League Of Losers

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 6:22 pm

Blitz the noob crusher.

It is pretty easy to punish him in lane if he misses his hook for as long as it is down (or punish the adc) he brings no healing, and has no range. If you are good enough to reliably dodge the hook and then punish, he isn't any better than other supports.

But everything south of diamond, you can usually count on either the adc or the support being bad enough that you can land every hook, and they may be stupidly cautious and not punish after you miss a hook.

He's a better Leona if you can land the hook, and a worse Leona if you can't.

Also, because of the reverse nature of the hook versus spear, Blitz can help you pressure really hard at their turret without diving and he makes it impossible for them to pressure at your turret.

I like him, but he is banned all the time in bronze/silver ranked, so I never play him.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 10:31 pm

Blitz is strong as fuck in a lot of situations. He's the ultimate late game support because pull = death on anyone who isn't the tank and he makes baron dances borderline impossible for the other team. His lane phase is scary against squishies but he doesn't do much for gank prevention.

He's situational, but in the situations he's good in he's incredible. A blitz hook after 40 minutes ends the game if there's any CC or burst near Blitz, nobody else can do that. He's banned 90% of the time pretty much everywhere. I love laning against him, but I ban him because if it reaches late game somebody is going to get caught by a hook and my team is going to lose. Organized play he doesn't HAVE to be banned, but he's still game changing.

That being said, learning blitz is tough if you want to do ranked because he's banned so often.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 1:41 pm

Speaking of supports, I need a new one. My current two mains are Sona and Thresh, who between them cover pretty much everything while being really dang good, but I plan on starting ranked play soon and both are highly contested picks and bans in my experience with draft play. As such, I figure I should pick up another support or two so I can have something to play in case my two main squeezes get taken away from me. I've played Taric a few times and I don't really like him, and the same goes for Soraka. I'm thinking about Fiddlesticks or Janna; does anyone have any thoughts?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 1:58 pm

As an adc, I hate Janna, because I feel like I am in a two v one lane. As Janna, a large part of her usefulness comes in timing tornadoes and the shield with when is the time for the adc to go in. If you aren't talking to each other, you are kinda fucked. If the adc is bad, you are really fucked.

Fiddle is super fucking fun, because he counters all ins really hard and brings his own sustain, so it is harder to poke him down. I like fiddle a lot. But he can be very easily bursted down if he gets cced out of an opportunity to fear like against a Leona all in or a Blitz/Thresh hook into knock up. So you could just end up dying instantly and then they 2v1 your adc for a minute and a half.

If price is no object, I would say go for Zyra. I might also suggest Nami. But I could understand price being an object.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 2:25 pm

Price is something of an object, sadly. I tried out Nami last time she was free and wasn't too thrilled- I tried to play her like Sona and ended up getting owned since she doesn't have anywhere near as much poke and sustain and I couldn't get the hang of landing her bubbles. I'm certainly not opposed to giving her more time, though. Zyra's free this week, so I'll try her out and see how she feels.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 2:51 pm

Janna takes a lot of practice to get down, and even if you get good with her she's a kind of weak laner. She's great if you pair her with a burst or poke ADC due to her shield's AD buff (Janna Graves is really scary, as is Janna Cait and Janna Ashe), but kind of crappy in every other lane. The idea is you shield your AD before they use their burst or harass to give it +ouch AD. Requires a lot of communication or mutual understanding of bot lane, though, and it's not nearly as faceroll as Sona just walking up and Qing people and then sustaining her partner with W.

Janna is one of my favorite late game supports though, because fucking nados and fucking ult and free BF sword shield. She's also the safest warder in the game because she's so damn fast, and her passive is one of the best in the game, especially now that people don't start boots all the time.

Fiddles is a good support, but his gank prevention is shit (he can only fear 1 out of 3 people) and he gets screwed if the other team shoves him to turret and just takes pot shots because his gank assistance is also shit pre-6. He needs to be paired with a good pusher so he can abuse dark wind and keep his opponents low so ganking his lane is impossible. Very dangerous if your lane partner doesn't understand how much Fiddle wants to push.

Fiddle is great against assassins though, I don't think any support is better at making them useless. That's almost his entire contribution late game aside from ward spam.

I really think if you want another support it should be a peeler/disengage since your current roster is more initiation and lockdown. Janna and Zyra are the best at that, with Zyra being more offensive due to poke + long-range roots and Janna being more defensive due to 3 peel spells and a shield. In lower divisions I'd run Zyra because she can easily win lanes with her fucking 575 range auto (WHY DOES SHE NEED THAT!?) and good damage.

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 6:03 pm

Zyra is a lot of fun because she can also build mage if your team isn't dealing enough damage or you want to secure a faceroll game.

