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The only thing you actually need to learn to climb

Kazo Kurosu·8/27/2018, 9:59:36 AM·78 votes·18,913 views

LEARN HOW TO LET OTHERS CARRY YOU

https://my.mixtape.moe/qaibbo.png

No, seriously.

Every smarty-ass coach, garbo "high-elo" youtuber or a reddit shitposter will tell you to cs properly, take good engages, roam, play for objectives. All bullshit.

Not bullshit because they're wrong advices, dont get me wrong. Bullshit because all of these are literally useless if you're already behind. And that WILL happen more often than not. You're climbing after all. You're forced to constantly play against people (theoretically) better than you

Spoken from toplane main's perspective. You can't reasonably cs in lane when you give away a kill/enemy jungler makes a successful gank. Enemy laner will just constantly freeze or position himself between your minions and you Taking literally any engage will kill you 90% of the time. You absolutely can't roam for shit because you either get outpushed by your enemy (who then proceeds to roam faster than you and god forbid your team actually pays attention to your pings) or if you go and leave lane alone your turret will be gone in half a minute (i hate jax with passion). You also lack objective control since playing vision game vs enemy who's ahead is like asking to get 3manned in the jungle/river. Which will happen because people play smarter when they're stronger (or rather, them being ahead means that stupid decisions they would make actually turn out to be good decisions more often since they can just power-through any mistakes thanks to their gold advantage)

Now, what do i mean by "letting others carry you".

This would obviously mean that you have to put faith into your boosted-ass team which is almost never a good decision, but bear with me here. Also keep in mind that this mostly works in divisions 3 to 1 since after getting through the closterfuck that is [insert your elo] 5 and 4 means you actually have to try to get ahead yourself since people wont actually try to win most of the time. This is most visible in the "fucking shitfest" aka diamond 5, where people either got boosted to diamond and cant play there for shit or got there by themselves and don't feel like climbing anymore since diamond 5 is for some god forsaken reason considered "good enough" by most of the community.

"right op you filth but how do i actually help my team carry me"

It's mostly about mentality. You need to understand that you're a weaker than the enemy. I play either slayers (fiora, irelia) or divers (aatrox, camille). Champion classes who are pretty damn bad when they're behind, and with their current state they end up behind pretty damn often. As such I had to often force myself into understanding my position as a weak link in the team. I also had to learn to detect mistakes my opponent makes. This is especially important on champions without any realistic CC but can "outplay" your opponent, like Fiora.

Here are couple of things you need to remember if you want your team to carry you.

  • Never, absolutely never think you can beat your opponent alone. This game, especially in top lane is highly based around stat differences, much more than actual abilities. If both players play their champs to perfection and start to fight each other, the one with an additional longsword will always win. Its different with Midlane for example, since it revolves more around wave manipulation and spell rotations. Missclicking your root on ryze means you have one less combo component for 10s. Misusing riposte on fiora turns you into a wet tissue that's also on fire.
  • Search for gold wherever you can. This not only means CS'ing properly. Try to take jungle camps that your jungler doesnt need. For example, if you're on red side. Did your jungler just left top-side jungle and rotates to midlane to gank without taking krugs? You're free to take them as long as it doesnt mean that your lane opponent will just slap your turret to death. They will respawn more or less at the time when your jungler would come to gather them, assuming he will gank mid > clear bot jungle > gank bot > back > clear top jungle including krugs that would just sit there for the last 5 minutes for no reason if you wouldn't take them.
  • Care for your carry in teamfights. Your adc somehow managed to not feed his ass in the laning phase? Do everything you can to keep him alive. Since you're behind, you wont actually do any damage (if playing offensive champion) or tank anything (if defensive). Sometimes this means being a literal meatshield. Sometimes it means threatning enemy backline with good positioning (for example, as Camille, Even if you're behind, your powerful CC tool that is your ultimate can ruin enemy adc's day pretty easily while knocking back everything that would help him/her. If your team was to gank up on that adc he would die instantly). This requires practice and basic understanding of matchups so i cant really help you with that in this post.
  • Do everything to not die anymore. Can your opponent dive you under turret? Just back the fuck up. He will take your turret anyway, getting bonus 300 gold from you definitely won't help your already tragic situation. Also, dont think that dying just so your fed carry gets a kill is a good deal. He's already fed and while you're lying there, dead, enemy minions crush under your turret, meaning free gold that could be yours is being wasted. Not dying is objectively better than killing. It's like, single most important rule in this game.
  • Look for any opportunity to punish your opponents. This kinda correlates with my second point about looking for gold wherever possible. If you're playing something that moves quickly on the map (quinn for example), its disgustingly easy for you to find badly positioned enemy. Remember, you're behind. You MUST think more and better than your ahead opponents if you want to win. Look for chances. Take only those which you know for 100% will pay off.
  • Prolong the game as much as possible, even if you're playing an early game champion. Late game (as in, 5 to 6 items for everyone), many teamfights are a coin toss. In fact, in lower elos, it's easier for the team that's behind win a late-game fight than for the one that's ahead. When people are ahead, they make more mistakes. A single mistake in the late game can mean a lost game.

