Overview

Pick compositions are one of the most aggressive form of composition; you work around the map to find single targets and destroy them so you have the number advantage in any future confrontations. Roaming, invading the Jungle and aggressively warding is the playstyle you need to undertake when playing the match. Push out your lane and find a strolling member on the map and burst them out before they can have an impact. The mid lane and jungle have vital roles in this composition and them working in unison is so important as they can work to get all lanes ahead. When a pick composition gets ahead, the enemy can have an incredibly hard time dealing with them.

Aggression is the main focus point as you lack in a lot of areas. Generally wave clear isnt a strong point in the champions played so you can have hard time dealing with the enemy sieges. Fight as a team needs to be done when they have the number advantage. Due to their single target damage, when champions with large AOE CC and damage get on top of them, they can find it hard to a single target. If they do fall behind, they can fall back on split push as they can win a lot of duels against all targets, especially mid lane assassins. For a basic overview of the composition; play aggressive, ward aggressively, try to efficiently roam and invade the enemy team, aim to get a number advantage and push when you have the upper hand.

Playing it Out

The pick composition has a few details which need to be kept in mind when your composition leads in this direction. Using these tips will help you succeed in the game in question;

-Roaming: Discluding maybe the ADC, nearly every role in the game right now can roam somewhat. TP on Top lane, Jungle and Mid together, Support roaming at the correct time. Getting your team ahead means you get item power spikes and advantages that help you get on the important enemies

-Jungle Invading: By consistently invading the jungler on the enemy team, you can try to lower his impact on the map. The jungler has a vital impact in helping other lanes get ahead so by weakening him, you reduce their effect

-Aim for the important targets: The Mid lane and ADCs mostly. They're the consistent damage dealers and by taking them out, the enemy lose most of their damage. Champions with consistent mobility and high damage are generally given this job

-When roaming, PUSH!!: When you're planning to roam to a different lane, don't just leave minions to hit on your turret. Push them into the turret and then roam. While getting a few kills can be good, it's generally not worth losing a turret

-Neutral-Aggressive Warding: Get the normal wards out around the river so you can get control of the dragon, baron etc. Your other wards want to get into the enemy's territory so you can get the enemy's movement across the map. By detecting this, you can plan to be aggressive with your team

-When behind: When your team is behind, due to the lack of AOE your team will normally not possess, you need to re-think what your plan of action is. Getting them picks is still important. So ward control is still important. The other strategy is split pushing. Use the enemy's movement to your advantage and take an objective when they're positioned incorrectly

Champion Choices

(champions from patch 5.5 to 5.7)

Top Lane:

Lissandra

-Her intense amount of crowd control in built into 3 of her abilities can lock down a target for a considerable length of time. A slow, snare and stun to control the movement of a target

-The low cooldown on "Ice shard means Lissandra can slow 1 or 2 targets for a good duration. It also brings consistent harass and safe farming in the laning phase meaning that she can stay safe while farming from a far

-"Glacial Path" gives Lissandra a mobility tool. She can reach a destination from a considerable length away, get over a piece of terrain to get to important targets and get through a team to lockdown an enemy

-"Glacial Tomb" has 2 uses, but the offensive use of the spell if where her pick potential lies. She can stun a target for 1.5 seconds so the rest of her team can follow up and output their own damage/crowd control. When used on a target such as the ADC or mid laner, this can result in a quick pick off for the team

Irelia

-Irelia is an insanely strong duellist and can out-duel probably every other champion in the mid game. With the trinity force power spike, she can output a lot of damage against any form of opponent from a mage to a tank making her a strong split pusher and damage source against one opponent

-"Equilibrium Strike" is an immense stun when used on the right target. With a stun that ranges between 1-2 seconds in duration, she can lock down them important targets on the enemy team

-Irelia's W auto attack enhancement, "Hiten Style", deals true damage on her auto attacks for the 6 second duration. With it ripping through all defenses, she can be really hard to stop in a fight, especially when you take into account her in built tenacity. CC doesnt mean anything to her, meaning she can run through a team

-"Transcendent Blades" has 2 main uses. Firstly, it adds to her dueling potential as she use the blades to proc a sheen enhanced auto attack. My weaving an auto attack in between every blade, she can create maximum damage output. Secondly, it can be used to quickly get through a wave, meaning she can be of use when facing sieges

Jungle:

Vi

-Some of the strongest scaling stats in the game on a jungler. This champion built as tank can one shot a carry in the late game. Doing serious DPS and how her abilities can get her to a carry so easily.

