What ELO Hell really is and how to get out of it.
As a Diamond, Silver elo is surprisingly hard.
The link is to another post about a Diamond player having trouble is Silver ELO, he describes his experience and how it differs from his own ELO. He makes some key points that I want to highlight and in this post I will share some of my own experiences as well so that you see both sides of the spectrum. In the first paragraph Slayton(OP) refers to Silver ELO as "inconsistent" referring to teamwork, CS, and objective focus. Now I found this interesting because he didn't say that the players were outright bad, he said "inconsistent". Now to me this says that their were players that were decent as well as the bad ones, he says he was even surprised that some did so well while others probably shouldn't even be in Silver. Why is this important? Well is suggest that skill level might not be the issue for some people climbing out of Silver. So what could the issue be?
Well lets look in the 3rd paragraph where Slayton states "Its different in Diamond because you can make smart plays and expect people to be on board...", he goes on to explain how in Silver ELO the teamwork is almost non-existent and that most of the time you are stuck having to do all the work to carry a game. So how does the lack of teamwork stop people carrying in low ELO? Shouldn't it just be easy to carry? Well for some it might not be and it isn't necessarily due to skill. As a Plat player I can say that I did have trouble playing through lower ELO's, even Bronze. That's absurd right?!?! Well again skill isn't always to blame.
Just to give you a short history lesson on my experience in Solo Queue, I started playing ranked in S3 where I mained Jungle and I did well as a  main placing in Silver my first season. However the start of the next season didn't do so well as  had just been nerfed and I moved on to tank junglers such as  and , I got placed in bronze and had a rough time climbing even in games where I pulled off successful ganks and got my team ahead. I didn't start climbing again until I switch to being a mid player and maining  where I went from Bronze to Gold that season. This season I had the worst set of placement game winning 1 out of the 10 and placing Bronze 3, went on tilt and ending up being Bronze 5 with 0 points. I literally hit rock bottom. After uninstalling LOL and reinstalling it 2 weeks later I had a goal to get back to gold. I somehow managed to end this season Plat 5 still playing mid while maining .
Cool, now we know your life story. Still don't see how it has anything to do with ELO Hell. Well if we look at both player, Slayton and myself. He being Diamond and Me being Plat, we both at some point struggled in low ELO and we obviously are both fairly decent at the game in order to be in the ELO we are in now. So how is it that we did struggle? I want to bring us back to me in season 3, my first season I played , an assassin, then he got nerfed and I moved to tank junglers. I still did well on these champs but for some reason I couldn't win game like I did on  and I only started doing well when I switch to another assassin, that being . Season 4 and 5 I had no problem carrying games and climbing out of low ELO with both  and. If we look back at Slayton he talks about how the teams in lower ELO's were too "inconsistent" and a lot of times didn't follow up on plays, coordinate in teamfights, and so on. So with what he is saying I am assuming he plays a role and champ that is dependent on teamwork and coordination, hence why it was his key point in why low ELO is a struggle and how you have to solo carry just about every game. So how do Slayton's and my experience relate? He and I only struggled while trying to play roles/champs that are team oriented, such as tanks, support, and utility champs, but that was our play style at the time so it was what we did to win games. Sadly though it doesn't work in low ELO's.
In conclusion It really is a struggle to climb low ELO with the mentality that if you do well your team will follow suit, this is why the teamwork style roles won't do as well as a solo carry roles. So with that said you can't actually play "proper" LOL in the sense that you play your role in conjunction with your team. So someone coming from a higher ELO that plays for and with the team will struggle, those who try to carry selfishly by themselves might find it to be freelo. This difference is what causes the debate of "ELO Hell" and why some experience it and others doubt it altogether. So yes ELO Hell does indeed exist but sadly only targets those who play selflessly. So if you feel you are stuck in ELO Hell, stop playing for the team, and start playing for yourself. Pick a role or play style that allows you to carry the game with not much help from your team. If you play support, play an aggressive support and stomp the laning phase for your ADC, DO NOT expect anyone on your team to do so for you. So good luck to everyone in Solo Queue next season and remember, it is up to you to win, do not blame or rely on your teammates until you are in an ELO that understands how the games works. Thank you for the read and I hope this post helped you to better understand the struggle that is Solo Queue.
