Snowballing is one of the most common and most powerful strategies in League of Legends. Choosing early game champions to play often results in a noticeable gold deficit within the first 10-15 minutes of the match. However, having a lead in one part of the map does not mean that the game is over. Transitioning this lead into other advantages for your team is more difficult than it sounds. In this article I will lay out some of the easiest ways to turn the one lane snowball into a team wide snowball.

Top Lane:

As a top laner, the choices have somewhat been decided already, as the majority of top laners take teleport. Once the tier one tower has been taken, and the snowballing top laner has a strong gold advantage over their top laner pushing the lane up can allow them to teleport down to the other side of the map. This allows the stronger team to have a 5v4 over the enemy team, as the opposing top laner is stuck in lane trying to get as much farm as they can in their opponent’s absence. If the opposing top laner does teleport in, they will be missing gold and experience at their tower. Also, they will not be as strong as their snowballing lane opponent, which often leads to the stronger team coming out ahead in the ensuing team fight. The opposing team cannot deal with the stronger top laner's damage or do enough damage to bring them down.

Instead of teleporting out of lane, another options is to bully the weaker laner into taking farm from their jungler or mid laner or be killed again. If the stronger top laner is able to attract the attention of the opposing team they are able to cause small windows for their team to take objectives. With a strong enough advantage a strong laner can pull two or three champions to themselves. This makes the rest of the map a three or four against the opposing teams one or two remaining laners.

Mid Lane:

Roaming is the most common way to snowball. When caught off-guard, the enemy bottom lane will not be able to respond to the power swing in their lane, which usually ends up in multiple kills, a tower, and/or dragon. Taking the middle tower and the bottom tower opens up the map for the now stronger bottom lane to roam top lane and take the reaming outer tower. Having three towers down when the opposing team has none is almost a thousand gold advantage over the other team.

Roaming top lane, instead of bottom lane, can be effective too. While, dragon is on the bottom side of the map, a successful roam top lane can free up the top laner to make teleport plays on the rest of the map. By creating room for the top laner to use, they can later roam bottom and create a five versus two or three. This can result in a couple kills, a tower, and a dragon.

The dragon is a key element to snowballing as taking it starts a timer for the other team. Instead of roaming, taking dragon with the jungler's help can easily free them up to roam top side of the map as well. So if the top lane matchup is a snowball esk one (EG: Riven, or Fiora), or if the champion can help the rest of the map (EG: Shen), delaying the roam might be a better choice.

Creating power swings in different areas of the map can be easy in lanes, it can be more effective in the jungle. With some help from their jungler, the stronger mid laner can push up and help ward the enemy jungle. This can lead to picks on the enemy jungler.

Bottom lane:

This lane is one of the most important to snowball, as there is not just one champion to benefit from the snowball, but two. Roaming as a support is one of the strongest ways to snowball, as most supports have the ability to lock down opposing players.

Another option for this lane, is to take the tower, and push the lane up as far as safely possible, then rotate mid lane. Once again, this creates room for their mid laner to move throughout the map.

A weak marksman can be detrimental to a team. The other option for this lane, would be to stay in lane as much as possible. Without the damage that would come from their marksman, the opposing team cannot contest dragons, barons, or sometimes cannot even defend their own towers. With the right warding, this can be the most powerful way to snowball a game. A three or four item Jinx can demolish a whole team when they only have one and a half items.

A word of warning though, be careful of the reverse snowball. Showing up in a lane as Kha'Zix when their Riven is extremely fed is not going to help the weak Maokai out very much. Taking care to avoid risks can increase the snowball; while taking large risks can end the game much faster, but can backfire Play smart, and good luck on the Rift.

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