Last hitting is a crucial skill in League of Legends. It allows you to maximize your gold income, quickly surpassing kills and assists in contributing to your total gold over the course of the game.
We’ve all been in a situation where, around 15 minutes into the game, you die, and with little else to do, you glance at the scoreboard only to notice how far behind you are on CS. High CS per minute is one of the biggest barriers to climbing out of low elo, especially outside of the support role, so it can be quite disheartening to see yourself falling behind in that metric.
Here are a few tips to help you gradually develop the ability to CS and last-hit almost subconsciously.
Wave Management
First and foremost, you need to find a wave to kill for gold. It’s not uncommon to find yourself low on CS simply because there are no safe waves to farm. This issue can even persist into the late game, so it’s important to be constantly mindful of where the waves are, where they’re pushing, and where they will eventually end up.
- To prevent minions from dying simultaneously, damage one or two randomly so you’ll know which one will die next. This will help you avoid the situation where you need to use abilities to finish off two very low-health minions before your own creeps do.
- In the mid to late game, be aware of which waves will be crashing into your towers so you can position yourself to get to them first.
- When farming a wave outside of a tower, it may be more useful to focus on the projectiles going between minions rather than their health bars. This way, you’ll know how much damage they’ll take ahead of time, allowing you to focus on the minions that will die first rather than trying to monitor the entire wave.
Practice Makes Perfect
It’s a good idea to invest some time in practice mode with your main champion, spending the equivalent of a game or two just farming and perfecting your technique. Familiarize yourself with your auto-attack animations and, if you’re a ranged champion, your projectile speed. Some might recommend practicing on champions with notoriously bad animations and slow projectiles, but this isn’t necessarily useful. It’s more beneficial to get used to your main champion’s auto-attacks instead.
- Spend 30-40 minutes farming outside of towers in the practice tool, aiming for a perfect score. Try to do this without items, as it’s also very important to learn how to freeze the wave. Last-hitting with minimal AD will help create a habit of freezing.
- Once you feel consistent, try applying the same skills in real games. Only by practicing in actual games will you truly commit these habits to muscle memory.
- Don’t be afraid to use abilities if necessary during actual games. Don’t be too hard on yourself; even pros can’t achieve perfect CS. However, you should be mindful of your mana and cooldowns.
- If you play an older champion with clunky, slow auto-attacks, such as Ashe, Miss Fortune, or Anivia, consider using a recent skin that improves the animation, making it feel snappier and smoother. If you’d like to check which animations feel the smoothest, look up videos online or consult our Skindex.
- Be patient. Unless you have a specific reason to push or need to apply pressure to your opponent, there’s no reason not to take it slow and only last-hit. Pushing should be a conscious choice to pressure your opponent, not an automatic reaction. This is an important habit to build.
Farming Under Tower
Farming under tower is one of the more consistent ways to secure CS since the number of tower shots required to kill a particular minion type is consistent across games and game time.
- Caster Minions: These minions will die after two auto-attacks and one tower shot. They are the last minions targeted by towers, so if a wave crashes into yours early in the game, you should immediately start setting them up by hitting them once. This ensures that tower shots will leave them at low enough health for you to last-hit. You can also let them get hit once by the tower, then finish them off with an auto-attack and an ability. However, unless you’re under pressure, using abilities on caster minions is generally a waste of mana.
- Melee Minions: These minions will die after one auto-attack and two tower shots. They are targeted after cannon minions but before casters and are usually the easiest to secure under the tower since they are closer to you and require no setup.
- Cannon Minions: These minions will die after one auto-attack and seven tower shots. They are the tower’s first priority, giving you ample time to set up for the caster minions. Generally, you should avoid hitting the cannon minion early in the game, as even one auto-attack can prevent you from last-hitting before the tower kills it. Typically, in the early game, it takes two or three auto-attacks to offset this and secure the cannon minion.
By following these tips and consistently practicing, you'll improve your CS skills and contribute more effectively to your team's success in League of Legends.
