Sunday, November 29, 2009

Hero Leak: Nidalee - The Beastial Huntress

Nidalee - The Bestial Huntress

As this hero is not released, expect any information here to possibly change.

Prowl (Passive)
Moving through brush increases Nidalee's movement speed by 25% for 2 seconds.
When in Cougar form, she is also stealthed for 2 seconds.

Aspect of the Cougar
Nidalee transforms herself into a cougar, gaining new abilities and increased movement speed in the process.
Levelling up increases Pounce, Swipe, and Takedown damage, as well as Takedown's damage per Dripping Wound stack.

Bushwhack/Pounce
In human form, Nidalee lays a damaging trap for unwary opponents that, when sprung, reveals the target and reduces their armor and magic resistance for 7 seconds. Traps disappear after 6 minutes. Also applies the "Dripping Wound" debuff.
As a cougar, she pounces forward, dealing a small amount of damage in a small radius when she lands. Also applies the "Dripping Wound" debuff.
Levelling up increases the Trap's armor/magic resistance debuff and (increases/decreases?) Trap mana cost.

Javelin Toss/Takedown
In human form, Nidalee throws a spiked javelin at her target that increases in damage the longer it's in the air, to a maximum of 300%. Also applies the "Dripping Wound" debuff.
As a cougar, she grabs her opponent by the throat and attempts to bring them down, dealing additional damage depending on the number of Dripping Wound stacks. Also applies the "Dripping Wound" debuff.
Levelling up increases Javelin damage and (increases/decreases?) Javelin mana cost.

Primal Surge/Swipe
In human form, Nidalee heals her target and grants them an attack speed bonus for 8 seconds.
As a cougar, Nidalee claws nearby enemies, dealing base damage plus extra. Also applies the "Dripping Wound" debuff.
Levelling up increases Primal Surge's heal amount and Primal Surge's attack speed buff.

Advice

Use brush to your advantage! Moving in and out of brush can heavily alter your effectiveness in battle.
In team fights, start by harassing with your javelin toss, and then switch to cougar form to chase down anyone who flees.
I have no idea what Dripping Wound does. Probably a damage over time debuff.

Hero Leak: Poppy - The Iron Ambassador

Poppy - The Iron Ambassador

As this hero is not released, expect any information here to possibly change.
Battle Hardened (Passive)
Each time Poppy hits a target, she gains 1 damage and armor for 8 seconds. This effect stacks.

Iron Form
Poppy transforms into the living essence of iron for 10 seconds. While in this form, Poppy shrugs off damage per hit up to a maximum. If, after 10 seconds, Poppy can still absorb additional damage, the cooldown on Iron Form is reduced to 10 seconds.
Levelling up increases damage reduction and damage reduction limit, and reduces cooldown.

Obtrustion
Poppy commands her summoner to bring her to a target ally. Once there, Poppy redirects damage from her ally to herself at a reduced proportion for 5 seconds, while protecting her ally from harm.
Levelling up reduces the amount of damage taken.

Rampage
Poppy forgoes her discipline and goes into a rampage, dealing magic damage per second to nearby enemy units. Drains mana every second.
Levelling up increases the amount of damage per second, and (increases/decreases?) mana drained per second.

Smash
Poppy leaps forward and slams her weapon into the ground. The resulting shockwave deals magic damage and slows enemy units in the area.
Levelling up increases the damage and the slow inflicted to enemies, and (increases/decreases?) mana cost.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

How to Zone Control



This is a video made by Shurelia, a Member of Clan AoN. A great player and one of the best Soraka in the game.

Last Hitting

Last Hitting:

Is one of the most important aspect of them game and even more so after the next patch that increases gold gain. The purpose of Last hitting is to maximize your gold gain and minimize your exposure to taking damage. The first point is self evident, you only get gold for last hitting the creeps. The second point: which is not as obvious. Depending on how you want your lane to flow, pushed out or freeze in. Push out last hitting consists of hitting multiple creeps and setting up their hp. Underneath this concept there are 2 branches. HP differentiating and hp balancing.

Last Hit Pushing
[b]For Hp Differentiating[/b] you want to hit multiple creeps so that their is a big enough difference so that the passive damage from the creeps will not kill 2 creeps at the same time allowing you to last hit one then get the next (Sometimes 2 creeps are at 5% health at the same time, you want them both but you only have a single target spell and you have to make a choice of only getting 1).

Next is HP Balancing If you have an AoE Spell you can hit multiple targets with your auto attack to balance all their HP under your AoE Spell damage threshold. Once they are, you can cast your spell and kill all the creeps in 1 blow.

