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You've loaded into champ select. You're top, good you got your role. Second pick redside. All you see is a Nautilus before you have to pick. It's ok, they didn't ban Darius. You'll roll over any top laner they can pick with your noxian might. You skim over the enemy picks, vayne? Elise? You don't care. You want to see your match up. Then Vladmir. You smile, you destroyed the last Vladmir you played against. You're smart, your favourite streamer taught you to change runes in champ select. You don't need phase rush, it's Vladmir, you're going to melt him with conqueror. You don't need ghost against a vladmir. You take tp, you're a team player. You take the magic resist rune because of your humongous brain.
You're loading in, eyeing the juicy vlad that will be your ticket to victory. You almost miss the enemy botlane running exhaust vayne and heal soraka. It doesn't matter to you though. You have a delicious vlad to eat up.
You're in game. You buy your doran's blade. You're going to farm this vladmir. You wait in your tri-bush. Watching for any sneaky invades. It looks all good until you see the pings on the minimap. A late invade from the enemy team into your botside jungle. You notice their vlad there. The idiot. You'll generate an exp lead over him and destroy him even harder. You go to ward the enemy blue. You're a team player, at least this way you'll know when this 2/0/0 elise comes to gank you.
You enter the river. Walk past the river brush. Quick your minions are just about to crash. Suddenly, a crossbow bolt goes straight into your back. You can almost feel it. The sudden stab through the back. You realise to your horror that it's vayne top. You keep walking down the river in panic. She stops chasing you. You're two-thirds hp. It's ok. Now that you know, you can still win. You forget to ward, there's a bigger problem. Vayne hasn't gone to lane. Which means she's waiting for you in the river bush or the tri bush. You can't walk the long way around, you'll miss a full wave at least. You'll fight her then.
You walk back up the river. You got flash. You got W. You got doran's blade. You have DARIUS. You walk up. You hear the familiar crossbow bolt. You instantly flash w her. WHAT'S THAT. She exhausted you instantly. She flashes back. It's ok you think. You keep walking forward trying to auto her. Your slapping your D key as hard as you can. Why are you not walking faster? Oh, you don't have ghost you have tp. It's not ok. She's half hp. Your dead.
You cool your head as you respawn. It's still ok. You can't afford to replace the potion you used, but it'll be fine. You'll tp back and catch the wave. She'll be a bit ahead but she has no tp. It's fine. You tp. You're back. She zones you from the wave, but it's ok, it's pushing into you. You'll just farm it up under turret. She's almost full hp again from her pot and her lifesteal, but it's ok at least you can farm up and all in her again when you're lvl 3.
You wait under your turret. Not much else you can do. She's practically zoned you from even exp range whilst she's stacking the wave. It's ok. The wave's building. You're not losing much. You can just last hit perfectly under turret. The wave finally crashes. You grab a melee and then eyes on the cannon minion. You watch the turret start to hit it. You walk up getting ready to take it. Then a silver bolt. Then a second. You retreat, that was a mistake. You'll have to walk up just for the last hit. You wait then walk back up. Juicy cannon. 1 Silver bolt. 2 Silver bolts. It's ok at least you'll get the cannon. Condemn. Your stunned against the turret. The cannons dead. It's ok she's tanking a turret shot now. Wait she's tanking a second. Sure you're getting hit still but this is great for you she can't out damage a turret. This is a good trade for you. Then, flash cocoon. The 3/0/0 elise has arrived with double buffs. You're dead again. The elise dives you flawlessly. There's nothing you can do. You watch the massive wave die. All that gold and exp eaten by the turret.
It's ok. Maybe your team will carry you. At least you're drawing some elise pressure. Maybe your team can carry. Maybe your jungler can go take dragon or gank another lane. Nevermind he's taking krugs. You sigh. Buy a refillable, all you can afford, and go back to lane. It's not looking good. The wave was so large that it stalled your wave at your turret. Which means the lane's going to push back into the vayne. You'll do your best. But do you fast push or last hit? There's no way you can push it fast enough. You'll have to just last hit and hope that the minion wave is large enough that vayne can't stop it since she's single target.
You take some melees. Walking back and forth. A vague thought passes your mind of where the vayne is. Surely she should have been in lane before you but she's still nowhere to be seen. Your too busy focusing on last hitting and managing your wave. You walk up. A cannon minion. Finally you get to taste the sweet sweet cannon. You walk just past the first bush in the lane to take it. Condemn. You're stunned again. She snuck in through the alcove. Silverbolt. Silverbolt. Silverbolt. It's ok now you're level three you can fight her you pull her in. Auto her and now to w reset and stack that passive. Elise cocoon, from tribrush. You're dead again.
You're upset. What can you do? You're drawing pressure right? Your jungler and adc died 1 for 2 diving the vladmir bot. HOW? Deep breathes. Calm your self. You can still come back. You don't want to be chat restricted again. You buy some boots and go back to lane. Vayne and Elise pushed the wave in but didn't stay for the plate. What idiots. You can easily kill these noob players. You're better than them, you can still win. You're 0/3/0, but you've come back from worse. Your walking to lane lightly clapping your face. Gotta get your head back in the game. As you walk past your inner turret, condemn. They were waiting in the lane brush. At this point there's nothing you can do. You're dead again. You look at the rest of the map. Someone else is winning right? No, your bot lane is feeding and your jungler has been trying to farm after his failed gank. He's 2 levels down on the elise. At least your lux mid hasn't died. But her talon is even with her in cs and is 2/0/0 from roaming bot.
You hold your breath. Slowly exhale. You'll build tank. Peel for your carries. You still got fight in you. You're still a threat building full tank with conqueror and passive. Build a reju bead. It's all you can afford and walk back to lane. You ward that pesky lane brush this time. Their not there. Maybe they finally backed off. You keep walking. Your flash is finally back up. You can survive now. Cocoon. This time they were in the krug-lane brush. It's ok you got flash this time. You flash just in time so that the condemn pushes you closer to your tier 2. Your still stunned but they can't reach you anymore. You should be able to just walk it off from here. But then out of the jungle comes the naut. All you can think is why is he here, as your stunned body is dragged across the lane by the mighty anchor. Ignite, exhuast, you die again.
Your botlane is flaming you for feeding their laner. Your jungler is flaming you for losing his topside jungle. Your midlaner is just flaming you for dying, the lux is asking how you can be so bad. She's complaing about how she's queued up with trash like you. You want to type back. Defend yourself. Say anything. But you can't hold back the tears. This has to be the worst feeling in league.
Edit: Thanks for the gold and everything. This post is semi-fiction. Whilst parts of this has happened to me or my opposing top laner, this particular sequence of events has never happened to me before. The purpose of this piece was to share some of the frustrations that top laners can face and not to complain about certain top laners or junglers, but more on some of the everyday pains that can happen to you as a top laner i.e. bad matchup, getting camped, getting roamed on by other lanes, (very painful) killed walking back to lane. As credit someone noticed that I left in a point about soraka being support then later mentioned being naut. I used soraka initially to maybe put in a soraka ult spoiling your one chance at redemption but settled for a roam by a support nautilus because the piece was getting quite long. I'm going to leave the inconsistency for the people who managed to catch me out on that. What inspired this was actually this post, which made me want to share some of the struggles that we toplaners have to go through.
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