Source
r/summonerschool•
Sonyei

Time Management

I've been playing League since beta off and on, and it wasn't until last season that I made an attempt to play ranked. I placed at Silver 2 and decayed to Silver 5 before I ever went back, and this season I didn't even start a ranked game until about 2 months ago, did all 10 placement matches in 1 night, and lost miserably, haha. Ranked Wood 1.

Next season, my fiance and I really want to go for gold together (so sad I missed Morgs skin), but we're not in the most grind-y friendly environment. We're balancing maintaining our household, his final year of college, separate job schedules, a very active animal rescue, a sizable DnD campaign, and a MTG night -- before we ever get an hour to dedicate to League. This mostly leaves me with an endless history of quick ARAM games, and near a constant stream of C9's LemonNation reruns on my tv, but very little "hands-on learning" experiences from actual matches.

I've tried to play some bot games taken from a tip here on R/SS to learn the CDs of enemy champs, but I wound up with instances like a bot Jax who was only jumping to a ward under his turret (never seemed to use any other skill), and a summoner Draven who was 45-1 and could literally 2 shot everything; 2 of my 6 allotted hours were used to 'learn' that platinum players in intermediate bot games are cray cray and bot Jax is broke as all hell.

So, I was wondering if any other working adult gamers (or perhaps some uber time-strapped teens) could share some time management tips on how you climbed the SR ladder around hectic RL schedules?

TL;DR: How2Rank with only 5-6 hours available per week to play?

Posted Nov 11, 2014, 8:43 AM UTC

416
fox112Fòx - Diamond Irelia and ADC•

TL;DR: How2Rank with only 5-6 hours available per week to play?

Play ranked for 5-6 hours per week.

Just do it. Play the game. Sounds like your goal is to get better. Well I'll tell you, the best way to get better is to just play. You don't need to study anything, watch replays, whatever. Just play the game.

The fact that you commented about playing bot games to learn, makes me think you are self conscious, worried about your skill level. Well honestly I think the rank system is perfect then, if you aren't playing so hot, the MMR system will do it's best to match you with people around your skill so it's okay if you're in silver or bronze, because you'll be in good company.

The game is so much more fun and you get a lot better when you stop worrying and just play.

5
SonyeiOP•

Yep, pretty much. I play so much ARAM that I feel I'm way too aggressive in lane as a support. I've been playing bot games to try and break that urge to flash kill with Nami, because...I should not do that with Nami. >.>

It's a bit frustrating when my ADC is a passive player and I'm hyper aggressive; just something I'm trying to undo.

2
KCFD•

As someone who is in the same sort of situation and also a Support player; Being aggressive as a Support is great stuff even if your ADC is passive. If you're out there zoning out your opponents with harrass they are getting less CS and your ADC should be easily able to focus on it.

If you're winning lane and the opponents both base and your ADC is still playing passive, just go place some deep wards or roam mid to get your mid player fed.

2
SonyeiOP•

Well, that's comforting. I've never thought about roaming as a support, but I'll give it a shot. Thanks. :)

1
Zappyle-NA-Diamond3•

If you wanna succeed in bot lane, I think you need to be able to adapt to the style of your partner, assuming he wont adapt to yours. If you play with a passive laner and wanna be aggressive, tell him beforehand, ping or just roam if you feel he wont follow your aggressiveness.

Also, bot games arent really good to break the urge of going ham 24/7 because it works 99% of the time against bots, whereas it doesnt always work vs human players. Bot just dont react to aggressiveness.

In conclusion, my tip would be to just play the game, like someone said before me. I would recommend playing ranked, but play normals if you dont want to rank. Avoid aram/bots games unless you really feel like it or you dont really have time. Remember its still a game, so if you enjoy more playing relax games, you can continue with bots, but I felt like you wanted to improve and get the gold!

2
SonyeiOP•

We're working on Teambuilder games today, I guess. Or do you think normals are more practical?

