What do you need to be good at League of Legends? Well, it’s certainly more than you think! Join us as we break down the things you need to know to be successful across every role in League!
There are just some irreplaceable skills that you need in League of Legends to succeed as a player. Naturally, some benefit more than others, but what we’re going into today is a wide foundational layout of the techniques you need regardless of your role.
I can hear your collective groaning already readers. Yes, we’re starting this guide out with having a positive mental attitude because it genuinely works. League of Legends is a team game. Long gone are the metas where a single Champion or role can absolutely steam roll the game off of one kill alone. And as the years have gone by, Riot has granted players ways to help combat their deficits and overcome the one man armies that some suspicious 87% winrate 7.5 KDA Master Yi’s can be in Silver.
But, before you can even begin to utilize the resources provided to you, you can’t lose hope when games start going south. You are the single most consistent factor in every game of League of Legends you play, and if you bring your positive voice and competitive presence to each and every game you play, you’re more than likely going to not only lift your teammates up but you’re also going find yourself in the driver’s seat of the game in terms of tempo and play calling. And it all starts with you being mentally strong through your unwavering faith in your teammates and your ability to win.
Supports and Jungle Mains might feel like they can get away with this one, because they truly don’t have to try as hard as the other roles do to be successful across their games, but Minions are the most consistent source of income in the entire game. If you’re being requested to push a lane after a gank, or you’re standing around in lane while your ADC runs back from base, then you should be last hitting those creeps that would otherwise go uncaught. Why? Well, income is naturally important to every role in League, even those like Support that operate off of less than everyone else.
An extra bit of gold here and there can translate into you backing and returning with a full item over a component vs. your opponents. Or, you may be able to use a pink ward to avoid that planned gank the enemy Jungler was trying to pull off. And it all came off the back of the fact you were able to catch the minions from the last wave you held or pushed forward.
And all of this goes doubly so for Top, Mid, and ADC. Your guys’ entire success in the game depends on your income vs. the enemy laner’s. With Minions being the most safe and efficient way to gain income in League, then it’s natural you want to have mastered your acclimation of wealth on your chosen Champions. Further, tie your skillful last hitting with a deep understanding on how to manipulate the waves and set up the various pushes and freezes that can be propped up in your lane, and on that alone you’re likely to ascend to the next division from where you currently are.
Naturally, the Support makes up the bulk of the warding in League. But, as we’ve mentioned, League is a team game, and if you can eliminate the need for your Support to ward extensively around your position, you’re opening them up to look for other opportunities to make picks, get ganks off, or setup objectives that would otherwise be too risky to attempt due to the lack of map wide information.
All this naturally can be cured with a simple tactic. Whenever you back, buy a Pink Ward/Control Ward, and place it as soon as you return to lane, even if it’s not an efficient spot. Why? Well, most mains of Jungle and Support will know the common warding paths and will be looking to clear or gank through those areas throughout the early game. You getting your vision down, even in an inopportune spot, creates a potential outlet for information. Even the briefest moment where a roamer easily catches the ward out creates a 4-auto attack timer to make a play. And while that might not sound like a lot, there are a plethora of Champions that can instantly jump in and take advantage of the fact that they see they have the power/safety advantage in lane. So, make it your effort to always ward up around your lane through the lane phase, and then even doubly so when it comes to just dropping a pink during the Mid to Late game. Randomly acquired info is better than no acquired info.
This one seems simple, but you’d be surprised how often these things go lacking, even at the professional level. In fact, one of the biggest criticisms for NA’s performance at Worlds was their pacivity around cooldown opportunities. But what do I mean by this?
Well, while the narrowed picture is referring to Flash and other important Summoner Spells that have lengthy cooldowns, the broad canvas here captures both that and ability tacking. Let’s utilize an example:
Say you’re in Bot playing Jinx-Lulu into Twitch-Blitz. Blitz, knowing that he needs to beat Lulu now or otherwise get outscaled, goes aggressive, pops his movespeed steroid and shoots for a hook. He whiffs wide and then hobbles his way back towards his starting spot. What should Lulu be doing at this time?
Well, she should be playing more forward and contesting every bit of CS that Twitch attempts or otherwise punishing Blitz should he be playing forward without his hook. Why, when he also has his knock up to play off of? Well, because at the start of Lulu’s aggressive positioning, she’s playing with 4 out of 4 of her abilities while Blitz has 3. This puts her at a resource advantage. So, assuming things like Health Pools are relatively even, she can step forward while Blitz’s hook is on cooldown to look to stack up her Support item and otherwise pester Twitch on his attempts to farm safely. Later down the line this situation may open the opportunity to go super aggressive should Blitz whiff again or should Twitch overstep when having been chunked out by Lulu. Cooldown tracking Blitz’ Q and playing to poke and be aggressive around its cooldown is what brings the victory here.
And you can translate this to any other examples in other lanes. Aatrox just randomly cycled his Q on the wave to clear, well he’s down his primary damage now, start fighting. Akali popped her shroud to gain energy to clear the wave, well now you can go aggro without worrying about her being extra evasive. These are things to consider when stepping up your cooldown tracking game beyond Summoner Spells.
Besides mechanical skill, League requires knowledge of the various items and effects in the game. And while sites like Probuilds and U.GG are excellent at helping carve out consistent templates to play around, what will really up your game play is knowing how to adapt your builds and runes to what has been presented to you in game.
For example, say we’re playing Soraka Support and the enemy locks in Blitzcrank. The game before you played against a Lux and decided to take Second Wind in your Resolve secondaries. That was an excellent call against Lux since you’re regaining some of the health she pokes away with her E, but when you went to the next game against Blitz, you didn’t think to adapt your runes because you had your Keystone set from the previous match. But Blitz catches you early and since you maintained Second Wind between your games, you were far squisher than expected since you were packing Bone Plating and thus you were forced to flash away from the successful hook. Moments later, you get hooked in and die because Blitz abused the fact you didn’t have Flash. (See our Cooldown talk above!)
It’s situations like these where if you take the time to be a little bit more aware and calculated in the Draft Phase, you can minimize risk or missteps in game, and maybe open yourself to unique turnaround opportunities or mitigate what otherwise would have been a negative outcome for you.
Thinking now about items, say you’re going against a Senna-Seraphine lane. This is extremely squishy, but it’s got a ton of sustain and shielding. You make the smark call to pick up Second Wind this time to help soak the poke they’ll throw down, but you also adjust your build path in game to rush an early Oblivion Orb into a Putrefier to mitigate their healing. The effect moments later then enables you to beat past a trade that otherwise would’ve been in their favor had Senna not been suffering from Grevious Wounds. This adjustment and awareness on your part established tempo and allowed you to create an avenue to find success in the game. If you had followed a standard build path, you may have lost the trade or given up a kill because you couldn’t dissuade them from continuing to fight through their regeneration.
So, always be aware of what items you can slot in and how early you can slot them based on their gold efficiency and effects to really turn the tide in your games. Additionally, be aware of your rune and Keystone choices. Naturally, playing to your Champion’s default strengths is fine. But there are flexible adaptations to be made if you know your Champ has a scope of how the lane is supposed to play out.
So, there you have it folks:
With all these pointers in hand, you should be well on your way to finishing out the season strong. Implant these concepts into your play with awareness driven practice, and eventually you’ll accomplish all these without even thinking. That’s all for now folks, good luck on the final push for the season!
