anyone else think aphromoo as support on CLG as support is dumb as shit? 

For those that have been following him, he's an excellent adc that often fails when it comes to tourneys. His stream is very entertaining to watch though and he seems like a great guy.  BUT - he's a smeh support.  My theory is that CLG picked him up because he will bring all of his viewers with him. So now, aphro won't get 100% of the profits from his steam, but will get tourney money if they win (+ whatever dough CLG puts out for active teammates).  I'd think Clg will take some % of his stream income.  Great opportunity for aphro at any rate.  

Love his stream and watch quite a bit.  Just watched him do play a terrible support ali for instance and misplay getting dbllift killed multiple times... I wish him the best and am thrilled he has a chance at making money as a support for CLG, but he's not a great support.  Here's to hoping he develops and becomes a strong teammate for CLG!

yesterday our wins indicate we really tore it up.

I haven't gotten to try the on-hit kassadin today yet.  What do you guys think the build should look like?  My thinking is

First item: Normally on Kass I like getting rod of ages first, because it increases the mana for warps and gives hp and ap, which are good.  For kass, with malady and w and spellsword, it is .45 of ap in magic on basic attacks.  That means the rod gives not quite 40 damage.  And an on-hit kass will still benefit from all that it gives.  I also think it's crucial for laning phase.  So I don't want to give this up.

Second item: Sorcerer's Shoes.  They won't know what I'll be doing yet, and kass gets lots of AS from passive already.

Third item: malady.  At this point I should have 125ish ap so the passive on it will add almost 30 by itself, over 50 with nether blade.

Four: wits end.  42 is better than that 30 or so from malady but the ap on malady might help more.

Five/six:  At this point I don't know if Nashor's Tooth or blade of the ruined king would be better to get first.  more speed and cdr and ap or a life stealing passive thing?  Assuming champs have 2k hp that's 40 hp (2% of hp) per attack, (Another question:  would nashors tooth make AS get maxed out?, because I've seen some insane AS because of passive...  if so gunblade would replaceit or wits end?)

Hextech gunblade?  It is 45 damage and 65 ap (making another 30 damage basics, so over 70 added by itself).  The only thing is that the abilities will be lower damage with this build and the spell vamp won't be very good, and the life steal only works on the base ad, so that's only like 10 hp per hit probably.  Not as good as ruined king blade.

As another option: Iceborn?  With nashor's tooth that's 30% cdr (so 3.5s cd level 3 warp) and mana for easier chaining.  Armor for getting in the thick of things, because this build necessitates getting close.

On another note.  An alternative build is to build rod, iceborn, and archangels staff into ap and mana, and the mana % into ap will make ap higher, as well as the base ap of the items.  Just heard about it...with 3000 mana that's 90 ap, and (90+80+40+50)*.3=78 added w from ap, at level 5 w that's 90+78 = +168 for basics while w is on, and it's a lot more tanky and is standard ap, but no AS.  How about it?

hmmm... says pacov to karl - http://www.twitch.tv/1pacov1/c/1820746

Note - 1st and only ping happens at the beginning of the vid. 

ah.... boooo

yah - been a long time swan.  catch u sometime soon.

Ok - so semi serious top lane discussion if anyone can muster up an opinion or has some insight.  I'd appreciate it.  I'm quite undecided on how best to build nidalee as a top laner.  Now, just to cover a few things, pro teams have used her as a top laner for her sustain and tower push (eg building tanky/ad).  This isn't logical against all comps, mind you, but it seems to consistently work.  Side note - karl - pacov knows he should not build armor against akali - my brain apparently did not work quite so well... as in at all.  I don't know why I sometimes lack the ability to determine if I should build mr or arm.  Anywho...

So, nidalee is great.  She doesn't need wards to be safe.  She's super annoying as she can out sustain most champs rather easily (even if you have a minor setback with a trade or 2).  Anywho, for my ad build I've been going r>e>q>w.  I start with uber sustain (flask/red+blue pots).  Sadly, I think this is best start for just about all top laners at this point as sustain is king early game in that lane.  Anyway, I can easily last in lane until I hit 1350 gold or so, with or without ganks... even being camped - at least so far. 

