**league_of_legends_thread_62: show_running_gag_title("The Wins Of Winthur");

[Grytorm]

How would Trundle versus Cho'Gath matchup go? I would guess that both of you sustain forever and never kill each other. Unless somebody messes up which might be a bit easier for Trundle because of Cho's burst.

Also what are good damage items on Cho? I just finished and interesting game. I got first blood top on Yasou with my ult. I then threw away tower and let him freefarm because I have no idea how to TP effectively. We got wrecked in teamfights for a while because they had Yasou, Galio and Wukong. So yeah. Eventually we were able to get fights in our favor. I did decent damage and got decent skills.

So what I got a Zhonyas as my third item and was going to get Rabadons as my last item. I know Abyssal is good but their team was AP light. So I wanted to stack some Armor. But then I got decent AP. I don't know.

[Math_Mage]

Cho can randomly catch a priority target with rupture, but apart from that Trundle should have the late-game edge. Cho should out-push Trundle early and have the harass edge, though.

I think your build was fine. I suppose Thornmail counts as an offensive item at that point.

[TFT]

I'm going to pull an aether and put up 2 games. If you are only going to watch one, definitely watch the second one.
I want to partially prove a point and partially partake in improving:
2 game's I've played recently:

Game 1: http://na.op.gg/match/observer/id=1609993127

Janna Sivir vs Soraka Corki botlane. This game went pretty well but I am sure there are mistakes.

Game 2: http://na.op.gg/match/observer/id=1610052701

Zyra Jinx vs Lucian Thresh

Focus on mechanics. I probably have some decision making issues, but mechanics are where I need to improve, especially considering if I remember correctly we lost laning that game.

Same note about OP.gg and batch files as aether.

[JKTrickster]

im pretty sure that just being in the irelia vs darius matchup tilts me immediately, but a lot of the time spent taking damage and not trading back was done in the belief that i don't really have kill pressure in that matchup at all but a few specific moments. so, even if i did trade back, the additional damage from committing for a few more seconds doesn't really advance my game plan but every additional auto and passive refresh i take makes his level 6 power spike more potent.

i think that mindset is sometimes but not always correct, but i get overly fixated on the difficulty of that matchup and play it as if i have no chance of winning. it's a really painful replay to watch, thanks for all the feedback thus far.

Um....no.

I don't know about you, but the way I learned it:

If someone hurts you in lane, you have to try and hurt them back.

It doesn't matter if you hurt them NOW (as in continue the trade) or LATER (as in win the next trade), but the goal is to always deal more damage to the other laner than they do to you.

This is especially true for Champions that rely on their abilities to trade - they use their full combo, and then have nothing left. For champions like that, you HAVE to attack them once their abilities are on CD - they literally can't hurt you anymore.

Likewise, you have to minimize your window of vulnerability in order to make sure you don't lose trades that started out favorably for you.

Basically the last thing you want to do is take free damage. It doesn't matter if you don't think you'll win - it'll definitely make you lose.


OH and pro-tip for top lane:


Pots win lanes.

[PersonMan]

This is especially true for Champions that rely on their abilities to trade - they use their full combo, and then have nothing left. For champions like that, you HAVE to attack them once their abilities are on CD - they literally can't hurt you anymore.

Well, not quite. If you're against an AD caster you can't just ignore their damage because their burst is down. Especially at the earliest levels, autos are actually pretty dangerous and if you eat one or two too many you may spell your own doom the moment their spells are off CD.

[thracian]

im pretty sure that just being in the irelia vs darius matchup tilts me immediately, but a lot of the time spent taking damage and not trading back was done in the belief that i don't really have kill pressure in that matchup at all but a few specific moments. so, even if i did trade back, the additional damage from committing for a few more seconds doesn't really advance my game plan but every additional auto and passive refresh i take makes his level 6 power spike more potent.

i think that mindset is sometimes but not always correct, but i get overly fixated on the difficulty of that matchup and play it as if i have no chance of winning. it's a really painful replay to watch, thanks for all the feedback thus far.