I could go on how to survive when you're behind, with vision game, wave management, teamcomps and matchups but it wouldn't be a Gameplay board material. Just to remind you some bullet points:

  • You're weak. Understand that, appreciate that.
  • Look for gold. Don't die for it, even it means getting gold for your fed teammate.
  • Search for opportunities. Mistakes happen. Often. Pray to lucifer that your enemies make more mistakes than you.
  • The longer the game goes, more 50/50 it becomes. letting a coin-toss decide the outcome is better than rolling a die in which 4 out of 6 sides would mean a victory for the enemy.

But perhaps most importantly, don't let it get to your head. Everybody loses from time to time. Some more often than win, and yet they still try to climb. Learn from your mistakes. Think when you're playing. Don't let yourself go on autopilot. I know it's hard. League is a very taxing game. Often even after winning you just dont feel like playing anymore, since you're so tired. Take breaks. Hour long, day long, month long if needed. Don't give up.

Stay strong. I believe in you.

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46 Comments

Wolfeur8/27/2018, 2:49:19 PM11 votes

Basically, play support for a few months and you'll understand why you need your teammates more than you need your kills.

Guzergus8/27/2018, 10:56:37 AM8 votes

Never, absolutely never think you can beat your opponent alone.

I disagree. There are certain matchups where you absolutely can beat your opponent even being 0 1 or 0 2. What's even more fun is that you actually have to try to fight your opponent 1x1 in order to understand when you can do it and when you cannot. Learning the limits of your champion is even better than playing passively the whole time.

Apart from that, really appreciate a sound advice and not another thread of bitching about how bad or unfair matchmaking is.

SwiftKitten888/27/2018, 4:17:47 PM8 votes

this thread is amazing.. there are so many times were i could have flat out carried so many's team if they took even half this advise

i mean like dude you couldn't 1v1 him when you both had zero kills, or when 2 kills up on you... he now has 9 kills on you and u still have zero. STOP FUCKING TRYING TO 1V1 HIM

now i cant even deal with him.

also... I'm not going to gank your lane if the guy is so fed that he would just 1v2 us. if u want a gank, don't make him that fed or convince mid laner to help gank with me.. because I'm not giving or shutdown gold.

also FOR THE LOVE OF GOD LEARN THAT I ALSO HAVE HARDCOUNTERS.

if im jungle and your laner hardcounters ME. YOU need to set that up. if your behind im not going near him.

im not going to pounce in a a full hp Garen

you're fucking crazy

RavenMagus8/27/2018, 1:26:22 PM8 votes

Misusing riposte on fiora turns you into a wet tissue that's also on fire.

Wouldn't being wet help with the fire situation, though?

Madsin258/27/2018, 4:08:09 PM7 votes

I would reword this a little, as getting carried by your team could be taken literally and it would just create 4v5s.

"Play around your team" would be better.

