im so sick of this snowball meta

Bard to Believe·May 25, 2017·65 votes·4,144 views

every game is fucking stomp either in my favor or other teams.

its not fucking fun watching some guy go 15/2 in 10 minutes because of the way this game is geared that whoever gets gold lead/turret first blood now instantly wins.

i can't even fucking say its my noobs teammates faults. because i see them play okay, but there's just so much fucking bullshit to come back from behind if you die even ONCE in the first 4 minutes.

i've lost almost 6 in a row over the past 4 days because of this ridiculous snowball meta.

im so tired of one lane getting beat and costing the whole team the game because that one guy who got fed can now walk through EVERYONE on the team unless your team has great communication and coordination.

this game is not fun anymore, and 90% of the time i get into lobbies im thinking "well one of them is gonna feed anyway"

88 Comments

obsesseMay 25, 201722 votes

This isn't a snowball meta. One enemy champ can be extremely strong and very far ahead but they will never be so far ahead that your team can't kill them. In season 3, it didn't matter if they grouped with their strongest member or if you collapsed on them or anything really, if they got ahead and were the better player then they could 1v5 carry the game. Now there are so many things you probably take for granted to catch players back up when they fall behind.

Knowing how to play from behind will get you loads more elo. My guess is that you're winning and losing games without knowing why you're actually winning or losing games. Of course it's always better to be ahead in gold and map pressure, but it still takes one team to break the base and end the game.

AvienalMay 26, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2017-05-25T22:29:00.133+0000)

This isn't a snowball meta. One enemy champ can be extremely strong and very far ahead but they will never be so far ahead that your team can't kill them. In season 3, it didn't matter if they grouped with their strongest member or if you collapsed on them or anything really, if they got ahead and were the better player then they could 1v5 carry the game. Now there are so many things you probably take for granted to catch players back up when they fall behind.

Knowing how to play from behind will get you loads more elo. My guess is that you're winning and losing games without knowing why you're actually winning or losing games. Of course it's always better to be ahead in gold and map pressure, but it still takes one team to break the base and end the game.

Lets go over the logic.

Can alot of 'common pick' champions do sizable range poke with high amounts of damage, especially pre level 3? Yes.
Are some of the champions using a beyond the standard build for what they do (cough cough)because they can pump out HUGE amounts of damage with straight up cheap damage items that is also due to them having a 'kit' that lets them easily disrupt a enemy hard or stick on them so hard they can melt thru enemies who do not have someone to disrupt them. While some other said champions have kits that let them get away with very strong early game damage and become so tankie they can dive under turrets? Yes
Is your team constantly not understanding that instead of rushing or saving up for , they should change tactics on build pathing and aim for a item like or similar items with low cost 'build items' to be able to trade back just as much damage against said EZ snowball type champions, especially if they can make use of scaling on their own raw damage stats to melt thru the early game abuser champion(s)? Yes
Is said scummy ADC able to oust you out of your lane then quickly first tower rip apart your turret, especially if the jungler joined in and is something along the lines of a or who can rip thru towers relatively well after either massacring your lane ? Yes.

Part of the issue that resulted in this include the limitation to wards(Basically thanks to control wards, scum champ can easily kill off wards and have the jungler buddies or themselves hide in the bush as soon as a player is forced to face check to clean out the control ward or just let the jungler EZ snowball ins while regular wards especially in early game don't allow enough stock even when control wards are not present to keep enough vision about before one can buy a sight stone and allows some enemy laners to use push hiding tactics to poke harass you while you are unable to properly 'target' or skill shot them without them hiding on the very 'edge' of the push to avoid said skillshot) , certain champions are STILL being part of the able to lane better because of using 2 items which should not be early-earlymid item pick ups, some champions get the combination of wave clear and mobility so they can easily jungle much faster, get the ganks much sooner and because they don't really need that much itemization for damage and can do considerable damage and even use said 'mobility' to jump over walls and CC enemies with fear or massive knock back effects, they end up just making matches unfun if the opponent does not pick a powerful counter jungler or laner who can counter out champions who are insanely good with bursting out damage.

The new Rift herald helps emphasize this even further where a jungler with insane clear and could also gank and pick up gold fast can quickly snowball pick up that and just basically auto delete a turret or two if the enemy team doesn't quickly abandon some turrets to take it out (easily leaving other turrets open for the rest of the team to melt the other turrets that were 'opened up'.

