Dominion, a worthy addition to the League of Legends franchise?

Dominion has been around for a long time now, and everyone has had their fill of the new map. Some players have even taken to playing it exclusively; which somewhat attests to the success of Riot's new conquest in MOBA gaming. That, and the fact the League forums haven't erupted into rage and QQ.

Dominion consists of five capturable bases/towers, each of which will spawn creep waves to attack the opposing side. Pickups are dotted around the map that grant a small increase to health and mana, reinforced with a stormshield buff for each team in the middle. Each player sports a collective healthbar for their team, which drains when you have less bases or get killed. This setup basically ensues an emphasis on champion fights, which is absolutely fine by me.

The fast paced style gameplay and short duration are a refreshing change to the snowball based lanefest of Summoners Rift. Dominion also seems to have a larger margin for failure; making a comeback when your team is low on health is entirely possible with good teamwork.

I must admit- when I ask my friends for a game, it is taken for granted it will be 5v5 on Summoners Rift. It's almost as if Dominion was never released to our small little community. We did play it obsessively during the first week of induction, until we got frustrated with the questionable viability of some of our favorite Champions. Ultimately, Dominion seems like the ideal solution when you can't afford to play for long.

I can no longer bring myself to play Dominion repeatedly. Instead, it's somewhat reserved as a back up map. With the laning phase being practically none-existent, it removes a core aspect of the game. I personally like the laning part of the game, good players can get ahead by maximising their grinding and ganking. They can use minions to win a fight against an enemy champion when victory is otherwise impossible. Although Dominion is the same to a lesser extent, it can also be won by just mindlessly rushing bases.

Pinpointing the weakness in your enemies defenses and then exploiting it to gain more bases is quite easy with a co-ordinated team; and there are a fair few strategies to force your enemy to do more than just sit and hold three points all game.

Essentially there are four character roles in dominion:
- Attacker (Rumble, Pantheon, Graves)
- Catcher (Singed, Rammus, Lee Sin)
- Defender (Heimerdinger, Teemo, Poppy)
- Hunter (Irelia, Shaco, Talon)

There are plenty of champions that can cover several of these roles, making them excellent picks and in my opinion more desirable overall.

As for balance, a large chunk of characters are invalidated because of how the map works. Ability power casters usually get the crappy end of the stick. But on the other hand, you can prepare for the enemy line up because they always pick the same champions. Hello Shaco, Rammus, Heimerdinger, Akali and Teemo!

I must concur the meta does have potential, and we'll see how it develops as the map ages. There are a lot of ways to approach Dominion so it could get very competitive if a real ranked mode was introduced. If you love Dominion and really want to play it in a ranked mode, check this thread out.

The League of Legends forums have a handy Dominion section for those of you who can't get enough of the delicious carrytastic goodness. It's a must for anyone who wants to take the map seriously; so take a look sometime.

What do you think about Dominion? I've added a poll on the top right, pick your choice and I'll reveal the results when there are enough votes. Feel free to comment aswell.

Collection of new epic comics

You can never have enough comics, the fact that they are drawn in paint seem to just amplify how amusing they are.

There are more than usual, I saved quite all the best ones I could find. Enjoy.

League of Legends Wallpapers

Hey everyone, I know it's been a long time since my last post, but I've been busy (poor excuse I know). However, I'd like to get back into the routine of releasing new content every couple of days again.

Starting off with wallpapers is a lazy move, but it gives me time to prepare a nice interesting post for you guys!

I also found a pretty picture with most of the champions on it (credit not to me, give it to google that's where I found it). Whoever must have persevered to get all these on one image!

Chinese Janna looks exactly the same as the new tooltip in champion selection. That's cool.

Chinese Nasus decided to try to summon a crow with his swain pose. Sadly, it wasn't quite enough and his only return was green glowy stuff.

And finally for today, a little Teemo strolling through the jungle!

New League of Legends comics

It's been a while since I posted any League comics, or posted at all! But I have brought some pretty epic ones for your pleasure today! I thought a couple of them were hilarious. I've been saving pictures for a while now, so you should find a couple to make you laugh.

Sadly, I haven't managed to locate any Talon ones yet - I'm sure there will be some soon. Deal with it!

Riot more than contends with DotA 2 by upping the stakes

So everyone was a little flabbergasted by Valve when they announced DotA 2 would be hosting a one million dollar tournament during beta. We all heard a lot of propaganda that said LoL would be killed by the newest moba on the scene. We all also know that the $1 million is merely a means to challenge Riot and their throne on the freemium market (free to play).

So when Riot announced their ridiculous prize pool of $5 million for season 2, anyone with a brain can figure out it's a direct tit for tat exchange between the two companies. In other words, it's heating up folks!



The only thing that could satisfy me more than this battle between Multiplayer online battle arenas would be watching Phreak and Icefrog beating eachother down IRL in the mud. I'd pay to watch that shit.

Anyway, please bear in mind while the season 2 prize pool is 5 mil, that means for the duration of the entire season. Whereas Valve's prize of one million is spread over a single tournament. Which is what led me to believe this is just a "we're better than you" move.

To everyone who plays DotA or LoL, who do you think is going to win? And how much would you pay to see this entire contest put down and resolved with a man to man between Phreak and Icefrog?

Byakuya's friendly guide to common etiquette on LoL

If someone linked or directed you to this post, it's for a reason. You need to learn some manners in League of Legends, you tosser. If you want to look at the nice images that accompany this guide, you don't deserve them so stop looking and read.

There is at least one troll in every game of League of Legends, that is a fact. If you try to dispute that, then clearly you are said troll and should either read the guide or get the fuck off this blog. Anyway, most of the time a troll/argumentative douchebag wants to win the game, but doesn't have the means to achieve the victory - which is where flaming the rest of the team comes in, because we all know that helps.

So this short tutorial here is going to teach you how to stop being a such an idiot. Arguing with your team in a match is obviously only going to demotivate your team and ruin your chances. Hurr durr. So if you want to win, you should either shut your blasphemous mouth altogether or learn to diffuse volatile conversations. Here are a list of tips you should bear in mind when playing a game:

- In the picking phase don't pick and lock in straight away, otherwise most of your team will already hate you. It's a good idea to ask what everyone is going to play, and mention your own choice before you select it.

- Insulting or raging at anyone on your team is not polite. Nor will it do anything other than contribute to your loss. If you want to say something, give advice and suggest what the player should do next time instead of calling them a retard.

- If someone is being nasty to you, you can either take the moral high ground and ignore or be nice to them, or go roll in the dirt alongside them by arguing back. I have no issue with anyone who fights back if their team is picking on them, but bear in mind your towers will be pushed while you squabble away.

- If the enemy team if harassing you verbally, there's really no problem with trashtalking back. If you make them mad enough, they will be furiously typing on the keyboards while you casually do some "Go where you want, do what you like". Just don't use too many swearwords, and DON'T let it disrupt your laning/farming.

- You shouldn't always say GG at the end of a round. Only say it if you truly believe it was a contested match that both sides had a chance of winning. It's like an insult if you say good game to the team you just stomped because they had a leaver and a feeder.

- Caps lock is cruise control for cool, not etiquette. Leave it off.

- Stealing kills is stupid unless you're a carry or underfed. Try to avoid it, you won't be the first team to fall apart because of a KS.

Everything written here is very simple stuff. It doesn't take a genius to realise you are 1/5 of your team and that means you should pull your weight and not be a douche. I'm not saying trolling games is wrong, since I do it every now and again. But for those people who do it every game, take this guide to heart or just uninstall. Do everyone a favour, go on.