As a person who almost exclusively plays hook champ supports and I wanted to include what I learned while playing. I think it cannot be stressed enough how much NOT THROWING OUT RANDOM HOOKS helps you in laning phase as support. It was mentioned in the video how you can pressure your opponents away from minions by just the threat of the hook itself and if your adc is at all decent at cs, providing them space will almost always guarantee them getting ahead in gold just by the fact they can freely focus on last hitting. As soon as you chuck out a random hook hoping for a lucky shot and miss, you are now giving the enemies the entire cooldown of your hook to basically do whatever they want unless you are very ahead. On top of this if you throw out hooks all the time the opponents will be much more attentive and more likely to dodge whereas if you just don't hook as often people are much more likely to let their guard down allowing for much easier hooks. Of course you do still have to throw out hooks but wasting your hook on bad opportunities is one of the easiest ways to lose laning phase. Hope this helps :)
The guide itself is great even if i don't intend to play Thresh to greater masteries, and i really appreciate the level of detail put into it. But when i heard the Forbidden Memories OST, i knew this video was a true masterpiece.
Something that you may have failed to mention about thresh hook in particular is where Thresh is aiming his hook during his cast time, because thresh does not look where you're casting hook until the hook is in the air which can bait a lot of people especially in botlane
@@mr.mc.doesntexist7693 Yea you are right I was thinking the same thing XD. but at the same time it did take him apparently months to make so I just kind of let it slide.
Just another type of "hook" is what I like to call "Did he just walk and downsmash!?". When I see an enemy overly paranoid about my hook and just caring about dodging that ability, calmly walk in, and flail backwards. Now(guessing you are in botlane) you have an isolated target, slowed, at melee range of Thresh and probably the carry too, and still having to deal with a Q while having this much preassure. This is probably only going to work twice but if the "hook a minion to dash" is what you use to punish an enemy that feels a little too lax, this is what I use when the enemy is overly anxious.
finally someone else that says people can also dodge lol. I used to play a ton of morgana when I was new to the game and everyone walked in a straight line, now 99% of my opponents sidestep and so do me and my teammates so I have stopped playing a lot of skillshot champs. it’s demoralizing to “miss” and be the reason why a fight is lost, one of the reasons why I never picked up thresh. but I’ve been looking for something new to play and this popped up in my recommended. thank you for this, I might try my luck today :)
Here're two things that I wished you mentioned in this video: 1. Flash, blinks and fixed distance dashes that would send you *in* a wall will send your champion on the side that is closest to the end point of the dash. This also applied to wards, traps, Shaco clone, etc. If whatever's getting placed *in* the wall, it'll be moved to the side closest to where it was placed. 2. Map height. Very few players know this, but the Summoner's Rift is actually a 2.5D map. The river is slightly below the lanes. If you shoot from the lanes to the river, you'll want to aim a little bit below where you would if they were in lane with you and vice-versa. This can result into shots that you were 100% sure should've landed or abilities going straight through people because of this. It's only by a few pixels/units, but it's enough to make you land or miss an ability.
i love ur editing style and voiceover, its got this familiar style to it that reminds me of like 2018-2022 youtube and idk why. maybe im looking too much into shit but this kinda voiceover style seems rare nowadays being replaced by twich vod edits and ai voiceover guides but i just wanted to say thanks for the content, keep it up!
This guide is wonderful even i am a thresh main and doing most of the tips and tricks in game. The MOST unpredictable thing is YOUR TEAMMATES, you will never be able to understand what they are doing, specially some champs can push or pull the enemy, causing the missing hooks
Im midway through and I dont think you've mentioned yet the very obvious fact that you can just hook as a way to limit movement as in if you try to go here you die, if you sidestep back you go towards my team. Most of the "corner" section was more of "you cant go there" more than a wall hug predict Imo. Excellent video!
As a Thresh player I can honestly say that it's not me that hooks the enemy, it's the enemy that hits my hook. Also, don't stress too much about the hook, Flay is where the money is.
something I've learned just by playing is that the hook hitbox is kinda big. For example, if your opponent is hugging a large wall (like bottom wall of botlane) and you're chasing, you can position yourself for a hook angle that literally accomodates every type of dodge minus flash. This is because the hook is big enough to catch them walking up/Down, but is still going in a relatively straight path to catch backdodges, stops and just walking forward. It's not a universal angle as it differs from wall to wall and champion to champion, but it's an intuition thing, might help to just hold Q to get the visual to help you visualise when the hook would cover every possible space your opponent can occupy there is also a difficult trick you can do with hitting through minions. Where if the enemy is close enough to a minion, the minion hitbox is simply wonky sometimes, and can allow a hook to hit even when someone's behind. This has to be when they're really really close though, but it's not rare for people to be that close since they feel safe behind them. Although at that point, if you're strong enough, you can just hook the minion anyway just to engage
Ah, this 6 months of work really payed off, incredible video,for real and now, i learned so SO many things from this and im not even a hook player. By the way, fighting games can also help to the concept of mind reading and predicting since this is most do for everyone if you are looking for training that kind of instict
The thresh hook knows where it lands at all times. It knows this because it knows where it misses. By subtracting where it lands from where it misses, or where it misses from where it lands (whichever is greater), it obtains a difference, or deviation. The guidance subsystem uses deviations to generate corrective commands to drive the thresh hook from a position where it misses to a position where it lands, and arriving at a position where it missed, it now lands. Consequently, the position where it lands, is now the position that it missed, and it follows that the position that it landed, is now the position that it misses. In the event that the position that it lands in is not the position that it missed, the system has acquired a variation, the variation being the difference between where the thresh hook lands, and where it misses. If variation is considered to be a significant factor, it too may be corrected by the GEA. However, the thresh hook must also know where it landed. The thresh hook guidance computer scenario works as follows. Because a variation has modified some of the information the thresh hook has obtained, it is not sure just where it lands. However, it is sure where it misses, within reason, and it knows where it landed. It now subtracts where it should land from where it misses, or vice-versa, and by differentiating this from the algebraic sum of where it shouldn't land, and where it landed, it is able to obtain the deviation and its variation, which is called error.deviation and its variation, which is called error.