I stopped losing games and started winning more when I stopped going for hero plays 24/7 and used my team as a meat shield for my own advantage.

Lakega8/27/2018, 3:06:12 PM6 votes

I honestly can't agree with this at all... I've tried this tactic back in the day when I wasn't as good as I am now (Not saying I'm amazing, but I was worse).

WHat ends up happening?

I let them take turret because they can tower dive me, and instead I try to take some jungle camps, the crab, or help another lane

The Result: I get bitched at for giving up tower, and not trying to defend it, while the jungler bitches at me for taking his jungle, and whatever lane I'm trying to help constantly pings me ???? telling me to gtfo since I'm apparently stealing their exp and gold.... This ends up tilting my low elo teammates...

**I do my best not to die, but in doing so all I've been able to do is soft push side lanes, slowly feed myself cs, and I'm 0/3/0 avoiding fights cuz I literally will be blown up in .02 seconds and do nothing but feed gold **

The Result: I get bitched at for not helping, refusing to help the team, and everyone reports me for inting, and not working as a teammate... Even though they keep running in face checking bushes blindly and getting cought out in a 2v5, cuz apparently my weak ass will magically be able to win a 3v5...

**I do the opposite (which you kinda contradicted yourself in yoru post btw.. You can't be both a meatshield, AND avoid dieing over getting kills which you claim is the #1 rule in league. I'll try to push the backline away, usually getting blown up but wasting alot of their skills and even eating an ult or two, giving my team a distinct advantage to some degree while their backline adc is pushed away **

THe Result: My team see's me go in, get blown up despite pushing them away, and despite 2 ults, and their adc being blown, or pushed back, they all pull back and not take the advantage, and bitch I'm inting, and trolling, and get 5 way reported....

I have many other examples, but yea you get the point... This simply doesn't work dude... The only way I've found that works is getting better at csing, and ouplaying my opponent, while learning what NA is horribly shitty at.. Macro play..

Succubús GF8/27/2018, 11:43:07 AM5 votes

You see you say that, but when pros stop playing soloq because of how dogshit matchmaking it is, it makes climbing look like an even bigger joke

DeadUnborn8/27/2018, 3:59:12 PM3 votes

in my experience in order to climb consistently you have to be the one carrying the game, since your MMR will be higher than most other people in the room and to compensate the game will purposely put less experienced players on your team

BIFF8/27/2018, 12:49:19 PM2 votes

This the true "HOW TO CLIMB POST". 8/10 Would be 10/10 if you had added. "/mute all"

Im a firm believer that rank is directly tied to toxicity and chat participation.

DemainaNyx8/28/2018, 12:43:35 AM2 votes

This works in bot lane too. I play aggressive poke supports mostly, and occasionally there will be a game where the enemy jungler and ADC are a duo and despite the enemy bot lane being at 20% hp all lane, the enemy jungler or mid laner will show up and double kill us. In those cases, you just let the ADC get CS and try to poke but stop trying to kill the enemy and just expect the jungler is sitting in that river bush or just over that wall or whatever. I've had games where the entire enemy team is bot lane getting a double kill and our top or mid laner are taking inhibs. Baffles me, but you learn to go with it.

You're 1/8/10 but you win. That's all that matters.

You kinda touched on it, but also learn to do stuff while being behind. As a Brand or Zyra I might caught and will instantly R and spam my other abilities so I do as much damage before I die. And yeah, most of the time I die and my team gets 3 for 1 if not 4 or 5. Top laners may not have the same AOE capability, but there's probably something they can do to either do damage or catch someone. Getting a Riposte on someone trying to kill your ADC might not stun, but it slows their attack speed so your ADC might win that. Or just a Jax using E and running at the enemy team at least zones some for those few seconds while hopefully your team can kill whoever the enemy teams tank/diver is.

As Lulu, I chased a Ryze out of a teamfight because I would poly morph him when he got close and ult to knock him up if he got in range of anyone. If the fed enemy midlane is being zoned by a low level enchanter support, that's the most free teamfight ever.

