Overview

The way you play the composition is in the name. A team fighting composition works around all 5 champions working in unison to win 5 v 5 confrontations around the map. They normally have champions with strong initiation tools, a front line which can take all the damage for you, a team fighting damage tool, ways to peel for allies and damage dealers who can optimize their damage in a team fight. Your team is looking to group when possible and fight using the cooldowns appropriately when there up. After the fight is won, the team then rotate around the map and get the objectives that are up.

Understanding when your team is strong is vital for this composition to work. Using the power spikes your champions have and using them to win team fights. These power spikes can be from either levels or items. The team with the team fight wants to be the one in control on these power spikes. You want to initiate the fights or peel back at the right time. By staying in control and staying focused, the game should stay in your favour. The main thing to remember is to make sure you rotate efficiently and get an objective of the won team fight. You don't want to use all your cooldowns and get nothing objectively from it. To conclude; stay in control, stay focused, rotate efficiently, use cooldowns effectively in 5 v 5 scenarios, peel and stay back when you need to.

Playing it Out

When your composition has become team fighting, there are a few tips I'd recommend you to keep in mind when playing the game out. By optimizing on these strengths, you can win the game;

-Understanding of Cooldowns: Knowledge of your own and the enemy's cooldowns can really help. Making sure your Sejuani has Smite and ultimate for a team fight. When you want to team fight, does the enemy Janna have her "Monsoon" to knock you all back? Understanding these little pieces of information can be the key to a won fight

-Rotating as a 5: Get together as soon as the laning phase has finished and use your superior team fight to win the game. Fight them with all your important cooldowns and get the global objectives

-Stay focussed and controlled: By being in control and making sure you get the important targets in a fight, you can make sure you win the team fight decisively

-Get the initiation: Most of the time your team will have some large form of AOE initiation that start of the fight. Be that an Annie "Summon: Tibbers", Leona's "Solar Flare" or Sejuani's "Glacial Prison". Try and get yourself into a situation where your using them offensively, not defensively to peel

-Neutral Warding: You want to use the wards so you can fight when you want to. If that a defensive fight in your jungle or an aggressive fight behind the enemy's turret, get the vision that grants you 100% success

-Jungle is your home: With the AOE your team will generally have, fighting the small corridors that the jungle provides is ideal. The enemy will have a hard time navigating themselves while you just pile on the damage

-When Behind: Farm from a distance and only fight the fights that you know you will win. So fighting the battles where you have the number advantage or the enemy jungler is on the opposite side of the map and the top laner has no teleport etc.

Champion Choices



(champions from patch 5.5 to 5.7)

Top:



Rumble

- Creates another AP threat from the Top lane. Scales really well of base damages so by building early magic penetration in Sorcerer's Shoes and Haunting Guise, you can still have an impact in the mid game team fights

-"Electro-Harpoon" when hit has a strong slow attached to it. With effective use, you can catch 1-2 targets out and slow their pace for your team to catch them

- Rumble's singular use of the energy source "Heat" means he doesn't have to worry about mana in fights. As long as the player controls the Heat source correctly and optimises the damage output created by the "Danger Zone" part of the Heat, Rumble should never have to worry about running out of mana

- Rumble's main team fight participation comes in his ultimate, "The Equalizer". Equalizer creates a line of rockets over a 1000 length area, leaving a large AOE which does magic damage for every second you stand on it. Also slowing his opponents, you can control how the enemies move around in a team fight, potentially changing a team fight completely

Hecarim

- By his damage scaling off his movement speed, he brings another way of dealing damage on the top lane. You need to be afraid fo the TP ganks that Hecarim brings in a game. With Homeguard, he can easily get to the back line and destroy one of your back line carries

-"Spirit of the Dead" means Hecarim can be a hard target to kill for the enemy in a team fight. By healing 20% of the damage dealt in an area around him, he becomes a really hard pony to kill in team fights when he's soaking a lot of the damage and healing it back

