Patch 4.2A flips the Wild Rift meta on its head, with bruiser buffs, marksman item reworks and magic damage adjustments shaking up the rift. As a long time Diamond player and analyst, I‘ll be sharing my inside track on the new S tier solo queue terror picks, how to play them effectively, along with underrated choices I‘ve unlocked success on recently.
Grab a coffee and let‘s dive into the best champions to abuse on the path to Challenger!
Chemtech Putrifier Shutting Down Healing Champs
Before delving into champions, we must address the red-hot priority item thats single handedly suppressing drain tank fighters and enchanters from S tier – Chemtech Putrifier. For only 2600 gold, this support item applies 60% healing reduction AND bonus magic damage to crowd controlled opponents.
That‘s a game changing tandem offensive and defensive buff in team fights. Suddenly Vladimir, Soraka and Dr. Mundo are wet blankets, as Putrifier makes their kits redundant. Carries like Jax and Irelia lose their safety net sustain while brawlers can‘t out trade with grey health bars.
To showcase Putrifier‘s dominance, at a 53.8% win rate in Platinum+ games it is the single highest win rate item. EvenHTTPError top lane mains rush this forbidden idol upgrade first in certain matchups now thanks to the raw stat efficiency.
No wonder champions reliant on healing and shields are struggling and shy away from S tier when 800 gold Putrified Oblivion Orbs permanently seats them from reaching full potential. Time will tell if upcoming patches address this.
Hotfix Buffs Prop Up Struggling Marksmen
Patch 4.2A saw massive itemization shake ups trying to bring crit ADCs back into viability after the Lethality Varus/MF meta. While late game hypercarries like Jinx and Tristana still put out scary numbers fully slotted, they suffered crippling early games.
However, recent micropatches buffed Doran‘s Blade / Shield starting items to give breathing room for scaling marksmen to survive lane. Combining with tweaks to essential purchases like Bloodthirster (80 attack damage now!), Infinity Edge and Guardian Angel, Jinx rockets to a 52% win rate since sitting at 46%.
Her AoE team fight damage was never in doubt late game. But actually reaching that power spike seemed impossible against bully Lucian and Draven lanes. Thanks to Riot nudging down oppressive early outliers while helping struggling champs, players willing to scale sensibly now taste success again on hypercarries.
Best Solo Queue Carries To Master
Based on my own climb to Challenger maining jungle and analyzing champion usage statistics across Grandmaster+ brackets, I‘ve curated picks to definitely practice this patch if you want to rise in ranks.
God Tier: Camille, Kai‘Sa, Lee Sin
Boasting over 50% win rates while maintaining 10%+ pick rates in the highest elo, this triplet shine bright as versatile team assets and solo carries.
Camille shatters turrets with spellblade proc Sheen items, while unlocking pick potential through long range engage tools. She‘s difficult to itemize against with mixed damage, sustained through Conqueror/Ravenous Hunter runes, but melts anyone caught mispositioned.
Kai‘Sa overtook Miss Fortune as the premier early game lane bully marksman, but also scales fearsomely into a hybrid threat. Everfrost and Nashor‘s Tooth proc her passive Supercharge plasma stacks, enabling her to assassinate squishies caught alone even super late game.
Lee Sin is simply eternal. Early game power ganks and dashes make him the quintessential jungle skirmisher across all metas. With a high skill cap kit rewarding creative Secures and Insec kick combos, mastering the Blind Monk teaches invaluable mechanics transferable to any champion.
Strong: Darius, Diana, Seraphine, Thresh
Retaining positive win rates on over 7% popularity sees this quartet thrive in solo queue‘s chaos.
| Champion | Win Rate | Pick Rate | Ban Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Darius | 50.3% | 10.5% | 16.3% |
| Diana | 51.2% | 7.3% | 3.4% |
| Seraphine | 50.5% | 13.6% | 11.2% |
| Thresh | 50.1% | 9.5% | 6.7% |
Darius sustains 1v2 or 1v3 skirmishes thanks to his Hemorrhage passive, netting multikills once Apprehend hooks stragglers. Phase Rush adds stickiness and mobility for a normally kite-vulnerable juggernaut. Stack Cleaver into Sterak‘s for 30% CDR and high AD to decimate teams after Noxian Guillotine resets.
