Unfortunately, I followed up qualifying with more ranked soloqueing but I slumped (I believe I was at 15-17, 1120; my elo was every so slowly but steadily dropping) and stop enjoying the game so I quit entirely. I would certainly have enjoyed having all chat off by default back then, though honor/etc wouldn’t have stopped from deealing with imbelciles on my own team. This was a time, and I can’t recall why, where I stopped ignoring idiots for some reason.
My entire ranked career was a parade of people who thought they had a deep understanding of the game and then would criticize every little move someone made (whether it was me or someone else in game). It was kind of remarkable; it’s weird to see someone critiquing small things but then unable to do something simple like push their own lane when another lane is ganged up on. I digress.
Also, if Chiffy’s already played his placement games and you duo with him, your entire team will be at at a disadvantage, as he’ll be high elo, and the intermediate elo of your team will be lower than the other team (so you might expect people to have problems.) If he hasn’t played too many placement games yet (or not done super well), then you’d do better with him. Even the pros duo queue at low elo to get those games out of the way.
I know how that stuff works; I did some duoing with MX when he was an elite player* at 1500 while I was !1200. Obviously the difference there isn’t as severe, but it produced some noticeably imbalanced lanes when we played together (obviously, people “fresh off the bus” on our team who were likely headed in the wrong direction).
Yeah, basically they always have to follow if their lane roams in solo queue. There are no exceptions to this rule because no matter how many times you ping or warn people to back because there’s a 4-man dive incoming, they will get dived and they will die. Your team retreating to an inner turret and waiting for the gank squad to leave is never something that happens. Anyhow, if your team is on top of their game, cleaning up a 3-4 man dive is usually pretty easy if they’ve taken a few tower shots.
I’ve never played ranked more then twice in my entire time playing loL (since beta). I just really dislike the pressure behind seeing your rank. It’a not like playing ranked means anything either. There is really no difference between it and Normals, except normals don’t have a unnecessary external pressure.
And people usually take ranked more seriously so you tend to get better team compositions and generally better play. I guess you’d probably see that at high elo normal, but I bet you also still see a bit of trolling there too. But it also sounds like you don’t really care about that.
Hey, if I can in any way avoid playing against strong team comps, I’m up for it. Sure, your teams composition might not be very good, but there is a good chance for the enemys to also be poor, which is nice. Plus, seeing more variety is always fun. And I haven’t ever noticed a lack of drive to win.
It’s not a lack of drive to win. But if I’m trying out a new champ, first maybe I’ll play a bot game (I might skip this if the champ isn’t that complicated). Then I’ll play a few normal games. I’ll most likely be pretty bad with this champ (like when I laned my bad Karthus against a pretty good Leblanc and got destroyed). Then when I get decent with that champ, I’ll play it in ranked. Maybe it all works out with the ELO, but I know my play in normal is way more erratic (trying different champs and builds, etc.) than my play in ranked.
Oh well, I think for me it balances out. I can afford to play a hero like Heimerdinger or Karma and not be bitched out. I just have had bad experiences with Hon and the way their ranking system worked, because I would constantly worry about losing ranking, and go back to the 1500’s (starting ELO) which was annoying.
To each his own, I guess. But I much prefer just not having any sort of visible ranking.
Normals have Elo aswell, it’s just hidden. My normals are always super serious and see a far higher standard of play then I could get queuing ranked at the moment (generally pulling in people from 1600-2300), but then I do always queue 5-man normals so that could be a factor as well.
Yeah I think you dudes might be a little too serious bidness for me but if anyone wants to queue up for some normals please add Pastrami Reuben to your friend list. Just started back up this week so I’m trying to build up a roster of champs I feel comfortable playing. Right now I’m feeling good about Sona (with arcade skin, natch) and pretty good about Ashe and Amumu. Probably working on Vlad and TF next and trying out some more of the champs that were added since I left.
Last night I played a couple of bot games to try out Elise and Volibear since they’re free this week. Man, why do custom bot games still suck so much? How come I can’t get the bot AIs from the matchmaking mode in my custom games? My bots were literally walking in circles while the enemy bots were teaming up and killing me. And how come I can’t tell the bots on my team that I want to take the solo lane? I was hoping custom games were improved a little since I last played but it looks like they just added a few new champion bots. Oh well.
So Elise is cool. I didn’t quite grasp exactly when I wanted to be in which form but I kinda played the way I used to play AP Nidalee (like a year and a half ago): start out ranged and then shape shift and use pounce to close the gap and finish stuff off. That worked out OK. I didn’t feel like the recommended items were doing me much good (surprise!) but I liked her enough that I’ll check out some guides and try her again this weekend.
Volibear seems cool. I guess he’s a tank, right? AoE slow, flip and health regen feels pretty tanky to me. So far the only tanks I have much playtime with are Shen, Amumu and Rammus. I should probably learn another, maybe Volibear will be it. You know, cause bear.
Our normal games are MOSTLY super serious. Every once in a while we get ambushed by 5 man mid push strats, or get a free win with support sejuani. Also, sometimes we get lucky and the 2300’s are playing “off role” (playing a role they normally don’t) and that handicap is enough to exploit. I’d say we’re probably ~ 90% of the time playing serious budinuss games, though we still (mostly) don’t bother with “strats” for certain team comps, etc. We’d probably win more if we did, but most people just pick for their lane.
In comparison, the placement games I played were AWFUL, and not just because of the lack of a 5 man premade. Playing ranked games in the 1200-1400 range had a lot of durp, but I’ve come to embrace the idea as part of the solo queue charm.
Speaking of getting through placement, WingsofDeathX has been streaming his placement games and has tried to be “entertaining”. He mentioned that he’s getting top tier players mixed in with 1500’s in his games, and the games are just…insanely silly. He was on form last night with his amusement factor - long lectures about how through history the bane of pirates have always been clowns (shaco tower diving his GP), the rise of the starbucks mafia, etc. Some guy on his team who I’ve never heard of kept on shouting in all chat “I’M GONNA BURN YOUR FUCKING HOUSE DOWN”, and similar, and Wings would respond “YEAH, we’re gonna burn your house down” and just mirror his crazy talk for the entire game. “I’ll fight you at starbucks!”
Oh lord, this is why he’s quickly become one of my favorite players. He’s informative for both new and old players alike and he generally takes the trolls or poor play from his teammates in stride. Also, “dude” isn’t every third word out of his mouth.
What I lack in skill at LoL I make up for in purchasing power! Went on a shopping spree today, picking up a few new champs and a bunch of cool skins for my old ones. Blood Lord Vlad, Arcade Sona, Corporate Mundo, Woad Ashe and Pulsfire Ezreal are all looking really nice. Mundo outsource your face! I’ve also been playing Lulu a bit, she’s awesome! So I had to get Dragon Trainer Lulu, natch.
I attribute the fancy skins to my current normal queue mini win streak, four or five in a row I think. Our last game we actually won a 4 on 5 by getting the other team to surrender after a team fight. Pix was our fifth! This seems like a good time to be playing a lot of support, too, because that new mermaid chick looks pretty awesome.
Lulu is quickly becoming my favorite character in the history of characters. She’s pretty good in the lane phase, especially with an aggressive partner. But what I really like is how awesome she is at team fights. Every one one of her abilities is great in a big fight and I feel like I’m doing a ton to help the team when I embiggen our tank, give an AP boost to our carry, shield whoever is getting whaled on first and exhaust one of their carries all in a very short span of time. Great, great stuff. And once I’ve got Shureliya’s my ultimate is on like a 1m cooldown and I can also throw in a speed boost for getting to a fight or chasing stupid Garen down.
