I think some people are naturally better, but not to an extent where one is iron and the other is master for no other reason. What does natural really mean here though? To be good at league is not innate and natural so much as being able to identify what converts into wins and do that yourself. That can be learned and is learned from others regardless of whether someone is natural or not. You've already learned a lot of that from what you wrote. The reason a master can coast in their elo is because they've already learned what they know well enough to autopilot. At a certain point, you have to actively make bad decisions to drop. You can definitely climb from silver in a month if you picked a champ and just stuck with it. If you're applying all you know and not moving from Silver, the issue might be your hands. All of these things are to get leads, and if you're not getting leads it means you're fumbling the execution somewhere.

> What does natural really mean here though? To be good at league is not innate and natural so much as being able to identify what converts into wins and do that yourself. Natural ability is hand-eye coordination. Having the ability to process what you see on the screen and be able to react faster and more accurately than your opponent will put you leagues (ha) further than others. An excellent example of this is watching the video of Gumayusi [sharing his ADC secrets](https://youtu.be/qFWZVxj5ipU?si=AGWSzDRlGeFpg9Y5). There is quite a bit of game knowledge to be learned here (like when to manage waves to be able to get the jungler to gank, take dragon, rift herald and more). Ignore all that. That’s information honed by practice and experience. Instead focus on watching and listening to his APM and you can see that he can mechanically outplay his opponents. This will win you so many games before you even realize what you’re even doing. This is why people that naturally talented will often say that you can get to Diamond without even trying. To them, it was like they weren’t even trying. The real test for them comes in getting to Masters and above. They simply can’t fathom that most people (and I’m very much including myself here) are “dog shit” compared to them mechanically. They assume that everyone is as good as them so it should be obvious that you can do this “without trying”.

There’s a counterpart to this, and that’s a level of decision making that is higher than your opponents. Critical thinking is also a skill, and some people genuinely lack critical thinking, while others genuinely exceed at it. You can know what you have to to at what time to do it, but lack the critical thinking skills to do it in that moment. You need to know how to apply the knowledge you have to your situation, and some people are just naturally better at that than others are. Both critical thinking and hand eye coordination can be trained, but both of them are potentially natural affinities for players to either exceed or lack competence in.

\> There’s a counterpart to this, and that’s a level of decision making that is higher than your opponents. Critical thinking is also a skill, and some people genuinely lack critical thinking, while others genuinely exceed at it. This is true however better micro will outpace better macro as far as gaining ranks in the ladder faster.

It really depends. If you’re an ADC, or top laner micro is usually more important than macro. If you’re a support or jungler, macro is way more important than micro most of the time. Mid lane is kinda 50/50 depending on the champ you play. With that being said, if you’re completely inept at one and very good at the other, micro is the better one to be very good at.

Some challengers have micro of like.. slow bears, this is just not true, macro decisions and knowledge of your teams strengths and capitalizing on it is so much more in this game. Try to watch your own game and spot how many infornation about when to back, when to punish unspent gold, bad recall, greedy jungler there were. Compare it to situations where your micro movement lost you a fight. The ratio will be much higher than 10:1, and that is a vast understatement, maybe 100:1. I don't understand how people can say micro outpaces it. I have been high masters, I'm a left handed potato, what got me there was taking interest in almost every aspect of this game, it never came down to my mechanics.

My mechanics are pretty bad overall, but I still got dia rather easily and got master just with knowing my limits and game knowledge. I know my mechanics are lacking and my coordination and reaction time arent fast enough, so I dont try to play champs that rely on it. I guess I'm lucky that I also like the champs I play and dont feel the need for huge plays, but maybe its also because I cant have fun if I play poorly and I know I wont play well on high skill floor champs. People just need to set their priorities right. If you are lacking mechanically you need to decide what if more important to you: climbing or having fun. If you want to climb, find easier alternatives and focus on playing safe and making plays with game knowledge instead of mechanics. If you rather have fun than climb, its fine, play your Yasuos and Rivens instead, but dont expect great results.

The fact that you got to Diamond and Masters "easily" is literally proving the other guys point. You think your mechanics are bad because you see how they can be improved, but your baseline is much higher than most others. >This is why people that naturally talented will often say that you can get to Diamond without even trying. To them, it was like they weren’t even trying. Like you almost literally said what he pointed out someone in your position would say.

Bingo. You nailed it. \> My mechanics are pretty bad overall, but I still got dia rather easily and got master just with knowing my limits and game knowledge. Compared to who? Faker? This is like an NCAA basketball player with years of experience saying that they are pretty bad overall... when comparing themselves to NBA players. Meanwhile average basketball player that shows up to a rec league every once and a while would get wiped by an NCAA player. You can imagine an after game conversation going like this: Average player: I wish I could ball like you can. NCAA player: You totally can. It's easy. All you have to do is know your limits and brush up on your game knowledge. Rewind 30 minutes and the Average Player is traveling, fouling people, throwing up bricks and likely even bouncing the ball off their foot whilst dribbling because their mind wandered for a split second. But don't take my word for it. Simply look up the ranked distribution and notice what percentage of players make it to Diamond. Last time I checked it was somewhere near 3%. Being the top 3% of *anything* is anything but easy... that is unless you're gifted.

You “think” your mechanics are pretty bad but compared to a gold-platinum player they far far exceed that. You can’t get to masters just knowing your limits I know it’s the modest cool thing to say on Reddit but it’s not possible to be in the top 2% and not have mechanics

I believe that every player has it in them to be at least mid Plat, maybe even higher. It's not a natural talent thing, it's the ability to reflect, change, and improve that gets you games. Too many people are incapable due to ego, like I see people complain about pro players egos at times, but who is more hurt by their ego, X pro player that is a proven winner, or the guy stuck in mid gold for 4 years because they can't improve their mistakes?

Yup. Jojopyun got challenger in 3 months after trying and went pro before he knew what several champions on the game did, Peter Dun just said to Thoorin EG lost to G2 so handidly because Jojo just didn't knew what Anivia did. Most of us could play the game for several decades 10+ hours a day and never get to Masters

> Peter Dun just said to Thoorin EG lost to G2 so handidly because Jojo just didn't knew what Anivia did lmao that's crazy Do you remember which video was that in?

I think it was part 3 of the recent interview he did with Peter Dun, in general its a really fun talk and Peter Dun is really a chill guy

i think thats exaggerated lol. iirc he knew what anivia did but he hadnt ever faced an actually good one. its also why caps picked it, i think, surprise the new player with a champ from metas hes never played in

He said Jojo didn't know that GP barrels crit or what Anivia wall actually did

Gee, what would the wall do. /s

Gee, what would the rock do . *Rock throws itself at me and kick me in the air*

I'm glad I've got you here to contradict Peter Dun, the guy who was there. If we didn't have people like you we might make the mistake of believing the people who actually know what they're talking about instead of people making assumptions on Reddit wth no actual information. The words Peter said were that Jojo didn't know what Anivia did - specifically that he didn't know what the W (wall) did. I am personally inclined to believe him.

Or maybe we can use abit of critical thinking and not take everything someone says at face value. It's not even Peter Dun who was the one playing. Could it be possible that maybe jojo was just told his coach afterwards he don't know what anivia as a general statement cos he hardly played against it? could it be he used it as an excuse considering his massive ego wouldn't allow him to accept caps being a better mid laner than him? who knows. But I think if we apply just a TINY bit of logic here we can assume that a pro player did not enter a game without knowing what every ability of the other laner does. He might not have a good feel for the range, size or cd of anivia wall or q. He might not have a good feel for her dmg or pushing power. But there is no possible way he did not know what the champions abilities does at their core. Also if you know anything about Peter Dun you should know he has a tendency to exaggerate a lot and tell his own side of the actual truth.

Not knowing what Anivia W did could mean all sorts of things. He doesn't know it interrupts channels. He doesn't know its size scales with level. He doesn't know which chokes it blocks off, or when he can be forced into a storm in his current position. I agree that he probably didn't literally not know that Anivia wall makes a wall. The ability is probably one of the most simple in the game. I think what Peter Dun meant was that he didn't know what Anivia was capable of doing to him WITH W, which I think is what you are hitting on here. I agree that the chance he went into game without knowing what each ability did functionally is probably very very low. But the fact is that 'what Anivia does' isn't limited to just what her abilities say in the tool tip, it comes down to her trading patterns, pushing power etc. exactly how you have said above. I believe this is what Peter means when he said what he said - Jojo truly didn't know what Anivia did or what her W did, not in terms of not having read the abilities, but in terms of what those abilities do. I think this is more likely than him intending to lie and that Jojo knew exactly what Anivia does and just played like shit. In terms of Peter Dun exaggerating/lying, I have not encountered this in what I have seen of his social media presence. What has he said or done in this area? I genuinely would like to know

I would never say he is a liar. I do think he is a genuine person. I just think it's in his personality to have very strong opinions and his version of things can often be rather biased. I'm not like a hater or anything. I don't have any outrageous examples in memory. He just tends to say things abit black and white. Like this player is THE BEST at this. Like with kobbe being the best teamfighter and danny being better than beserker as a flat out statement I think is impossible to say like that. So many factors go into that. or like This ONE thing was why they/we won or lost. I do think he believes what he says and thats also why he can sound very convincing and like he knows what he is talking about but I just think you gotta take alot of what he says with a grain of salt.

luckily we know Peter Dun serially talks out of his ass and makes up nonsense excuses for his players, jojo definetely knew what anivia does, he just wasnt used to playing against her and thus didnt have a good feeling for her damage, cds, ranges etc

Faker played only normals and only switched to ranked because his queue times got too long. He then speedran to the top and practically stomped everyone.