I absolutely love switching targets mid-fight. Hook enemy 1, commit a couple auto attacks, maybe even flay. As teammates come to help, pick one of them and hook that person, commit a couple autos, hook the next guy, and so on. Not only does it feel great to be in absolute control of the fight, and looks cool, you keep the fight moving. From one enemy to the next, to the next, etc. by far, my favorite.
For predicting your opponent's predictions, we can borrow from what we already know about the similar "level-k framework". Generally, your opponent is gonna think more layers ahead if you give them more time to think, if they're more serious about dodging the skillshot (which would have both, how much they're tryharding, which can be influenced by how many times this game you've already landed skillshots as they may be embarrassed/frustrated at their inability to dodge them, and how deadly it would be if the skillshot landed), and how focused they are. It's hard to predict them the first time you throw out your skillshot, but if they juke your skillshot the first time, for instance, then, if you give them the same amount of time to think, in a similarly chaotic fight, they probably wont change the strategy since after all it worked the previous time. The easiest variables to account for are what they did the previous time you attempted to hit the skillshot, whether they succeeded in dodging (and how close it was to hitting/missing), and how much time you give them to react. You can guess that he's more likely to change strategies if he failed to dodge the last time (though how much more likely the "more likely to change" is exactly, is also depends on each opponent and something you'll have to pick up a pattern), but it's harder to guess if he's gonna juke in a chaotic teamfight if this is the first time this match you've shot a skillshot at him in a chaotic teamfight.
I've been playing Thresh since i was in high school and i love this video, it really shows what an ordinary Thresh mains think when they play their champ and all of the things that were shown here are literally every aspect of what a Thresh player should do. 10/10
I think one of the best characters to learn long range skill shots is Rek'Sai. I main her and throughout my time I spend playing her I saw that my skill shots have improved a lot [I used to miss Morde Qs]. It's one thing when you can constantly track your enemies and you see them it's totally different story when you get Rek'Sai 1 second interval radar. I learned to predict my opponent's movement and I can't even count how many times I sniped low health champ at maximum range. Ofc you will get juked and enemies will dash but if you know champion you're playing against you can try to predict that and just hope. I know Rek'Sai burrowed Qs aren't that deadly like thresh hooks but it's still some damage so landing it still depletes enemy resources and annoys them. I think it's pretty good practice and if you ask me what is the best place to learn that I'd say go play Top or go wild with AP Aram Sai. I know I know, it's much easier to hit anyone on Aram but 1: It's the only place where you can play AP Rek'Sai and be useful. 2: Satisfaction is also a part of learning and that burrowed Q AP bomb it quite satisfying to land. As Cryo said, don't be afraid to miss, your miss may force enemy to move into even more dangerous skill shot. And if you land your Q on a low HP enemy you can reward yourself with that nice R execute.
This is a really great video. One thing you almost mentioned with the "rounding corners" bit is just to use the physical layout of the map in your favor. The number of times I've seen my gf miss a skillshot bc the opponent jukes, when all she had to do was wait 1 second for the opponent to walk into a choke in the jungle... Use choke points (in the jungle, between turret and the wall in side lanes, etc) to your advantage. Also, think not just about where the opponent "might" go but where they "want" to go. You could shoot that hook at the ADC now and roll the dice, but in 2 seconds the cannon minion will be low and they absolutely 100% will want to step up (in a straight line) for that. Use that to your advantage.
Been a thresh main for over a year now, seeing this video truly shows the growth that I’ve developed, cause these are the skills I learned on my journey on becoming a thresh main
as a long-time thresh main, I thought there was a mechanic related to how the game looks might be mentioned, but then I guess this is more niche than useful to know. Basically the game looks like its in 2.5D, with your POV, but what actually is happening when the hook lands is it actually hits where the champions' feet are, so you usually want to use the enemy's feet as a reference point when you hook another thing is that minions hitbox is actually somewhat smaller than champion hitboxes, so when a champion is standing on top of their own minions, there's a good chance you can hook the champion even if it appears they are standing behind the minions. combining both of those together, you can sometimes hit hooks where it looks like you hook actually when through minions to get to the enemy champion, which makes for some great "scripted" looking hooks. If you want to see how this works, there's a Chinese thresh player called XiaoHai that utilizes this tool very well. But then again, this is very niche and you are probably just better off practicing those tips in the videos first anyway
This is more applicable in lane but it can work outside of it as well, just throw out a hook a few times in a consistent manner, you can get two things, conditioning on how you are going to throw your hooks and bait them to keep dodge in a certain way, and you can see how they like to dodge, most people tend to how a preferred side to dodge and if you can roughly keep track of the odds of them dodging in a specific way you can increase your chance of hitting future hooks, really helps in team fights where people dodge based on instincts.
