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
Thanks, swan. Was fun. Anyone check and see if there have been any recent PBE updates? I'm trying to figure out when they are going live with the new guy and figure there need to be a few more patches on PBE with changes before that happens. I'm really looking forward to watching the season 2 finals.
It was fun
I don't think that Draven top is that bad...
I just need to be more careful and not pick before the enemy top picks.
Malphite is a pretty bad matchup for Draven.
I was fine until I was ganked by him, the jungle AND mid...
they really wanted me...
I'd like to talk about nunu top and get some feedback. I'm going to cover quite a bit including my build, playstyle, what I like, etc. I don't think I quite have the optimal setup for mid/late game re: itemization. I'll also point out that nunu is becoming a more frequent ban in tourneys due to his role flexibility.
1st - I love taking nunu as a 1st pick. He could be a support, jungler, or top. And if he's the 1st pick, its not immediately clear what he will be doing, so (if the rest of my team picks in an intelligent order), we can often setup counter picks as they pick their characters... and nunu is flexible enough that if we somehow didn't get a matchup we wanted, I could easily rotate to a support role (from a top lane) pre game. While support nunu is certainly viable, he's pretty far from the best supports imo.
K - so why I like him top lane. He has exceptional sustain and trades favorably as a result. His mana goes pretty quickly at early levels, but his every 5 hits = a free spell passive provides the rest of his sustain. His snowball + move speed/as buff lend INCREDIBLY well to ganks at any time. This makes him exceptionally effective. For instance, let's say I'm pretty low hp and my jungler is coming in for a gank. Now, the enemy character is likely low hp, but probaby thinks they might be able to kill me and go all in assuming they are dead anyway. Because of his speed buff, nunu can stay around and bait or move like he's going to engage to kite the enemy back to him, only to peel off. Nunu can also easily escape ganks due to his snowball + speed boost... this is also why he can generally safely counter jungle up a storm. Anyway, provided you are playing him right, you have near infinite sustain (as long as you can land auto attacks here and there). Oh, and he's exceptional pushing his lane (though you wouldn't think it). I use my ult with nunu during early/mid like a madman. If I'm pushed to my tower and the enemy is trying to push - boom... I'll ult to stop his advance or force a fight.. getting all the cs possible in the process. If I have the enemy top pushed to base or dead, I'll ult the creeps depending on how many are there, etc, so that I can ensure I deny a ton of cs/xp. Or I can use it in the logical I'm gonna kill you or get your flash method (snowball + ult when you are right on top of them).
k - a few of the downsides of solo top nunu: If you are up against a decent opponent, you will run out of mana pretty quickly. You'll have to snowball to harass and you can't really afford the extra mana very often for bloodlust. Because you have low mana, you have to be incredibly mindful of where you are with your 5 hit passive. As a safety net in case you get ganked, you generally want to have a snowball and bloodlust available at any given time. You'll still have flash most likely, but you really don't want to burn it ofc. The biggest downside is tied to his passive. You'll often be in a situation where you have to auto attack creeps to keep your abilities up... and this means that your lane will push. And every consume is essentially guaranteed cs... but its also 1 less creep that's going to push your lane. So, its generally really a matter of when you lane will be pushed to the enemy tower unless the enemy is an idiot. This is mitigated really easily if you have a jungle that considers top a viable target early game as you just push the creeps a few times to the tower after securing an easy kill. The last downside is that I do not run teleport. I could, but the ignite make a big difference in owning my lane and getting kills.
ok - so runes - I run full support runes and full support masteries. Eg literally what I use on all supports unless I'm going a bruiser like ali or leona. I gain extra gold per second, I level faster due to xp buffs, etc. The early part of my build is all about money as its quite expensive.
Itemization - this is where I need to make some changes. I start boots + a bunch of health pots or 2 hp + a ward. I'm pretty flexible on what I'll take outside of boots (which I will always take). Then, my next 2 items are gp/5 - the hp regen 1 + heart of gold - kage's lucky pick might be a bitter pick over hog, but I fnd the extra hp is much more valuable. Then, I'll typically build merc treads. Honestly, he could probably run with boots of mobility, so I might give that a go. AFTER I have those (and I get typically get both gp/5s at the same time (eg very early in the game)), I'll build a catalyst into a rod of ages. This usually does not take all that long due to my support masteries/runs + 2 gp5/s. And it just about completely ends my mana problems. After this, I often go into a stinger to build a nashor's tooth. This isn't completely ideal imo, but the as boost + cdr increases my dmg output. If might be better to skip nashor's tooth and build a different item altogether. From there (game is typically over by this point), I start building a death cap for additional dmg output. Anyway, curious what you folks think of nashor's on him. Also note, I literally have 0 ap until I get ROA up and running. I'm guessing that sounds awful, but I'm pretty successful with things so far.
