The Four Wards Podcast - Episode 507: Taking the ReinZ

[00:00:04] Speaker A: Welcome to the Four Wards Podcast. Hey, what's up? [00:00:08] Speaker B: It's Eric Bra, voice of Draven Jerks and Velkoz. And you're listening to the Four Wards podcast here to help you move forward in League. Hello and welcome to episode 507 of the Four Wards podcast. I'm your host as usual. I'm Jack Sohlman and I've got with me two other wards to help you move forward in League of Legends. Of course we have Mike of many names. [00:00:49] Speaker C: We're winging it. Fuck it, let's do it. [00:00:52] Speaker B: And we've got Pillow Pet. [00:00:54] Speaker A: Hello. A record amount of times I think I've made it in a row. [00:00:57] Speaker C: Four. [00:00:57] Speaker B: Yeah, probably. Definitely. Because we've shifted our recording a little bit around your crazy work schedule. But it's because we appreciate you. We want you here. [00:01:07] Speaker A: I'm glad. [00:01:08] Speaker B: I want. [00:01:09] Speaker A: I got lots of to say all. [00:01:10] Speaker B: The time and if you guys have lots to say, you should join the Discord and talk to us. The link is in the episode description. Come join the Discord. Come hang out, play games with us, ask us questions. We have a question submission channel. If you're one of those people who doesn't want to send an email, just drop it in there and we'll still answer it on the show. It's a fun time. We look forward to seeing you there. We also do stream on Twitch. I can be found at Twitch TV Jacksoman. Mike hopefully will be streaming again soon at Twitch TV mikeofmanynames. [00:01:41] Speaker C: We'll get there. [00:01:42] Speaker B: I'm gonna bully him into it and pillow when time allows. Twitch tv Pillowpet. And we've got shout outs. Shout out to Codex, Ninja, Pillow Pet, Skippius, Esquire, Labana and Uncle Chrisco for supporting us at the shout out tier on Patreon. Thank you guys. You are keeping the podcast on the Internet now. If you want to support the podcast, we do have a patreon. It'[email protected] theforwards podcast. $1 a month just tells us that you love us. $5 a month gets you an exclusive feed of some behind the scenes audio of our prep work before each show. And $10 a month gets you that exclusive feed. And we will shout your name out at the top of every episode. And all of those perks also apply to our general gaming podcast. Check out From 8 Bit to 4K on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Last but not least, listeners, Uncle Chrisco carried you this week, but we always need More questions. Write in to the fourwards podcastmail.com so we can answer your questions on the show. Or if you're email shy, drop it in the question submission channel in the discord. Alright, our actual topic tonight comes from Rains, longtime question writer who gave us a topic suggestion a couple months ago and we're using it. So we're going to talk about tempo and agency. These are words if you have watched pro play at all, doesn't matter which region, you will hear the shoutcasters constantly talking about tempo and agency and using it to describe the map state and which player has an advantage. But those terms don't just mean so and so is winning. So let's talk about what is tempo and agency. First of all, who wants to explain tempo? [00:03:25] Speaker A: So to my best understanding, and I'm sure everybody has their own like personal definition of what tempo means to them. So for me it's like if I have a lead, I'm carrying that lead and I'm not stopping, I'm not pausing. I'm just trying to suffocate the enemy with my, with my speed and not giving them a chance to like catch up. So I like, I look at it like a foot race or a car race. If you're ahead, you're not going to hit the brakes and slow down and let your opponent catch up and pass you. You're going to keep your foot down and you're just going to keep running at that speed and try to just always stay in ahead. That's the best way I've always explained it to myself. [00:04:07] Speaker C: So there's, there's two parts of tempo that I can notice and one is sort of the position. In laning, there's lane tempo and then there's the overall like positional tempo where you are farm, health, etc. And those are very different things and they mean very different things for the map and in different ranks because being ahead in, in this tempo, in position, in bot, lane, in gold, silver, bronze, iron is actually more dangerous for you than it is for your enemy. Which is pretty inverse from where it is in Platinum Challenger Pro, where having that extra agency. Agency is the word that we use there because it gives you more of, that allows them to control more of the map. [00:04:58] Speaker B: And when you say more dangerous, you don't mean like oh, you have tempo, you're at a disadvantage. You mean you have tempo, you have more to lose if you make a mistake. [00:05:10] Speaker C: Both that and like just positionally you are now as in a position, you are now ahead of the halfway point because your tempo has pushed you forward positionally. That's a more dangerous position in gold, silver and bronze than it is in Platinum, Challenger, etc because they're more likely to actually be able to tower dive, to move across lanes, to roam, to actually like have proper ward set up so that you're not getting ganked. So there's a wide variety of what that tempo does for you as a player and it changes across ranks. So we're gonna probably focus on the gold, silver, bronze half. [00:05:46] Speaker B: Yes. So I think we've defined tempo pretty well. But let's define agency. Agency is your ability in the moment to make decisions. So if the enemy has crashed a double stacked wave into your tower, even if you're stronger than they are, you don't have agency. You need to be collecting that wave. You're not the one dictating what is happening. You're not the one making decisions on the map right now. And tempo is tied very heavily to that. Because in that moment, even if you have a huge advantage overall, they have tempo because they have the ability to go and do something and you don't. [00:06:28] Speaker C: This is really commonly seen across dragon fights, across grub fights, herald fights, etc. Yes, tempo and agency are everything there. [00:06:38] Speaker B: This is why you should never try to do dragon. When your bot lane is pushed into their tower like their own tower. Because the enemy bot lane has tempo and agency, they have the ability to walk away and come harass you and they are in a position to do so. [00:06:59] Speaker A: I would say bringing up the double stacked wave is a good example because that's the one that you're going to see nine times out of 10 and you're going to have to make the decision on sit there collecting gold and XP or trying to assist your team. And I can't say that 100% of the time that the collecting the XP and the gold is always going to be the right answer, but it's going to usually always be the right answer. If your jungle is we're saying this from like a bot lane or top lane, mid lane, like a laners perspective, you're going to lose more in late. [00:07:33] Speaker C: Laning phase