Advice for losing streaks.

Niskii·3/18/2015, 7:20:37 AM·4 votes·8,262 views

So, I'm currently on a 10 losing streak. Which I suppose could be normal considering I'm fairly new to this game again, I played it seasons ago but not for long. I realise I don't build properly but I do try to build as I see fit. I try to analyze who I'm laning against but for the life of me I just can't win, even if I do pretty well and win my lane. I try not to bash people for mistakes I see ( not that I have much right to being level 25) I try to encourage people when they do something really well. So in short I'm not abusive/destructive, I try to make sense of what I'm doing, and I do try react accordingly to what's the most dangerous thing for me in that specific match. Are there any other tips? Surely I'm not so terrible that I'm the reason for 10 losses in a row.

Any suggestions are welcome, thanks in advance. :)

20 Comments

RiotRiot ShadowStorm3/18/2015, 8:37:37 AM15 votes

It sounds like you have the right mindset, but are experiencing a rough patch. It happens to everybody. Ragnola has some good advice about getting better, so I'm going to tell you a story instead.

In season 3, my goal was to hit Gold. I hadn't made it the previous season, missing out on the Victorious Jarvan skin (and Jarvan was one of my favorite champs!), so I didn't want that to happen again. I did all of my placement matches, did pretty well, and started off in Silver 1. I was fired up - just needed to climb one division! I could totally do this!

So I start up the next game... loss. Next one, loss. Next one, loss. I don't win a single game and get demoted to Silver 2. But it didn't stop there. I continued to lose, game after game, and fell into Silver 3. I hadn't won a ranked game since placements; a 10+ game losing streak. My goal was slipping away, and it was really frustrating.

So i just stopped playing ranked for a bit. I played a bunch of normals, just trying out new things, and rediscovering some old favorites. I didn't have any goals, or any focus here - I was just playing. I also started playing a lot of Coop v. AI, and just had a blast destroying the bots over and over again. Somewhere along the way, something clicked. I realized I had gotten better. I figured out how I was finding success, and on what champs.

So I went back into ranked, armed with my newfound confidence and - most importantly - my newfound experience. This time, I went on a positive run. I didn't lose a single game climbing back into Silver 1, and had over a 60% win rate with some of my champs to climb into promos for Gold. After a few attempts, I finally 3-0'd my promos, and accomplished my goal.

What I didn't realize until afterwards was that I had that major losing streak because I'd hit a wall. Some aspect of the game had gotten ahead of me, and I wasn't able to execute as well. My old strategies and mechanics weren't enough any more. By stepping back and just rediscovering the fun, and exploring stuff, I actually leveled up, and got ahead of that block.

It still happens to me every once in a while, where I get blocked and just can't seem to win. But I know now that this is a sign that I'm at a stretching point as a player - I need to overcome these growing pains, and I do that by practicing in different ways. Once I break through, not only will the wins return, but I'll KNOW that I'm a better player now that I was before.

You're probably in a growth spurt as a player right now, but you just don't know it yet. So keep your head up, and remember to have fun with it! Try a new champ, stomp some bots, watch some streams - whatever it is that works for you, find it and own it. You'll be back on your feet in no time.

GL HF!

Niskii3/18/2015, 10:08:07 AM2 votes

Yezarul, apologies for the late reply I'm watching Dyrus play, however I actually never realized how much I could learn from ARAM so I think I'll start playing it tomorrow and see how I go, thanks for the tip man, hopefully I may find a new champion that I decide to main or hopefully will enjoy as much as I enjoy playing the Dunkmaster :D

Godhri3/18/2015, 8:21:36 AM2 votes

your scores don't look bad. They look pretty decent and consistently so. Sometimes, it's just your team. Don't just automatically give kills to the ADC. As I said, Map awareness is more than being aware or pinging things. It's taking into account the things you notice or are aware of. If you notice that your adc is playing poorly and doing poorly in general, it may be better to delegate a kill to someone else who is doing better like the APC or Mid laner. Or maybe just take the kill yourself. "Falling off" is concept of little relevancy in like 99% of games. Sure his damage won't be as good, but his ability to create team fight winning situations will remain static throughout the game regardless of how much time has passed. Having a better set of equipment/gear will just make it that much easier to achieve this.

Don't just assume your champion will "fall off" late game and start delegating kills to your ADC. If your adc is competent, they will usually be able to obtain kills on their own unless someone is intentionally taking kills from them.

