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Games does not endorse or sponsor this project.

Copyright © 2023

All rights reserved.

To contact the author, please email laststand2231@gmail.com

First Edition: June 2023

About the Author
Mahmoud Emam is a multiple season Master-Grandmaster top-lane player at
both servers EUW/EUNE that started playing League of Legends in August 2018.
He took the game very seriously early on and managed to reach diamond IV on
the EUNE server by the end of season 9, Then reached grandmaster on the EUNE
server in season 10, Then he decided to switch to the EUW server on season 11
where he managed to peak 450LP Masters at a very tough season where the pro
players from all over the world were playing in EUW in preparation for the
annual world championship which was held then in Iceland, and stayed masters
for the 3 months he played in season 12. He is also an undergraduate chemical
engineer and an aspiring self-taught data scientist.

In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his family and friends, solving
coding puzzles on websites like codewars, playing League of Legends with his
friends, working out, and many more!

LoLPros Profile: https://lolpros.gg/player/emam (Peak is higher than registered

on the site)

Twitter: @MisterE666

Discord: emam1 (Previously Emam#7228)

 PART III
5
CHAPTER 5: ADVANCED WAVE
MANAGEMENT

Proper wave management is the most important skill to have as a

laner, you can not make it past diamond without mastering this skill,
proper wave understanding is also what differentiates between a good
jungler and an excellent one. In this chapter you will learn all the wave
manipulation tricks.

Identifying Your Champion

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First things first, you should pick your champion while keeping in
mind how good that champion is when it comes to wave manipulation.
The champions that control the wave best are champions with good
wave clear, meaning they have AOE abilities to damage several
minions at the same time, making it faster to push or trim your waves.
On the other hand, champions with bad wave clear are those that do
not have enough AOE to kill many minions at once. Some examples of
good wave clear champions include Yasuo, Yone, Renekton, Anivia,
and Sivir, while bad wave clear champions include Camille, Shen, and
Poppy.

Champions with better wave clear sometimes have multiple options

when managing the wave. There are infinite scenarios, and you will be
presented to many throughout this chapter.

Estimating Wave Position

You can estimate the position of your enemy’s minions by observing

the position of your own minions on the minimap. This information
will assist you in determining whether you should slow push or fast
push the wave.

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This is important because it helps you avoid what I refer to as "The
Deadly Position." You find yourself in the deadly position when you
have partially pushed your wave, but not quickly enough to crash it
into the enemy tower before your opponent returns from the base and

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freezes the wave near their tower.

Figure 52 First deadly position

Fiora finds herself in the deadly position in this scenario. If she were to
attempt to forcefully crash the wave into Aatrox's tower, she would
likely lose her life in the process. As a result, she is now forced to recall,
and Aatrox will begin freezing the wave, causing Fiora to miss out on
gold and experience.

The only way such a wave can be fixed is if Fiora’s jungler helped her
crash it. We are trying to avoid this situation when we can.

Another deadly position we’re trying to avoid as a melee champion is

when your enemy caster minions are under the enemy's tower, while
your allied minions are outside the tower's range. In this scenario, you
are unable to crash the wave without taking damage from the enemy
tower, while your opponent can freely deal damage to you in a safe
manner.

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Figure 53 Deadly position #2, however it is not that deadly because Kled is full hp, but he will still take free
damage.

It is crucial to remember that when you find yourself pushed this far in
your lane, you become vulnerable to ganks. Unless you are strong
enough to handle a 1v2 situation or you are certain that the enemy
jungler is not nearby, you should aim to minimize the time you spend
near the enemy tower. Alternatively, you can make it challenging for
the enemy by stacking waves.

Reducing the number of times you find yourself in this position will
greatly improve your laning phase. Effective wave manipulation
allows you to avoid these situations, leading to better in-game results
and higher ranks.

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Make sure you understand everything that will be taught in the next
sections, don’t just memorize them, understand the why behind the
concepts so you can manage your waves in any situation.

Wave Bouncing

Waves in league of legends always go back and forth, when you have
pushed a wave, this means the next wave will push into you and vice
versa.

