Extensive Guide On Team-play and Getting Better to Climb By A Diamond 1 Player.

Hello! I've a peaked at Diamond 1 50 lp playing all different roles, (mostly jungle, now an adc/mid main) since s3, and I wrote this guide focused around team-play and what you can do to help your team play better. I go by the IGN: Lucid. I'm on NA and am currently D3 50 lp.

Common misjudgements about your team:

My top laner hasn't tp'd to help bot lane at all, but the enemy top laner has. My top laner doesn't know how to roam and is so bad!

Possibly, but not necessarily. A few things to remember when it comes to this:

• Proper setup and wave control. A top laner can't really tp to bot lane if it's pushed up to the enemy team's turret, unless by a means to countergank.

What you can do: If you want your lane in the best position for your top laner to gank for you, you want to let the enemy team push up and get a ward in the farthest brush from your turret. This sets up the easiest possible tp opportunities that even your silver teammates are likely to understand.

• If your toplane is losing his lane, it's really hard for him to tp! This is when you need to be most mindful of the enemy top laner tp'ing on you without chance for a counter tp. If your top laner is losing horribly or even just getting camped but not dying, chances are he's used his tp to get back to lane to pick up 2-3 waves he might have missed otherwise.

What you can do: Respect the enemy teleport and keep track of your own. Riot added the nifty little feature of being able to see when your top laner's tp is up. If you know your top laner's tp is down and you're not sure if the enemy's tp is up, the best course of action is to not make many plays around botlane. Either let yourself get pushed in, push the lane all the way in and back off, or just ward up and play the lane as safe as possible in a stalemated position. If you're confident you can win a 2v3, or a 3v4, then is your only time to really play aggressive in this position. Of course, if you know the enemy top laner won't tp to your lane, and you have wards/know where the enemy jungler is, then it's always okay to play aggressive and try to gain an advantage. It's also better if you ask your top laner if he knows if the enemy top laner has tp, if you're lower elo it's not likely he does, but it never hurts to ask.

My jungler hasn't gotten any kills for my lane, and i'm being camped by the enemy jungler!

• Again, proper setup, and wave control. It'll be hard for a lower elo jungler to recognize to gank your lane unless your wave is in a good position.

What you can do: When it comes to setup this can start in champ select. You can pick a champion who's easy to gank for. Someone with cc/setup/follow up/gap closers of their own to make it easy. Examples would be Leblanc, Fizz, Irelia, Darius, Vayne, etc. There isn't a lot of champions you can pick that have terrible gank setup, just make sure you don't pick them if you expect good ganks, or ganks often. After that wave control can be important. It's easier for your jungler to recognize a gank opportunity if you let your enemy laner push you into turret. To follow this if you're getting pushed into your turret but start pushing slowly after the reset, you can stack up a huge wave and call your enemy jungler over to go for a dive. These can be hard to execute properly but always worth it and will gain you a huge advantage if executed properly.

• Proper warding.

What you can do: Know what jungler you're playing against. If you're playing against an evelynn, rengar, or another invisible jungler, ward the camps. You can't rely on your jungler enough to keep tabs on them and counter gank them, so ward the camps with your trinket and then pink one side of the river. Then ask your jungler if he can pink the other side, most of the time this gives you guaranteed safety. Lane ganks from invisible champions can be almost impossible to avoid so just be mindful! If the enemy jungler hasn't shown up on the map in a while and you're in a position where you could be lane ganked, respect it. The few farm isn't worth the death you'll give up. If the enemy jungler has a way to get over walls recognize that, and ward in positions that would see them before they could jump over the wall, not just the lane brush. The sooner you know the enemy jungler is coming, the better. This is why usually the deeper the wards, the better. The sooner you know where the enemy jungler is going, or could be headed, the easier it is for you to call your jungler for a counter gank, or avoid the gank entirely. Nothing sways the early game more than an early double or triple kill on a gank gone wrong because you knew they were coming.

• Simply knowing when it is possible you can get ganked.

