The Power of the Draft Phase: Analyzing the enemy team’s picks and bans

In League of Legends, the draft phase of a game adds a level of complexity that is critical to how the game is played. Games are tilted into one team’s favor before the timer even starts. Analyzing the enemy team’s picks and bans is imperative to having the advantage throughout your game.

To show this, let’s use solo queue as an example. By chance,Team Yolo is on the red side of the map, and Team Swag is on the blue side. With fairness in mind, I randomized the order of roles chosen for each team. The collective bans are (say) Maokai, Braum, Alistar, Yasuo, Morgana, and Tristana.

DRAFT PHASE 1:

At this point, opposing Team Swag has first pick since they are blue side. They choose Zilean, a flexible pick. Now it is time for Team Yolo’s two first picks. Yolo’s mid laner is up, and his star champion is Zed. The Master of Shadows does not consider the ramifications of this choice and locks in a comfort pick, giving no regard to the composition of his or the enemy team. In addition, your top laner is also up for his pick. He chooses Dr. Mundo, a go-to tanky champion who can run amok with disruption but does not pose a serious threat to the enemy team.

DRAFT PHASE 2:

Now it is time for Swag’s 2nd and 3rd picks. Their choices are Lulu and Kog’Maw. Team Swag has coordinated a “Protect the ADC” composition. Unfortunately, Team Yolo still does not know where each of the opposing champions will go except for the Kog’Maw.

Yolo’s rotation of 3rd and 4th champion picks begins. Nami and Corki are picked up, a strong duo lane with excellent poke and catch potential - great to sustain while wearing down the enemy Kog’Maw. However, considering the enemy composition, other support options such as Janna, Thresh, or Nunu may have been more viable. These picks should have been of a higher priority to stop the amount of protection Kog’Maw will be getting in lane and in team fights.

DRAFT PHASE 3:

Swag’s final two picks: support Thresh and jungle Nunu. Yolo finally realizes how scary the opposing team is. From here, Yolo recognizes which champion will take each role. Finally, Yolo’s jungler decides on Nocturne, in an effort to get into the back line at the scary Kog’Maw. So, let’s sum up what these teams look like:

	Blue Side:	Red Side:
Top Lane:	Lulu	Dr. Mundo
Jungle:	Nunu	Nocturne
Mid Lane:	Zilean	Zed
ADC:	Kog'Maw	Corki
Support:	Thresh	Nami

Now we can analyze both teams: Blue side, Team Swag, is clearly going a Kog’Maw carry in the late game with several heals, shields, and buffs and have him tear through the opposing team while his four allies peel for him. Team Yolo has two strategies that could work: Get the solo lanes fed and go for a 1-3-1 splitpush with Dr. Mundo and Zed in the side lanes, or go for a hard dive plan to get onto Kog’Maw and annihilate him from the Rift as fast as possible. Both strategies seem viable in theory, but let’s go a little deeper into how this game would likely play out, lane by lane:

    VS.  

Top Lane: Lulu and Dr. Mundo will have very little kill pressure on each other except for early game, and even then, it would require strong jungle pressure from one side or the other. This lane will most likely become a farm lane, leaving Lulu to have high AP and Mundo as a strong tank.

Jungle: Nocturne relies on farming in order to earn his Feral Flare jungle item, but Nunu is an excellent counter jungler. Nunu chooses to pitch a tent in the opposing jungle, sustaining through his Consume. Nocturne’s ability to scale throughout the game is greatly hindered.

Mid Lane: Zed will have an almost impossible time winning this matchup. There is no chance for an assassination as long as Zilean has his ultimate up. And because Zilean is building AP, his ult will revive him to full HP (or at least close to it). This means Zed will have to kill Zilean two times in the time it takes Zilean to kill him once.

Bot Lane: This is where Yolo’s chances of winning are greatest-- Shutting down Kog’Maw is essential. Unfortunately, this is not going to be an easy task for Yolo as Swag will most likely play the lane safe. With Thresh’s Dark Passage giving Kog’Maw a constant safety net to escape with, Swag’s bot lane can focus purely on farming. For Team Swag, having Kog’Maw behind by 10 CS means he’s still won lane.

