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I want to learn an arsenal for draft / ranked.

Creator: Elsworth July 26, 2012 9:20pm
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Elsworth
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Hello reader,

I am relatively old to the League of Legends game in general (I've had my account for 2-3 years, around Season One's start) but I have only come back to the game on my original and only account recently, in the past month or so. I revisited the account at level 22 and have since gotten him to level 30, having an even 11-11 win/loss ratio in ranked matches.

I like champions and I like unlocking new champions. A lot of people saying unlocked champions with Riot Points (on sale or not) is a bad idea, and it probably is, but I've caved. Together with the majority of my IP, I have come about to own 43 champions total (not including the rotation,) and plan to more in the near future.

The issue I have currently is that while I know how to play some champions efficiently, I am very much a jack of all trades. I want to develop a list of champions to learn that suit my playstyle, one primary and one secondary. I was hoping that the community here on Mobafire could help me out, as so far from what I've seen they've been very nice compared to most LoL communities.

While I understand at the end of the day I'll have to make the decisions and find what works best for me, I would love some suggestions.

My playstyle is a very safe one; unless I am certain I will pick up a kill and will base and survive, I will not dive a turret without more people, regardless of my role. I play very safe and try to limit my deaths, even if it means I have to sacrifice assists, CS and potentially even kills.

I do not complain about killsteals (unless it's blatantly, blatantly rude) and go by the ks=kill secure motto.

My current mains are Olaf in the top lane and Soraka as support. I feel I'm fairly decent at both and would like to keep those are either my primaries, or secondaries in their roles.

In terms of tanks, I like to go as an off-tank similar to Lee Sin or Olaf, while not daring to go near champions like Singed. (I tried him one and it ended catastrophically.)

I like Twisted Fate's kit (specifically his W, with the mana sustain and stun/slow that it brings to the table) as an ADC, but I try to venture away from the ADC role in general, as it is one that I feel I haven't found a perfect champion for my playstyle yet.

In terms of jungle and mid, I have jungled in ranked as Olaf and Darius, winning the majority of said games (100% as 2 games with darius and 66% on Olaf with three games) but I have lately felt insecure about the jungle position in a whole; it's something I need to look into.

In terms of mid, I don't think I'm an efficient mid in any stretch of the imagination, but would like to get a set of champions to try and learn to see if any click.

I think that winds up my line of text. If you leave a reply I'd be super grateful, I know I didn't give a lot of information about my playstyle but I hope it gives you an idea. I'm looking for ten slots total, two for each position but am willing to try as many as necessary to improve my knowledge and flexibility as a player.

If you got this far, thank you very, very much for reading, and have a good day.
ShiftyCake
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You never want to become a jack-of-all-trades, I had the same thought as you before. I thought it'd be great, I'd be able to fill any role the others can't and lead my team to victory! Well I got taught a harsh lesson, you cannot do it. No matter how hard you try, eventually you will need to pick one position and master it. Why? While you can learn all the positions, it takes so long that by the time you have finished learning the next one you have gotten rusty with the last one. You can only hope for mediocracy in four positions, and one mastered position.

Pick a lane, and create an arsenal for that lane alone. Always be able to have one or two positions you can change when team-mates won't give you yours. Yet in the long run, learning one position will make you much better then learning all of them.

In short, give up on jack-of-all-trades, learn one position, and create an arsenal for that position.
thanks Hogopogo for the banner :D
The Overmyynd
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ShiftyCake wrote:

You never want to become a jack-of-all-trades,

In short, give up on jack-of-all-trades, learn one position, and create an arsenal for that position.


Im sorry Shifty, but i'm going to have to disagree with you on this one. The way to do extremely well in this game is to find champs that can go to multiple lanes and still dominate, e.g. Vladimir and Cho'Gath, who can do top or mid extremely effectively. The best way to play IS to become a jack-of-all-trades, master of one or two. Be good at everything, but extremely good at one or two lanes. It does work, especially if you grab some champs that can cover several places at different times.

