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How to carry a bad team?

DeloricVI··1 votes·4,106 views

DISCLAIMER: I do not blame my elo on my teams entirely; this thread is not about that. It is about carrying a team more consistently under circumstances where many other players in the game feed. I do acknowledge that some (if not a lot) of games that I lose are partially, or in large part, my fault.

With that out of the way, while I'm tilted over a few games I lost totally to people who feed before I can do much of anything and/or picking champions that they don't understand or have only played once or twice before joining my match, I'm seeking advice on how to climb once again.

The climb out of bronze 5 is really hard going. I went on a win streak when everyone on my team played like they actually knew how to play league of legends in general, but when you throw some people into the mix that play Singed, feed 3 kills to wukong in the first few minutes... what can I do?

This is especially true for gank junglers that get super fed in the first few minutes because they just pick up free kills of people who don't know how to play safe? I mean, I tell these people what they should do to not get killed again, but lo and behold, they push the lane under tower, Yi, Xin, Warwick or any number of junlgers pop out of the brush and fuck them up again, picks up a double kill, and goes back to stacking their devourer or making top lane's life a living hell or whatever they were doing.

Normally, I play mid. Because of the meta and because of these players that don't know what they're doing, I've had to stop playing Veigar and pick up Lulu so that assassins can't really kill me (at least, not easily) and, hopefully, I can help protect the rest of my team in the mid/late game. Even when I play lulu mid, or try to adc, we still lose because most of the rest of the team just feeds...

It's something that frustrates me so much. I understand that, there is always going to be someone that feeds, whether it's on my team or the enemy team; the game wouldn't end and last forever if no one fucked up and died a few times. However, I need some advice so that I'm not so much at the mercy of a feeder. I need to know how to play when everyone else is behind and I'm doing ok.

I know that it very much depends on the situation; everything from rune pages to item builds has to adapt to the situation, but I'm looking for some tips. For instance, if me and my mid are around the same skill level, but I have a cs lead, while at least one other lane is feeding hard. This seems to happen a lot; I'm up against a "freelo" champion like Fizz, Zed, or Lux, and we're in a deadlock because we're about even skill level. We can't really kill each other, and most of the time ganks more or less fail (until the jungler gets fed off one of these struggling lanes).

I look forward to reading your advice if you would be so kind as to help out a poor bronzie stuck in the bottom of the barrel...

I have a lot of good games, and I got up to 80-ish IP. It looked like I was going to make it up to B4, but then I get a top lane that feeds hard in the laning phase, a jungler that's totally ineffectual, and an... admittedly alright bot lane, but we cracked under the pressure of a super fed enemy team. Then my last two games had somethings wrong that I feel were totally out of my control.

The first was a hiemerdinger jungle. He locked in after I asked if he could go a different champion and said he didn't know how to jungle all that well.

The game directly after, we had a top lane singed that didn't understand the champion; no on in bronze understands Singed, but this guy admitted that this was the SECOND TIME HE'S PLAYED SINGED PERIOD.

Ugh, #tilted

That last one was the last straw; all these people knocked me down to 18 lp in Bronze 5, and I'm sick of people like this that just pretty much set me back completely after a good win streak.

12 Comments

Darkmaster Xae2 votes

Honestly the best advice I can give is to try and roll with the punches. I keep getting super weird team comps, but instead of says "WTF are you doing, that's not an adc?!?!" I just relax and be positive. At the same time, pick a champion you play well and don't rage. Literally do nothing negative, mute everyone if you have to. Just be concerned with your own playing and eventually your win streak will get you to bronze 4, then 3 and so on.

DeloricVI1 votes

I try to stay positive; in fact, half the time I'm the most positive one on my team. I never really call out picks, unless we could really use something in our team comp. I usually just ask general questions, like, "Does anyone have a good tank champion that they could play?" or something like that.