-The constant spam and small AOE that "Rampage" provides for Hecarim means he can deal constant damage over a long winded fight. Especially when combined with the Sheen proc from either Trinity Force or Iceborn Gauntlet, he can deal a surprising amount of damage

-"Onslaught of Shadows" is a massive ability in a team fight. It can get Hecarim to the back line really easily while fearing all enemies away from Hecarim. This can create forced mis-positioning on priority targets, meaning Hecarim can easily set up his team for a won team fight

Jungle:

Sejuani

-The flavour pick in Sejuani excels with the new item that's just hit the item store, "Cinderhulk". Granting an extra 25% bonus health, Sejuani scales exceedingly well with that stat and makes her an unkillable monster. The damage overtime it emanates as well, due to Sejuani being so close to the enemy at all times, stacks quickly on an enemy

-Sejuani has 3 CC tools in her kit so she can keep people down for a long time in fight. Her Q, E and R abilities all provide different forms of soft and hard crowd control, meaning she works well in team fights

-She can consistently deal damage to all opponents throughout the game. Her "Flail of the Northern Winds", hits the target with damage that scales of their maximum health. Meaning any target will take damage from the ability, tank to ADC

- The large AOE stun that Sejuani gets from "Glacial Prison" makes her a beast in a team fight scenario. She can potentially lock down the whole team and stun them for around 1.5 seconds. This is easily enough time for your team to follow up and kill everybody

Rek'Sai

-One if not the strongest early game jungler in the game right now. Her pressure through the knock up and base damage she provides from 1-2 abilities means she can bully her enemy jungler around and get her allies ahead in lane

-A strong passive which comes from Rek'Sai's "Burrowed Form" is "Tremor Sense". In a range around her of 1300 units, she can detect the movement of all enemies and neutral creatures on the map. Meaning she can keep track of sneaky plays and not have her team fall prey to anything surprising

-Rek'Sai's ultimate "Void Rush" sounds ridiculous in theory. Right now the ability is used to get Rek'Sai to her jungle quickly so her CS is never lower then her counterpart. The other strength in Void Rush comes from the unknowing scare that the enemies have to take. Never knowing where she could be, the enemies will be worried about fights suddenly gaining another member

-She can built in multiple ways. As a damage source, the team will use her early spike in damage to quickly get the team ahead. As a tank with "Cinderhulk" she becomes a front line member of the team, being an annoying threat that helps keep the damage carries of her team

Mid:

Orianna

-Orianna's "Command: Protect" is one of the strongest shields when Orianna gains some items and levels. Not only granting a pure health shield, when the ball is on an ally it grants them from 10-30 armour and magic resist. That can be the difference on ally dying sometimes

-"Command: Dissonance" has 3 main properties attached to it. It deals damage. Secondly, the AOE it leaves both speeds up allies and slows her enemies. Orianna's ability is really good for chasing an enemy while also retreating from a bad fight

-"Command: Attack" is Orianna's main harass tool and is how Orianna can maintain pressure and zoning in the laning phase. As a team when moving through the map, Orianna can use this ability to check places that are covered by the fog of war

-Orianna's main tool in a team comes from her ultimate "Command: Shockwave". She pulls in all enemies hit and clusters them into a small area in the middle. While doing a lot of damage, this can initiate a fight and dictate the way the fight will go

Vladimir

- Vladimir is the epitome of what you want from a mid lane mage in a team fight scenario. He can increase and optimize his team fight composition damage with his abilities when his team is ahead, while if behind he can split push in a side line and push the waves with his AOE.