here matters. [00:07:35] Speaker A: Like you're going to lose a lot more trying to assist your jungle in a bad decision that they're making than you would staying under your tower and collecting your experience and gold even if you can't last hit like you're getting the experience like and that's just as important down the road. So you, you kind of want to be selfish In a lot of these tempo decisions, I feel like if you're going to sacrifice losing something in lane, you got to almost guarantee that you're going to gain somewhere else. And if you can't 100% guarantee that, I don't think you always want to be losing the certain or the guarantee, like your tempo is going to go a lot off of like your guarantees and you want to make sure that you're making the right decision. And it's really hard to do when you have a half a second to decide what you're going to do. So I always like to focus on my guarantees. [00:08:32] Speaker B: Fair enough. So let's say you're laning and you're in a position where you now have tempo, you're dictating the lane. How can you use that tempo to exert your agency onto the map? [00:08:45] Speaker A: I'd say like the first thing that comes to mind is you have time now since you have tempo, place wards, go scout. Go scout with your jungler. If they're available right there, you can go see if the enemy jungles at one of their camps and help with an invade. But you got to remember the longer that you're helping your jungle or longer your warding, warding, you're losing tempo, like you're trading your tempo and now it's dwindling down and at some point that wave is going to be pushing back into your lane. And now your tempo is even or negative. [00:09:22] Speaker B: Yep, that's, that's. I think the best way to think about it is tempo is a meter you fill up and agency is your ability to use the meter. [00:09:28] Speaker C: Yes, it's a builder spender. [00:09:30] Speaker B: Yes. So I think warding is like especially early game, the biggest, most important one. Games have been won and lost because Elaine had tempo and used that to go and ward the neutral objective near them, whether that's Dragon or Rift, Herald or Grubs, whatever it is. And then someone gets caught being greedy trying to sneak the objective. But because it was warded with tempo, now your team is able to collapse, kill them and get the objective and slingshot into a massive lead, a common. [00:10:01] Speaker A: One that I come into with tempo and agency, especially in the top lane. It's, it's a battle of who gets the better back. Do you take the even back where you're like, okay, I cleared my wave, you cleared your wave, we're going to both back here and we're going to meet back up and in an even state, or is it all right, well, I see you're trying to Back. I'm going to shove this wave and stop your back and then try to back. And it's just a constant wave of who's going to get the better back. So you're spending your agency if we're talking it like a currency to get a good back and that's how you just spent your tempo and now you're like okay. Especially if they didn't get to leave lane, you had a really good back. Now you got like a lot of tempo because you're up in gold depending on how much you got to go spend. That's why a lot of people prefer to take teleport over ignite in a lot of lanes because it just saves your tempo. [00:10:59] Speaker B: It lets you cheat it once every what, six minutes for the regular teleport and then once every four minutes once you're past the 10 minute mark. [00:11:06] Speaker C: Sounds alright. [00:11:08] Speaker B: Something in that ballpark. Yeah, it's. I think the. The one that is the most misunderstood in lower Elo. The one that listeners you should be practicing and trying to understand and learn is cashing in your tempo as back timing. It is so easy to just have a huge item advantage in lane when the gold is actually even just because you got a good back off and they were stuck dealing with the wave and never got to back. And now they can either fall behind an entire full wave or sit in lane at a weak state and not be able to interact with anything other than the minions. Good point. [00:11:43] Speaker C: There's also realistically health and health is going to be this. This big portion. It's more agency than it is tempo depending on the character. The more you have in your health bar, the more agency you have to control. Position in the lane, position around a map, roaming entrance into the lane, etc. Etc. This, this is really where things become different. Is there are going to be positions where that health bar matters a lot less or in certain matchups where you're spending your health as part of that matchup. This happens a lot in mid lane and top lane where I know I'm going to lose these fights. So I'm spending my health bar to gain my self tempo so that I have the agency to go and do things. This is very common in ranged versus melee matchups where the melee character is really focused on. All right, I'm not going to be able to do a lot more meeting of the roaming. So we're going to push ahead with this tempo. Spend my health to get more and then you have less agency around the map despite the fact that you have more tempo. [00:12:51] Speaker A: The health is a really good point because like, think back at your games. Especially like as an ADC, you've taken bad trades. As an ADC, you're sitting under tower with 15% health. How safe do you feel? Like, how scared are you? Like, do you want to step out? Would you feel comfortable going into the enemy jungle and warding? Are you comfortable going into your jungle and warding? Like, you don't have agency or tempo there. [00:13:17] Speaker B: How often do you guys see where someone lane kills their opponent and then overstays and gets ganked and a teleport comes in and they give up a kill and suddenly they're behind even though they got the kill first? [00:13:30] Speaker C: About half of games. I see. [00:13:32] Speaker B: Yeah. It's a common mistake of not realizing how much tempo you actually have. Because if they have teleport up the moment their death timer is up, they can start channeling that and arrive in your lane. And you need to be prepared for them to show up with your full health. And you have missing health, however much you lost in the kill that you got. Because it's pretty rare to kill someone and still be full health. [00:13:55] Speaker C: Very. It happens one in every hundred games. [00:13:59] Speaker A: I'd say I'm extremely guilty of this early game. [00:14:03] Speaker B: It happens a lot. [00:14:04] Speaker A: Like I'm extremely guilty of this. Especially. It's so easy to do in the top lane. You get a solo kill and in your mind you're like, yes. You know, it's. You're thinking, I got 10, 15 seconds to do what I want. 10, 15 seconds when you're idle isn't a lot of time. It's maybe enough to get a plate. Is that 160 gold worth you losing two waves? Is it. Is it worth. You know, there's. You don't want to trade that. Like it the best thing to do, especially if your waves in a good state. You get a kill press B. Go back spend. [00:14:37] Speaker C: Unless you are trying. There's