Re: ability sequence, I vary every game based on what is going on. If we are going to pull some jungle madness, I might start consume. If I'm just laning or most other circumstances, I'll start snowball. For my 2nd skill, if I'm just laning normally, I'll get consume if I'm hurting at all or get bloodlust if I'm cs'ing fine and hp is up. I'll have a level in each skill by level 3 though. From there on out, I max the ult whenever possible and play the rest by ear. More points in snowball to harass, another point into consume if I'm doing poorly for more hp - more into bloodlust if I'm wailing on someone. Guess I usually max snowball 1st in most cases.
blahblah done.
With your steroid and slow combination, there's no need for Nunu to take boots. Start with the items for a philosopher's stone and you have a more efficient passive sustain. You can afford to push the lane less, and the extra mana regeneration will keep you in shape for a gank.
It takes a three man gank to make much headway against him. Even pushed, you can typically snowball the jungler out of commission before you're in trouble, and use your steroid to easily escape pursuit by your lane opponent. The only Nunu I've ever seen die top to anything less than a three man gank when trying to get away was an intentional feeder that never used his abilities to flee.
yeah - the only combo I've had any real trouble with was a jax top with a fed hecarim jungler. Hecarim would close and slow me and then jax could stun while I'd be getting wailed on. You really need a specific jungler/top or 3 man gank to shut him down in most cases.
re: itemization changes - I'm not sure about dropping boots as the initial buy. I get what you are saying, though, and dropping it could be ok, but its less safe AND reduces the odds of getting an early kill by doing some crazy jungle stuff. We've been toying around with starting wolves/blue - then to red (when on that particular side), then either immediately stealing red or grabbing wraiths and then red. That puts both me and the jungler at level 2... if any of that plan goes to rot, the boots might keep me from having to flash and certainly increase the odds of us getting a kill on top lane.
Trying to think how much gold I'd have at start... its 475 + i think 40 extra gold from support masteries - so only 515. Not sure its worth it to go with a philo component over boots + pots or boots + pots/ward. Might give it a go and see how that works, though. Hp is generally not the concern - its more mana over a prolonged start - not sure that I'd want to just dump 180 gold into the extra regen... wonder if it would even be remotely worth it to try something silly like running tp, starting with the health regen component, getting the total gold for philo (it would be like 30 seconds or so of laning), and then porting back to base, picking up the early philo, and then tping back. Kind of silly, imo, but I'd wager you wouldn't lose alot of cs/xp that way and you immediately get the gp/5 bonus...still wouldn't have boots tho.
good info graphic for moscow 5's tourney performance. Worth a look
http://i.imgur.com/pXIK8.jpg
I like being tanky, so I don't like deathcap as an item really. rylais gives tanky and slows. I would think that the extra slow on snowball and ult in fights would be helpful...and it makes ganks easier when the enemy can't run at all. And it's cheaper. Deathcap makes you do more damage, but rylais makes it so your teammate can get more hits in and do more damage. More ap I think would only be worth it if you can kill with 1 combo, otherwise you're just stuck there waiting for cd on abilities which is most of the damage.
for Kassadin?
tanky is good
Yup. Sorcerers shoes, rod of ages, abysmal scepter, rylais, zhonyas, and then either banshees veil, GA, or lich bane. HP, MR, armor, AP, and the other unique goodies.
Also pacov and krazikarl had a nice little fight. gg
for Kassadin
my build
boots 3 pots
finish boots, get wards and more pots
go for RoA and maybe some dorans
then build Abyssal
and then either deathcap, rylai's, or deathfire.
Typically I will build deathfire first
then deathcap, then rylai's.
void staff is always last.
I feel like the replay shows that the enemy team had a ward and backed when you approached, karl.
Also - Bryff - you earned your 1st vid today. KS master bryff. Fun to watch anyway. Uploading that now. Off to bed. Will be live on the channel in 30 min to an hour.
http://www.youtube.com/user/LeagueOfPacov?feature=mhee
edit - bryff vid live... sleeps the pacov...
Upcoming sale:
Rengar sees some changes/nerf on PBE. Seems like its still possible to easily 1st blood various enemies at level 1. Read about PBE changes here:
http://www.reignofgaming.net/news/21360-pbe-patch-8-20-the-news-roundup-the-creation-of
new champ live?
Yes
Rengar is live.
He's fun.
Also
Katarina is fun
also
Lee Sin is fun
...
Did I mention that Katarina is fun?
yah - i see there's a new patch live.
ah - I finally solved a really annoying bug on my side of things. I had an issue where I could not purchase from the riot store on my main pc. The riot points stuff would just not fully load in the store. AND - you know how some of you folks would take a long time to connect when I'd host a custom game? Pretty sure its all related... spent alot of time a little while back trying to figure out if it was router related or firewall. I ruled out router when my laptop had no issues with the riot store. Anyway, I played with the firewall, specified ports, the whole nine yards - no joy. Then I check a suite of "tools" that came with my latest mobo. Asus has this "great" utility called iControl. It's supposed to provide various performance boosts on the net along with a few various other features. Anyway, I disable that and boom - problem is gone. Pretty strange that it was the culprit, but it was...