Is the enemy jungler extremely mobile/fast? (Hecarim, master yi, etc) Does he have a global? (Pantheon, shen) Could he gank me through lane? Could he be sitting in the lane brush right now? All questions you need to think about and recognize a possibility for. If you do not, or have not seen the jungler on the map recently, you need to be mindful of these things. Obviously controlling the lane can help you avoid these situations. If you're pushed up you're more susceptible to a lane gank. If you're pushed in, you're more susceptible to a brush gank. If you're pushed in and low on hp you can get dived. If the enemy laner has gank setup and if you're as far as halfway out, you can get ganked. If you don't have your summoners up, you're more likely to get ganked. If you are in a matchup where you can possibly 1v2 the enemy jungler/laner combo or 2v3 them, you can play more aggressive then you normally would. It's hard to recognize these situations so if you're not sure it's better to just play it safe. If you're sure the gank is gonna be coming your way, (You're being camped, you have a lane that's easy to gank, you're pushed up really far), it's also a good idea to tell your jungler that! That way they can either counter gank, or make a play safely on the other side of the map.

The enemy laners have roamed on me constantly! My laners haven't followed!

• Warding and lane control. I'm not gonna go over the basics again, because they're almost the same as the ones for jungler ganks.

• Map awareness.

Map awareness is the key to not dying to a roam, almost more than anything. If your team calls missing make sure you see it, and make sure you recognize the possibility of a lane roam. If you see the enemy champion on a ward walking through river, dying to that roam is an extremely bad mistake to make. Just checking to make sure the enemy laners are still in their lane every 15-20 seconds can be a life saving tactic.

• Recognizing roam potential.

Is your team's laner getting destroyed in cs? Is he getting pushed in over and over again? Is there a champion with a global ability? Can the enemy adc 2v1 the lane without dying? Does the enemy support have great cc/ganks (i.e. alistar, blitzcrank) and possibility one of the biggest ones, is that lane's tower gone already? If your lane loses it's tower pre-15 minutes, there's a good chance that the enemy lane will be able to roam on you without losing almost anything. There are certain champions that hold a lot more roam potential than others. The fizz is a lot more likely to roam than a ziggs, the rengar is a lot more likely to roam than the jayce, the alistar is more likely to roam than a janna, etc.

• Your laner not following

There are quite a bit of reasons a laner wouldn't follow their opponent to counter their roam. Much like the tp scenario, maybe they're getting pushed it and don't wanna leave, maybe they don't have nearly as much mobility or quickness, maybe they believe you'd lose the 2v2, 3v3, 4v4 or 5v5. Maybe if they try to follow there is a potential of them getting caught out/dying. (If a 0-2 Xerath tries to follow a 2-0 talon roam, the talon can easily kill him). Or maybe they would rather get the turret than follow the roam and get the guaranteed gold/xp. If one of the enemy laners roams on you and you avoid it, that gives a lot of potential for your laner to catch up or get ahead in gold/xp.

My carries aren't doing any damage in teamfights!

• Do you need to peel?

There's a few things that should go into this. Can the carries peel themselves? Can your team peel them? Do you have anything to offer in peel? Can you reliably take out the enemy carries if you don't peel? If the choice is between protecting your 0-5 Jinx, or killing the 5-0 Lucian, killing the 5-0 Lucian obviously gives you a better chance to win the fight. But you need to recognize if you can't reliably kill the enemy carries, you're always better off sticking with yours and protecting them, and doing as much damage/soaking as much damage as you can. If you have late game carries on your team, and you have any kind of cc however small, it's never a bad choice to make sure you carries can output all the damage they can. Especially if they're fragile like Jinx and can't protect themselves that well. If the enemy team has a lot of dive, (fizz, vi, xin, etc) then peeling them off can result in free kills, leading to unfair teamfights. If their most fed member is a diver, and you successfully peel them, they didn't do their job, and you've allowed your carry to do their job. If you are the cc heavy tank, or the support, most of the time you need to peel your carries if you want them to carry the fights.

• What if I can kill the enemy carries?

This factors in a few things also. Are their carries late game carries who dps a lot? Are their carries the most fed on their team? Are your carries more fragile? Does your team have the peel without you? If the enemy's team fed players are divers, peeling is often better. If your carries can handle their own diving is better. If the enemy has late game carries who you need to shut down (like azir) and your team has mid game/mobile-self peeling carries (lucian), then diving is better. If you're the only peel on your team, and you can't wipe them by diving with your team, peeling is better. You also need to factor in what champion you're playing. Nunu is always a better peeler than a Kha'Zix. Try to coordinate the picks to what your team is picking. If your carries are immobile, try a cc oriented peeler. If your carries can handle themselves, and the enemy team has immobile carries, try a diver.

My laners are all dying to the enemy jungler!