a. There's a specific one on this one. Unless you are trying to shove a wave or deny. Like you need to get that farm in. Unless you are trying to deny the enemy a really big wave. Sometimes it's worth it to die for that. [00:14:51] Speaker B: Occasionally. [00:14:52] Speaker C: Occasionally. Especially if that death goes to someone not in your lane. But then again, that also depends on what else is on the map. If you give it to like a Sejuani, that's less impactful than giving it to a Leblanc or a Katarina, an ARI, etc. So like a lot of these things are Going to be very judgment based. You can get away with a lot of things. Should you get away with a lot of things? [00:15:16] Speaker A: I mean there is a reason that death is a mechanic in this game especially you start thinking like Sion and Karthus and those other champions. I think it's just those two that come back alive now. I can't remember. [00:15:29] Speaker C: It's gonna be a new one. [00:15:31] Speaker A: Oh yeah. And then there's Tryndavers who denies. Yes. I mean so Death is a mechanic. [00:15:37] Speaker C: Like oh Rell or not rel. Renata. [00:15:41] Speaker A: Yes. She has the possible revive upon kill. But I mean I think that's. That's a whole maybe different topic for another day. Like taking advantage of passives and back to agency and tempo. [00:15:55] Speaker C: Yes. [00:15:57] Speaker A: But yes, you can use your. Your deaths completely to maintain a tempo. Even if you're giving up gold. Say if you're. If your death timers are short enough. [00:16:07] Speaker C: If you can give your death to a tower and make it a. An unopposed death. It's usually worth clear and execute. That's almost always worth it in comparison. [00:16:19] Speaker A: Especially worth like early games when your death respawn is going to be shorter than what a back timer would be. Plus waiting to get full health. [00:16:29] Speaker B: Yeah, it's. It's a hard judgment call to make too though. Because if you don't know where the enemy jungler is, your attempt to go execute to the tower can just be handing over a free kill for no fucking reason too. [00:16:40] Speaker C: Also true. You've said something there. Jungle. Jungle Tempo is completely different than everyone else. And their agency is. Yes, Junglers have all of the agencies. [00:16:52] Speaker B: The jungler who has tempo. The agency is. Yes. [00:16:56] Speaker C: Unless they are denying you your jungle. And if you are clearing against each other you have as much agency as the other. [00:17:03] Speaker B: Yes. [00:17:03] Speaker C: If you are being denied and one person has significantly more tempo then they have the extra agency to deny you. [00:17:11] Speaker B: Yes. We've all played those games as jungle where you can't get a camp because the enemy jungler is stronger than you and is at every camp you go to. [00:17:20] Speaker C: Yeah. And this is where like this is where agency across the map really matters is because jungle has this freedom agency. This your jungle. Your laners should always have that sort of agency to turn and help you. In fact sometimes it's even better than the alternative in fighting. Not always true, but it's. It's really. How do I say this properly while. [00:17:53] Speaker A: You think about it. I know coming from like. I'm not like a jungler by any means but I know my way around A jungle. And I've been on the receiving end of both having the tempo and not having the tempo. And I can tell you when you're down bad early, especially early as a jungle, it does not feel good. You feel helpless. You feel like, oh, my gosh, I'm the reason that we're now 15 and four at seven minutes in the game. Like, it just feels bad. [00:18:25] Speaker C: I. I have the reason. [00:18:27] Speaker B: Okay. [00:18:29] Speaker C: The enemy will have, depending on where you're at, like, if your jungle is so far behind that you're in the that situation, the enemy most likely also has the tempo and the agency across the lanes. So it's usually more beneficial unless your team is like, this is the only farm we're getting. We're getting this farm. You have this. This is your map, your half of the map. You should be able to transition the lack of agency you have in your lane into an advantage into another position because you have the faster movement. It's your side. [00:19:04] Speaker A: I think another good thing to add, and I just thought about this. Even at level one, everybody's even. You don't even see anybody on the map. There's tempo and agency right there. And I'm going to throw an example. A twitch support, A twitch jungle all of a sudden now as a mid laner or a top laner or even bot lane, but typically mid lane or top lane, you know, somebody is going to see this twitch support at level one and like, you immediately are thinking, all right, I got to play safe now. You're losing tempo, like, immediately, right off the bat, just from a champion pick. [00:19:41] Speaker B: Yep. Same thing. Like if they have a Fed Evelyn, for example, suddenly you're afraid to walk away from the tower, even if you could massively out stat check your direct opponent. Let's say you're a top laner and you're like, I've killed this guy five times. He can't even approach me. But there's a 10 in 1 Evelyn in the game. I can't leave my tower. You don't have agency or tempo, even though you should, because someone else has taken it from you. [00:20:07] Speaker C: Now, in these scenarios and in most scenarios, what you do when you lack the tempo and the agency, spend the money on a pink ward. It's especially good in these scenarios where you have someone who you can see them with pink wards because you can see Evelyn with a pink ward. You can see twitch with a pink ward. [00:20:24] Speaker B: Yes. [00:20:25] Speaker C: But then conversely, pink hordes are the ultimate in like, okay, I know there's no extra vision here. I can Move in this position. I have another little open window of area. Now I have a little more. Larger Notice safety. [00:20:38] Speaker B: There is a lot of power in. I know they can't see me here. You've ever seen people try to bushwhack people and no one bothers sweeping the bush? And they realize they've been sitting on a ward for 30 seconds waiting for someone to walk by, but no one ever would because they can see them waiting there for them. [00:20:57] Speaker C: Or even better, you whack the bushwhack. I know they're sitting there waiting in that spot. You come from this way. I'll come from this way, Jump over the wall here. Boom. Yep. [00:21:09] Speaker A: I think that's some good points. And how to lose your agency as well. Like, you're trying to create, like, you have tempo and agency, and you're trying to carry that into, like, oh, let's do the bush cheese dragons coming up. And then all of a sudden, you guys just got aced because they all saw you there and you weren't expecting that. So after, you know, a bad death, like, that's a good way to lose your agency and your tempo. Now all of a sudden, you're starting off fresh and they have the advantage. They've placed wards now that you don't know where they are, They've cleared vision. Like, now all of a sudden, you're