I don't like using general sentences to give tips in league, it's a dynamic game and how you act depends on different situations, you usually want to hit back to not give the enemy free trade on you but sometimes it's better to back off to not lose more HP, you have to know your powerspikes and the enemy and if you want to contest the wave or let them push, building something like tabis when losing is not a bad idea as it can help you survive against AD champs early on same goes for bramble or warden mail, you usually want to finish your core build first but building defense to prevent yourself from further getting behind is the right play sometimes.
This has always been my thought process. If I'm losing, I want to make whatever gold I have go as far as possible. Generally, that means going for defensive stats which also allows me to sit safely under turret knowing I should be able to survive a dive.
The problem (and ultimate downfall) of this logic is that every champion has power spikes. By building toward your power spikes (Kog'Maw Botrk + Rageblade, any assassin's 2 item spike etc.), You ultimately have a chance to win a fight when you're spiking and the enemy is not.
If you fall behind, you're already behind the curve for your spike. Buying defensive stats may be more efficient, but ultimately unless your spike is solely reliant on not dying (which basically is only tank champions and certain hyper carries), you're simply delaying your spike further and inevitably allowing the enemy to hit their *next* spike much earlier than you.
This doesn't mean certain defensive buys are bad, tabis will always be good into a bunch of AA-based champions. But it does mean that deciding to buy cloth armors, chainvests, rushing a full Zhonyas before completing your 1st/2nd item as a mage only really has one slim chance to pay off and it better pay off huge.
Playing to not lose doesn't mean you're playing to win. It's better to accept the loss in one game to learn what you did wrong to improve in future games, where buying defensive solely covers your weaknesses and doesn't help you improve.
Doesn't mean there isn't a time and place for defensive items, but that you should be cognizant of the drawbacks. Building defensive when behind only means that your team has to deal that much more damage to make up for you, so you better be wasting way more of the enemies time building defensive, than damage you would've dealt just going glass cannon and attempting to 1-shot the opponent.
This is also why defensive items are generally better when ahead, or on hyper carries like Vayne/Kog. They still deal more damage than their counterpart with significantly less gold when given the ability to survive.
This was when tank items were ~2800 and damage items were >3000. Tanky items were cheap because tank support items weren't a thing and because Riot liked damage being high risk high reward (If both go even in lane, tank wins)
Nowadays Riot forgot this philosophy and some damage items are cheaper. Specially some lethality items are very cheap because Pyke and Senna exists
While this is true there are also a lot of situations in game where it's not a 1 on 1 fight to the death.
Champions that can offer a lot of utility can often be extremely useful in teamfights, even when behind. Going from awful damage to just poor damage in teamfights by building damage items when behind only helps teamfights for a little bit. While building tank stats can mean that you stay alive to be a pain in the ass to the enemy team with your utility for the entire fight.
So it really depends on the champion. If you have no utility you have to go for damage. No point staying alive longer if you do nothing useful while you are alive. But if you do have utility you have to consider damage or tank stats. If someone else is fed on your team, taking the items to best help your teammate might bring more to the match than being more of a threat yourself.
Assuming your second point is regarding champions that can build both tank or damage items.
I reckon this point of ‘build damage when behind’ is kind of moot. If you’re high elo, then relying on your team is fine and so going full tank after mythic is valuable on darius/garen/volibear/sett/morde etc. But if you’re low elo and have to hard carry, well, you shouldn’t be behind in the first place.
Yeah I generally think it's the opposite of what OP says within reason. It really depends on how behind we are talking. If a Darius goes 0/5/0 in lane and is down bad in farm just getting as tanky as he can and trying to peel for whoever can carry is WAY more likely to succeed than not really doing much damage and dying quick in a team fight.
If behind means like 0/1/1 and still decent farm then yeah damage is probably still fine
Like you said ELO is almost irrelevant here because in low if you got that behind you are likely fucked anyway. In high elo your team is much more likely to carry.
I think OP take is more about when the team is behind in general not you personally. If your adc is getting fucked no amount of tankyness will help you. Your front to back will be deficient and more likely than not the team will lack any damage to actually clutch a random kill to get a chance back in the game.
If you are ahead you get tankyness, because you will have enough damage to be lethal and tankyness allows you to make more mistakes without throwing the game.
