League of Legends Silver Rank Guide

League of Legends Silver Rank Guide by Artiquinno

Hi! This is Artiquinno again with some more advice about climbing the ranked ladder, this time about Silver. Most of my advice is the same as being in Bronze – warding, etc, but this time I will give my opinion about some champions that can carry rather well in Silver

In Silver people tend to be a little bit better – sometimes you will encounter people who obviously deserve to be in Bronze – and then you will meet others who will deserve of Gold. In low silver I would still mute everyone and focus on your own game but you can really start to focus on your own game a lot more. Here is where maining support seems to become a lot more viable than it previously was in Bronze.

Most of the fundamentals however remain the same. I would stick with champions that I mentioned before at low Silver level becasue there is not much difference to Bronze level play. The one thing I would say though is that you want to help your team mates more as well. They can be trusted more at this level. Champions such as lissandra in the mid lane are really good because of the amazing CC that they offer, so in this section I am going to list some champions that I wouls heavily reccomend learning becasue the concepts are pretty much the same as before.

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MID:

Lissandra – Lissandra has incredible laning and a great late game as well. It is difficult to lose lane with her if played correctly because her Q gives incredible poke and farming capability. You are relatively safe in lane from jungler ganks as long as you keep your lane warded and you dont push too much because you can jump away with your E and root people with W.

She has great synergy with a lot of junglers becasue she has a gap closer so she can get close to her enemy mid laner and completely keep them still while the jungler simply walks into the lane. The real reason why I played Lissandra though was her ability to roam and peel. If you can push your lane out and you see an ability to roam then do so, even before level 6! Your E covers enormous distances and can get over unexpected walls. I implore that you look up ‘Lissandra all jump spots’ on youtube, you will see the potential she has to enter lanes and easily lock people down so your team mates can help you kill them.

Another amazing point aabout lissandra is her ability to peel in teamfights. In Silver I would build her relatively tanky (Rod of Ages, Zhonyas, etc.) If the other team has an assassin you can ult them as soon as they come for the carries and kite with Q+W. Alternatively you can engage fights if you want to play the role of an initiator. E into the middle of their team and ult yourself, this does massive AOE damage and sets a slow up that will allow your team to follow up. All in all – lissandra is awesome.

Katarina – Katarina is an amazing champion for carrying at silver level. You just have to have the right mindset to play her. She can have some very difficult laning phases so be prepared to be outfarmed and have to roam a lot! Nonetheless she snowballs incredibly hard and if you can go even in lane or roam and get some kills in the other lanes then she can easily carry an entire game.

What allows her to do this is her passive and the resets that it gives her on a kill/assist. This means that you can continue to dish out damage continuously in teamfights if you play it right. The difficulty with this is encountering CC which will stop your ultimate and mean that you have rather limited damage. It is essential that you act as ‘Clean up’ and try to go in after the enemy team has used a lot of their CC on other people. This will mean that they cannot interupt your ultimate and you can do your full amount of damage

A rather important part of playing katarina is the ability to ward jump – there are a lots of people who take a second to ward jump, you have to be able to do it instantly and react to situations. If you have extra buttons on your mouse, then use them to smart cast wards and practice in custom games until you’re good enough becasue you will notice a great difference in your play!

Ahri – She can easily win lane with constant poke with her Q and has sustain because of her passive. Ahri has the potential to escape any gank becasue of her ult, or outplay people early game by dodging skill shots with her ult. Her roam is incredible because she can ult into any lane and E people towards her. This can set up the other lanes to get fed which allows your team to* snowball hard*.

Some other good points about her are her ability to pick people out late game, she can sit in a bush and Charm an unsuspecting victim towards her. This also works in teamfights, you can jump out, charm a priority target towards you and get away without being punished for it.

Ahri also has the potential to peel for the ADC if she is behind. A charm will stop a tank running at the ADC and paired with a DFG and the true damage from her Q she will be able to take a large chunk out of their health – this ensures that your ADC can stay alive and get as fed as possible. With the recent changes to DFG you can’t burst people fully quite so often but it is still a good item, but make sure that you use it on the neccessary people!

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JUNGLE:

Warwick – Warwick is incredibly strong in silver and even low gold. He can farm feral really easily because of his sustain in the jungle, despite his ganks before 6 being horrendous, as soon as he hits 6 he can almost guarantee a kill to any lane that he ganks.

What I love about warwick is the assassination potential. If you reach 30 stacks on an unleashed Feral have boots, Blade of the Ruined King and a Wits End then you can pretty much assassinate any carry just by ulting onto them and pressing Q. This means that they are one carry down and you proceed to fight 4v5. After those damage items I would suggest getting tanky items because then you can survive after you initiate and continue to help burst down the enmy team.

If your ADC is ahead then it could be worth playing carry protect, ulting any tanks that come towards them. This means that your adc will also be able to chunk down the tanks and their enormous frontline will be gone, once again leaving your team with a huge advantage. The one thing to be careful of is that you don’t ult someone when your team isn’t ready to fight. This could throw a fight and end up with a lost game.

Xin Zhao – Despite me recommending him in the Bronze section I would also suggest that he is a great pick in Silver as well. He is an incredibly versatile champion who can build both damage and tank. Feral Flare also works amazingly on him but hit early ganks are very good so you should take advantage of this and gank lanes that you can! An important thing to remember is to save your E when you gank until they use an escapeso that you can catch them up and ensure a succesful gank!

