League of Legends XXXIII: Game of Mundo

[PersonMan]

Tips and tricks for the New Horseman in the toplane? I found his jungle unstable and schizophrenic. Heard he's good top, wondering how people have been doing it.

I haven't played him personally, but a friend of mine ended up randoming him top, so I have a bit of secondhand info.

He used teleport/flash, taking Spirit of Dread I Set the Ground on Fire and It Heals Me For Some Reason early for the sustain. I'd recommend keeping TP up if possible, as the effects of 'suddenly Hecarim teleported into the middle of that fight and got a triple kill*' are tough to understate. Even in other situations, the disruptive effect of 'he was top, now he's in the middle of us' brought by TP + Ult is quite useful.

I don't know much more, as I didn't really watch him in lane, but he went for a Trin Force early and took Merc Treads before the Triple Kill Incident.

*Although, the fight was basically over and consisted of me (Supportlesticks) suicide-ulting the enemy team and getting three of them to about 10% HP.

[SlyGuyMcFly]

Yeah, I would say they are banned most games but not exclusively. The bans I tend to see most often are Shaco, Kass, Shen, Lee, Ahri and maybe WW but a lot less often than the previous 5.

Many, many Morgana bans too. With good reason.

[Eldariel]

Yeah, I would say they are banned most games but not exclusively. The bans I tend to see most often are Shaco, Kass, Shen, Lee, Ahri and maybe WW but a lot less often than the previous 5.

It used to be Rammus but after his nerfs people seem to think he is less useful. Then you get things like Morde, Galio, Kennen but I wouldn't say they are banned anywhere near as often as the above champions.

WW bans really, really confuse me. I keep hearing these arguments about how he "carries harder lategame" than other tops but eh, really? WW better late than Riven, Olaf, Wukong or Yorick for instance? I have a hard time buying that, and they all beat him on lane...

Every time I ask about it in a ranked game, about 70% of the players seems to be convinced that WW is the most OP thing ever and then they're surprised when he doesn't do **** to help them actually win the game. Like, WW beats Vlad but that's like...everybody beats Vlad. Vlad's like the worst laner ever (yeah, I know he has some good match-ups too and that his scaling is decent, I just don't really like champs with that many terrible lane match-ups).


Morg ban I like quite a bit in lower Elo since she's so easy to do well with; someone like Cassiopeia, Karthus or even Ahri is pretty easy to mess up but Morgana is the safest champ in the game, has inevitable scaling and is pretty strong all things considered.

Kassadin ban is kinda silly though 'cause he has so many counterlanes. I like leaving him unbanned simply because if enemy picks Morgana, I can just pick Kassadin and autowin 'cause Morg can't match Kass's midgame impact and you can't die on lane vs. Morgana.

[Talesin]

WW bans really, really confuse me. I keep hearing these arguments about how he "carries harder lategame" than other tops but eh, really?

Oh I agree. I don't think WW is actually more of a problem than any of the other characters you listed. He won't do the damage of Riven, Olaf or Wukong in my opinion but a wits end-bloodrazor'd ult on the ap carry is going to inflict a fair chunk of damage.

I would argue, from personal experience, that it isn't his carry status that makes him such a problem but more that you need a conscious effort to kill him during the laning phase so he's a really safe lane that will guarantee the other guy isn't fed.

Kassadin ban is kinda silly though 'cause he has so many counterlanes. I like leaving him unbanned simply because if enemy picks Morgana, I can just pick Kassadin and autowin 'cause Morg can't match Kass's midgame impact and you can't die on lane vs. Morgana.

Again though i'd argue that he requires a conscious effort to stop, in this case a counter pick, and if he's picked after the mid and top lane are already chosen that does potentially leave someone in trouble. So he's probably better to just flat out ban and stop this problem occuring.

The thing I find most frustrating about laning against Kass is his combo stops all hope of a counter trade. He riftwalks in, silences you, slows you, runs off.

[9mm]

so patch notes... can anyone explain the random WW nerf?

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

so patch notes... can anyone explain the random WW nerf?