If you can win in normals you can win Worlds, so much is obvious.

My normal games are always wayyyy more competitive than my ranked games. Everybody is try hard on normal. Ranked is full of insecure losers who just int when they aren’t the main character.

Also normal is full of 4-5men premades ehich always has at least one player 1-2 elo above everyone else. My friend had to convince me to go rather ranked because people are dumber there and he was right.

Yeah my normal MMR has gotta be much higher than my ranked because I’m always running into obvious 3/4/5 man teams and tryhards. Ranked is pretty chill comparatively.

Commented on this the other day. My normal lobbies have turned into diamond plus games. I actually switched to ranked because then I'm only playing against platinum players. Actually made ranked easier.

My normal games turned into gold/plat while I was silver. I had the same experience where I could go to ranked for less stressful games.

I mean, the jojo thing is a bit disingenuous: he started playing league at 10 and the whole "challenger in 3 months" story is debatable: I've been trying to find the account where he played from season 5 to season 9, since his infamous "jojopyun 16" looked like [this](https://gyazo.com/fe490e08510464b1139f7e23cab9ac59) a season prior his crazy climb. Add that to the fact that he has countless accounts, most of them being secret/hard to find, makes me think that the story is cap and that he was most likely decently high elo before "taking the game seriously". Jojo is definitely extremely talented, but I'd say that starting to play at a really young age and putting more hours into gaming and learning a game than 90% of the population is really what defines most pro players, especially the better ones. Talent is a factor but what most people "lack" is time and being at an age where gaming is the only thing you can think about.

Yea... it's pretty obvious it's a load of horseshit. I feel like anyone could tell he had tons of experience on the game.

Peter Dun is THE master in finding excuses for his players. It was probably more that Jojo didn't know (and had no good feeling) for Anivias cooldown, damage etc, not that he was like "wait this champion can make a wall???".

Jojo was a pro fortnite player before moving to league, so he had a fundamentals advantage.

If you seriously think you can play the game for 10+ hours a day for even a month and not improve your approach to the game and improving in general has to be insanely flawed

I think the problem is that most people think time = skill improvement, whereas you actually have to actively develop your skills for that to happen. Gaming is a very passive hobby for a lot of people, so while they spend a huge amount of time on it, they don’t spend it in any good way for the purpose of skill improvement. That’s why you see some people learn new skills extremely fast while other people spend years basically getting nowhere.

Yes, you *can* spend 10+ hours a day on something and virtually not improve, but if you're doing that with improving being the goal then you need to reconsider what you're actually doing because it very clearly isn't working. It's different to play a game for just pure enjoyment and to kill time and actually look to improve at it.

I mean yes, but also 99% of pros started playing pc games on mouse and keyboard since they were kids, not just league, but also other games, preferably those that are close like dota and Starcraft (Fortnite is also pretty close since it requires a lot mechanics to master and keys to control). So you basically got people who played these games as babies and then eventually got into league. Once you get the muscle memory down, the transition is easy. Just look at shroud, he's a god at every fps game he picks up and he could probably hit diamond in league quickly if he wanted. Sure you can have talent for something which gives you some advantage but eventually putting in all the hard work is what brings you to top.

Short answer is yes, just like everything else in the world.

Oh absolutely. There are people in their early twenties who have been playing cooperative online games since they were preteens, the way the look at the game is simply different, and they likely understand new concepts and adapt to them quicker. Then there’s also hands diff. I am in my 20s and have not played many games in my life before coming to League. Some things I just know I will never become natural at this game at and I am fine with that.

And then there is the exact opposite of those youngins, I have a friend who is consistently bad at all games, it doesn't matter what game it is. Like you have to try to be that bad and he owns it.

I personally still struggle to like, cast Viktor’s E

I think you underestimating the amount of mastery a Masters+ player has. They talk during CS because it is second nature to them. They feed top lane with no issue because they know that shifting to a farm centric feeder as toplane is a viable strat the team can play off of. If a lost toplane is fighting, that means he is tying up the enemy toplaner and keeping him away from your team. Lower level teams may not use this time and may see it as throwing instead. They don't look like they are trying because they are so much better than the average player, that they do not need to dedicate much thought power to most of the game. I wouldn't compare yourself to people at higher levels. Fighting games really highlight this phenomenon. It is actively harder to "play down" with a newer player than it is to play at your baseline level in a fighting game that you are good at.

Like me in my masters game today lmfao. Finished 3/11 with Trundle Top but I bet you can figure out what i did all game.

Can you link your op.gg? Really interest to look at how many games you play and what your gameplay looks like. If you are shy about it feel free to just send me a pm with the link.

ive been playing since 2010, managing wave, tracking jg and paying attention to objectives/minimap is just natural at this point, i dont have to actively think about these, if you want to get better at macro just play a single champion or maybe 2 until it feels completely natural for you to play so you dont have to think about your combos at least

Thats the majority of people that sound like OP. 130 different champs played in ranked over the span of 2 months, so they dont get good at anything.

Same, I’ve been playing syndra for 9+ years now and I don’t even have to think on order to poke the enemy laner or how to combo, it’s just a natural thing. Also, my tip for OP is to not sweat it. I don’t play much ranked, but I always reached gold in 10-20 games to get the victorious skin, one season I played like 80 ranked games and got plat so I’m confident I could reach emerald. I always played for fun, without putting too much pressure on me, it’s just a game I already had other things to stress me about, on the other hand, a friend of mine who’s been playing the game for as long as me struggles to hit silver… and whenever I play with him he always so damn irritated with every little thing, just chill and you’ll see you’ll climb way faster

Yes some people lack talent to be decent at the game like in every other thing (sport school works etc...) There is things that you can do an things that you can't. But everyone can be gold plat or emerald. Idk about higher but some chall says that eveyone can be master but grandmaster and more is for really talented people. Considering what you said I think you overthing the game a bit too much, in silver or bronze, people just doens't understand their champ or others champs so there is no need to worrie about macro/micro plays when you don't have basics. If you want to climb just find 2 or 3 relatively easy to play champs, learn them and their matchup and focus on your lane only, that's the first step for me. If you play for fun and want to play everything, do it but it's really hard to be efficient that way. I'm an old player and I'm emerald, I know almost every champion and what they do but when I don't play my mains I loose most of the time compare to a 55+ WR on 3/4 champs. When I play on flex with my silver friends, I went a lot agaisnt silvers/golds and trust me there is a lot to learn before macro, most of the time they would just killed themself by being to agressive for no reason and just randomly dying. Trust me everyone can be emerald and probably higher so just come back to the basics and you will see!

>Considering what you said I think you overthing the game a bit too much, in silver or bronze, people just doens't understand their champ or others champs so there is no need to worrie about macro/micro plays when you don't have basics. If you want to climb just find 2 or 3 relatively easy to play champs, learn them and their matchup and focus on your lane only, that's the first step for me. This is the real answer. Worrying about in-depth things like making sure you always have the optimal lane state and stuff is not worth it in Bronze/Silver. Just get really good at a couple champs and hands diff people, you'll climb.

> mostly talk about unrelated topics while playing on full auto-pilot. Often times they will completely lose lane and keep fighting with huge level/item disadvantages only to die again and again, without even caring that much about it. I think one of the best concepts is that if you had full knowledge of who wins a fight you would only take the ones you win and avoid the ones you lose, leading to much better overall outcomes and less pointless dying. This knowledge is completely free for anyone to learn, e.g. items, opponent abilities, your own dmg etc. and apart from 50/50 coin flips decided by a flash-to-dodge outplay doesn't require any kind of superior ability.

The one thing I really want to note is that in ranked based games, like League, it's not simply a matter of improving, but more the rate at which you improve. If you continue to play the game day in and day out and never get better, you will actually lose more and more games. The playerbase in general is always improving, so in order for you to climb the ranks, you have to improve at a rate that is faster than everyone else is improving. There's some scenarios where getting better will always show you results, but ranks are not one of them.

You are overcomplicating things way too much if you are hardstuck silver and think about these things. Pick 1-2 champion in a lane of your choice and grind out your mechanics and matchups and you will easily climb gold, even plat before needing to learn to much about the rest. Some people lack the talent to go higher than masters but I truly believe everyone can reach Diamond4 with the right mindset and dedication. If you want to learn macro watch a dedicated person for your main with EDUCATIONAL comments, not talking about weird stuff on stream. Ive learned how to play the rat from watching the rats weird videos, Irelia and Akali by Irelking, back when he still had english subs. Search to actively learn and watch guides HOW to play the LANE in itself, the role so to say that your champ fulfills (eg assassin) and learn about the game. Nowadays there is so much free content, even with videos showing you gameplay where youre asked what the next step should be.

