Three seasons in a row, I sought Gold, but remained stuck in Bronze.
Am I delusional? Let's see what happens this time around. I got a late
start to this season and I've been thrown into Bronze again by placement
matches. This is the story of my attempt to turn reverse the trends of
previous seasons. This is Going for the Gold.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Malphite
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Thresh
vs.
Mid: Fiddlesticks
Top: Riven
Jungle: Pantheon
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona
My
team had positive attitudes initially, but that quickly degenerated. I
knew that Fiddlesticks would be a tough lane, but if he couldn't get
fed, I'd outfarm him and be fine. That was happening, although I fed him
one kill by accident (I saw him draining a minion and didn't back away,
but he was actually draining me, because apparently I was hallucinating
until it was too late), I also got him ganked twice due to his
aggression, so I was initially ahead, but he got fed by roaming, as did
the whole rest of their team. Malphite and I were ahead, but the rest of
the team fed hard. We fell further and further behind, but I was
getting stronger and had some hope of holding out for late game. Then my
teammates all surrendered at 27 minutes in. So much for that. In the
end, I went 5/6/4, but I don't even count this one. I was doing fine and
then got screwed out of a chance to fight back by surrendering
teammates. Also, they fed Sivir. I keep having teammates that feed
Sivir. My status message before this game was already, "Stop feeding
Sivir." Yes, really. It just keeps happening. Down to 2 LP now.
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Shen
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Morgana
vs.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Pantheon
Jungle: Nidalee
Marksman: Graves
Support: Sona
My
team began bickering and flaming each other before the match started.
They raged, went AFK, and actively encouraged the enemy team to defeat
us. The only one I didn't report was Jinx, and she played badly anyway.
For my part, I was constantly ganked by Nidalee and Pantheon, even as I
killed Ahri before being finished off. Where does matchmaking find these
people? In the end, I went 2/9/3, which isn't so bad against a fed
enemy team when not one of my allies is helping me in anyway the entire
time. So yeah, down to 0 LP, because somehow this is fair. Bullshit.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Singed
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Blitzcrank
vs.
Mid: Nidalee
Top: Fiora
Jungle: Volibear
Marksman: Ezreal
Support: Gangplank (built AD, but played as a support anyway)
I
was pretty confident against Nidalee mid. She can be a huge bully early
on, but I outscale her damage easily. Well, she bullied me
relentlessly, then Volibear ganked me under my turret and killed me.
Then, yet again, I was outnumbered by roaming enemies and repeatedly
killed in my lane while my allies made no attempt to help me. They
descended into bickering, as usual, and we were thoroughly trounced. Mid
is my best role and I'm playing some my best champions, but I'm losing
hard. I almost never have a negative kill/death ratio as Karthus, and
yet it's happened twice today. I don't even think that I'm playing
badly. I just have no opportunities in these games. My opponents are
skilled and my allies are not. Matchmaking wants me to be
demoted. That's the only conclusion I can draw from what's happening
here. In the end, I went 0/3/4. Not securing any early kills and being
denied CS by a bullying team set me behind the whole time, so I couldn't
get enough damage to pick up kills. I'm in disbelief right now. Karthus
has been my main from the beginning. He's my best champion. Yeah, I've
always had a negative win/loss ratio with him, but that's down to
feeding teammates. I've generally gotten fed and held my own with him,
even while losing. But now I'm being beaten. And it's not even by
superior opponents. I'm not losing to just one person. I'm losing to
coordinated efforts by opponents while my allies ignore my plight and
proceed to rage at each other. I'm stubborn, but I don't know that I'm
this stubborn. These matches are downright depressing.
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Master Yi
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Viktor
Top: Shyvana
Jungle: Rek'Sai
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Morgana
Well,
I went mid yet again. This time, I managed to trounce my lane opponent
without dying to ganks. Rek'Sai tried, and actually tried quite a bit,
but I survived. Meanwhile, bot lane Sivir got fed as always, but this
time she was on my team for once. It took a long time for me to start
scoring kills, but once I did I began to snowball, joining the fed Yi
and even more fed Sivir. The other team held us off for a while, but
surrendered around the 29 minute mark, by which point I went 6/2/6. This
win saves me from demotion again, and now I'm up to 26 LP.
Mid: Akali
Top: Gnar
Jungle: Warwick
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Sona (me)
vs.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Riven
Jungle: Hecarim
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Brand
Our
Jinx wasn't particularly good, but I supported the crap out of her, so
she got enough to become useful. Our Warwick and Akali were stellar.
Warwick controlled the jungle so much that we eventually got five
dragons, while also controlling Baron. I roamed and help my team, mostly
Akali, to win skirmishes. Late game I was tanky enough to rush into the
other team and bully them, forcing them to focus me, bursting me down,
as Akali swept through and killed them all. In the end, I went 4/4/29.
Two wins in a row has brought me nearly back to a neutral win/loss ratio
of 15 wins, 16 losses, and now I have 52 LP.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Rek'Sai
Jungle: Udyr
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Tryndamere
Jungle: Sejuani
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Shen
Katarina
played too passively and ran into too many of my Lay Wastes, so I
easily won lane. I snowballed and would have carried my teammates, but
of course they fed hard enough to counteract me. It was a reasonably
close match in the end, but the feeders fed and it was too much. Big
surprise, since that's my typical Ranked Karthus match. In the end, I
went 16/5/11. Down to 33 LP.
Mid: Ezreal (AD)
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Galio (me)
vs.
Mid: Diana
Top: Malphite
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Varus
Support: Sona
Kalista
flipped out and griefed for no apparent reason. So we lost. In the end,
I went 3/7/6 trying to tank for my allies. It was hard to do well when
my lane partner was intentionally feeding. Down to 14 LP. Yay, Ranked!
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Diana
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Malphite
vs.
Mid: Zed
Top: Garen
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Varus
Support: Karma
Yasuo
did well in the laning phase, but kept trying to break away from the
team and overxtend, then would whine about not having any help. I won
lane decisively and proceeded to have Singed do what Singed does. In the
end, I went 7/1/14. Up to 32 LP now.
Mid: Diana
Top: Malzahar
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Soraka
vs.
Mid: Heimerdinger
Top: Wukong
Jungle: Talon
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Morgana
This
one was all my fault. I should never play Udyr. My whole team thought
so. I think I just lack the jungling skills to do much when all three
lanes start feeding right away. But seriously, these people were strange
and delusional. Malzahar fed throughout the laning phase and attributed
it all to losing one early fight, and that he couldn't catch up. Diana
whined about me "diving" Heimerdinger even though I never did any such
thing, hadn't died to Heimerdinger at all by that point (I did later
kill him when he was fed and died to his rockets in the process, but
that hadn't happened yet) and she had fed him several kills on her own.
Caitlyn pinged and requested help in the chat at the turret when she was
still dead and there were three fed enemy champions pushing that
turret, then blamed the fact that we were losing on me. Soraka outfed
them all. In the end, I went 4/3/5. Not great, but the next best was
probably the Malzahar who managed to stop feeding once the laning phase
was over, hid in the base and only went 1/6/3. Down to 18 LP. In past
seasons it would let me climb to Bronze II or even Bronze I before
dialing the bullshit up to 11. This time, I'm still only in Bronze III
and seriously still in danger of demotion to Bronze IV. How exciting!
Hey everyone, this is Going for the Gold and I'm totally serious about
that. Yep, I've got the skills to win games and climb through these
divisions. I may only have 16 wins to 19 losses right now. But just you wait.
Wednesday, March 11, 2015
Monday, March 9, 2015
Going for the Gold Part XLIII: Promoted, Then Almost Demoted
Three seasons in a row, I sought Gold, but remained stuck in Bronze.
Am I delusional? Let's see what happens this time around. I got a late
start to this season and I've been thrown into Bronze again by placement
matches. This is the story of my attempt to turn reverse the trends of
previous seasons. This is Going for the Gold.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Swain (me)
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Varus
Support: Morgana (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Lux
Top: Wukong
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Twitch
Support: Lulu
In my lane, Lee Sin tried to camp me. But I surived and dominated my lane. Nick and his ADC also came out ahead, and our Vi picked up a lot of kills. They held out for a while, but we were way ahead and were able to get into their base and win eventually. I went 14/4/12.
Mid: Brand (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Graves
Support: Braum
vs.
Mid: Diana
Top: Vladimir
Jungle: Jarvan IV
Marksman: Twitch
Support: Morgana
I think my teammates might have surrendered this one, but I forget. Nick was there to help, but he lost lane anyway. I killed Vladimir and was winning my lane, but he got help from Jarvan IV and then other members of the team too. I started killing champions and getting strong enough to tank most damage, but then Diana ulted onto me and destroyed me. I looked at the scoreboard and saw that she was stacking a Mejai's Soulstealer. My allies had simply fed too much. On top of that, I had most of our kills. I did make a few embarrassing mistakes in this one, but for the most part I think I played well and just couldn't overcome the massive difference between the two teams. In the end, I went 4/5/1, while our whole team only picked up a total of 9 kills against the enemy's 36.
Mid: Karma
Top: Diana
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Galio
Top: Jax
Jungle: Riven
Marksman: Miss Fortune
Support: Morgana
Another very one-sided match. Top and bot were frozen at first, so I killed opponents there a few times, then went back to farming for the rest of the match while my teammates snowballed. Sivir had 28 kills by the end. They actually managed to drive my team out of their base in a last stand, but then I ran in with baron-boosted minions and took down the nexus. In the end, I went 10/1/6. This was incredibly dominant. After I gave them some initial help, my team only needed me for dragon and baron control and could probably have won without me. Meanwhile, I was probably close to being able to solo the enemy team. It was that one-sided.
