League of Legends XII: It's Worth It Because I Said So In The Thread

[Dogmantra]

League of Legends XII:
It's Worth It Because I Said So In The Thread

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TRAVEL BACK IN TIME: PREVIOUS THREADS

League of Legends XI: It's Hard to Post Like This in Heels (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=192695)
League of Legends X: Armored Armadillo Delivers Ambiguous Affirmative (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=10646164#post10646164)
League of Legends IX: New Thread Available! Only 6300 IP! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=188076)
League of Legends VIII: Gali-Os: They're idolicious! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=185516)
League of Legends 7: Truly, Truly Outrageous! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=182486)
League of Legends 6: Jannaaaaaaaaaa! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=178334)
League of Legends 5: Tall Grass Used Garen! DEMACIAAA! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=173805)
League of Legends 4:CAWCAWCAWCAWCAWCAW (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=169616)
League of Legends 3: You only need to click once (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=164008s)
League of Legends Goes Where It Pleases 2 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=158135)
League Of Legends: We post where we please. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139094)

[KaizoMK]

FIRST! Urfyea!

So GP. I find that, like most carries with on-hit abilities, sheen is an amazing start. I've also found (not really found) that Crit is boss on him. I'm a fan of the whole "sort of scaling through the game" thing, so I'm thinking:

A) rushing triforce on GP is awesome (movespeed, crit, a bit of health, DAT PROC)
B) Trinity Edge Plank is Bestplank.
C) My roger is now 300% more jolly.
D) My roger is now diamonds.

Thoughts on itemization/this theory? Also, at request I shall make a quick n' dirty guide to tanking, as a way of teaching others/myself how to tank. Just want to make sure I'm not wasting time.

[Volatar]

Yay, new thread!

Thread op needs another I at the top btw Dog.

[Faulty]

Man. Whomever came up with the thread title is soooooo clever.

Anyway I want it to patch so I can see how much Brand will be. Maybe by some freak chance he'll be 3150. @_@

[Volatar]

Man. Whomever came up with the thread title is soooooo clever.

Anyway I want it to patch so I can see how much Brand will be. Maybe by some freak chance he'll be 3150. @_@

Yeah, Dogmantra came up with the best title.

He will probably be 6300. Which will suck. I still think I will want him though.

I will probably take forever to get to getting him though, as now I am going to buy Ryze and Malphite after their price reduction. And then I will keep buying CDR runes.

[Lyxie]

So I was streaming and a few people ended up watching me... and I made this while they were watching me, and we were all slightly amused by it.

http://i51.tinypic.com/23lbf9f.png

Also there are some amusing videos from our shennanigans:
http://own3d.tv/lyxie

I know some of you have seen me through my ups and downs of the streaming process, but I think I've finally nailed it down... from here on out it shouldn't be choppy. However, if you're ever watching it and it's choppy please let me know in mumble or in game:

Mumble/IGN: Lyxie

Note: Made a thread because I suck at forums and am used to more categories rather than huge threads for different topics. Sorry! :(

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

FIRST! Urfyea!

Kaizo! Link that epic Malphite game! DO IT!

[Duos]

Well, after a horrendous losing streak (I miss free blitz week...) and a subsequent recovery by defaulting back to burst casters, I'm finally closing in on 6300 IP again. My short list of champions that I have my eye on:

Blitzcrank
Kog'Maw
Karthus
Urgot
Heimerdinger
Jarvan

Any suggestions?

Also, I don't see my name in the list yet, so to clarify: I'm DapperGuy, on the NA server.

Kudos to Faulty for the hee-larious thread name, by the way.

[Nargan]

Yeah, Dogmantra came up with the best title.

He will probably be 6300. Which will suck. I still think I will want him though.

I will probably take forever to get to getting him though, as now I am going to buy Ryze and Malphite after their price reduction. And then I will keep buying CDR runes.

Since I joined LoL, all of the new champs have been 6300 except trundle and jarvan (I think). Riot just likes that number I guess...

[toasty]

Since I joined LoL, all of the new champs have been 6300 except trundle and jarvan (I think). Riot just likes that number I guess...

Basically, because of their business model they need to release champions that are really expesnive so people actually spend money on the game. At this point I own like half the champions, so I could honestly care less, especially since I own the two new champions I actually want to play (jarvan and noc, and I don't really even like noc, except maybe on 3v3, which I never play). What I want right now is about 5 more rune pages. :smalltongue:

[Master_Rahl22]

The idea is that if you want to collect every champ, you need to somehow come up with 6300 IP every few weeks or spend some money on the game. Me personally I don't need to collect every champ, but I'm fine with spending some money on skins and stuff purely because I enjoy it and think Riot deserves to be paid for making a great game.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Since I joined LoL, all of the new champs have been 6300 except trundle and jarvan (I think). Riot just likes that number I guess...

Yep. Higher IP price = longer time to purchase with IP = higher chance of an RP sale.

On the plus side, they did just lower the cost of several champions. Personally, I'm fine with a high initial IP cost so Riot earns more cash on anticipated new champions, and then lowering the price on the older champions, preferably on a more regular basis. It's actually a really good marketing idea: game systems, for example, are often released at a very high premium, only to decrease in cost after a few months. Those who really desire the product are happy to pay the initial fee, and those who aren't as excited (or are unable to afford it) can grab it later for a lower cost.

It's quite effective, and, while not exactly fair, at least not incredible unfair.

[Dallas-Dakota]

Yo Dog, if you can dog your way through last thread to page 47 or click on this link (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10754462&postcount=1357), could you add my GP Guide to the OP? Thenks.

Ps. On sheen, movement speed? Crit chance? Phantom Dance Party is just so much better for those stats. It costs far too much gold considering it also gives stats GP Just doesn't care about. Besides. Boots > Trinity > IE -
Only two items(And you need IE) and you're up to 9 K gold already. I don't know how well you farm but...If you're going to get Trinity I'd get a sheen and a zeal first, then IE and then finish Trinity...

[Arcanoi]

Any suggestions?


You mentioned Burst Casters. Brand, perhaps?

[Dralnu]

Any suggestions?

Veigar and LeBlanc have scary, scary burst. Kassadin is similar but he trades some damage for a huge silence, slow, and basically can't die. Ever.

By the way, has anyone seen these IE buffs?


# B.F. Sword

* Attack damage reduced to 45 from 50
* Gold Cost decreased by 200

# Cloak Of Agility gold cost decreased by 50
# Infinity Edge

* Attack Damage increased to 80 from 75
* Critical Strike increased to 25% from 20%

-250gp, +5AD, +5% crit strike. Not bad.

[Astrella]

Are we sure the price is going to change? Seems like a pretty powerful buff if it is.

[Volatar]

Are we sure the price is going to change? Seems like a pretty powerful buff if it is.

They did not say that the combine cost was going up, so yeah, its reduced in price.

[term1nally s1ck]

IE was up there as the best item before buffs. There is now no real other choice.

[Eldariel]

...so... They're basically reverting the IE nerfs? And dropping BFS-price to, I suppose, make basic items slightly less expensive (it and NLR are still far and away the most expensive base items, of course).

[TechnOkami]

Queeeestion: I want to be added to that list of LoL players, who do I pm (because the last thread was posted by Djinn and this one by Dogmantra, so...)?

[Master_Rahl22]

Hmm, I'm going to have to start getting that first on my Trist instead of Black Cleaver.

[Math_Mage]

Queeeestion: I want to be added to that list of LoL players, who do I pm (because the last thread was posted by Djinn and this one by Dogmantra, so...)?

PM Dog with your IGN and the server you play on. Alternatively, just post it--but then you have to count on the OP seeing it, which doesn't always happen.

[Dogmantra]

PM Dog with your IGN and the server you play on. Alternatively, just post it--but then you have to count on the OP seeing it, which doesn't always happen.

If you make sure to post it in bold, I'll see it. I check the thread really regularly.

[Dralnu]

We might be seeing a nerf to all CC in the future (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=7814809&posted=1#post7814809). I think this is very wrong. I posted my argument (DireJew) but I doubt Riot will care about non-Blue posts.

They really undervalue the heck out of Cleanse and especially QSS. What a pity.

EDIT:

5) Cleanse is a top tier summoner spell. All cleanse does is remove CC... you don't take reduced damage, you don't deal more damage, you don't move faster or help your allies, it just removes current CC and reduces CC duration. It's about as un-versatile as summoner spells get, and yet it is a top pick simply because it means you actually get to use your champion in a fight!

...

8) Speaking of Cleanse and Suppression, let's look at QSS. This item is so incredibly UP that the mind boggles as to why anyone would buy it. For it's upgrade cost I could DOUBLE IT'S STATS which is usually the opposite of what upgrading an item would do, it usually makes the stats/cost MUCH better. So why do people still buy it? Because it is the ONLY counter to suppression, and another counter to the ridiculous amount of CC. Sure it can also reduce DoT damage, but honestly it is very rare (Mordekaiser aside) that anyone will buy this item in a game where they will be using it to counter DoT damage.

Cleanse and QSS are UP but they're the best anti-CCs in the game, therefore CC is OP? :smallconfused:

Aka "Waaaaah I don't wanna buy smart I just want to stack IE's! Make me better by nerfing anything I don't like! :smallfrown:"

[KaizoMK]

Yo Dog, if you can dog your way through last thread to page 47 or click on this link (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10754462&postcount=1357), could you add my GP Guide to the OP? Thenks.

Ps. On sheen, movement speed? Crit chance? Phantom Dance Party is just so much better for those stats. It costs far too much gold considering it also gives stats GP Just doesn't care about. Besides. Boots > Trinity > IE -
Only two items(And you need IE) and you're up to 9 K gold already. I don't know how well you farm but...If you're going to get Trinity I'd get a sheen and a zeal first, then IE and then finish Trinity...

I tried sheen>IE>Triforce, but it didn't work as well as my last game of Triforce>IE. And GP uses the slight damage and random slow from phage, and since he's a melee dps a little health doesn't hurt either.

Also, the reason I rush Triforce is because it's built out of a lot of smaller items. If you have 500 gold, you can contribute to your Triforce, which is nice. I mean, if I can ever just *afford* an IE, I'm ****ing buying that ****.

The reason having a small amount of crit isn't a problem with triforce is because you're automatically doing crit-worthy damage, so a crit is just icing, as Triforce procs cause you to do 250% of your AD on hit. Once you have more crit/IE, your parley will usually do something like 400% of your AD, which is, needless to say, ****ing awesome.

[Math_Mage]

We might be seeing a nerf to all CC in the future (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=7814809&posted=1#post7814809). I think this is very wrong. I posted my argument (DireJew) but I doubt Riot will care about non-Blue posts.

They really undervalue the heck out of Cleanse and especially QSS. What a pity.

Just gonna say, Morello doesn't seem to be for it, from what little he's said so far.

[Dralnu]

Yeah, reading his comment over I may have jumped the gun a bit. Wouldn't mind a little more anti-CC options but an overall nerf to all of it would be terrible.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Yeah, reading his comment over I may have jumped the gun a bit. Wouldn't mind a little more anti-CC options but an overall nerf to all of it would be terrible.

I'm really not convinced it would be, honestly. Maybe it's just me, but I like a positioning, hit-and-run, very active playstyle. The whole "dog-pile someone with chain CC" playstyle, and the recent "be really tanky and just push push push" playstyle aren't really my thing, so I'd much rather have CC be the ace in the hole, rather than the absolutely required and incredibly potent thing it is at the moment.

Purely my opinion, by the way.

[KaizoMK]

I'm really not convinced it would be, honestly. Maybe it's just me, but I like a positioning, hit-and-run, very active playstyle. The whole "dog-pile someone with chain CC" playstyle, and the recent "be really tanky and just push push push" playstyle aren't really my thing, so I'd much rather have CC be the ace in the hole, rather than the absolutely required and incredibly potent thing it is at the moment.

Purely my opinion, by the way.

True, but I've been slowly dabbling in doing creative, not-nubby things. For instance, my last game as Trynd, a couple of guys were hella-stacking armor. So I got last whisper and literally laid waste to everything in my path. The next step is going to be getting a QSS in games where I get crazy focused. I might even smite cleanse from now on.

EDIT: I guess my point is, when it comes down to it, there are still counters to the things you mentioned, like a properly standard teamcomp, of having one or two *******s do all the damage, along with giving said *******s a QSS if the enemy team has a "lol CC" teamcomp

[Dralnu]

Imagine how much harder it will be to stop tanky pushers with much less effective CC though. Already they have more than enough survivability to just run to safety even against multiple attackers. You need CC to keep them in place long enough for them to actually die.

Personally, Cleanse + QSS, two CC breaks in a fight, is enough for even the craziest CC combos.

There's counters set in place for everything IMO. Void staff for MR, Last Whisper for Armor, Bloodrazors and certain champs for high HP, Ignite and certain champs for health regen, Cleanse + QSS + Veil + Merc Treads and certain champs for CC. No counter should be too good though (though really, Cleanse + QSS is already pretty nuts against CC when you try it).

[KaizoMK]

Imagine how much harder it will be to stop tanky pushers with much less effective CC though. Already they have more than enough survivability to just run to safety even against multiple attackers. You need CC to keep them in place long enough for them to actually die.

Personally, Cleanse + QSS, two CC breaks in a fight, is enough for even the craziest CC combos.

There's counters set in place for everything IMO. Void staff for MR, Last Whisper for Armor, Bloodrazors and certain champs for high HP, Ignite and certain champs for health regen, Cleanse + QSS + Veil + Merc Treads and certain champs for CC. No counter should be too good though (though really, Cleanse + QSS is already pretty nuts against CC when you try it).

Come to think of it, there is a lot of powerful anti-CC. They had to counter that with CC that could only be countered by saving an item slot exclusively for anti-CC.

[ZombyWoof]

...so... They're basically reverting the IE nerfs? And dropping BFS-price to, I suppose, make basic items slightly less expensive (it and NLR are still far and away the most expensive base items, of course).
They're reverting the IE nerfs, perking it back up (with an extra 5% crit chance iirc), and lowering the price by 250.

IE perks: because Ashe wasn't good enough.

EDIT: So TF + IE on Paaaarley involving crit dam runes and 340 base attack (GP + BT + IE + TF and then a pair of PDs for the crit chance).

We're talking 680 base attack for the Paarley, +X where X is the paarley's bonus damage, then probably 320% crit for 2,176 damage. Then add in 3.2 X?

Sexy.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Imagine how much harder it will be to stop tanky pushers with much less effective CC though. Already they have more than enough survivability to just run to safety even against multiple attackers. You need CC to keep them in place long enough for them to actually die.

