When you talk to people about Bronze, you’re going to get a different response from everyone depending on what kind of person they are. Historians will dote about the importance of The Bronze Age, Beauty Gurus will rave about the perfect tan, and Olympians will tell tales about the glory of a podium finish- but League of Legends players will cringe, remembering the struggles of our game’s most notorious level of ranked play.

Players have forever searched for the secret to breaking free from the chains of Bronze and beginning their journey to becoming the world’s best League player, but fear not! Through this guide we will break down the most important pieces of knowledge you will need to get out of Bronze and get started on your road to bigger and brighter levels of Ranked play.

The Power of Tilt

Attitude is a huge part of playing Ranked in League of Legends. Developing your game-sense is one thing, but understanding your own mentality as you play is something entirely different and is often overlooked by players in lower ranks. So let’s take a look at one of the most important and widely used phrases when we’re talking about player attitude: being tilted.

“Tilt” was originally coined by poker players to describe a state of confusion and frustration that causes a player to adopt a less-than-ideal strategy, usually resulting in the player becoming over-aggressive. Tilting in esports causes players to lose control of their game due to anger that can be drawn from a wide range of sources; their own performance, the attitude and performance of their team and the actions of the enemy team are all examples of these sources.

Dealing with tilt is one of the greatest challenges that League players face. With League games lasting longer than 20 minutes on average and hundreds of player interactions occurring throughout a standard match, there are plenty of opportunities for your tilt to negatively affect your performance and spiral your attitude downwards even further. The simple solution is to stop playing, take some time to refresh, and come back to League with a rejuvenated mindset. However, the harsh reality of tilt is that not every tilted player will react to this situation the same way. To help address this problem, Riot has created a test to identify your “tilt type”.

This tool is uniquely helpful in that it attempts to analyse how you as a player specifically react to certain situations and how you can combat tilt in your own way. By focusing on individual strengths and weaknesses, tilting moments, and strategies to overcome adversity and keep your cool, understanding your tilt type can offer fresh insight into your playstyle and ensure you don’t tilt off the face of Summoner’s Rift.

A No-Brain Main vs. A Versatile Playstyle

One of the strongest pieces of advice that you’ll hear is “practice, practice, practice” when talking about ranking up in League of Legends. This is not untrue. At the end of the day, you’ll only get out what you put in. However, there is a very big difference between worthwhile practice and mindless grinding. Too often you’ll hear about a Mastery Level 7 Sona Support main with 150+ games in Bronze who complains that they’re hardstuck because they’re constantly unlucky or matched with (politely put) bad teammates.

When you queue up for Ranked Solo/Duo, you have the choice of 2 preferred roles to be placed in, unless you happen to be autofilled. Your practice should be directed towards these two roles primarily for ranked. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t play every role, but if you’re looking to break free from the chains of “elo hell” then you should be proficient in at least 2-3 different champions in at least 2 different roles. There’s nothing worse than loading into a game and seeing “Xx0nlyZedxX” give up on the game ahead because the other team banned away his one-trick pony. Don’t be that guy!

The benefits of this kind of focused practice are numerous, but let’s start with the simple ones. A one-trick player is heavily reliant on a positive synergy with their own team by chance, whereas a diverse player with a wider pool of picks can more easily adapt to the other players on their team and play around the picks that already exist. In the same way, a one-trick player is susceptible to counter-picks from the other team more than anyone else. Reluctantly picking a champion is never the way to enter a game. It’s all about confidence, baby.

By playing a wider array of champions, you also get to understand how they work and how to play against them. Your game sense develops more extensively when you learn the intricacies of different champions, making you knowledgeable enough to give effective advice to your teammates if they’re uncertain and take charge of those game-changing plays.

Meta Megamind

Leading on from our discussion of widening your champion pool, you should also make sure you stay up to date with the meta and patch notes; more specifically, the changes that are being made to different champions and how that will affect their performance in game and the overall state of the Rift. As an example, Patch 9.17 made some pretty serious changes to Aurelion Sol and, with Patch 9.18 giving him extra base health to play around with in lane, there is no question as to why we’re seeing The Star Forger more frequently in game.

This creates a flow-on effect in both the Mid Lane and Summoner’s Rift as a whole, as players will more frequently be playing champions that counter Aurelion Sol (providing he isn’t banned due to popularity/newfound strength) and building items to prevent him from stomping each and every one of his games. Being clued in on recent changes to the game can have huge in-game and out-of-game benefits for the player, as they are more aware of potential threats from enemies “playing the meta” and how best to counter this behaviour.

