Life on the Fields of Justice

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The PAX Arcade Sona Skin Giveaway

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Special thanks goes to Sugafly for going to PAX and donating some Sona skins for me to give out!  Without him, none of you would have a shot at getting a skin from me!

Here’s the rules:

Post the play you liked most from the Season Two World Championships in the comments section below this post.  If you want to be a winner include an email that works or your IGN so that I can contact you if you win.  I don’t want things to get too crazy on here so I’m only going to look at the first 100 comments.  This isn’t the only promotion I’ll be doing, so if you miss the first 100 comments, don’t lose hope!

Here’s an example of a play I liked.  It was when Alex Ich got to play Eve for the first time and his team also ran Xin Zhao top, two rather abnormal picks for competitive play.  They were slightly behind and going into a Baron fight.  In an amazing feat of skill Xin and Lee both pounced on Ezreal as Evelynn came around the back side.  They quickly erased Ezreal off the map and set their team up for some easy kills.  If I would have tried to dive on Ezreal I would have gotten eaten alive, but they managed to make it work and just melted his health bar.  It took planning and perfect execution.  I love that kind of team play.

That’s just an example.  Write as much or as little as you’d like about your play, just so long as we know which one you’re talking about.  If you want extra brownie points find a clip of it on YouTube and throw it in along with your submission.  I’m more interested in what you liked personally about the plays than the plays themselves.

Best of luck to all the submitters!  The winner will be decided hopefully by a non-biased poll.  I am technically the winner because I’ll get to read all your fun comments!

First Ranked

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We made a new ranked team!  This was a massive undertaking that took weeks of planning and thought and emails and team crafting and theory crafting and…  You get the idea.  Well, we didn’t like where that took us, so yesterday we just said “screw it” and jumped into the ranked queue!

We told ourselves that we would ban Ezreal if we were second pick and pick him if we were first pick.  We were second pick, but the other team banned Ezreal for us, so  we didn’t have to.  Let’s go through the pick stage though.

First pick Varus.  I guess with Ezreal out the other team felt very comfortable on Varus.  We picked up Tristana and Nunu.  Nunu was going into the jungle, but the other team didn’t know that.  The other team picks Sona and Vlad.  Silly kids, they thought we wouldn’t have any sustain in bot lane.  Well, we out-smarted them by conforming and picking support Morgana and Lux for mid.  The other team countered with Amumu and Darius.  Oh no.  I hate Darius.  I don’t like his kit.  I hate that if he hooks you, you burn flash.  That drives me crazy.  He’s too dangerous without damage items.  Oh well.  We’ll send Steve up there anyway.  Best of luck, Steve!  Steve picks Nasus.  It actually worked better than I thought it would.

Level 1 we’re just minding our own business in bottom lane when Amumu, Varus, and Sona come walking in behind us in river.  Game on!  Our first instinct is to run once we see three.  However, Sona is already low from helping Amumu steal our blue.  I ignite and start hitting her with autos.  I flash to match her flash.  One more hit, but she’s under tower.  I get the first blood on Sona, and turn to see Amumu and Varus.  Then a wild Nunu appears.  We had helped him steal the enemy red, so he was in the bottom jungle, ready to wreck some kids.  He helps to DPS Varus so even though Varus used summoner heal we still kill him before he can get out.  Amumu is crying at my feet, probably because of the double kill I just got, but that double kill, combined with the creep wave that I got to soak up before they showed up ticked me up to level 2.  I quick level into my rocket jump and away I go!  See ya, suckers!  Double kill for the ADC?  What a great way to start the game!  Blood Boil OP!

I won the race to Infinity Edge, then got my Phantom Dancer, and was going to get a Last Whisper, but the crits were too much.  I was somewhat frustrated with my mid-game because I kept getting bullied by Sona and Varus.  Their combined poke burst was too much for my small health pool.  I guess I was too used to playing as Ezreal and having Dorans and Phage.  I also prefer to just sit in bot lane and farm until I’m huge and then team fight and get my kills that way.  I felt like the way that bottom lane was going I kept missing lots of experience and gold from waves that I had to miss because I was too low.  I would have Varus and Sona tower dive me if I was at or below half health.  It was VERY annoying.  However, the feeling of just mowing stuff down later was priceless.  I haven’t felt like that on Ezreal because I don’t get as much crit through Trinity Force as I would with Infinity Edge and Phantom Dancer.

The Fall of M5

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Losing is inevitable.  Every dynasty sees it’s end.  I knew Moscow 5 would lose eventually, but after their dominance in game 1 vs Taipei Assassins I didn’t think there would be a reason for them to drop a series.  However, enough things went wrong for them to drop it.  Let’s cover those things.

