Saturday, December 12, 2009

League of Legends Tips and Strategies

[UPDATED: Dec 12, 2k9]


This is by no means a complete guide. I've posted this as a list of things that I keep forgetting ingame. Hopefully others will find this useful as well.

I'm using Kayle the Judicator at the moment and usually equip her with tanker/support items. (Others break away from this usual build and use tanker-DPS items.)


League of Legends tips and strategies after the jump.

* This is the most annoying: people insisting on Champion kills when your team has already dominated the match. People overconfident in their powers continually go solo, traipsing across the maps and wiping the terrain with any enemy Champion they see. Oftentimes, the opposing group will then form up and push from multiple locations. They win, your team loses. KNOW WHEN TO END THE GLOATING AND PUSH! Two people pushing while the other three are playing Chuck Norris is a disaster. Someone will get ganked and/or they will outpush you. I've almost forgotten why I quit DotA a year back. Again: KNOW WHEN TO END THE GLOATING AND PUSH!

* Support heroes should not waste their time healing/tanking for newbie feeders. Stick with the heavy hitters of your team. You will ensure that they get more kills between shop trips.

* When using Kayle, remember that Reckoning slows down enemies while Divine Blessing speeds up you or your target ally. This is useful for chasing down dying enemy Champions or helping a dying ally flee.

* Don't even so much as touch an enemy Champion while you're in range of their turrets. Be careful of AoE spells and abilities --- if they harm your adversary, the turret will start to fire on you.

* When playing DPS Champions, don't invest too much on Health items. I once had a teammate who bought two Ruby Crystals for his first items. He was controlling Ashe.

* Use the ping feature (hotkey: G)! It confers a greater tactical advantage when used wisely. Ping if you need help. Ping to warn teammates they are in immediate danger of getting ganked. If an enemy hero goes into the jungle to escape/take a roundabout route to ambush one of your mates, ping the vicinity where he vanished or where you think he will appear.

* In a large battle, take note of who your mates mark (the ping feature can double as a target marker; simply ping the enemy champion you want focus fired).

* Focus fire! Enemies go down faster if your team does.

*If possible, go after the squishes (low armor and/or HP champions) first before taking care of the tanks. Tanks, by their very nature have enormous amounts of health. It takes a very long time to kill one. In RTS PC games, skirmishes are decided in seconds, not minutes. You may well lose a skirmish if you target a tank.

* For the love of God, don't try to teleport back to your base alongside or in front of your tower when low in health. I take absolute glee sniping low HP champs with a one-shot kill from a nuke. Really if this happened to you, you just gave the enemy a ROFLNuke moment. Get some distance between you and your enemy before teleporting.

* Above. Get some distance between you and your enemy before teleporting. Many times in mid/late games I've hunted down for teleporting enemies after a battle. When you're low in life after a battle, find a safe place before teleporting. Don't assume that a battle is over just because you've killed one or three champs. A zealous nuker might be hunting for you.

* Gank! Early game, try to see if someone's dying. At level 4 or so, if you an enemy on an adjacent lane who's hovering on the brink of death, mark that champion and arrange for a gank. The first team that goes on a ganking spree holds a great advantage for most of the game. I can gauge the chances of success for a particular match by observing teammates. Getting killed by towers a few times? That's fine, everyone makes mistakes. Everyone doggedly pushing separate lanes and ignoring pings even at level 6-8? Disaster. Expect your team to be owned. (Unless the opposing team is equally idiotic and mimics the same asinine behavior.)

* This tip isn't mine; I'll have to search who wrote this. Word to this effect: It's your responsibility to observe the minimap; if you're at the front lines (or worse, across the river) and the enemies have gone missing, don't wait for a warning from your mates. GO BACK. There's at least a 75% chance they're all playing Booboo and have brought their friends along. Your mates are not your babysitters.

* Play the babysitter. Ping and warn your mates of an impending gank if you sense it. Call out "MIA" whenever you notice enemies are missing.

I'll be adding more League of Legends tips and strategies here.


>>> The download link and an HD trailer of the game can be found HERE

>>> See more downloadable free full version real-time strategy (RTS) games HERE

18 comments:

MrKirby said...

you make it sound like everyones noobs in that game lol lol

Ildamos said...

You can't imagine how much some good players make newbie mistakes --- going solo, not coordinating with the team, believing they're such hotshots, etc.

On a sidenote, I'm a beginner myself. :) The list serves as a reminder for me not to make the same mistakes. :D

Try the game! It's free and it's fun!

Mr. Wallet said...

