The League of Legends Championship Pacific (LCP) is an upcoming professional esports league for League of Legends teams competing in the Asia-Pacific region.[a]Riot Games, the game's developer, and tournament organizer Carry International created the league on 29 September 2024. This followed an announcement in June by Riot in which they planned to form a single tournament to replace the Pacific Championship Series (PCS) and Vietnam Championship Series (VCS) as a tier-one league. Both leagues, along side the League of Legends Japan League (LJL), which was integrated into the PCS for the 2024 season, became tier-two leagues.
The LCP will utilize a hybrid franchise and promotion and relegation model, similar to the Valorant Champions Tour (VCT) in Riot's tactical shooter Valorant. Four teams will be "partners" in the league and can't be relegated, while another four are "guest teams" that can be relegated to the PCS, VCS, LJL or other sub-regional leagues based on their location.
The LCP is made up of three organizations from Vietnam, two organizations each from Japan and Taiwan[b] and one organization from Oceania. All teams will play from a studio in Taipei.
History
Prior to the LCP
The first professional esports league for League of Legends players in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and Southeast Asia was the Garena Premier League (GPL), which ran from 2012 to mid-2018 and ran by Garena, who distributed the game in those regions. Teams from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau were given their own league, the League of Legends Master Series (LMS), in late 2014.[1] Three years later, the Vietnam Championship Series (VCS) was upgraded to a Tier 1 tournament and Vietnam became its own competitive region, separate from the rest of Southeast Asia.[2][3] The GPL was rebranded as the League of Legends SEA Tour (LST) in mid-2018.[4]
On 25 September 2019, Garena announced its intention to merge the LMS and LST into a single league. This was fully announced by Riot Games as the Pacific Championship Series (PCS) on 19 December for a 2020 start.[5][6][7][8] The league, whilst originally franchised to feature 10 teams, would shrink to 8 teams for Spring 2024 (following a relegation series demoting Impunity Esports and Dewish Team whilst the promoted teams, Nate9527 and PSG Talon Academy, did not secure sponsors in time) and 7 for Summer 2024 (when Beyond Gaming closed operations). The PCS would "merge" with Oceania's league, the League of Legends Circuit Oceania (LCO), in time for the 2023 season, giving the two best LCO teams spots in the PCS playoffs instead of the league qualifying for international tournaments on their own.[9]
Japan's professional esports league for League of Legends, the League of Legends Japan League (LJL), was formed in 2014. Throughout the course of the league's history, DetonatioN FocusMe (DFM) dominated the competition, scoring 16 LJL titles and representing the region several times in international competition. On 26 November 2023, Riot announced that the league would become part of the PCS, much like Oceania, for the 2024 season.[10] During the season, DFM's dominance would be replaced by that of Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks Gaming (owned by the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) team of the same name), who won both LJL splits and finished as PCS runners-up in Spring and Summer, qualifying for the 2024 World Championship in the process.
Formation
On 11 June 2024, Riot Games released a blog post titled "LoL Esports: Building Towards a Brighter Future", in which they would overhaul the competitive scene for 2025. Among these changes were the announcement of an 8-team pan-Asia-Pacific tournament that would take the place of the PCS and VCS as a tier-1 league. This league was announced to feature a hybrid promotion and relegation system, with some teams being franchise partners of the league while others were "guests" that would be relegated.[11] On 19 July Riot publicly announced that the league would consist of four partners and four guest teams. The league would officially launch as the League of Legends Championship Pacific on 29 September,[12] with the format for the inaugural season announced on 1 November and the teams revealed on 3 November.
Despite being part of the larger Asia-Pacific region, it was announced on 20 September 2024 that the LCO had folded. It is currently unknown what would replace the competition as a domestic league that promotes teams to the LCP.[13]
Format
Split 1
8 teams compete in a single round robin best-of-3 group
The top 6 teams advance to the Qualifying Series, a yet-unknown playoff bracket
All series during this split utilize Fearless Draft, where picked Champions cannot be picked again in later games during a series
Split 2
8 teams compete in a double round robin best-of-1 group
The top 6 teams advance to the Qualifying Series
First round is single elimination between the 3rd to 6th seeds, the rest is double elimination
The first two rounds are best-of-3, all later rounds are best-of-5
The winner and runner-up of the second split qualify for the Mid-Season Invitational as the LCP's first and second seeds respectively
The winner and runner-up and third place team of the Season Finals qualify for the World Championship as the LCP's first, second and third seeds respectively
If the LCP secures an additional Worlds spot via MSI, the fourth place team in the Season Finals qualifies as the LCP's fourth seed
Promotion Tournament
Teams
Eight teams will make up the league. This will consist of four partner teams that can't be relegated and four guest slots that can be relegated to the domestic leagues below the LCP (currently consisting of the PCS, VCS and LJL) based on their location. These initial four guest teams will consist of two merit slots consisting of the best non-partnered teams in the 2024 PCS and VCS Summer splits and two additional teams.
3 teams from Vietnam, 2 teams each from Japan and Taiwan[b], and 1 team from Oceania make up the LCP as of the 2025 season.
^GAM Esports were guaranteed a guest spot in the LCP by winning the VCS Summer 2024 season, but were announced as a partnered team on 3 November 2024.
^PSG Talon were guaranteed a guest spot in the LCP by winning the PCS Summer 2024 season, but were announced as a partnered team on 3 November 2024.
^The official name of SoftBank Hawks is Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks Gaming, as they are owned by Japanese baseball club Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks.
^DetonatioN FocusMe qualified via the PCS merit spot as the 5th place team in the 2024 Summer season; 1st place PSG Talon, 2nd place SoftBank Hawks and 4th place CTBC Flying Oyster were all selected as partnered teams, while 3rd place Frank Esports wasn't selected.
^Vikings Esports qualified via the VCS merit spot as the runners-up of the 2024 Summer season; GAM Esports, the winners of the season, were selected as a partnered team.
