One of the things I like to think as a strength is my ability to explain new technologies to older generations. I've been adept at comparing the new to something familiar to them that they can recognize.
So with that in mind, I'm going to try to bridge a gap, this time between traditional sports, specifically basketball and American football, with one of the most popular eSports in the world, League of Legends. I'm choosing these specifically because of my experience with both. Sorry DOTA, just never played you so I don't know exactly how different you are from League. I'm going to try to speak in broad terms, so you can at least understand a few things if you see a League broadcast when on Twitch, or randomly on TV.
In broad strokes, League of Legends is a 5-on-5 team based game where the goal is to destroy your enemy base. The map is laid out in three lanes, with some winding pathways between them. The map's general layout looks like this.
It's a lot to take in, but for now, just notice the dirt paths extending from the bases in the upper right and lower left corner. The one that covers Left and Top part of the map is called "Top Lane", the diagonal path is "Mid Lane" and the path that covers the Bottom and Right part of the map is "Bottom (or Bot) Lane". While we have the map here, the river running from Top Left to Bottom Right is also a path people can walk on. We'll touch on the non-dirt path stuff later.
The game is broken down into a few unofficial phases. The Early Game usually fills the first 10 to 15 minutes of the game, the teams keep to their standard formations, and this acts like the feeling out phase. Teams will kill the enemy monsters that automatically spawn at each base, and build up money and levels so they can gain new abilities, level up those abilities, and buy items. Teams also try to go for kills and destroy the other team's protective turrets, so they can advance in the lane. The Mid Game occurs when teams start to mix up who is in what lane, and start going for map objectives, like the Dragon or Baron, which I won't cover at this time, but I will say they can give some benefits to the entire team that kills them. The end game is when both teams are starting to reach their full power and big team fights break out, and lasts until a team's base is destroyed.
One of the first concepts you may hear about is the "meta". This exists in traditional sports, in a way, but is never called that really. A meta, short for metagame, is a description of what strategies are in right now. In a game like League of Legends, the meta includes things like your team's strategy for the game, the characters they choose to fulfill that strategy, and even how they make character bans at the beginning. In basketball, the current meta has slid more towards the Space-and-Pace style of offense, and the most in demand role player type is the 3-and-D wing, which is a sharpshooter on offense and a solid defender. The meta in a game like League of Legends can change multiple times per season, due to patches the developers release, which can drastically increase or decrease the effectiveness of a specific character.
There are 5 roles typically filled on a team. They are named after the lane or area they occupy. The roles are: Top, Mid, ADC (Attack Damage Carry, or just Carry), Support, and Jungler. I'll go over these roles and the types of characters fill these roles, and try to compare them to popular sports positions.
Top Lane
League of Legends Typical Roles: Tanks, Bruisers
NBA Equivalent: Rim Protector, Shooting Big - i.e. Rudy Gobert, Karl-Anthony Towns
NFL Equivalent: Pass-Blocking Specialist, Pass/Block Tight End - i.e. David Bakhtiari, George Kittle
The top lane can form the backbone of your team. A tank role is a character who specializes in having a lot of health and defensive abilities, either for itself or for their allies. They also can have abilities that makes it harder for the other team to hurt the rest of their team. They want to put themselves between their damage dealing teammates, and the damage dealers of the opponent. They can also try to use those abilities that slow or rehabilitate the opponent to help secure an advantage. They can be hard to deal with in a 1-on-1 scenario but a coordinated team effort can render them ineffective, as they don't usually have the ability to deal with many opponents at once.
Bruisers exchange some of the defensive staunchness for a bit more attack power or enemy impacting abilities. In a game of basketball, this could be the difference between having a Rudy Gobert and a Montrezl Harrell. Harrell gives up some defensive power in exchange for being a pick and roll threat. They still offer some rim protection, but they're really there to be an extra threat on offense. Your more offensively tilting big men, like a Karl-Anthony Towns, can help shape your team and provide unexpected range from an unlikely position, which can allow you to do some different things than a worse shooting big man can.