- His sustainability in a long winded fight makes him one of the most frustrating champions to deal with in that situation. Him and his team can be in a fight for over 1 minute and the Vlad player won't have any health bars missing to show it

- "Sanguine Pool" grants the same ability that Lissandra's "Frozen Tomb" gives her when used on self-cast. The 2 seconds of invulnerability can help him survive ganks and potentially fatal scenarios. It's also really good follow up on his ultimate as it provides him an AOE slow on potentially multiple targets

- "Hemoplague" helps Vladimir become a dangerous threat in a team fighting composition. On cast to multiple enemies, the increase damage output for the duration that the hemoplague sticks on them can help his team kill off the enemy targets and rotate to the objectives

ADC:

Sivir

- A long ranged skillshot in "Boomerang Blade" that can effectively wave clear a line of minions and can pierce a lot of health off an enemy champion in the later levels. Using this ability o push the wave means Sivir can quickly get with her team and join a team fight

- "Ricochet" brings a lot of AOE auto attack damage to a large scale team fight. Scaling of her TOTAL AD , it bounces between all targets in a range for the next 3 auto attacks. In a close cluster this can output a reasonable amount of damage to all targets hit

- Sivir can be incredibly self-sufficient when her "Spell Shield" is used for the right ability and at the right time. Example in this is Sejuani's ultimate. By spell shielding the stun, she can escape the potentially fatal situation and fall back behind her team

- Sivir's main attribute in a team fight comes from her ultimate "On the Hunt". It rallies herself and her allies, granting them a 60% movement speed boost which reduces to 20% over time. It helps her team kite, chase and retreat in an team fight scenario, meaning it has multiple uses as an ability

Kalista

- Kalista's constant dashes from her passive "Martial Poise", makes her a tricky threat to deal with in a fight. She can dodge all the important skillshots and move around her enemies, making her a constant damage threat that has tons mobility

- With her W, she can scout out parts of the map to find her enemies loitering around. Especially in the jungle, she can keep track of the movement her enemy team, especially the jungler. By knowing that information, her team will know when to be aggressive and defensive around the map

- "Rend" is one of Kalista's main damage tools and with the damage being based on how many spears Kalista has left in the target with auto attacks (with a potential of up to 254), she can deal unexpected amounts of damage. It's also really good at objective control as she can use the Rend as a way of smiting objectives such as Dragon and Baron

- Kalista brings a non damaging ultimate but a clever way of initiating fights. With the soul bound ally, she can use them to initiate a knock back slow on enemies. When combined with a champion such as Annie, Kalista can use the "Fate's Call" to throw Annie in and initiate the fight with her AOE stun

Support:

Annie

- Annie brings one tool as a support and that is stuns. She has no form of peel, shield or heal. Her supporting comes from the stun in built into her passive on every fourth ability cast. There's an animation that occurs around Annie when the stun is up, the player can use this to pressure the opponents to not act aggressively

- Annie's roams are one of the strongest as a support at all points in the game. Buy mobility in items like "Righteous Glory" and "Talisman of Ascension" to quickly get in the enemy's face. Using one of the offensive spells to stun 1 or multiple enemies down for the team to follow up

- She brings high base damage as a support. Her poke in lane can hit like a truck in some ways and force her opponents out of lane, meaning herself and her allied ADC can get ahead in terms of EXP and gold. In team fight terms, your ADC can buy better items meaning they will have more impact in fights

- "Summon: Tibbers" is Annie's strongest spell to use the stun passive with. It's her largest AOE and appears straight away on the field meaning enemies can have a hard time reacting. When used with the summoner spell Flash, a fight can be started from anywhere and enemies have to be cautious of this happening all the time

Leona

- Leona has one of the easier times of a support of getting to the backline and locking them down. "Xenith Blade" will only jump to the last person hit, meaning she can go through multiple enemies and still get the ADC

- Her abilities all leave a de-buff on the enemy called "Sunlight". This de-buff is only usable by her allies. On allied hit of ability or auto attack, they will deal extra magic damage on hit which scales with the levels of Leona. With the AOE that some her abilities bring, it can be applied to a lot of enemies and deal considerable damage

- Leona can become a tank in the later stages of the game with her increased resistances that "Eclipse" brings into her kit. Scaling of her bonus armor and magic resist, she can become pretty beefy in the late game. She needs it as most of the time she'll be in the middle of them first, initiating the fight

- Leona's main initiation tool comes from "Solar Flare" From a range, Leona can call a beam of solar energy to hit a small area. This is great for starting the fight as it can get on the integral targets and either stun or slow them down considerably. The more enemies she hits, the more CC she has used to lock the enemy team down

Facing It!

