Looking for Actual Advice on Winning Ranked Games

Swaggernaut42··1 votes·529 views

Hi, everyone. The reason I'm posting this is because I've been getting advice from a friend who is silver 2. I'm bronze 3 currently. I started in bronze 5 and got to bronze 1 I believe and fell back here. Anyhow, the advice he gives me is typically hindsight and as far as I've seen, probably wouldn't have helped. I believe a part of why he is ranked higher than me is because he plays with a diamond smurf. I don't really believe that's appropriate and it feels unfair to other teams so I don't take part in those games.

I've numerously beat this friend 1v1 and almost always produce a better k/d/a and the same farm. Where I think I struggle the most is decision making. I can play champions relatively well but I get caught out or engage at bad times or maybe don't go baron when it would've been ideal. My friend is quick to call it out and put the blame on me whenever something goes wrong, many times despite the fact that I'm doing very well in my lane and he is doing okay.

I've talked to him about it but he's convinced I need to take his advice and I just don't believe he's the one to be taking advice from.

Would anyone be so kind as to give me some tips? Who to play? What lane? Dealing with counter picks? When to do objectives? Some games you just lose and I understand that but I genuinely believe that I can make it to silver again.

9 Comments

Nameless Voice2 votes

One piece of advice I can give you is to focus on a small number of champions you love playing and spam them as much as possible. Knowing your champion inside and out and how to play against and beat even your counters will go a long way towards ensuring that you win your lane in most games. Particularly, learn your weaknesses and know exactly what you can get away with and when you should withdraw or not commit.

Another area to suggest is to try to play safe. Often, not dying is more important than getting a kill. If you can kill someone but know you will die for it, then you shouldn't do it unless you were going to die anyway. This mostly applies to the laning phase and small skirmishes. Later on, if you can die to make sure your team wins a teamfight and gets objectives afterwards, then that is worth it.

Try to focus on objectives. Players love to fight and kill each other, but often don't follow through on it and grab easy objectives while the opponents are dead. Winning a teamfight is only moderately useful in terms of becoming a little stronger than the enemy team - but winning a teamfight and then taking an objective or two will help you to actually win the game.

Learn map awareness. This is a really important skill that a lot of players even in higher leagues are lacking. Especially, keep an eye on your jungler when he is near your lane. Be ready to rush to defend your jungler if they get invaded. If you are jungling, keep an eye on your laners and on the position of the enemy jungler. Be ready to rush to counter an enemy gank.

Finally, try to pick a good team composition that works well together. Try to round out what your allies are picking if you can. You generally want to have at least one tank on every team. Other than that, you can try to do build specific compositions focused on poke, siege, pushing, etc.

FindingBemo1 votes

It all depends on what you play/main. For example, if you are playing top and get counterpicked, just stay back and try take as little poke as possible, but still getting as much farm as possible. Make it as easy as possible for the jungler/mid-laner to gank your lane.

I main support, so I usually try and take picks that counter the other adc and/or support. Taking Thresh against a morg and sivir botlane is not a very good idea, but I do that in normals so I know what to do in those types of situations.

The best thing that I can say is to practice a LOT in normals. I have 1600+ wins in normals, and just getting that experience has helped more than any advice I've gotten from the boards(haha) or watching videos on how to play a champ.

I hope I helped! Have a great time on the Rift!

Swaggernaut421 votes

Support is my favorite position. Braum is my favorite champion. I just never win unless I'm in a position to carry.

FindingBemo1 votes

Never think that you have to be a carry to win. Sadly, that is the way that most people in bronze/ silver and maybe even gold, think. By you doing your part as a support and protecting your carries is just as important as dishing out the most damage. Focus on what you can do better as a support and how you can help give advice to other teammates. Flaming never helps a situation, but giving/receiving helpful criticism during a game is always good.

Swaggernaut421 votes

Ok. Maybe I'll start trying some support again. Then just try to get some more awareness and knowledge of the game. Thanks.

Dolasaur1 votes

There are basically two paths. The first is to just play a ton, like the person who mentioned 1600 normals recommends. The other, and the only real option if you're already played a ton of games, is to become more self aware.

There are lots of ways to be more self aware, and the core is observation and analysis. Observation is hard when you're playing, so try out something like replay.gg or recording streams of yourself (or both). Doing it after every game might drive you crazy, but if you play 3-4 games in a night, or if you lose 2 games in a row, it can be nice to take a break from the intensity of playing.

When you're observing your old replay/stream, now is the time for analysis. Watch yourself, your opponent, and the minimap constantly. Ask yourself questions related to things that are generally good advice, like what Nameless Voice posted.

  • "After that team fight, I ran after a low enemy champion. Would it have been a better choice to take an objective?
  • "Was I watching the minimap often enough while I was extended? My ward caught the enemy jungler about 8 seconds before I started moving to safety. Maybe I could have lived there if I was checking the minimap more frequently while extended."
  • "Am I overestimating how much damage I can do? I tower dived the enemy 3 times and each time she survived with at least 100 hp."
  • "Was that trade worth it? Was the amount of damage I inflicted worth the damage I received and the CS I missed?