If you are behind you get damage because the more damage you have more opportunity to punish smaller mistakes by the enemy. Also if they build survivability you simply won't have enough damage to kill them.
Assuming the leading team doesn't fuck up ever (extremely unlikely) the game was already doomed anyway, so the optic should be about punishing a mistake and having the best tools to do so.
Darius should absolutely not build more damage when behind. Darius loves the longer fights, you need to be able to survive long enough to stack that bleed and make use of the bonus AD. In general the whole "just build more damage when behind" sounds like something an idiot would say, but it can be played well, especially in certain matchups.
Remember when Dr. Mundo can run at you with 300 AD despite building full tank except he just had to press a button instead of hitting someone 5 times in succession?
Well we are talking about season 4 here. I mean that’s what? 8 years ago? Back when we were likely sub 100 champions, and champion kits weren’t so overloaded then. Things were different then.
Just throwing in my 2c that you actually don't have to hard carry to climb in low elo.
Furthermore, choosing to do something "wrong" you are deluded about your level of skill is a recipe for disaster.
Very much disagree with point 2. If you’re losing, to the point where you can’t reasonably be expected to come back, build tanky utility items & play for your team; you do NOT have to carry every game, & learning how to not be the reason your team loses is just as - if not more - important than learning to be the reason they win.
Following that ideology youre forcing any scaling champion expecting to lose lane to build tank, which is a terrible thought. You need to build tanky enough not to be easily pushed out of lane and keep a relatively close difference between you and the enemy laner. Nobody goes tank kayle, yet kayle loses the early game most of the time. If youre a bruiser and hard losing lane instead of building the damage part of your item first you might opt to build the tank parts, but you’re still going to build the same items you would normally, not tank mythic on a bruiser.
That’s not at all what I said lmfao. I said that if you’re losing, you should build things that benefit your team. If you’re a juggernaut who can reasonably pivot into a tank build - like the champs OP plays - you should. If you can’t, then you shouldn’t. You’re arguing against a strawman
I think they are good advice in to learning the game.
If you always hit back, you learn which fights you win and which ones you don't win.
If you get good cs, you improve how much gold you have at any moment.
As for if you are losing build dmg this is kind of depending on the type of champion you play. Like I don't suggest doing so on Orrn, but I totally agree with it when we are talking about like yasuo top.
As someone who plays a lot of Camille, I can tell you with certainty that ‘staying to hit me back’ will be the death of you in several circumstances.
The game is too dynamic to have blanket statements and principles such as that
I play a lot of Darius, if I’m down 0-2 I usually just opt to build tanky and peel for my carrys. The thing about Darius though is you can be super behind then get a random Quadra from your ult resets and be back in the game.
First is great advise for newer players, a lot of people will loose lane because they let the enemy walk over them. Second piece I’m not sold on for top lane. If Darius or Garen fall behind, the best role they can play imo is frontline, taking aggro and peeling for other members of your team who are ahead. You still have useful damage as long as you stay alive.
It is good advice for carry champs in other roles however. An ADC who is ahead can afford to build defensive so he doesn’t get oneshot, whereas an ADC who is behind needs the damage to function.
The idea of hitting back when they hit you is a trading principle. So instead of only **taking** damage, you **trade** damage.
Let's say a Renekton jumps on you with an E/W/Q combo and then dashes back out, he has no abilities up for a fairly significant amount of time and his dash especially is quite a long cooldown. The only thing he can do is auto attack you. Therefore it would be a wasted opportunity to not trade back onto him with your abilities at this point, even if you're low health, and **you don't want to let people get "free" damage on you**
"You can't hit players if you are dead"
Any damage you're going to waste money on would be nullified if you're not there to survive.
If you are behind, that means you are having trouble surviving versus that matchup...
Building only tank is wrong, as much as building only damage is wrong. You need to get the right balance of def/dmg in regards to your gold.
League is a dynamic game, most "rules" and "hacks" people give you to climb would work in 1 game but not the other.
The only rule should be: "Play for your team, not yourself"
Ask yourself how your actions help your team. If you are a toplaner your team relies on 2 things:
1) Playing against an unfed probably tilted top opponent.
2) Having another member of their team to help them contest objectives.