For example, Towns could allow a team to play a 5-out team, with 5 good 3 point shooters filling all positions, which can force the defense to stretch thin. This can be done in League of Legends as well, through a 1-3-1 or split push late game setup. In a 1-3-1, typically your Top Laner, and the ADC count for the 1's and they go put pressure on two separate lanes, while the other 3 members team up to fill the last one. The pressure those two solo laners put on the opponents defense can cause the opponent to be out of position for the bigger group, and it can even allow a single person to cause significant damage to the opposition's defenses. This type of strategy requires specific team construction, and to have the flow of the game give them the opportunity. In terms of the NFL, this is similar to disguising your blitz's pre-snap. You show that you have some pressure coming from somewhere, but you try to confuse the offense as they try to figure out if the linebacker is coming up the middle, the safety on the outside, or if they're going to drop into coverage and try to undercut your slant you just tried to audible to.
Mid Lane
League of Legends Typical Roles: Damage Dealer Solo Lane
NBA Equivalent: Two-way player, Iso scorer - i.e. Paul George, James Harden
NFL Equivalent: Target Receiver, Shutdown Man Cornerback - i.e. Calvin Johnson, Jalen Ramsey
Your midlane is another solo lane, but this one focuses more on damage output than top lane would be. Mid and bottom lane are typically your main focuses early game, and help build your first arm of your late game damage. Mid lane is a good target early game by the Jungler because slowing down that player can help your team gain a significant advantage, as your solo mid laner will be able to safely attack the enemy monsters for money and experience. This can snowball into an advantage, if you can get a level lead, as you will be able to dictate the pace of the game in your lane. Attacking midlane can be a risk though as they usually have the damage to at least threaten the additional attacker.
Mid lane can be a pretty versatile position. You can have characters with abilities that can stun or root your opponents while still dealing damage. This would be like a good all around offensive and defensive threat like a Giannis Antentokounmpo or a Kawhi Leonard. They can still get their own buckets, but their presence can open the game up for other players. Alternatively, they can also go the full offensive approach, like when James Harden or Luka Doncic try to carry a game on their own. In football, you would think of this like your big target receivers. They have the ability to carry you to a win, but can also act as a smokescreen or distraction to let someone else break out. Whether this is acting like a fade to clear out a safety for someone to come underneath, or stopping to block for a running back screen. A good mid laner can have an impact on the game without racking up big stats themselves.
Attack Damage Carry (AKA Carry)
League of Legends Typical Role: Late Game Carry, Sustained Pressure
NBA Equivalent: Closer, Volume Scorer - i.e. Kobe Bryant, Steph Curry
NFL Equivalent: West Coast Offense, Big Play Threat, Pass Rush Specialist i.e. Adrian Peterson, Aaron Donald, Khalil Mack
It'd be unfair to call the ADC, or Carry, the primary damage dealer of the team, but it may not be inaccurate. Midlane, toplane, and your jungler can all do their fair share of damage, but no where else is the job of compiling the counting state of "Damage Done" more supported on the Carry. The Carry starts off in the bottom lane, with the Support character. Early game, it's job is to deliver the last blow to the enemy minion waves coming through lane, harry the opposition's bottom lane pair, and secure kills when it can. Late game though, these guys become some of the biggest threats on the battlefield. Carries typically scale well with their item purchases, meaning they get a lot of bang for their buck. Some characters are weaker in the early part of the game, due to their skills not being as good until they level up, or they're more item reliant, but once the late game rolls around, if they weren't kept in check, they can be a force to reckon with.
Your Carries and Mid Laners tend to make up your backline. Think of this like your baccourt or backfield, while your more defensive minded characters get in front of you. In a team fight, you can either coordinate as a team to take out the defensive wall first, then mop up the enemies who aren't as saunch, or you can try to break the back line by flanking, forcing enemy movement with abilities, or by simply outranging them. By taking out the back line first, you can increase the odds of your own team's survival by getting rid of the biggest threats. You can think of this option like throwing a screen right past an over-aggressive defensive end. You take them out of the play entirely and try to gain an advantage elsewhere.
Support
League of Legends Typical Role: Healer, Buff teammates, Debuff enemies.
NBA Equivalent: Pass-First Point Guard, Defensive Disruptor, i.e. Chris Paul, Kyle Lowry
NFL Equivalent: Game-Controlling Quarterback, Middle Linebacker i.e Peyton Manning, CJ Mosley.
