Last week Riot Games took some time out of their busy schedule to visit the Curse office in San Francisco for a guided tour of the new Summoner systems they recently unveiled for League of Legends. We got the lowdown on specific details for each, as well as a chance to play the game -- a first for me personally since GDC earlier this year. It's progressed quite nicely since then and it's great to see all of the aspects beginning to take shape as Riot Games sets their sights on a September release.
The Summoner System
At its core the summoner is your account, but there are three facets to the system: Spells, Runes and Masteries. As you level up your summoner by playing games you'll unlock additional spells, more rune slots, and additional mastery points to not only enhance your summoner spells, but also the champions you play.
You can also unlock access to new champions and more powerful runes as you level up. Marc Merrill described this as "gating content" so new players aren't overwhelmed by complex heroes and other aspects from the start. As you level up you'll unlock more complexity in the game, but early on the focus is on learning the game. And there will definitely be a lot to learn -- even for seasoned Defense of the Ancients veterans. You might recognize a few similar items and abilities, but for the most part these champions are in stark contrast to the heroes of the Warcraft III mod. And then there's the whole persistence of your summoner and deciding how to best set up your spells, runes and masteries for the champions you enjoy playing.
Summoner Spells
Early on you'll have access to a small selection of basic spells. Some of these will let you heal your champion and surrounding allies, reduce the movement speed of a targeted enemy, deal extreme damage to a minion or neutral creep, teleport to a targeted friendly minion, or allow you to run a bit faster and ignore unit collision. As you level up your summoner, you'll unlock more powerful spells. A few examples were the ability to revive your champion instantly when it dies (though with a long cooldown), or to teleport your champion forward a short distance -- allowing you to either escape harms way or gain on a fleeing enemy.
You'll be able to equip your champion with two of these spells during a match, so choosing wisely is important. You'll also want to pay close attention to your team's choices so that you can set up your spells around what will help the team as a whole.
The Rune System
The rune system can probably be best compared to the attribute leveling of Defense of the Ancients. The system will allow you to boost all kinds of attributes on your character; critical chance, movement speed, health regeneration, health, mana, etc. There are three different colored runes, as well as a fourth "uber rune" as Marc described it. These runes are of course offensive, defensive, and utilitarian in nature. At max-level you'll be able to slot up to nine of each of the red, yellow and blue runes, as well as three "uber" runes.
The major difference is this all takes place outside of the game, at your summoner profile -- giving you the time to decide which rune combinations fit your playstyle best. You can have up to three different rune combinations saved in your rune book, and will be able to choose from them when you start a match -- after selecting the champion you want to play. So if you want to play a tank champion, be sure to load up your rune configuration that fits that game play best!
Acquiring runes will be through the Influence Points system, which Merrill mentioned will accrue over the course of playing games. For each win or loss you'll receive influence points, which can then be used to purchase runes.
Masteries
The mastery system is essentially a World of Warcraft talent system, to best describe it. You have three mastery trees, though they're the same for every summoner -- it's not based on the champion you play. One tree is devoted to offense, another to defense, and the third to utility. Some examples Merrill gave were the ability to augment your Clairvoyance spell to also reveal stealthed units and increase its duration, augment your Smite spell to reward bonus gold and reduce its cooldown, or various ways to enhance your champions directly -- critical chance, mana regeneration, etc.
Similar to World of Warcraft, each tree is tiered, so you must spend a certain number of points in a tree to unlock deeper tiers. But as expected the best stuff is at the bottom, so you may want to focus on a single tree; some masteries will have multiple ranks as well. You'll start off with 1 point to spend, and as you level up, you'll receive additional points -- similar to unlocking rune slots or new spells. From the number of masteries available -- at least 30 -- it doesn't look like you'll be able to max out each tree by the time you reach the level cap for your summoner.
Best of all is that you'll be able to reset the mastery tree at will. So if you just played a game as a tank champion, but want to mix it up and play a bit of support, then just click on the "Return Points" button and you'll be able to set up your mastery spec for a different playstyle.
Hands-On
The game has changed substantially since the last time I played, way back in March of this year at GDC. To start off with, the game shop -- which you spawn at and have access to immediately -- now has a list of recommended items for the champion you're playing. For new players this is a godsend, as it means you don't have to memorize the massive number of potential item combinations you'll encounter while leveling up your champion and gaining gold.
In addition to this, Riot Games has implemented a range overlay for using abilities. When you use an ability that's targeted, a range indicator will display; this green radius around you is where your champion can successfully cast the ability from its current position. Anywhere outside of that radius and your champion will need to move a bit to cast it.
Overall the game is shaping up nicely for its September release, and it's going to be Free to Play, so it'll be worth checking out for any avid action strategy fan -- whether a novice or a pro. Merrill went as far as equating League of Legends to Defense of the Ancients as being the same as World of Warcraft to EverQuest. Whether he's right, only time will tell, but Riot Games seems to have the recipe for something that will drive the genre forward -- especially thanks to Tom Cadwell, the person who helped develop World of Warcraft's talent system and the new player experience.