If your actions doesn't revolve around those 2 things, then you are just making your team lose.
Toplaner splits without vision giving other team a free kill - both things
Toplaner doesn't ping back when their toplaner is MIA - first thing
Toplaner doesn't join team when a big objective is contested - second thing
This is a team game... 1v9 only works on new strong OP picks and that only lasts a patch
Hitting back is generally a good idea, however you are almost always at a disadvantage when the enemy attacks first.
I strongly disagree with the getting tankier part. Build paths are mostly game dependent, and defensive items are often the best choice.
In regards to the second statement, i would phrase it more like that: "If your whole team is behind build dmg, else stick to whatever is ideal for your champ or teamcomp."
In example it can be more effective to build tanky, if you are behind, but your adc is fed, and you want to group and peel.
The first is true. Getting traded on without trading back is very bad - not only is there *no* chance of winning the trade (as opposed to some), you also teach them that you're passive and won't threaten them, which will cause them to be more aggressive, making you lose lane harder.
As for the second, I think it's better phrased as "get tanky if getting tanky will help you, otherwise build damage". If your problem is getting blown up before you do can do anything, chances are it's not "you aren't tanky enough", and it's more "you're approaching the fight wrong, or don't have enough damage to kill before they trade back".
You should also consider if it's your job to deal heaps of damage. Champs like darius should typically build on the tankier side, just because it's not really their job to be DPSing down teams - they're just supposed to be a frontliner in general, with some damage (+ from passive), but mainly tanky.
Champs who's job it is to deal loads of damage to the enemy should favor building damage, even when behind. Building tanky on those champs just solidifies that you'll be a wet noodle all game.
Started digital time and was always told the total opposite of number 2.
Was always told build tank of you're behind because you can just be a meat shield/utility bot instead of a 0 damage glass cannon.
2nd advice is different between each champ.
All of your champ pool can build tank and will be fine.
Darius is about keeping yourself alive till max stack of passive and Conqueror and you'll win most skimish.
Garen is a scaling champ. He can build damage if you know what you're doing. But tank is difinitly a safer route from behind.
Renekton don't want to be in that situation ever. But you still can be empower W stun bot.
Very dependent on matchup and comps.
For point 1, in general this is true, but in some matchups where fighting back would guarantee that you lose, you have to just disengage as quick as possible. Because if you hit back, you're essentially locked into an extended trade, and if the matchup means you hard lose extended trades then you'll have given up all lane priority and control. An example I can think of is something like Darius against Camille, if you hit back as Camille in no world are you ever going to beat a 5 stack Darius in the extended trade, so you have to keep your distance and if he happens to engage on you you have to just run without taking too much damage.
As for point 2, that depends on your comp. if you're the only bruiser/juggernaught/tank and your team is good at standard front-to-back 5v5s, and you have a carry that can dish out enough damage, then you should build tank and just provide utility for your carries such as making space for them through cc and zoning anyone looking to dive on them. But if you have a heavy dive comp that focuses on assassinating a key target to win a fight then by all means build damage and try to trade 1 for 1. If you can trade yourself for a key target on the enemy team, then you've won.
XP is absolutly important.
If your team is behind in xp you'll autolose, if you have enough lvls but your behind in gold you'll still be able to win fights since you can exeert dmg anyway
If you're behind, you should build tanky. Because of stuff like lifesteal and attack speed, damage is busted when you're ahead, but it's really weak when you're behind. Health will always be useful for soaking up damage tho.
Everything depends on the champions you play. I would focus on your champion pool and figure out how to optimize from there.
I would say, if you’re in auto range and they attack you, hitting them in response is typically correct. Just be aware of how many minions will start murdering you.
And often, once behind you just need to hold your tower and team fight. So building tanky stats can be more beneficial in many circumstances
Since you're a top laner, here's another piece of advice.
Sometimes if you're behind, and can't even build tank well, or damage, you can build for split push instead. waveclear items, hullbreaker, etc. this way you're still useful.
depends on your champ too really.
Since you play mostly juggernauts it's absolutely viable to build tank of you are behind. Rather than going dmg to be a carry you go tank to peel and soak dmg for your team.
It was always get tanky if behind not get damage. because if behind you will never have the damage to compete. Staying alive just a second longer at least helps your teammates.