I feel like right after the part about masked hooks you should have included the concept of conditioning/ desensitization, which is the high elo “wiggling” you see. The idea is that your opponent will know your hook/root/charm/whatever range and will move away when you move up. So you move to them then away, to them then away, and when they get used to you being close to them and not throwing out your cc is when you break that pattern and use it.
I actually do this often just as you've described but didn't think to detail that! Definitely a useful technique to catch players, and glad to know I'm suddenly high elo, and that it's called "wiggling".
@@CryoBeat It’s one of those things you understand intuitively and eventually becomes second nature. As an ahri main, the wiggles is one of the first things I look for in a lane opponent’s neutral - if they don’t do it, or make very long retreats when I walk up to them, I intuitively understand they’re not a midlaner and so I can bully them out of early cs and exp. And if they’re an irelia or kat that *does* do the wiggles, then I understand they’re high elo enough to know about conditioning, and will adjust my play to match. There are other things like objective rotations, map state and threat level assessment that lower elo players don’t think about that might be useful in developing an understanding of macro, but aren’t very useful for a video on the micro of landing skillshots.
honestly as someone who went from mid main to jgl main and now supp main and playing hook supps a lot the last few months ive been feeling drained and my performance has drastically got worse this video helped me pick up those champs again ty cryo for this guide
Not thresh hook specifically but very similar to the lantern bait is using Swain w to force the enemy to make a quick choice in where they want to go. Most often, that’s straight in one of the 4 directions. Depending on my position, i can aim his E in a way that covers 2 of those directions, and the diagonal between, letting me maximize my chance of predicting them. And most players dodge skillshots in a pattern. Some will dodge to the left more often than the right, as an example. Map side and champion also influence this but if you pay attention, you CAN learn their pattern. I find taking a chance and missing gives me more information on what they’ll do next time. The wonderful thing about Swain’s w is that if they don’t try to walk out of it, it’s a pretty decent slow. If they do walk out via walking back or sideways, that.. also slows them down. It’s largely a win win for me, letting me catch up to get damage off with my q, or lets my ADC (if I’m support) catch up to auto the opponent. It’s also very good for burning flashes, which is worth the long CD on w, 100%. Swain has a lot of innate pressure just like the traditional hooking supports, he was my go to for it for a long time. You miss 100% of the hooks you don’t throw. It’s ok to miss them, because you can always learn from it and try again when you get a chance. Holding is good in some situations, but you can’t be afraid to try it. Because they can make or break a teamfight or an important pick. TLDR: While Thresh lantern bait isn’t always the best option, Swain can make great use of the same concept with his w. People have patterns, use misses to learn them and outplay their instincts.
Learning to break your own pattern of dodging is another skill actually. Most people dodge in the opposite direction of the threat. Back and to the left if you’re coming from their right for example. Maybe forwards and left in that same direction. I notice a lot of players do that. Especially new ones. Can often tell when someone is new by the way they try to dodge things, just as you can tell by how they throw skillshots. Wild stuff, league is largely a mental game, where game knowledge, champion knowledge, and macro play are just as important as personal skills like last hitting etc. All of it matters. I do warn people this game is hard to learn and master for a reason.
there is another hook type that i use pretty often and dont see anyone talk about (possibly cus it rarely works). its using the long wind up to bait people into believing they are safe cus they cc'd you, like milio landing Q and then walking up slighly cus they didnt realise the hook was casted before the ball hit, the later you cast the hook the better. and even tho i said it rarely works, the amount of times it does work is pretty suprising
Can definitely confirm this is always great and worth doing even if to just partially "negate" the stun duration. Nothing like catching a Lillia mid-W when they think you'll be fast asleep.
idk if this was mentioned or not but thresh's q animation is not changed based on the direction he casts his hook. this means that you can be looking at one person who is going to try to dodge bc they think the hook is coming for them when in reality u threw it at their unsuspecting teammate who is not trying to dodge
I would argue it’s more important to throw more thresh hooks in the early game to get a feel for your opponents reaction time and dodge patterns. Lower elo players also tend to have a preferred dodge direction I’ve also seen alot of players that didn’t know you can press S to stop your character. Blitz I would hold more because it’s more of a threat and uses more mana.
I once flashed right next to a wall instead of behind a minion wave to juke a blitz hook. He either had no idea what he was doing or predicted that I would flash away from safety. The world may never know.
Another thing to pay attention is player habits. Best way to dodge a skillshot is going perpendicular to that skillshots trajectory. So going downwards or upwards in the lane is generally the best way to dodge and players will prefer one over another unconsciously.
Great guide honestly, I would like to point something out but I just can't. The video had good pacing and covered pretty much everything. 10/10 would recomend
Not only with hooks, but you can actually use your character movement to make players often dodge where you want and hit the skillshot, this is even more useful with thresh hook because of his cast time.
when you are chasing an enemy and are bearly inside the maximum hook range and you know they still have their flash, you can flash yourself towards which will make them flash *straight* away from you very very often. Once you flash you are much closer to them which makes them panik because they have less time to react-dodge your hook they will flash once you do hook them. And because they panic, they oftentimes dont think about juking and flash as far away from you as they can. That also means you can angle your flash to make your prediction even easier, allowing to trade flash for flash and getting the kill (thresh flash is less worth than adc flash, more so if you run hexflash)
oh and btw if you play on botlane, you can flash towards the enemy support and then hook the adc. The adc most likely wont juke, if you flash convincingly enough towards their support and in the best case the support flashes away from you.
