Going for the Gold Part XXXII: At Long Last, Qualified

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.

I got some more Ranked games in. I had a plethora of  trolls, but still managed to account for myself in these games, I think. I started out getting first pick, which gave us Karthus (me), Kayle (top), Lee Sin (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Thresh (support). Our opponents had Vel'Koz (mid), Volibear (top), Vi (jungle), Corki (ADC), and Janna (support). While Vel'Koz isn't particularly problematic for me, the enemy Vi was quite good and, for some reason, the Kayle player was completely out of place here, feeding with a baffling intensity. Lee Sin took to raging rather than playing the game, and Lucian, the only player besides me not to become completely outclassed from the start, was arrogant. I was initially a bit ahead on my kill/death ratio, but I purposely went into deadly situations trying to swing teamfights, which never actually worked. I'm trying to prioritize giving my team a chance to win the game, rather than just going for kills. I think I did a good job of that, but this just wasn't a game that we could win. In the end, I went 3/4/5.

I tried another game. This time, I got mid, but without Kassadin banned. Haven't seen one in a while, actually, but I'm not risking it. I picked Veigar. I was up against a Lux, and I was narrowly beating her in lane, but she abandoned the lane early and became a roamer, which worked marvelously for her, as our bot lane repeatedly fed her. I pinged that she was missing. I did it a lot. They just kept dying and then our Lucian would whine about "mia." He and his Annie support were facing a Caitlyn/Alistar lane, which didn't get many kills but was able to feed Lux and the enemy Master Yi (jungling) kills. Our Garen top decisively beat a Xin Zhao, but our Tryndamere wasn't doing much. In fact, he fed Lux some of the kills that let her get going in the first place, going for stupid ganks that weren't going to work, then getting snared and killed by her turret. There was a lot of bickering between Tryndamere and Garen. It started in the lobby when Garen first-picked, then waited for Tryndamere to lock in before switching away from Smite and declaring "top." Ultimately, Tryndamere failed to adapt and had poor decision-making. Garen was a better player, but was all in it for himself, refusing to help the team or coordinate in any way. With those two and a feeding bot lane, I didn't stand a chance. I went 7/6/2 because Veigar can dish out the pain, even with a fed Lux trying to stop him, but we lost and it wasn't even close. I called it a night, frustrated that I'd fallen behind.


For my next two games, I did a duo queue with Justin (Schweizerhof). Our team composition was Xerath (mid), Urgo (top), Udyr (me), Varus (Justin), and Thresh (support). We were facing Talon (mid), Lissandra (top), Jarvan IV (jungle), Ezreal (ADC), and Orianna (support). Our bot lane came out ahead and our mid also did better than the enemy, although top did a bit worse. But skirmishes started to go against us, so this was actually a pretty close game for a while. The other jungler did pretty well for himself, which might have salvaged the game for them, but the combined poking power of Varus and Xerath helped us control objectives. And then there was me. I revisited my characteristic Udyr farm-intensive jungle domination. I assembled my full build and was able to annihilate any opponent I caught alone. A couple of times, two of them tried to team up against me, thinking that their combined power would stop me, but I'd kill them both instead. Fights in which I could find and opening quickly became very one-sided. In the end, I went 13/4/8.

In the second game with Justin, I jungled again, taking Maokai this time. He went top as Aatrox. Our mid was Malzahar and our bot laners were Vayne and Soraka. The other team had Heimerdinger mid, Darius top, Pantheon jungle, and Tristana/Karma bot. Justin can take most of the credit for this one. He tore Darius apart in the laning phase. Pantheon made some effort to turn that around, but not enough. I earned some assists, but wasn't doing very much for my team. I did serve as tanky bait to net Justin a few more kills, though, which put him over the top. This game was marred by both Malzahar and Tristana getting one kill each and then disconnecting. As Justin dominated the match and it drew to a close, the other team whined about it being 4 vs. 5, failing to notice that it was actually 4 vs. 4. I think Tristana did disconnect earlier, though, which might have given us a substantial boost, allowing Vayne and Soraka, neither of whom did particularly well, to control their lane and then go mid with me to help win skirmishes against Heimerdinger and Pantheon. I only went 1/2/7, but that's not so bad for a generally starved tank in a very short match. The other team surrendered at 25 minutes in.

