“Why are the enemy champions fatter than me?” – The Ultimate Guide to Wild Rift Gold Economy

Hello Wild Rift Builders! Someone on our youtube channel came and ask this:

Basically, they’re asking about gold economy. They discovered that they end up with less gold than others even if they are ahead on kills. Let’s see how we can prevent this from happening with this Economy Guide!

The concepts presented here are mostly for the laner roles (Mid lane, Baron lane, and Dragon lane). Some of the jungler role’s concepts are also glossed over but as it is such a unique role, some of the concepts does not apply to them.

We are going to talk about the following sources of gold in Wild Rift:

1. The Laning Phase
2. Killing and Ganking
3. Pushing and Other Objectives.

First, we should know the Gold Values given by each of the entities in Wild Rift:

Minions
Melee minion	65
Range/Caster Minion	40
Siege Minion	85
Mega creep	120
Minimum for a single wave
Full CS	210
No CS	84
Max for a single wave With Full CS – double siege starting @ 12:15	300
Red Buff	140
Upgraded Red Buff @ 8 mins	220
Blue Buff	140
Upgraded Buff Buff @ 8 mins	220
Gromps	140
Raptors (Total 160 )
Big	70
Small ( 3 )	30 x 3 = 90
Wolves ( Total 140 )
Big	100
Small ( 2 )	20 x 2 = 40
Krugs ( Total 200 )
Large	80
Medium ( 3 )	20 x 3 =60
Small ( 6 )	10 x 6 = 60
Scuttlers	120
Champion
First Blood	500
Kill	400 less 40 per death without a kill
Turret
Plate	100-150
Demolish	250 First turret – 100 to 150 other turrets
Global gold bonus	150
Turret minimum gold solo siege	400
Rift Herald	300
Drakes	100
Baron	200

Now knowing these things, let’s start with the tips on how to stay on top in terms of gold:

Laning Phase – CS, trading, wave management, and recalling.

First, we’ll have to go through the basics:

CS is Creep Score. It is the act of last hitting the minion to earn gold from it. I usually call it “last hitting” instead of “CS” in this site so those who did not come from PC would easily understand what I mean.

Why does last hitting matter? Majority of the gold that you will earn come from minions. Look at it this way:

Minions spawn at 25 second intervals and you can earn a minimum of 210 gold (not accounting for siege minions for simplicity) for each wave if you are able to last hit all minions. Otherwise, you’ll earn a minimum of 84 gold if you are simply standing near the wave, not being able to CS anything.

After 10 minion waves, you’ll earn a minimum of 2,100 gold if you are able to CS every wave perfectly but only a measly 840 gold if you are unable to CS every wave. 2,100 gold earned is almost a full item, considering that everyone starts with 500 gold.

In a duo lane, it’s worse as two champions who are unable to last hit will only earn 420 gold.

But Siege, of course I’ll CS!

It’s an oversimplification of what happens in the laning phase, but I told you this to show you the important of CS in the game. Every time you die or are forced to go back because you took a bad trade, you’ll lose important CS which will lose you precious gold and XP.

“Every minion is a negotiation.” – NEACE

It’s up to you whether or not the enemy is allowed to take one of your minions without consequence. for example: Having a kill advantage while still in the laning phase means you shouldn’t be scared of pressuring the enemy when they’re going in to take a minion or two; this may lead to later on in the laning phase to scare the enemy to take ANY CS/deny the enemy any CS. We’ll talk about this concept later on when to get to our wave management basics.

As a rule, for beginners: Do not take a trade that will not lead to something. In other words, do not take pointless fights. For example:

1. Is your jungler near? Force a fight. The enemy who was playing it safe suddenly manned up? The enemy jungler might be near, play safe for now.
2. You’re almost level 5 and have a strong ultimate? Force a fight to lower the enemy’s HP so you’ll be able to kill him once you level up.

Levels are as important if not more than gold, as an approximation, each level is worth 300 gold and leveling up faster has greatest advantage in the laning phase.

To make sure that you’ll maximize the amount of gold and experience you earn in the laning phase, you have to learn Wave Management.

Simply put, wave management is knowing the appropriate action or reaction in terms of what to do to minion waves. In the lower tier, people will want to press all buttons they can every single time but this is very inefficient.

There are three wave management basics that you should know:

