Good character for a total newb

[Thrawn]

Nasus is one of my favorite champs, great early sustain, deadly late game if you get that Q farmed up. I'd check out Hyfes guide on any LoL site.  Thing I like most about him is most people don't expect you to be able to take off 1/3 or more of their life with a really short cooldown ability.

My biggest issue with Nasus (who I am also a big fan of) is that currently he almost has to solo to get his levels and Q farm.  But he loses lane to a LOT of champions 1v1 if the two players are of equal skill level.

[Prospero]

Nasus is the best. A crit siphon strike is just broken. I've seen hits for over 1500 damage with that thing.

[Rasix]

He's cheap. I'll have to give him a shot.  A problem with low level games, however, is that you're more than likely going to have a lane partner.

Sometimes you'll have support, and most of the time they'll be just trying for ganks or cs.   

[Prospero]

He's fine with a lane partner, just make sure you get last hits with your Q as much as humanly possible. If you are getting zoned out and can't feed your Q, switch gears to maxing your AOE so you can hold your lane and get a ton of gold. I've pulled off an AP Nasus in that situation a couple times and it worked really well. It's not as good as criting for 1500, but you'll still be useful.

[Margalis]

Anytime anyone on the other team chooses Nasus I choose Cass and counter-lane them. They have to switch lanes or they can't farm Q at all, at least until they buy a lot of magic resist.

I also play a fair amount of Nasus, I have a set of runes with MR and one with Armor depending on who I think I will be laning against. In general if you can make it to level 6 in good shape you're ok.

Farming with AOE is kind of a waste, Nasus without farmed Q is not particularly valuable.

[Prospero]

I agree he's not fabulous if he can't farm his Q, but using his AOE lets you get way more gold than most other melee champs would be able to against a Cass. I feel like Nasus can still bring a lot to the table in teamfights through his slow and armor debuff even when he can't bring damage, which is a fallback position other melee carries don't have. His AOE also makes it nearly impossible to push down his tower without killing him. I just really like how fault tolerant he is.

[Amaron]

Uh. This is the thing. Out of that list, the only ones you can reliably claim to be good in every solo-queue are Annie, Brand and Kennen. Nocturne maaaaybe (is he snowballs out of control and the other team has no brains).

The solo queue list is for heroes that you can carry with by being better than the other team.   Janna isn't even tier 1 on that list for obvious reasons.   In some respects it's probably only a list you use when you are first or second pick.

[Rasix]

Ohh god, this next free week of champs is going to be hell.

edt: Altough, I do admit there are a few here I'd be trying.

[statisticalfool]

What? What? No stealth champions. Only Vayne and Kassadin as assassins, and not too much derp potential. It's going to be awesome!

I'm actually really excited to be playing Nidalee, Riven, Kog`Maw, Yorick. They're all on my "try out/maybe buy when they go on sale" list.

That said, it's been literally 17 weeks since Irelia has showed up. Booooo.

[K9]

Kassadin looks fun

[Thrawn]

Kassadin looks fun

Kassadin is probably one of the most enjoyable characters in the game to play if you get fed.  You just riftwalk in, kill the person of your choice, riftwalk out and skip away until you feel like doing it again.

[Chimpy]

That said, it's been literally 17 weeks since Irelia has showed up. Booooo.

Could have sworn Irelia was free like 3 weeks ago.

[statisticalfool]

Nope. :( June 14th.

[Rasix]

What? What? No stealth champions. Only Vayne and Kassadin as assassins, and not too much derp potential. It's going to be awesome!

I'm actually really excited to be playing Nidalee, Riven, Kog`Maw, Yorick. They're all on my "try out/maybe buy when they go on sale" list.

That said, it's been literally 17 weeks since Irelia has showed up. Booooo.

No Yorick this week.   Weird, says Riven on the site.  Link points to Yorick.

I'll probably try out Kog'Maw, Vayne, Fiddle, Garen, and perhaps Morg.  I think she'll be snagged pretty early as she's pretty strong at this level of competition.   I was having all sorts of problems with her on Gangplank, but I think that's because she could land that root when I came into range.  Citrus helps, but it still hurts like a bitch.  (Didn't help that center fed her pretty hard).

