Board Thread:Help desk/@comment-77.40.147.46-20130125185653/@comment-155.33.156.194-20130126181550

The differences are more player dictated than actual. You can go with any champion to any lane and could still do well, but the most common set up is this:

Top: Bruisers and tanky-dps. Champions like Renekton, Jarvin, Rengar etc... The top is a solo lane if your team has a jungler. Usually you want these guys to have access to farm, but they need to be durable enough to get it.

Mid: Most often the AP carry. Complete access to as much farm as they can get. Never send a melee champ mid under normal circumstances. Some can get away with it, but its more difficult because of the brush on both sides hiding ganks.

Bottom: Support and the AD carry. The AD carry focuses on farming exclusively for the early game. Support is to keep carry alive at all costs.

The reason that jungling is so popular is because if you jungle effectively, you are accessing a gold/exp source (the creep camps) that your team wouldnt use very much otherwise. Plus, your top lane, which is now a solo, gets the advantage of levelling up as fast as mid would, because there isnt a second champion to split the exp with. Jungling also lets you help every lane a little bit. When you are hidden in the jungle, the enemy team doesnt know which lane you are going to, so you can (and would be expected to by teammates) surprise enemies that are pushed too far.

Other set ups can definitely be successful, but if you are joining a random queue, especially at level 30, this is what your teammates will expect you to be doing.

Hope this helped.