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new level 30 - ranked?

ValyrianBlade··1 votes·393 views

I've recently hit level 30, :). So, obviously ranked is on my mind. I know there's a LOT I need to do before starting ranked, but I'd love any comments on my position.

Currently: I have 2 rune pages. I'm hoping for a 2 for 1 discount or something, so I can have 4 going in to ranked. At minimum I won't start ranked without 3. runes: 3 MS quints, 9 magic pen marks, 9 ad marks, 9 flat armour seals, 9 scaling mr glyphs, 9 flat mr glyphs. I want to get attack speed quints for my adcs (which happens to be one of my main roles, This will be what goes on my third rune page). So the first 3 rune pages will be mid mage with MS for roaming, standard adc with attack speed quints, and jungle (with movement speed quints for roaming and because my main jungler is hecarim).

Roles: (in order of preference) ADC: currently have and am well practiced with caitlyn and tristana. I have sivir pretty much solely to counter caitlyn when tristana is banned, and ashe because she's supposed to be easy and is sort of an "if all else falls apart" option. I've played both jinx and lucien on free week, I think my top priority after rune pages is to buy jinx to add her to my main role.

MID: I play Ahri more than any other champion (adcs included). I've practiced Syndra a lot on bots and will bring her to normals before ranked. I intend to pick up ziggs as my third option once his ip cost is lowered to 4800. I suck with melee champions against ranged, so I'm avoiding things like zed/talon/etc...

JUNGLE: pretty much only ever do well with hecarim, and I play him a lot since he's never picked/banned. Will be my main jungler unless further jungle changes mess him up even more. I also have jax, Warwick, Evelynn, maybe nunu (he's 450 anyways). I do not bad with jax. I'm prioritizing Jarvan 4 as my next champion purchase after jinx, for useusein jungle and top if necessary.

Support: Morgana, alistar, Taric. I used to really like Morgana, but recently I don't play support much at all and when I do, I feel more comfortable playing something tanky.

Top: hecarim, jax, Ryze. Top is by far my weakest role. I manage okay with hecarim because I know the champion so well. I've also Lane swapped and played ahri top against a kayle with great success. I've managed with Ryze but think once he gets mana scaling removed on some skills I won't stand a chance with him. The J4 purchase will hopefully give me a good option here, and I'm thinking about maokai later if top proves problematic (but after I start ranked). I want to be a tanky top as I know I won't know the matchups and will lose Lane, so I'm going to just try to not feed and be relevant late game.

In summary: Currently have ahri, hecarim, caitlyn, tristana, Syndra, Morgana, alistar, jax, Taric, Ryze, sivir as practiced champions. Will buy before ranked: a third rune page, some runes, jinx, jarvan 4, ziggs. Would hope for: a fourth rune page, more runes. After starting ranked if needed: maokai, lucien, a melee mid laner, a new jungler.

Does my plan sound reasonable? Should I try placements in the preseason, or definitely not start ranked until season 5? Is my comfortable champion pool sufficient? (I have other champions: kayle, twisted fate, garen, maybe a couple more 450s/1350s; I just don't play them). Are my priorities before ranked on track? Any advice is welcome! Thanks!

7 Comments

Leti the Yeti1 votes

dont make the assumption that you are experienced or well practiced or whatever :l people bring their A game in being completely stupid or completely god-like in ranked games, the likes which you have never seen before.... s4 was my first season so I'm unsure if placement games get reset if you do it during preseasons I would highly reccomend doing it if it does get reset, get the general feels down

most people would advise against doing ranked right as you reach lvl30 now idk why you would need so many rune pages, dat shits expensive and i only use 1 more ad and 1 for ap... lol

no offense, but if there is someone better than you at adc... i... would.... let them have that role ;l for the sake of everyone on the team, bot lane has to not suck at all cost

ValyrianBlade1 votes

Well, thanks for the criticism without seeing my play at all I guess.

I'm not so worried about skill level. I've watched enough ranked Games ranging from silver to challenger level to have a general idea of how good/bad players can be.

I'm moreso looking for advice on what I need to have going in to ranked so as not to hinder my team due to my lack of options. Like say if maokai is really OP and I'm first pick and can't secure him for the top laner because I don't own the champion.