Last Hit Freezing You want to do this if you are 1, playing defensive or 2 preparing for a gank. The purpose of last hitting in lane freezing is to only do the minimum damage to the oncoming creeps so the flow of the wave is always in front of your tower. This will 1. provide you protection and 2. allow you to gank them because it is harder for them to get back to tower. When you are doing this, one of the thing that you can do is stay back out of attack range and run for for exp and last hitting.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Need Ideas for Future Posts

Most of my ideas comes on a whim and I know its relevant to some more than others. This post is ask you guys on what you would like to see more of. Like how to videos, guides, or fun stuff on LoL.

I was thinking of making a tower diving highlight compilation video. Using "Holy Diver" as the background music. Whats your take?

Monday, November 23, 2009

Analysis on Premade & Solo Queue

This post is in regards to my quick analysis on Pre-mades and Solo Queues. In this post I want to address the advantages and disadvantages of both and how the Elo system works with and against you. Please excuse my poor grammar and unorganized thought (I wrote this on a whim).

Pre-made:
The advantages of being in a pre-made is that you get to play with the people that you want to and enjoying playing with. In the beginning when you first build a pre-made, with the current Elo system, it puts you at a disadvantage. It puts you at a disadvantage because the system assumes that because you are queuing in a group you are coordinated, have good communications, and are employing a real strategy. Because of those assumption the systems raises the average Elo of every player (it feels about 150-250).

What does this mean to you? It means that if you are making a pre-made with players you do not regularly play with, the system will have an incorrect assumption about your overall team's skill level and match you against often better solo queue players which you have no advantage over. The consequences are: you lose more frequently and gain less Elo for winning.

Light at the end of the Tunnel for Pre-mades:
If you regularly play with a group of friends or have a set 5 man team, in the long run you will acquire the team skills to fulfill those assumptions. Some strategies and line-up cannot and usually will not be employed by solo queuers which you will be able to execute with enough practice. You will start off losing more frequently than winning but after several games, your team's average Elo will have adjusted for a 50:50 W/L ratio. However, because you are in a team, the overall learning and teamwork curve of your team will be higher than those of the solo queuers you matched with then you will start winning more frequently than losing. On an end note: Premades sucks at the beginning but, they are the best at the top therefore a majority of the players will have a negative impression of pre-mades if you do not queue together frequently and consistently.

Solo Queue:
Quite the opposite of the 5 man pre-made. The system actually works quite well in your favor in terms of Elo points rating system. You will feel this especially of you started out in random pre-mades with players you do not play with frequently. Playing in premades with relative sub-standard teamwork and coordination will tank your Elo. So when you start playing in solo queues, you will be continually be match with better players and against worst players (with the assumption that you are being matched against the unorganized pre-mades).

Advantages: You get better players more frequently on your team and your Elo climbs higher and faster.

Disadvantages: Overall, solo queuing all the time hinders your team play potential. Also, once you cap out on where you should be, you will think that pre-mades are the way to go. So once you start forming a pre-made after solo queueing the system will try and reassess your team's skill level and once again will have an inaccurate assessment and place your pre-made against better solo queuers or a correctly assessed team (happens specifically at the top). So if this situation arises you will lose more often than your win.

End Note: With the current system: it is too difficult to assess how to place solo queuers versus pre-mades because players switch between the two, too often. So I am not sure if I should applaud riot or not for taking a "road less traveled" by placing solo queuers and pre-mades in the same pool (take warcraft 3 ladder systems for example).

Saturday, November 21, 2009

How to Jungle Warwick



Full Guide coming soon! Posted here and archived on solomid.net

Friday, November 20, 2009

Nunu the Yeti Rider - Ap Guide by Dan Dinh

Nunu - The Yeti Rider

Runes:
X9 Marks of Magic Resist per lvl
X9 Seal of Evasion
X9 Glyphs of Magic Resistance
X3 Quint of Fortitude

Summoner Spells:
Exhaust
Smite

Masteries -

Offensive:

3/3 Archmage Savvy
1/3 Deadliness
4/4 Sorcery
1/1 Archaic Knowledge

Utility:
Spatial Accuracy x 1
Perserverance x 3
Expanded Mind x 4
Meditation x 3
Utility Mastery x 2
Quickness x 3
Intelligence x 3
Presence of the Master x 1

Spell Builds

Level 1: Snowball (if team fighting,comsume otherwise)
Level 2: Consume (if you got snowball first, otherwise grab snowball)
Level 3: Snowball
Level 4: Blood Boil (if you are having trouble laning grab consume for extra heals)
Level 5: Snowball
Level 6: Absolute Zero
Level 7: Snowball
Level 8: Blood boil
Level 9: Snowball
Level 10: Blood boil
Level 11: Absolute Zero
Level 12: Blood Boil
Level 13: Blood Boil
Level 14: Consume
Level 15: Consume
Level 16: Absolute Zero
Level 17: Consume
Level 18: Consume