A composition which excels at grouping and fighting as a team across the map need to focus on their positioning as a team. A positional error can quickly tips the tide in the opposite team's favour if abused and capitalized upon. So as the opposing team, try and abuse errors made by the players and use your numbers to get ahead. On the point of positioning, due to the initiation tools on this type of composition you and your team don't want to cluster as you become easy pickings for them. Finally, try to keep the important cooldowns recorded on their team. Fight around their initiation tools and AOE damage abilities so you're not vulnerable to losing because of them.

Out of the other 2 compositions I would say the one you can look at for working best vs a team fight centric composition is the Poke/Siege. By using their grouping against them, the champions on the team can use their long ranged damage to poke the champions out of the fights. By doing so the team fight comp will rarely want to fight as their health bars will be too low to do so. As long as the frontline champions hold strong for the back line and try to get the team to waste their initiation on them, the back line can just freely pile all their damage on to them. Using their range and frontline, a poke composition can effectively rotate around the team fight composition and capitalize by taking the objectives across the map.

Strong champions that work in defeating a team fight composition



Conclusion

As a team fighting composition your focus as a team is to use your champions in unison and obliterate them with cc and AOE damage. By stacking multiple pieces of soft cc and hard cc, you keep the enemy locked down optimizing your team's damage output while minimizing theirs. Try and understand the map so your team are the ones under control. Creating a situation that makes you the ones initiating. If you're being caught out or initiated upon, you and your team will most likely have to use their spells defensively. By doing that you lose control and are quickly overridden, leading to you seeing the defeat screen. By being in control you will see the opposite.

There are a lot of compositions in League of Legends and its one of the many reasons for the games diversity and one of the reason we come back to the game every day. I've only gone into 3 very broad compositions here and there are a lot more intricate ones that exist. Juggermaw is a prime example of a more intricate composition which relies on specific champions to exist in the composition (etc. Kog'maw, Lulu). A lot of the times when you're in soloQ, you won't have time or the ability to communicate with your team and aim for archetype composition. You'll get champions people are comfortable with, champions that counter their lane opponent and champions that are troll for the meta (eventhough there is argument right now that in the current patch meta, there isn't a champion who can't be played).

Your aim in champion select and before the game properly begins is to see what properties your composition has. How can you utilise each champions strengths and get that end game win. Also focussing on the enemy composition and what strengths their champions have and how must you work around it. A few aspects to look at;





- Power Points: When is your champion, allied champions and enemy champions strong. Is it an item? Is it a champion's level? Orientate around that champions if its an ally and abuse that point of strength and try and avoid fighting when you know another champion has hit their spike in power

- Vital Champions: Which champions make your and theirs work. In mostly every game, every champion is strong but due to the meta and the composition your team has fell into, there is going to be one or two champions that determine the success of your team

- The Map: Where do you and your team want to fight on the map and where you don't want to. Fighting a team fight composition is incredibly scary in a 5 v 5 situation in the jungle. The small corridors make it easy for them to lock you up. While a Siege compositon is looking to fight in the lane so they can rush the turrets down and use their advantage

- Win Conditions: As a team, what's the focus of your team to win. How do you do it and how quickly do you need to do it. Whats the enemy comp's winning conditions. How do you work around it and counter it.

There are more pointers out there but these are only a few as there are thousands of compositions in League of Legends. Due to the amount of champions in the game that can be combined, a game can be completely different to the next. While I looked into 3 rather broad archetypes ad focussed on them, it doesn't mean that you can't use the same skills to identify other compositions. What are your strengths and weaknesses and focus on that. To conclude, I hope this rather long article gives you a look into 3 used compositions in League of Legends right now. My aim was for you to understand how they worked,how you dealt with them and what kind of champions fit into them. If you got to this point in the article, it means you read a reasonable amount. I hope you found the article interesting and helped you play your games. Please leave me feedback as I'm always looking to improve as how else am I going to :)

Copyright and Source goes to Riot Games