1. Fast Push – This is what low elo players usually do. Attack everything in sight and spam abilities. Clearing the wave fast is good for these three scenarios:
   1. In the first two waves, you’ll want to do a fast push in order to reach level 2 faster than the enemy.
   2. When trying to recall and buy items. So that the enemy won’t have the chance to crash their minions into your turret and make you lose CS.
   3. When trying to crash your minions into their turret to take plates and reset the wave so the enemy will lose CS to punish the enemy further if they die or recall in a bad time.
2. Freeze – Once you gather a sizable gold or kill advantage (*state to constantly check and compare your and the enemy’s gold and items – considering if they have backed recently (may have more items than you)), try to freeze the lane near your turret. You’ll be able to do this only by last hitting the minions when they are low on health, and also by matching the damage done to minions by the enemy champion.
   You’ll want to do less damage than the enemy, so the minions will push into your side once you are near your turret. Protect the freeze by Zoning the enemy, which means to threaten to kill or deal (poke) damage them if they approach the wave.
   Once your minions die and there is still a sizable wave, you can protect the freeze by dragging the enemy minions to the side where the brushes are, so they won’t be able to reach your turret. You maintain the freeze for three reasons:
   1. To farm safely on your side of the turret so you’ll be safe against ganks while making the enemy vulnerable to ganks at the same time.
   2. To zone the enemy easily once you are ahead. Freezing and Zoning will exponentially widen the gap between you and the enemy champion.
   3. To farm safely on your side of the map if your first turret is taken down.
      This third point is usually neglected because it is a mind-numbing task to freeze a wave after the laning phase. But, this is the simplest and safest way to get back into the game if you lose your laning phase.
3. Slow Push – A slow push is set up after the laning phase in order to start a passively growing minion wave that is capable of destroying towers by itself. The simplest way to start a slow push is by killing only the ranged/caster minions of a wave at the side of your map. It is recommended to do a slow push a minute before your team takes a secondary objective, mainly the Drakes.

Finally, for the laning tips, Recalling. Do not blindly recall because as mentioned before, you can be punished for it. Here are three tips to keep in mind about recalling.

1. Always shove/fast push a wave before attempting a recall so you’ll lose minimal CS.
2. Always recall around 30-45 seconds before the Drake/Rift Herald spawns so you’ll be able to regenerate health and make use of the gold you have farmed so far and so you’ll be able to have a better chance of securing the objective.
3. Reset after an objective. (Respect turns: if you have killed or forced an enemy to back, you have earned a turn to get objectives (towers, steal enemy jungle, dragon) then recall. Never take two turns, don’t take a kill then stay on the field as it is then much easier for you or your team to get killed in return. In a different video game genre context, this can be classified as “Saving”; saving before a boss/major fight.) If your team has taken Baron Nashor and the enemy team is alive, go back to base before attempting a Siege. This is not always the case though. For example, if you secured a Drake, and a fight broke up ending in an Ace of the enemy team; take a couple of turrets first, or take Baron Nashor before recalling. Once you see that the enemy is respawning soon, begin the recall. Going greedy and forcing a fight when they’re fresh from respawning almost always ends up badly.

Miscellaneous laning phase tips:

1. Always tend to a crashing wave, especially if it is a big wave with three or more siege minion which can easily net you 500 gold or more.
2. Always secure your area before recalling and recall behind turrets or under brushes.
3. If your champion has an empowered attack ability, like Nasus’s Siphoning Strike, Garen’s Decisive Strike, or Fizz’s Rending Wave. Chances are it will be an auto attack reset which is a great way to secure last hits.

Killing and Ganking

This is where the fun is at, but this could also spell your doom. Let’s find out why.

Pop Quiz: Is killing the goal in Wild Rift?

Answer: NOT! Killing champions is far from the goal in Wild Rift. How far? Killing champions are actually called TERTIARY OBJECTIVES. Meaning, they are the third most important thing to do in the game.

For your perspective: Here are the three objectives in the game.

1. Primary Objective – Pushing turrets to eventually destroy the enemy’s Nexus
2. Secondary Objectives – Taking down Drakes, Baron Nashor, and Rift Herald to gain buffs and various effect that will help to take the Primary Objectives.
3. Tertiary Objectives – Killing Champions to acquire gold, deny them gold and experience and deny the enemy team from taking secondary objectives or defending their turrets.

But… But… Killing is fun!

Heck yeah, it’s fun! But it won’t win you games by itself so don’t get caught up on it. This is the very problem our commenter talked about and here we’ll find out why.

Killing basics: Every time you kill the enemy, you’ll gain bounty gold and experience and while the enemy is waiting for their respawn, they’ll lose the opportunity to acquire gold and experience.

The first blood nets you 500 gold. Your bounty increases every time you kill an enemy by 30 gold, and it decreases every time you die by 40 gold. (I’m not entirely sure of this, if anyone can confirm this, please reach out to us!).

What does this mean? It means that every time you kill the enemy, you’ll gain less and less gold and when you are shut down, which will eventually happen if you keep on chasing the enemy, will net them a huge amount of gold.

But that is just the tip of the iceberg. Once you leave your lane to seek out enemies, you’ll leave your lane vulnerable, and allow the enemy to free farm and get turret plates.

If you leave for a gank and miss two waves, the enemy will be able to get at least 420 gold from minions. If they are able to take down the turret during that time, they’ll acquire another 400 gold at the very least. This is an 800 gold swing to your enemy laner’s favor (this is not even accounting for the global bonus gold for taking down a turret.)

If you are able to kill one enemy, you’ll get 400 gold and the enemy will still be up 400 gold. You’ll need to at least have a double kill just to even out the gold you freely gave to the enemy.

The important thing to note about this is that the gold the enemy would acquire is a sure thing while a kill is not.