Figure 54 Waves under tower, the cause of two second lateness of collision 1

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Figure 55 Collision 1

Figure 56 Aftermath of collision 2

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Why? In the previous images, the two seconds that the blue minions
come in contact with the red minions under tower caused the minion
colliding to not meet exactly in the middle of the lane (wave colliding
number one), but closer to the Blue team’s tower. This means when the
next minion waves spawn, the Blue minions will join the combat (wave
colliding number two) before the Red minions. Killing some of the red
minions immediately before the Red minions arrive. Which creates the
advantage that causes the push to occur.

Freezing

Figure 57 Waves frozen in Red team's side

As previously mentioned in Chapter 3, freezing refers to the strategy of

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maintaining the wave on your side of the lane and only last hitting
minions. This approach serves two main purposes: keeping your
enemy vulnerable to ganks and zoning your opponent's champion
away from your minions, particularly if you have a significant
advantage over them. On the other hand, freezing can also be
employed defensively when you are in a weaker position, lacking flash
or vision. It allows you to farm safely and makes it challenging for
your opponent to engage in an all-in fight or successfully gank you.

But this may come with a price:

1- Your enemy laner might give up the wave and try to roam or
play with his enemy jungler. You should ALWAYS ping that
your enemy is missing when you are freezing and your enemy
laner is not in the lane.

2- If you die while freezing a wave on your side, this means you
lost a massive amount of cs and exp, also the wave being on your
side makes it easier for your enemy to push the wave faster than
normal and take more tower platings when you’re dead.

Generally, make sure you don’t die when freezing a wave. It will hurt
you much more than a regular death.

Freezing a wave grants your opponent a minion advantage, which

could potentially give them an advantage in trades depending on the
circumstances. Keep this in mind when implementing a freeze.

You can minimize the damage taken while tanking minions in

preparation for a freeze by repeatedly entering and exiting an
unwarded bush. When you enter the bush, the minions will stop
attacking you, and upon exiting, they will target you again. Repetition

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of this process confuses the minions, resulting in reduced damage
while they remain in roughly the same location

Figure 58 Bush utilization to freeze

Reminder: as previously mentioned in chapter 3, to freeze a wave, you

should focus on last-hitting enemy minions by landing the killing
blow. It is essential to avoid dealing excessive damage to the minions.
The purpose of freezing is to maintain a higher number of enemy
minions compared to your own, allowing them to push towards your
tower and eliminate your allied minions.

Efficient Freezing

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Almost every video guide will show you something like this image,
where they slice a lane to partitions. In this illustration, the red
partition indicates that to successfully freeze the wave, you need a
minimum advantage of three enemy minions over your own. The
yellow partition requires a two-minion advantage, while the green
partition necessitates only a one-minion advantage.

Figure 59 Zones of freezing

This is very very impractical. This is not how you should be freezing.
Surprising, isn’t it?

The image shows the absolute minimum number of minion advantage

you need to create a freeze. This is not what you should be looking for.
You should aim to freeze with a higher number of minions, freezing at
the absolute minimum number will almost always turn into a slow
push. Using any AOE ability on your enemy in such a situation will
break the freeze, and even engaging in trades will cause enemy
minions to target you, reducing the damage per second on your own

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minions. Consequently, the freeze will transition into a slow push due
to freezing at the minimum number available.

Moreover, freezing a wave with a greater number of minions will

cause the enemy laner to lose their minions at a faster rate compared to
maintaining a slow freeze. This scenario frequently arises when you
force your opponent to recall after a disadvantageous trade for them.

The only thing I want you to understand from the previous image is
that the further you go from your tower, the less minions you will need
to freeze, which introduces us to the concept of wave pulling.

Wave Pulling

Pulling a wave can help you freeze in positions where you normally
couldn’t or enables you to create a better freeze.

Figure 60 Pulling a wave from in front of the tower to create a better freeze
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 TEST YOURSELF 5.1
Why does wave pulling work this way? Why is it that the further your pull enemy minions
from your tower the better the freeze is? You should be able to answer this question if you read
through “Wave bouncing” carefully.

The Recall Freeze

Figure 61 The recall freeze

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The recall freeze is when you choose to recall on a wave that is
naturally pushing towards your tower. By timing your recall correctly,
you can return to the lane just in time to catch most of the minions,
minimizing the loss of experience and gold for yourself. Meanwhile,
your opponent will suffer from their minions killing yours, resulting in
them losing out on gold and experience.