You never really had kill pressure because you took too much random damage, so no matter how much you traded back you'd have gotten dunked anyway. If you'd taken the opportunities for free damage Darius gave you on a few occasions and not taken so many random Qs and AAs for no reason, you'd have had him in a position where you may have been able to fight him pre-6, especially if you backed just before 6 and not randomly to buy some pots.

[Slayn82]

Um....no.

I don't know about you, but the way I learned it:

If someone hurts you in lane, you have to try and hurt them back.

.....
OH and pro-tip for top lane:


Pots win lanes.

Amen brother.

I've been playing as Taric, almost entire defense tree of talents, in bot lane. Since everyone and their grandma is building infinity edge first, having an early armor, specially Wardens Mail, along with reduced critical damage and opression, is reasonable, but becomes excelent on Taric's kit - W passive easily give 10 armor for allies. So i bait a lot, allowing my adc to hurt them back, make a few stuns and shatters on them, maybe throw an exaust, and just red pot and blu pot to zone the enemy early. Works pretty well, with agressive adc players.

Timid adc players in place of pressing our early advantage going for the stunned/exausted enemy adc, instead retreat to under tower, or even go to base right then to buy a second DB. Specially grating because i often come alive from the trade, 2 summoners down for the count, and they usually are the ones who pinged the target.

So, i'm mostly convinced that young adc's are either tireless farmers who are scared of teamfights, or relentless killers who can't farm under pressure.

Also, on Taric i wholeheartly recommend getting W to lvl 2 early, and then maxing E, get lvl 3 in W and then go for max Q. Specially if you want Iceborn Gauntlets. Q scales with your health and ap, but it's increasing cost per level is too expensive for a true healbot, and will heal you around 8-9% hp with just lvl 1 most of early game. E has a decent damage early game when people have a lot less magic resist, specially if they are jumping at you, fixed cost, allows you some playmaking and along with Bracers of Targon, minion executing never was this fun before. W is a good skill, but using Q and E more often is very huge on Taric. You end up doing far more in the teamfights, without much fear of losing a few points of armor, and your allies get the full aura anyway.

[Anxe]

Amen brother.

I've been playing as Taric, almost entire defense tree of talents, in bot lane. Since everyone and their grandma is building infinity edge first, having an early armor, specially Wardens Mail, along with reduced critical damage and opression, is reasonable, but becomes excelent on Taric's kit - W passive easily give 10 armor for allies. So i bait a lot, allowing my adc to hurt them back, make a few stuns and shatters on them, maybe throw an exaust, and just red pot and blu pot to zone the enemy early. Works pretty well, with agressive adc players.

Timid adc players in place of pressing our early advantage going for the stunned/exausted enemy adc, instead retreat to under tower, or even go to base right then to buy a second DB. Specially grating because i often come alive from the trade, 2 summoners down for the count, and they usually are the ones who pinged the target.

So, i'm mostly convinced that young adc's are either tireless farmers who are scared of teamfights, or relentless killers who can't farm under pressure.

Also, on Taric i wholeheartly recommend getting W to lvl 2 early, and then maxing E, get lvl 3 in W and then go for max Q. Specially if you want Iceborn Gauntlets. Q scales with your health and ap, but it's increasing cost per level is too expensive for a true healbot, and will heal you around 8-9% hp with just lvl 1 most of early game. E has a decent damage early game when people have a lot less magic resist, specially if they are jumping at you, fixed cost, allows you some playmaking and along with Bracers of Targon, minion executing never was this fun before. W is a good skill, but using Q and E more often is very huge on Taric. You end up doing far more in the teamfights, without much fear of losing a few points of armor, and your allies get the full aura anyway.

I always maxed E first but then my ADC would yell at me for not healing him the maximum possible amount I could. Nevermind that I got him kills by having more damage...