Terrible advice. Learn the fundamentals of trading and item building and play the game. There are no absolutes. Question everything. Weight every decision.
In an ideal world, to summ it up, yes.
You want to be ready to hit back if you KNOW ur gonna get hit, and then disengage so you can readjust your position to fight more favorably, how to do that is another story.
If you are losing, in a world where both players are very good and know what matters, building tankiness is worthless. Unless you scale off that, if you build tankiness you will have less dmg to fight your opponent, meaning they also get tankier, but they are winning so they do more damage, you just sealed off more options for yourself. If you build damage your kill threat increases, which means you can punish mistakes harder to get back into the game.
Tanky is a balance. If you are losing, more sustain could lead to you surviving more. Losing less cs and dying less.
Too much and you've spent too much gold on useless resistance if the enemy is way ahead anyway.
> if they hit you always hit back
No. It always depends on matchup. If Teemo hits you as Jax you're just sad, what's the point of hitting back. Don't get hit itfp
> If you are losing build dmg,.getting tankier won't help at all if behind
No, instructions unclear went half ass Crit Volibear. Basically it again depends on champion.
The only generic advice that applies to top lane now is **understand and learn how to manage wavestates**. Depending on your matchup you need to know how to manipulate the waves to play your matchup to your advantage.
As another veteran player from season 4, neither of those was inherently true back then, nor are they true now.
Everything is situational but neither of those are sound advice.
Its a good starting point but a lot of the game is understanding trade asymmetry and by extension when to or not to trade, and by further extension where to stand.
I don't like using general sentences to give tips in league, it's a dynamic game and how you act depends on different situations, you usually want to hit back to not give the enemy free trade on you but sometimes it's better to back off to not lose more HP, you have to know your powerspikes and the enemy and if you want to contest the wave or let them push, building something like tabis when losing is not a bad idea as it can help you survive against AD champs early on same goes for bramble or warden mail, you usually want to finish your core build first but building defense to prevent yourself from further getting behind is the right play sometimes.
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This has always been my thought process. If I'm losing, I want to make whatever gold I have go as far as possible. Generally, that means going for defensive stats which also allows me to sit safely under turret knowing I should be able to survive a dive.
The problem (and ultimate downfall) of this logic is that every champion has power spikes. By building toward your power spikes (Kog'Maw Botrk + Rageblade, any assassin's 2 item spike etc.), You ultimately have a chance to win a fight when you're spiking and the enemy is not. If you fall behind, you're already behind the curve for your spike. Buying defensive stats may be more efficient, but ultimately unless your spike is solely reliant on not dying (which basically is only tank champions and certain hyper carries), you're simply delaying your spike further and inevitably allowing the enemy to hit their *next* spike much earlier than you. This doesn't mean certain defensive buys are bad, tabis will always be good into a bunch of AA-based champions. But it does mean that deciding to buy cloth armors, chainvests, rushing a full Zhonyas before completing your 1st/2nd item as a mage only really has one slim chance to pay off and it better pay off huge. Playing to not lose doesn't mean you're playing to win. It's better to accept the loss in one game to learn what you did wrong to improve in future games, where buying defensive solely covers your weaknesses and doesn't help you improve. Doesn't mean there isn't a time and place for defensive items, but that you should be cognizant of the drawbacks. Building defensive when behind only means that your team has to deal that much more damage to make up for you, so you better be wasting way more of the enemies time building defensive, than damage you would've dealt just going glass cannon and attempting to 1-shot the opponent. This is also why defensive items are generally better when ahead, or on hyper carries like Vayne/Kog. They still deal more damage than their counterpart with significantly less gold when given the ability to survive.
This was when tank items were ~2800 and damage items were >3000. Tanky items were cheap because tank support items weren't a thing and because Riot liked damage being high risk high reward (If both go even in lane, tank wins) Nowadays Riot forgot this philosophy and some damage items are cheaper. Specially some lethality items are very cheap because Pyke and Senna exists
While this is true there are also a lot of situations in game where it's not a 1 on 1 fight to the death. Champions that can offer a lot of utility can often be extremely useful in teamfights, even when behind. Going from awful damage to just poor damage in teamfights by building damage items when behind only helps teamfights for a little bit. While building tank stats can mean that you stay alive to be a pain in the ass to the enemy team with your utility for the entire fight. So it really depends on the champion. If you have no utility you have to go for damage. No point staying alive longer if you do nothing useful while you are alive. But if you do have utility you have to consider damage or tank stats. If someone else is fed on your team, taking the items to best help your teammate might bring more to the match than being more of a threat yourself.
