Everyone who plays League of Legends knows that objective and objective control is what wins games. Now, if you find yourselves wondering what objectives are I'll take a moment to go over what objectives are in League of Legends. Objectives are anything that give you a spike in gold, that being everything from minion creeps to kills all the way to the nexus. Today I will be going over the various acceptable trading scenarios as well as when it is okay to make these trades. You may be asking, “But Monster! What does it mean to trade an objective?!”, do not fret, I have an answer for you.

An objective trade is simply when you get one objective while your enemy team is getting another. An example would be, you take mid turret while they are taking dragon, if that happens you are trading the dragon for a turret. Also, just for the sake of not being too over complicated, we will be sticking to the larger objective trades like a Dragon for a Kill or a baron for an Inhibitor. I will be going through a couple different objective trades today, these trades will be; Dragon trades, Turret trades, and Baron trades.

To start it off, let's talking about the Dragon. Killing the dragon gives you a different tier buff for each time you kill the dragon in a single game. A lot of people are willing to trade a dragon for a turret in the earlier game, which really isn't that bad to do. The first dragon you kill will give you 6% more attack damage and ability power, trading that for the 125 global gold and 150 local gold that an outer turret gives is not that bad. You will end up getting more combat stats with that buff over the tower. The issue you run into is if you continue to trade turrets for dragons. The 2nd, 3rd, and 4th dragon do not give you any stats to help you in fights. If you kill 4 dragons but the enemy team is able to kill 4 turrets they will be getting at least a combined gold amount of 2,500 gold. With this gold lead, they should be able to fight you when you are trying to take the 5th dragon and take their first dragon, which will put you even further behind. After your first dragon, you should never be looking to trade dragons for anything more, only take dragon if it is a free dragon.

The next set of trades I would like to go over is Turret trades. What is a good turret for turret trade? Early game, top tier 1 turrets have the least affect on the game. There is no real objective on the top side of the map that losing that turret will expose until 22+ minutes into the game. If you trade your bot turret for a top turret early in the game, it is going to be harder for you to have dragon control. The most important lane to have a turret in though, is your mid lane. If you lose your mid lane in a trade for another turret you lose control of the middle of the map, meaning you lose control of part of your own jungle also. Once you get later into the game, the inner turrets and inhibitor turrets are all pretty crucial, with mid still being the top of the pyramid. Trading a bot for a top in this situation would not be bad, as long as no one dies in the exchange and you don't lose anything else.

Lastly we have the big daddy of objectives, Baron Nashor. Baron gives multiple buffs to you and also the minions surrounding you. With these buffs, it is very easy to take multiple towers or push in for the win. So the question is, do you ever give up Baron for anything? Most people would tell you no, but I am here to let you know it is okay to give up Baron if you are getting an inhibitor out of it. Now it isn't ideal, but if you get an inhibitor, even with Baron, they will have to pay attention to that lane pushing into them constantly. With a lack of attention, you can stall out the game and let your super minions do all the work for you!

Let's quickly recap what we went over today. Dragon number one for a tier 1 turret is an okay trade, but continual trades of Dragons for turrets will cause the enemy team to snowball out of control. Never trade early tier 1 turrets for a top tier 1 turret and never trade any turret for a matching mid turret. Lastly, trading a baron for an inhibitor is an okay trade if you have to make it. I hope my little guide on objective trading was enjoyable and educational, have a good one! See you on the rift!