Niskii3/18/2015, 8:36:32 AM2 votes

Yeah the ADC thing was just an example, I don't just give every kill away, I just try not to be greedy and KS. Hmm I dunno perhaps I need a break, I'm about to lose a 12th game, this is unfortunate because I really do enjoy playing league, this is just pushing me away from the game...

DestructoDave3/18/2015, 10:33:53 PM1 votes

One problem, especially when leveling, is champ selection. You are playing primarily Darius, who does well early game but falls off like a rock late game. People still make it work, but hes not exactly the champion that is going to dominate games. Looking at your losses, you are facing the typical types of champs people spam that outscale you and out carry you: leblancs, yi's, katarinas, rivens, fizz's, etc.

Those are the kind of snowball champs that people are going to spam and out-carry and out-scale you, especially while leveling. Whether you do well or not, you are not going to have the same impact on the game as that Leblanc who kills your mid-laner every time he shows up to lane.

Personally, i just dont like Darius. I've lost a lane to Darius so bad, I was 0/5 on Sion. He wrecked me in lane. But, I was still 10000x more useful during the game and won despite that. You really have to know how to abuse a lead with a champ like Darius. Hes easy to lane with, and seems like you are doing well, but he falls off so hard that its easy to squander whatever advantage you gained unless you are really good at pushing your advantages.

If you plan on sticking with Darius, you really have to be able to push your advantage down their throats, because all the other Yi's/Kats/Leblancs are going to win their roles just as hard, and have far more impact than Darius will.

It happens to everyone. You destroy your lane on a mediocre champ, but not hard enough, and someone playing Irelia or Zed or something demolishes their lane, and completely outclass your champion in carrying ability. I'm not saying to play those kinds of champs only. I dont play those kinds of champs. But, when leveling or in low elo where there is a high chance these snowball champs can easily snowball and win, its hard not to recommend them.

bad arcade kitty3/19/2015, 2:57:48 AM1 votes

a random sequence with ~equal chances of some binary event (heads or tails, win or lose when your long term winrate is close to 50%) is always streaky, it's just the nature of random for a tiny sequence of 6 games you already have 2/3 chance to get a streak of 3+ wins or losses and 1/4 chance to get a streak of 4+ wins or losses

Godhri3/18/2015, 7:44:09 AM1 votes

Well... are you feeding hard? What is your KDAR(Kill/Death/Assist Ratios)? Are you ignoring your team or do you participate in team fights? Do you notice a lot of mistakes that lead to devastating consequences such as the loss of allied structures or objectives that can REASONABLY be attributed to your incompetency? When applied to your teammates, do the answers to these questions give you reason to believe they are the cause?

The answer to those questions will tell you whether those losses are a result of your inability or the inability of your teammate(s).

In regards to your build, it really doesn't matter what your build is as long as it isn't too far fetched. If in doubt, just follow the recommended build order suggested by League until you are more experienced.

The thing that matters most is the fundamentals; Map awareness, Cost/Benefit Analysis of every action you take, and experience.

Map awareness: This has more to do with how you take into account your surroundings and the surroundings of your teammates relative to your situation. It's not just simply being "aware" of your surroundings. You must take into account everything that is happening all over the map at once. That is, if you clearly see that their jungler is ganking down in bot lane and you are mid lane, then you can justify pushing your lane forward to try to make their mid laner lose farm from tower or to try to get a kill. Even with wards in bushes, without a visual on the current location of their jungler, it is risky to push past the mid point of your lane.

Cost/Benefit Analysis: I feel this is pretty straightforward and has a lot to do with logical thinking. That is, do you take into account the most likely potential risks and benefits of your actions? For example, if you pushed the lane forward hard against a Xerath, that probably isn't a good idea. He can clear the lane pretty easily and all you are doing is putting yourself at risk for a gank in doing so. The only benefit out of this situation would be that you could maybe lure their jungler to try for a gank here thus making it safer for your other laners, but such a strategy is overtly risky and would probably require more skill and experience on your part.

The key thing here is forethought. You must consider the possible outcomes and how you will react to them. Obviously things do not always go as planned but having a basic plan of action is key to keeping your brain from simply freezing up when something unexpected occurs.

Experience: This is pretty self-explanatory. As you stated, you haven't played this game for very long. You are bound to lose many games, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. The good thing here is that you have acknowledged that you are prone to losses. What you can do here is try to make those losses and future losses beneficial and productive by actively engaging in your gameplay to improve it.

