The 4 Decks that got me to 1000LP – by Brokenball

I recently hit 1000 LP on the EU ladder! With the new patch, I experimented with a few concepts to try to get an edge over the ladder and secure a strong ladder finish for this year’s world championship.

The way to gain an edge on the master’s ladder is to either find something strong that people don’t know and abuse the surprise factor or to stay ahead of the meta and counter the meta on that day.

So, today I want to share my most successful decks, which helped me get to 1K LP, and why I believe they performed.

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Let’s start with a well-known archetype, Jayce/Lux was already a fringe meta pick before the patch despite the awful match-up against Mono shurima.

The new play/cast merge change is a massive buff to both Jayce and lux coupled with the nerf to Mono Shurima, which prompted me to give the deck a shot on the ladder.

The list I used foregoes a lot of top-end cards you may expect like Albus Ferros and Remembrance in favor of a more classic Demacia approach with challenger units and Vanguard Seargeant.

An ideal curve is a 6 mana spell on 3, followed by challenger 2 drops on 4, followed by Lux on 5 and from that point onwards you can dominate the board and at some point use either FOR DEMACIA or Jayce’s Acceleration Gate to close out the game.

You obviously won’t be able to go for this curve every game but it should give you an idea of how you win, the fact that your 6 mana spell does not need to resolve to get your Mageseeker persuader and progress your Jayce makes both a lot more consistent, and Lux generating the Final Spark at burst makes a lot of matchups easier, for example against decks that run Concerted Strike.

This deck shines in midrange metas, and struggles a bit more with decks that go “Bigger”.

• Good matchups:
  • Ziggs/Taliyah
  • Sivir/Akshan
  • Cait/Ezreal

• Bad matchups:
  • Fated
  • FTR
  • Draven/Sion

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Nasus finally received his fearsome back in the recent patch! Most people, me included, immediately tried Thresh/Nasus again to see If the deck still can compete.

Thresh/Nasus is usually played as an aggressive deck running Baccai Reaper alongside the classic slay cards and Merciless Hunter. I wasn’t doing badly with the deck, but I wasn’t happy with my match-up against Cait/Ez which was very popular in the first few days of the patch and I wanted to justify in the deck.

That’s why I decided to give Viego a shot. A few cards become a lot better when you run Viego over thresh.

The first one is Rite of Calling, as Viego is a win-con himself and doesn’t need the attack token to make use of his game-breaking abilities, once he gets 2 Encroaching Mist rolling he is already dominating the board, not to mention his champion spell is a very efficient removal to engines like Lux, Jayce, Udyr and more.

Treasure Seeker is one of the best one drops in the game but it never impressed me in Thresh/Nasus. With Viego Waking Sands gains a lot of additional utility, as it helps level him up much faster and Ephemeral units allow you to get a mist at round start.

Quicksand is very good at covering from developed swings when you drop Viego on 5, and keeps him safe from challengers. In addition to that, Quicksand allowing your gigantic Fearsome champions to hit face is not rare.

Lastly, Atrocity gains an extra powerful target with Viego.

This deck loses a bit of the explosiveness of the classic version’s aggressive hands in favor of more value and threats which you can consistently find thanks to Rite of Calling.

You are still able to go aggressive in the matchups that demand it like against Fated, but most of the time the best course of action is to hold on sacrifice effects to get your Viego rolling on turn 5/6.

A lot of decks currently struggle to deal with Viego and his level up is game-breaking – I have more than once sacrificed my Nasus to level Viego.

• Good matchups:
  • Demacia
  • Cait/Ez
  • Midrange

• Bad matchups:
  • FTR (the deck is still better than Nasus/Thresh in this MU)
  • Ziggs/Talyah
  • Ionia Control

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This is a burn deck with 2 side win conditions and is meant to abuse the new Ezreal changes. I would attribute a lot of my success with the deck to the surprise factor, but the deck still has legs even when you take that away.

Your first few games with the deck will be a mess, but once you get the hang of it the deck can be very rewarding.

Your primary objective is to swarm the board and get your small units to connect face a few times, this can be done thanks to Flame Chompers or your spells clearing the way for them.

Heimer acts as refill and Ezreal can finish the opponent off, but don’t tunnel vision on either champ, you will often win by just throwing burn at the opponent’s Nexus.

A lot of optimization can probably still be done with this archetype, for example, recently I cut 1 Heimerdinger for a Ziggs and there is still more that can be done, so don’t be afraid to change things up.

If you want a more in-depth look, you can check my recent Deck of the day about the archetype!

• Good matchups:
  • Mono Shurima
  • Cait/Ez
  • Fated

• Bad matchups:
  • FTR
  • Nasus
  • Sentinels

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You may have noticed that all of the decks I mentioned lost to FTR, and in recent days the deck got REALLY popular. On Sunday I lost around 200 LP and I was back to square 1. But afterward, I found a way to attack the meta with…

This deck dominates control decks, and I went 15-1 with the deck on Monday, which got me back to 1K LP after I lost a lot of LP the day before due FTR’s comeback into the meta.

The deck shines when it is allowed to set up its engines and is filled with a lot of slightly expensive clunky cards like Unraveled Earth and Endless Devout, and Slower decks allow you to get the most out of your Ancient Hourglass and very consistently get a Taliyah off on it.

In particular, FTR and Caitlyn/Ez are very good matchups for the deck and if you face a lot of those, give this deck a shot.

The deck is well-positioned in the meta and can hold its own even in previously bad matchups, thanks to the newly buffed Quicksand and your usual interaction.

• Good matchups:
  • FTR
  • Caitlyn/Ezreal
  • Mono Shurima

• Bad matchups:
  • Sivir/Akshan
  • Jayce/Lux
  • Fated

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• Closing words:

The meta is very dynamic and changes every day, so staying on top of it can be challenging, but if you manage to get an edge you can gain a lot of LP in a single session!

I hope this article inspires you and gives you a new perspective on climbing. Thanks for reading my article, you can follow me on Twitter to stay up to date with my content