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Need tips from people who managed to get out of silver this season

Żoom·2/26/2017, 6:52:38 AM·1 votes·1,383 views

Title kinda says it all. Either way in the past couple days I've had some of the worst teams possible. Call it crying if you want, but silver is a hard elo cause its impossible to carry when the people that the team feeds are hard meta people. Im not sure what more to do in solo que anymore, I've tried going jungle from my original mid main lane and then people feed to the extreme pre level 6 so my lane options become limited to help since who wants to gank a jinx who is 4-0 while I'm under-leveled? What can I personally do to try and reach gold this season? Im on a 5 or so loss streak cause I legit am getting teams who dont want to team up or just out right feed without any consideration of the team and just want to give up. I dont agree this season with better communication since the lethality buff and the feeders are making it harder and feeders dont want to communicate, they just want to ff at 20 and try again.. Some advice how you got out of silver and some tips and tricks would be nice.

7 Comments

jaymc11302/26/2017, 7:00:54 AM4 votes

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There are many climbing tricks higher level players use to help climb the ladder and I'll get to those in a moment, but the best advice is still, and always was, that there is no substitute for experience in this game so acquire as much as you can in as many ways as you can and always look to find ways to improve your individual play on a game by game basis!

As for what many higher level players term "Proper climbing technique", it consists of the following (keep in mind these techniques were gathered for solo q ranked play and with the new addition of Dynamic queue many, perhaps even all of them may be less useful than they were in the past) pieces of advice:

Specialize! Sure, many players say you should be able to play many roles and be a versatile player, and this is definitely a good thing. However, to become a master of a trade instead of a jack of all trades requires intense effort and focus and means you will need to specialize your play style. Its wise to pick one specific role and to master a smaller pool of champions to play within it, perhaps only 2 or 3. Be ready and willing to play whatever is required of you in any game, but be polite in lobby about your preference for, and dedication to, a specific role and champion. If you are an extraordinary Lulu player out of the support role (as was the case with a poor silver player I met while smurfing early last season named Zeretov who showed far greater skill than his ranking indicated and so he became a student of mine, 6 months later he's a diamond level player and quickly climbing even there!) explain this to your team in a polite way and tell them if they need further convincing they need only to op.gg you to see you are indeed an excellent Lulu support. Most players appreciate this kind of teamwork in lobby and will go out of their way to let you do your thing because they are hoping to benefit from that 70% Lulu win rate! Everyone likes a free win!

Op.gg your teammates before every match. This will allow you to do a couple of things. You can easily identify an optimal role and champion for each player and this information can be communicated in lobby to help organize your team and get everyone on the same page quickly and efficiently. You can also identify when matchmaking has paired you very poorly and you've been unlucky as you will be able to identify certain "red flags". That player on a 7 game losing streak? Likely on tilt and in a poor frame of mind to play ranked. You can soothe this player, pump him up, motivate him, or simply dodge the game instead of risk a loss (Use your dodges!!!! Use them wisely! They cost nothing but time. It doesn't matter if you are in promo matches, a loss costs you LP and MMR, a dodge costs you a fraction of the LP but no MMR and only a small amount of time for the first dodge of the day!) Have a duo with a sub 60% win rate? Red flag, act accordingly. Have a player playing a champion for the very first time ever in ranked? Red flag! Use your third party resources, they are of immense help when making a serious effort to climb. In addition you can monitor your MMR+ (or your MMR relative to the division you are playing in) and this can help you determine how much LP you stand to gain from a match should you win. If op.gg says your MMR+ is 150 or better and you are seeing 30 LP gains from wins get ready to skip a division and bypass promos after another win or two! You can also identify opposing players who are very skilled and warn your team and craft a game plan to shut them down early so they don't get going and carry the game! Use that op.gg mates.

Ignore LP at all costs. It does not matter for any player below diamond 1. Focus on increasing that MMR so you can skip divisions and climb even faster!

Dodge games that look like a loss in champ select. Bad team comp with no frontline and an awkward off meta pick? Don't lose MMR and LP, sacrifice that 3 or 10 LP and a little of your time and keep that MMR intact! Super troll in lobby? Dodge! Uber toxic premade in lobby? Dodge! Don't sacrifice MMR and LP when all you have to do is wait a little while for the dodge timer to be up. Dodges, in essence, cost nothing but time.