Riot was talking about doing the update for 'diver' based champions and again because now that AD assassins have been addressed for the most part, they need to start looking towards rushing out fixes to deal with the common culprits in dominating matches of particular junglers, get rid of the Lucian build, probably re design Draven to let him stop getting such a repetitive empowered auto gimmick that lets him 'repeat' it indefinitely by catching the axes at no extra cost, his passive just lets him snowball that much harder because of how much the gold piles up just from the first 'kill' he does and he still has his R which by his simple rush attack damage first method, lets all his moves hit hard, give little care on having 'crits or attack speed and just uses it as a extra boon then having it actually necessary for him.'

Really wished Lucian 'nerfs' were coming on next week's update and take out some of Draven's power in his Q and W since that is part of the main culprits that let him pull off his EZ mobility run around and empowered damage chunking Q rushing shenanigans.

[slayer-jinx-unamused]

obsesseMay 26, 20176 votes

It's extremely hard to read your post. It's mostly in English (I think), but it feels like you're saying a lot of things but not actually connecting the dots in between them.

Also, you've only addressed two champions. In a snowball meta, everyone should be trying to snowball their lane. Don't get me wrong, in your elo it's basically win lane win game, but this concept doesn't persist throughout all ranks.

ThefrostyvikingMay 26, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2017-05-25T22:29:00.133+0000)

This isn't a snowball meta. One enemy champ can be extremely strong and very far ahead but they will never be so far ahead that your team can't kill them. In season 3, it didn't matter if they grouped with their strongest member or if you collapsed on them or anything really, if they got ahead and were the better player then they could 1v5 carry the game. Now there are so many things you probably take for granted to catch players back up when they fall behind.

Knowing how to play from behind will get you loads more elo. My guess is that you're winning and losing games without knowing why you're actually winning or losing games. Of course it's always better to be ahead in gold and map pressure, but it still takes one team to break the base and end the game.

Why hello!

I just wanted to let you know that if a single carry gets ahead (like a mage or ADC) and the rest of the team doesn't perform too poorly then it's essentially easy to "solo" carry.

Something i pretty much did last game playing Syndra, other team was busy with my frontline while i pretty much annihilated everything in range. I ended up with over half my teams kills and most of the damage done too.

All because i got a early snowball going and became really strong of it, it's not actually uncommon.

And thus i really want to mention, first tower and herald are both insanely strong if your team get them, gaining one is nearly a guarantee for the other which is snowballing in a sense.

Tobias BracknerMay 26, 20172 votes

My guess is that you're winning and losing games without knowing why you're actually winning or losing games.

This this this this this this this.

ThefrostyvikingMay 27, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2017-05-25T22:29:00.133+0000)

This isn't a snowball meta. One enemy champ can be extremely strong and very far ahead but they will never be so far ahead that your team can't kill them. In season 3, it didn't matter if they grouped with their strongest member or if you collapsed on them or anything really, if they got ahead and were the better player then they could 1v5 carry the game. Now there are so many things you probably take for granted to catch players back up when they fall behind.

Knowing how to play from behind will get you loads more elo. My guess is that you're winning and losing games without knowing why you're actually winning or losing games. Of course it's always better to be ahead in gold and map pressure, but it still takes one team to break the base and end the game.

I do actually know about that stuff to a degree, i can personally handle myself falling behind quite easily but i am still working on when my team does.

And I guess you are right, s3 snowball was from our current perspective closer to an avalanche.

However snowballing currently is the idea that a single champion in a team is so strong that they make it impossible to beat that team head on as long as that champion is there which is a notion i do understand, and the idea that snowballing currently happens very quickly isn't wrong either.

I mean, people are busy developing strategies for lvl 2-3 rushed early ganks or even towerdives on elise and lee sin, to make sure one lane collapses early on.

Or just force enemy botlaners to leave so one can take their turrets because they lack fortification.

Jungle currently is really powerful from a early point and snowballing for some champs is enough to make some people bash their heads on walls x)

obsesseMay 27, 20171 votes

When making claims of a snowball meta, it implies that players are picking champions that exceed in snowballing are are successful at transitioning their strengths to a win. But if you look at champion pick rates, the trifecta of mages in the mid lane are still Ahri, Syndra, and Orianna, none of which are especially insane (like Zed, Fizz, Katarina, Talon). Top lane we see great duelists, because top is mostly ignored. The most picked junglers are Lee Sin, Elise, and Graves because they have healthy first clears and great dueling potential. Lee Sin and Elise both have amazing early ganks and are very fun to play, but Graves is basically a power farmer, which shouldn't be a feature in a snowball meta. The 3 ADCs are Cait, Lucian, and Ezreal. 2 are literally poke champs. All 3 are played twice as much as the next ADC. Then we have the supports, Thresh and Blitz vs Karma and Lulu. No more Malzahar, no more Zyra.

