League of Legends: Free Week Analysis (Week 4)

New champion rotation. Here's the rundown on them.

Jax: One of the "noobkillers" along with Master Yi. He's an absolute brute if he gets out of hand. Most players build him HP tanky too so by the end of the game, he's really hard to kill and can fearlessly jump in and stomp people. Typically played top lane, he will help make your ganks scary if your jungler doesn't have a really strong CC oriented initiate. Alternatively, if your ganker DOES have a good CC (like Amumu) then you can keep someone chain stunned for 2 seconds which can be a really big deal. You're going to see him ALOT this week and understanding how his counterstrike works is REALLY important. When you see yourself start to miss, STOP ATTACKING HIM. You're only investing in hurting yourself.

Kassadin: He's a mage assassin by design though he doesn't really excel in that role until he gets two points in his ultimate. The real power comes later when you can speed quickly to a fight by chain teleporting and boosting his teleport to the 3-4 stack range. At that point, it's going to hit for ~700 damage with a followon for ~800 damage. The silence has a good duration. He has really good mana sustain through his Nether Blade passive but he has to farm in melee to use it so keeping pressure on him will be a big help. If you have good range, I'd suggest aggressively farming at least until lvl 6. He'll silence you occasionally but at those early levels, you're not comboing people so it's not that big a deal and you have ranged poke that trumps his melee. If you can stay ahead of him, he wont' really become a terror until late game.

Singed: One of the weirder champions because he doesn't really have any traditional abilities. Beware the poison trail. He also can fling you over his head and slam you behind him. Be aware of the tower positions as Singed has a very specific area he wants to fight in where he can grab you and pull you into tower range.

Taric: An aggressive sustain support character. He can heal both himself and his carry simultaneously and he has a 1.5 second stun that can really be scary. He will also be constantly in your face attacking you because his auto-attacks give him mana back and refresh the CD of his heal thus allowing him to CONTINUE to fight in your face. I suspect also that good Tarics will take that point in pick pocket so that every auto-attack that lands on you gives him 5 gold.

Nidalee: I don't know a whole lot about her so i can offer only limited advice. The spear does ALOT of damage if it lands at max range (more damage at longer range) and you're going to want to dodge it because losing 30% of your health in one shot hurts.

Gragas: A "melee" champion with a whole lot of ranged abilities. He throws a beer keg to do a variety of things. He also heals himself every time he uses an ability (by drinking beer!). His ultimate is the real icing on the cake because it does a DISPERAL aoe (with a pretty big range). Don't use this in team fights early because it will screw up your team mates AoEs. Use it late to zone out key players (tanky characters that get out of position for example).

Akali: Melee assassin character. You need to learn how her shadow works to play against her properly because it's the key to everything she does. It gives her an 8 second zone of terror in which she slows, stealths and gains MR/Armor. She also has a stupidly quick cooldown on her ult which she can cast for free (it accrues charges like Teemo Shrooms and costs her no energy). It has three charges that she will likely use in quick succession (1 second CD at lvl 3 but 2 second CD at lvl 1). So stay out of her Twilight Shroud (20 second CD) and pressure her. She typically builds hybrid and so you're likely to face a Hextech Gunblade as well (meaning a lot of lifesteal and spellvamp). You don't want to get in a war of attrition with her. You need to outburst her. Typically played top lane but occasionally you see her mid.

Vladimir: He will build health. And then he'll build more health. And when he's done, he'll build more health. It's not uncommon to see a Vlad player with 4k health by the late mid game and a full build Vlad will have well over 5k (with respectable amounts of armor/MR taken on the side). That doesn't gimp him because it gives him 1.4 AP per 100 health. He wont' get to 500AP most likely but he'll be at 300ish without trouble and VERY survivable. His pool will make him untargetable and immune to AoE damage but it will NOT wipe out DoTs. Also, early on, his drain has a very long CD (10 seconds at lvl 1, declining by 1s per point put into it). So he can't do very much damage early and should be pushed aggressively before he hits ~5ish.

Urgot: Apparently used to be a premier AD carry but gets less played now. His autoattack has really good scaling and his abilities have good synergy launching rockets at range. One of the problems is that he doesn't have a really good escape and his auto-attack range is on the short side for an AD carry. Those two issues combine to make him not ideal in the current meta. Having said that, it doesn't mean he shouldn't be respected. His ult is a body switch which is frightening against isolated opponents. If you can snag the enemy AD / AP carry, by all means do it. Just make sure your team understands what's happening so that when the switch happens they're ready to pound the enemy.

Nautilus: He's an odd mix of tankiness, ganking and aoe. He doesn't QUITE fit in the jungle and he doesn't QUITE fit as a support so it's not totally clear on where/how he fits into the current meta. An interesting character though and you'll run into him alot. His initiate is unusual in that it's dual modal. If he hits a person, it works similar to Blitzcrank's with a less damage and a little bit less stun (it also pulls him and his target TOGETHER rather than a one sided pull) . If he gets a wall, he pulls HIMSELF towards it. You can take advantage of this by staying near walls and dodging because it may result in an initiate for your team rather than for his.