(Warning! Wall-text alert!)
Season 3 ended, and in its last days I didn't feel the urge to play no-stop to raise my rating or league.
(A minute of silence for a friend who didn't manage to pass the wall between Silver and Gold. You deserved more than 0 LP per win. You may be silver outside, but you sure are gold on the inside!)
On the contrary, I was so relaxed that I spent more time playing Hearthstone than LoL.
As a "former" World of Warcraft and Magic: The Gathering player, I was really excited of the beta key I managed to receive at Lucca Comics & Games. And here I am, totally caught by this new game. BLZURD STAHP! But let's go back to LoL.
In S2 I started at 930 rating (deep Bronze of course) and reached the highest ELO of 1210: the bare minimum to be classified as Silver (it was a very close call!!). It's been a long and desperate trip.
Preseason time, the ELO reset bringed me up to 1250, and after the placement games I was listed... Silver, with a rating of 1292. In the preseason games I dropped to 1172.
S3 came, and I was thrown into the Silver V division. Better than expected, to be very honest. Game by game I managed to climb the ladder even tho I didn't play that much, and as the season ends now I find myself in Gold IV.
The time has come to ask myself the question: did I make it?
Did I finally climb out of the ELO Hell?
Well some time ago I found a tweet who was citing a reddit quote (et cetera et cetera) which I found really inspiring:
"Elo Hell is like traffic.
Everyone thinks they are in it, when they actually ARE it."
That's it. There's no ELO Hell. I should know, I visited it and drawed a map of its circles, too XD
There are players who are so bad, they can ruin a game all by themselves.
Flamers and ragequitters do exist and lower your chances of winning by 80%.
Blame the jungler and blame the support are #1 and #2 excuses for losing a lane, respectively.
Getting sick of your teammates and wanting to surrender @ 20 without even trying is a harsh but common reality.
But I found all and if possible more of these things in both bronze and silver. And in gold it was no different.
What changed for sure was my playstile, my attitude towards my fellow teammates and the conciousness of my errors. (Correcting them is a different story, I will have a hard time working on this!!)
What can I tell from my games history? I must thank Nami and Janna who totally carried me. That is, the characters I am most confident with. I can play them better than anything else and know their abilities and weakpoints very well. I was able to win lanes and contributing to the victory of many games 'cause of that.
On my experience I can totally suggest to master 2-3 characters per role one can play and focus on these ones to improve both playstile and rating.
Many will not agree. And it's ok with that. Someone could try a new character in ranked for the first time and still carry games (THE MECHANICS ARE AMAZING!).
But players like me, who don't feel confident with 3/4 of the available characters, should probably limit themselves to their very best heroes of choice in ranked queues.
I continue seeing some people I know still struggling in bronze, trying hard to improve their rating and play, but almost never blaming themselves when they lose a game. (Typical sentence: "I was 20/1/7! And I still lost the game, noob teammates feeders and leavers!!")
I didn't blame myself a lot, too. This is also a weak point which I want to improve in the coming season.
But I learned that a game is never really lost until the very end. Or, as a friend of mine says, "A game is only lost when the nexus is down".
A positive team spirit, the will to cooperate and help each other: that's what wins games. It really does. In Summoner's Rift, not just in Happy Rainbow Land. Encouraging a failing teammate instead of crucifying him for his errors has always proven to be a worthy choice. My team was able to completely turn the fate of an apparently lost game due to good team presence and fights. "In late we trust", as I said once XD and it worked. As a support, not only can I help my team by playing well, but also by supporting the team spirit.
I also realized (well there was no real wonder in that, to be honest) that a good warding can, in every game phase, give a huge advantage even when your team is behind in farm, turrets and kills. I never had a full build as a support, not even in 60-minutes-long games, 'cause the majority of my gold was spent in wards and oracles. And it was good as it was.
"Whoa whoa wait: are you trying to give us suggestions? You're still a little nab, don't you know?"
Oh I surely am. But sometimes pointing out the most basic notions can be helpful, too. So why not? :)
Last but not least, I am really excited to see what will happen in the preseason, with all the changes they planned for supports.
