Master the League #1: The Basics

If you're reading this article, you are either curious about what League of Legends is, or more likely, you've played your first game and wondered what was going on. Fear not! This is the first of many in a brand new series I'm starting to speed along the learning curve for new players such as yourself! In this very first article, I will be giving a very basic overview of what League of Legends is, and what you need to know for your first game. Later installments of this series will delve more deeply into specific roles, advanced mechanics, and how to play as a team in solo queue.

The Client
When you first log into League of Legends, it will prompt you to select your experience level with games of the Moba genre. I shouldn't have to be too specific on what to pick, as it's all up to each individual's personal experience. Next, it will ask if you would like to play the tutorial. I recommend that you do so, as it teaches the very minimum you need to know to understand how to win your first match.

After you play through the quick tutorial, take a little time to explore a bit before you jump right into your first match against other level 1 summoners. While on the main page of the client, you can see your summoner name, along with what level you are in the top right. You can also see the amount of RP and IP you have. RP is short for Riot Points, points that are optional to purchase with money that can enhance your game experience by buying Champions, Character Skins, Boosts, Bundles, and Name Changes. IP is short for Influence Points, points that rack up after playing games. You can spend these points on Champions, and Runes.

Below this bar are four buttons, the store, your summoner profile, a guide to the store, and the help menu. Let's take a look at the store. When you click on the store you'll be shown the current sales, several suggestion champions, and the sales for the week. On the left you will see many tabs among which are the skins, champions, runes, bundles and boosts tabs. You can explore around if you want to, but don't feel pressured to purchase anything without getting a feel for the game first!
 

Moving on, we'll click on the summoner's profile tab. You will immediately be greeted with your profile tab, in which you can see the number of minion kills, tower kills/player kills/player assists, and wins that you have. Click on the Champions tab. Inside you will be able to see every champion in the game. If you look to your left, you can see several checkboxes that will divide them into different roles, you can also see which champions are free for the duration of the current week!

Choosing a Champion!

This is it! The time has come to make an important but also very fun decision! Take your time looking through the champions listed under the available tab, and pick the one that you think you would enjoy the most. Read up on what all the abilities do, this will save you a large amount of time once you get in game that you can spend getting ahead of your opponents that might not have done the same!

There should be a few champions for each "Role" in the current free week rotation, but at the lower level, all of the roles are not very important for your first few games, I will touch on those in later installments of this series. For now, pick a champion that looks and sounds cool to you by it's skill description. One of League of Legend's greatest streangths is the diversity and many champions it's roster boasts!

 

Queuing Up and Playing Your First Match!

By clicking the League of Legends emblem in the top left of the client, you will go back to the "home page" of the client. You should see the red "play" button in the top center. I recommend that you play a few Co-OP vs. AI games first on the beginner difficulty to get a feel for the game without having to play against real players, but the choice is yours. There you go, you are armed with enough knowledge to tackle your first game of League of Legends!

 

I will continue to update this series weekly so that you can continue to be ahead of opponents of your level, knowledge and skill-wise. Look next week for a more in depth installment featuring steps to managing your lane, farming a good amount of gold, and what to do throughout the different stages of the game. This has been Theorie, and as always, thanks for reading!