This was a comment I made on reddit yesterday.  I didnt’ know if I was being ridiculous, or making a sensible call.  Alex Ich, the notorious farming machine, ended up playing Zilean and Gragas after his comfortable Evelynn pick was banned in both the second and third game.  Is that a problem?  I feel like Zilean is a one-trick pony; if you can predict his damage output or play something that counters it then it becomes a non-factor.  Gragas is a strong mid, and I felt comfortable with Alex on that as it gave him the opportunity to farm, was a good lane opponent for Anivia, and had surprising synergy with Nunu’s Blood Boil.  I know that sounds strange, to use Blood Boil on your AP mid, but Gragas’ Drunken Rage can increase his Attack Damage by 70!  That’s nothing to scoff at for a champion receiving solo experience.

Both top lane losses were Nidalee vs Yorick.  Something I never thought I’d see.  Yorick would lose his first turret to how fast Nidalee would push, and then Nidalee would just keep pushing.  She would fight until she was out of mana and then she would swap form and execute people.  Her build was the wonkiest thing I’ve ever seen!  Doran’s Blade, Chalice of Harmony, Spirit Visage, Guinsoo’s Rageblade, Trinity Force.  Oh, so she does it all?  Ok, that makes sense…  They just couldn’t kill TPA Stanley on Nidalee!  He was really impressive both games.  However, if you’re one of the best (four) teams in the world, wouldn’t you want to counter-pick or ban Nidalee after what she did against you in game 2?  If you can’t spare a ban, at least don’t pick the same champion expecting him to go top and lose all over again.

Lane swaps heavily favored Taipei Assassins and I felt like M5 knew this, yet just let it happen.  I can see Kog thriving in a 2v1 situation because he doesn’t have the fear of two champions pouncing on him and taking advantage of his lack of escape.  However, Ezreal can abuse a Kog’Maw because of his poke and burst.  Even though both of them have skill-shots, Ezreal has a way to dodge skill-shots built into his kit, while Kog’Maw does not.

I honestly thought that M5 would be able to rise above the pressure that TPA put on their lanes early.  However, TPA could effectively fight 4v5, leaving Nidalee top or bot to take towers on her own.  No champion could fight that Nidalee and kill her, so there was no risk of death.  It was a simple variation to the old Shen split push strat, partly because Nidalee was running Teleport.

Box of Chocolates OF DOOM!

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I knew this day would come.  Blind Pick is like a box of chocolates.  This box of chocolates had multiple threats that I was afraid of facing.  Nocturne hurts Teemo because Teemo lacks a method of getting outside of his tether range.  Vlad can really hurt a Teemo because his sustain is something Teemo is jealous of but can’t have.  Darius is the largest threat because Teemo must get into attack range in order to lane against a Darius and if Darius pulls once Teemo dies.  I actually started joking with my team and said “$5 says I’m first blood.”

I actually managed to get first blood on Darius as he tried to last hit the wave that I had pushed.  Right after that I backed off, afraid of where Nocturne would be.  However, my jungler pointed out that he was being counter-jungled at the moment; Nocturne was at our Elder Lizard buff.  I bunny-hopped down there to see the little minions resetting.  Our poor Rammus was right, Nocturne was taking the jungle, no regrets.  However, I found a 200 HP Nocturne taking our Wraiths.  Goody!  Free red buff for Teemo!

At this point Darius gives up.  He sees me with first blood (and second blood) and a red buff.  However, it’s shortly after this that I make my first mistake.  I push Darius out of lane with red buff.  He’s forced to take harass and try to last hit with his Q.  I freeze the lane and take a lot of CS that Darius can’t reach.  I go back, buy wards and health pots and come back to lane.  I ward the river, and leave a couple Easter Eggs down there as well, and walk back to lane.  Before I can step out of river bush Darius goes balls to the wall on me.  I’m confused because I’m so far ahead that he’s not a threat.  Then Nocturne is standing next to me.  Level 5 Nocturne.  How did Nocturne get next to me, you ask?  I have no idea.  It’s my mistake, somehow pre-ult Nocturne had managed to stealth into my lane and catch me at the mouth of river.  I was standing in the bush so I knew he wasn’t in there.  I had a ward at the opening to blue and 10,000 mushrooms in the bush behind.  Yet, I knew I was dead.

I have my long walk of shame back to the lane.  Now Darius is really going to pay.  I abuse Darius so hard that he rages in all-chat and then swaps for mid.  I actually suggest the change so they won’t surrender right away.  Vlad comes top.  I go to auto attack into a Q and another auto attack, but Vlad just pools after my first auto, so he loses 20% of almost his full health pool to his escape spell.  As soon as he shows himself again I commit.  I know his W is down, I get my ignite on early to stop his initial lifesteal from his Q.  I flash to secure the kill and stay with him.  He disappears off the screen trying desperately to heal off something, but nothing can save him now.  Wait for it.  Wait for it.  Wait fooooooooor iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.  Killing spree.

