Once fiercely criticizing Riot Games for making the AD Carry position a “deadweight” in League of Legends, Tyler1 set a challenge to push his limits while proving to Riot that other roles (besides bot lane) could climb ranks “easier”. He set a goal to reach the Challenger rank on the North American League of Legends server playing in the top lane.
However, life is not a dream, and Tyler1 is certainly no poet; this male streamer faced real difficulties when trying his hand at this position. Specifically, the “Toxic Saint” took nearly 8 months (from the end of the 2020 ranked season) to achieve his goal of climbing to Challenger. In a recent stream, Tyler1 celebrated wildly as he officially reached the ranked Challenger tier in solo/duo after being… carried by teammates in a ranked match. He himself had a pretty poor performance in this match, with a KDA of 1/6/5. But that didn’t matter much; after all, a win is still a win.
The world is in awe of Xiaohu’s achievement when moving from mid lane to top lane. Each competitive position in League of Legends has its own unique characteristics, and even top players face a monumental challenge when adapting to a new role.
However, Tyler1 was even bolder, shifting from AD Carry to top lane, two positions that are, to put it accurately, completely opposite in champion pools. To adapt to this new position, Tyler1 initially tried the top lane AD Carry style like TheShy, with Quinn being the most frequently chosen champion. The result was a complete failure. Quinn is a champion that is currently heavily out of meta, and her long-range advantage does not help her against popular top lane picks like Ornn and Renekton… and she is easily ganked and completely useless if behind in items.
In total, Tyler1 played 1,740 matches, winning 898 and losing 842, achieving a win rate of 51.6% over 8 months to reach Challenger. This means that on average, he played 25 ranked matches a day, a figure that might even be more staggering than the training intensity of professional stars.
Only in the later stages, meaning in the last few months, did Tyler1 find the “winning formula” with two champions, Urgot and Cho’Gath, in the top lane. These are two names that are not on the list of hot champions in League of Legends in recent years, but they are also not as out of meta as Quinn.
They remain safe choices and have many points that align with the playstyle of a “career-changing AD Carry like Tyler1”. Among them, Urgot is the champion that Tyler1 spams the most in Grandmaster ranked. The strength of this champion is that he has a long reach and much better tankiness compared to traditional AD Carries. Additionally, a playstyle that is half damage and half tankiness seems to suit Tyler1 better, as he no longer has the support of his ally as when playing AD Carry. Finally, even when behind in items, Urgot can still be useful in team fights, especially with his ultimate that has a mechanism to finish off enemies.
Although he “failed” to prove to Riot that other positions are favored more than AD Carry, the journey to climb Challenger in the top lane has certainly been an incredibly interesting and memorable experience for streamer Tyler1.