Can someone explain the intricacies of bot lane to me?

HudnofskiBleh·Jul 11, 2017·1 votes·1,047 views

I'm absolutely garbage at bot lane. I don't know what supports synergize with what ADCs, I don't know when to farm or to go in, when to stay in lane or start grouping up, etc. etc. Could anyone take the time to explain to me how to play bot lane? I would like to know information on both supports and ADCs.

11 Comments

BabyNaixJul 11, 20173 votes

Support ADC synergy: In general passive support should go with passive adc. Aggressive support should go with aggressive adc. If your adc is a lane bully like lucian or draven a support that has cc and can go all is good. Leona and zyra are example. If the adc just wants to farm like ez or kog or jinx then a support with peel or heal is good. For example braum or janna or soraka. Support with poke is good with any adc. Many adc are strong early game and game and can more or less 1v2 (mf and cait) they can go with any support. IMO these are the best adc if your support is garbage. Some supports have a bit of everything poke peel, cc, shield, (nami, sona, thresh) they can go with any adc. In general ranged support are stronger in lane since they have better poke, melee support are better with all in and team fights.

Push or freeze lane: In general push the wave to get map control, freeze the wave to deny farm. Push first wave to get level 2. Push the wave to their tower if you have enough gold to get the item you want and want to recall. This gives you time to walk back to lane without missing cs. Push the wave if your jungler is invading or a fight is about to happen in river or jungle, this prevents the enemy bot lanner from helping. Push the wave if your jungler wants to sneak dragon. Push the wave if you want to relieve pressure from the other lanes and you have good escapes (this will make the enemy jungler gank you rather than mid or top). Freeze the wave near your tower if you are stronger than the other bot laner to stop them from farming. Freeze the wave near your tower if you jungler is going to gank soon.

Farm or fight: In general fight if the enemy is out of position or if you have a number advantage (jungler gank) or item/ level advantage. Fight if you reach level 2 first. Fight if your minion wave is bigger than theirs. Fight if they are out of position or if you are stronger want want to contest farm. Fight if the enemy is trying to cs. Fight if the enemy skills are on cd. Farm if the enemy minion wave is larger (This is pretty important in lanning phase). Farm if there is no team fight or objective going on in the map.

What to do if you killed enemy laner: Try to get advantage after the lanner died. Take the objective that you think you can get. Ideally dragon or tower. If not then at least push in the minion wave or pressure another lane/ jungle.

When to bacK: ideal situation is when the adc has enough gold to get a good item buy or one of the enemy laner was killed. adc and supp push out the wave and back together. If one of you got killed or you are pushed under turret then you should stagger the back to have one person hold the turret.

Who to focus in fight: Focus the adc in most cases since the adc does more damage. IN certain situations you should focus the support if the support can keep the adc alive (soraka or tham). If you can only get one of them kill the one that you can instantly pop (ex if support is at 25% health kill the support)

What to do if you are pushed under tower: Very few adc can farm well under tower (sivir jinx kennen). Ask jungler for a gank if this happens. As the support you should hit each ranged minion once so that it takes 1 hit to kill after tower. Or else the ADC will miss some of those.

Warding: Ward the area you think you'll get ganked from. It's usually the bush closer to where the minon wave is. Ward dargon if the enemy have a jungler that can easily solo dragon like shyvana ww or tyrnd. The first gank usually comes around 3:30 mark. However junglers usually start bot buff and gank mid or top first.

When the group: Group once your bot tower or enemy bot tower falls. If enemy bot tower falls, push in the wave and go help mid. If your mid laner is a mobile champion or a good skirmisher (zed le blanc) then the adc and support should seige mid and let the mid lanner hold bot. If the mid laner is not one of those champions then there's 2 things you can do. 1. use the support to help mid laner seige mid and the adc hold the tower (freeze wave dont push). 2. supp stay with adc push out bot wave go seige mid. once the bot wave goes back to your tower supp and adc return to bot. If you lose bot tower first then 1 person hold bot at inner tower (usually adc can be the mid laner), have 2 ppl seige mid (usually supp and mid can be supp with adc). Once more towers fall and you are winning rotate around map have 1 person push out a lane and join the group. If you are losing, then farm at towers to stall game.

HexaDecimelJul 11, 20172 votes

Well when it comes to selecting a support its a combination of picking a champ that works well for your adc, your whole team, and something that counters the enemy team.

If you are lacking a tank you may want to select a tankier support. If you are an ad heavy team you probably want to go ap. If the enemy is poke heavy you might want to take a healing support to help your lane sustain. I think in general its best to just find a couple supports you really enjoy playing and focus on getting proficient with those rather then worrying about counter picking or comps.

However, to give you an idea.....to counter teams with lots of stuns Tahm can be very useful. To counter teams that are skill shot heavy Braum is very effective. It counter mobile assassins champs like Nautilus or Leona can be useful because they have lots of cc to lock them down. I am not very good so take this however you like, but I like picking Poppy support against a Leona because it renders her zenith blade useless. Or if its a dash heavy team I may take veiger because his stun is great for zoning them and basically ensuring a kill. But just because something works a couple times doesn't mean its a good pick lol.

