League of Legends – Ultimate Beginner’s Guide – Part Two: Pick Your Class

Hi, and welcome back to our Ultimate Beginner’s Guide to League of Legends. In Part One, we explained the basics of the game, what the objective is, how the game is played, and the basic layout of the map. In this Part Two, we’re going to go a bit more in depth to all the different classes you can play.

We’re not going to explain each and every one of the characters, because then this guide would have like a hundred parts, and we’d have to update it every month. So no, we’re going to stick to a general outline of the character types.

Which Classes can you play as in League of Legends?

As we mentioned in Part One of our Guide, there are over 160 Champions in League of Legends, and each of them is a special little snowflake with its own abilities and playstyle. Nevertheless, the stats and abilities of a Champion are usually given in such a way that make them more suited for a certain role during the game, and less suited for other roles. These roles correspond to certain areas in the game.

Technically speaking, you don’t ‘have’ to play a certain role in a certain way. In the beginning of League of Legends, a lot of people were doing whatever they wanted. Over time, however, the pro players found out that playing in a certain way was most likely to win games – this is what is called the ‘meta’.

This has become the most accepted way of playing, so if you don’t play in this way, you’ll most likely lose more games. Also, you’ll piss off your more experienced team mates who expect you to play according to the meta.

We’ll go over the commonly used categories of roles, and explain what makes it more suitable for a certain task / area instead of another area.

The Tank

A Tank is a type of Champion who is able to take a lot of damage and is pretty hard to kill. They have a high amount of HP and defense, but in return, they’re not able to deal a lot of damage themselves.

Tanks have abilities that are focused on disrupting their enemies, but not necessarily taking them out completely. Tanks want to attract all the attention and the damage to themselves, because they can easily handle it.

Because of these abilities, it’s easier for them to hold the line when playing alone. As such, they can usually hold a single lane by themselves without needing support from another team member.

As a tank, obviously you’d want to invest in defensive items to maximize this defensive capability.

Tanks are also further divided into two categories, Vanguards and Wardens.

Vanguards

Vanguards are offensive tanks. This type of Tank is more specialized in taking the fight to the enemy and messing up their game, for example by pulling them or dashing to their location to attack. This allows other teammates to use their abilities to finish them off.

Examples of Vanguards are Alistar and Sion.

Wardens

Wardens are defensive tanks. Wardens specialize in holding the line and making sure they can’t harm teammates. This allows those teammates to take out enemies safely, without them taking any damage themselves.

Examples of Wardens are Poppy and Taric.

The Fighter

Fighters (also called Bruisers) are Champions that strike a good balance between attack and defense. While their defensive skills aren’t as good as those of tanks, they can still take a few hits in a fight and keep standing. The term Fighter is sometimes interchangeably used with the term Bruiser, although the last more is more commonly used for ‘tankier’ defensive builds.

While Fighters can take a few hits and hold their own in a fight, they lack the defensive capability and the abilities to hold a lane all by themselves. The Fighter is more suited to survive a fight for a longer time but also to do some real damage to the enemy.

Fighters are also subdivided into two categories. These are Divers and Juggernauts.

Divers

Divers are high mobility Fighters that literally ‘dive’ into combat. They can pick out a single target and attack it, so that target and his teammate are forced to deal with the Diver before it deals a killing blow.

Their defensive stats are a bit lower than those of Juggernauts, but they can still hold a fight long enough to deal lots of damage and become dangerous to the enemy.

Examples of Divers are Diana and Pantheon.

Juggernauts

The Juggernaut is the counterpart to the Diver. He has both good offensive and defensive skills, and can really do serious damage in battle. However, the Juggernaut has low mobility and range, so he has a hard time closing in on opponents and getting away from them.

Examples of Juggernauts are Mordekaiser and Sett.

The Mage

Mages are Champions that focus on damage through ranged combat, crowd control and Area-of-Effect damage. This way, they can trap enemies and take them out from a distance. As a Mage, you want to invest in items that increase the speed and strength of your spells.

Mages are good at dealing a lot of damage, especially through the use of burst damage (high damage in a short period) spells. They can also handle opponents through crowd control and other abilities that make them weaker, so teammates can finish them off.

On the flipside, Mages are very fragile, and can die very easily if an enemy melee-based Champion is able to get close to them. This makes them very vulnerable to Assassins, who can avoid their abilities with ease, and Tanks, who can soak up a lot of the damage Mages dish out.

Three subtypes of Mages exist: Artillery Mages, Battlemages and Burst Mages.

Artillery Mages

Artillery Mages are good at dealing lots of damage from large distances (like artillery, surprise surprise). However, once enemies are able to bridge the gap, this type of Mage dies really fast.

Examples of Artillery Mages are Xerath and Lux.

Battlemages

Battlemages (or Warlocks, as they are sometimes called) that have to get a little closer to the battle due to their decreased range. Once in range, they can do serious damage with more sustained (as opposed to burst) types of area damage.

