I've locked/archived this thread/blog and have started a new discussion over here: http://forums.demigodthegame.com/454943/
Please join me if you like.
Am I streaming?
Well, I started a thread back in August (https://forums.joeuser.com/411269/) that's seen a lot of activity and actually had quite a few good bits of information for new and old players alike. I figure it's time to start a new thread and perhaps keep the OP up-to-date with useful information, etc. Feel free to use this post for any LoL discussion, etc.
Super fast background: I played a lot of Demigod as pacov/cheesuscrust. Back in August 2011 or so, I started getting heavily involved in LoL and folks have been kind enough to chime in with tips and links to various sites that have been quite useful to me. In addition, I've been able to keep up with folks that I've played Demigod with in the past and meet some new folks that play LoL and frequent these message boards.
Here's some of the things I've learned in the previous thread:
New Player tips
Great site I visit every day for LoL related news - http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends
pacov's misc info
Here's a guide I made
pacov's Guide to Improving at League of Legends and Moving Up in Elo
k - so I'm just going to put down some of my thoughts. I'm not amazing at this game, but I do certain things that improve my odds of winning in ranked and so far its panning out just fine (bronze 5 to gold 5 in about a month or so). We all have varied skill levels, so some of this might be useful and some not. Caveat complete.
Prerequisite- you need to know how to play every single role. You don't have to be a god at every single role (more power to you if you are - I'm certainly not). You need to be able to play at a serviceable level in every single role and excel at least at 1 role (preferably 2). In my case, I'm good at support and adc. I'm not great, but have serviceable mids and jungles and so so tops. Knowing what you are good at and bad at is very important. If you don't know, I can probably tell you - but you really should know... Anyway, you need to have enough champs to make solid picks in any role and you need to be able to cover any role if it comes down to it. I'll talk about how to get better at specific roles in a bit.
Champ select advice - Don't be the "fill" guy unless you really feel like you are awesome in all roles. Call your preferred role immediately when you hit the lobby. Say "adc pref." Do this as soon as you hit the lobby. Some people believe that if you call a role you magically get it. This is stupid, but if you call something out, folks will often accomodate your request. If you are feeling wishy washy for whatever reason, call out multiple roles in order of what you want to play - "adc/mid pref." In my experience, you generally do not want to call support. It's a very important role, but you want to be in a position to carry every single game if possible. If you aren't calling out a role, you are hoping that other players can carry you. If you are hoping that folks will carry you, you don't deserve to win. You need to know your best roles and you absolutely should request them.
Solo or duo in ranked? - Well, my 1st thought here is that you should solo. If you solo, you have to rely on yourself. IMO - its a much bigger test of skill to play solo and win than to duo. Do you want someone to carry you or do you really want to know that you are actually good? That said, provided you have the right duo partner, you can increase your odds of winning quite a bit. The simple math is that instead of having 4 teammates as unknown quantities, you only have 3. If you have a good duo teammate, you know what you can expect. When you duo, you get the most bang for your buck by having complimentary roles. Support/adc is good; jungle/mid also works. Even if you don't have direct symmetry in roles, if you are an amazing mid and I'm an amazing adc, our odds go up quite a bit if we both get those roles. Our odds go way down if we can't get those roles and are forced to play out of positions that we are weaker. For example, Bryff is a good mid. If he duo's up with me, the only way he will get to play that role is for me to call mid, take it myself, and then put myself into a position like support where I can't carry out of (I'm always 1st pick, Bryff is always last pick when we duo)... that and I have to show the mid I'm picking at the start which means Bryff gets hard countered. In short, we can expect that we will be a disadvantage when duo queuing. Now, if Bryff queued up with someone at a lower elo than himself that was solid, he'd likely be 1st pick and be able to get mid and have a better chance of carrying the game. Anyway, you need to keep in mind where you end up in pick order when duoing if you aren't looking to go adc/support. If you want that, you can usually get it.