Diana deletes squishies with her 3 core damage abilities having AP ratios, while stacking HP via Riftmaker and Demonic Embrace to gain surprise bulk. Her level 6 Hextech Ultimatum all-in hard snowballs lane priority to roam or secure objectives. She teaches excellent dart-in burst playstyle concepts.
Seraphine‘s scaling damage and CC stands out, especially during mid game sieges, dragon fights and jungle invades where her long range shines. She fits into almost any team composition, enabling allies to pop off and rewarding meticulous positioning that less forgiving mages lack. Plus she‘s fun!
Thresh dominates 2v2 all-ins thanks to Death Sentence into Box trap combos that force blown summoner spells. Flay interrupts mobile carries then Dark Passage enables converting picks into objectives across the map through portals. High skill cap but huge game influence.
Special Mentions – Malphite, Kassadin, Kha‘Zix
Sleeper OPs with dedicated mains that suggest niche counterpick or otp potential:
| Champion | Win Rate | Pick Rate | Ban Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Malphite | 54.1% | 4.2% | 1.3% |
| Kassadin | 51.9% | 5.3% | 2.1% |
| Kha‘Zix | 51.3% | 3.2% | 1.7% |
Let‘s analyze why these unique choices shine.
Malphite pops up specifically as counter to auto-attack reliant carries thanks to his E passive and W movement speed steal allowing him to glue onto targets. His Unstoppable Force initiation potential cannot get ignored 5v5, while maxing Q poke whittles down champs wanting extended trades who underestimate his damage and early power.
Kassadin reaches menacing late game hypercarry status with evergreen mobility, stacking Riftwalk portals and mana scaling burst from Force Pulse and Nether Blade. Struggling pre-6 and having weak tower taking limits reliability, but smart Kassawins avoid fighting before core items, safely farming towards scaling spike timings.
Kha‘Zix epitomizes the assassin fantasy, evolving abilities based on game state to either aggressively snowball via isolation Q poke kills in lane, or adapt into a cleanup skirmisher picking off caught enemies in teamfights. Unique evolution builds and intelligent map movement paths make Kha‘Zix mains unpredictable carries.
This just scratches the surface of solo queue. There‘s over 50 champions boasting positive win rates to experiment with carrying games! But these highlighted picks offer reliable and proven performance at high MMR right now.
Winning Mid With Ziggs & Veigar
Now to highlight champions you might not expect to be S tier who actually perform admirably. Let‘s discuss mid options that aren‘t always banned!
Ziggs is criminally underrated right now despite topping mid lane damage charts and enabling safe objective control through pushing and zoning tools. His Satchel Charge escape combined with endless tower chip harassment via bouncing bombs means smart Ziggs players hardly ever die.
Once securing Lost Chapter and Luden‘s Tempest core, endless mana sustain allows long range hard shoving waves then roaming to side lanes to convert leads through early tower takedowns. Come mid game sieges, Ziggs chucks AOE nukes onto clumped backlines.
Veigar mirrors this scaling into explosive team fight damage threat, but trades range for close quarters lethal 100-0 all-ins through stacking AP buffs from Baleful Strike farming. Event Horizon and Dark Matter combine into devastating AOE CC combos, enabling allies to run over trapped victims.
Both mages spike insanely at 2-3 items, are fairly easy to pilot focusing on farming safely into mid game power, turn team fights with AOE damage and offer objective pushing/zoning pressure. Give these short ranged sorcerers a try before they inevitably get nerfed!
Support Meta Favors Playmaking roams
The dominant engage support picks shine by knowing when to roam mid or into the enemy jungle to enable allies in early skirmishes and invades. After warding and pushing out bot lane, creative pathing catches opponents off guard much more effectively than reactive Enchanter playstyles.
