Justin Duewel-Zahniser

First off, good job Anthony Kennedy. Now, onward.

Jason wants to know my thoughts about Blizzard’s newest game, Heroes of the Storm. He is stuck at work on a Saturday, so I’m writing this out for his eventual and/or incremental review.

Heroes of the Storm is a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena), which is still an awkward name. It’s pretty much what you would get if World of Warcraft had a baby with the NBA. Or, for those of us old enough to have played it, it’s pretty much what you would get if Warcraft 3 turned into a five-on-five game, which turned into another one less Warcrafty, which turned into another one non-Warcrafty, and then eventually became one mostly Warcrafty. If you just fell asleep, sweet dreams.

Since I have played League of Legends, as has Jason, and since it is the 800lbs gorilla of MOBAs (and to a lesser extent, esports itself--lord, are we bad at naming things), I’ll do a lot of compare and contrast. I think this is fair because it is obvious that the HotS (naming...) team put a lot of thought into what parts of League of Legends they didn’t want in their game. Similarly, they clearly tried to smooth out some of LoL’s inherent rough edges, in much the same way that LoL made DOTA more accessible. Let’s take a look at some of those decisions.

Transferable Knowledge

Basic Mechanics - right click to move, left click to attack, QWER for abilities with R being your “ultimate.” A few number keys are also used. You have health and mana, for most heroes, and abilities have cooldowns. There are active and passive abilities.

Objectives - your goal is to take down the enemy Core (read: Nexus). Along the way, various structures will fire cannonballs at you, help the enemy team defend, etc. Incrementally defeating them moves you closer to victory. The longer the game goes, the faster you can push them down, putting a natural clock on play.

Teams - whereas League of Legend is a team game, the differences between playing in a team and playing as a team are enormous.

Laning - you assemble your team into 2-3 lanes, depending on the map. Minions periodically stream down each lane. Minions give you xp (more on this later). In the early game, you lane. At a transition point, you typically try to group and focus on objectives.

Roaming - during the laning phase, roaming is even more common. Supports will often jump between lanes wiht the game’s increased mobility and shorter distances, trying to catch other people off-guard and also picking up healing orbs from multiple lanes.

Leveling - xp levels you up and hitting levels faster gives you an edge in stats and skills. The big one is not level 6 for your ult, but level 10 for your ult. The team that hits level 10 first often has a huge edge in the first teamfight.

Free Hero Rotation - you won’t start out with any characters, but several rotate through being free each week and it’s best early on to get a feel for as many as you can before making any major purchase decisions.

Important Differences

“SoloQ” - in Heroes of the Storm, it is not really possible to individually carry a team, mechanically. The closest thing in HotS that I have experienced to a carry is getting paired with an amazing shot-caller. They carried the game by organizing everyone toward the right objectives at the right times. Individual mechanics are important and rewarded, but the some insane mid-lane AP Carry dragging you up the ladder with them, blowing up entire enemy teams, doesn’t really happen. A semi-competent team who moves to the right objectives at the right time will almost always beat less coordinated players with more skill. This, I think, is a very important distinction. Consequently, name-calling, hate speech, rage quits and all those other mainstays of League of Legends do not seem to be prevalent. I’m sure they exist, but I honestly have not encountered them yet. As more players transition, perhaps it will increase. Let’s hope not.

Maps - there are several different maps with different additional objectives and play styles from the main structure (see Objectives). Rather than just learning Summoner’s Rift, you have to get the hang of those as well. Luckily, they are not complicated.

Last-Hitting - it doesn’t exist, which is FUCKING AWESOME. You get xp by being within a fairly generous distance from dying enemy minions, which is called “soaking.” The laning phase can be done successfully without fighting by simply staying in lane, alive and soaking as much xp as you can. Because you only need one champ in each lane to soak, technically, this is what really supports early roaming.

Leveling - the team levels together based on collective experience. Your team can get slightly ahead or behind, but huge disparities are virtually non-existent due to a diminishing returns system. Consequently, there’s less snowballing on the basis of levels. Most of what appears to be snowballing is actually just a disparity in two teams’ understandings of the importance of...