So for build... I've been really going back and forth between a few things.  Sometimes I start out on my first shop building a giant belt + boots.  The gb for sunfire.  The stats on it are great and it makes lane clearing a breeze without spending mana.  And its very safe (eg another reason why you can go wardless and get out of a gank).  Then, I'll start building a cleaver or toss in a dorians blade.  Anyway, then I just stack dmg or w/e.  But I haven't built consistently yet and I'm certain I could better itemize.  Everything pretty much works for my goal of staying in lane as long as possible and then pushing towers.  I also want to give boots of mobility a go as well.  That + her passive means I can get most places very quickly... and as I'll be split pushing when possible or picking up the slack as needed. 

Anyway, I think I've done well in every game but 1 (but I got my crap together at least a bit) as nid.  Room for improvement, but consistent performance methinks.  Downside to my build - there's no huge ranged poke damage on my spears.  There's some, but not enough to send most characters to base.  Other downside - while she can be useful in teamfights, she's probably not as useful as other charcters (though my tankalee is more useful without us having one).  Her damage output is very strong over sustained engages, but not as strong for burst after her 3 abilities in tiger form.  Her AS steriod is pretty damn useful if I'm building all damage, but I often feel like i should cast it to heal someone or to buff our adc (who might not have as much burst potential as me). 

I'm set in my ways re: my opening items (flask/blue+red pots).  And I'd be willing to try out a hybrid build, but am not looking to do a full ap.  Any thoughts on good builds or things to try?  Keep in my that my 1st shop will very likely have 1350 gold. 

Also a question about laning based on pacov's post above:

Why is sustain king in top lane?  Is it because in your games a jungler leaves top solo (in my <30 games there is no jungler to speak of)?  I understand why staying in the lane is so key - but I don't quite grasp why top and bottom are given different distinctions.  Is it just an accepted strat for all?  There are times in my games, which are blind pick, where you get a crappy match-up in your lane.  Sometimes you can call for a switch and get a decent response and sometimes a poor response.  I imagine in a draft pick game there is a whole aspect of pick and counter that plays into it - but then what determines who goes where?

Any insight into this (or any) aspect of the game is much appreciated.

I'll try to get you into some games in the near future with us. 

Don't get rammus.  He's currently not so great.  Best as a jungler, but there are many better choices than him.  Imo, the best 2 tanks in the game are shen and malphite.  Both of those guys are often banned, but perhaps not at your normal elo (and perhaps you are still doing blind pick anyway).  Malphite's great for his initiate and his attack speed slow ability that can shut down adc's right after an initiate.  You could try amumu as well, though he's really only useful as a jungler.  You can build him tanky/ap.  If you can snowball top, darius is a great pick as well and you can build him tanky and still have reasonable damage output. 

For ranged ad carry - I'd personally recommend caitlyn and ezreal.  Imo, those are the 2 best now.  Both have higher skill caps than ash (imo), but its not rocket science.  Cait is one of the easiest ad carries to lane as.  Ez has exceptional mobility Cait shines best in the laning phase if you have a solid support - its very easy to zone the enemy out and deny them cs/xp.  Cait's biggest asset is her long range autoattack.  She out ranges all of the ad carries - and she has an ok escape mechanism.   Anyway, she's currently my fav adc.

These guys are bruisers. Same sort of category as wukung and olaf.  It's not always optimal, but you can build those guys tanky/damage.  They are top laners or sometimes used as junglers.  Your build should reflect what the team needs.  It's not like the ad carry role where you typically build the same sort of things every game.  The top laner should be making decisions based on team comp, if they need to initiate and tank, etc.  For instance, if I have a reasonably tanky jungler, then I can likely focus more on damage as top lane.  If I do not and will need to tank, then I should invest some money into tankier items.

Nope.  The basic principal is that if I have health/mana, I can stay in lane longer and farm cs/xp.  If I'm forced to retreat, then I lose that cs/xp... and if I die, I also lose that cs/xp.  So, I can get sustain several ways - some characters have built in lifesteal or abiltiies that get you hp.  Then you can itemize for sustain (flask + all red pots or a mix of red/blue).  The thing is, if I have more sustain than another character and I smartly manage the creep waves, I can eventually force whoever I'm laning against to recall to base.  As soon as I've pulled that off, I will push my creep wave into the enemy tower to deny whoever I was fighting against cs/xp (eg they can't get it if I've forced them to base).  This will result in me being stronger when we come back to fight again.  I'll recall immediately after pushing my creep wave into their tower.  Anyway, you can only do that if you manage your health and mana resources well - AND having that extra sustain means that you can quickly heal up and stay in lane even if you have a bad exchange where you lose a bunch of HP. 