How do you get better in roles that you are not good at? - Well, here's what I do. And this is really what I do on a regular basis. I think about what I'm good at and what I'm not good at. For instance, I realized that I don't play any hyper carry ads. So, I read up on hyper carries like vayne and kog maw. I look for guides on how to build them (most adcs are the same btw ), I look for vids on how people play them (eg how do I all in with a specific champ - is there a combo - when do I all in - what's the best way for me to burst - how should I behave in lane with this champ). Then, I fire up a custom game and try out the mechanics of whatever champ vs AI. Usually I learn a few tricks during that custom on how to position myself, etc. Then, I'm off to normal games where I'll request the role or character I'm trying out. Now, people still report your for being awful in normals, but it really is where you need to try out characters to see if you are any good or not as the bots are useless for proving your skill level to yourself. So, fire up that normal and ask to play a role (again - after you've tried out the champ against bots). If you don't know anyone you are with and you are quite awful, I suggest muting everyone at the start of the game. Then, do your best. Continue with this until you feel like you have a serviceable skill level in whatever role. And keep in mind what you need to work on. For me, I noticed I didn't really have alot of mids for ranked, so I started practicing some with gragas against and karth. That way, I'll be able to get the job done if I need to play mid. The next thing I need to do is put more time into being better top lane. Again, because while I prefer adc/support, I might need to play top for the team. So, best to be ready for it. Put your time in and practice roles.
One last thought - there are certain things you can generally expect in ranked. 1 - if you are 1st pick, you generally can call whatever you want. Common knowledge, I'm sure - but I'll add - CALL WHATEVER YOU WANT. 2 - if you duo queue, you generally can lock down both adc and support. It works best if your adc is 1st pick, ofc. I've bumped into like 10 random dedicated supports in all of my games of LoL. People generally aren't going to call support. So, if you are 1st pick and duo'd, just call adc and then your duo partner can almost always get support.
Lol King profiles for ranked tracking
I'm not going to update this regularly, so just consider it a snapshot (I'll add a date when I update them). Anyway, I enjoy seeing folks progress through ranked and keeping tabs on that sort of thing from time to time.
Snapshot updated 05/28/2014
Character guides
off to bed in a sec - short recap of the night. played some sc2 right after work. Still loving working through the campaign. Good stuff.
Switched over to lol and did nothing but play on my alt account (lv 30). Game 1 - I'm 1st pick. Some guy says adc plz that is last pick. I say going adc. Begin whiny troll nonsense - I just tune it out and they resolve they are idiots. I mute all at the start because its the 1st game of the night and I already know they are both going to be bad and then flame after they do dumb things. Within 5 minutes, my support gets himself killed. Then my jungle, by himself, tower dives and gives double buffs to the enemy adc. So, things went great. I wonder how much I was blamed for that awfulness. Anyway, they run around the map and do no proper engages. We lose, but I'm warmed up. The next few games I get to adc and I actually pull more than a few clutch moves getting triple kills on dives and/or just lighting folks up. One game I had like 8 kills at around 8 minutes or so. Sadly, I'm the only one with kills and no tank/initiate, so it goes downhill. I do not think folks care much about team comp at whatever mmr this account is floating at.
Anyway, I start playing some with hunny, who apparently views normal games with me on my alt account as troll matches - he goes jungle karma in game 1. I think we win, but its mostly me doing the carry routine. I played all mf tonight as adc as I don't have many adc's unlocked on this account (ash/trist/corki atm). Mf is free and one of my weaker adc's, but I now have the hang of her. Can probably do a decent job with her. Barrier + flash + my ult = sorry the 3 of you are dead, nice dive though. Anyway, we play a bit and I end the night. I really feel like I need to unlock another solid adc. For me, my bests are probably ez/cait/drav, but I think I'll either unlock vayne/kog/mf on this account... but I have a stupid long way to go - only like 1100 ip. So, it will be a bit. Again, really happy mf is free.
So - if you would like to play, feel free to add 1cheesuscrust1. I'm not playing on this account to dodge anyone; I really just like unlocking crap and also I give no fucks on this account. Not to say I don't try, mind you, I just don't care a hell of a lot if I win or lose. So, if you want me to duo with you and you are lower level for ranked, I'm cool with playing with anyone.
@psychoak - add me on this account. We can duo and I can hopefully get you out of bronze if that's where you are at. Hopefully we can restore your faith in the human race once you move past silver 3 or so. I'm currently unranked on this account (eg 1200 elo at the start) and I have 2 losses in my placement matches. So, competition shouldn't be all that tough. Love to play with you as well - don't even know if we ever have and I don't give a crap if you are amazing or rot. We'll have some fun if you are up for it.
Oh and so many cool things on pbe including the new champ. I just updated PBE and will stream from it some tomorrow. Keep an eye out if you are interested in that crap. No idea what my schedule will be like as I have my in laws in town.