starting over. [00:21:47] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:21:47] Speaker B: Yep. Any other last thoughts on tempo and agency before we move on to some listener questions? [00:21:53] Speaker C: There is the most powerful role with both tempo and agency is mid lane. They're the middle of the map. Their agency gives them access to everything. So if you're going to, like, truly master tempo and agency, that's the role you want to master it with. [00:22:11] Speaker B: Yup. [00:22:12] Speaker A: Good points. [00:22:13] Speaker B: All right, we've got some listener questions. Most of them come from reigns because reigns, you have been a boss when it comes to writing in questions, and we appreciate you. So we're gonna answer some more of them. [00:22:23] Speaker C: You should just make this the reigns episode. Nothing but reigns questions. Nothing but rain topic. [00:22:27] Speaker B: I mean, our tentative title is taking the reigns. So. Yeah. So rain's first question tonight is in pro, we keep hearing how things like otacon or sol are worth x amount of stats. How do you quantify stats in gold? [00:22:43] Speaker C: This is very simple. [00:22:44] Speaker B: And he gives then an example of a pro game. [00:22:48] Speaker C: The easiest way to do this is look at the basic item that you can buy of any one stat, that is its quantity cost in gold. [00:22:58] Speaker B: So for example, A longsword is 10 AD for 350 gold. That means gold is 35 gold per AD. That is the value of AD. You can do similar calculations for armor. Mr. AP attack speed. It doesn't translate quite like you'd think for movement speed, because movement speed has weird rules in place, but that's the general theory. So if someone. Let's say we're trying to quantify how much difference in gold power do they have with four infernal dragons? Well, it's 12% AD and AP. So how much AD is that giving them? Let's say it's giving them 35 AD. Cool. 35 times 35. That's the gold advantage that player has off the dragons above and beyond their actual gold. [00:23:50] Speaker A: 1200 gold. [00:23:51] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:23:53] Speaker A: And times that by five. We'll say just times that by five. And then there you go. [00:23:58] Speaker B: Yes. Bearing in mind that not every champion has the same amount of AD or AP that is getting multiplied. Same thing for mountain dragons and armor and Mr. For the tanks that have a lot of it. It's worth a lot of gold and power for an ad carry. Yeah. You got four mountain drikes. It's giving you like, 10, 10 armor, which is less than a cloth armor that costs 300 gold. [00:24:20] Speaker C: There are unquantifiable buffs as well. You can't properly give them things. What is the value of an ocean Soul? What is the value of Windsor actually is one of the better ones. [00:24:34] Speaker B: Yep. [00:24:34] Speaker C: So, like, not everything can be properly quantified in gold, but you can get a rough estimate, and then you think, all right, well, certain champions benefit from this more. So if we think our half benefits from it a little bit better or than there's. We've had plenty of games where it doesn't matter if they get sold that it's not going to benefit them or it's not going to benefit them very much in comparison. [00:24:58] Speaker B: Yep. But like, for example, one of the ways they do this is they will say, oh, well, teams with this soul on average win X amount of times from this gold state. And there's enough games played of League of Legends that they have this information at a global level, which is what the stats people that you're hearing on pro play are feeding to the casters, which is where the rough estimate of about 4,000 gold is what a soul is worth came from. It's very much a like, take it with a grain of salt kind of number. But that's where it comes from is literally just analyzing thousands and thousands of program games across all regions and figuring out which team won From a gold deficit because they got soul. How often to try to quantify that? It's definitely some voodoo shit. [00:25:55] Speaker A: I like that into interpretation. I like the Attican question at the end. Like, trying to tie it up when it's worth to try to group for Attican, or is it just stalling it out? And the, like, the way I look at it and try to measure it. If the enemy was to get to Attican right now, how many of these feathers are they getting or the petals? [00:26:16] Speaker B: Yep. [00:26:16] Speaker A: Because if they're gonna get, like 30 petals from it because nobody's been collecting it, that's a lot of adaptive force. So they're gonna get a lot more value out of it than you would say. You've already collected 20 and you're getting, like, 10 petals from it. Like, it's gonna be even as far as, like, you guys are gonna end up with the same amount of power depending on. Well, okay. The same amount of pedals depending on who got it, but they definitely get a lot more out of it. [00:26:44] Speaker C: So initial petals are worth more than the later petals. [00:26:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:48] Speaker B: Yes. [00:26:49] Speaker A: Try to. I try to think like, okay, my team, we already got 30, and there's an attic. Is it really worth all of us going in there and possibly dying for the 10 that they're going to get off the. The Attican that fly in and get them? Like, is it really worth everybody dying over that? That's the way I look at it. I don't know if it's the right way, but that's how I try to justify am I going there for 10 AD or not? [00:27:11] Speaker C: There is the secondary portion. Like, Otacon is the most dangerous fighting pit in the game. [00:27:17] Speaker B: Yes. [00:27:18] Speaker C: So sometimes it's worth it to fight because you know they're going to be weaker there. Sometimes it's worth it to fight because you know their strongest person isn't going to be able to contest you. [00:27:29] Speaker B: The debuff from Otacon is crazy. [00:27:33] Speaker C: Otacon has caused more throws than Baron has in, like, five years, and it's only been out this year. Yep. And if anyone can tell you about Baron Crows, like, take a look at some of the old Dignitas games and you'll start seeing. Oh, my God, the Baron crows. [00:27:53] Speaker B: Please, please don't. They're painful. All right, speaking of painful, question two, how do you best play out early game champions in the late game, specifically relating to Pantheon and Renekton, who have an infamously weak late game? Is it a case of spacing out your abilities to Maximize DPS Pantheon is. [00:28:13] Speaker C: Not an early game late game champion. [00:28:16] Speaker B: Renekton agree to disagree on that is. [00:28:18] Speaker C: A is a bruiser tank. So what he provides that tank portion is weaker than other tanks. Pantheon is a damage dealer. He is always going to be able to deal that damage late in the game. [00:28:33] Speaker B: So I think the first thing to keep in mind is champions who have an infamously weak late game can still 1000 a squishy who missed positions. Also true like full stop. I agree that Renekton and Pantheon both have infamously weak