The support works in the bottom lane with the Carry. By calling the support the quarterback is both an exaggeration and an accurate definition of their role on the team. It's an exaggeration because in football, the quarterback is a prestige position. It's the most visible, highest paid position on the team and often considered the most important position in the game. Supports are, as their name indicates, supportive. You won't see huge flashy plays from them, or high kill numbers. They may even have the most deaths on the team, as they may not have many options for surviving an enemy engagement. They are important because they can serve as the eyes for the team, and their players typically perform as the team's "Shotcaller", sometimes splitting this role with the Junglers. The Shotcaller will dictate the pace of play for the team, and call out strategic decisions. They are the strong, driving voice of the team, instead of having 5 people shouting over each other and mixing up targets.
Beyond their player's ability, the characters themselves are good at coordinating for their team. Supports typically place the most vision wards on the map for their team. These wards act like little watch towers, hidden from the opponent, and can reveal opponents passing through an area, or near an objective. If you look at the map above, you can see there's a lot of unknown territory between the three lanes. On the map, every character has something called vision. It's the radius around them that they can see in the open. You share vision with your team and the allied monsters on your side. So if everyone was in the middle, you could still see what your minions in the bottom lane were doing, and see if an enemy is attacking them. Wards let you place these little towers that can act like another point for your team to watch from. If you look at the river in the map, there are two big caverns. Powerful monsters will spawn in these areas so by putting a ward near the pits or in the pits, you can keep an eye on the monster and see when it's clear to make the attack yourself, or you can try to interrupt an opponent trying to take them for their benefits.
Besides managing a share of the team's vision, they can use their abilities to make the enemy easier to kill, by slowing them down, stunning them, or knocking them around, or by extending the life of their allies through healing, boosting stats, or shielding. Sometimes, taking down the support is key for turning a battle, because the team without a support can lose a lot of their Crowd Control, which refers to conditions inflicted by moves such as Stun, Slow, Root (trap in place), Knock up, knock back, or being pulled. Basically, by taking away a team's ability to control the battlefield, you can battle in more favorable conditions. Because they're so supportive, they may sacrifice themselves, figuratively and literally. They forgo the glamor of a high kill count to setup someone else. They may jump in front of some attacks to take the damage for the Carry or Midlaner. Support characters also need to make do with less, typically. Since they're not killing the minions in lane, instead opting to let the Carry get them, as they improve more with items, Supports tend to suffer through gold shortages from time to time. They can purchase items from the match shop to increase their passive gold gain to offset this, and earn some bonus gold from assists, but they are typically left behind in terms of money to buy items. This is why champions with strong effects on their abilities are important, rather than ones that get more bonuses from increased stats. There's just not enough gold in a single lane to support two carry types.
Jungler
League of Legends Role Type: Roamer, Assassin, Backup Tank
NBA Equivalent: Stretch 4, Multi-positional Defender i.e. Kevin Love, Draymond Green
NFL Equivalent: Big Play Quarterback, Free Safety. i.e Aaron Rodgers, Earl Thomas.
The jungler is responsible for all that territory between the lanes, including the monsters that inhabit those woods. Normally, the Jungler will stay in the jungle on their side of the map, which includes their base to the river, but will occasionally wander into the opponents jungle, to try to hinder them by killing their monsters for their own gold and experience. Junglers are also good for securing early game kills. Since they wander from area to area, it's easy for them to coordinate with any of the lanes to try to secure a 2-on-1 or 3-on-2 advantage. Winning these fights can set your team up for future success. It's like hitting a big 30 yard pass play on the first play of a drive. It helps set you up for future success and keeps the opponent on the back foot. Vision is important, so Junglers will also drop down wards. This allows their team to try to track the opposing Jungler, and if the other characters decide to move for an attack. It doesn't do much good if your 2-on-1 attack swings in the opponent's favor of a 3-on 2.