Because late-game WW is actually a really, really scary thing. I've been finding this out recently, and it's always alarming. Sure, you can shut him down...but that Ult on a carry is one of your most important teammates dead due to a teleporting, high-damage suppress...and then WW usually has enough tankiness and enough sustain to actually walk out of the midst of the enemy team, and/or continue fighting after that. Think Malzahar if he couldn't be nuked during his Ult, and would lifesteal up to almost full afterwards.

When you think about it, 275 + 1.0/AP + 20% of a target's max health is a LOT of damage to be regaining 80% of...and more than 80% if your team has any spell vamp or you've got a Spirit Visage. Without Blue or any CDR it's on a 6 second cooldown, which is a ton of free healing. Then his passive adds to that?

He's just a super-sustaining, tanky, high-DPS champion with a suppress for the enemy carry or mage (that grants him lifesteal in the process), great chasing power, and a team-wide AS buff. It's a nasty combination, and easy to exploit to great advantage. Sure, he's not as raw-damaging as Olaf or Wukong, but he outsustains the hell out of both, and 20% of max health is a lot of extra damage if your enemy team doesn't have a lot of MR.

It's a reasonable nerf, in my mind, although I might have liked to see the mana cost decreased a bit to compensate for the loss of power, since WW is rather mana hungry with Hungering Strike.

[TechnOkami]

Bug: If you use a health potion on Summoner's rift, sometimes it will give you a targeting cursor instead of automatically activating. It cannot be used on other champions and will only affect the summoner with the health potions. Easy to reproduce.

[Eldariel]

Because late-game WW is actually a really, really scary thing. I've been finding this out recently, and it's always alarming. Sure, you can shut him down...but that Ult on a carry is one of your most important teammates dead due to a teleporting, high-damage suppress...and then WW usually has enough tankiness and enough sustain to actually walk out of the midst of the enemy team, and/or continue fighting after that. Think Malzahar if he couldn't be nuked during his Ult, and would lifesteal up to almost full afterwards.

When you think about it, 275 + 1.0/AP + 20% of a target's max health is a LOT of damage to be regaining 80% of...and more than 80% if your team has any spell vamp or you've got a Spirit Visage. Without Blue or any CDR it's on a 6 second cooldown, which is a ton of free healing. Then his passive adds to that?

He's just a super-sustaining, tanky, high-DPS champion with a suppress for the enemy carry or mage (that grants him lifesteal in the process), great chasing power, and a team-wide AS buff. It's a nasty combination, and easy to exploit to great advantage. Sure, he's not as raw-damaging as Olaf or Wukong, but he outsustains the hell out of both, and 20% of max health is a lot of extra damage if your enemy team doesn't have a lot of MR.

It's a reasonable nerf, in my mind, although I might have liked to see the mana cost decreased a bit to compensate for the loss of power, since WW is rather mana hungry with Hungering Strike.

Uh, are you saying there are carries that don't build QSS against WW (I mean, one builds QSS in general on carries but especially against WW; also in teamfights there's enough CC to negate his ult quite easily)?

[Anonomuss]

So... I got Mordekaiser recently, and boy, do I like him!

First game I played, the enemy team didn't have a jungler, and ran a 2-1-2, so I just pushed my lane to hell and back, while taking wraiths. Ended up with 399cs in around 45 mins. It was a nice intro.

Every game since then, I've wanted to play him mid again, but haven't really been given the chance. So... Jungle Morde? Played three games, and got a decent sense of where he's at. 2 losses, 1 win. He's fast, but cannot gank unless the enemy overextends. He's a bit like shyvanna without a gapcloser. In the game I won, I was lvl 5 by the time the opposing Lee was lvl 3, and I had successfully ganked and scored an assist on mid. Stole Lee's second red, and ended up becoming a powerhouse by late game, with almost a full build.

Its fun enough in normals, but I don't think I could recommend it. Its got some potential in the fast-clear meta, but the lack of a ganking threat is pretty severe. But, with his ult, a gank into bot can sometimes turn a 2 v 2 into a 4 v 1. Doesn't happen often, but when it does, it makes me smile.

[toasty]

This surprises me. Are there seriously games at 1200 where Shaco/Lee aren't banned? I've religiously banned them this whole ranked season and whenever I see them not banned, they usually win the game.

You begin to understand my frustration, yes?

You have no idea what this elo is like. People ban WW over Shen. Ban rammus over shaco, ban Morgana over Lee Sin. People are very slow the learn. I mean, I ban Shen, Lee Sin and Shaco every game now, but really, its frustrating.

