League-of-legends – When is it appropriate to farm in the mid-late game

Sadly, there's no sure-fire way of resolving this situation.

You won't be able to rely on minions to take out their towers and nexus, especially if their uber status gets to the point where they can start defending their respawning inhibitors. If you get really lucky and get their nexus towers down, you could just farm minions hard enough for yours to take the nexus down a bit then try to dive the nexus. I'd consider this a Hail Mary more than anything else, though.

If you know you're going up against a team that is going to steamroll you once they get maxxed out (2+ carries), the main goal is to take advantage of the fact that they will be weaker in the early game. If you zone the carries and/or kill them enough to keep them from getting geared and leveled, your team will get powerful enough to take their nexus before they can do anything about it.

Assuming you find yourself in that unfortunate position anyway and forcing their team to split up isn't working, you absolutely have to focus the primary damage dealers down first. If they stick together and you're not killing their carries first, you'll take way more damage than you will deal out over the course of the fight and you're sure to lose.

Playing other champions really gives you a feel for how to handle situations. It is important to know what your champion is capapable of and what they are capable of. I can offer some tips though.

1. Watch your map: This one is the most important, always watch your map. When more than one person is missing on the enemy team you should be moving to a safe position. Make sure you know where your enemies are or where they were heading last seen. Keep the map scouted and when 3+ people are missing you should be trying to bunch up aswell. If theres 3 or more people missing and you're pushing a lane deep then most likely they are coming to kill you.

2. Know your role: If you're the tank, be the tank. Protect your squishies, stay close to them and protect them. They are usually your carries and thats how you will win the teamfights. Rally your team, don't be afraid to boss them around. "All push mid" "Group up". Late game power is all yours as the tank, you engage, you chose where and when to engage and where to push. Without you your team is pretty useless. If you're the carry, stick to the tank farm within moderation and keep an eye on the map. You're who they're disappearing to come kill. Stick to the brush when teamfights engage so they can't come in and just ice you and run away. Don't reveal yourself till some spells have been cast and they have already begun focusing another less squishy player. If you're support, keep the tank alive and watch your squishys.

3. Don't wander: If its late game and you're all level 18 its time to be a team, move together, stay close. Don't over extend and wandering also involves watching the maps. If the enemy team is pushed into their base and fending off super mionons go steal their camps, but just always farm in moderation and never over extend.

4. Know your enemy: Once again coming back to knowing the champions. If you're the tank and the majority of the enemy team damage dealers are ability power then stack magic resist, if you're a carry and a majority of the enemies are tanky high health grab a madreds and tear them down. Don't trust mobafire 100%. No build is gaurenteed every time. I say this all the time, LoL is dynamic and should be played as such. Build your build around the enemy team and what your team needs from you.

Also a side-note worth mentioning, once you can buy tier 3 runes build some pages for your favorite champions. Try to make ambiguous pages that can apply to for example all AD carries or all tanks. Some good purchase starting points are armor seals, armor pen marks, and magic pen marks. You can use them for basically any character.