Three games!

Match 1 :

Champion : Pantheon

Role : Jungle

Build Order : 

Runes & Masteries : 

Notes : 

     This was a one of those one-sided back and forth throwfest games. By that I mean we were ahead the entire game but we gave the enemy team so much extra gold because of silly shit like double nexus turret diving 15 minutes into the game. Personally, I think we did really well this game but there were still many critical errors.

     The main thing I took advantage of this game was their weak link. In this game, Evelynn played top lane which isn't exactly a "meta" pick. Not only that but she didn't have much MR in her runes so Vladimir was destroying her 1v1. 4 minutes in, I saw that Evelynn was pushed under her tower and had 15% health so I told the Vladimir that I wanted to dive her. He dove first, w'd, and I auto q'd her for a quick kill. That was first blood. Shortly after, Lee Sin attempted to invade me because I was a little low but Pantheon is INCREDIBLY powerful in 1v1 skirmishes early game. Lee Sin can't fight a Pantheon effectively, even if Pantheon is at 60% vs his 100% health. This is due to Pantheon's passive which blocks auto attacks. I forced Lee Sin to flash and spent the rest of the game shutting him down by deep warding in his jungle and planning accordingly. I watched where he was (e.g. if he was at wraiths, I would move towards mid/bot side) and counterganked wherever he showed up. This effectively made Lee Sin useless. Au contaire, I ended up incredibly fed. Once I hit 6, I used my ultimate on bottom lane every single time they overextended. The key thing with Pantheon is that his bottom lane post 6 ganks are incredibly potent. He's an almost guaranteed double kill if you position the ult properly. To position the ultimate, you generally aim to block their escape paths (e.g ult behind them). If they have no summoners, someone will die for sure. With the amount of pressure on the map, we had free reign over dragon. I had my duo queue partner (who was the support) maintain vision around their red side and managed to secure every dragon. In the mid game, we kept vision control on the enemy team's blue side jungle (specifically, the intersection by blue buff and their wolf camp) and managed to sneak an early baron. Shortly after we secured baron, we snagged a 5th dragon and pushed to win the game.

     So the main issues this game were that uh, we got REALLY cocky. And where there's cocky... there's throwing. Both Vladimir and I were culprits of this which is why we had the most deaths. This is really the only issue in this game. Both he and I would overextend and force teamfights which would result in a 2 for 2 or worse exchange. In a game where you're 20K+ gold ahead of someone, it is really not worth giving them shutdowns and then more free gold. You should avoid getting that cocky because we very nearly threw this game because of how much gold we gave them.

Match 2 : 

Champion : Pantheon

Role : Jungle

Build Order : 

Runes & Masteries :

Notes :

    So the beginning of this game was really awkward. Morgana, my duo queue partner, called an invade and we immediately ran to the bottom of the map. I facechecked into 4 people and immediately died for first blood. Then the 4 proceeded to kill the other 3 people who were following me. We managed to kill one of them but, off the bat, the game was 1 - 4.

     Honestly, this game was well played all around /sarcasm. The enemy team had a hefty lead but I played the early game really well. Early on, I managed to get two quick, successive ganks on the Maokai so Jarvan snowballed really hard. Shortly after the two ganks on Jarvan, I went back and purchased two long swords then immediately went to mid lane for another gank to help snowball Veigar. Unfortunately for Lee Sin, he also tried to gank and he was counterganked by me. It resulted in 2 kills for Veigar. Right after that, I immediately went bottom lane for another kill on the Janna. At this point, despite the game starting off 1 - 4, the game was now 5 - 4. Shortly after that kill though, I got dragon stolen from me by a Janna Q. Yeah... It was that kind of game. Because of the double kill mid lane, Veigar snowballed uncontrollably and I sat in his lane for a little while to get more gold. It resulted it in a few more kills. The game continued going in that direction with the enemy team just walking into us over and over again. The enemy jungler, Lee Sin, was incredibly tilted, especially right after the countergank in mid lane (hence his 1/16 score). The game just kinda went on and on and we eventually won the game just because the enemy team would suicide repeatedly.

     There were a shit ton of mistakes this game but most of the mistakes were made by the enemy team. Despite that, I made my fair share of mistakes. Because of the start of the game, the game was difficult to take seriously but I still tried my best to gain the elo. Despite that, I missed smite on dragon with dragon living with 3 health. Janna's q ended up stealing it. 6 minutes later, the enemy team stole another dragon from me because of Janna again. It was INCREDIBLY awkward. We were winning hard but it just didn't feel like a solid performance from me. 

     

Match 3 : 

Champion : Rengar

Role : Top

Build Order :

Runes & Masteries : 

Notes :

     Games like this are painful. I did really well early game as a top laner but, unfortunately, my team was too busy raging at each other and it led to a defeat. If people had stayed calm in the early game, it would've been an easy victory but our jungle and ADC tilted so we ended up losing.

     The Rengar vs Jax matchup is a really brutal matchup. Jax can E through most of your damage (Autos/Q/Empowered Q). To win the matchup, you need to engage on him after he uses his E. So you have to bait out his E. How I handled it early game was getting 4 ferocity at level 1, wait in a bush until level 2, jump on him, run back towards the bush, force him to chase me with his E active, and immediately turn/ empowered Q him and burst him down. He almost killed me but I secured first blood because I ran ignite and he didn't. Because of that, I won the lane until later. Once I hit level 6, I generated 5 ferocity and forced a gank mid lane. Jarvan counterganked and I secured a double kill. So things were looking good at first. I went back to top lane and started pressuring Jax hard. The only reason I didn't end up snowballing as effectively was Xin Zhao got caught by their Jarvan and I jumped in but didn't notice that Xin Zhao was already dead. So I basically killed myself and gave Jax a double kill. After that, Jax could 1v1 me again and the lane became a little troublesome. At this point, my team was hardcore raging at each other, specifically at the bot lane. The only thing I could do at that point was roam a bit more with my ultimate up and try to keep my team calm. So I did the best I could do in my situation. I tried to tell them to relax and that the game was easily winnable but they were  a little too frustrated.

     Despite it sounding like this game was lost just because of my team tilting, I definitely feel that I could have done somethings to prevent them from tilting in the first place. If, instead of ulting mid lane for the double kill, I had ulted bottom lane, I may have been able to help the Jinx enough that she could hold her own in the mid game. Instead, they just raged at each other and the game was lost. Another major issue was my lack of awareness with Xin Zhao. He got caught a few times and I definitely could have not only saved him but secured at least one or two kills. 

     Overall, it was a really rough game but it was winnable throughout the entire time. If you're playing ranked, just try to keep your cool. Most of the time, everyone on your team has the same goal : to get LP and to climb. 

     Anyways, that's all I've got for today. Overall, it was a pretty good day. I'm now Plat III with 57 LP. If you guys have any questions or comments, comment here, send me a message on FB, or tweet me at @Lilnovalas. Thanks for reading guys!