Justin took a break but came back to spectate most of my next game. It was Karthus (me), Fiora (top), Amumu (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Morgana (support) vs. Cassiopeia (mid), Ryze (top), Udyr (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Janna (support). I was worried about facing the new Cassi, but I've had Karthus vs. Cassi lanes in the past, especially practicing with Nick. This Cassiopeia player was rather bad and I was easily able to control my lane. I got farmed and tried to carry, but everyone else on my team did poorly. Fiora lost to Ryze, badly. Lucian built the wrong items in the wrong order and fell behind. Morgana fed. And then there was Amumu. He had a habit of entering my lane either just as I was returning or just in the middle of a fight. These weren't ganks. He'd stick around and get cozy, stealing CS from me and pushing the lane. Once it was pushed all the way out, I'd usually have to back off, either because I spotted Udyr or because I had no ward coverage at all. Then Amumu would run off into the enemy jungle, get ganked by three or four opponents (because they had wards), and rage at me. Lucian was begging Amumu to help bot, but Amumu continued this pattern of failing to counterjungle despite those pleas. Udyr and Ryze easily carried this for their team, with the other three doing their share to help ensure victory. I only went 7/3/13. Not bad, but it would have been better if my teammates ever tried to pick a fight when my ult was actually available.

Later on, I tried solo queue again and got first pick. Since I refuse to learn my lesson, I took Karthus again. My allies were Nasus (top), Hecarim (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Fiddlesticks (support). My opponents were Lux (mid), Dr. Mundo (top), Kha'Zix (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Soraka (support). Lux played passively and I was able to farm against her, which was good because kills were slow in coming. I saw very few ult opportunities, and most of my attempted ults didn't pick up kills. So I was forced to get up close and personal for this one. Fiddlesticks actually got fed the quickest, but Hecarim and I weren't far behind, and Lucian eventually got fed too. On the other team, Mundo held his own, but none of the others could. I went 9/2/5. Well, at least I finally won a Karthus game again.

I'd struggled with trolls and I knew that I was, yet again, one match away from qualifying for a promo series. I tried again. It was Ahri (mid), Singed (me), Udyr (jungle), Ashe (ADC), and Braum (support), against Ziggs (mid), Riven (top), Fiddlesticks (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Thresh (support). I actually picked Singed into Riven, which was risky on my part, but I'll explain. Riven isn't a good matchup for Singed, as she is manaless and has a much stronger early game than he does, as well as winning games if she gets fed. With the help of a good jungler, Singed is in a pretty bad spot against Riven. But I also know that most players in Bronze are liable to feed Riven kills and make her dangerous. I was banking on being more skilled than the enemy Riven, or at least on not being pressured by her jungler, and being able to survive and help my team. Singed outfarms Riven if the pressure isn't on him, and he can control teamfights. Another top, such as Mordekaiser, could potentially bully Riven, but I thought I could make this work. My choice was vindicated. A lot. Riven won a few early exchanges against me, but got tossed into my turret, which she survived, but that allowed me to catch up. Rather than recalling, she stuck around in the lane with low health, which let me take control. She attempted to coordinate with Fiddlesticks to circle around behind me for a gank, but I saw it coming and popped my Ghost. They chased me, but I use Fling. Riven used Flash to escape my turret, and Fiddlsticks managed to run away with low health. I teleported back and Riven refused to leave. Eventually, I killed her under her turret and took over top lane completely. I farmed up and was able to get Singed to do what Singed does best: run around causing mayhem so that his team can easily clean up. In the end, I went 5/2/17. And that win propelled me into a promo series.