Ask a Diamond [Week 5: Bot lane]

[quote=Vynertje][quote=OTGBionicArm] Didn't we do bot lane already? [/quote] Yeah, we covered every lane already so we just go back to the first week's lane again.[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje][quote=Out Of Pancakes] How do you lane against a [[karma]] ? And which support(s) do you think does the best against her ? [/quote] Well she's a poke support and relies heavily on mobility. If you can constantly hard engage her you win. Problem is that is quite hard to do with all her shields and slows (which is also why she's such a good support right now). [quote=I want to be a Blitzball] How strong are [[sona]] respective [[zyra]] right now? When should you play them etc. Also is [[vel'koz]] worth buying as a support? [/quote] They are both decent but have significant weaknesses which is why they're a situational pick. A good zyra is a monster to deal with though. Vel koz is OK as well but sooo squishy. He's a monster if you manage to keep him alive. It's up to you to decide whether you like him or not :p[/quote]

[quote=xIchi][quote=NateDog13] [quote=Lisk] Suppose a 2v2 fight goes on bot lane. The Blue Team's adc and the Purple Team's support kill each other, while the other two champs remain alive and with enough HP to stay in lane. Who wins the trade? On one hand, the Blue adc got a kill, but on the other hand, he will miss out on cs/experience. Sometimes there are situations when I'm playing as support, and I could flash + dive the enemy AD and kill him, but I will certainly die. Typically, I will play safe and not make that kind of play, but I've always thought about it. [/quote] Wooo! This is my area \m/ Bot lane Main 5lyfe. Anywho, let's start off with what team got the most worth out of this scenario. Blue Team's ADC just netted either first blood or 300 gold, and the purple team support just got 300 gold or first blood, BUT THEIR ADC ONLY GOT HALF! From the start of this scenario, the Blue Team won the trade, however, if the purple teams ADC stays to get enough gold to equate to that 150 or 200 more gold to make the gold amount of the kill the same, then all the sudden purple team won the trade. When you trade an ADC for a Support, whichever ADC gets the kill wins that exact trade. It's like chess, would you really trade your Queen for a pawn? And just realize, when you want to flash dive an ADC but sacrifice your life to do it, that's another how much gold for the other adc? It's a terrible thing to do, just puts the ADC further ahead. Also, take note that when you play as a support, if your ADC is dead before theirs, you failed somehow lol (that's how I see it when I let my ADC die xD) [/quote] ^thing to add to this. Generally, if the enemy laner is low, especially an ADC. Leave him low if you cannot 100% kill him without risking to die. Denying farm is also a way to go ahead. Sometimes it is actually better to just try to outfarm your enemy laner while denying him farm(-> push to tower, make him low, zone him out of cs range).[/quote]

[quote=I want to be a Blitzball]Who would be stronger in silver-gold of [[zyra]]/[[vel'koz]]? Not judging by team mates, but the stronger pick in low elo and vs the most popular picks[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje]Probably zyra since she's a super hard counter to thresh (if played well).[/quote]

[quote=NateDog13][quote=I want to be a Blitzball] How strong are [[sona]] respective [[zyra]] right now? When should you play them etc. Also is [[vel'koz]] worth buying as a support? [/quote] Sona and Zyra are still pretty damn strong supports, most of your time will be spent learning how to deal with Leona and Thresh, because those will be the most frequent supports you'll face, and the most irritating. Generally Sona gets played with ADC's like Ezreal, sometimes Cait, Ashe, and MF. The problem that comes with Sona is that in order for her to make an impact in lane, she needs someone who thrives off of lane bullying and who has a decent enough mana pool to last a bare minimum of 3-4 mins at a time in lane with Sona heals (if not longer). Otherwise, if damage isn't always constantly being dropped on the enemy adc/support, expect all ins to crush you. Now Zyra is at a point where she's more of a comfort pick support against supports like Thresh, Annie, Nami, and a few others. She's strong, I wouldn't call her the best AP support, but when you need to help your ADC win trades early and get ahead to deal with the enemy team, by level 2 you'll have the enemy ADC/Support either dead at your feet and being consumed by your plants, or screaming and running out of lane from your Deeps (Which are still really good even after those small nerfs they kept dropping). Either way, expect to play both of these supports in very strange scenarios, a lot of times even though either may look like a good pick, the enemy team might have so much dive that you need something like a thresh lantern to keep your ADC out of the fray, or mad burst from someone like Leona to peel for them, and the list of things goes on. [quote=Out Of Pancakes] How do you lane against a [[karma]] ? And which support(s) do you think does the best against her ? [/quote] Laning against Karma isn't too bad, It's like laning against Thresh or Blitz, you always want to be behind minions until you engage/all in. Generally as an ADC, I find that when going to trade with Karma, the best thing you can do is run up behind 2 minions and AA, because when she tries to trade back with R + Q, she ends up taking two minions, stopping her from getting 10 gold from hitting me, and she's denying her ADC cs without even realizing it. It's always good to keep in mind that in laning phase, Karma requires a lot of precision to do well. Take away that minion wave, and you'll be facing down a poking monster. Focus on trying to get ahead in the lane, and when you see an opportunity, all in and take her out right away, generally locking her down with hard cc to keep her from running away with shield or mantra shield). In terms of supports that are best against her, I'd say Thresh, Leona, Nami, and Blitz. I've played quite a bit of Thresh Karma lanes, and just landing a hook into the box makes her potential to get away almost nil. Leona is obvious, insane all in and her passive make Karma a very dead support, very fast. Nami is a bit stranger, but she's still definitely top tier in the viable support pool, against Karma you can pretty much easily bubble engage when she goes to Q or Q+R and then if she tries to get away, drop tidecallers blessing on your ADC and throw your tidal wave in the enemy bot lanes direction and let Karma rest in pieces. Blitz Karma is a bit hilarious, everytime she tries to go for a Q or Q+R, she's in range for you to land a hook, so you can go for a face tank and end up grabbing her, knocking her into the sky, then R-ing and let your ADC pick up that easy kill on her. Definitely a rough lane for Karma :p! [quote=I want to be a Blitzball] Who would be stronger in silver-gold of [[zyra]]/[[vel'koz]]? Not judging by team mates, but the stronger pick in low elo and vs the most popular picks [/quote] Honestly, I feel like at that level of play, both are pretty suck-ish. A lot of the times you'll see Vel'koz's at that level missing half of their abilities and try to force kills with their Ultimates and are generally only successful because of teammates assisting them. However, with Zyra it's like... most players at that level always miss their stranglethorns and get way too close to the enemy support/ADC and end up getting smashed because of it, but I have to agree with Vyn in this case. Zyra has a lot of power behind her, and if she just drops all of her abilities in a teamfight in whatever area the enemy is, she's generally going to do damage no matter what, even if she dies, unlike Vel who would get torn apart the second he starts ulting.[/quote]