Oh hey, yeah that dc I had yesterday was due do my crap router. I need a new one, that is reliable and can handle 3 laptops wirelessly and 5 desktops, simoultaneously. The price should be reasonable. If you guys can recommend any that would be awesome.
linksys e3000
I have completed my masterpiece. Men and women alike will speak of the amazing quality of my creation. I give you THIS - the greatest LoL video of all time. Or perhaps just something many of you will say wtf of. I had to upgrade to adobe premiere to bring you my vision. I will release a directors cut at a later time. That will run about 1 hour and 32 minutes and showcase the majority of the video.
Anyway, tis uploading. Check the channel in about 5- 30 min. Enjoy
edit - live now
edit... also, watch this along with that - new champ is still pretty op... maybe hold off on buying as the nerf bat will hit in a bit
"This video has been removed by the user"
which video, chatty? My crap?
Side note - I am a bit disappointed with riot releasing the new character in this state. We're talking a character that can still pretty easily destroy a full hp champ at level 1 or 2 in 1-3 seconds. We're also talking about a video being shown to riot before he was launched indicating that this was exceptionally easy to do... and they only change they make is a very slight nerf to his damage output. Completely stupid. I was considering picking the champ up, but its quite clear that he will be nerfed again very soon... which will likely significantly reduce his viability top lane. With zyra, its difficult to imagine how riot could think she wasn't over powered at release. Its even more blatant, imo, with the new champ. What sucks is that folks are going to shell out ip or rp for the champ and he's simply not going to be as valuable as he was at the time of purchase because of piss poor balancing. I mean, seriously, the level 1 sure fire kill only required like a dorians blade + AD masteries. And you can pull of the same rot at level 2 with boots and pots pretty easily. The only way I think they can fix it is to reduce his level 1 damage output on his ability quite a bit. Probably what they should do anyway... sigh. Riot had all the information they needed to fix this before release... right down to multiple "how to" videos.
lol
Zyra is STILL OP
and it's his video, not yours
your video was ridiculous
Zyra is definitely still OP, but not insanely so. Still plenty of other BS on par with her.
I think Zyra is weak......I must be noob. The stun is so short range it's funny.
oh my yes. Completely and totally ridiculous. Kind of what I was going for - a nice nice that will induce the "wtf am I watching" effect. Shame not everyone loves my nonsense.
Zyra's not as bad as she was. Still pretty strong, though.
Pretty good AMA (ask me anything) from scumbag krepo (pro support player) over on redit. Worth a look. Most of the Q&A are in the OP. http://en.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/ympip/im_skumbag_krepo_i_support_for_clgeu_ama/
random thoughts on ranked - I kind of want to have 2 different accounts for ranked games. 1 just for duo queue and 1 for solo queue. I have an alt account (that I haven't touched in some time) that is around level 27 or so.. might put a little time into leveling that account to 30. That said, I find I take a lot more satisfaction with ranked games than just normals. Not that I dick around a ridiculous amount in normals, but I don't really do any of that rubbish in ranked (pretty sure I've never taken a blue and a big wolf from my jungler in ranked at level 1). So, I'm generally more satisfied when we lock down a win. That said, I don't really want to lose elo by playing with randoms in solo queue. Sure, sometimes you get good folks... other times, not so much. Duo queue is the way to go imo. I still think the best way to duo queue ranked is with a support/adc combo, though.
Other thoughts - ranked anxiety. I don't really have it anymore. I did at one point, but I just sort of got over it. It might be primarily because I choose to pick my games a little more. I don't care if I need to queue dodge because we clearly have a retard at the load screens. I'm extremely confident that if I'm duo queued, we'll always be able to get the adc/support roles (as they only allow 1 duo group per team) - pretty easy to say that X and X would like to duo bot and have everyone fall into line immediately. And we haven't really rolled into any competition that can outplay us as a duo yet. Sure, we occassionally get behind or have a crappy moment, but pretty much every single game we pull it together. I think vlad and I are like 12-1 now or so. Anyway, its fun to see how high we can go up in rank. Support doesn't get a super amount of love (eg getting carried by a carry), but understanding how your lane partner is going to play and handle situations is a pretty huge deal. Knowing where I'll ward, knowing when vlad will pick up an extra ward, etc... know how I'll initiate, etc, it all goes a long way. Wish you could queue up with 3 folks as I'm sure a jungler would be quite useful that you know.
off ranked topic - My current fav jungler is udyr. In particular, early oracle udyr. That early oracles goes so far for dominating lanes. Anyway, blahblah done.
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