What do I mean by actively engaging in your game play? Don't just zombie your way through and use the same plan of action every time. Experiment. You played passively last game as mid lane? Ok, well why not try to do riskier play. Even if you do poorly, you learn from your actions if you are ACTIVELY engaging yourself. Active engagement requires you to consciously think about your actions and the consequences of those actions as you engage in them. This will allow you to improve your way of thinking and analytical skills which will in turn improve the way you react to situations.

If you just take these three factors into account, I feel that your game play will improve dramatically. I know it is a lot to think about and consider for just a game but to me, this is how it works for those of us who want to improve.

I wish you luck in getting better! In case you are wondering, I originally placed as Silver 3 in my very first ranked season and rose up to Gold 2 after a few seasons of play. I learn best by active engagement and constantly thinking about what I do and how I do it so that is my advice to you.

JaXoRNiX7/25/2015, 7:29:20 PM1 votes

i wish i could take this out peacefully like you but i don't... i just can't enjoy game when my team feeds enemy player 35 kills and 4 deaths...im on 6 loss streak right now and i lose even if i have good team, and if i have bad team, enemy team has every champion with scores from 10-5 to 35-2 and my team has scores of 4-8 or 3-16...how the hell is that fair? i cant judge my skills if riot is a prick and cant fix their damn matching system in 3 years...and i can't carry either if enemy team champion does like 4000dmg 1 hit...

Niskii3/18/2015, 8:11:32 AM1 votes

Well I wouldn't say I feed, I just generally try to give kills to ADCs etc as I main Darius and he falls off late game, my KDAR is usually around 0.8 - 1.5. I always ping everything from enemy wards and their location to MIAs etc. I try to roam when I can and help out in team fights, I'm so unsure of what I have to do anymore, I might be on a tilt but it's bugging me so bad. I played a game a couple minutes ago and I had an AFK Sona all match. :/

Niskii3/18/2015, 8:46:55 AM1 votes

Well Shadow, you may be right about mechanics. I'm finding myself Ulting almost in a panic now, I'm not letting my passive build up like I should be, I'm missing a lot of hooks. I think I'll play bot games for a while, working on mechanics (despite Darius not being mechanically dificult, plus I'd like to erase the losses from my match history LOL.) Then I'll go back to Normals, perhaps I will learn a new toplane in bots, I was considering Renekton or even Pantheon, I used to play Pantheon top around season 3, I know he's more prominent in jungle now, but I enjoy playing him, and all negativity and frustration aside I still come back to this game even when things are rough, I do enjoy it, it's just dificult to do so when you're losing constantly.

I know when I finally get the blue victory symbol I'll be hella proud, thanks for the support! You and Ragnola, you guys are hella neat :>

Piltover Customs3/18/2015, 9:36:45 AM1 votes

I will add on my story. I came over from Heroes of Newerth back in December 2012. Main reason was because of wait times. I still enjoy it more than League to be honest. That being said I placed in Silver 5 sometime in early to mid 2013. I had my ups and downs going from S5 to S3 then back to S5 and then back up to S1. At one point I got up to S1 then lost every game all the way back down to S5, 40 some odd+ games I believe. I just couldn't get out of silver.

Then I found ARAM in custom modes, it was a blast, no pressure. I started playing the hell out of it. I'd play 1 ranked game a day and the rest of the day I'd play ARAMs. Then Howling Abyss came out and it was queuable. By this point I'd played 800~ or so ranked games and was S5, the same as I placed. I had no desire to really play ranked since I wasn't getting anywhere. All I did was play Howling Abyss. It was fun, I learned lots of champions. I learned how to dodge Nidalee Spears and other skill shots. I'm not saying I became a pro, and definitely not over night.

After about 2000 ARAM queuables (and 500+ when it was still only costums) I decided to give it a shot. I had been having lots of fun with Janna in ARAMs so I figured I'd take it into RANKed. I took her mid 95% of the time. With-in 100 games I was Gold 1. Skipping a division here and there. My win streak was something along the lines of 17~. I had an 80%+ win rate with her. People thought I was trolling and I'd tell them to look at my LoLKing, It would show 30+ wins and 1-5 losses over the last 7 days with her.

I carried hard and enjoyed doing it.

What I'm trying to say is play the hell out of ARAM and get a feel for all the champions you own. Learn your champions. Learn the abilities/cooldowns of other champions. Learn how to avoid poke in team fights.