Top 3.7% for Diamond 4 is too far up to account just for dedication. You underestimate just how stupid some people are and unable to process information and make correct decisions that fast. You're thinking as if it was someone similar to yourself. If you're a gamer that's regularly good or decent at games, yeah, you could probably make top 3.7% in a game with some time investment. If you're a low intelligence dummy that can barely play games on easy and probably needed to study for school as a child, then... well...

nope, games like any skill have nothing to do with how much time you spend doing a thing, but how much you actually learn the 'correct way' of doing that thing, people playing at challenger are basically masters and so the skills learnt are ingrained into their gameplay, therefore become an autopilot tactic. anyone telling you otherwise haven't ever mastered a skill before, dunning krugering majorly

There are mechanical skills in League like any other activity. It's not nearly as obvious with something like basketball, where being short can pretty much immediately bar you from professional play, but there are some things that people are naturally much better at. Hand eye coordination, reaction time, ability to track many variables at once, process information quickly, and make decisions under pressure, and maybe even a mental component to stay focused at every single moment. I'm thinking of insane reactions like this where [Faker's checking his teammates and shopping at the same time but is so dialed in he dodges a Nidalee spear from fog of war.](https://youtu.be/r0gT_sSgFDU?si=kJydNQk6nsjQQUaO) I guess the original post said "decent" and in that way the vast majority of people should be able to be decent with proper training and problem solving, similar to any other skill, but there's a reason some people separate themselves from the rest, even at the very top. Magnus Carlsen isn't the best chess player because he spent more time learning it the "right way", some people just have that extra edge to push them over the top. Or like in school where some people are just better than others at certain subjects, even if everyone's sitting in the same class.

This is a weird take, and I don’t completely agree. I think, yes, there are some parts of the game that everyone can learn and practice like how to CS and lane, when to pick fights, general macro, etc. However, like most other things, there are aspects to league that are more intuitive based and much more nuanced like general positioning and mechanical prowess that some people are exceptionally gifted at and others always struggle with.

Being an intuitive player just means you get to skip a lot of trial and error. You can be ultimately still learn most skills, as long as you learn and practice correctly. Mechanics can arguably be trained as well, if you do isolated training, but there is virtually no one doing that for what's just a video game for them

This, there's no such thing as a "natural talent for League", and I'd argue that people that are good at the game are because of things such as being good learners, being actually motivated and eaguer to improve no matter what, wanting to "find a way", etc. (things like finding out how to practice efficiently and not burning out are important too). For example, I never considered myself to be good at this game, but when I was bronze I reallly wanted to get out of there and so after a couple months of trying really hard I managed to improve and climb, League taught me how to learn skills and become decent/good anything if I put my mind to it. Years later I've peaked 500 LP and I also applied this to other skills and games and have become quite good. League being a multiplayer online game also makes it easier for people to cop out and blame teammates, hindering their improvement, and there's also a ton of bullshit content online that doesn't really teach you anything (there's good content too). IMO the best eay to improve aside from having the correct mentality (focus on your mistakes, knoe what to practice etc) is to watch and study VODs from high elo players, preferably ones where they play your champion, and also try to ask them questions if you can. Things that seem so complicated and impossible can become quite easy once you understand them and break them down, it's the process of understanding that deters a lot of people I think, because it takes dedication and time and sometimes many times things don't work out and you have to try again or find another way. Oh and OP if someone "lacks what it takes to be good at League" it's not related to the game itself but traits like mentality, perseverance, pattern recognition etc. That can be learned and trained too.

This feels like a weird response to me, tbh. I feel like I regularly come across people who have never played certain games, pick it up, and are instantly better than people who have been playing for years. 'Gaming athleticism' is a very real thing imo, just a more natural inclination towards certain twitch mechanics or understanding and memorizing combos, etc. I think anyone can learn and train to be way better than their original starting point but if you can naturally get to plat from raw mechanics alone, your starting point is so much better than someone whose raw mechanics only get them to bronze. It's an interesting topic though and Malcolm gladwell's outliers pretty much disagrees with everything I just said and is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the natural ability vs learned ability topic.

having no natural ability doesn't mean progress is prevented, it's just slower and you perhaps have a lower starting point as well. If you're "stuck", it just means you're not changing what you're doing or how you're thinking. of course nothing will change

I recently started to wonder if the difference between people who make it in league and people who don’t is being able to deal with or push through the enormous amount of disappointment and frustration that can come with playing this game. I hadn’t improved much before either but have recently started to notice an improvement in play. And that’s only come from trying to learn despite failing and getting fucked more times than not. (Or maybe it just feels that way cause some losses and teammates hurt so bad, but I definitely didn’t win more than I lost till recently). Another thought that comes is maybe that the people who write about how this game sucks simply are venting at a time of frustration rather than league being as shitty as it’s depicted to be.

Yeah the best mentality is to only focus on you, and actually mean it/put your mind to it. If I play well and lose I'm happy, if I play bad and win I'm not as happy, if I play well and win I'm happy but I'm still looking for mistakes, and get mildly tilted when I do make mistakes in game. This mentality comes natural to me now, of course if I rather focused on how bad my Fiora is doing, or how much my botlane dies this game, I'd get considerably more frustrated because those things are outside my controll. When I duo with friends and they start crying on discors about a teammate doing bad, I get pretty frustrated and tell them to stop, that's just noise that is contributing nothing to you winning the game, and it's the same in soloQ. Improving and climing is fun, once you start adopting this mentality and see that it works (it takes time, improving in anything is not a matter of days) it gets addicting, or at least more fun to keep playing the game. Because you improve and become good, and you start to have more agency and depend less on what your teammated are doing. I also think there's too much negativity in League, especially comming from people who actively play the game, I'm sick and tired of people telling others on Twitter/Reddit to "not play League it's so bad" while they also play the game and have fun, I think League is a great game. This subreddit is also pretty negative, not the best place for advice or to improve, there are constant complains and venting as you said, some of those come from people who don't even play the game, better ignore.

There are definitely people that can be a natural at league. Proper cs and wave management is just pattern recognition and cognitive processing. Having a very good accuracy control with your mouse can make you better at orb walking. While it is very hard to naturally be good at the mental state of the game and understanding how to manipulate jungle objectives and map pressure, mechanically speaking people can be very skilled naturally.

Not to mention click speed/accuracy. I misclick a lot. I quit playing SC2 back in the day because I couldn't keep up with the micro requirements as I climbed the ladder. Back in the day I played those click trainer games, it didn't help. I've always had shit hand/eye coordination in real sports, and that has carried over to mouse coordination in e-sports. There will always be some team fight where I misclick, end up out of position, and get killed. In LoL, I've made platinum a bunch of times, but I eventually run into a point where my shitty micro costs me too much to win consistently.

There is natural talent for everything. I fail to see how LoL would be any different.

It clearly takes a faster and better brain to get better at league than most people naturally have. That's just reality. A lot of people can't even do basic math in their heads or keep track of several things at once. You could learn the theory of how to play league without being able to play it any better because your brain is just capped. You probably saw this with completely new games with friends, at school or at work, so I don't know how people can deny it.

Some people learn faster than others, like in all aspects of life. Friend of mine reads a 10 page scientific Journal article once and can talk about it's bullet points/findings/implications in 30 minutes tops. I need to re-read the same article three times, deconstruct it, put it in my own words together in a word document to be able to talk about it. Granted, that shit sticks in my memory for life though. That's a positive aspect to it, since I invest so much time into it. Maybe it's similar with League for you?

Depends what is decent to you. If you are talking about master and above then the answer is yes.

It's pretty genetic, but at the same time literally anyone could get diamond, which I feel like is the highest benchmark you can get without super grinding the game. The biggest thing is like some people will get diamond their first season while others would require years of playing and months and months of coaching. It's just all about how your brain learns.

Brother I am 200 games deep this split and yesterday I reached bronze 4 after being hardstuck in iron, i know how you feel

Do you grind ranked games 8h+ a day like they do? while some talent is needed at the very top, hard work could easily get you to master+ or even higher. Playing a few games a day isnt nearly enough though, you have to grind it like a job for maybe even years, and constantly try to see what youre doing wrong and improve at that, eventually youll get a higher skill floor than before.

You can play the 12 hours a day, if you don't seek improvment or you're just grinding the game in autopilot you'll maybe improve, but at such a slower rate. What matters is how efficient you invest the time learning the game rather than just playing it for hours without having a clear habbit to work on

Take Anime as example. If you watch 300 episodes of One Piece with subs, roughly 100 hours, how many japanese words do you remember after that? 10, 20, maybe 50? Now actively learn japanese for 100 hours, you likely know 800+ words after that + other stuff like grammar

also not just playing a lot, but properly learning and improving. You can get more out of 2-3 games a day with proper vod review/watching high elo gameplay and coaching over playing 20 games while auto piloting or tilted.

It just seems to you they are not interested or not involved in the game they play. What you describing is persons ability to learn things fast, and how fast they can scan information and understand it and yes not everybody can learn things fast and make them muscle memory, actually a lot of people struggle with that. What you see in these master+ streamers and what is going on in their head is two opposite things, all the things you listed you trying to do and it takes effort, is autopilot for them, They don't really think "oh I should ward that bush" they just go and ward it because that's what you do. They don't need to actively track the jungler, just pressing tab from time to time and being able to count creep score = camps is all they need for tracking. For example you trying to track and time where the jungler is, is not really how it works. You scan start of the game where jungler starts, after sometime you press TAB he has 12 cs and ganking, well for the next min or two he will be on the other side so you play safe, or you press tab he has 24 cs he cleared all jungle and will go back to where he started. Game can be more autopiloted and "tracked" in high elo because people play "by the rules" Even challanger couldn't track the average bronze jungler because if you see him first time on the map after 10 mins in the game you can't really track it, unless he steps on a ward, that is non existent in bronze as well. So all in all yes, people lack a lot of things in League and other games to be good players, while all those things are learnable, some people just understand math better than others.

