League of Legends: Intricacies of the Middle Lane

Middle Lane in League of Legends is an intriuging and difficult lane to play. Typically home to mages that primarily rely on ability power, the middle lane offers one of the largest pool of champions to pick. On the opposite spectrum, this means that there are a huge amount of enemy champions you must be wary of. The middle lane typically provides great crowd control, engagement, fight control, and burst damage. When played properly, the middle lane can easily carry a game with tricky engagements where you can elegantly take an enemy champions from 100% to 0% HP. Let's take a look at some counters, strategies, and things to watch out for in this lane.

 

I. Passivity vs. Aggression

Middle lane is played out in two ways, either aggressively or passively. Champions such as Karthus and Morgana love to farm and push lanes, and their relatively low mana costs and far range allows them to safely accrue a huge amount of gold from afar. These champions are relatively more passive in lane as it can be difficult at times to close the range to the point where significant damage can be delt. In passive lanes, you must deal with these champions in one of two ways.

A. Fight Back

Champions such as Karthus scale hard into late game. With enough AP, late game Karthus doesn't even care whether he dies or not. As long as he can turn on his AoE in the midst of his enemies when he dies, pressing R with enough AP can change the entire tide of a fight.

For champions such as Karthus, it is important to attempt to make engagements or zone him off the creeps. Of course, this may be difficult as it puts yourself in the front line, but with proper ward control it is important to remember that Karthus does not have any skill that locks onto you. A smart player that utilizes unpredictable movements will often be able to harass a champion such as Karthus while dodging his Lay Wastes. 

 

 

B. Knowing When to be Passive

Of course, it's not always black and white whether you should fight the enemy or not. Sometimes, you yourself may be the middle lane that seeks to farm and gain a large amount of gold. Some champions I would consider include Anivia, Veigar, Ryze, and Twisted Fate.

These champions are all capable of farming safely from a distance and scale hard with items when it comes into late game. If you are laning against difficult opponents such as Sion, Ahri, or Orianna, it may be in your interest to stay passive as these champions can easily push a fault in your positioning. 

On the other spectrum, certain champions are made to be played aggressively, and you should seek to capitalize on their higher early stats or base damage in order to halt the enemy in kills or creeps. Some champions that you should consider playing aggressively on include (but are not limited to): Brand, Ahri, LeBlanc, Akali, and Swain.

Typically, these mages falter a bit late game as their cooldowns and damage output are negated by enemy resistances, and these champions may find themselves in a bit of trouble if they cannot gain a significant gold lead through kills earlier. As such, it is in your best interest to constantly harass your enemies and use their kits to the best of your ability in order to kill them early.

Let's examine a few possibilites:

LeBlanc - This champion was made for early advantages and is typically considered the most annoying anti-mage. At level 4, this champion can do a total of 315 damage from her Q + W + E combo at level 4 with no AP runes or masteries or ignite. Adding in a total of around 10-30 AP from her runes and masteries sharply increases this damage number and throwing in ignite can guarantee an instant burst on almost all but the hardiest enemy mages.

LeBlanc is also a champion that will be rather useless late game if she cannot gain the necessary AP to one-shot enemies, as her relatively long kit cooldown will eventually catch up to her and put her into a period of uselessness while a team fight occurs.

      

Akali - Akali is another assassin that can deal tremendous burst damage. The real reason that Akali is so great at killing others, however, is because the incredible range on her Shadow Dash will negate almost all enemy escape manuevers - even flashes - and makes it easy for her to proc her marks to do bonus damage on her enemies. Additionally, because her burst is so high at all levels, using her Shroud properly can effectively zone enemy mages off of the creep line.

Akali's high mobility, tremendous burst, and great zoning ability make her another example of a champion made for killing others. Akali, however, like LeBlanc, will eventually get countered late game if she is unable to create a lead for herself. Because much of her mobility comes from being in her shroud, late game Oracle Elixirs will deny her this option and the fact that she needs to place herself in the midst of her enemies to deal damage will allow her to be focused down rather quickly.

Ahri - Ahri is incredibly similar to Akali. At level 6, the damage and chasing potential of her Spirit Rush denies enemies the ability to escape, and the lock-ons of her Fox Fire make it easy to deal damage. Additionally, her Orb of Deception's true damage stops her damage from being fully negated by magic resist, an important factor to consider when harassing the enemy. Chaining her abilities and landing a charm will heavily damage if not kill your enemy at level 6.

As we've demonstrated above, sometimes, aggression does pay off. Many champions have a kit designed for early kills because they are provided great mobility and burst damamge. However, a common trend we see with these champions is a declning role late game as their lower ratios, higher cooldowns, and positioning limitations allow them to be picked off quickly.

II. Farming and Harassing

Another very important aspect to middle lane is harassing. Often concidered the most aggressive lane in League, mages are amongst the few classes of champions in League that can truly catch you off guard, exploting mistakes in positioning or missed skill shots in order to deal tons of damage. Thus, as a middle laner, it is important to understand the values of intelligent aggression and harassment. There are two underrated aspects to harassing.

a. Auto Attack Harass

Auto attacks are certainly not the main attribute of any mage. Boasting amongst the lowest of base attack damage, last hitting may be hard enough on several mages like Anivia or LeBlanc, but it is important to remember that these champions are also squishier and have less health.

