midlane - J2Woo (NA) - /u/hachimitsufan
Range Classes
Low Range
Vs: Freeze wave near tower to prevent them from farming without taking harass
As: Freeze wave near tower so you can farm without taking harass
Mid Range
As: Try to keep wave in the middle of the lane so you can harass / avoid ganks while farming
Vs: (As short range) - try to freeze near tower and zone them off the wave, (As long range) - push the wave to their tower so you can harass without taking harass back
Long Range
Vs: Push the wave so they have to use their spells to waveclear instead of harassing you
As: Push the wave to the enemy tower so you can harass / poke without retaliation
Damage Type
AP Mids
Vs: Early banshees or hexdrinker rush can turn a bad matchup into a farm lane
As: Deathcap is overrated, always go void before dcap unless you're playing utility scaling mid (Ori / Lulu (why?)). Void gives more damage even with just base mr
AD Mids
Vs: Seeker's armguard p good to buy early if hard lane
As: If vs AP, can go early hexdrinker
Try not to pick an AD mid if your jungler + top are AD as well - enemy team can just stack armor
Macro
Warding
If you know where enemy jungler started, push first two waves (if possible) and ward their second buff to gain vision
Vs Junglers like Shaco, Eve, Zac, ward raptors or middle of river to avoid ganks
When important objectives are coming up, consider buying more than 1 control ward so you can place another even if a current one is cleared
If enemy jungler can cross walls, ward raptors if you're pushed out
Roaming
You're stronger than other mid
Constantly shove lane and look for opportunities to roam
If enemy mid tries to follow, can try to wait for them in fog and turn on them
Ward river / enemy jungle aggressively to make picks
Force trades, push lane, and secure honeyfruit in river
You're weaker than other mid
Ward river / your jungle defensively to watch for enemy roams / invades
Freeze wave near tower and wait till enemy mid shows on map before pushing back out to follow
If trying to follow enemy assassin roam, care that they don't just turn on you, oftentimes will mean you show up to a fight late, but better than dying for nothing
Early roams can be effective, especially against mids with low early waveclear (kassadin)
Roaming to shut down a side lane that's ahead, even if it sets you behind a little, can win you the game
Farming
mid / late game, rotate between lanes to soak up farm
Can usually only get 1 / 2 waves before people start to collapse on you, unless you have vision of them
Stay grouped with team so you can force objectives, unless you have tp
If game is close, stay with your team even if you DO have tp
If someone from your team is already farming a wave, don't go to that lane unless you're grouping for an objective
Seriously, just go farm another lane if there aren't any objectives up at the time
Awareness
Use function keys (f1-f5) to constantly check state of other lanes / jungle position
Press tab to check enemy items / for control wards in inventory
If you know the enemy laner is trying to get gold for an item breakpoint
can try to force trade to make them back before they can finish the item
Or can bait them into overstaying and have your jungler gank
If your team is arguing, use anonymous default ping
If you see your jungler invading, push your lane so you can assist him before the enemy mid if needed
Ping fucking MIAs and let your team know where wards are
Laning
Check "Range Classes"
In range v range, lanes play out normally
In melee v range, try to avoid pushing the wave and try to freeze near tower so you can zone enemy off cs
Early lane phase, if you eat an auto or two from the ranged mid, their wave will push towards you, letting you establish a freeze
Always be aware of all-in potential of other mid -> their combos
Dodge impactful cc (Leblanc chain, ahri charm)
Teleport
If enemy mid has teleport and you don't, don't take even trades because they can recall and tp back, leaving you at a disadvantage
In all-ins, the non tp user has the advantage (usually), but have to be careful not to just take a bad trade and let the other laner tp back
Harassing
Look up enemy laner's cooldown on lolwiki beforehand and go for trades whenever damage spells are down
Harass when enemy laner is going for cs
Depending on the range class matchup, try to save spells until you can hit both the wave + enemy laner if you want to push
Wave control
If enemy mid is pushing because they want to roam / recall, push back so they miss cs if they do leave the lane
If you're weaker than the other mid and you can't farm safely, back up out of vision range
Enemy mid has to assume you either recalled / roaming
If they freeze, you can just recall and come back with items
