LoL Bronze to Gold Guide

LoL Bronze to Gold Guide by Hawkki

Hello guys, my name is Hawkki and recently I reached my objective for this season, climbing to gold from Bronze IV. I’ve been through a lot during these ranked games and thanks to this subreddit, it has been a very funny road where I learned so much!

So that’s why, today, I’d like to share my knowledge and tips that helped me the most to reach gold. I know Gold isn’t such a good rank, but every day, I see threads about how to climb silver, bronze and stuff, and I think that the tips I’m gonna give will be very helpful for those summoners.

I’ll divide this guide in two parts, one being the champions and the other one being laning and strategy. I know that being gold doesn’t mean that everything I say is the best for the situation, so If you think that anything in this guide is not of your liking, feel free to post your thoughts in the comments :)

So let’s start!

Champions

• This is the most important part, everyone in these elos, thinks that countering is very important, but in reality, the most important thing is knowing the champion you will use very well. It’s better to know everything about 2 o 3 champions than to be able to play “decently” 8. So in short, don’t counter if you don’t know how to play the champion you’ll use.
• If you are able to use an easy champion, USE HIM! I’ll put an example to explain this, if for example there is a tristana available for picking, and you know how to use her, pick her! I know this sounds very bold, but using champions that doesn’t require too much skill or have a very easy and intuitive kit, will definitely help you win more games. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t pick champs like Vayne or Draven, that require more of skill than other adc’s, but as some old dude said: the simpler, the better.
• Don’t use champions that require a jungler to help, think of the jungler help as a bonus and not as a necessity. If the junglers good, that’s great! But having this mindset and using those kind of champions will help you a lot climbing.

Enough theory, now it’s time for the champions that I think that are the best for climbing.

• TOP LANE: Ryze, Jarvan, Pantheon, Nasus. I chose those 4 because they have quite a simple kit, yet their kit is so good.Ryze is a late game POWERHOUSE, he can kite pretty good in laning, and you can’t get shut-down if you ward properly. If you manage to learn how to harass properly and you farm well, this champion will win you a lot of games alone.Jarvan provides a lot of utility to any team-comp, he has a very strong early game, a incredible mid game, and decent late game depending of how you built him.Pantheon has one of the best early games in LOL, and if you are able to get 1 or 2 kills during this phase, you will become unstoppable, atleast during mid-game. Using your ulti properly can easily win any teamfight.

  Nasus is one of the most risky picks in any ELO, he depends a LOT on his Q farm, but if you’re able to survive early game,without feeding your enemy top laner, with a decent amount of farm, you will outscale everyone in the game. The downside of Nasus is that he can get kited pretty easily.

  ---

• MID LANE: Ahri, Orianna, Akali,Syndra. Those 4 champions can be divided in two groups because of their playstile, roaming and farming-type champions. In the first group we can find Ahri, she can easily win games by catching people out of position, and Akali, who can snowball really hard by picking kills around the map and getting the resets. Orianna and Syndra don’t depend that much on roaming, but they depend a lot on farming and lane dominance. Those 2 champions can win a teamfight with just 1 or 2 well placed skills, especially Orianna’s ult and Syndra’s stun.

• JUNGLE: Vi, Amumu, Kha Zix, Pantheon and Yi. I don’t think I need to explain too much about these great junglers. Vi can lock-down anyone and can ensure an easy camp-kill after she has ult, and Amumu is a jungler that cannot be shut-down if he has well placed wards in his jungle, anyway, no one really counterjungles in Bronce and Silver. Amumu’s ult is one of the best in the game, nothing much to explain here really.Kha’zix, change is good, so is the way people adapt to his playstyle, right now this bug is a pretty strong jungler, that can win almost all 1 vs 1 matchups. His evolved E can give you easy pentakills, and his isolated-kit damages are extremely strong. Learn to position yourself with him and enjoy stabbing people to their death. But of course, don’t forget to think wisely before you jump into an enemy face.Pantheon has the strongest lvl 2 gank in the game. An easy Q-W-Q gank can ensure a flash from the enemy team. His ulti is one of the best tools for ganking or counter-ganking you can find. Bot lane is pushed and with LOW-HP? Enjoy the free kills in bot.Master Yi everyone loves to have a well fed-farmed yi on their team. Pick him when the enemy team hasn’t got that much cc/stuns. Your primary job as Yi jungle is to farm until you get 2 or 3 items, and for example, if you’ve takenteleport and smite combo split-push the empty lanes. His teamfight potential is huge when the other team doesn’t have any means to immobilize you, as you can easily reach their carries. So in short, if they enemy team doesn’t have enough cc to stop you, Yi is a good pick.

  Taking junglers that can solo dragon and baron early on, can also provide you with great global-gold that can help you aid some of your teams wealth deficiencies. Most of the junglers I mentioned can solo dragon with very few items, but the ideal jungler for this kind of role, is Fiddlesticks.

• AD Carries Tristana, Lucian, Caitlyn and Jinx. All of them have a rather easy kit to learn and can snowball REALLY hard. Tristana’s only weak point, in my opinion, is her early-mid game, but a good Tristana knows that this champ only needs to farm well, anyway, her e-auto combo in early game is veeeery good. Once you have Statik and Infinity on her, you can start kicking ass. Lucian is the king of trades in the bot lane, good base damages and excellent movility. Caitlyn, I’ll just say this, no one in bronce and silver, knows how to deal with a good Caitlyn, your range is just too much for them. Jinx is one of the best AD Carries out there, her missile q outranges Caitlyn, she also has an attack speed steroid, and a global ult. The downside of her is that she is quite immobile and only has her chompers and a slow for self protection. She’s perfect for objective control, as she can splitpush and take down objectives pretty fast.

