Structure of the Draft
So as many people are aware, before a game on Summoners Rift begins, each team must draft their 5 champions. First, each team gets to ban champions which are off-limits for either team to pick. The blue team gets the first ban and the teams alternate bans until 6 champions have been banned, with the red team getting the last ban. After bans, the blue team gets the first pick, then each team alternates picking two champions at a time until the red team picks the final champion.
DraftLayout
This is a very basic outline of how the draft plays out for both teams. Pick and ban order is important when preparing draft strategies, but there are many other factors to consider as well.
For this article, I will be using LMQ's games in the first half of the Spring North American Challenger Series (NACS) to exemplify how teams play out the draft. Click here to see the picks and bans from the first half of the Spring NACS. (Keep this open in another tab, I will refer to it many times.)
The Metagame
One of the first factors to take into account when preparing a draft strategy is the current metagame. In particular, there are certain champs which are too strong to leave open at all. If there is only one such champion, typically it is up to the red team to ban it. If there is more than one, it is unlikely that any of them will make it through bans, with both teams banning them. On 4.1, the patch which the examples in this article are played on, Kassadin is the only “must-ban” champion, so in almost every game the red team bans it. The only time the blue team should ban it is if they can not play it, and this gives the red team an extra ban, making it a weakness to ban Kassadin on blue side.
Priorities and Champion Pools
As I said, there are many factors to consider when preparing for the draft in a game of League of Legends. This is where planning and research become important, and it is where you must choose priorities. A team's priorities is essentially a list of champions determining which champions are the most important to secure. Priorities will typically include your team's strongest champions, and often champions which are considered strongest in the current metagame. Priorities are champions which you will pick any time they are available, regardless of team composition. Therefore, most priorities are generically strong champions which can fit into any team composition. For most the first half of the Spring NACS, LMQ’s priorities look something like this:
Kha’Zix (jungle/mid)
Elise (jungle)
Lee Sin (jungle)
Thresh (support)
Leona (support)
Renekton (top)
Dr. Mundo (top)
A few notes about this list:
LMQ’s draft strategy changes drastically in the finals against Complexity Black, so this does not apply to those games.
Kassadin probably belongs at the top of this list, but he is banned every game in these examples so am not to including him.
These priorities are not a strict “must pick champions in this order” list, but rather a guideline for LMQ’s overall draft strategy. I will talk about some of LMQ’s specific draft strategies later on.
Aside from your priorities, you must also be aware of your overall champion pool. As a player, having a wide variety of champions to choose from gives you options for team compositions and keeps your opponent from targeting you by banning out all of your champions. Your team should be aware of your overall champion pool in order to give them a strong basis to execute an effective draft. A strong champion pool consists of five or more champions in order to prevent a full denial of your champion pool from an opponent on blue side by banning three of your champions and first picking another.
Scouting Your Opponent
In addition to deciding your own strategy, it is important to be prepared for your opponent’s draft strategy. Against an opponent who has played in high-profile games in the past, you can look over game footage to determine what their strongest champions are and what their champion pools are like. In addition to this, you should also look at what they have been playing recently in soloqueue. Against opponents you can not find footage of, this will be your main scouting tool, but it is important in all situations to know what your opponent is capable of playing, and perhaps what champions they are practicing for competitive games. Scouting will help you determine what priorities you do and do not share with your opponent, which can help you determine what to ban and pick. Let us look at LMQ’s drafts and see how scouting worked into their strategy.
In the first match against YSO eSports, the only footage LMQ had to work with was this game YSO against Cognitive Forge Gaming. Against Cognitive Forge, YSO showed a very strong Kayle, Thresh, and Lee Sin. LMQ’s very dive-heavy assassin playstyle is countered by Kayle and Thresh, so they ban those champions. On blue side when they do not have to ban Kassadin, they also ban Lee Sin, deciding that none of the champions YSO showed in game 1 were enough of a threat to warrant a ban.
In the second match against Complexity Red (formerly known as Skyline), they know that Evaniskus has a very strong Annie, so they ban her. Additionally, they know Complexity Red plays Kayle, so because of that champion’s strength against diving assassins they ban it. The rest of their bans are determined by champions which members of Complexity Red play in soloqueue. It is important to note that Complexity Red bans Kassadin from blue side in game 2, essentially giving LMQ an extra ban.
In the final match against Complexity Black, LMQ changes their ban strategy. They do not ban Kayle because they do not expect Complexity Black to pick it. They ban Thresh and Elise, two champions which Complexity Black had a high amount of success with in previous challenger games. In the second game, they actually make a reactive ban to get rid of Pr0lly’s Ziggs which was very effective in game 1. After Complexity Black bans Elise, giving LMQ an extra ban, LMQ bans Yasuo.
Now that I have highlighted some of the important aspects of preparing for a draft, I can move on to the actual execution aspect.
The Early Draft
There are two definable phases of a draft in a competitive game of League of Legends: the early draft and the late draft. The early draft is oriented around denying your opponents’ high priority champions and securing your own high priority champions. I will highlight the structure of the early draft and the strategies available for the early draft.
