Need a couple of Solo Queue beasts

Kold

So I've powered up to Plat 2 using pretty much Pantheon, Fizz, Fidd, Tris, Ryze, Udyr, Cho and Rumble.

Now I'm finding my champ pool small and somewhat outdated. Problem is that ip farming takes so bloody long that I no longer main ADC because I can't afford the champs (recently spunked 6300 on MF who I feel is one of the best all round solo q adcs).

So I'm looking to invest some rp in maybe one of all the other positions. I don't really like to play champs that you see in every second game and I also don't like champs with complex combos. I'm also terrible with champs that have like 2 different movesets.

Who I have my eye on:

Top: Wu Kong (seemingly a mid/lategame beast), Darius (Not sure how strong he is now, haven't seen him much lately), Renekton (Prob one of the top picks but I used to play him before he was cool :cool:)

Mid: Diana (I ban her because I can never beat her), Galio (I haven't seen a Galio in close to a year, he's hardly trash?), Viktor (I always did pretty good with him in free weeks but I think they're reworking him soon?)

Jungle: Hecarim, Vi, never really played either, I'm just getting frustrated with Udyr/Fidd/Cho being hard to gank with when they're warding well.

TheDoc

I think your covered in terms of top lane with Ryze, Cho and Rumble. I'd keep Renekton into that mix, he is one of the strongest top lane solo queue champions, and maybe consider Zac as well. A high sustain tank with good damage output that can carry a game . Shen is obviously always a good reliable.

Darius is pretty trash toplane, easily countered and dealt with. Wukong is good but really only at lower levels, and require good early feed to carry. Can be easily countered at your level.


Tryndamere and Singed are solo queue niches that you can do really well with. However this requires you only ever split push, and pretty much ignore your team. So you have to hope your team understand split pushing, something difficult at my ELO, but maybe better at yours. The bonus of Trynd however is that come midgame when you get a Statik shiv up, you'll most likely two shot people

I myself am looking to integrate Zac and possibly Rumble into my pool. I currently run Shen/Renekton/Kennen comfortably toplane.

Kold

I think maybe it's better if I learn champions to counter certain 'problem' champions of mine.

Problem champs: Nidalee, Jayce, Diana, Kha'Zix, Kennen (although I do alright as Panth vs the last 2)

TheDoc

Kold wrote: »

I think maybe it's better if I learn champions to counter certain 'problem' champions of mine.

Problem champs: Nidalee, Jayce, Diana, Kha'Zix, Kennen (although I do alright as Panth vs the last 2)

I find that the only real problem there is most like Kennen.

Jayce's nerf to acceleration gate has made his poke more manageable in lane, and you should be able to dodge them on fire. You then get a pretty long cooldown to trade or CS before you need to worry about the next. I find dealing with Jayce's comfortable on Renekton and Kennen

Nidalee is one of those weird champions that I don't really encounter often to be honest. When I do I find I can deal fine with Renekton or Kennen. While her harass is annoying, unless you are getting mauled by her skillshot then early armour should negate most of the problems.

Diana and Khazix come into the same category. I deal with Khazix more then comfortably on Renekton, but have had problems trying to deal with as Kennen. If you keep par for par in lane, and can manage to dodge the spikes, Renekton combos should chunk Khazix nicely into submission. Diana can be a little more troublesome, but once your not getting hit with her skillshot, again no major problems.

Kennen relies on getting ahead, and an early gank to really carry a game. If your cautious in dodging his Q, and forcing his charged W autoattack to be wasted on minions, he is ok to deal with. He is really squishy and requires good skill on the enemys part to land a stun to get out of a dive.

I don't know how to you play and have never watched you, but the one thing in common with your problem champs is that they all rely heavily on skillshots. Are you having trouble with them and getting hit frequently by them?

Or you feeling just in general they overpower you in lane regardless?

Oddly enough Pantheon is a champion I have some problems with, but I always rely on the fact most people build him damage, and he drifts off entirely mid-late game, he is totally reliant on snowballing in lane.

Sycopat

There's probably little point in me offering an opinion due to my being generally terrible and not really playing top, and less in you listening, but what the hell.