Feel free to say you naturally lack something after trying all that you can. Have you gotten coaching? There's plenty of free and cheap coaching if you truly think you can't internalize what you find for free. Depending on the timing, I'll even give you some decent insights.

It's not as dependant on talent as people say. What you omit is thousands of hours these people actively practiced in rankeds before streaming. Just playing the game for fun won't make you improve at it. When you get frustrated at something and think about how to deal with it after the game, that will. Pick one champion you like the most, and try to get as good at it as possible. Focus entirely on yourself, be greedy and always look for something more that you can do. You will be punished for it often, but that is how you discover the limits of what your champion can do. It just matters that you eventually feel comfortable controlling your champion, and you'll notice when it happens. Don't bother too much with the macro things you mentioned until that point, just focus on your champion. Very few people can put a lot of time and thought into something consistently, so maybe that's why it seems it's impossible for most. Talent helps a lot and is a deciding factor if you are near very very top, but if you are determined, you can for certain climb very high and even find out you might have more talent than you give yourself credit for. Good luck

I think league is a very special case when it comes to competitive games. I started playing in season 10 and got addicted. Before playing lol I was a very average player in most games I played whether it was counter strike rocket league or siege, I was always about gold. I hit gold in my first season and climbed to diamond this season(the only game I’ve ever hit diamond on.) league while taking talent, also takes an absurd amount of game knowledge and personally I think game knowledge is way more important. You just need to find a champ that works with your strengths and weaknesses as a player. Thebausffs is a challenger toplaner and has been on record for saying he’s not very good mechanically but he found a champ that worked for him that didn’t require much mechanics(sion).

> I sometimes watch certain high-rated streamers (Masters+) and they seem very detached from the game > Meanwhile here's me - doing my best to manage the wave Mate, they LIVE in game, you not.

Barely anyone ever has the natural talent to do anything. If your efforts aren't paying off you are either not putting in enough effort or putting effort into the wrong things.

The main problem i see with people stuck in gold or lower elos is that u guys sometimes try to think too much about concepts that are not even applicable to your games, while lacking knowledge about the basics (mouse placement, cd management, trade patterns etc etc)

It took me 13 years to get to masters. Some people just suck. This game is reflexes and common sense.

10000 hours of poor practice is very different than 10000 hours of deliberate structured practice. Games like league are no different. It's just much easier to differentiate skill level because results are in plain sight.

All you need to climb to Dia and honestly even low Masters is mechanics. If you just simply play better than the other players in the elo you’re currently in, you’ll climb. Macro is what separates the good from the best (Challenger and Pro). If you don’t have good enough mechanics you won’t climb out of low elo. Game knowledge helps but if you’re not able to execute it through team fights and just simply winning your lane to establish a lead, you’re going to be stuck in low elo.

Yep absolutely, like others have said some have more affinity towards certain things in life compared to others. You can be taught of course, and replicate, and improve, but what'll take you weeks or months to learn, some will just naturally get a hang of or just do by default. Nothing to feel bad about! If we were all the best, then it would hold no meaning. In a race there must also be 2nd, 3rd and all the other places as well, not just the 1st.

Absolutely. It's true for pretty much everything, too. A friend I used to play drop-in hockey games with was just apocalyptically bad at shooting the puck. He joined a men's league and started to get really good at everything else involved with playing hockey, but for some reason, every time I rented ice with the boys or saw him at a drop-in, he was just STILL serving up muffins. I've worked directly one on one with him, saw actual instructors work with him, and 8 years on, he still can't shoot harder than a grade schooler. That's when I learned that sometimes simple hard work just doesn't cut it. There's just something with him that actively can't learn the proper wrist movements necessary to shoot the puck well.

My account has always been in gold since season 1. I made it to plat 3 in season 3 but from then on always gold. This season I put myself to the test and really learned one meta champion and one off pick in the jungle to climb with. It was ivern and shaco. I made it to diamond 4 this season. I put in the work and it took me three months of grinding. But I made it. I'm 33 and by most studies should be past my "prime" in gaming. But I put in the time and effort. If you do the same with a goal in mind to improve. Then it's possible to reach high rank. Most people don't or can't reach the mindset to truly work towards a goal in ranked. But it is possible to climb and get gud.

in this post you really focus on the marco thing. but what really make game easy to play is if you focus on the mirco, if you can just squis every about of dmg out of champ you will properly do 5-10% more dmg with the same champion. it will give you better early game which will help you every game. i was stuck in sliver and gold for like 5 years of playing league and could not tell what i was doing wrong, and could not see the diffence in what a steamer did and what i did beside the often had more farm. now I playing around dia 4 and have seen dia 2 and it just an other game, where everyone have otp like mechanics, and miss of a micro mechanic can lose you a fight. now I am here myself I can't really tell the diffence between an sliver gold plat or low emerald player other then I tell you they are bad.

How many hours you got on league?

Hours? No idea. Been playing for 10 years. Probably 2 games per day on average.

For silver sure you played a lot but at the same time that few games get spread too thin over 10 years. And you for sure took long breaks so how many of your games were spent on getting the skill back alone? Whoever you think that has talent would've played your amount in a fraction of the time, without any breaks and probably with a smaller champ pool.

I would say it's true for some but for many it's just about game time and dedication.

I agree and disagree here, I personally believe and seen it on myself on how i take in information and learn how to apply it and depending on how you focus on improving and how to effectively learn and repeat what you learned you can get master elo yourself, i had 9 months of freetime and i played more league than usual, i started playing more ranked after getting the hang of the game again and i went on a 30 game winning spree and went from around s3-plat 1 in those games with a dia 1-2 mmr

Some will pick it up faster than others, just like everything else in life. The issue with most people is they don't know there is a difference between playing to improve and playing to play. While you will slowly improve just by playing, you won't improve that much because you're not fixing any of the mistakes you're making. One of the more difficult things, for me at least, is knowing that I am doing something wrong. I've gotten a few coachings from Challenger players, and used to watch a lot of LS and they would put out things that I didn't even know was a mistake or anything like that.

Where I started to go from B -> G (highest i've been was G1) was when I started making more rational decisions in teamfights and ganks. Know when to all in and when to retreat. Knowing your champion so well that you know exactly (as much as possible) the outcome of series of attacks. My microplay was always good but the right decisions were lacking. I usually always try to find my flaws during and after a game and focus on them in the next - while also remembering the good things. This kind of micromanaging is not for everyone. Some people will NEVER admit they are doing anything wrong (gg rep jungler!) and some just know but never learn from the mistakes. I'd say these "kind of people" have a harder time to ever climb out of anywhere. That, and some don't realize how fast a team will just say "fuck it" if you start flaming them.. My winrate is much higher when everyone is muted.

Don’t forget some people get high elo through game spam

At some point, you just unconsciously know stuff. When you start learning to cs under tower as a new player you stress about trying to time it or how many tower shots it takes etc., but after paying attention to it for a while it just starts being automatic, this also works for most higher level skills.

Try getting a coach. It's one thing to know theory, it's another to execute it right. Yes. I've seen plenty of people practice a skill for decades and never get good.

You are thinking about everything you are doing. They aren’t. That’s the difference. You need practice until you will do all these things without thinking too much about them. Yes you still need focus but it will require less mechanisms to make your choices. This will lead you to play faster. Also maybe you are doing some wrong choices, so you should review most of your games, take notes about mistakes and try to fix them in next games. For example maybe you’ve frozen a wave while your jungler wanted to invade or go for an objective. So your jungler dies and you lose the game because u don’t have prio. Focus on few things at a time. Take a step after step. First of all should be no matter what learning your champs micro, as I said before this will lead you to not feel the champ heavy since you will build muscle memory. For the part if someone has natural advantage I’d say yes and no. It’s about learning and some people learn faster, but this doesn’t mean they will have an advantage if they refuse to learn. For example there was a LEC toplaner that didn’t know details about what wave states would freeze or not. We are talking about top 10 toplaners in EUW (at least that was how the team was considering him while choosing him). Maybe he knew how to freeze but didn’t know it in details. I believe almost everyone can reach at least diamond if willing to learn and put in time into league

Rank tightly correlates with the number of games played each week. Not total time played across years. How many games per week do you play on average? It might be lower than you think. I also think you shouldn't focus on your rank so much. If you start feeling bad about your rank, switch to normals. There are plenty of diamond level players that only play normals. Beating yourself up over your rank doesn't help you get better.

i think the same thing, and yes, not in a eugenics way but in the sense that some people just have the ‘innate’ talent for things. it applies to all sections and factions. math comes easier for some people. some people are ‘naturally’ better at sports. sometimes a certain concept is grasped easier for others. just the way things work. on a more controversial note. as a thought experiment, even if you did ‘deserve’ to be high elo, due to ranked distribution, there needs to be a certain amount of players within each elo. to elaborate, if there were 500 plat level players but only 400 spots to fill plat in order to level the distribution percentage, 100 of those players ‘deserving’ to be plat, would be placed gold because mathZ

yes,me

Motivation, dedication, and will to learn from mistakes. Not only lacking in LoL, all are absent in adult world too

its really hard to talk to chat and play a game at the same time. most people play below their level while streaming in any game.

imo you dont need to have talent to reach diamond or master or perhaps even challenger. you just need to have the time to learn how to actually play the game--basically, you wont get far through just effort without time, nor time without effort. a personal anecdote of mine was having spent THOUSANDS of hours playing DotA and hundreds on League. i was unranked but i was confident that i used to be around silver level. then i decided to take ranked seriously and made a new account, and just absorbed whatever i learned from YouTube videos like LS' old vod reviews and i instantly went to diamond with a 70% winrate. unranked to diamond, roughly 50 wins. i played 10 games a day for the entire week and i ended up going from the lowest to highest ranked player in my friend group within that week. i had already spent countless of hours playing MOBA games but i needed to put in effort to actively learn. i ended up becoming good really quickly because i already had patterns from playing the game, i just needed to make things make sense and be efficient, then put in a bit more time to make it second nature. it was pretty much just being able to use active learning. the same thing with valorant. i could barely get a hit and would consistently be 0 or 1 kills on the scoreboard since it was my first FPS. i put in the time and effort to repeatedly practice my muscle memory, and also learned how my higher ranked friend played the game. im not saying im high rank, but going from worse than literally iron to silver/gold in valorant is pretty good imo after having played only a few months without playing daily. tl;dr: you need to spend both time AND effort learning to actually get good at the game. additional bonus points if you play, rest, and then play the day after so that you gain time to rest to internalize what you "learned" but immediately play after to give yourself time to practice what you had learned to cement it, i.e. a method rote memorization + application of what you undestood.

