Why do people need someone else to tell them something is viable?

Wolf Queen·Jun 24, 2015·1 votes·597 views

I like doing out of the meta supports. Such as anivia, liss, teemo, and kennen. The first 3 90% of the time ill get called a troll when i do them(get called a troll cause i go bard too)i did kennen support before he was played as a support in the lcs. And before that happened everyone raged when i went him too yet when he is seen in the lcs suddenly hes a viable support and people whove never played kennen before suddenly wanna do kennen support and think theres nothing at all wrong with it. Why cant people just make there own meta and do what works for you instead of thinking that anyone who doesnt play whats in the lcs is trolling. Yes the pro players are pro for a reason but they are pro cause they did what they liked best not cause they were a copy cat of someone else. Like play what you want and what works for you dont be an image of someone else. Like yes there are limits. Adc vlad probably not the best idea..but still

17 Comments

RueianJun 24, 20152 votes

Because competitive games with generally competitive communities like to flock to the meta but the reality is the vast majority of players don't understand why the meta is what it is because they haven't developed the critical thinking skills to identify the strengths and weaknesses of a champion in relation to the game as a whole. Realistically there are very few strong theory crafters (including professional players) who drive the meta, everyone else just follows.

the Meta is literally just matchup and utility data. What bothers me more is the 'break the meta' saying and mentality. You can be good with a character but you aren't breaking the meta, you just are more skilled than the people around you that you can compensate for your champions weaknesses.

Icestar1186Jun 24, 20151 votes

People don't like breaking their precious meta. In the minds of most people, Meta = Good. Therefore, Off-Meta = Bad. Therefore, they won't experiment. They can only jump on the bandwagon when someone proves something works. (See: Smite top, Kennen, Urgot, any strange build a pro player thinks of.)

I personally have no problem with Lissandra, Anivia, or Kennen support. Teemo, though, is... Teemo.

RueianJun 24, 20151 votes

From a numbers perspective, Meta is good/most optimal, and off meta is not as good.

I think people should really research fighting games to grow their understanding of what meta means.

OhBoyItsaMegamanJun 24, 20153 votes

From an actual definition perspective, metagame means all of the strategies that you expect all the other players to use, and how good they are against one another.

There is a perception that LoL has a stale metagame, where there's only ever one dominant strategy at one time. If bruiser junglers are popular, then bruiser junglers are "the meta". If late-game hyper carries are popular, then late-game hyper carries are "the meta". In a healthy game, one type of champion or team would be weak against another type, and as one type became popular, more people would be drawn to its counter. Eventually there would be less of a reason to play that counter because the popular type would become less popular and people would be drawn to the counter's counter.

But because you can't switch to mastering another champion or another completely different team composition at a moment's notice, pro play doesn't have many of these counters. If one professional team is playing the popular dominant team composition, most other teams are just going to hope to outplay them with roughly the same kind of team comp. Mastery is too important; it is difficult and risky to make huge changes to the way you play. People latch onto these copied dominant strategies and assume that they are the only correct way to play, because if there was a better way, wouldn't the pros do that instead? But that's incorrect. It also ignores the fact that what's strong in high level 5v5 play is not necessarily any good in high level solo queue, let alone low level solo queue.

"Meta-" means "transcending". The metagame is the combat that transcends the autoattacks and skillshots that are built into the game. This dance that players do around each other as they try to gain an advantage before they even enter the game. If you are only willing to play what is established as the current best without thinking about what beats that strategy, then you are most certainly not playing the meta.

I hope that I have helped you to grow your understanding of what meta means.

RueianJun 24, 20151 votes

LoLs meta is actually rarely stale because of the constant changes from patches. There are varying levels of metagaming that is done as this game much more complex than games that develop much more solid metas quickly (fighting game). Its hard to justify individual match data, but from a utility/kit stand point you can build synergy and understand that a champions kit can be weak to certain things. This is of course taking out the 'skill/playstyle' aspect of the champion which adds a whole new level to the metagame.

If you want to look at the core of the meta it is very stale, because of the 1:1:1:2 lane meta from gold/xp distribution

The thing is people look at Meta and associate it with this character/strategy is good/best. Instead of looking into why, which is why i suggested people look at tier lists and match data for fighting games. Its a much more bare bones strictly data rendition of a metagame being established.

Icestar1186Jun 25, 20151 votes

Even the fighter/tank top; burst mage/assassin mid; fighter/tank/assassin jungle; support and adc bot teamcomp can be changed. You can have a two-bruiser kill lane bot, send Janna or Nami mid as utility mages, replace an ADC with Cassiopeia, use mage junglers like Karthus, etc.