Even 1600s lack the coordination to efficiently deal with those much of the time (unless you get to play Lee yourself, then you just trounce Shaco since Lee is ridiculous), and good Lee/Shaco will invariably score early kills. Lee maybe less so since he has too high a skill cap to be utilized effectively by most 1200s but Shaco is obscenely easy.

At this point I've realize that if you jungle Lee Sin you're good at it. Honestly, though I've never played Lee Sin, it doesn't seem that difficult to get first blood top with him.

Besides, strong early gankers mean you can't play as aggressively on lane as you could normally. Since you can win basically every 1200 game ever by playing a strong solo lane and trashing your lane opponent, that decreases your chance of victory considerably. I usually ban Alistar too and would ban Maokai if I had 4 bans.

No one plays Moakai anymore, I'm more likely to ban Mundo if I want to ban a jungler. Honstly Arhi is a good band because that Taunt is really strong. Vlad is dumb too because ... he's vlad. Alistair is scary enough that if I had an extra ban I'd consider it.

[Maeglin_Dubh]

For horse top, I want to start Boots+3 or Cloth+5 and focus Angry Fire for sustain?

[shadowwalker64]

For horse top, I want to start Boots+3 or Cloth+5 and focus Angry Fire for sustain?

Boots 3 or Cloth5 start is always good, depending on lane matchup. I skill QEQWQR, then skilling R>Q>W>E. You shouldn't really max W as not only does it push your lane a lot, but you're also only healing around 80 damage in total every use at early levels. Your Q is much better for helping you brawl in protracted engagements against other tops, and is one of the main reasons why Hecarim can be played top (can actually gain advantage on Riven if playing correctly lvl 1, from experience). Early level in E is to escape jungle ganks since it gives you ridiculous amounts of movespeed.

Runes, if you were wondering, should be Arpen Reds, Armour Yellows, Mr/lvl Blues and Movespeed Quints (Movespeed Quints+Masteries allow you to start Cloth5 and always have enough speed). Arpen Quints, AD Quints and Health Quints are ideal substitutes. Masteries should be 0/21/9 to capitalize on tankiness

[ex cathedra]

@Toasty: allow me to channel my inner Morello and suggest that no one plays Maokai at your Elo.

[PersonMan]

@toasty: I agree, Ahri is a great band. I love all her music.

Also: hybrid (AP, off AD) Hecarim is hilarious. I might even try it in a real game at some point. W scales at .8, ulti at .8 + .4. Early Sheen for Q spam, then Rageblade, followed by Rylai's, upgrade Sheen to Lichbane, Derpcap.

[toasty]

@Toasty: allow me to channel my inner Morello and suggest that no one plays Maokai at your Elo.

This is of course what i meant. Zach will also inform you that you can just play Mundo so why play anything else. Mundo stronk King.

[Psyborg]

This surprises me. Are there seriously games at 1200 where Shaco/Lee aren't banned?

Context: My ranked ELO is currently low 1100s because I played a string of ranked games a while back right as I was switching from being primarily an AP mid player to being primarily an AD carry player, and so sucked at both. I'm confident my normal ELO is higher than that, if not dramatically. Most of the people I play normals with have ranked ELOs in the mid-1200 to high-1500 range. So my normal ELO is probably...pretty typical mid-bronze-level, I guess.

In normal draft at this level, in my experience, the following are 95-100% permabanned, and guaranteed to be first-picked if left unbanned:
~~Morgana
~~Shen
~~Shaco
The following are banned about half the time:
~~Kassadin
And the following are also not uncommon bans:
~~Ryze
~~Kennen
~~Warwick
~~Olaf
~~Soraka
~~Ahri

Oddly, I don't see a lot of Lee Sin, either played or banned. He does generally do very well when he's picked, too, but (like Xerath and Cass, who I would absolutely ban out if I saw them more often) he's so rarely picked that he's not worth the ban.

Personally, I also see a lot of Janna bans, but that's because me and my friends ban her when running an AoE-to-Win comp. I don't think the Janna bans are typical for my level. (I suspect that we'll have to start banning Gragas eventually as we improve; so far no one has countered us with him.)