Objectives - once teams hit 10, laning and killing minions yourself generally becomes a losing proposition. The equivalent of LoL’s jungle camps are “mercenary” camps, or mercs. Defeating them will cause them to lane for you, allowing you to focus on other objectives. You can tell when someone is new to HotS (and probably newly come from LoL) because they will stay in their lane and push forts on their own. They will feel like an uncontested god, despite the fact that they are basically helping the enemy team. The first lesson everyone needs to be taught is that if they are personally laning in the late game, they are losing.

Items/Gold - have you ever felt a little odd playing Ashe (an archer) and having an inventory of five swords and a suit of platemail? She’s clearly not shooting swords at people. Nor is she swinging them. Where do they go? In this game, only xp/levels and your build advance your character. This ostensibly makes game balance easier as the devs don’t have as many variables. Flavor-wise, it makes sense. Thrall, who wields the Doomhammer, always uses the Doomhammer. Your squishy assassin does not wear platemail. Teams cannot amass enormous gold leads and get ahead of the other team in both damage and mitigation at the same time.

Healing - unlike LoL, which shies away from healing and has trouble even balancing Soraka, Heroes is chock full of healing. Caster minions in lane drop hp/mp regen orbs and most supports have significant, re-usable healing abilities. Plenty of champions have lifesteal, regen or burst healing tricks as well. Taking out the healer early in a fight is crucial to not lose on pure attrition.

Traits/Builds - heroes start the game with all of their moves unlocked except the ultimate. So, from the beginning, you have three moves you can use. As you level up, rather than putting more points in those moves, you choose “traits” which usually either enhance those moves or add passives or secondary actives (e.g. healing wards). So rather than a different build for a character meaning leveling different abilities first and getting different items, a different build pushes your gameplay in a different direction by, say, emphasizing your crowd control over your healing or adding hops to your chain lightning instead of increasing your single target burst.

Game Duration - the average game time is about 15 minutes, with the upper bounds being in the 20s. You can play more games per day of HotS than League, generally.

Earning Heroes - okay, there is actually gold, but it’s the equivalent of IP. You have a player level (0-30, surprise) which unlocks periodic rewards such as free gold and extra free champ rotation slots. You also have hero levels, which unlock extra builds for the heroes and earn you one-time gold rewards. You can use gold to buy heroes and skins, or of course you can use $. Individual game wins/losses do not reward as much gold, comparatively, as LoL. Therefore, you’re not punished for being unable to grind as much--mostly you get gold from daily quests and your initial leveling. However, if you play insane amounts, you are not rewarded as much. That works out to be more friendly overall to filthy casuals. Like me.

The Quiz

Do you enjoy the play style (if not culture) of League of Legends or another MOBA?

Do you have fond memories of any of these Blizzard franchise games: Diablo, Warcraft, Starcraft?

Are you comfortable when you do you play your best, but lose anyway?

Do you get more joy from a well-coordinated team victory than from good dueling?

Do you have less time to play than you feel like you need for LoL?

If you answered yes to several of the items above, you are probably the target market. Either way, I’d give the game a try. Don’t skip the tutorial, even if you have the mechanics, as some of the banter is actually cute.

What follows is the text of a sermon that I gave to my church's congregation about 14 years ago. I believe I was home for the summer from school, probably between my freshman and sophomore years. It was very popular, got emailed around to family members who lived in remote areas, spawned a discussion group, etc. That tells you less about the quality of the sermon and more about the quality of the church.

I thought I had lost this. It used to be on the church's website, but they overhauled that and there weren't any backups. Over the holidays, my mom forced me at gunpoint to dig through a trunk of things from my childhood, and I found this speech. Along with computerized student match-making printouts. They were actually... not far off. If you did one of those these days, you'd be sued into oblivion. They had no concept that anyone could possibly be not straight, among other things. Apologies to my gay friends on behalf of the past.

At any rate, I'm going to type up and post this thing here so I have some shot at retaining it should the printout not survive (another) apartment fire. I won't tell you whether the views contained within still express my beliefs accurately. Or ever did. If you want to get into that, you'll need to talk with me. Not to me. With me.

