Going for the Gold Part XXXIX: Shaky Progress

After playing League of Legends for over two years and accumulating over a thousand normal games, I finally entered ranked play. In my own, totally objective, assessment, I am skilled enough for Gold. My placement matches disagreed, and threw me into Bronze II. More recently after failing to climb out of Bronze I, the ladder was reset and I found myself placed lower still, all the down way at the bottom of Bronze V. The Ranked matches I've played so far have clearly marked me as a Bronze player. This is the story of my attempt to prove them wrong. This is Going for the Gold.

Almost a week after finally being promoted, I queued up for my first match in Bronze I of the season (I had over a hundred games in Bronze I last season). I was fourth pick, with my teammates already taking Twisted Fate (mid), Yorick (top), and Jinx (ADC). Last pick had requested to either go top or jungle, so I grabbed Sona to support the Jinx, with our last pick taking Xin Zhao to jungle. We were up against Azir (mid), Ryze (top), Aatrox (jungle), Tristana (ADC), and Braum (support). I tried to get Jinx off to a good start, but she gave up a few early kills and made our lane problematic, although I managed to stay alive and keep the outer turret from falling too soon. Our jungler was good and managed to punish the enemy bot lane for getting greedy, but some counterganks by Aatrox mitigated that, so I was still struggling. Twisted Fate fell a bit behind, but eventually got his ult and started helping with ganks. Yorick won his lane, of course, but it wasn't going to be enough to save us. The other team had a bit of a lead, much of it on their ranged ADC, and we needed to turn things around. Since I was playing Sona, all I could really do was look to support my teammates and look for openings. We won some skirmishes, then we lost some. Yorick and Xin Zhao started to get further ahead of our opponents, and I picked up a couple of kills too, so I was able to build some tankiness and become a bully for mid teamfight pushing. It worked. We caught up and stayed ahead, winning multiple pushes on mid turrets and punishing them for attempting to push other lanes. After 22 minutes, they surrendered. I was 3/0/15. That win gave me 26 LP. It also makes my current record in solo queue 62 wins, 60 losses. I was so happy to get promoted in my previous match that I didn't even notice the fact that it was the match that finally took me to a positive win/loss ratio for the first time this season. Well, let's see if I can keep this going.

It's weird. I started emphasizing on-hit Udyr as my main jungler, and I was really on a tear for a while. Now, I just can't catch a break with Udyr. I'm playing the same as far as I can tell, but my allies, with seemingly no exceptions, are playing very differently. They tend to back off when I try to initiate for them, and they lose their lanes and fall back into our jungle, stealing camps from me and making it even harder from me. That just happened with a new level of intensity. I was with a Zilean (mid), Riven (top), Lucian (ADC), and Anivia (support) against Zed (mid), Pantheon (top), Fiddlesticks (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Heimerdinger (support). I just couldn't catch a break. Most of my deaths came from four or five enemies jumping on me, either when I tried to help my allies or when I tried to clear camps in my own jungle, desperate to catch up. At one solitary point I caught an enemy alone, quickly and easily killing my victim (the fed enemy Jinx). The rest of the match, I felt terrible: nothing I tried worked. I ended up going 1/8/7. While I'd be despondent, this loss couldn't have happened to a worse set of teammates, excepting the weird support Anivia, who was OK. As for the other three, they were extremely toxic and also bad players. That's a loss I'll just have to accept. Maybe I can bounce back from it. I'm not even discouraged from playing Udyr because if I'm not getting allies with a modicum of brainpower anyway, another jungler wouldn't serve me much better. Oh, I'm down to 13 LP now. But I still have a positive win/loss ratio, albeit barely.

