On the contrary, trying to go for picks against a roaming deathball is playing right into their hands.
If they are roaming as a group, you aren’t going to get picks that easily. Far more likely you’ll just end up getting caught and killed yourselves.
If they split up and soak to try to keep ahead on exp, then you can definitely try to go for that gank to take back the initiative. But you need to force them to split up like that first, which means trying to force them back into a macro game where they can’t just group as 5 and run over anyone in their way.
And you don’t get nearly as much exp from capping a merc camp as you do from soaking waves, so they won’t be able to maintain their lead that way.
If you safely soak near your own structures and make them come to you and fight on your own terms, especially near or under your own defenses, or split them up and force them to counter-soak, you are far more likely to both catch up and win any fights/ganks you or they try to force.
I think this thread is kind of dumb. Not the op’s topic but the discussion that followed. There are so many factors coming into this that can change the rules of “dont fight from behind” (which are pretty solid and saying its wrong is just arguing semantics).
If youre three levels behind and have an etc moshpit with few interrupts on enemy team => desperate fight over a key objective might be worth trying
If you have a 4v5 advantage ==> force fight if you can
If you can get a pick thats great but honestly your only choice is to play defensively and see if your enemy oversteps. If they fight under keep, split up, go for boss at a bad time, then you can tip the scales. Most people that say “we need a pick” actually just mean that they plan to chase a tank/bruiser with massive survivability halfway across the map into a 5v5.
Where did I ever say to go up against a deathball? Making a pick happen doesn’t mean forcing a stupid team fight. You can do things like bait a boss attempt (of course, leave if it doesn’t work, doubling down on a bad play is stupid), push hard as 5 somewhere they aren’t, or interrupt a rotation. Simply staying by your towers and hoping that the 11 v 14 will magically turn into anything other than a 13 v 16 is typically futile.
Yes, if you are on the verge of something like a 13 v 15, go for the soak, but I very rarely see a team come back without something risky happening at some point. Don’t take a stupid fight, but at some point, make a fight in your favor happen.
You want to force the enemy to come to you. They’ll try to capitalize on their advantage, you have to make sure you have your own for when they do come at you. The only way to ensure that without taking a potentially game-throwing risk is to play defensively while soaking until either you catch up, the enemy slips up, or the enemy forces the issue under your defenses.
“Go for a pick,” isn’t wrong, per se, it’s just ignoring everything leading up to that point. It is far more simple to say than to do. How are you going to get that pick? What does “going for a pick” entail? What risks are worth taking in pursuit of that pick?
Like I said, trying to get picks on a roaming deathball is a losing strategy. You have to force them to split up or commit to a fight under your own Towers, and you do that by threatening to force the game back into a macro phase by going back to soaking near your Towers.