If anything, I'd call this a skirmish heavy, team fighting oriented meta. We see an insanely high amount of grouping and objective control. I'm just not sure how any of this equals a snowball meta.

ThefrostyvikingMay 27, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=000100040000,timestamp=2017-05-27T10:19:49.999+0000)

When making claims of a snowball meta, it implies that players are picking champions that exceed in snowballing are are successful at transitioning their strengths to a win. But if you look at champion pick rates, the trifecta of mages in the mid lane are still Ahri, Syndra, and Orianna, none of which are especially insane (like Zed, Fizz, Katarina, Talon). Top lane we see great duelists, because top is mostly ignored. The most picked junglers are Lee Sin, Elise, and Graves because they have healthy first clears and great dueling potential. Lee Sin and Elise both have amazing early ganks and are very fun to play, but Graves is basically a power farmer, which shouldn't be a feature in a snowball meta. The 3 ADCs are Cait, Lucian, and Ezreal. 2 are literally poke champs. All 3 are played twice as much as the next ADC. Then we have the supports, Thresh and Blitz vs Karma and Lulu. No more Malzahar, no more Zyra.

If anything, I'd call this a skirmish heavy, team fighting oriented meta. We see an insanely high amount of grouping and objective control. I'm just not sure how any of this equals a snowball meta.

Elise and lee sin are all about early snowballs, Graves farms a bit then he also starts dueling, not lvl 1-4 maybe but anytime after and he is taking fights all over.

Ahri is a hybrid mage assassin, she excels in grabbing kills via roaming and then snowballing insanely hard, Syndra is a bit slower but she grabs kills in lane to stomp out anything after kinda as i did in the previous example i gave. Ori....is just because of LCS, probably x)

Cait is a lane bully, one of the ADCs more likely to snowball compared to most of them and Ez is just versatile and most seem to enjoy playing.

Thresh and blitz are great aggressors from them moment they can hook, even better when paired with a cait who can snare the caught person for a easy kill. This is a case of duo éffort snowball^^

Toplane is divided between Riven, Fiora,Yasuo and Darius mainly as i know it, all of them well known lane bullies and snowball heavy champs meant to stomp out from early on.

If action happens early and people all around look to get fed from the first 10 minutes then crush on objectives with their lead is that not a snowball heavy meta?

obsesseMay 27, 20171 votes

Lane bullies =/= snowballing. Draven is a snowball ADC and rarely sees play. Ashe is the 4th most picked AD, not snowbally at all. Ezreal is the 3rd most picked AD, not snowbally in any way whatsoever. Like I said, the concept of snowballing exists, but people aren't playing the more notorious snowball champions in the game. Thresh and Blitzcrank are of course great at "grabbing" kills, but their companions aren't the types of champions to solo carry games, in general. Cait isn't going to 1v5 the enemy team, nor is Ashe. Again, not that people aren't trying to snowball, it just doesn't define the meta. People are obviously trying to get leads because it helps to win the game, but those leads to determine the outcome of the game. That was my point. In a snowball meta, those leads should always translate into a win. A snowball meta means whatever team gets the first advantage has SUCH a huge advantage that it's impossible to overcome. That's not what's happening though. The outcome of the game is determined by mid-game skirmishing and objective control. You can be behind and still maintain those objectives by having superior team fighting/team composition.

ThefrostyvikingMay 27, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=00010004000000000000,timestamp=2017-05-27T10:55:13.336+0000)

Lane bullies =/= snowballing. Draven is a snowball ADC and rarely sees play. Ashe is the 4th most picked AD, not snowbally at all. Ezreal is the 3rd most picked AD, not snowbally in any way whatsoever. Like I said, the concept of snowballing exists, but people aren't playing the more notorious snowball champions in the game. Thresh and Blitzcrank are of course great at "grabbing" kills, but their companions aren't the types of champions to solo carry games, in general. Cait isn't going to 1v5 the enemy team, nor is Ashe. Again, not that people aren't trying to snowball, it just doesn't define the meta. People are obviously trying to get leads because it helps to win the game, but those leads to determine the outcome of the game. That was my point. In a snowball meta, those leads should always translate into a win. A snowball meta means whatever team gets the first advantage has SUCH a huge advantage that it's impossible to overcome. That's not what's happening though. The outcome of the game is determined by mid-game skirmishing and objective control. You can be behind and still maintain those objectives by having superior team fighting/team composition.

