League of Legends 101: Dragons & playing around them

Dragons, Dragon Souls, and Elder Dragons can be either game winners or game enders. Here’s how you can play around dragons better!

Season 10 brought a massive overhaul to the game in form of changes to dragons. Adding the ‘Dragon Soul’ and changing the Elder Dragon buff have since made dragons a crucial win condition to nearly every game. Both in ranked and professional play, how a team plays around the dragon pit can ultimately be the game decider. Knowing how and when to play around dragons can be one of the most important skills in a team’s macro play. Here’s the basics of dragons and our tips on how to play around them!

The Four Drakes – Their buffs and who they benefit

There are four basic drakes that stack to ultimately give the Dragon Soul. The different dragons, while all providing unique buffs, can benefit different team compositions and individual champions differently. Each dragon’s buffs also stacks, drastically increasing their priority as the game goes on (especially if it should be one of the stronger drakes).

Cloudbringer’s Grace comes from the Cloud Drake and grants stacking ultimate haste. The Infernal Drake brings Infernal Might, boosting attack damage and ability power. Hard carries, especially in form of ADCs, heavily benefit from this dragon specifically. Mountainous Vigor from the Mountain Drake changed from granting structural damage and now buffs armor and magic resistance. Oceanic Will restores a percentage of missing health every 5 seconds, and is especially good if a team composition is lacking in sustain or healing.

Elder Dragon & Dragon Soul – The big buffs

Dragon Soul has become imperative to winning games in the late game. Killing four dragons now grants the entirety of a team a permanent buff that persists through death. Both the Elder Dragon and Dragon Soul help winning teams snowball their leads, making teamfights far easier and paving the way to the enemy nexus.

Same as the individual drakes, the four different Dragon Souls wane in strength. Infernal Soul grants bonus damage every 3 seconds on attacks both to the intended target and nearby enemies. The Mountain Soul gives a passive shield anytime you’re not in combat. Ocean Soul drastically aids in team healing and encourages team fights, as dealing damage to opponent heals and restores mana. Cloud Soul gives a passive 10% movement speed increase, giving you priority over neutral objectives and allows you to capitalize faster on potential picks.

The Elder Dragon provides perhaps the biggest team fight advantage in the current state of the game. Only spawning after a team has gained a Dragon Soul, the Elder Dragon gives players an ‘execute’ mechanic. When enemy players hit below 20% health, a powerful beam shoots out to finish them off.

When to look for dragon opportunities

Now that the basics are covered, finding opportunities when to start taking a dragon will be the next topic. Given that the dragon pit resides between middle and the bottom lane, having pushing lanes and priority in these two spots help immensely in gaining early vision. Spawning at 5:00 minutes in the game, you’ll rarely get the opportunity to kill your first drake exactly as it spawns.

You should keep your eye on the enemy jungler and have a keen eye for when they show up on the mini-map. Should the jungler appear topside, whether farming camps or trading for either a structure or the Rift Herald, this innate jungler advantage will give you the edge in taking the drake. Also winning botlane fights are another good opportunity to take early drakes. Ultimately, anything that gives you an inherent numbers advantage create an open opportunity to get a dragon advantage.

Dragon fights – when (and when not) to commit

Late game Dragon Soul or Elder Dragon fights can prove far more complicated, as often they are full 5v5s and can decide the fate of a game. The moments before a team starts bursting down the late game dragon is actually the most important. Should you be on the aggressing end, poking down frontline members and carries will make your ultimate engage far easier. If your jungler has smite available, going for the fight and dragon steal has become a viable option.

If you’re on the side attempting to secure the dragon and fending off your opponents, you have a far more difficult job. When not immensely ahead of your enemies in terms of items, you should keep a keen eye on your health and mana bars. When poked too low, you should ultimately opt to disengage, reset and at least keep your opponents off the dragon. Either a disjointed engage or over extension from a damage dealer are key to finding a winning fight.

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