Tag: lol (Page 9 of 12)

      LoL: Did Riot patch too soon?

      February 7, 2010 /

      Server Unavailable.On the whole, I’ve been pretty impressed with Riot for its support. The servers are rarely down, and when they are, it’s typically for short periods of time. Until recently, anyway. It’s no secret that there’s been a lot of server trouble since the last patch. I won’t blame today’s issues on the patch, not in full anyway, but there have been red posts confirming that the latest patch included at least one crash bug. Couple the server-crippling problems with glitches like double spell casting and I have to ask, did they patch too soon?

      My answer is yes. Absolutely. Frankly, I don’t know why it wasn’t broken into to two patches. There was so much content that something was bound to go wrong, particularly on a rushed schedule. Granted, the community was getting restless for Pantheon and Gragas, but both in one patch? Why? Pantheon was obviously ready – the only complaint I see about him is his ultimate, which needs very little change in my mind – but Gragas is a confused mess of AP, physical damage, and tanking skills. He doesn’t scale well and fits poorly into most team comps. Why not save him for a later patch.

      I wouldn’t bother writing this if it didn’t have me worried about later patches. My hope is that the Twisted Treeline patch will get plenty of testing before it flies through. On the whole, I’d be much happier with six hours of scheduled maintenance each week to roll out small patches than the 10+ hours we’ve had this week to fix the blunders of the latest patch.

      league of legends, PC

      LoL: Getting started with Pantheon

      February 4, 2010 /

      PantheonThis post is not meant to be a full on guide for Pantheon, just a quick selection of tips that I’ve found useful in my time with the hero. I’ve probably logged about 25 games with him so far and been highly successful for the most part. I think Riot did a great job with champ, definitely the best I’ve seen from any of the newer toons, anyway.

      The thing you need to understand, and by understand I mean completely internalize so that it is second nature, is that Pantheon is pretty squishy. Despite having a huge shield and a very cool passive, he can still get his socks rocked if you aren’t paying attention. Think of him like a Master Yi and you should be just fine.

      In the early game, I take Spear Shot as my first skill every time unless I’m going for a 3-man or 5-man gank. It’s a great harassing skill, is extremely cheap at any level, and gives you a farming method against ranged champs. From there it’s 1 rank of stun and then maxing Heartseeker. Stay with me.

      A lot of people say to max stun first because it lowers the cooldown. It’s a decent idea, but at max rank the CD is still greater than 10 seconds, meaning you’ll probably only get one off before your opponent is in tower range. While Heartseeker has a longer cooldown, it deals double damage to champions and can be devastating at early levels.

      I’ll leave you with an idea for getting some early game kills: It’s all about saving your stun for the last minute. You really need to make it count. Start off by running in with a Spear Shot and getting some melee work done. If you have exhaust, blow it early and get some smacks in. Just keep up the melee until your target starts to run. That’s when you pop the stun and Heartseeker away. At that point he should be low enough that Spear Shot takes him to 15% health and you crit for the kill.

      Check back soon for a complete Pantheon guide.

      league of legends, PC, Strategy

      LoL: Avoid your matchmaking woes

      February 3, 2010 /

      Annie nuking Morgana.No, this is not a post to encourage queue dodging. This is not a rant about matchmaking. It’s just a quick little guide on getting the most enjoyment from the game, particularly if you’re new and want to play with some friends.

      For starters, I’ve been in this situation a lot lately. I have two friends with whom I regularly run arranged team games. One is over level 20 while the other is in his high teens. Unfortunately, our pairing makes it difficult to find a team of similar level/skill. Some games we get stomped, the others we do the stomping. Out of five games this evening we only had one that was at all close. Here’s how Riot explained the situation to another user on the forums who was experiencing similar difficulty:

      I am going to strongly advocate that you start a practice game for you and your friends until he gets a better command of the game. By grouping with him in MM on one of his first games you’re presenting matchmaking with a decision:

      1) Either place players of level 13+ into newbie island, where the level of play is appropriate to your friend’s skill level, but the two of you, as experience players will be extremely dominant.

      or

      2) Place your friend into the regular player pool, where it is going to attempt to match you against a similar premade. If there isn’t a premade of similar construction in MM, which is unlikely, given the level (and probably Elo) disparity between yourself and your friend who is brand new, you’re much more likely to end up with a mismatch.