Early game do your best to keep the river warded and watch the map for ganks. Get a feel for how your adc plays and try to compliment his style. Do your best to punish the enemy adc when they try to cs and always look out for ganks. If your adc wants to just farm don't be too aggressive, if they are really aggressive be ready to bail them out and generally focus the adc. If you have a rough laning phase stay closer to your adc to help them catch up. It wont be safe for them to be in lane alone if they are behind. If your adc gets fed start roaming. Help out the jungler invade, or get a pick in the midlane. Try to ward in traffic heavy areas that give your lanes time to react, and do your best to place and clear wards at major jungle objectives.

DrugothJul 11, 20171 votes

At risk of sounding snide, there is a whole wealth of information at your fingertips on the internet. Open up Google and start searching. There is league university.

The info is all there, you just have to put in the effort to find it!

HalcyonDwellerJul 11, 20172 votes

A Flogging Molly fan I see! Greetings to ye :D

DrugothJul 11, 20172 votes

It's actually an old sailing adage from centuries ago.

But Flogging Molly are definitely great!

HalcyonDwellerJul 11, 20171 votes

Ah oops! I've revealed my ignorance :O Time to burn the evidence >:D

kappa

[slayer-jinx-catface]

That's a clever username, well chosen!

Eevee In A JarJul 11, 20171 votes

That's not snide. That's common sense. You can't teach someone the intricacies of bot lane and how comps work there without the OP learning the champions and their kit. You need game knowledge to be able to understand how to apply game knowledge in champion picks

HudnofskiBlehJul 11, 20171 votes

I have a counter! You say start searching on the internet? This is the internet! COUNTERED!

http://imgur.com/RvMMKDw But in all seriousness, how does league university work? Does it give guides?

Eevee In A JarJul 11, 20171 votes

Knowing how certain champions synergize at bot lane really is about learning the champions themselves. But generally ADC's are separated by certain classifications just like any other roles. There are Late game hyper carries and then lane bullies. There are ADC's with gap closer/escape and there are those without. Generally the ADC's with shorter range and no mobility are considered high risk high reward champs. They are usually well fitted with a powerful kit that needs items to scale. Then there are lane bullies that don't necessarily NEED items to burst damage and bully opponents in lane but they need to use that lane bully strength to get ahead early in the game and deny/delay late game-carries from getting their core items.

Now as a support, you have to consider what the ADC needs. If the opponents have a lot of gap closers like Jax/Irelia/etc; people that can instantly jump on your ADC and delete them, then you need strong peels and adding survival/utility to your ADC. These champs consist of Lulu, Nami, and Zilean; having both peels and utility to help the ADC survive a strong hard engage. However what if they don't need as much utility like that but need peels as well as a front line? Then you need someone like Alistar, Thresh, Leona, etc. Choosing a support is about complementing the ADC and you can't do that well without learning the champions in general.

If the opposing ADC has no escape? Choose someone like Thresh/Blitz or someone with hard engage and strong dueling potential. If your opponents have a poke heavy comp, then you probably need damage mitigation (shield) and heals (Soraka, Lulu, Nami, Janna).

Keep in mind you're not exactly bottlenecked into these small list of supports. I frequently play Shen support at the plat level (prob won't work diamond and above in Solo Q at least not as efficiently as I am currently doing) and I also have been success with Poppy support recently; perhaps Poppy support is coming back again.

HalcyonDwellerJul 11, 20171 votes

It's important to use auto-attacks to harass enemies at opportune moments. The ADC will be trying to farm, and they cannot attack two targets at once. So you can look for when they are about to try to last hit a minion, this is the time to harass or catch them with abilities / auto-attacks (you can do this as both ADC and Support).

Also there's a trifecta of laning styles, Poke, Sustain, and Engage. Sometimes there's crossover between two of them, but basically it works like rock paper scissors. Sustain beats Poke, Poke beats Engage, and Engage beats Sustain.

I'd recommend watching some youtubers for more guides, strategies, playstyles and tips & tricks. Some youtubers I've seen a lot of stuff from regarding this are:

Scrap Computer: Here is his main page
Jeremy Gaming Curios: Here is his Tips & Tricks Playlist

DeathBurstJul 11, 20171 votes

Don't bother with such complicated details right now, it's too early for you.

For now, keep it simple.

As ADC:

First priority is not dying. Don't try to farm if you'll take too much damage. It's better to just wait for the lane to push under your tower.
Second priority is farming. Never trade just because you feel like it. Try to get all the last hit, and a last hit is more important than putting a spell on an enemy.
Third priority is hurting your opponents when they cannot retaliate. Wait for them to waste their spell or to try and last hit, and then attack them, when they are busy or don't have their cooldowns.

Don't get greedy for kills, don't tower dive, try to ward a little (your Support will love you). Be patient. Wait for your jungler or your toplaner to come, and when you get a good opportunity, kill your opponents or push them out of lane and take their tower. Then group mid and repeat. If you lost your tower first, try to farm under your T2 without pushing the wave too strongly. Never go past the river. When the wave pushes, go group mid or farm a jungle camp or two.