late games in the sense that they become really bad in a 1v1 against someone designed to 1v1 champions. [00:28:55] Speaker C: There are infamously strong 1v1 champions by. [00:28:58] Speaker B: The end of the game. [00:28:59] Speaker C: There are infamously weak 1v1 champions at the end of game. I think Pantheon is a middle one. But that's a. That's a debate. [00:29:06] Speaker B: What both Pantheon and Renekton bring to the table. They have point and click single target CC and decent single target burst in the late game on both of those champions your job is find a buddy who can go with you and blow someone up when they miss position. [00:29:25] Speaker C: If you want a very good look at what to do with a mid to late game Pantheon, you're going to want to watch the last game of Worlds. Second to last. [00:29:36] Speaker B: True last. [00:29:37] Speaker C: The the final game of Worlds from this year is a brilliant use of why these champions are picked specifically Pantheon in this one. But like there's a bunch of other things that are noticeable across the board in this one. It's gonna be really insightful. It will show you how to use that for movement. It will show you how to do it for spacing. It'll show you a couple points where why not to do that and how they have their own weaknesses. [00:30:08] Speaker A: I probably have thousands of games on Renekton. I love Renekton. He's one of my go to's. I don't play him as much because I'm just. There's other champions that I like playing because Renekton has a very simple simple kit. But I have thousands of game on Renekton. So I could tell you like there's a difference between being a very like an early game bully champion like Renekton. To say that like he's really strong. No, he just has a lot of sustain and like movement. But as far as the late game comes and everybody like These guys were 100% right on everything. Like Renekton is just one cc. He has the dashes to get in. But other than that like you're not able to provide a whole lot than others. Some AOE damage and a point and click cc. A lot of it comes down to on Rennington late game is what build did you go? So the reason I say that is there's probably a dozen different builds on Renekton. You can go one now that is surfacing that I really enjoy is the hex plate one. It's really nice. Instead of stride breaker you go hex plate and you can just run people down with your ultimate. And he does really good with attack speed. It helps him a lot. The stridebreaker build gives you more health and does the same kind of thing that lets you just stick on top of them without giving you. It doesn't give you as much combat stats. There's, you know, you can go what's the other one I'm looking for? The Sundered sky builds. You know, you're always usually getting Eclipse just with how his kit works. A lot of how you're going to play and when you're going to be useful comes down with him is a lot of your build choices that you're going to make. Are you building to be early game monster and mid game monster because you're going to fall off or are you building to where you're going to be a damage sponge Late game and kind of someone that just sticks on a. Like a. An ADC or whatever. Someone that you can just kind of like take out of the fight because you're, you're. You bring up spacing out your abilities. Renekton doesn't really necessarily have to space out his abilities because they're short enough cooldown at the end. The only thing that he wants to use strategically is his W as it's empowered because when it's empowered it breaks shields and increases the stun duration, etc. That saying like I hate, I've said it before but I don't like the saying that he's weak. Late game because Renekton is strong all game long. It's really how are you cannot play him the same early as you do late. You have to be more strategic late game a lot of people just like oh, Renekton press r go in die. Like you can be smarter about how you play these games and you don't have to be weak late game. [00:33:06] Speaker C: The reason he is considered weak is because he is a frontliner and as opposed to other dedicated tank frontliners. He doesn't hold up towards the middle and the end of the game. But what he Lacks in damage absorption, he makes up for in damage dealt. And so this actually sort of leads into this agency thing. Your agency matters entirely with a champion like Renekton. Can I get into a back position? Can I get into a flank? Can I TP over here and jump in like Renekton, this is where that power really shows. [00:33:40] Speaker A: An excellent champion to pick. He's probably one of the top, I would say 10 at least. Probably top five in diving champions. Like Tower diving champions, just because of his empowered wife. Like, there is no barrier in the world that's going to save you from an empowered W if you use it. Like, it's just gone. Like, I love the shield break they added on Renekton. [00:34:02] Speaker B: He's especially good at fucking over someone protected by a Lulu or a Karma or something like that because of the shield break on his W. That's why. [00:34:11] Speaker A: Like a Yasuo hates to see a Renekton. Like his passive is just non existent. [00:34:19] Speaker B: So let's go on to question three. Would you ever build Hollow Radiance over Sunfire Cape? Even if there's only one magic damage threat on the enemy comp and you're not laning against them, how bad is your wave clear? Right. So that's where I go with this. Hollow Radiance is better than Sunfire at Waveclear, period. It's always better than Sunfire for Waveclear. It is worse than Sunfire at PVP damage. Sunfire ticks harder than Hollow Radiance does, so it does more damage to enemy champions when you're fighting them. The main reason I can think that I would ever consider doing this is if I'm laning against someone who is completely not a threat to me. And I need wave clear and. And here's the most important part. I don't have a high value on getting Spirit visage, so I need to not be someone with good healing in my kit or shielding in my kit. Because if there's only one AP threat and I can use Spirit Visage, well, that's going to be my Mr. Item as any kind of tank or bruiser type champion, just period. [00:35:26] Speaker C: Not everyone really needs that Sunfire Hollow Radiance in general. Yes. So thinking that that is your your armor item isn't always a good idea. It is there to supplement your damage because it gives you slightly less tankiness overall than some of the tankier armor health items. So if you're having trouble fighting people, Sunfire is better. If you're having trouble with clearing waves. Hello. Radiance is Better. But each of them is weaker in pure tankiness than another stat item that you could get. [00:35:59] Speaker B: Yep. [00:35:59] Speaker A: So you don't buy it for the armor in the Mr. You buy it for the the. The immolate. [00:36:05] Speaker C: There is a third point that we should point out. If you are in a jungle who uses the Sunfire point? It really doesn't matter which of the two you do you care about the bomby center Proc. That's going to be entirely based on what's better. [00:36:17] Speaker