1
Zappyle-NA-Diamond3•

I include normals and teambuilder in the same category. You play against human players on summoner's rift in a non competitive environnement. The advantage of Teambuilder is that you can secure your role/champ.

When I wanna warm up for ranked games, I often do 1 teambuilder, if the queue isnt too long.

1
salocin097•

The best way is just to play. I made that mistake. I have Silver 3 MMR and sitting at Bronze I 50LP because I was afraid of ranked and didn't really try until this last weekend.... I think my MMR dropped to like Silver 5 they were not fun games.

Play a normal to warmup or a bot game as a mechanically intensive champion and then go into ranked and play

DON'T play ranked if you are stressed. Stop ranked for the night after 2-3 consecutive losses. You will probably just start getting frustrated and lose the next few after.

2
ryzolryzolGold - Ryzol Ryzo Ryz R - NA•

Stop playing aram and bots and start dominion. Dom is far better practice wrt builds, mechanics, vision, and skirmishing.

Best thing to do is to consolidate your league time. 2 hours sat and sun is a lot better than 30 mins. every day.

2
SonyeiOP•

I think I have played Dominion a whopping once or twice in all the time I've played League. Lol, I really never thought of that. Thanks. :)

1
Goat_Bot•

To be honest, it's impossible to constantly improve your own play unless you are willing to make sacrifices somewhere else to be able to commit more time. Some players I know who want get on a challenger team or climb out of Master tier are practicing hard for usually more then 4-5 hours a day which is not including CS practice, Ranked 5 games and out of client research. For my personal experience, from the point when I started playing it took me around a year and a half of playing 5 hours a week to get to the point where I was comfortable in low gold. When you are only able to play 12-15 ranked games a week a lot of losses or wins can have a substantial impact on your rank, which is why it's usually very hard to climb without playing a large amount of games.

1
SonyeiOP•

Ya, and it has a pretty heavy impact on whether or not the game is still engaging. 2-3 losses in a row really sucks when you can only play 2-3 games. :(

That's exactly why I don't want to reach Challenger, I just want to reach Gold, haha. I would have to quit my job, never rescue another stray, and end my engagement for that sort of time commitment. x.x

1
billeht•

I'm kinda in the same boat as you. I'm 26 with a wife and 2 lil kids. I work 40 hours a week so that's not bad, but the kids take up all the free time and by the time they are in bed I'm about ready to go to bed so I can get up for work the next day.

If anything I'll play 1 maybe 2 games depending on how the first one went. Only played ranked. I try and not stay up to late, because I find that if I do, then when I play the next day my performance is worse. I almost made gold earlier in the season, then started staying up later to play more, switched champs, when on a big losing streak...

So my advice is play the ranked games and just make it count. Don't get angry, but play as smart and as focused as you can. If you lose, it's okay. I had a couple binge days where the wife and kids were out of town, so I could grind like crazy/watch a lot of streams and whatnot (One time this backfired on me though and I burnt myself out and this is where my losing streak came in).

2
SonyeiOP•

Ya, that's a sizable problem for us as well -- by the time the day is over, all I want to do is crack open a bottle of whiskey and go to bed. We don't have children, but we've got lots of furbabies to look after until they get adopted. Haha, you want one?

I'll definitely take your advice of not staying up too late over it into consideration. That's exactly how/why I did all 10 placement matches in one night, and it was just one long stream of nightmare. I'm surprised I didn't rank lower, to be honest.

1
billeht•

I don't mind sharing some whiskey, but I don't need a pet :P Kids are already expensive enough! hahah

1
SonyeiOP•

I know this thread is a bit dead, but I just wanted to pop back in and say that I have since decided that support was just not my calling, I want to main ADC. I picked up my most hated champion, Tristana, and got my first pentakill. Whoo! :)

We're trying to play at least 4-5 games a night, and it's made a pretty big difference.

1