[Psyborg]

This surprises me. Are there seriously games at 1200 where Shaco/Lee aren't banned?

Context: My ranked ELO is currently low 1100s because I played a string of ranked games a while back right as I was switching from being primarily an AP mid player to being primarily an AD carry player (and so sucked at both), and haven't played ranked since. I'm confident my normal ELO is higher than that, if not dramatically. Most of the people I play normals with have ranked ELOs in the mid-1200 to high-1500 range. So my normal ELO is probably...pretty typical mid-bronze-level, I guess.

In normal draft at this level, in my experience, the following are 95-100% permabanned, and guaranteed to be first-picked if left unbanned:
~~Morgana
~~Shen
~~Shaco
The following are banned about half the time:
~~Kassadin
And the following are also not uncommon bans:
~~Ryze
~~Kennen
~~Warwick
~~Olaf
~~Soraka
~~Ahri

Oddly, I don't see a lot of Lee Sin, either played or banned. He does generally do very well when he's picked, too, but (like Xerath and Cass, who I would absolutely ban out if I saw them more often) he's so rarely picked that he's not worth the ban.

Personally, I also see a lot of Janna bans, but that's because me and my friends ban her when running an AoE-to-Win comp. I don't think the Janna bans are typical for my level. (I suspect that we'll have to start banning Gragas eventually as we improve; so far no one has countered us with him.)

[toasty]

so patch notes... can anyone explain the random WW nerf?

People QQ about WW, WW gets a nerf. He's not OP. He's not even really that good, except as a counterpick. His jungle is slow, his laning early is very, very weak. There is no reason to pick or ban WW except as a counterpick to specific heroes (Shen comes to mind, he actually does pretty good against Shen; WW probably exists as a decent galio counter). WW does nothing that other Bruisers can't do; Lee Sin and Udyr can become equally immortal and are actually better and being aggressive and getting kills. Vlad's sustain is the highest in the game, AND he can actually PUSH his lane. And Vlad actually scales properly into late game. Vlad's early laning is almost as weak as WW, but he has a ranged autoattack and longer ranged harass that costs NOTHING. Oh, and troolpool.

There is no reason to pick WW over Vlad, Udyr or Lee Sin unless you want to stack Suppress, but that's just a silly idea.

Because late-game WW is actually a really, really scary thing. I've been finding this out recently, and it's always alarming. Sure, you can shut him down...but that Ult on a carry is one of your most important teammates dead due to a teleporting, high-damage suppress...and then WW usually has enough tankiness and enough sustain to actually walk out of the midst of the enemy team, and/or continue fighting after that. Think Malzahar if he couldn't be nuked during his Ult, and would lifesteal up to almost full afterwards.

QQS means WW is useless for this reason. Carries that are getting caught are bad carries that deserve to die. WW has flash and ult. Play like it.

Maybe I'm in a really pissy mood because of my recent elo loss (QQ im 1200 elo right now) but the its really a lot easier to play safe than people realize I feel. I mean, I suppose if you are Vayne or Graves you might be in trouble, but Corki, Trist, Cait, Ashe and Kog'maw really don't have an excuse. Well, maybe Kog.

Uh, are you saying there are carries that don't build QSS against WW (I mean, one builds QSS in general on carries but especially against WW; also in teamfights there's enough CC to negate his ult quite easily)?

Yeah, this is sensible speak here. WW probably will never catch the AD carry with his ult unless the AD carry is out of position. Now, I've played a fair bit of WW (probably more than any other hero) and I admit, its actually kinda easy to catch people late game if they're derps. But in a proper 5v5 fight? WW isn't going to be killing the AD carry, he'll be killing the tanks. He actually is probably the best anti-tank Bruiser in the game right now.

When you think about it, 275 + 1.0/AP + 20% of a target's max health is a LOT of damage to be regaining 80% of...and more than 80% if your team has any spell vamp or you've got a Spirit Visage. Without Blue or any CDR it's on a 6 second cooldown, which is a ton of free healing. Then his passive adds to that?

WW is tanky as ****. That's his greatest asset. His damage is alright late game, but its not stellar. Shen does more damage and is almost as tanky. Olaf is better and beats WW in lane. CC and ignite WW and win the game. Olaf cannot be CCed. Neither Shen nor Olaf care much about Ignite (though it hurts). If you didn't save your ignite for a WW team (assuming they don't have vlad; now there is a scary team) then you're probably play wrong.

