Is League of Legends too difficult to get into as a newbie?

August 10, 2022

Is League of Legends too difficult to get into as a newbie?

Are competitive video games becoming too hard to get into as a newbie?

Hello lovely readers, I'm sat under a fan as I write this which is probably a good thing because something tells me this could be a *interesting* blog post. I originally got the idea for this from a Twitter tweet I saw by Ashley Kang (at the end of this I will link the original tweet) and it got me thinking, is League of Legends becoming too difficult to get into as a newbie? I joined League in season 10/Worlds 2020, I don’t play ranked and I haven’t played in a while, but even for someone who is already versed in how League works, it feels off-putting to go back in when so much has changed in the sixth months I was unable to play. Is it getting too hard to go in completely new? There are guides and videos everywhere and the game is over ten years old, it has to be kept fresh somehow. Let’s leap right into this discussion – and feel free to leave your thoughts!

League of Legends first appeared in 2009, it is now over ten years old and in that time we have seen the creation and evolution of the game from its conception, to new champions, new game modes, international competitions, regional leagues, and new in game factors such as the new drake that were added (and in one case disabled – and as of writing, not re-enabled/instated). I think we can all acknowledge; it is a good game – otherwise why would we give hours of our lives to it? And we probably don’t hate it as much as we may claim to otherwise, we likely still wouldn’t have it installed – like I said I haven’t played it in over six months because life, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have a certain level of fondness for the game even if the try-hards in unranked are hella annoying. Yes, EUW solo queue, I am looking at you.

As the game is over ten years old, of course it has to have the aforementioned updates, if it was still the exact same, would we all play it still? Familiarity is great but monotony is going to get old really fast. New champions offer us a reason to keep playing, and to have so much choice (over 140 champions are currently available in game), we can learn new roles, try new abilities, learn new mechanics etc. and while we can help newbies with guides to the best champions to play at the most basic level – is it took difficult to even know where to start? The in-game tutorial is good, it tells you a basic set of things you need to know, and the rankings of champions is great for working out which champions are best for experience level, but is it overwhelming nonetheless?

Something I noticed from a few forums and threads was that players had noted how there was a lack of help with jungle pathing in the tutorial and this was something I hadn’t thought of but thinking about it now, the tutorial teaches how to play lane – starting in mid with the same theory applied to other lanes – and this is the same in Wild Rift. This doesn’t teach anything about the jungle role, the pathing or indeed how to land damage on drakes and the Rift Herald – so perhaps the tutorial also needs to take this into account. Most of us play multiple roles anyway, teaching jungle in the tutorial might help those who play jungle as an additional role, especially with getting the grips on mechanics of each role.

We often discuss how many pros are just good at mechanics, and yes, we can teach mechanics, but if you download and power up League on your own with very little idea of anything about the game, how would someone know where to start to get better at mechanics? Sure practice is great and we’re all familiar with the idea of practice makes perfect but that doesn’t help someone who is literally staring at the client and has likely watched YouTube videos that have overloaded their mind with every detail of the game to the point where they can tell you what a champion does and what matchup it works in but cannot play it to the level of understanding they have for it.

Think back to when you started playing League, how difficult was it to get started? Riot have done a solid job keeping the game up to date and still in a place for newbies to start if they want to. But if people are try-harding so much in unranked, and you are still getting your head around controls, the necessary mechanics, abilities of champions, and all the other intricacies of the game – especially aiming with free camera, how easy really is it? And this doesn’t take into account the kind of teammates you could end up with – after all, we are all familiar with toxic team chats that need muting. I'm sure there are some who are thinking suck it up and cry about it if you struggle that much then don’t play, but this isn’t exactly a helpful disposition to have.