That is, unless someone makes a really dumb pick, for instance, Hiemer jungle, or just Singed. In ranked Bronze, Singed is way out of anyone's skill level. I don't play Singed, I don't know how to play Singed, but I do know that he is one of those champions that requires you to know a lot about pressure and proxy farming. If I do have to talk about those champions to someone, I make sure I do so in a calm way, and try not to tilt anyone. I know a lot of this game is not having a team who tilts and makes stupid mistakes, so I try to avoid it as much as possible.

It's also why I never surrender; as long as our Nexus is standing, I will not surrender, and try to encourage everyone to keep doing their best and play it out.

LQ9tcXETvN1 votes

It was too long to read but, solo queue can be a toss up half the time. Now I play with my friends. Thank god they added something more than duo queue. If you have no irl friends that play the game then find a group of people that you connect with in a good game i guess.

DeloricVI1 votes

Well, I tried that, but half of my friends play on Mac, meaning we can't get on Curse. I would Skype if I had the bandwidth and my computer wasn't a toaster -.-

Without that communication, it's pretty much a moot point to enter with friends; half the time, the enemy team is going to be on Curse or Skype, and they're going to stomp you if you're not in voice contact with your friends. Let's face it; it's nowhere near as effective as voice chat.

No, I'm focused on earning my way out of bronze; I know I can do better than where I am right now, and when I get teams that require me to carry 3-4 teammates... it gets really hard to do.

alasarcher1 votes

What i wanna ask you is, how come things are happening to you arent happening in opponent team? As elo is basically same, and people have same mentality. Is it possible that you are causing some of that negativity with your actions/words? Things like "take tank top" or "dont pick teemo" " dont pick veigar into zed" "dont pick warwick jungle", "dont pick xyz support" tend to tilt people.

If you dont mind i would like to point some things from your match history:

Veigar game- Why did you get Rabadons Deathcap as first item? You should never get Deathcap before Void Staff and you should never get Void Staff before your CDR item on Veigar. Also in 31 min game, you placed 6 wards, you did least damage in your entire team. Only thing on par with your opponents/allies was your CS count. So you could say,thats one thing you got out of the way. Lets asume u just had a bad game, although 6 wards per 31 min is more than a bad game.

Jinx game- 7 wards in 30 mins. If you watched some of those "how to climb out of bronze" guide videos or read some, you would notice that ALL of them mention vision. Believe it or not, wards are what keep most people away from Gold. Wards give you informations which you can use to plan and execute actions. You did buy 1 pink ward in minute 11 , which is commendable, but i can bet you only did that cause of Shaco. Your build was somewhat good and overall you were not that bad in that game

i will skip won games, but if u want they can be analyzed too

Skiping to next Veigar game- again low ward count, first item Deathcap (dude wtf you MUST get high CDR asap to stack faster) , whats the point of getting extra 30-40 ability power early. I know you were best in your team, but nothing impressive. Everyone in opposing team was much better

Lulu game- Well, ill be damned. 21 wards. Well i think that you played well that game, but that Shaco got fed as hell. I guess your Velkoz was support? Dunno why he ran teleport and didnt buy Sightstone

Well, improve your warding. As soon as you hit lvl 9 upgrade to blue trinket. Buy pink wards.

DeloricVI1 votes

I'll start from the beginning as I really like your analysis, although there are a few things that I feel I should answer about the social aspect of the team. Occasionally, yes, I do question some picks, but most questions are pretty clearly done with the best of intentions, and for the team. At least, I presume.

I avoid picking on individuals, especially at this level when not everyone has a specific champion or type of champion (tank, assassin, etc) prepared for each role. I typically don't say things like "don't play teemo" "You shouldn't play Yasuo" or "Lulu is a bad support, especially in bronze," but when I see people making bad choices in team comp or champions I do try to sway them to make the team comp good.

If there is no tank, or we only have, say, jax or xin who does carry, but doesn't tank all that well, I opt to ask, "Does anyone have a tank champion they can play?" And I also make it abundantly clear that people shouldn't pick champions they don't know, but it would be nice if we could get more sustain/more ap/more utility when it looks like our team will be 1-note and easy to counter.