For some reason, I just think with these choices, this week is going to be really smurfy for those of us low level folks.  Luckily, I'm nearly level 12 so I'll be able to flash away from Fiddle in a few games.   Fucking Fiddle.

[Slayerik]

As a general rule (and one I find myself overlooking at times), don't commit to a team fight unless you have eyes on the fiddle. If you don't, assume he is in position to get all crowstorm on your team's face. Ask yourself - 'if I were a cocksucking fiddlesticks, where would I be waiting?'

[HaemishM]

I had a game last night playing as Maokai (?) where I chose my masteries wrong. Went for physical damage instead of AP, so I had a real slow buildup to anything. We won the game purely on the guy playing Nassus. He was a bragging fucker, but they just could NOT seem to kill him. Not sure why. Meanwhile, there were a few times where I popped my ult and jumped into Fiddlesticks, only to see him just hammer the shit out of me. I played him once, but don't remember his powers enough to know what the hell he was doing to me (obviously I was in melee range). So what the fuck was he doing to me?

[Chimpy]

The only time I like to see fiddlesticks is when he is on my team and Thrawn is playing him.

[Slayerik]

I had a game last night playing as Maokai (?) where I chose my masteries wrong. Went for physical damage instead of AP, so I had a real slow buildup to anything. We won the game purely on the guy playing Nassus. He was a bragging fucker, but they just could NOT seem to kill him. Not sure why. Meanwhile, there were a few times where I popped my ult and jumped into Fiddlesticks, only to see him just hammer the shit out of me. I played him once, but don't remember his powers enough to know what the hell he was doing to me (obviously I was in melee range). So what the fuck was he doing to me?

Probably first feared you, and then held his arms out and drained you (channeling spell). The shit hurts, especially on a fed fiddle.

[Viin]

I played two rounds as Nasus last night and actually did pretty good the first game (first time out with him), getting several kills and dying only a few times.
But the second game, phew that stunk. Up against Kennen and one other, who were doing a really good job keeping me from farming - ended up with 2 kills and 7 deaths and a few assists. Since you need to farm for your Q as Nasus, keeping me from doing that really hurts my damage abilities later in the game. They had a Fiddle which would jump into a team fight and basically toast us all. Since they were *always* running around in a team towards the end of the game, it was pretty hard to counter (and I couldn't take Fiddle on my own unless I got real lucky).

[Kirth]

I played two rounds as Nasus last night and actually did pretty good the first game (first time out with him), getting several kills and dying only a few times.
But the second game, phew that stunk. Up against Kennen and one other, who were doing a really good job keeping me from farming - ended up with 2 kills and 7 deaths and a few assists. Since you need to farm for your Q as Nasus, keeping me from doing that really hurts my damage abilities later in the game. They had a Fiddle which would jump into a team fight and basically toast us all. Since they were *always* running around in a team towards the end of the game, it was pretty hard to counter (and I couldn't take Fiddle on my own unless I got real lucky).

Did you have a jungler? I've solo top laned (as nasus) vs 2 before and I was pushed back but still managed to farm up Q pretty well plus had a lin sin who came up for a gank at the right time to help. I agree vs ranged he has some short comings, best thing might be to build up spirit fire and try to zone them out.

[Viin]

Did you have a jungler? I've solo top laned (as nasus) vs 2 before and I was pushed back but still managed to farm up Q pretty well plus had a lin sin who came up for a gank at the right time to help. I agree vs ranged he has some short comings, best thing might be to build up spirit fire and try to zone them out.

No jungler, had a lane partner but he might as well not have been there. I did get spirit fire going to keep them away but the ninja has that long-range throwing star and (now I remember) Singed with his counter Trail just made it hard on all of us. :P

[HaemishM]

That's what it was, lifesteal. I forgot he had that.

[statisticalfool]

Ugh. So Nidalee and Kogmaw both kind of require camera being unlocked to do their stuff. So how do you people who do this manage it? Are you holding down space a lot? Are you using the edges to scroll? Clicking on the map a lot? It just feels like a whole nother thing to juggle.

[ezrast]

Edges to scroll. I have no idea how anyone plays locked given how far you can zoom out.

The only time I really need space is when I lose my champion in a big fight (and I think that's just me being special). Usually keeping your champ centered is just wasting half your screen.