[Winthur]

also, on Taric i wholeheartly recommend getting W to lvl 2 early, and then maxing E, get lvl 3 in W and then go for max Q

I have to question the idea of forsaking additional AoE burst damage and better armor shatter for slightly (+0,4 seconds at max rank? Seriously?) longer stun and better situational single target damage (how the hell do you make use of the damage ramp-up on Taric's stun, other than people facechecking your bush?). Especially since W-max is still more useful against some of the stupider picks in bot lane, like Morgana, who makes your stun useless anyway. Actually, I have to question the idea of actually playing Taric in the bot lane in the current climate, but that's beside the point.

Specially if you want Iceborn Gauntlets.

Which sounds like "pretty much never". Taric's base AD is enough to make use of Sheen, but his skills don't lend themselves to proper utilization of the passive and there isn't much IBG would give you that any other item with better utility wouldn't. If you want a slow, you might as well get Randuin's Omen. Aura items or special utility items are better, dinky slow doesn't seem worth it.

and just red pot and blu pot to zone the enemy early. Works pretty well, with agressive adc players.

Risky, weird (do you autoattack enough in lane to make use of the red pot? Why not just a Ruby Crystal?) and replicable with, dunno, a Chain Vest or Cloth+Ruby for almost the same price without the drawback of expiring.

Sorry man, I don't get it.

[NineThePuma]

I think he literally meant pots, rather than elixers.

[Math_Mage]

E max is worst max. W if winning trades, Q if stalling. Then the other one.

[Slayn82]

I have to question the idea of forsaking additional AoE burst damage and better armor shatter for slightly (+0,4 seconds at max rank? Seriously?) longer stun and better situational single target damage (how the hell do you make use of the damage ramp-up on Taric's stun, other than people facechecking your bush?). Especially since W-max is still more useful against some of the stupider picks in bot lane, like Morgana, who makes your stun useless anyway. Actually, I have to question the idea of actually playing Taric in the bot lane in the current climate, but that's beside the point.

My skill leveling is preferentially EWWQEREEEWRQQQQRWW

Morgana is quite easy. Since you get CDR faster than her, and you have a passive that reduces 2 seconds of cooldown of all your skills as long as you hit an enemy. I want to use E, W, and Q, and hit a minion or enemy after every use. So, that 15 sec CD once you buy Frozen Hearth is actually closer to 7-8. Since both Frozen Heart and IBG give you a ton of mana, i can pull a full rotation like E, auto, W, auto, Q, auto, and throw another E pretty soon, way before her shield comes back from CD, , and you quickly add a second W to it. If she hits you with her Q+W, you have the talents Tenacious, Resistance, Opression (from an early Warden's Mail), Evasive, Perseverance and the improved healing of your own Q to endure.

Which sounds like "pretty much never". Taric's base AD is enough to make use of Sheen, but his skills don't lend themselves to proper utilization of the passive and there isn't much IBG would give you that any other item with better utility wouldn't. If you want a slow, you might as well get Randuin's Omen. Aura items or special utility items are better, dinky slow doesn't seem worth it.

His skills do lend themselves to the use of IBG pretty well. His own passive is Sheen-like. Every level in Q or E work to reduce the CD of all your skills by one second if you are using them on quick sucession. The thing is that buying a second Glacial Shroud after FH is an awessome item for Taric, a Sheen is pretty good on lane, the area damage from IBG more than compensates the lost damage from W levels and that slow often allows Taric to pull a second stun on a fleeing enemy or peel much better for his team. And makes you hurt people quite a bit too, so you can even push towers, or clear minion waves. Makes your presence when roaming much more effective.

Also Taric's ult increases Minion damage. Add sheen and slow, and you win trades that people don't expect a support to win. (At least in Brazil, playing unranked, with Bronze - Gold players - i know the limits of my arguments). Im quite satisfied on my record against Master Yi, Yasuo or Fizz in the mid game.

Risky, weird (do you autoattack enough in lane to make use of the red pot? Why not just a Ruby Crystal?) and replicable with, dunno, a Chain Vest or Cloth+Ruby for almost the same price without the drawback of expiring.

Sorry, i think you missunderstood when i said early on. Yes, i try to stay front and close, and since i rather start with Relic Shield, 2 red 1 blue pot, because people spend too much mana in lane early and i rather stay longer in lane and level and come back latter with Warden's Mail + pots and maybe a ward. Meanwhile, i add armor from W passive. But if going against true AP poke like Annie and Karma, yes, i'll anticipate buying that Targon, that Sightstone.