THE THING I MENTIONED ABOVE

Good morning. I am, in theory, supposed to tell you as much as I can about faith and college in about five minutes. Both in five minutes. Well, they are more closely related than you think. For example, many students don't discover either of them until finals week. Anyway, let me give you a little background. Oh, and please forgive me for just reading this off a slip of paper. I figure I'm in the best place for forgiveness anyway, might as well milk it. Oh, and for those of you who are counting, I lie twice in the course of this speech.

I, Justin Duewel-Zahniser, currently attend West Virginia University, a higher education institution not unlike our Shepherd College. Higher education, in this sense, means that it is situated on the apex of a huge mountain. I have been learning there for 3 full semesters thus far. I am majoring (which isn't technically a word) in Computer Science and minoring (which really means buying beer for the underaged) in Philosophy.

But enough about me, you're here for college and faith. I'll start with college. God is more patient. College, although I'm not learning much yet, is worth every penny I'm not paying for it. I have met a wealth of interesting new people, from the rich upper class white republican, to the affluent upper-middle class white republican. I've seen fire and I've seen rain. One time I got sick enough that my friends thought I would die, so I took two unlabeled pills from a pot smoker across the hallway (true story), and I recovered in two days, whereas the prior $5 visit to the health sciences center was only followed by a week of steadily declining mobility and steadily increasing spinal discomfort.

I'd like to say I go to class all the time, so I will. I go to class all the time. I'd also like to say that I'm studios, but I shouldn't have lied even once in this house of the holy. The real value of college is in learning who you are. This can only be done, as far as I'm concerned, by the time honored methods of caffeine, consumption, sleep deprivation and loud music. This ties in to faith as well, as those are three methods used to induce healing trances by some Midwest shamanistic cultures. Actually, I sleep more than everyone else, don't drink caffeine, and I don't (insert pause) drink alcohol.

By now you are probably wondering how I got into WVU without drinking alcohol. Well, I have a lot of quirks, believe me. I also decided I wanted to stop swearing. I'm not sailor, mind you, but hear me out. I have come to the conclusion that, although swearing can be a legitimate form of expression, it is completely unnecessary, and therefore, a waste of energy. I have also tried to scale back, or stop, my consumption of beef. Not because of mad cow disease, or some vegetarian-vegan sense of self pride. Beef is 27 times as bad for the environment, in terms of soil erosion, soil pollution, water pollution, and water consumption, as chicken. And I like chicken better. I learned this all in Geology lab. I got a 115% in there. The hardest thing we did all year was put Ph testing stuff in water. We had to determine if it stayed clear or turned pink. Real brain teaser. Speaking of brain teasers.

Why did the chicken cross the road? Is it possible that we will never know the origin of life simply because it occurred at or before the big bang? I mean, how can we tell what happened at or before the big bang if, during that time, there were no physical laws? How can we describe something that exists in a context we can't even comprehend? I have come to the conclusion that there are a few things we may never know. And I've decided that makes me happy. So, on that note, one of blissful yet intentional ignorance, let's move on to faith.

Several people, close friends and angry missionaries alike, have asked me what I really believe. I've decided that I will stop telling people who really care, because it's more fun that way. And in the process of grilling me for my absolute stance of faith, the griller and the grillee can learn something important. I'd like throw out a hypothetical, at the risk of offending someone. I'd also like to say that one thing college has taught me is that you can't do anything constructive without offending someone.

Hypothetically, what if God came to you in any appropriate context, and said simply, "Paul of Tarsis was a nitwit!" As Theodore Drange, my Philosophy of Fundamentalism teacher was fond of describing, God dropped angelic CD-ROMs from the sky. You put them in your iMac, your Gateway, or what have you. A flashy, yet convincing display tells you that God has declared Paul of Tarsis a nitwit.