Items to start:
Dorans Ring
Health potions x 1

Build:
1. X2 Dorans Ring ASAP.
2. Boots Lvl 1
3. Health Crystal + Mana Crystal = Catalyst the Protector
4. Combine Boots Lvl 1 to Ninja Tabi if they have 3 Physical Carries or More otherwise Combine to make Mercury Threads.
5. Finish Banshee Veil
6. Get Aegis of Legion of your Team does not have 1 or go for Void Staff
7. Get another Void Staff

Spells

Consume (Q): This spell does 500 damage to a creep at level 1 and heals your for 100 Hit points. Try to consume only when you're hit point is not topped off. It is more efficient to last hit creeps and save your mana for snowballs so you can keep up the harassment. When you go back to base to heal or get items make sure to run across a creep camp to grab a creep or two before blue pilling. Then as you run back to the lane, finish them off if you haven't already.

Blood Boil (W): This skill is very good for getting away and initiating on heros. This spell will most definitely save you and your teammates lives over and over. Also you want to keep this spell casted on your physical carry, because it will make a noticeable difference in their damage output.

Snowball (E): I call this spell the snowball of doom. You want to throw this in the face of the enemies champions constantly to keep them low so they play defensive in a lane. A very important thing to remember is to be selective when you choose who to throw it at. You want to throw it at champions without hit point regeneration and you want to focus 1 hero so that champion would stay passive and not double up and gank you.

Absolute Zero: More like absolute destruction. This spell is very good but getting it off is very tricky. This spell is the primary reason for getting a lot of survivability. It will be hard to get this spell off because as soon as the enemies sees you casting it in a team fight they will stun you. So my suggestion in a team fight is to run in snowball them hit a few times and wait for the malphite/sion/taric etc to cast it first (usually 3 seconds into a teamfight then cast your ult. This spell will be a lot easier to pull off once you get your banshee's veil. Also, something very important to note is that Nunu can detonate his ult at anytime while he is channeling his spell by simply moving. In doing so it will deal the percentage of damage it is suppose to relative to the channeling time. Say for example: the full channeling time is 3 seconds and is suppose to deal 900 damage. If he cancels at 1 second he will deal 300 damage and 600 damage at 2 seconds respectively.

How to play Nunu

Laning: You want to harass the other champion as much as possible with your snowball. The reason I got x2 Doran's Ring because It gives a lot of Health, a lot of mana regeneration (for snowball/consume) and AP to make your consume heal more. The best time to throw a snow ball at a champion is when you notice that one of your creep is about 1/5 hit points because you can safely assume that the other champion will run up to last hit it. Now they can expect to run up to eat a snow ball. Doing this will deter them from last hitting and will keep the low on hp which makes them easier to gank. If you are laning with a partner. and you are top lane as purple team, when ever your smite and consume is up both at the same time, run to the neutral camp to smite and consume them. This will give your lane a level advantage over the other team.

Ganking: Nunu's snowball and bloodboil makes not a very good ganker. He will allow fast initiate and continual slows on the person you are chasing down. Couple those two spells together, your opponent is as good as dead if they are running away alone.

Runes books I've used.

Physical Carry:

x9 Desolation Mark or x9 Furor marks
x9 Furor Seals
x9 Furor Glyphs
x3 Furor Quints or x3 Desolation Quints

Defensive Tank

x9 Mark of Warding
x9 Seal of Evasion or Seal of Warding
x9 Mark of Warding
x3 Quint of Evasion or Seal of Warding or Quint of Fortitude

Casters

x9 Greater Marks of Resilience
x9 Greater Seals of Evasion
x9 Greater Glyphs of Insight
x3 Quintessence of Fortitude

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Tip of the day - Fully Utilizing Map Awareness

In order to control any game you need to maximize your map awareness. This can be done either by buying wards, dropping Teemo's mushroom in key locations. Alternatives to this would be using clairvoyance.

But a couple of things the better players use but most people don't, is to anticipate character movement direction and game sounds. What I mean by this is; say you see 1 person from mid heading south and 2 players from bottom backing into the woods. Automatically I would assume a gank or a dragon run.

The second thing I mentioned is sounds. With the way the map is set up, you can still hear each players casting spells or hear collision sounds even if you do not have sight of them. For example: They have a mundo on the other team and hes off the map for quite some time now. Scroll around the map to: Nashor, Dragon, and other creep camps. You will be able to hear his infected cleaver if you vision is in that area even if he is in fog.