I would suggest looking up a Xin Zhao guide becasue of the endless possibilities but there are some factors that really make me think that he is a good contender for carrying at low ELO. His ultimate does %HP damage so you can use it on tanks to shred their health. He has a slow and a knock up so you can easily chase people and deal out damage. As a pure damage jungler – he can burst a carry with 3 autos late game if you’re ahead. As a tank, he acts as a massive frontline, getting to their backline, displacing everyone and sticking to them while your team follow up!

Vi – Vi is a great pick at all levels of play. She has incredible damage early game with her Q and Auto attack reset on her E. If you get far enough ahead from succesful ganks you can even build a tri force and continue to burst people throughout the game. What makes Vi a strong pick is her ability to go tanky and have a really good engage with her ult. Due to her passive she is deceptively more tanky than she looks and she has an awful lot more damage as well.

I usually start of by building Spirit of the Elder Lizard, Feral flare is not a good idea because her power comes from ganking early, an early brutalizer is incredibly strong because of the armour shred on the W – this means that you can do a lot of damage to tanks and to carries as well. If you’re behind then you can go full tank, and the good thing is that you can control when your team fights as the main initiator; which is very important when playing a tank.

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TOP:

Nidalee – Nidalee is an incredibly strong laner at the moment, on the verge OP. Her early game damage is amazing. She has a ranged form, attack speed steroid, and an execute in cougar form. This makes her incredibly strong against melee tanks top lane with the ability to wreck her lane. Rushing a Tri Force and maybe one other damage item allows you to 1v1 almost anyone making her an incredible split push champion.

Because of her pounce (W) being on a short cooldown she can escape ganks very easily and run away if a team comes to gank her when she is split pushing. Due to her new rework her teamfighting isn’t quite as strong and doesn’t have very good poke so I would recommend her as a split-push only champion. She is rather easy to learn and although she doesn’t play a huge role in teamfights – she makes up with it in her ability to draw champions to her lane and slaughter them allowing her team to force objectives with relative ease.

Rumble – Rumble is an incredible lane bully that can dish out tonnes of damage to the enemy top laner while standing in his own minions, his inability to escape ganks very well is easily overlooked when you consider that he has very strong 1v2 potential (that’s why they played him in LCS) and very good teamfight. With some simple magic penetration and a rylais you can keep people locked down on top of your ult dealing incredible AOE damage.

This AOE damage means that you can single handedly carry in team fights with a well placed ult and Heat management. Lots of people in silver don’t think that rumble does a lot of damage and aren;t afraid to stand on top of his ult while it slowly kills them in a a teamfight. This means that they can’t escape due to incredible slows, and your team can easilt clean up. The best place to fight is in the jungle or at your own towers as rumble; your ult will cover large areas and there will be few places that the enemy can stand where they arent taking damage from your ult + Q. The reason I didn’t suggest him in Bronze is that he is rather difficult to play and will require some practice. Don’t give up!

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ADC

Tristana – Incredibly strong late game. A Hyper Carry. Her incredible 703 range at level 18 allows you to melt people from the back of a team fight whilst you can jump away from any danger and ult people away to remain safe. She has an attack speed buff which allows her to dish out an awful lot of damage, and she can apply grevious wounds to people.

Her laning phase is very safe but she pushes quite hard becasue of the passive on her E – sometimes this allows you to hit CS you otherwise wouldn’t, other times it makes you miss CS – but overall I would heavily recommend Tristana because of her safety and ability to sit at the back meaning positioning is easy.

Kog’Maw – Kog’Maw is an incredibly strong ADC at the moment because of his range, and his poke in lane at level 6. As long as you manage your mana and get good at aiming you can have an incredibly strong laning phase/ teamfight. His passive is very good at all stages of the game; if you narrowly lose a fight then you can finish people off with the large amount of damage that it provides.

Kog’Maw’s downfall is his lack of mobility, he really needs a support that acts as a bodyguard becasue he can get jumped on very easily. There is a counter part to this though – he completely melts tanks because of his %HP damage on all autos, this means that he does a very good job at handing out damage in teamfights.

Caitlyn – Caitlyn can win almost every lane single handedly due to her absurd range. Her traps give her the ability to zone the enemy ADC and her ult can either act as poke in lane or a finished. Her E acts as a gap closer/escape which means that she is safe in lane if played right.

In teamfights you want to make sure that you position correctly because one mistake and your team loses an awful lot of damage. Also: don’t be afraid to ult before a fight because it means they’ll be on lower health.

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SUPPORT

Thresh – Thresh is a playmaker. He can set up kills with ease by catching people out, he can act as a carry protect and peel with great ease. His Lantern can save people from horrific situations – despite his recent nerfs he is still borderline OP because of the utility that he offers.

There is not much else to say but if you pick up thresh and get good at him you won’t regret it as you can win lanes by feeding your ADC and then win the game by controlling fights with your abilities and items.

Zyra – She is a very strong lane bully and can zone two people away from an ADC with great ease, and she is also a very good body guard, with the ability to disengage and engage fights with her E/R. She has very good AP ratios making herr a fun support to pick up and this ensures that you will still do a lot of damage late game in teamfights.

There are various build paths that you can take, and I’d advise looking up some guides on MOBAFire because they will really help in the long run!