Personally, Cleanse + QSS, two CC breaks in a fight, is enough for even the craziest CC combos.

There's counters set in place for everything IMO. Void staff for MR, Last Whisper for Armor, Bloodrazors and certain champs for high HP, Ignite and certain champs for health regen, Cleanse + QSS + Veil + Merc Treads and certain champs for CC. No counter should be too good though (though really, Cleanse + QSS is already pretty nuts against CC when you try it).

But consider this problem.

A carry who is purchasing QSS and carrying Cleanse is a carry who has been forced into a certain defensive playstyle. Which would be fine if only a couple characters could dish out that sort of punishment...sort of like how Madred's or Thornmail are bought vs. certain opponents, and not others.

With the incredible prevalence of CC in the game at the moment, however, virtually every team comp that stands a chance can shut down those carries instantly, and keep them shut down. I understand part of the balance is that carries die quickly, but all this hard CC is making actually surviving incredibly difficult, especially in light of the tanky DPS metagame (i.e. you can't kill them before they've stunned you several times, and they're dealing at least as much damage to you as you are to them). Burst characters like, say, Shaco and Kassadin can't even pull their weight, and are stuck performing clean-up. Items should be options for greater chances of living/killing, not practically mandatory in order to survive a CC-fest. Any time you're all but forced to make a single purchase, something needs to be altered a bit.

Basically, CC punishes squishy characters to much, especially since many tanky characters can only be stopped by excessive CC, meaning the team with them doesn't have that CC hit its carries, or has its beefy DPS live long enough to vaporize the enemy team. Yes, that's sort of how the tactics of the game should be working, but, at the moment, I think it's a little off balance in favor of the tanky, survivable characters. The duration of the CC and the characters who have it are a large part of this: most solid CC is on characters who are either naturally tanky, or build that way, giving those characters an even greater advantage in a game that is currently favoring them to begin with.

[Dralnu]

They're reverting the IE nerfs, perking it back up (with an extra 5% crit chance iirc), and lowering the price by 250.

IE perks: because Ashe wasn't good enough.

EDIT: So TF + IE on Paaaarley involving crit dam runes and 340 base attack (GP + BT + IE + TF and then a pair of PDs for the crit chance).

We're talking 680 base attack for the Paarley, +X where X is the paarley's bonus damage, then probably 320% crit for 2,176 damage. Then add in 3.2 X?

Sexy.

The BFS is also an indirect buff to The Black Cleaver and The Bloodthirster too, -250gp to build each of those as well. Hooray for physical DPS!

[Nargan]

EU servers down 3 times in one day. It's getting ridiculous now. NOW I HAVE TO GO AND PLAY TEAM FORTRESS 2 AFTER I *JUST* BOUGHT MY NEW EZREAL SKIN! /fume

[Math_Mage]

Imagine how much harder it will be to stop tanky pushers with much less effective CC though. Already they have more than enough survivability to just run to safety even against multiple attackers. You need CC to keep them in place long enough for them to actually die.

Personally, Cleanse + QSS, two CC breaks in a fight, is enough for even the craziest CC combos.

There's counters set in place for everything IMO. Void staff for MR, Last Whisper for Armor, Bloodrazors and certain champs for high HP, Ignite and certain champs for health regen, Cleanse + QSS + Veil + Merc Treads and certain champs for CC. No counter should be too good though (though really, Cleanse + QSS is already pretty nuts against CC when you try it).

Thing is, the most powerful aspect of tanky pushers is that they can initiate on you under a tower...with chain CC focusing down targets so they can get out before tower damage starts to hurt. This is what makes defending towers against tanky pushers so difficult.

[ZombyWoof]

This is actually why I stopped buying skins. Their server stability is RIDICULOUS. I play a game where the servers are maintained by volunteers and the game is entirely donation driven, and it has less than a 10th the server issues LoL has.

I think the worse part is everyone gets downvoted whenever they say "Riot needs to get its act together." The truth is, though, RIOT NEEDS TO GET ITS ACT TOGETHER.

[Dralnu]

But consider this problem.

The difference between Thornmail/Bloodrazors and QSS is price. QSS is a very cheaply priced item. I don't think carries investing in Cleanse + QSS is much of a sacrifice to their DPS. Two CC outs should be more than enough to escape any unfavorable skirmish. In a 5v5 fight though, assuming every single person is targeting the carry with a CC 2/5 CC removals is still pretty darn good because the rest of your team should be protecting you anyway. If the team just lets their carry get dogpiled on then they're a bad team. With Cleanse + QSS and the team's own CC, I don't think protecting a carry is impossible or "too hard".

I do agree with you that Tanky DPS have it too good. I don't think it's a a problem of CC though. I think it's that the DPS route is currently a little too expensive. Tanky DPS can wade into a fight and deal good damage while the carries struggle to put any heat on them until the late late game. That's why I'm happy with changes like the BFS price drop. They should keep doing these small tweaks and I think the problem will level out soon.


Thing is, the most powerful aspect of tanky pushers is that they can initiate on you under a tower...with chain CC focusing down targets so they can get out before tower damage starts to hurt. This is what makes defending towers against tanky pushers so difficult.

I don't see how this is a problem with CC though. Even with little CC, a bunch of people with gap-closers and high damage (instead of CC) in this situation will still ignore the tower and snipe an easy kill. Sounds like a Tanky DPS problem, not a CC one. Getting out of 2 CC's really can't be underestimated.

I do have a proposal for that problem: Buff Fortify so it does an additional +100% increased damage to champions. Fortify becomes more desirable and helps towers maintain their danger in the later portions of the game.

[Math_Mage]

This is actually why I stopped buying skins. Their server stability is RIDICULOUS. I play a game where the servers are maintained by volunteers and the game is entirely donation driven, and it has less than a 10th the server issues LoL has.

I think the worse part is everyone gets downvoted whenever they say "Riot needs to get its act together." The truth is, though, RIOT NEEDS TO GET ITS ACT TOGETHER.

Server traffic volume might have something to do with the prevalence of server stability issues...

[ZombyWoof]

Tanky-dps has it "too good" because there's only one champ who counters it, and that's Kog'Maw.

If they released some items or champions who would be able to punish champs for building tanky... like maybe an item that had an active which dealt damage based on the target's MResist and/or Armor, or a champion who had an AoE ability that scaled based on the HP/armor/mresist of those affected.

You can counter ranged DPS by CCing the DPS. Yes, even with QSS and Cleanse, it's possible to lay the smackdown on someone squishy in back. Just follow your shen!

You can't really counter tanky DPS with CC because they'll survive the initial onslaught or, if they are olaf, simply ignore it. Alternatively-ternatively they have QSS and Cleanse meaning that they're JUST AS CC immune as the squishies... only they're also damage immune?

There's nothing wrong with tanky-dps being a meta if there's a counter to it. Like for example in competitive pokemon, tanky stall teams are owned in the face by teams that set up a superpowerful sweeper (gen 3 it was pastting a bellydrum to a Medicham).

Oh and % health isn't the right way to do it. The right way to do it is something else because %health punishes everyone :smallyuk:

@Math: then the solution is simple. Upgrade. I mean really when was the last time you saw a company shut down because "We just have too many customers. Sorry!"

[Silverraptor]

Man. Whomever came up with the thread title is soooooo clever.

Anyway I want it to patch so I can see how much Brand will be. Maybe by some freak chance he'll be 3150. @_@

Faulty. Clearly you need to look at the 9th thread title again.:smalltongue:

[Dogmantra]

But consider this problem.

A carry who is purchasing QSS and carrying Cleanse is a carry who has been forced into a certain defensive playstyle. Which would be fine if only a couple characters could dish out that sort of punishment...sort of like how Madred's or Thornmail are bought vs. certain opponents, and not others.

I don't understand... the entire game is based around countering your opponents. I was under the impression that being forced into certain playstyles is what makes a good team comp. Like how putting LeBlanc mid lane forces their mid to play more defensively/be Galio and then you base your team on their having a less farmed/fed carry. I think it's perfectly legitimate to have a heavy CC team based on making your opponents buy QSS/BV so they don't get to buy as much damage to make up for the fact you're lacking a tank.

[ZombyWoof]

But there's no real good counter to tanky dps. Except maybe kiting but they like nerfing that (see Rylai's).

[Neftren]

But there's no real good counter to tanky dps. Except maybe kiting but they like nerfing that (see Rylai's).

Lots of stuns, and/or a push heavy comp, and/or another tanky-dps team.

[Dogmantra]

That's... still not a problem with CC, which is the point I was making. That's a problem with itemisation for tanky dps characters.

[Dralnu]

snip

Yeah, basically how I see it as well. We need more options that reduce X defensive attribute by a % to hit the tanky ones the most. I highly advocate items to do this, but champions work too.

[toasty]

This is actually why I stopped buying skins. Their server stability is RIDICULOUS. I play a game where the servers are maintained by volunteers and the game is entirely donation driven, and it has less than a 10th the server issues LoL has.

I think the worse part is everyone gets downvoted whenever they say "Riot needs to get its act together." The truth is, though, RIOT NEEDS TO GET ITS ACT TOGETHER.

Here's my question: What type of load does that server have? Sure, I hate the downtimes, but I don't know how much load riot's server has. Furthermore, keep in mind that League of Legends was a bit of a run-away success and no one really expected it to be this popular (kinda silly, when you realize that DotA has millions of players and might have boasted a playerbase of similar size to WoW at one point). It might just be they don't have the capital because of the popularity to "fix" their servers long term. The server downtime used to be much worse, its getting better.

I agree its stupid that the servers go down a lot, but I find it tolerable. At least it means I'm not so tempted to play LoL once every two weeks.

Edit: @Tanky dps. THe problem is a really challenging one. That is to say, I remember long ago when people complained that melee champions like Yi and Jax had it really hard because they couldn't do damage without getting into the middle and would just die. Unlike Ashe/Trist/Ez etc who had mobility/range/kite and could poke and harass and a lot easier.

They fixed that by making tanky guys ... tanky. But the problem now is that they do decent sustained damage without a lot of offensive items. As of yet, they don't seem to have a middle ground. Either you are yi and a glass cannon that doesn't really have a lot of use in a team fight, or you are renekton/garen who doesn't really build damage because you don't really need it (though, the double sunfire garen was probably somewhat more OP than renekton, just because sunfire stacking was basically OP. I do miss it though. :smallbiggrin:)

[Makensha]

@Math: then the solution is simple. Upgrade. I mean really when was the last time you saw a company shut down because "We just have too many customers. Sorry!"

At one point their player base was doubling every month. Explain how to handle a situation like that without having things go wrong. Especially in a game like this where it often takes time for people to be willing to spend money on it. Obviously the coders for the original game (Shiny update can't come to soon) were terrible and they have to deal with that until Shiny. But I once worked at a place that handled a lot of events. One event was expected to have 20 people. 112 people showed up. How do you deal with that? We had to delay it by 30 minutes as we moved chairs and equipment to a room that could actually hold 115 (event workers) people.

Now imagine if instead of just having to get a bigger room we also needed to get more chairs and speakers. We would have had to delay the event for a week. Luckily we had a lot of chairs and speakers lying around because that was the only event for the night.

When you have a dramatic population growth, things are bound to explode every once in a while.

[efdf]

But there's no real good counter to tanky dps. Except maybe kiting but they like nerfing that (see Rylai's).

heal poke

it'll come back, and I will herald it as my savior

but seriously, split pushing destroys tanky DPS pretty hard

[Brother Oni]

@Math: then the solution is simple. Upgrade. I mean really when was the last time you saw a company shut down because "We just have too many customers. Sorry!"

You say that as if Riot could pop down to the local computer hardware shop in the morning and have the upgrade bought, installed and fully qualified by that afternoon.

They probably are trying to upgrade, it just takes time to get hold of the correct hardware, install it, then integrate correctly into their current setup.

Unless you're all for Riot to shard the servers further and limit connections by region or timezone, which would pretty much kill the game's popularity.


It might just be they don't have the capital because of the popularity to "fix" their servers long term. The server downtime used to be much worse, its getting better.

Not to mention that because of their business model, that just because their player base is doubling every month, it doesn't mean their income is doubling every month as well.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Here's a thought that I came up with just not regarding the tanky DPS/CC situation.

What if the idea of a stun (the worst offender of the bunch) were reworked? Consider this:

A stunned target cannot move or take actions aside from casting Summoner Spells. A stunned target's Armor and Magic Resist become 90.

Obviously, the numbers are subject to change. The basic premise of this is that a stun becomes a more tactical utility: stunning the carry removes them from the fight for a while, but makes them harder to kill during that time. Stunning a tanky DPS or pure tank leaves the carry alive and kicking, but makes the tank much easier to focus down. Both options become good, and tanky characters now have a way to pull CC away from the carries on principle, as stunning a high defense character gets a greater return in terms of raw damage. Obviously the exact numbers could change, but the point is that it opens new doors. It also lessens the power of long-stun characters like Sion and Taric in the early laning stage, which is probably a good thing overall.

Additionally, allowing the use of Summoner Spells gives another escape from CC for those packing Flash or Exhaust. With their high cooldowns it's not going to be incredibly overpowered, but it helps deal with the chain CC problem a bit better...you're still stunned, but you may be slightly safer while you're stunned.

[KaizoMK]

But consider this problem.

A carry who is purchasing QSS and carrying Cleanse is a carry who has been forced into a certain defensive playstyle. Which would be fine if only a couple characters could dish out that sort of punishment...sort of like how Madred's or Thornmail are bought vs. certain opponents, and not others.

With the incredible prevalence of CC in the game at the moment, however, virtually every team comp that stands a chance can shut down those carries instantly, and keep them shut down. I understand part of the balance is that carries die quickly, but all this hard CC is making actually surviving incredibly difficult, especially in light of the tanky DPS metagame (i.e. you can't kill them before they've stunned you several times, and they're dealing at least as much damage to you as you are to them). Burst characters like, say, Shaco and Kassadin can't even pull their weight, and are stuck performing clean-up. Items should be options for greater chances of living/killing, not practically mandatory in order to survive a CC-fest. Any time you're all but forced to make a single purchase, something needs to be altered a bit.

Basically, CC punishes squishy characters to much, especially since many tanky characters can only be stopped by excessive CC, meaning the team with them doesn't have that CC hit its carries, or has its beefy DPS live long enough to vaporize the enemy team. Yes, that's sort of how the tactics of the game should be working, but, at the moment, I think it's a little off balance in favor of the tanky, survivable characters. The duration of the CC and the characters who have it are a large part of this: most solid CC is on characters who are either naturally tanky, or build that way, giving those characters an even greater advantage in a game that is currently favoring them to begin with.