The same applies with Anivia, Corki, and several other heros.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Runes to get for Tomorrow

The best runes:
Marks of Desolations (Red Runes) For Carries ie: Ashe, Teemo, Yi, Jax, Tryn etc.
Seal of Evasion: if you spec nimbleness
Quintessence of Desolation for Carries
Quintessence of Furor for Carries
Quintessence of Fortitude
Any Magic Resist runes for Tanks

Decent runes:
Any HP runes for Tanks
Any secondary Furor runes for Carries
Any secondary Desolation Runes for Carries

I listed those runes because they are the most flexible in terms of rune book composition and quality. The other runes that adds crit and attack speed are very specialized and would not provide you as much utility.

What do you think about my recommendations.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Knock up / Pull Back Bug



A bug my friend Randuin told me about today.

I need help populating our guide/strategies section

I'm trying to create a more comprehensive League of Legends gaming database at solomid.net. Right now a complete make over is in the works. I have 2 professional web developer and 1 designer working on looks, feels, and databases. However, I need help from you to create content. I would like if any of you have a question on how to play a certain character or do a certain strategies to ask about it on my forums. The forums is populated by most of the top 10 and even more top 500 rated players in the us aswell as some of the top EU.

Come with questions and hopefully we have answers! Thanks!

http://www.solomid.net/forums or the forums tab on this blog.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Void Staff

Is by far the best caster item in the game. The way the item is right now, a caster like annie with offensive spec can burst 2000 of pure damage on a carry instantly. Did I mention that she has 2 AOE spells as part of that 2000 damage?

Right now, void staff is incredibly broken. The 40% magic pen is additive. Having 2 void staff and the 10pt magic pen mastery will give you 95% magic penetration. There is absolutely nothing that can block you except a banshee veil. Even if you have 1000magic resist, that build will pierce through 950 of it.

If you are having trouble with MR stackers, try out the void staff.... It's OP until they fix the "Unique" ability (which apparently is not).

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Cool Bug - We Broke the Game



Just a bug that we found how to replicate. It happened to me the first time in a game and I was wondering how my lane was always pushed to tower. The way it happened to us did not involve a heimer. As a matter of fact I don't know how it happened except that our creeps were blocked and it almost killed a katarina with 3000 health and shunpo (massive dodge) in 1 second.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Exp Required to level up pre/post patch

This is a post from Skystriker

"Previously, it required a grand total of 32651 experience to get to level 30 from level 1.Now, it requires 40083.This is an increase of 22% in the grand total of experience you need to reach level 30.For those who want specifics, here you go.

Previously:
1- 0
2- 90
3- 98
4- 105
5- 113
6- 448
7- 476
8- 504
9- 532
10- 560
11- 840
12- 880
13- 920
14- 960
15- 1000
16- 1040
17- 1080
18- 1120
19- 1160
20- 1200
21- 1705
22- 1760
23- 1815
24- 1870
25- 1925
26- 1980
27- 2035
28- 2090
29- 2145
30- 2200

Now, it is:
1- 0
2- 90
3- 98
4- 105
5- 113
6- 448
7- 476
8- 504
9- 532
10- 560
11- 1050
12- 1100
13- 1150
14- 1200
15- 1250
16- 1300
17- 1350
18- 1400
19- 1450
20- 1500
21- 2131
22- 2200
23- 2269
24- 2338
25- 2406
26- 2475
27- 2544
28- 2613
29- 2681
30- 2750"

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Patch Notes 11/11/2009

PVP.Net 30.10

PVP.net Help System: If you see a “?” button anywhere in the PVP.net client, click on it to bring up the help system. This system is designed to give you some basic information about various aspects of the PVP.net client.
The PVP.net client has been significantly optimized for performance. Users will have a slightly longer loading and login time, while transitions and loading in the rest of the client are up to 5x faster in some areas.
Summoner Runebooks have been significantly optimized and should perform much better.
Fixed an issue with Maestro that would cause users to see errors at various points.
Fixed a typo on the Masteries page in the Summoner Profile.
Changed the primary font in the PVP.net client to Fritz Quadrata.
Fixed various Localization Issues

League of Legends 1.0.0.52 (displays as 1.0.0.1)

Amumu

Tantrum Damage modified from 115/130/145/160/175 to 100/120/140/160/180
Curse of the Sad Mummy Duration reduced from 3 to 2.5

Blitzcrank

Static Field Damage increased from 200/300/400 to 250/375/500

Cho'Gath

Feral Scream Cooldown reduced from 17 to 16
Feral Scream Range increased from 615 to 650
Rupture Range increased from 900 to 1000

