What champions did you use to climb elo?

I get wanting to climb elo, and sometimes champions that are fun to play and useful don't see the light of competitive play until you get a team that knows what they do. Most of the time, there's at least one champion in the meta that works very well in soloqueue for some reason. However, one thing to understand is that having a powerful champion does not always ensure that you will win more often.

But, to get to the section that you're trying to get to, the recommendations, assassin characters are usually a good bet. Many people don't know how to deal with assassins. Many inexperienced teams don't know how to focus, and you can probably get away with a lot when playing champions with high burst such as Akali and Ahri. Most adc's are a good bet (but use your better judgement; Urgot probably isn't the best for carrying you out of bronze).

Here's a quick rundown of champions that seem to be very successful for each role:

Mid

Sindra - known for her high burst and tricky mechanics, those that master her dark spheres usually carry games all by themselves

Xerath - huge range, high burst, a mana regenerating passive, and an ult that can get you from a mile away; most people can't trade with him, and don't know how to deal with his range.

Zed - still has high burst, has great range, and it's one of the champions that people in low elo can't really grasp the concept of. He's also an energy champ, so that's a plus

Hiemerdinger - master this champ, and the only way to beat you is for the other team to mold their strategy around you. In soloqueue, they don't know how to do this effectively, so Hiemer is really hard to deal with for most players and even teams.

Top

Darius - very good top laner that has great sustain and a lot of dunk potential. A good darius has a huge presence in teamfights, forcing most players to focus him so they don't get dunked. He's very safe, very powerful.

Sion - A great lane bully that becomes pretty close to unkillable in the late game. He's got a lot of abilities that deal %max health as damage too. Requires some technical skill to get used to, but can be overall rewarding.

Fiora - this one is a toss up. Most fioras have terrible positioning. If you can master her without getting caught out constantly, which she's infamous for, then go ahead and give her a try.

Teemo - love him or hate him, a good teemo can carry a game. Shrooms give you map control, you have ranged poke, and a blind. Fiora? Sorry. Darius? No way. Garren? Adorable. He's a big lane bully. A little risky, but if you play him well, he can take you to Diamond because you counter most tops in the game.

Gnar - most people don't know how to deal with gnar, and don't understand the concept of his rage bar. They'll try to kill you when you transform into a tanky colossus and usually die in the process. A lot.

ADC

Graves - very easy to pick up and play, has great scaling, and a passive that's very close to broken for an adc.

Jinx - a bit more advanced that Graves, but she's the queen of cleaning up kills. With her passive, she can chase down stragglers to execute them, or disengage after taking a tower, or getting a kill or assist. She has a surprising amount of cc for an adc, but still blows people up like the rest. Also, her q can give you AOE CRITS.

Caitlyn - outranges most other adc's, so she's real easy to play, and, as we said before, being outranged is something that some players can't handle. She's probably one of the safest adc picks.

Ezreal - infamous for being very easy to play, and can burst people down with the rest of them. Also, has global ult like jinx.

Support

Thresh - landing a hook is almost a death sentance, has one of the biggest slows in the game, and flay is very powerful. He can save with his lantern and is just generally a pain to deal against. He also scales when people die, including minions.

Blitzcrank - very strong pick because of his cc combo; one pull can mean death for the enemy. He is melee range, but he's very safe with his passive.

Braum - this guy's cc is insane. He's got slows, stuns, and knockups all over the place, has a wall to ruin the enemy's day, and can dash to people and make them tankier. Just... Wow.

Morgana - Has a spell shield that blocks cc, so counter to most enemy supports, deals huge damage and has a bind that keeps an enemy firmly in place for roughly a year and a half.

Jungle

Pantheon - can solo dragon very early, has a teleport from base to pretty much anywhere, has a jump-stun and does huge damage.

Fiddlesticks - Pretty much the only viable caster in the jungle right now. He has amazing sustain, huge cc, and does lots of damage. Also, ult+zhonia's... still broken.

Maokai - huge cc, hard to kill, and cinderhulk makes him dangerous.

Sejuani - She cc's on everyone, builds tank so she's hard to kill, and just locks people down for long periods of time.

Nidalee - Her prowl makes her very mobile, and she's infamous for doing tons of damage with her javelin toss, and her cougar form can leap over a lot of terrain in the jungle. Also, her "hunt" can now be applied to monsters in the jungle... so yay for breaking that mechanic, I guess.

There's more for sure, but these are the more consistent ones I can think of that are a terror to see in soloqueue.

Not recommended:

Katarina - While many people are giving up on her because got some nerfs this patch, people still ban her all the time. Powerful, but not useful if you can't pick her.

Akali - pretty much the same reason as Kat.

Blitzcrank is often banned, so I recommend that you go thresh instead or just have both just in case.

hope this helps.

Leona. If you're good enough, and your ADC doesn't have a stupidity complex, you can win games purely by the amount of CC and lockdown you provide.