One hook i love to use but it's pretty hard to land is to try to send the hook between minions or jungle monsters. It's really hard to find a situation where you can use it, but when see an enemy in an opening between 2 caster minions, I just send it. If the hook makes it through the minions, the enemy most likely, won't be able to dodge, since they think they are safe "behind the minions". It also makes your team think that you are a god and can make the enemy team think you have scripts. Btw, loved the video :)
Another thing that's feels important for me is things like Rengar passive. Does the opponent have an ability to situationally gain more mobility than what they otherwise would have. Nida brush speed is another that comes to mind, or Taliyah rock sliding on the topic of wall hugging ^^. Also I think you should've gone over buffering cast time into being cc'd but either way a really good and informational video.
You can stand behind a line of enemy minions (so enemies think they are safe), then flay them so that the minion line moves behind you and suddenly that creep wall is behind you and you have free space for hook
So right at the beginning, I thought I was about to get treated to some mobile add shenanigans in terms of animation nonsense. Was I disappointed? No, but I still want it.
Flash on F I think stems from those of us that played a lot of warcraft/starcraft, and with DOTA coming from warcraft, it translates! The hotkeys in these games are usually the first or second letter of the action/unit's name (Exceptions exist... But not that many!) so the habit sticks.
I do bait wards over walls in the jungle sometimes before seeing an enemy so they think I had placed that ward much before and they dont even think about the chance of me staying
I sometimes miss some easy hooks that may not end up as a kill to make my opponents think that I am an idiot and I hit it when it counts. It works very well especially in lower elos
I have heard the recall hook. The deep terror skin recall starts like a hook (his first skin I think) and many people get startled by that. I don't have that skin and I don't rly like it but it's another attempt to hook enemies
i find it strange how well i can land my pyke hook compared to thresh. something about the charge mechanic on it makes it easier for me (especially since you can bait much easier with charge direction). It's like the cast time- without the cast time- but i've become interested in thresh after the overexplained thresh souls
Playing Ashe or Ez or Jinx or Draven, you really have to learn how to predict the future, tricks that can help is to align the ult with the wall, especially in the case of Ashe in fights in the botlane and on the dragon, another tip is to try to hit the ults of these champions in the mid when you recall, from base to mid is the easiest way to hit, start like this and then start trying to hit from bot to mid or from bot to top, and remember, you have to play a lot to get good, a good method is to take advantage of ARAM, normal games and alternative modes (especially URF) and build as much cooldown reduction as possible, remember, the goal is to learn and have fun.
One thing I'll say is to not feel pressured into using quickcast. Unless you're top level, the milliseconds it gives you isn't worth messing with your muscle memory, imho
i usually tell my friend to play other champion to know how it's feel to play agaist thresh , that why when you play thrsh you'll understand what that champion gonna do next more .
I believe it's a gmod player model that was imported to SFM. It was a long time ago now that I did that, but I'm sure I searched "how to import gmod player model into sfm" and went from there. Sorry for late reply!
Great vid, I'm actually climbing on thresh in ranked. Careful I don't pass you, rn I'm the best thresh in bronze 1 NA. I smell a long line of thresh tips (possibly new items guide?!?!)
New copy and paste every time i see someone miss a hook either from me or my opponent
F is for flash
As a person who almost exclusively plays hook champ supports and I wanted to include what I learned while playing. I think it cannot be stressed enough how much NOT THROWING OUT RANDOM HOOKS helps you in laning phase as support. It was mentioned in the video how you can pressure your opponents away from minions by just the threat of the hook itself and if your adc is at all decent at cs, providing them space will almost always guarantee them getting ahead in gold just by the fact they can freely focus on last hitting. As soon as you chuck out a random hook hoping for a lucky shot and miss, you are now giving the enemies the entire cooldown of your hook to basically do whatever they want unless you are very ahead. On top of this if you throw out hooks all the time the opponents will be much more attentive and more likely to dodge whereas if you just don't hook as often people are much more likely to let their guard down allowing for much easier hooks. Of course you do still have to throw out hooks but wasting your hook on bad opportunities is one of the easiest ways to lose laning phase. Hope this helps :)
The guide itself is great even if i don't intend to play Thresh to greater masteries, and i really appreciate the level of detail put into it.
But when i heard the Forbidden Memories OST, i knew this video was a true masterpiece.
Something that you may have failed to mention about thresh hook in particular is where Thresh is aiming his hook during his cast time, because thresh does not look where you're casting hook until the hook is in the air which can bait a lot of people especially in botlane
me when i comment before watching the video
@@AHueman the masked hook section does not talk about this tho?
If so, please could you tell me when he said it? Maybe I missed something?
@@mr.mc.doesntexist7693 Yea you are right I was thinking the same thing XD. but at the same time it did take him apparently months to make so I just kind of let it slide.
Being afraid of missing my hooks was a problem I've been having for a while. This really helped. Thank you.