      The key part of that post is “practice games.” You still get XP and IP, albeit at a reduced rate, but you can choose what level players you’ll see and whether or not you want to play. In my case, since we have 3, we can even premade some Twisted Treeline, which would be a lot of fun. It’s not a bad way to get around landsliding in matchmaking and the more people that look in that practice queue, the easier it will be to find games.

      league of legends, PC, Strategy

      LoL patch day: Servers are live

      February 2, 2010 /

      Gragas the Rabble Rouser.If you’ve been anxiously logging in every twenty minutes to check the servers you can stop your wait. Everything’s back up and running with the reported changes in place. As of this writing the store isn’t functioning, so I haven’t been able to pick up Pantheon just yet.

      I am looking forward to a lot of the changes, though. As a Gangplank player I was glad to see the change to Parrrley in that it now applies Grog Soaked Wound. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve crit someone to a sliver of health just to watch him run off. There is a strange bug in his attack animation wherein every few attacks he points his gun at the target and it clicks as though you’ve tried to fire Parrrley and it didn’t go off.

      I will miss that 10% extra crit damage from my runes, though it’s not a terrible nerf. I’m looking forward to giving it a go on Pantheon. I’ve got a feeling that Heartseeker Strike will be a crazy opener most people won’t expect for a few days.

      And then there’s Gragas. I’ve not played him yet so I don’t have much to say other than this: he’s HUGE. His skills seem to be balanced just about right for a tank – nice control with just enough damage to overbalance a fight. I’ll have to experiment with some builds later in the day.

      Development, league of legends, News

      LoL: Learning the tanks

      January 30, 2010 /

      Alistar base pic.In my opinion there are very few pure tanks in League of Legends. A lot of characters can tank, but that doesn’t make them the best for the position. Tanking is also a bit of a strange concept in LoL because there isn’t an aggro mechanic forcing players to attack the thickest guy on the team. Tanks do pose significant threat to a team, though, not because of their damage output but because of their control skills.

      Take Alistar, for instance. If the opposing team is rushing your inhibitor turret with Alistar at the forefront, do you try to focus him down while the rest of the team is out of range, or do you let him beat on the tower and focus the weaker targets, hoping he won’t land a crucial headbutt combo? As negligible as his damage may seem, he can quickly put you in a bad situation.

      When I see a tank played well it makes me want to tank. Since I’ve been seeing a lot of solid Alistar players lately, I decided to give him a shot. In my first game I had a lot of trouble. I was blowing through mana, despite my manipulator and a few regen runes. What it all came down to was an overuse of skills, particularly for the item build.

      Playing a tank is all about picking the situation. Despite your thick exterior, smart play and attentive farming still works best. With Alistar I focus on last hitting exclusively until level 5 or so, stepping in and out of the brush to keep control of the lane. From there it’s just lending support to your carries. Keep building toward survivability until you’re meaty enough to take a solid beating from a couple opponents. When you’re headed for towers, don’t be afraid to rush in and smack the tower while your teammates handle your opponent. That’s the paradox a tank presents to an opponent. Do they deal with you, in which case you can blow your mitigation skills and back up to prep for some control, or do they let you continue to beat down the tower and try to deal with your opponents.

      As with all things in this game, discretion is best. If you’re picking your fights wisely, using lane position and teammates to your advantage, and saving your mitigation skills for moments you truly need them, you should be just fine. From there, it’s all about experience.

      league of legends, Strategy

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