B: I would argue if you are a jungler you are going Sunfire period. [00:36:22] Speaker C: You care more about fighting other champions. You're correct. [00:36:24] Speaker B: Well, Sunfire is also higher clear speed for jungle camps than Radiance is because you're not getting mega pops on any camp except Raptors. [00:36:32] Speaker C: Yes. [00:36:34] Speaker B: And. And you're doing more team fight jungle camps. Except for Gromp do physical damage. Grump's the only one that does magic damage. I think so you should go Sunfire. I think it is. But it's magic damage. [00:36:45] Speaker C: If it is a mostly magic damage team. Sunfire will be your only armor item. Because it's always useful to have one armor item. The reason why it's always useful to have one armor item no matter what game state you're in. Tanks do physical damage or not Tanks. Towers. [00:37:00] Speaker A: Towers. [00:37:01] Speaker B: Towers do physical damage. Objectives mostly do physical damage. Baron. Baron being the main exception. Baron does a good mix but like dragons and Otacon. Mostly physical. So yeah. Any other thoughts on Hollow Radiance vs Sunfyre? [00:37:16] Speaker A: Nope. I think you nailed it. [00:37:18] Speaker C: That's pretty much covered it. [00:37:19] Speaker B: Good. Then I have the last question that I have opinions on. Why don't we see more tanks in the mid lane? I've been finding a lot of success in norms with Sion Mid. If we have threats everywhere else because mages are assassins. Tanks can't really deal with Sion before he gets too much health. Q max with Tiamat means you can wipe waves quickly with minimal threat too. I imagine you could find this kind of non interaction with other tanks. However, it wouldn't be as effective as Sion who has ult to arrive quickly at side lanes. Yeah, that sums it up. Sion Mid is bullshit. I fucking hate Sion Mid. I have never had a lane go well against Sion Mid. Even the game I played as LeBlanc into a sion where I killed him five times in 12 minutes. He was then an unkillable monster wrecking my team and I was not able to win that game. So mages are not equipped to deal. [00:38:04] Speaker C: With him outside of Sion in particular. The reason you don't usually see tanks in the mid lane is because now you have a dearth of damage. Yep. [00:38:13] Speaker B: So the other tank you'll see mid a fair amount is Malphite. Into heavy AD teams with an ad. [00:38:19] Speaker C: Mid or Galio into heavy AP teams. [00:38:22] Speaker B: Galio. But he also is more bruiser because he tends to build an MRI or an AP item or two. [00:38:27] Speaker C: Yes. [00:38:27] Speaker A: Those were going to be my occasionally three. Like those are the only three tanks you'll ever see Mid. If you see anything else like. Like, yeah. Cho, Goth and again show is the. [00:38:38] Speaker B: Same reason as Scion of. He's really good against mages. [00:38:42] Speaker A: Like yeah, they're. They have their niche reasons that they can go. There's a reason you're not going to see an Orn mid because he doesn't do much. Like, he's not like he is a full on damage sponge. And you want someone strong in the mid lane and Orn doesn't bring strength. [00:38:59] Speaker C: So we mentioned it actually. And the base point of this episode. What is the tank gonna do with the agency that you get as a mid laner? Sion is one of the few tanks that with that Agency. Hey, Science altering. Boom. He's now in your lane. Oh my God. [00:39:16] Speaker B: Yep. That's why Malphite as well. Because, oh, you got agency because you beat the shit out of that Zed. Now you can just walk bot and go, boom. [00:39:25] Speaker C: Dodge this motherfucker Galio because his teleport range is absurd. So like, there's a reason why these very specific ones are allowed to be in mid lane. The reason why you don't commonly see Sion in mid lane is obviously that lack of damage. But if you pick it too early, there are Mid lane mages that demolish Sion. [00:39:49] Speaker B: Not true mages don't play tanks. Into Aurelion Sol. [00:39:55] Speaker C: Aurelion Sol, Cassiopeia, Azir Rise. [00:40:00] Speaker B: Smolder. Even though he's not a mage, he gets a free lane off of any tank. [00:40:04] Speaker C: Yeah. The reasons to do it versus not to do it are much smaller. There are a couple of niche counter picks. Like for a while back when Kassadin was obscenely powerful, the best counter to him was Shen. Shen just didn't give a fuck. Walked in, absolutely murdered him. This is old Shen and old Kassadin. So old Shen did things very differently. [00:40:32] Speaker B: Old Shen had a point and click damage spell that then healed him every time he auto attacked you. He was a weird champion. [00:40:39] Speaker C: Yeah, but like outside of specific Counters you should not generally ca tank in the mid lane because it's really dangerous to give your enemy that much free agency. [00:40:53] Speaker A: Sion Mid didn't become popular till I would say not too long ago when he had his Trifill Triforce build mid lane that people were going with Triforce hullbreaker and he was just like the. [00:41:06] Speaker B: Several times I've run into it this year. They've just built full tank. [00:41:09] Speaker A: Yeah, they just built full tank cuz that got nerfed. [00:41:12] Speaker B: But I've run into it all year. It's been a just reoccurring thing out of 500 something games. I've probably seen it 10 times which is like 8 times more than I should. I hate it so much. I want it gone. Get him out of fucking mid lane. [00:41:27] Speaker A: A side note, that's no, not at all related but it's always funny when you see like a Scion get picked mid lane and all of a sudden your mid laners also a top laner and then you're like all right, cool. Darius Mid like all of a sudden you get these FUD matchups that are just completely off the wall literally. [00:41:46] Speaker B: If I know it's a Scion mid I'm playing Mordekaiser or Volibear. [00:41:50] Speaker C: There's a reason that Garen and Nasus mid became a thing very briefly. [00:41:54] Speaker B: Yup, that or I'm playing something like Brand that has the ability to burn through tanks and play far back. Alright, let's get some more questions from Reigns. That completes that one but Reigns sent in even more. What makes Aatrox, Ambesa and Renekton such good blind picks in solo queue? [00:42:16] Speaker A: They're sustain honestly like they're this. They have so much sustain. [00:42:20] Speaker C: All three of them have something very in common. Have you noticed it? What it is immediately dashes they're resourceless. [00:42:27] Speaker B: Also true. [00:42:27] Speaker C: They are resourceless champions who have sustained built in their kit and all of them have movement. [00:42:33] Speaker B: All right, I'm gonna push back on resource lists since Ambesa and Renekton literally have a resource bar. Aatrox is the only one of them that is actually resourceless. [00:42:41] Speaker C: No, no, you're actually right. But they aren't a true resource isn't true. Renekton is technically true resources because he can always cast his abilities and Bessa technically uses energy. [00:42:52] Speaker B: Yes, but they don't use