With respect to rune pages, most people say runes are what make your champion strong in the early game. There's no point in buying new champions if you don't have the right rune page to make them strong enough to compete. For example right now having MS quints on my adc rune page hurts my dueling/trading potential in Lane fairly noticeably until the first or second back for items.

By being practiced, I mean to point out the champions I've played more than 2 or 3 Games with in normal Draft. The point being I don't intend to try a champion for the first time in a ranked game, so I'm identifying my champion pool as only those champions I'll play in ranked.

FarRockBF1 votes

To the OP. I've been 30 for a year and never ranked. But I can tell you that of the 2 platinums I 1v1ed last week I won both and I win most golds I fight. Yeah, I'm good at laning and suck at map awareness so I wouldn't hit plat in ranked but probably gold.

I ONLY HAVE TWO RUNE PAGES: AD, AP.

AD: Mix of AD and Armor Pen AP: Mix of AP and Magic Pen

the only other page you NEED is a tank page, but even that you can get away just fine with using one of these. For example, if you are playing nunu or amumu jungle, you can build tank but still use an AP page for extra spell damage.

TLDR; you shouldn't ranked right away but rune page is the not the reason why. It's cause I hear bronze is just a mess. Get yourself good enough to jump to silver so you don't have to deal with bronze hell.

ValyrianBlade1 votes

Thanks, this is what I was looking for :) Anything with respect to the champion pool? How many I need in my main roles, etc..?

So do you think if I only have 3 rune pages I should have an ap centered, adc centered, and tank rune page? I'd then likely use the tank page on my jungle hecarim I guess?

Dr Clueless PhD1 votes

One more thing I would consider adding to your list: A duo queue partner you can rely on.

The worst part about Solo Ranked is the randomness of who's on your team and how good they're going to be this game. You may have someone who got to level 30 on bot games jumping in to jungle (I pray for your soul in this case). You may have someone trying out a Champion for the first time, or someone's little brother playing on their account.

Naturally, this is no different than queue'ing up for Normals, but it's way more frustrating in Ranked, because your rating is on the line each game. A duo queue partner you know you can trust will do wonders to help mitigate this effect.

HOWEVER, there is a danger here. It doesn't take long in the community to find people asking for duo queue to be removed from Ranked, and it's not for no reason. Lots of duo's are toxic together, they feed together, or they simply don't help the other 3 members of the team. I've seen plenty of duo queue's single-handedly destroy a team's chances of victory. It's really easy to fall into a trap of becoming the thing you hate when you duo queue. You have to be very aware of what you're doing so you can avoid this trap.

Having said that, lots of duo queue's go on to do great things for the team. There's generally a common bond between them (and I advise you look out for this when looking at your own teammates): the good duo queue's I've seen have never said anything about them duo'ing in Champion Select or the game. The guys that say stuff like "Duo bot with XXXSephirothXXX69Naruto" or "I'm duo with Shadowheart93" are probably going to feed, and they will not talk to the rest of the team at all except to blame you. I don't know why, but that's the way of things. When you see the good ones, you'd never know they were duo unless they mentioned it after the game. It's strange, but it's pretty damn consistent.

One theory I've heard is that the bad duo's let the team know because they want to use their duo as leverage with the rest of the team. They want to be given certain allowances by their allies because they are together. Good duo's simply want to work with the team and win.

ValyrianBlade1 votes

Thanks, I'll keep this in mind.

I'd assume the bad ones say they're together because they want the duo to get their preferred Lane. Unfortunately playing other roles helps you learn all roles, so these players may be okay in Lane but fail when a gank comes or just in late game in general. The good ones will just play to win.

I've heard that if you duo queue your team's mmr for the match will be upward adjusted to account for the advantage of duo queueing though - this worries me about it. Or that duo queues are typically placed against eachother, which could mean I go up against two people in the same room who can talk to eachother (and I don't plan to use voice with someone, at least not at first).

These may just be rumors though. I'll keep an eye out for a reliable partner while I play though. I've actually been reserving spots on my friends list for such players I meet (and add a note to each person on the list to keep track of those I would queue with versus low levels that just were asking for help).

Dr Clueless PhD1 votes

Both of those things are true. Your MMR is adjusted up when you duo, for the exact reasons you outlined. And duo queue's are weighted more heavily to play against each other (though not guaranteed).

They are both points to consider.

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