Just another type of "hook" is what I like to call "Did he just walk and downsmash!?". When I see an enemy overly paranoid about my hook and just caring about dodging that ability, calmly walk in, and flail backwards. Now(guessing you are in botlane) you have an isolated target, slowed, at melee range of Thresh and probably the carry too, and still having to deal with a Q while having this much preassure. This is probably only going to work twice but if the "hook a minion to dash" is what you use to punish an enemy that feels a little too lax, this is what I use when the enemy is overly anxious.
finally someone else that says people can also dodge lol. I used to play a ton of morgana when I was new to the game and everyone walked in a straight line, now 99% of my opponents sidestep and so do me and my teammates so I have stopped playing a lot of skillshot champs. it’s demoralizing to “miss” and be the reason why a fight is lost, one of the reasons why I never picked up thresh.
but I’ve been looking for something new to play and this popped up in my recommended. thank you for this, I might try my luck today :)
may the algorithm gods smile upon the long awaited hook video
it sure did
Here're two things that I wished you mentioned in this video:
1. Flash, blinks and fixed distance dashes that would send you *in* a wall will send your champion on the side that is closest to the end point of the dash. This also applied to wards, traps, Shaco clone, etc. If whatever's getting placed *in* the wall, it'll be moved to the side closest to where it was placed.
2. Map height. Very few players know this, but the Summoner's Rift is actually a 2.5D map. The river is slightly below the lanes. If you shoot from the lanes to the river, you'll want to aim a little bit below where you would if they were in lane with you and vice-versa. This can result into shots that you were 100% sure should've landed or abilities going straight through people because of this. It's only by a few pixels/units, but it's enough to make you land or miss an ability.
7:28 Brushy brushy! What a throwback :D
i love ur editing style and voiceover, its got this familiar style to it that reminds me of like 2018-2022 youtube and idk why. maybe im looking too much into shit but this kinda voiceover style seems rare nowadays being replaced by twich vod edits and ai voiceover guides but i just wanted to say thanks for the content, keep it up!
One of my favourite hooks is the unleashed spellbook smite-a-minion-then-hook hook, it works very well.
This guide is wonderful even i am a thresh main and doing most of the tips and tricks in game. The MOST unpredictable thing is YOUR TEAMMATES, you will never be able to understand what they are doing, specially some champs can push or pull the enemy, causing the missing hooks
Im midway through and I dont think you've mentioned yet the very obvious fact that you can just hook as a way to limit movement as in if you try to go here you die, if you sidestep back you go towards my team. Most of the "corner" section was more of "you cant go there" more than a wall hug predict Imo. Excellent video!
As a Thresh player I can honestly say that it's not me that hooks the enemy, it's the enemy that hits my hook. Also, don't stress too much about the hook, Flay is where the money is.
something I've learned just by playing is that the hook hitbox is kinda big. For example, if your opponent is hugging a large wall (like bottom wall of botlane) and you're chasing, you can position yourself for a hook angle that literally accomodates every type of dodge minus flash. This is because the hook is big enough to catch them walking up/Down, but is still going in a relatively straight path to catch backdodges, stops and just walking forward. It's not a universal angle as it differs from wall to wall and champion to champion, but it's an intuition thing, might help to just hold Q to get the visual to help you visualise when the hook would cover every possible space your opponent can occupy
there is also a difficult trick you can do with hitting through minions. Where if the enemy is close enough to a minion, the minion hitbox is simply wonky sometimes, and can allow a hook to hit even when someone's behind. This has to be when they're really really close though, but it's not rare for people to be that close since they feel safe behind them. Although at that point, if you're strong enough, you can just hook the minion anyway just to engage
Ah, this 6 months of work really payed off, incredible video,for real and now, i learned so SO many things from this and im not even a hook player.
By the way, fighting games can also help to the concept of mind reading and predicting since this is most do for everyone if you are looking for training that kind of instict
The thresh hook knows where it lands at all times. It knows this because it knows where it misses. By subtracting where it lands from where it misses, or where it misses from where it lands (whichever is greater), it obtains a difference, or deviation. The guidance subsystem uses deviations to generate corrective commands to drive the thresh hook from a position where it misses to a position where it lands, and arriving at a position where it missed, it now lands. Consequently, the position where it lands, is now the position that it missed, and it follows that the position that it landed, is now the position that it misses.
In the event that the position that it lands in is not the position that it missed, the system has acquired a variation, the variation being the difference between where the thresh hook lands, and where it misses. If variation is considered to be a significant factor, it too may be corrected by the GEA. However, the thresh hook must also know where it landed.
The thresh hook guidance computer scenario works as follows. Because a variation has modified some of the information the thresh hook has obtained, it is not sure just where it lands. However, it is sure where it misses, within reason, and it knows where it landed. It now subtracts where it should land from where it misses, or vice-versa, and by differentiating this from the algebraic sum of where it shouldn't land, and where it landed, it is able to obtain the deviation and its variation, which is called error.deviation and its variation, which is called error.
mans wrote a whole paragraph to say trial and error xD ( gotta hit that essay mark somehow :P )
Clearly xPetu troll #shenanigans
I absolutely love switching targets mid-fight. Hook enemy 1, commit a couple auto attacks, maybe even flay. As teammates come to help, pick one of them and hook that person, commit a couple autos, hook the next guy, and so on.
Not only does it feel great to be in absolute control of the fight, and looks cool, you keep the fight moving. From one enemy to the next, to the next, etc. by far, my favorite.
I've been waiting for a Thresh hook guide for YEARS. Thank you my goat, for pushing this video through even though it took a while. Cheers!
For predicting your opponent's predictions, we can borrow from what we already know about the similar "level-k framework".