RueianJun 25, 20151 votes

It can but it wont, There arn't champions who are effective at doing so. The 1:1:1:2 meta is driven by the want to soak as much XP/Gold as you possibly can from the map and pretty much ignoring your enemies unless they make a huge mistake.

ZergReapJun 25, 20151 votes

Which team is more viable?

Quinn Shaco Velkoz MissFortune vs Hecarim Gragas Azir Alistar Kalista . Team 2 is pretty much LCS meta right now. People will always want to be able to play what is the strongest without figuring it out for themselves. Least amount of effort, highest chance of victory. Now picking something just because you saw it on the LCS might also be a problem because a lot of times they have specific strategies that you will not be able to do with your solo queue team.

What happened to your Fizz support anyway? :P

BluePolarizerJun 25, 20151 votes

in solo queue team 1 would stomp team 2 up to maybe mid-diamond I think.

ZergReapJun 25, 20151 votes

lol I always say it's not the champion it's the player. There are a lot of nasty shaco players out there. My point was that the LCS is "telling you" that team 2 is viable meta and Miss Fortune adc and Velkoz mid might get you flamed for picking em.

Their JunglerJun 25, 20151 votes

{quoted}

lol I always say it's not the champion it's the player. There are a lot of nasty shaco players out there. My point was that the LCS is "telling you" that team 2 is viable meta and Miss Fortune adc and Velkoz mid might get you flamed for picking em.

Are you saying that Brand will ever beat Azir in Mid lane and that Miss Fortune can beat a Kalista?

I'd like you to demonstrate that.

After tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of games, the numbers do not lie. Some champions are simply better than others. It's math.

BluePolarizerJun 25, 20151 votes

Brand has a FAR higher win rate than Azir and Miss Fortune has a higher win rate than Kalista.

ZergReapJun 25, 20151 votes

You guys lol. I used Velkoz MF Brand as examples because they are picked a lot less often and "not meta". Actually I've seen quite a few Brands do well though. Anyway, yes I am saying an AP Vayne could beat a Caitlyn 1v1 mid if the Vayne was that much better than him. Jinx is a good example of an extremely high pick and win rate (based on last time I checked a month or two ago). But that doesn't mean I can't beat the Jinxs (multiple multiple times) with a super low win rate adc.

It's the player not the champion. If it's two players of equal skill, but one is playing a higher win rate champ than other, the numbers might be right. Except this is simply one variable in the game and in the overall picture may not matter at all.

Icestar1186Jun 25, 20151 votes

Actually, no amount of skill would help a Vayne building items that literally do nothing to help her. Vayne has no skills that scale on AP.

Their JunglerJun 25, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Brand has a FAR higher win rate than Azir and Miss Fortune has a higher win rate than Kalista.

I don't think you are interpreting the statistics correctly. Brand and Miss Fortune only have a couple hundred games played, while Azir and Kalista have thousands, a lot of which are ranked in high diamond/challenger. If Brand and MF saw the same play I guarantee you their win rate would drop significantly.

oreosauceJul 1, 20151 votes

The meta is purely based off of each patch and change to the champions and items. People from the LCS usually pick certain things because Korea did it first (ahhh, Veigar support....) Most people pick champs for certain things because of how well they adapt or how effective they are in game. For example, I don't think Warwick that good of a champ because while he is good at clearing camps, he can't do much for early game gank pressure. If your Warwick goes AFK jungling until level 6 (and which, you'll probably be 7 or 8 by then) while the enemy team's Gragas roams constantly and ganks every lane, you're bound to lose out on kills and towers. The reason we have a meta is because it's a standard guideline that most people have found success on. And honestly, Anivia has always been very viable for support and Teemo isn't that bad either (I had a Teemo support once and we rocked the game). The main rules imo for a good support is just decent to good cc and the ability to either help sustain or damage early on just by passively poking (which is why Annie does so well). And also, many people will want the opinion of others first, others who have actually tried out certain things, to see how effective or good it is. I remember I used to build AD Akali which, wasn't bad but i missed out on a lot of damage when using spells, compared to if I had built AP. In this patch, tanks are just more suitable since they aren't susceptible to being one-shotted and can help get easy wins (TANK THAT NEXUS TURRET BRO) In fact, I've even built tank on Janna before and it worked out fine because no one could kill me as easily.