General Advice For Climbing In Lower Ranks

A DISCUSSION ON BASIC LEAGUE FUNDAMENTALS:

*This is targeted at those in the League Of Legends community who participate and care about the competition, ranked system, and general self-improvement, that are also either between the ranks of BRONZE to GOLD, perhaps feeling stuck, maybe they are completely new to the SOLO/DUO ranked system, or just simply interested in a discussion on general sportsmanship and practices. Personally, I have been climbing through the ranks for the about a minute here and been typing my thoughts down in between games because its been blowing my mind how many people are putting themselves into ranked with such severe handicaps on themselves. So I decided I would throw up a discussion post if anyone is interested in this stuff. I am taking this waaaaaay back to the basics as often my team or the enemies devolve into a flame-storm of STATS and SCOREBOARD and this all seems shallow and unrelated to any actual critique and implementation of strategy within the game. In addition, the fear of getting flamed for STATS I believe can be holding people back.

VOCABULARY:

The topics of discussion are IMPACT, MICRO, and MACRO. [Simplified: MICRO = Mechanics. MACRO = Game Sense]

Many use the term IMPACT in competitive games specifically because it means a whole lot more than simply your end game stats. i.e. K/D/R. damage, healing, damage taken. It is your actual influence on the outcome of an objective based game game. Impactful players are often told that they "carry games" but their stats are not a direct indicator of it. Impact can come from anyone; the Jungler makes huge play to get the ADC a quadruple kill, SUPPORT protects the carries during a vital team fight, important pick offs in clutch moments, calling objectives at the right time, excellent ward vision, etc. This is impact. A player can be incredibly skillful at dashing back and forth and back and forth as Yasuo in the Laning Phase, or do some insane Shaco jukes, but if the screen says DEFEAT at the end, it was all for nothing, aka not enough impact for the player to earn LP. It is a safe assumption to state that maximizing your individual impact on a game will influence whether you climb, fall, or get stuck in any given rank in a solo/duo queue system like League.

CHEER UP BUTTERCUP:

It should be clear that your SOLO/DUO queue rank and LP does not accurately represent your entire net worth as a player, you may posses extremely rare skills in certain aspects, and be specialized into something very skillful. It is designed to rate your level of IMPACT and ability to affect the outcome of games.

THE MENTAL DIVISION OF LOW TO MID RANKED PLAYERS:

Now for both those new players that are just now being introduced into competitive e-sport type games, as well as those with some experience, but are now frustrated with the task of climbing out of the lower division ranks, knowing they can compete at a higher level in specific aspects on specific champions, by drawing attention to two key elements of this game that I believe are the fundamental concepts that you build upon, you can start to achieve your maximum impact as an individual in any given match at any given rank. It is commonplace at lower ranks to see players who can get fed but do not know how to close out a game, or the polar opposite, the people who know exactly what to do to close out a game and/or the win condition at hand, but cannot execute it physically, they often fall victim to such catastrophes as getting drastically, mechanically outplayed. The most general and applicable recommendation possible for a lot of BRONZE, SILVER, and even some lower GOLD players to consider, is that in order to climb in a solo/duo queue environment, you must be way more critical of your own game. Focus on developing your game where it is the weakest, and identifying what this actual weakness is starts with going all the way back to, improving, and effectively implementing both the simple yet complex ideas of MICRO and MACRO. Knowledge and Skill is required to become ultimately IMPACTFUL, implying that player that has any desire for of climbing. You cannot just choose one, you are only as strong as your own personal weakest link.

This is a simple and common competitive sports concept, but maybe because League is a video game, it is different. Its more casual. I see a huge divide in the mindset of the player base at these lower levels, which is not necessarily wrong nor their fault. Some people just want to see how far they can get on one champion, I get it. This discussion, however, is to focus on the opposite of handicapping oneself and take a self critical approach to climbing for those wanting it like those who are actually new to ranked or those have some experience and got unwillingly stuck lower than they want, these players may find another perspective useful on how to get the ball rolling. Lets take basketball as an analogy, in Rank Silver you got all your specialized players out on the court but the point guard doesn't know any plays, he doesn't know whats going on, or how he got here, or ended up solo top lane when 5 enemies were MIA. Yeah he can dribble REALLY good but who cares if he has a middle schooler's knowledge of the game of basketball. Much of the community will say something in regards to the question "How to climb?" to just get good at one champion, aka one-tricking, or play whatever is flavor of the month, or tell you one role or lane is simply the best for climbing, and while this can help to some degree in the short term, maybe rarely in the long term, as league is inherently very "snowball" oriented, this can also get you dead stuck in a rank just as easily, as that entire practice stints your individual improvement as a player and, in addition, the meta changes so very frequently. I agree with having a few mains and some pocket picks for sure but if you want to improve/climb as fast and efficiently as possible, find what your bad at, watch or read a guide or physically practice what you are bad at more often. If you opt into the one-trick category of players, fair enough, use that time saved on learning champions to improve your MACRO game play to snowball yourself and your team.