So - in one of my games last night, some idiot was going on about how LoL has peaked and is on the way out... I didn't pay much attention to that.. then I see this today.
http://www.riotgames.com/articles/20130312/700/league-legends-players-summit-new-peak
20 years later I'm logged into PBE. I'll probably stream in a little bit an aram game on the new map and just testing out the new champ.
Guess what...got another ranked game as kass. Guess what...the our cho top fed elise 9 kills. Guess what...we lost.
The fluffy jelly seems interesting.
Gee I'm so negative
streaming from pbe in about 3-4 minutes
streaming the new map now
There's a new *hic* mmmmmmmmaaapu? spluuuush
your stream is moot...I cannot see...at least the actually gameplay...is black
hurm... weird. i can see it...
ah - i see what you are talking about. Bummer.
it turns out that all you need to do to win is listen to this and make idiotic space jam references in game... I had no idea. It works though. 100% loss rate tonight until SPACE JAM. space jam udyr is best udyr tho.
https://soundcloud.com/delta-lemma/noisia-vs-qcd-jam-heat
Also.. hmm... pacov says... hmm...
http://en.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1af2b6/aaa_nono_running_14115_masteries_for_doran/
well... my placement matches on my alt account are certainly interesting. I mopped the floor with a cait that ran tp + flash... who knew... oh.. and I had a support singed. Tis a strange world in low level placements.
You Have No Idea.
well... 3 ranked games on alt acct. all stomps. These are my placement matches on an acct that was 1200 elo. I lost my 1st 2 games, then 3 in a row tonight as wins. Guessing I'm playing folks around 1300 elo or so now and that will keep going up if I keep winning.
Enjoy this clip - http://www.twitch.tv/1pacov1/c/2039795
Full vid of my adventures tonight here for any interested: http://www.twitch.tv/1pacov1/b/379122968
Also, this amused me quite a bit, but curious to see what folks think. Am I being a dick or is duo queue being an ass for thinking they get whatever they call regardless of pick order? YOU MAKE THE CALL!
http://www.twitch.tv/1pacov1/c/2039809
Personally, if i were that duo i would have just not supported you and made you go 2v1. Swearing does that.
Though i do think that pick > call for sure, i think that to a certain extent it is easier to let the duo have their thing if they both are going bot.
Why? Because support. Having a happy support that has a particular (known) playstyle with the adcarry is really good.
Additionally, they were 2nd/3rd pick. So you disrupt the duo. They now decide they are going to go mid/jungle. Now 4th/5th pick gets to support - and they are grumpy at you because they "could have" potentially played a solo lane if you hadn't been stubborn. But now they are supporting.
Three people are displaced (the duo and the 4th/5th pick who could have solo'd). You don't get displaced (and you could have just gone top or mid). You have a grumpy support. The entire game is just on the wrong foot.
Other alternative? You go somewhere else. You get displaced - but you still get to play a solo lane so that is fun for you.
I think we are on the same page, then. I don't know if you've seen it or not, but Riot kindly made the pick order/"i'd called it" concept even more convoluted. I don't think they officially endorse either concept and say you should work it out in lobby. Unfortunately, that means 1st pick can say "well, I'm 1st pick," a duo can say "screw you - we are duo and play bot lane," and some jackass can say "I'm mid" as last pick and think they get it because they called it. Overall, its a dumb system. Riots talking about changing things, but no idea when/if that will happen... and what they will change it to. My personal view is that you "generally" should be flexible and that someone calling a position means nothing. You state your preference and then talk a little more if needed.
In that particular game and at this wtf elo, I need a role I can carry out of pretty hard and with my current runes, adc/support is the way to do it. Demanding my 2 best roles isn't going to help the team unless you are the magical amazing low elo duo crew. That said, if I was anything other than 1st pick, I'd probably have gone along with it and not made much of a fuss. I typically fall in line with pick order > whatever the heck else.
Anyway, you know how that game would have likely gone if we played it out and they acquiesced. At least 2 guys will flame and troll if anything goes wrong in bot lane. But that's easily mitigated by a quick mute at the start when it becomes clear that their primary contribution to the game will be bitching. I sadly think its worth it to bust out people like this so they don't go in assuming they get whatever they want just because they are duo'd up. I always dislike it if I'm duo'd and someone else wants to play adc ahead up me, but I just suck it up. I'll typically ask if its ok as we are duo'd for us to lane together, but if they are ahead of me in pick order, then that is that and I'll do whatever I need to.