And there goes my positive win/loss ratio. I tried. I really did. But it wasn't even close. Just another terrible match. We had a Fiora top and a Master Yi jungle. One person picked Fiddlesticks as a support and our last pick wasn't saying anything. I took Kog'Maw as an ADC. Last pick took Volibear...support? Yeah, Volibear ignored Fiddlesticks, so Fiddlesticks agreed to switch and go mid. The other team had Fizz (mid), Azir (top), Hecarim (jungle), Tristana (ADC), and Leona (support). Remember how I tend to lose in Ranked when playing ADC? This one was way worse than usual. Volibear gave up an early kill and generally didn't do anything to protect me, so they killed him again and then killed me under the turret. From there, Tristana kept killing me under the turret. When I teleported top to take minions there, Hecarim charged in on me and almost killed me. Then I left and got killed under mid and bot turrets a few more times. I couldn't do anything all game except get killed in turret dives by enemy champions that were way too powerful for me to actually fight. Meanwhile, Yi was off doing his own thing and Fiora was busy complaining about everyone. Fiddlesticks tried, though. So for both of the matches I've tried so far on October 19th, there's been one teammate who wasn't a consummate asshole. Well, I went 1/11/7. And now I'm down to 1 LP. My win/loss ratio is neutral. So much for that hot streak. Bronze I is beating me down harder than it did last season. Or maybe today just isn't my day.

Well, the next day I came back and tried some Ranked with Scott again. The first game saw Karthus (me), Wukong (top), Maokai (Scott jungling), Corki (ADC), and Sona (support) against Katarina, Nasus, Amumu, Draven, and Nami. My lane was uneventful, with the enemy Katarina putting too little pressure on me to stop me from farming. Wukong initially outlaned Nasus, but wasn't stopping his farm, which became a problem. But it was bot that doomed us, feeding at an alarming rate. I thought Corki had good escapes and would be a good candidate against Draven and Nami, but I think ours was just too unskilled. Draven snowballed, then Katarina, Nasus, and even Nami joined the party. It was simply too early in the game for my Karthus to compete with the level of domination our opponents had. I went 6/5/7 in the end. Not to whine, but our feeder bot lane made this one unwinnable. Even though I played my main and held my own, I suffered a brutal loss and saw my LP drop to 0 and my win/loss ratio go negative again. Damn.

In the second game of the day, we had Fizz (mid), Sion (top), Cho'Gath (Scott jungling), Kog'Maw (me), and Soraka (support). We were fighting Lux (mid), Darius (top), Rammus (jungle), Tristana (ADC), and Leona (support). This one was really frustrating. I was annoyed at how underpowered I seemed to be and I was raging a bit, but Scott reminded me that the real problem in the bot lane was Soraka, who was very, very bad. I'm not mad at Soraka: the player was either lagging heavily or was not sufficiently skilled to have been placed into this match (I never found out which, and I thought I saw evidence for both). Fizz was nearly as bad. Sion was initially ahead, but fell behind against Darius and played too aggressively to stop that from spiraling out of control. So we lost all of the lanes. I eventually got the damage I needed to kill things, but none of my allies protected me in any way the entire time. Looking back, I don't see how Paul was doing so well with Kog'Maw this season: I'm consistently getting teammates that make it hard for me to carry. I went 5/9/3, which was better than it could have been, considering how badly the rest of the match went. Scott held his own too, but it was a battle we just couldn't win.

On October 22nd, I managed to get back to Ranked, this time in solo queue. I got first pick, so we had Karthus (me), Talon (top), Volibear (jungle), Sivir (ADC), and Leona (support). The other team consisted of Twisted Fate (mid), Akali (top), Warwick (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Zilean (support). Even in the pre-game lobby, our Sivir whined that we were going to lose. There was some bickering, I forget by whom, that it was a mistake for me to pick Karthus into Akali (incorrect), but it turned out that Akali was top anyway, so that was a moot argument. Sivir continued to complain once bot lane lost an early scuffle and our team was slightly behind on kills. But Leona did a good job of holding the lane and Volibear came to the rescue multiple times, so bot wasn't a disaster. Talon got fed and was snowballing so hard that he got greedy and bought Sword of the Occult. My own progress was slower and more inexorable, as I outfarmed everyone and picked up kills and assists from distances too great for the other team to retaliate. Eventually, Sivir started getting fed too, and the other team surrendered at 30 minutes in, concluding what had become a very one-sided match. I went 7/1/10. Well, now I've got 63 wins, 64 losses and I'm at 25 LP.

