How to win the most annoying matchups in the game: A comprehensive list.

People always complain about really annoying lanes that make them feel helpless and useless. Here's where this thread comes in: I analyzed and broke down each and every matchup and provided counterpicks and countermeasures to counter the influence of these champions. Here we go.

---

A staple of every player's complaints, Riven boasts incredibly high damage outputs, being lethal even at level 1. Her mobility, immense damage output, and low cooldowns make her a horror to face off against. But she's not invincible. #Counterplay The main thing you have to remember when fighting Riven is that she can and will kill you. But that's her greatest weakness: her feast or famine playstyle. If you have any respectable damage from your top laner or jungler, utilize it to take down Riven early so that you can gain level advantages on her. Make sure to coordinate with your team to warn them about when Riven is missing, as she can snowball off of just 1 kill. If you do not have any respectable damage from your jungler or top laner, and your mid laner is pre-occupied, play the long game.

When playing the long game, you have to be smarter than the Riven player. You can afford to last hit away from Riven as long as you have some way to hinder her mobility enough to force her to back off. Riven players generally are very aggressive, using her Q's relatively short cooldown (for what it does, anyway) to tear through everything in their path in order to get harass on you. A good way to abuse this is to bait Riven into attacking you, backing off, and she will have torn though a minion wave and pushed harder, meaning that you can easily freeze the wave and force her to lose farm or risk getting ganked.

If you had an "oops" moment during laning phase, taking down Riven is just like taking down Katarina: wait until she goes in, then lock her down. Focus her hard and she will be obliterated. While tanks may generally lose against Riven in lane, they prove to be the best line of defense against her later on. Make sure you don't create openings for her to go in and deal damage, and position your team defensively so that Riven cannot reach your carries without wallowing through the rest of your team.

#Counterpicks Champions with stronger dueling such as and can really screw up a Riven if they play their lane right. Also, champions who can completely negate Riven's all-in such as and prove to be nightmares for her, as silences and CC make her absolutely useless. Paired up with this damage, Riven is sure to have difficulty with lanes like these, and may or may not rage quit. 76% of the time, they do.

---

The mid laner terror as he is, Fizz is an extremely mobile champion that deals terrifying amounts of damage even early on, and can turn 1 kill into a won lane. But even he has his flaws.

#Counterplay During the laning phase, keep your distance and try to farm. If you have any ranged harass you can nail Fizz with, be sure to pressure him by using it, while managing resources. Make sure you stay away from Fizz's melee range as his W's DoT is extremely detrimental to your lane, especially if you are low health to begin with. Avoid his harass with Q by staying out of range, and if you have any mobility you can bait it, dodge his all-in, and hit back strategically, finding a way around his E. His E has a relatively high cooldown early on, so punish him hard when it's down.

Should you have a jungler gank, most of the time accept the fact you won't kill Fizz. Sometimes ganks are there to expend resources of the mid laner to make the lane easier to deal with. Should your jungler put pressure on the lane, Fizz will start having to expend lots of his mana to use his E to escape. Eventually he'll be forced to back or die, and from there you can get a lead by farming up.

Mid-late game, keep extensive map vision a priority. A surprise ult from Fizz can disorient most teams, and destroy any squishy carry. Additionally, have your carries keep their distance so that Fizz doesn't have an opening to go in on. Should he dive the carry, fall back and eliminate him. ADCs like are nightmares for Fizz later on because her dash and long range make it nearly impossible for Fizz to reach her.

#Counterpicks People that can straight up duel Fizz and mitigate his damage can deal with him easily. and are two prime candidates for those lanes where Fizz can't do much but farm and pray he doesn't die. and are examples of champions that can easily avoid Fizz's all-in and strike back harder. Once Fizz's cooldowns are used up, all he can do is walk and auto attack.

---

The infamous strong-armed champion that makes us all wonder what Riot was thinking, Tryndamere is a menace in lane with his critical strikes and incredible mobility, sometimes he needs more than 5 seconds to do his job.

#Counterplay Tryndamere is a strange one. He will try to auto attack minions early on, then proceed to jump onto you and crit you to death. That's never fun. However, while it is annoying to deal with, you can use it to your advantage. Similar to Riven, he will push very fast, since his passive works against him in that regard. Let the lane push out, do your best to freeze the lane, and watch him grow bored and roam. Once he does roam, coordinate with your team to take him down.

Should Tryndamere be up against somebody with good dueling potential, you can bet there's a lane you can win. Don't extend your stay until 6, you need to shut down Tryndamere before he ever gets his ultimate. It's just easier that way. Juggernauts and bruisers can deal with Tryndamere's all-in with CC, heavy damaging abilities, or straight up auto attacks. You can easily keep your distance from him if you know how to position yourself behind minions and respect his E's range. Giving him free harass on you will just help him with the lane with his Q's heal.

Later on in the game, Tryndamere becomes very difficult to deal with. He will split push all game, then proceed to destroy your carries by jumping onto them through your entire team. Coordinate with your team to utilize slows and other soft CC that can slow Tryndamere's advance to a crawl, then retaliate. When his E is back up, make sure to use your hard CC then in order to stop his escape. Should he advance with his team, either pressure the back line with AoE or presence, and fall back to deal with Tryndamere effectively. Hard CC is the best way to stop a raging Tryndamere.

