Drafting seems to be a lost art.

Bârd·Feb 27, 2018·32 votes·2,761 views

Outside competitive play, I rarely see people picking for the situation.

People just recklessly pick whatever they feel like playing, rather than what we need.

The composition failures I see on a regular basis include, but are not limited to:

Not having an actual carry, relying on an Ashe or Jhin to wipe the enemy.
Having too much of one damage type.
Having no CC.
Having no tank.
Having no engage.
Having no disengage.
Picking poor match ups.
Drafting too many late game champs without somebody to carry them through to the late game.
"All eggs in one basket".
Picking your teams trump card early in the draft.

You get the point.

What's worse is that people make these egregious mistakes, lose, and then complain that "the game is imbalanced".

Bring a knife to a gunfight, you're gonna lose.

44 Comments

IT3etlWEXJFeb 28, 201821 votes

God forbid I want to be playing a champion I at least somewhat enjoy in a game that might last an hour. Champions are also a lot harder to unlock for new players with the new loot system, not everyone has the time to spend the thousands of hours you need to grind to unlock even half the growing roster. If you want to pretend you're an LCS player in games and dictate what other people on your team pick, then draft a premade team and play flex.

flibitydooFeb 28, 20183 votes

except the champion unlock grind is actually faster

the 50% rp champion discount now applies to BE so if your plan was to unlock all the champs like I did (mostly by doing 1 co-op vs ai a day for first win), it's way more faster.

Moonfall SaberFeb 28, 20184 votes

Not even in the slightest. They brought a random roll mechanic into a grind mechanic. This is stupid by design and I haven't rolled a 3200 champion yet at level 73 let alone a 6800

flibitydooFeb 28, 20181 votes

except it is

you acquire BE at the same rate you got IP from (aka roughly 1k per week assuming you only do daily first win)

except now you can buy the champs for 50% cheaper because of the sales.

I know you want even more freebies, but as someone who went through the original grind to get every single champ unlocked, it is much much faster since you can effectively spend half the BE you need to unlock everyone.

Moonfall SaberFeb 28, 20181 votes

I went through the original grind twice. Its much slower because unless you get the champion you want in a box its tedious. Think about starting new and how many champions you have to disenchant just to get the champion you want. Then you still have to unlock the champion that you have disenchanted and its completely random which one you get. It takes longer and it feels 5 times as shitty.

flibitydooFeb 28, 20181 votes

you aren't reading my posts at all have you

you can LITERALLY ALL BUY THE CHAMPIONS FOR 50% OFF. (I swear to god if you really lack the reading comprehension to understand what I put in bold which is what I've stated in my past 2 comments)

that's the thing. The total change is "you get BE at the same pace" (aka roughly 1k IP/BE per week assuming you are picking up first win of the day everyday), but now you can buy champs for 50% off.

Right now, if you go to the store, you can buy Twitch for 1575 BE. You can buy leblanc for 1575 BE. You can buy Aurelion sol for 3150 BE. You can buy Ezreal for 2400 BE.

And then a few days later, that selection is going to change. It's RNG, but if your objective is to unlock champs, then using these discounts is literally faster than the previous method of "grind the same way you always did but buy them at regular price".

Like I know you are mad about shards and whatever and the level up system but that's not the point I am making. That is not what i am arguing. If you want to circlejerk for Riot to hand out more freebies regarding currency then go make your own thread requesting that. But my point is that you can literally unlock champs much faster than before if you use the discounts.

Moonfall SaberFeb 28, 20181 votes

I WENT TO THE STORE AND THEY ARE ALL THEIR REGULAR PRICE! IM NOT EVEN DOWNVOTING YOU SOMEONE ELSE IS. YOU ARE DELUSIONAL. It takes 2 months to unlock a champion now when it used to take 1.

flibitydooMar 1, 20181 votes

Alright apparently, I was wrong.

The sale was actually a january only thing for 50% off a selection of champs meant to celebrate the new season.

However, you can still use the 40% off discount if you own a champion shard. Right now I have 2 mordekaiser shards and if I wanted to I could dust one and buy mordekaiser for 810 BE instead of the 1350 BE. I could do this with any other champion shard I own.

It's a bit RNG which ones I get discounts on (although I will say, that personally, in my past 10 or so levels since I stopped disenchanting the shards, the only duplicate shards I own out of 17 champion shards have been garen and morde both of which I own 2 of), but assuming the goal is to unlock every champ, then yes it's still technically faster because of the discounts.

the weeabooFeb 28, 20181 votes

there is one of each type of champ available for 450. Don't tell me you don't own any tank jungles, watch a couple YouTube guides on Amumu and you can play him. I'd rather have a competent amumu on a cc-less team than an expert XinZhao

Not to mention that you can just buy champs that can serve multiple roles and save up for them so at least you have a balanced champ pool available. J4 can be an assassin, bruiser, and engage. You can pick him every game but play him the way your team needs you to.