For my 2 cents, Hecarim is worth it in the jungle. Gets banned a fair bit though. I haven't played vi, and I like nasus but with his reliance on the slow he can also be tough to gank with.

To theorycraft for a second, I also think the reworked yi has a tiny bit more gank potential than the old one. Still lacks cc, but with doublestrike occurring every fourth hit he'll proc on hit effects more often and slightly earlier* than previously, increasing the effectiveness of items with the 'icy' effect. Only mention it because he's so cheap.

*unless they follow a similar "corrected" distribution as critical hits do. This obviously also wouldn't make any difference once you have frozen mallet completed.

Seifer

Kold wrote: »

Top: Wu Kong (seemingly a mid/lategame beast), Darius (Not sure how strong he is now, haven't seen him much lately), Renekton (Prob one of the top picks but I used to play him before he was cool :cool:)

Mid: Diana (I ban her because I can never beat her), Galio (I haven't seen a Galio in close to a year, he's hardly trash?), Viktor (I always did pretty good with him in free weeks but I think they're reworking him soon?)

Jungle: Hecarim, Vi, never really played either, I'm just getting frustrated with Udyr/Fidd/Cho being hard to gank with when they're warding well.

Just going off your list; you rarely see Wu but when you do the player usually does very well on him. He's a lot of fun but can be hard to stay in lane as he has no built-in sustain.
Darius is great. He's more of a counterpick than a first pick though. He's one of those champs that you can't really shut down. Even if he loses lane he always has potential for that quadra kill in a team fight with the resetting true damage ult.
Renekton is one of the ultimate top lane bullies. He needs to fulfill that bully role though, if you don't win your lane you're pretty useless.

Diana: high skill, high reward.
Galio: He counters a lot of other mids very hard but he doesn't really bring the damage the same way they do. So you need your top lane to be a damage AP to make up for it.

Hecarim: Is still considered borderline OP. His ganks are insane and once he starts that snowball rolling he's very hard to stop.
Vi: She ate a lot of nerfs that put her in kind of a weak place.

Kold wrote: »

I think maybe it's better if I learn champions to counter certain 'problem' champions of mine.

Problem champs: Nidalee, Jayce, Diana, Kha'Zix, Kennen (although I do alright as Panth vs the last 2)

Jayce is getting reworked to be less annoying. Kennen is on Riot's radar. And I know she isn't on your list but Elise got touched this patch. Those three are the champs Riot consider out of line in top lane.
For Kha'zix, Kayle absolutely rapes him if you can play her.

Kold

Yup, call me bad or whatever but when a Nida is throwing her spear every 6 seconds I'm getting chunked and forced out of lane. Some of the Nida's over here are complete freaks too. Completely untouchable post 6. Gets the 2nd or even 1st blue sometimes and completely f*cks my eyeballs in. When I see an opportunity to go aggressive on her, WITHOUT FAIL, that's when the jungler strikes. I hate her with every ounce of my being. I hate her so much.

I just don't see why she gets one of the highest damaging pokes in the game, the highest ratio heal in the game, map awareness to F*CK (the vision must last for like 8 seconds or something!?) then manaless high damage and mobility at the touch of a button. I've always hated this bitch and long for the days where they add mana costs to her cougar form.

My problems with Diana really stem from her refreshing shield, Lux also. Those shields are too f*cking strong.

Mid is generally my worst role but I've been playing it a lot lately, I might pick up TF actually, it's mainly his W that has put me off in the past but I'm sure 2 or 3 games will sort that.

Kold

Seifer wrote: »

For Kha'zix, Kayle absolutely rapes him if you can play her.

I used to play a fair bit of Kayle but I'm not really sure how to build her. I used to take her toplane and build on hit but then when she became a popular ap, I also did well... She kinda plays the exact same. Haven't seen her a lot lately, has she just fallen out of fashion?

Seifer

Kold wrote: »

I used to play a fair bit of Kayle but I'm not really sure how to build her. I used to take her toplane and build on hit but then when she became a popular ap, I also did well... She kinda plays the exact same. Haven't seen her a lot lately, has she just fallen out of fashion?