Dr Mundo

Burning Agony AoE range increased from 300 to 325
Burning Agony Movement Impairment Reduction increased from 20/25/30/35/40% to 25/30/35/40/45%
Masochism cooldown reduced from 8 to 7
Stats: Increased Attack Speed per Level from 2 to 2.3

Janna

Eye of the Storm Mana Cost reduced from 70/90/110/130/150 to 70/85/100/115/130
Adjusted the selection radius to match her size

Karthus

Lay Waste Ability Power Ration is now correct
Fixed a bug with Wall of Pain where it was slowing units 2 second after the particle had faded

Katarina

Shunpo Ability Power Ratio reduced from .8 to .75
Shunpo Cooldown reduced from 9/8/7/6/5 to 10/9/8/7/6
Death Lotus Ability Power Ratio reduced from .4 to .35

Malphite

Seismic Shard now steals the amount of Movement Speed that the target has lost instead of increasing Malphite’s Movement Speed by the equivalent percentage lost
Unstoppable Force Stun Duration reduced from 1.5/2/2.5 to 1.5/1.75/2
Unstoppable Force Cooldown increased from 120/100/80 to 140/120/100

Morgana

Black Shield Cooldown increased from 15 to 17
Black Shield will now no longer dispell debuffs when cast. It will still block incoming debuffs.

Nasus

Spirit Fire Cooldown increased from 11 to 12
Spirit Fire Mana Cost increased from 60/75/90/105/120 to 70/85/100/115/130

Nunu

Blood Boil Attack Speed increased from 20/30/40/50/60% to 25/35/45/55/65%
Absolute Zero Damage increased from 400/600/800 to 500/700/900
Absolute Zero Attack Speed Slow per second increased from 15% to 25%
Absolute Zero Range increased from 525 to 575

Rammus

Increased base Health from 400 to 420 and Health per level from 76 to 86
Tremors damage increased from 55/110/165 to 65/130/195

Shaco

Deceive Cooldown increased from 9 to 10
Deceive Mana Cost increased from 80/70/60/50/40 to 90/80/70/60/50
Deceive Duration reduced from 5 to 4
Deceive Range reduced from 575 to 500
Two-Shiv Poison Mana Cost increased from 75 to 80
Jack in the Box Fear Range reduced from 450 to 400
Jack in the Box Base Health reduced from 200 to 150
Jack in the Boxes are no longer magic immune, but instead have 50 Magic Resist

Sivir

On the Hunt Attack Speed increase for allies should now be properly reduced in half for allies

Teemo

New Passive: Lie in Wait: Teemo will no stealth after standing still for 6 seconds without taking an action (damage will break this effect). Moving or taking actions will break Teemo out of stealth.

Tristana

Increased auto attack missile speed from 1450 to 2250
Rapid Fire Mana Cost decreased from 100 to 80
Rocket Jump Mana Cost decreased from 100 to 80
Exploding Shot passive explosion damage increased from 30/50/70/90/110 to 50/75/100/125/150
Exploding Shot active component now will tick damage every second as opposed to every half second
Buster Shot Mana Cost from decreased from 150 to 140
Buster Shot pushback radius increased from 150 to 175

Twisted Fate

PAX Skin will now properly display in game
Gate now has the proper team color indicators
Gate will no longer create a vision bubble at the target location

Veigar

Primordial Burst Base Damage increased from 100/250/400 to 200/300/400
Dark Matter Cooldown reduced from 13 to 12
Dark Matter Mana Cost modified from 90/105/120/135/150 to 100/110/120/130/140


Summoner Spells

Clairvoyance Cooldown reduced from 60 to 55
Heal: A debuff is now placed on Champions healed by Summoner Heal for 25 seconds. Subsequent Summoner Heals will have their effect dimished by 50% on allies with the debuff. Your Champion will still receive the full amount of the heal if cast by your Summoner.
Ignite: Fixed an issue that prevented ignite from being cast while silenced

Items

Guardian Angel Health / Mana Restored on Respawn reduced from 50% to 40%
You can no longer teleport while being revived by Guardian Angel
Oracles Crystal Cost Reduced from 450 to 400
Malady Attack Speed increased from 40% to 50%
NEW ITEM: Void Staff: Mid Tier Ability Power/Mana Item: Gives your spells 40% Magic Resist Penetration
UPDATED ITEM: Sorcerer’s Shoes: Changed to flat 15 Magic Resist Penetration.