• Warding for your laners

One of the easiest ways to help your laners avoid ganks, is simply warding for them. Maybe they don't pay attention to wards at all, maybe they do what they can but it's not enough, maybe they don't ward properly. No matter what, warding is more than a one person job, and it's hard to get good enough wards to not die if only the laner is doing it for himself. If it's an evelynn/rengar/shaco/etc., ward camps and pink for your laners, if it's a pantheon ward as deep in the enemy jungle as you can get.

• Keeping tabs on the enemy jungler

Warding in their jungler, guessing where they would gank/be, counter ganking them and lying in wait for them to show up, all important, and useful things. Nothing will help your laners more than a good counter gank. A good counter gank will potentially take the enemy jungler off the map for a good 30-45 seconds, relieve pressure on your laner, or sometimes even set them wildly ahead. If you can make sure your team almost always knows where the enemy jungler is, not only will it be extremely easy for you to gank, it'll be way harder for your team to die to any kind of ganks. It also makes it easier to counter jungle them, and punish them/set them behind for any ganks they might attempt, especially if they fail.

My adc keeps dying, and I'm the support

• Ganks

If ganks are what's getting your adc killed, then there's plenty of ways as a support to prevent this. Wards, wards, wards. Like always, wards are pretty much the key to denying this. In special cases like globals, or tps, you just have to be the map awareness for your adc. Attack moving on creeps can be focus consuming work, if you notice the top lane rengar has been missing for 15 seconds, just let your adc know and back off, better save than dead.

• 2v2 trading/all ins

If you force your way into some bad trades/all ins, you can force your adc to kill himself, without even realizing that you have. If you're the Braum/Ezreal, into the Caitlyn/Nami, your adc can't afford to walk up and get harassed in a lane like that. So if you're not all-ining, or getting a gank, walking up and taking a trade could put your adc at an extreme disadvantage, if not straight up killing him. If your lane opponent is a healer, you can even afford to take trades that are slightly in your favor, if you're not also a sustain lane. Alternatively, if you're a healer and you end up getting yourself into a 2v2 all-in against a playmaking support/adc duo, this is a surefire way to get yourself, and most likely the adc killed. Even if they're bad, and sure to misplay, you'll want to force all-ins or trades that your ad can't possibly mess up, if you don't want them to die at all.

• Knowing when to roam

Even if you're a blitzcrank, there can be bad times to roam. Roaming at the wrong time can deny your adc a lot of farm or even get him inevitably killed. If the enemy botlane is an Alistar/Draven, who are sure to dive your adc if you leave him alone, then you can't afford to leave him alone. Even if you know you can get an advantage for your midlaner, setting your adc that far behind is rarely worth it.

A few more general tips I wanted to get out of the way before I close this up:

• Be vocal, but not a nuisance.

Communicate what you can. What you want your team to do for you, what you think they should be doing, important timers. When your opponent blows summoners let your team know, when they're missing let your team know. If you see the enemy jungler on a ward, let your team know. If you see where your enemy laner warded, let your team know. Feel free to ask questions, or ask them to do things. If your teammate makes a misplay, and you want them to do it differently next time, say it politely if you can. Don't argue with them if they disagree. It's better for them to be wrong and not know it, then for them to tilt/afk/rage and lose you the game entirely. The more time you spend typing meaningless things, or getting your teammates to type meaningless things, the less time you can focus on winning the game as a team.

• This guide focuses on a lot of reactive tactics, but a lot of proactive tactics work out great too!

If your the top laner, you can be the one telling your bot lane to setup for the ganks, and making great tp plays. If you're the engager, you can be making great plays and setting your team up for victory.

• Focus on what you could be doing better, at all times!

The important part is to always focus on yourself. Could your silver 2 teammate have played the 3v3 fight better? Probably. But that's never what's important. What's important, and what's gonna help you climb, is always gonna be improving and focusing on yourself. In-fact, it can be easier to enable your teammates to do better, once you become a better player! The jungler who wards properly, and keeps tabs on the enemy jungler, even if you don't have a big ganking/playmaking impact, will win more games than a jungler who misplays and doesn't even try to do those things.

I think that's all I have to say in this guide for now. Of course I couldn't touch on every aspect of the game in one guide, but I think if you take all of this advice seriously, climbing can get much easier.

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns feel free to leave them in the comment section. I also do stream at twitch.tv/screamm regularly where I will be more than happy to answer any league related question I can answer. Thanks for reading!