CASE STUDY:

On the topic of MACRO -heavy players, i mean these guys are rare, but I know one or two, someone who watches more streams than me, hes got more objective awareness but loses in a 1v1, this endangered species of players that possess a much stronger understanding of the game playing out around them and generally possess a more genuine desire to be a team player, They call plays, try to brace their team and crutch their teams weaknesses, but to a fault. (These players are generally found naturally attracted to roles like JG, SUP, TOP), they often lose out any some point by being too passive during lane phase to mid phase to late game team fights due to a weak physical MICRO, losing duel and such, weak ganks, greatly decreasing their individual impact. The complete opposite appears in game way more often: MICRO focused players: (for a generalized example, this appears particularly in carry roles like ADC and MID and such things like the Ever-So-Popular Yasuo one-tricks, as these roles are incredibly alluring for those with this mindset, though it can also occur elsewhere on other roles and champions). These MICRO oriented players appear to get side-tracked often. Some may find it is simply very fun to become entirely engaged in trying to see what rank they can get while ignoring the actual win condition of destroying the Nexus and other such objectives, They will very often, though obviously not absolutely every single carry player is like this, tunnel vision throughout the entire game and do not know where they should be and at what time, found off doing their own thing, and often, possess bare minimum knowledge of their own team needs and just the overall game happening around them, such as identifying, coordinating, and countering the enemy team's plays and strategy and covering their teams weaknesses. Commitment to only this mindset decreases their impact potential on their own behalf, There isn't anything intrinsically wrong with one-tricking a champion in ranked league so long as they practice the idea of a balanced MACRO and MICRO understanding that is being discussed here.

My point is try not to become either of these players, Try to bring up both aspects of your game. Really try your hardest to find your weakness in game sense or mechanics and 100% focus on those is casual games, find your blind spots in map awareness. To start seeing significant increase in your impact is by striking a balance between developing your mental game sense and physical mechanics, as it is key to bringing a lot more to the game and your team as an individual player. When one element of your game is weak and one is strong , your impact is essentially neutral. You can try to push your strongest further but its possible to be in a higher rank based on mechanics alone but your game sense will be sub par at that level and be a burden to the team. Overall it will be a much harder battle doing that than hittin the books and bringing up your weakness. As a solid, well-rounded player, you can guide your team to a beautiful VICTORY screen more often than not, via key plays, counter plays, exploitation of enemy weaknesses, etc. that you will see before anyone else. As an added bonus, it appears that the average league player will mentally clock out after one or two outplays, oppressive opponent, camped by jungler, etc. Adaptability and keen playmaking goes a long way in this game.

APPLICATION OF CONCEPT:

An advantage to keeping this simple concept in mind is that is always relatively practical. For example, those of their respective focus on MICRO or MACRO naturally flock to certain roles subconsciously, but taking a second look and thinking about consciously what you personally enjoy and naturally excel in can help you find a role more natural for you to enjoyably climb the ladders with, plus being self-aware enough that you cover what most would generally consider your weaknesses as a player in order to not be taken advantage of by an enemy player that may be specifically looking for an opportunity to exploit. IF you can identify your own personal game play strengths and weaknesses, stop neglecting your weaknesses, you will not only strengthen yourself for many more situations, but you will also know what to expect and be able to manipulate the entire outcomes of games by identifying and exploiting other players weaknesses, and thus climb relatively quick, no matter what your preferred champion or role is.

CONCLUSION:

League is relatively complex with many things both within and completely outside your control within the ranked queue. I believe that by having this general goal or at least the basic outlook, no matter the role, on having the most positive IMPACT over STATS and SCORE, your own game experience is generally going to see more success, less tilting, maybe even be a little enjoyable, who knows. I think for the general community, within the ranks mentioned, if they start being able to actually see a success or failure beyond their K/D/A within the matches themselves, they will see a higher Rank on their profile.

P.S. Been typing this in between matches on my short climb up through ranked so far and this all may sound like basic common sense when I am sitting here spelling it our but in these games that i am participating in at these ranks, this is all abandoned, people completely are tilting after first blood i feel like it suggests there is some problem with how people are viewing what they can do to control a games outcome.