After winning one in solo queue, I teamed up with Justin (Schweizerhof) for two more games. I got first pick again and took Karthus. The rest of the team consisted of Kennen (top), Udyr (jungle), Miss Fortune (ADC), and Janna (Justin). In the laning phase, I was fighting a Fizz that couldn't kill me without dying under my turret, but he got a few free kills from Udyr making bad plays, so he came out ahead and used that to farm up and become strong. Top lane was an AFK farmfest, but the enemy Ryze was able to capitalize on that moreso than our Kennen. Our bot lane fell behind too. In the end, I went 7/4/2, but our team fell behind too much and failed to coordinate for necessary base defenses, so we lost. That took me down to 9 LP.

We queued up for another game and, yet again, I was first pick, taking my Karthus. My lane opponent was a Katarina. Justin picked Lee Sin top. He was going to switch to jungling when he saw the enemy team take Ryze, but he stayed top when he saw that they also took Nunu. We ended up with a Warwick jungle. Bot lane we had Jinx and Leona against Twitch and Lulu. Justin gave up early kills and fell behind against Ryze, who farmed continuously. I easily avoided Katarina and farmed myself, but she and Nunu helped pressure bot lane, so that was where the action was. As Ryze kept getting stronger and more difficult for Justin to deal with, I switched with him. He was able to handle Katarina while the farmfest in top lane worked out for me. After I picked up a double kill with my ult and won a teamfight that was going on in the mid lane without ever actually leaving the top lane,  I was surrounded and killed by a five-man gank. That gave Ryze the time he needed to pass me up in CS, but I came back and started killing his allies. I got fed and helped Jinx and Warwick get fed too. Justin finally got the items he needed to start catching up, so he turned things around too. We pulled way ahead and started winning every teamfight. I went 7/3/11. And now I'm up to 34 LP. Since arriving in Bronze I, I've won three matches and lost five, but technically I have climbed the ladder. Progress is shaky, but for now, it is happening.

Sion is dead. Long live Sion.

Sion is one of my favorite champions. I'm a sucker for necromantic stuff in games, but I didn't pick him up right away because I was intently focused on Karthus, an undead mage having more appeal to me than an undead warrior. But I did eventually get around to buying Sion, and then I worked on learning how to play him. I became a huge fan.

I played Sion as a tanky fighter. My runes and masteries gave me some attack speed where it was accessible and went purely into defense otherwise. My item build was Ravenous Hydra, Mercury's Treads, Phantom Dancer, Frozen Mallet, Atma's Impaler, Guardian Angel. My Sion was an all-in late game gambit, which made me hesitate to play him much, since my laning phase was so bad. The idea was that if I played cautiously and farmed where possible, I could survive the laning phase and get a decent start on stacking my bonus maximum health from the passive on Enrage. This coupled with the offensive and defensive capabilities my items provided and with the massive boost from my ult, turned me into an unstoppable force. Eventually. With infinite scaling on the bonus health and Atma's Impaler to translate some of that into more damage, Sion could outscale almost anything. But that could take a long time and by then it could be too late. Still, I did try it on occasion. I described my approach to playing Sion as going into the laning phase "like a little girl." I didn't want to fight. It wasn't about killing my lane opponent. It wasn't about denying my lane opponent CS. It was all about surviving and farming. Some players hated it, but most of my teammates wound up appreciating what I was doing, just because it usually paid off. When it failed, it failed badly, but it usually worked. Last season, I even took my Sion into Ranked play for a single match. And in that match, I stopped a push on my team's inhibitor by scoring a pentakill, and then proceeded to lead my team back from the brink. That ended up being the final Ranked match for me in the season, and I didn't pick Sion up again in Ranked this season, just because I knew I wasn't going to top that performance. I did think about it. I certainly had fun with Sion in Normals. I even picked him in a couple of Ranked lobbies, but those got re-queued.

Sion may not have been my most played champion, but he was my favorite anyway, or my second favorite after Karthus, depending on my mood. For most of the time that I've been playing him, though, I had the lingering fear that Riot would rework him and ruin him. Well, they went and reworked him. Since then, I've been testing him out in co-op games to find out if the rework ruined him. While I do miss my old Sion, I've since come to the conclusion that new Sion has his own advantages. Maybe he'll even become one of my favorites. It's too early to tell. Breaking down the rework, Sion's old kit consisted of...

