Why are some champions considered to be better at blue/red side?
This questions got in my mind when I was watching the LoL World Championships. I do not know who it was, but one of the broadcasters made a statement like this:
When playing on red side you always want to ban Alistar.
(Well, I'm not quite sure if it was when playing on red side or on blue side)
I have a decent knowledge about team composition but I did not really understand this statement. Even though it would be interesting to get the answer to such a specific question like "Why is Alistar regarded to be stronger at red side?", I want to ask a more general question instead:
Why are some champions considered to be better at blue/red side?
Even if this does not matter in Soloqueue, I do not see why the side you are playing on influences the strength of any champion.
Best Answer
You're right, most of the time the side you are playing on doesn't really influence the strength of any champion. (Debatable with Nautillus maybe if you consider walls)
The reason why the casters said that red (purple) side should ban alistar is so that blue side don't get it.
In draft mode (bans included), blue side pick the first champion after each side bans 3 champions. Purple then pick 2, blue pick another 2, purple pick another 2, then blue pick their last 2 champions, while purple pick their last champion.
Thus blue side is most likely to pick the champion they most desire first to keep it away from purple side. And Alistar is great top lane and is well wanted from both teams.
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Is red side or blue side better lol?
In any League of Legends game, the blue side has a higher chance of winning after any given objective than the red side. It's a bold statement but it's backed up by statistics. In fact, the last time the red side had a higher win rate than the blue side was June 2016.Why does blue side have an advantage?
We can eliminate player skill from the equation if we take a big enough sample, allowing us to study the influence of the camera on red versus blue. Here's what we discovered: Across ~3500 games: Blue side won 1946 games and lost 1505 games. The overall win rate of the League of Legends blue side is 56.4 percent.Does red or blue side win more?
Red side usually has the higher mmr players, while blue side has lower mmr players.Red side vs. Blue side | Champion picks, terrain advantages, pro play, gank routes
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Answer 2
Aside from the differences in draft order and map layout, there is also the perspective.
Blue side players will generally have the enemy towards the top of their screen, where the view is wider, while purple side players will have enemies on the bottom of the screen, where the view is more constrained, both by perspective and by the UI elements. Because of this difference, champions who rely on long-range skillshots tend to do better on blue side where they don't have to fiddle with the camera as much.
Answer 3
One example I can think of is top lane Nunu. If you're on red side, you are closer to the Golems which will allow you to consume them on a regular basis to get the 10% bonus hp. If you're on blue side, you'll be closer to the Wight, which gives you the Spooky Mystery Meat buff. "Killing a unit grants Nunu 15% bonus movement speed for 3 seconds." While that's useful, the 10% max hp is going to be more useful in laning phase.
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