Soon, the grind for the Season 8 is going to come to an end. Some of you may have gotten to where you wanted to, and others may have not. But everyone still wants to improve but may not know how to go about it. Here are some tips that’ll help you improve in the offseason in order to come back a stronger player into Season 9.

Watching VODs of Challenger/Pro Players



(courtesy of IWDominate's youtube channel)

Watching LCS/Worlds matches will help you improve how you lane and how you teamfight. One of the ways you can improve yourself is to gain more knowledge. The best way to do this is to watch high-level gameplay from pros in League of Legends. By going to the LoL Esports YouTube channel, you can watch back the VODs of not only all the games that happened at Worlds, but also an older archive of games from the LCS. Watching analysis videos from content creators like LS or coaches like Locodoco can help you to understand why players make certain choices.

Watching informational streamers can also help your gameplay. Many times, even entertainment streamers like Imaqtpie will sometimes explain why they go aggressive in lane or why they position the way they do in a teamfight. Currently, IWDominate has series on YouTube called “How to Dominate” that teaches you how to play jungle at a higher level. This series and others similar to it are recommended.





Improving Hand-Eye Coordination and Mouse Accuracy

When I was starting out, my hand-eye coordination wasn’t exactly on point. Not only playing the game helps, but playing other genres of games aids your skills.

OSU!

Osu! is a rhythm game that requires you to move your mouse to circles that appear all over the screen. The catch is that you have to click the circles when the outer circle closes on it. Not only does this help your mouse accuracy, it also helps your eye tracking (how fast your eyes move around the screen to look at important indicators like enemies ganking your lane). Not only this, but it helps your hand-eye coordination as well. The only part about OSU! is that it’s a little hard to get into. If this is not for you, then I’d recommend this next genre of games.

Fighting Games

Various fighting games can't help with mouse accuracy, but they can help with hand-eye coordination! Most fighting games involve you making split-second decisions on what combo/punish you want to go for. In these types of games, you learn how to read what your opponent will do so that you can punish appropriately. This same mentality can be applied to League of Legends. If your opponent makes a misstep in lane, think about how you can punish them in an optimal way that you either get a kill or force a recall. Having your combo punishes on both a fighting game character and your LoL champion will improve your gameplay extensively. The trick is to apply your combo and punish mentality to your gameplay.



Fixing Mentality

Sometimes we have games that tilt us and put us into a terrible state of mind. It’s okay to have bad games sometimes. Personally, I find it hard to accept that bad games will happen sometimes. The best way to change this is to tell yourself constantly that not every game will go your way.

Work on de-stressing during and after games and not letting yourself tilt. You win some and you lose some. The best way to do this is to take breathers if you die in-game and also take a 5-10 minute break and not think about the game for a bit. Talk a walk or browse social media for a few minutes. Emotions can get the best of us, so it’s better to let them pass so that we can reflect on our gameplay without trying to blame your teammates entirely.

Taking breaks even helps. Longer breaks can also be beneficial for your mentality. High-level streamers didn’t start off being able to tough out a loss streak. When they first start out, they definitely took tilt breaks. Go play a different game for a bit or maybe do some other work you might have to complete. Not everyone is going to play like how you want them to. Many players have different mentalities and play styles of how the game is played. Try to work on cooperating with your teammates in order to maximize your chance of a victory.





Practice

Most importantly, keep practicing! You can’t get better at a game without actively playing it. Use the knowledge from pro players and implement it into your gameplay one mechanic at a time. Always be asking questions about what you can improve and don't be afraid to ask higher level streamers questions. Keep practicing until your game sense becomes second nature!





I hope this guide assists in refining your gameplay for next season. These tips can always be used during the season as well! Using these tips effectively will be key in climbing the ladder come January. Good luck in your climb summoners.

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