But that's generally a low-ranked strategy. Stop using if you hit gold.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 6:35 pm

...You Lost Me wrote:Zyra is a lot of fun because she can also build mage if your team isn't dealing enough damage or you want to secure a faceroll game.

But that's generally a low-ranked strategy. Stop using if you hit gold.

Unless you are in the LCS, in which case totally go back to doing it.

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 7:40 pm

D1 / Challenger is so beyond my comprehension.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Wed Oct 02, 2013 8:54 pm

...You Lost Me wrote:D1 / Challenger is so beyond my comprehension.

My understanding is everyone is trolling in it, but they're all good enough that nobody cares.

At least that's what my (now former) D1 "I only play AP Warwick, and I do it in every role including support lol" friend says. He dropped a division or two because he decided to learn Lee Sin by playing a bunch of ranked games, but now he's spamming split push Shaco and climbing again.

Seems to work decently to just pick one champ and play the shit out of it. I started going Gragas whenever possible and have won about 6 games and lost 1 (and the loss featured an AFK).

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Thu Oct 03, 2013 7:39 pm

Between blitz and thresh I'd say thresh is better overall, especially during team fights all throughout the game. Thresh can create opportunities for some pretty damn interesting plays and he can be built for a decent amount of damage if you so choose. That being said blitz is a game changer. The positioning requirements to avoid a hook can put a different sort of pressure on opponents. It can be the same fro zyra and thresh to be sure but blitz can do it from a safe distance since, if he misses a hook, you just can just pull back and wait for another opportunity or pop your E and see about fighting it out if the other team is particularly aggressive and you think you can pull it off. Blitz can wreck late game if you can hook, there is no doubt about that. As Kaelik pointed out, however, he is basically perma banned in bronze/silver. Out of all the supports I like having a thresh -> Sona -> Leona as my second in that order.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Fri Oct 04, 2013 6:27 pm

One thing I've been curious about: Does tenacity affect Thresh's hook duration? Lolwiki doesn't say one way or the other.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Sat Oct 05, 2013 12:27 am

My guess (although it is just that) is that while the stun duration is reduced commensurate to tenacity, the ability can still be reactivated for the full duration, just like it can be if the ability is cleansed.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Mon Oct 07, 2013 4:02 pm

Anyone else watch the world finals? I sure as fuck did.

SKT made Royal Club their bitch, it wasn't even close. Every match except the world finals were entertaining. The finals were just a clearly superior team snowballing over a clearly inferior team, the whole thing was a huge anticlimax.

Unrelated:
As a PSA to the League community, do not counterpick Zed with Kayle if you are a shitty Kayle. I've seen so many people do this when Zed is not banned.

"They picked Zed, I'm going to counter with Kayle! Gg."

<picks Kayle>

<pushes without wards>

<dies repeatedly in lane>

"So much camp. I can't do anything."

Buy a fucking ward if your 0 escape champion auto pushes. I don't understand how they die 4 times in lane, but every Kayle vs Zed I've seen has done this. It's obnoxious to have to carry them or lose to a fed Zed. Buy. A. Fucking. Ward.

This isn't an isolated incident, it has happened with every Kayle I've seen (note: only 2, but both as counterpicks to Zed. Double the anecdotal evidence!) lately. Don't counterpick with a champion you don't even play! Don't play lanes you suck at because "lol it's a counter pick!"

Even if you are getting camped you shouldn't die a lot. Maybe once or twice to "wow he stayed in lane and got me when I tried to ward," but whoa. I actually don't understand how people can die in lane so much unless they're getting 3 man dove repeatedly.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Mon Oct 07, 2013 10:25 pm

I only caught the last game live, which was an absolute shitfest. As soon as the level one fuck-up put Kennen in a 2v1, RYL were done for. Impact's Jax is way the fuck too strong, and Uzi's (insane) mechanics can't do shit against that. Honestly, I think the real star of those matches was Wh1t3zz- he managed to mostly hold his own against Faker, who might actually be a literal demigod. While Faker of course did his thing, I was really impressed by Piglet, too.

More generally, I'm really sad Fnatic didn't pull out their double TP comp in the semi's.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Tue Oct 08, 2013 1:00 am

It might be because I'm American, but I'm sad both C9 and Fnatic did not get to play many games. I find them entertaining to watch, whereas the only Asian team I really like watching is Sword because they play aggressive to a fault. The "every lane is shoving and then our jungler just picks who dies" gameplay from SKT is really effective and clearly strong (though Sword almost had it!), but it just isn't very exciting.

Except Faker, who is some sort of cyborg sent from the future to make mid laners feel bad about themselves.

Archmage · Post by **Archmage** » Thu Oct 10, 2013 2:24 am

This might be a very stupid question, but: Who are the "best" ADCs?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Thu Oct 10, 2013 3:01 am

Umm... far more than any other role I think that counts as a stupid question.