Insofar as these champs are concerned, here is a decent starting list (i know there will be some i miss, its k, no one rage at me)

Maokai- Support, Jungle, Solo Top
Zilean- Support, Mid
Lee Sin- solo top, jungle
Lulu- Support, Solo Top, Mid (some will also add on ADC and Jungle... Yes its possible to do literally everything with her, but the first three actually WORK more than 50% of the time)
Olaf- solo top, jungle
Kennen- solo top, mid
Vladimir- solo top, mid
Cho'Gath- solo top, mid
Lux- support, mid
Nunu & Willump- support, jungle
Soraka- support, mid

Picking up a nice blend of these characters will ensure you can play any position, and play it well, since you will be using a single champ to cover several roles.

However, concerning your original question, I think i have a few suggestions for you. Working with a passive playstyle, there are certainly champs that roll from that.

Top:
Nasus, Mordekaiser. These guys just want to farm. Farm all day. Everyone else can ****off, they just want to farm. Nas wants to farm because of his passive, which gives him AD every time he kills a minion, and is super survivable when he hits his ult. Mord is just super survivable all the freakin time with HIS passive, Iron Man. I build a Max CDR combo on him to keep this shield ALWAYS up, and usually win 1v3 fights by later mid game.

Mid:
Veigar, Karthus. Veigar... Well, he gets AP every time he kills something with Baleful Strike. SO farm that Q baby. If someone gets squirrely and decides he wants to bust your balls, just pop a Event Horizon and say no. As far as karth goes... Well, he never needs to turret dive to secure a kill. Press R and Requiem will do the diving for you. Plus, who cares about moving to damage enemies? Just hover your mouse under their feet, and a bomb will be kindly placed there. Slow wall, an aura of death, and upon death, an extra 7 seconds of un-life to let you secure that final kill before you hit grayscreen.

Jungle:
This is actually entirely up to your playstyle. Really any jungle champ can be played passively, insofar as just staying in your jungle and farming. However, this mentality will probably get your teammates raging at you for not helping.

AD:
Sivir, Ashe. Sivir has a long range harass that doesnt put her in danger at all, as well as a built in Banshee's Veil spell shield. The ultimate passive player's wet dream. Ashe has a perma slow that says "no" to any unwelcome advances, and a 3.5 second stun that goes across the map to end skirmishes quickly.

Support:
Soraka. None other needed. Infinite heal and mana, everyone else can go away, she doesnt care, harass her AD all day long, she doesnt care. Graves will always be full of health and mana, he will always dash forward to buckshot you in the face, take your return fire, and not give a damn. He has a raka.

Well, there is MY wall of text, and i hope it helped XD
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
ShiftyCake
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Im sorry Shifty, but i'm going to have to disagree with you on this one. The way to do extremely well in this game is to find champs that can go to multiple lanes and still dominate, e.g. Vladimir and Cho'Gath, who can do top or mid extremely effectively. The best way to play IS to become a jack-of-all-trades, master of one or two. Be good at everything, but extremely good at one or two lanes. It does work, especially if you grab some champs that can cover several places at different times.


I beg to differ, but I would take The Overmyynd's advice over mine; he has a lot more experience then me so what he's saying would be true.
thanks Hogopogo for the banner :D
The Overmyynd
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Well, the main reason i say so, is: How often do you go solo q, and people instantly call out what lane they want? If you like to play mid, you better have a quick internet connection and quick fingers so you can get into champ select and call it before anyone else. Now, if you are like me and in a clan with a set job roster, by all means, do what you are best at all the time. But those people that you log in with regularly know what you do best, and do not contest you. I'm just saying that if you can do everything at least fairly well, you can take someone calling your best lane before you in stride, and go ahead and kick *** anyway.
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
Elsworth
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Hey you two, thank you very, very much for the responses - first off I want to mention a style of play in the champion select (solo queue at least) that I do.

I almost always say I'll do anything, and one thing that drives me to higher elo is the silence that is presented - from what I've seen from streams at least. That kind of teamwork where top pick grabs what he wants, second pick gets what he want that's available and so forth. I think the 'I called mid before you so piss off' attitude is part of the wrongness in LoL - plus there's the fact there is currently a bug where someone says something and someone else says something almost at the same time, and it shows up separately on both screens, giving the illusion that both won. This needs to be fixed.