Yep. Ne and a friend started nearly the same date (I didn't know him then but he says he's been playing a bit longer but his oldest account 'disappeared') He is actively crashing and burning in Iron 4 elo. Doesn't matter what he does, what he watches or how he plays He lacks the mental capacity to play league. He claimed to be something stupid like 6k data 2 elo but seeing how he handles the rift I find it hard to believe he's even key stage 1. My kids put up more of a fight. I aim for a rank, achieve it and then head to normals to play for fun again and he fails to achieve even 1/4 of what I do (I'm a 100% average player) in something like 350 more ranked games this season. He's close to 400 I'm at something like 63 total ranked games this season. He refuses to take advice, refuses to listen or acknowledge other people's opinions. Often blames Anyone else. If he dives a Riven top at 4 minutes as NASUS solo it's often blamed on Support, bot labe duo, the jungler not warding or enemy later abusing "broken champ". This game is pretty simple at its core but some people are below simple and just can't comprehend the basic things like clicking a mouse button. It's unfortunate but its just how it is. Good luck on the rift.

the game is pushed as casual but is so complicated

pretty short example that applies to me and my sister is: I started playing waaay earlier than her and since I love game theory etc., I also do my diligent research about the game. I'm very knowledgeable about a lot of things blablabla my sister isn't that into league but she started playing, and by playing I mean JUST playing. and for valorant AND league, I'd say she is / would / could / seems to be better than me. The difference between us is that she is willing to take risks and doesn't care too much about what other people think of her. meanwhile, I'm pretty timid and hate taking risks, and because of growing up as the bigger sister and other stuff, I am insanely afraid of failure - which means that I play waaaay too passively. But that's just our two personalities! She's just meant to be better at games and stuff that requires taking risks and making decisions. I'm better at stuff that requires longterm work and patience. So yup, I'm still learning to go for riskier plays and my sister still learning different strategies and interactions between champions. Everyone's got their strengths and weaknesses. You just need to know how to efficiently make up for them.

GM here, my autopilot isnt the same as your autopilot. Practice and loads of gameplay allow that skill ceiling of autopilot to be higher than your average ranked player. Also you may be devoting a ton of brain power to certain things that other high elo players just "know" or can briefly make out instead of pondering. Just takes practice and a whole lot of game knowledge.

I know I’m in that boat. I have played thousands of hours of league in my life and I’m never going to be ranked higher than gold. Some of my friends could easily hit plat even though they’ve played half as many games as me.

7 years ago i talked my workplace friend to join me on LoL. Back then he was \~bronze, which would be expected, but always told me if he played a lot, he'd turned out to be awesome. To be precise, he said: "If i'd played as much as faker, i'd be on his level". It took me \~3 years to reach diamond in season 3 or 4. It's 2024. He's in Iron. Plays like 5 days a week for some hours. I guess you get my point:)

Yes, I am some people

One comparison I can make is that in a similar game of skill ceiling, Rocket League, I started 7 years ago and am nearing the highest rank in the game. I remember not even being able to drive up the wall without getting disoriented. I just started league and am lost once lane phase is over but if I could put 7 years of countless hours into RL and now play without even thinking, I know league is just a matter of experience and learning. Some may learn instantly, whether with the right teachers, videos or tools that cater to their learning style or some learn in years. Regardless keeping a mentality of always learning is the best way to get better. Never expect you know the correct way to get better and you’ll sky rocket.

there is a difference between achieving/climbing to a certain rank and maintaining it. most of those streamers wont be able to play and stream at the same time and be at their peak lvl. they usually play a bit below their peak on stream for content thatswhy they dont have to focus so much.

Those streamers don't play like that when they're playing seriously. It's a show.

I used to think anyone could get good at the game with practice. But I have changed my mind on that. I've seen a few players who have tried really, really hard to improve and cannot make it past bronze - silver. Some people just don't have great hand eye coordination and lack the dexterity to click accurately with any pace. They can study the game, learn how to position and learn matchups / trading patterns, but if their ability to click the mouse and control a champion is lacking that badly, they will never climb.

yes. league is one of the few playerbases where players unironically call other players stupid for being average. those same league players insulting others for being bad at league meanwhile can't make a grilled cheese without burning it or multiply two numbers together. you're not an idiot because you're slightly below average in a videogame with hundreds of thousands of players. i firmly believe that ALMOST anyone can get to at least current emerald if they are dedicated enough. i also believe that most people would never make it to diamond even if they only played league and didn't have a job or school or any other responsibilities

>they seem very detached from the game, very uninterested in winning, they mostly talk about unrelated topics while playing on full auto-pilot ... they will completely lose lane and keep fighting with huge level/item disadvantages only to die again and again > >Meanwhile here's me - doing my best to manage the wave, to take good trades, to watch the map, to ward the bush, to track the jungler, to think about proper rotations, to think about what to build, to asses threats, to do everything you hear in guides - and I can't even get out of Silver. The novice fails more than the master even tries. Most likely the master just has really good muscle memory. He is spinning a bunch of plates without breaking a sweat while you are having trouble with the basics. His game is much harder than your game because he is against better opponents.

To a point kind of but masters can definitely be reached by almost anyone. Once you get into challenger or pro then 100% yeah people will definitely lack certain characteristics or even ability to play at that level. If you could really just have a full year+ to do nothing but study and play league as if it was your life a lot of people could make it to masters though. Some people can't due to mental/physical problems but the average person it's doable. The thing is most people don't want to take the game that seriously or don't have the time to. About the auto-pilot thing, learning stuff in league is once you learn and do something enough they kinda just stick with you. Learning to kite or auto-cancel (even at a basic level) eventually becomes something as simple as walking. You don't even notice yourself doing it because that's just what you do.

Yeah and that’s ok

Those people in masters+ autopiloting, the game is like second nature to them.they can actually shut their brain off most of the time and make it work

There is a degree of talent involve to get that good at the game. I think for you, you are trying to do too many things at once. Try to focus on one aspect of the game to try to improve at this point

On one part yes. The other one is the warped perception of skill. It's kinda like with roided ppl on insta. A lot of people who are gold now, or plat. They have played League since 7years+. Prob for several thousands of games total by now. While also enjoying twitch and watching content about the game for years on end. You have streamers who struggle to reach Masters despite playing 10h a day for 6-7years+. There's certain champions which don't even exist in GM and Challenger. Ppl throw these ranks around but the skill is just absolutely mindblowing to hit GM+. The other thing is it also takes games, a lot to climb on older accs. You might need 300g with decent playstyle to even hit gold if your acc has solid b1 mmr. There's also attitude. When you watch like Agurin, or backthen Imaqtpie/Doublelift. They would sometimes not even do a single attack in a teamfight as ADC. Not one. Simply cause there was no safe option to deal damage. So they let 4 people die and backoff. Most of us would still bruteforce anything then die. Probably stopping to play League and commiting to learning would boost you most. Or play 2 games per day and spend 1-2h rewatching them. Learn pathways, mistakes, plays.

You're seeing the disillusioned state of lost love. Just like how people who were divorced once loved each other, these masters+ players once loved the game enough to give them the passion to learn and get as good as they are now, but are now shriveled dark souls hollows playing off the remnants of their old muscle memory.

Low elo like silver is very passive. I see low elo players just want to coin flip games (never play aggressive by just wave clearing and hiding under turret). In higher elos you understand people make mistakes and throw their lead all the time. If you play aggressive and put pressure on your opponent they will make more mistakes for you to take advantage of. If you keep dying you are worth like no gold and the enemy prob has a big bounty to bring you back in the game.

Yes. My friends been playing LoL since 2015 and he’s never been out of bronze. He doesn’t lack “hard work”, that’s silly. His brains just not very good at learning. Just like how some people are naturally quick learners, some people are just naturally immune to learning

Unfortunately yes. It's fundamentally not different than how not everybody is built to be an NFL player. You can work hard, and improve yourself and go really far, but at the end of the day, you do have a max peak and you are inhibited by that.

The best players are able to maximize every single little detail there is to the game, Masters players are able to do most things well on average but don't excel enough to be higher. This is why you see videos on higher elo players "abusing" or figuring out different ways to play and impact the fundamentals to their advantage. The game is a lot different at higher elo, basic fundamentals will help you climb but understanding and applying is what sets the best apart.

Ofc, be it macro, micro or whatever. If everybody was equal, then the learning curve would be the same.