I suppose it's slightly idealistic to expect "the crazy damage to be frail" and "the undying to be....not the crazy damage", but consider that carries left unchecked *will* ace a team. I mean, Xin running around murdering people and being really hard to kill is annoying, but he still has at least *some* balance between survivability and power, and the reason he's not a carry is because he doesn't scale crazy well with items.

Don't get me wrong, it's easy to itemize him to do awesome damage and still survive a lot of things. But consider characters like kog'maw, who absolutely wrecks every champion, tank or no, when not CC'd, because he scales amazingly well with attack speed. Or Yi, who has innate AS and AD buffs, and so can pretty much wreck everything by pretty much building damage, pen, and some lifesteal. Or Tryndamere, who has natural crit chance/damage, and can ignore death for 5 seconds while he autoattacks for like 1000 per hit.

No tanky DPS could possibly achieve that. In fact, the only kind of non-carry that could achieve that damage in one shot are burst casters (a step down from carries in terms of item scaling), and AOE ults (which are ults, and still usually have some sort of counter (usually channeling.) And the reason AOE CC exists is because everyone except for some carries and casters have CC, and so you can CC the carry, but that's countered by CC-ing whoever's about to kill your carry.

Teamfights are a race to see who can kill each other first, which is achieved in different means depending on who you are. If you're all beefy dps, you want to focus the key people that will destroy you. If you're a "big bulky guy protects the small guy" team, you want to defend your carry while he om noms people.

So yea, the problem with the latter is tanky DPS living through CC and trying to eat your carry, typically with CC, since a carry by end game can typically mop the floor with anyone with even a bit of protection (I.E. isn't focused by the whole team). If you're a carry and you get CC'd, you're dead, and you're not doing damage, thus why murdering the carry is the primary goal of a teamfight.

Sorry, that's one of the primary goals. The other one is keeping your carry from getting murdernated. Your carry helps with this by murdernating people that can kill them (you'd think it'd be mostly everyone, but picture a well-positioned Ashe kiting that Renekton I was talking about, or that Yi who can 1v1 anyone because he has the innate stats to actually get away with lifesteal-winning fights, or that Trynd I play :P).

Now picture Sion, who has powerful CC along with a crazy nuke. O****, Ashe can't kite that, and Yi can't win a sustained fight while stunned. [On a minor note, Tryndamere doesn't care ;) ] You deal with that with cleanse. Not rocking cleanse because you wanted flash/exhaust? Understandable, but you're going to die. Even worse, you picked cleanse, but Malz/Malphite/Alistar used his flash-ulti skills (or Ali uses his flash-everyday knockup) and you can't cleanse knockups/suppression (or milk those). QSS. Galio? QSS. Malphite? You QSS and all of a sudden you're walking on air (lol try it). Sion? QSS and murder him.

Yea, it's a waste of an item slot, but that late in the game, 1440G isn't a terrible amount to spend, and if you're that worried about being behind on gold, buy an elixer. Also consider that on a carry, your damage is directly proportional to how long you sustain it, which is as long as you're alive/not CC'd, making QSS not that big of a nerf to your damage. As a burst caster, your damage is based on your AP and your one nuke, so QSS is a nerf to your damage, but who cares if you get CC'd after you blow your load, as long as you killed/crippled/shart-induced someone. Honestly, I don't even see QSS as something that's imba simply because tanky dps can use it, because though they make use of it, they still can't match the damage output of other people, even if it is awesome.

In the end, I think making tanky DPS have crappy stats but scale better with items, though seemingly making them more like carries in a way, will help fix the problem, because those characters will still never match the crazy burst of a caster or the epic sustained damage of a carry, and I think nerfing CC is just going to make carries OP.

[toasty]

heal poke

it'll come back, and I will herald it as my savior

but seriously, split pushing destroys tanky DPS pretty hard

Except Singed and Shen are basically tanky dps and both do split pushing very well...

Also, tank dps like gragas, mundo, and morde LOVE heal-poke, it doesn't hurt, its exactly what they want.

Personally heal poke is a very tiresome and obnoxious game and I hate it when the game devolves into poke-fests in mid lane for 10-15 minutes. Frustrates me to death.

[Dallas-Dakota]

That is sounding very good, Djinn!

For your latter idea, perhaps a spell that acts roughly like Zhonya's stasis/active.

[Istari]

So I thought they were going to buff TF and Cass, Cass got some buffs but really no change except for a slightly better ult and better comboing. Despite bug fixes for TF he definitely got nerfed with that Blue card nerf which really hurting his lanning especially for AP

Edit: Also making Singed harder to catch, really?

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Now picture Sion, who has powerful CC along with a crazy nuke. O****, Ashe can't kite that, and Yi can't win a sustained fight while stunned. [On a minor note, Tryndamere doesn't care ;) ] You deal with that with cleanse. Not rocking cleanse because you wanted flash/exhaust? Understandable, but you're going to die. Even worse, you picked cleanse, but Malz/Malphite/Alistar used his flash-ulti skills (or Ali uses his flash-everyday knockup) and you can't cleanse knockups/suppression (or milk those). QSS. Galio? QSS. Malphite? You QSS and all of a sudden you're walking on air (lol try it). Sion? QSS and murder him.


But it's an item slot that THEY don't have to use, 'cause they can simply live through it. And QSS and Cleanse both have cooldowns much longer than the cooldowns of most CC abilities. Which would be fine if there were a bunch of isolated 1v1s like the above situation seems to dictate. But having to avoid teamfight after teamfight and generally mess around 'cause you've blown all your CC avoidance and the enemy still has CC to spare?

The solution I outlined above doesn't give the carries THAT much more survivability, but it DOES make the decision of who to CC a less glaringly obvious one, which I feel can only be good for gameplay and depth.

[Douglas]

@Math: then the solution is simple. Upgrade. I mean really when was the last time you saw a company shut down because "We just have too many customers. Sorry!"
Ah, but many of Riot's customers aren't paying. "We just have too many freeloaders. Sorry!" is a very different statement. Also, upgrading a system on a scale anywhere near what the LoL servers have to handle and making sure that the upgrade doesn't screw things up horribly is a very difficult and time consuming task requiring a lot of specialized knowledge and skill, not merely expensive. It is orders of magnitude more difficult than just ordering new hardware and slapping it in place.

Acquiring the knowledge and skill required, or finding someone to hire who already has it and then teaching him the details of your system, takes a lot of time - time that Riot hasn't had all that much of since the scale of LoL's success became apparent. Sure, if Riot had planned from the beginning for the number of players they have now they could have had the required expertise in place in plenty of time, but they originally expected a much smaller scale success and that kind of planning would have been expensive overkill for what they expected to need.

[pilvento]

If you make sure to post it in bold, I'll see it. I check the thread really regularly.

i was ignored by the last PO hope u notice me.

America server. Summoner name Kandrass

[Dogmantra]

What if the idea of a stun (the worst offender of the bunch) were reworked? Consider this:

I like how Bloodlines handles it. Most of the long lasting CCs are incapacitates/sleeps, which break on damage. Stuns all last around 0.5 seconds, unless they're ultimates or EXs (like mini ults), where they last maybe 0.6 seconds. It makes CC really USEFUL, just not get CC win game.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

I like how Bloodlines handles it. Most of the long lasting CCs are incapacitates/sleeps, which break on damage. Stuns all last around 0.5 seconds, unless they're ultimates or EXs (like mini ults), where they last maybe 0.6 seconds. It makes CC really USEFUL, just not get CC win game.

While I really like this, I'm not sure how well it would work in the DoT/AoE heavy LoL.

[Spartacus]

i was ignored by the last PO hope u notice me.

America server. Summoner name Kandrass

See, he said to bold it, and you did not bold it.

EDIT: Hey Dogmantra, there's a classy gentleman what wants to be in the OP.

[toasty]

Servers just need to come up already. I want to play me some LoL. :smallfrown:

[Dallas-Dakota]

Yo Dog, if you can dog your way through last thread to page 47 or click on this link (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10754462&postcount=1357), could you add my GP Guide to the OP? Thenks.


Classy Bold text here.

[Brother Oni]

While I really like this, I'm not sure how well it would work in the DoT/AoE heavy LoL.

Especially not with the new king of DoT, Brand, just released.


Servers just need to come up already. I want to play me some LoL. :smallfrown:

Servers will apparently be up at 3:30pm PST, so it looks like I'm on the EU server tonight.

[Dogmantra]

While I really like this, I'm not sure how well it would work in the DoT/AoE heavy LoL.

Yeah, the game would need to be redesigned pretty heavily, but there's one other type of incap in Bloodlines, called Moon Stone, which stuns, and gives your opponent a shield, reduces damage taken, and then breaks once the shield is gone. Something like that could work in LoL, but it would require work.

[KaizoMK]

But it's an item slot that THEY don't have to use, 'cause they can simply live through it. And QSS and Cleanse both have cooldowns much longer than the cooldowns of most CC abilities. Which would be fine if there were a bunch of isolated 1v1s like the above situation seems to dictate. But having to avoid teamfight after teamfight and generally mess around 'cause you've blown all your CC avoidance and the enemy still has CC to spare?

The solution I outlined above doesn't give the carries THAT much more survivability, but it DOES make the decision of who to CC a less glaringly obvious one, which I feel can only be good for gameplay and depth.

I did think your idea was pretty cool. ^^b

I also think you underestimate the amount of damage a carry can do when farmed, because most reasonably farmed carries (not even fed, farmed) will destroy pretty much anyone they choose. Granted, you can stop a carry from getting farm sufficient to rape teams, but early game you counter tanky dps by having good positioning/teamwork/wards/protecting your carry while his ass farms.

In fact, tanky dps having even *amazing* damage while being hard to kill is just fine, because killing the enemy carry shouldn't instantly win you a teamfight. I mean, you should and will be punished for letting your carry die/not having one, but not all is lost if it happens, although it's considerably harder. The problem is not everyone plays consistent damage, or plays too much of it, so that when a tanky dps team wins, it's because you had no way to protect your carry, or you had no carry-like sustained damage in order

The way I see it is that it's a strategy-y, timing-y, playing chicken-y, rock-paper-scissors-y, situation, where tanky beats burst, carries beat tanky, and burst beats carry, and so you need to have a strategy involving protecting everyone by properly coordinating your CC and your damage to kill the enemy team while stopping them from killing you.

[Dralnu]

Hey Dogmantra, could you add me and my guide to the OP?

IGN: TomerIsHot
NA Server

And this Lee Sin guide. (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=636475)

[efdf]

Except Singed and Shen are basically tanky dps and both do split pushing very well...

Also, tank dps like gragas, mundo, and morde LOVE heal-poke, it doesn't hurt, its exactly what they want.

Personally heal poke is a very tiresome and obnoxious game and I hate it when the game devolves into poke-fests in mid lane for 10-15 minutes. Frustrates me to death.

No, wrong mentality. Singed and Shen being good at both split pushing and tanky DPS is insignificant. The purpose of a metagame in LoL is so that you can predict what the enemy team is likely to pick, and split pushing is perfect for abusing a tanky DPS metagame. If it helps, don't think of it as "this team has 3 tanky champions, thus it is a tanky DPS team" but instead try and get inside the person's head who is picking the team and figure out what their objective is.

For example, at the moment a godlike team would be Shen, Ashe, Zilean, Olaf, Ryze. The thinking behind it is make a team that has no real counters; very hard to kill, very hard to CC, very hard to outlane. It's considered a tanky DPS line-up because survivability and constant damage are valued more than burst when choosing characters.

But on the other hand, Singed, Udyr, Cho'Gath, Lux, Twisted Fate would not be considered a tanky DPS team, despite having many tanky characters because survivability and constant damage are valued less than tower pushing, tower defending and escape ability when choosing characters.

Saying that because teams are mostly composed of tanky characters, thus we are in a tanky DPS metagame is wrong. Glass cannon teams should never work. Tanky characters in LoL should always outnumber squishy characters. The only reason glass cannons could ever work as forming the majority of a team is if support characters are tremendously overpowered. The way to tell what is the metagame is is to think about what characteristics are currently being searched for and valued out of the roster.

And no, most tanky DPS hate heal poke.

[pilvento]

Thanks Dogmantra for adding me to the OP.
Also this is not my comic but its awesome so its amust for all of you to read it, add it to the OP if u want.

Soraka exelent adventure: http://soraka.blogspot.com/

[ZombyWoof]

You say that as if Riot could pop down to the local computer hardware shop in the morning and have the upgrade bought, installed and fully qualified by that afternoon.

They probably are trying to upgrade, it just takes time to get hold of the correct hardware, install it, then integrate correctly into their current setup.

Unless you're all for Riot to shard the servers further and limit connections by region or timezone, which would pretty much kill the game's popularity.



Not to mention that because of their business model, that just because their player base is doubling every month, it doesn't mean their income is doubling every month as well.




Acquiring the knowledge and skill required, or finding someone to hire who already has it and then teaching him the details of your system, takes a lot of time - time that Riot hasn't had all that much of since the scale of LoL's success became apparent. Sure, if Riot had planned from the beginning for the number of players they have now they could have had the required expertise in place in plenty of time, but they originally expected a much smaller scale success and that kind of planning would have been expensive overkill for what they expected to need.
Translated:

"Riot isn't incompetent in that way, they're merely incompetent in another way."

Bwuh?


Ah, but many of Riot's customers aren't paying. "We just have too many freeloaders. Sorry!" is a very different statement. Also, upgrading a system on a scale anywhere near what the LoL servers have to handle and making sure that the upgrade doesn't screw things up horribly is a very difficult and time consuming task requiring a lot of specialized knowledge and skill, not merely expensive. It is orders of magnitude more difficult than just ordering new hardware and slapping it in place.
First, off, your first statement doesn't make any business sense at all. Do you want these players to become paying customers? Then don't give them a game that goes down twice a day because your servers decide to split themselves in half.

Second off, it's not that much more difficult than hiring new hardware and slapping it in place. GitP for example had exactly that problem a while ago and they found a way to fix it. Basically it means we're down the forums for 30 minutes a day. And that is a bajillion times better than going down for hours at a time randomly or having server maintenance take 4-5 hours longer than initially expected.

Oh and here's the kicker: how much does Giant make on the forums? 0. How much does Riot make on their game? Presumably they turn a profit. They turn a profit by people playing their games and deciding to buy skins. If people can't play their games, then people won't buy skins in which case Riot has exactly 0 income despite the fact that they are still paying their coders, etc. (who are likely salaried). In addition (and this is important mind you) server instability drives people away from the game and prevents people from getting into it. What about all those people who heard about LoL and were like, "Hey, let's try it out! Downloading client... sweet! Boot it up... servers down? Well screw that I'm going to go play Starcraft instead." Customers lost because Riot couldn't figure out how to work their hardware.