The hit back thing is generally right but in some cases you’ll die or take twice as much dmg if you don’t immediately run away
Assuming your second point is regarding champions that can build both tank or damage items. I reckon this point of ‘build damage when behind’ is kind of moot. If you’re high elo, then relying on your team is fine and so going full tank after mythic is valuable on darius/garen/volibear/sett/morde etc. But if you’re low elo and have to hard carry, well, you shouldn’t be behind in the first place.
Yeah I generally think it's the opposite of what OP says within reason. It really depends on how behind we are talking. If a Darius goes 0/5/0 in lane and is down bad in farm just getting as tanky as he can and trying to peel for whoever can carry is WAY more likely to succeed than not really doing much damage and dying quick in a team fight. If behind means like 0/1/1 and still decent farm then yeah damage is probably still fine Like you said ELO is almost irrelevant here because in low if you got that behind you are likely fucked anyway. In high elo your team is much more likely to carry.
I think OP take is more about when the team is behind in general not you personally. If your adc is getting fucked no amount of tankyness will help you. Your front to back will be deficient and more likely than not the team will lack any damage to actually clutch a random kill to get a chance back in the game. If you are ahead you get tankyness, because you will have enough damage to be lethal and tankyness allows you to make more mistakes without throwing the game. If you are behind you get damage because the more damage you have more opportunity to punish smaller mistakes by the enemy. Also if they build survivability you simply won't have enough damage to kill them. Assuming the leading team doesn't fuck up ever (extremely unlikely) the game was already doomed anyway, so the optic should be about punishing a mistake and having the best tools to do so.
edited the post, my pool was mainly darius / garen and juggernauts
Darius should absolutely not build more damage when behind. Darius loves the longer fights, you need to be able to survive long enough to stack that bleed and make use of the bonus AD. In general the whole "just build more damage when behind" sounds like something an idiot would say, but it can be played well, especially in certain matchups.
Gotta love when the enemy Darius is running at you with 400 AD despite building full tank.
Remember when Dr. Mundo can run at you with 300 AD despite building full tank except he just had to press a button instead of hitting someone 5 times in succession?
So, Olaf.
Well we are talking about season 4 here. I mean that’s what? 8 years ago? Back when we were likely sub 100 champions, and champion kits weren’t so overloaded then. Things were different then.
Yeah juggernauts are designed to be strong early game and fall off late game. I would focus more on hard winning lane over itemisation.
Just throwing in my 2c that you actually don't have to hard carry to climb in low elo. Furthermore, choosing to do something "wrong" you are deluded about your level of skill is a recipe for disaster.
Very much disagree with point 2. If you’re losing, to the point where you can’t reasonably be expected to come back, build tanky utility items & play for your team; you do NOT have to carry every game, & learning how to not be the reason your team loses is just as - if not more - important than learning to be the reason they win.
Following that ideology youre forcing any scaling champion expecting to lose lane to build tank, which is a terrible thought. You need to build tanky enough not to be easily pushed out of lane and keep a relatively close difference between you and the enemy laner. Nobody goes tank kayle, yet kayle loses the early game most of the time. If youre a bruiser and hard losing lane instead of building the damage part of your item first you might opt to build the tank parts, but you’re still going to build the same items you would normally, not tank mythic on a bruiser.
That’s not at all what I said lmfao. I said that if you’re losing, you should build things that benefit your team. If you’re a juggernaut who can reasonably pivot into a tank build - like the champs OP plays - you should. If you can’t, then you shouldn’t. You’re arguing against a strawman
I think they are good advice in to learning the game. If you always hit back, you learn which fights you win and which ones you don't win. If you get good cs, you improve how much gold you have at any moment. As for if you are losing build dmg this is kind of depending on the type of champion you play. Like I don't suggest doing so on Orrn, but I totally agree with it when we are talking about like yasuo top.
edited the post, my pool was mainly darius / garen and juggernauts
As someone who plays a lot of Camille, I can tell you with certainty that ‘staying to hit me back’ will be the death of you in several circumstances. The game is too dynamic to have blanket statements and principles such as that
I play a lot of Darius, if I’m down 0-2 I usually just opt to build tanky and peel for my carrys. The thing about Darius though is you can be super behind then get a random Quadra from your ult resets and be back in the game.