In terms of the argument about jack of all trades from mister ShiftyCakes, I don't want to be a jack of all trades, which is what I am now. I want to be a master at all trades, which is part of the reason I want a roster to appropriately learn champions and master them, adapt to my playstyle, ect., if you get what I mean.

Now as to what you suggested, Overmynd, I wanted to start off by thanking you for the wall of text. I wasn't sure if wall of texts were really appropriately dealt with around here, but thankfully I was incorrect.

As to your list, your starting list is one that I really do think is good - I own Lee Sin, Olaf, Vladimir, Cho'Gath, NuNu and Soraka out of that last. I mained both Vladimir and Cho'Gath before (before i got into draft/ranked games and maining a single champion was acceptable) and much enjoyed them. However, I think I've lost my touch with Cho'Gath, and in terms of Vladimir, I haven't quite mastered him yet.

I love Olaf. I bought Brolaf after two games as him. He may my favorite champion, and he and I mix so well in my opinion.

For Lee Sin, my opinion is similar to Olaf in that matter, to a lesser degree. I feel I've mastered Olaf to a degree - if I had to give a -/10 of what I think my mastery of him is, I believe it'd be around a seven. I'm good enough to get a fair bit of kills without dying, but I need to learn LoL further before furthering my logic and knowledge with him. With Lee Sin, I'm not as good in ranked, and often die in the top lane. Repeatedly and repeatedly. I have never jungled Lee, which is something I'd like to try in draft pick soon, and may very well tonight after I finish typing this.

Soraka is my sweetheart champion. I've always loved the bugger, and she may very well be my favorite champion on a pure subjective point of view. Her skillset is amazing, and when you sustain that ADC, you get an incredible feeling of actually doing something - while you can fail as other champions, you aren't as depended on as much as support I feel in low elo - personally, I think she is the best support. Alistar ain't got **** on her. But I have wanted to get Sona very badly (partly to try her AD.. I've heard it's good early game but falls short lategame.)

Nunu is one I haven't tried yet, whenever I have I've kind of shied away - he's kind of like Poppy, one of the champions I picked up before why the hell not, he's 450 IP and I love having / buying champions.

Lux is somebody I want to buy, or at least try. I don't think I'd be good with her, but she looks fun for maybe some blind pick matches.

I played Maokai 1-3 weeks back on the rotation, can't remember how long ago it was in a precise matter. i played exactly one game as him, as I was AFK during champion select due to some issues and was autopicked for him. I did alright with him, but I'm extremely good at adapting to new champions. I think I could definitely do well with him when/if I pick him up.

Zilean is one I have to pick up eventually - I have all but four 1350 IP champs, him being one of them. Whether or not I'm keen on playing him however.. that'll be a discussion for another day, if you catch my drift.

Kennen is one I'd want to try before I buy him, but I'll undoubtedly add him to my collection eventually.

Now on to the majestic second list! I think I may have presented myself a bit wrong - what i meant by when I said I play passively (or whatever I said) I meant that I tend to poke and harass, and eventually burst the enemy down. While this technically goes for Mordekaiser, I feel Nasus doesn't go by the same example, giving me some thought that I misrepresented myself. I love Mordekaiser, the Master of Minions, which should be his real name due to his power. I don't own him, but I played the **** out of him during his rotation that was around lately.

For Veigar.. no no no. I did not like him at all I'm afraid, as I'm not that good at lasthitting as of yet. I'm getting better, but he's not good for me yet - I don't own him yet either, tried him during his rotation.

Oddly enough, I have never, ever played Karthus, in all my ins and outs over the past two years. I think I'd like him though, and I want to pick him up eventually.

For jungling, I like Olaf. I need an extensive guide to how to jungle though - i'm a bit lost on my own. Any suggestions?

For ADC, I like Twisted Fate as earlier stated - I also really, really like Ashe and Jayce. I want to try Sivir - I REALLY do! I just haven't gotten to it like Nunu yet.

For support - hell yeah. Soraka all the way, baby.

