A legendary name in the esports community, Cloud9 has excelled at many video game titles across esports, but none more so than League of Legends. After a string of second-place finishes, Cloud9 finally became champions at the 2020 League of Legends Championship Series (LCS) Spring Split. They have followed up that win with another Spring Split championship in 2021, continuing to show they are one of North America’s top teams.
After the dominant performance where they finished the season with a remarkable 17-1 record, Cloud9 has continued to dominate on the rift with new players and new coaches. One major factor in Cloud9 reaching the next level is their commitment to using data and technology to find insights that can help their players and coaches get the competitive edge.
But another factor that gives Cloud9 an edge is its focus on team-building and camaraderie. Cloud9’s LCS gaming house is where it all comes together. The gaming house is hub that helps the team’s athletes bond and provides them with everything they need to hone their gaming skills, including state-of-the-art technology coaches and players use to find the competitive edge.
See the Cloud9 LCS House up close and personal
This 360 Tour gives fans the chance to explore and connect with their favorite Cloud9 LCS players like never before. Get an immersive look at the LCS House and explore the training resources that set Cloud9 LCS apart—from rigorous fitness regimens to nutritious meals to holistic development via sports psychology.
A ‘League’ of their own
Enjoyed by millions of players around the world, League of Legends is a dynamic game that has grown over the years to take center stage in esports. Even though the multiplayer online battle arena game has been around for a decade, mastering it takes an ongoing investment of time, skill-building, and developing an impressive knowledge of the game. It is ever evolving, with Riot Games releasing new patches or updates to League that changes the strengths and weaknesses of champions every two weeks. With over 140 champions for players to choose from and a combination of 10 champions battling it out throughout a match, the strategies for victory are endless.
There’s no shortage of data in League of Legends, including champion selection, win rates, builds, and historical team drafting strategies. The ultimate challenge is how to leverage the data to find the competitive edge. Cloud9 collaborated with Microsoft to develop solutions that allow coaches and players to train, draft, recruit, and play at championship level.
Data and technology has just made our whole process easier.
Philippe "Vulcan" Laflamme, Support, Cloud9
For the win
Using the power of Microsoft Azure, Cloud9’s Game Insights Platform dynamically takes in information from a variety of sources—including the game’s own API and, more impressively, from actual video of matches. Using computer vision to create millions of data points, the system can track the movements of all 10 players throughout a match and draw critical insights that Cloud9 players and coaches can leverage during their match preparation.
Driving this new effort, Cloud9’s lead data scientist Halee Mason has been critical to the team’s success. A diamond-level League of Legends player herself, Halee and her colleague Danny Brady have paired an intimate understanding of the game with in-depth data analysis, helping Cloud9 with everything from champion selection to scrim feedback.
Preparing for battle
During each split, Cloud9 players and coaches craft their weekly schedule to prepare for the upcoming weekend matches. Every day includes a morning workout, scheduled scrims against other teams, and team meetings.
Throughout the week, the players and coaches consult the Cloud9 Power BI dashboard to review which champions their opponents are competing against and who they've historically drafted. Before implementing the dashboard, players and coaches used to search websites for hours to glean similar insights. Providing Cloud9 players and coaches with these trends and patterns allows the team to focus on preparing and applying these insights to anticipate their opponent’s next move.
Competing with collaboration
Communication is a vital component of esports. With players and coaches often based in different locations and teams having to travel around the world to compete in tournaments, staying connected and on the same page is important.
Whether it’s real-time comms during scrims, or reviewing replays and stats in the days before and after matches, Cloud9 relies on Microsoft Teams and other Microsoft 365 apps to stay connected and collaborative. "Teams quickly became the place where we work together, share files, and hold meetings," says Halee Mason. "Now I'm so organized with my data files broken out across different Teams channels.”
Meet the players
Looking to the future
Innovating and optimizing data analytics at Cloud9 doesn’t stop with the current solutions. Cloud9 and Microsoft continue to collaborate on future technology, including at a two-day hackathon that took place late last year. Pairing Halee Mason, Cloud9 owner Jack Eitenne, Senior Data Engineer Danny Brady, and Cloud9 jungler Blaber with around 100 Microsoft employees, the group created prototypes that might one day make their way into the Cloud9 toolkit to gain the competitive edge—not just in League of Legends, but also in games like Team Fight Tactics and Super Smash Bros.
While it’s still too early to say what’s coming next, as the team continues to drive esports innovation alongside the tireless work of their champion players, one thing is for certain—second place just isn’t enough for Cloud9.