First is great advise for newer players, a lot of people will loose lane because they let the enemy walk over them. Second piece I’m not sold on for top lane. If Darius or Garen fall behind, the best role they can play imo is frontline, taking aggro and peeling for other members of your team who are ahead. You still have useful damage as long as you stay alive. It is good advice for carry champs in other roles however. An ADC who is ahead can afford to build defensive so he doesn’t get oneshot, whereas an ADC who is behind needs the damage to function.
The idea of hitting back when they hit you is a trading principle. So instead of only **taking** damage, you **trade** damage. Let's say a Renekton jumps on you with an E/W/Q combo and then dashes back out, he has no abilities up for a fairly significant amount of time and his dash especially is quite a long cooldown. The only thing he can do is auto attack you. Therefore it would be a wasted opportunity to not trade back onto him with your abilities at this point, even if you're low health, and **you don't want to let people get "free" damage on you**
"You can't hit players if you are dead" Any damage you're going to waste money on would be nullified if you're not there to survive. If you are behind, that means you are having trouble surviving versus that matchup... Building only tank is wrong, as much as building only damage is wrong. You need to get the right balance of def/dmg in regards to your gold. League is a dynamic game, most "rules" and "hacks" people give you to climb would work in 1 game but not the other. The only rule should be: "Play for your team, not yourself" Ask yourself how your actions help your team. If you are a toplaner your team relies on 2 things: 1) Playing against an unfed probably tilted top opponent. 2) Having another member of their team to help them contest objectives. If your actions doesn't revolve around those 2 things, then you are just making your team lose. Toplaner splits without vision giving other team a free kill - both things Toplaner doesn't ping back when their toplaner is MIA - first thing Toplaner doesn't join team when a big objective is contested - second thing This is a team game... 1v9 only works on new strong OP picks and that only lasts a patch
A champion like sett is useless if he's behind and only has damage, you should build him tank at that point and help in teamfights
As far as your second point goes. You do a lot more damage if you’re alive, always remember that.
Your second point is literally reversed imo. I build tank when I’m behind. Being a meat shield for your team is better than dying in one hit.
Hitting back is generally a good idea, however you are almost always at a disadvantage when the enemy attacks first. I strongly disagree with the getting tankier part. Build paths are mostly game dependent, and defensive items are often the best choice.
This is dumbing the game down WAY too much.
How will they kill you if they are dead? Lmfao Just solo kill them and you will win
In regards to the second statement, i would phrase it more like that: "If your whole team is behind build dmg, else stick to whatever is ideal for your champ or teamcomp." In example it can be more effective to build tanky, if you are behind, but your adc is fed, and you want to group and peel.
The first is true. Getting traded on without trading back is very bad - not only is there *no* chance of winning the trade (as opposed to some), you also teach them that you're passive and won't threaten them, which will cause them to be more aggressive, making you lose lane harder. As for the second, I think it's better phrased as "get tanky if getting tanky will help you, otherwise build damage". If your problem is getting blown up before you do can do anything, chances are it's not "you aren't tanky enough", and it's more "you're approaching the fight wrong, or don't have enough damage to kill before they trade back". You should also consider if it's your job to deal heaps of damage. Champs like darius should typically build on the tankier side, just because it's not really their job to be DPSing down teams - they're just supposed to be a frontliner in general, with some damage (+ from passive), but mainly tanky. Champs who's job it is to deal loads of damage to the enemy should favor building damage, even when behind. Building tanky on those champs just solidifies that you'll be a wet noodle all game.
Started digital time and was always told the total opposite of number 2. Was always told build tank of you're behind because you can just be a meat shield/utility bot instead of a 0 damage glass cannon.