It's cool if you don't get it. A warm hug to you and Anxe.

Edit

E max is worst max. W if winning trades, Q if stalling. Then the other one.

And then get sleepy because all the playmaking have to come from the ADC. At long range, E does little damage, but up close, it's quite a good amount, is what passes as your mobility skill, and comes back fast too. W is mostly a way to add some damage, give some armor to allies, procs sheen and your passive. Q is just a way to spend too much mana too fast ,I subscribe to the tought that Taric scales well with Armor, CDR, Mana and HP, mostly on this order.

[Winthur]

My skill leveling is preferentially EWWQEREEEWRQQQQRWW

Morgana is quite easy. Since you get CDR faster than her, and you have a passive that reduces 2 seconds of cooldown of all your skills as long as you hit an enemy. I want to use E, W, and Q, and hit a minion or enemy after every use. So, that 15 sec CD once you buy Frozen Hearth is actually closer to 7-8.

By the time you have Frozen Heart, the laning phase is over, and you still have priority buys like finished Targon (or preferrably finished FotM), Sightstone and Boots. Not to mention vision wards and pots. Finished end-game tank items don't usually appear in a laning phase. By the time you do reduce that cooldown, Morgana is off firing off bindings and peeling for her carry with ult while still enjoying the benefit of blocking any initiation you might attempt, because Taric's spermatozoid is an extremely slow projectile. Black Shield's casting range is pretty good and the spell casts instantly.

Since both Frozen Heart and IBG give you a ton of mana, i can pull a full rotation like E, auto, W, auto, Q, auto, and throw another E pretty soon, way before her shield comes back from CD, , and you quickly add a second W to it. If she hits you with her Q+W, you have the talents Tenacious, Resistance, Opression (from an early Warden's Mail), Evasive, Perseverance and the improved healing of your own Q to endure.

Or she just walks away while firing a binding at you (hard to dodge while in a chase situation especially with that stupid hitbox) and then you're chasing her for another 8 seconds. Not to mention that if you can fire 3 autos during a single Taric stun then congratulations because he has horrible attack speed and his attack animation is horrible as well and I don't know how would you do it.

Also, why would you ever pick high-tier defense talents on Taric if you aren't going for the one that gives bonus resistances in the middle of an enemy pack? You only need stuff to survive the laning phase. All those things like bonus tenacity and lessened movement speed don't really do anything because after you've fired off your kit then your stun and heal aren't crucial enough that you would need bonus tenacity or something else. Nobody will aim for you with their CC. 0/16/14 with Hardiness and Resistance or even 0/9/21 is just enough.

His skills do lend themselves to the use of IBG pretty well. His own passive is Sheen-like. Every level in Q or E work to reduce the CD of all your skills by one second if you are using them on quick sucession. The thing is that buying a second Glacial Shroud after FH is an awessome item for Taric, a Sheen is pretty good on lane, the area damage from IBG more than compensates the lost damage from W levels and that slow often allows Taric to pull a second stun on a fleeing enemy or peel much better for his team. And makes you hurt people quite a bit too, so you can even push towers, or clear minion waves. Makes your presence when roaming much more effective.

Sheen gives you next to no combat stats, no survivability stats for sure. It also delays your utility items if you get it early. Would rather buy a Vest, smoke, 2 flashes and a nade maybe Giant's Belt. Not sure if it's worth a tiny bit higher burst damage that's also kinda situational.

In mid game where I actually can get an item like this one attempting to catch someone offguard is directly related to their ability to just dash away from my skill. You can go a huge distance before Taric's stun actually hits you. Just look at Riven, she basically outraces the thing.

Finally, if I'm getting this close to an opponent anyway, why not just pop Randuin's and enjoy both a better item and a good slow?

I can't justify spending this much on a lackluster offensive/utility item, on a gold-starved support, with a "seen better days" laning phase. Maybe if this was top lane or if I was really fed.