Same goes for any other position, be as annoying as you can be despite being behind cause at the very least you're providing pressure that the enemy team has to play around. No one complains about Janna being OP because she one shots them, they complain because she negates too much. Be like that. Be annoying. I had a game where I was a Karma and I literally got caught multiple times, but used Karma's RW to keep getting health back and kiting away until my team came. We won the game because the enemy Urgot used his ult on me instead of our ADC because I was THAT frustrating to play against. I wasn't dying and it annoyed him so he took me out instead of the real threat. That's your goal when behind, be something that absorbs cooldowns from the enemy so your damage dealers don't have to.

ExpStealer8/27/2018, 4:45:51 PM2 votes

Yeah, well, can't win with a Katarina, Tryndamere and Udyr against a team comp in which 4 out of 5 champions have at least one ability that forces them to sit in one place and the fifth one has a real fucking strong slow. It's just lost in champ select 'cause we get CCed and AoEd into the next century without any way to counter.

In pro play such a situation would be turned into a 24/7 power splitpush on both sidelanes with simultaneous picks where possible, but good luck explaining that to a Katarina that only knows how to spam ping. [sg-ahri-3]

Your advice is correct, though in most cases your team ends up feeding themselves and you can't do anything about it. If they started stalling it'd be K, but nah, better scream "SPARTA" and go 1v5.

Whisperwind238/27/2018, 5:20:51 PM2 votes

thats based on the premise that your teammates arent feeding which most of the time they are.

SuperNova00798/28/2018, 3:30:00 AM1 votes

Hey I am getting over whelmed by the huge blocks of text I am seeing in these comments and the main thread itself. Can you organize your thoughts in concise paragraphs that are divided by spaces? I scrolled passed everything you wrote I was so overwhelmed but I want to know what you have to say I am open to any advice to add to my collection.

I read the beginning paragraph. Yes it is all BS. Because they do not tell you HOW to cs better. or HOW to position better. They just tell you to do it because they lazy asf.

example,

Stuff (space here) stuff continues 👍👍

Solutate Smurf8/28/2018, 4:22:01 AM1 votes

If i can get a team that just sits under tower and never dies the game would be more fun as a jungler. Rather you be down 20-30 cs then the enemy team have 6 kills on you

d4rkshock8/28/2018, 5:43:14 AM1 votes

It's a paradox thing. It's a ifYasuo in on your team, it's a trashuo and if he's on the enemy team, be will be capable on getting 1v5 pentakills. Also I climbed on my own just by playingShyvana jg from b5 to b1 and I'm hardstuck b1 now. I'll get out eventually. If your not there, I'm not going fo them if they are at tower. I also farm if I'm doing nothing. If I'm on the other S de of the map, I'm not ganking. If dragon is up, I don't care if it's a you die 5v1 and all the kills are on me. I'm taking dragon. Objectives>kills. If your feeding, I'm not ganking. Also by playing jg, th game can go 1 of 3 ways. I get fed and just give every building and enemy champion the legendary za warudo knife road roller da combo. My team gets fed off of my ganks, or I get stomped and we lose.

Ionian Vulpix8/27/2018, 4:32:44 PM1 votes

Stop feeding sounds rude, but it is good advice. The less gold the enemy gets from you, the better.

Linna Excel8/27/2018, 4:36:53 PM1 votes

I've heard diamond and challenger level players talk about this from time to time on youtube.

crispy668/27/2018, 6:06:26 PM1 votes

This gets posted really frequently

Norglics8/27/2018, 7:19:51 PM1 votes

start shittalk to enemy , so they will get angry and focus you -> teamfights 2-3 enemy will be chasing your ass while your 4 mates should finish off 2-3 enemies easily

PowerSlave9938/27/2018, 8:52:08 PM1 votes

Ashe 0/12 adc

So I need to learn how to let her carry?

Meep Man8/27/2018, 8:53:40 PM1 votes

Teamwork you say? In the League community?

