Practice is for new champs

I’m always miffed when I fire up a normal game and the first thing out of my teammate’s mouths is “I’ve never played this champ before.” Each match is a bit of an investment in time, anywhere from 30-60 minutes and ideally you’re going for a win here. While you may have all night to play you don’t quite know what this particular match means to your team mates so choosing a champ that you’re guaranteed to be inept with is completely ignorant in normal matches. There’s a whole section dedicated to matches for practice, make use of it.



Tower Priority

Towers are a good measurement of how your games going. You could be completely behind in kills but if you’re ahead in towers you could very well win the game so understanding them is important. I won’t get too specific but here are the rules: a tower will target the first enemy in range and minions first. A tower will shoot a target until it is dead or out of range. The tower will target an enemy champ when there are no more minions in range. However a tower will immediately target an enemy champ if that champ is attacking a friendly champ. So if you go in and attack another player under their own tower expect to get lit up by the tower. Finally, if your champ has the ability to taunt like Shen or Rammus, you can essentially force your tower to attack the enemy champ as they are now attacking you. If you’re not a tank or extremely high health I would always avoid getting hit by the tower at any level.



Know your role

There are a lot of different types of champions in League of Legends, casters, assassins, tanks, etc. At the selection screen you should choose a champ that compliments your team and then play the role you’re expected to play. Other players on your team will assume you’re going to play the role your champion is intended to play. If you’re a tank you should be initiating fights and soaking up damage, assassins should be ganking, support should be…well you get it. Voice what kind of role you’re champion will be playing just be 100% certain your team is going to adjust accordingly.



Find a build

For me it takes a while to perfect a build for any certain champ. Your play style, champion abilities, and enemies will mean you need to tailor it like a recipe. A good place to start looking for ideas is leaguecraft.com. Head over there and read a few guides so you can find out what others have done successfully in the past and then combine the elements you like and try them out in practice games. During the match you’ll need on the fly adjustments on the last couple of items but you should have items you always get and always start out with. If you don’t have a good idea what kind of build you’re going to go before the match starts, you’re going to be a weak link on your team.



Call MIA’s

Everyone forgets this occasionally and sometimes with stealth units it’s a little difficult to stay on top of but this is a courtesy to your other teammates. You should communicate to some degree that the champion in your lane is missing and possibly heading to another lane to gank. They need to know when to pull back and hug their tower for safety. You don’t have to be a chatty Cathy in matches and if the only thing you ever type is MIA notifications most people will be pretty pleased with you.



Play it safe

Here’s a secret, before you’re level 6 the odds of you taking down a tower are extremely unlikely. You don’t have the damage output even if left completely alone in the lane for a full minute to bring down a tower. Go ahead and let yourself get pushed early game back to your tower, that’ll be a nice safety net and most of the time when you do that you can score a kill and do a serious push back. The farther you push early game is the farther you have to run when they put some damage on you, and I promise you they will. Playing it safe the rest of the game you can simply sum up as “Don’t get in fights you aren’t really sure you’ll win.” Don’t dive in when you’re out numbered, even if a team mate is getting butchered. Don’t stand by a tower that’s about to go down.



Work together

Occasionally there seems to be that one guy on the team that wants to target someone else in a team fight or go off and do his own thing. The best teams have good synergy and I’ve had matches where even just a group of random players do well simply because they work together. Your teammates aren’t you competition, the other team is. Even if you don’t completely agree with the plan, you should be going along with the group because even a bad plan has a better chance of success then one you personally doom to failure. Sometimes you end up on a suck team and you can’t sway them to do the right thing, that’s just life. Either surrender or stick with them, don’t be a pompous ass and do your own thing because you’re stubborn.



Don’t solo late game

There hits a point in every game where your team needs to stick together to stay alive. If you constantly keep trying to push the same lane just to get ganked by the whole other team like some kind of idiot lemming you’re going to drag your whole team into the gutter. If you’re under-leveled or need cash then go jungle creeping somewhere safe when your team doesn’t need you right then and there. The first target of every team is the guy soloing because it’s a guaranteed win. You will die, you will feed, and eventually if you do it enough your team will be outmatched in team fights later.



Be map aware

I called MIA’s a courtesy because ultimately your safety depends on you. Working together, playing it safe, and playing your role is very much contingent on how map aware you are. Some champs have abilities with a global affect that may need for you to call in at a critical point. You should know where your team mates are and always be trying to figure out the location of the other team. Knowledge is power and you will be victorious if you can have a full understanding of the overall battle.



Take a breather

Losing really sucks and every match involves a ton of multitasking and on the fly strategy. For some folks emotions can run high and make you do stupid things. There’s a handful of people out there that rage quit on me or sat in base and pouted on me and they’ve been permanently crossed off my list of people to team with because of it. After a match, win or lose, scrutinize the statistics afterward to see how you did. Did you play your role well or did you feed? What did you do that worked well and what can you do better? Sometimes these things are out of your control and that’s ok. Grab a beer. Chat on vent. Walk around a bit. Don’t rage right into the next match.



Bonus tip: Be a good sport

Every loss is a chance to learn what works and what doesn’t. You get to examine what the other team used in their builds and incorporate it into your own and can take away a plethora of valuable information so long as your not busy raging and calling everyone a faggot. You won’t make any friends being a douche to the other team and don’t confuse some good natured ribbing with being a bad sport. Play through, play hard, respect your team mates and enemies alike even if they’re not reciprocating. The moment you turn into a poor sport is when you lose in real life.