This week, I’ll be talking about trading. I’ll cover the definition of trading, its importance, how to trade, and some tips and tricks at the very end.
WHAT IS TRADING?
Trading is an interaction in the game where you and your enemy exchange or trade blows. Trades are when you use basic abilities to engage, deal damage, and disengage. Any trade aims to take less damage than you give to your enemy. As well as being able to force him out of lane or get them low enough to kill. Trading is the first step to killing an enemy or winning your lane.
WHY IS TRADING IMPORTANT?
Trading is essential because it is the core method of getting an advantage in the lane. Proper trading is the gateway to getting many more strong advantages in lane such as:
- Applying Pressure
Getting your opponent lower than your HP makes them play more cautiously and forces them to be careful. It lets you be more dominant in the lane with the potential to zone him. For those who don’t know, Zoning is when you use yourself to create a big zone between yourself and the minions. This is to keep your enemy from getting gold and experience. You can do this if you’re confident you would win any fight if he got too close. This will snowball your lead the longer you can hold him back.
- Forcing the Enemy to Recall
Winning trades repeatedly and getting the enemy low could also force him to recall. Knowing that if he sticks around, he could die. This makes him lose more gold and experience, putting you further ahead.
- Knowing When to Kill
Trading also helps you know when you can kill your enemy. It gives you an idea of how much damage your abilities do to your enemy. If you can use two of your skills and it does half of his health, that means by using those abilities again, you kill him. But you wouldn’t have known this unless you traded with him to find out.
HOW TO TRADE
Now we get to the important part: How do you trade? — It’s easy, and there are four steps that you need to remember:
- Assess the Situation
This is the first step. Before trading, you need to know your enemy. You need to know his abilities and consider what he will do in return. Get in his head and think — “What would I do if I were him and this guy went on me right now? How would I react? Would I win?” then you can decide whether you should even trade. If you don’t think you’d win the trade, then don’t start the trade. But if you think you can win the trade, you can proceed to the next step.
- Engage and Deal Damage
This is the second step. Engaging means getting in range. If you’re a ranged champion or have any ranged abilities, all you need to do is get in range to use your abilities. If you’re a melee champion and you don’t have any ranged abilities, you need to get in there. This step is when you do your damage. There are two scenarios where it’s best to do this. First, it is after an enemy has used one of his abilities that they would have used to trade back with you. Second, you come in as they’re going for the last hit on a minion. The aim is to do as much damage as possible quickly to reduce your enemy’s opportunities to hurt you.
- Disengage and Avoid Damage
This is the third step. Much like last time, disengaging means getting out of range. Not your range this time, but the enemy’s range. You want to decrease the amount of return damage that he can do to you. This means getting out immediately after you’ve landed your damage and get out of his range. Part of that is knowing what his return damage is. This is why knowing your enemy is so important. If you can understand what his damage is and avoid all his damage, then you’re on your way to winning your lane.
- Repeat
This is the fourth and last step. Once you’ve gone and done that trade, you should roughly know how much damage you can do to him and how much he can do to you. If you’ve won that trade, you want to return there at any given chance. Keep going in; get him lower and lower until you’ve gotten to a point where you can get the kill. If you lost the trade, then now you know how much health you need to stay in a safe range without dying.
TIPS AND TRICKS
Wiggling is a great way to find an opportunity to trade. To do this, you walk back and forth in your lane. At some point, the enemy will walk closer to the wave. Then, you take this opportunity to turn on him while he’s moving toward you, and he will walk into your range. You can use this to do a quick combo on your enemy and force him to retreat.
Some champions have great tools for engaging and can do lots of damage but don’t have a way to disengage. They rely on you getting so scared that you don’t trade back. A great example of this would be Riven. Once she jumps in and burns all her abilities, you are usually so hurt that you walk away because you think you’ll lose. But if you save your mobility to catch her or fight her after she trades with you, you’ll often be able to trade back well. This is also part of knowing your enemy. It is helpful to know if their damage falls off after they’ve used their cooldowns.
The fake recall is another good way to find an opportunity to trade. Start walking at the edge of your enemy's vision and start recalling. They might think it’s a mistake and start walking towards you to try and stop your recall. As they walk in range, you can trade with them. You must be careful with this one because good players expect you to react. They might turn around before they get in range, stopping your back and not getting hurt.
Finally, you need to be aware of the minions. They do lots of damage early, especially in the Laning Phase. If you fight your enemy while he is in a group of minions, they will turn on you and chunk your health. Remember that if you are in a big group of minions, try to provoke the enemy to trade with you because they will hurt him.
That’s all for now! I hope you learned something from this article. Good luck on the Rift!