• Feel No Pain (passive): This passive was basically crap. It offered minor early game damage reduction, which could help Sion survive attacks by minion waves and such. Eventually, everything outscaled it into uselessness. This was a very, very bad passive.
• Cryptic Gaze (Q): As a targeted stun, this was exceedingly simple to use. It offered some protection early on and could help win duels or catch squishies later, but the flat damage was puny and the scaling was AP, meaning that for my purposes, this was practically a non-damaging stun.
• Death's Caress (W): Again, the damage was based on AP, so it was paltry on my build. Unfortunately, the magnitude of the shield itself was also dependent on AP, so this skill really fell off. Still, it offered some early tankiness to make up for the rest of Sion's bad early game.
• Enrage (E): I took this right away, maxed it first, and always left it toggled on. In some long games, I rebound it to a different key so that I wouldn't accidentally toggle it off. Enrage gave a huge boost to Sion's autoattacks and, most importantly, allowed him to permanently gain maximum health for killing things. Most champions only get gold from farming. Sion got gold and he also got tankiness.
• Cannibalism (R): This was what made my Sion a viable choice. The infinite scaling on the E, while very nice, was too slow to turn Sion into a dominant tank by itself. But the massive boost here allowed Sion to actually have a presence in fights. It also saved me in lane, letting me heal back up after being picked on by an opponent.

It's obvious that this kit was problematic. The Q and W were extremely weak without ability power. But I knew that if those skills were fixed and Sion got a real passive, it would mean that the skills I really cared about would need to be changed too. If I'd had my way, I would have reworked the Q into a skillshot and given the defensive portion of the W maximum health scaling. Of course, I knew that wasn't going to happen. Then the rework was finally announced. I knew the damage was going to be done. I got a couple of farewell Sion games in, with the last one being a very fun teambuilder match (I lost lane, but went on to murder enemies under their own turrets). But that was old Sion. And he's gone. What about new Sion?

• Glory in Death (passive): The concept of having Sion gain massive life steal and attack speed was shifted from his ult to this passive, which only does anything after Sion dies. In theory, this passive, which lets Sion keep on being a killing machine even after he is taken out, seems good. I mean, Sion gets to keep on doing things for a while after he's dead? That's reminiscent of Karthus, my other favorite champion. But in practice, it didn't work that way. When I tested Sion, I found this passive to be like a bad version of Kog'Maw's passive. Sion in his passive form can easily be avoided and his health drops so quickly that he has no time to stay around and fight the ones who killed him.
• Decimating Smash (Q): While this is harder to use than the old Q, it still has some crowd control and also does a lot of damage. It's great against minion waves and in big fights.
• Soul Furnace (W): This inherited the health stacks from old Sion's Enrage. I was dismayed to see that kills now add only 2 health instead of 3. But more on that in a moment. As for the active portion of this skill, it's essentially an upgrade to Death's Caress. The shield now has maximum health scaling and the damage scales off of enemy maximum health and covers a much wider area. All of that means that this new version of Sion's W can continue to be useful all game, not just early on. 
• Roar of the Slayer (E): This skillshot has AP scaling, but it comes with a short-lived slow and armor reduction, which are obviously useful to have. Shredding enemy armor could be especially useful for duels. There's also the potential to launch minions into enemy champions with this skill, which could be valuable in some situations.
• Unstoppable Onslaught: This is a big, flashy gap-closer that's reminiscent of Nocturne's ultimate. It lets Sion move with incredible speed, but it's very difficult to steer. Struggling with trying to hit enemies with this, I started saying, "Choo choo, here comes the moron train."

This version of Sion seems more like an AD caster than the old one, which isn't what I wanted. Trying the new Sion out against bots, I found that he didn't seem as robust as the old Sion. Yeah, the new abilities are generally better, but it bears emphasis that Cannibalism was one of the best ultimates in the game. I had a better pre-6 laning phase, but my old build just wasn't working. Once I came to terms with the fact that my old approach to Sion wouldn't work, I pondered whether he could still be a good champion. Well, I haven't tested the new Sion against human players yet, and I'm still working some details out, but there's definitely something to work with here.