[quote=I want to be a Blitzball]Anything in favor of [[vel'koz]] that [[zyra]] doesn't have?[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje]Long range true damage. Both are quite similar in terms of kit (long range waveclear / poke / AoE) but I think Vel'Koz overall has more damage without any items because of the true damage, whereas Zyra offers more utility and crowd control.[/quote]

[quote=sirell]Mad amount of +reps giving to the Diamonds here. Especially NateDog. Learning quite a lot and I haven't even asked a question yet. I'm just curious as to what non-meta support picks you might like to play (let's say it wasn't a ranked game), along with their effectiveness.[/quote]

[quote=NateDog13][quote=I want to be a Blitzball] Anything in favor of [[vel'koz]] that [[zyra]] doesn't have? [/quote] Tentacles. Lots and lots of tentacles. *eye see what you did there, ba dum tish* But ferreal, Vel Cosby has the most SINGLE target damage out of the two, however Zyra is more reliable in terms of dropping hers. Vel Cosby has the true damage, but Zyra's got a ton of magic damage with plants that add on to it. Vel Cosby has the slow and the knockup, while Zyra has the hold and the multi knockup. Overall Vel doesn't really do too much as a support other than turn your lane into a kill lane, moreso than Zyra can, and I say that because generally when you play Vel'koz as a mid laner, you need some sort of support to take anyone out, otherwise you're wasting flash to try and pick up something. He's a very.... strange champion. Not enough damage to really tear apart a single champion alone, but put him 2v4 and all the sudden you traded 1 for 4 because whoever is with him just pulled all of the attention to them, and Vel just got his whole kit off with his ult and ripped them apart. His damage and CC stacks up pretty ridiculously when it comes to 2+ v 2+ scenarios. So that kind of style translates over to bot lane quite well, and his Q spam bot is the most irritating thing to deal with as an ADC, because you constantly have to be juking inwards or outwards when he throws it out, or standing between minions to have them at your side blocking the shots. Oh, and in terms of harass, Vel hands down beats Zyra, he doesn't drop his kit and destroy half or a third of his ADC's CS wave because he's trying to harass the enemy ADC behind it rofl. [quote=sirell] Mad amount of +reps giving to the Diamonds here. Especially NateDog. Learning quite a lot and I haven't even asked a question yet. I'm just curious as to what non-meta support picks you might like to play (let's say it wasn't a ranked game), along with their effectiveness. [/quote] xD, Thank you :3 Lee Sin support, is hands down the greatest non-meta support imo followed by Pantheon/Rengar. Another non-meta support pick that I really like bot, is Xerath. He just keeps on dropping mad harass on the enemy ADC, and having faced it so many times, it basically forces you to go Vamp Scep -> Zerkers in order to be able to dodge his Eye of Destruction (another eye pun? Jeez :p!). Other than that, there aren't too many other fun shenanigany non-meta supports imo, I've seen Brand, I've seen Mundo, and I've also seen Cho, but those kinds of picks tend to be pretty bad for your early laning phase which sucks for both the support and the ADC.[/quote]