Interview with Kayle Bot, a Diamond EUW Kayle main

Kayle Bot is a fast climbing Diamond 2 player on EUW. After being placed in Plat 3 and spending a lot of time in between Plat 1 and Diamond 5 finally broke through and started the climb back to Diamond 1. He did this only playing Kayle, if Kayle was picked of banned, he would dodge.

He truly only played Kayle, which has been working for him in his climb to the top. Overall, Kayle Bot has around 1,500 games on Kayle alone. I had the chance to talk with him about maining a single champion vs having a champion pool, advice for playing against Kayle, and if playing Kayle ever gets boring.

What made you start playing league?

Kayle Bot: I’m really not sure of who showed me the game, but I remember I was pretty burned out on Call of Duty, I used to play it a lot (1 trick pony shotgun only there) and I needed something new, this was also the time where I switched from console to PC gaming.

 

How long have you been playing league?

Kayle Bot: Can’t remember which champion was out when I started playing, but I got the Judgement Kayle skin on my oldest ccount so I’ve been playing since mid/late season 1 I think.

 

What drew you to Kayle and why?

Kayle Bot: Well back in season 1 I was still learning the game with friends and I mostly played Ashe and Teemo and one game this friend of mine pulled out Kayle and completely wrecked everything and everyone, I picked her up after that and I remember that I started playing her even more with SIV HD Critamat Kayle Guide, it was a really troll build but it worked surprisingly well.

 

Does she ever get boring? Why or why not?

Kayle Bot: I only really started this Kayle only thing in season 3 so I haven't really been doing the only kayle thing for long. I don't get bored for two reasons, the first is the fact that she’s such a versatile champion, I play her in all the 5 roles, and they all are a different experience. You can build differently and adapt to multiple situations, so it’s always fresh and new for me. The other reason is that I have a smurf where I play every other champion (most played champ there is Skarner).

 

Kayle has lately had decently high win rate, why do you think this is?

Kayle Bot: It’s funny isn’t it, after countless nerfs in the past year, she still holds one of the highest (usually the highest) win rate in league. First off, they never touched the core aspect of Kayle, her ultimate. Intervention is an extremely strong spell that can turn around any kind of fight and in solo queue; we mostly see one target getting caught in fights and a team diving to burst him ASAP. Kayle counters that entire strategy.

Moving on and despite having nerfed her Q and one of her core items (Lich Bane) they buffed her utility with the 0 mana ult and the added movement speed on Divine Blessing, this gives her a ton of utility that can be used on anyone on her team. Apart from that she still has decent burst and decent sustained damage; she’s this jack of all trades that can do everything right now.

To finish it off, players found a way to adapt and the Runaan’s build has been showing a lot of success after the Lich Bane nerfs. She can adapt to any given game by choosing what to build to benefit herself and her team.

 

What advice would you give to someone wanting to learn her?

Kayle Bot: First off, get used to last hitting with your E (Righteous Fury), if you haven’t played Kayle you’ll find it super weird, it it'll screw up other last hits due to the AoE damage and naturally push the lane, but practice makes perfect.

The other thing would be knowing how to use your ultimate. Good ultimate usage is what makes or breaks a Kayle. Even when you’re behind in game, if you land a good ultimate you can singlehandedly turn the tides in a fight.

 

How would someone go about beating Kayle in lane, in your opinion?

Kayle Bot: Ok so, Kayle gets absolutely wrecked by LeBlanc, number 1 counter at the moment. Ziggs and Lulu are pretty good matchups but they don’t directly counter you, they just make your job much harder. Kassadin is quite good but I’m not sure if he’ll see play after the Q nerfs.

Kayle loses in lane if she can’t trade, so champions like LeBlanc and Annie make it very hard, LeBlanc can just distortion in, do a full combo and distortion back out and kayle won’t be able to hit her more than once.

Annie is a stun bot that won’t let you do anything, her high auto range also makes it a pain in the ass.

Overall the secret to beating kayle is chaining crowd control on her so she can’t cast her ultimate. Exhaust is also a very strong tool as it works similarly to a double whammy, shuts down her damage AND her attack speed.

 

What are some fun tricks people can learn on Kayle, if any?

Kayle Bot: Kayle isn’t really a complex champion. She has no skillshots and she only has two damage spells, one being a kind of autoattack with a tiamat splash. My favorite thing to do that always tricks people (even in high elo) is having a high percentage of cooldown reduction. With 40% you have your ult up every 36 seconds; this means that in a prolonged fight you’ll have it twice.

I like to bait people into thinking that I’m vulnerable, just to surprise them with a second ultimate and then kill them. It works way too often because people aren’t expecting you to have your ultimate up again.

 

What advice would you give to lower elo players in general?

Kayle Bot: Don’t get distracted by the in game chat. Convince yourself that if you want to go up in the ladder you’ll have to carry. You won’t be able to carry every game and that’s fine, not all games are winnable, but regardless of that, try to always do your best, even though your mistakes might not be the reason why you lose a game, try to correct them and make sure that you play at the best level you possibly can.

Oh and play Kayle, she’s an extremely strong champion in lower elos because it’s very easy to bait enemies into tower diving with your ultimate.

 

Do you think it's better to be a jack of all trades or a one trick pony in lower elos?

Kayle Bot: Neither really, or rather, it depends on what one defines as a jack of all trades. Personally I think having 1, 2, 3, 4 main champions is fine, but I think that if you’re playing too many champions you’re ultimately wasting potential.

Having a smaller champion pool of say, 10 champions allows you to master them and unlock your true potential with them, knowing every single matchup with each will allow you to play better overall.

Giving my own example, the champions I think I’ve mastered are: Kayle, Skarner, Karma, Nasus, Trundle, Lulu, Twisted Fate and Udyr. It’s quite a weird champion pool but I think it’s the way to go; you’re not playing competitively so I don’t see why having a big champion pool is important.

 

You can find him streaming at http://www.twitch.tv/shakarez and read his guides at http://www.lolpro.com/members/Shakarezz to learn about Kayle in all positions.