Also Taric's ult increases Minion damage. Add sheen and slow, and you win trades that people don't expect a support to win. (At least in Brazil, playing unranked, with Bronze - Gold players - i know the limits of my arguments). Im quite satisfied on my record against Master Yi, Yasuo or Fizz in the mid game.

Back when Taric was good I just relied on burst damage and being invincible with Shatter's aura, blowing flashes until the enemy finally croaks. Sheen only works if your enemies let you hit them, and I have problems in that regard with Taric, autos being obviously important but hard to land consistently enough for me to like a Sheen. Mostly I just hate his autoattack animation.

Sorry, i think you missunderstood when i said early on. Yes, i try to stay front and close, and since i rather start with Relic Shield, 2 red 1 blue pot, because people spend too much mana in lane early and i rather stay longer in lane and level and come back latter with Warden's Mail + pots and maybe a ward. Meanwhile, i add armor from W passive. But if going against true AP poke like Annie and Karma, yes, i'll anticipate buying that Targon, that Sightstone.

Right, I imagined Fort and Brilliance pot because Fort pot is also called Red Pot. I could say it's your fault, but actually I'm just dumb, it should be obvious to me what you meant especially since you talked about sustain before. Mea culpa.

Also, I'd much rather go Targon->Sightstone first on pretty much any bottom lane. Two reasons: FotM is OP and you need vision if you play aggressive. Pokey supports are more magic damage based usually, so Warden hardly helps against stuff like Corki/Thresh or whatever else. Health is also a good combat stat.

And then get sleepy because all the playmaking have to come from the ADC

In a 1.2 second window of time there's plenty of time to explode Shatter and let the AD carry blow his burst damage. You literally hold the enemy still and soften them up, without your presence your ADC shouldn't be trading and he shouldn't be initiating all-ins without a good reason.

Also if you don't want to get sleepy in bottom lane, I propose just not playing Taric. Even when he was good, he was only fun to bait people into your outrageous armor. By the time the clock says 20-25 minutes, you're only there to give everyone auras - he has the worst playmaking ability of all the "playmaking" supports by mid game especially when Mercury Treads are involved. And his only form of CC is just a weak, slow, single-target stun.

[Math_Mage]

Hmmmmph. I'll submit that, potentially, two single-target 1.6s stuns about 4 seconds apart, using optimal CDR reduction with autoattacks and carrying 40% CDR, is the best contribution Taric can aim for. You still won't have that kind of CDR before your second ability max. All you're doing before then is marking time between trades.

And you're still playing a worse Alistar.

[Siosilvar]

Also if you don't want to get sleepy in bottom lane, I propose just not playing Taric. Even when he was good, he was only fun to bait people into your outrageous armor. By the time the clock says 20-25 minutes, you're only there to give everyone auras - he has the worst playmaking ability of all the "playmaking" supports by mid game especially when Mercury Treads are involved. And his only form of CC is just a weak, slow, single-target stun.

+1

Taric is just the cheap & easy version of the other tank supports and it shows in how dull he ends up being most of the time. Everybody with a ranged autoattack is more engaging and usually contributes more to the success of the lane. So does everybody with a gapcloser and hard CC.

They keep remaking his passive but he needs a lot more than that to actually be interesting. The only advantage or unique niche he has compared to Thresh/Braum/Leona/Alistar would be cheaper IP price and auras, except Alistar is free and auras are boring.

[Winthur]

They keep remaking his passive but he needs a lot more than that to actually be interesting.

This kinda thinking is what brought new Sona, sorry guys I still think it was the Hitler of reworks

[Siosilvar]

This kinda thinking is what brought new Sona, sorry guys I still think it was the Hitler of reworks

To be fair, new Sona is more engaging than old Sona and her power is more obvious.

Whether or not it's what people wanted is up for debate but it certainly fit Riot's design goals.

Personally I'd have kept some of the passive benefits just so that the increased duration for tagging somebody actually means something. Or made them reset for each ally tagged. Or tied Power Chord to the number of allies you tag. Or anything really. A half-second of extra duration to give somebody a one-off boost is a silly mechanic.

