I miss zz so much... 

so many games I think... if I could just drop a zz.  farging reddit man.  i swear that's a huge portion of why climbing on this acct has been a total cake walk.  

Hunny hit gold so I think I'm about done here.

Some good points from mr meteos.  Talking about stuff that SUCKS as jungler - correct.

kog/darius pretty much at must ban win rates now.  Kog with a higher win % than darius.  Protect the kog comps are pretty freaking viable.

Darius? Oh funny way to say udyr

it's not darius - its DARE - E -UDYR.  Had the D on my mind hue

ain't pretty, but highlight of the night for me sadly

http://plays.tv/video/56c681fa24019e7663/this-morg-play-lost-game-but-still-woo?from=user

One of those, you are fugged, but feels good plays.  

Anyway, back full time on my main acct. Still want to play ranked primarily, but i'll be sending out invites if you are able to join.  I looked into it and I think I can play with anyone in plat/gold/dia.  So, rip my alt for a bit.

recap on alt acct.  I had a ton of fun playing solo a bunch.  I meant to play w/ hunny a bit to help him power up to gold, but only ended up playing a few with him.  It was nice to go hypee most games.  

Braum in this elo discussion - Elo being silver/gold.  Here's the thing with braum and other supports that are engage oriented.  1st - braums not quite the same as a leona for engage oriented, but I find he's a heck of a lot more about your adc understanding exactly what braum brings in order to have an optimal lane.  Eg, an adc that factors in exactly how many stacks braums passive will be at after a trade vs someone that occassionally picks up on the whole 4 stack = stun = kill potential, etc. Or understanding exactly what a dash to them means or that shield means.  I kind of think braum is a champ that you really need to understand to be able to do well with him if you are evenly matched at least.  2nd point - braum ain't carrying shit.  He can have excellent plays, block key dmg, but his scaling is straight garbage.  There is no damage braum option (looks at tahm kench building tank and hitting like a truck).  

Add in that the entire team needs to get what braums passive does properly and now its even worse (eg top lane could have a kill right now if he's willing to flash for 1 more AA for the stun, etc).  Anyway, I think braum asks too much of your team in lower elo.  I think its better to play supports like morg that offer clear engage windows and some carry potential.  

I started my low elo journey with braum.  Decided after 2 games, no... this isn't a good idea.  Swapped to my carry lux shite.  Carried to silver 3 or so.  Hopped back to morg and carried up to silver 1 near gold V and now I'm done.  Wish I could have played braum more but I'm 100% sure I would not have climbed anywhere near as fast with him.  That's also kind of why I think amumu was really strong in lower elos.  People understand that if amumu hits a grab and ults, well its fing go time.  If I land 3 stacks of my passive as braum folks don't always see that a big an opening.  

Anywho... night!

http://plays.tv/video/56c7eab7083abae82b/support-fugging-karl?oreferer=notifications

So folks were a bit grouchy here and there tonight.  So, in this game I fugged up a bit.  I make many awful mistakes.   I dare ask you, kind folks, what would have been a good, safe play in the clip above? 

Flashing in front of him, next to the tower, would have been quite safe, he only needed a few hits blocked.  Doesn't seem worth getting excited over though.  He was definitely retrievable for a summoner.

So I'm generally not going to blow a flash there when the death isn't going to result in an objective for the other team (they didn't get the mid tower) and it puts me at risk of dying myself.  You can say that it was "completely safe", but I was pretty sure Lux had her bind up (she did, she used it right where I would have flahsed into in the video) and I thought she had her ult up too.  When you combine that with a Mundo who can dive towers very easily, a support can die there.

I generally want to hold the flash and keep my HP up.  This increases our chances of holding the objective.  If I flash to save you, in the best case scenario we both have to back.  Then they have a 4v2 against 2 ADCs and therefore have a very good chance of getting mid.  On the other hand, if you die and I hold the flash, we can defend the mid tower easily 3v4 (as it played out).

So what I did was arguably the best TEAM decision since it greatly increased our chances of keeping mid tower up, although I likely could have saved you (at the cost of a summoner and maybe my own life).  In any case, it was a close decision other way and I don't really feel that it was necessary for you to whine about my supporting for the next 20 minutes because of this play.

All I ever wanted was to help you become a better person, karl.  #youknowuthoughtIwasaskingyoutodiveincrediblydeepintotheirteaminsteadofwherethesaveobviouslywouldhaveoccurredbutatthetimeyouthoughtIwasaskingyoutodosomethingstupidbutratherinfactyoujustkindapussedoutandnowaretryingtojustifyit.

I dreamt of you last night whispering the first 5 seconds of this to me:

Instead of this: http://plays.tv/video/56c7eab7083abae82b/support-fugging-karl?oreferer=notifications

hue.  Anywho, my funnin aside, folks seemed really edgy a bit last night.  Dear god you and hunny were going it at hardcore after 1 game together.  It was kind of an agitation machine - cow wound up about ranked and then us getting stomped that game, you and hunny laning together brought out the best in the world, me harassing you, bleh, bryff hopping out of retirement blehbleh.  Its k.  Its ranked garbo queue... supposedly not shit queue is coming.  

Anywho, see you placed in silver 1 - so hopefully hitting gold is quick n easy.  

got dr boaz into a series (I think its silver V to III.  Hit gold on my alt.  Still kind of bummed to have to play on an alt to play with pals atm.  

Night folks!

So romantic

Got my 1st penta of the season playing tank akali.  hurm.

So, I decided I'll take advantage of being at a lower elo to work on my crappier champs/roles a bit.  Here's some thoughts about what I've been up to.

• malzahar mid - I kind of suck with him.  I find laning to be really easy.  I blow with last hitting early levels due to slow animation speed and not calculating space aids right.  That's just mechanical and something I'll iron out if I play him more.  I'm getting better at trading in match ups, etc and playing the lane.  I straight up suck with proper roaming/presence.  And I'm straight garbage without a proper initiator.  Haven't quite figured out how to stagger myself in fights, etc.  He's prob not a good fit for me and how I like to play, but giving it some reps
• tank akali top - current kind of FOTM.  Like I mentioned, got a penta w/ her last night.  I'm pretty used to akali from reps a long time back, so I think I've got most of the mechanics.  Its fairly easy for me to last hit early with the AD/AP rune setup recommended (pretty much running redmercy's tank build 1).  I find it very difficult to lock down kills pre 6 as if I make good headway on trades, folks usually just go passive.  Other problems/good things occasionally - so I rush sunfire.  This causes the wave to push a bit.  But it also screws me if the wave is pushed, I'm 1v1 and I want to work on the tower while someone is being a puss as I draw aggro.  I feel really safe with her escape potential.  It's usually really easy to get onto a mid/adc as the game progresses and quickly change targets  if needed to peel or redirect the enemy team.  Some energy issues, but manageable even in prolonged fights.  

I'm finding the akali tank build fun so far, but I might try for the redmercy 2 akali build (google redmercy akali tank for the vid if you haven't seen/are interested).  the first build feels freaking awesome if you ever manage to go full build with titanic hydra.  That's how I got the penta - you are just a truck.  The other build is a bit closer to normal akali - you still go sunfire, but get the hextech gunblade.  

Anyway, I honestly don't think its super viable, but it is fun.  Ideal usage would probably be to level up to 6 then get a gank for a kill and then apply pressure elsewhere.  I'm not quite good enough with my tps.  I'm forcing crap without good setups.  Something to work on.  

So been winning a lot of games with sion top.... Hurm....