#Counterpicks Champions like and who can impair Tryndamere's ability to deal damage, then retaliate with immense damage themselves are valuable against him. Wither and Counter-Strike are two of Tryndamere's worst nightmares, as it affects his ability to deal damage in lane. Juggernauts like and can hold a lane against this rager, and maybe even end a fight gone wrong with a timely execute. Darius in particular has a good pressure tool on Tryndamere with his bleed, as even after Tryndamere escapes the bleed can kill him. Champions that can make his laning phase hell like Satan and are also very effective against him. To deal with his split pushing, people who can split push harder like or can counteract his presence.

---

is a champion that many mid laners have had the misfortune to deal with. Sporting a combination of long range poke, AoE burst, and a pair of executes that synergize with each other, it's no wonder people have trouble dealing with this mobile shadow ninja. But we can shed some light on that.

#Counterplay Zed is a champion who relies on his shadows to deal heavy damage to targets. While this may not be news, it can be difficult to deal with his constant harass with his energy-based resources that are seemingly limitless. Dealing with Zed is all about windows of time and opportunity. Did Zed throw a shuriken just now? Harass him, he has no ranged projectiles. Did he just expend a full combo to clear the wave and/or try to kill you? No matter, his only pre-6 mobility is down. You have to abuse his cooldowns to their full extent, and if you dodge his poke you can deal with him by harassing him hard.

Zed's abilities focus mainly on him landing them. While it may seem difficult to dodge things like his W-E, you can always do what most immobile mages do to deal with him: hide behind minions. His shurikens will hurt a lot less if it went through a minion or two beforehand, and if he uses a full combo in your minion wave he'll just have pushed extremely hard, forcing him to back off or risk getting ganked. Also, if you dodge Zed's abilities, you have a good 10-15 seconds to punish him, as his energy bar is limited and runs out quickly. He is melee, but be wary of his shurikens. Moving erratically and strategically is key in this matchup. Otherwise you'll play into his strengths.

Later on, Zed becomes a menace as he will not even need his ultimate to kill squishies anymore. One way to counter this is to keep the carries far into the back line, so as to force Zed to think twice before going through your team. Should he use his ultimate (this also applies in lane), aim all your skillshots on the opposite side of where he approached from. If you land any hard CC on him, or even a silence, Zed's whole assassination will have backfired. It's easy pickings from that point. Even if you don't kill him, you will force him to back off early, but be wary of this as he can still use his shadows to harass from long range with his abilities.

Another way to mitigate Zed's damage in general is to fake him out. This applies to most skillshots with a cast animation. If you see a good Zed throw out his shadow, he will try to slowroll the skillshot in order to wait for you to panic and use your mobility or play into his hands. Instead, you should walk one direction, and starting moving completely randomly. Once you see him casting his shuriken, walk in the complete opposite direction of where you were, preferably diagonally away so that you can dodge it easier.

#Counterpicks Champions that can shut down a Zed are strong picks that can mitigate his harass and hit him back twofold. and are extremely good at this, because their array of targeted damage, mobility, and shields grant them the ability to make Zed extremely underwhelming. Ekko in particular can just press R to counter Zed's entire all-in combo. Champions that can easily duel a Zed like and can make his life difficult. Fizz can avoid Zed's harass constantly with his E (troll pole, for reference), and can avoid the detonation damage of Zed's ultimate while launching a counter attack. The anchored points of Zed's mobility also make it easy for Fizz to have a target for his ultimate, and he can easily force Zed to blow his own should he get the fish on him. Malzahar in particular can keep up even, if not stronger harass and pushing power against a Zed, and his level 6 power spike is so strong that it dwarfs Zed's level 6 strength in comparison. Zed with all his mobility cannot avoid Malzahar's Nether Grasp (R), and as squishy as he is will melt under the damage quickly.

Other champions include those that can outright outsustain and tank through the laning phase and the game, such as and . Cho'gath in particular stacks so much health that Zed has trouble killing him to begin with, and his incredible sustain in lane with his passive and ultimate allow his harass to go nearly unpunished. Irelia has very decent sustain, and while not usually a mid lane pick, can prove to be an issue to the Master of Shadows throughout the game. Should Zed deal even a sliver of damage to Irelia, she can use her Equilibrium Strike (E) in order to get a heavy 2 second stun on Zed, rendering his entire window of strength useless.

---

The Queen of Deleting, Fiora is a very menacing champion to deal with. Armed with an array of utility tools and true damage that bypasses even the tankiest champions' defenses, Fiora is truly something difficult to deal with. But we're determined to let you know how to beat her.

#Counterplay A link to a guide to deal with Fiora is posted here: https://www.quora.com/How-does-one-perform-a-DDoS-attack

Other than that, you can find a deity to believe in, and pray to them that this Fiora be extremely bad.

#Counterpicks A better

---

Feel free to post your own guides down here! I'd appreciate the help and could add them to the post with credit to the person in order to help our community improve!