You know what really grinds my gears?
‘Fun’ champions.
I know some sadists out there have a blast playing Nunu and Teemo, but that’s not what I mean. You know what I mean – mechanically fun champions. Yasuo, Riven, and Vayne come to mind right off the bat.
It’s not even about the personality of the players who pick them. I know tons of people attribute ego, blind aggression, and incessant feeding to anyone who ‘mains’ these fun champions. I’m actually pretty cool with that because we should be able to express our personality within the game itself. These champs are insanely popular from season to season, regardless of balance, so its obvious that many value this freedom of expression. However, when someone decides from day 1 to main a ‘fun champion’, they fundamentally never learn one thing.
How to play the game…
Let’s look at Riven as our first example. She ignores half of top lane principles in non-Challenger play since she has such a dynamic kit. Three points in particular separate her from the majority of other meta top lane champions:
- Choosing any fight at any time – Riven has so much mobility that she, in 90% of cases, determines the field of engagement.
- Resource-less wave clear – now that Renekton is out of the meta, no other popular top laner can instantly clear minion waves without expending mana or health.
- All-in potential – until opponents learn how to space top lane immaculately, Riven will almost always have the opportunity to take enemies down from 100 to 0.
So basically you can see why a Riven main might not know how to play the whole game, or even lane. She doesn’t need to carefully manage mana. Worse, she can heavily undermine minion dynamics. Combine those with all-in cheese and you have a bunch of top laners with no transferable skills (to other champs).
And Vayne might be even worse…
At least if you fall behind on Riven, the game can get pretty limited. But Vayne presents a nearly opposite view. With one or two items, she can 1v1 nearly any other marksman in the game, even if they have a 1-2k advantage. Bad (most) Vayne mains simply don’t learn to trade properly or how to position. You don’t need to. A two-second cooldown on Tumble makes pre-fight positioning way less important, and trading is suboptimal in most cases without perfect spacing.
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At the highest level, she actually emphasizes movement mechanics even more in laning. But everywhere else, she encourages a level 6 all-in (sound familiar?).
Her stealth and true damage make her one of the even more fun champions, since there’s always the hope for a late game comeback against the current super-tanks. But worse, when we get there, Vayne mains are encouraged to split push, courtesy of Doublelift’s season 2 antics.
So if you’re starting the game, please don’t be one of these people…
I know you want to be a cool guy having a chill time, but no one is really going to think that. Hop over to League of Hunnies if that’s what you’re looking for. No need to become an edgy one-trick.
Worse yet, what if one day these fun champions loose their attraction? You’ll be struggling to climb back to where you once stood in solo queue.
And I love watching what happens when your ‘fun’ hero gets banned.