if they assume you recalled, they'll probably recall after you push so that they won't be behind in item breakpoints, giving you time to farm the wave under your tower + push the next wave (only if enemy mid doesnt have tp)
If you want to freeze, enemy minion wave should have 3 more creeps than yours -> just try to keep this balance in front of your tower and just last hit
If you're in a bad lane matchup, don't just randomly hit the wave. You'll make it push and then the enemy mid will freeze the wave, zoning you
Summoner Spells
Flash is standard
Ghost - immobile mids who benefit from the repositioning it offers
Exhaust - probably better than ghost right now, really good if in a bad matchup vs someone who wants to all in you or even if you want to duel them as well
Heal - immobile mids who dont benefit as heavily from the actual movespeed of Ghost, but want survivability
Ignite - you have a big dick and you have a winning lane matchup
Teleport - want to impact map outside of actual lane (low kill pressure, need setup, etc) - ekko / liss usually
Also good on splitpushers / rough lanes where you might be forced to back early
Cleanse - You're laning vs TF / Liss / Varus or the enemy team has several hard CCs that you NEED to avoid (Ashe ult / elise cocoon / etc)
It's ok if you can't take cleanse in some matchups (like vs zed / lb) but that means you have to rush qss
Doesn't remove suppression
Barrier - You want to play defensive / you're in a bad matchup and the other mid is probably taking ignite
Recall timing
Try to recall when you're reaching item breakpoints (needless large rod, completing void staff, lost chapter, etc)
If enemy has backed and the wave is in the middle of the lane but you're too oom to push it to tower before they come back, just recall with the waves in the middle of the lane
If enemy has backed and you can push wave to tower, do it
If you're in a melee v range matchup, half pushing the wave can lose you the game, range mid can come back and just freeze and keep you from farming
Not terrible if you're in range v range / range v melee because it's easier for you to push it back out, but still bad
If you're weaker than the other mid but they won't let you recall (harassing you / freezing wave), just back off from the wave and stand next to tower out of vision
enemy mid forced to assume that you either roamed / recalled if they have no vision of you so they'll probably push the wave then leave the lane, allowing you to farm safely -> recall under tower once they do
If you want to sneak an early recall for an item (such as tear), hard push the wave before the cannon wave and recall as the cannon is coming to lane. Because it takes so long to push against a cannon early, you can recall then return to lane and only miss one / no minions
Itemization
Boots
Cdr boots
Good if you're running double mobility spells (Flash/ghost, flash/tp)
Also good on ad casters like jayce / zed
boots + cleaver + ghostblade = 40% cdr
Also good if you're an ap who won't be getting a lot of cdr through items (not buiilding morellos / lichbane / etc)
Merc treads
Usually built on AD mids vs heavy ap / cc
only build on ap mid if you're gettting absolutely dicked by cc
If you want MR as an AP champion, consider getting banshees at some point
Sorc boots
Standard on ap mids if you can reach 40% cdr with runes + items
10% runes + morello + banshees/ hourglass/lichbane
10% runes + banshees + hourglass + lichbane
Standard even if you don't reach 40% cdr but want more damage
Ninja Tabi
Only built if enemy team is all AD / you're laning vs lucian
If you need armor as an AP champion, rush seeker's armguard
Swiftness
Usually on AD mids who want to roam to utilize their early game power
Mobis
Would only really buy this on zed / talon - roaming assassins who don't have an ad equivalent of sorc boots
Berserkers
AP: Only Kayle / Azir
AD: Potentially Yasuo / adcs being played mid (lucian usually)
Starting items
AD
corrupting
You want a lot of sustain so you can stay in lane until you hit a strong item breakpoint (ex. sheen on corki - 1050g)
long sword + 3 pots
need core items asap to use early game power
prefer starting 3 pots over refillable because the lack of health / sustain from longsword can make laning difficult
can get refillable on 2nd / 3rd back if you want sustain
dblade + pot
good lane matchup that you want to win early
acceptable to get corrupting / refillable on 2nd / 3rd back
AP
dark seals + refillable
you want the sustain + potential snowball
dring + 2 pots
standard
can get refillable on 2nd / 3rd back
If in bad matchup, double drings are good for sustain
mana crystal + refillable
first item tear
corrupting
basically a more defensive dark seal (more sustain, less damage)
AP
Seraphs
If you're going tear -> seraphs, it's good to go tear->first core item->seraphs. Early seraphs good for the mana refund
On cass, example would be tear->morello->seraph. On ryze, tear->roa->seraph
RoA