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Rengar
Jungle: Xin Zhao (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Morgana
vs.
Mid: Fizz
Top: Jax
Jungle: Hecarim
Marksman: Miss Fortune
Support: Sona
I got to carry a game as Malzahar! It might have been even better than if I'd played Karthus, since I was able to apply early pressure to Fizz and kill the fed Jax with my ult. It took a bit of time to catch up to Jax, but the rest of his team were easy to pick off. In the end, I went 19/9/12. Another really dominant match.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Riven
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Morgana
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Master Yi
Support: Blitzcrank
How does someone completely fail to play against their own main champion? Our Riven made a big deal about calling Nasus top in two lobbies, but then the other team got Nasus first. I figured that top should be fine, although Riven was an odd counterpick choice. Instead Nasus easily killed Riven and farmed like crazy. Our bot lane went better, but ultimately Jinx was rather unskilled. Didn't matter. I carried them. Wukong helped me get ahead so I could completely control my lane, then Nick provided initiations so that I could stomp on the other team. In the end, I went 14/2/10.
Mid: Morgana
Top: Darius
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Kayle (me)
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Akali
Top: Irelia
Jungle: Sejuani
Marksman: Graves
Support: Thresh
The Graves/Thresh bot lane combo is very dangerous. Nick and I didn't coordinate with each other very well and we made ourselves vulnerable, falling behind. Sejuani charged in and helped secure the laning phase for them, but our Darius was way ahead and Morgana was ahead too, so I thought we might get carried. My teammates messed up and got taken out by Graves one-by-one after he killed me when I was asking for help against him (they were focused on dragon), giving him a quadra kill and helping him snowball. And then on-hit Kayle struck again. I'm so glad I've gotten to keep this build for as long as I have. Full on-hit builds aren't very popular, but mine have been working, especially my Kayle. In the end, I went 9/5/10. Not my best Kayle game, but it wasn't too shabby.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Zac
Jungle: Tryndamere
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Heimerdinger
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona
I've never seen such a passive Heimerdinger. While he was an easy lane opponent, our bot lane completely collapsed, as our Jinx was outclassed. The enemy team roamed and killed me under my turret a few times. Tryndamere got fed, which kept us going until my massive CS let me get fed too. Zac also started getting fed, and while we were still behind on total kills as a team, the combination of a fed Karthus, Tryndamere, and Zac was enough to win us teamfights and take the match. In the end, I went 10/5/7.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Tryndamere
Marksman: Tristana (me)
Feed: Lux
vs.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Galio
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Viktor
I say "feed" for Lux, but I was actually the one to give up the most kills overall. Lux did start feeding from early on, but the real problem was that Lux made no attempt whatsoever to support me or do anything useful. She did pick up a couple of kill and assists over time, but she may as well have been a bot. Actually, I think she might have been except a bot should have done better. I'm not exaggerating: our Lux was useless, even going so far as to shoot ults off the map instead of at enemies. I tried to overcome that disadvantage, but our whole team was behind. I picked up several kills, but my allies weren't getting kills and we were all dying too much. In the end, I went 6/11/2. I swore off going as marksman with random players. Having a bad jungler can make mid or top dangerous, but having a bad support makes bot absolutely miserable.
Mid: Ziggs
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Skarner (me)
Marksman: Varus
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Zed
Top: Kayle
Jungle: Irelia
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Sona
This wasn't a total shutout, but we were able to get ahead and stay ahead. I successfully ganked top and bot multiple times, and our team won both, which left us with three fed champions. They put up a fight, but we overpowered them. In the end, I went 11/7/7.
Mid: LeBlanc
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Galio
Top: Garen
Jungle: Nautilus
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Nami
I tried to help my team, but they fell way behind before I could get going. In the end, I went 1/6/7. This one sucked.
Mid: Fizz (IMLRG)
Top: Aatrox
Jungle: Shen (me)
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Zilean
vs.
Mid: Zed
Top: Nidalee
Jungle: Pantheon
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Janna
This was a repeat of the previous game, only I was playing Shen for some reason. I went 1/6/5. Tried to help, but the lanes fed aggressively before I could get going. Scott eventually picked up some ult kills, but it was too late.
Mid: Teemo
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Kayle (me)
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Annie
Top: Gangplank
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Alistar
I told Scott that I was sick of losing like that, and that I was going to force mid because I carry matches when I pick mid. He talked me into going Kayle/Braum duo bot with him. It was rough at first, then got rougher when Lee Sin ganked us and got a double kill. I thought that Lee Sin would snowball, but we killed him twice (I killed him once and someone else killed him) and he ragequit soon after. We were already winning by then. I was getting fed and Nasus was getting even more fed. But having a 5 vs. 4 made it even more one-sided. In the end, I went 9/2/10.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Jayce
Jungle: Fizz
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Volibear
My team had to be pretty screwed up to let Fizz outjungle me as Udyr, but screwed up was exactly what they were. Vayne and Nasus fed the most, which of course left Nick dying a lot too. Malzahar fed a little less, but still more than me. So he decided that our defeat must be my fault. Yeah, the guy raged pretty hard, then called me "butthurt" when I responded. Trolls gonna troll, I suppose. In the end, I went 4/7/3, which sucks, but is better than the rest of my team could do. Recently, it seems like all of my games as jungler involve my allies in the lanes collapsing and losing their lanes while I'm still on my first clear. I'm in danger of being demoted (I forget when I was promoted to Bronze III, but I totally was) because of this crap.
Mid: Orianna
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Xin Zhao (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Ezreal
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Maokai
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Varus
Support: Teemo
Not sure how the Teemo support was supposed to work. I was too busy having Vi fly at me all the damn time. I couldn't keep from feeding with all the pressure she put on me in the laning phase, but I was able to farm like crazy and weaken Maokai's outer turret. While I was doing that, Katarina got incredibly fed. I tried to tank for my teammates, and while none of them were egregiously bad, they just kept getting caught when they shouldn't have. In the end, I went 4/8/10. Another loss, which puts me in even more danger of demotion. What a fantastic start my season is off to. Oh yes, Gold is looking as impossible as ever.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Gnar
Jungle: Rammus
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Thresh
vs.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Fiora
Jungle: Sion
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Braum
I won my lane. The other lanes lost badly. From there, we tried to mount a comeback. It looked like we might pull it off, but we just didn't have enough competent people. Rammus was good, and Gnar fed early but started getting stronger. Jinx and Thresh just weren't doing enough. I was able to deal with the fed Fiora and the fed Sivir on multiple occasions, but it wasn't enough. In the end, I went 16/5/17. I tried, but I failed. Next loss from here should demote me. And as usual, I think that it just isn't right. I'm getting unwinnable match after unwinnable match.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Teemo
Jungle: Warwick
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Ezreal (AP build)
Top: Pantheon
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Morgana
I messed up rather badly in the laning phase of this one. I held off on teleporting as I took a beating from Ezreal's skillshots. I decided to back off and teleport, but wanted to flash as I saw him ulting. Then Pantheon tried to ult in too. Even though Pantheon's ult was too far back to possibly hit me, I panicked over it and flashed right into Ezreal's ult, giving him a kill. Couldn't believe it. Fortunately, I already had a kill from my own ult, and was able to get Warwick to gank Ezreal and take his outer turret. From there, I got fed and walked all over the whole enemy team. Our Vayne, who had farmed much better than me early on and had dominated lane, got fed too, dooming the other team even more. They tried to play defensively, which just let us pick them apart at our leisure. In the end, I went 10/3/9. Guess I won't be demoted yet! I'm at 20 LP in Bronze III.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Swain (me)
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Varus
Support: Morgana (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Lux
Top: Wukong
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Twitch
Support: Lulu
In my lane, Lee Sin tried to camp me. But I surived and dominated my lane. Nick and his ADC also came out ahead, and our Vi picked up a lot of kills. They held out for a while, but we were way ahead and were able to get into their base and win eventually. I went 14/4/12.
Mid: Brand (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Graves
Support: Braum
vs.
Mid: Diana
Top: Vladimir
Jungle: Jarvan IV
Marksman: Twitch
Support: Morgana
I think my teammates might have surrendered this one, but I forget. Nick was there to help, but he lost lane anyway. I killed Vladimir and was winning my lane, but he got help from Jarvan IV and then other members of the team too. I started killing champions and getting strong enough to tank most damage, but then Diana ulted onto me and destroyed me. I looked at the scoreboard and saw that she was stacking a Mejai's Soulstealer. My allies had simply fed too much. On top of that, I had most of our kills. I did make a few embarrassing mistakes in this one, but for the most part I think I played well and just couldn't overcome the massive difference between the two teams. In the end, I went 4/5/1, while our whole team only picked up a total of 9 kills against the enemy's 36.
Mid: Karma
Top: Diana
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Galio
Top: Jax
Jungle: Riven
Marksman: Miss Fortune
Support: Morgana
Another very one-sided match. Top and bot were frozen at first, so I killed opponents there a few times, then went back to farming for the rest of the match while my teammates snowballed. Sivir had 28 kills by the end. They actually managed to drive my team out of their base in a last stand, but then I ran in with baron-boosted minions and took down the nexus. In the end, I went 10/1/6. This was incredibly dominant. After I gave them some initial help, my team only needed me for dragon and baron control and could probably have won without me. Meanwhile, I was probably close to being able to solo the enemy team. It was that one-sided.