Top Tips for In-Game Greatness

Now we’re going to take a look at the most game-defining part of grinding Ranked in League of Legends - actually playing the game. Astonishing, I know, but this is what makes LoL so exciting, as you could follow the rest of this guide to the letter and still end up walking away with a crushing defeat if you can’t perform in game. Breaking away from the styles of play that typically characterise Bronze elo is the most important step in the process of climbing the ranks, so we’ll split this final chapter into 3 parts for you to focus on:

1. Creep Score > Kills

Playing in Bronze will, more often than not, feel a little hectic. Getting kills in League of Legends is fun and many inexperienced players will tunnel their focus on getting into fights in their games at the expense of farming out their lanes. This actually works against the bloodthirsty player, as the humble farmer accrues more gold per minute by killing minions than others will by killing enemies. Changing your perspective here will make a huge difference and is one of the biggest changes you can make in your games, as many Bronze players will load into the Rift expecting an absolute fiesta every time.

As funny as Darius looks with a sombrero on, games like these are very erratic and will be much less consistent than games where you can farm up and close out games after you’ve strengthened your economy in a more strategic manner. Instead of valuing kills above everything else, picture kills as the means to dominate other areas of the Rift as well, by taking down a few tower plates in your enemies’ absence or farming up a huge minion wave in peace.

To learn more about CS in League of Legends and to hone your craft as a farming machine, check out my previous CS Guide here.

2. Playing Safely

Tying in with the discussion of kills, we’re going to focus on the phrase “better safe than sorry”. Sure, kill timers in the early game might not feel very long, but every second counts in a game where you want to take any advantage you can. In lane, there are a huge number of potential threats that you should not only consider, but play around in order to give yourself the best chance of both surviving and punishing your opponents when they forget to take the same precautions.

Always ward the river! You have a trinket for a reason and gaining a vision advantage in the early game allows you to call the shots as to how your lane will play out- for junglers, controlling the Scuttle Crabs means controlling the flow of the game for you too. This simultaneously allows you to identify potential threats and cause some trouble of your own; if your top laner throws down a ward in the river and catches the enemy jungler lurking up there, your own jungler can respond by ganking bot lane as they don’t have to worry about a counter-gank.

Tower-diving is another high-risk play that many people in lower elos will attempt, often unsuccessfully. Many players will forget how much a tower can hurt and if you’re trying to dive an enemy with any kind of mobility (Tristana’s Rocket Jump) or survivability (e.g. Vladimir’s Sanguine Pool), you’re likely to come off second best. Instead of diving to thirst after a kill, let them Recall so that you can either farm the wave or pressure an objective, which leads nicely into our next point.

3. Chasing Early Objectives

What's scarier, a team with a 6/0 Zed at 25 minutes, or a team that has slayed 3 Infernal Drakes? What about a team that just 5-man ganked bot for a kill on the enemy support, versus the team that just took down the Rift Herald as a response? In both of these examples, the team that has a stronger focus on objectives is the one that’s coming out ahead, as the objectives on Summoner’s Rift are scarce and invaluable to any player. This doesn’t mean try and sneak a cheeky Baron kill while your Nexus is being sieged, but prioritising objectives across the map is more useful than kills in nearly every scenario.

If a team is being killed by the enemy team repeatedly in the early game, their immediate focus should turn to securing Dragon Buffs. The regeneration of the Ocean Drake, objective damage of the Mountain Drake, the movement speed of the Cloud Drake, and the raw power of the Infernal Drake scale fantastically into the late game when every second counts, and will matter even more if they can be empowered by the all-important Elder Drake. Many low-elo teams throw games by dominating the early game in kills and disregarding these vital objectives, allowing the enemy team to find a way back in if they can keep them at bay for long enough.

In the top river, the Rift Herald has the potential to cement a lead or spark a comeback by sieging towers with lethal efficiency. If the Herald can be taken and used while tower plates are still up, that extra gold will go straight into the pockets of the team that prioritised this objective ahead of starting up a fiesta.

Combining all of these tips and tricks will allow any player to increase their chances of taking out a win on the rift and climb the Ranks in League of Legends. But the benefits of these strategies do not end here, as they can and will be beneficial in higher elos as well! That, however, is a guide for another day, but until then I hope that you can find some clarity in this guide about how you can Break Bronze over the course of your next games. GLHF!

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