mana is the key. So they can't be attritioned through their resource bar only through their health bar. [00:42:58] Speaker A: Yeah, they don't have to trade mana for health or anything. Like that, you know, or health for health or however, you know, some people's resource is their health. Renekton is awesome as a blind pick. I love it. Unless you know, they. They pick like some of his worst counters. But even on his worst counters, like it's like Nasus, like he just can sustain through some bad lanes. That's why they're really. These three are good blind picks. I don't think in Bessa's sustain hits till she hits level six, Right? [00:43:28] Speaker B: Correct. She has no sustain in her kit until six. Although she does have a shield, so she gets to cheat it. [00:43:33] Speaker A: Still she does get the shield. But again, another thing, like you said, another three things these have in common is they have like get out buttons. Especially like in Bessa. She has 800 dashes with her abilities. Renekton can close or get away very far space with a double dash if he hits a Minion. Aatrox gets one dash, but he also has the chain which is a slow. And he has knock ups and heals off of his damage that he deals. So yeah, it's. I would say sustain and dashes make these guys very good like blind picks. [00:44:08] Speaker C: There is a third portion of this and that is that they are primarily damage champions. They are something that allows you to fight in a lane to kill an ad carry. So they have agency in the late game like Renekton does. They are very good at blowing something small up. So it, it really gives you that extra agency later. But also they're lane bullies. Their early game can be a little bit like first couple levels could be a little bit weak, but once they hit their stride, they usually just start racking the other mainstays of the lane. [00:44:44] Speaker B: Absolutely. And I think that kind of ties into the next question. So let's go to Rain's next question specifically for Top Line. How do each champion archetype found in the top lane use their agency to win games? And why does it feel like some archetypes have an easier time winning games than others? So the archetypes you'll typically see in top lane are bruisers, which is what I would classify someone like Renekton as. Or Aatrox for that matter, carries tanks. And then juggernauts. And Juggernauts is kind of the weird one because juggernauts are tanky like tanks, but do damage like bruisers. And their weakness usually is less mobility than those other two. So juggernauts would be someone like Sett or Dr. Mundo where they have to actually just run at you yeah. [00:45:32] Speaker A: So I think a good way to start with this is we're already halfway there. It's like let's define a champion in each role and let's see what's like what gives them what makes their laning good. So we already talked bruisers. You got, you know, we'll say Renekton a carry. Who would you call like a carry? I'm thinking like a really a riven Fiora. Like Fiora. [00:45:53] Speaker B: All of those. All of those. [00:45:56] Speaker A: And then you got tanks. We'll just, you know, both. I. I don't even think ORN is just a primary tank. And then Juggernauts will I. I think of when I think Juggernauts I think. [00:46:07] Speaker C: Scion or Monday was one of the part was there for the juggernaut remake. [00:46:13] Speaker B: Mundo mordekaiser, those kinds of champions. Scion is definitely a tank. He does a lot of damage by tank standards, but he's definitely a tank. [00:46:23] Speaker A: Oh yeah. So we'll start with Renekton. What makes him gives him the agency to win games. High end damage early lots of dashes sustain and all in capability like from. [00:46:35] Speaker B: Level three on and all of that with decent duration. Single target cc. [00:46:44] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:46:44] Speaker B: Renekton, if he finds a window can jump on the squishiest person on his opponent's team and say you fuck you. You don't get to play the game anymore. [00:46:56] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:46:56] Speaker A: Now as a carry, you know I like to think of. I just said her. I'm drawing a huge blank here. Dashie woman. [00:47:06] Speaker B: Aurelia. [00:47:07] Speaker A: Aurelia. Aurelia. Now so Aurelia's scary as a carry. The same reason that like Fiora is they have power spikes within their kit. Will say like for a really. She can be super far behind and as soon as she gets a blade of a rune king all of a sudden like it doesn't matter where she was. She. Her kit is built around that. So the being a carry. The same reason an ADC is a carry. She. They have power spikes with like items and just can just 0 to 100 someone. She has built in CC, she has built in damage reduction. She has a million dashes. So it's kind of hard to just build like target her. You can't just fight her. You got to be strategic about it. That's why sometimes these people take hey, there's an Aurelia in a side lane. Now all of a sudden there's three people having to go answer her because you can't 1v1 her. That's just. That's that's why they're strong. They're carries. They can carry you. Do you guys have anything else about Carries? [00:48:06] Speaker B: No. Usually the weakness of Carries and the reason I think they actually have a harder time using their agency to win games over Juggernauts and Bruisers. Specifically his Carries are easy to overextend on. If that Irelia goes too far forward and gets 1v3'd she just dies. She doesn't kill anyone. Whereas if Renekton gets 1v3'd if they can't literally hundred to zero him inside of their CC, he might take one. [00:48:32] Speaker A: Of them with him or just gets away. [00:48:34] Speaker C: The other thing that's very common with Carries is they have a relatively weak early game in comparison to their late game. [00:48:43] Speaker B: Yes. So like Jax is a perfect example of this. He's barely a champion before six. [00:48:49] Speaker A: Jax is a wonderful example. Like he is the one that can be 0 and 11 and all of a sudden he can 5v1 or 1v5 and get a pentakill out of it and keep taking your tower. Like Jax is an awesome example of a carry. Thank you. Yeah, yeah. You're welcome. So like a juggernaut. I. Juggernauts are. If you've ever faced a Mundo or you know exactly why a Juggernaut is strong. I mean, like I like to use Mundo. I skipped tanks. Sorry. [00:49:24] Speaker B: It's fine. We'll come back to tanks. [00:49:26] Speaker A: Like Mundo himself. Like his. He is so frustrating to play against because like he goes where he pleases. Like it's right there. It's. He is a meme of himself. He does what he wants. [00:49:37] Speaker B: Once a Juggernaut gets powerful enough that they can actually kill people, they're the one with all of the Agency Alois famous Mundo player will frequently jokingly say, oh, you should have played safe when he Tower dives people and kills them. Because he just pressed Ghost and Ult and ran at them and murdered them. And they literally. The only play they could have done to not die there is not be there in the first place. That's a Juggernaut. Or bring their friends