Absolute faith in the word of the Bible would require that you eject that CD-ROM and start using it as a coaster. Yet, it's God's CD-ROM right? Let me tell you what I think. As if the above wasn't offensive enough, I think John Shelby Spong is right. I think Paul was gay. But, I don't think that really matters. Absolute faith is contradictory, because it requires rejecting new insights. Rejecting them not based on their actual value or merit, but on the fact that they don't float with the old insights. Under absolute faith, to the strictest degree, the New Testament is just kindling.

Out of the millions of religions, cults, and heathen regimes in the world today, I was blessed enough to be raised in this here Presbyterian church with Randy Tremba. The odds of that happening are akin to winning Powerball. Actually, probably winning Powerball four years in a row. My church attendance record rivals my Geology 1 attendance record, but I already knew about plate tectonics when I took Geology 1. Randy asked me to feel free to discuss faith, or lack thereof.

I'm going to tell you my philosophy/religion, and you have to decide for yourself whether this is the one remaining lie in my speech, or what I really think. The world we live in is an input for our minds, senses, and biases. We, and as I argue with my Existentialism teacher, the animals are all subjective. That means we interpret the world we live in. Throughout the course of our lives, we view the world through our uniquely prejudiced eyes and decide for ourselves what it all means. Now, since we decide for ourselves what it all means, based on how we view the one world around us, how can we say who is wrong and who is right? The answer, I think, is that no one is right and no one is wrong. Blasphemy, eh? No one person can be right because everyone interprets the world differently. through their own eyes. No one person can be wrong because everyone interprets the same world through their own eyes. I know that ruins the whole missionary thing, but bear with me some more.

So as not to be a hypocrite, I have to add a disclaimer. What I have said is my own belief. It's my own view of the world. So it's just as spotless, and just as shabby, as everyone else's. Every person I've taken philosophy with, from metaphysics to existentialism, has either sworn there is undeniably a god, or sworn that there is absolutely no god. That bothered me. It all seemed like a matter of faith to me. Everyone got so staunch that they lost their sense of humor. And that, my friends, is when you know you are spiritually dead.

I seize this opportunity to extend my unalloyed compliments of the new season to you and your family hopping that this year will bring more joy, happiness and prosperity into your house hold.

I am certain that by the time you read this letter I might have already gone back to my country United States. I visited South Africa during the New Year period and during my stay, I used the opportunity to send you this letter believing that it will reach you in good state.

My name is Mr. Justin Duewel-Zahniser, I am the auditor and head of computing department of a large land surveyor in United States. I wish to inform you of large parcels of land that has been available since before my inception into office in 2001, and according to our record, it was evident that no private interest has any claim over these parcels. I therefore took the courage to look for reliable and honest persons who will be capable for this important transaction.

I have discovered the owner of this land is You; there is a government public law in United States 88-577 which decrees that all citizens of United States own these lands in common. Furthermore, I have discovered that with support, organizations and persons are working to increase amount of land owned by you.

I am therefore seeking reliable persons that will play the human role as stewards of this land in the amount of 109,500,000 acres (One Hundred and Nine Million Five Hundred acres). I have also discovered that if I do not find stewards of this land who will support its defenders and advocates, it may be forfeited to the short term considerations of private interest.

Please respond immediately via my private transaction site: https://secure.wilderness.org/site/Donation2;jsessionid=FD1066724859CC6E214A20C14D54F07C.app337b?df_id=12541&12541.donation=form1

You will henceforth stand to share 100% of this land with the collective citizens of United States, for your part in the effort. I will also share 100% of this land with you for my efforts. I believe this is a mutually beneficial and joyous outcome.

I will fill you in with further details upon your swift donation before midnight in eastern coast of United States time zone. Please be informed that confidentiality of this transaction is not necessary.

Yours truly,

https://medium.com/p/544f35965a0d

Not you, though. You understood that people like that would get experimented on or used by the military for the "public good." Or, in the case of ice cream fingers, it would be a curse in disguise.

Here's a good, safe one for you:

The ability to take a longer time reading a really good book, without changing anything about the book or how you read it.

I haven't played a game of League of Legends in something like a month now. The game is still awesome, but I'm just too old. Here's what has been going on with me:

I don't have enough time to make anything of ranked.