Always play when you are primed and ready! Don't play when you are tired, or hungry, or have too many distractions around you. Ranked is a serious game mode and you need to be in a serious frame of mind to work with your team in a well coordinated fashion.

Take breaks! Don't spam games one after another unless you are a high level player smurfing for some reason. Take your time in between games. Everyone needs a break to properly prepare for the next match. When you lose two ranked matches in a day, stop playing ranked! Make the goal every day to win as many ranked games as you can until you lose your second match of the day. When you get on a groove you will find you average better than 4 wins for every 2 losses each day of a given week which can lead to some pretty impressive climbs! If you get in the zone on a particular day and reel off a streak of 8 in a row or something find an obvious benchmark stopping point and let that be the end of your ranked session for the day, perhaps that 8th win got you promoted, let that be how you end the day, on a high note. This will keep you motivated and eager to get back down to business in a serious fashion the following day.

Avoid playing ranked during peak usage hours. Weekends and the time frame immediately after school lets out is a very risky time to play ranked. A lot of casual players will be on then and they tend to perform more poorly when compared to the average teammate during primo ranking hours.

Always work with the team! Even if some one is a dick with a capital D to you remember it requires the efforts of all 5 members to win on a consistent basis. Find ways to ignore the flame and blame game and focus on being productive. Be a leader, a communicator, and a team organizer regardless of how you feel about that jungler who just fed doubles to your lane opponent. Teamwork is op, be a team player.

Feel free to One Trick Pony! This has been, for the past several seasons one of the best ways to climb quickly. One tricking will allow you to get into a groove with your champion and reel off wins at a prodigious rate as playing your favorite champion becomes so second nature it feels less like manipulating a character and more like wiggling your toes, or taking a breath, an extension of your body. Getting into this zone and playing by reflex frees your mind to pay more attention to the map, communicate more effectively, and craft more intelligent game plans in game because playing your champ is like being on autopilot. It allows you to focus on the strategy you need to implement to achieve success.

If all else fails and you feel stuck, make a new account and start over! Its far easier to climb quickly on a fresh account that has never played a single ranked match because fresh accounts have increased MMR and LP gains in their first 50 lifetime ranked matches, starting with the biggest bonus in the first placement match on that account and slowly decreasing over the next 49 lifetime ranked matches. Smurfing can lead players to quickly achieve a higher ranking on a secondary account than they have achieved on a primary account and playing against tougher competition then can teach new lessons, gain you new experience which can then be applied on your primary to get it going the right way on the ladder. Alternating play on these accounts can lead to a feedback effect where each keeps climbing higher than the other!

Always happy to help out around the community, hope this advice can help get you where you want to be mate! Best of luck on the Rift!

Eedat2/26/2017, 7:14:56 AM1 votes

I dunno I climbed back to Gold with a 65% WR. Didnt have any problems

Żoom2/26/2017, 7:24:43 AM1 votes

Decided to give ranked a break and practice some other lanes and I want into some fun! Gotta love it sometimes on blindpick.

https://gyazo.com/64043278e1ee9d0254740a0e75e432a1

Snowman Arc2/26/2017, 7:44:15 AM1 votes

Get good. No, seriously, it's cliche but it's the truth. The better you become, the more chances you have of winning. It sure needs a lot of luck to get the good teammates, but even I got teammates that fed their lanes and managed to climb out of silver (already Gold 3). The way you do that is you get better. You win your lane harder, you influence the map in a more efficient way, you might even want to pick on a champion that specializes in doing both. Personally, play Maokai or Shen top and Graves jungle, especially Shen. Shen can win a lane because people underestimate him in lower elo and can impact the map and solo carry a game by a good ulti play. I can't count the amount of times that a game was won, simple because I ultied down bot and we won a 3v3, which would be lost at that point. It led to a big advantage and we snowballed the entire map ever since that.

Another tip is to play META picks and itemize / runes / masteries / summoners correctly. Sure, they are not necessary if you are a very good player, but having the best possible tools in your disposal increases the chances of doing well and winning.

Play smart. You can even play psychological games with the enemy. Tilt them, camp them, stomp them, even "flame" them (like, lol this X enemy feeding) if you have to. It will tilt the enemy, make him play even worse, even make his teammates flame him and generally deteriorate the enemy team.