Ah but here my definition of snowball carrying comes in.

You are certainly correct that a fed cait won't 1v5.

However a fed cait makes it a hellish lot harder to handle her team.

And as for snowball meta, it is isn't it? Because whoever grabs those first bloods gets a lead, then they consolidate those leads and proceed to grab objectives and then carry on so until the next objective.

A single good herald can wreck two turrets quite easily, two towers down in a lane before 18 minutes? A massive advantage both in map control and gold.

And it starts with one or two kills.

And fight back when behind by means of superior skill? A pipe dream since both teams are supposed to be equal but when one side is stronger by stats vise it causes the scales to tilt and crash.

It´s only natural that a side with 5 trained knights in steel armor will beat 5 equally trained knights in chainmail and leather. Because superior equipment is no joke.

And honestly, its easily possible to snowball to the point where you can blatantly brute force through whatever the enemy team does to a point, the champs that are good at this are the snowball heavy ones as i see it.

I mean, even if an Ashe gets fed she still needs a ton of protection to not die from stay shots.

But a fed Syndra or malza can just dumpster up to 3 people at the same time in a short rotation, a equally fed Draven can probably 2-3 shot any offender.

It´s honestly not much of an issue in the higher elos when people can deny getting stomped on a bit more but for plati and below this stuff happens a lot.

obsesseMay 27, 20171 votes

Okay it's clear that your definition of snowballing does not match up to what snowballing is. To put it simply snowballing starts out as a small lead like cs advantage after your first back. This lead causes a snowball effect, which extends the lead even more, causing a bigger snowball. So if it were a snowball meta, whatever leads you gain net you even more advantages, giving even more advantages and the enemy team has no chance of fighting back. This should lead to players playing the game extremely passively because one mistake could cost you the game.

That's not how league is though, at all. First blood is a great start. but doesn't win you the game. First dragon is a great start, but doesn't win you the game. First tower is great, but doesn't win you the game.

Have you ever seen anyone in game get first blood only to die to the same lane repeatedly? That's because different champions are better at doing different things. Some are better at snowballing a lead than others, and the most popular champs are not the notorious snowball champs. Instead we just see champs that are great in skirmishing because even when behind you can still turn the game around in a single mid-late game teamfight.

ThefrostyvikingMay 27, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hestia Chan,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=0001000400000000000000000000,timestamp=2017-05-27T18:14:57.768+0000)

Okay it's clear that your definition of snowballing does not match up to what snowballing is. To put it simply snowballing starts out as a small lead like cs advantage after your first back. This lead causes a snowball effect, which extends the lead even more, causing a bigger snowball. So if it were a snowball meta, whatever leads you gain net you even more advantages, giving even more advantages and the enemy team has no chance of fighting back. This should lead to players playing the game extremely passively because one mistake could cost you the game.

That's not how league is though, at all. First blood is a great start. but doesn't win you the game. First dragon is a great start, but doesn't win you the game. First tower is great, but doesn't win you the game.

It does tho? I´ve played plenty of games when i or someone else get a lead early and then slowly build up that lead to become nearly unstoppable, i´ve won nearly all my games on malz and Syndra like that. And plenty of junglers are good at doing it too and they are ones like lee sin, elise, zac.

You grab/gain a lead early and then use that lead to brute force objectives or more kills to increase your lead without giving your opponent a chance to fight back, isn't this snowballing?

Have you ever seen anyone in game get first blood only to die to the same lane repeatedly? That's because different champions are better at doing different things. Some are better at snowballing a lead than others, and the most popular champs are not the notorious snowball champs. Instead we just see champs that are great in skirmishing because even when behind you can still turn the game around in a single mid-late game teamfight.

And several popular picks are notorious snowballers, lee sin,ahri,TF, elise, Syndra, zac, All the currently top tier toplaners.... And then we have botlane that doesn't really snowball in the same regard due to a greater need for gold but they will become hella strong early on if fed to the point where a good botlane duo can 2v3 or even 2v4 in a good situation if the circumstances aren't too unfavorable.

I am fairly sure that in soloq currently there are a great deal of people that play champs with the goal to gain a lead early and then build that lead to a unstoppable momentum without letting the enemies catch up to your lead.

And it happens quite easily, doesn't even take a lot of gold to archive such a lead.

