Maverick launched a frontal attack on Kai, but the whole operation ended before it could even start. Kai masterfully disengaged and avoided confrontation, which was the right thing to do.
It felt like a desperate attack. Yuel analyzed. Maverick must be getting anxious about her farm, and for a good reason.
That Dark Knight was operating on a clock. Her KDA was 1/1/0, not a great score for a hyper early-game class.
Maybe it's about time to deliver the final blow. Yuel thought. I just have to bait her one more time and get her killed. That'd be a wrap.
Honestly, that probably wasn't even necessary. Stratus was the stronger team, so they'll eventually come out on top even if they don't do anything special.
Nonetheless, Yuel had a strong urge to thoroughly shut Maverick down. That cunning girl pulled a fast one on Stratus when she killed Luke, so it was a good idea to test the limits of her ability.
We might run into her at the regionals. Yuel reasoned. If she plays a proper meta class, then I can see her becoming a potential threat. So, I'd better use this game to find all her weaknesses.
Thus far, Maverick's eagerness was the only thing that stood out. She wasn't the type to sit around and let the game pass by. She wanted to be in control, and she was willing to take action in order to create her own opportunities. Yuel took advantage of that when he lured Maverick to steal the Hyena Camp.
And now, I can tell she's eager to kill Kai. So, this looks like a recipe to turn the tables on her. But how to best do it?
Asking Luke to gank the lane seemed like the most obvious direction, but this will only work if Maverick overextends first. For example, that didn't happen in the recent lane exchange because Kai retreated too early.
The most surefire way to make Maverick overextend is to have Kai fight her and slowly drag her toward our side of the lane. On paper, her fighting style is well-suited for plays like these, but...
Could the current Kai pull this off? The Kai that was suffering from the Softhearted Amazon syndrome? Doubtful.
I've seen some signs of improvement ever since she started sparring with Nia and Julia, but as I suspected, this is a very selective cure…
After enough repetition, Kai's win rate against Nia improved. Now, their matchup was around 5-5 on average. In fact, if only the most recent matches counted, then Kai would be at 6-4 now. She sure came a long way.
There was a similar sense of progress against Julia. When they started playing, Kai had a terrible 3-7 matchup. It felt almost like a one-sided beat-up, even though their skill levels couldn't possibly be that far apart.
This was perhaps a blessing in disguise, as the frequent wins motivated Julia to keep sparring regularly. Either way, the odds sure weren't looking good for Kai at first.
However, just like against Nia, Kai gradually adjusted. It seemed her brain began to register Julia as a "strong opponent", which overrode the "female opponent" classification.
The statistics changed rapidly in a matter of days. Kai caught up and evened the score to 5-5. It quickly became evident that Julia only had an early lead because Kai was too lax at first.
Of course, this drastic shift in results made Julia salty. Fortunately, instead of quitting, this only made her more motivated to get back at Kai. So, she kept accepting duel requests nonstop. At that point, these were no longer practice games but vengeful bloodbaths…
After countless more battles, the score still remained even. Kai managed to improve her results tremendously at first, but then reached a plateau. Nonetheless, this actually suggested that Kai was the stronger duelist overall.
If she can get a 5-5 score while being bogged down by the Softhearted syndrome, then she probably can get to 6-4 without it. Yuel reasoned. Also, with all due respect to Julia, I think that Kai is the more consistent player overall.
Julia was a hyperbole of extreme ups and downs. Sometimes, her explosive offense overwhelmed Kai. Other times, her chilling defense denied Kai opportunities that looked like an assured victory.
On the flip side, there were also many cases when Julia's extremes played against her. Her extreme offense made her prone to overextending, while her turtly defense made her miss golden opportunities.
Compared to that hurricane of a girl, Kai was a more balanced player. Her offense was just fierce enough to seal the deal when she had the right opportunity, and her defense was excellent at dismantling enemy attacks.
Sure, at the most extreme, Kai's offense wasn't as explosive as Julia's, and her defense wasn't as cautiously bulletproof. Nonetheless, Kai knew how to smoothly transition from offense to defense, and vice versa. This was something Julia struggled with to this day. Because of that, Kai was far better at adapting on the fly during the match.
And so, in the end, the two girls were about even. Half the time, Julia's extremes allowed her to seize overwhelming victory, but other times, Kai's adaptation won out.
Overall, Kai's results were far less volatile in nature. Therefore, Yuel believed her to be the more consistent duelist even though their win ratios were on par.
Either way, Kai definitely improved against Nia and Julia via repetition. However, as Yuel feared, this looked like a localized improvement. She became better against the opponents she sparred with, but not necessarily better against female opponents in general.
I suspected this for a while, but this game confirms it. Yuel sighed. She has zero drive to fight Maverick. Even that wild DK pick isn't enough to spark her fighting spirit.
Of course, Kai will deny all of this if Yuel just talks about it. The only way to convince her that a problem existed was through first-hand experience.
"Kai, I'd like to get another kill on the DK," Yuel said. "She seems eager to fight you, so how about you give her that fight? Try to lure her in so that Luke can gank her."
"Is that necessary?" Kai asked. "She's a walking dead at this point, isn't she?"
"Yes, most likely." Yuel nodded. "But she still has a chance to rebound. She seems to understand her situation well, so she's dialing up the aggression. There's a chance she'll recover her momentum if she can get a kill."
"Well, she's not gonna kill me, that's for sure."
"Well, it's true that you've been handling her cleanly so far, but don't lower your guard. Maverick has already surprised us once in this game."
"Yeah, that one play was sure something," Kai agreed. "Alright, so you're basically saying that we shouldn't just sit here and wait for her to become irrelevant, is that it?"
"Yes, exactly," Yuel answered. "Playing passively will just give her more time to hatch a plan. So, I want to shut her down before she gets to her next scheme."
"Fine." Kai shrugged. "Luke, get ready to gank."
"Heck yeah, let's go!" Luke grinned. "I'm always down for some action!"
In the end, everybody agreed on the plan. It seemed like a normal development, but actually, it was very peculiar.
Against a male opponent, Kai would've insisted on getting the kill all by herself. Yuel thought. She should know she's way stronger than Maverick, so there isn't much reason to hesitate, especially now that Maverick has lost momentum. Yet, Kai is letting Luke do it…
In a way, this was also a positive. This passive version of Kai was more agreeable than usual. Yuel didn't even have to argue much to convince her to cooperate with this gank.
I suppose this is one of the beneficial traits that Vincent sees in this syndrome. Yuel sighed. Honestly, though, I'd much rather have Kai play assertively and give it her all, instead of putting in like 50% of the effort.
Either way, there was no fixing this problem on the spot. Kai was going to play this round meekly, locked in her Softhearted Mode. Hopefully, this won't cause any problems with the plan…