General
Fixed a bug causing some spells or characters to not preload properly.
Tutorial text altered to reference proper default key bindings.
Melee minion gold per kill increased from 18 to 20 on three lane maps and from 22 to 24 on two lane maps.
Increased base gold per kill from 250 to 300
Decreased max kill streak multiplier from 4 to 3.333 (effectively 1000 to 999.9 gold)
Decreased gold pool for assists from 70% of base to 58.3% of base (no effective change)
Decreased kill stream bonus multiplier per kill from .2 to .166 (no effective change)
Decreased minimum death stream penalty from .35 to .3 (no effective change)
Mender's Faith now provides 10 x level bonus HP on Summoner Heal from 75 flat bonus HP and 10 seconds of cooldown reduction.
Fixed some brush visibility issues where you can see one user from another patch of grass or from certain angles
Fixed a bug for chain missiles disappearing when a unit dies / goes out of range
Fixed a large amount of server and game crashes (About 15 different types of crashes)
Improved minion turning when they appear from fog of war
Fixed a bug with bots always spawning in middle of platform
Fixed the illusion of “loss of health” when moving the camera around distant units
Fixed a bug related to disappearing and reappearing particles
Fixed a bug where a player under rare circumstances could reconnect as another player and have full vision of the map

Turrets

Turret damage scaling changed to 85% to 155% at 10% increments on hit resetting to 125% when switching champions from 75% to 200% at 25% increments on hit resetting to 150% when switching champions.
Turret backdoor bonus decreased from 250 to 200.
Turret armor and magic resistance growth decreased from 2.5 to 1.5.
Turret armor and magic resistance decay decreased from 5 to 3.
Second turret base armor decreased from 42.5 to 37.5
Inhibitor turret base armor decreased from 55 to 47.5

Baron Nashor

Reduced Mana Regen from 25 Mana per 5 to 17.5 Mana per 5
Reduced Health Regen from 5% per 5 to 3.5% per 5

Twisted Treeline

Reduced Inhibitor Health from 3600 to 3000
Reduced Crest of Flowing Water's Movement Speed Buff from 50% to 45%
Increased Respawn Time from 18-35 to 20-37
Adjusted Crest of Crushing Wrath (The dragon buff) to increase damage by 1% per level.
Adjusted Crest of Nature's Fury (The wolf buff) to increase attack speed by 20% and reduce cooldowns by 10%.
Decreased the range of the vision sentry in the middle, such that you cannot see into the lanes above and below the jungle.
The nexus should now have only one turret instead of two.
Increased the health of Super Minions by 200 and their damage by 20.
Cooldown reduction should now be properly capped at 40% on Twisted Treeline.
Fixed minion pathfinding

Insights on Current/Future Strategies

Currently, the game is heavily revolved around healing. Ever since the level reset and rune wipes. The game has changed drastically. Prior to this, heal was never too big of a deal because almost no hero can out heal burst physical damage. A Yi with with an armor pen/crit damage book can bust a hole through a Soraka is seconds disallowing her to take full benefit of healing over time. However, as things are in its current state, healing is the new "in" and it is hard to play with out.

You may correctly me if I am wrong, but I have experienced this game prior to the reset and generally have a good understanding of how this game is played recently and will be played in the future. I believe that slowly, you will see a transition away from heal stacking because the effectiveness of heal will slowly diminish as people acquire more masteries and the opportunity cost of it will increase as more champions become feasible once again.

I will further support this by explaining that most teams that runs multiple healers generally do not get ap. The ap scaling for heals is so low that it makes it not worth it. So as champions increasingly hit harder and harder passively (through runes/masteries). The healing will not beable to keep them up. Below is a chart showing what I just said. Say a champion with 2000 hitpoints. The base healing is 30/secs and is subjected to 100 damage/s with increments of 10 damage. The bottom row shows how long the champion will last.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

lvl 8 Dr Mundo vs Baron Nashor


This is a video of mundo solo'ing Baron Nashor at Lvl 8. There are obviously easier ways and better summoner's spells if you use your team to jump him when hes at 1400 hit points. Also yes, I know this is an obvious exploit. I just want to throw this out there. This has been a known exploit since Mundo came out.


If you want to try it out, you don't really have to get all Doran's Shield. As long as you have enough hit point and health regen you won't die from throwing cleavers. You want the Ancient Golem buff before you start to expedite the process. You don't need smite unless you plan on solo'ing him. It would also be easier to do it at level 9. I did it at level 8 because thats was the level I got to when Nashor spawned.

Experimental Jax Build

I've been trying to experiment with heros lately and revisited a build I once used when I played Jax a while ago. I thought it was pretty effective so I gave it another try.
The build is as follow:
Summoners Spells: Either Exhaust/Heal or Exhaust/Rally

Items: Doran's Shield + 1 Health pot as starting Item.
Ninja Tabi
Emblem of Valor to Starks Fervor
Sheen, Phage, Zeal to Trinity Force
Banshee's Viel
Guardian Angel

The Game hasn't lasted long enough for a 6th Item but when Death Fire Grasp comes back I'm gonna stick that between Trinity Force most likely.

