Common Misconceptions of Tempo vs. Loss Streak Comps

Playing "tempo" means fielding a strong board in stages 2 and 3 in order to preserve HP and also gain the 1g round win gold bonuses. This usually includes leveling up on rounds 2-1, 2-5, and 3-2, making completed items early, and occasionally losing econ intervals to hold pairs on your bench.

On the other hand, playing for loss streak maximizes econ and item quality by ignoring wins on stage 2, and sometimes stage 3. Loss streaking sacrifices your HP but allows you to maximize interest by not spending gold on buying XP, playing cheaper and fewer units, and streaking more consistently (because most players play tempo). You can also hold on to your components longer to make more informed item decisions. You still want to scout and be slightly weaker than your weakest opponent in order to preserve your streak while still killing units to save HP.

These two playstyles are on a spectrum rather than being black or white- sometimes it is appropriate to be playing somewhere in the middle, like losing econ to level for board strength while greeding item components, or vice versa. Additionally, it is very common to loss streak in stage 2 and then play tempo in stage 3. For example, 2 cost reroll comps almost always want to maximize econ for their level 6 rolldown on 3-2, and then want to try to winstreak for the rest of the stage.

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You should usually try to play tempo in most of your games (top NA players tempo in about 90% of ladder games), and loss streak only with strong augments or as a last resort if you lowroll your opener. Another benefit of tempo is that if you do manage to full winstreak, you will have even more gold than a loss streak player due to the extra 1 gold you gain from winning a round. However, less than 1 player on average per lobby tends to full winstreak into stage 4, so make sure you rely primarily on interest rather than streaks for econ.

As always in TFT, these are just general guidelines rather than hard rules to always follow. There are spots to play anything from any opener but tempo and loss streak have different features that support different comps. Understanding your opener’s strengths and playing towards a composition that matches them often is key.

Tempo comps can use a wide variety of items, since you will often pick late on carousel. Oftentimes you will be making many items in the order you receive the components in order to be as strong as possible to win rounds.

Tempo comps often have a lot of overlap between their ideal endgame items and generic strong early game items. This allows you to maximize your item efficiency throughout the entire game, rather than compromising a weak early game to have the best in slot on a 4 cost, or playing strongest board in the early game only to have a subpar build on your endgame carry.

Standard level 8 tempo comps benefit from having their low cost units upgraded that you can keep the entire game. When loss streaking, you will often not have your 1 costs upgraded on your final board for a long time as your odds of hitting them is low on higher levels.

Level 8 tempo comps generally can spike with upgraded 5 costs. The jump from to level 9 or 10 requires you to hold 70g+ during stages of the game when most other players have already rolled and hit strong endgame boards. Realistically you will be losing rounds while hoarding this much gold, so having high HP allows you to sacrifice rounds while hoarding economy to roll on level 9 odds.

While not always the case, tempo comps can afford to have bad matchups, as you will have HP to spare. Even if you have an unwinnable matchup in the lobby, you can still often go 2nd if you were the highest HP player on stage 4. Certain tempo comps tend to have much higher top 4 rates but lower 1st place rates.

Loss streaking favors playing contested S tier compositions. As much as we would like TFT to be perfectly balanced, realistically there is usually an S tier comp on each patch that can match the power level of other boards even if it has a few less upgrades. Oftentimes multiple players should be contesting the strongest comp, and loss streaking gives extra econ allowing you roll first to take contested units before other players.

Tying in with the above point, loss streak comps need to be able to winout against all matchups and play for first. Sacrificing your HP for a better position lategame is a huge risk, so the reward needs to be great in order for it to be worth it. Additionally, having a single unwinnable matchup in the lobby is a death sentence if you are two lives on stage 4.

Loss streak comps tend to not require upgraded 5 costs, or possibly even 5 costs at all. With low HP, you often cannot afford to risk delaying your level 9 power spike for too long and cannot save up a large bank to roll after leveling.

Comps that require specific components favor loss streaking, especially if they are built from the most desirable carousel components (historically bows, rods, and tears but it can vary by patch). In fact, taking as much damage as possible before stage 2 carousel is often ideal- killing one less unit each round is only a very minor 3 HP difference, but being first pick instead of second pick can drastically improve the trajectory of your entire game. Even if you start winning in stage 3, you often will have an early pick on the stage 3 carousel as well where players often go for specific 4 costs rather than contested item components.

Comps that benefit from higher item quality in general also prefer loss streaking as you do not need to make items in stage 2, giving you more visibility on your component distribution.

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Good luck to you! – Cheng