You do still see her occasionally in the LCS. Solo queue wise she does seem to be quite rare. I don't think there's any particular reason for it.

I am also a proud member of the absolutely hating Nidalee with a passion club. She is so frustrating to play against because she cannot be engaged upon unless she fúcks up or you flash. And even then her disengage is so strong that you have to be sure you can 100 to 0 her before committing.
I thought the removal of the free MR + AR from cat form would finally make her killable but against a good Nid it makes no difference; I suppose that's why Riot considered it unnecessary power.

Companion box

Im by no means a top tier player but i have had a lot of luck with top lane nasus. Seems like no matter how well i do early game once i get to around 400 stacks there isn't a lot the other team can do to stop me.

Anyone know any really decent counters? A few champions can shut him down early but nobody scales as well into teamfights.

Kold

Companion box wrote: »

Im by no means a top tier player but i have had a lot of luck with top lane nasus. Seems like no matter how well i do early game once i get to around 400 stacks there isn't a lot the other team can do to stop me.

Anyone know any really decent counters? A few champions can shut him down early but nobody scales as well into teamfights.

I've been jungling Udyr a lot and I find even when Nasus becomes a monster, Udyr scales better as a fighter tank. Teemo and Kayle should beast him also. I used to take Rumble but his early damage has been nerfed so much.

(been playing a good few Kayle games since you reminded me of her).

TheDoc

Companion box wrote: »

Im by no means a top tier player but i have had a lot of luck with top lane nasus. Seems like no matter how well i do early game once i get to around 400 stacks there isn't a lot the other team can do to stop me.

Anyone know any really decent counters? A few champions can shut him down early but nobody scales as well into teamfights.

It's a weird one. I find Nasus really only decent in the jungle. I know for a tournament we did well in, we used Nasus as a primary jungler due to his wither and ult. His ult allows for good aoe dmg in teamfights and during drake and baron, especially when we comboed it with my Renekton.

I've found little to no trouble with Nasus toplanes. Granted they get to a point where they obviously become pretty tanky and difficult to kill, playing a ranged style champion allows you free harass. If I'm ignoring team comp and going straight lane matchup, I'd typically pick a Kennen into a Nasus.

His harass is strong and combination of early game AD + AP provides problems for Nasus, along with Kennens stun that can counter the Nasus rush ( when a Nasus withers, drops his ground slow and comes at you).

Against a Nasus, it's a farm lane most often then not. Meaning you should be keeping even or above in CS. Tell your jungler not to come near ( nothing worse when a **** jungler feeds a Nasus a kill), as it is a hard lane to gank. Just last hit, and build up that CS and gold. When it comes to midgame and lategame, you should be influencing teamfights well based off the gold earned in that farm lane.

I'd normally go Kennen, shen or Renekton ( no particular order) if I see a Nasus. Kennen for the direct counter, but allowing me to outfarm a Nasus due to harass. Renekton and Shen will keep equal or just ahead, and have high mid - late game impact in teamfights.

Simple to remember, against a Nasus, you need to farm well, so you can influence teamfights hard.

also Nasus' typically toplane at lower ELO focus on their Q stacks ( which is incorrect and makes it easier to harass toplane when he goes for CS stacks )

n1ck

Renekton is a HUGE counter to Nasus, I wouldn't go Kennen into a Nasus because initially yea you'll be fine but he'll just go back and get armor so your AA does nothing and he'll just farm.

You need to gank a Nasus to put him behind, then you'll be fine.

UnleashTheBeast

I recently made a list of champs for myself for ranked play. I went from a promotion to Plat to Gold 3 in only a few weeks so I felt I needed to buck up my ideas. I don't think I had a stale champion pool, I just didn't vary my picks as much as I should. Champions in bold I would consider top champions for soloqueue in their respective roles.

top: irelia, jax, ryze, riven, rumble, vlad, renekton, malph, kennen, singed, shen, trundle, cho, yorick, elise.

mid: ahri, gragas, fizz, kassa, zed, jayce, akali, karthus, talon, twisted fate.

jungle: fiddle, master yi, jarvan, udyr, zac, xin, lee, nunu, nasus.

adc: vayne vayne vayne trist, varus, twitch.

support: thresh, fiddle, sona, lulu, zyra, nami.