In addition to simply securing priorities in the early draft, which is very significant, it is important to note the difference between blue side and red side. Blue side’s advantage comes from the early draft, and specifically the fact that the blue team gets first pick. This means that the blue team can always pick the strongest champion left available after bans. Not only is this an advantage in itself, but it also forces the red team to ban any overpowered champions to make sure the blue team does not take them. In LMQ’s games in the first half of the Spring NACS, the overpowered ban that the red team is forced to make is Kassadin.
Another slightly more subtle advantage that the blue team gains from first pick, is the ability to deny their opponents access to four champions in a single role. If there is a player on the red team which has a small champion pool (four champions or less) then the blue team can target that player with three bans and first pick the player’s fourth champion, essentially denying that player any comfortable picks. LMQ never does this in the first half of the Spring NACS, but it is definitely a factor of which teams should be aware.
Red side has a slightly more subtle advantage in the early draft. The red team is the first team able to pick two champions at once. This advantage can manifest itself in many ways. The red team can pick a strong champion and take away its counter at the same time. They can also secure more high priority picks than the blue team if there are many left after bans. The advantage is sometimes subtle, but it is there.
A great example of the way LMQ uses the early draft advantages of red side is in their second game against Complexity Red. In that game, almost all of their high priorities were off the table. They choose to grab one of their few remaining priorities, Thresh, but this leaves Annie open. They do not want to play Thresh against an Annie/Caitlyn lane which will outrange him and cause him to be ineffective in the lane phase, so they choose to pick Caitlyn at the same time, denying Complexity Red the opportunity to play Annie and Caitlyn together. They do give away their Lee Sin priority in doing so, but they save what could have been a disastrous draft for their duo lane.
The Late Draft
The late draft plays out very differently from the early draft. After the first sets of picks, once both teams have picked away their important priorities, the draft reaches point where teams must fill out team composition, and sometimes even counterpick their opponents. At this point it is up to a team to be aware of what their champion picks so far lack so that they can fill in those weak points, and also to pick champions whose strengths complement those of their earlier picks. While the first few picks a team makes generally consist of generic top tier champions, the last few picks might be more niche to fill out a team composition.
The way LMQ generally chooses to use the later half of the draft is to wait to pick their marksman and mid laner. This is a common strategy, as marksmen in the current metagame are generally just back-line damage dealers whose job is to kill towers, and mid-lane is a very matchup-dependant lane which can be decided by counterpicks. While knowing exactly what the right picks are in the later portions of the draft depends heavily on experience, some questions to ask yourself when filling out a
Structure of the Draft
So as many people are aware, before a game on Summoners Rift begins, each team must draft their 5 champions. First, each team gets to ban champions which are off-limits for either team to pick. The blue team gets the first ban and the teams alternate bans until 6 champions have been banned, with the red team getting the last ban. After bans, the blue team gets the first pick, then each team alternates picking two champions at a time until the red team picks the final champion.
DraftLayout
This is a very basic outline of how the draft plays out for both teams. Pick and ban order is important when preparing draft strategies, but there are many other factors to consider as well.
For this article, I will be using LMQ's games in the first half of the Spring North American Challenger Series (NACS) to exemplify how teams play out the draft. Click here to see the picks and bans from the first half of the Spring NACS. (Keep this open in another tab, I will refer to it many times.)
The Metagame
One of the first factors to take into account when preparing a draft strategy is the current metagame. In particular, there are certain champs which are too strong to leave open at all. If there is only one such champion, typically it is up to the red team to ban it. If there is more than one, it is unlikely that any of them will make it through bans, with both teams banning them. On 4.1, the patch which the examples in this article are played on, Kassadin is the only “must-ban” champion, so in almost every game the red team bans it. The only time the blue team should ban it is if they can not play it, and this gives the red team an extra ban, making it a weakness to ban Kassadin on blue side.
Priorities and Champion Pools
As I said, there are many factors to consider when preparing for the draft in a game of League of Legends. This is where planning and research become important, and it is where you must choose priorities. A team's priorities is essentially a list of champions determining which champions are the most important to secure. Priorities will typically include your team's strongest champions, and often champions which are considered strongest in the current metagame. Priorities are champions which you will pick any time they are available, regardless of team composition. Therefore, most priorities are generically strong champions which can fit into any team composition. For most the first half of the Spring NACS, LMQ’s priorities look something like this:
Kha’Zix (jungle/mid)
Elise (jungle)
Lee Sin (jungle)
Thresh (support)
Leona (support)
Renekton (top)
Dr. Mundo (top)
A few notes about this list:
LMQ’s draft strategy changes drastically in the finals against Complexity Black, so this does not apply to those games.
Kassadin probably belongs at the top of this list, but he is banned every game in these examples so am not to including him.
These priorities are not a strict “must pick champions in this order” list, but rather a guideline for LMQ’s overall draft strategy. I will talk about some of LMQ’s specific draft strategies later on.
