Mindgames on the Rift

Mindgames on the Rift.

You have to ask yourself. Is there a Garen in that bush? You just saw him toplane but if you facecheck this bush near middle lane, there is no way to be sure he's not there, right? Even worse; there's no Garen in the game but how can you be sure there won't be one in this bush by using some glitch? Is he there or isn't he? Risk death or just stay safe?

What role do mindgames play on the Rift? Now if I see your enemy midlaner disappear towards his tower around eight minutes into the game, what do I tell my allies? That he went back? He's getting his blue buff? He's roaming to the side lanes? If it's the latter, which lane? And much more important than what I tell them is my own action. If he simply went back, I should be pushing mid as hard as I can. Same goes for if he went to get his blue buff, however then other questions arise. Can I steal that blue buff? Can I catch him out while he's focused on the buff? If he's roaming, do I follow him or do I shove mid?

All of these are important questions that have to be answered within seconds, if not split-seconds. And it's incited simply because someone's out of your sight. However it's not just the fact that he's currently not on your map but also the fact that he walked towards his tower. Had he walked towards river you could generally have excluded the possibility of him simply recalling. Had he walked towards top and you're on blue side, not only dragon and a botlane gank are off the table; blue is as well and it's clear he's roaming top. All of these things have to be realized, analyzed and then the option have to be weighed against one another so you can make a sensible choice.

If you've watched a lot of the pro scene in League of Legends you will have seen many different level one strategies. With the earlier minion spawn and reduced first blood bounty they won't be as common any more; but they relied solely on mindgames. Where does the enemy team expect us least? Do they think we'll go for their blue buff? Then they might set a trap there so let's take their red buff instead. Of course this could simply be a bluff and they're either at our buffs or actually expecting us to think this and waiting at red buff.

This uncertainty is what made level one engagements so dangerous and so terrifying. Because all of these champions are human beings they sometimes do unexpected things; you never know with definite certainty what they will do next.

This is also a very interesting phenomenon that sometimes manifests itself when playing with lower level summoners. Suddenly you, a veteran level 30 summoner, comfortably settled in at Silver II or Gold IV or whatever, are thrown in with a few level 10 summoners. They are playing Alistar for the first time and don't know how the Headbutt-Pulverize combo works. Nonetheless you cannot help but expect it every time he walks towards you simply because you know the terror it can mean to get properly engaged on by that scary cow. You will play more carefully because that threat is there. It is the essence of how a Blitzcrank is capable of zoning. That Rocket Grab has a pretty long cooldown (20/19/18/17/16 seconds) and he wants to use it sparingly since he's more vulnerable / not as effective while it's on cooldown. The rest of the time, simply the threat of Blitzcrank having that Rocket grab available can be enough to deter the enemy AD and support from getting close to the minion wave. Mindgames. They work.

Another thing I have seen a few times that I think incredibly descriptive of how much psychology is involved in League is something that sometimes happens after barons. Let's say the blue team was overall about 5000 gold ahead of the red team around 30 minutes. So they have a sizable advantage but it's not crushing. Kills are 12-10 in their favor; towers are even. Now the blue team gets baron, is even farther ahead right? But shockingly enough, it's actually the red team that's pushing. It's like a cornered mouse that's trying to kill the cat looming over it. Now the blue team frantically scrambles to get a defense together. Their midlaner tries to defend the inner turret and gets dropped to 200hp. The blue team's jungler comes in to save him, dies. The tower still goes down.

Now the blue team's AD gets caught in a well-placed Solar Flare from the red Leona and dies following a panic-flash that didn't get him over the wall. Look at the situation again now. Two dead, one low for blue. A tower down, another one vulnerable. All five of the red team's members are probably still high on HP since they only picked targets off and didn't dive or do a full-on fight. Baron buff only remains on three members of the blue team and the momentum as well as the momentary advantage are clearly in favor of the red team. Simply because they didn't act scared of the baron buff and instead just forced their own issue. Blue thought “If they do that, they must be strong”, didn't communicate for a full-on engagement and instead tried a feeble, half-hearted defense that turned out horribly wrong for them. They threw away the advantage because they didn't trust themselves to win a 5v5 engagement despite having the obvious advantage of baron.

I've seen this happen in tournament games and I have been on both sides of this phenomenon.

Rotations and pulling enemies to sidelanes is what can win games. Far too often have I seen a fed Shyvana shoving botlane by herself and as soon as somebody goes down to deal with her, baron is started. The essential strategy of splitpushing is putting the enemy is a state of dilemma. Defend or fight? He has a numbers advantage for this fight, but what will it cost him? While fighting out this inner turmoil he is vulnerable. You can take advantage of this indecisiveness and with every second he has to think he loses out more in the battle of minds.

You have probably heard the infamous phrase “baited and outsmarted”. A successful bait relies on a won mindgame. You make the enemy think you're an easy kill while the rest of your team lies in wait. A teleport gank or a stand united fight is a mindgame. Oh, you thought this was a 2v2? Well guess again because here's my friendly neighborhood Shen to make it 3v2.

Mindgames are everywhere. They affect every second of the game. In the end fast decisions win mindgames. If there's a call from your teammates, don't question it, follow it! Discussion time is lost time. You can lose far more by questioning every call made than by taking the chance of following a bad call every once in a while. Trust your teammates; they'll generally have a reason they made the call they did. Everyone can make mistakes and make a bad call. But nothing is worse than second-guessing calls because you're indecisive. If you say “maybe we shouldn't be doing this because this and that could happen” you've just lost the mindgame. And possibly the entire game.

Remember not to be fooled, be cautious, ward and follow calls! Good luck on the Rift!