TFT: A Complete Guide to Leveling and Econ in Set 2

3. In the Early Game Buy Out the Shop

Many players in TFT get overwhelmed by what to do in the early game when they don’t have an idea of what their comp is going to be in the long-term. In the first few levels, econ means very little since you won’t have an opportunity to bank a lot of gold from win/lose streaks and interest.

Instead of banking money, during the early game (before the second Carousel), your goal should be to buy as many units as possible to see if you can level any of them to 2-stars. Try to get as many 2-star units onto your board as possible early, since their raw stats should allow them to beat most comps.

My strategy during this stage was to always buy the lowest cost units first, selling the highest cost units to make room on my bench. For instance, if my units to purchase are two 1g units, two 2g units, and one 3g unit. I’d buy the 1g, then 2g, then 3g if I had enough money and space in my bench. If I had a full bench, I’d sell any 3g units, then 2g units, then 1g units to make room.

The only exceptions to this strategy are that you should always take or keep a pair of units regardless of gold cost, since they can get you a powerful 2-star unit. In that case, sell the highest cost unit that you have one copy of to make room and/or get the income to pair up your units.

4. Lock in Your Comp Before Level 6

By the second Carousel, you should have three or four item components. After the Krug round, you should have at least four and maybe six components. From those components, you should be able to figure out what strong items you have available to you and which units they would be strong on.

Ideally, you want to pick one of the champions you can build a comp around and lock in a comp that can utilize that carry. For instance, let’s say you end Round 2-5 with two Tears and a Needlessly Large Rod. You have the option of going a Mage comp with these items, a hyper-roll Predators comp with Kog’Maw, or an Inferno comp with Kindred at the centerpiece.

Determining which TFT comp you should go is a tough question to answer, as it’s dependent both on the units you already have and the units your opponents have. In any case, you want to make that determination before the first round where you will roll your gold so you know what units you are looking for. This is also the point where you would want to sell your opening units (Woodlands, Predators, Lights, Infernos, or whatever) unless you plan to keep them as part of your endgame comp.

5. Know What to Do When You Fall Behind

With this strategy, there is a risk that you’re going to fall behind in the first few PvP rounds. Other players might have leveled to four at Round 2-1 to try and get an extra unit to start an early win-streak. There is a huge risk that you might be put behind in the early game.

That is not a massive issue, initially, because losing early doesn’t take a ton of HP and it sets you up to get a great spot in that second Carousel. Losing 15-20 HP in that first part of the game isn’t a big issue if it sets you up to springboard your comp into overdrive after Level 6.

But let’s say you lose more than 20 HP by the time you hit Level 6, or the RNG gods don’t reward you with a lot of good items, units, or both? Well, in this case you’ll have to adapt this strategy by employing a more aggressive leveling system.

If you fall below 70 HP upon hitting Level 6, only have components for two items, and don’t have any 2-star units that might be able to use those items efficiently, you need to employ the “Rush 7” strategy. This means that you abandon the leveling/rolling strategy and level up to Level 7 and roll down to 20 gold at Round 3-5. If you only have enough gold to level, you do that.

After this point, you basically have to keep re-rolling your gold until your comp stabilizes. The drawback of the Rush 7 strategy is that it becomes very hard to econ high enough to level to 8, so only use this strategy if you are significantly behind. Once your comp is strong enough to string together a few wins (hopefully they should be since you’ll have more units on the board than most of your opponents) then try to econ up as much as possible.