I for one have been told that being a girl means I shouldn’t game at all, or at least not where multiplayer games are involved such as League, Valorant, COD, etc. I don’t think we need to add to that with a ‘just leave if you’re bad’ mentality, it’s really not helpful. Arguably this isn’t a very pressing issue, we have the issue of inclusion in esports already and that needs limelight for important discussions to take place, but we can’t have those discussions if we are allowing newbies to be told to go away because they are still learning the game. Aram the same with co-op vs AI, they are both great starting place for unranked games in League, there arguably isn’t too much pressure and it offers the opportunity to master a champion (let’s put a pin in the whole discussion of one tricks for the moment) before attempting to learn every match up in game or how to successfully rotate on the map. It also offers the opportunity for improving basic mechanics – especially as you level up and flash, cleanse and all the other summoners are added in.

This is of course great; in an ideal world all players should be afforded the basics of being able to master a champion and improve their mechanics in a low stress environment as well as master the use of summoners. So why is it hard for newbies to get into? As so many others have said, there is just a lot of content. And not in a GCSE kinda way, there are items, champions, ever changing systems and frequent patch changes, as well as the need for good mechanics (which I for one lack), as well as the in game on map tasks such as drakes, turrets, the Rift Herald and Baron Nashor. There is no perfect solution, pro players and newbies are obviously not on the same level and trying to keep both groups happy is a difficult task. But there has to be something to help newbies.

The game has to be difficult enough to keep pro players competing but also to keep newbies joining and playing as well as maintain those already playing – and also bring back those who have been away from the game for a while. It’s a tall order. But for the question of getting newbies in and not overwhelming them in 0.5 seconds I do have a suggestion of sorts, something I have looked for and haven’t really found outside of a few examples are online game academies to help newbies learn the mechanics and basics of the game, so they don’t just fall down into watching video after video while gaining nothing. Written guides and videos are great, but I wonder if an academy with higher rank people helping newbies get into the game and mentor them in the basics would help more, because then it would be a space where questions could be asked directly. Or as some users have pointed out, a beginner space on the client, to ask questions, have guides put forward by Riot, and make mistakes before being unleashed onto the rift where the chat feature is active. In relation to this, another suggestion I saw, pinpointed the idea of having something similar to ARAM i.e. one lane, but vs AI so that people can learn a champion and potentially in conjunction with Riot own guides.

While writing this I spent some time looking at public opinion of League and found several sites with the advice of ‘just practice’ which as earlier discussed, isn’t really that helpful. I’ve practiced crocheting granny squares and flowers for a year and guess what, still can’t do it, just practice as advice isn’t helping people, and if anything, it’s really infuriating to hear. Especially as a lot of people are reliant on friends who get them into League, to then help teach them what they need to know; League is a great game for friends, but if we are relying on friends to teach us, is the game becoming too hard to be a newbie alone in? League is difficult for many people, and this isn’t just a result of not being able to practice as much as is recommended to be good at the game, there is a lot to learn, and an ever-changing patch (patch changes are every two weeks) makes learning the game difficult. It keeps the game fresh and engaging but it can also make it hard to keep up with who is meta, and this is where we will now discuss the joys of one tricks.

Yes, it is meme-ed a lot, one tricks. We all likely started as one, and some of us may still be them, but even being a one trick won’t make League the easiest game out there. Not only because of mechanics, items and everything else still has to be learnt, but also because being a one trick requires a knowledge of what champions are good/bad to play against and all the ways your champ can be countered. Being a one trick doesn’t mean getting away with easy matchups every day of the week and I'm sure we’ve all had at least one match on a one trick where the matchup was not in our one trick favour. And if you’re like me, this likely decimated your KDA as the match progressed 😊

Another thing I looked into while writing this was the disabling of Chemtech Drake, for anyone who is really new to League and is staring at their screen in bafflement, Chemtech Drake was put into the game ahead of 2022 competitive/ranked season, and disabled shortly after due to a number of reasons but specifically difficulties of playing the rift in Chemtech Drake soul mode – especially from behind. It was disabled by Riot and was said it likely won’t be back in game for a while. But here’s the thing, this drake did make the game harder for pros but it also made it harder for newbies, as said before I don’t think there is a way to balance the two groups’ needs and wishes, which is why an academy for beginners could help massively. Especially considering the number of champions, abilities, items, runes (which are a figure it out yourself process for newbies) and in game things to learn that reading wiki and fandom pages won’t necessarily help make easier to understand or how to put into practice.