Winning support players watch the mini-map for which nearby teammates have priority or power spike advantages to assist, while identifying juicy out of position squishies to punish cross map. My personal preference playmaking supports this patch include:
Rakan – Mobility combined lockdown CC
Rakan dishes high damage augmented by passive heal shields, while Xayah lovers enjoy the synergy. But his true power shines from Grand Entrance into Charm combo engages, enabling allies to collapse. Rakan zips through teamfights, dodging threats then CC chaining airborne victims.
Thresh – Reliable ranged initiation
A skillshot heavy kit tests players, but begins dominos of disruption by Death Sentencing fleeing enemies, dragging them back and securing kills for damage allies to clean up after the Box traps victims. Lantern saves throw games that other supports can‘t match.
Galio – Global map presence
Thanks to Hero‘s Entrances swift roaming potential, Galio functionally acts as a second jungler post-6 to turn fights and dives effectively 2v1. He soaks immense burst while locking down targets for follow up burst. Flash taunt engages will never get old!
Counter Bruisers With Health Shredders
Despite direct Divine Sunderer spellblade nerfs and Hullbreaker losing ranged power, Jax, Fiora and other on-hit fighters continue dominating games through split pushing mayhem. But certain anti-tank itemization shuts them down in side lanes.
Bramble Vest – Applying Grievous Wounds instantly neuters duelists relying on lifestealing through your damage. At only 1000 gold, this armor spike rushes efficiently first back.
Blade of The Ruined King – Max health damage works wonders against stacking resistance juggernauts. The active Speed burst helps escape all-ins after safely poking them down without taking extended trades.
Liandry‘s Anguish / Demonic Embrace – % max health burn damage also effectively cuts down normally imposing champions. These tend to feature in most AP champion optimal builds anyway due to high ability haste .
There are certainly more tank busting options like BotRK, Kraken Slayer or Divine Sunderer itself. But the theme is sustained damage through health cut or healing reduction works better than attempting to burst through beefcakes. Just avoid letting Fiora/Jax drag games out to 5+ items where they may still outscale given time to stack resistances against your penetration.
Climbing From Low ELO As Janna Support
For players struggling in lower ranks like Gold, I recommend spamming Janna for freelo since enemies won‘t respect her kits roam and disengage potential. Max shield second for stronger trading and safety then make plays across the map.
Even platinum ADCs position wrongly expecting engage supports to front line tank. Janna hangs back peeling while itemizing Putrifier into flowing Redemption team wide heals and Knighs Vow damage redirects. Late game safe poke with Eye tornado, Zephyr slows and Howling Gale area denial presses siege advantages.
With somewhat mechanical cap on mastery needing only game sense, objective focus and map awareness, Janna enables learning fundamentals and climbing into higher brackets teaching correctly supporting carries from the backline before diving onto mage or engage styles.
Give this eternal solo queue stomper a try before nerfs kick in!
Final Tips To Abuse On The Ranked Ladder
As a closing note, take these universal tips that apply climbing as any role:
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Limit Testing in Normals First – Intentionally push champion limits and matchup experience in normal PVPs. Learning when you genuinely spike in items/levels and creative mechanics trains good habits for ranked.
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Focus Objectives Over Kills – Towers, dragons, Baron buff win games more reliably than chasing kills greedily. Track respawn timers and play for constant vision setup into takedowns then structure sieges.
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Communicate Roams/Plans – Even basic "On my way" signals or danger pings dramatically raise team coordination. Be a proactive shotcaller directing the team with objectives timers and making pick/dive suggestions when fed.
That concludes my mammoth deep dive into Patch 4.2A! Let me know which hidden gems you‘ve found success carrying ranked games with right now. Considering item win rates and champion statistics, there‘s clearly optimal but also counter meta picks to abuse once mastered.
Flex your skills and take these S tiers for a spin. As always, thanks for reading and see you on the rift!