He's just a super-sustaining, tanky, high-DPS champion with a suppress for the enemy carry or mage (that grants him lifesteal in the process), great chasing power, and a team-wide AS buff. It's a nasty combination, and easy to exploit to great advantage. Sure, he's not as raw-damaging as Olaf or Wukong, but he outsustains the hell out of both, and 20% of max health is a lot of extra damage if your enemy team doesn't have a lot of MR.

Wukong and Olaf rape WW in lane. Its not even funny. Like, its NOT funny. A Ignite/Flash Wukong who starts Doran's Blade can probably kill Warwick at level 3 with proper harass. The only answer for WW is to play passive and call for ganks. That's bad. A good Wukong or Olaf will make sure that WW never gets strong enough to be a threat. He will be tanky, but tanky isn't a threat.

It's a reasonable nerf, in my mind, although I might have liked to see the mana cost decreased a bit to compensate for the loss of power, since WW is rather mana hungry with Hungering Strike.

The mana cost is the only thing keeping WW from being stupid in lane again, as it is, come mid-game, once WW has a Wits End, he's already kinda dumb. Not in the "overpowered" way, but in the "don't harass me, its a waste of time." He still is vulnerable to multiple CC ganks from heroes like Nautilus or Alistair though.

The damage nerf on his Q doesn't really change anything. He is still tanky. He still kills tanks alright. His laning is still alright because of mid-game dominance. But Vlad is still better.

(I suspect that we'll have to start banning Gragas eventually as we improve; so far no one has countered us with him.)

Gragas probably won't be a problem. Outside of a very small number of players at high elo he's completely unplayed. He's a great, great asset to a poke comp though.

[Eldariel]

You begin to understand my frustration, yes?

You have no idea what this elo is like. People ban WW over Shen. Ban rammus over shaco, ban Morgana over Lee Sin. People are very slow the learn. I mean, I ban Shen, Lee Sin and Shaco every game now, but really, its frustrating.

It's true that I don't have long-term exposure, but I have played 4 accounts out from 1200s this season so I have some idea; silly bans happen, that I do remember. I didn't really focus on things like bans since I spent all of my energy making people let me mid so I could carry the games (though was usually able to sway people to ban Shaco, which is all that really mattered since a good Shaco can really make it hard to get kills on lane especially since it was basically par de course for enemy jungler to camp me).

At this point I've realize that if you jungle Lee Sin you're good at it. Honestly, though I've never played Lee Sin, it doesn't seem that difficult to get first blood top with him.

Well, first blood isn't hard but executing ganks competently throughout the game is more so, let alone teamfighting.

No one plays Moakai anymore, I'm more likely to ban Mundo if I want to ban a jungler. Honstly Arhi is a good band because that Taunt is really strong. Vlad is dumb too because ... he's vlad. Alistair is scary enough that if I had an extra ban I'd consider it.

I do find Ahri is a silly ban. If you wanna ban a solo queue stomper, ban LeBlanc. She's pretty much autowin if you have any clue and play against 1200s. Ahri is no more or less problematic than e.g. Annie on low elo in my experience.

[toasty]

Well, first blood isn't hard but executing ganks competently throughout the game is more so, let alone teamfighting.

Firstblood is often enough to snowball top lane though.

I do find Ahri is a silly ban. If you wanna ban a solo queue stomper, ban LeBlanc. She's pretty much autowin if you have any clue and play against 1200s. Ahri is no more or less problematic than e.g. Annie on low elo in my experience.

I haven't seen a leblanc in at least two months. Ahri is FOTM right now.

[Eldariel]

I haven't seen a leblanc in at least two months. Ahri is FOTM right now.

Aye. Luckily FotM basically means "learn to destroy this champ with any one champ, keep leaving it unbanned and enjoy your free wins".

[Eakin]

Hey guys, just joined up with this game a few days ago. Summoner name's Eakin3. Everything you're talking about is going waaaaay over my head. I've been playing 5v5 matches against Beginner AIs, and I'm about to hit level 6. I've been trying to get a feel for the different champions and styles. Beginner AIs are starting to feel a little too easy.