Now for the last element of the game: Teamfighting. While the laning phase may be up for controversy, Yolo’s disadvantage shows itself when exposed to Swag’s composition. Yolo’s best option: Kog’Maw is dove on by both Zed and Nocturne, while Corki hits whoever he can (safely) with his Missile Barrage and auto attacks, Nami sustains her team and locks up key targets, and Dr. Mundo runs amok in the middle of the enemy team.

However, diving onto a Kog’Maw with Nunu’s Bloodboil, Lulu’s Wild Growth and Help, Pix!, Zilean’s Chronoshift, and Thresh’s Dark Passage is going to be nigh impossible. Kog’Maw will likely melt the divers before they can get through his entire HP bar twice. Not to mention all the peel and crowd control that comes from Team B’s defensive line: Lulu’s Glitterlance and Polymorph, Nunu’s Ice Blast and Absolute Zero, Zilean’s Time Warp, and Thresh’s Death Sentence, Flay, and The Box.

Yolo’s composition cannot hope to move through all of these spells while twice killing an ADC that is shredding massive chunks of HP per auto attack, and so we observe that the 1-3-1 splitpush is more viable, but requires the solo lanes of Team Yolo to be significantly ahead, enough to solo kill Swag’s solo laners. By navigating through picks and bans more carefully, this entire game could have been wholly different for Team Yolo.

For example, the draft phase could have gone better for Team Yolo if the players chose champions that worked well against Swag. If bans and Swag’s opening draft was the exact same, here is how Yolo could have adapted and countered effectively:

Swag first picks Zilean, keeping their opening draft the same. Team Yolo should instantly know that assassins should be avoided at all costs - Zilean can simply ult the target and the fight will continue. Knowing that Zilean can stop burst, it is best to choose a champion with harrass, such as Ziggs, Xerath, or Orianna. These three champions have the ability to sit back and wear down the enemy team, creating a powerful stall and siege setup. Top lane for Yolo is also choosing. Seeing the enemy Zilean, Yolo’s top laner should have realized that the best type of champion would be one that can deal consistent DPS to burn through HP bars quickly, while having potential to be tanky. In my opinion, that perfectly represents Ryze.

Now it is time for Swag’s 2nd and 3rd picks. As we know, the choices are Lulu and Kog’Maw, going for the “Protect the ADC” composition. Now it is time for Swag’s 3rd and 4th picks. Seeing the Kog’Maw, it is critical to recognize that Swag is going for a late game composition. Jinx is one of the few hyper-carries left on the board, and that makes it ideal for team Yolo. It also adds to the waveclear and helps prevent sieges. Next is Yolo’s support. Here, Thresh is one of the strongest choices. Not only does it prevent Swag from having a safety net for Kog’Maw, it also enables Yolo to get a Death Sentence onto an incredibly high-priority target and wipe them off the map.

This forces a change in Swag’s composition for their final picks. Here, they pick Nami for the strong disengage instead of Thresh like before. The Nunu pick stays the same because there is no current reason to change it. Now it is time for Yolo’s final pick, their jungler. While the Nocturne was a nice option, it makes more sense to use a jungler that can make picks in coordination with Thresh’s Death Sentences. A Jarvan IV would be perfect here. If Thresh lands a priority Death Sentence, a Jarvan IV knockup combo would force the enemy Kog’Maw to be CC’d for a long time, effectively crushing his DPS while the Team Yolo can run through the fight, getting consistent Jinx resets and running down target after target.

This new composition helps to deal with quite a bit of the issues seen in Team Yolo’s previous composition. Even if there is a large amount of CC and defensive spells to deal with for Yolo, the spells are useless if Kog’Maw is CC’d for the majority of the fight while Jinx tears through the team. By carefully constructing a draft that works against the opponents, Team Yolo has come out ahead with significant potential before the match even started. The next time you play through a draft phase of League of Legends, try to predict the goal of the enemy team composition to counter it.