Firstly, Ravenous Hydra isn't going to cut it anymore. I got away with that as my only life steal item because of Cannibalism. No more Cannibalism means that I need to move on. But one of the main advantages of Ravenous Hydra for old Sion was that its passive and active AOE damage could be used to kill minion waves. The new shield is so much better than the old shield at doing that, so it's not much of a consideration. I switched from Ravenous Hydra to Blade of the Ruined King. More attack speed early on. I might even build a Bloodthirster too in a final build, or throw in Ravenous Hydra at some point. But Blade of the Ruined King is just looking too good to pass up, since it gives both life steal and attack speed, both of which were missing from the loss of Cannibalism. The amazing passive and the useful active are also considerations in this.

Secondly, I realized that while the health scaling on minions got weaker, it's now triple for large monsters and for kills and assists on champions. This makes jungling, rather than laning, a more tempting choice for farming up health stacks.

Thirdly, I realized that jungle monsters let Sion engage on them by fully charging up his new Q. They don't notice the Q charging up, so it easily deals full damage to them. This combined with a better shield makes new Sion's early clears in the jungle way better than old Sion's were.

Fourthly, I realized that if I was building Sion as a jungler and already putting one on-hit item on him, that it only made sense to include our lord and savior, Feral Flare.

Fifthly, I found that his new ult, while it pales in comparison to Cannibalism, isn't half bad for ganks.

So yeah, new Sion isn't a laner like old Sion was. He's a jungler. I've been building him with Blade of the Ruined King, Mercury's Treads, Feral Flare, and Atma's Impaler. Well, he's no Udyr, but I'm convinced that this actually works. Now to figure out the rest of my build...

Going for the Gold Part XXXIII: Promoted With Scott

After playing League of Legends for over two years and accumulating over a thousand normal games, I finally entered ranked play. In my own, totally objective, assessment, I am skilled enough for Gold. My placement matches disagreed, and threw me into Bronze II. More recently after failing to climb out of Bronze I, the ladder was reset and I found myself placed lower still, all the down way at the bottom of Bronze V. The Ranked matches I've played so far have clearly marked me as a Bronze player. This is the story of my attempt to prove them wrong. This is Going for the Gold.

Previously, I'd qualified for a promo series. And that's the point at which I left off last season before the ladder reset. I got on and did a duo queue with Scott, hoping to finally make it into Bronze I for the first time this season. The matchup was Fizz (Scott) vs. Akali mid, Singed (me) vs. Ryze top, Diana vs. Warwick jungle, and Sivir and Zilean vs. Jinx and Braum bot. Diana helped me get first blood against Ryze and I was able to bully him in the laning phase, but the other lanes fared poorly and our team was thoroughly crushed. I ended up going 3/6/3, but Jinx and Akali consistently destroyed my teammates before I could attempt to tank for them in teamfights, and we were generally unorganized.

With one loss in my promo series, I was determined. Scott and I tried again, with a team of Mordekaiser (mid), Fiora (top), Udyr (me), Ezreal (ADC), and Braum (Scott). Our opponents were Teemo (mid), Yasuo (top), Sion (jungle), Tristana (ADC), and Nami (support). This was just a weird and very frustrating match. Fiora got an early advantage and became fed, but Yasuo got fed too. Neither one was as fed as Tristana, though. For my part, I just couldn't get help when I needed it. My teammates would ping, I'd rush in for a gank, and then I'd see, too late, that my teammates were running directly away from me for some reason. I fell behind and started getting ganked in my own jungle. In the end, I was 2/6/0, never once getting my allies to coordinate with me at all (even though I was in a Skype call with one), I picked up two kills on enemies that were retreating and happened to head in my direction. With that, I failed to qualify and was dropped back into Bronze II.

Only partly deterred by those defeats, Scott and I decided to shake it off and try again. This time, we had Yasuo mid, Dr. Mundo top, and Elise jungle. Scott and I took the bot lane together, with him supporting my on-hit Kayle as Braum. I'd played Kayle before in Ranked, but Scott was surprised. Well, I chose her pretty deliberately this time, as we were up against an imposing enemy bot lane in Caitlyn and Morgana. Scott had wanted to play Braum, his main, and that combination was liable to put a lot of pressure on us. I had last pick, so I took a champion that I knew I could use to hold out against that kind of harassment. The enemy team also had Xerath mid, Jarvan IV top, and Amumu jungle. I told Scott that I should be able to use Kayle to farm underneath the turret if necessary, and that we could probably hold the lane against our opponents for a long time. It ended up working better than that. They put up a fight, but we bullied them and won lane handily. Scott died in ganks, but I started to snowball and I was pretty sure we'd win. The game took a weird turn, though, with both mid-laners becoming very fed. Yasuo and Xerath were each destroying each other and their other respective opponents, so they almost cancelled each other out, but our Yasuo came out ahead. Yasuo aside, our team would have been at a slight disadvantage, but, like I said, I was starting to snowball. I went 7/4/5. With that victory, I was on my way back up the ladder.