I'm probably leaving out 1 or 2, apologies if I missed anybody obvious. I'm a toplaner but I can also play mid or jungle just fine. Limited to really Vayne as an ADC and not a very good support at all.

Seifer

I think the list of champs for each role is a good idea. I have done the same because I felt I was spreading myself over too many champions; especially if I went on a losing streak, I'd pick things I rarely play just because it felt like I was having no effect on the game. So I've picked a max of 5 champs for each role and have rigidly stuck to that for the last couple of weeks and it seems to be going pretty well.
Saying that since 3.10 went live if I can get Yi I take him and roll some face :P

TheDoc

In fairness to that list, I think that is pretty much the entire "relevant" champion pool for the current meta

Like, you've pretty much just listed of the entire champion pool for toplane

Surely it is more efficent and effective to narrow your pool down. Specialise in a role, have a strong backup, then have some stuff for other lanes when your forced into it. From all the guides and AMA's you read from Diamond players, its the one common factor. Specialise in a role with 4 champions, have a strong secondary role, then have a clue about the rest.

Mine are :

Top : Kennen Shen Renekton Trynd Zac (currently learning)

Mid : Kennen Twisted Fate Ahri Lux

Jungle : Zac Nocturne Amumu

Support : Thresh Sona Zyra


I've planned that when I get promotion to my next tier, I'm going to break away and play normals for a while. Playing only specific roles. I want to get between 25-50 games in roles I dont normally play. I normally play top, and I can do well as ADC in solo q. But I want to get 50 games under my belt at everyone, so come Gold and onwards, I am able to slot into any role required.

YouSavedMyLife

Can play all roles pretty well but play top, jungle and support a hell of a lot more than ADC and Mid. Reason being that someone always seems to call ADC in games and ill let them have it no problem and first or second picking mid in my experience can be disastrous with some of my mid champ pool having some really really hard counters. Top on the other hand i find counters dont always matter as much as mid.

Top: Vi, Renekton, Shen
Mid: Xerath, Brand, Zyra
Jungle: Sejuani, Vi, Hecarim, Udyr
ADC: Vayne, MF, Vayne, Graves, Vayne, Vayne
Supp: Zyra, Alistar, Taric

While doing this list i realise how small my champ pool actually is with only 7 of them having more than 10 games in ranked play. Gonna try expand my pool abit over the next week or so. Been eyeing Trundle (top/jungle) Udyr (top) and Karma (top)

Magill

Seen quite a few top lane Nasus in the LCS this season, twice this weekend in fact. Never really been a fan of him tho.

My champ pool isn't too bad at this stage i guess.

Top: Renek, Rumble, Cho, Shen
Mid: Ziggs, Leblanc, Ahri, TF
Jungle: Sejuani, Zac
ADC: Ashe
Support: Janna, Sona

Wouldn't mind adding another adc, as with most of the other positions i can play at least another 2 or 3 champs quite well with.. just never really bought another ADC.

n1ck

Generally if you can ADC you can ADC with any champs, it's not that much of a switch over. Seeing as you play Ashe though her playstyle is a bit different to most other ADCs, at least from my point of view anyway. I find her much different than most other ADCs.

Kold

Rumble was my best champion but I don't like where he is now. They've weakened his laning to be situational but his lategame is half of what it was and quite simply, he can't carry a game anymore.

This is from playing him since release. I know we're seeing him in LCS but that's with an organised team and quite frankly if you whiff the ult, you're f*cked. The fact that the slow and upfront damage isn't what it was means any dash can mitigate a huge amount of damage. The only thing that has kept him viable is Liandrys.

I think I'm going to pick up Zac as a DPS'ing tank now as I see him as being more effective in everything except range.

Seifer

Kold wrote: »

I think I'm going to pick up Zac as a DPS'ing tank now as I see him as being more effective in everything except range.

Zac is perma-banned in solo queue so I don't really see the point; by the time you'll be able to pick him he's going to be much weaker.