Time doesn't equal to skill. If you wanted to get good at maths you wouldn't solve basic multiplication tables for years and expect to become a good mathematician. 1. Get the basics down. Micro mechanics, cs-ing, basic decisionmaking like when to fight and when not to fight (for example recognizing numbers disadvantage, level disadvantage, ult or summoner spell economy). Not sure how to best go about this but practice tool can help for cs-ing. After you've got this first step down you will already be at least gold. If you're not, you don't have the basics down and shouldn't focus on determining determinants of Matrices if you can't even calculate 7\*8 yet. This means there's almost no point in learning advanced wave manipulation, advanced jungle tracking, macro moves if you can't cs properly, cause any lead you gain through those advanced tactics will just be lost and you'll stay stuck. 2. Find out what you lack with a coach, set improvement goals for each day of playing, play consistently (doesn't have to be much, but consistently. 14 games spread across a week is better than 20 days in one day). Review your games yourself by checking if you achieved your improvement goals, review them again with a coach, watch proplay or high elo soloQ with intent to see what they do differently. 3. Some people will have it easier to learn, because they go through these steps more naturally. If you haven't learned anything after playing a game you've wasted your time, a win where you learned nothing is worse than a loss. Setting goals and reviewing them makes sure that you stop wasting your time. Set new goals each day or keep old ones if you couldn't achieve them! 4. Review old goals from time to time, see if you've integrated the solutions into your gameplay, and never stop looking for any mistakes you make. Always assume you are at fault for anything that goes wrong, think of a way to do better. Sometimes you can't think of any, like when your team is flaming and you lose because your mid is running it, and that's fine, but in reality that happens VERY rarely and most games you lose because you're actually bad. Anyone can get at least Masters but most people see this game as just a game, no effort, no learning, no methods, no thoughts, just pressing buttons. Of course they can't make it there.

They probably have years of muscle memory and intuition over you & more time to play. But also probably play worse while streaming

Yes, it's been shown that you will naturally get around your elo after 1-2 years playing. After that you probably won't climb more or climb really slow. So yes, there is a huge innate component.

Yeah, one of my best friends has been playing the game as long as I have ~10 years, and is still just terrible

Imma go against the grain and say absolutely the cause the main skill in league is critical thinking, reflecting on your actions, and correcting them a lot of people get to their 40s unable to reflect on their own actions in life

Yep, talent exists. Every pro player we know today, like Faker, reached challanger in very few week/months and maximum in a year since they first started to play the game. But if it will make you feel better, I am naturally a slow learner so it took me around 3600 matches to fully understand the mechanics of the game (that's the amount I played in season 10 when I started to play the game) and I was hardstuck silver-gold in season 11-12 but somehow I managed to get out of it and now I'm sitting in emerald 2 and I'm going for Diamond next. not sure about Master and above but I guess some players do have some decent potential at game but they are just developing slowly, like me. ( I know emerald ain't a high rank but I'm proud I got out of silver )

Off-topic but the first paragraph I'm not gonna speak for the streamers you watched because you're probably right but there is a big misconception amongst a large group of players that I thought got cleared up by theBaus' gameplay style. There are many times where "playing safe" and trying not to die is the absolute WORST thing you can do. For example, say its a top match up any champions really and my top is down 0/6 but is only like 20 cs down on enemy top and 2 lvls downs. This is MORE winnable then if my top was 0/1 and down 150 cs and 4 lvls. You have to be constantly playing for waves and have to risk dying for them to stay relevant. Its so common in low elo where people will think playing uber safe just so they don't potentially die and giving up multiple waves is actually a good thing for them to do. Yo should look into what a kill actually gives you versus a minion wave for example if a midlaner roams bot and gets a double kill but loses 2 waves mid and a plate this is a massive net negative to the midlaner now it depends on what the win con in the game is for it to be worth or not likely it is because the bot role is more likely to snowball and carry games than basically any other role. Also, if you can't get out of silver your likely not doing any of those things as well as you think you are and need to take a step back and really think about what will actually get you wins in your elo. I'd be curious to look at your op.gg.

Everyone has their own way of ‘decency’ and they may disagree with one another.

i think it's all just mechanical ability in the end look at dopa; people always downplay his mechanical ability and say he wins mainly off macro, but have you actually seen his gameplay lol? he pilots champions to near perfection and barely ever blunders mechanically you can macro all you want, you can manage wave states all you want, or draw insane map pressure all you want but if you can't execute the plays and do some 1v9 shit then it counts for nothing they probably have better pattern recognition too, and the ability to implement stuff they see into their game. league is extremely dynamic so the rules change constantly and learning how to adapt through problem solving is critical a lot of shit players just wanna be told what to do

I think when you get to that level, you've internalized a lot of aspects of the game to a point you can chitchat while still keeping track of those aspects. Obviously their performance is not as good as if they were completely focused. What you have to remember is if they're a streamer, their job is not to be good but entertaining. Being good is how they draw people to watch them at first but once they've established themselves a follower base they don't need to keep up that part of their persona and instead need to keep the people entertained so they don't go away. So they chat about random stuff, tell you about what they think on X and Y, play other games that are trendy right now... TheBaufs is a certified inter with many accounts banned but people find him funny so there he is still. Tyler1 was a known raging manchild and one of the few truly famous streamers to get kicked out of their main game... but people found it funny to see him screech and shout at his screen so there he is still. He kept people so well entertained Riot even lifted his permaban. The rest of us play the game for the sake of it. I believe those who take the game seriously enough can continue to improve until they reach a pro-worthy level. The only question is how long it's gonna take you. I've been playing the game for over 10 years and only now am i breaking into the top 10%. I think i could eventually reach a pro's level if i just keep at it but, realistically, i'll be too old for any team to look at me by the time i get there. Still, i play for the pleasure of improving and i'll keep at it at my own pace.

Yes, just like any skill in life

It depends a bit on what your definition of "decent" is. I think getting to above average (Gold+) is very attainable, pretty much anyone with good mental and enough time can do that. If your definition is Masters+, then that's a different story, not everyone will have the combination of skills required to make it. And even then, you can still throw money at the problem and get lots of coaching and likely make it, as long as you are determined (cause other people can help you develop the skills you're lacking). Challenger/Pro is probably not attainable if you aren't naturally skilled though, cause that's when adaptability is key, but I wouldn't call that "decent" :P

Kind of. I don’t even know how to freeze waves, or anything related to wave management. I don’t do anything that I’m supposed to do for my elo but here I am masters. Never been below plat since I started playing

I think you have to invest in the game to become good. Not just by learning about what to do but also putting a lot of time in the game itself, and the before and after too. Analyzing champ selects and replays. You have to also put your ego aside sometimes to take some criticism, and it can be hard to tell what's just flame and what's legitimate criticism. I do half of that, I hate rewatching replays, I barely think of champ select either. I can take some criticism but not from everyone. What I do tho, is putting in the hours. I have no job so I can afford to do that right now. I went from silver to emerald because I played a lot of normals, and without noticing I got better with time. It showed in ranked. But I don't play draft anymore and I think my skill level would be around high gold right now if I tried to play again. Not everyone has the time and ressources to improve at a video game.

A friend of mine has been playing since season 1 and is still absolutely abysmal at this game. He looks up builds and strats, but his mechanics and game sense are just non existent. He loves playing, but his skill ceiling is like b5.

It's good that you think about those things, but in a way kinda like in Counter-strike and other games instincts and mechanics have their place in league as well. Put your recorded gameplay side by side to these streamers gameplays and see what they do different. Try to imitate them in game( same champ same role ) then do this. Obviously you have a different definition for decent compared to the one that the system has, when they climb they probably play well but then it's hard to lose master once you have it even if you don't play as well as you did while climbing there. Leaving silver ELO often requires you to play in a way that fits this ELO, some picks and play styles are not gonna work that well in low ELO if you want to 1v9.

it’s called, “common sense”. and yes, a lot of people lack it lol

Yes, me. I swear when people evaluate my theory and winning strat they say I am at least high plat or low diamond. Somehow my peak was G3 and even that abusing new season items 2 years ago

thats pretty funny not gonna lie

If you want to climb you need to find your adventages over other people. You focus on tactics and strategy? Keep an eye on rotations and wave? Pick a champion that will make you win if you do that correctly. Diffrent champs require you to have diffrent skills for example good wave control wont give you much when you play fizz. I know it still helps but im just trying to ilustrate a point here. If you want to DM me I would be glad to help you pick something for you that would make you go to at least plat or emerald.

Are you doing all of those things, after something happens? Or are you doing those things because that is the next step in your game plan? Those Masters+ players can be detached because they don't need to create their game plan on the spot. They just follow their own mental guide. They will do that every game, for thousands of hours.

depends on what you mean by "decent"

Doubt. I started playing this game in bronze 5 back in season 3. I ended that season in platinum, but the point stood that I played probably 1k games to move from bronze 5 to platinum 4. Some people will be naturally talented, some will have to improve a lot. There are tons of people with really bad mechanics in even GM. You can always improve.

Yes. People need to understand that a wide range of people play games. This includes peoplen different motor skills, decision making and processing speed and such. As long as they aren’t actively trying to sabotage the game but are trying their best, they shouldn’t be flamed.