IT3etlWEXJMar 1, 20181 votes

Playing Amumu was the most boring time I have ever had with League, so boring that I would rather play a 30 minute game and lose with a champ I like than win a 60 minute game with Amumu. When I play league it's my leisure, i'm not going to troll and play Ash jungle but i'm not going to play a tank jungler I hate because my team demands it either.

SwiftKitten88Feb 28, 20188 votes

id be happier to get teammates who can actually play their champs... screw drafting. i don't want you picking a fucking champ you have never played before because its "better for the team comp"

if you are mastery 7 on the champ, sure.. then if it works better with the team pick it.. but I'm tried of people going champs they have absolutely no idea how to fucking play because its "better for draft"

MimrFeb 28, 20187 votes

Couple of problems with this:

People want to play what they enjoy. It's a videogame they spend their precious free time on so no one is going to voluntarily play a tank or support if they don't enjoy it. Even on their promo's.
Over the years champions have, on average, become much more complex to play. It takes a while before you have mastered a champ sufficiently enough to take them into ranked. As a result the champion pools of most people will be rather narrow and not include champions of every type.
SoloQ is too unorganized to do organized, tactical drafts. You can at most adapt your personal pick to how both teams are shaping up. The most you can expect from SoloQ draft is later picks asking you (if you're first pick) to pick their champion if he/ she is popular.

Jerry SeinfeIdFeb 27, 20183 votes

People just recklessly pick whatever they feel like playing, rather than what we need.

cuz we just want to have fun, if i feel like playing shaco, i'm not gonna switch to a tank cuz noone else in my team wants one. i've picked Singed into teemo, sometimes i win, sometimes i lose. I know the pick was bad but i'm not gonna play fucking malph.

Common SatyrMar 2, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Jerry SeinfeId,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=chh7JyJj,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-02-27T23:12:20.024+0000)

cuz we just want to have fun, if i feel like playing shaco, i'm not gonna switch to a tank cuz noone else in my team wants one. i've picked Singed into teemo, sometimes i win, sometimes i lose. I know the pick was bad but i'm not gonna play fucking malph.

Then go play normals

Jerry SeinfeIdMar 2, 20181 votes

if you could point out to me where they were talking about ranked feel free to, but i don't see anything about it.

xelakerFeb 28, 20183 votes

god forbid you play league for fun. nope. meta is betta

Somebody Love MeFeb 28, 20183 votes

I'm honestly so sick of everyone just picking what's broken if they want to even remotely come close to having fun.

I want this game to go back to being play to win, not pick to win.

BârdFeb 28, 20181 votes

Every comp and every matchup has a win condition.

The problem comes when people pick horrible win conditions.

This is the reason I hate seeing Jhin in my ranked games, because without specific comps tailored around his strengths and weaknesses (which will not happen in solo queue) his win conditions are unreliable, unrealistic, and not even in the Jhin player's control.

Somebody Love MeFeb 28, 20182 votes

Nowadays, win condition doesn't matter much in solo q. It's come down to which team has the most meta champs. Then it's which team has the most people who actually know how to play said meta champs.

RewtFeb 27, 20182 votes

well lets put it this way.

All the viable tops right now are ADs and Tanks.

There arent any Viable AP jungle champs other than AP tanks so its all tanks and AD

Mid Has diversity but people like to play AD assassins.

ADC is ADC

And support in most cases doesnt do damage so its irrelevant.

It does feel kind of shitty that Mid is basically forced to play AP champs if you want to the perfect roster

BarkleyFeb 27, 20182 votes

Lets not forget that if you don't play a tank jungler, you don't get a tank.

I'm so fucking tired of playing sejuani/zac/skarner/warwick every single game because my team just outright refuses to pick tanks anywhere else.

BârdFeb 27, 201811 votes

gets mid

"Ok guys we need a tank"

team locks GP, Shaco, and Janna

"Shit... I guess I have to go Galio"

Enemy locks Galio

"gg"

Tails9016Feb 28, 20185 votes

You see, that's where you pull out the item 3001 and item 3102 as your first two items on Veigar

Nik NikersonFeb 28, 20182 votes

And Vlad. Top is all ADs and Tanks and Vlad.

OnotoriFeb 28, 20182 votes

In a balanced game, the outcome would not be determined in champ select.

EbonPFeb 27, 20181 votes

Tthat was why i was recently suggesting an app that would play that part of the game like fantasy league . So players could get more practice in the picking a champ as opposed to waiting 30 mins and losing badly.

