So, on Dragon.

There is only ONE reason in the current meta anyone on either team goes to dragon: __They think the enemy team made a mistake. __

The thing about dragon is that the area is easier for the people doing dragon to defend than it is for the enemy team to contest it, given equal numbers of people.

If there are 4 people doing dragon and bot lane pings mid while the jungler is ganking top?

I'm gonna be looking at the support or ADC and wondering how long it's been since they reconsidered their life choices and whether or not they should still be playing League.

Contesting dragon isn't mandatory. As long as the enemy team is nowhere near 4 or 5 stacks, you can get a lot done if you are 1) not dead and 2) not contesting dragon. Not as much as getting dragon itself mind you, but contesting it in a pub means you are going to give the enemy team doing dragon at least 600 gold in an even contest, and many times it's a pyrrhic victory. Rito didn't INTEND for it to be pyrrhic, but in a pub, it often is. People overcommit for dragon, and to be honest 6% AD/AP or extra damage to minions or towers is not worth the money you give up from teammates dying trying to contest it. It's remarkably underwhelming and often gives only as much gold as all 5 members of the team would have gotten doing creep waves in the time it took to do dragon.

If your team isn't already in position to contest dragon, chances are you are not going to be able to realistically contest it without the jungler being in position and 2 people having teleport. Leave it the fuck alone and take top/mid tower instead, preferably after warding.