Hey everyone, melee vs ranged matchups can be difficult for some players, because they don't know when they should all in.
Sometimes, they go in and get punished too hard for it, then get scared to trade throughout the rest of the lane.
So in this video, I'm going to be going over one of my own high elo games,
Where im playing fizz versus vel'koz. The concepts in this video will apply to any melee verse range matchup.
Let's break down the matchup first before getting into the gameplay.
Fizz is an AP assassin versus vel'koz a long range ap control mage.
Vel'koz has more waveclear more poke and more range while fizz wins extended and burst trades.
At Level six fizz can get kills with his shark,
but if Vel'koz has summoner spells up he can easily turn it around and kill fizz as well since his full combo does just as much damage.
in terms of Laning the matchup is actually in Vel'koz's favor.
He can clear the wave quickly, and leave the lane or freeze
Fizz needs to wait for vel'koz to make small mistakes, and take advantage of those all in Windows.
Knowing this let's make a game plan.
Mission one let the wave push. it's impossible to push vs Vel'koz. So we need to let the lane push to us.
Mission two, avoid taking too much harass. if we get poked too much in Lane,
It will prevent us from being able to go for trades. So we need to choose CS wisely
and mission three take advantage of trading windows,
Small windows to trade will open up throughout the lane. and we need to take advantage of those and punish
all right, let's get into the gameplay.
As lane starts, I'm going to wait for these three melee minions to get low, then when I go to auto them
I'm prepared to use my e to dodge vel'koz Q
He ends up using it so I dodge it grab all three CS then back away
This is pretty standard but you don't want to be using your e to dodge everything because the mana cost
It's good to use it here though, because I'm full mana and when taking into account, mana regen having full mana is just a waste
Anyways since none of the cs are low
I'm sitting out a range of vel'koz working on mission one and giving him no ways to harass me
The next wave is arriving now though, which lets me walk up again
If vel'koz autos me with a big wave here my minions will trade back for me.
I used my e to grab a few CS and damage vel'koz a little but I didn't really play this
Optimally I should have just waited for him to use Q and then dodged it with my E
but since I didn't I take return damage from vel'koz's Q on the way out,
A melee minion gets low and me being the greedy player that I am,
I take two Vel'kos's Ws taking even more harass without even getting the CS
Safe to say not a good start to mission two. I just needed to have better movement or give up that CS
The wave crashes now, so I focus on grabbing a few minions
But this is a really important part in any melee of a strange matchup
When the third wave arrives the cannon wave is when you both with level three
Level three is when melee champions can actually start trading back since they'll have all three of their abilities
Except for Diana since she has no mobility and Talon, since he can trade at level two
So you should always be ready to hit level three and look for a surprise all in if they don't respect it
We both had level three. So I walk at him to bait out his abilities. Then Q to a minion to close the distance
I was gonna look for a trade here, but I decided not to since this is around the time junglers can be ganking
But the way I initiated the trade was something you should pay attention to
When playing melee champs, you don't want to just sit back the whole time then only walk up when you want to trade
Just by walking at them. You can bait out their abilities which puts pressure on them. It opens up all in windows
Right here,
I bait out his E and Q which are his two main spells that can mess up my all-in and since I baited them out,
a Window opened up for mission 3, but I got scared of the jungler and backed off
Anyways, I go back to missions 1 and 2 grabbing CS and avoiding harass while the lane is pushing
I Use my E to dodge his E only because he used W with it
So if I didn't dodge the E I would have got hit by the first part of the W then the E in the second
Part of the W which would have also proct his passive doing a large chunk of damage
After he uses all of his abilities like t hat a window opens up for mission three. He has no way to trade back
So if he lets me jump on him I can win the trade
So I walk at him and he doesn't respect it letting me proc electrocute with my Q Auto W combo for a nice little chunk
After that, I go back to collecting my CS waiting for my cooldowns
What happens next is super important when it comes to mid lane for any matchup not just melee verse range.
First let's look at both waves
They are even and it's closer to my tower
Using the even minion rule the wave will slowly push towards vel'koz. This gives him a few options here.
He can either recall,let the wave push back, or try to shove then recall.
The first option, he might lose a few CS since I'll hard shove the wave
The second option lets him set up for a freeze and could be really good and the third option gets me recall without losing anything
Most players especially lower ELO's will go with option 3, so they don't miss any CS when they recall
as soon as vel'koz uses his W on the whole wave like this is when I know he wants to do option 3.
And then watch my movement as soon as he does it, see how aggressive I get
this is because as soon as I know he wants to show the wave and recall I want to pressure him to over stay. and not let him clear that wave, if I don't walk up he'll use all his abilities to clear it and recall for free
He backs away and tries to hit me with his Q, but I walked back and dodged it
This is really good for me now because he doesn't have his Q to clear the backline minions
As I go in for the CS I know he still wants to clear these. so he walks up and uses his E and W on the ranged ones to clear them, since his Q is down.
But I take advantage of their all-in window for mission 3 and go in making him burn flash and barrier
So that's what I mean when I say you need to take advantage and recognize windows to go in
I knew his thought process was I'll just use my E and W on these minions to clear them then back off and recall and
Since I knew that I was able to punish him really hard
Not having summoners vs. Fizz when I'm going to be level 6 soon is a really big deal as we all know
Anyways, after I blow summoners, I know he wants to recall so I hard shove the next wave and recall myself
When I get back to Lane, I'm thinking about how to go about my level six all-in
I don't want to force anything too hard before them because I really need to take advantage of the opportunity I'll have.
Basically, my main focus is to not die before I hit level six
After collecting a few CS I'm already preparing my plan to all-in
I'm level five and the wave is starting to slow push towards vel'koz since he has no summoners
I know I can dive him and the biggest advantage I can get right now is stacking this wave then diving him
So he loses the whole thing. So that's my plan. While I'm last hitting and letting the wave slow push,
Warwick walks over a bunch of wards and goes into our jungle
This really sucks for me because I will hit six after killing these minions and I want to surprise all in right away
But if Warwick is looking to gank mid right now he can mess it up.
I finished clearing the minions and hit level six then leave vision to dissuade Warwick from ganking mid if he's looking to.
I notice Vel'koz is trying to stop the minions from crashing to last hit easier and says he can't see me when I'm behind this wall,
And I see Warwick top river. I figure I have enough time to look for a one-shot
I'll land my shark since vel'koz couldn't see me first him quickly then run towards my jumbo doing dragon
Warwick shows up a little later than expected, but I was already gone
Alright, so that was a close to perfect example of how to play melee versus range matchups with no mechanics required
Let's do a quick recap before closing this one out.
At the start of the lane,
I just focused on last hitting and avoiding harass while letting the lane push
Then once I hit level of three, I could actually start trading
So I walked at Vel'koz to bait out his abilities, then look for a trade but backed off since I thought Warwick was near
After that, I took advantage of an all-in window when vel'koz used his abilities on the wave, dropping him to 70% health
Then vel'koz used his W on the wave letting me know he wanted to shove and recall.
So i got really aggressive, and went in, making him blow both summoners
After shoving the wave and recalling myself, I came back to lane at level 5 preparing for level 6 all in
I wanted to go as soon as I hit 6 since the wave was slow pushing, but Warwick was in our jungle
I cleared the waves and left vision so Warwick wouldnt gank mid.
Then hit a shark from the fog of war
To burst Vel'koz and exit bot side towards my jungle air in case Warwick showed up
Alright, that's gonna be it for this video. Thanks for watching.