Generally, your opponent is gonna think more layers ahead if you give them more time to think, if they're more serious about dodging the skillshot (which would have both, how much they're tryharding, which can be influenced by how many times this game you've already landed skillshots as they may be embarrassed/frustrated at their inability to dodge them, and how deadly it would be if the skillshot landed), and how focused they are. It's hard to predict them the first time you throw out your skillshot, but if they juke your skillshot the first time, for instance, then, if you give them the same amount of time to think, in a similarly chaotic fight, they probably wont change the strategy since after all it worked the previous time. The easiest variables to account for are what they did the previous time you attempted to hit the skillshot, whether they succeeded in dodging (and how close it was to hitting/missing), and how much time you give them to react. You can guess that he's more likely to change strategies if he failed to dodge the last time (though how much more likely the "more likely to change" is exactly, is also depends on each opponent and something you'll have to pick up a pattern), but it's harder to guess if he's gonna juke in a chaotic teamfight if this is the first time this match you've shot a skillshot at him in a chaotic teamfight.
I've been playing Thresh since i was in high school and i love this video, it really shows what an ordinary Thresh mains think when they play their champ and all of the things that were shown here are literally every aspect of what a Thresh player should do. 10/10
me too I finally found someone that actuallys says the same stuff I do
"be one with Yuri"
nah man "be one with Thresh Hook"
I think one of the best characters to learn long range skill shots is Rek'Sai. I main her and throughout my time I spend playing her I saw that my skill shots have improved a lot [I used to miss Morde Qs]. It's one thing when you can constantly track your enemies and you see them it's totally different story when you get Rek'Sai 1 second interval radar. I learned to predict my opponent's movement and I can't even count how many times I sniped low health champ at maximum range. Ofc you will get juked and enemies will dash but if you know champion you're playing against you can try to predict that and just hope. I know Rek'Sai burrowed Qs aren't that deadly like thresh hooks but it's still some damage so landing it still depletes enemy resources and annoys them. I think it's pretty good practice and if you ask me what is the best place to learn that I'd say go play Top or go wild with AP Aram Sai. I know I know, it's much easier to hit anyone on Aram but 1: It's the only place where you can play AP Rek'Sai and be useful. 2: Satisfaction is also a part of learning and that burrowed Q AP bomb it quite satisfying to land. As Cryo said, don't be afraid to miss, your miss may force enemy to move into even more dangerous skill shot. And if you land your Q on a low HP enemy you can reward yourself with that nice R execute.
This is a really great video. One thing you almost mentioned with the "rounding corners" bit is just to use the physical layout of the map in your favor. The number of times I've seen my gf miss a skillshot bc the opponent jukes, when all she had to do was wait 1 second for the opponent to walk into a choke in the jungle... Use choke points (in the jungle, between turret and the wall in side lanes, etc) to your advantage. Also, think not just about where the opponent "might" go but where they "want" to go. You could shoot that hook at the ADC now and roll the dice, but in 2 seconds the cannon minion will be low and they absolutely 100% will want to step up (in a straight line) for that. Use that to your advantage.
Been a thresh main for over a year now, seeing this video truly shows the growth that I’ve developed, cause these are the skills I learned on my journey on becoming a thresh main
thresh main for 4 years and still miss the easiest hooks on earth
this is so helpful, your editing is also very fun and can really tell how much time you put into this! thank you!!
as a long-time thresh main, I thought there was a mechanic related to how the game looks might be mentioned, but then I guess this is more niche than useful to know.
Basically the game looks like its in 2.5D, with your POV, but what actually is happening when the hook lands is it actually hits where the champions' feet are, so you usually want to use the enemy's feet as a reference point when you hook
another thing is that minions hitbox is actually somewhat smaller than champion hitboxes, so when a champion is standing on top of their own minions, there's a good chance you can hook the champion even if it appears they are standing behind the minions.
combining both of those together, you can sometimes hit hooks where it looks like you hook actually when through minions to get to the enemy champion, which makes for some great "scripted" looking hooks. If you want to see how this works, there's a Chinese thresh player called XiaoHai that utilizes this tool very well.
But then again, this is very niche and you are probably just better off practicing those tips in the videos first anyway
This is more applicable in lane but it can work outside of it as well, just throw out a hook a few times in a consistent manner, you can get two things, conditioning on how you are going to throw your hooks and bait them to keep dodge in a certain way, and you can see how they like to dodge, most people tend to how a preferred side to dodge and if you can roughly keep track of the odds of them dodging in a specific way you can increase your chance of hitting future hooks, really helps in team fights where people dodge based on instincts.
Honestly, the best strat to hitting the hook is to just believe the hook will never miss because he's a good boi and would never let you down
this is such a funny and wise vid the mind games aspect of skillshots is always quite entertaining and the advise u give is so hilarious and accurate
instructions unclear, i hooked enemy Nasus and he solo'd my entire team
I feel like right after the part about masked hooks you should have included the concept of conditioning/ desensitization, which is the high elo “wiggling” you see. The idea is that your opponent will know your hook/root/charm/whatever range and will move away when you move up. So you move to them then away, to them then away, and when they get used to you being close to them and not throwing out your cc is when you break that pattern and use it.
I actually do this often just as you've described but didn't think to detail that! Definitely a useful technique to catch players, and glad to know I'm suddenly high elo, and that it's called "wiggling".