The recall freeze is a good strategy to use if:

1- You have just killed your enemy laner, you are low on
health, and the wave is pushing towards you. In this
scenario, it would be more worthwhile to freeze and recall
instead of pushing. This is because, depending on your
champion, you won’t have enough time to push the wave
and fully crash it into the enemy tower. By opting for a
freeze and recall, you ensure that your enemy loses out on
more resources during this time.

Figure 62 Scenario#1 of Recall Freezing

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 2- Your enemy laner did not die, but they decided to recall
due to being low on health. However, you are also low on
health and unable to effectively lane against them when
they return with a full health bar, but you won’t be able to
crash the wave in time. In this situation, it would be
optimal to recall and freeze the wave upon your return. By
doing so, you can recover your health fully and minimize
the losses you would otherwise experience, allowing you
to re-engage in the lane with a better chance of success.

Generally, this technique is good when your enemy is not in the lane
and hard pushing is not the best option to make your enemy lose the
most exp and gold. It could be because of your champion not having
good wave clear, the wave is too big, or both.

There are a couple of things you should consider when you’re going
for the recall freeze:

- How big are the waves? Sometimes the wave would naturally
crash into your tower when you’re walking to lane, and you
would end up losing more exp-gold than you expected. You
should always trim big waves, so they don’t crash into your
tower.

- Are you getting mind gamed? In higher levels of play, your

enemy might hide in a bush, so you think they recalled, and then
when you recall yourself they will simply crash the wave into
your tower, causing you to lose exp and gold, while they lose
nothing.

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Slow Pushing

As mentioned in chapter 3, slow pushing is the act of killing minions

slowly, so they stack creating a big wave. It is crucial to have a plan in
mind when implementing both slow pushing and hard pushing
strategies.

Slow pushing is particularly effective when you are trying to dive your
enemy laner, if you’re ahead or your champions are known for their
aggression in tower diving, e.g., Renekton and Nidalee or Renekton
and Elise, you can often stack these waves in the early game and go for
a dive.

What makes tower diving good when your waves are stacked is the
fact that your enemy loses so much gold and experience, it is still even
worth if you die during the dive, as long as your enemy dies as well.
The gold and experience they lose from 2 or 3 stacked waves will give
you the upper hand in the early game.

Slow pushing is also beneficial when you need to recall to your base.
While your enemy laner spends time clearing the stacked waves, you
can safely recall and return to the lane with minimal minion loss.
Additionally, when you crash a stacked wave, it provides an
opportunity to invade with your jungler or look for a roam.

If you see that you and your jungler are able to dive your enemy on the
wave you are stacking, you should communicate your intention to
your jungler by pinging ahead of time, most junglers don’t play
around waves, so taking charge and shotcalling can ensure that your
team plays around your strategy. As the one with knowledge of the
situation, make your team play your game if you are confident in your
understanding of the circumstances

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Figure 63 Tower diving on a stacked wave

Slow pushing can also be utilized in the mid game to exert pressure on
the enemy team, particularly when split pushing. If you have lane
priority in both the side lane and mid lane during the mid game, it is
advantageous to push your waves when the mid lane wave is nearing
the enemy tower. This creates simultaneous pressure in two lanes,
preventing your opponent in the side lane from joining the fight as
they are occupied with clearing the wave. Meanwhile, you can freely
move around and be prepared in case your enemy decides to engage in
a fight in the mid lane in response to the pressure your teammates are
generating, or you can tower dive your enemy in the side lane safely
because the rest of the enemy team is in the mid lane.

Ultimately, slow pushing is just normal pushing, just with more

minion advantage.

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Fast Pushing

Fast pushing involves quickly eliminating your enemy minions, and it

should be done with a specific purpose in mind. You should engage in
fast pushing when you need to take immediate action. One common
mistake I observe among lower elo players is mindlessly fast pushing
every wave, which grants their enemy free farm. Instead, you should
hard shove the wave if you intend to dive right away, participate in an
ongoing fight in the river, or if you plan to roam or recall to base
immediately. However, the primary use of fast pushing is when your
enemy laner has left the lane, and you aim to swiftly crash the wave
into their tower to deny them minions. You can also use it to apply
pressure by harassing your enemy under their tower.

The Cheater Recall

The cheater recall is a technique applied in the first levels of the game
to gain an early advantage if you have priority over your laner. You
slow push the first two (or three) waves, then hard push the third (or
fourth) wave. This will allow you to crash a big wave into the enemy’s
tower early on, giving you a chance to recall and buy an item (long
sword for an example), and then you can trim the wave and freeze,
which gives you an advantage early game.