Questions:
-How big is the difficulty jump between Beginner AIs and Intermediate? How long should I play before I jump into actual PvP matches?

-Should I be going after the neutral monsters in the jungle, or sticking to a lane?

-Does anybody actually unlock all of these champions? Or do people pick a half dozen or so of them to focus on?

-Who should I be using my IP to unlock? I have the cross-boomerang girl and the cheap healer (Soraka? Sokara? Something like that). Are the more expensive champions better?

[Eldariel]

Questions:
-How big is the difficulty jump between Beginner AIs and Intermediate? How long should I play before I jump into actual PvP matches?

Eh, you should have no trouble in Intermediate bots I'd wager. They get some bonus gold and probably have slightly better coordination and more advanced behavior sensibility but all in all, they're still bots.

-Should I be going after the neutral monsters in the jungle, or sticking to a lane?

If you can. There's a "player slot" in the game called "jungler", which is basically always used in the PvP games between the most skilled players; basically, this player starts the game in the jungle (leaving the toplane also a solo lane) and farms the neutral monsters all game long.

Other than junglers, there's a handful of champions (and champion pairs) who can take some of the small camps like Wraiths, Golems or Wolves before minions engage on lane without losing a significant amount of health for a small XP/gold boost, and later in the game you should pick them up whenever you can spare the time; passing by, kill 'em once you have enough damage/survivability to do it fast and without losing a lot of life (or even gaining with Lifesteal/Spellvamp).

Important camps are the "Lizard"-camp in the middle of the rightside jungle, and the "Golem"-camp in the top of the leftside jungle; those camps confer buffs on you if you kill them. Blue buff gives you mana regeneration and cooldown reduction for its duration (2.5 minutes) and red buff makes your autoattacks deal true damage and apply a slow on the target. These are mostly used for the buffs and in botgames you probably can pick them up yourself come midgame (around level 10 maybe) pretty safely.

Generally autoattackers, particularly ranged ones (like Miss Fortune, Graves or company) without inherent slows like the redbuff (melee types too) and mages like Annie or Morgana like the bluebuff (as CDR increases their damage the most, and they can use the extra mana regeneration).


But the short answer: Pick them whenever it doesn't cost you any creep kills on the lane and you aren't needed somewhere else immediately.

-Does anybody actually unlock all of these champions? Or do people pick a half dozen or so of them to focus on?

You'll eventually unlock them all if you play enough. I try to own all just for trading considerations; in draft mode games champions are picked in player order so picking champions for different roles and counterpicking against those champions is an important consideration and requires trading champions between players after the picks are done.

That said, it's not necessary and I've played over 4000 games already and I still lack some (ones I consider lower priority to get, mostly). But I'm going to have them all eventually. And I can even play basically all of them at least semi-competently (though obviously, the road to true mastery is much longer; I'm only a master of few).

-Who should I be using my IP to unlock? I have the cross-boomerang girl and the cheap healer (Soraka? Sokara? Something like that). Are the more expensive champions better?

Champion cost is in no ways related to their power. What you should unlock depends on what kinds of champions you want to play. Keep trying, find the ones you love and go from there. My first purchase was Janna who I played for the first 20 levels until I ran into Anivia and she froze my heart forever. She's probably still my most-played champion though I've branched out after the ~200 games with basically only her.

[Dienekes]

Hey guys, just joined up with this game a few days ago. Summoner name's Eakin3. Everything you're talking about is going waaaaay over my head. I've been playing 5v5 matches against Beginner AIs, and I'm about to hit level 6. I've been trying to get a feel for the different champions and styles. Beginner AIs are starting to feel a little too easy.

I started by jumping straight into player vs player and that worked fairly well for me. If Beginner AI is too easy just try Intermediate you'll be fine.

-Should I be going after the neutral monsters in the jungle, or sticking to a lane?

By the time you gain a few more levels teams will be roughly divided into:
2 bottom lane (currently AD Carry/Support)
1 middle lane (currently AP Carry)
1 top lane (Bruiser/tank)
1 jungler (very wide range from gankers to carries to tanks)

But even then a lot of times folks still go two people top lane and no jungler and can still win if it's not a super serious ranked game. Now you might be able to go through the jungle right at level 6 but you don't have to. At your low level you're fine just picking a lane and testing your champion out.