@@CryoBeat It’s one of those things you understand intuitively and eventually becomes second nature. As an ahri main, the wiggles is one of the first things I look for in a lane opponent’s neutral - if they don’t do it, or make very long retreats when I walk up to them, I intuitively understand they’re not a midlaner and so I can bully them out of early cs and exp. And if they’re an irelia or kat that *does* do the wiggles, then I understand they’re high elo enough to know about conditioning, and will adjust my play to match.
There are other things like objective rotations, map state and threat level assessment that lower elo players don’t think about that might be useful in developing an understanding of macro, but aren’t very useful for a video on the micro of landing skillshots.
honestly as someone who went from mid main to jgl main and now supp main and playing hook supps a lot the last few months ive been feeling drained and my performance has drastically got worse this video helped me pick up those champs again ty cryo for this guide
Thanks!
Not thresh hook specifically but very similar to the lantern bait is using Swain w to force the enemy to make a quick choice in where they want to go. Most often, that’s straight in one of the 4 directions. Depending on my position, i can aim his E in a way that covers 2 of those directions, and the diagonal between, letting me maximize my chance of predicting them. And most players dodge skillshots in a pattern. Some will dodge to the left more often than the right, as an example. Map side and champion also influence this but if you pay attention, you CAN learn their pattern. I find taking a chance and missing gives me more information on what they’ll do next time. The wonderful thing about Swain’s w is that if they don’t try to walk out of it, it’s a pretty decent slow. If they do walk out via walking back or sideways, that.. also slows them down. It’s largely a win win for me, letting me catch up to get damage off with my q, or lets my ADC (if I’m support) catch up to auto the opponent. It’s also very good for burning flashes, which is worth the long CD on w, 100%. Swain has a lot of innate pressure just like the traditional hooking supports, he was my go to for it for a long time.
You miss 100% of the hooks you don’t throw. It’s ok to miss them, because you can always learn from it and try again when you get a chance. Holding is good in some situations, but you can’t be afraid to try it. Because they can make or break a teamfight or an important pick.
TLDR: While Thresh lantern bait isn’t always the best option, Swain can make great use of the same concept with his w. People have patterns, use misses to learn them and outplay their instincts.
Learning to break your own pattern of dodging is another skill actually. Most people dodge in the opposite direction of the threat. Back and to the left if you’re coming from their right for example. Maybe forwards and left in that same direction. I notice a lot of players do that. Especially new ones. Can often tell when someone is new by the way they try to dodge things, just as you can tell by how they throw skillshots. Wild stuff, league is largely a mental game, where game knowledge, champion knowledge, and macro play are just as important as personal skills like last hitting etc. All of it matters. I do warn people this game is hard to learn and master for a reason.
there is another hook type that i use pretty often and dont see anyone talk about (possibly cus it rarely works). its using the long wind up to bait people into believing they are safe cus they cc'd you, like milio landing Q and then walking up slighly cus they didnt realise the hook was casted before the ball hit, the later you cast the hook the better. and even tho i said it rarely works, the amount of times it does work is pretty suprising
Can definitely confirm this is always great and worth doing even if to just partially "negate" the stun duration. Nothing like catching a Lillia mid-W when they think you'll be fast asleep.
Just started learning Thresh and this guide gives so much insight on which aspects I should work on. Love the pjsk references as well
idk if this was mentioned or not but thresh's q animation is not changed based on the direction he casts his hook. this means that you can be looking at one person who is going to try to dodge bc they think the hook is coming for them when in reality u threw it at their unsuspecting teammate who is not trying to dodge
Great video! very enjoyable
I would argue it’s more important to throw more thresh hooks in the early game to get a feel for your opponents reaction time and dodge patterns. Lower elo players also tend to have a preferred dodge direction I’ve also seen alot of players that didn’t know you can press S to stop your character. Blitz I would hold more because it’s more of a threat and uses more mana.
Enjoyed every minute, great content Cryo ❤
I once flashed right next to a wall instead of behind a minion wave to juke a blitz hook. He either had no idea what he was doing or predicted that I would flash away from safety. The world may never know.
4:13 Good to see another pilot 😄
you're literally better than i expected buddy
Another thing to pay attention is player habits. Best way to dodge a skillshot is going perpendicular to that skillshots trajectory. So going downwards or upwards in the lane is generally the best way to dodge and players will prefer one over another unconsciously.
16:27 this is the first time in my life that i see a Thresh player predict a Yasuo ult WHILE GETTING BUMPED BY THE TORNADO
Great guide honestly, I would like to point something out but I just can't. The video had good pacing and covered pretty much everything. 10/10 would recomend
Crazy how much intuition plays into all. Still learned a lot and Hope i can improve with my Green hook boi.
ah the video of legend. For real though, this was an awesome video and honestly has kinda inspired me to revisit Thresh after a long break
24:46 im laughing in front of the Thresh named "Wonderhoy"
Not only with hooks, but you can actually use your character movement to make players often dodge where you want and hit the skillshot, this is even more useful with thresh hook because of his cast time.
Thanks for triggering my ptsd at 27:17
when you are chasing an enemy and are bearly inside the maximum hook range and you know they still have their flash, you can flash yourself towards which will make them flash *straight* away from you very very often. Once you flash you are much closer to them which makes them panik because they have less time to react-dodge your hook they will flash once you do hook them. And because they panic, they oftentimes dont think about juking and flash as far away from you as they can.
That also means you can angle your flash to make your prediction even easier, allowing to trade flash for flash and getting the kill (thresh flash is less worth than adc flash, more so if you run hexflash)
oh and btw if you play on botlane, you can flash towards the enemy support and then hook the adc. The adc most likely wont juke, if you flash convincingly enough towards their support and in the best case the support flashes away from you.