"Who to play? What lane?" - Pick a small number of champions for two roles (since you need to select two roles in queue), maybe 2 each. Ideally they play different team comp roles (i.e. if you like Braum, maybe your second support should be Janna or Zyra rather than Tahm Kench or Alistar). You'll need more than 2 each if your picks are popular (other team might pick first) or frequently banned. Support's a fine role to main, and you'll get faster queue times and the knowledge that you're helping out everyone else's queue times too :)

"Dealing with counter picks?" - Don't stress out over them! Many reasons for this.

  • Just because person A tells you it's a counterpick doesn't mean it's effective. It could just be that he played that matchup before and did really bad, and he blamed it on "being countered".
  • Lots of people put so much emphasis on counterpicking that they'll play champions they don't know well at all just to counter you; this gives you a huge advantage because champion experience is so much more important.
  • Some people sacrifice their own team composition in order to counter you. If the opponent picks an assassin when their team could use a tank, then the rest of your team can frequently take advantage of that (even if you're behind personally).
  • The more you play against perceived counters, the better you'll get at playing against them. You'll know exactly what they can do and when, which will help you play against them. When combined with the previous points, this can really wreck the enemy team; if they're not even gaining the lane advantage expected against you, then sacrificing personal experience and team composition is a HUGE loss for their team.

Lastly, based on other parts of what you said, you should remember that there are many paths to being successful at League. I'm a support and jungle main because my mechanics are terrible. I can't hit even 90% CS in custom games unless I'm using someone like Annie, and I lose 1v1s in most matchups even when I'm ahead. I'm Gold5, and it's quite possible I'd lose to you in a 1v1 lane matchup. That's because my strengths lie in other areas; I know how to be a good decoy, my macro awareness is good, I'm a reliable shotcaller that can get people to follow my suggestions, and I have a pragmatically positive attitude in game.

The important part of this is not to view KDA and CS as competitions, particularly in game. It's one thing to say "Hey team, Orianna killed me 3 times in lane and has 50% more CS than me. We can't team fight unless we catch her out first." That's productive. Saying "I shouldn't listen to this person because I have a better KDA" is not productive. I'm not saying you should listen to everyone who offers unsolicited advice; just make sure you don't tune them out simply because your CS is better.

Swaggernaut421 votes

Thanks for the advice. I'm definitely cooperative regardless of how the team is doing and stay positive throughout the game. I love league. I enjoy it and I wish more people realized how great the game is with positive teammates. I'll also think about those questions to ask myself more. I don't even think about it sometimes.

Swiftstrike41 votes

Quick tips that are applicable to most players in silver and bronze elo. I have just gotten my third account to Gold V and the climb I think is pretty easy once you are significantly better than your opponents. Currently on my main I sit at Gold 3, but got as high as Gold I this season

  • CS more - Your Average CS is really low for solo lanes. You should be around 150-160 average easily top or mid and 200+ at ADC.
  • KDAs don't matter too much in low Elo because it just means the person doesn't know how to win game and can stomp bad players. Win rate is more important in Bronze and Silver.
  • Play 2 roles in ranked - Limiting your roles is a quick way to improve. It looks like you play too many roles and thus you remain OK at all of them but do not excel in any of them. When you understand your role really well (by playing it over and over again) you will improve as a player because you will be focusing less on what you "should be doing as a support vs a top laner" and more on understanding EXACTLY what you should be doing. You should have one "off role". Something that you can play adequately if the circumstances call for it. E.G. I am a Top main, support secondary, but I can go mid if it is requested. I don't queue for mid often but I play the role enough in normals that I can do it in a ranked game.
  • Play 2 champions per role. Have a main champion and then a secondary champion as backup. The fewer champions you play the faster you will climb because you will understand the limits of your champion very well. I play only 5 champions in ranked at the moment.
  • Dodge games that look like the team is toxic - seriously take the 3 LP hit unless you are in your promos. It isn't worth playing a game through if people are rude in champion select
  • Don't chase kills unless you are 100% certain you can get the kill. If you aren't certain don't chase.
  • After ANY enemy death ask "can we take an objective?"
  • If you have vision of the enemy jungler on the opposite side of the map instead of near a dragon or baron, ping to take that objective. In low elo players often make really bad calls for objectives and if the enemy jungler is dead or on the other side of the map of a monster objective try to take that monster.
  • Ward - Your wards per game are low from the one support game in you states (13 and you had sightstone!). In an average game as a support you should drop about 40 wards, anything less than that is pretty poor. I usually fall on the higher side for wards (45-55 per game) than the average player but you need to actively ward as a support.
  • Stop playing LeeSin - Don't play him. He is a high skill cap champion and you are playing at a bronze level. Play lower skilled cap junglers. Also Lee Sin drops off if games are not closed out and lower elo games are just longer in general. If you want a high utility jungler go Amumu or Warwick. If you want a jungler with a mid tier skill cap go Vi.

Edit: Also I would like to reiterate like the previous poster that counter picks don't matter in low elo (Gold and Lower) because most players do not know how to capitalize on their advantages with that champion unless the main him.

Swaggernaut421 votes

Thanks. I'll try these out and see how things go. To explain the sights tone, that lane was so hectic and my adc even afk'd for awhile. Idk if it was right to just camp at my turret but I that's what I did for the most part.

Thanks!

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