League of Legends: Tanks

You know, I used to mostly play Xerath and Malzahar when I first started league back in 2013. The I picked up champions like Nasus and Cho’Gath, and despite the stigma of ‘boring gameplay,’ I actually enjoyed playing them just as much.

Then I get to level 20, and almost no one is playing tanks, and I’m loosing every game where the enemy team has a tank and mine doesn’t. So I grab Cho’Gath, and go full tank…

And proceeded to laugh my ass off at the enemy team’s complete inability to kill me. There’s a certain enjoyment to be had from eating a 1000 AP Veigar’s entire combo and laughing it off. Or deliberately walking into full-build Nidalee spears and only taking a tenth of my health as damage.

Playing Tanks in League of Legends

I’m going to say this now, playing a tank isn’t super rewarding from a mechanical aspect unless you’re playing a mobile tank like the reworked Galio, and even then, not by much. If you want to outplay your enemies with mobility, then play a Slayer (Assassin's and Skirmishers).

If you like assasins and super-high skillcap champions like Azir, tanks may not be for you. Playing a tank requires a certain mindset. One that I lack some days admitted;y.

You don’t outplay people so much as you beat the living shit out of them while eating their damage and laughing it off, and/or CCing them into oblivion. I personally prefer to play aggressive, hard CC-heavy tanks like Sion and Galio.

Now, tanks can be broken down more or less into two categories, Wardens and Vanguards. Now, before you come at me with ‘What about juggernauts?’ I’m going to say this now:

Juggernauts are not true tanks. They are fighters. They can be as tanky as a tank, but they are not tanks. A true tank is supposed to be a brick wall, or a CC machine. They are NOT supposed to be damage threats. You can find out more about sub-classes on this page: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/game-updates/gameplay/dev-blog-classes-subclasses

When a Juggernaut falls behind, they’re essentially a burden, useless; good examples of this are Illaoi, Darius, and Nasus. Even when a tank falls behind, all they do is have to land a multi-man piece of hard CC for their team to capitalize on and turn the game around.

Notice what I said there. Their team, not them. You generally will not see a Tank carrying a game by 1v5ing like a fed Darius or Yasuo. Rather, as a Tank, your role is to get your team fed, and keep them alive.

With that out of the way, let’s start on the categories. Wardens are tanks that have kits that allowing them to save their squishier allies from being brutally murdered by assassins – I’m looking at you Rengar.

Playing Wardens is about know where the enemy is going to strike, and shutting their attempt down and locking them down for your team to kill, or making their lives difficult with defensive abilities like Vengeful Maelstrom or Spirit’s Refuge, which make it hard to hurt people inside of them, or Unbreakable and Devour, which make it harder, if not impossible, to even reach a specific person. There are a few that simply function as a huge ‘no-no’ zone, that have terrifying powerful ults that can cause serious harm if you wander within their range.

Basically, Warden’s are all about the satisfaction of looking at that Zed or Katarina that jumped your squishies and saying “Not today motherfucker!” or protecting you carry from what seemed like certain death.

Where Wardens are the ones that prevent their allies from getting killed, Vanguards, on the other hand, are the ones that start fights. Generally possessing massive AOE damage and/or CC, these guys are similar to Fighters in that they are usually found in the thick of the action. Unlike their more notorious counterparts -I’m looking at you Darius- they don’t generally get kills; rather, they dish out horrendously powerful crowd control. More often than not, a Vanguard will have an AOE ult that applies some form of hard CC, and has at least one hard CC ability in their kit, and then soft CC, and some form of gap closer. Sometimes the gap closer and the ult are the same ability, such as in the case of Malphite and Sion. With these guys,  they engage and blow all their CC on a priority target, or targets if applicable or possible, and stay in the thick of the fight, making a huge nuisance of themselves. While they can peel for the carrys, they don’t do it nearly as well as a Warden-think the difference between a Leona (Vanguard) peeling and a Thresh (Warden) peeling/saving.

Notice how Thresh is a Warden? Warden’s and Vanguards aren’t set in stone, the name just describes where their strength’s lie.

And that’s basically it. I’ll be making posts about specific tanks and their playstyles, so stay tuned!