I need to be able to pick up and put down a game without affecting other people.

League is hard to play with my kids.

So, while I imagine I will still play Normals with my friends for fun when I have enough spare time, I've been enjoying the hell out of some...

Path of Exile

If you're not familiar with this game, it's basically Diablo or Torchlight II, but with the Final Fantasy XII skill tree on steroids/LSD and a huge amount of freedom to build nearly any character you can imagine. And it has these wonderful characteristics:

Playable in chunks.

Can be played solo or with a group.

That group can include my kids*

I would highly recommend you pick up this game and give it a spin. Just be warned: it's a grind-based game. You don't have to grind to enjoy it, but if you have always hated the grinding aspect of MMOs, avoid this game. It clearly has gear-fetishists and build-perfectionists in mind.

Also, be warned that your first character will probably not work out and need to get thrown away. Don't worry, they are very replaceable. And you start with 24 character slots. It's fun to experiment and the game actually rewards you for trying different things. Just go nuts and enjoy it.

Magic the Gathering

Despite the lack of Magic content here, I haven't quit the game. I've just become a dirty casual player. My format of choice? 93/94. I started a blog on it, which I suggest you read. The tl;dr is that it's pretty much casual Vintage as played in the year 1994. As I get to play more in 2014, two decades later, I'll post articles about key cards, decks, the process of acquiring ancient stuff, etc. For now, I'm the proud owner of a Mox Jet. My first piece of Power!

Last me left... me, I had placed into Silver IV in my first foray into competitive League of Legends. I was unsure whether I'd keep playing this season given that I didn't have enough time to climb out of Silver anyway. Even at 100% win rate. In the end, I decided to see what I could do because the practice would benefit me later on.

I rather quickly lost enough games in a row to drop down to Silver V. I was playing support, my strongest role, and encountered a consistent problem: I could not rely on my team to capitalize on any advantage I provided.

Created a ward advantage and established vision control? No one could roam and the jungler was busy in other lanes (where they had vision of him/her).

Lost vision control due to a better bottom lane opposition? Jungler or mid roams to try to help, gives up a double kill.

Marksman/woman can't last hit and trades poorly? I get kills and end up with ineffective gold due to playing utility champions.

After doing some research, talking to some friends in Gold, Diamond, etc., I came up with a solution!

Don't Play Support!

I know someone has to play support. Just make sure it's not you. The only way out of Bronze/Silver is to train yourself to carry your entire team. Supports cannot do this, currently, due to their gold handicap. At least not reliably. If the team refuses to run a support and you end up duo bot, play a carry champ and quickly determine if your marksman has any hope of carrying you. If not, take over.

So far, I've had my best luck on top lane Nidalee. Bruiser with good damage, sustain in lane, highly mobile, great outplay potential and limited vision without gold invested. I've had some mixed results with Nocturne in the jungle and Varus in the mid and bottom lane. The mixed results mostly owing to a fantastic laning phase with no deaths, possibly some kills, a huge CS lead and then the team shitting the bed in the team fight stage.

My plan now is to continue with Nidalee and try out mixing Ezreal and Zed into my kit. They both seem like skill champs that are forgiving, have good escapes, don't have really bad matchups and can carry and split push like fiends.

Elo Hell is Other People You

That said, I'm definitely not talented enough and consistent enough to climb out. I haven't earned it. Every time I win two games in a row, I lose the next two. Often, I lose one of those games despite winning lane, a positive KDA and completely solid play. My team doesn't play on my level. But I've also learned that the only sensible approach to this situation is to recognize that it's my fault.

In gold and above, every player is there because they can nearly single-handedly defeat a team of silver players. The only people who deserve to be in gold (didn't luck out or buy an account and are stuck in gold V ruining other people's lives) are people who can 1v3 a silver team and come out with a clean triple. Not because you have to be godlike to be in gold. You just have to be the person in silver who is that much better than the other people in silver.

You are everyone else's elo hell unless you can carry your entire team.

But, Season 4?!