It's a really unacceptable way to run a company regardless of how "shocking" their success is, and "we didn't anticipate this many people" is a poor excuse especially since this playerbase growth has been going on for months. Tracking trends and responding to them quickly is the mark of a good company.

Keep in mind, all you who defend Riot, that I really like League and will play it for a long time. It's just... really dumb to claim that this server instability isn't their fault (when it is) and how they can't do anything about it (they can and could have) or how this is all unexpected and they haven't had time to fix things (they have). LoL is great, Riot is awful.

[Spartacus]

Upgrading servers for a forum is a rather different beast from doing so with a game.

[Douglas]

Translated:

"Riot isn't incompetent in that way, they're merely incompetent in another way."

Bwuh?
Incompetence at predicting an inherently unpredictable market is hardly something you can blame them for. Blaming them for failing to correctly guess how many players they'd get is similar to blaming someone for failing to correctly guess who would win the lottery.


First, off, your first statement doesn't make any business sense at all. Do you want these players to become paying customers? Then don't give them a game that goes down twice a day because your servers decide to split themselves in half.
Deciding that you want them to like the game enough to pay doesn't do a damn thing to bring in money right now in order to help pay for the upgrade in the first place. I was not saying "Riot shouldn't care", I was saying "those players aren't contributing their share of what an upgrade would cost". Riot has a huge number of players who are contributing only on the problem side of the issue, making the problem worse but not providing funds to help make fixing it possible.


Second off, it's not that much more difficult than hiring new hardware and slapping it in place. GitP for example had exactly that problem a while ago and they found a way to fix it. Basically it means we're down the forums for 30 minutes a day. And that is a bajillion times better than going down for hours at a time randomly or having server maintenance take 4-5 hours longer than initially expected.

Oh and here's the kicker: how much does Giant make on the forums? 0. How much does Riot make on their game? Presumably they turn a profit. They turn a profit by people playing their games and deciding to buy skins. If people can't play their games, then people won't buy skins in which case Riot has exactly 0 income despite the fact that they are still paying their coders, etc. (who are likely salaried). In addition (and this is important mind you) server instability drives people away from the game and prevents people from getting into it. What about all those people who heard about LoL and were like, "Hey, let's try it out! Downloading client... sweet! Boot it up... servers down? Well screw that I'm going to go play Starcraft instead." Customers lost because Riot couldn't figure out how to work their hardware.
A server handling real-time gaming constantly is a very different thing from a server handling a forum.


It's a really unacceptable way to run a company regardless of how "shocking" their success is, and "we didn't anticipate this many people" is a poor excuse especially since this playerbase growth has been going on for months. Tracking trends and responding to them quickly is the mark of a good company.

Keep in mind, all you who defend Riot, that I really like League and will play it for a long time. It's just... really dumb to claim that this server instability isn't their fault (when it is) and how they can't do anything about it (they can and could have) or how this is all unexpected and they haven't had time to fix things (they have). LoL is great, Riot is awful.
It is their fault, and they can and should and most likely are doing something about it, but - and this is speaking as a professional in the relevant industry - fixing problems with real-time server performance is incredibly complex, to a degree that is difficult to imagine without appropriate experience.

[Joran]

Upgrading servers for a forum is a rather different beast from doing so with a game.

Very much so. Increasing server hardware is not a "throw money at the problem and it's fixed" type situation. Heck, World of Warcraft in the beginning was an utter clusterf*** situation where the server would crash constantly and patch days were a no-go zone.

Anecdotally, League of Legends US Server is much better than it was a year ago. We used to not be able to play on Wednesdays after patches, but now it's free-sailing.

Ideally, League of Legends will continue to see stability improve as time goes on and these complaints will be in the past.

[Neftren]

Yeah, they've definitely come a long way from when I started playing in January.

[Raistlin1040]

I suspected that it would be possible to do a regular run, but I'm still smarting from the time I tried it and the golem ate me for breakfast.

At level 29 (so close to thirty omg) here's what I have runewise.

Tier 3 ArPen Reds
Tier 3 Armor Yellows
Tier 1 CDR blues (that are slowly being upgraded to Tier 3)
1 Tier 1 HP Quint, 1 Tier 3 HP quint.

I skilled Phoenix/Turtle/Phoenix/Bear, using turtle to get some health at wolves but mostly with Phoenix. To be safe, I was running with...I think 1/16/12 picking up Smite Mastery, Veteran's Scars, 1 point in Utility Mastery and then Meditation. Honestly, after dominating so hard with Udyr (even if it was a bot game), I'm willing to pick him up again as my go-to jungler when I don't need to tank as Amumu or Rammus, and don't feel like playing Warwick, but I still need to figure out how to work his jungle better.So, I never got definitive advice on how to run a regular jungle with Phoenix Stance based Udyr.

[Winthur]

Hey Dog, I made a video guide to Prince Jarvan IV (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGTiaywatro), add it to the OP if you please. >_> Somehow those posts ticked me off as a little silly

[term1nally s1ck]

Watch and be amazed. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hc6OrgzyAMs)

Easier rune build to have (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOpsGntBMvk&feature=related)

[toasty]

So, I never got definitive advice on how to run a regular jungle with Phoenix Stance based Udyr.

Run tiger if you want to be a better ganker. Run Phoenix if you want to be a faster jungler. I run tiger, but it brings me low at golem, that's okay if I have a good team and someone leashes golem, but please be aware of that.

In general, the thing about Udyr is he is the most versatile jungler (that's why Stonewall rates him #1). Unlike all the other junglers he really has no set path that is the "best", no matter the situation. If needed, he can start pretty much anywhere with any ability (except bear, really) and still pull out with a pretty decent jungle time, etc. Find out what you like and what fits your play style and roll with it, learn to improvise, and see what happens.

[Brother Oni]

Second off, it's not that much more difficult than hiring new hardware and slapping it in place.

Really? I guess taking the time out for things like design qualification, installation qualification and operational qualification are just for incompetent companies then.

MySQL databases can auto-migrate themselves onto new servers in minutes and do it first time correctly without any errors or flaws.


GitP for example had exactly that problem a while ago and they found a way to fix it.

As others have mentioned running a server here is vastly different for running servers for an online game. A quick look at Riot's job vacanies shows positions like a MySQL data administrator (http://www.riotgames.com/careers/mysql-database-administrator) and lead software engineer (http://www.riotgames.com/careers/lead-software-engineer-game).



How much does Riot make on their game? Presumably they turn a profit.


Not necessarily. A lot of new venture companies are loss making, but they remain in business because their product in development, or news about their product is sufficient to drum up enough money from their investors to keep them afloat for a while.

For example, it's reported that the majority stake that Tencent bought in Riot Games brought in over $350 million, which is enough to keep almost any small company going for a while.



It's a really unacceptable way to run a company regardless of how "shocking" their success is, and "we didn't anticipate this many people" is a poor excuse especially since this playerbase growth has been going on for months.

This I agree with, but as long as they promise to make improvements, then actually deliver the improvements sometime, then I'm happy (EU server, I'm looking at you... :smallsigh:)

I'd also be happier if every other patch didn't break the game on my Windows 7 64 machine, like it did a while ago.


LoL is great, Riot is awful.

Despite my posts, I'm not actually a Riot fanboy. I just don't think you fully appreciate how intricate or complicated their situation is.

[Inhuman Bot]

New Sivir Art.

Damnit, I might spend money on RP for the third time now to get STALKER Brand, who is 6300 IP.

Gragas' new skin is neat.

Teemo's new skin is.. okay.

Kayle's is.. I'm not sure what to say.

Zilean's sucks.

[toasty]

No, wrong mentality. Singed and Shen being good at both split pushing and tanky DPS is insignificant.

You say this... but it doesn't make sense to me. Shen is OP because A) he can split push B) despite split pushing he is still a tanK! (this makes him harder to kill, even if caught). C) unlike a lot of other tanks, he has good sustained damage (the only other one I can think of is Amumu, and Shen is, in my experience, more beefy than amumu). In other words, Shen is a tank-dps that breaks your rule. Of course, this might be why he's so freaking OP. :smalltongue:


The purpose of a metagame in LoL is so that you can predict what the enemy team is likely to pick, and split pushing is perfect for abusing a tanky DPS metagame. If it helps, don't think of it as "this team has 3 tanky champions, thus it is a tanky DPS team" but instead try and get inside the person's head who is picking the team and figure out what their objective is.

Somehow this seems like exactly something I would say. Its good advice, I just need to work out exactly how to follow it up.


But on the other hand, Singed, Udyr, Cho'Gath, Lux, Twisted Fate would not be considered a tanky DPS team, despite having many tanky characters because survivability and constant damage are valued less than tower pushing, tower defending and escape ability when choosing characters.

At the same time, this is a team that too me, is a good example of why "tanky-dps" is so annoying. Singed and Udyr are really hard to pin down and focus (if udyr goes full tank). Cho'gath has tons of CC and is one of the most durable tanks when focused directly. Sure, they might not play exactly like a tank-dps team (they kite more), but the fact that you can have that much CC and that much tanky on a team makes very dificult to pin down and kill them, one of the problems of tanky dps.

At least, that's my take. I'm probably somewhat wrong.


And no, most tanky DPS hate heal poke.

I'd actually like this explained in more depth. Why exactly?

[Arcanoi]

most tanky dps hate heal poke
I'd actually like this explained in more depth. Why exactly?

Most tanky dps characters have no ranged abilities or pokes, and have to fully commit to a fight to deal damage.

[Maeglin_Dubh]

In my experience, though, a tanky DPS team has no trouble wading through the poke to wreck the faces of the healy-pokey team.

[toasty]

Most tanky dps characters have no ranged abilities or pokes, and have to fully commit to a fight to deal damage.

Jarvan, Gragas, Mundo, Morde, Warwick (well, he can at least survive poke), Udyr (again, can survive poke), Shen (because he can just split push to win), Garen (just needs to get his regen passive up a little)

I'm missing people, but besides Xin and Renek (who probably don't do good at poke-heal), that's a lot of tanky-dps heroes.

[ZombyWoof]

Really? I guess taking the time out for things like design qualification, installation qualification and operational qualification are just for incompetent companies then.
I didn't realize this process would take months! And yet it took a completely free game that I was a part of exactly 2 weeks to not only purchase a new server and test it for stability, but migrate the code for their game onto the server. What was a REAL shock is that one person was able to fund this server out of pocket.

So in short, no. And I have the experience to back it up.



As others have mentioned running a server here is vastly different for running servers for an online game. A quick look at Riot's job vacanies shows positions like a MySQL data administrator (http://www.riotgames.com/careers/mysql-database-administrator) and lead software engineer (http://www.riotgames.com/careers/lead-software-engineer-game).
And I'm sure they have had no qualified applicants and are also incapable of contacting a temp agency or hiring a temporary freelancer as a stopgap. For the past 5 months that the job position has been open.



This I agree with, but as long as they promise to make improvements, then actually deliver the improvements sometime, then I'm happy (EU server, I'm looking at you... :smallsigh:)
They haven't made any improvements to their infrastructure.



Despite my posts, I'm not actually a Riot fanboy. I just don't think you fully appreciate how intricate or complicated their situation is.
Their situation is NOT complicated. I don't think you quite understand how businesses work. Companies will fail because they do not react quickly to problems, and LoL's client and server infrastructure has most of the same problems that started when I was first playing six months ago.

Here is their problem: their servers blow.

Here is the solution they should take: quickly fix the problem by either upgrading or replacing their servers.

Here is the solution they have taken: "Sorry guys, looks like you won't be able to play today. Servers broke again. This is just so miserably complicated I don't know how we'd take care of the problem at all..."

Why does no other game or company I've ever played for or with have this problem? Whether it's free-to-play or a for-profit game I have yet to see any successful company have servers that went down this frequently or that had this many problems.

Oh and remember when the servers went back up an hour ago? I'm only going to have to wait another hour to get in and play despite being in "qeue" this whole time!

[Manticoran]

I actually strongly disagree with Djinn's idea for a couple of reasons. In reverse order of importance...

First off is that there are too many types of "Stun". Should a fear also have this effect? What about a snare? Or Amumu's snare, which functions as a stun in basically every way, but isn't actually one?

Second, there are only two stuns in the entire game which are actually single target abilities and are not skillshots. Characters such as Kennen not only hit a wide range of targets with their CC, but CAN'T damage their enemies without stunning them.

Third, CC simply isn't a problem to a well-made, well-coordinated team. I mean, well, it's THE problem, other than damage, but it's easily enough handled. I've been playing with a few very very good players for a bit, and what runs as a tanky DPS team in queue would be laughed at and torn apart. Characters like Ashe, Tristana, and other fairly squishy people are feared far more than any of the tanky DPS except probably Olaf.

EDIT: ZombieWoof, you should offer your services and tell them how much money they should pay you to fix all of their problems, then.

[Arcanoi]

Jarvan, Gragas, Mundo, Morde, Warwick (well, he can at least survive poke), Udyr (again, can survive poke), Shen (because he can just split push to win), Garen (just needs to get his regen passive up a little)

I'm missing people, but besides Xin and Renek (who probably don't do good at poke-heal), that's a lot of tanky-dps heroes.

Gragas, Mundo, Garen and Kaiser never see High-Elo play, and Udyr can survive the poke but that doesn't help his team, especially since he has to physically run up to the enemy team to start fighting. Jarvan doesn't suffer as badly, even though his poke is pretty bad. He's also pretty much considered overpowered. Shen isn't even tanky dps, so yeah.

[Inhuman Bot]

I like how Bloodlines handles it. Most of the long lasting CCs are incapacitates/sleeps, which break on damage. Stuns all last around 0.5 seconds, unless they're ultimates or EXs (like mini ults), where they last maybe 0.6 seconds. It makes CC really USEFUL, just not get CC win game.

Riot has said they're not adding Sleeps.

Anti fun or something like that. :byodood:

[Dogmantra]

Riot has said they're not adding Sleeps.

And I never suggested they were. I merely supplied my opinion on CC.

[term1nally s1ck]

Woof, they've upgraded the servers 3 times in the last 6 months. Lol is EXPLODING. It's getting more popular than anyone expected.

They need more tech staff to be able to apply changes as needed and still keep up with the demands on servers. The replays and magma chamber got delayed cos they had to re-assign staff to other areas.

And Mundo was in CLG's last game of the week. They killed oh god bears with a malz/mundo/mumu/blitz/someone team (Some ranged carry. I forget who.)

