I caught a game late this afternoon with a four-man premade. Everything looked good except that our fifth picked Yi. I asked him to switch and he went to Veigar. Not a great swap, but that stun is still better than Yi’s nothing.

This guy also wanted to solo. When I’m premading I try to make sure that one of us is always in mid because solo is so important. I decided that as TF I should probably take mid over Veigar. That was all well and good until I went to gank top, as TF is prone to do, and Veigar came middle. When I came back to resume solo farming, he wouldn’t leave. This stranded our Shen bottom alone and while I was top, my opponent’s mid, Annie, stayed and farmed. I was a level and a half behind her, but nothing I couldn’t fix by farming solo. Even after many requests Veigar wouldn’t leave. By the time Annie hit ten, he had just hit level six and proceeded to feed her two kills.

Things went downhill from there. With solo experience and three kills (sadly I died to Annie once early because I fell for a very nice cleanse bait on her part) Annie was hugely ahead. Veigar wouldn’t leave middle so I was falling behind and our bottom lane was losing traction. By the 14-minute mark we had lost five towers and were on the way to losing our sixth.

Nearly all of this could have been avoided had Veigar let me solo. The importance of a solo is not just easy farming. It’s about evening out the level advantage the other team gains with their solo. That’s the reason junglers are so strong – they create a level advantage in two lanes. By leeching XP mid, Veigar stole our level advantage and gave the other team a 2v1 opportunity to push a lane against our Shen.

This isn’t to say a 2v1 mid is a bad idea – it can work, but it needs to be done from the beginning of the game so that your own lane facing a 2v1 can get level gapped. If he’s given a 2v1 too late, it’s just a 2v1 and h’s probably going to get pushed.

Whenever you can avoid it, try not to lane juggle your mid. You need that level gap.