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Figure 64 Cheater Recall

If you are applying this technique, you should be absolutely focusing

on hard shoving the 3rd or 4th wave without worrying about losing
some of your health bar since you will be recalling anyways and you
will have your full health bar again. It’s okay to take some damage and
just focus on shoving the wave.

In top and bottom lane, the fourth wave crash allows you to help your
jungler on scuttle crab if they’re pathing to it (scuttle crab spawns at the
timer 3:30 in the current season of 2023)

It is not necessary to recall after you push the 3rd or 4th wave, you can
roam, invade, help your jungler on scuttle crab, or tower dive your
enemy laner if it’s possible. It is a versatile technique. In the end, it’s
just a slow push, so apply it with a plan in your head.

Recalling after 3rd or 4th wave crash in mid lane is not always
ideal since the lane is shorter than bottom or top lane. Cheater
recall is good only in top lane and bottom lane.

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The Suicidal Wave Crash

The Suicidal Wave Crash is a technique used to ensure that your

minion wave crashes under the enemy tower. This is achieved by
intentionally luring the wave towards the enemy tower and potentially
executing yourself if your health is low enough. While this technique is
not commonly used, it can be useful in certain situations. You may
encounter it occasionally in higher ranks.

This technique is applied when you realize that your minions will not
fully crash into the tower (By estimating the wave position as
mentioned earlier), you determine that they will collide just outside
the tower (the dangerous position mentioned earlier). To counter this,
you position your champion under the enemy's tower to delay the
enemy wave while your own wave crashes, it’s crucial to note that this
technique carries significant risk, so ensure you apply it only when you

112
are certain no one is present to kill you or launch a long-range
projectile, such as Jayce's E-Q cannon combo.

Figure 65 Step 1: Realizing the wave is not going to crash.

Figure 66 Step 2: Tanking tower shots to drag enemy wave and force your wave to crash.

Usually, the Suicidal Wave Crash technique is used when you're

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 unable to stay and clear another wave of minions. This can happen if
your health is low and your opponent is about to come to your lane,
freeze the wave, and pose a threat to kill you. (Deadly position)

This technique is not applicable in mid lane.

Proxying

Proxying in League of Legends refers to a strategy where a player

deliberately bypasses the standard lane phase and moves between the
enemy's turrets, farming minions and applying pressure to the
opposing team. Instead of engaging in direct combat with the enemy
laner, a proxy player aims to disrupt the enemy's wave management,
draw attention from the enemy team, and create map pressure. By
proxying, the player aims to gain an advantage by denying minions to
the enemy laner, drawing jungle attention, and potentially opening up
opportunities for their own team to secure objectives or make plays
elsewhere on the map. It is a high-risk, high-reward strategy that
requires careful decision-making and map awareness.

Singed is the most famous champion that uses this strategy.

Figure 67 Singed proxying

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If you chase an enemy champion that is proxying, every second you
waste on them (assuming you don’t kill them) is gold and experience
lost, because your enemy’s wave will be always crashing into your
tower since there are no allied minions to collide with your enemy’s
wave.

Proxying can also be used when you are sure that no one is around to
kill you, and you can kill your enemy laner in his wave due to the huge
difference in strength between you and your laner, for example Riven
in the next image is proxying the wave and abusing the fact that she is
lvl 6 and Rumble is lvl 5, and no one is around from Rumble’s team to
help Rumble anytime soon, so she is not even allowing Rumble to get
back to the lane and gain experience and gold from his minions under
tower.

Figure 68 Riven Proxying (Grandmaster game)

This is not applicable in mid lane.

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General Wave Tips

Here are general wave tips that you can keep in mind:

1- Do not fast push into a champion that heavily scales (Nasus or

Kayle) and give them free minion access, into these champions
you will be mostly looking to freeze to zone them off exp and
gold, or slow push in preparation for a dive with your jungler.

2- If you see that your enemy is going to freeze the wave on you,
and you will not be able to break that freeze safely, ping your
jungler in advance to help you break that freeze.