-"Vault Breaker" hits like a truck when hit. Like seriously, its hurts so much. It's so important in her early ganks to land but when landed, it's so good. Especially when you combine it with a strong solo damage dealer such as an assassin, the single target damage can be out of the roof

-Part of her late game damage comes from the in built armor shred and max health damage on third auto attack provided by her "Denting Blows" ability. Having this means she can get through most defenses and scales insanely well into the late game

-The part that makes Vi such a good pick for the jungle in a pick composition comes from her ultimate "Assault and Battery". Only stopped by a spell shield which only 3 champions can provide unless Banshees are bought, Vi can lock down a champion from a reasonable range disregarding any mobility they have (etc Kalista). Her team can then easily follow up and destroy the target she caught

Lee Sin

-One of the best early game junglers in the game due to the early ganks he can pull off and how he can nearly every duel. A shield and life steal/spell vamp, true sight and slow and a 2 part damage mobility tool in "Sonic Wave/Resonating Strike"

-Lee Sin has the ability to jump through every living being on the Summoners rift map. With "Sonic Wave, he can jump to enemy champions, enemy minions and neutral monsters. With "Safeguard, he can jump to allied champions, allied minions and wards

-The slow provided by "Cripple" can slow down a priority target for his team to follow up on their own damage and crowd control. While it isn't the strongest slow, it can do a lot when trying to set up Lee Sin's impact in a game

-"Dragon's Rage has the ability to make an enemy champion get out of position. With the 1200 unit knock back it provides, Lee Sin can potentially get behind the enemy (with his multiple mobility tools, he has the ability to do this) and fly a target into his team for them to get a quick kill

Mid:

Ahri

- One of the most versatile mages in the game right. Ability to assassinate, roam, wave clear and win duels. Strong in nearly every composition right now so having Ahri in theory is never a bad choice in the mid lane

-"Orb of Deception" provides long medium ranged harass that can potentially knock the health bars of enemy champion she faces. Dealing true damage on its return, the orb can do a surprising amount of damage to targets it not dodged

-Ahri brings a unique form of crowd control to the table with her kit. "Charm" makes an enemy aimlessly move towards her for a duration of time. This can work into other forms of crowd control such as Morgana's "Dark Binding", Elise's "Cocoon" which on a target such as the ADC, can be a deadly duration of cc

-As an assassin, having the ability to get around terrain and the enemy team to destroy the important targets is essential. "Spirit Rush" gives 3 dash charges which deal damage in a proximity. With good spell rotations, she can use every rush in combination with her other spells to create maximum damage output on an important target

LeBlanc

-One of the hardest mages to keep locked down. Her dash in the early levels combined with the double dash she eventually gets at level 6. With her high burst on a target, she can destroy a target before they have time to react with the mobility her "Distortion" grants

-"Sigil of Malice" while not doing much damage on its own, when combined with another spell can reduce an enemy's health bar pretty quickly. At level 6, this burst gets even stronger as she can use the "Mimic" enhanced Sigil of Malice to proc the original Sigil off and then use another spell to proc the enhanced Sigil of Malice off

-LeBlanc's E, "Ethereal Chains" when used correctly can mean the death of a target. The snare it grants after 2 seconds of being shackled keeps a champion locked in place in which her jungler or other allied champions can jump on top off and follow up. With LeBlanc's high single target damage, this can result in kills across the map

- Mimic has multiple uses with the high AP ratios that it adds to her original spells; With Q, she's mainly looking at the increased burst, On W, LeBlanc has 2 dashes meaning she can dash around and get to a target she needs to get, The E adds to her cc duration increasing the snare duration to potentially 4 seconds