-Does anybody actually unlock all of these champions? Or do people pick a half dozen or so of them to focus on?

It depends on the person. A friend of mine has like all but a dozen or so unlocked who is much, much better at this game than I am. I just have about 6 guys I play a lot that I've gotten pretty good with. But I have enough IP to buy quite a lot more, but I just don't. It also helps that the champions I like to play are absolutely never banned, so I'm more or less free to always play what I'm comfortable with.

-Who should I be using my IP to unlock? I have the cross-boomerang girl and the cheap healer (Soraka? Sokara? Something like that). Are the more expensive champions better?

Now when I started playing I set my goals on playing Pantheon because he's a Sparitiate, and I was a History major in college focusing on Greco-Roman era. Lucky for me, I actually really enjoy Pantheon's gameplay and he's still my most played champion.

Now, you'll see that every week they change which champions are available free to play. Personally (after my Pantheon grab) I never buy a champion until I've played them a few times for free. What I would suggest is playing around with each champion, see which position you're most comfortable playing in (personally, I can't support, I'm just terrible at it, and am only starting to not absolutely suck as an AD carry) and then look for which champion feels the most right for you in that position. For example for me, I tank Cho'gath and AP carry with Ziggs. Neither of which are considered the best but they're viable and I'm good with them.

Also just starting out, the cheap 450 IP champions have perfectly fine champions for every style of play. When just starting out, you can do a lot worse than grabbing a couple of those. Hell Ryze is often put in any of the top 3 positions for best AP carry in the game, and he's one of those 450 champs.

[Karoht]

Yeah, the Lizardman/Golem Buffs are frakking awesome to have. Having my skill shot drop below a 30 second cooldown is awesome. Having my auto attacks just burn down creepers at a positively insane speed AND slow everyone down? That's awesome too.

I have never seen what killing Baron Nashor gets you, and I know that slaying the dragon near the bottom lane by the middle of the map basically gets you an XP/Money reward, though I have no idea how large.
You need the full party to kill Nashor, or so I hear tell.

[Eldariel]

Yeah, the Lizardman/Golem Buffs are frakking awesome to have. Having my skill shot drop below a 30 second cooldown is awesome. Having my auto attacks just burn down creepers at a positively insane speed AND slow everyone down? That's awesome too.

I have never seen what killing Baron Nashor gets you, and I know that slaying the dragon near the bottom lane by the middle of the map basically gets you an XP/Money reward, though I have no idea how large.
You need the full party to kill Nashor, or so I hear tell.

Baron Nashor gives the whole team...I recall 3% Health/5 seconds and 1% Mana/5 Seconds regeneration and 40 AP & AD. It's also 300 gold for everyone in the team (and kill reward for the one with the last hit; 25 gold and 900 XP IIRC?). The gold alone is equivalent of 5 kills and the whole packet is easily worth 10k gold.

Dragon is simply 190 gold for the whole team and 25 gold & 200 XP (IIRC) for the killer. It's about equivalent to two kills or a tower in terms of gold gained. Of course, it being spread across the team makes the gold a bit less powerful. Early game in higher level PvP is generally focused around securing the Dragon (and/or Towers; trading Tower for Dragon is common) for the early advantage.

[Daverin]

So... they 'buffed' Irelia. Not nerfed. Buff...


ABANDON SHIP!!!

In all seriousness, the patch notes don't appear too bad. I must say, I think Ryze players should honestly be happy with some of this; sure, there is some raw scaling power lost, but the making AP slightly more attractive is decent, and a few of the changes look directly aimed at making early game less rocky (having a much quicker projectile can only be a boon. And Overload is actually probably better now very early game.)

However, Hungering Strike nerf; really? Was he causing trouble?

Also, lol at the Zilean change. I can only hope that it is there because someone actually needed it.

[Reinboom]

Also, lol at the Zilean change. I can only hope that it is there because someone actually needed it.

It reduces the impact of an accident (leveling rewind at 1) without actually limiting any real play.

[toasty]

Scarra was talking about the Ryze stuff and he said it was a pretty big nerf. Ryze will still be good, but its still a nerf.

[Qwertystop]

When do they add that Chalice upgrade?