Question about picking characters.

I'm looking at all sorts of guides for characters and a lot of them say something along the lines of, "If the enemy team has one of the following champions, do not pick this champion" and then lists a bunch of champions that can act as hard counters against the champion in question. For instance, this AP Yi build I'm following states that I should not pick AP Yi if I encounter squishy mid-laners and/or squishy support on the enemy team, but how would I possibly know that? The characters need presets like Masteries and Runes to get their full potential out, so if you pick your runes and masteries for a certain build, going another will be detrimental.

How would anyone possibly know what the other team is going as? Do they get shown before the match begins, before even the loading screen, in ranked matches? In regular queue matches, I cannot possibly know if the other team has any champion that these guides are telling me to pick a different champion if I face them.

You're doing blind pick meaning you don't see the enemy team. In draft/ranked (aram too i guess) you see what the enemy has. For example in draft pick it's

Blue side bans 1 champ then purple side bans 1. Then you go back and forth for 3 champs each. Then

Blue side picks 1 champ
Purple side picks 2 champs
Blue side picks 2 champs
Purple side picks 2 champs
Blue side picks 2 champs
Purple side picks 1 champ

No duplicate champs. You can swap champs around as long as two players own the respective champs.

Also you might be reading that backwards. AP yi is supposed to be good against squishy champs because when he kills someone when his ult is active, his skills refresh allowing him to keep killing people.

For blind pick, just pick champs and practice. Nobody should take blind pick seriously.

Oh, I see. Very insightful. Thank you. :P

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Originally Posted by Kaasoljoyyx

Also you might be reading that backwards. AP yi is supposed to be good against squishy champs because when he kills someone when his ult is active, his skills refresh allowing him to keep killing people.

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Yeah, you're right. I was mixing up when to and when not to in that part of the guide. Damn reading guides at 5am! xd

In blind pick i'd say just pick a champion you enjoy. Since nobody knows until the game starts what they are playing you don't need to worry about specific champion counters, and anyway the counter may not play true if you just have more skill playing your champion than the opponent theirs.

Your best bet is to choose a few champs that have little to no counters (tank-kass, jayce, khazix, diana, caitlyn for examples).

Also, http://www.championselect.net/

It could be wrong sometimes but it's generally good to seeing counters and such.

Counterpicks are balls under platinum, really. Play what you play well, not what counters the other laner. If something works well against more than half of their team then it's worth doing.

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Originally Posted by Five Second Pose

Play what you play well, not what counters the other laner.

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I cannot stress this enough. It doesn't matter that you picked someone like Orianna* vs. Kassadin, if you don't know how to play Orianna you're never going to counter Kassadin in the first place.

*I think Orianna counters Kassadin? Good wave clear, very good poke, all of that amplified with Chalice/Grail...

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Originally Posted by Five Second Pose

Play what you play well, not what counters the other laner. If something works well against more than half of their team then it's worth doing.

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This. One time I picked Ryze after the enemy picked Malz, my team was like "why did you choose him" "malz counters ryze" yada yada yada.
Long story short, we won.

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Originally Posted by Corn

Also, http://www.championselect.net/

It could be wrong sometimes but it's generally good to seeing counters and such.

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If you ever go into ranked please never use this site to determine your pick. It's usually never going to work unless you're actually good at the champion it suggests. Counterpicks hardly mean anything in lower skill levels anyways, it can all change depending on ganks and such and really isn't that accurate.

What everyone else said, play what you know. After you get some more practice and learn more characters, you can start switching it up.

As someone that mostly plays support, my best character is Lulu and she's usually my default pick. I'm also good with Blitzcrank, Leona, Soraka and Sona, they're different types of support and I can whip them out if the occasion calls for it.

You can use champ select to see which champs counter the enemy that you can actually use, not like "oh, kass counters ziggs, idk how to use kass though, but it should be ez right". Well tbh I do that sometimes, like this one game I went malz vs morde, but I only do it cause I'm awesome.

And yea, you pick who you're good at, I pick fizz into ryze 24/7 , and get ryze picked into me, and still win. Now I can use syndra and zyra, so I don't need to do that vs ryze anymore.

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Originally Posted by koplje

If you ever go into ranked please never use this site to determine your pick. It's usually never going to work unless you're actually good at the champion it suggests. Counterpicks hardly mean anything in lower skill levels anyways, it can all change depending on ganks and such and really isn't that accurate.

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TBH the site offers some decent insights on why you counter the champ and how to do so, a lot of posters explains different ways of dealing with x champion and how y champion can defend themselves from the said x champion. It's actually good if you are a first timer against x or y champ, since you can get some tips if you never faced the matchup