Other talking points that I want to give quick mention to include the topic of the ability of flash being added in at summoner level 7 (whether this is too late as some forums suggested) and the topic of buying accounts that are already ranked up (and smurf accounts) – which will be carried over into the final paragraph of this admittedly quite long blog! The discussion centring on whether flash is added in at level 7 is too late made me wonder what difference it would make if it was unlocked from the beginning such as ghost – we’d learn it faster, probably learn how to use it effectively from the start but is adding something else onto the list of things that we expect newbies to learn counter intuitive when we know there is already a lot? That’s an answer I will allow you to come to yourself but definitely something to think about.

My final point of discussion for this article surrounds the ability to climb the ranks once out of the newbie stage, and aforementioned the lucrative trade of buying already ranked up accounts and/or creating a smurf account to play at lower ranks. We all know the basics of how the League ranked levels go, and assuming you make it out of noob stage with the intention to keep going, how easy actually is it to climb the ladder? We know League is saturated with players especially in major regions such as NA, EUW and KR (with 27.8 million, 34.8 million and 19.8 million accounts respectively per region), and that the level of competition is high – but does this add to the potentially difficult nature of League and make newer players unlikely to want to climb if they know they are in a highly saturated region with hugely talented solo queue players, and their chances of success of rank climbing are lower?

But what about those who want to skip the queues and go in high or just outright stomp matches in low rank/levels? Aka smurf accounts. Well, a quick search on eBay (on the 9^th August 2022) under the search of ‘league of legends account’ gave some answers. 8 listings on the UK based eBay site demonstrated to me at least that buying accounts was more popular than I had expected, the rankings and levels differed from each listing but most (6 out of the 8) listings were for EUW accounts with unranked level 30 and ranked accounts to the level Diamond as well as some EUNE accounts to Platinum level. And if you were wondering how much these cost – anywhere between £2 to £84, having done some research on how much these accounts were going for I then had a look at a few articles on the topic. We can tell this takes away integrity and if people buy or create these accounts, then what happens to the actual weight and time behind levelling up as well as the experience for those just trying to learn? Does it diminish the whole motivation to rank up? Put newbies off playing because they’re getting stomped before they have a chance to learn? Arguably it’s all of the above, and I’ve played games where the opposing teams feels a little too good for the unranked bottom of the level-board match I'm playing. If you would like to read more on this topic as I only wanted to briefly touch on it, then please check out my source list where some articles will be linked that go into depth on smurf accounts.

Hopefully this hasn’t put new players off joining, as at the end of the day League is a good game, but when I saw the topic on Twitter, I thought it would be interesting to write about, and think about on a deeper level, especially considering all the intricacies of the game. Thanks for reading!

See you on the next blog! ヽʕ •ᴥ•ʔﾉ

Editing note – I'm still working on format and trying out a few things, including adding doodles/pictures and am considering adding sub titles as well, please let me know what you think! Thank you again for reading!

Notable Sources of Information –

Ashley Kang Tweet – Whether League is now too difficult to enter

https://twitter.com/ashleykang/status/1483079596572811264?lang=en-GB

Mobalytics – Everything you need to know about team comps and team fighting in League of Legends

https://mobalytics.gg/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-team-comps-and-teamfighting-in-league-of-legends/

League of Legends – Patch Notes

https://www.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/news/tags/patch-notes/

Dot Esports – Riot disables Chemtech Drake in League of Legends

https://dotesports.com/league-of-legends/news/riot-disables-chemtech-drake-in-league-of-legends

Dot Esports – Solution to Smurfing Problem in League of Legends

https://dotesports.com/league-of-legends/news/solution-to-smurfing-problem-in-league-of-legends

Game8z.com – After 13yrs of development, is the game becoming too difficult for newcomers to access?