Welcome to RGL Highlander Season 4! This is shaping up to be an exciting season, especially for Advanced. With the Invite Qualifiers now concluded, the teams now playing in Advanced seem pretty set but there could be more shake-ups down the line with the newly-loosened guidelines surrounding players with Invite-level experience playing in Advanced. Furthermore, there is a new team in Advanced made up of mostly ESEA-IM and Invite players! If you have your own take on predictions for the week, post them here. If you want to post your own thoughts about Advanced, post them here.

Power Rankings

1. Marker and the e-boy
Lehcs
pup
Plurl
Avian
|Bonesaw|
Lasky
raisins
Markers
agb

With many players ( Lehcs, pup, Avian, Markers, and agb) coming from Season 3’s Third Place team Markers team is looking ready for another strong season with solid pickups in Plurl and raisins. Already-solid pick classes combined with strong combo pickups could be what it takes to take the Gold this season.

2. Gotta Blast

myk
josh
nazara
nickk
bran
baocn
reyylin
nerdaloid
lut

Gotta Blast struggled in Advanced in Season 2 before going on hiatus. They are back again with a new set of offclasses. myk and josh are a powerful flank combo with the potential to hold their own against any of the other flanks in the division. nazara may be a newcomer to pyro, but they have the experience to adjust to the class and the rest of the combo in nickk, bran, and reyylin looks powerful. It is a bit up-in-the-air just how strong the pick classes of nerdaloid and lut will be, but it’s almost certain that they will be nothing to scoff at.

3. division dysphoria

Cheers
Diego
cookie
brandon
extrasolar
reptiguru
Abridge
piney
Zokie0

Another team with a strong flank in Cheers and Diego. However, the strongest point of this team is certainly in their combo of brandon and extrasolar. Both players have a substantial number of seasons under their belt and extrasolar has played at a Top level in ETF2L for a while. With a veteran gamer like Abridge backing them up, they should be ready to punish other combos in Advanced. piney (another European) is a very strong pickup and has already shown that they are certainly in contention for the best sniper in Advanced this season.

4. Home Depot eSports

animus
Wubs
Kitty
zbra
Luigi
cyclowns
Ness
?
BustaMcNasty

While Home Depot may have struggled in Advanced last season, their roster is looking very solid this season. animus and Wubs were powerful on flank last season and will likely remain so. The combo of zbra, Luigi, and Ness have multiple seasons of experience playing with each other and that cohesion will certainly help the newcomer of Kitty to adjust. With the uncertainty surrounding who is playing Sniper for Home Depot, and the potential rustiness of BustaMcNasty, I am not quite willing to put Home Depot into the Top 3 (although I hope my old team more than proves me wrong).

5. 1 Korean, 9 Keyboards

sparhawk
Kami
Bliztank
cookiemonster
Bz
Constantly
Ava
Kronky
?

One of the new teams in Advanced this season, with many new pickups and some players carrying over from last season’s NKB ( Kami, cookiemonster, and Constantly). Kronky has, in the past, been a dominant player on sniper and it will be interesting to see if he is able to make a return to form over the course of this season. Asides from him however, the combo of Bz, cookiemonster, and Bliztank looks to be the solid foundation of this team. It is uncertain, however, if they or the flank of Kami and sparhawk will be able to go head-to-head with some of the higher-ranked teams. This is a team to watch as the season goes on for-sure, especially if they get a solid pickup on the Spy class.

6. Turbo Alcoholics

rosario
msh
B_RED
TeatsMcGee
Rue
CapeKid
Melonlord
Deadpixel
galaxy

A team largely composed of old, and good, players. However, while they may be boomers, they no doubt have the experience to be able to take rounds (and matches) off any team who underestimates them. The combo of TeatsMcGee, Rue, and B_RED are all solid and rosario is nothing to scoff at. galaxy is one of the biggest question marks on their roster as a player with little experience but who can succeed in advanced given a team who can help him out. Overall, Turbo Alcoholics looks like a solid mid-Advanced team with the potential to improve dramatically over the season depending on how serious (and how rusty) their players are.

7. The On God Team

lukamine
stutterduck
moxie
wild
attentiondeficient
Gramps
Lay
jerry
CraftKitty

In my opinion, the most solid move up team from Main this season is Lay’s. With almost none ( CraftKitty being the exception) of their players having any high-level experience, this season could be rough for them, especially with the top of Advanced looking quite competitive. That being said, if any of the Main teams could break through and exceed expectations, I think that The On God Team will be the team to do it. With solid players across the board in lukamine, stutterduck, wild, attention deficient, moxie, jerry, and CraftKitty this may be a team which lacks any particular stand-out players but which benefits from having few blatant weaknesses.

8. STARDUST CRUSADERS

Rushie
?
fordo
Glaistig
?
Austin
patricK
podgy713
ghost

ghost’s team suffered the unfortunate fate of being the last non-moveup team to get a solid roster and thus saw most of the best LFT gamers getting snatched up before ghost could get them. However, she has managed to pull together a solid roster despite that setback. Rushie will be a capable flank partner for whichever soldier they eventually pick up. podgy713 is also a highly-capable sniper who has the experience, and the ability, to do serious work for his team even if the roster isn’t set-in-stone. However, the current uncertainty surrounding the flank and combo pickups for this team, as well as the lack of any standout high-advanced/invite players, doesn’t give me a lot of hope for their success going into this season.

9. catch the chach

J_PEG
?
subinka
funky
Sebbers
StarTard
rona
WiLLmaTiC
Sylon

The second strongest of the Main move-up teams, and the winners of Main last season, WiLLmaTiC’s team can succeed if they manage to shore up some of their biggest weaknesses. While J_PEG is a solid player on his class, it will be important that chach manages to find another strong player on Soldier in order to even out their flank. With a strong flank they may be able to help their more uneven combo where you have a solid player in Sebbers but you also have funky and subinka who have struggled in their pre-season scrims versus other Advanced teams. The players they will likely need to pick up the slack from their combo are WiLLmaTiC and Sylon who both have experience but who might not be able to do enough to carry their team. As with the other Main moveups, their ability to do well this season will depend largely upon their ability to learn and improve over the course of the season.

10. Oprah Winfrey Network

rk
r4t
Raptoir
Joey Lemons
Secretly Satan
R4bbit
Manslaughter
tua
Stardust

Joey Lemons has his work cut out for him this season. Moving up at the same time as catch the chach, who beat his team in Main Grand Finals last season, means that they will likely be even with a team who I believe will already struggle in Advanced. There are certainly capable players on the roster such as rk, tua, and Joey Lemons himself but I am not sure how far these gamers can take them. It will be up to the whole team to be able to learn and improve over the season (and pre-season) in order to catch up to the higher-ranked teams.

???. Banned from RGL

With an uncertain roster that, as of this moment, does not even have 9 players, it is hard to tell how strong this team will be. However, the players that they have right now are all good at the game and will probably pose a threat on whatever classes they play. The question will not be if this team is good but rather just how good they will be.

EDIT: WiLLmaTiC