I disagree that ganking is inherently a good idea. Just like any other strategy, there's times it works and times it doesn't. Every time you leave a lane, that's pushing and fighting you're not doing because you're walking almost halfway across the map for a gank (this doesn't apply to Twisted Treeline 3v3, which is a small map and thus basically a nonstop gank ballet). If you can't get away from the lane without looking suspicious, once you start matching with real pros, they will warntheir buddies every time and you will get nothing accomplished for all your traveling around.

One major piece of advice I have is always be doing something. If the whole enemy team is MIA, poke a lane to make yourself a gank target and then retreat before they can all gather up; this will waste their time and free up other lanes for safe pushing. Or just go jungle 2 or 3 things until your minions provide better intel.

Remember, time is money and xp. Don't run all the way across the map to a big team battle that will be over by the time you get there; it's your allies' responsibility to handle it or run their butts off depending on their own evaluations of the situation. The best thing you can do for your team is to jungle or push where you are as aggressively as you can with the knowledge that you won't be ganked by anyone. If your team loses the fight, noobs will ping you and cuss you out for doing this; ignore them. They're just looking for someone to blame other than themselves for overestimating their strength, and the obvious scapegoat is the living person.

Ildamos said...

Great tips! Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Great tips. I'm still learning myself, but here's things might help beginners:

Once you kill a turret, finish off any enemy minions if you can quickly and retreat to another lane. Blowing up a turret usually draws enemy champions like a magnet (unless they're busy getting ganked). In another lane you can reinforce teammates and hopefully score another turret.

If you have a fast and/or invisible character look for backdoor opportunities on turrets and inhibitors. If a turret only has 300 or so health, or an inhibitor is unprotected, and you're high enough level, jungle to the turrent, take it out, the disappear.

I don't really worry about killing champions (I mostly play support or ranged) - just focus on turrets/inhibitors and farming. Sooner or later a champion will do something absolutely stupid and you can punish them.

Try to protect friendly champions, even if they are idiots. If they are near-death and running, get in between them and the enemy chasing them. Usually the enemy will be so focused on killing your ally you can set up for a nice combo and try to kill the enemy (unless you're a tank and they run when they see you)

Obviously drawing enemies into turret range is good, but can help even if you're going to die. If you're a weaker hero fighting a stronger enemy who's looking to ax you and you're running, consider holding your ground near a turret, especially if you can stun them. They're probably going to kill you anyway if you can't outrun them or their ranged attacks, but even if they kill you, if your turret kills them afterwards you get credit for the kill.

If you see an ally or friendly turret that is going to be killed no matter what you could do, cut your loss and fall back. To me LoL is very much a game of not making mistakes or acting on impulse.

You probably already figured this out, but if you have a player calling everyone "noobs" and saying "my team sux", you can bet he is probably feeding the enemy- 0 kills and 15+ deaths. If you want to win (as opposed to troll him) try to keep an eye on him and help your team by keeping him from getting killed. You can troll him in the chat room after you win.

Someone here probably has a better suggestion for this, but try to suggest your team put one tank and one ranged together in the top and bottom lanes (5v5). People want to play with their friends or fight over mid, but two tanks together can get owned early on, and two ranged can get owned later on.


There is no shame in fleeing.


hth someone :)

Anonymous said...

I just started playing the other day, and as an absolute beginner (no DotA or anything), I have a few thoughts/observations to share for those in a similar position.

First of all, realize that just starting out, you are probably going to suck. Horribly. My first game online, I got one kill, and ~15 deaths. Second game: the same, only minus the one kill. But don't despair, you will get better. But only if you ask lots of questions. The community of LoL is generally pretty friendly. Go into the Noob chat room and ask questions. Ask your teammates to give (constructive) advice. Also, try setting up practice rounds with bots. Try a few different characters out. See what you like.

What the other Anonymous above said is absolutely true: there is no shame in fleeing. Are you low on health? Fall back. Are all your minions dead? Fall back and meet your next wave. Are there two enemy champions vs you alone? Fall back. You are probably not going to win. So why chance it when you can have the support of your minions or other players who are on the way, or friendly turrets. That being said, your retreat doesn't always have to be a huge one. Sometimes just backtracking a bit will be enough to give you breathing room.

The flip side is of this observation is to be cautious when attacking. This is not a game that rewards bravely and blindly rushing ahead. The enemy champion may be low on health, but if he's about to lead you past one of his turrets, don't follow. Your being alive at the front lines is worth far more than the chance of possibly killing an enemy champion while risking your dying and giving the other team XP. That being said, if you think you can do it with minimal risk, by all means go for it. Just be smart and don't overextend yourself.