The jungles themselves are full of different types of wild monsters. They aren't allied with any team, so they can be killed by whoever. In each jungle, there are two stronger enemies that provide benefits to whoever kills them. These creatures provide what is called Red Buff and Blue Buff, named after the visual effect that surrounds the person who slayed them. The Red Buff makes your regular attacks slow enemies, deal additional damage, and regenerates your health faster. This is great for Junglers, as it can allow them to stay active for longer, meaning they don't have to return to base to heal, and it can help them slow down enemies trying to retreat from their sneak attack. The Blue Buff on the other hand, increases your Mana Regeneration, so you can use your spells more, and your Cooldown Reduction. Cooldown is the period between when you can use your skills again. So if a spell has a 4 second cooldown, you need to wait at least 4 seconds to use it again. Cooldown reduction typically comes in a percentage amount, so a 10% reduction would reduce the previous example by .4 seconds. Not a lot in the grand scheme of things, but big when things get frantic. It's kind of like the inverse of a shot clock or play clock. These bonuses have a set duration, and if you're killed by an enemy player, their character gets the buff for the remainder of it's duration, unless they are killed and pass it on.
Junglers fill a lot of roles, depending on their team composition. The role allows for a wide variety of play styles and character types to fit whatever your team needs. Having a player that is versatile in the types of characters they can play can really help during the picks and bans phase, and can help with a variety of team compositions.
The Rest of the Game
So we've covered the main players in the game, and how they can relate to other professional sports. I want to quickly touch on some terminology and concepts that will come up over the course of a game.
Picks and Bans - While your team of players is set going into each match, the characters they play is not set. First, teams will alternate banning 3 characters each. This allows teams to remove characters that are powerful on the current patch (The current game version the game is being played on. The game is updated on a frequent basis which can change the characters in minor or major ways), or characters that cause the team's normal strategies problems. They may also ban characters they know a specific player on the other team likes to play. After the 6 characters banned, the first team will draft their first champion. Then the other team gets two picks in a row, then the first team gets 2, then the second team makes their third pick. Then, the second round of bans occurs. The team that banned and picked second in the first round will now ban first. They ban one character, then the first team will ban 2. Then one more will be banned by team 2. Then, the final round of selections occurs to fill the remaining two spots. Here, Team 2 picks 1, Team 2 picks 2, then Team 2 picks the final pick.
THe purpose of this is that during the starting phase, Team 2 doesn't get the first pick, nor the first ban. This allows them to have the first pick of the remaining pool after the second ban phase, and the last pick, which can be used to counteract one of the opposing team's choices. To wrap it up, I tried to just put it in a line. B and a number shows which team is baning, and P shows which team is making a selection for a character to play.
B1 > B2 > B1 > B2 > B1 > B2 > P1 > P2 > P2 > P1 > P1 > P2 > B2 > B1 > B2 > B1 > P2 > P1 > P1 > P2
Champion Champ - This is generic name of the 134 characters in the game that the players can choose from. Each has different abilities, roles, and stats that affect their viability in the game.
Meta - The meta describes what tactics or characters are currently popular. For example, the meta in the NBA is space and pace with 3-and-D defenders. The meta in League of Legends evolves rapidly, as characters are changed from patch to patch. A character who wasn't ever played or banned may suddenly become banned in every game by a team because it becomes too powerful after a change. The inverse can also occur.
Objective - These typically refer to the Rift Herald, Baron or Dragon in the map. Those two pits along the river I mentioned house these powerful creatures. The one on the north side of the map will spawn the Rift Herald during the first 20 minutes of the match, and the Baron later. The southern pit will spawn different types of dragons. The dragons will give your team different permanent buffs, corresponding to the type of dragon slain. The Rift Herald, when slain, give syou an item that makes a temporary allied attacking creature, and the Baron give you a team wide boost that makes you teleport to base faster, deal more damage, damage enemy structures faster, and enhances your minion waes when you're near them, making them more threatening.
Base - The areas in the upper right and lower left corner of the map. The base is comprised of your Fountain and Shop area, where you can heal and buy items, your Nexus, which is your key objective to protect, 5 defensive turrets (2 at the nexus, 1 at the base of each lane) and your Inhibiters, which when destroyed, allow the enemies to periodically spawn powerful minions as long as that lane's Inhibiter is down. To win the game, you need to destroy the enemy's Nexus.
That's some basic information about how the game is played from a spectator's position. There are more details, but this should hopefully lay some groundwork for understanding the game as it's played. There is a lot of other information out there, but I wanted to make a basic Primer for understanding how the game works.