I push lane, take turret and steal blue.  Now I have complete control.  With blue buff I can abuse their jungle and put shrooms all over the place!  Now the fun starts!

I literally had a 1v4 fight that I managed to prolong with mushrooms.  First it was Nocturne and Soraka.  Soraka baited me out and then Nocturne ulted with her vision.  I was surrounded by shrooms, so Nocturne was already hurting by the time he got to me.  I dropped Soraka and saw that I had enough damage to kill Nocturne once the fear wore off.  That means that I have double buffs!  I start working my way back up my lane because I’m down to just a few hundred HP.  Vlad shows up.  He wards the tri-bush that’s up and to the left of blue-side’s blue buff.  I’m not in it, but a present is waiting for him in there.  He steps on it, bringing him critically low.  I don’t know if he has pool, but I wait for him to use it before I take a step in to secure the kill.  Then Darius, desperate to exact his revenge, he comes crawling through a minefield of shrooms, losing all of his HP before reaching me.  However, I’m equally low after battling the rest of his team.  I run up the lane, taking time to put a ward at the mouth of river and right between the two bushes of top lane.  Darius just wants to get me in range.  If he can land his pull he can press R and kill me.  He knows it.  I know it.  I’m dancing just outside of his reach, so I throw him a bone.  I step in towards Darius, dancing on the furthest range of his pull.  He tries for it.  No dice.  I auto attack with poison and red buff and Q him and start to recall.  He’s slowed by my buff, I’m outside of his range, and his pull is on cooldown.  Sion appears out of the river and finishes off Darius as I finish my recall.  Sometimes I just like to rub it in.

After my last purchase I was able to pick off Soraka in top jungle again (I have no idea what she was doing there) and then I heard the lovely sound of “Legendary!” being screamed by the announcer lady.  I almost got away, just died to a Nocturne ultimate.  I think he finally timed his spell shield to block my blind instead of my DFG.  Once they killed me, they promptly surrendered.  I received no “Honorable Opponent” credits from the other team that game, but thoroughly enjoyed myself against champions that I thought would give me a lot of trouble.

Not at a “Loss” For Words

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I always blog about my victories, but people never get to see my losses.  Maybe I like it more that way, but I don’t want to mask the sad truth; I lose games sometimes.  Luckily, I get to pick which games you see, so this will be my example.  You’ll notice the positive KDA and highest creep score in the game, but if you would have been in that game with me you would have believed that we could win.  That’s what I believed as I was playing.  I knew we could win this game.  All we had to do was somehow DDOS Irelia.

This game started better than it finished.  We probably shouldn’t have dragged it out this long.  Our bot lane was insanely strong with Ezreal/Lux.  Very skill-shot dependent, but high range and damage.  Lux and I shared kills, but she let me farm the creeps.  She was an exceptional Lux.  Despite a mental misstep of my own causing me to lose my Flash early we still were able to zone bottom away from creeps.  My 5-0-5 start combined with Lux’s similar start are not shown in this game.  Some team mates are too heavy to carry.

Losing out on five early kills to my support and jungler didn’t help me this game, especially when our top fed three kills and then rage quit.  I don’t know if he was ashamed or just bad, but if you’re going to take a solo lane and lose it you may as well stick around to help your team as best you can.  If you can’t survive top then gank mid, steal jungle, or gank bottom and take Dragon.  Your other option is to not feed three kills to top in the first five minutes of the game.

We stayed in this game, and had surprising success.  Our game plan was to ignore Irelia.  She was already fed.  If she showed up, we ran.  If we could team fight without her then we could win.  She actually verbally attacked her Corki after the game, saying that he was non-existent, so it was a 4v4.  He was still richer than anyone else on my team.

I probably should not have gotten another BF, and I probably should’ve grabbed a Last Whisper, I just was hoping to get to Black Cleaver and sustain with it’s attack speed and armor reduction.  This would have let me melt targets like Annie, Corki, and Jax.  Unfortunately, they were able to pick off Teemo and push to end.  In the final seconds of the match Irelia Q’d to get on Lux and Lux died instantly.  It made me question why I don’t play Irelia every game; if she can two-shot a champion of equal level with two items that deal damage while not using a summoner spell or an ultimate.  Ability Power champions focus the whole game  and all of their precious money into items designed to make them deal damage, and Irelia can counter that with a Trinity Force and Wit’s End?  Balance in all things.  I hate you, Rengar.