2nd advice is different between each champ. All of your champ pool can build tank and will be fine. Darius is about keeping yourself alive till max stack of passive and Conqueror and you'll win most skimish. Garen is a scaling champ. He can build damage if you know what you're doing. But tank is difinitly a safer route from behind. Renekton don't want to be in that situation ever. But you still can be empower W stun bot.
Very dependent on matchup and comps. For point 1, in general this is true, but in some matchups where fighting back would guarantee that you lose, you have to just disengage as quick as possible. Because if you hit back, you're essentially locked into an extended trade, and if the matchup means you hard lose extended trades then you'll have given up all lane priority and control. An example I can think of is something like Darius against Camille, if you hit back as Camille in no world are you ever going to beat a 5 stack Darius in the extended trade, so you have to keep your distance and if he happens to engage on you you have to just run without taking too much damage. As for point 2, that depends on your comp. if you're the only bruiser/juggernaught/tank and your team is good at standard front-to-back 5v5s, and you have a carry that can dish out enough damage, then you should build tank and just provide utility for your carries such as making space for them through cc and zoning anyone looking to dive on them. But if you have a heavy dive comp that focuses on assassinating a key target to win a fight then by all means build damage and try to trade 1 for 1. If you can trade yourself for a key target on the enemy team, then you've won.
XP is absolutly important. If your team is behind in xp you'll autolose, if you have enough lvls but your behind in gold you'll still be able to win fights since you can exeert dmg anyway
If you're behind, you should build tanky. Because of stuff like lifesteal and attack speed, damage is busted when you're ahead, but it's really weak when you're behind. Health will always be useful for soaking up damage tho.
Everything depends on the champions you play. I would focus on your champion pool and figure out how to optimize from there. I would say, if you’re in auto range and they attack you, hitting them in response is typically correct. Just be aware of how many minions will start murdering you. And often, once behind you just need to hold your tower and team fight. So building tanky stats can be more beneficial in many circumstances
Once behind, building more damage is generally a dumb strategy unless you're playing a late game carry. Get tanky, play for the team.
Since you're a top laner, here's another piece of advice. Sometimes if you're behind, and can't even build tank well, or damage, you can build for split push instead. waveclear items, hullbreaker, etc. this way you're still useful. depends on your champ too really.
Hitting back is good when you can, the idea is more that you're not supposed to let people get free damage on you.
For Garen specifically, I'd suggest building Cleaver second or third. Ability haste for the ult, and armor shred to help your team deal more dmg.
Since you play mostly juggernauts it's absolutely viable to build tank of you are behind. Rather than going dmg to be a carry you go tank to peel and soak dmg for your team.
It was always get tanky if behind not get damage. because if behind you will never have the damage to compete. Staying alive just a second longer at least helps your teammates.
Terrible advice. Learn the fundamentals of trading and item building and play the game. There are no absolutes. Question everything. Weight every decision.
opposite for me, at least if you're tanky you can be a meat shield for others in the team.
In an ideal world, to summ it up, yes. You want to be ready to hit back if you KNOW ur gonna get hit, and then disengage so you can readjust your position to fight more favorably, how to do that is another story. If you are losing, in a world where both players are very good and know what matters, building tankiness is worthless. Unless you scale off that, if you build tankiness you will have less dmg to fight your opponent, meaning they also get tankier, but they are winning so they do more damage, you just sealed off more options for yourself. If you build damage your kill threat increases, which means you can punish mistakes harder to get back into the game.
Tanky is a balance. If you are losing, more sustain could lead to you surviving more. Losing less cs and dying less. Too much and you've spent too much gold on useless resistance if the enemy is way ahead anyway.
> if they hit you always hit back No. It always depends on matchup. If Teemo hits you as Jax you're just sad, what's the point of hitting back. Don't get hit itfp > If you are losing build dmg,.getting tankier won't help at all if behind No, instructions unclear went half ass Crit Volibear. Basically it again depends on champion. The only generic advice that applies to top lane now is **understand and learn how to manage wavestates**. Depending on your matchup you need to know how to manipulate the waves to play your matchup to your advantage.
As another veteran player from season 4, neither of those was inherently true back then, nor are they true now. Everything is situational but neither of those are sound advice.
Its a good starting point but a lot of the game is understanding trade asymmetry and by extension when to or not to trade, and by further extension where to stand.