[Math_Mage]

The dynamic between tanky DPS comps and heal-poke comps is that the tanky DPS are constantly looking for opportunities to dogpile on one of the heal-poke-y champs, while the heal-poke comp is trying to avoid a direct engagement. Maybe it's my Elo bracket/skill level, but my teams always have huge trouble avoiding that initiation.

But then, what makes a heal/poke comp right now, anyway? Lux, Nidalee, Cho, Gragas, Taric? I know CLG ran Lux, Nid, Taric, Corki, Amumu against DAO way back when; is Amumu strictly for counter-initiation in that comp?

EDIT: Also I'm seeing these Ryze/Blitz/Malz/Mumu etc. comps popping up more and more. Roaming chain stuns to take out anyone they meet, and Blitz to create the gank dynamic in an otherwise 5v5 scenario. Suggestions on how to handle that sort of comp?

[efdf]

I'd actually like this explained in more depth. Why exactly?


too short range
all of them.
you may think they have enough range, they don't

+ not enough burst to force a fight that enemy can't just run from if they have enough range, walls, and healing

only one that really has a chance is Jarvan

[Spartacus]

Why does no other game or company I've ever played for or with have this problem?

Because you didn't play WoW in the early days.

EDIT: Or SC2, frankly, now. I suffer server problems and horribly irritating and experience destroying bugs more often than I do in LoL. At least LoL will let me navigate the interface without constantly yelling at me to click slower.

[Inhuman Bot]

Why does no other game or company I've ever played for or with have this problem? Whether it's free-to-play or a for-profit game I have yet to see any successful company have servers that went down this frequently or that had this many problems.

Riot didn't expect to the game to be so popular, so they cut corners with some ****ty code, IIRC.

[term1nally s1ck]

EDIT: Also I'm seeing these Ryze/Blitz/Malz/Mumu etc. comps popping up more and more. Roaming chain stuns to take out anyone they meet, and Blitz to create the gank dynamic in an otherwise 5v5 scenario. Suggestions on how to handle that sort of comp?

You gotta counterinitiate. All those champs are pretty bad for the few seconds you have between CC cooldowns. If they burst one guy down, then you can immediately jump on them without fear of reprisal.

In ranked, an AoE comp could pretty much clear them out, and cleanse is a must in that sort of game. I'd take cleanse or QSS and flash on everyone, hope the guy that gets caught can get out using them, and pile in the second they blow everything on the one guy, to get at least 1 kill before their cooldowns refresh.

[ZombyWoof]

Woof, they've upgraded the servers 3 times in the last 6 months. Lol is EXPLODING. It's getting more popular than anyone expected.

They need more tech staff to be able to apply changes as needed and still keep up with the demands on servers. The replays and magma chamber got delayed cos they had to re-assign staff to other areas.

They still manage to poop out a new champion ever other week. That no one can play because the servers broke down on! Again!

WOOO PRIORITIES!

[† Dran †]

champion design is not server maintenance. Two totally different fields. They have a strong design team and a weak infrastructure team at the moment.

An really if its that big a deal that you cant play this game cause of the servers why not find a game you can play and stop moaning about this one on the internet.

[Astrella]

Different teams.

[ZombyWoof]

Because it's a really fun game when I get to play it. Because I want to play League of Legends not HoN or any other game I own/have installed.

[term1nally s1ck]

Different people.

The art people can't help with the servers.

The character balance team cannot help with the servers.

The model makers can't help with the servers.

The concept designers can't help with the servers.

I'd even think that the people who code the champions can't help with the servers, being trained in a completely different part of the job.

If you saw an INCREASE in champion creation rates, you'd have a point. As-is, they're just holding position on the character creation with the same people, and hiring in the places that need them to try and keep up. No sense firing people just because a different area needs more hired.

The people who put in the code for maps seem to be able to help out, so I suspect the work with the same type of code, while the people who code in the animations and moves of champions are working at a more superficial level, rather than with the main engine.

Replays are nearly ready, and are to be released when the new launcher comes out in the off season, which has the capability to support older versions of LoL, and hence a full replay system including all data is viable.

[Faulty]

They still manage to poop out a new champion ever other week. That no one can play because the servers broke down on! Again!

WOOO PRIORITIES!

They're a small company running a free to play game that's popularity far exceeded their expectations. They have more champion designers than people who do server stuff, so give them a break.

EDIT: Ninja'd. That's what I get for opening a new post to respond and then stepping away for 10 minutes.

[Inhuman Bot]

They still manage to poop out a new champion ever other week. That no one can play because the servers broke down on! Again!

WOOO PRIORITIES!

This again hell yeah

To be fair, I guess Brackhar, say, having designed 2 champions, or the guy who made GP/Mundo, who probably doing something else. Right?

Edit: and at least they should try to balance old champions instead of nerfing LEE SIN or something.

[toasty]

Gragas, Mundo, Garen and Kaiser never see High-Elo play, and Udyr can survive the poke but that doesn't help his team, especially since he has to physically run up to the enemy team to start fighting. Jarvan doesn't suffer as badly, even though his poke is pretty bad. He's also pretty much considered overpowered. Shen isn't even tanky dps, so yeah.

Gragas: that's a lie. He was nerfed because EU was beginning to abuse his amazing poke/initiation/counter-initiation (he's janna, but a tank). Gragas is a great champion, he's just not popular in the US.

Mundo: this isn't so true anymore. He's going up in viability, see terminally's post.

Kaiser: Kaiser has problems. It doesn't mean that he would become viable with the advent of poke.

Shen: shen isn't standard tanky-dps. He is a tank that deals more damage than most tanks in terms of sustained damage. You can build him more DPS if you choose, there is just no reason to do that.

Jarvan: Yes, Jarvan is OP. So is Shen, so are a lot of heroes, that's not my point.

Garen: Garen might come back in poke-heal comes back. He was very strong when Poke-heal was dominant pre-WCG last year, he's been changed/nerfed/buffed/whatever but he is still the same basic hero, he'd just have to be more DPS-built.

Basically, you're mostly wrong. :smalltongue: There are enough tanky-dps heroes that survive the Poke-heal meta to argue they might do okay. Not to say that poke-heal will evolve (IMO it won't until team global/split push is "dealt with", but that's another story).

[Inhuman Bot]

Kaiser: Kaiser has problems. It doesn't mean that he would become viable with the advent of poke.

Literally the only character with no gap closer or snare!

[toasty]

Bleh what is the "busy" code? the Patcher is giving me the busy signal and I wanna play... :smallsigh:

[efdf]

javascript:setServerStatus(1);

Is anyone willing to post Brand's spells' base damages and ratios? I'm thinking he could be a pretty good jungler.

edit: Jarvan's not really OP. He's a good character for sure, but people are still almost always running Ranged Carry/AP Carry/Support/Tank/Bruiser and there's still bruisers I'd take over him. Maybe it will change though with the Renekton nerf.

[TechnOkami]

Um... 2 things.

1: Can I get added to the magical name list of LoL players? My IGN is almost the same as my GitP name, just swap the O for an 0. (Capital O for a zero).

2: With this thread constantly being extended, do you guys just add the next thread and delete the previous one (as in subscriptions to it, not the thread itself...)?

[Brother Oni]

I didn't realize this process would take months! And yet it took a completely free game that I was a part of exactly 2 weeks to not only purchase a new server and test it for stability, but migrate the code for their game onto the server. What was a REAL shock is that one person was able to fund this server out of pocket.

So in short, no. And I have the experience to back it up.

And how many connections was this server able to maintain, compared to how many Riot's are estimated to have?

Putting it another way, World of Warcraft has over 12 million subscribers spread over 300-odd realms, but each server can only hold about 4000-5000 active people.
Eve Online has a mere 300,000 subscribers, but a maximum server population of over 60,000.
One of these games has one of the most powerful network setups currently in civilian hands.

I'm not disputing that it's possible to just slap some hardware in and fix things instantly, but I don't think it's possible at the scale Riot is running at.



And I'm sure they have had no qualified applicants and are also incapable of contacting a temp agency or hiring a temporary freelancer as a stopgap. For the past 5 months that the job position has been open.


The point of that comment was to highlight the differences in running a server for a webforum, compared to running a server for MOAB game, rather than on Riot's recruitment issues.



They haven't made any improvements to their infrastructure.


Certainly not to the EU server.



Their situation is NOT complicated. I don't think you quite understand how businesses work.


Interesting that you believe that, when you also apparently believe that Riot must currently make a profit.



Companies will fail because they do not react quickly to problems, and LoL's client and server infrastructure has most of the same problems that started when I was first playing six months ago.


I've been playing since beta when GoA ran the EU server. Trust me, things have improved since then, both on the EU and US servers.



Here is their problem: their servers blow.

Here is the solution they should take: quickly fix the problem by either upgrading or replacing their servers.

Here is the solution they have taken: "Sorry guys, looks like you won't be able to play today. Servers broke again. This is just so miserably complicated I don't know how we'd take care of the problem at all..."


I agree with your assessment of the problem. I disagree that a quick fix is possible.
I have no comment on your perception of Riot's attitude.



Why does no other game or company I've ever played for or with have this problem?

You seem to have not played that many MMOs, or games from fledgling companies. I see it all the time and I accept it as part of their development/growth cycle.
If I didn't agree with it, then I would simply take my money and time elsewhere.



Oh and remember when the servers went back up an hour ago? I'm only going to have to wait another hour to get in and play despite being in "qeue" this whole time!

They have regularly maintenance every week which doesn't permit anybody in Europe to play at a decent time unless you're a student.
If you're getting this worked up over an hour, I'd hate to see what you're like if you lost an entire evening every week.

Edit: People have beaten me to the point about different teams with different skill sets. Riot employ receptionists on their staff - would you want them monkeying around with the code or the database?

[toasty]

@edfd: where does that line of code go? :smallfrown:


too short range
all of them.
you may think they have enough range, they don't

+ not enough burst to force a fight that enemy can't just run from if they have enough range, walls, and healing

only one that really has a chance is Jarvan

Hmm... I guess I'll have to take your word for it. The burst thing is a legit complaint, I admit. But I do want to believe that it can be worked around.

[efdf]

press control + L in the busy screen

[toasty]

32 minute queue. I hate my life. I HATE IT.

I am, not, however, going to complain. SInce this game is still cheaper and better than 95% of all MMORPGs I've encountered.

[term1nally s1ck]

Ok, problem has been explained.

Basically, they added new servers while patching.

One of the new boxes failed on the restart, and had to be removed. This leads to having less capacity in a single area than is needed to process the number of people all streaming in at once.

They tried to do an upgrade quickly, without causing extra downtime for players. Sadly, load tests don't adequately test servers for real conditions, and they are still sometimes faulty. Add that to once again higher than expected turnout, and this happens.

[Faulty]

New Sivir splash art.

[Science Officer]

32 minute queue. I hate my life. I HATE IT.

I am, not, however, going to complain. SInce this game is still cheaper and better than 95% of all MMORPGs I've encountered.

I just had a 50 minute wait... and then the client crashed. :smallfrown:

[toasty]

I just had a 50 minute wait... and then the client crashed. :smallfrown:

First time I waited 21 minutes, it crashed, and I haven't been able to stay in queue till now. :smallsigh:

[Arcanoi]

Gragas: that's a lie. He was nerfed because EU was beginning to abuse his amazing poke/initiation/counter-initiation (he's janna, but a tank). Gragas is a great champion, he's just not popular in the US.


There are reasons why he's not popular in the US. And from what I've seen, the US teams beat the EU teams.



Mundo: this isn't so true anymore. He's going up in viability, see terminally's post.


And he just got nerfed back down with today's patch.



Shen: shen isn't standard tanky-dps. He is a tank that deals more damage than most tanks in terms of sustained damage. You can build him more DPS if you choose, there is just no reason to do that.


Shen isn't a tanky DPS. He's a tank who does damage. If Shen can deal well with poke comps, that's because tanks with good initiation and split-push power can deal with poke comps.



Jarvan: Yes, Jarvan is OP. So is Shen, so are a lot of heroes, that's not my point.


My point is that Jarvan might not be able to deal as well with Poke Comps when he gets nerfed.



Garen: Garen might come back in poke-heal comes back. He was very strong when Poke-heal was dominant pre-WCG last year, he's been changed/nerfed/buffed/whatever but he is still the same basic hero, he'd just have to be more DPS-built.


That was mostly because Garen, the champion, was very, very strong when Poke-Heal was dominant.

[toasty]

There are reasons why he's not popular in the US. And from what I've seen, the US teams beat the EU teams.

The last time the an EU team beat the US was a long time ago. A lot has changed since then and I can only hope the EU scene has evolved. SK gaming looks pretty sharp, from what I've seen on Go4LoL.


And he just got nerfed back down with today's patch.

Point conceeded.




Shen isn't a tanky DPS. He's a tank who does damage. If Shen can deal well with poke comps, that's because tanks with good initiation and split-push power can deal with poke comps.

What, exactly, is tanky-dps? DPS that builds tank? tank that builds DPS?

For instance: Is Vlad Tanky DPS? (I say yes. And, fyi, he's a champion that would do decent on a Tanky-DPS team). Is Xin Zhao tanky dps? Is Udyr tanky dps? All of these heroes build differently, yet they are pretty much tank-dps heroes: heroes that have both a good amount of defense (for some reason) and a good amount of offense (for some reason).

Shen is a tank. Of the tanks, he does the most sustained damage. He might not be 100% tanky dps in the sense that Jarvan or Mundo is, but he is, in my mind, pretty close.


That was mostly because Garen, the champion, was very, very strong when Poke-Heal was dominant.

And seeing as I haven't seen hide nor hair of a decent champion since his nerfs long, long ago, I have no idea how to judge him in his current iteration.

[efdf]

What, exactly, is tanky-dps? DPS that builds tank? tank that builds DPS?

For instance: Is Vlad Tanky DPS? (I say yes. And, fyi, he's a champion that would do decent on a Tanky-DPS team). Is Xin Zhao tanky dps? Is Udyr tanky dps?

this is the real issue. teams are still almost invariably AD/AP/Support/Jungle/Wall
it's just you can call Urgot tanky DPS, Ryze tanky DPS, Taric tanky DPS, Olaf tanky DPS, and Cho'Gath tanky DPS and call it a tanky DPS team. and honestly, I don't have a problem with teams like that. longer team fights in my opinion are much more interesting. the only thing you have to avoid is making Urgot and Ryze too tanky or have too much range, because then team fights devolve into smacking the nearest target rather than attempting to pressure the damage dealers.

fyi, Vlad is bad :{ very weak champion

[Eldariel]

There are reasons why he's not popular in the US. And from what I've seen, the US teams beat the EU teams.