Despite this lightning bolt of clarity around my solo queue strategy, I anticipate that Season 4 will make non-utility, carry supports a real possibility. Therefore, I plan to revert to my preferred support role and try to carry from that. If I can have enough gold and items to impact laning and team fights while also having better vision focus than my average opponent, that may be even more advantageous than a snowballing but squishy champ.

Someone invited my smurf account to do 1v1s. Completely shut down Caitlyn, who tried to 2v1 me with Fizz (double kill for me). Caitlyn ragequit. Darius tried to step up, but I dunked him a few times.

I'm looking for more people to duoq with for League of Legends!

My CV:

Primarily play on weekends, due to work/family/girlfriend schedule.

EST (GMT-5)

Placed into Silver IV, currently in Silver V

Decent champ pool, full runes/masteries

IGN: EdgarAllan Throw

Main support, willing to play anything that works

Support comfort champs: Leona, Lulu

ADC comfort champs: Quinn

Mid comfort champs: LeBlanc, Fizz

Jungle comfort champs: Elise, Rammus

Top comfort champs: Nasus, Vladimir

Learning: Riven, Nocturne, Caitlyn

Favorite teams: C9, Coast

What I'm Looking For:

Semi-competitive: it's a game, have fun, but definitely need to be trying to win, improve and gain LP. Target for S4 is *at least* Gold but definitely not high Diamond/Challenger due to real life.

Although best at support, looking for any of these partnerships: support/jungler, support/mid (roaming), adc/mid (roaming), adc/jungler, duo bot. May change w/ Season 4, however.

No casual (or professional?!) racism, homophobia, etc.

Skype preferred, TeamSpeak also an option.

Would consider a team setting, but unlikely to be able to sustain a competitive practice schedule.

I'm trying to get into a soloq/duoq mentality, deprogram my mindset from LCS strategies and learn a few champions that can carry for every role. I've had trouble playing "good champions" that are team-oriented and had trouble carrying from a support role. I would prefer support or at least bot lane or jungling with players in those roles that can coordinate ganks, vision, objectives. In other words, probably not top lane/bot lane duo.

I've been toying with the idea of trying out ranked League of Legends play for a while. No, let me start over.

I've been talking myself out of ranked League of Legends play for a while because I was afraid to see truly bad at the game I am. I conveniently managed to stall until the season was almost over, thereby making it pointless to start until S4.

Then Riot ganked me and extended the season into early November.

I know when I've been outplayed, so I decided this weekend to rip the band-aid off and play my placement series. I planned to duo quo most of it with my friend Jason. However, once I got going, I tunneled a bit and played a majority of the series solo. I wanted to keep going so I had no "got rusty" or "forgot the lessons from yesterday" excuses.

Here's how it went:

Game 1

I end up getting the top lane role. I do not have much experience with top lane or a good bruiser champion pool (more on this later). I decide to play Quinn, on whom I am mechanically comfortable. I end up laning against Darius. I don't have much practice against him, although I know that he is an early burst snowballer. I play quite safe but die twice in lane. I kill him once, but that's to his advantage.

What I should have done, other than skip BoRK and build Bloodthirster, was simply turret farm and only poke him if he missed his hook. That way, he'd have no way to kill me outside of a gank (which I avoided all game by using Quinn's W reveal).

That said, despite the kills, I held the turret and got his down first. Sadly, our other lanes lost and his ult chains rolled all over us for the rest of the game.

Immediate lesson: Respect Darius twice as hard.

Reflective lesson: fix Quinn's item build, don't pick her into unknown top lane.

Game 2

Jinx/Leona bot lane. I feed Jinx a total of five kills in lane, taking one myself and returning zero deaths. We start to get heavy jungler focus along the way, but our jungler counter-ganks. The team surrenders shortly after 20 minutes and a team fight where I get a four-man Sword stun and we clean up. I get big kudos in chat and Jinx calls me pro. Blursh.

Immediate lesson: play more Leona, on whom I am VERY mechanically comfortable.