[Winthur]

To be fair, new Sona is more engaging than old Sona and her power is more obvious.

Blah. All I liked about her is how you get to autonomously do every single support thing (sustain + poke + utility + CC) but you also have to be really precise with your positioning due to random stuff like making sure you're exactly within Q range, poking well with autoattacks and casting good ults.

Now I just feel like my most important contribution is consciously tagging with those auras. Mostly in the laning phase. I hate how weak your Qs are now when you use them by yourself.

Sona's laning phase was fun and good Crescendos were fun. Now the laning sucks so I don't feel like playing her just for Crescendos.

[JKTrickster]

I think he literally meant pots, rather than elixers.

Yep. This.

HP Pots are amazing.

You lost that trade? Oh but you have pots and your opponent doesn't?

THEN YOU WIN LANE.

Assuming you aren't playing bad....having more pots or inherent sustain means you have something to leverage on your opponent. Something you can use to help you snowball the lane and win.

[Grytorm]

Just experienced a typical Cho'Gath deathspiral. Not being able to stay alive long enough to get tanky enough to stay alive. Although it was partly because I had a really greedy heavy AP build and kept getting blown up. But out entire team kept getting blown up. But then we got a lucky Ace and were able to take their whole base.

[ex cathedra]

If someone hurts you in lane, you have to try and hurt them back.

It doesn't matter if you hurt them NOW (as in continue the trade) or LATER (as in win the next trade), but the goal is to always deal more damage to the other laner than they do to you.

understand that i was not talking about laning in a broad sense. i was talking about a specific matchup. in that matchup, i believe that irelia is disadvantaged both when harassing darius and when all-ining him.

while it is possible to juke Q's, realistically you're going to have to take unavoidable damage when trying to farm against darius. after taking a Q, you have a choice: back off or E + W + auto + auto + auto + q him. doing the latter opens you up to auto-W-auto-Q, and, between his passive and his attack speed slow, you don't make much progress against that.

here's an example: say that i'm at 60% HP and that Darius is at 70% HP. i take a Q, go to ~50%. if i decide to trade, he goes to 50% or even 40% but I go to 30%. even if we were at equivalent health pools, a darius at 30% is more dangerous than i am at 30% because his ultimate gives him significantly more burst than i'm capable of. at 30%, i can't stay in lane against him. at 50%, i don't weaken him at all but at least i don't immediately lose any additional gold/xp by being forced to back.

while that lane was played sloppily, i'm not actually very dissatisfied with essentially going even with a darius despite poor farming and poor use of teleport. i was much less concerned with mistakes made in the first half of that game than mistakes made in the second, though the opposite is true of the aatrox game.

[JKTrickster]

Um....I don't know how or why you're thinking of the lane like that.

You're literally resigning yourself to "immediate defeat, no matter what, will take free damage anyway, so why bother" mentality.


If you were literally doing that badly, then you might as well stay under tower and farm. You would never venture past half of your lane and you would just sit back and CS for 10 - 15 minutes.

You would buy 5 HP pots every time you went back to lane and then just CS some more under tower. You would ask for no ganks cause you probably don't even have the items to even deal any damage and you'll just wait for mid game.

It is really rare for that to happen at the beginning of the game, right off the bat, without ANYTHING happening yet.

I seriously doubt you were SO helpless that your only choice was:

1. Take damage or

2. Take even more damage and die.

If your lane is seriously THAT bad from level 1 - its either you or your champion. Something is wrong.

~~~~

Also the answer to your "example" is - trade better.

Even if you are right, then trade when you have more minions. Or trade when you have more pots to spare. Or trade when you can juke into a bush. Or trade only after he misses the first Q. Then back off before his next Q is up.


~~~~~

[Clarkson]

Well that was interesting. I played my first PvP match in quite a while (neither Lolking or the website remember either), and wound up getting support. I figure no problem. I'll just grab my go-to Soraka, and then use the runes I use for AP midlaners, because I apparently deleted the ones I use for AP supports. I get in game and am disappointed to discover that they've completely redone her since I last played her.