Also, trist is very, very strong now imo. Must run barrier, but oh my, I'm really starting to dig her.
In random video game news, I beat the sc2 expansion yesterday. I really like the campaign, but it was a bit too short imo. I wish they would have made it a bit lengthier. I played through on normal and that was a cake walk. I'm sure I'll play it a few more times on hard/brutal before too long.
In lol news, I haven't been super pumped about ranked play on my main account and am more interested in trying various characters and getting better. Anyone move up a div/tier recently? I think I'll get back into the swing of things and play more ranked on my main in the near future.
I'm really enjoying playing on my alt account. My main has like 10k ip with all champs unlocked atm. So, nothing too exciting there. My alt, on the other hand, is pretty gimped for IP - I don't have enough adcs unlocked (literally trist/corki/ash atm). I don't have proper rune page setups either. Just the 2 pages with minimal runes (yellow arm, gold quints, ad red, mr blues). I'd love to get that 1% crit rune, but I'm not going to spend 400ish IP on it for a red. Maybe I'll get a blue crit chance... not sure if that's cheaper. Anyway, I have 1800 ip after games yesterday on my alt. Need 4800 to get another adc. I feel like I can win consistently with trist, but if she's taken, then I'm stuck with ash (side note - I'm running gold quints + gold in utility on my adcs - that + extra money with ash helps quite a bit). still, I'd rather have a more versatile adc, so I'll likely want cait or ez - cait is 4800 ip, not sure about ez.
So, I'm on my alt account yesterday and I decide to play a normal. Well, I end up playing with a douchebag 4 man premade. I'm 1st pick, do my usual adc pref, then pick adc. Last 1 of their pals is apparently not a fan of going support. So the twat decides to wait for the countdown to finish and randoms riven. This puts me (mf-she's free atm and I can play in normals) vs leona/vayne. Anyway, I quickly head bot, farm whatever I can and push my wave. Then I head to mid to leach xp and money from my mid as riven has made it so I can't farm safely. Anyway, bot lane sees me doing this, so they push their wave... so I run bot and repeat. Guys quickly got thru their head that I would happily lane with them unless they did something useful to help bot. Knowing these are twats, I mute them quickly on. Anyway, I carry bot quite nicely as the vayne/leona have a low skill level even though its 2v1. All of that said, I immediately decide its time to play ranked so I don't end up with a 4 man twat premade. Not sure why I didn't play ranked in the 1st place. So, I'm 3/2 now in my placement series. I actually hope I don't end up in silver.... but I have the added benefit of not caring a ton about this account.
dem patch notes are live: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/news/patch-304-notes-0
They did not take the taric nerf far enough...
Dazzle
@Pacov
Shatter
Taric was already somewhat vulnerable to AP lane damage like Lulu's harassment and Leona's burst. Now?I think he's going to be their bitch.
As far as your pick vs call order issue goes, that wasn't an ideal situation since you were on your alt and didn't have much choice as far as going top or mid went, or doing trades to not get countered. And when you're first pick, ADC is a good route to go... no need to give that up for a duo that's acting like twerps.
Of course when you end up with someone as your support who doesn't want to play the position and isn't very good at it, you could maybe not report them at the end of the game since there was someone willing and able to do it before you pulled rank.
I like that stun change, he falls off a little in the late game with only a 1.5 second single target stun anyway. Actually having to level it up is nice too, that's his biggest problem is that stun is a gimme with one level. The nerf to shatter is unneeded I expect, now that you can't just pump heal and shatter to max while ignoring dazzle.
supports are kinda supposed to fall off: that is why they are supports and not carries. Also you don't get to be a lane bully and strong end game. That is called OP (unless you have some other critical weakness like horrific mana costs or plenty of counterpicks - see Kass).
Also: most of taric's endgame power comes from giving his team a baron buff, not from his catch.