there in the first place. But 1v1, they can't answer it. [00:50:11] Speaker A: Like, think of X Men's Juggernaut. Like you just can't take them down. Like you just literally cannot take them down. It's a team effort. They're raid bosses. I mean, the same reason that like going into the next archetype. Archetype Juggernauts are just very strong at absorbing all the damage while doing all of the Damage. Plenty of damage like they are. They're a bruiser and a tank combined. Like with less armor. [00:50:39] Speaker C: Yep. The. The reason to pick a tank over a bruiser is every tank brings some form of major cc, not just a slow. They'll do stuns. They'll do knock ups. They'll do suppresses and. [00:50:54] Speaker B: And a lot of juggernauts and bruisers have one form of this. Tanks often have multiple forms of this. Ornna has his ultimate knockup. He has the brittle knockback. He has the charge knockup. Maokai has a root. A root and a knockback. [00:51:11] Speaker A: Tahm Kench has a stun, a knockup and a devour. [00:51:14] Speaker B: Exactly. So tanks generally have multiple forms of CC that they can layer to either stop a dude from killing their teammates. Reminder. Tanks are really fucking good at that. Or hold a dude in place while their teammates kill him. [00:51:30] Speaker A: I mean think of any MMO ever. Like what's a tank's job to take the damage while their allies kill the thing. Like that's. That's a tank. They don't do the most damage but they don't have to. Some of them do a crap ton of damage for no reason. But yeah, that's another problem. [00:51:50] Speaker B: Yep. So tanks are probably the hardest to use your agency to win games in solo queue because tanks rely on having teammates respond to their plays generally. Unless you're very far ahead or your opponent has massively fucked up. The tank isn't solo killing people unless he's Ornn. [00:52:11] Speaker C: Reminder. Ornn does bullshit. Orn is he does so much. The reason why Orn over any other tank does is so powerful here. Even. Even versus like Scion. Scion has ridiculously large base damages. Ornn has a bunch of percent health damage plus a bunch of multiple frequent cc's. Yep. That he's layering on top of you so he's not taking a lot of damage while he's dealing a ton to you. [00:52:40] Speaker A: Another like it's Orn's passive. Going back to your previous question like added gold value even though you're below possibly by numbers in gold value is Ornn's item upgrades. Like those are worth thousands of gold a piece. I don't know if that adds to the game's total. I don't know how that works, but it does not. It adds thousands of gold on an upgrade. [00:53:03] Speaker B: The the key with Ornn upgrades is they give approximately a thousand gold worth of base stats on every item they upgrade. Upgrade. The upgraded versions of items are intentionally tuned to be worth about 1,000 gold a base stats more than the regular version. That's why we say they're worth about 1,000 gold each. And yeah, you get five upgrades on a team. So if Ornn is level 18 or 17 I think is when he can do the last upgrade, that team gets 5,000 invisible gold. [00:53:29] Speaker C: Essentially not counting his own bonuses from giving out upgrades. [00:53:34] Speaker B: Yes, he personally gets a multiplier on armor and Mr. For each item he has upgraded. So like he has a multiplier. Oh and health. He has a multiplier baseline and then the multiplier goes up when he upgrades things and it's. It gets big. I want to say it scales up to like 30% by the end of the game. [00:53:53] Speaker C: Sounds alright. [00:53:54] Speaker B: Let's find out. We have access to the wiki. Let's go to Orn's abilities. Why does he look different? [00:54:02] Speaker A: Why you guys put that up? I want to just touch on his last bit. Like why is it easier for investor to win a game over Tank Gragas. Gragas isn't meant to be a tank. Like he. He relies on AP to like do a lot of damage. [00:54:19] Speaker C: Where it's who they made into a magic version of a bruiser. [00:54:23] Speaker A: Yep, he's an AP bruiser. He is not meant to be built tank. So what he becomes when he's a tank is a belly slam bot. Like and he can scramble a team fight with his R. Whereas in Bessa has lots of damage, lots of movement, lots of pressure she can exert. [00:54:45] Speaker B: So I found it. Ornn gets 10% bonus armor, magic resistance and health. Increased baseline. And then each time he upgrades an item into a masterwork item that goes up by another 4%. So at five upgrades he has 30% more armor Mr. And health. That's why Orn is the tankiest champion in the fucking game. [00:55:08] Speaker C: Yes. Outside of the infinitely scaling health on. On Sion specifically Orange is the single. But yeah, tankiest champion you will see in the game. He will get the most. Well actually him and Ramis sometimes Ornn is. [00:55:23] Speaker B: Ramus is conditional. Ornn is permanent once he has it. [00:55:27] Speaker C: Ornn is always Rammus's sometimes. [00:55:29] Speaker B: Yeah. And just to add insult to injury, Ornn's charge that knocks you in the air if he hits a wall scales with his armor and Mr. So it goes up in damage as he builds masterwork items. [00:55:40] Speaker A: I mean really though, like tanks have a true counter in the top lane. Actually all these picks have a true counter in the top lane. And that's just Lucian in the top lane. You just build Kraken. Slayer, Blade of the Ruined King. And you just melt through everybody. It doesn't even matter. They can't touch you. [00:55:57] Speaker C: Build whatever you want. True counter. And it's vain. But. But Lucian's too far off. [00:56:02] Speaker B: We don't advocate for Vayne Top on this podcast. [00:56:05] Speaker C: I don't. [00:56:06] Speaker A: Absolutely not. [00:56:07] Speaker B: Please don't actually play Vayne Top. She kind of sucks. [00:56:10] Speaker A: She's getting. You'll just get an aatrox with a spell shield. [00:56:14] Speaker B: All right, this has been episode 507 of the Forwards Podcast. Listeners, we need more questions. We have two left in the dock for next week. Write in to theforwardspodcastmail.com or drop questions in the question submission channel on the Discord so we don't run out. [00:56:35] Speaker C: Reigns, thank you very much for the questions that you sent on the topic that you sent in. Send some more. We'll slowly answer them because you just got your full episode today. [00:56:44] Speaker A: Yes, yes. We're out of a rainy day. We're out of questions. [00:56:48] Speaker B: We appreciate you. Yes, Reigns, we appreciate you other listeners. We want to hear from you. Write in so we can answer your questions on the show, too. All right, this has been episode 507. I'm Jack Zoman for Mike of many names for Pillow Pet. Have a great night. [00:57:02] Speaker A: Good night. [00:57:03] Speaker C: Good night, everybody. [00:57:05] Speaker B: Thanks for listening to the four Wards podcast. If you want to support the show directly, consider checking out our [email protected] theforwardspodcast. And of course, send your questions to [email protected] so we can answer them live on the show. That's the [email protected].