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Rengar
Jungle: Xin Zhao (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Morgana
vs.
Mid: Fizz
Top: Jax
Jungle: Hecarim
Marksman: Miss Fortune
Support: Sona
I got to carry a game as Malzahar! It might have been even better than if I'd played Karthus, since I was able to apply early pressure to Fizz and kill the fed Jax with my ult. It took a bit of time to catch up to Jax, but the rest of his team were easy to pick off. In the end, I went 19/9/12. Another really dominant match.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Riven
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Morgana
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Master Yi
Support: Blitzcrank
How does someone completely fail to play against their own main champion? Our Riven made a big deal about calling Nasus top in two lobbies, but then the other team got Nasus first. I figured that top should be fine, although Riven was an odd counterpick choice. Instead Nasus easily killed Riven and farmed like crazy. Our bot lane went better, but ultimately Jinx was rather unskilled. Didn't matter. I carried them. Wukong helped me get ahead so I could completely control my lane, then Nick provided initiations so that I could stomp on the other team. In the end, I went 14/2/10.
Mid: Morgana
Top: Darius
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Kayle (me)
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Akali
Top: Irelia
Jungle: Sejuani
Marksman: Graves
Support: Thresh
The Graves/Thresh bot lane combo is very dangerous. Nick and I didn't coordinate with each other very well and we made ourselves vulnerable, falling behind. Sejuani charged in and helped secure the laning phase for them, but our Darius was way ahead and Morgana was ahead too, so I thought we might get carried. My teammates messed up and got taken out by Graves one-by-one after he killed me when I was asking for help against him (they were focused on dragon), giving him a quadra kill and helping him snowball. And then on-hit Kayle struck again. I'm so glad I've gotten to keep this build for as long as I have. Full on-hit builds aren't very popular, but mine have been working, especially my Kayle. In the end, I went 9/5/10. Not my best Kayle game, but it wasn't too shabby.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Zac
Jungle: Tryndamere
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Heimerdinger
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Leona
I've never seen such a passive Heimerdinger. While he was an easy lane opponent, our bot lane completely collapsed, as our Jinx was outclassed. The enemy team roamed and killed me under my turret a few times. Tryndamere got fed, which kept us going until my massive CS let me get fed too. Zac also started getting fed, and while we were still behind on total kills as a team, the combination of a fed Karthus, Tryndamere, and Zac was enough to win us teamfights and take the match. In the end, I went 10/5/7.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Tryndamere
Marksman: Tristana (me)
Feed: Lux
vs.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Galio
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Viktor
I say "feed" for Lux, but I was actually the one to give up the most kills overall. Lux did start feeding from early on, but the real problem was that Lux made no attempt whatsoever to support me or do anything useful. She did pick up a couple of kill and assists over time, but she may as well have been a bot. Actually, I think she might have been except a bot should have done better. I'm not exaggerating: our Lux was useless, even going so far as to shoot ults off the map instead of at enemies. I tried to overcome that disadvantage, but our whole team was behind. I picked up several kills, but my allies weren't getting kills and we were all dying too much. In the end, I went 6/11/2. I swore off going as marksman with random players. Having a bad jungler can make mid or top dangerous, but having a bad support makes bot absolutely miserable.
Mid: Ziggs
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Skarner (me)
Marksman: Varus
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Zed
Top: Kayle
Jungle: Irelia
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Sona
This wasn't a total shutout, but we were able to get ahead and stay ahead. I successfully ganked top and bot multiple times, and our team won both, which left us with three fed champions. They put up a fight, but we overpowered them. In the end, I went 11/7/7.
Mid: LeBlanc
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Galio
Top: Garen
Jungle: Nautilus
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Nami
I tried to help my team, but they fell way behind before I could get going. In the end, I went 1/6/7. This one sucked.
Mid: Fizz (IMLRG)
Top: Aatrox
Jungle: Shen (me)
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Zilean
vs.
Mid: Zed
Top: Nidalee
Jungle: Pantheon
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Janna
This was a repeat of the previous game, only I was playing Shen for some reason. I went 1/6/5. Tried to help, but the lanes fed aggressively before I could get going. Scott eventually picked up some ult kills, but it was too late.
Mid: Teemo
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Kayle (me)
Support: Braum (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Annie
Top: Gangplank
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Lucian
Support: Alistar
I told Scott that I was sick of losing like that, and that I was going to force mid because I carry matches when I pick mid. He talked me into going Kayle/Braum duo bot with him. It was rough at first, then got rougher when Lee Sin ganked us and got a double kill. I thought that Lee Sin would snowball, but we killed him twice (I killed him once and someone else killed him) and he ragequit soon after. We were already winning by then. I was getting fed and Nasus was getting even more fed. But having a 5 vs. 4 made it even more one-sided. In the end, I went 9/2/10.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Leona (Al0ysiusHWWW)
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Jayce
Jungle: Fizz
Marksman: Caitlyn
Support: Volibear
My team had to be pretty screwed up to let Fizz outjungle me as Udyr, but screwed up was exactly what they were. Vayne and Nasus fed the most, which of course left Nick dying a lot too. Malzahar fed a little less, but still more than me. So he decided that our defeat must be my fault. Yeah, the guy raged pretty hard, then called me "butthurt" when I responded. Trolls gonna troll, I suppose. In the end, I went 4/7/3, which sucks, but is better than the rest of my team could do. Recently, it seems like all of my games as jungler involve my allies in the lanes collapsing and losing their lanes while I'm still on my first clear. I'm in danger of being demoted (I forget when I was promoted to Bronze III, but I totally was) because of this crap.
Mid: Orianna
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Xin Zhao (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Ezreal
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Maokai
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Varus
Support: Teemo
Not sure how the Teemo support was supposed to work. I was too busy having Vi fly at me all the damn time. I couldn't keep from feeding with all the pressure she put on me in the laning phase, but I was able to farm like crazy and weaken Maokai's outer turret. While I was doing that, Katarina got incredibly fed. I tried to tank for my teammates, and while none of them were egregiously bad, they just kept getting caught when they shouldn't have. In the end, I went 4/8/10. Another loss, which puts me in even more danger of demotion. What a fantastic start my season is off to. Oh yes, Gold is looking as impossible as ever.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Gnar
Jungle: Rammus
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Thresh
vs.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Fiora
Jungle: Sion
Marksman: Sivir
Support: Braum
I won my lane. The other lanes lost badly. From there, we tried to mount a comeback. It looked like we might pull it off, but we just didn't have enough competent people. Rammus was good, and Gnar fed early but started getting stronger. Jinx and Thresh just weren't doing enough. I was able to deal with the fed Fiora and the fed Sivir on multiple occasions, but it wasn't enough. In the end, I went 16/5/17. I tried, but I failed. Next loss from here should demote me. And as usual, I think that it just isn't right. I'm getting unwinnable match after unwinnable match.
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Teemo
Jungle: Warwick
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Ezreal (AP build)
Top: Pantheon
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Morgana
I messed up rather badly in the laning phase of this one. I held off on teleporting as I took a beating from Ezreal's skillshots. I decided to back off and teleport, but wanted to flash as I saw him ulting. Then Pantheon tried to ult in too. Even though Pantheon's ult was too far back to possibly hit me, I panicked over it and flashed right into Ezreal's ult, giving him a kill. Couldn't believe it. Fortunately, I already had a kill from my own ult, and was able to get Warwick to gank Ezreal and take his outer turret. From there, I got fed and walked all over the whole enemy team. Our Vayne, who had farmed much better than me early on and had dominated lane, got fed too, dooming the other team even more. They tried to play defensively, which just let us pick them apart at our leisure. In the end, I went 10/3/9. Guess I won't be demoted yet! I'm at 20 LP in Bronze III.
Sunday, March 8, 2015
Going for the Gold Part XLII: Late Start
Three seasons in a row, I sought Gold, but remained stuck in Bronze. Am I delusional? Let's see what happens this time around. I got a late start to this season and I've been thrown into Bronze again by placement matches. This is the story of my attempt to turn reverse the trends of previous seasons. This is Going for the Gold.
I've been busy and I'm getting a late start on the new season, but I am getting a start, and that's what really matters. Will placement matches screw me over again? Probably. We'll see...
Placement match the first
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Jayce
Jungle: Nocturne
Marksman: Ezreal
Support: Janna
vs.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Darius
Jungle: Fizz
Marksman: Corki
Support: Thresh
I've hardly touched Karthus since last season ended, and it was good to get back to him. Malzahar is a pretty easy lane opponent, as he has to really commit to trade with me, and I can recover and hold the lane almost indefinitely, only getting in range of his E right after he uses it on a minion, and being careful to avoid letting it spread from minions to me. Nocturne got a successful gank that put me ahead by a kill, and I snowballed. The enemy top and bot lanes snowballed too, only faster. My allies briefly speculated that I might actually be able to carry them, but our team was way, way behind. In the end, I went 8/1/2. Blah, blah, blah, this always happens to me. Cry, cry, cry. Boo hoo.