And if you want pro play examples just look at pretty much any of SKT peaunts lee sin games x)

He snowballed in nearly all of them and became a monster whose charge couldn't be stopped, all from a few early kills.

Isn't that snowballing?

obsesseMay 28, 20171 votes

The great thing about Lee Sin and Elise is that you don't need a lead to be useful. Sure, if Lee Sin is way ahead then he can just outright kill a carry but his kit is just incredible on its own. Same with Elise, she will always have a stun, total health % + missing health %, and a great escape.

If you want examples of pro play that almost never snowballs, look at G2. They constantly sacrifice the early game, give up objectives, etc., and rely on mid-late game team fighting.

Remember, if a snowball meta exists then you can't catch up from whatever lead is gained. In League, you get bonus XP just for being behind. You get shut down gold. Turrets are harder to kill early, multiple kills on the same person give less gold, the list goes on and on.

You do know what the word meta means right? I've acknowledged that snowballing exists, it's very intended. Good players will snowball games and are more likely to win because they know how to use small leads and gain bigger advantages. Just because this occurs doesn't mean the entire meta is comprised of snowballing. I would argue that specific champs that snowball extremely hard are actually very bad right now, because of the heavy team fighting meta that exists. Like I said before, some champions are just better at certain points of the game. Vayne is really terrible until late game. Draven is extremely good early game. If Draven gets killed by Vayne at level 2, it probably doesn't have any effect on the outcome of the game at all. If Ahri kills Syndra at level 4, it probably doesn't effect the outcome of the game in any way. If Elise steals Lee Sin's red buff, etc.etc.

The whole point of the word snowballing is that once a lead is gained it gets you more and more leads until it's this huge avalanche and you win. I think what you're referring to is good players being able to get leads by being better players, and the same good players able to get more leads because they're better players. It has nothing to do with the lead itself and entirely to do with the player's skill. Even still, no matter how great a jungler is they aren't going to carry hard enough to overcome an entire team. Assuming all players are equal in a game, a snowball meta literally means once a lead is gained the game is over. This simply isn't the case. It makes much more sense that it's not the lead that helps a player getting first blood to win a game, they're just a better player and therefore are able to play better than their opponents. Whichever team with the better players wins.

ThefrostyvikingMay 28, 20171 votes

What i am trying to say is that many of the currently popular champions are good at securing leads and then using them to gain more, then they keep going an become unstoppable because it's too difficult to shut them down.

That's certainly something that only happens when a good players is behind the wheels though.

But, lee sin, elise, Ahri and others are all good at gaining a small lead early and then building on that lead to get a snowball rolling.

And neither elise or lee sin are terribly good unless fed, as i understand it they both need to be fed in order to have the weight to compare to a "normal" jungler.

And vayne using a critbuild actually powerspikes like 2-3 items into the game, it's pretty damm scary however the Vayne needs to be good enough to manage laning well which isn't easy at all.

And Jungle is currently known as probably the most influential role for how a game will go just due to how much impact one can have, a fed lee sin or Zac are super difficult to deal with even if their team isn't doing much.

And i would argue that i´ve played against people who were better than me and then still won just because i got fed enough to steamroll over them.

I might have mentioned recently playing Syndra? That was such a game, whoever i played against mid wasn't that good but their toplane and botlane was beating mine and their jungle was also beating mine.

Until i crashed the party that is.

I started roaming all over and killed pretty much everything in sight giving no one any chance to fight back and my team just grouped around me and we pretty much crushed the game that we were losing prior to that.

Sure, i was better then whoever i was playing against, but when 4 slightly fed people on the enemy team can't handle 1 super strong midlaner it starts feeling silly.

I ended the game being massive, but i didn't start out with much.

And last night i did something similar when playing Malzahar.

I got fed in lane, all my teammates were losing all over and we were getting crushed.

Then i started walking around and stomped super hard.

The fizz i had been oppressing also started roaming and got fed for it, but it was too late.

I was so strong that i alone could dominate teamfights forcing the enemy team to look for picks rather than normal confrontations, a single fed mage causing that felt ridiculous .....and the moment when my team caught the other one out we actually managed to end the game right away.

If what i did isn't snowballing outa control and then carrying while using my team as meatshields then what is? O_O

obsesseMay 28, 20171 votes

Not to be rude to you but google the word meta

ThefrostyvikingMay 28, 20171 votes

meta in context of lol simply means whatever is currently the most popular right? That's is how i understand it at least....