MalfectiousFeb 27, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Tthat was why i was recently suggesting an app that would play that part of the game like fantasy league . So players could get more practice in the picking a champ as opposed to waiting 30 mins and losing badly.

Go to the play store and download. Lol champion manager, it's not bad

130xFeb 27, 20181 votes

Just go pure tank, build pure defense, and one combo the entire enemy team gg. Not to mention 10 shot towers with 0 dmg items...

DexterousGeckoFeb 28, 20181 votes

I'm just a lowbie Silver, but in my elo team comp really means nothing. It's all about playing the Champion you're best at. I can pick Rammus into almost any team comp and he'll do just fine. A good Nasus can easily survive against a Teemo that just picked Teemo to counter Nasus. I know at higher elo team comp really does matter, but for most people, I would argue it's better to play who you're good at.

StarboyˇFeb 28, 20181 votes

Yeah a lot of games are decided in select when people just pick what they want to play instead of making a decent team composition

Nik NikersonFeb 28, 20181 votes

It's okay to have a comp with flaws, as long as you know how you have to play it, and what you have to do to win. The problem is, most people don't get that you have to play the game differently with different comps.

It took me a long time of playing (too long tbh), to realize that you have to know how you're going to win before the game starts, and I think that's lost on a lot of people.

MorganFreemanBotFeb 28, 20181 votes

From personal experience, I think the only two things you absolutely need to have are a tank and an adc.

If you've got those bases cover, the rest is mostly gravy in yolo que. But you will sorely feel both of those loses.

Pika FoxFeb 28, 20181 votes

LCS teams play together constantly and know what everyone else can play, and need to play more optimally as a result. In solo queue youre generally better off playing what you can play well than whatever makes youre teamcomp "better" because you have no idea how well your team plays or how they like to play.

Playing a pure protect the kog comp with a random kog wont go well if kog thinks hes playing rammus. You still want to protect him, sure, but you still want options.

FullmuteAll playFeb 28, 20181 votes

True, but from my experience drafting and working on team is very unreliable. Last season I focused a lot on drafting and picked most suitable champions for my team comp, being able to perform decently or better on these champions. I couldn't go farther than Silver 3 for the whole season. Now I am just OTP and pick it regardless my team comp (unless our comp is so bad, that if I don't pick Alistar we gonna lose). It is only start of the season and I am already Silver 1. So yeah, it tought me a lesson, that if you want to win --pick whatever works best for you, not for team.

SpecterVonBarenFeb 28, 20181 votes

I think it derives from role selection. Used to be that it was required that you discuss champ picks and positions in champ select. YES, you would have jerks auto locking or being uncomunitative but the necessity of having to parse out who would work best where ked to actual comp decisions.

Now people just enter thinking, I got my role so ill pick what I want.

SpoofghoulFeb 28, 20181 votes

i always pick Sion been doing so since his rework

i don't really have to think about drafting

CrookodileFeb 28, 20181 votes

Honestly, there are two sides tot his coin:

Drafting a counter that you know how to play

Drafting a counter you DON'T know how to play

and that kids is why you a get a diverse champ pool.

~~looking at you yasuo/riven~~

EternvlFeb 28, 20181 votes

Wow it's almost like it's been that way since ever? Ever heard of a otp?

O Fallen ScholarFeb 28, 20181 votes

While drafting is the art in any MOBA, it doesn't really work in solo queue. And I like that about LoL. There's more flexibility and games are still winnable even if you're worried about the enemy team comp.

Feed Like UnicefFeb 28, 20181 votes

Higher ELO players tend to suggest that, until at the highest of high ELO, it's far, far better for a player to play a champion he/she/pony/it/creature/attack helicopter/big bird is skilled with and enjoys rather than playing a first game Sion because it's Meta, provides engage and can front line.

Trufax

zZ KanKuro ZzFeb 28, 20181 votes

I mean, I want to have fun if my team wants a tank they can pick one, I will not rage at anyone for not picking a tank when I did not chose one.

UpDownLeftRightABFeb 28, 20181 votes

Considering most of the viable picks are tanks with reliable AoE CC, the people who don't pick them are trying to have fun. Sure, more losses for everyone, but no one seems to care about winning. Just flaming their teammates for not carrying them.

The game doesn't teach Macro or Meta play, it only teaches micro and that if you are good enough at one thing, you might eventually reach challenger. They don't tell you it'd take 10k games in a season by playing that way, but as long as everyone has fun and no ones feelings are hurt.

EbonPFeb 28, 20181 votes

i tried to get that lol champion manager but says item not found ?

DavidKnowsSep 6, 20181 votes

If you play for fun... like Trick would say just uninstall man. How can you play for fun in a competitive team game where one mistake can turn the game around. Go play ARAM