The Reasons You Can’t Escape from Bronze ELO

Have you ever just been so frustrated with League of Legends because you just can’t seem to escape from Bronze, no matter what you do? You’re right along with thousands of other summoners who can’t climb a ladder when the rungs are loose and untested – stuck. So why can’t you make it to Silver or higher? We’re going to take a look at the simple and avoidable mistakes people make when playing the game as well as covering the concept of tilting to ensure you get the escape you’ve been clamoring for.

Learn to Place Wards

This is a simple concept most summoners in Bronze have forgotten, it’s not just the supports job to ward, it’s everyone’s – ensure you get the Greater Stealth Totem (yellow trinket) as soon as possible and do your part; keep the map visible and you’ll see them coming from a mile off.

• Where to Ward When Losing Top/Bot: Ward beside you in the tri-bush and by the blue/red buff. If you’re stuck camping your tower you need to keep vision on where the enemy is most likely to come at you, through your jungle. Try to keep vision of these places open as much as possible to ensure your high survival rate. Additionally, for bot lane – keep a ward in the bush closest to your tower as much as possible, the enemy jungler may come from there!
• Where to Ward When Losing Mid: If you’re losing in mid the best places to ward would be dependent upon which other lanes are losing and their junglers invade tactics. If the enemy jungler is posted up in your area, assist your jungler and ward the entrances to your jungle. If the enemy is sticking more to their lanes, ward the single bushes in the river.
• Where to Ward When Winning Top/Bot: Ward the river. It doesn’t matter how far up you plan on pushing for either lane, if you’re pushing at all there should be a ward in the river. Additionally, for top lane – ward their tri-bush if you plan on pushing their tower. This is very important and many deaths I see from top lane are because they decided to push without vision.
• Where to Ward When Winning Mid: When you’re winning mid the best places to ward would be the entrances to their jungle. You can almost guarantee that you’ll be pressured into backing off, if not killed for pushing mid tower, from any other lane. Warding the entrances to their jungle will allow you to see not only the river but the avenues of approach for their jungler as well.
• Where to Ward in Jungle: Jungle is a place you want to keep warded to avoid counter-jungling and invades. The best places to ward are behind the red buff, the four-way right beside blue buff and the entrances. Which side to ward will be solely dependent upon what measures you need to take to keep the enemy jungler away from an early kill.

Bloodthirsty: Don’t Always Chase

We’ve all done it, chased from one end of the map to the other in order to kill that one champion with 5 HP left. They’re almost dead, one basic attack will kill them and grant you some gold to play around with – but let them go. While chasing isn’t always a bad thing to do (i.e. they’re a straggler from the last teamfight), the tunnel vision from chasing is eventually going to cause you to lose a game. When you chase a champion without any vision of the map and there are enemy champions still alive: they’re baiting you, and they’re baiting hard.

There’s no telling how many games I’ve seen thrown (and thrown myself) due to chasing a single champion into a trap. For the love of your LP, just have some patience and back off instead.

Poke Before You Waste Your Burst

Regardless of what lane you’re in you need to poke the enemy champion first, and wear them down. Don’t go wasting your full combo on something that’s only going to make them go heal up instead of getting you that kill you so rightly deserve. You really should sit back and poke as much as possible before attempting something that could cost your life as well.

For example, say you’re mid and you’re going as Leblanc. It’s very tempting to attempt a full combo kill at level 3, but it will more than likely not kill the enemy champion unless you’ve poked them down first. Use your Q and your W more than for the kill, get their health lower first! Don’t always try to burst someone from full health to zero, try bursting them from half health to zero instead.

This video explains properly what exactly poking entails aside from just “hit the bad guys.”

Farming is More Than Last Hitting

Now this is the section that most people have an issue with. Farming is more than just hitting a minion, it’s knowing when to hit them so the lane doesn’t push. It’s also knowing how to corral minions into a postion that allows your jungler more opportunities to gank.

Last hitting is something that will keep you from getting ganked while you’re waiting on more wards or while you’re waiting for a gank. Either way, this explanation video is something every ranked player needs to see in regards to getting some good last-hitting advice.

Grouping: “It’s Dangerous to Go Alone, Take Blitz!”

INow it can be very tempting to go push that bot lane when the rest of your team is mid, I mean, look at all those minions you’re missing out on! Don’t. Don’t do that. When your team has 3-4 people in one place – join them!

The likelihood of a fight starting is extremely high and without you, your team has a higher chance of failing. This is the most common mistake done in teamfight phase and it’s the most likely to lose you the game.

Teamfights Win Games

When it comes to teamfight phase the one important thing you need to keep in mind is that the enemy back line will do more damage than their frontline, take them out first. It may be tempting to attack the ulting Nasus attacking your Maokai, but ignore them – attack their carries! When their carries eat your tanks you’ll be left stuck against all of them, maybe minus a frontlinesman, and less likely to turn that fight around.

Another thing you want to strive for is to catch the enemy team unaware. If a member is farming bot while the rest are top or mid, take the whole crew bot to take her out. The remaining fight will be a 5v4 in your favor, much easier to win than a head on 5v5 – especially when you’re pushing them.

Lastly, unless you’re super fed and your tanks are thick, never dive the enemy team. It may sound like common sense, but this is an even more common mistake. Bait them out, poke, siege, and take objectives carefully.

Take a Break When You Are Tilting

The last thing we’re going to cover is a term called “tilting“. Tilting is when you’ve made a mistake or two and get frustrated, so you begin to make more. Eventually you just keep losing and losing, your mindset becoming more and more bleak than you once were.

When you find yourself on a losing spree, take a break. Go clear your head and come back to it when you’re ready. When you’re frustrated or upset your mind isn’t going to be focusing on how to win, it’s going to be focusing on how you’re losing.

Raging Helps No One

Your teammates will make you angry, they won’t be as good as you all the time and sometimes they’ll be tilting. Be encouraging to them and give them advice, don’t degrade them. There’s a reason Riot initiated the Honor System in the first place, and it’s because negative players create negative games.

If they’re being unreasonable or irresponsible, ignore them and mute them. Keep the game fun for you and you’re more likely to play well with the rest of the team. Don’t let the trolls win!

TL;DR Be a Team Member

Remember the game isn’t about what you can do, it’s what your team can do together that decides the match. Ward where you need to, pay attention and don’t forget to poke! The more you act like a cog in a greater (winning) mechanism, the better the team will play. Make sacrifices if need be, but play like you want to be part of something great – not something upsetting.