Placement match the second
Mid: Fizz
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Miss Fortune (went AP)
Top: Vladimir
Jungle: Volibear
Marksman: Graves
Support: Annie
My team needed a jungler and I gave them one. Top and bot were both losing badly from the start, but I helped keep them from falling too far behind. I snowballed and became a huge threat. At one point, I was 7/0. I noticed that Fizz and I were the only ones who were succeeding, and that worried me. My concern turned out to be well-founded: we kept losing every teamfight. My allies didn't seem to comprehend how to cooperate, so making an effort to do so was beyond them. I tried to flank for them and they'd run away and whine at me for "going in alone." I'd try to initiate and they'd run away and whine at me for "going in alone." I'd hang back to let them initiate, and they'd keep saying "we need to group." When I tried to explain politely, they accused me of "throwing a fit." Meanwhile, even though Fizz and I kept killing the other team, they persevered and used teamwork to beat us. They won and deserved us. In the end, I went 11/9/11. Placement matches are turning out to be thoroughly unwinnable. Bronze V, here I come?
Placement match the third
Mid: Annie
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Corki
Support: Janna
vs.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Zac
Jungle: Rengar
Marksman: Varus
Support: Blitzcrank
Our Janna was disconnected at first, but eventually came back. Bot struggled but didn't fall too far behind. I bullied Zac, but couldn't recklessly push with Rengar and Ahri both coming in to gank me. Being Singed, I was able to farm and become tanky, so I disrupted their team with Amumu as Annie started nuking everything. They put up a fight and won at dragon twice, but we gradually gained more and more ground. In the end, I went 13/6/9. But most importantly, I finally won.
Placement match the fourth
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Jarvan IV
Jungle: Shaco
Marksman: Draven
Support: Thresh
vs.
Mid: Brand
Top: Kayle
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Braum
Our Thresh immediately freaked out or pretended to freak out over being shoved into a support role, whining about being horrible at it, but in weird ways. It was like, "I can't land hooks." So don't pick a champion with hooks. And then the person picked Thresh. Jarvan and Draven kept trying to encourage Thresh to just do his best, but I figured that Thresh might be trolling anyway, so I blew it off. My lane opponent didn't know how to deal with Malzahar, so I was able to control mid easily and avoid a couple of gank attempts. I died because I got greedy and chased Brand down the river for too long with my allies too far behind me, but I went right back and started killing him, then killing others. Shaco snagged a couple of kills that my E already had secured, but I still snowballed, as did Draven. With both of our primary damage-dealers fed, we won decisively, while the other team descended into bickering and reporting. In the end, I went 12/3/8 and easily outfarmed everyone.
Placement match the fifth
Mid: Katarina
Top: Riven
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Jinx
Troll: Karthus (me)
vs.
Mid: Lux
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Jarvan IV
Marksman: Draven
Support: Nami
I have to own up to it. I made a big mistake here. I was in a lobby as a solo mid, and it was requeued. I wasn't paying attention and I looked at the wrong side of the screen, so I picked Karthus instead of a support. To be fair, I thought something was weird, so I didn't lock in, but instead started looking at the chat. Somehow, I thought Nami was on our side. And I saw someone call support. Then I locked in and my teammates started freaking out. They must have thought I was an idiot, which was fair. They tried to order me to do things like take Exhaust or build that one support item I never build. I tried not to panic and went bot, scheming for ways to make this work. I settled on a plan of harassing the enemy bot lane with my Q to scare them into thinking we had some weird bully lane or kill lane. They backed off, we avoided Jarvan's ganks, and both of us were able to farm a bit. Draven turned out to be somewhat unskilled, and that combined with my Q-spamming scared him into playing passively. Nami focused on hitting Jinx with her Q, which left me free to do whatever I wanted. Then I roamed and ended the laning phase early, which was a huge risk, but again it paid off perfectly. Their Cho'Gath did win lane. With Lux to help him burst people down, they started to mount a comeback, winning some key teamfights. But they just couldn't kill me and I kept getting more powerful, which kept us ahead the whole time. No, really. I had the most kills (tied with enemy Lux, actually), fewest deaths, most assists (tied with enemy Nami) and kept the other team off our turrets even when they burst down my allies. In the end, I went 12/2/16. My teammates must have thought I did it on purpose or something. Where in the beginning they'd been freaking out at me for not picking a support, they concluded by declaring me "MVP." While I hope not to make that mistake again, I'm glad that I was calm and handled it the way I did. I'm also glad that Jinx cooperated with me instead of becoming toxic, which is what would usually happen.
Placement match the sixth
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Master Yi
Marksman: Graves
Support: Braum
vs.
Mid: LeBlanc
Top: Jax
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Blitzcrank
LeBlanc played too passively and I controlled my lane while avoiding gank attempts. Scott won his lane initially, but Yi went top and force-fed Jax kills, which allowed Jax to snowball and dominate the whole match. Our bot lane failed miserably too, leaving me hopelessly outclassed against a team that was way ahead of me and coordinated to take objectives. I couldn't get fed because kills that I was about to get were poached, then enemies started surviving and escaping, leaving me perpetually behind. In the end, I went 3/6/7. This match was stupid, but I really think I did what I could. Scott fared better, but the two of us weren't enough to compensate for our heavily feeding allies.
Placement match the seventh
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Shen
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Nami (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Nidalee
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Braum
My worst Ranked game of the season so far. Scott said that he played badly, but our teammates presented more problems. Shen refused to group up with the team, remaining top all game. Vayne did pick up kills, but fed more than anyone else. And then there was Wukong, who refused to group up, raged, then began spamming in the chat, trying to bully us into surrendering, and intentionally feeding. I worked hard to win my lane against Ahri, then her team got ahead and undid all my work. It was too early for me to become strong from CS alone, and since I couldn't pick up kills, I was overwhelmed by a team that was already fed. In the end, I went 2/3/4. Pretty rare that I have a negative kill/death ratio as Karthus, but in this situation, it couldn't be helped. It was a bad day for us anyway. After losing two Ranked games, we moved onto Normals and lost a couple more. It was brutal.
Placement match the eighth
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Darius
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Elise
Jungle: Hecarim
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum
I think our Amumu was a smurf or something, because that was one of the best Amumu jungle's I can remember seeing. In the other lanes, Ashe couldn't get kills, but they held their own, while Darius lost lane. I had a farm fest against Yasuo, but eventually outfarmed him and picked up Requiem kills, then Amumu ganked him and it was all over. I don't think any one person on the opposing team ruined things for them, but none of them could stop me. In the end, I went 25/0/10 and outfarmed everyone by a lot.
Placement match the ninth
Mid: Anivia
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Master Yi
Marksman: Ashe (me)
Feed: Olaf
vs.
Mid: Xerath
Top: Shen
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Sona
Worst Ranked match I've ever been in. I was second pick and took Anivia, then our last pick cried about not being able to play a marksman. I tried to be nice and offered to switch. I shouldn't have bothered. The person picked Ashe, then clicked to switch with less than a second remaining. I changed my runes but had no time to fix my masteries or summoner spells. And then I realized that I had an Olaf "support." Olaf ran in and fed, then Tristana picked me off too. Olaf continued to feed, so Scott, trying to salvage things, called for a lane swap. And then Scott ran in with no health and died, so I was alone again and killed yet again. Anivia fed. Yi farmed the jungle without ganking for too long, picked up some kills, and raged that everyone else was feeding. I never managed to get enough items to do any real damage, so I was completely screwed. In the end, I went 1/12/0. I want a damn mulligan or something here. This isn't right.
Placement match the tenth
Mid: Ahri
Top: Jax
Jungle: Warwick (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Kog'Maw (me)
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Sion
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Nidalee
For my last placement match, I paired up with Nick, who was working on his own placement matches. He lied and said he'd support me, as he thought that was funny and for some reason he wanted me to be a marksman. So I was stuck with a horrible Leona who fed and raged. Ahri also fed, and two feeders was enough to easily ruin it for the rest of us. In the end, I went 5/6/3. Welcome to Ashe's Elite, Bronze IV. Crap. Well, it's not as bad of a start as last season...
I've been busy and I'm getting a late start on the new season, but I am getting a start, and that's what really matters. Will placement matches screw me over again? Probably. We'll see...
Placement match the first
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Jayce
Jungle: Nocturne
Marksman: Ezreal
Support: Janna
vs.
Mid: Malzahar
Top: Darius
Jungle: Fizz
Marksman: Corki
Support: Thresh
I've hardly touched Karthus since last season ended, and it was good to get back to him. Malzahar is a pretty easy lane opponent, as he has to really commit to trade with me, and I can recover and hold the lane almost indefinitely, only getting in range of his E right after he uses it on a minion, and being careful to avoid letting it spread from minions to me. Nocturne got a successful gank that put me ahead by a kill, and I snowballed. The enemy top and bot lanes snowballed too, only faster. My allies briefly speculated that I might actually be able to carry them, but our team was way, way behind. In the end, I went 8/1/2. Blah, blah, blah, this always happens to me. Cry, cry, cry. Boo hoo.
Placement match the second
Mid: Fizz
Top: Nasus
Jungle: Udyr (me)
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Miss Fortune (went AP)
Top: Vladimir
Jungle: Volibear
Marksman: Graves
Support: Annie
My team needed a jungler and I gave them one. Top and bot were both losing badly from the start, but I helped keep them from falling too far behind. I snowballed and became a huge threat. At one point, I was 7/0. I noticed that Fizz and I were the only ones who were succeeding, and that worried me. My concern turned out to be well-founded: we kept losing every teamfight. My allies didn't seem to comprehend how to cooperate, so making an effort to do so was beyond them. I tried to flank for them and they'd run away and whine at me for "going in alone." I'd try to initiate and they'd run away and whine at me for "going in alone." I'd hang back to let them initiate, and they'd keep saying "we need to group." When I tried to explain politely, they accused me of "throwing a fit." Meanwhile, even though Fizz and I kept killing the other team, they persevered and used teamwork to beat us. They won and deserved us. In the end, I went 11/9/11. Placement matches are turning out to be thoroughly unwinnable. Bronze V, here I come?
