Maybe start out with a new tutorial?
League of Legends Bots Getting Updated to Help New Players
League of Legends is a game with one of the steepest learning curves in the world. There is just so much to do, and information to absorb, turning away a lot of potential new players.
And no matter how many beginner guides we read or watch, unless you have friends there to explain things along, it's going to be difficult to learn even the fundamentals. And on top of that, actually trying to play against others who will destroy you, is just icing on the cake.
So, Riot Games are now focusing on updating their bots, so that playing in Co-Op versus AI, actually gets players ready for games against real-life players. Something that this mode was incapable of doing so far.
League of Legends Bots - History
League of Legends champion bots have existed since the game was released, and they've fulfilled the same purpose ever since. The only rewrite ever employed happened in 2014, for the existing champions up until then.
The purpose was, of course, to help players get accustomed to playing the game. But even the most difficult of bots are unable to execute any complex plays, and even stimulate a normal team composition, with the jungle role not even existing.
This is all due to change, however.
Bringing Bots Up to Speed
When looking at player feedback and pain points, Riot say that they could see that many players were wanting a low-stakes, League-like experience that’s less stressful to practice and get better overall, especially with friends who are new to the game.
Thus, they started to reinvest in their bot system. Something that has not given any significant results until now, with even Riot saying that the available data shows that regardless of how many Co-Op vs. AI games a new player played prior to entering a PvP queue, these games would not improve the new player’s chances of winning.
So to make playing against bots actually useful to new players there are a few objectives Riot hope to hit with their updates:
- Bots that jungle, gank, and take dragons!
- Team AI that helps bots work more strategically and cohesively.
- Bots that can react towards meta shifts.
- Expanded champion pool.
- Bots that can scale to match your skill.
- New game modes.
- Editable bot behavior.
- Tools that enable quick iteration.
Now, of course, doing this is no easy feat. There are currently 163 champions in the game, and creating bots for all of them is a lot of work. So, how does one not only create all of them, but also support them with different game modes, and at varying levels of difficulty?
The answer is to develop a new Behavior Tree system for the Bot Decision Making logic. They explain the Behavior Tree as the decision-making process for evaluating what action should be taken at the current time, with the highest priority actions being evaluated first, with actions that will typically be grouped into subtrees.
In addition, they also promise that this system will become a foundation for quite a lot of new opportunities. Or at least that is the idea, with the possibilities of bots that can train players, those capable of machine learning, and so much more!
Riot announce that the beta bots will be on PBE for two weeks in the latter half of this year. And even though they may not seem impressive at first, they call on the player base to give feedback, and help improve them!