Use your brain to crush bot lane

Hello there friends. Today I will teach you the ancient and venerable secrets of bot lane. Listen well, and be empowered with the dark knowledge I will bestow, below.

Higher level? Fight!
Here is the best tip. The easiest way to gain an advantage right away is to hit level 2 first and immediately attack your enemy, so long as they don’t have too many minions. If you are facing a double melee combo then be very very scared of them hitting 2 before you.

This also applies at level 6. If you hit 6 before your enemy then engaging is a great idea. This clever Leona saw her partner Varus hit 6 before anyone else. The crowd control chain will make for one very dead Janna.

Don’t be cheap with wards!

Here we see Lucian and Annie pushing up to the turret. Draven is looking pretty vulnerable and could possibly be killed with a flash stun and Lucian combo. But is someone missing from this picture?

Hello Lee Sin! Annie’s use of only one ward to cover the river is going to cause a lot of pain in a few seconds. With bottom lane you have many wards at your disposal. Any time the enemy jungler appears you should not complain, but rather rejoice for you have wasted their time with your superior vision.

Match playstyles with your partner
This requires a bit of champion knowledge. Blitzcrank is a support who wants to grab and punch people. You want to pair him up with a champion that dishes out lane damage, like Draven, Twitch or Corki.

 

Here is an example of strong synergy vs a poor combo. Sivir’s spellshield protects her from burst, and Soraka outheals poke very well. Leona is a pure lane bully, but Kogmaw’s damage does not kick in until mid to late game. Unless they are ganked well or very much outplayed the Soraka Sivir combo is going to win this one as they are hard to burst down and can keep poking until someone has to base.

All alone? Be afraid, so very afraid
When your partner is running back to lane you should play like a coward. Every unseen brush could be full of pure death.

 

Here Kogmaw wants some of that delicious gold. He kills a minion and immediately starts running, but Taric is ready and forces a Flash. Kogmaw paid dearly for that 19g. Two minutes after I took this screenshot he was ganked next to his turret and died horribly, making me feel rather smug.

That wraps it up for this article. I wanted to keep it short and sweet, with lots of pretty pictures. If you’ve read it this far then the secret word is turtle. Thanks for reading!

(Click the present to find out what it is!)