In game, I typically am one of the most positive in the game, and I absolutely forbid surrender; I make sure everyone knows that there is always a chance while our Nexus is standing. Come hell or high water, I never surrender, never flame people, and try to keep my whole team from tilting and, subsequently, throwing.

As far as my item builds on Veigar, I got some advice from some guy in gold last season that said, against most mids, you should probably build Chalice of Harmony, and then rush Deathcap, which seems to work most of the time. I know in some matchups where I don't have even ground (against, say, Talon, Fizz, or Zed) I definitely go for Zhonia's first. I usually find that it's easier for me to compete chalice first against a lot of champions (Lux, Fizz, Ekko, LeBlanc, etc) and then going straight for the high damage. Half the time, no one bothers with abyssal scepter or chalice. I admit I should check tab on the enemy item builds more often, but I just went with what someone told me (within reason, of course) and continued because it seemed to get results.

As for the low ward counts on my lost games, I guess I just get flustered trying to win lane, keep my team together, try to get as much cs as possible, and make sure that I don't let my enemy laner roam, or if they do roam, I follow them and try to stop them from getting a lead on me off of my awful teammates. I guess I do tilt a little when I hear "First blood" and see that my top lane already fed someone really strong or good for carrying a game or being super annoying like Wukong, Jax, Fiora, Yasuo... etc.

To clarify that lulu game, Vel'Koz was supporting, and Shaco just became way too powerful. He ganked top and bot and killed everyone every time he went into a lane, other than me, sometimes. He ganks top, he kills top. He ganks bot, he gets a double kill. He didn't even visit my lane until after he had a huge gold lead, and he still had trouble killing me; iirc, his first gank failed.

I feel like the only real times I end up feeding is when the enemy team beats me over the head with a bag of gold because they're already 20 kills ahead before they even think about coming to the mid lane. -.-

Iqqi1 votes

Some things come to mind.

1st I didn't read your whole post. Way to long and my time is very valuable.

Now moving on.

First I would highly suggest learning a champion that has the potential to carry a game. Typically these are top lane champion fighters and or jungle. Champions like Yi and Jax always stand out at the very front of the potential super carry pack. It is really hard to influence the outcome of a game playing LuLu unless you are fairly skilled yourself and somehow able to roam to other lanes and initiate kills.

So if you are not comfortable or think of yourself as skilled enough to be able to roam out of mid lane to bot or top and gank those lanes for your teammates I would suggest at looking for another solution. The ultimate goal of mid lane is to be able to try to make place and influence the overall laning outcome for both the top and bot lane. Much easier said than done for sure.

If you were to say learn top lane and one of the potential super carry champions your direct intervention in the laning phase becomes much smaller. Instead the laning phase is all about winning the 1v1 (+jungler) matchup. Your goal is to get gold. You do this by killing your enemy and by maximizing your CS. You are less required especially in bronze 5 to have to worry about supporting your other lanes. If you farm wall or get some kills you will hit your carry potential much sooner and will have the potential to push that advantage to help win games.

The 2nd unfortunate fact that you will have to come to grips with is this... Everyone in probably Bronze 2 and lower is there for a reason. Still have some people in bronze who probably should be higher, but with the recent promo system throwing everyone down they have not had ample time to move up yet.

However what I mean by that is everyone in the lower parts of bronze are there because they are very new and do not have the game knowledge yet, and or they are there because of other game reasons. Meaning they DC fairly often which contributes to their team loss and thus since they likely lose every game they DC, they continue to move down. Same goes with people who play with high latency and such.

The only advice I can give is to completely forget about your rank and just play. Of course you should always play to win, but do not get wrapped up in the ranked ladder system. Today the ladder system and MMR system is so corrupt it in no way accurately represents the performance and skill of a majority of its players. Both systems are completely based on your Win/Lose record and as every player of this game would honestly admit whether you win or lose in no way reflects your individual skill. You will lose games because of others and you will win games because of others. Riot has the system they have today because it is super simple and because they are not smart enough to create a real solution. (this is what happens when your game designers change almost every year and you hire them straight out of college. You get a lot of inexperience.)

But back to my points.

