They did over stay their welcome, though, and despite exposing the Vain Crystal they gave up an Ace. Tsunami brought out the backdoor for the second win.
The third game saw quite a few changes including the swapping out of Daniir for TonyLuo on the side of Angry Pandas. Tony got his signature pick, Taka which was interestingly played as a Lane WP Taka. On the side of Tsunami, Lookatme went for CP Jungle Fortress. Tsunami started off once again with two early kills. Lookatme and Sosiska were caught out taking the enemies minion mine, though, and gave up two kills to Angry Pandas. In the 7th minute, Tony was forced to return to base giving Tsunami a chance to get the first turret. Angry Pandas returned with a vengeance and an Ace, and were even able to get a gold mine and Tsunami’s back Jungle camps. They didn’t attempt to go for the turret. Tsunami were able to catch LeyaLeya out and got killed both her and dinoEgg. They were also able to sneak out a gold mine pick. In a fight that followed, Tsunami brought all the members of Angry pandas low but couldn’t get any kills, even losing Lookatme during the fight. At the 15th minute, though, Tsunami got a clean Ace, Kraken and a turret to go along with it. During the push Angry Pandas took out Araxi and Sosiska and were able to kill Kraken just before it destroyed the last turret. Tsunami followed through on their momentum, finding another fight and took out all three Angry Pandas for the ace and the win.
NA:
Series 1: Necrolyte vs Nemesis Titan
The first match saw an interesting pick from Nemesis in the “Carry Cath” on DragonDagger. The start was pretty even with DragonDagger being very passive in Jungle. StutterStephh did steal a bunch of farm from Nemesis’s side, but Dragon was able to counter jungle pretty well due to their team’s vision. Necrolyte were able to get a gold mine and had superior jungle farming giving them a 2k gold lead by the 10th minute. Nemesis had an amazing engage in the 15th minute with a triple stun from Gauntlet and a Blast Tremor along with 3 infusions on the side of Nemesis. All this led to an Ace and a Kraken capture. They also got an Ace during the push and were able to finish the game, putting Nemesis on top 1-0.
In the second game, Dragon opted for a WP Jungle Lance. The start was very even and gold leads were pretty negligible until about the 13th minute when Nemesis was able to secure an ace and take a turret down. In the 15th minute, StutterStephh was overextended and Nemesis were able to transform this from one mistake into an Ace. After taking a turret they moved onto Kraken. Necrolyte contested, and although they couldn’t get the steal, they fought hard and managed to grab two kills. This allowed them to kill Kraken relatively quickly, only giving away one turret. In the 21st minute, Necrolyte was able to get two more kills and their first turret. In the 23rd minute, they followed this up with an ace and a Kraken. They got another Ace during the push for the win. During the last couple fights, Riesgo’s Phinn wasn’t able to use Fountain or Crucible for Nemesis, which really hurt them.
Nemesis Titan won the third game because Necrolyte surrendered in a moment of confusion, despite not really intending to do so. By the EVIL 8 rules, the win went over to Nemesis, putting them up 2-1.
The fourth game saw StutterStephh trying his hand at CP Saw. The early game was mainly Nemesis building up a lead slowly but surely, as was very apparent at the 13-14 minute mark when they started bringing out Aces by capitalizing on Necrolyte’s squishy Saw. They got another 2 kills at the 15th minute and unleashed Kraken, allowing them to push for the win the game with it. Nemesis Titan will move into the EVIL 8 for the next season and earned themselves a spot in the live championship.
Series 2 Ardent Aurora vs Gankstars Sirius
WizardSibs brought out a WP Jungle Lance for the side of Ardent. The first game started with a quick 4 kill lead for Ardent, picking off the members of GSS one by one. In the eight minute, Ardent tried to get themselves a gold mine but GSS spotted them out and MacDaddy was able to steal it away with a perfectly timed Quibble. No matter, though, in the 10th minute, Ardent got two kills off GSS and pushed down one turret, building up a 7 kill lead and a 2k gold lead. In the 12th minute, though, GSS were able to get a perfect Ace knowing that Ardent was down on their Ultimates. Ardent came back from the setback and got an Ace of their own and a turret to show for it. In the 15th minute they were able to get themselves a kill and force the rest of GSS to retreat to base allowing them to get themselves Kraken. They got two kills during the push and finished the game after it with Kraken.