Game 3

Vayne/Leona bot lane. Vayne misses her first 5 or 6 last hits, takes free harass and charges turrets to her doom. I realize what's going on and start setting myself up to get kills, rather than let her miss them. We lose all three lanes at once, the enemy team starts focusing me at the start of the fight and we get cleaned up after a long game that was close considering we started out 0-3 in outer turrets. The real MVP was their top lane Zed, who outplayed everyone and did the split push thing which was almost impossible to deal with.

Immediate lesson: If the ADC is clearly way outgunned in lane and can't get kills even in favorable situations, consider leaving lane, asking her to ward and turret farm, then focusing mid lane.

Game 4

Thresh is not picked or banned, so I select 100% wifesteal. It's a Thresh/Jinx lane. I get Hook/Flay and Hook/Flay/Box combos on their support over and over, feeding Jinx. She says nice things about me in chat. I die a lot in the late game getting focused in team fights, which Jinx cleans up.

Immediate lesson: if Thresh is open, take Thresh.

Game 5

Another ADC who can't last hit, takes a ton of minion damage by going out of position and generally makes my job impossible. I position poorly in the late game and initiate for a team too scared to fight, which was a bad mistake. I should run away with everyone else. Supporting in my placement series is proving to be kind of obnoxious.

Immediate lesson: the thing I just said, and also try to remember the lesson from game 3, idiot.

Game 6

Thresh gets through again and I have early pick, so I hook him (har har!). Unfortunately, this game my ADC is okay, but their bot lane is quite good. I land a fair few hooks, but we can't do anything them and they disengage well. Their jungler focuses us, our jungler focuses top lane and we end up pretty shut down.

Immediate lesson: this game, Leona would have done a better job of everything I was trying to do with Thresh. Despite the shininess of Thresh's OPness getting through picks and bans, I should have played Leona.

Game 7

Someone calls support, I get stuck with ADC and I go with Quinn. I actually go even in lane kills and outfarm the enemy ADC. However, late game our composition has no CC, theirs has a lot, and I get blown up early in every team fight despite building a Zephyr. As a result, we lose them and lose the game.

Immediate lesson: do not play a short range champion in a game with a huge CC imbalance.

Reflective lesson: BoRK should have been Bloodthirster again. Was a bit too light on raw damage.

Game 8

I am now 2-5 in the series and basically resigned to my Bronze V fate. I get support again and decide to grab Zyra, wanting early damage in case my ADC is sketchy. I'm fairly comfortable with Zyra. She's probably in my top 3 supports behind Leona and Lulu.

I expect a sketchy ADC at 2-5. My ADC is okay, their support is sketchy and we get fed. I sit on Philosopher's Stone, Kage's Lucky Pick, 3 GP/10 Quints and 4 GP/10 Seals for a LONG time. I build mobility and Twin Shadows to counter their AP-heavy comp, with good CDR and we wreck face late game with team fights in which I'm the only death.

Now I'm 3-5. Maybe I can start higher up in Bronze!

Immediate lesson: We're in YOLO mode now, so might as well go for carry supports and just hope the ADC can pull their weight.

Game 9

I get support again and decide to bust out Annie. My ADC runs Ignite, so I run Exhaust and my AP mid runes and masteries. It looks like a kill lane, and we're on blue side with them being late to lane on the leash for their jungler. So I make the executive decision to start Doran's Ring and Potions. I take W first and charge it a few times on the fountain. This is Sparta.

Long story short, I do a bunch of damage, stun the support and ADC several times and feed my ADC. I build another Doran's and Sorceror's Shoes for pure damage. Once I hit six, I bust out a clutch Tibbers and we get a kill and the tower. I use the gold to build Sightstone and transition to a more supporting roaming phase. A few more Tibbers' later and we take out a fast nexus, with my inventory containing an unused Oracle's Elixir.

Immediate lesson: support Annie is the real deal, fun to play and is a strong blue side bully in the early game, controlling the brush without buying wards. I would be more cautious with this approach on purple side, unless the jungler starts red buff.

Game 10

Alright, we're 4-5 and one game left. I really want to win this one and end up with an even score. This would make me feel like a competent player, given that I was in a tough role to carry from for most of my games. I look forward to busting out support Annie again.