Theres a lot of thing I haven't tested concisely yet. Like how beneficial empowering strike/leap/counter strike procs with trinity force and whether the sheen proc is made AOE from the empowering strike.

If anyone comes across this and tries it out. Post what you feel about it. By no means is this a guide. It is just an experimental build I've had a few successful games with.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Reviving the Early Baron Strat

Yesterday, I had a chance to play against a team that ran a very similar strat that I did 2 months ago. They ran a Warwick, Sivir, Taric, Soraka, and Malphite. Similar to ours, we ran a Warwick, Sivir, Taric, Ashe, & Nunu.

The strategy was to go team items: Starks and Aegis ASAP to do baron then push the base. It generally resulted in a fast 15 minutes win. My god, now I kind of know how it felt to be on the other end. At the time we used it, we had won 40 games in a row until the next patch came out at the time which introduced Blitzcrank. The OP Crank AOE silence had shut us down so we abandoned that strategy and opted for a different 1. In retrospec, now that they significantly nerfed Blitzcrank's ult (AOE Silence) that strategy has become viable once again.

For those that are interested. The strategy for Clan OP is as follow:

Team Comp: Warwick, Sivir, Taric, Soraka, and Malphite.

Summoner's spells: 5 Smite, 2 Heals, 2 Rally, 1 Promote.

Have 5 man kill Elder Lizard together (warwick gets the buff), then 5 Man Dragon. Warick and Malphite can roam in an out of jungle to control buffs around the map. Then gather as 4-5 to smite down dragon everytime it spawns.

Soraka: goes fast Aegis/Mecury Threads(mr boots)/Innervating Locket
Taric: Mercs/Banshees/Guardian Angel
Malphite/Sivir/Warick: Fast Madreds/Merc Boots

At lvl 6-8 when baron spawns: group up and kill it then push.

Important aspects of this strat: it is crucial to control the dragon for exp gold and the buffs around the map.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

What I like about Soraka

You guys probably know by now that I really like playing soraka. This post is to just list some of the things that I like about soraka. You may or may not know it already but I'm going to post what I feel about her anyways.

1. Her heal level 1 allows you to harass constantly keep enemy champions behind exp line. It always allows you to tank hits for a few moments so creeps do not make it to the tower to freeze the last just out of tower range.

2. She has one of the longest normal attack range in the game. This allows you to harass heros infront of towers and behind creeps.

3. She can detect invisible units with her starcall ability. Whenever a stealthed unit is within starcall range the spell will light up telling you that you are about to get ganked. It also lets you chase down invisible units and kill them while they are stealthed.

4. Her magic resist aura is very beneficial throughout the game.

5. Her magic resist debuff from starcall, will greatly benefit any magic damage based team. By making all spells take more on debuffed champions sometimes by up to 3 times more when stacked enough times.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Sivir- The Battle Mistress by Reginald

Sivir- The Battle Mistress

I will be writing this guide without runes because currently no one has any.

Summoner Spells:
Heal
Teleport

Masteries:
Defensive:
Mender's Faith x 1
Hardiness x3
Evasion x 4
Nimbleness x 1

Utility:
Spatial Accuracy x 1
Perserverance x 3
Expanded Mind x 4
Meditation x 3
Utility Mastery x 2
Quickness x 3
Intelligence x 3
Presence of the Master x 1

Level 1: Spiral Blade
Level 2: Spell Shield
Level 3: Spiral Blade
Level 4: Ricochet
Level 5: Spiral Blade
Level 6: On the Hunt
Level 7: Spiral Blade
Level 8: Ricochet
Level 9: Spiral Blade
Level 10: Spell Shield
Level 11: On the Hunt
Level 12: Spell Shield
Level 13: Spell Shield
Level 14: Ricochet
Level 15: Spell Shield
Level 16: On the Hunt
Level 17: Ricochet
Level 18: Ricochet

Items to start :
Meki pendant
Health potions x 2

Build:
Philosopher stone ( if under 6 minutes), if not then Chalice of Harmony.

If you're able to farm very well and able to get Philosopher stone and Chalice of Harmony under 10 minutes then buy it. ( these items are the ultimate pushing items on sivir)

Next, Beserker's Greaves, Stark's Fervor, Catalyst Protector, BF Sword( then make Infinity's Edge) , Next Catalyst ( to Banshee's Veil), Guardian's Angel, then Black Cleaver)

(SELL Philospher stone by 25 minutes)

End game items: Beserker's Greaves, Stark's Fervor, Banshee's Veil, Infinity's Edge, Guardian's Angel, Black Cleaver)

Basically getting Banshee's Veil on Sivir will make her unkillable in team fights.