I logged on to find that Scott had just lost his first match in a promo series. He was in Bronze I, so he had up to four more matches in his series. We decided to team up again and try to turn his series around. Our first match in the session consisted of Ziggs (mid), Swain (me), Kha'Zix (jungle), Twitch (ADC), and Alistar (Scott) vs. Zed (mid), Xin Zhao (top), Blitzcrank (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Thresh (support). I was worried about a possible invasion, and my concern was vindicated: Blitzcrank and Xin Zhao went after our blue buff and Xin Zhao attempted to kill Ziggs, but got caught by my snare and I killed him for first blood. From there, Blitzcrank mainly eschewed the jungle, camping top for a duo lane against me. I held out and eventually got help from Kha'Zix. Bot was in trouble, though, and mid was pretty close. Twitch apologized for feeding, and eventually farmed up enough to contribute. Once that happened, I was fed, Kha'Zix was fed, and Twitch was fed. The fed enemy Lucian couldn't compete with that, and the gap between our teams grew as we pushed lanes and won decisively. I went 16/3/18. That was enough to qualify me for another promo series. It also tied Scott's record in his promo series, so we were effectively in the same spot: best of three to advance. Not bad.

It didn't last. We queued up again and somehow the client didn't register me attempting to pick a champion, so we were dropped. That added a virtual loss onto my promo series, although Scott's record was unaffected. Now, in order to advance, I had to win both of my next two matches. Of course, I wasn't happy about this. Well, after we waited for the time penalty and finally got into another match, it was Fizz (mid), Garen (top), Udyr (jungle), Kog'Maw (me), and Scott (Braum) against Annie (mid), Sion (top), Aatrox (jungle), Tristana (ADC), and Thresh (support). With my abysmal ADC record this season, I wasn't particularly hopeful. Scott tried to protect me, but I died multiple times in lane against the relentless pressure that our opponents brought. Fortunately, the other two lanes did well, which gave our jungler the freedom to focus on helping us. I thought I'd be stuck behind the whole game, but I should have given Kog'Maw more credit, as that little guy can really pack a punch. I caught up, which put our whole team way ahead. They couldn't kill Braum without exposing themselves to me, and they couldn't kill Garen at all. I went 7/6/5, which isn't amazing, but it's a nice comeback from 0/4/1, so I was satisfied. This also meant that if Scott and I won our next match, we'd both be promoted.

Scott got first pick, and we decided to do the Braum/Kayle bot lane again. Since I wasn't last pick this time, we had to explain to our allies that I was going bot with Kayle, and that it really would work. Scott told them that we were both in promo series, to emphasize our seriousness about the matter. Our teammates were still apprehensive. I replied, "Trust." They didn't have much choice, so they went along with it. They took Vladimir mid and Garen top. Our last pick cycled between Diana and Master Yi to jungle, and Scott thought Yi was the better choice. Our opponents had Zed, Ryze, Jarvan IV, Tristana, and Janna. Scott thought it was a good sign that they picked Janna into Braum, but he was worried about Ryze top against Garen. That ended up working out. Garen outfarmed Ryze by a bit and didn't die to him. But it was in the bot lane that the real plays happened. Janna ran into a brush that Scott had warded, and Tristana wasn't close enough to save her when he attacked and hit her with Exhaust. I used Ignite and finished her off for first blood, then bullied Tristana for the rest of the laning phase. I proceeded to demolish the entire enemy team. Zed put up a fight, but the rest of them didn't stand a chance. I went 20/5/9. I got multiple triple kills. After a while my teammates were claiming that Kayle was free LP. And with that victory, I have finally returned to the place I spent all of last season. But just as I arrived in Bronze I, Scott left it. He's now in Silver V.