Aside from your priorities, you must also be aware of your overall champion pool. As a player, having a wide variety of champions to choose from gives you options for team compositions and keeps your opponent from targeting you by banning out all of your champions. Your team should be aware of your overall champion pool in order to give them a strong basis to execute an effective draft. A strong champion pool consists of five or more champions in order to prevent a full denial of your champion pool from an opponent on blue side by banning three of your champions and first picking another.
Scouting Your Opponent
In addition to deciding your own strategy, it is important to be prepared for your opponent’s draft strategy. Against an opponent who has played in high-profile games in the past, you can look over game footage to determine what their strongest champions are and what their champion pools are like. In addition to this, you should also look at what they have been playing recently in soloqueue. Against opponents you can not find footage of, this will be your main scouting tool, but it is important in all situations to know what your opponent is capable of playing, and perhaps what champions they are practicing for competitive games. Scouting will help you determine what priorities you do and do not share with your opponent, which can help you determine what to ban and pick. Let us look at LMQ’s drafts and see how scouting worked into their strategy.
In the first match against YSO eSports, the only footage LMQ had to work with was this game YSO against Cognitive Forge Gaming. Against Cognitive Forge, YSO showed a very strong Kayle, Thresh, and Lee Sin. LMQ’s very dive-heavy assassin playstyle is countered by Kayle and Thresh, so they ban those champions. On blue side when they do not have to ban Kassadin, they also ban Lee Sin, deciding that none of the champions YSO showed in game 1 were enough of a threat to warrant a ban.
In the second match against Complexity Red (formerly known as Skyline), they know that Evaniskus has a very strong Annie, so they ban her. Additionally, they know Complexity Red plays Kayle, so because of that champion’s strength against diving assassins they ban it. The rest of their bans are determined by champions which members of Complexity Red play in soloqueue. It is important to note that Complexity Red bans Kassadin from blue side in game 2, essentially giving LMQ an extra ban.
In the final match against Complexity Black, LMQ changes their ban strategy. They do not ban Kayle because they do not expect Complexity Black to pick it. They ban Thresh and Elise, two champions which Complexity Black had a high amount of success with in previous challenger games. In the second game, they actually make a reactive ban to get rid of Pr0lly’s Ziggs which was very effective in game 1. After Complexity Black bans Elise, giving LMQ an extra ban, LMQ bans Yasuo.
Now that I have highlighted some of the important aspects of preparing for a draft, I can move on to the actual execution aspect.
The Early Draft
There are two definable phases of a draft in a competitive game of League of Legends: the early draft and the late draft. The early draft is oriented around denying your opponents’ high priority champions and securing your own high priority champions. I will highlight the structure of the early draft and the strategies available for the early draft.
In addition to simply securing priorities in the early draft, which is very significant, it is important to note the difference between blue side and red side. Blue side’s advantage comes from the early draft, and specifically the fact that the blue team gets first pick. This means that the blue team can always pick the strongest champion left available after bans. Not only is this an advantage in itself, but it also forces the red team to ban any overpowered champions to make sure the blue team does not take them. In LMQ’s games in the first half of the Spring NACS, the overpowered ban that the red team is forced to make is Kassadin.
Another slightly more subtle advantage that the blue team gains from first pick, is the ability to deny their opponents access to four champions in a single role. If there is a player on the red team which has a small champion pool (four champions or less) then the blue team can target that player with three bans and first pick the player’s fourth champion, essentially denying that player any comfortable picks. LMQ never does this in the first half of the Spring NACS, but it is definitely a factor of which teams should be aware.
Red side has a slightly more subtle advantage in the early draft. The red team is the first team able to pick two champions at once. This advantage can manifest itself in many ways. The red team can pick a strong champion and take away its counter at the same time. They can also secure more high priority picks than the blue team if there are many left after bans. The advantage is sometimes subtle, but it is there.
A great example of the way LMQ uses the early draft advantages of red side is in their second game against Complexity Red. In that game, almost all of their high priorities were off the table. They choose to grab one of their few remaining priorities, Thresh, but this leaves Annie open. They do not want to play Thresh against an Annie/Caitlyn lane which will outrange him and cause him to be ineffective in the lane phase, so they choose to pick Caitlyn at the same time, denying Complexity Red the opportunity to play Annie and Caitlyn together. They do give away their Lee Sin priority in doing so, but they save what could have been a disastrous draft for their duo lane.
The Late Draft
The late draft plays out very differently from the early draft. After the first sets of picks, once both teams have picked away their important priorities, the draft reaches point where teams must fill out team composition, and sometimes even counterpick their opponents. At this point it is up to a team to be aware of what their champion picks so far lack so that they can fill in those weak points, and also to pick champions whose strengths complement those of their earlier picks. While the first few picks a team makes generally consist of generic top tier champions, the last few picks might be more niche to fill out a team composition.
The way LMQ generally chooses to use the later half of the draft is to wait to pick their marksman and mid laner. This is a common strategy, as marksmen in the current metagame are generally just back-line damage dealers whose job is to kill towers, and mid-lane is a very matchup-dependant lane which can be decided by counterpicks. While knowing exactly what the right picks are in the later portions of the draft depends heavily on experience, some questions to ask yourself when filling out a
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