I think there will be a big difference between Teambuilder and Teambuilder 2.0 which I like to call Rolebuilder.

At first I was hesitant about them allowing people to specialize more with the upcoming Rolebuilder as I considered myself a jack of all trades.  The closer I got to Plat, the more I realized what a crappy Jungler/Mid/Top I was.  So yeah, now I can't wait for the new system.

The current Teambuilder is a bit of a joke to me.  It's for people who want to play troll Supports, have Morde Mirror Matches, and to just fuck around with 'fun mode' games cause of the crazy Teambuilder matchmaking that could pit you against a Bronze Support Poppy or a Challenger Ezreal ADC.  Or on occasion, people use it for its intended purpose of learning a new role or champion.

Getting to Diamond probably takes a lot of hard work and dedication no matter how talented you are.  My point was I doubt those people waste much time in the current Teambuilder.  I don't know many Diamond players but I know I never see Cow in that game mode.

Welp, now I remember why I don't play solo queue at Gold ELO.  It is incredibly unpleasant.

So I got screwed in my promos.  Last season I go 8-2 and go from Gold 1 to Plat 1.  This season I go 8-2 and get demoted from Plat 1 to Gold III.  So that makes sense (its because only the first ~3 games in your promos really matter - the last games just move you up or down a total of a few divisions, but the first few games are MASSIVE).

But jungling in Gold doesn't really matter.  Gold players aren't good enough for it to matter.

The purpose of a jungler is to get your team ahead, then be a tank later in the game.  So you can't really carry.  I get my team ahead every single game, but Gold players are too incompetent for that to matter.  10k golds don't matter in Gold - its literally irrelevant.  All that matters in which team has players who throw less hard late game.

I mean, I lost a game where my team had a 13.5k gold lead and 5 dragons simply because we couldn't figure out how to group despite all my pinging.  People just kept wandering all over the map dying 1 by 1 until only I was left.  The fact that I was 10/4/16 didn't really matter when its 1v5.

Thats the thing - getting your team that 4k gold at 20 minutes or whatever by outplaying their jungle doesn't mean anything.  You win gold games by being the person who does the damage in the fights late game, not by doing stupid stuff like getting teammates ahead and being a tank.  Being a tank is stupid in gold because nobody groups anyway if your team is bad, and if your team is good you will just autowin.

So yeah, I'm done with solo queue.  Its a waste of my time.  I remember why I dont play it.  You have to play hundreds of games to get rid of the randomness in jungle in gold, and I'm not willing to invest that just get a different border.  If I mained a damage dealing class I'm sure I could do it in a lot fewer games.

I think that in gold in jungle you are supposed to just screw your team and build straight deeps (jungle Yi etc).  That way you can actually carry.  Its a terrible strategy with competent players, but Gold players are so bad that its probably what you are supposed to do in jungle.

Mark/Snowball

Mark / Dash is a summoner spell exclusive to the Howling Abyss. It deals 「 (10 + (5 × Champion's Level)) 」true damage, over the next 3 seconds the player may reactivate the spell to dash towards the marked target and deals 「 (10 + (5 ×Champion's Level)) 」 true damage.

Notice how LB, Graves, Jinx, and Blitz were the only ones without true damage.

ah - thx.  Was scratching my head on that one. 

Well the physics GRE is over so I should be around a lot more. It went pretty poorly but I am not entirely sure that that test can go well no matter how prepared you are. Here is hoping for the 40-50 percentile.

@Karl

Vi is a great champ for climbing.  You know how to play Vi.  You could easily just spam Vi games and get Plat.  I'm guessing that instead, you're picking the 'right' champs and builds to fit a teamcomp that would win with good teammates.  While playing with goombas.

Ranked rewards are rewards for playing Ranked and not intended as an accurate measure of skill and ability.  You don't play much ranked so the system is working as intended.  Riot's goal isn't to quickly and efficiently get everyone to their 'correct' League as possible.  The more of us 'grinders' that are out there, the happier they are.

Their only concern on the subject of people at the wrong MMR is for when Diamond players had to start the season in Silver and ruin a bunch of games for people on their way up the ladder.

@Cow

Glad you're done with that nonsense!  I'd love to take you up on your offer to give me some playing tips when I start playing again.  Or just post them here.  I'm always open to criticism. 

@DanKnee

Sound like great choices to get The D.  The Big D.  Diamond, not anything Cow was thinking I meant when I said 'The D!'

Good luck man, you can do it.  You deserve The D.

@Pacov

I'm sure he meant to say Plat V.

Had a really sub par night of gaming last night.  Played solo all night and was pretty much crap.  Even lost an easy win aram by the team suiciding instead of killing a base (which would have been my 1 win of the night).  Some games felt like my reaction time was off and I just played poorly - other games I was spot on and tweaked, but the rest of the team was under performing.  

Still trying to maintain a big focus just on calling out flash timers - still getting better.  I've been getting a lot more games with higher elo players tonight.  I really wish we could see some mmr stats instead of rank tier stats in normals.  There are quite a few people out there that don't play ranked at all or much.  

I do not recommend Bard at lower levels...  He might be okay in gold, but down here in silver, people tend to blow each other's ults up...

Boots are mostly for melee matchups since you get "free" blue cards early game or if you're worried about being ganked early since TF has to push to be aggressive and is SUPER squish. You would probably want to go dorans against mage matchups. The boots aren't really for the level 6 teleport since you'll often be hoom/oom.

If you're thinking about maining TF, I hope that you stick with it long enough to find some success.  He'd be the perfect champion for you.

- TF is a high skill cap champion but it's not completely about mechanics.  You tend to want to try new things all the time so Twisted Fate is someone you could come back to easier than let's say Azir, but would still be fun and rewarding to play.  Wouldn't be like "I haven't played Mid in forever... guess I have to play Annie if I don't want to get beat up."  Not that Ult Gold Carding is easy to do, but it's easier to pull off when you're rusty than The Shurima Shuffle.

- You gravitate to Support because you want to have something important to do for your team and more control of the games outcome besides just winning your lane.  Unfortunately this role tends to have drawbacks that you don't accept, and that leads to you doing things like splitting and using GP/10 Runes to try and get rich playing champions that don't scale well with gold.  You try to have the best of both worlds sometimes and don't always embrace the true spirit of being your team's "Support" unless you're playing with much better players than yourself.

Let me introduce you to TF: The Amazing Teleganking Support Carry!  When you get good enough with him, you can win every lane including your own. You have unmatched map presence and vision control with your Ult so he's a fantastic split pusher.  Even if you don't win early, he still scales pretty damn well. Kinda a U shaped power curve.

-Lotsa skins.  You like to have skin options.

hahah

I skimmed tonight - saw that and I lol'd.  Night bro!