Placement match the third
Mid: Annie
Top: Singed (me)
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Corki
Support: Janna
vs.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Zac
Jungle: Rengar
Marksman: Varus
Support: Blitzcrank
Our Janna was disconnected at first, but eventually came back. Bot struggled but didn't fall too far behind. I bullied Zac, but couldn't recklessly push with Rengar and Ahri both coming in to gank me. Being Singed, I was able to farm and become tanky, so I disrupted their team with Amumu as Annie started nuking everything. They put up a fight and won at dragon twice, but we gradually gained more and more ground. In the end, I went 13/6/9. But most importantly, I finally won.
Placement match the fourth
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Jarvan IV
Jungle: Shaco
Marksman: Draven
Support: Thresh
vs.
Mid: Brand
Top: Kayle
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Braum
Our Thresh immediately freaked out or pretended to freak out over being shoved into a support role, whining about being horrible at it, but in weird ways. It was like, "I can't land hooks." So don't pick a champion with hooks. And then the person picked Thresh. Jarvan and Draven kept trying to encourage Thresh to just do his best, but I figured that Thresh might be trolling anyway, so I blew it off. My lane opponent didn't know how to deal with Malzahar, so I was able to control mid easily and avoid a couple of gank attempts. I died because I got greedy and chased Brand down the river for too long with my allies too far behind me, but I went right back and started killing him, then killing others. Shaco snagged a couple of kills that my E already had secured, but I still snowballed, as did Draven. With both of our primary damage-dealers fed, we won decisively, while the other team descended into bickering and reporting. In the end, I went 12/3/8 and easily outfarmed everyone.
Placement match the fifth
Mid: Katarina
Top: Riven
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Jinx
Troll: Karthus (me)
vs.
Mid: Lux
Top: Cho'Gath
Jungle: Jarvan IV
Marksman: Draven
Support: Nami
I have to own up to it. I made a big mistake here. I was in a lobby as a solo mid, and it was requeued. I wasn't paying attention and I looked at the wrong side of the screen, so I picked Karthus instead of a support. To be fair, I thought something was weird, so I didn't lock in, but instead started looking at the chat. Somehow, I thought Nami was on our side. And I saw someone call support. Then I locked in and my teammates started freaking out. They must have thought I was an idiot, which was fair. They tried to order me to do things like take Exhaust or build that one support item I never build. I tried not to panic and went bot, scheming for ways to make this work. I settled on a plan of harassing the enemy bot lane with my Q to scare them into thinking we had some weird bully lane or kill lane. They backed off, we avoided Jarvan's ganks, and both of us were able to farm a bit. Draven turned out to be somewhat unskilled, and that combined with my Q-spamming scared him into playing passively. Nami focused on hitting Jinx with her Q, which left me free to do whatever I wanted. Then I roamed and ended the laning phase early, which was a huge risk, but again it paid off perfectly. Their Cho'Gath did win lane. With Lux to help him burst people down, they started to mount a comeback, winning some key teamfights. But they just couldn't kill me and I kept getting more powerful, which kept us ahead the whole time. No, really. I had the most kills (tied with enemy Lux, actually), fewest deaths, most assists (tied with enemy Nami) and kept the other team off our turrets even when they burst down my allies. In the end, I went 12/2/16. My teammates must have thought I did it on purpose or something. Where in the beginning they'd been freaking out at me for not picking a support, they concluded by declaring me "MVP." While I hope not to make that mistake again, I'm glad that I was calm and handled it the way I did. I'm also glad that Jinx cooperated with me instead of becoming toxic, which is what would usually happen.
Placement match the sixth
Mid: Malzahar (me)
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Master Yi
Marksman: Graves
Support: Braum
vs.
Mid: LeBlanc
Top: Jax
Jungle: Vi
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Blitzcrank
LeBlanc played too passively and I controlled my lane while avoiding gank attempts. Scott won his lane initially, but Yi went top and force-fed Jax kills, which allowed Jax to snowball and dominate the whole match. Our bot lane failed miserably too, leaving me hopelessly outclassed against a team that was way ahead of me and coordinated to take objectives. I couldn't get fed because kills that I was about to get were poached, then enemies started surviving and escaping, leaving me perpetually behind. In the end, I went 3/6/7. This match was stupid, but I really think I did what I could. Scott fared better, but the two of us weren't enough to compensate for our heavily feeding allies.
Placement match the seventh
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Shen
Jungle: Wukong
Marksman: Vayne
Support: Nami (IMLRG)
vs.
Mid: Ahri
Top: Nidalee
Jungle: Lee Sin
Marksman: Kalista
Support: Braum
My worst Ranked game of the season so far. Scott said that he played badly, but our teammates presented more problems. Shen refused to group up with the team, remaining top all game. Vayne did pick up kills, but fed more than anyone else. And then there was Wukong, who refused to group up, raged, then began spamming in the chat, trying to bully us into surrendering, and intentionally feeding. I worked hard to win my lane against Ahri, then her team got ahead and undid all my work. It was too early for me to become strong from CS alone, and since I couldn't pick up kills, I was overwhelmed by a team that was already fed. In the end, I went 2/3/4. Pretty rare that I have a negative kill/death ratio as Karthus, but in this situation, it couldn't be helped. It was a bad day for us anyway. After losing two Ranked games, we moved onto Normals and lost a couple more. It was brutal.
Placement match the eighth
Mid: Karthus (me)
Top: Darius
Jungle: Amumu
Marksman: Ashe
Support: Sona
vs.
Mid: Yasuo
Top: Elise
Jungle: Hecarim
Marksman: Jinx
Support: Braum
I think our Amumu was a smurf or something, because that was one of the best Amumu jungle's I can remember seeing. In the other lanes, Ashe couldn't get kills, but they held their own, while Darius lost lane. I had a farm fest against Yasuo, but eventually outfarmed him and picked up Requiem kills, then Amumu ganked him and it was all over. I don't think any one person on the opposing team ruined things for them, but none of them could stop me. In the end, I went 25/0/10 and outfarmed everyone by a lot.
Placement match the ninth
Mid: Anivia
Top: Cho'Gath (IMLRG)
Jungle: Master Yi
Marksman: Ashe (me)
Feed: Olaf
vs.
Mid: Xerath
Top: Shen
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Sona
Worst Ranked match I've ever been in. I was second pick and took Anivia, then our last pick cried about not being able to play a marksman. I tried to be nice and offered to switch. I shouldn't have bothered. The person picked Ashe, then clicked to switch with less than a second remaining. I changed my runes but had no time to fix my masteries or summoner spells. And then I realized that I had an Olaf "support." Olaf ran in and fed, then Tristana picked me off too. Olaf continued to feed, so Scott, trying to salvage things, called for a lane swap. And then Scott ran in with no health and died, so I was alone again and killed yet again. Anivia fed. Yi farmed the jungle without ganking for too long, picked up some kills, and raged that everyone else was feeding. I never managed to get enough items to do any real damage, so I was completely screwed. In the end, I went 1/12/0. I want a damn mulligan or something here. This isn't right.
Placement match the tenth
Mid: Ahri
Top: Jax
Jungle: Warwick (Al0ysiusHWWW)
Marksman: Kog'Maw (me)
Support: Leona
vs.
Mid: Katarina
Top: Sion
Jungle: Xin Zhao
Marksman: Tristana
Support: Nidalee
For my last placement match, I paired up with Nick, who was working on his own placement matches. He lied and said he'd support me, as he thought that was funny and for some reason he wanted me to be a marksman. So I was stuck with a horrible Leona who fed and raged. Ahri also fed, and two feeders was enough to easily ruin it for the rest of us. In the end, I went 5/6/3. Welcome to Ashe's Elite, Bronze IV. Crap. Well, it's not as bad of a start as last season...
Monday, December 1, 2014
Sorry Sion, but we're done
First they took away his AD enhancement, weakened the max health scaling on killing minions, and replaced his ult with the Moron Train. But that wasn't enough.
I used the new passive on his shield with jungling to compensate for the changes. I rushed Feral Flare and farmed the jungle. Then they took away Feral Flare. But it wasn't enough.
I had it all worked out. Rushing Ranger's Trailblazer with the Devourer Enchantment compensates for the loss of Feral Flare. And with Blade of the Ruined King, Mercury's Treads, and Atma's Impaler, I'd have the stats I'd need to wreak havoc. And now they've taken away Atma's Impaler. That's enough.
We're done. I've called it quits on three champions so far. Ages ago, I abandoned Karthus, but Liandry's Torment brought me back and Karthus became my main again. I still haven't touched Sivir since her second rework. I was holding out hope that Riot wouldn't ruin Sion, but this is too much. Goodbye, old friend.
I used the new passive on his shield with jungling to compensate for the changes. I rushed Feral Flare and farmed the jungle. Then they took away Feral Flare. But it wasn't enough.
I had it all worked out. Rushing Ranger's Trailblazer with the Devourer Enchantment compensates for the loss of Feral Flare. And with Blade of the Ruined King, Mercury's Treads, and Atma's Impaler, I'd have the stats I'd need to wreak havoc. And now they've taken away Atma's Impaler. That's enough.
We're done. I've called it quits on three champions so far. Ages ago, I abandoned Karthus, but Liandry's Torment brought me back and Karthus became my main again. I still haven't touched Sivir since her second rework. I was holding out hope that Riot wouldn't ruin Sion, but this is too much. Goodbye, old friend.