Thus, over time, longer ranged auto attackers such as Annie or Anivia can slowly whittle down the enemy health purely using auto attacks. Additionally, the long range that they have usually allows them to pull back without retaliation from both the enemy champion or minion aggression. As such, keep in mind that it is always a smart move to attempt to harass the enemy with some auto attacks. 

 

 

b. Timing Skill Shots

Often times individuals seeking to learn how to play mid will be unable to hit skill shots. Because the majorit y of mages rely on these high damage but hard to hit skills, predicting enemy movement and understanding their pathing and movement is critical both in lane and in team fights. There are moments where harassing is more intelligent, such as when the enemy goes in for last hits.

If you are able to keep a tab on the health bars of both you and your enemy's minions and have an understanding of the approximate range in which one of your minions is about to be killed, you can attempt to move forward in the time previous to that to line up a skill shot. As you will see many skilled players do, such as Scarra's Anivia or Ahri, many of the aggressive skills he launches are carefully timed to when the enemy has to make the decision between retaliation or farm. Because many players may be passive, you can easily trade off additional damage for free at these times.

Adding on to farming, while we now understand that period of farming may also incite harass, you may be wondering why many players such as Froggen, Alex Ich, or Reginald can accrue such a massive amount of farm on their champions, often to the point where they exceed every other lane including the AD carry.

While indeed much of this falls onto their mastery of basic technical skills and an understanding of their damage, players should also attempt on certain mages to farm both allied and enemy wraiths. Because much of the junglers popular in the current meta rely on constant ganking (Malphite, Nautilus, Alistar, etc.) they may not be spending that much time farming in the jungle. This produces vast periods of time where you can push up your lane and move back to take the wraiths in your jungle for an extra 4 cs.

If you are able to do this every time the wraiths respawn, you will slowly build up a large farm advantage on the enemy and produce numbers similar to what the pro's can do. 

certainly riskier, but you can always farm the enemy wraiths

This method, however, is executed better by certain champions. Because the ultimate goal of this strategy is to shove your lane and gain more farm without losing any minions to your turret, champions that use this method usually have AoE clear (Mordekaiser, Anivia, Annie). Furthermore, these champions either have good range, fast clear, or some sort of spell vamp. You don't want to directly weaken yourself as a result of farming these wraiths, and, as such, should not attempt to do them at too early of a level as well.

III. Shoving Lane and Ganking

Earlier I talked about shoving your lane. While this allows you to farm enemy jungle and your own in relative safety, there is also the option of ganking other lanes. Many middle lanes provide great range, damage, or crowd control and are capable of taking advantage of other lanes should they be underwarded. For example, ganking both lane as Morgana or Annie can yield quick kills due to their long ranged crowd control.

For enemies that are engaging on your team, you can easily assist them as Galio or Lulu by providing a shield. Enemies that are overextended but warded will also have no response to champions such as Ahri where quick mobility allows them to catch up no matter how huge the gap between them is. 

The entire point of middle lane is to assist the enemy team in kills and objectives. It is definitely a more aggressive lane than top or bot lane where the usual goals are to push turrets and to earn creep score respectively. As such, there is no use in freezing lane and playing excessively passively in these lanes where you are so much more beneficial to the team by moving around.

IV. Warding and Sabotaging the Enemy

Warding is a necessity that I shouldn't have to speak twice about. Every lane is responsible for warding certain portions of their map, a job no different for the middle lane. However, as the middle lane is accessible from two sides, the usage of wards is slightly different and the positioning can vary. There are usually three to four spots where wards are especially effective.

 This first spot has seen a surge in popularity recently. Again, the focus of warding is to alert you of where the enemy jungler is and allow you to preemptively alter your positioning to prevent ganks. Wards that are right along the bushes on the left and right often provide you with vision too late for you to escape. This spot allows you to check if the enemy jungler is farming their wraiths, and to warn yourself and your top laner as such on the blue side. Additionally, should you choose to begin farming wraiths, it is also an option to begin taking the enemy's as well.

 This second spot is also great for seeing if the jungler is coming down from his Blue buff/Wolves and gives you vision before should he choose the gank from the right side. 

This spot is not a necessity, but I consider it useful because it alerts you to when the enemy is taking his or her blue buff. For champions that are quick with mobility or have long distanced skills such as Lux's Lazer, you may even be able to snag the enemy blue buff with a bit of luck.

This last spot I DO consider a necessity, and brings me to my next point: sabotaging the enemy. While there are many ways to do this such as clearing the enemy wards, zoning and denying farm, or pushing your lane, none hurt quite so much as taking blue buff from a dependent champions such as Anivia or Swain.

As such, it is imperative to your success to communicate the location and timers of the blue buff with your jungler. This ward gives you the ability to steal it with your team and time it for future reference. It also provides a much more clear picture of the health and quality of your enemy and makes it eaiser for you to steal this buff or engage directly with a low HP jungler. 

At 1900 elo, when I play mid, I always tell my jungler that I intend on invading enemy jungle at 7:05, the approximate time of spawn on the Blue Buff for junglers that start there (keep in mind that Red and Blue buffs respawn exactly 5 minutes after the entire camp is cleared). If you realize the enemy has little vision, you can opt to leave a lizard or two there to deny the camp time for respawning and prevent your enemy from getting blue even longer.

 

Thank you for reading, as always, and I hope you learned something about middle lane!