Well, shit. Every role gets called except ADC, so I just have to try not to throw. I lock in Quinn, my comfort ADC, and hope I get to play against Vayne or Graves.

As it turns out, I'm facing off against Sivir. My support is decent, although she doesn't ward at all. I have to spend some mana on my W to watch for ganks around level 3 and 4. That said, I out-farm Sivir, never shoot a spell into her spell shield and win the lane despite neither of us getting kills in the bottom lane. We get the turret first. Meanwhile, our mid lane Pantheon snowballs hard. I build BoRK again, sadly, but I use it to peel for Pantheon in the late game. The rest of the time, I split push like a dirty bastard and only die when they send two or more people to deal with me. The split + Mantheon combo is too much and we roll them over.

Alright, 5-5. At least I'm not a loser (strictly speaking). I hit the button over the ruined Nexus to see what Bronze division I will land in. I'm presented on the Victory screen with a nice surprise: Silver IV!

After the series, I reviewed some of my opponent teams and tried to determine how I made the cut into Silver. Here's what I pieced together:

Most of the games I lost appeared to be against higher-ranked teams, overall. Some had multiple silvers, to our bronzes and no-ranks, for example.

It seems as if the matchmaker, around 7 games, figured out the level at which I should probably be playing somewhere in Bronze. Winning three games in a row (in different roles, with different champs?!) at the end of the series probably pushed me a division with each win, from something like Bronze 1 or 2 into Silver country. That seems better than winning in the beginning and losing because the system sees you "where you should be" and then sees you play above that, consistently, for the rest of the series. Going above the bar progressively is less of a fluke than doing well and then falling back over and over, I suppose.

Although I doubt this factors in, my average win times were faster than my average loss times. I feel like this might indicate that I played well consistently, making the wins easier and the losses tougher.

Overall Assessment

1UP 'shrooms:

My focus on vision control was pathological and that made a huge difference in games we won. Several games, I popped a mid game Oracle's only to discover that the enemy team had no wards anywhere.

My support results were heavily dependent on my ADC results. This suggests that duo placement with a competent ADC was probably a plan I should have stuck with through my impatience.

Taking the approach of filling rather than fighting for roles was a good approach. I got to play support most of the time, but whenever someone was more comfortable with that, I trusted myself in a weaker role more than I trusted them and did my best with it.

Wilt 'shrooms:

My ADC champion pool needs a lot of work. I'm mechanically competent on Quinn, but she is not a good pick into an unknown ADC opponent, which came up.

I actually have a top lane pool that is better than Quinn, but I haven't practiced top since it's the most popular lane and I never get that role in normals or ranked. I need to practice top lane in normal 5v5s somehow, so that I'm not the weak link when it does happen. Plan B is to just assume that someone will always want it and never try to get that role. But I'd rather be well-rounded just in case.

Big lessons:

If supporting, play a support on which you can soft-carry.

Vision control is just as OP as it is in competitive play. However, if you only control vision, you can't rely on your team to take advantage of it, so see #1 above.

Stick to your comfortable roles and champs. Games where your team is competent and you are, you will win on a comfort champ, but could lose on a powerful, non-comfort champ. Games where the team is barely competent or barely connected, you'll lose either way.

Getting ahead and then split-pushing with a split-powered champion is a very strong way to secure a game. In the entire series, anyone who could get into split push mode always won without the game being very close. I hope Season 4 does something about this because it's frustrating, boring and non-interactive. That said, might as well use it if it works.

So, What Now?

The season is about three weeks longer. The number of games I would have to play between now and then to even have a shot at climbing into Gold is basically not feasible with my lifestyle (kids, job, girlfriend). Given that there are less than 28 days left, I'm locked into Silver rewards and don't even necessarily need to play ranked anymore this season to maintain that tier.

But I will. Because I want to get better. I enjoyed the competitive environment more than I expected. I'm looking forward to Season 4, with buffs to the support role's gold flow and game impact, and I'd like to try to get into Gold and stay in gold for Season 4. Or go even higher, though I think this would be unlikely with my time constraints.