Laning: Always solo middle. Sivir is the type hero that is only great for soloing because the fast levels that she gets help her pushing ability significantly. The object for sivir is to push down the turret in her lane. Always look for hits on the tower when it is available. Don't stop attacking the tower until the last creep is being focused by the tower. After destroying the first tier tower in your middle lane, switch up the lanes and push other ones.


Spiral Blade (Q): This skill is mainly used for harassing and farming. When casting the skill always target the ranged creeps on the back. Additionally, it would be very good if the spiral blade damaged the enemy champion too. The goal is to hit the ranged creeps and the enemy champion as well. Look for a good time and throw your spiral blade. Other times when throwing your spiral blade, you might want position you hero so when the boomerang comes back, you will hit them with the second hit. Doing this takes time and effort. When you have learned the correct positioning and areas to throw the Spiral blade, it is even easy to hit good players twice .

Ricochet (W): This skill is mainly used to push and is very good for farming. Usually the player wants to use Ricochet when Sivir is targeting the tower. While Sivir attacks the tower, the glaives bounce and hits the creeps. Ricochet is really good for team fights as well, make sure it is always on during battles. The bounces can decide a team fight easily.

Spell Shield: This is Sivir's built in survivability. Its her " Banshee's Veil". With masteries are shield is around 10 seconds. This spell is very good because it can block ANY spell. This spell is very simple, however it takes skill and timing to use correctly. In team fights, you're going to be targeted by multiple spells and your job is to block the spell that does the most damage or is most detrimental to yourself. Some good things to block are ; Ashe's Arrow ( Crystal Arrow), Morgana's bind (Dark binding), cardmasters gold card. Using the spell shield to block stuns and disables is much better than blocking pure damage. Blocking disables prevents them from damaging you while you're stunned. If the disabled are negated, then you're able to change your postion ( where it is safer to deal damage from).

On the Hunt: Her ultimate is very good for pushing and a great team fighting spell.

Situations:

Team fights
Early Pushing
Late Game Pushing
Baron
Dragon
Chasing/ Ganking
Retreating

When solo pushing, its best to save On the Hunt to escape rather than dealing damage to the tower. What happens is usually, sivir breaks off from the group and pushes a tower. The 5 enemy champions gather up to gank her, as they come to gank her, Sivir can use On the Hunt to escape. As they chase Sivir, the 4 teammates on your team can push another side lane. This is a great strategy that i have done many times. Teams usually do not send less than 2 heroes to kill Sivir because she is such a hard champion to kill.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Mundo Playstyle Video - Dan Dinh


So in the last 3-4 days, I've been solo queuing Mundo to 1-up Tree Eskimo. I think of all the Mundo games, I went like 15-4. Not too shabby. Here is a video of my refined mundo play. To my suprise, Mundo is pretty beasty and is pretty fun in random plays.

Team Composition - Supports

First off, I'd like to say sorry for not posting in such a long time. It's been really hard because I'm trying to work on my website at solomid.net and its been a head ache because I'm such a noob at this webmaster stuff and it has been hell trying to find a new forum host that can handle the traffic it is generating and moving the databases over. Enough of the rant, lets get down to business.



To me, support is the most fun to play. As the support your job is to harass, crowd control, and heal. Sure you don't go on god like streaks and do big crits but all the intricacies, to me, make it worth while. Well what makes a good support?

1. The ability to baby. This means that in a lane you are able to harass the other team and support yours while your lane mate happy farms it up. A good example of a champion that can baby and harass is Soraka. She has one of the longest range to auto attack harass and she can continually heal herself and her ally so they can more safely farm. A second example would be Janna. She can use her shield to increase damage output and shield against incoming damage. She can aslo use her zephyr then gale to gank and harass. If she wants to retreat she can gale (tornado) to escape.

2. Protect the tanks and carries in team battle. Piggybacking again off of what I just mentioned above. Janna's/Morgana's shield can protect the key champions in team battles and keep they up while they lay massive damage out put. Janna's gale/ult can CC oponents aswell as Morgana's Ult. Other forms of protection would be Soraka/Taric/Mino Heals.

3. Ability to crowd control. Basically means any type of disable. Minotaur stun, Fiddle silence, etc.

With all these in mind, there are only a hand full of good champions that fit these criteria out there that I dare classify as support. They would be: Minotaur, Soraka, Taric, Morgana, Janna.

Next Time I will post so specifics on Laning, Playstyle, Harassing, and Babysitting.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Annotations to Soraka Video

I added annotations to my soraka video. It includes somethings to keep in mind when you want to lane soraka.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax2PeFLMM00