Chances are, if you’ve been playing League of Legends for long enough, you’re a bit frustrated at your ELO. You’re stuck in Bronze but know you deserve at least Platinum. Teammates are keeping you down; if they weren’t feeding then these games would be so easy. You’ve watched all the crazy videos online and copied Foxdrop’s jungle routes perfectly but still find it impossible to achieve success. Don’t worry, I will show you how to climb ELO in LoL and this guide focuses on how to get out of bronze.
Players with over 100 ranked games, no matter what they say, deserve to be at their ELO. The new season has been out long enough for people to settle into their correct spots. Some people get angry over being paired with “scrubs” and start flaming as soon as champion select. My piece of advice, if that happens, is to dodge the queue. If your Top laner and Jungler are already at each other’s throats over leaving Dr. Mundo open in champ select, just dodge. You’ll lose 4 LP instead of 22 LP and a half-hour of your life.
Before you even enter the game, you have to know what items to buy. Players in Bronze build whatever they want, no matter how bad of an item choice it is. Going Ability Power on a Warwick might seem like a good idea, but it isn’t. Probuilds or Moba Fire are your best sources on what items work best for your champion. Start with the basics there, and adapt them for your own games. Is the enemy team all Attack Damage? Might be a good idea to buy a Thornmail instead of a Spirit Visage.
Pick a champion and learn how to last hit with them. Practice this one champion in as many games as you can play.. Start a custom game, with just you on Summoner's Rift. Don’t take any runes or masteries and see how many creeps you can kill with your main champion’s auto attacks. I promise if you do this a few times you’ll see improvement, last hitting creeps you thought were unattainable.
A good champion to start with in Bronze is Annie, because she’s easy to last hit with and has great damage Once you’re in a game, focus on bashing those little minions and scooping out the gold that comes from them. If you have more gold, you can buy more items, which leads to more damage, won team fights and hopefully the game. According to League Math, the average Creep Score for a Bronze player at 20 minutes is 80, while a Platinum player nets closer to 200.
In Bronze, players often try to go for plays that net them nothing. When an enemy is running away, unless you are 100 percent sure you will catch them, do not chase. I repeat: DO NOT CHASE. Salty Teemo is the source for Bronze games, showcasing the worst players ranked has to offer. These players will try and fight 1v5, dive towers alone and chase enemies for minutes on end. If an enemy gets away from you with a sliver of health, just let them go. They have to go back to base, netting you more CS or damage on a tower.
Don’t forget about the importance of Vision wards. I know how much Bronze players hate spending gold on items that don’t give stats. Please buy them and try to remind your team to buy them to. The best time to strike is when you see where your enemies are before they see you. Season 6 made acquiring vision on the map easier. You get two trinket wards to place anywhere on the map, please use them. If you can see where your enemy is (or isn’t) you can predict where’s the best place to go. If you warded the enemy red buff and see that their jungler is there, now might be a good time to gank a lane. Switch out for a blue trinket if you’re playing bot lane, sweeper is irrelevant in Bronze (nobody wards anyway.)
I know I’m not the best at League. Last season I managed to climb all the way from Bronze 5 to Platinum 5, so I’ve seen all the horrors that solo queue has to offer. If I had a quarter for every time a jungler blamed me for dying to a level 2 gank, I’d be able to afford an ELO boost to Challenger. Sometimes just hitting your abilities and farming can win you the game.
Mountain Sage’s video “Unorthodox ways to Climb Elo” is the most comprehensive guide to playing in low ELO. Big League YouTubers push the importance of vision control, proper invade strategies, and outplaying your opponent. For someone in Bronze, these might not be the skills you need.
The most important piece of advice Mountain Sage gives is “not to play above your level.” Last night I played a game as Karthus against Yasuo. The Yasuo tried to out-trade me by dashing all over the place. He would end up flying too far and end up in my Defile and Wall of Pain, allowing me to chunk him easy. I waited until I had my Rylai’s Crystal Scepter and then proceeded to spam him with slows until he was dead. After dying five times the Yasuo quit, netting my team an easy game.
Karthus’ champion select quote sums up my feelings on solo queue: “agony, ecstasy, peace, every passing has a beauty all its own.” You are going to have bad games; there is no way to avoid it. League of Legends has you paired up with four other strangers, and you can’t know what’s going through their heads.
Remember that League is just a game, having fun is still the main goal. If I lose two games in a row, I stop playing. Try to take a break and do something else. Tilt loses more games than anything.
