League Of Legends : What it is, How it is Played, and Why You Should Bet on it

Understandably, there are a ton of people who are simply taking a break from betting. However, those people are missing out on a great opportunity to pick up a new hobby and make a killing in the process. There are 12 professional leagues around the world for League of Legends, and there is action almost year-round.

League of Legends is a fairly easy game to handicap from a betting perspective because you generally know what to expect from each team and player. There is a ton of strategy involved in this game (which I will touch on in a second), and most teams don't change their style of play very often from game to game.

What Is League Of Legends?

League of Legends is a PC game that is free to play and is a team-based game. Each team is composed of five members who each have a somewhat specific role (see below). Professional leagues will play either a single match, a three game set or a five-game set depending on how the league is set up and what point they are at in the season. The way to win the game in League of Legends is to destroy a structure in the middle of your opponent's base, otherwise known as the nexus.

The five players on each team will each control a different character (or champion) who all have different abilities. There are approximately 140 champions in the game so I won't get into each champion's specific abilities, but the pre-game draft and composing the correct lineup of five champions is key. Before the beginning of each game, teams have the option to ban five champions from play. Typically, you will see a team ban a known strength of their opponents. After the ban phase, the players will draft champions and then play will begin.

The Gameplay

Although in order to win the game you must destroy your opponent's nexus, there are many more "objectives" that dictate how the game will play out. There are computer-controlled "minions" which automatically push towards the enemy base, and teams use these for leverage and positioning on the map. Many times, you will see opponents killing minions while in close proximity to each other, but they won't engage in a fight.

Teams will battle throughout the match for drakes (dragons) that spawn periodically throughout the game on a timer in an area known as the Dragon Pit. There are four different types of drakes that will appear, and each of these provide a team with a different kind of boost. Across the map from the Dragon Pit is an area known as the Baron Pit. This will be home to a creature known as a Rift Herald early in the game which are extremely helpful in taking down enemy structures.

After 20 minutes of gameplay, a creature will appear in the Baron Pit known as Baron Nashor. Taking down this baron is another key part of victory in League of Legends. Killing the baron gives your team a boost from three and a half minutes in which champions are more powerful as well as the nearby minions. This "baron buff" would be the equivalent to a power play from an NHL game. Killing these creatures, as well as other, less-powerful creatures, help players become much stronger.

As the game progresses, each champion levels up and becomes stronger. This is done from gaining experience points from killing creatures and enemies as well as taking down the structures of your opponent. You gain gold for all kills, and you will see teams killing minions, or "farming", to increase their gold. This gold is then used to buy items which, in turn, provide the player's champion with a boost of some sorts.

The last key part to winning in League of Legends is controlling the vision on the map. Players can only see the immediate area around them until their team's vision has been improved. Champions have an item called a "warding trinket" in which they can place a limited number of around the map. These trinkets give vision of the area around it for a three minute period. This are perhaps the most crucial part of the strategic play in this game as a player can see where their opponent is and they are less susceptible to sneak attacks.

The Roles Of Players

As I mentioned earlier, each of the five players on a team have a role, although most of the fights come from team fights in which there is a five on five battle. The five positions in League of Legends are jungler, top laner, mid laner, bottom laner (otherwise known as ADC or attack damage carry) and support.

The jungler is an important part of a team although they aren't typically the most involved in terms of kills. A jungler, as the name would imply, is in charge of mainly controlling the jungle (areas outside of the main three lanes) on the map. You will see most junglers roaming around by themselves killing various creatures, and they are also used as a flanker to sneak onto an opponent and provide an momentary man-up advantage.

Top laners are usually the hardest champion to kill on a team, and for this reason, they typically roam by themselves towards the top lane of the map. This position is important in the sense that you want to have the lane control (the deeper push into opponent's territory) coming from all three lanes. In a team fight, the job of the top laner is to lock onto their opponent's strongest champion and aim to take them out.

The mid laner is one of the two most important roles on a League of Legends team. These champions are usually one of the strongest in terms of damage dealt. Their goals are to push the middle lane and to kill the opponent as quickly as possible. Due to their normal positioning in the middle of the map, mid laners will also rack up assists as they can respond to either side of the map with relative quickness.

The bottom laner, or ADC, is the second of the most important roles on a team. This position is typically another primary damage dealer who tends to stick towards the bottom lane of the map. Many players at the ADC position prefer to use a range attack based champion, this way they can deal out a ton of damage from a distance. This is the position that you will rarely see running alone on the map as teams try to protect their ADC.

The last but certainly not any less important position on a League of Legends team is the support role. Early in games, the support helps the ADC position in the bottom lane but most professional players in this role will move to supporting the whole team as the game progresses. Support champions don't normally dish out a ton of damage, but they have abilities that prove very useful in many sticky situations.

Why Should You Bet On League Of Legends?

One of the great aspects to betting League of Legends, aside from the simple fact of providing a sweat when there isn't any other sports going on, is that games are fairly easy to predict. Many books provide prop bets as to which team will take down the first drake or baron, as well as a spread (much like a run line in baseball) of one and a half. The juice on lines are very similar to other professional sports, and you don't have to know a ton about the game to figure out which teams and players are good.

DraftKings is offering nice daily contests with League of Legends, and there are several offshore books offering lines and props on matches as well. Once you understand the few basics of the game and watch a few matches, you will see just how exciting these games can be! ESPN was airing the playoffs to the LCS (North American League of Legends league) just the other day, and the eSports market is growing quickly. League of Legends runs almost year-round, and it provides a ton of opportunities to make money while enjoying watching a live, competitive professional event.