Usually though, metagame trends come from EU. Champs like Evelynn, Twisted Fate, Gragas, Malphite, etc. were "discovered" on EU when they saw little-no high level play on the US and then that creeped onto the US scene as well. Likewise, CLG even admitted that SK had a leg up on them strategy-wise during WCG; CLG just adapted faster which allowed them to triumph in the end. There's an interview with Elementz on the subject. Needless to remind people that that particular encounter ended with two games won each; just, CLG got both in the finals and thus went on to win the championship.

That said, CLG has improved since then; I doubt there's a team that is stronger than them right now, on either side of the Atlantic. The other top teams on the US are pretty weak compared to the top EU teams tho, so it's really a matter of whether you compare the very best team or the whole group of top teams. I suppose we'll see everything in Season 1 Finale at the very latest.

Ultimately though, it's probably a good idea to take strategies, champion selections and overall, gamestyles originating on EU seriously, since at least historically they tend to hold up on the US scene once adopted as well.


Certainly not to the EU server.

That's patently false. Chat is up basically constantly on EU. Last week had maybe 4-5 hours of non-update downtime total from what I've observed. The servers are amazing compared to what they've used to be. Maybe you've just been unlucky with your timings?

[Dienekes]

huh, delays kinda sucks.

But anyone else vaguely amused by getting the position on the queue "Over 9000"?

[Eldariel]

huh, delays kinda sucks.

But anyone else vaguely amused by getting the position on the queue "Over 9000"?

Was fun for the first 9000 times. Teehee.

[TechnOkami]

Um... 2 things.

1: Can I get added to the magical name list of LoL players? My IGN is almost the same as my GitP name, just swap the O for an 0. (Capital O for a zero).

2: With this thread constantly being extended, do you guys just add the next thread and delete the previous one (as in subscriptions to it, not the thread itself...)?

...anyone?

[Faulty]

...anyone?

I don't delete the subs because when they stop getting posted in they stop showing up in my CP.

[Dienekes]

Was fun for the first 9000 times. Teehee.

Ahh, I've been lucky, first time I've seen the message. Apparently I'm so tired right now my brain funneled any random meme into the height of hilarity.

[Eldariel]

...anyone?

Patience. Dog made this thread so you'll have to wait for him to get on.

And yeah, no need to remove subscription... If a thread isn't posted in, what does it matter?

[Spartacus]

Um... 2 things.

1: Can I get added to the magical name list of LoL players? My IGN is almost the same as my GitP name, just swap the O for an 0. (Capital O for a zero).

If you want Dogmantra to read your post, I suggest you read his. Specifically, the part where he asks you to bold your name(s) so he can see it more easily.

[TechnOkami]

Patience. Dog made this thread so you'll have to wait for him to get on.

And yeah, no need to remove subscription... If a thread isn't posted in, what does it matter?

Thank you. Just wanted an answer.


If you want Dogmantra to read your post, I suggest you read his. Specifically, the part where he asks you to bold your name(s) so he can see it more easily.

Will do.

For you doggy!: IGN name: Techn0kami, GitP name is self explanatory :smalltongue: NA server.

[Draken]

huh, delays kinda sucks.

But anyone else vaguely amused by getting the position on the queue "Over 9000"?

I was more amused by seeing the number start to roll down from over 9000 at the speed of light a moment ago.

Seriously, the digits just started going down faster than banks two years ago.

[Qwertystop]

I was more amused by seeing the number start to roll down from over 9000 at the speed of light a moment ago.

Seriously, the digits just started going down faster than banks two years ago.

Happens every time, but you should remember that the number it gives is an estimation. You see the little pie-chart timer in the corner of the box? It updates the number shown every time that rolls around, then goes back to estimation. Of course, this is even more hilarious, as it often drops by 100-500 when it does roll around, meaning that even that ultrafast drop estimation is still off by tens per second.

Of course, then it hits "postion in queue: 1" and "time remaining: 1 second" and sticks there for about a minute.

[Dralnu]

So, Brand:
Lanes like a beast. Very minor CC. No escapes. But does ridiculous AOE damage. Passive hurts HP stackers. Highly team-dependant, but if protected can crush the entire enemy team. More desirable than Kog'maw for same role?

[term1nally s1ck]

Wow. I get into a game, and I play with an amumu who would rather gank a lane with kayle and akali in it, rather than the ashe who is stuck mid against a katarina. And then says that ashe should have no problems against kat.

40 CS at like 10 mins, didn't get IE til 25 mins, and didn't get why I was pissed that he ghost-bandage-tantrumed to steal a kill from me.

[St. Viers]

So, Brand:
Lanes like a beast. Very minor CC. No escapes. But does ridiculous AOE damage. Passive hurts HP stackers. Highly team-dependant, but if protected can crush the entire enemy team. More desirable than Kog'maw for same role?

Can he jungle?

[Volatar]

There seems to be a multitude of problems coming down with this patch that is making it so messy. The bad new hardware, some new client bug that is causing crashes on login, AND some weird in-game bugs that are making many games really horrible to play (I heard some reports about Kog'Maw friendly fire for example). Just go to sleep, it probably will be resolved by tomarrow.



In different news, Djinn will be very, very happy. Guinsoo is doing a rework of Gangplank (your guide just became obsolete by the way). Specifically, he is removing the deny mechanic and replacing it with something else.

Source: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo/status/57913947151540224 and other Tweets on his Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo

[St. Viers]

According to guinsoo, the kog-maw hotfix is being worked on.

EDIT: As long as raise morale is replaced with something as interesting, I won't mind, but I liked how he can deny.

[Inhuman Bot]

New Sivir splash art.

Beat you to it by a thread.

Brand is great.

[Draken]

Hmm... Riot's website not working for anyone else? (Also, it looks like the servers went down again).

Edit: website logged. Forget about that part.

Edit: Aaaand. Failed to log again.

Edit: Aaaaand Up.

Edit: Aaaaaaand Down.

Edit: And Up again. Looks like it will remain working now. Probably lag from all the people going to their forums to rage.

[Faulty]

So Brand is awesome. Suuuuper fun, I love his feel, great damage. I think if you run Flash/Ghost and put him on a team with a carry with inherent mobility to like Corki, Tristana or Ezreal and some people who can protect him (Janna, Shen, Zilean, Alistar, etc), he'll totally shred people. I did really well with him the one game I've played, though the enemy was kinda bad and we all did well.

[Dralnu]

Can he jungle?

Likely with proper kiting. Unsure of how efficient.

100% sure he'll be nerfed though. His early game harass and 1v1 capabilities are just ludicrous at the moment. It's like if Cass had higher damage and her Twin Fang had a 2-sec stun. On another note, playing Brand is very fun. :smallbiggrin:

Actually, more like Annie who trades the possibility of an AOE stun for MORE FRIGGIN' DAMAGE RAAAAAGH!!!!

[Spinoza]

In different news, Djinn will be very, very happy. Guinsoo is doing a rework of Gangplank (your guide just became obsolete by the way). Specifically, he is removing the deny mechanic and replacing it with something else.

Source: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo/status/57913947151540224 and other Tweets on his Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo

No...graaahhhhhhhhhhhh

[Volatar]

No...graaahhhhhhhhhhhh

Go play HoN :smalltongue:

[Inhuman Bot]

Go play HoN :smalltongue:

Compare downtimes. People get uppity and surprised when HoN is down for a day.

[Math_Mage]

Thank you. Just wanted an answer.



Will do.

For you doggy!: IGN name: Techn0kami, GitP name is self explanatory :smalltongue:

What server, NA or EU?


Compare downtimes. People get uppity and surprised when HoN is down for a day.

HoN has the advantage of a much smaller playerbase, hence far less to worry about technically.

I don't want to start a LoL vs. HoN discussion here, though. Those are always the most vitriolic and least interesting threads on the LoL forum.

[TechnOkami]

What server, NA or EU?

NA, and I fixed it above.

[Brother Oni]

That's patently false. Chat is up basically constantly on EU. Last week had maybe 4-5 hours of non-update downtime total from what I've observed. The servers are amazing compared to what they've used to be. Maybe you've just been unlucky with your timings?

Quite possibly, knowing my luck. :smallsigh:

I don't play on the EU that much - I just used up my last free IP boost from the previous set of instability issues.

[Moonshadow]

I... really dislike Brand. Really really really dislike him. Nerf him! NERF HIM, I say!
:smallbiggrin:


Also, what kind of Sona ends up with 196 Armor at the end, and is a bigger tank than the actual tank?

Me, thats who >>

But I suppose going full Aura support does that to a girl :3

[Zen Master]

Ok - about the servers?

It's a cash flow problem. They have a free game, with millions of players, requiring entire server parks. Millions of players is wonderful if you are Blizzard, and they all generate a monthly revenue - in advance, no less.

If you're Riot, and they generate a revenue, eventually, hopefully - doling out piles of cash to accomodate all that trafic is an entirely different proposition.

At a guess, I'd say they have to borrow money to update the servers. Based on a free-to-play business model. Yea.

[Faulty]

Maybe it's because I've only played one game with Brand in it (I was Brand and they had a Brand), but Brand does not feel crazy to me. He does great damage but his CC is more inconsistent and/or less versatile than Annie, Anivia or Sion's. He also has absolutely no defensive abilities, compared to a number of other mages: Annie (shield), Sion (shield), Kassadin (blink), Kennen (move speed + defense steroid), LeBlanc (flash), Lux (shield), Morgana (shield), Vladimir (blood pool). All you'll need is to get someone like Akali or Poppy or Xin or basically any tanky or assassiny character up in his grill and without team mates like Janna or Shen or something he'll probably go down pretty quickly.

[Astrella]

Ok - about the servers?

It's a cash flow problem. They have a free game, with millions of players, requiring entire server parks. Millions of players is wonderful if you are Blizzard, and they all generate a monthly revenue - in advance, no less.

If you're Riot, and they generate a revenue, eventually, hopefully - doling out piles of cash to accomodate all that trafic is an entirely different proposition.

At a guess, I'd say they have to borrow money to update the servers. Based on a free-to-play business model. Yea.

According to their release (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=655229) on the events of yesterday it isn't though.

[Dogmantra]

Faulty:
I've seen as much Brand as you have, and I'm not going to judge him, I'm just thinking that you're not comparing him to the right people. From what little I've seen, it seems like he's supposed to work as an AoE nuker, I guess the best comparison I can see would be Malzahar. Basically, I don't think it's fair to compare him to Annie and Kennen (lane dominance CC bots and initiators), Sion (tanky single target burst/melee DPS with stupidly good sustain and good burst), Kassadin, LeBlanc and arguably Lux (assasins, with Lux working as a bizarre ranged support/assassin in certain playstyles), Morgana (support) or Vlad (Ashe but magic) because he's always going to come up short in at least one area. I'm not saying he is or isn't crazy, but I'm saying that comparing him to guys who fulfill other roles won't give the best picture of how good he is. From what I've seen, he's who you pick when you've already got Alistar or Amumu or Galio, with maybe Taric or Janna, Ashe or MF, with Udyr in the jungle. You're set for CC, you'd like some damage, and from the spotlight and seeing him in game (albeit briefly) I really think he does well at the damage part.

[Faulty]

I'm just comparing him to mages in general. Honestly I think the team he'd be best with would be one with good protectors or peelers, people with reliable shields, CC or anti-initiation to protect him, and a self-sufficient carry who can afford not getting the main focus as far as being protected. So a team like Brand, Corki, Shen, Janna, Jarvan IV or something.

[Brother Oni]

At a guess, I'd say they have to borrow money to update the servers. Based on a free-to-play business model. Yea.

Further to Sirro's comment, I doubt it's a cash flow issue, unless they've somehow spent all $350mil they earned in February.

Even if the payment was in installments, that's still money coming in on a regular basis (it'd be interesting to see what their share price is, if they were a public company).

I'm still of the opinion that their runaway success has left them trying to fast track new hardware and their alleged coding shortcuts are now catching up with them.

[Zen Master]

I'm not getting into a speculation-based discussion about Riot Games' economical situation. And I know I started it, so there's that. But ... that they earned 350 million says nothing about what they spent in the same time - and the post linked by Sirro (as far as I could see) doesn't say anything about the cause of their on-going problems with server stability and availability.

So ... I'm entirely convinced Riot has cash-flow problems - I quite frankly cannot see any way they can avoid it - and that is my opinion on the matter.

Absolutely everyone is entitelled to having any other opinion on the matter they like. Also, my sig.

[Tono]

Ill try to find the red post I say yesterday(No garuntees, and I have an advisor appointment to make and I looked at a lot of threads.), but I believe the gist of it was, Plenty of servers(I also remember the term High-end being used, but idk), some new ones failed. Cash-flow was never mentioned as a problem.

Other news, I love karma. (http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h58/Thantonus/karmalong.png) That Garen though at some point was 0/9/3. -.-

[Volatar]

The following two redposts should clear up a lot of questions and speculation on the downtime:

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=655229

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=654620

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

In different news, Djinn will be very, very happy. Guinsoo is doing a rework of Gangplank (your guide just became obsolete by the way). Specifically, he is removing the deny mechanic and replacing it with something else.

Source: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo/status/57913947151540224 and other Tweets on his Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/RiotGuinsoo

YES. I KNEW IT. THANK GOD.

[Neftren]

The following two redposts should clear up a lot of questions and speculation on the downtime:

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=655229

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=654620

Wow, that Q&A was so vague. I appreciate the attempt to let us know what's going on, but it seriously doesn't help when all the answers are some form of "I don't know" or "I couldn't say, because I didn't want to bother our team".

[toasty]

@Gangplank: i knew they were planning on reworking him for a while. He's anti-fun. I'm sad though, I like his quirky playstyle. Then again, maybe they'll make it so that he's actually viable.

[Hyudra]

Played Cassiopeia with the changes. The most annoying bugs seem to still be present, but I do feel a little more effective. (Twin fangs spam only. Haven't seen a huge difference with the ult.) Not sure if it's just all in my head.

One of the bugs that persists crops up when you're using Twin Fangs to shoot down a last couple of enemies. Oftentimes if you get the killing blow via. twin fangs, a dead enemy won't count as being poisoned, so your skill has the long recharge. Annoying when you're aiming to mop up a minion wave or the remnants of a team fight.

The ult remains rather buggy. I had one instance in my last game where I ulted against 3 enemies, two of whom were facing me, and got no stuns. None had Banshee's, none were slowed that I saw (they were tower diving, and they had no problem retreating after the fact.)