ADCs which I consider highly viable pretty much no matter what league you are in are:

Vayne, Ashe, Corki, Ezreal, Graves, Varus, Twitch, Tristana, Kog'Maw, Miss Fortune, Caitlyn.

Draven maybe not at high diamond/challenger, I don't know, but definitely low diamond to bronze.

So that excludes Lucian, Sivir, Quinn, and Urgot. So... basically everyone.

Patch to batch different people are the "best" but Vayne was the best pre Botrk nerfs and Tri Force buff. Corki is probably the "best" now.

In like 99% of cases what you want to do with the adc is going to be more important than picking the best adc because they are all so close. So you pick adcs to counter enemy team comps, or because you want to split push, or with escapes, or to provide global presence, or because your team doesn't have engage, or because you really want to win lane, or because you like a champ.

But you basically can't go wrong in that first group up there. You could probably do just fine with some of the ones I excluded too, IE Sivir shits on Blitzcrank or something, quinn is I don't know what the fuck.

If I were really saying who the "best" are in a small list, I would say Corki, Vayne, Trist, Ashe, Twitch, and Caitlyn.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Thu Oct 10, 2013 6:54 am

Quinn is probably a much better top laner than ADC, given her excellent dueling potential and splitpushing, CLG pulled out Urgot in their famous 1 hour game against TSM and did pretty well with him.

Probably the most coherent division amongst ADC's (although it's by no means perfect) is early power vs late power- Twitch, Vayne, Tristana and Kog'Maw are all monstrously powerful late game in different ways, but tend to pay for it in a weak early/mid game. It must be noted, though, that Tristana has an extremely strong level 2 and 6 all-in, and Twitch can do excellent work in mid-game teamfights. Conversely, ADC's like Draven and Corki can faceroll early game, but tend to fall off late game, and need to get kills in lane to snowball into late game.

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:49 am

I'd call it differently depending on what you want:

Baby's First ADC: Caitlyn. She's got glorious range so you can farm and harass easy. She comes with big damage and waveclear, an escape, and you can do hilarious things with traps.
Carrying ADC: Vayne. She scales really hard, splitpush easily, and she's got awesome dueling potential.
Team Player ADC: Ashe. The only real adc with a stun. She can initiate fights from far away, gets free cc, and can scout easily.

It's always good to get tristana, cause she's free.

Urgot is especially hard to play, and not that gratifying. He's got a range of 425, which is 125 less than the next lowest ADCs (vayne, lucian, etc.) but his attack skills have huge ranges (900 on noxian corrosive charge, 1000 or 1200 on acid hunter) which makes him play more like an ad caster with bad waveclear. His ult has awesome utility for initiating team fights, but he needs to be tanky to make it worthwhile.

If I remember right, CLG picked up urgot for his godly laning phase and then built him tanky while the rest of the team scaled up.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:01 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqpFjeFHiE0 - this is the game in question, and Doublelift ends up with a Randuin's, Maw, Manamune, CDR boots, Black Cleaver and Last Whisper, so you're basically right. It's a fantastic game, and I can't recommend it highly enough.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Fri Oct 11, 2013 8:27 pm

Rather than mentioning useful ADCs, it's easier to list all the useless ones: Sivir.

Sivir has a bad lane phase, bad teamfight, bad siege game, and offers nothing but chase potential. Decent waveclear I guess, but no better than Cait/Varus/Corki.

You can win challenger games as Heimerdinger though so who gives a fuck.

Weirdly enough Kog is completely off the radar now. He's good, but people don't like to rely on teammates and Kog is 100% reliant on his team to stop him from both literally and figuratively exploding. I've also been seeing Lucian and Draven more recently and am not sure why.

Jinx seems pretty good, but super team dependent. Would probably rather have a Kog on my team.

Archmage · Post by **Archmage** » Sat Oct 12, 2013 2:08 am

I figured whether it was a stupid question or not I'd learn something from polling Denners for input.

Now I just need to get to max level so I can play "real" games. And ideally stop sucking somewhere along the way. Only way to do that is practice and study.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Sat Oct 12, 2013 5:51 pm

Has anyone played the Heimerdinger/Xerath reworks? the Heimerdinger rework actually looks really cool, but I'm not so hyped about the Xerath rework. Any thoughts?

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Sun Oct 13, 2013 12:19 am

Heimer can have four turrets when ulting I believe. Kind of excited for that.

I think xerath will be a whole lot more useful and less annoying, but the rework has also made him feel a lot more like other mages in the game. I'd personally rather have a unique champ than a champ any player can pick up, but I dunno...

All I want is the yorick rework. Riot pls.