Also, top lane is a kind of a mini game in and of itself.  And to clarify - in the current meta, top lane is most often 1v1 with junglers on each side occasionally ganking or camping your lane.  Anyway, the goal of the mini game is to make as much money as possible while denying the enemy as much money/xp as possible.  Your job is to never die to your lane opponent or enemy jungler.  And you generally want to keep the creep wave from pushing to the enemy tower unless you are going back to base. 

Top lane is less action packed for the most part.  It's all about me outmaneuvering another individual player.  Bot lane is 2v2 + jungler ganks.  There are more variables and therefore more risk associated (even though you have a support to look out for you).  Sustain is great for bot lane as well, but I don't think you'd want to take the flask+pots approach as an adc.  You could, but this would likely result in the enemy adc out damaging you.  For instance, take a bot lane composition of zyra and cait.  Now those 2 could burst you down from full hp to nothing if they landed their abiltiies right, etc.  Because there are 2 people wailing away on you, its more likely you will die.  So, if you went full sustain, you'd have to play very cautious while you heal up and the enemy can keep pressing.  Again, following the example I gave with cait/zyra.  Let's say those 2 manage to catch you and you barely get away with around 100hp.  Now, if you have pots, you could heal up OVER TIME, but you'd be exposed for possible 2-3 people to work you over while you are healing up.  Because the possible damage could kill you off before you could heal, sustain is not as good bot as it is top.  Some sustain is good for bot lane (life steal in particular), but I don't think I'd ever go pots/flash on an adc. 

Super.  Thanks for the information.  Very helpful as I try to piece together how the next stage of the game is going to go for me.

I'm level 15 now and I generally only get in 4-6 games per night depending on the day.  Weekends may be more...

I'll take a look at those champs and see what looks good.  Cait has been on my radar for awhile but I really want a good tank and a support that I can learn to give me more options.  Sometimes on the blind pick Ashe is taken...or the spots fill up quick and I notice that we don't have a tank/support at all.  It matters less in this type of game I'm sure...but it still seems to make a decent difference.

I'd like to try out some voip games if it works out.  I think I'm fairly malleable but at the same time...still new.

Mauxe - I'll probably be around 7 or 8PM EST tonight.  If I'm not running with a full group when you are around, I'll play some games as support for you (unless we are rolling with someone else that wants to play that role for you).  Keep in mind that there are pretty good odds you'll be at a bit of a mismatch due to runes and masteries as if most of us are level 30, you'll quite possibly be up against a level 30 adc.  Anyway, if you are around, mayhaps we will get in a some games tonight.

fair enough.

Here's a recent chart from lolmatches that breaks out the current elo distribution.  Brand new players start at 1200. 

I can play Shen top (I have over 100 ranked games with him - I used to play a substantial amount of top with Sion and Shen, but I don't know the matchups with some of the newer champions), but its really hard to get him consistently.  He is banned almost 70% of the time in NA.

I think that you have to consider who you are playing when you go flask/pots only.  It makes sense on some champions.  It doesn't on others.  I don't think it makes sense on Udyr in that matchup.  If I was looking to play Darius or something, it would definitely make sense.

It's not like I was doing that terrible top.  Even when I got hard countered, I was only down 120 cs to 150 at just over 20, and I was at 4/4 while he was at 5/3.  So nothing terrible.  I just don't like being in the long lane, while I got hard countered in picks, and we are playing bot, so I can't really expect many ganks from top due to geometry.  I personally find that crap really frustrating since there is just nothing you can do unless your opponent sucks.

I've played Udyr vs Riven once before top, and I know the champions abilities.  If you look at the numbers -  early on, Riven's and Udyr's skills are about the same in terms of pretty much everything.  The problem is that Udyr has to use 55 out of a starting 250 mana to use a skill, while Riven gets it for free.  Which is why its a hard counter - Udyr holds even on a few exchanges, but then he is out of steam with no mana.  Udyr's advantage comes later when he can passively get back lots of life from just being in turtle, but it takes too long to get to that point against an aggressive riven.

this is worth a read if not a quick skim - http://www.facebook.com/CLGDoublelift/posts/407863505961619