Again, these are just my observations based on a couple of games. I'm still pretty new at this. Feel free to dispute, repute, or otherwise completely disagree with what I've said.

Anonymous said...

As a semi-experienced player I agree with don't overextend, especially early in the game.

Another thing I wish people did more is make use of the jungle. if there are people fighting in your lane, they will run when they see you coming straight up the lane, so don't let them see you. Hide in a bush and you've turned an intelligently fleeing enemy into a dumber one who doesn't know what's about to happen. This would be very useful later in the game when enemies tend to group up and make single lane pushes, as your surprise attack will probably cause them to run, letting you pick them off one by one as the slower members of their team get hit by everybody on your team.

Another recommendation: even if you're alone in a lane with two enemy champions, you still can fight them, so long as you fall back near your turret. You'll level twice as fast as they will, making them great overconfident gank targets, as ganking you will seem foolish because there's already two enemy champs in your lane. Plus They'll push to the very edge of your turret range, giving you lots of room to chase them after a team-mate shows up.

Anonymous said...

I like the posts so far on here, if only more people listened to these sensible ideas...one more tip about TEAMWORK, yes the dreaded "t-word" that so many people forget about. It's not your teams job to babysit you. Use your minimap to keep track of enemy heroes. If you can't see them, assume they are gathering and ganking and be on your guard. I got yelled at by a Master Yi that went off on his own and got himself 3ganked. According to him "that was all you Fiddlesticks" I cleaned up the language a little bit, but keep in mind it's your fault if you do stupid things. Yelling at your team will only make them less inclined to help you in the future.

LuckyMorde said...

This is a great short guide on some very important tips for all newbies to League of Legends. I hate seeing someone at level 30 that still make a lot of these mistakes. Make sure to read guides AND follow them! I found some other guides that are good for newbies at http://www.lol-op.com/guides.html. They have a good newbie guide there that discusses some pointers for newbies and how to lane and team fighting.

Bodain said...

One thing i havent seen mention is minions. One thing to be aware of is that especially at lower levels waves of minions have a significant impact on how fights turn out. Much like fighting at an enemies tower, minions do a significant amount of damage to you, so try and back off till most of them are dead before trying to take out champ.

Bodain said...

Be aware of minions. Especially early in a match, minions have huge sway over the course of fights(team or solo). try and fight when you have a numerical advantage. its not hard for a wave to do 300 or more damage to you, and also they can block your abilities from hitting your enemies(stuns/slows etc). Remember minions are fodder, use them as such and save yourself

Ildamos said...

Thank you for all the additional input! I'll try to integrate them into the main article when time allows.

Unknown said...

My first time playing was 3 kills and 6 deaths. Not bad! =D

Anonymous said...

haha i know how you feel when teamates are only killing people instead of killing towers. I played with a yi once and he insisted on getting kills instead of pushing. Late game the other team started pushing like crazy. Our inhibitor got destroyed and yi was jungling. I got so mad people if yi just attacked towers we could have won. Finally he stops jungling and helps us, and we start pushing. Then we win. Of course, the game probably would have been around 30 mins shorter but yi was getting his precious kills

Ildamos said...

Yep, very frustrating to say the least. Lucky for you, you won. I can no longer count how many games we've lost because someone was refusing to coordinate in pushing, all the while playing Rambo.

Anonymous said...

I've been playing a few days now, and have a vague understanding of how to play, my tips for new players would be as follows.

Push when you can, heal when you can't Theres no point trying to steal a few minion kills for the exp if your hovering above death. chances are a champion will come along and one hit you anyway. Port back to base and heal then run back.
If they have pushed through in your absence you'll be able to push them back with full health.

Becareful about what your buying, dont be to hasty accepting something thats 2500 when theres a better item for 2850. Farm the line, push them back, fall back and go shopping.

This games very much a team effort. it wont matter if you managed to get 20 champion kills or 2, you win by defeating the nexus.

Get to know the champion your playing.

More importantly though have fun :D

Anonymous said...

The tips on your article are very basic but are still vital in forming any good League of Legends player. They are the backbone knowledge before players go onto learning more in depth concepts in League of Legends such as decision making, map awareness, map control, greed, etc. This is still a good basic post though for beginners that would still prove to be useful.

http://leagueoftips.com/

Ildamos said...

Thanks! Oh yes, I made this list way back when LoL was still in its Open Beta phase and it still only had NA servers.

Hopefully I can find the time to add to the list in the months ahead.