short / mid range + low mobility + need the mana (Ryze / Karthus / TF / Anivia / Kassadin)
If you're winning lane, get blasting wand component before catalyst. If losing, catalyst first
Hextech glp
Only on Kass / asol / taliyah I think
Good if u want an earlier powerspike than Roa
Ludens / rylais
Rylais if you have a constant source of damage to apply the slow (cass / asol)
Ludens if you just want movespeed to position spells / avoid cc (ori / ahri)
Also a pretty good item for burst / waveclear IF you're ahead and can afford to delay building other core items
Void Staff
Unless you're a utility mage whose utility scales off AP (Ori / lulu), buy void before dcap
If you have to choose between deathcap and void in a 6 item build, go void like 95% of the time (unless utility scaling)
Even if you have 1250 gold on a back, it's usually better in the long run to buy blasting wand -> finish void staff early instead of buying a large rod and delaying void
If you're a lichbane user
You can run cdr boots + 15% in runes for 35% cdr (not 40%)
You can run cdr boots + runes + banshee / hourglass + lichbane for 40%
Can swap out cdr boots for sorcs and get banshee + hourglass if you actually need both the MR and the stasis
If you build morellos
get lost chapter first for mana sustain
Can either finish morello straight up or can do lost chapter -> sorc boots -> finish morellos if ahead
Should be looking to constantly push waves and roam with mana pool
Hourglass
Need the armor / need to dodge all in burst (Fizz shark)
Can sit on the armguard and build into other core items first if you just want the armor but don't fear burst
Good early on champions that need to dive in (Diana / Akali)
Protobelt
Usually built 1st/2nd item when you want burst
The actual dash isnt too notable except on champions who can set up their whole combo within a certain range (liss / annie / ekko)
Haunting guise / liandries
The flat pen and health is really from guise is really nice early and synergizes well with sorc boots
Early liandries is really nice if you have good DoT (brand / malz)
Nashors
Can be built on Azir but I personally think Morellos + Zerkers are better
Pretty sure Kayle is the only champion that consistently builds it
Banshees
You need MR / other team has hard to avoid cc / your reaction time is too bad for qss / cleanse
A decent buy if you want more cdr + need mr
Deathcap
This item is an AP noobtrap, it's almost never worth buying before void staff and it's NEVER worth rushing.
Only get before void staff if you have utility that scales with AP (Lux / Ori / Lulu)
For their respective costs, void staff will do more damage to champions per gold even if they only have base 30 mr
AD
Hexdrinker
Can build it early if struggling vs AP burst, don't upgrade to maw until 3/4 items
Lethality
Ghostblade
Usually build this first on ad casters for the CDR
warhammer before dirk is ok if you're losing lane and you want the cdr so u can farm from range with spells
Edge of night
not really worth buying unless you really want the spellshield or REALLY want to stack lethality
Duskblade
Pretty good as a 1st item on assassins or 2nd item on bruisers after ghostblade
Get dirk component first if lane is even / you're ahead
Cleaver
Not really a rush item, usually built after 1st or 2nd lethality item
Phage before kindlegem if you want the hp
2nd item on lucian mid unless u need qss/hexdrinker
Manamune
You're playing jayce / ezreal
Finish your first item then finish manamune
LW
You need the armorpen
LDR vs high health tanks
can get giant slayer component early before lw if tanks are high health but low armor
mortal reminder vs one or more healing champions
early executioners calling is good vs healing champions
BT
Probably only Jayce mid as a 5th item if you want the sustain in teamfights but aren't terribly worried about getting bursted
Bork
Stop playing lucian mid
Tiamat
I honestly can't think of an ad mid that would buy this outside of something off-meta like J4
Some people like building titanic hydra on zed / talon for the tankiness / burst but I don't know how ideal this is
Trinity force
Ezreal / corki / gp
If you can't afford sheen on one back, build the phage components (ruby + longsword) first
Sheen + Stinger instead of sheen + phage is actually pretty good for the early CDR stacking
Defensive
GA
Good as 4th/5th item if you want to keep snowballing and you just want another damage item
QSS
Couldn't afford to take cleanse due to lane matchup / vs malzahar
Finish mercurial as 5th/6th item if AD, just finish it as last item if AP and you need the QSS
Abyssal Mask
Build on tanky ap champions when they need the MR more than the damage from RoA
Gunblade
You have pretty good AD / AP scalings and want burst (kat / corki)
Tank
copy a galio build from probuilds.net
Vs Yasuo
fuck you
seriously fuck this champion
pray your jungler ganks