Climbing in Solo Queue can be tougher than it seems, especially during times where you may feel that you aren't improving at all. There are times where you may not be actively improving in terms of mechanics or just general game sense, but that doesn't mean that you can't teach yourself a few new tricks. Here are just a few tips that really helped me to optimize my gameplay and climb the ladder faster.

1. Use the "Select Champions Only" Keybind:

Here's something that not many people know about but, in my experience, is one of the more useful features of the game - the keybind that ignores all minions. It does exactly what the name implies - minions are treated as if they aren't there - at least for your cursor. This allows you to easily target champions that may be hiding within a minion wave, or save you the embarrassment of auto attacking a tower while diving the enemy. This same button also prevents you from targeting allied champions, which may help you to secure a kill with champions that can target both allies and enemies with a single ability, such as Tahm Kench, Lulu, or Nami. Just assign it to a key that's easily accessible and pretty soon you'll be able to hit every single targetted spell or auto attack without failure.

2. Play Safe/Allow Yourself to Get Carried:

A lot of times I see people with the mentality that they absolutely need to carry their team, or else they won’t win at all. By doing this, they take unnecessary risks in a lane that they might’ve already lost, and, in turn, actually end up putting their team further behind and in some cases lose their team the game. Learning to drop your ego and just play safe, even if that means giving up a few waves of cs, is much better than the alternative. Think about it logically, if you had to carry every game to get to where you are now, then your teammates should have had to do the same- just sit back and try to make their load a bit lighter.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't try to cs at all though, try to take a gauge on your situation. Who's your lane opponent? If it's a snowball reliant champion such as Riven or Zed, you may only be able to give up a single kill before being relegated to your tower. If it's a weaker laner or not as strong early, you could probably get away with trying to cs normally until you hit around 2 deaths. Any more than that and I strongly suggest that you refrain from leaving turret range. If you've already given up 4 kills, I really recommend that you try to go anywhere but your own lane without an ally there. At this point, it'll be nearly impossible for you to cs properly without dying, and you're definitely better off trying to make an impact on lanes other than your own.

3. Take Blue Trinket:

One thing that a lot of people seem to be forgetting to do is upgrade their trinkets into a blue trinket later in the game. Blue trinket is better in almost every situation than green trinket right now. I'd argue that unless you're the support or jungler, you should definitely take blue trinket as soon as possible. It allows you to watch objectives without having to worry about even going near them, as well as dismantling champions whose kits are based around flanks or surprise ultimates, such as Nunu or Fiddlesticks. The amount utility that this free upgrade provides is just truly immense, especially in lower elos where good vision is very hard to come by.

4. Learn How to Trade in Lane:

The simplest way of landing skillshots in lane actually doesn’t involve some kind of godlike mechanical prowess. It’s fairly simple, just aim your skillshots at them while they’re in an animation of some sort. The most common animation that freezes champions in place is the auto attack animation. Fire away while they’re attacking a minion; this is almost guaranteed to hit them as they can’t do anything else until their animation has completed. Using this to your advantage, especially on champions with skills that pierce through minions like Cassiopeia or Brand. It can really make the difference between a lost laning phase and a won one.

If you're playing a ranged champion, trading is pretty simple. The most basic way of trading is by auto attacking them whenever they walk into your range. This might take a while, especially on champions on the shorter end of the range spectrum, but if you remain patient and don't get greedy, you're eventually guaranteed some free hits on your opposing laner.

Trading as a melee far and away the most difficult out of all of the classes. While most have long range abilities that can be used to poke, the few that don't have an incredibly hard time dealing with their ranged counterparts. There really isn't an easy trick to laning as a melee into ranged match-up, you just need to know what opportunities you can take and when they pop up. As for melee into melee matchups, it's essentially the same as playing a ranged champion - auto attack them when they're in your auto attack range.

5. Ignore Counters and Play What You're Good at:

People seem to be obsessed with counter picks whenever they play draft pick. This really shouldn't be what you worry about in champ select. You're much more likely to win a champion that you can play well on and is countered by its lane opponent than on a champion that you aren't as proficient with but counters your opponent. That being said, if you're good at a champion that also counters the opposing champion, you might want to lean towards that one while deciding on what to play.

6. Remember to Use Consumables:

Potions can and have saved lives. But, they aren't just for sustaining in the laning phase. You'd be surprised at how much help a potion can provide when you use it at the beginning of a teamfight. It could honestly make the difference between a won fight and a lost one. 150 hp (or 175 if you take the "Secret Stash" mastery) during a mid-game team fight can nullify the damage of the majority of the spells in the game at that point, excluding ultimates. The extra hp you gain can also save you while kiting, those two or three extra auto attacks it allows you to tank can mean a kill for you (or your opponent if you didn't use a potion). It's a purchase that's cheap and efficient, you should try to use it to give you that slight edge in a fight. Who knows how far it'll take you.

Conclusion

These tips should definitely help you in your ranked games; even if it's not noticeable at first. If you keep them in mind and turn them into habits, I promise you that you will notice some major improvements in your own gameplay. Hopefully you'll notice the improvements sooner rather than later, but nonetheless I wish you luck on the rift.

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