Sunday, November 9, 2014
Going for the Gold Part XLI: Still Stuck in Bronze
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.
Not done yet, I tried some duo queue games with Scott (IMLRG). First, we had Fizz (Scott), Mordekaiser (me), Rengar (jungle), Caitlyn (ADC), and Morgana (support). Our opponents were playing Karthus (mid), Gangplank (top), Udyr (jungle), Ezreal (ADC), and Xerath (support). I was able to bully Gangplank top, but he did a good job of farming as I whittled his outer turret down. Scott got first blood on Karthus, but then fell behind after Rengar went in and fed Karthus two kills. Karthus snowballed. Xerath snowballed. Gangplank lost his turret, roamed, and snowballed. In the end, I went 4/7/3 and we lost heavily.
Wanting to take another shot, we tried again, this time with Karthus (me), Jayce (top), Kha'Zix (jungle), Caitlyn (ADC), and Braum (Scott). We were up against Morgana (mid), Gnar (top), Shaco (jungle), Corki (ADC), and Taric (support). I started off farming well, but Jayce fed hard (and whined about Shaco camping him, even though Shaco only actually ganked him once, the same number of times as he ganked me) and bot collapsed with Corki and Shaco getting fed. My teammates were all getting destroyed, and I couldn't keep up against an entire team. I was 2/2 for a while, but I tried to save objectives and died some more times, with a final score of 2/5/3. Team score was 8 to 38. It was a very, very one-sided match.
Being a glutton for punishment, I tried one more time. We had Ziggs (mid), Dr. Mundo (top), Master Yi (jungle), Kayle (me), and Braum (Scott) against Ahri (mid), Nasus (top), Xin Zhao (jungle), Sivir (ADC), and Thresh (support). I got fed, but so did the other team. This actually made things pretty close for a while. Eventually I got full build, but found it hard to keep picking up kills without dying, because only Scott ever actually bothered to help me. Seeing an opening, I wanted to push mid while our opponents were down. The other four players all went for Baron. I said, "Fine, I'll recall and enchant my boots, then we'll push mid." They decided it would be better to push mid without me. They all died and left me alone to defend our base against all five opponents, which I could not do. I went 16/9/12, but couldn't solo five people (three of them being fed themselves). This takes me down to 47 LP. I'm done. Stuck in Bronze at the end of another season.
Not done yet, I tried some duo queue games with Scott (IMLRG). First, we had Fizz (Scott), Mordekaiser (me), Rengar (jungle), Caitlyn (ADC), and Morgana (support). Our opponents were playing Karthus (mid), Gangplank (top), Udyr (jungle), Ezreal (ADC), and Xerath (support). I was able to bully Gangplank top, but he did a good job of farming as I whittled his outer turret down. Scott got first blood on Karthus, but then fell behind after Rengar went in and fed Karthus two kills. Karthus snowballed. Xerath snowballed. Gangplank lost his turret, roamed, and snowballed. In the end, I went 4/7/3 and we lost heavily.
Wanting to take another shot, we tried again, this time with Karthus (me), Jayce (top), Kha'Zix (jungle), Caitlyn (ADC), and Braum (Scott). We were up against Morgana (mid), Gnar (top), Shaco (jungle), Corki (ADC), and Taric (support). I started off farming well, but Jayce fed hard (and whined about Shaco camping him, even though Shaco only actually ganked him once, the same number of times as he ganked me) and bot collapsed with Corki and Shaco getting fed. My teammates were all getting destroyed, and I couldn't keep up against an entire team. I was 2/2 for a while, but I tried to save objectives and died some more times, with a final score of 2/5/3. Team score was 8 to 38. It was a very, very one-sided match.
Being a glutton for punishment, I tried one more time. We had Ziggs (mid), Dr. Mundo (top), Master Yi (jungle), Kayle (me), and Braum (Scott) against Ahri (mid), Nasus (top), Xin Zhao (jungle), Sivir (ADC), and Thresh (support). I got fed, but so did the other team. This actually made things pretty close for a while. Eventually I got full build, but found it hard to keep picking up kills without dying, because only Scott ever actually bothered to help me. Seeing an opening, I wanted to push mid while our opponents were down. The other four players all went for Baron. I said, "Fine, I'll recall and enchant my boots, then we'll push mid." They decided it would be better to push mid without me. They all died and left me alone to defend our base against all five opponents, which I could not do. I went 16/9/12, but couldn't solo five people (three of them being fed themselves). This takes me down to 47 LP. I'm done. Stuck in Bronze at the end of another season.
Going for the Gold Part XL: The Return of the Clamps
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 did one solo queue Ranked game on Halloween. We needed a top and an ADC. My track record this season as an ADC has been terrible. I wanted to win, so I took Singed, with whom I've had considerable success this season. I was immediately counterpicked by the other team, using Jayce. Well, crap. Singed does have a few problematic matchups, and Jayce has generally been the worst in my experience: he can poke Singed, kite Singed, close the gap on Singed, break away from Singed, outdamage Singed, and farm while doing all of it. I let my team know that I'd probably be useless for most of the match, but that I'd do what I could. The lineups were Annie (mid), Singed (me), Master Yi (jungle), Ezreal (ADC), and Morgana (support) vs. Ziggs (mid), Jayce (top), Lee Sin (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Alistar (support). I was able to stay alive against Jayce, but he was increasing the CS gap between us and keeping pressure on me from the start. I eventually completed my Catalyst and got a Glacial Shroud. Even when I started poking my head out and poisoning waves of minions to catch up, Lee Sin showed up with gank attempts that kept the pressure on me, but I survived and kept my turret standing. Annie lost lane to Ziggs, but Morgana was able to bully bot initially. Yi just kept on rushing Feral Flare. The combination of Ezreal holding his own, Morgana getting an early lead and playing aggressively, and Yi having farmed so much gave our team an edge in mid-game skirmishes, while I slowly caught up to Jayce in CS and managed to avoid every Lee Sin gank attempt. It was a close match up to that point, and then my Singed tankiness reached a critical point: Jayce stopped being able to bully me and started struggling to hold his lane against me at all. He proved the value of having a farmed up Jayce in teamfights, and together with Jinx he managed to kill my allies quite a bit. But soon I got my Rylai's and had Singed do what Singed does. When the enemy team chased mine, I snuck into a lane and pushed it. And when I showed up to contest objectives, we won every fight. Eventually, I went bot to push alone and the whole enemy team tried to five-man gank me. I survived it and didn't even try to escape, opting to weave around the bot lane and the enemy jungle, wearing them down until my own team showed up and forced them to retreat. Then I recalled, teleported top, and we pushed hard on two lanes while the other team was recovering in their base. That was the beginning of the end for them. They simply couldn't kill me. I went 4/0/5 and accumulated 351 CS. That brings me to 59 LP and a neutral win/loss ratio of 65 wins, 65 losses.
Queuing up for another solo queue match on November 1st, I initially got into a lobby with first pick and was all set to play Karthus, but we were requeued and I ended up with a different team. It was Veigar (me), Jax (top), Sejuani (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Soraka (support) vs. Gragas (mid), Riven (top), Amumu (jungle), and Jinx and Wukong (kill lane). At first, Sejuani was AFK, so I was pretty worried that this would be an automatic loss. Sejuani made it back though (some problem with the player's son) and started catching up. I farmed up a whole lot of Q stacks, but the deciding factor in this match was the top lane, where Riven inexplicably posed no threat to Jax, then roamed and mainly gave up kills, including a few to me. I was farmed and fed and so were Jax and Lucian, so this quickly took a turn toward domination. The enemy team surrendered just as we were destroying their nexus turrets. If they blamed weird feeder Riven, they wouldn't be wrong. I went 11/4/5. Now I have 66 wins, 65 losses. I'm at 84 LP. Silver is closer than it has been in a long, long time.
I got first pick in my first Ranked match on November 2nd. So of course I took Karthus mid. My allies were Jax, Amumu, Ezreal, and Morgana. Our opponents were Fizz, Fiora, Malphite, Lucian, and Janna. My lane opponent tried to be aggressive at first, but got caught by my Lay Waste too much for that and had to back off, which let me farm easily. Amumu's ganks helped me get ahead even more and kept our bot lane from falling behind. But top failed and Fiora snowballed. I was 6/2 for a while, then 7/4, and ended the game 8/8, with my teammates falling behind as well, but the thing that enraged me was that all four of them elected to surrender when the other team wasn't even attacking our base. We lost some jungle skirmishes, yet again, and fell a bit more behind, then they just abruptly surrendered in what had mostly been a close match. I have no patience for that crap. If you're going to just give up in a Ranked match, don't play. They also kept failing to group up when I begged them to, which was a big part of why we were falling behind, but sometimes we accomplished things that way, hence the pretty close match. I'm not mad that my teammates often made very bad decisions in this, as I made some myself and it's part of the game. But to just suddenly give up when we still had a chance? Despicable. And I was getting so close to a promo series too! Now I'm at 66 wins, 66 losses, and 66 LP.
I tried again and got first pick again. For some reason, I picked Karthus even though I just keep losing Karthus games now. He really is my best champion, but things just keep going badly. We had Karthus, Darius, Amumu, Varus, and Leona against Viktor, Garen, Kha'Zix, Lucian, and Thresh. Varus gave up first blood when the enemy team invaded our jungle, and then Leona proceeded to flame him and insist that he lose his promo. She succeeded. I tried to talk her down. Amumu ignored it at first, then saw her hide behind the turret when he went for a gank and started raging at her, which made the bickering continue. I just kept asking them to stop and to try to win, but Leona refused, saying that her goal was to make sure that Varus and Amumu lost. We stayed slightly ahead for a while, but the 4 vs. 5 eventually wore us down. I went 6/2/15. Down to 51 LP. League of Trolls.
