League Of Legends Season 8 has ended, and with it, a lot of our comrades have failed to get out of ELO Hell. Season 9 will start on January 23, 2019, and with it, you can re-start you climb to ELO Paradise! Read on to arm yourself with the latest updates that can help you prepare for the upcoming season.
What Is New?
RIOT GAMES product lead and designer Ed “SapMagic” Altorfer has posted a blog post about the changes they will roll out at the start of Season 9. They will overhaul The Rank system as we know it and update the experience for new players.
Ranked Seasoned Veterans
This is the biggest change yet, the next season we will have not just one or two or even three Ranks, but five! The system will now place the player according to their role. Say, you are Gold III and are auto-filled as a Jungler, instead of following the old system in which it will match you with players in the same ELO, you will find yourself against an easier opponent or people with lower MMR (Match Making Rating) than you. RIOT team said they made these changes so they could place players on their respective Tiers and Divisions.
Shorter Season, More Rewards
Unlike the previous year, in which the season would run for about 10-11 weeks, RIOT announced that they will divide Season 9 to three splits. According to the developers, they want to motivate the players and let them earn more rewards at the same time. Earning your Rank Border at the end of the season and that well-deserved Victorious Skin at the end of the year remains unchanged, but there are still awards waiting for anyone who performed well at the end of each split.
The Death of Bronze Memes
Since the dawn of time, League players have been using the BRONZE V memes as a direct reference for bad players, this will be no longer the case. RIOT announced that they will add a new Tier below Bronze, called IRON.
As stated by the developers, the differences between Diamond and Bronze players are too stellar and thus resulting in overpopulation between Tiers and Divisions. To solve this, they added two new Tiers and removed a Division, making it only four Divisions per Rank Tier. Players in higher ELO spectrum will now have more chances of moving up, as the developers have added the Rank Tier GRANDMASTER between MASTER and CHALLENGER.
No More Provisional Surprises
Everybody has gone through it, performing well on provisionals, and ending in Bronze. However, with the changes at hand, every game in your provisionals will give you feedback, thus earning you a provisional rank. With you knowing the lowest possible Rank placements, you will be able to plan for pushing your MMR higher.
For the New Recruits
No one likes tutorials at the beginning, but we can’t deny that knowing the ropes around a new game is essential to mastering it. League of Legends is a Multi-player Online Battle Arena or MOBA, the game is a fast-paced one, also very competitive that blends the speed and intensity of RTS with RPG elements. That is why it doesn’t hurt to try the tutorials first instead of diving right in. RIOT games have improved their tutorials, so new gamers can get an overall feel of the game without taking the fun factor away.
Auto Buy Feature for the Unsure
They gear this feature towards new players, and if you are a seasoned veteran, you do not need to worry about this – there is an option to turn it off. The auto buy feature will guide players into building optimal items until they are comfortable enough to build them on their own.
Looking Fine in Season Nine
This new updates will make the next Season even more fun to play. With new changes making its way veteran and newbies alike should know the updates for a more productive Season 9. RIOT has pointed out that they are bound to make more announcements in the upcoming days, so stay tuned and let us welcome the new Season with aspirations of leaving that dreaded ELO Hell.