Because they have to get closer to the fight than the other Mages, they also tend to have abilities and stats that are more geared towards preventing / avoiding damage.

Examples of Battlemages are Karthus and Vladimir.

Burst Mages

Burst Mages are Mages that, also unsurprisingly, are geared towards dealing burst damage. This means that they can deal a lot of damage in a short amount of time. They are also good at immobilizing enemies for a while. When they can effectively combo their immobilizing abilities with their burst damage abilities, they are extremely dangerous.

Because using their abilities against opponents that are at full health still gives that opponent the chance to escape afterwards, Burst Mages are instead really good at finishing off weakened, low health Champions from a distance.

Examples of Burst Mages are Brand and Vex.

The Marksman

Marksmen (also commonly known as ADC – Attack Damage Carry) are, as the name suggests, Champions that are good at shooting at stuff from a distance. Just like Mages, they primarily deal ranged damage. They differ from Mages in that most of that damage comes from their standard attacks, instead of their abilities (although those can do some serious damage too).

Their playstyle is therefore more geared towards dealing a more continuous, sustained type of damage from a safe distance, protected by their teammates. Because of their ranged attacks that deal a good amount of damage, they are pretty good against slower, melee type enemies such as Tanks and Fighters. On the other hand, because they are so fragile, Assassins and Mages can take them out fast.

Examples of Marksmen are Miss Fortune and Jinx.

The Slayer

Slayers (also commonly known as Assassins) are fast, mobile Champions that specialize in getting up close to the enemy fast and dealing out high burst damage. They focus on attacking single targets that are vulnerable and taking them out fast.

However, because of their fragility and low defensive stats, they can be taken out fast too. As a Slayer, attacking the enemy can be pretty risky, but if you’re successful, you can do some serious damage to enemy Champions.

Slayers are strong against weak and fragile opponents, like Mages and Marksmen, but are weaker against opponents that can take a lot of damage, like Tanks and Fighters.

Assassin used to be the commonly used term for Slayer types, but more recently, the official name for that type has become Slayer. More recently, the name Assassin is being used to describe a subtype of the Slayer. Most of the established player base continues to use the term Assassin, so don’t let this confuse you.

Slayers are further divided into two types, Assassins and Skirmishers.

Assassins

As we said earlier, the name Assassin was previously used as the name for Slayers. Now it is officially used as a subtype, although long-time players continue to use Assassin instead of Slayer.

When speaking of Assassins as a subtype of the Slayer, Assassins specialize in getting to enemy positions fast. Once they reach the enemy, they deal out a lot of damage with melee-type attacks. To avoid getting killed, they usually also have a few defensive abilities that help them avoid getting killed.

Examples of Assassins are Ekko and Zed.

Skirmishers

Skirmishers are less focused on moving in fast and dealing lots of burst damage. Instead, they tend to have better defensive skills and can deal out high amounts of sustained damage.

Examples of Skirmishers are Fiora and Riven.

The Controller

Controllers (also known as Support) are, as the name implies, Champions that play a supportive role and help control the battlefield. The Controller isn’t necessarily a strictly delineated class, because some other classes, like Mages, also play a supportive / controlling role

However, certain Champions are specifically geared towards playing a supportive role, which is what warrants putting them in a separate class from all the others.

Controller Champions are usually found in the Bot Lane, where their task is to keep a more fragile ally alive. This ally is usually a Marksman / ADC. The Controller keeps the enemies at bay, giving their ally a chance to damage them while staying safe.

Besides assisting teammates with their special abilities, they can also engage enemies, place wards or scout the map (more on that later on). This gives their role during a game a lot of variety. If you prefer to stay out of the heat of battle and just help out here and there, playing as a Controller might be the right fit for you.

Controllers can be subdivided into Catchers and Enchanters.

Catchers

Catchers are Champions that slow down enemies or hold them down. In general, they make the battlefield just a bit more inhospitable to the enemy team. The abilities of a Catcher make the enemy vulnerable and less mobile, making them an easier target for friendly Champions.

Examples of Catchers are Bard and Pyke.

Enchanters

Enchanters are Champions that are mostly focused on boosting and protecting their allies, and weakening the enemy through the use of abilities. They are very fragile and their offensive abilities are limited as well. This makes them less useful in one-on-one combat. To be effective in a fight, they need to be paired up with an ally.

Examples of Enchanters are Taric and Janna.

The Specialist

Specialists (or Unclassified) are Champions that don’t fit very well into any of the other classes. Their skillsets also differ too much from one another to constitute a class of their own. Specialists are Champions that do all sorts of things, although many of them (although not all) are focused on ‘zone control’. This basically means that they prevent enemies from entering a certain area by making that area a more dangerous place.

Examples of Specialists are Kayle and Quinn.

Next up, in our Ultimate Beginner’s Guide…

In this post, we went over all the different classes you can play as. Stay tuned, kids, because in Part 3 we’ll go over the best way to play each Class in League of Legends.