One hook i love to use but it's pretty hard to land is to try to send the hook between minions or jungle monsters. It's really hard to find a situation where you can use it, but when see an enemy in an opening between 2 caster minions, I just send it. If the hook makes it through the minions, the enemy most likely, won't be able to dodge, since they think they are safe "behind the minions". It also makes your team think that you are a god and can make the enemy team think you have scripts.
Btw, loved the video :)
This advice is a game-changer for the LOL gameplay guide lmao
Seeing Emu Otori and Thresh on the same frame of a League video guide is probably the least unexpected thing I've ever experienced in TH-cam
with the project sekai bgm lol
One main to another, this was a great video. And I even learnt some new details about my favourite green boi. :)
BRO THE HOOK ON THE YASUO ULT IS INSANE
Another thing that's feels important for me is things like Rengar passive. Does the opponent have an ability to situationally gain more mobility than what they otherwise would have. Nida brush speed is another that comes to mind, or Taliyah rock sliding on the topic of wall hugging ^^. Also I think you should've gone over buffering cast time into being cc'd but either way a really good and informational video.
Let's go, more Cryo!
You can stand behind a line of enemy minions (so enemies think they are safe), then flay them so that the minion line moves behind you and suddenly that creep wall is behind you and you have free space for hook
if your opponent feels proud that they dodged your hook, it means it was a good hook.
hey you should mention the hook projectile length and width as it is important since not only the tip of the hook is needed to connect
such a great video cryo! love your content always, whether it's league or something else (ultrakill)
Great vid buddy, much love!
So right at the beginning, I thought I was about to get treated to some mobile add shenanigans in terms of animation nonsense. Was I disappointed? No, but I still want it.
Flash on F I think stems from those of us that played a lot of warcraft/starcraft, and with DOTA coming from warcraft, it translates! The hotkeys in these games are usually the first or second letter of the action/unit's name (Exceptions exist... But not that many!) so the habit sticks.
thresh's hook's hitbox gets wider with the ditance traveled, use that to hit slightly behind minions and surprise people :)
5:25, i feel attacked
Flash belongs on F. I will die by this.
@@parasocks1613 yup
I do bait wards over walls in the jungle sometimes before seeing an enemy so they think I had placed that ward much before and they dont even think about the chance of me staying
Missing is okay, and every shot you don't take is a miss.
ayy nice hooks mate you sure are getting better at it :P
I sometimes miss some easy hooks that may not end up as a kill to make my opponents think that I am an idiot and I hit it when it counts. It works very well especially in lower elos
"Flash should be on D... but some people are weird"
Me : .... HEY
yeah he misspelled F somehow...
Really good Guide, my ass may have quit league but this will prob help for Eternal return too
man i love thresh mains
I have heard the recall hook. The deep terror skin recall starts like a hook (his first skin I think) and many people get startled by that. I don't have that skin and I don't rly like it but it's another attempt to hook enemies
Great video man
This video is very satistying, thank you so much！
28:55 OMG MORE ULTRAKILL MUSIC
i find it strange how well i can land my pyke hook compared to thresh. something about the charge mechanic on it makes it easier for me (especially since you can bait much easier with charge direction). It's like the cast time- without the cast time-
but i've become interested in thresh after the overexplained thresh souls
Playing Ashe or Ez or Jinx or Draven, you really have to learn how to predict the future, tricks that can help is to align the ult with the wall, especially in the case of Ashe in fights in the botlane and on the dragon, another tip is to try to hit the ults of these champions in the mid when you recall, from base to mid is the easiest way to hit, start like this and then start trying to hit from bot to mid or from bot to top, and remember, you have to play a lot to get good, a good method is to take advantage of ARAM, normal games and alternative modes (especially URF) and build as much cooldown reduction as possible, remember, the goal is to learn and have fun.
One thing I'll say is to not feel pressured into using quickcast. Unless you're top level, the milliseconds it gives you isn't worth messing with your muscle memory, imho
Thanks, now I can finally win as Zeri
I personally have an issue hitting backwards flays. I always angle them weird.
20:25 I didn't expect to see her here
As soon as I heard the Yugioh Forbidden memories soundtrack I gave it a like
i usually tell my friend to play other champion to know how it's feel to play agaist thresh , that why when you play thrsh you'll understand what that champion gonna do next more .
Im a toplane Main so i dont play hook Champs but still great in depth Video i learned alot
i heard a ultrakill song and i feel happy
May i ask how did you get the thresh models for animation plz 🙏🙏🙏
I believe it's a gmod player model that was imported to SFM. It was a long time ago now that I did that, but I'm sure I searched "how to import gmod player model into sfm" and went from there. Sorry for late reply!
Use the e cast after hooking to catch a spellshielding Sivir offguard
So you're saying I should play tresh mid? Got it!
underated video!!!
Great vid, I'm actually climbing on thresh in ranked. Careful I don't pass you, rn I'm the best thresh in bronze 1 NA.
I smell a long line of thresh tips (possibly new items guide?!?!)
This start remembered of a game I played yesterday that a garen player called me trash bc I missed 2 hooks the whole game
20:26 Suisei jumpscare
5:23 Did you know that flash has +20 units of range when on F? Its very LoL spaghetti code, there are some good videos explaining it
Thank you based Cryo