For builds, it varies a lot, depending on Patch and specific champions, so check dedicated websites, but the most basic build of all, that is at least OK for everyone even when it's not optimal is: BF Sword -> Zeal -> Infinity Edge -> upgrade your Zeal into whatever you prefer -> last 3 items are 1 Lifesteal item/1 Last Whisper item/1 other Zeal item, the order depending on the game, with Boots somewhere in the middle.

As Support:

First priority is still not dying. Don't try to poke with Spellthief or to execute that minion with Relic Shield just because you want 15 gold if you'll take 150 damage in exchange.
Second priority is warding and watching your mini-map. Ideally, you should always know where the enemy Mid and Junglers are. In practice it's a bit hard, but if you can't see the enemy Mid at the mid lane, get paranoid. As for the enemy Jungler, when you begin, it's a bit hard to know all the jungle paths (especially when you don't play Jungle yourself), so just put enough wards deep enough in the River/Tri-bush to see them coming. Note that this "enough" varies from Jungler to Jungler. If you're against a Rammus or an Hecarim, you have to ward farther away because they run faster than average. If you're against a Lee, you must be careful about him going over walls and avoiding the standard routes where you usually ward. Etc.
Third priority is using your gold item. But remember, don't die for that, don't take too much damage.
Fourth priority depends a lot on what you play. But without going too deep into details: there are 3 big play styles. All-in, beats Sustain, beats Poke, beats All-in.
- If you're on the winning side, try to zone the enemy ADC out of CS. In that case, point 2 above is especially important. You WILL be ganked by the enemy Jungler, so you have to get ready for it. And remember! Your ADC wants to farm, not kill the enemies, so if you play Leona or Morgana or Thresh, don't necessarily engage and go 100% if your ADC is not in position and ready to follow. If you engage and they don't follow, it's your mistake, not theirs.
- If you're on the losing side, well, you don't have much more to do than the previous 3 points. Try to survive, get what little Gold you can get, and since you'll probably be pushed, communicate with your Jungler and try to set-up a good gank. That means warning your Jungler 30 sec to 2 minutes in advance, if he doesn't realize himself what's happening, so you need a bit of experience to "feel" the game flow and see the opportunity coming in advance, but that will come with time.
- If you want more details on the various play styles match-ups, reply to this comment.

Once again, don't get greedy for kills, be patient, etc. Zoning the enemy ADC far from their CS is already a win, you don't necessarily need kills. When any tower falls, go mid and start to roam and help other lanes. If it's their tower, your ADC will go mid too, if it's your tower, your ADC should be able to farm alone. Just remember to set up wards and vision for him.

For builds, it varies even more than for ADC, but the beginning is generally: Gold item T2 -> Sightstone -> either Gold item T3 or go for your other items (depending on your champ). In the second case, combine your Gold item T2 and your Sightstone when you need more slots.

For both roles:

If the enemies attack your partner, attack them back! That counts as them "being busy" and "not having their cooldowns to retaliate"! If they used them on your partner, they have nothing left for you. Of course, don't go too close to them, and try to retreat at the same time, but don't just retreat, punish them for this aggression.
If you have 75 spare Gold, buy a bloody Control Ward! Yes, even as ADC. This sh*t is OP. If you don't know where to put them, just ask in chat, but at least buy them first.
Never, and when I say "never", I mean NEVER, EVER flame your lane partner. You should never flame in general, but especially in bot lane, you have to work together. It's never only their fault, responsibility is shared. If they flame, mute them, but don't flame back. If they make mistakes and you know better, and you have time, tell them what to do in chat, explain. But don't waste your time just to say mean comments or something along the line of "WTF, that R". That doesn't help. (This is also generally true for your Jungler, btw. If you want him to gank and help you, build some trust, don't blame him.)

Match-ups, synergies, team-comps, and all that stuff:

YOU. DON'T. CARE.
Choose a couple champs you enjoy playing, and play the hell out of them. Sometimes you will have hard lanes, sometimes you will have easy lanes, tough luck. But it's always better to have a hard lane on a champ you know well than to first time a so-called "counter" and lose horribly because you don't know how it works.
If you can have at least a Tank and a non-Tank in your Support pool, that's better, but that's not mandatory. But it does mean you can choose to play in the Front or Back line depending on what your team need (whereas the ADC has to be in the Back line, at least if you follow the meta).
If really you want to pay attention to all that, at a very rough level: Early-game ADC like All-in Supports, Late-game ADC like Sustain Supports, and Poke Supports can go with whatever ADC as long as it's not a Sustain Support on the other side. But again, this is very rough and there are tons of exceptions, and most people don't think about it anyway, so they pair a Caitlyn with a Soraka or something like that.
If you're against something strange, like Lux+Morgana, or Pantheon+Leona: 95% of the time, they will be bad in team-fights. Just. do NOT. DIE. Play super safe, don't underestimate them since you don't know their champs well, don't get suprised, farm as well you can and wait for the late game. You will win team-fights, and they won't be able to take towers.