I've started building Philosopher's Stone on Cassiopeia, on top of Tear. I enjoy spamming relentlessly, and Philo Stone gives me a ton of lane stayability, the ability to use Miasma without worrying about conservation and a little extra gold. So my item build goes Meki Pendant + Potions (depends what I expect to face in my lane, oftentimes 1 health + 1 mana) > Tear > Boots > Faerie Charm > Philo Stone > Sorc Shoes > Rylai's > Mejai's (if doing well) > Rabadon's > Archangel's > Banshee's. Of course, that's just an outline, but it's my general plan, adjusted for as needed by game flow & enemy composition.

I find this makes for a very consistent game. Meki at 1st gives me the mana I need to hit 1.2k gold and the Philo Stone gives me the extra mana regen I need to use my skills constantly. By the time I sell the Philo stone, my tear & Mregen runes have kicked in. The main drawback is that it leaves me pretty vulnerable as far as itemization goes and is fairly reliant on the team to peel enemies off me and/or just watch my back.

Still, I had a spree of three great games earlier today, (20-3-10, 13-6-21 and 18-9-19) benefiting from a TF mid and Cho'Gath laning partner who I kept playing with after the first game went well. Extra gold from TF + my being a champ that's very good at farming meant I was getting a bonus 10-14 gold per minion wave as I pushed up. Cho was surprisingly useful as a teammate, as he punished foes who tried to close in on me, and between the two of us, we always had something to finish off the harassed enemies. Between all that, the kills and the assists, I had several games where I had gold to spare (Bought all buff potions, had 2.5k gold left in bank) before many other players had a fifth or sixth item purchased.

[Volatar]

New Sivir art looks much better. Sivir actually looks female now, as opposed to a man with massive boobs. :smalltongue:

[Hyudra]

New Sivir art looks much better. Sivir actually looks female now, as opposed to a man with massive boobs. :smalltongue:

and a waist smaller around than her thigh.

[Volatar]

and a waist smaller around than her thigh.

I don't hold that against her. All MY fat goes to my thighs, never my waist. :smallbiggrin:

[Dogmantra]

Unlisted change in the latest patch: Evelynn now has new animations that make her walking look less impossible.

[Faulty]

http://img812.imageshack.us/img812/6889/winningspree.jpg

Finally off my terrible losing spree.

[Dallas-Dakota]

@Gangplank: maybe they'll make it so that he's actually viable.

WHATAREYOUTALKINGABOUTHEISTOTALLYVIABLE.

[toasty]

http://img812.imageshack.us/img812/6889/winningspree.jpg

Finally off my terrible losing spree.

You need to branch out and stop playing AP-Carries. :smalltongue:


WHATAREYOUTALKINGABOUTHEISTOTALLYVIABLE.

Meh, he's kinda like trymedere I feel like. Viable if your opponents don't know how to handle him.

Edit jiji finally got to #1. :smallcool:

[Inhuman Bot]

You have great taste in freeware.

The following two redposts should clear up a lot of questions and speculation on the downtime:

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=655229

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=654620

tl;dr PR bull**** that's been going on for months, I guess.

[Faulty]

You need to branch out and stop playing AP-Carries. :smalltongue:

http://img858.imageshack.us/img858/9629/corkied.jpg

Acceptable? :smalltongue:

[Volatar]

So, I realized I pretty much (apart from when I tank) only play female champions. Annie, Ashe, Janna, Lux, Soraka, Tristana.

And who did I just buy?

Sivir :smallbiggrin:

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

So...after reading FAR to much complaining on the Riot forums, I wrote this: LINK (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=658554)

Thoughts are appreciated, preferably on the LoL forum thread.

[Winthur]

YES. I KNEW IT. THANK GOD.

Gangplank called. He's very sad about the nerf, in fact...


*puts on sunglasses*
he can't deny that he's unhappy.

In other news, this is the best thing about Shaco hands down. Those few seconds of bliss that comes as you wait patiently for the inevitable.
http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/2365/poormummy.jpg (http://img853.imageshack.us/i/poormummy.jpg/)

trollface.jpg

[Neftren]

So, I realized I pretty much (apart from when I tank) only play female champions. Annie, Ashe, Janna, Lux, Soraka, Tristana.

And who did I just buy?

Sivir :smallbiggrin:

I only play female characters. This is mostly in part because a large number of the carries are female.

[Volatar]

I only play female characters. This is mostly in part because a large number of the carries are female.

You only play 3 champions :smalltongue:

[Faulty]

So I have 10 consecutive victories in my match history for the first time.

http://img848.imageshack.us/img848/6725/10wins.jpg

Woooo!

[Joran]

So I have 10 consecutive victories in my match history for the first time.

http://img848.imageshack.us/img848/6725/10wins.jpg

Woooo!

And all games over .500 for K/D. Very nice.

I play tanks mostly, so my K/D is very much below .500. Might be close to the Mendoza line.

Heck, when I play Ashe, I usually have a crappy K/D since I play ultra-conservative.

[Faulty]

And all games over .500 for K/D. Very nice.

Not quite. 7/4 Sion game (was soloing top vs. two argh) and 6/4 Brand game. Still quite proud. Thanks. :3

[Raveypoos]

YAH! Galio buffs again! but a small damage nerf to Righteous Gust, though.

[Neftren]

So I have 10 consecutive victories in my match history for the first time.

http://img848.imageshack.us/img848/6725/10wins.jpg

Woooo!

The closest I came was 9/10. Nicely done. :smalltongue:

[PhoeKun]

Not quite. 7/4 Sion game (was soloing top vs. two argh) and 6/4 Brand game. Still quite proud. Thanks. :3

...What's the formula for calculating K/D ratio if 7/4 and 6/4 aren't plus .500? :smallconfused:

I've got your ratio with Sion in that game as .634, for your Brand game I'm showing you went .600 even. Am I missing something, or are we just looking from different ends of the sabremetric pond, here?

[Joran]

...What's the formula for calculating K/D ratio if 7/4 and 6/4 aren't plus .500? :smallconfused:

I've got your ratio with Sion in that game as .634, for your Brand game I'm showing you went .600 even. Am I missing something, or are we just looking from different ends of the sabremetric pond, here?

You're calculating the same way I am. Kills Divided by Death = K/D. So, when I said .500, I meant every game Faulty had more kills than deaths. Either way, major kudos.

Aren't ratios 1:1 or 2:1? I use "positive kill death ratio" as short hand for Kills > Deaths, but I don't think that's proper use of the terms. =P

[Volatar]

Aren't ratios 1:1 or 2:1? I use "positive kill death ratio" as short hand for Kills > Deaths, but I don't think that's proper use of the terms. =P

Actually, that is proper use. Simply take the 7/4 as a literal division problem. Positive is greater than 1. Negative is less than 1

[PhoeKun]

You're calculating the same way I am. Kills Divided by Death = K/D. So, when I said .500, I meant every game Faulty had more kills than deaths. Either way, major kudos.

Aren't ratios 1:1 or 2:1? I use "positive kill death ratio" as short hand for Kills > Deaths, but I don't think that's proper use of the terms. =P

It's not a proper term usage, no. I should have said percentage, but I got all caught up in the LoL terminology and obsession with ratios, so I let that affect my word choice. :smalltongue:

edit: also, the formula is Kills + Deaths / Kills. That's your K/D percentage.

[Volatar]

Actually, that is proper use.

It's not a proper term usage, no.

SHOWDOWN TIME! :smallcool:

[PhoeKun]

SHOWDOWN TIME! :smallcool:

A Kills/Deaths calculation would provide (properly) a KD ratio. (So you're right).

Joran and I were both performing Kills+Deaths/Kills, which is properly stated as KD percentage. (So I'm right. And was wrong).

And either way, Faulty went positive on each and every one of those games, barring some incredibly weird statistical calculation I've never heard of. So... you know, yeah.

[Volatar]

I personally aim for 2:1, Kills+Assists:Deaths. Generally I am able to obtain it these days with the characters I am competent with.

[ZombyWoof]

If we're including assists I shoot for a 4:1. With straight kills I aim for a bare minimum of 2:1.

EDIT: Unless I'm playing, like, Janna. In which case I aim to break the lol servers with how many assists I got.

(it takes about 3)

[term1nally s1ck]

Kills+Deaths/Kills means nothing, to be honest.

I don't know if you mean Kills + (Deaths/Kills), or (Kills+Deaths)/Kills.

In the first case, it's your number of kills plus a hopefully small amount. You can't analyse a thing, because a guy who goes 17-0 gets the same number as the guy who went 1-16.

In the second, it's a number you want as close to 1 as possible, and it goes off above that a lot, and is never below 0. Weird way to do it, when you can just go kills/deaths which tells you their average efficiency.

A negative k/d ratio does not exist. A negative k/d spread does.

[Eldariel]

Jungle Shen OP in 3v3? You decide!

http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/3576/jungleshen.png

The game was all sorts of silly; Akali took the most damage [I was second], I dealt the most damage, 3 players had doublekills which, in 3v3, is quite the achievement; I got to steal one Dragon and two Reds 'cause we had Smite and they didn't and Shen dashes walls, and all that goof stuff. I actually healed myself for over 12k with just Vorpal Blades, and we had great success with the strategy of "focus Mordekaiser".

Oh, and first item on Shen? Well, Madred's Razor, of course! Bloodrazor waited until I had finished Aegis, FoN & Boots and got the Giant's Belt tho. In fact, I got the Belt second for some extra Ki Strike damage.

[Joran]

If we're including assists I shoot for a 4:1. With straight kills I aim for a bare minimum of 2:1.

EDIT: Unless I'm playing, like, Janna. In which case I aim to break the lol servers with how many assists I got.

(it takes about 3)

Well, she is the Goddess Sl** of Assists.

I like to judge myself based on "stupid deaths". I've had some horrid K/D ratios, but getting murdered while the rest of my team aces their team makes me smile inside.

P.S. Any thoughts on solo top Mundo? I've had at least three Mundos ask for solo top (over Irelia and Ashe) and every one of them epic failed during laning. The last one managed to turn it around during the mid to late game, but he started out 0-6 =P

I have a feeling this is going to be a "it depends" type answer =P

[term1nally s1ck]

Mundo is an amazing solo....if he plays smart. Last hit and harass with dem cleavers, and let them push your lane just enough that you can last hit safely nearer tower.

[Dogmantra]

I have my own sort of ratio that I judge to see how well I did.

(Fun had + ½ contribution to team)/rage induced to me and anyone playing who I care about

It is a good measure I find. It is half contribution to team because screw lame things like winning. Tankzreal was one of the most fun games I've ever had.

[toasty]

HotshotGG doesn't like Roaming. (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=658944)

Thoughts? Personally, I haven't done much roaming, I usually go lane till level 4 with alistair and then gank (well that's what I've done the last 2 times I roamed), but it I'm not at all an experienced roaming alistair. I need more experience roaming alistair and taric.

[Spartacus]

Aren't ratios by definition always positive?

[PhoeKun]

Kills+Deaths/Kills means nothing, to be honest.

I don't know if you mean Kills + (Deaths/Kills), or (Kills+Deaths)/Kills.

In the first case, it's your number of kills plus a hopefully small amount. You can't analyse a thing, because a guy who goes 17-0 gets the same number as the guy who went 1-16.

In the second, it's a number you want as close to 1 as possible, and it goes off above that a lot, and is never below 0. Weird way to do it, when you can just go kills/deaths which tells you their average efficiency.

A negative k/d ratio does not exist. A negative k/d spread does.

I'm not doing very well today. (Kills+Deaths)/Kills. It's the same formula used to calculate winning percentage, and it's generally easier to write out/more precise than a ratio. A positive percentage is over .500, a negative percentage is sub .500. It's useful in tracking every other sport known to man, I don't see why e-sports would be so radically different.

Regardless of what I'm using to calculate statistics and how much I may care about it, it is completely useless to enter a game with a desired set of statistics in mind. Good stats rise from good play, and good play rises from a desire to play well. That should be your goal. Statistical analysis helps us provide historical context (to a certain, somewhat flawed degree) for a player's performances, but in the heat of the moment, the player's own awareness of his or her stats is usually a detriment to the team. Knowing what it's going to take to win and working to put your team in a position to achieve that should always be the number one goal when playing, and targeting a specific level of kills and assists over deaths (or indeed, even worrying about the number of times you died as opposed to worrying about how you died) will almost always take away from your performance.

[toasty]

Aren't ratios by definition always positive?

They aren't below 0 if that's what you mean. But if its below 1 its a "negative" ratio in context.

[term1nally s1ck]

(Kills+Deaths)/Kills?

Uhhh.

Unless you have negative deaths, that's at least 1. No matter what.

And the more deaths you get, the higher it goes....

If you mean Kills/(Kills+Deaths), I could see it.

EDIT: And the ratio between 3 and -6 is 1:-2, a negative ratio. They just can't come up in games where there's only positive stats to deal with, except in some odd measurements.

[Eldariel]

I don't judge my own play by archaic things like kills, deaths and assists. The only relevant meter is if I made mistakes. If dying was indeed the best thing to do (to save multiple allies, a last ditch effort to steal Baron that would seal the game, getting killing spree gold off some target in trade, generating a scenario where the team can do Dragon or w/e since smite is dead, etc.), I ignore it. It was a good line of play.

If I get caught helping my teammates and die because of that, I likewise file it away as teammates' mistake and make a mental note to at most notify them that they're making the mistake next time it happens. Bigger mistakes I find are things I don't do; if I do well but could've done better, those are the learning experiences where I know I did bad. Oft-times games that are complete stomps reveal those since there are so many cases where we could get kills but did not. And if I get a kill due to enemy's mistake, I don't count that as any skill of my own other than "abusing mistakes". Which, of course, is a fine skill to have but does not make you a master.


This, of course, is only the assessment I use to improve my play (and, as a corollary, to assess how well the other players played). After all, the most important thing is if you enjoyed the game. But if I play ranked, I'll play to win. If I play normal, I'll do whatever the heck. Though I still try to stay sharp technically but I might do that on Jungle Janna rather than Solo Anivia.

[PhoeKun]

(Kills+Deaths)/Kills?

Uhhh.

Unless you have negative deaths, that's at least 1. No matter what.

And the more deaths you get, the higher it goes....

If you mean Kills/(Kills+Deaths), I could see it.

...I do. I don't know what the hell is wrong with me. I can perform the calculation just fine, but when I have to describe it I somehow wind up derping the whole thing up and transposing the relevant information.

Sorry for the confusion.

[Nargan]

How come you guys on the US server get to play as Brand? On the EU server he isn't available :(

[efdf]

I judge my play by how many Leviathan stacks I have

[Astrella]

I judge my play by how many Leviathan stacks I have

Teehee. Then again, not everyone is you, efdf.

[Spartacus]

How come you guys on the US server get to play as Brand? On the EU server he isn't available :(


Isn't available, or isn't free? New champions tend to be free two weeks after they come out, as the next new champion comes out.