  1. Completely forget about your rank. It is worthless and only means you group rank queue or you play a TON of games.

  2. Learn champions who can hard carry games. Commonly knows as hyper carries. Learn a hyper carry top lane and keep practicing so you can influence the outcome of your games.

  3. Pick 1 hyper carry and spam the hell out of that champ. A concept a lot of people have a hard time with is understanding that it is far better to be really good at one champion than somewhat average at several.

DeloricVI1 votes

I guess I need someone other than Veigar... in fact, I need to stop playing Veigar, which I'm in the process of doing. I always want to roam from mid to pick up some kills, but I just never get that power spike early enough; I feel like Lux, Katarina, Zed, all of those champions and more have a spike in power that lets the go bot and get free kills, or at least have a good chance of dealing enough damage to get a kill or assist... Veigar is pretty hard to use in that kind of way, especially if river is warded.

Although, I have heard a lot of advice to the contrary of what you said about hyper carries, specifically top lane hyper carries. A lot of what I see points out the clear risks of these snowball-reliant champions. They need to do well, or they will fall off the face of the earth and do absolutely nothing. Not to mention, they typically have a lot of times where mistakes can be made... it also doesn't help that I can't wrap my head around melee-ranged champions; I've tried playing a lot of assassins... Katarina, Ekko, Zed... all of which are hyper carry assassins, none of which I learned anything about from playing them or seemed to be good for me to play. :/

Iqqi1 votes

{quoted}

I guess I need someone other than Veigar... in fact, I need to stop playing Veigar, which I'm in the process of doing. I always want to roam from mid to pick up some kills, but I just never get that power spike early enough; I feel like Lux, Katarina, Zed, all of those champions and more have a spike in power that lets the go bot and get free kills, or at least have a good chance of dealing enough damage to get a kill or assist... Veigar is pretty hard to use in that kind of way, especially if river is warded.

Although, I have heard a lot of advice to the contrary of what you said about hyper carries, specifically top lane hyper carries. A lot of what I see points out the clear risks of these snowball-reliant champions. They need to do well, or they will fall off the face of the earth and do absolutely nothing. Not to mention, they typically have a lot of times where mistakes can be made... it also doesn't help that I can't wrap my head around melee-ranged champions; I've tried playing a lot of assassins... Katarina, Ekko, Zed... all of which are hyper carry assassins, none of which I learned anything about from playing them or seemed to be good for me to play. :/

Hyper carries don't need to get ahead. That is far from true. They just need to get enough gold for 2-3 items. Hard concept for new players to understand. You dont have to kill 3 kills in lane. You survive laning phase and farm gold. Get kills if you can, but ultimately you are pushing towards another goal.

Also Ekko, and Zed are not champions you are going to be carrying games with. Katarina possibly, but only if played very well.

DeloricVI1 votes

Most of the Zeds I've seen in my ranked games die very few times, and blow my carries up very fast (including me if I happen to be mid or adc at the time).

Most of the Ekko's... well, they're really bad Ekko. I don't have much of a problem dealing with them now, but an Ekko that knows how to ult, position his q, and land his w every time? that's something I'm not sure I can handle so well.

Anyway, as far as hyper carries go, I see so many of them that are kind of hard to cs with; in fact a lot of the ones I know of are assassins... I mean, you have junglers that get to farm all they want, but it's really complicated to jungle. I know that sounds like me whining, but it's why I stopped queueing as Jungle in the first place... that and I only really have Master Yi when it comes to infamous jungle carries. I have Vi, but even if you build full damage, you'll probably have trouble carrying a bad team; you can ult someone but that doesn't mean your team will follow up or be able to pick up a kill or clean up the teamfight. Full AD Vi is also not a great decision most of the time, as she works much better as a bruiser or tank. (At least, last time I checked)

MLDzXnRRR1 votes

If your team doesn't want to win, you will not win. It's simple. There are many people who just play for the kills and they don't care about winning at all.

Nivloc1 votes

Play well, don't be negative, try to make good calls, don't get into fights. You'll still lose at least 40% of your games, and people will always be stupid.

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