Botlane meta

Pineaplepenetr8r·Jul 13, 2015·3 votes·1,093 views

I main botlane, and just wanted to share my thoughts in the current meta. Currently, most botlane supports can be put into 3 categories, cc, poke, and sustain. They make a sort of triangle, where cc beats sustain, sustain beats poke, and poke beats cc. ADCs fall into 2 categories, there's ones that can't do very much in lane early without the help of a support, they're farmers. Then you have the ones that can create pressure on their own, we'll call them poke. I've found that generally a poke support doesn't work well with a farming adc, and a sustain support doesn't work too well with a poke adc. Any thoughts?

8 Comments

LordDarkshaydeJul 13, 20152 votes

My thought is simply why do we have to constrict ourselves to a meta to begin with? Before her rework Soraka used to be my favorite support because I would play Lux, Xerath, or any other pokey APC champ and just spam their bot lane out because I had her provide me with a constant source of mana. I was yelled at every time I did this by my team until they saw how well it worked and even then I was told we were lucky because we won game not that my idea was good enough to throw the other team off. I have also played Azir in the botlane as a marksman because his soldiers give him the range to safely farm up against even a Caitlyn (and we all know how annoying trying to farm against that bitch can be). My thoughts on the subject are break the damn meta and play what you want so long as you are good at it. If you have a duo partner that is willing to go duo top or duo mid in lieu of a jungler don't be mad that you aren't gonna have ganks be happy that their jungler is gonna have to either concentrate on that duo lane or be forced to lose it cause most players in this meta cannot handle the idea of a 2v1 lane. There are strengths and weaknesses in all of the strategies I have outlined, but the biggest hurdle is breaking everyone out of this rut that is 1 top 1 mid 1 jungle 2 bot. I mean yes the LCS does conform to the meta, but how often do we see lane-swap games simply so the bot lane can effectively free farm early and push down 1 tower by 10 minutes into the game? That in itself is a break from the meta, but since it is LCS it is widely accepted. I say we all work together and play OUR game OUR way and see what comes of it. I have actually been considering creating a Ranked 5's team solely with the purpose of breaking the meta and trying out different strategies just to see how far we can climb by not conforming to a state of the game that isn't even legally enforceable.

Pineaplepenetr8rJul 13, 20151 votes

It's a good point, the reasoning for the jungler though is for those camps in the jungle. If you don't have a set jungler, all those camps are just extra gold just sitting there, and sure laners could go in and farm them, but there's a chance that they miss some of their own lane farm, plus camps do alot of dmg, that's why you can't have these super squishy junglers. The point behind the botlane is to have a big damage dealer be able to get gold. Sure, the same can be said for mid, but it's a shorter lane, not as much help is needed because the minions don't have as far to go. Technically you could have an apc bot and an adc mid, but it doesn't work very well with an all ad or all ap team, or at least your big damage dealers being the same, because itemization allows the other team to just mitigate more damage. The laneswaps in lcs are to get the tower down early and because the adc wants to farm with little interruption. Early game you don't see the entirety of the other team punish for a lane swap because early game farming is important, but not giving the other team kills is also important, that's why you see top lane go with the jungle for a bit to get levels to be able to get farm against the adc later on. It's too risky to play a 1v2 right at the start because the one is just going to struggle to farm against the 2 putting pressure, it hardly ever works out well. The meta is what it is because that's what the pros found work best. The early tower gives extra global gold, plus they try to set it up for a freeze to make it a farm lane for a bit afterwards.

khorneyJul 13, 20151 votes

It's not just the gold but the xp as well

ShuffledPancakeJul 13, 20151 votes

Wouldnt a sustain champion (Sona,soraka) be a poke champion and a sustain, so poking is very important because you dont have to worry about hp (Support - heal)

Pineaplepenetr8rJul 13, 20151 votes

They are soley classified as a sustain champ because of the triangle of power, sure they have poke, but they are countered by cc champs. There are a few exceptions though, simply because they're hard to classify, like alistar has heal and 2 forms of cc. Even though he has a heal, he falls into the cc category because he has such hard disengage for other cc champs, and he's countered by poking him down and burning his mana.

khorneyJul 13, 20151 votes

Your right like I find my self losing lane every time when I use Leo with kalista and when kal rushes runaans so all they have is runaans and dorans for that you need sustain or poke b3cause she can't do shyt to help you out and falls behind

Pineaplepenetr8rJul 13, 20151 votes

Leo is a great support, I used to love playing leo, but lately, I've been finding her less and less effective in laning phase. All she can really do well is start a fight, she needs a poke champ to be able to back her up effectively. With kal, if you want to play cc, try blitz for pulls, or ali and taric for sustain and cc. Janna can give cc, but she tends to be squishy, and in solo queue, I wouldn't want to put all your faith in a kal as to when to pull you out in time.

khorneyJul 13, 20151 votes

Not saying she isn't but when kal rushes runaans she can't back you up that's the problem when peopl who play kal rush runaans instead of getting pref nd sword and or pickaxe however when a kal decides to rush runaans2 you need a sustain or poke supp not cc all in like Leo