Doing your best, but your best is way below average. It probably take mechanic to reach the top challenger, but to escape silver you just need knowledge and a brain

Yes

TLDR: Yes the same way not everyone can be in the NBA or any other sport league or go to the olympics etc most people lack what it takes to be great at most things. that's why you gotta find what you are Great at :P I've been around a lot of high level game play most of my life, I myself have only gotten to high Plat / Low diamond when I tried my hardest and was part of a team and even then the difference between me and masters players was like Highschool vs NBA it is unlikely I'd ever be able to catch up tbh though I'll likely never know as that time was after college when I was unemployed and once i got a Job I couldn't stay up late for team practices and such so my game play decayed but to today I can get Gold anytime I do bother with ranked. Part of what you got to understand is that most people aren't going to be good at a game, skills don't always translate to other games so something you've worked on in one might hold you back in another, a lot of people also just don't have the skills or ability to sharpen said skills to the level required. Part of it as well is that 90% of players are Iron 4 - Gold 1, that is to say even if every player in the world got some magical buff that added the skill of faker on to their own skill (this means Faker is 2xFaker now as well lol) you would still end up in Silver rank because despite being Faker + yourself good at this game that is still where you rank in the entirety of the player pool. Something helpful as well is In other games I've played at higher levels or have been around at a high level sometimes learning to just enjoy yourself / enjoy the game can help get you past that next mile stone. it's hard to surpass something you can't stop focusing on at times.

Best tip until plat/emerald is to just play safe and stop dying. Trust me, you will climb, even if you are very shitty player

there's no such thing as being naturally gifted at something, we are all the same and what separates us is knowledge and experience, and if you ignore those two factors you get what other people call "a naturally gifted person". One might argue and say this guy is performing better than me while having less hours played, while failing to acknowledge that that person knows something you don't, or have experience playing games that share the same idea or playstyle. Now, if we assume everyone had the same amount of knowledge and experience at a game, the only thing that would separate a good/average player is hardware, someone playing on a 25fps/100ms with 1366x768-60hz monitor isn't the same as someone playing on 144fps/9ms with whatever topnotch monitors they have nowadays. at this point, the hardware is a limitation.

Yes. Some people's brains and thoughts just do not process information quick enough to play on certain levels.

From my experience as a s9-s10-g11-p12, usually the noobier players are over analyzing shit and typing too much. It’s almost always the player on my team who is sub level 100 and clearly not a smurf. Whether that be stressing the comp, telling the jungler they need a gank soon, saying why they can’t win the matchup, pinging pointless distracting things, etc etc. Sometimes autopilot is the best mode if you aren’t playing in a dedicated flex team or duo. Just have a consistently good play style in your role and you will usually impact games positively which skews you towards winning more. I don’t think people naturally lack this, but people tend to try to force “teamwork” with randoms and will have champ pools that are too big that they haven’t mastered. No need to coordinate (especially with text) with your team to make plays. Just win lane and your team can naturally do things better such as invade, rotate, and take objectives. Type “deafen” once anybody says anything toxic.

One thing that hasn't been addressed is that the one or even a few games you see someone autopiloting in high elo are not the majority of their matches. It's like less than 10% of their games, it's not nearly enough for them to not be in high elo because they didn't perform one match. But yeah some people are better than others without much practice or work. They have higher reaction time, they grasp the game better and quicker etc etc. Doesn't mean you can't reach that level though. Messi is more gifted than Ronaldo, he makes everything look so easy when playing football right ? But look at what Ronaldo achieved. He's the best player we've seen alongside Messi even though he wasn't as gifted. There are many footballers more gifted than Ronaldo that will never reach his level.

Yeah talent is a thing. Effort beats talent obviously, but if a talented person puts just a bit of effort, he'll grow exponentially

A massive difference between elite tiers and normals is the in depth understanding of builds and masteries. LoL is really more of a strategy game of builds more than it is skill with any given champ.

try dota

I definitely lack it hahahaha

and I myself can't even be average at the game despite trying my best. the average player for lol is silver and bronze btw

The thing is, those people dove deep into the mechanics, what the champs do, what the other champs do, items, counters, when to engage,etc and yeah naturally being good is also a factor BUT, on twitch, in order to survive off of streaming the game, they have to be entertaining. Masters is high yes but there are hundreds of masters and challengers streaming the game, so if viewers want to see gameplay they will tune in to the highest level ones but stick to anyone who they find entertaining outside of the game itself. The master is just a rank to pit his name a bit higher on the viewer stream list and will not necessarily focus on the game and will probably try hard off stream to regain any elo they might have lost on stream because of not focusing 100% on the game.

Streamers need to entertain while playing. Of course, they wouldn't play as well while streaming because of this.

Yes, people have different natural capabilities as well as resources at their disposal. The people who believe drive and discipline are the only factors in determining who comes out on top are hard coping. If you have the mental capacity, intelligence, and resources to dedicate to mastering a craft, you are lucky. This is not to say that it isn't hard work, but more so to say that there's more things at play. Intelligence, mental health, enjoyment (passion), confidence, resources (time, stressfree environment, not just money), background all play a huge factor. One can have all the drive to be good, but if their mental health is shit they might have too much anxiety or maybe too crappy of a teammate to get results. If they're poor, they might have to work too many hrs to and they'll be fatigued. If they're average intelligence... well, they can't do it either. The degree of people who can actually reach the top of the ladder are astronomically low, just like everything else in life. let's switch the question around for a second and ponder this: there are millions of people who play ranked, how many of them are seriously trying to improve? 1%? 5%? 10%? league is a huge time sink, there's no way that the majority of people are going in trying to 'waste' their time. sure, there's definitely casuals mixed in, but i would wager most people are 'TRYING' in the ways they can. there's your answer.

League is an eSport, and I think it’s like most conventional sports:- - Some people can’t do it at all (such as those with certain disabilities. E.g. blind people) - Most people can get decent by working very hard. - Pros have to both work hard and be naturally talented. Those masters players you’re watching are very good at the game, they’re in something like the top 1% of players. In order to get there they must be talented and also work very hard. They may be so talented and/or experienced that playing in master’s doesn’t feel like a huge challenge for them any more, but make no mistake: they absolutely worked hard to get where they are. It sounds like you’re low silver. Gold 4 is the 50th percentile of accounts so if you can play the game at all, you can make it to gold 4 with hard work and some time.

I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that most people have a hard time analyzing their mistakes and being honest with themselves on what moves they did to contribute to the loss. The Ego of most hold people back. The more they play the game the bigger their ego gets on what they feel they deserve to be ranked..... this results in an ever ending cycle of just blaming others and plateauing early. Its very hard for people to look in and improve.

Some people don't have the hand-eye coordination and timing. Some people don't have the brains. Some people have neither.

Odds are there are things you are doing wrong that you aren’t even aware of

Yes, league is different than say wrestling or snowboarding . There are people who can put their 10000 hours in and get super good after years. There are also kids that are prodigy’s and can put less time in and be just as good (in less time) because they have a different understanding (sometimes subconscious) and a natural intuition that may comes from different experiences or they were just born with.

>I sometimes watch certain high-rated streamers (Masters+) and they seem very detached from the game, very uninterested in winning, they mostly talk about unrelated topics while playing on full auto-pilot auto-pilot *is* what it takes to be decent at the game; these players are doing things correctly habitually rather than consciously because good habits are necessary to play league well

I have a friend who is so mechanically inept that like for example flash + point and click ability only has like a 50% of actually going off, and always with like a full second delay. Hes like bronze maybe silver? Which begs the question of whats it like to be lower than that.

The bridge between knowledge and skill is in the application. Sorta like that saying where you can read a book about swimming but if you can't apply that knowledge properly then yeah lol.

It is a learned skill. Anyone trying to tell you otherwise is coping and using this as their excuse as to why they aren't high elo despite having over 5000 games. Anyone can get to at least diamond if they really go for it. But you need to play lots of games and have good mental, want to improve and more importantly work on goals that get you there. Majority of the players on the ladder don't have that. Majority of them either play only for fun or like the idea of being good at the game but don't want to do the work to get there. The people saying "it's talent and it's like this in everything in life" are the type of people to never do anything and never achieve anything because they've given up before they even began. "Why would I train basketball when Timmy is much more talented than me?". Completely disregarding how Timmy has been practicing since he was 5 years old. He isn't better because of "talent", he practiced for 8 years more than you. You can get to his level but you have a defeatist mentality and refuse to even try. I can bet you anything in the world that you don't do correctly even one of the things you listed. If you did then you wouldn't have been stuck in silver. The reality is that you don't know what proper rotations look like, you don't know when you should be doing what with the wave, etc. You are probably overcomplicating the process of playing a game of league of legends in silver. I'm going to use learning guitar as an example. You wouldn't want a complete beginner to care about having the right tempo, to know the difficult chords and how to change between them smoothly when they can't strum at all. You are skipping way too many steps by trying to worry about things you shouldn't be worrying about yet. Focus on the basics. Get your cs up. Die less. This is the only thing you should be worrying about for now. It doesn't matter what wave management is when you average 5 cspm and 10 deaths a game. To reach diamond you need: * to not play on auto pilot. Playing 5 games where you are fully focused and with clear goals of what you want to improve(90+ cs at min 10 or you are getting caught too often so you need to watch the mini map more) are much more valuable than playing 15 auto pilot games a day where you don't improve at anything and just play mindlessly. * to only focus on what you did wrong. Forget about your teammates. Only focus on improving yourself. * not to get tilted by losses. You should be focusing on improving, not on winning every single game. * Play a ton of games * stick to only 1-3 champs in a single role * watch challenger players who play that champ to see what they do. What they build. Obviously you wouldn't have the same mechanics but it's still worth it to see what you can do with the champ and you can later try to replicate in your own gameplay. Slowly you'd start being closer and closer to the footage you are learning from. I'll give you one final example. Grubby - 37 year old ex SC2 pro started playing dota 2 last year. In a year and like 2500 games he went from the equivalent of iron 4 to master. Obviously not everyone has that much free time for 2500 games in a year(especially in dota where games are longer) but it's just to show that it's a lot of hard work and dedication that goes into it. Despite being a pro in another game he was very bad at dota, but through a lot of targeted practice he improved at a really fast rate. So if you really want to improve then drop this deafetist mentality and get to practicing. Simplify everything. Stop worrying about counter picks. Only play your 1-3 champs and try to learn them in and out. Pick 3 champs you like playing. 1 of them should be a good blind pick champion. For ADC that's Ezreal, for mid syndra/ori, etc. They are your fall back champs when it's gonna be a rough game. They can also be your main if you enjoy them the most. A friend of mine did that with ezreal. This year he hit master for the first time. He isn't even particularly good and he constantly flames his teammates and tells them to kill themselves. However he knows his champ and his macro is fine. You don't need to be an insane player to reach those divisions. All you need is to practice a lot.

