League of Legends Is Getting Upgraded Bots

By Tanner Dedmon

League of Legends has its normal play and ranked systems, but before players get to those, they often start playing against the AI. These bots give players an opportunity to experience Summoner's Rift without the stress of being in a PvP match until they get acclimated to the experience, but the bots aren't always great indicators of how a match will actually play out regardless of what difficulty level you put them on. League developer Riot Games agrees, and in light of that, it's put together a team to work on upgrading the AI in the game with players able to test out these new bots at some point later this year.

Right now, bots typically meander down their lanes in awkward positions and matchups and provide players a bit of extra resistance while players take farm, towers, and other objectives. Darcy "Riot DashiJador" Ludington, the technical product lead for League's bots, said that the bot experience didn't really adequately prepare them for playing against real people despite putting in quite a few matches in that space, and acknowledged that the problem was not unique to them with data supporting that bots aren't great at actually helping players practice at a level that'd win them a PvP game.

"Our 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," Ludington said. "So we want to give players an area to enjoy the strategy and team aspects of League, in a less stressful environment with more varied levels of skill."

These new bots will have a more varied range of actions such as working together "more strategically and cohesively" with one another instead of operating independently from the team (even though rogue teammates aren't exactly atypical in League anyway). Bots will eventually be able to jungle, gank, and claim jungle objectives like dragons, too, Riot hopes. They'll even be able to respond to shifts in the meta throughout the season.

For those who are already deep into PvP and don't have a reason to revisit bots other than playing with newcomers who want to dabble in League, Riot's also working on some features that might incentivize you to give bots another look. They'll pull from an expanded champion pool, Riot said, so the odd picks that aren't exactly representative of the meta may soon be a thing of the past. Perhaps more exciting than that, Riot said it hopes to have bots scale to match your skill level, though just how accurate that scaling will be remains to be seen.

These new bots will come to the PBE for two weeks later this yar, though an exact release date for the upgraded AI hasn't been set yet.

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