Lohrr8/27/2018, 9:11:25 PM1 votes

First, just because they currently have a higher MMR than you, it doesn't mean they're going to play better. It could be their last game of the day where they're kinda getting burnt and not playing their best. It's just a number... a statistic. If you are better than them, then your MMR will rise over time above theirs (if the system developed to calculate MMR is accurately depicting the better players - not saying it is or isn't). It sounds like you're trying to learn a lesson in humility; I can't beat my opponent so ... you ask for help from your team. You're not going to win without them anyway, nor are they going to win without you, so it benefits both of you for them to give you good advice. In low elo, especially accounts where their elo / level is not earned, you will run into lots of people who would rather yell and complain about their team mates instead of winning. In those games, it really is a 4v5, and good luck (reality is you suffer because your whole team gets punished for their behavior). I made a mistake in the not too distant past where I wasn't getting beat on top lane and didn't ask for help fast enough, so I couldn't only chat "conceding turret" and walk away.. I should have asked for help earlier, but was in that state of not having time to chat because I was constantly being engaged. Also, I would argue that they didn't make a mistake if they could "power through it" using their gold advantage. Being ahead means you can do things that you wouldn't be able to do if you were behind. It's why snowballing happens. And long games don't always make for a 50/50. Longer games benefit some champs and punish others (Nasus with 2k stacks is rough to get, but in a long enough game is inevitable). You're obviously upset about a match, and, until you can let go of the emotion, you really shouldn't go on to another match (in an identical next matchup, you'll just make more mistakes there trying to prove that your mistakes weren't mistakes). Once you've reached a point where you can watch the replay of the match where you got upset, see what happened, and understand why you failed (your team lost -> your team failed + your part of the team -> you failed). Then you actually get better. BTW, if you're really playing to Lucifer, shouldn't you capitalize his name?

Vlada Cut8/27/2018, 10:07:58 PM1 votes

Not only that... but also to accept that not everything can be like you, not everything can go according to your plans, they are not your team, you are THE team. It's what Ranked Flex and Aatroy's quote taught me. Sometimes it's.nice to see tze team's carry carry the team, oh boy how fast they grow...

Blades in Exile8/27/2018, 10:29:04 PM1 votes

Im gonna leave a comment here so I can go back to this thread whenever I get the resolve to start climbing, This seems like good advice so I cant wait to try it out.

I Smell Pizza8/27/2018, 10:55:05 PM1 votes

So I read this post this morning and said "fine Ill try it". got so chill music playing and played support and climbed from g5 to g4. seriously great tips!

BigFBear8/28/2018, 1:24:23 AM1 votes

This is one of the best guides ever posted here. I can totally agree. Too often you think you can make the same plays like every game although you are behind this game. People just look at their own stats and think "ahh shoot... 2/6/0! I have to kill something to be viable again! I have to carry!" No you DONT! You don't see that one of your teammates is carrying. Just support HIM instead of making risky plays by your own and die. You are not the centre of THIS match... Accept it. Maybe next game. My No. 1 advice is "PATIENCE". You need to be patient. I know it's hard in a 45 min. game where you seem to lose. You're starting to get impatient. You think ah fuck this game... NEXT. You start making stupid engages just because you are bored and want something to happen. I do this! But believe me. THIS are the games that make you climb if you win them. Just wait. Play save, don't waste your flash and active item CD in dumb maneuvers because you are bored. Wait and the enemy will make a mistake. Someone will be splitted from his team or something.... You will instantly know when they make a mistake and you will instantly know "NOW is the time for my flash + Ult + Active item". It's like playing poker and getting shit cards for 2 hours. At some point you start playing this shitcards cause you are bored. And then you will lose all your money. You can bluff when you are fed, but when you're behind just wait for your Pocket Aces. (speaking about LoL. In real poker you have to bluff from time to time even if you are behind).

P.S. No. 2 Advice. If your teammates is splitpushing because you can't win teamfights. Let him! Don't think you are Faker and make risky moves on midlane while 4vs5. Just stay the fuck away from them. Remember they can engage with flash. Just don't get caught!