ADC:

Graves

-A Graves player should be never scared to get in the fight. With the resistances his passive grants and high burst, by getting close and personal with the enemy team, Graves can output a lot of damage with his abilities combined

-Graves with "Buckshot" has one of the strongest laning phases of an ADC right now in the game. With the small AOE it deals in front of him, he can quickly clear through a round of minions and win a trade with the enemy ADC

-"Quickdraw" gives Graves a small dash meaning he can quickly create a larger or smaller gap between him and an enemy champion. When mentioning the up close and personal playstyle Graves has, the attack speed steroid Graves grants means he can use the dash to get close on an enemy and pile a lot unreturnable damage

- His ultimate can be good at both dealing a lot of damage on a single target and dealing mass AOE to a whole team. When going for the all in on a single target, Graves can use all of his abilities combined with "Collateral Damage" to decimate an enemy off the map

Vayne

-"The Night Hunter" has the potential to snowball a game really hard into her favour if she gets ahead. Her mobility and how she can kill most targets she's faced with, from Tank to ADC. She excel in a scattered team fight or split push and can potentially duel anyone that tries to stop her

- Vayne's main mobile tool, "Tumble" can help her dodge multiple skillshots which could lead to her death. The second attribute it brings is the increased damage on the next auto attack after using the Tumble. With her "Silver Bolts" third proc, it can put out damage on the target she went for

-"Condemn" helps keep Vayne safe from oncoming threats by knocking back the enemy from her. It will also stun on hit with terrain which she can follow up on after

-"Final Hour" acts as an enhancement to Vayne for a small duration of time. It grants her bonus attack damage which scales from 30 to 70, enhancing all of her abilities which scale of AD. Her passive movement speed is also tripled and she gains invisibility on Tumble use. In this mode she can deal with mostly any opponent in 1 v 1 duel when played correctly, meaning she can pick people off

Support:

Morgana

- Morgana doesnt need items to have impact on a game. With the tools in her kit she can lock targets down with multiple forms of crowd control that scales with levels and prevent any lockdown from hitting wither herself or any of her allies

-"Dark Binding" is Morgana's main catching skill and is a strong one at that. When the skillshot is hit, it locks down that target from a scaling duration of 1 second to 3 seconds. Alongside it's high base damage, this CC duration is easily enough to keep the target in place for her team to follow up

-Morgana can help peel her important allies in the team fights. By using the "Black Shield" on an ally such as her ADC, she can help keep what they bring to a fight real by preventing any crowd control from being used on them. That could be pure damage, crowd control, tank stats, engage or disengage

-"Souls shackles helps Morgana follow up on her already existing crowd control by elongating the lock down with an extra stun that lasts for 1.5 seconds. This is a possible 4.5 second length of CC on a singular champion which if you don't think is long enough to kill an ADC or other squishy target, then something's wrong

Thresh

-Versatility is Thresh's middle name. Thresh's skills can be used in multiple methods depending on the situation at hand. He can engage, disengage, peel, catch, check the fog of war, mostly anything (the only thing he lacks is a heal). In a pick composition though, you want Thresh to be catching people out of position

-"Death Sentence" is the main reason Thresh works so well in this archetype composition. It will keep the enemy he's caught stunned for 1.5 second and bring them closer to Thresh . When keeping mind his other abilities such as "Flay" and "The Box", he can keep someone locked down for a while

-While it doesn't engage or catch, "Dark Passage" is a great follow up tool for him to bring in an ally when he's caught somebody. In the right time frame, a player can use Death Sentence to catch the enemy then use Dark Passage near his ally while he flies toward to the enemy to bring in the ally as well

"The Box" is one of the versatile abilities in his kit. In this particular composition though, his ultimate helps follows up on any enemy he can catch. Using Death Sentence or Flay to bring them into the walls of The Box. The 99% slow follow up CC is effective for keeping them champions in place

Facing It!