[Qwertystop]

just got an incredibly good game. Only my second time soloing mid, and look what happened:
http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/1864/lolkf.png

[Eldariel]

Isn't available, or isn't free? New champions tend to be free two weeks after they come out, as the next new champion comes out.

The patch hasn't gone live on EU yet, far as I know. At least Heart of Gold still grants armor, so...

[ZombyWoof]

Is there some silly bad build guide for sivir going around or something? Every sivir this week has been building manamune->bloodrazor. For that price they could get 2 bloodthirsters!

[Volatar]

HotshotGG doesn't like Roaming. (http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=658944)

Thoughts? Personally, I haven't done much roaming, I usually go lane till level 4 with alistair and then gank (well that's what I've done the last 2 times I roamed), but it I'm not at all an experienced roaming alistair. I need more experience roaming alistair and taric.

I personally love roaming. It breaks the standard laning phase, and makes the game much more fun and dynamic. I enjoy roaming as Annie, but am still unsure when to start roaming around. 2? 3? 4? 6? I have tried all of the above, and while they all work I don't know what is ideal.


just got an incredibly good game. Only my second time soloing mid, and look what happened:
http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/1864/lolkf.png

High five for the same Gmail Theme! :smallbiggrin:

[Douglas]

Manamune is good for allowing more boomerang/ricochet spam while also boosting damage, but I'd agree bloodrazor is trash on Sivir. Her ult gives a lot of attack speed already, and the special bonus magic damage doesn't work with either BB or Ricochet.

[Frankelshtein]

Is there some silly bad build guide for sivir going around or something? Every sivir this week has been building manamune->bloodrazor. For that price they could get 2 bloodthirsters!

Personally, I build her Tear/Catalyst > Manamune/Bveil > Bloodthirsters. I'm not sure about viability nowadays (I have not played her in a while) but that build gives her a great early/mid, and scales very well into late game.

EDIT: I also don't see Bloodrazor as viable on her, except for some very specific situations. Although again, I haven't played her in a while, so I'm not sure what the current viewpoint on her is.

Also, is Sivir still viable in ranked? Every time I suggest her in ranked (low 1300s) I get very strong negative responses. Additionally, Elementz seems to dislike her as well. I know she has been nerfed pretty badly, and that she isn't on the level of say, Ashe, but is she all that bad?

EDIT 2: Space Gmail is best Gmail

[ZombyWoof]

Manamune is good for allowing more boomerang/ricochet spam while also boosting damage, but I'd agree bloodrazor is trash on Sivir. Her ult gives a lot of attack speed already, and the special bonus magic damage doesn't work with either BB or Ricochet.
Manamune isn't bad on her, but I don't feel like she's spammy enough to take advantage of it. If you're running out of mana I'd rather see the cheap-as-sin Chalice or just give you blue buff.

But really I don't understand why every single one of them is like "MUST GET BLOODRAZOR!" it's a great item... on champs who aren't Sivir!

[Qwertystop]

High five for the same Gmail Theme! :smallbiggrin:

Knew I should have cropped that out :smalltongue:

[Eldariel]

Is there some silly bad build guide for sivir going around or something? Every sivir this week has been building manamune->bloodrazor. For that price they could get 2 bloodthirsters!

At least they aren't building a friggin' Chalice of Harmony, like half of the Miss Fortunes I've seen in non-Ranked games lately...

[Dogmantra]

Oh man, had an awesomely amusing moment. Trying to teach my friend how to mid, he's not great so I won pretty easily, so we did an experiment. I surrendered just after finishing the nexus then he surrendered right after that. His nexus began to explode, the game paused and started going back towards mine. Then it turned around and started towards his again, but didn't get there in time. The result was a victory screen for me in the middle of mid lane.

[Silverraptor]

Oh man, had an awesomely amusing moment. Trying to teach my friend how to mid, he's not great so I won pretty easily, so we did an experiment. I surrendered just after finishing the nexus then he surrendered right after that. His nexus began to explode, the game paused and started going back towards mine. Then it turned around and started towards his again, but didn't get there in time. The result was a victory screen for me in the middle of mid lane.

You better have screenshotted it Dog.

*Prepares the pitchforks*

[Eldariel]

You better have screenshotted it Dog.

*Prepares the pitchforks*

How do you take screenshots in-game without using actual video capturing software, at any rate? I know for a fact if you try to screenshot with Prn Scr, all you get is a black screen due to layering (same reason Prn Scr doesn't work with standard settings on media players, for example).

[term1nally s1ck]

Manamune warmogs atmas is a good sivir build if your team is too squishy as-is. Walk into middle of fight, turn into AoE death machine of doom.

In other news, I finally learned to ranged carry effectively. Ashe is by far the best one to learn. kite kite kite kite, hide behind tanks and kill everything.

3 normal games since I got the hang of her: 8-1-1, 10-8-15, 16-3-12.

That's a .739 for the statisticians among you, and a 5.17 KA/D ratio.

[Astrella]

Print screen - paste in paint works for me. :smallconfused:

[Eldariel]

Print screen - paste in paint works for me. :smallconfused:

Huh. Well, then. I must have some settings effed up. Unless you run it in Windowed mode?

[Astrella]

Nope. Full-screen mode.

[Eldariel]

Nope. Full-screen mode.

What the deuce? All I get is a black screen if I do that ._.

[Dogmantra]

What the deuce? All I get is a black screen if I do that ._.

Same. I'm going to put it down to different settings/video cards/drivers.

[Eldariel]

Same. I'm going to put it down to different settings/video cards/drivers.

Video card/drivers wouldn't make sense since it should overlap with other programs. Settings, on the other hand, seems incredibly logical.

[Brother Oni]

It's a DirectX thing.

I remember on one of my old computers that if I tried to screengrab with hardware acceleration enabled, I got a black screen. If I disabled it and went with full software rendering, I could screen grab normally.

These days I think it's dependent on what flavour of Windows you have. You also don't need full blown video capturing software, a graphics program with image grab function will do it as well.

[Eldariel]

It's a DirectX thing.

I remember on one of my old computers that if I tried to screengrab with hardware acceleration enabled, I got a black screen. If I disabled it and went with full software rendering, I could screen grab normally.

Interesting. So am I to assume that Dog and I are running Windows 7 64bit with DirectX 11 while e.g. Sirro is running an earlier version?

[Faulty]

Yeah I got my math wrong because I am REALLY BAD AT MATH HA HA HA OH MAN and like the whole discussion about it confused me. :(

[ZombyWoof]

Manamune warmogs atmas is a good sivir build if your team is too squishy as-is. Walk into middle of fight, turn into AoE death machine of doom.

In other news, I finally learned to ranged carry effectively. Ashe is by far the best one to learn. kite kite kite kite, hide behind tanks and kill everything.

3 normal games since I got the hang of her: 8-1-1, 10-8-15, 16-3-12.

That's a .739 for the statisticians among you, and a 5.17 KA/D ratio.
Ashe is friggin' NUTS ever since they perked IE back up.

EDIT: Whenever I duo with my friend I get retarded teams... something tells me his ELO is a lot lower than mine.

[Math_Mage]

Ashe is friggin' NUTS ever since they perked IE back up.

EDIT: Whenever I duo with my friend I get retarded teams... something tells me his ELO is a lot lower than mine.

On a related note, I actually feel like I get really bad teams whenever I duo with anyone, good or bad; but with a 4-man premade, the pubbie is usually good. I dunno what that says about, well, anything. Just throwing it out there.

[Dralnu]

An AD evelyn just roflstomped my pub team. All 4 of her deaths were to me, the oracle + thornmail shen, because she stubbornly would autoattack me until she killed herself. End of the game she built 2 IE's and was almost done her third.

I must say I've never seen that build before.

[Spartacus]

Interestingly, Duo Queue actually inflates your ELO compared to what it would be normally.

[TechnOkami]

...is an AP Renekton a viable build? Or should he- in fact because of his recent nerf, how should he be played?

[Volatar]

...is an AP Renekton a viable build? Or should he- in fact because of his recent nerf, how should he be played?

The nerf is actually a buff if you build more than 50 bonus AD on him.

[Math_Mage]

...is an AP Renekton a viable build? Or should he- in fact because of his recent nerf, how should he be played?

Er...only his ult scales with AP, and that poorly. I can't imagine the nerfs actually changed much about how you want to build him. They just make him less effective with a regular build--they don't make any unconventional builds better. Except, I think the damage on Slice & Dice got upped. Maybe that'll affect skill builds, I dunno.

[Neftren]

How do you take screenshots in-game without using actual video capturing software, at any rate? I know for a fact if you try to screenshot with Prn Scr, all you get is a black screen due to layering (same reason Prn Scr doesn't work with standard settings on media players, for example).

I just use Steam's screenshot feature.

[toasty]

On a related note, I actually feel like I get really bad teams whenever I duo with anyone, good or bad; but with a 4-man premade, the pubbie is usually good. I dunno what that says about, well, anything. Just throwing it out there.

Which is funny. 90% of the 4-man queue pubbies I have suck. Hard.

[ZombyWoof]

One leaver, one guy who bought six boots, and a 2/12 xin.

What is it with LoL today?

EDIT: And a Veigar who thought he was awesome because his team kept focusing me in a teamfight XD

[term1nally s1ck]

4-6-15

3-7-22.

How does one get such scores as ashe? I do not comprehend how I did this.

[Eldariel]

4-6-15

3-7-22.

How does one get such scores as ashe? I do not comprehend how I did this.

Easily. I do that with Anivia, occasionally.

[Raistlin1040]

Ugggggggh. Just played a game as jungleWW. I went 7/8/16 (Not a great score but nothing to scoff at). My team was me, Fiddles, Nocturne, Kayle and Maokai. Their team was Nunu, Renekton, Kennen, Gragas, and Blitzcrank. Their Gragas, Nunu, and Blitzcrank all ended the game with around 4K HP and over 150 resists. I build a Black Cleaver early on and was shredding them anyway, but our Fiddles spent the whole game complaining that they had resists, yet refused to buy sell his Stompers for Sorc shoes and only built a voidstaff at the very end. Epic lose.

[Neftren]

So anyone know when the new rotation is coming up?

[Math_Mage]

4-6-15

3-7-22.

How does one get such scores as ashe? I do not comprehend how I did this.

Tough laning phase but good positioning and overall play, with teammates who did well. Is that a good guess?

[Neftren]

Tough laning phase but good positioning and overall play, with teammates who did well. Is that a good guess?

Yeah honestly, as long as you're getting assists or kills, it doesn't really matter.

[ZombyWoof]

4-6-15

3-7-22.

How does one get such scores as ashe? I do not comprehend how I did this.
I find with Ashe I'm either really lucky and get the kills or not.

[Math_Mage]

I find with Ashe I'm either really lucky and get the kills or not.

I find that when I play League of Legends I either win or lose. :smalltongue:

[Neftren]

I find with Ashe I'm either really lucky and get the kills or not.

That's why I prefer Caitlyn. Not as much guesswork and random luck involved.

[Arbitrarity]

Ugggggggh. Just played a game as jungleWW. I went 7/8/16 (Not a great score but nothing to scoff at). My team was me, Fiddles, Nocturne, Kayle and Maokai. Their team was Nunu, Renekton, Kennen, Gragas, and Blitzcrank. Their Gragas, Nunu, and Blitzcrank all ended the game with around 4K HP and over 150 resists. I build a Black Cleaver early on and was shredding them anyway, but our Fiddles spent the whole game complaining that they had resists, yet refused to buy sell his Stompers for Sorc shoes and only built a voidstaff at the very end. Epic lose.

Sorc shoes are ineffective against MR.

People don't understand this very well. Flat Magic Pen has the best effects against opponents who resistances in the first place. Saying "build magic pen" to counter MR is wrong, UNLESS you mean void staff.

[term1nally s1ck]

Tough laning phase but good positioning and overall play, with teammates who did well. Is that a good guess?

Nope, dominated laning phase, and teammates went barely positive. Took a massive comeback to win the games. And yeah, the low deaths generally says it was good play.

[Faulty]

I don't see how it's really luck. I almost never go like... 7/3/6 or 4/0/5 or something even like that. Either you get a lot of kills or a lot of assists or you do crap and have twice as many deaths as either and I think it just depends on your play and your teams other damage, etc.

[Flechair]

I find that when I play League of Legends I either win or lose. :smalltongue:

This.

Except when I play with a couple of my friends. Then it's-

"I find that when I play League of Legends, I either dominate the early game and win around 25-35 minutes or surrender at 20."

[Neftren]

This.

Except when I play with a couple of my friends. Then it's-

"I find that when I play League of Legends, I either dominate the early game and win around 25-35 minutes or surrender at 20."

This is basically how it goes for me. Games seldom last longer than 35-40 if we're doing well. If poorly, it's surrender at 24 or so.

[ZombyWoof]

Nope, dominated laning phase, and teammates went barely positive. Took a massive comeback to win the games. And yeah, the low deaths generally says it was good play.
I feel like Ashe is one of those champions who can just ROLL her lane except in certain situations. I remember my first time laning against irelia once I realized that being stupidly aggressive with Ashe pays dividends.

I swear her jungler spent more time in my lane than the jungle :smallyuk:

Really the only issues I've had so far are Twitch, Corki (even then he was, well, a REALLY GOOD corki), and (sort of) Annie. I only say sort of because really while the first kill was me being stupid, the second kill was because my Shen screwed up. And he even admitted it after XD He was like, "Oh my god I can't believe that happened."

[Neftren]

I feel like Ashe is one of those champions who can just ROLL her lane except in certain situations. I remember my first time laning against irelia once I realized that being stupidly aggressive with Ashe pays dividends.

I swear her jungler spent more time in my lane than the jungle :smallyuk:

Really the only issues I've had so far are Twitch, Corki (even then he was, well, a REALLY GOOD corki), and (sort of) Annie. I only say sort of because really while the first kill was me being stupid, the second kill was because my Shen screwed up. And he even admitted it after XD He was like, "Oh my god I can't believe that happened."

Yeah, Irelia is extremely vulnerable to early game harass. Also, I roll Ashe as Caitlyn, unless said Ashe is running Armor Seals and Health Quints, at which point we're mostly evenly matched.

I feel like Ashe could do better than Corki at harass (doesn't Ashe outrange Corki?), though Corki has a better escape.

[Arbitrarity]

Phosphorus Bomb has better range and minion penetration. It also gimps Ashe's AA's in an extended exchange. Missiles are more spammable than Volley by a longshot. Finally, Ashe can't pin down Corki like she can other champions (i.e. Karthus) with frost arrows, since Corki has Valkyrie.