I'll have to learn the mechanics from scratch again :V
Oh well, I'm ready. I really like the feeling of having build choices depending on situation, hero and playstyle. I guess the meta will point out the strongest combinations soon, anyway :p and some items / trinkets will soon become a must!
No matter what the new meta will be, I will continue cheering up my teammates as much as I can, even though my work often remains in the shadow.
I want to end this needlessly long post with one of my favourite mottos, which also sums up the spirit of good team cooperation:
See you at the start of the preseason :)
That's it. There's no ELO Hell. I should know, I visited it and drawed a map of its circles, too XD
There are players who are so bad, they can ruin a game all by themselves.
Flamers and ragequitters do exist and lower your chances of winning by 80%.
Blame the jungler and blame the support are #1 and #2 excuses for losing a lane, respectively.
Getting sick of your teammates and wanting to surrender @ 20 without even trying is a harsh but common reality.
But I found all and if possible more of these things in both bronze and silver. And in gold it was no different.
What changed for sure was my playstile, my attitude towards my fellow teammates and the conciousness of my errors. (Correcting them is a different story, I will have a hard time working on this!!)
The Ward Call is too strong to be resisted!
What can I tell from my games history? I must thank Nami and Janna who totally carried me. That is, the characters I am most confident with. I can play them better than anything else and know their abilities and weakpoints very well. I was able to win lanes and contributing to the victory of many games 'cause of that.
On my experience I can totally suggest to master 2-3 characters per role one can play and focus on these ones to improve both playstile and rating.
Many will not agree. And it's ok with that. Someone could try a new character in ranked for the first time and still carry games (THE MECHANICS ARE AMAZING!).
But players like me, who don't feel confident with 3/4 of the available characters, should probably limit themselves to their very best heroes of choice in ranked queues.
I continue seeing some people I know still struggling in bronze, trying hard to improve their rating and play, but almost never blaming themselves when they lose a game. (Typical sentence: "I was 20/1/7! And I still lost the game, noob teammates feeders and leavers!!")
I didn't blame myself a lot, too. This is also a weak point which I want to improve in the coming season.
But I learned that a game is never really lost until the very end. Or, as a friend of mine says, "A game is only lost when the nexus is down".
A positive team spirit, the will to cooperate and help each other: that's what wins games. It really does. In Summoner's Rift, not just in Happy Rainbow Land. Encouraging a failing teammate instead of crucifying him for his errors has always proven to be a worthy choice. My team was able to completely turn the fate of an apparently lost game due to good team presence and fights. "In late we trust", as I said once XD and it worked. As a support, not only can I help my team by playing well, but also by supporting the team spirit.
I also realized (well there was no real wonder in that, to be honest) that a good warding can, in every game phase, give a huge advantage even when your team is behind in farm, turrets and kills. I never had a full build as a support, not even in 60-minutes-long games, 'cause the majority of my gold was spent in wards and oracles. And it was good as it was.
Sightstone, sight wards, vision wards, oracles: this is (or was, after S3) the only support's build!
"Whoa whoa wait: are you trying to give us suggestions? You're still a little nab, don't you know?"
Oh I surely am. But sometimes pointing out the most basic notions can be helpful, too. So why not? :)
Last but not least, I am really excited to see what will happen in the preseason, with all the changes they planned for supports.
I'll have to learn the mechanics from scratch again :V
Oh well, I'm ready. I really like the feeling of having build choices depending on situation, hero and playstyle. I guess the meta will point out the strongest combinations soon, anyway :p and some items / trinkets will soon become a must!
No matter what the new meta will be, I will continue cheering up my teammates as much as I can, even though my work often remains in the shadow.
I want to end this needlessly long post with one of my favourite mottos, which also sums up the spirit of good team cooperation:
support the support!
See you at the start of the preseason :)
Just a little sketch I made in some spare time at work. Sushi-Zombie Nami was also my idea
for the Zombie Hero Harrowing contest, but I had no time to put up some real art.
for the Zombie Hero Harrowing contest, but I had no time to put up some real art.