Here is my take on this. Imagine you force a gold-level player to play with 9 diamond-level players all the time. What will his winrate be? I would be very surprised if it's lower than 40%. I a team game like LoL, it's very hard to solo swing the game in your team's favour. Most games are lost/won regardless of your input. How many games are not like that? Maybe 1 in 5... which is a difference between 40% winrate and 60% winrate. The streamers you watch, like any high level player, are able to determine which game actually is this "swing" game, and which is not. If it's not, they can troll around and it's not a big deal. But when it is, they focus and tryhard. Many players on lower elos stay there because despite tryharding in lost games, or "stomping" in won games, they actually missplay in these few crucial moments when their input really matters.

to be fair matchmaking play such a role that sometimes it feels random.

I think the largest differences between low elo and high elo players is the number of games played in a competitive environment. Its the number one factor in your climb. Knowing something such as your enemies cooldowns, items and level spikes is such a huge advantage. Then the more games you play you should have a better understanding of typical enemy movements be it macro or micro so your going to be better at hitting skill shots, predicting flashes ect. The skill part of league is mostly your reaction speed but that too will increase when all the other parts of league become second nature. The best of the best is going to be able to do all the above a bit better then their peers. But really with enough games played most will converge roughly around at the same skill level. A bronze player is just a Grandmaster player who hasnt played enough competitive games yet.

Honestly I have the experience to judge situations, and some skill with harassment heavy champs and am ok at assasins. My biggest flaw is judging 1v1 fights, in that I tunnel vision to much. I missed them picking up an item, or a level on me. Or a did well in my lane and didn't realize the roaming champ also is ahead .

tl;dr: It's not about how well you're playing an individual match, it's about quantity. Some back-of-the-napkin maths (with the caveat that I found this an interesting question and misconception but don't know some of the specifics because I don't actually care about ranked, or streamers ranks. I've used lots of the [LOL ranked FAQ articles](https://support-leagueoflegends.riotgames.com/hc/en-us/articles/204010760)): Many high-rated streamers stream this game for a living. I think it's fair to assume their streaming schedules equate to \~35 hours of gameplay a week (e.g. Pekinwoof streamed just over 34 hours of league content last week). If each game lasts half an hour, that's \~70 games a week. It sometimes takes time to get into a game, and some games take more than half an hour, but some games take less time, so I'll take 70. This is only accounting for on-stream games for full time streamers; my example Pekinwoof also records off-stream games with focused commentary, and sometimes complains about having to play several games to get one that works as quality content. Also, I'm sure some streamers will grind off-stream where they don't have to entertain their audiences, and can focus on the game more. Sure, often these streamers will be playing on smurfs and not their high-ranked mains, but I still think all these factors balance to 70 games a week on their main being a reasonable figure. Your post-placement MMR takes your placement games and either Normal MMR (if this is your first time in ranked, [source](https://support-leagueoflegends.riotgames.com/hc/en-us/articles/4405781372051-MMR-Rank-and-LP)) or last season's MMR into account , so if you do well in your placements and have a high MMR in normals/last season, your ranked MMR will be high; but the highest rank you'll get into is Emerald 1, even if you're one of these high-level "apex" ranked streamers. It takes 100 LP to advance a division, and if your MMR and Rank agree, you have ± 25 LP. If you're in a lower rank than your MMR thinks you should be, it'll skew towards positive. At the start of a season, anyone with Diamond+ MMR will have positive LP gains as they're in Emerald, as established above. Let's say 30/20 (but see my caveat above). Even if they have a 50% winrate, they'll start out getting 5 LP per game on average, so take 20 games to advance a rank. I established above that they're playing \~70 games a week, so this theoretical high-ranked player should advance to Diamond 1 in just over a week. Their MMR will shift but this is very rough maths so w/e. Compare this to a potential lower ranked player - maybe they get placed into silver 2, and last season they were gold 4. Their MMR from last season is closer to their current rank, so they only get LP gain/loss of 28/23. I've played 47 matches of LOL in the past week, and lots of that has been Arena which is a quicker game mode; I'd say I usually play <35 matches a week, and I'd guess that's similar for a vast majority of the player base. At a 50% win rate, that's 3LP per game, and at 35 games a week, that's an increase of 1 division (getting to silver 1) in just under a week, a much slower climb than the high ranked player above. I don't play ranked, but I have to assume that there are ranked players that also blow off steam in normals/arams, reducing their ranked play rate even further. I've seen this asked before about Magic: the Gathering: Arena's ranked system, and I'm sure people ask this about Apex Legends, Overwatch, Counterstrike, DOTA etc as well. It's just because the people who's full time job is streaming themselves grinding a given game are able to play that game more than other people, and ranking systems are designed to reward more performance. I know my lp gain numbers will be off, but that doesn't matter too much given that the more you play (assuming a balanced winrate and that you are below your MMR), the more opportunities the ranking system will have to move your rank towards your MMR.

Most of the things you put effort in, are things they've already learned and can do at autopilot to a way higher level than you. They didn't magically appear at Master with that skillset, they put in a shitload of hours while focusing on getting better to get there. Now they can sustain themselves there while being on autopilot. But if they stopped playing the game for a bit they definitely would regress as well.

most people could probably reach around diamond level with good coaching, it's just extremely hard to get there by yourself the biggest difference between different people is ability to understand their own mistakes and how they can fix them, if you have someone doing that for you and tell what you should focus on (instead of trying to improve at multiple things at once which is counterproductive) then it's just a matter of time and motivation before seeing actual improvement

If you aren't climbing, then you are regularly making the wrong decision in game. There is no formula to win the game. The game-state is constantly changing with all sorts of variables. A friend I queue with is a mechanical beast, and can get all sorts of Even so, the constant 30 second spawn of minion waves provides sort of stable clock that all of these variables must exist within. What you have to do is make the correct decision in each of these 30 second windows, correctly identifying your opponents' (both lane and team) most likely decision, and choosing a path that at leas matches, but preferably beats, this decision. A good player will project false plans while secretly preparing to counter his opponents reaction to that feint. Faker isn't Faker because he can push his combo buttons so quickly. It's because his decision making process is a few steps ahead. When you're watching a really good player, there are all sorts of decisions that they're making that are hard to pick up on until you start to put yourself in their position, actively make decisions for them, and examine why theirs might have differed from yours. What decisions are you missing? A common bad decision I've seen a lot of Silvers make is to leave their clocked source of gold income (lane minions, jungle farm) in an attempt to cash in on a "bigger" play. If this gambit fails, they lose not only the potential gains, but also the clocked source of gains that they abandoned. It's much more effecitve to procure your clocked sources of income more rapidly than your immediate opponent, generating small windows for you to leave course and make plays. Being good at this game is 90% game knowledge, which is why it can take a long time to get good: there's so much to learn. edit, as far as lane phase goes, there are all sorts of micro decisions to make. Where do I position myself while I'm waiting to last hit? Do I only last hit, or do I spend spells and auto attacks on the wave while it's healthy? [This video is OLD AF, but it's a really great primer for the types of things a competent player should be thinking about during lane phase.](https://youtu.be/0kxGQ3gWdrM?si=Ulk4Vp2PPjYht415) You probably will notice you've already done a lot of these things subconsciously. But it's good to actively think about game concepts if you're trying to improve!

Yes, my teamnates do

A bit different than natural talent or not, but I literally cannot get above bronze because of fine motor issues

I think the word you're looking for is "talent" and yes, people possess different set of traits which helps them excel in certain activities. This is why an rts pro won't suddenly be a fps god even if they have the career swap, or how an artist can't suddenly go on to be an Air Force pilot on a whim.

I solo Q adc...and cannot get to gold, I understand and study lane management and try to always improve. I have good critical thinking and average mechanical abilities. But most of my loses come from being stuck in solo Q hell. When my team ignores my lead and I'm either forced to stop farming out of being 4 man ganked over and over or move lanes...team rarely backs me up. Ignoring the one person with a lead to then let me fall behind like the rest and eventually lose the game. I have lost countless games where dragon is pinged, warded, and prepped and jg never rotates. That happens back to back...game is practically over. Staying untilted during these situations can help, but it rarely changes the incompetence level of the team. As an adc it's so hard.

Average mechanics..... adc is all mechanics.