A pick composition is looking to have an aggressive playstyle, using mistakes that you make against you, using your champion's vulnerabilities and effectively using their cooldowns to exploit both of these. Try to not position badly in team fights if you're one of the most vulnerable target. They're looking for that, they're waiting for you to do that. So standing behind your front line and attacking from a range is where you need to position yourself. Disengage is worth a lot when facing pick champions. Lulu, Janna, Gragas and Sivir have ways of doing that. Speed ups, Knock backs, polymorphs, mass heals, slows etc.

Out of the 3 compositional archetypes, the one that sees the most success against a pick comp is a team fighting composition. The team will mostly stick as a 5 after the early game and will try to find situations where they face the enemy in a 5 v 5 confrontation. Using superior AOE crowd control, AOE damage, low CD and sustainable damage and team fight presence they can win theoretically all of the team fights they go into when they used their cooldowns correctly. Making sure to disengage when important cooldowns are down and only fighting when cooldowns are up. By never giving the enemy a chance to assassinate a target as the team is always grouped, you reduce the effectiveness of a pick composition working. If you have a pick champion waste their cooldowns and not kill someone, that champion suddenly becomes very vulnerable and a team fighting composition can do this.

Strong Champions that work in defeating a pick composition

Conclusion

A Pick composition orientates around aggressive actions and plays across the map. Putting pressure on the lanes using early power spikes and single target damage to destroy enemy champions quickly. Making sure your roamers are controlling the game by using lane advantages to get other lanes ahead as well. Invading the enemy jungle to get aggressive wards placed so you can understand the movement of the enemy team and using that information to rotate and get objectives/kills. By doing so, your team gains the advantage across the map and you can use that to decimate team fights and control the objectives through number advantages.

There are a lot of compositions in League of Legends and its one of the many reasons for the games diversity and one of the reason we come back to the game every day. I've only gone into 3 very broad compositions here and there are a lot more intricate ones that exist. Juggermaw is a prime example of a more intricate composition which relies on specific champions to exist in the composition (etc. Kog'maw, Lulu). A lot of the times when you're in soloQ, you won't have time or the ability to communicate with your team and aim for archetype composition. You'll get champions people are comfortable with, champions that counter their lane opponent and champions that are troll for the meta (eventhough there is argument right now that in the current patch meta, there isn't a champion who can't be played).

Your aim in champion select and before the game properly begins is to see what properties your composition has. How can you utilise each champions strengths and get that end game win. Also focussing on the enemy composition and what strengths their champions have and how must you work around it. A few aspects to look at;

- Power Points: When is your champion, allied champions and enemy champions strong. Is it an item? Is it a champion's level? Orientate around that champions if its an ally and abuse that point of strength and try and avoid fighting when you know another champion has hit their spike in power

- Vital Champions: Which champions make your and theirs work. In mostly every game, every champion is strong but due to the meta and the composition your team has fell into, there is going to be one or two champions that determine the success of your team

- The Map: Where do you and your team want to fight on the map and where you don't want to. Fighting a team fight composition is incredibly scary in a 5 v 5 situation in the jungle. The small corridors make it easy for them to lock you up. While a Siege compositon is looking to fight in the lane so they can rush the turrets down and use their advantage

- Win Conditions: As a team, what's the focus of your team to win. How do you do it and how quickly do you need to do it. Whats the enemy comp's winning conditions. How do you work around it and counter it.

There are more pointers out there but these are only a few as there are thousands of compositions in League of Legends. Due to the amount of champions in the game that can be combined, a game can be completely different to the next. While I looked into 3 rather broad archetypes ad focussed on them, it doesn't mean that you can't use the same skills to identify other compositions. What are your strengths and weaknesses and focus on that. To conclude, I hope this rather long article gives you a look into 3 used compositions in League of Legends right now. My aim was for you to understand how they worked,how you dealt with them and what kind of champions fit into them. If you got to this point in the article, it means you read a reasonable amount. I hope you found the article interesting and helped you play your games. Please leave me feedback as I'm always looking to improve as how else am I going to :)

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