I just somehow get the impression you're arguin for pro play while i am talking about soloq below diamond x)

obsesseMay 28, 20171 votes

No, but you yourself just gave several reasons for why it isn't a snowball meta. You mentioned 4 enemies getting slightly fed but you were able to take the game over. That shouldn't happen in a snowball meta. Those 4 people gained a lead which should be insurmountable. The fact that you were able to make plays and win the game means it's a lot more about skill than simply gaining the first lead.

ThefrostyvikingMay 28, 20171 votes

Well....that is true.

But all i did was get more fed and suppress them with it, isn't that quite the same?

I simply snowballed harder and became too much for them to handle even with their combined lead.

obsesseMay 28, 20171 votes

I'll let you think that one through a few more times

StoryDuckMay 25, 201713 votes

It would be nice to have fewer games where it isn't decided before I can get one item.

Sun Wu RyuumokuMay 26, 20173 votes

yeah i know this feeling... when i just have a poor item 3134 and i see Xayah in 6/0*[slayer-jinx-unamused]*. As top laner its the worst feeling

TheorcheroMay 26, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ryuumoku no koke,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=00090000,timestamp=2017-05-26T03:33:53.509+0000)

yeah i know this feeling... when i just have a poor and i see in 6/0*[slayer-jinx-unamused]*. As top laner its the worst feeling

If you have 1100 gold at 10 minutes you probably need to farm better.

NiaphimMay 26, 20172 votes

I think you meant "more", not "fewer" :)

6KEMBE4ORBAMay 25, 201711 votes

It's the changes to the game that Riot has implemented for some time now and continue to implement.

I was plat in s3, diamond in s4& s5, in s6 I was away for 6 months and decayed to gold.

Snowballing is out of control, one team gets lil ahead and/or flocks for clown fiestas in one lane at 6-10 min mark and risks everything which results in games being practically over by 15 min mark, 20 at most.

It's always one team flooring the other one, zero skills required. I had like 2-3 games in 20 that were somewhat interesting and "even".

Before you could rarely see 10+ kills/deaths at 15 min mark. Now this is present almost every single game.

Other problem is people (and certain champs) building like tanks and still doing dmg which allows outright derping around, kiting or better yet straight out running backwards and waiting for cd, much more room for mistakes and bad plays to remain unpunished ---->

----> Basically BAD GAME DESIGN.

This is topped by the new Herald, removal of green wards, minions changes which seal the deal.

deadlychuckMay 26, 20179 votes

I would also include the keystones and riot's approach to champion designs.

Where keystones lock players into, what's effectively a unique passive, before the game even starts. So where players might pick an aggressive keystone (which is 2/3 of all keystones), falling behind becomes even more impacting because now, the enemy who also has an aggressive keystone can better utilize it. Where as a player who fell behind in lane might choose to purchase defensive items first, they've already been locked into a massive "purchase" with which keystone they had picked before even getting a grasp of their lane opponent's skill, or luck.

The champion design factors in by the new approach to kit design, being holistic rather than utilitarian and vague. Which far more often results in champions which lack many, or any, deficiencies in their approach to succeeding. What does champion X do? Well they're designed to stay back away from a fight and poke enemies down, and then execute them when they get low. Well let's given them a knock back and a way to punish enemies which try to approach them... ok, well where is the weakness? How do you punish this champion besides just picking from some specific list of champions which have the ability to bypass or reliably negate the distance opener and the engagement punishing move.

This makes it even more difficult to create a dynamic game, when champion advantage has become so static based on needing a whole kit, in order to counter another whole kit. As a result, if you get put against a lane opponent who is playing an aggressive champion who's kit counters exactly what it needs to counter in your kit, then not only are you expected to lose your lane, it becomes almost impossible to even mitigate the loss, because you're unable to add emphasis to appropriate parts of your kit which they don't counter, at the expense of the parts of your kit which they can nearly ignore anyway. An example of this might be something like the Darius vs Yasuo match up, where Darius is simply such a hard counter to yasuo, that he can overwhelm even the best yasuo players with relative ease, and then snowball from either a free farming advantage and/or kill advantage.

Unironic SJWMay 25, 20178 votes

this is what you guys wanted in season 5 because "individual skill doesn't matter anymore".

deadlychuckMay 26, 20178 votes

Individual skill going away was a product of riot reducing the "real time" aspect of the game's strategy, in fact they've recently brought this back to the forefront with their pre-game philosophy post.

"an individual's skill doesn't matter anymore" would a more accurate way to describe the complaints, not that 1/5 of the team didn't matter.