Well, I got fourth pick, and my allies already had Akali (mid), Darius (top), and Warwick (jungle). Our last pick could pick at the same time as me, so I waited and saw last pick take Morgana. That meant I was designated to be the ADC, so I picked Kayle, of course. No one complained, although Morgana and Darius did ask about it, but seemed cool once I said that I knew it worked. Our opponents had Talon (mid), Pantheon (top), Diana (jungle), Twitch (ADC), and Sona (support). Initially, our lane was pretty brutal, but we gave as well as we got. Morgana supported competently enough, but the two of us weren't always coordinating with each other as much as we could have. Twitch outfarmed me, but also died a bit more, with neither bot lane carry really doing much at first. Progress was slow as I fell behind on CS and this was one of the roughest Kayle games I've had lately, but eventually the power of on-hit Kayle triumphed, and I went 6/4/7 as well as catching up on CS and passing up almost everyone else. But it didn't really matter: Akali snowballed and scored two pentakills, so the enemy team surrendered after just 26 minutes. I'd imagine that Talon's teammates were none too pleased with him, since he was the one to drop the ball moreso than anyone else for this match. It happens, though. This takes me up to 70 LP.
With mid and jungle already settled and a Jayce in the enemy top lane, I decided to just take Sona and hope I could support a random sufficiently. We had Heimerdinger (mid), Jax (top), Lee Sin (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Sona (me). Our opponents were playing Lulu (mid), Jayce (top), Volibear (jungle), Ashe (ADC), and Thresh (support). This one went badly everywhere. The Lucian I was supporting turned out to be incompetent and also disconnected a lot. Jax was even worse, and Heimerdinger just kept overextending and getting killed. Lee Sin was toxic. This match was a disaster. I went 2/8/3 and could have played better in a few cases, but my teammates were always there to compensate for any of my successes anyway. Back down to 52 LP. Silver is looking a whole lot less attainable than it was yesterday.
Next up, I did a match with Ahri (mid), Ryze (top), Skarner (me jungling), Jinx (ADC), and Sona (support) against Yasuo (mid), Wukong (top), Warwick (jungle), Vayne (ADC), and Thresh (support). Ahri initially held her lane, but eventually fell a bit behind. Ryze dominated top. Our bot laners did poorly at first, but they were definitely trying. Eventually, Yasuo got fed, and the only thing that was going to save this match for my team was a scorpion with a penchant for destroying everything in his path, which was exactly what happened. I got to my full build. On-hit Skarner strikes again. I went 14/4/6. Now I'm up to 76 LP.
On the 8th, I got one Ranked game in. Karthus (me), Singed (top), Sion (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Vel'Koz (support) vs. Fizz (mid), Irelia (top), Riven (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Janna (support). Fizz laned passively against me, then roamed and went for ganks on bot all the time, which let me farm up and become powerful. The bot lane became very chaotic. Jinx got an early lead, but Fizz and Riven both showed up to help, which got Sion involved, and eventually that even drew me in some of the time. Unfortunately, Singed fed Irelia pretty hard. We had the advantage for a while, but Sion and Vel'Koz did their own thing and didn't capitalize on fights that we won, while Singed continued to perform poorly, although he did eventually start doing better. We destroyed their nexus turrets, but they managed to fend us off. Twice, we got horribly baited at Baron and nearly lost. My teammates were whining and saying "gg" a lot, but we worked together to defend and were able to keep our nexus alive, albeit barely. I had full build for a while with this match. They pressured us, with Irelia and Riven attempting to sneak our inhibitors at various points, but eventually we got all of our inhibitors back up and started pushing. Finally, we caught them in an advantageous fight and pushed into their base. I kept my Teleport ready to save our nexus if Irelia went for it, but she didn't, and we finally won after 67 minutes. Irelia's teammates cried that we should report her, but I'm not going to fault someone who almost managed to carry her team and lost a 67-minute match just because she appeared to be AFK in the final few seconds. Anyway, I went 16/6/27 in this one. I'm back to a positive solo queue win/loss ratio (69 to 68) and I'm at 95 LP. Well, this is awkward. No matter what, if I win my next match, I at least get a series. I think I stand a good chance of winning that series and closing the season in Silver V. But if I lose my next match, I'm dropping in LP. I probably won't have enough time to push for the series again. The season is ending in a couple of days, I'll be out of town for work anyway, and I just won't have enough time...
November 9th will almost certainly be my last day to try for Silver. I queued up and got fourth pick. Last pick really wanted top, but picked Riven into Yorick and fed hard. "I can't jungle." Yeah, well you can't solo top either. Our first pick was LeBlanc, who did beat Diana in lane, but then went too aggressive and, ultimately fed the enemy team. Bot lane we had Vayne and Leona. Vayne farmed quite effectively, picked up kills, and kept us going for a while. Leona mostly just caused Vayne and LeBlanc to whine with her uncanny kill-securing, but in the end, she did more than anyone else besides Riven to lose us the game, refusing to initiate when our inhibitors were under attack. Having had success the first time I tried it in Ranked, I picked Skarner. I got ambushed by Kha'Zix at red early on, nearly killed him, but messed up. Kha'Zix snowballed, but I shut him down multiple times. It wasn't enough. My teammates were oblivious around Kha'Zix and simply focused him last even though he was killing them. I hoped we could turn it around with the damage output that Vayne and I had, but the other three people had absolutely no sense for teamfights. I went 10/7/12 and now I'm down to 81 LP. I really wanted to win this one, but it was not possible. Skarner gave me a better chance than most champions might have, but my team was just outclassed this time. This probably leaves me stuck in Bronze at the end of yet another season, but I'll take one more shot at that promo series.
Trying again, I ended up on a team of Ziggs (mid), Darius (top), Skarner (me), Miss Fortune (ADC), and Blitzcrank (support). Our opponents had Fizz (mid), Vi (top), Jarvan IV (jungle), Vayne (ADC), and Braum (support). I noticed that the loading screen was taking a long time. Checking back after a bit, I saw that Vi's loading percentage hadn't moved and that Fizz hadn't shown up at all. Fearing the worst, I reset my client. Sure enough, the match was underway. But I wasn't the only one it had happened to. Multiple players on both teams had experienced problems. Not having any other options. I raced into my forced late start in the jungle. My team got the better of the disconnections, with bot land snowballing. Mid got fed too, despite Ziggs also getting a late start. I was only 2/1/1 when the other team surrendered at 25 minutes in. And that took me up to 99 LP. Yeah, 99. This means that even if I were to win my next match, I would only be qualified for a series and would still have to win the best of five to complete it. That's too much. If I'd had the series now as a guaranteed thing, maybe I'd go for it. I don't know. I had other plans for today. I think this is the end. So close. Just one LP off. The clamps are back.
I did one solo queue Ranked game on Halloween. We needed a top and an ADC. My track record this season as an ADC has been terrible. I wanted to win, so I took Singed, with whom I've had considerable success this season. I was immediately counterpicked by the other team, using Jayce. Well, crap. Singed does have a few problematic matchups, and Jayce has generally been the worst in my experience: he can poke Singed, kite Singed, close the gap on Singed, break away from Singed, outdamage Singed, and farm while doing all of it. I let my team know that I'd probably be useless for most of the match, but that I'd do what I could. The lineups were Annie (mid), Singed (me), Master Yi (jungle), Ezreal (ADC), and Morgana (support) vs. Ziggs (mid), Jayce (top), Lee Sin (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Alistar (support). I was able to stay alive against Jayce, but he was increasing the CS gap between us and keeping pressure on me from the start. I eventually completed my Catalyst and got a Glacial Shroud. Even when I started poking my head out and poisoning waves of minions to catch up, Lee Sin showed up with gank attempts that kept the pressure on me, but I survived and kept my turret standing. Annie lost lane to Ziggs, but Morgana was able to bully bot initially. Yi just kept on rushing Feral Flare. The combination of Ezreal holding his own, Morgana getting an early lead and playing aggressively, and Yi having farmed so much gave our team an edge in mid-game skirmishes, while I slowly caught up to Jayce in CS and managed to avoid every Lee Sin gank attempt. It was a close match up to that point, and then my Singed tankiness reached a critical point: Jayce stopped being able to bully me and started struggling to hold his lane against me at all. He proved the value of having a farmed up Jayce in teamfights, and together with Jinx he managed to kill my allies quite a bit. But soon I got my Rylai's and had Singed do what Singed does. When the enemy team chased mine, I snuck into a lane and pushed it. And when I showed up to contest objectives, we won every fight. Eventually, I went bot to push alone and the whole enemy team tried to five-man gank me. I survived it and didn't even try to escape, opting to weave around the bot lane and the enemy jungle, wearing them down until my own team showed up and forced them to retreat. Then I recalled, teleported top, and we pushed hard on two lanes while the other team was recovering in their base. That was the beginning of the end for them. They simply couldn't kill me. I went 4/0/5 and accumulated 351 CS. That brings me to 59 LP and a neutral win/loss ratio of 65 wins, 65 losses.