[Malakili]

I ended up getting Tyrn and he is pretty much just what I was looking for, thanks for the input all.  Next up, a mage!  Both Morgana and Fiddlesticks are free this week and I had fun with both of them.

[Rasix]

Ugh. So Nidalee and Kogmaw both kind of require camera being unlocked to do their stuff. So how do you people who do this manage it? Are you holding down space a lot? Are you using the edges to scroll? Clicking on the map a lot? It just feels like a whole nother thing to juggle.

I used to press space while getting use to it, but just stopped. It's pretty easy to click around and just scroll around using the mouse.  Like ezrast, I tend to lose myself in team fights, but that's just me sucking at team fights.

[Chimpy]

One problem I have with the scrolling is that there is no way to adjust the camera scrolling independent of the mouse scroll speed. My mouse sensitivity is pretty high so I can move the cursor around, but it makes the camera move at ludicrous speed.

But I have gotten used to the unlocked camera more and more. Especially in Dominion.

There is also a bug that comes up occasionally with dual-monitors where the mouse is not totally captive in LoL and if you go off the side of the screen into the other monitor space your cursor moves and if you click it tabs you out (happens to me about 1/3 the time since Dominion went live).

[Malakili]

I scroll a bit, but I also use the minimap a lot.

[Thrawn]

I scroll a bit, but I also use the minimap a lot.

Not having my side scrolls is the only reason I don't play LoL across all my monitors instead of just on one. 

[Arinon]

Working my way through this week's free champs and christ is Kassadin fragile early game.  Even with a couple of HP pots I usually need to bail before I can buy anything useful.  Have to return to him later on as once he gets rolling it's pretty sweet.

Kog'Maw seems pretty hilarious once he's decked out with attack speed and proc items.

Going to play some more Fiddle next few days.  I really want to like him and I hear he's a good fuck-with-you champ but I haven't quite made him work yet.

[HaemishM]

Tried Shen on a Dominion game last night. He's uhhh pretty good. We lost the game, but I ended up with a 7/6/4 - which for me is a goddamn accomplishment, not dying more than I killed that is. But we lost, so it really wasn't that great. For some reason, my record on W/L record on Dominion is horrible, but my W/L on SR is decent.

[Rasix]

I tried Fiddle, Vayne and Morgana last night.  Fiddle was hilarius.  I had no idea what I was doing with him.  I couldn't lane worth crap (probably should have just jungled) and my gank attempts were pretty bad.  I had probably my worst PVP game ever with him.

Vayne was a bit easier.  Plays a bit like Cait.  Ridiculous closer, but incredibly fragile.  I see this as a character I could get decent with.

Morgana was a mixed bag.  I didn't do great with her, but I didn't do horrible either.  They stuck me in bottom, because Ashe wouldn't get out of mid.  The GP with me was goddamned terrible and were were going against a smurf duo of Garen and Xin (serioulsy, they had matching names).   I got some kills on both of them, but not before the retarded pirate fed them.  I'm not sure how she's supposed to kill people outside of using her ulti.  The root does pretty damn good damage, what do you follow up with?

If anything, this changing of chracters has shown me that I need to have everything outside of my ulti on smart cast.  I'd put the ulti on.. but I'm afraid that'd make for some really awful GP ults in the future.

[HaemishM]

Wait, you had laning problems with Gangplank and Morgana? Goddamn, that Plank player must have been TERRIBAD.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Morg doesn't really kill so much as facilitates kills.

[Rasix]

Wait, you had laning problems with Gangplank and Morgana? Goddamn, that Plank player must have been TERRIBAD.

"Gangplank, they're in the bushes don't go over there."

* Gankplank runs off to the bushes and dies horribly *

 

I did fine.  I maybe died once to the that combo.  All they did was sit in the bushes, so I really couldn't push the lane.  The Gangplank was useless.  I was pretty much just zoned out and had to bait them out and gank them with the ulti, which worked well enough.

Ideally, top and bottom should have switched or bruiser should have come down in my spot.  Most favorably the Jax, who was tanky as hell all game. He would have put a massive hurtlock on those guys.  

We still did pretty good, considering our Urgot disco'd at level 8 and it was 4/5 a majority of the game.