SnakDatSmilesBakMay 25, 20175 votes

Dude couple patches ago riot raised the xp you get from killing champs higher level than you. The best way to stop a snowball is kill the snowballing champ for a high amount of experience. If the enemy champ is so far ahead or is playing well enough to not die then sit down and lose because you deserve it.

VenomarMay 26, 20175 votes

Bad news bud. That's not the meta, it's the current game design and direction.

This is why LCS farms for 40 minutes. You literally can't give up a string of kills becuase it's GG. I Mean look at when Peanut got to pop off and got fed on Lee in the MSI against FW. That game was over when he had like 7 kills. SKT was just playing with thier food. When they decided to put their foot down on the pedal they ended it like 8 minutes later, and by ended I mean wrecked the map and every objective and a few teamfights before they popped the crystal.

What's the real ass kicker about all of it is that Riot keeps implementing snowbally tactics hoping that it will spice up Pro play when in reality it discourages it more on that level because now leads become exaggerated more. If you want more excitement and more action you need to make it less punishing to take risks, not more.

But Feelsbadman as well.

Sun Wu RyuumokuMay 26, 20174 votes

i can't even fucking say its my noobs teammates faults. because i see them play okay

Ur mates and u are bronze... they don't play okay. And yeah game are snowbally af. but somebody at 0/8 at ten is at fault.

the weeabooMay 26, 20173 votes

They play okay for bronze you self righteous hypocritical barnacle skull.

Sun Wu RyuumokuMay 26, 20173 votes

Seems like u dosn't understand what hypocrit' is. And, it seems i hurted your ego when i say bronze. It wasn't an attack to begin. U take personnaly just because u are bronze too.

Sadistic VeigarMay 26, 20174 votes

you losing 6 in a row is your own fault.

Bard to BelieveMay 26, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Sadistic Veigar,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=18Fr3ZB8,comment-id=0012,timestamp=2017-05-26T05:49:45.588+0000)

you losing 6 in a row is your own fault.

i'll admit i had less than stellar play, but those 6 in a row were literally games where enemy gets fed in 5 seconds regardless of what lane it is.

because this game is a snowbally MESS.

AirKingNeoMay 26, 20172 votes

No, you're just trying to blame someone. Season 5 was a very slow paced game meta. Season 6 was speed up, but also introduced many anti-snowball mechanics as well as healthy snowballing ones. Season 7 doesn't change snowballing, but just fucks up jungle.

But how does this make it a snowball meta? It isn't. The early and mid game has ALWAYS been the most important parts of League because 1) You cannot rely on late game alone, 2) It's easiest to win in the mid game, 3) Most objectives are taken during the mid game, and 4) the powercurves of all roles allign near mid game.

Now that I've explained that part, let's talk about you? Why do you lose games? https://na.op.gg/summoner/userName=Bard+to+Believe The answer, is very simple. You pick champions in roles they shouldn't be played in and build incorrectly.

You played Diana, a mid laner, in the top lane. Lost to Kennen (not shocking) and went 1/8. You build Sorc Boots vs Kennen, instead of Merc Treads. You were building what seems to be Rylai's. This is the worst choice you could possibily make. Rylai's isn't gold efficient in stats and Diana can't make good use of it.

Next, you played Gragas top. The problems: You went Bond of Stone for your keystone. You build Sorc Boots vs Teemo, instead of Mercs or Tabi. You bough Doran's Ring first back instead of Corrupting Potion, which would be much better vs Teemo. You sold both Doran's items at 15 minutes in, which is way too early.

Next, you played Lee Sin, a jungler, top lane. First off: You had 14 deaths. Without enough kill participation, that's a huge no-no. You were losing lane, but you build a snowballing item, Rav Hydra. You build Rav Hydra on Lee Sin, which you shouldn't do. You didn't build Black Cleaver. You sold Doran's Blade at 17 minutes for a Pickaxe. Don't sell your only Doran's Item for a component that's worse than the Doran's item unless it's around 25 minutes or beyond. Finally, you began to build Sunfire Cape, a laning phase item, on Lee Sin, way after laning phase.

Every single Bard top game: You played Bard top unironically. Also top going Mobi Boots, makes you lose more 1v1s by not having Ninja Tabi.

