Author: Jeff Morgan (Page 177 of 260)

LoL: 3v3 Matchmaking goes live!

March 30, 2010 / Jeff Morgan

I got a nice surprise when I logged in for a quick game over lunch – 3v3 matchmaking is LIVE! Yes, the long awaited Twisted Treeline has finally entered live play. It’s going to be a strange new world in the tiny map. This really does change the dynamic of the game in a big way.

If you haven’t played on Treeline, you’re in for a bit of a surprise. Melee toons do very well, to the point that most think Mundo and Mordekaiser are severely OP. It’s really a matter of selecting a team that’s durable enough to withstand some damage and still dish out enough to wipe three people.

3v3 is where you’ll find me for the next couple weeks, testing out different characters and comps. First project – Heimerdinger.

league of legends, News

3v3 3v3 matchmaking twisted treeline twisted treeline matchmaking

Xbox 360 flash drives are still crazy expensive

March 29, 2010 / Jeff Morgan

There was a lot of noise a few weeks back about the coming support for USB hard drives for the Xbox 360. It’s definitely great news, despite the artificial size limits, but it doesn’t mean Microsoft is ready to get out of the storage business. Quite the opposite, in fact. According to a few items listed at GameStop, Redmond is just getting started in the gaming storage business.

GameStop recently listed two different flash drives for use with the 360 – 8GB and 16GB. As is the case with most Microsoft storage, these drives are ridiculously expensive – $40 and $70, respectively. That’s basically double what you’d normally pay for a flash drive of those capacities.

Granted, there’s no official announcement from Microsoft for the peripherals, so this could be fabrication. I’m willing to bet it’s real, though. There’s nothing Microsoft loves quite like banking off over priced periphs.

Xbox 360

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LoL: The push strat

March 29, 2010 / Jeff Morgan

It can get a little boring running the same teamfight strategy over and over, so I like to switch things up. Lately I’ve been running a heavy push strat with a couple friends, and though we’ve been taking our time learning it’s still been a lot of fun. Here’s a quick run down of a few of your options.

When you’re going for a push strat you want to have at least one tower down under the five minute mark, but preferably a second if you can manage it. Your team comp focuses on early game durability and push. When four people surprise push a lane it’s very hard to counter without a lot of ports or quick action. Alistar is a must for keeping creep waves healed and his ability to rip up a turret. You should also take Sivir along for obvious reasons. Personally, we’ve been rolling with a Heimerdinger as well to keep up the push. He is great at mowing down minion waves to set things up. From there it’s pretty much your pick. Janna is great for AOE crowd control on your opponent and her AOE heal can grant you some extra push time. You can take Warwick then for his global attack speed buff or Taric for heals/aura and Radiance for pushing.

I’ve not tried a game with Taric yet, but the Warwick game does seem to work well. I’m planning to try Taric at some point this evening and I’ll drop some comments when I know a little more.

As for summoner spells, you need to have a few rally flags for the early game push. It keeps everyone healed up and gives you the extra damage you need to push. Taking Clarity and Heal can also keep a push alive. Basically you want your mid toon, in this case Heimer, to push the opponent back to turret. At level three you rush four people middle to take the first turret and the second if you have the health. Then it’s back to lane for farming and leveling until you have a minion wave prepped to take another turret.

If you can get an inhibitor down in 15 minutes you’ve done your job. The super minions are extremely difficult to manage at low levels which forces the other team to clear them, giving you the time to push at will. In the end it’s all about coordination. If you communicate well and move as a team you should be able to give your opponent a painful game.

league of legends, Strategy

alistar best push farmer heimer heimerdinger lane combos push push strat pusher quick win rally rush strat Strategy strats

LoL: The state of Heimerdinger

March 28, 2010 / Jeff Morgan

I had a nine-game winning streak going just the other day. Nine games. It was great to look at my summoner profile and see so much green. Unfortunately the tenth game I drew a 20-minute 0-6 Taric. You can imagine how things went from there. I decided to end my quest for the elusive ten-game streak and go on a Heimerdinger bender. Here’s what I found out.

As great as Heimer used to be in mid, he was always easily shut down. The old turret system required too much time to be effective and was easy to counter. You were also dead if you left those turrets for any reason. Now things are different. The ability to drop red turrets at will gives you great DPS if you’re in a pinch and allows you to set up lanes much more quickly.

I like to start off mid by alternating turrets and rockets. I’ve had a little trouble with some of the ranged DPS, but once you get to level four you can push minions back easily and place turrets as you will. I tend to bury mine in creeps to make them a little harder to target and keep them close enough to attack as many enemy creeps as possible. By level five you should be pressing your opponent to his tower with little trouble. Start watching for ganks – they’ll be coming if the other team is intelligent.

From there you’re just trying to burn down that mid turret. I can easily take a turret before the ten minute mark. If your opponent leaves you alone, keep pushing. Encourage your teammates to join you if you can. I recently had a game in which I had aegis by the eight minute mark. We were knocking down the nexus before 19. It was insane.

For teamfights you should be trying to stay out of the mix. You want to be dropping as many turrets as possible for both the damage and the MR/AR reduction and the potential slow. Whatever you do, do not underestimate that slow. It will save your ass. It will save your team. It will get you kills.

As it stands, Heimer is an excellent pusher. I think he’s a great candidate for heavy AP builds, but I really prefer to run around blowing up turrets at level 5. If you were a Heimer fan in the past, give the new version a shot. I’d be shocked if you didn’t like it.

Development, league of legends

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LoL: The state of Shen

March 27, 2010 / Jeff Morgan

A couple days before the latest patch went live I gave an overview of the ninja champ, Shen. At first glance he seemed as though he might suffer from confused design, and that his energy system wouldn’t scale well. I was reluctant to unlock him at first, but after seeing the way he changes a team fight, I decided to give him ago.

First, I think Shen is among the more balanced champions in the game, even though he dramatically changes the dynamic of any game he’s in. His ultimate gives him the ability to prevent ganks and sometimes turn them for a kill. It’s a unique skill, despite similar abilities in someone like Pantheon or TF because Shen shields his target, actually for quite a lot. At rank one, Shen’s ult is a 450 damage shield, more than enough to soak damage output of two heroes at level 6. Shen also shields himself for half that amount, giving you a serious advantage, particularly in what used to be an even fight.

Unfortunately that’s about it. Yes, his taunt can mess things up, but it’s short enough that it doesn’t drastically alter the course of a fight unless you’re near a tower. The rest of his skills are actually pretty boring, and that’s Shen’s biggest drawback. He’s boring. His ultimate has a fairly long cooldown – two minutes or more. The rest of the game seems to be a lot of running around waiting for a chance to use that ult.

Part of the problem is that his CC, the taunt, is so expensive. It takes most of your energy pool to cast, which is why I recommend building him with a Rylai’s. Vorpal Blade becomes a spammable slow, basically guaranteeing no one will get away from you. The chase is long because you do so little damage, but you’re durable enough that you should almost always get the kill.

I’ll be curious to see if he gets any changes in the next patch. The Ezreal buff surprised me, and though Shen hasn’t seen the same overwhleming negative outcry, I also haven’t seen many people singing his praises.