League of Legends

[SnowleopardVK]

My best friend has been addicted to League of Legends for the past few months and has been constantly praising it as "the only good online game she's ever played". So I decided to try it out.

I have to say I found it to be among the worst, if not the worst online game I'd ever played. I can't say I've figured out why she finds it so great. I spent hours downloading it, and then played several games, and lost all of them because I never once got a full group of teammates who weren't too laggy to help, or didn't quit after a few minutes.

So... I dunno. I feel like spending my day off trying out this game was a huge waste of my time. Has anyone else tried it? Maybe found it better than I did?

 

[Meatboy]

Well first off play with friends against some beginner level comps first and try to find a type of character whose style fits you. I play melee tank/fighter types well but my friends can't stand them.
Once you find some characters that you don't mind. Go to MOBAfire.com and look up some builds to suit your needs and learn a bit about how to most effectively use the guys you like till you start to learn the item system. Oh and don't forget to get as many last hits against minions as you can.
And again try to play with friends. Playing with randos is super aggravating.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

Playing with randos is super aggravating.

That's a risk in all teamwork-based online games yeah. It seemed worse in this one than others I've tried though.

I don't really have enough friends who play video games to make this any less frustrating anyways. My best friend's the only person I know who's willing to try them, and even she has never liked any before this one.

(I think I forgot to say in the OP. I played every game against beginner-level bots. They still slaughtered me and all my teammates every time.)

 

[Meatboy]

yeah it can be a frustrating game for sure. It does take time though. I have "won" most of my games but its rarely because I have a high kill count. Also take a look at the difficulty for the champions some have abilities that need to be used in certain orders to be effective. Unfortunately it is not a forgiving game if you pick characters because they look cool or what have you. It is a very mechanics oriented game for good or ill.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

take a look at the difficulty for the champions.

Most of the ones I found I liked were ranged specialists and had a medium difficulty. Once I noticed the difficulties I tried a few games as Warwick since he was the only character I saw with a listed "easy" difficulty. I got beaten down even worse unfortunately.

 

[RithTheAwakener]

Much like DotA, Heroes of Newerth, Realm of the Titans, etc. League of Legends requires you to learn most of the heroes' abilities and items available to buy before you can really play the game as intended. Until you know these aspects you cannot effective predict, initiate, or retreat effectively and your enjoyment of the game will suffer for it.

That being said, once you learn the game it is actually quite fun, especially when you find a hero you love to play.

 

[PureGoldx58]

It has a large learning curve, one so steep that most players will never truly be good at it in the end. Once you get competent at least you start to realize how much fun you have when other players actually try to play as a team rather than a one man show.

The Game is amazing, the community....

 

[Meatboy]

Retreating too is a good thing to do. I rarely engage enemies unless I have a clear advantage. I like to think of the game as if its tai chi or judo. There is pushing and pulling between the two teams but the one who over reaches is bound to lose.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

when other players actually try to play as a team rather than a one man show.

I'd say that was a big part of the problem. Or rather it was that they weren't playing at all and I was consistently forced to try and do the work of five players by myself.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

My best friend came up to visit and convinced me to give this game another shot. It was a bit better than last time. For the most part.

For one thing she, an actually good player who doesn't quit in the middle of the game, was on my team. No desperately trying to fight an entire enemy team by myself this time.

She's also a pretty extreme powergamer in this game. She picks the statistically "best" characters, memorizes internet guides of the "best" builds, and is both deadly and hard to kill as a result. Because of that she picked up a lot of wins, got a lot of playing experience, and is rather skilled with the game. (It works, but it's not really my style. I don't even really consider myself to be playing the game if I'm just mimicking what a guide tells me I should do).

Because she knows the game so well she was able to help me, which I think helped contribute to our wins together, but she's a REALLY frustrating backseat gamer. She looked over my shoulder and told me every move I should make, every enemy I should click, when to attack, when to run... To the point where I wasn't really making any choices of my own. Eventually I just handed my computer over to her because I was getting annoyed and she was pretty much the one playing anyways. She turned the game around and single-handedly won because she's a significantly faster clicker than me (and she micromanages really well, handling two computers and the glitchy unlocked screen movement all at the same time) but I'd say that despite the wins it was one of the worst games today. I didn't have fun. I was actively thinking "can we just get it over with" throughout a lot of it.

Things got better when I discovered that I really liked playing as a certain champion that I'd never tried before. I actually started killing enemies at the same speed that she was telling me to, so for the most part she backed off with the instructions and focused on playing her own character.

At that point I started to have fun with League of Legends for the first time ever.

tldr: It's not bad if you have reliable teammates and find a champion you like to play as I guess. But it takes a lot of work and a lot of frustrating losses to find good teammates and to discover who you play best as.