Gankstars switched out xTsuki for Inane before continuing to Game 2, where we saw double WP from both sides. Ardent was able to pick off GSS over one by one, just as in Game 1. They picked up another kill in the 8th minute when Foojee was stealing their jungle and took a turret to follow it up. They also captured a full gold mine at the 9th minute for a large gold swing in their favor. Aurora got another 2 kills in the 10th minute and found Inane for the Ace and the 2nd turret. When Kraken came up, it was highly contested with both teams going all out for it–but Ardent was able to land the final blow and secured the ace directly afterwards for the win.
Foojee was swapped out to bring xTsuki back in Game 3. Gankstars ran the same comp as Ardent did in Game 1 with xTsuki going for a WP Taka. For a change, GSS got the first blood in this game with a strong Jungle play. It was no matter to Ardent though, as they picked up 6 kills before the 10th minute. Despite this, the gold was very even between the teams. Aurora eventually got an ace in the 13th minute for the turret and a pulled out a slight gold lead. They got yet another ace in the 16th minute after an early shutdown on Inane and got the Kraken. They wisely retreated after getting two turrets, not wanting to overstay. In the twentieth minute, GSS gave up an ace when they came out to the Kraken Pit, giving Ardent the perfect 3 match win for their place in the live championship.
Series 3: Team Parallel vs Hammers Velocity.
Hammers Velocity saw Gabevizzle back at his original position as Roam on Phinn. They started out strong with 5 quick kills. Zio picked a CP Ringo with a WP Skye on Aloh4. By the eleventh minute, they had a large 7 kill gold lead but were actually down on gold by 1k after losing a turret and a gold mine after losing one kill to Parallel. In the 13th minute though, Velocity were able to get themselves a turret for the gold lead. They followed it up with a 1 for 3 trade in the 16th minute and secured a turret from it, but weren’t able to get Kraken. This hurt Velocity when they gave up an Ace in the 17th minute, giving Kraken over to Parallel. During the push, Parallel gave up 2 kills but still managed to push down till the last crystal turret. The 22nd minute saw another Ace go over to Velocity and they went on to get Kraken this time. This owed in part to yet another amazing block on Blast Tremor from Gabe, allowing Velocity to win the game with Kraken.
The second game started off very even in kills until about the 8th minute, when Velocity engaged under Parallel’s turret and managed to secure an early Ace. Velocity snowballed terrifically, taking a turret and quickly following up with three separate kills. After taking down TheBlank in the 12th minute, they pushed for the second turret. This was followed by a triple pull by Gabe’s Phinn near their turret and Velocity brought out a clean ace and were able to destroy the third turret. By now they racked up a 6k gold lead and a 12 kill lead. They picked up a kill on Chenshua and forced the rest back to base . Velocity took advantage of this to get Kraken. During the push, after another great pull by Gabe, Velocity picked up another 2 kills making it an easy push for the win.
The third game went in Parallel’s favor early with 3 kills going over to them right at the outset. In the 6th minute, though, Velocity evened out the kills. In the very next minute they got another two kills and were very close to getting an Ace. Seeing reason and not chasing the last member down, they went ahead and took a turret down and satisfied themselves without an ace. Even so, they compensated with an ace to follow in the 9th minute. They nearly destroyed the next turret but were forced to retreat when the members of Parallel respawned.. Aloh4 had a really strong full WP Kestrel this match which was doing insane damage to the ranks of Team Parallel. Velocity killed TheBlank and brought down the second turret and the Gold Mine to go along with it. In the eleventh minute, Gabe pulled the whole of Team Parallel to Velocity making it easy for Aloh4 and Zio to kill them with the high damage glimmer shots and the Resonance bounces from CP Vox. In the 14th minute, despite not having that great of an engage, Velocity were able to take down the crystal turrets and the Vain Crystal for the win, securing their spot in the Live Finals. Apart from those initial three kills, Team Parallel couldn’t get anything off of Velocity giving them a decisive win. velocity moved on to the Live championship.
This week saw the knocking out of Necrolyte from the EVIL 8 and the Live Finals, as well as the Update 1.21 Notes. Thanks for reading and please do stay tuned for more 🙂