• SUPPORTS Leona, Braum, Thresh and Alistar. These are the generic supports that everyone loves to pick, but why? I’ll tell you the answer. They’re very easy to use, especially Leona and Braum because they are the CC GODS, if you love playing an aggressive-engage style without worrying too much about your HP, these are the champions for you. Thresh is the PLAYMAKING GOD, his hooks can win anything, his poke can win the lane, the lantern saves lifes, his ulti zones pretty well… what’s the downside of him you ask? You need to land those hooks and place your skills well. Alistar, the king of peel, his skill-kit provides him with knockups, knocbacks, heals and an attack-armor steroid. Perfect for diving objectives or ensuring protection to your carries.

That’s it for the champions part, it’s time to move on to the mindset,strategy and laning tips. I’ll be a bit brief, because I think that this guide is going to be too long if I continue at this rate.

PRE-GAME TIPS

• Don’t be scared to play ranked,just care about your gameplay, and think about what you did wrong and right in it. Not caring about winning or losing and just focusing on getting better will help you a lot. If you deserve to get a higher rank, you will get it eventually. If you want it, get it.
• Learn to deal with tilting, tilting is a part of this game, and If you learn to accept it, your mentality will improve a lot.
• NEVER FLAME, as the flamer I was myself, I’ve learned that not flaming and keeping a cool-chat time with your teammates, will boost your team’s morale and productivity.
• Use the mute button! If any teammate is bothering you, use it. Don’t think about it twice.
• This is the most important tips I’ll give, remember that LOL is a game, and games are made to have fun in them. If you aren’t enjoying anymore this game, take a break, and come back when you feel the urge to play it again.
• Forget about the “I carry myself mentality”, this is a team game, If you have that individual mentality, you’ll just have too much pressure on you every game.

IN-GAME Tips

• Farm is more important than kills, because farming well ensures you a reliable source of gold.
• If you know that the champion you’re against counters you really hard, play safe, don’t die and ask for help if it’s possible, asking help once in a while isn’t bad. But don’t ping for 2 minutes and then flame, because you won’t likely get help that way.
• WARD, some people say that wards don’t kill, well, they are right. They don’t kill, YOUR TEAM is the one that will kill. Apart from giving kills, wards give you map information. Use this information to choose the correct lane for split-pushing, objective calls, etc. Buying an early pink ward, is really worth, because those pink last wards, last a very LONG time in this ELO.
• If you’re having problems against your lane oponnent, have this mentality, lose the lane, win the game. If you manage to keep a decent cs number without feeding your laner and have the patience to reach your powerspikes, you’ll be able to have almost the same impact as your enemy, and of course, your teammates will be able to help you without being a multi-kill for your enemy laner.
• If you’re feeding and the other lanes are doing well, stop feeding and back-up. Let your team clean up the mess you did, while they can.
• In the other case, if you’re winning you’re lane pretty hardcore, push and roam. Help lanes that are able to follow up with your ganks. Do not gank that lvl 7 4/0/1 Darius with your level 4 Nasus teammate. I guarantee that it won’t go well, well, maybe if you’re level 10 and you’re ULTRA FED. So in short, choose the champions you want to kill wisely.
• Analyze the team-comps: do they have a lot of CC? Back till you bait their cc and win the fight. Are they split-pushers? Force them to teamfight. Analyzing those little thigs will help you improve.
• Never surrender, enough said. By never surrendering I meant, that you shouldn’t surrender at minute 20 when your team is only 10 kills or 10k gold behind, for example. If you are sure that you can’t win a game because there are 2 or 3 trolls or afk’s and your team is 30 kills behind, yes you should surrender xD
• Side inhibitors are more important than the middle inhibitor, especially the bottom one. The bottom lane inhibitor will give you Baron and objective control. If you get any of these side lanes inhibitor, you will be able to push the other side lane, making the enemy team go back and forth to defend. After taking down an inhibitor, leave that lane and go for the easiest objective you can get. Never stop taking objectives. Objectives win games.
• Inhibitor > Baron > Inhib turrets > Drake > Turrets > Buffs > Camp Monsters.
• I’ve seen this mistake a lot in bronze and silver junglers, DON’T USE SMITE ON A CAMP WHEN YOU’RE ABOUT TO FIGHT A DRAKE OR A BARON. Sorry, I had to take it out of my chest.
• Be friendly when asking for ganks or making calls. Saying, “omg assholes come mid” won’t help.
• Learn from every matchup your faced against, always try to improve your game knowledge. Mechanics will come eventually.
• Adapt your game depending of the summoner spells the enemy team has, and start thinking about how you can use yours against them. Did your enemy mid laner used ignite 1:30 minutes ago? Knowing that could ensure you the decisive edge in a trade.
• Make looking at the minimap an habit. Looking once every 10-25 sec can give you so much info about how you should act during every game situation. I’ll give an example, imagine that you’re a 70% hp level 6 Riven vs a 10% hp lvl 5 Nasus undertower in the TOP Lane, you start thinking about diving him but you might be worried about an enemy teammate preparing a gank against you, gladly if you looked at the map 5 seconds ago, you got able to find out that their laners are in their lane and the enemy jungler just passed by a pink ward your team got near a the drake minibush. Thanks to that information, you got able to execute what you thought and get that safe and easy free kill. So what I’m trying to say? Map awareness is an essential part in any playstyle.
• Did I say ward?

So that’s it for today, sorry for my english, I’m not that good at writing :P

I hope these tips help you climb :)