And now actually looking at her abilities I notice that her heal is no longer point and click, and actually drains her health to cast it.

I did hear that they completely changed my go-to toplaner's (Sion) abilities around.

Feel free to add me to the NA server. I'll probably be doing at least a game a night for now. In game handle is fkrts

That said, I'm currently level 16. So don't expect to play many games with me for a while.

[Ashen Lilies]

Her heal is still point and click. Just significantly shorter ranged. It's still basically the same skill, only with the health drain and a much lower cooldown. Her ult is identical pretty much. Her Q (is now an AoE skill-shot which heals her) and E (AoE zone which silences and snares - no more ally cast to replenish mana) are her main changes. On the other hand, Bananambulance! (dat passive)

Sion... uh... yeah, good luck with that.

[Ninja_Grand]

Anyone up for a game? Im on till 4 GMT -4.

[thracian]

Um....I don't know how or why you're thinking of the lane like that.

You're literally resigning yourself to "immediate defeat, no matter what, will take free damage anyway, so why bother" mentality.

He's mentioned before that he tilts immediately upon first going into that matchup because it is such a bad Irelia matchup, but to be honest I'd suspect that aether is probably a little more experienced with the matchup than most in this thread.

Irelia will take random Qs that she can't trade back on, that's just part of playing Irelia vs. Darius. The goal is to minimize those free damage opportunities from your enemy and maximize your own opportunities for landing free damage.

If you were literally doing that badly, then you might as well stay under tower and farm. You would never venture past half of your lane and you would just sit back and CS for 10 - 15 minutes.

You would buy 5 HP pots every time you went back to lane and then just CS some more under tower. You would ask for no ganks cause you probably don't even have the items to even deal any damage and you'll just wait for mid game.

It is really rare for that to happen at the beginning of the game, right off the bat, without ANYTHING happening yet.

It's actually fairly common in toplane (due to the typically lower amounts of burst compared to HP pools and the predominance of melee champions) to be in a matchup where the only chance you have of coming out ahead is due to large mistakes by the laner or simply leaving the lane and trying to get something done elsewhere. Some matchups can be recovered through repeated jungler ganks (Malphite vs. Ryze, for example), some are often simply lost causes.

Due to Irelia having the weakest form of movement (enemy-targeted) and no real interaction beyond melee range, it becomes difficult to make a classic "outplay" beyond the enemy getting greedy and you punishing with E. Measured Q harass without going too ham on tower dives will result in Irelia being whittled down without many real trade opportunities. Ask for jungler pre-6, I guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

I'm not saying that you'll always lose the matchup, but having the only realistic way to win the lane being through your enemies' mistakes is super frustrating as a player.

If your lane is seriously THAT bad from level 1 - its either you or your champion. Something is wrong.

It might be related to the fact that it's been mentioned multiple times that Irelia has a very losing matchup vs. Darius.

Also the answer to your "example" is - trade better.

Even if you are right, then trade when you have more minions. Or trade when you have more pots to spare. Or trade when you can juke into a bush. Or trade only after he misses the first Q. Then back off before his next Q is up.

As I mentioned above (melee interaction space, enemy-targeted movement) it's actually really difficult for Irelia to end a trade against some champions without using E and backing off in the stun. Between Darius' movespeed bonus and slow, he can often force you to take multiple AAs after the Q and with his pull, he may be able to stick to you long enough to force another Q.

Using E and backing off during the stun is problematic enough due it being a "lose less" tactic by its very nature (you lose trading time when he's stunned as you're using the stun time to escape, you also guarantee that you're never at more HP than your laner with this tactic [dangerous against dunk]).

[Ionbound]

Just hit level 30! Yay! *sets off fireworks*

[abadguy]

Just hit level 30! Yay! *sets off fireworks*

Congrats! Now for that wretched hive of scum and villainy known as Ranked.

[NineThePuma]

Don't jump into ranked unless you are comfortable on at least three champions in at least three roles.

[thracian]

Uh, I only play like one champion in support, one in ADC, none in mid. Should I avoid ranked, then?