When Do People Start Playing With The Normal Meta?

ScarletTyph00n·8/1/2014, 6:21:43 PM·1 votes·877 views

So I'm relatively new to league. I joined a month ago. I already know about the current meta: 1 top, 1 mid, 2 bot, and 1 jungler. The problem is most of the people that come on my team in blind pick don't. And it's not as simple as they play this meta: 2 top, 1 mid, 2 bot. Sometimes I'll find that my team chooses 3 top champions, no mid champions and 1 support champion. So my question is, when should I see people using the normal meta or when do people start playing with the normal meta? By when, I mean like summoner level or how long they've been playing league. I appreciate any answers.

7 Comments

Stephenizgod8/1/2014, 6:36:36 PM2 votes

Well there is no exact number, it depends on who you play with. Some people never pick up Jungle and some people pick it up quick, but around level 10-15 you should find a lot more people using the current meta if not everyone. BTW instead of waiting for others to adhere to the meta why not take it upon yourself? Learn to jungle or ADC or whatever your team needs? All roles are fun when played correctly.

I didnt know about jungling until after i played around 30-40 games actually lol, didnt try it until a ranked game when no one gave me the choice but to jungle even when i told them i didnt know how :) it was terrible. Oddly enough thats also how i started to ADC, the guy below me autolocked my champ and role before i could pick them even after i called it, so i was left with ADCing for the first time ever. More advice to give you, not everyone in Ranked is nice so make sure you can play every role comfortably and try to have around 3-5 different champions per role, but at least being able to play the role should be good enough.

Dr Clueless PhD8/1/2014, 6:36:54 PM2 votes

I don't have a solid answer, unfortunately. I would like to say at level 30, people know what good team strategies are... but that's simply not true. The brief forays I've had into Ranked have definitely shown me people in their placements who had no idea that a jungler was a good idea. It's really a function of MMR. If you win more games, you'll play with people that that are better and better, and better team setups will become the norm.

Sir ArmaMalum8/1/2014, 6:40:42 PM2 votes

The lack of jungle is largely, in my experience, lack of proper runes making the role very difficult. The latest machete changes helped out but the jungle role didn't pop up often for me until around lvl 25, this was back when if you didn't have flat armor runes the jungle would rip most champs a new one, preventing an early gank.

Sluiceway8/1/2014, 11:26:57 PM2 votes

I think you misunderstand what meta means. Meta is not the deployment of champs into top, jungle, mid, and bot, but it is the champs that are favored in those positions and what role they play on the team (tank, assassin, adc, support, etc.). This is what Riot is attempting to address in their most recent patches: Lee, Eve, and Elise are signs that the jungle meta is early damage, just as the meta for bot is late game scaling ADCs (Tristana and Kog'maw).

But, as has been said, the solo top and jungle will have an advantage if it is played well, as a duo top will have to share xp and gold, while a solo top will have the level advantage as long as he/she does not play too aggressive early and get killed. In the meantime, the Jungler will have full roam of the map, taking buffs as he/she pleases (or donating them as the situation and preference dictate), and will be in a better position to either help out the solo top, or use the advantage of roaming to get his/her other lanes ahead uncontested and begin taking control of the map and objectives by taking down towers..

Worgslarg8/1/2014, 6:41:18 PM1 votes

Once they find that the meta following teams usually win. It can take some time

Hikkupz8/5/2014, 8:25:05 AM1 votes

For me, I don't think there's such thing as top champions, mid champions... I bring Vayne on top million of times and it works quite well in some matchup so you can't really say this champion has to play in this role.