"Games shouldn't be won in champion select" -Riot 2015

MurderByNumbers·7/28/2016, 11:21:40 PM·4 votes·1,105 views

2016: Jhin/Annie vs Draven/Brand bot.

Anyone want to explain to me how it is possible to win this lane without jungler intervention?

If Annie hangs back, Jhin gets poked out of lane. If she goes forward, she gets bursted before she can get in range.
Brand's burst is better than Annie's. Normally this means the correct play is to CC and burst brand before he can get his combo off, but his laning partner is Draven.

2016-07-29 Edit: it isn't fair for me to ask for what I could have done without giving the link to the match. Here it is:

http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/2252592352/233240291

23 Comments

Faie7/29/2016, 12:00:01 AM2 votes

"Games shouldn't be won in champion select" means that just there shouldn't be champions that are so "OP" they guarantee a win straight from champ select, and that super hard counters shouldn't exist. Also, Jhin/Annie is a pretty terrible lane to begin with, and you're playing it against 2 early game bullies.

III BAKURYU III 7/29/2016, 12:14:05 AM2 votes

Champion diversity some champions are stronger than others at the start of the game and the strong champions early tend to fall off while the weak early champions scale into monsters.

Just play safe if your in a counter or bully lane or just not winning trades and try to farm under tower.

Duke Anax7/28/2016, 11:40:33 PM1 votes

Keep in mind that you don't have to win lane in order to win game, often it is enough not to lose lane.

One alternativeoption with Annie, if you can't win with damage, is to go tanky. Get some points in Shield and go item 2301 for quick support item. Then what i like to doon a lot of champs is this combo: item 3025 item 3001 seems weird at first but it gives you a nice combnation of mixed offense and mixed defense.

1wolfpack7/28/2016, 11:51:04 PM1 votes

all things being equal. no one wins, they farm all game and nothing happens. or they trade kills here n there but still stay relatively equal.

but things are never equal in this game. different skill sets, plus u got 4 players in 1 lane and ofcourse junglers are a thing, and so is roaming, TP ganks from top

Meep Man7/29/2016, 4:43:33 AM1 votes

Play extremely passive until Annie reaches Level 6, upon which she can try and make some sneaky vision plays with her ultimate. If she can, she can snowball the lane with Jhin with one good Flash+Ult. If Brand and Draven take the lead, Jhin is going to be forced to try and farm with his Q or maybe even W. It's not an ideal lane to begin with, both Draven and Brand being known for their strong early game, but it can be done through very passive farming. Another possibility is by just poking down Draven and Brand as Jhin. Only Brand has the chance of poking back and even then his poke isn't very reliable at longer ranges. They have no healing mechanics in their lane excluding the Summoner Spell, so just poking with Jhin's extreme W is good too. This means maxing W first by the way.

Also, why are we excluding jungle intervention? Shouldn't all factors be considered for winning a lane including the jungler? You are up against two lane bullies, even champions with longer range than Annie and Jhin would want at least a little bit of assistance from the jungler.

DarkLordArbitur7/28/2016, 11:27:13 PM1 votes

Well if you had a real support, like Leona, you would be able to stunlock the Brand or the Draven for the Jhin to get massive damage off, or you could use someone like Sona and poke the squishies down until Jhin can do the damages, or you could do any number of things since you're fighting two feast or famine champions that don't do well when not getting constantly fed kill+assist gold. Taking anything other than a support into bot lane to do support things is just a terrible idea.

dim2a7/29/2016, 5:00:22 AM1 votes

Games should not be won in champ select. But games can be lost in champ select. If you, say, pick soraka mid and lose, that game being lost in champ select is not a balance problem.

Annie can be played at support but she is not "standard" support. If it was leo or soraka or sona support, you probably wouldn't lose that hard. Annie is a damage support without long range poke, and the champion is designed as midlaner, so it's OK if she fails at support vs. certain matchups (or even all the time!). Off-meta/niche picks are fun, but I don't think they fall under riot's statement of "games not being won in champ select".

In response to above post: In this situation the right strategy is to pick someone with "support" either primary or secondary as your support (surprising as that may sound) if you're not wiling to take risk of being counterpicked. Not annie who is designed as mid.

Astôlfo7/28/2016, 11:34:03 PM1 votes

Picking that in the first place was a bad idea. That doesn't automatically determine a win. Skill is a huge part of it. But going into a matchup like that is asking for trouble.

It's like playing Pokemon. Sure, you could play a Water type against a Grass type. Sure, you can still win. Will you have a hard/frustrating/bad time? Yes, you will.