Finally, your Xin Zhao jungle. Three things: You should have gone Ninja Tabi because all their CC were knockups which aren't reduced by Merc Treads. You went Blue smite for some reason; As Xin Zhao, always take red smite. It's literally the best smite because it's really overpowered. Finally, and this is the best advice, unless you're playing Master Yi or Kayle, don't build Rageblade on a melee champion. What you should have build was Sterak's Gage (because of the Trinity Force synergy).

These are basic, all-too-common mistakes in picking and building seen in low elo. You wanna play Tristana ADC even though she isn't meta? Go ahead, she's an ADC. Playing Tristana mid? Please don't; you have a team and they want to win. It isn't the game's fault you're losing, unless it's matchmaking (which does tend to happen from time to time), it's yours.

LegacyDAPMay 27, 20171 votes

Stop dude!!! He doesn't want to learn how to play! He just wants to get upset at the fact that the game is too snowbally in his elo and something needs to be changed.

AirKingNeoMay 27, 20171 votes

But I already explained that isn't as snowballing as he claims. The problem is him and he needs to change.

LegacyDAPMay 27, 20171 votes

the comment I left was /s

AirKingNeoMay 27, 20171 votes

Yeah I thought but I remembered this is the Boards so people might actually think that.

hhaavviikkMay 26, 20174 votes

I agree, every ARAM game 10 snowballs, I wish they would go out of meta

ChotenMay 25, 20173 votes

While it is a problem when someone on the enemy team gets really fed, you can always try to turret hug and farm safely for gold. There are exceptions like a Trynd that can dive because the team isn't ganking him or someone who can kill you under the turret without taking too much damage but what I usually see happening is that people start to play more reckless because they think the game is over when someone gets fed. Then it makes it almost impossible to come back. It's better for them to kill you 1 or 2 times under your tower playing safe then 5~6 times playing reckless.

deadlychuckMay 26, 20173 votes

If it's not a 1 sided stomp, it's a 50 minute stall, until the snowball is no longer important.

TwitchInMyPantsMay 26, 20173 votes

I mean snowballing has always been a game mechanic, a kill always is 300ish gold and 10-60s of the enemy in base which means 1-4 minion waves of advantage for you. Kills have always meant a big lead in gold and XP. You can argue against things they've added like global gold over time, first tower, and global gold on every kill but that doesn't change the fact a guy who's 15/2 would've had a huge lead even in League of Legends Alpha. "Snowball meta" isn't some problem they added into the game, its League working as intended.

VekknaMay 25, 20172 votes

summoner 32

oSEXYPLATYPUSoMay 25, 20172 votes

hmm seems like you should play smarter and not go so ham early and play to win conditions and power spikes or your champs and team comps

Fondling GemsMay 26, 20172 votes

This is why I play a lot of Nautilus. Now I get to shut down the enemy team if only one of them snowballs.

LOSINGISMYPRIDEMay 26, 20172 votes

http://i.imgur.com/QiuzY7W.jpg why ? Yo dont like me ?

Ad Astra per AspMay 26, 20172 votes

It's the result of Riot every season pushing for shorter average games in their game design. Which is something I think a lot of people wanted but lets face it, most the people asking for stuff in the community don't really know what they're asking for. Either that or they feel shorter games will be more engaging and exciting and action packed or something and "good for the sport" as they say.

I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, just focusing on the early game limits the options I have to worry about and makes the game easier even though for some reason riot thinks pushing early game on people makes the game harder and demonstrates skill more I will always disagree, it just leads to cheese fests and people figuring out and memorizing the limits of every champs early game power spikes, it's not even risk once you know a champ and their matchups to all in people. I also like shorter games from a real life standpoint. On the other hand, I don't really like games where knowledge of knowing how to play from behind doesn't matter very much. It still can matter just most the time it doesn't and increasingly matters less and less.

Sire HippingtonMay 26, 20172 votes

First tower: 71.78 win% First Dragon: 68.3 win% First Baron: 80.7 win% First Inhip: 91.4 win% Riftherald: 70.4 win%

So yea, in most games the winer is declared in the first 10-15min(by that time, first tower, riftherald and first dragon are usually done), and when it isn't it's mostly because of an epic series of dumb throws rather than an actual comback play.

It's sad what this game has become...

FiddlesOnTheRoofMay 26, 20172 votes

A) Most of your games are going 30+ minutes. This is not 20 minute stomps. B) Two of your last three games, YOU have fed your ass off. To die that much isn't being snowballed, it's positioning and playing poorly. C) A team that gets an early lead SHOULD be rewarded for doing so. If a baseball team gets up 5 runs in the first inning, it SHOULD be very hard for the other team to come back.