So, I cannot stress this enough, shove/fast push your wave first before attempting a gank.

The same concept goes when you are playing as a jungler. A jungler can earn 400 gold+ per minute when farming monsters. So, do not waste more than half a minute trying to force a gank which can go wrong on so many ways if you can farm reliable gold on jungle monsters.

This is why top junglers always stress the importance of jungle pathing. Kill the jungle monsters on your way to a lane. And if you are a laner, play it safe if you see the jungle completely full of monsters. Do not force your jungler to gank on your lane because it will simply cause unnecessary mental pressure on your jungler.

Think of it this way: every time you go without 1 minute without a kill while you are trying to force a gank without farming, all the enemy champions earns 400 more gold than you.

As a rule of thumb, do not take more than half a minute on your gank attempts. And do not go for a full minute without killing minions or jungle monsters. Ask yourself if you have gained any gold for the past minute, if not, you have been wasting your time chasing ducks.

Pushing and Other Objectives

A.K.A. how to win games.

Have you ever flamed or be flamed as a jungler who won’t just take the Drake or Rift Herald?

GG JUNGLE DIFF!

Actually, Dragon control is a joint effort of the Jungler, the mid laner, and Dragon laner. If there is no Lane Priority in both those lanes. Taking Drakes is a lot harder.

Lane Priority means having the upper hand in the lane being able to shove demand. Lane Priority and lane matchups is a wide topic in itself, but what you have to remember in lower Elos is one simple thing: Do not die against your matchup, so you won’t give them too much of an upper hand.

If you cannot win the lane without the help of a jungler, at least do not lose the lane and feed the enemy champions.

Help! The enemy Mid and Dragon lane got fat! It’s impossible to win the first Drake? Is all hope lost?

Of course not! A little after the first Drake spawns, the Rift Herald appears. A Drake grants 100 gold and a permanent buff but the Rift Herald grants 300 gold and a one-time ability to summon it.

If taking the first Drake is impossible, focus your efforts in taking the Rift Herald. Taking the Rift Herald and using it to take a turret can cause a massive gold swing into your favor.

It is often better to give up an objective and take another one at the other side of the map, instead of choosing to fight a losing battle.

Remember: Do not let the enemy take something in the map without any consequences.

If you are a mid laner or a jungler, you help your team not only through ganks, but also through turret control.

Scenario: You are the jungler. Your Dragon lane is being pushed in and in danger of being dove by the enemy’s mid laner and jungler. What do you do?

1. Ask for your team to group up in Dragon lane and defend your turret.
2. Help your mid laner take the mid turret.

Most of low elo players will instinctively choose option A, but option B is much better in reality. Once you take down the mid turret, you’ll get lots of gold, and the enemy’s jungle opens up for ganks and counter jungling. Additionally, if the enemy is slow to react to your strategy, you’ll actually be able to head to the top lane and take another turret if the enemy is still at the bottom lane, but if they are now missing from the map, recall to reset and “save” your progress.

If you go for option B, you’ll immediately recover the gold gap you lost and you might even be able to snowball easily to victory.

Once the lanes open up, play around your team’s behavior. In solo queue, players won’t always respond to calls. For example, if you are farming the jungle, leave the jungle even if its half health to help your teammate. If you are the initiator, do not initiate if someone in your team is split pushing because it is extremely hard to win 4v5 scenarios.

Yes, I know, playing with people who only want to ARAM (all mid) feels really bad sometimes, but take advantage of it by farming near your team as to not lose out on gold. You may instead take the Teleport Enchant,so you can tend to the side lanes and be able to split-push and respond to your team when needed. This is especially important when playing as a Baron laner.

To close out your games in the late game, take out one or more enemy first then look at the map.

1. If you have lots of minions near the enemy turrets, attempt a siege to destroy the enemy Nexus.
2. If you are pushed in. Rally your team to take Baron Nashor immediately then recall then 1-3-1 to push minions in then end with an all-mid push.

That’s all for this guide! If you are reading this, congratulations and I applaud your effort to improve! Keep on it! I hope you get something from this wall of text. If you think we missed something, feel free to comment down below!

TL;DR – Key Points

1. Ask yourself if you have earned gold in the past minute. If the answer is no, you are wasting your time and playing inefficiently.
2. “Every minion is a negotiation” – NEACE – Do not let the enemy do whatever they want to do.
3. Killing is fun, but it does not win games! Your objective in this game is to destroy the enemy’s Nexus (base). Here is the list of objectives in the game ranked based on importance:
   1. Destroying the enemy’s Nexus and turrets.
   2. Taking Drakes, Rift Herald, Baron Nashor.
   3. Killing enemies.
4. Killing is the most unreliable source of gold. Here is the list of sources of gold ranked in terms of reliability:
   1. Minions/Jungle monsters
   2. Turrets
   3. Killing champions
5. Taking objectives is a team effort!
6. Team effort wins games and team efforts are built upon individual accomplishments. If you cannot contribute to your team, at the very least, do not feed.