The problem, imo, is that they did not nerf the stun enough. 1.2 seconds vs 1.5? pfft. I'm sure it makes a difference, but I just don't think much of 1. Honestly, they need to over nerf and then adjust. Guy is picked like 56% of the time with a similar win rate. Methinks drastic measures best so his pick rate falls off, then buff. Not these pissant nerfs.
pacov's jungle is now officially better than jungle annie. I know. I'm surprised as well. Getting really annoyed with streaming lately. I'll be completely fine and lagless, then just spike for reasons I haven't figured out. I was thinking it was skype, but its not. Played a bit without skype on tonight and still had a spike. Compared to yesterday, I had zero spikes playing solo. My wife's been more into using the laptop lately. That shouldn't really have an impact, but that's the only angle I can think of. No idea why that would be using much upload bandwidth though. She wasn't using the laptop yesterday and all was well. Anyway, mayhaps I'm going to throttle my router and see if that fixes me up.
Had some fun in house games. Can't quite get Bryff's adc logic through my brain yet (other than - ooo piece of candy (look - farm!)). Guy wanders off like a champ. Ah well - he'll play more adc and get better. Night all.
In completely random news, I really dig the main page of reddit (www.reddit.com). In the past I only kept an eye on the league of legends reddit (daily). I was surprised to see how many LoL posts actually end up on the main page of reddit. And there's quite a bit of amusing stuff there as well. If you haven't checked it out before, I recommend you. Creating an account doesn't even require email confirmation, so you are up and running in about a minute or less.
Ok - so Janna question for folks. I was reading about the NA challenger tier and the number 1/2 spot is occupied by a dedicated support player that mostly plays Janna. I checked out his rune pages and masteries along with some of his game history to get an idea of how he itemizes. Itemization varies by game. Mostly runs AP janna as support. Always with a site stone but often with items like morellicon and an ap centered kit - picking up a support item here and there as appropriate, but focused mostly on AP.
That said - she's generally a defensive support. For instance, taric/leona, ali, and nami all rely on their stuns/knockups to provide for initiates. She can safely disengage for her adc via shield/slow/knockup without much trouble. She can shield to add dmg for her adc or self to poke. I haven't figured out a proper initiate yet or seen a vid of someone playing her as a support at top level (season 3, mind you, though the intiate is likely the same). How does one initiate properly with her in a way that your adc knows its time to go all in? If I shield myself, aa, then slow, the adc likely isn't following that up and would likely just assuming I'm poking and doing some zoning. That method also just leaves me with the whirlwind to protect my adc and disengage. I'm wondering if all you can do is play defensive, zone as possible, and then just back your adc when/if he makes a move. There's just no clear sign to your adc that its all in time, so its a bit like soraka in that your adc makes the call and you back them. Or if you shield your adc, whirlwind and slow, if your adc doesn't back you, you lose quite a bit of hp and become too weak to do much for your adc. I suppose I could ping a target when I'm looking to go in and hope the adc backs the play. Still kind of ify. Any thoughts or does anyone have a link to some pros playing as janna during the laning phase?
janna's initiate is the same as Nami/Leona: the support shoots a skill shot. If it hits, commit and hit all the buttons. If it misses, don't hit all the buttons and don't commit.
If you Zephyr + Tornado then shield yourself i assume you are doing soloharrass. If you want me to follow, you better have a shield.
hmmm.... see, I still don't feel like the adc follows even if I go zephyr + tornado and hold off on the shield. It certainly seems like I'm setting up an engage, but if the adc doesn't back my play after zeph/tornado, I get ripped up if I don't shield myself. I can certainly slap a shield on my adc after that 1-2 punch, but the adc is often hesitant to commit. Maybe some of my problem is who I'm laning against. For instance, let's say I'm up against cait/taric. So, taric is standing in a warded bush and cait is in the mid. I angle around onto cait, get the slow off and toss out a ww. Now, the knockup from an insta cast ww is very weak (weaker than tarics "nerfed stun" btw - great job riot!). So, unless my adc reacts almost instantly, the enemy can just instantly re-engage when taric moves to stun my adc. I toss out a shield and we likely come out on top of the trade, but not by much. But that method only works if my adc reacts immediately to what I'm doing due to the slow stun duration. I'm trying to figure out appropriate rules of engagement based on her kit. Eg w/ leona its completely obvious when you are committed to the adc. You know that if you don't back leona when she hits her stuff, leona will take a pounding and be useless to you (if the lane is even ofc). Anyway, just trying to figure out how to play it. Conversely, I could charge up a ww and attempt to position so that I catch the adc in a full power ww + zephyr - that's obv a little harder to do based on the angle. Anyway, this is making me think that playing her as a defensive support might be the proper posture as she has such good disengages. Not sure tho...
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