Winning Through Organization: Early Game Map Pressure

In a team-based game such as League of Legends, it is of highest importance that the team members are on the same page. How often did you lose a game because your Top Laner got ganked in the early game and his opponent snowballed? How many times did the enemy Jungler successfully invade your jungle? How many times did your Jungler die trying to do the same? By improving your understanding of strategy and how the map should be played you can try to prevent those things from happening and improve the early game of your team drastically.

Seeing the map as a battlefield

The map in League of Legends works in many ways the same way as a traditional battlefield and many rules of traditional warfare apply to your match as well. I’m sure you heard of such things as “map pressure”, “overextension” or “vision war”. Most players may know what these terms are about and could explain what they stand for, but in a vast majority of games these factors aren’t effectively used to gain an advantage. Let’s try to analyze the map and how it’s played with more details to try to find out what map pressure really means.

We all know how the map looks. There are three lanes, each one of them having three towers, leading from your nexus either on the top or bot side or through the middle of the map to the enemy base, which looks exactly the same. Between these lanes there is the jungle with its bushes, curves and monsters. In the middle of the map there is the river containing the two epic monsters and two crabs, four of the most important objectives. As the game starts we only have vision of what our towers show us, we can’t see neither the jungle nor the river and not even all parts of the lanes.

Towers and their defence

Our towers are like little fortresses. While the outer ones are very separated and easily destroyed by flanking or outnumbering the defenders, the inner ones and especially the inhibitor turrets have huge defensive mechanisms. The inhibitor towers are also so close together, that a team can sometimes defend all three of them at once, because the rotation ways are short and safe. But even the outer towers apply a certain amount of map pressure defence, especially in the early game and with standard lanes. Towers basically set the maximum distance that a player can push his lane.

The towers create points of control and safety in which a player can farm and prevent getting zoned or killed. They prevent the enemy of invading further into the own territory. At least this applies to the lanes themselves, but the outer towers have a somewhat diminished ability to defend own territory outside of their lanes. As we all know there are 4 entries into the jungle through the river and the river itself is not defended directly through the towers. These entries allow the enemy to invade further into our territory despite the towers being up.

These invades are what can create a complete breakdown in the outer part of the map and completly snowball the game out of control. Through these invasions you can kill the enemy Jungler, take away his farm, flank towers, kill more enemies and gain huge vision advantages inside the enemy territory. But most of the time these attacks are started by the Jungler himself without strategy, communication or rational thinking and therefore may work, because the enemy is not organized either, or fail miserably. Don’t leave your winning chances to luck!

In this video Samsung Ozone doesn't have any wards inside the enemy jungle but they have vision of all the relevant enemy champions and pressure in mid lane. This gives Dandy the opportunity to invade the enemy jungle and go for a (risky) towerdive. If you don't have pressure mid or if the enemy jungler is not seen anywhere on the map, you need more wards to safely be able to make this play.

Map Pressure through lanes

But how can you make these invades work or prevent them as a team? To create a non-luck based environment for jungle invades you need to apply pressure and coordinate the move with your team mates. Every one of the three lanes has the ability to be a pressure point. The towers may prevent the players to push far into the enemy territory but pushing to the tower still creates a certain amount of pressure. As soon as you pushed your lane, your minions give you vision of enemy territory and as soon as they reach a tower they force your enemy to defend it and to farm them to get gold. Further your enemy lacks both the vision of his minions in his lane and he also can’t force you to stay in the lane, because he is stuck under his tower.

As soon as a lane is pressured in, this created the opportunity for the player in said pushed lane to be flanked or to roam. As a Jungler, if you see that your top lane is pushing-in early in the game, you should try to get to the area as fast as possible, because there is going to be action almost for sure. As a Top Laner, tell your Jungler that you are pushing and call him over for action. There are several possibilities of what is happening next. The enemy Jungler could see his top lane getting pushed-in and he could try to help his laner, thus creating a 2v1 or 2v2 fight. Now because your top lane is pushed-in, you get the ability to counter-gank, improving your chances of winning drastically, plus you have more minions on your side. A counter-gank is one of the most effective ways to create an early lead.

Invades

On this Map you can see the "Pressure Lines" and where the Top Laner and the Jungler should invade enemy territory. They are cautious, because mid lane doesn't have pressure.

If the enemy Jungler is, however, on the bottom side of the map or inside his own jungle, Top Laner and Jungler can now think of invading the enemy’s territory. Before you invade the enemy jungle you need to take a look on the mid lane. If the enemy mid lane has a clear pressure advantage, you can’t go very deep inside the jungle and need to get out there without having a long fight. Just go inside the jungle together or send the Jungler ahead while taking his back, place deep wards and get out when there is enemy contact. If the enemy isn’t there for sure or if you have placed some nice wards inside, you can steal the different camps and go out or maybe think about a flank on the enemy Top Laner. If the enemy jungler is seen or known to be outside the top side jungle your Jungler can also invade by himself (as seen in the video of Samsung Ozone above). Still, top and mid lane have to be ready and pay attention to the move and be ready to help.

On this map you can see the new Pressure Lines. There is a Vision Ward in the Tri-Bush and there are 2 to 3 Green Wards inside the enemy jungle. You could also place another Green Ward in the Bush between Top Lane and the Jungle to ensure that no one is waiting behind the tower for a Counter-Gank. The Green Wards don't "give you Territory" because your enemy may still have vision there as well, while the Vision Ward ensures control of the area.

The next step is to push the lane in again. At this point you should have two deep wards inside the enemy jungle, one or two inside your river and of course the crab vision. This vision ensures that you see all movements of your opponent towards top lane. The next time your lane is pushed-in your Jungler can invade the enemy jungle by himself, because he knows if someone is there, and steal the camps or flank the Top Laner. To ensure that your moves remain unseen you can also place a few pink wards or bring sweepers. A pink ward creates much more pressure than a green one, because not only are you sure to see the enemy’s movements at the place but you can also be sure to remain unseen.

You can prevent your enemy of doing the same moves by taking the crab before your lane is completly pressured-in and by warding the entrances to your jungle. If you have a pushed-in mid lane and your enemies want to invade, and you know it, you can even set up a trap and kill them doing it. Or if you see the enemy Top Laner and Jungler invade through your wards you can also call an early Dragon and tell your Top Laner to play safely for a moment.

 

Conclusion

This is only a small explanation of basically two to three different strategies you can go for, still, these little tricks can give you huge early game advantages. By invading or preventing invades correctly, by understanding pressure points and early game vision wars, you can win many games in both solo- and team games.

 

Keep on thinking and make Swain proud with your tactics - leDachs

Are you into fantasy leagues? Then check out AlphaDraft and put together your allstar lineup!