Queuing up for another solo queue match on November 1st, I initially got into a lobby with first pick and was all set to play Karthus, but we were requeued and I ended up with a different team. It was Veigar (me), Jax (top), Sejuani (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Soraka (support) vs. Gragas (mid), Riven (top), Amumu (jungle), and Jinx and Wukong (kill lane). At first, Sejuani was AFK, so I was pretty worried that this would be an automatic loss. Sejuani made it back though (some problem with the player's son) and started catching up. I farmed up a whole lot of Q stacks, but the deciding factor in this match was the top lane, where Riven inexplicably posed no threat to Jax, then roamed and mainly gave up kills, including a few to me. I was farmed and fed and so were Jax and Lucian, so this quickly took a turn toward domination. The enemy team surrendered just as we were destroying their nexus turrets. If they blamed weird feeder Riven, they wouldn't be wrong. I went 11/4/5. Now I have 66 wins, 65 losses. I'm at 84 LP. Silver is closer than it has been in a long, long time.
I got first pick in my first Ranked match on November 2nd. So of course I took Karthus mid. My allies were Jax, Amumu, Ezreal, and Morgana. Our opponents were Fizz, Fiora, Malphite, Lucian, and Janna. My lane opponent tried to be aggressive at first, but got caught by my Lay Waste too much for that and had to back off, which let me farm easily. Amumu's ganks helped me get ahead even more and kept our bot lane from falling behind. But top failed and Fiora snowballed. I was 6/2 for a while, then 7/4, and ended the game 8/8, with my teammates falling behind as well, but the thing that enraged me was that all four of them elected to surrender when the other team wasn't even attacking our base. We lost some jungle skirmishes, yet again, and fell a bit more behind, then they just abruptly surrendered in what had mostly been a close match. I have no patience for that crap. If you're going to just give up in a Ranked match, don't play. They also kept failing to group up when I begged them to, which was a big part of why we were falling behind, but sometimes we accomplished things that way, hence the pretty close match. I'm not mad that my teammates often made very bad decisions in this, as I made some myself and it's part of the game. But to just suddenly give up when we still had a chance? Despicable. And I was getting so close to a promo series too! Now I'm at 66 wins, 66 losses, and 66 LP.
I tried again and got first pick again. For some reason, I picked Karthus even though I just keep losing Karthus games now. He really is my best champion, but things just keep going badly. We had Karthus, Darius, Amumu, Varus, and Leona against Viktor, Garen, Kha'Zix, Lucian, and Thresh. Varus gave up first blood when the enemy team invaded our jungle, and then Leona proceeded to flame him and insist that he lose his promo. She succeeded. I tried to talk her down. Amumu ignored it at first, then saw her hide behind the turret when he went for a gank and started raging at her, which made the bickering continue. I just kept asking them to stop and to try to win, but Leona refused, saying that her goal was to make sure that Varus and Amumu lost. We stayed slightly ahead for a while, but the 4 vs. 5 eventually wore us down. I went 6/2/15. Down to 51 LP. League of Trolls.
Well, I got fourth pick, and my allies already had Akali (mid), Darius (top), and Warwick (jungle). Our last pick could pick at the same time as me, so I waited and saw last pick take Morgana. That meant I was designated to be the ADC, so I picked Kayle, of course. No one complained, although Morgana and Darius did ask about it, but seemed cool once I said that I knew it worked. Our opponents had Talon (mid), Pantheon (top), Diana (jungle), Twitch (ADC), and Sona (support). Initially, our lane was pretty brutal, but we gave as well as we got. Morgana supported competently enough, but the two of us weren't always coordinating with each other as much as we could have. Twitch outfarmed me, but also died a bit more, with neither bot lane carry really doing much at first. Progress was slow as I fell behind on CS and this was one of the roughest Kayle games I've had lately, but eventually the power of on-hit Kayle triumphed, and I went 6/4/7 as well as catching up on CS and passing up almost everyone else. But it didn't really matter: Akali snowballed and scored two pentakills, so the enemy team surrendered after just 26 minutes. I'd imagine that Talon's teammates were none too pleased with him, since he was the one to drop the ball moreso than anyone else for this match. It happens, though. This takes me up to 70 LP.
With mid and jungle already settled and a Jayce in the enemy top lane, I decided to just take Sona and hope I could support a random sufficiently. We had Heimerdinger (mid), Jax (top), Lee Sin (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Sona (me). Our opponents were playing Lulu (mid), Jayce (top), Volibear (jungle), Ashe (ADC), and Thresh (support). This one went badly everywhere. The Lucian I was supporting turned out to be incompetent and also disconnected a lot. Jax was even worse, and Heimerdinger just kept overextending and getting killed. Lee Sin was toxic. This match was a disaster. I went 2/8/3 and could have played better in a few cases, but my teammates were always there to compensate for any of my successes anyway. Back down to 52 LP. Silver is looking a whole lot less attainable than it was yesterday.
Next up, I did a match with Ahri (mid), Ryze (top), Skarner (me jungling), Jinx (ADC), and Sona (support) against Yasuo (mid), Wukong (top), Warwick (jungle), Vayne (ADC), and Thresh (support). Ahri initially held her lane, but eventually fell a bit behind. Ryze dominated top. Our bot laners did poorly at first, but they were definitely trying. Eventually, Yasuo got fed, and the only thing that was going to save this match for my team was a scorpion with a penchant for destroying everything in his path, which was exactly what happened. I got to my full build. On-hit Skarner strikes again. I went 14/4/6. Now I'm up to 76 LP.
On the 8th, I got one Ranked game in. Karthus (me), Singed (top), Sion (jungle), Jinx (ADC), and Vel'Koz (support) vs. Fizz (mid), Irelia (top), Riven (jungle), Lucian (ADC), and Janna (support). Fizz laned passively against me, then roamed and went for ganks on bot all the time, which let me farm up and become powerful. The bot lane became very chaotic. Jinx got an early lead, but Fizz and Riven both showed up to help, which got Sion involved, and eventually that even drew me in some of the time. Unfortunately, Singed fed Irelia pretty hard. We had the advantage for a while, but Sion and Vel'Koz did their own thing and didn't capitalize on fights that we won, while Singed continued to perform poorly, although he did eventually start doing better. We destroyed their nexus turrets, but they managed to fend us off. Twice, we got horribly baited at Baron and nearly lost. My teammates were whining and saying "gg" a lot, but we worked together to defend and were able to keep our nexus alive, albeit barely. I had full build for a while with this match. They pressured us, with Irelia and Riven attempting to sneak our inhibitors at various points, but eventually we got all of our inhibitors back up and started pushing. Finally, we caught them in an advantageous fight and pushed into their base. I kept my Teleport ready to save our nexus if Irelia went for it, but she didn't, and we finally won after 67 minutes. Irelia's teammates cried that we should report her, but I'm not going to fault someone who almost managed to carry her team and lost a 67-minute match just because she appeared to be AFK in the final few seconds. Anyway, I went 16/6/27 in this one. I'm back to a positive solo queue win/loss ratio (69 to 68) and I'm at 95 LP. Well, this is awkward. No matter what, if I win my next match, I at least get a series. I think I stand a good chance of winning that series and closing the season in Silver V. But if I lose my next match, I'm dropping in LP. I probably won't have enough time to push for the series again. The season is ending in a couple of days, I'll be out of town for work anyway, and I just won't have enough time...
November 9th will almost certainly be my last day to try for Silver. I queued up and got fourth pick. Last pick really wanted top, but picked Riven into Yorick and fed hard. "I can't jungle." Yeah, well you can't solo top either. Our first pick was LeBlanc, who did beat Diana in lane, but then went too aggressive and, ultimately fed the enemy team. Bot lane we had Vayne and Leona. Vayne farmed quite effectively, picked up kills, and kept us going for a while. Leona mostly just caused Vayne and LeBlanc to whine with her uncanny kill-securing, but in the end, she did more than anyone else besides Riven to lose us the game, refusing to initiate when our inhibitors were under attack. Having had success the first time I tried it in Ranked, I picked Skarner. I got ambushed by Kha'Zix at red early on, nearly killed him, but messed up. Kha'Zix snowballed, but I shut him down multiple times. It wasn't enough. My teammates were oblivious around Kha'Zix and simply focused him last even though he was killing them. I hoped we could turn it around with the damage output that Vayne and I had, but the other three people had absolutely no sense for teamfights. I went 10/7/12 and now I'm down to 81 LP. I really wanted to win this one, but it was not possible. Skarner gave me a better chance than most champions might have, but my team was just outclassed this time. This probably leaves me stuck in Bronze at the end of yet another season, but I'll take one more shot at that promo series.
Trying again, I ended up on a team of Ziggs (mid), Darius (top), Skarner (me), Miss Fortune (ADC), and Blitzcrank (support). Our opponents had Fizz (mid), Vi (top), Jarvan IV (jungle), Vayne (ADC), and Braum (support). I noticed that the loading screen was taking a long time. Checking back after a bit, I saw that Vi's loading percentage hadn't moved and that Fizz hadn't shown up at all. Fearing the worst, I reset my client. Sure enough, the match was underway. But I wasn't the only one it had happened to. Multiple players on both teams had experienced problems. Not having any other options. I raced into my forced late start in the jungle. My team got the better of the disconnections, with bot land snowballing. Mid got fed too, despite Ziggs also getting a late start. I was only 2/1/1 when the other team surrendered at 25 minutes in. And that took me up to 99 LP. Yeah, 99. This means that even if I were to win my next match, I would only be qualified for a series and would still have to win the best of five to complete it. That's too much. If I'd had the series now as a guaranteed thing, maybe I'd go for it. I don't know. I had other plans for today. I think this is the end. So close. Just one LP off. The clamps are back.
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
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.
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.
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