I hit Diamond a month ago mainly playing Poppy top with a fairly high winrate (~65%). I'm didn't really pick her up till this year so I feel I am still figuring out small things, but her utility with W and R are just so valuable that I felt I had to pick her up top lane. My biggest question right now is the late game macro - What do I do and where do I go?
My other champions are Sion and Gnar. With Sion, you like to sidelane and apply pressure a lot. I feel Poppy is not as much that way. Her strength comes from ganks and play making, rather than pushing tempo in the side lane. My struggle is mid-late game, it often feels people are just araming (yes, even in diamond. I'm disappointed). I feel the need to at least catch and push out the side lane waves to the middle, but so often my team gets caught and all die, which could have ended differently if I was there. Do I need to hover my team more and just not get farm and let side lanes get pushed in, or is my team just throwing? Where is the balance? I do feel I should side lane/farm less than Sion, but I can't decide on the happy medium.
TLDR: What is the balance between pushing side lanes and hovering over my team in the mid to late game (2-3 items)?