I think that concludes my mammoth of a post for now.. sorry for my rambling, I just thought it was necessary. Thank you so much for your replies.
The Overmyynd
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Hey man, its good, thats what this place is for. Wow, alot to respond to... OK lets start from the top down.
A "Master Of All Trades" is damn near impossible to achieve. Even teams that play for cash, like CLG and TSM, have designated roles that each player sticks to. If you want to achieve this, well, good luck LAWL. I would be happy to help you get there (seing as how i am a jack of all trades myself, master of Support and Mid)
Cho was one of my very first champs. I hadnt played with him for quite some time (about 3 months) then picked him up again for a troll game in mid. Destroyed a morgana with him, no contest at all. I've re-fallen in love with him ever since. Give him another shot! His lane sustain is beyond ridiculous.
Lee Sin jungle is, arguably, one of the best jungles in the game. Try it!
Soraka, i frankly dislike. Sorry :( I just prefer more... aggressive supports. Zilean, Nunu & Willump, and Maokai are my supports of choice. But she is undoubtably a powerful support pick. Nunu works extremely well as a full on AP caster support. Rush an ROA. Immediately as soon as you hit lvl 6, you can do 800 damage with your ult. That turns the tides of fights, especially during jungle ganks. And Mao is my 'main', i've played the hell out of him for months, and he hardly ever lets me down, as long as teammembers know how to use him properly in teamfights. Zil also works very well as AP support, his bombs have stupid range, and do crazy damage. The speed up/slow is great for helping ganks, or escaping them, and his ult is invaluable during teamfights.
AD sona is kind of a troll pick... it CAN work, but... Eh. Sub par, use it to have a good laugh. Kind of like Magewick.

And i get what youre saying. OK, so i'll try to make a second list.

Top:
Olaf, Kennen, Talon
Mid:
Karthus, Zyra, Brand
Support:
Zilean, Maokai, Nunu & Willump (hey, looks like you have my style!)
ADC:
Caitlyn, Sivir, Kog'Maw

These guys are all about major harass, and a huge burst at half health to win lane.

Good luck out there! If you want more information or training, feel free to add me in game, my ign is The Overmynd.

P.S.- If this seems kind of rambling or off topic, i apologise. I picked tonight to have a couple of drinks. So... Salude!
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
Embracing
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The reason why a "jack of all trades" wouldn't work is because there would be a cap as to how well you can do with all roles.

However, there's nothing wrong with learning roles that have similar playstyles.

Jungler and Top
APC and ADC

These are roles with similar playstyles.

What I would suggest is that you focus on one champion first. When you become good at a champion you subconsciously focus more on the game rather than your champion.
Steps:
1) Get fundamental mechanics down (Play any champion)
2) Focus on one or two champions (Also know one champion of every role)
3) Play ranked, get higher elo
4) Get high elo, branch out champion arsenal, learn a role.

Once your fundamental mechanics are down learning another champion will be no problem.


P.S Don't play TF AD. AP TF is a lot better.
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You should just find a role and stick to it. Although it's great to be good at all, there will always be one your best at.

Sigs By: Syther Blade (me), TheNamelessBard
Somalie
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Try to not be bad in every role.

If you have to play a role that you do not master, then take a champ you already know, Jungle Olaf when being a Toplaner Olaf is an example. You know the champ, what to do in team fight, what you can/can't do, you can't do very bad.

Whatever role you prefer, be able to play some champs in that role. Because of bans, because of your champ already being picked, because of facing a champ you do not love to face with your champ, etc etc.
You could be a strong top kennen player, against some champs it would be better to play something else.

You like passive lane, passive play ? Don't. Bully the enemy, harass him, make him understand you're the alpha male in this lane. Especially in ranked, people do not rely on late game to win because late game is all about communication and nice team comp. What you never have with 4 unknown players. So better have more gold/xp/kills/assist than the other "role".
A lot of people do not like being harassed and become very shy, being easily zoned.

PS : forget talon and nasus as toplaner, better have strong champ doing the work by their own.

Feel free to add Somalie if you're on EUW server, if you want to try some matchup/situation or just want to train.
English is not my native langage, I'm sorry about how painful to read my text are :c
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