3- When your enemy is slow pushing the wave towards your

tower, always place a defensive ward and be prepared for a
potential tower dive, you can also ping your jungler to counter
the tower dive, although this is more common in higher ranks as
tower diving on stacked waves is less prevalent in lower ranks.
In the worst-case scenario, if you are about to get dove, it is often
better to leave the tower and lose the wave or give up plates.
You’re better off losing minions and platings and staying alive
instead of dying and losing minions and platings anyway.

Jungler’s Wave Management Guide

Understanding wave control for junglers is as important as it is for

laners. However, most junglers lack sufficient knowledge on how to
effectively play around waves. After reading through the previous
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sections, you should have solid knowledge of how wave management
works. As a jungler, you can leverage waves to your advantage using
the following key points:

- Your laner’s wave is in a deadly position? Break the freeze.

Figure 69 Viego breaking the freeze for his ally Jax

- Your ally is slow pushing the wave? Consider whether you can
dive your enemy when the wave crashes. Always keep in mind
that enemy jungler can react to the dive, and a failed attempt
could cost you the entire game.

- Your enemy is slow pushing a wave? You should consider

whether it’s possible to gank your enemy when the wave is
closer to your ally tower. This can be dangerous as sometimes if
your enemy is fed or is a strong early game champion, they can
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 just 1v2 using their big waves, it depends on what champions
you are playing and what champions your enemies are playing.
Your ally laner should be trying to trim the big waves in
preparation for your gank.

Figure 70 Potential for an upcoming tower dive for the Red jungler, and a potential for a gank for the Blue
Jungler.

- Your ally is freezing a wave? You should be prepared to gank

your enemy laner when he contests the freeze.

After a successful gank, most junglers ruin the wave, they help their
laner push when they shouldn’t and they don’t help their laners push
when they should, here is what you should do after a successful gank:

- If your allied wave is in a slow push position, help your laner

push it to make the enemy laner lose the wave and give your
118
 laner more time to recall or take plates. However, there is an
exception: if your allies have fast enough wave clear and your
assistance wouldn't make a difference, it's better to let them clear
the wave on their own without sharing the experience with
them.

- The wave is frozen? Don't take any action; simply allow it to

remain frozen unless your ally laner instructs otherwise or if you
notice your laner pushing the wave and breaking the freeze. It's
possible that your ally laner intends to forcefully push the wave
in a frozen position to purchase a powerspike item. An exception
is that if you want to push to spawn rift herald to get tower
platings before they fall for example.

If your ally is not in lane and your enemy has hard pushed a wave, try
to hold this wave and prevent it from crashing into the tower if
possible. This will provide significant assistance to your laner.

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Supports should also prioritize doing this for their AD carries.

Figure 71 Support Nautilus holding(tanking) the wave for his adc.

If your ally is dead and your enemy has crashed a big, stacked wave
into the tower, you should walk to the lane and take that free gold and
experience, this on its own can put you so far ahead of your enemy
jungler for free.

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 TEST YOURSELF 5.2
Just by looking at the mini map and the current wave state, explain what Malphite, Camille and
Viego should be thinking.

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 TEST YOURSELF 5.3
Camille here in this platinum elo game made a wave management mistake that caused
her death. Can you spot it and explain why it was a huge mistake?

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 TEST YOURSELF 5.4
Looking at both midlaners’ health bar and summoner spells, Yasuo here made a wave
management mistake that caused him to lose much gold and experience, the right play was
explained earlier, can you spot the mistake and illustrate the right play?

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Underused technique

An often-overlooked wave management concept, even in Masters+, is

delaying the killing of minions under the tower. For instance, if you
plan to last hit a melee minion that requires two tower shots and one
auto attack, you should refrain from delivering the killing blow
immediately after the second tower shot. Instead, wait for the third
tower shot and then kill the minion just moments before it is hit. By
doing so, you delay the death of your enemy wave, causing your
minions to clash closer to your tower. This results in the wave pushing
towards your opponent (refer to the previously explained wave
bouncing section to understand why).

Rekkless (professional player) explained this concept

amazingly in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhEdNM-rYeY

Summary

In this chapter, you learned everything about wave management. It is

arguable that players can reach even low diamond without having
proper wave management, but the knowledge that was given to you
will put you so far ahead of so many players. You have been presented
to several techniques like wave pulling, recall freeze, cheater recall,
suicidal wave crash, and proxying. You understood how important
wave management is for junglers. In the next chapter you will learn
about the advanced techniques that you can implement in your laning
phase after you learned how to manage your waves well

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