Originally Posted by
DrHax
Ryan spent a good 45 minutes to an hour 30 scrimmaging me and helping me understand the value of counterpicks.
Well I had the hardest time against one specific ADC: Jinx
What I do? I researched who is jinx weak against. I came up with Corki as a good solution.
Learning counterpicks is good, but learning WHY something is a counterpick allows you to discover new shit that could actually be meta changing.
First, you describe the champ you want to counterpick. For Jinx, she's a hyper carry adc with low initial mobility and damage, which scales as the fight progresses. She has her highest damage output in close range, though capable of dealing long range damage with good zoning tools, along with strong burst potential. This fairly accurately describes Jinx.
Now, you break it down into what counters each individual part. There are very few hard counters in league, solely because most champions are multi-faceted and cover weaknesses with strengths in other areas. What you try to find is something that counters the important parts of the champion, or the parts you want/need to mitigate.
Hyper carries are very item-dependent champions. They usually suffer in the early game with somewhat poor overall fighting capabilities, and are very vulnerable to being outplayed or bullied. Combined with her low mobility and cc at early levels, means she is best shut down early, and hard. Naturally, you want a lane bully then, preferably one that can capitalize on Jinx's somewhat lackluster early range. Commonly, this would be something like Cait or Lucien, though it can be fulfilled somewhat by someone like Draven, MF, EZ, or Sivir.
The above deals with the early game of hyper carries, but now you need something for the late game. Since Jinx has her highest damage output in her minigun range, you typically want to stay out of that range. Again, Cait fits this very well. Because of this, I view Cait as one of the top counters to Jinx ONLY if you have a support that can facilitate a bully, solely because Cait can't effectively keep up with Jinx as the game goes on; it requires an early win with her. Thresh, Leona, Annie, and Blitz support would allow Cait as a viable counterpick because of the huge pressure they provide. Taric also works in theory because, while not as easy to provide pressure, he makes up for it with better sustain and protection. All of them are also somewhat tanky in lane, so they can brawl better in the early bullying.
Jinx is one of those weird champions that gets countered by what other lanes pick. She's still a relatively safe champion overall, as she has no true hard counters in lane, as it's mainly supports who can make her laning difficult. She's pretty squishy though, so a heavy dive comp is what's best to counter her. By that logic, Sivir has a special place as a soft counter because her ult can facilitate such dive comps.
tl;dr: she's one of the safest champions out there right now, so most counterpicks to her are in other lanes. Get jungle help early, and try to shut her down hard so you can prevent her from farming her items. That's really the best counter you have to her.
Last edited by Oracle; Feb 20, 2014 at 06:56 AM.