Summoner’s Rift. The name is almost synonymous with League of Legends. It is the most famous battle arena of any MOBA ever. It’s a map that players have called home for the past 10 years, but with such a prominent map, is there even room for other maps in League of Legends?
We take a look at League of Legends gameplay to further understand the complexity of League of Legends maps. As shocked as you may be right now, yes, there are other maps in League of Legends.
What maps exist in League of Legends?
Currently, there are two playable maps in League of Legends. The most popular one is Summoner’s Rift, where players compete against each other and destroy each other’s Nexus. The other permanently available map is Howling Abyss.
Summoner’s Rift
The Lanes of the Summoner’s Rift
The Summoner’s Rift, the main map of League of Legends, has three lanes – the Top, Mid and Bot lanes. On these lanes, champions begin to gain experience points, which help them level up. These lanes also each have inner and outer towers that keep friendly champions safe from enemies.
Each team has a base where towers and the nexus are located. Small Minions spawn at the Nexus during the game and make their way to the Lanes. You have to kill these minions to get gold and experience points. This is especially important in the early game, when you don’t have a high level yet.
Each lane is like its own position – there are clear differences between Top Lane, Mid Lane and Bot Lane Champions. In Bot Lane usually two champions play together – ADC and Support, while on Top and Mid Lane duels are 1 vs 1.
In League of Legends, you and your team’s sole objective is to kill every opponent and destroy the enemy Nexus.
The Jungle of the Summoner’s Rift
Between the lanes lies the Jungle. There is a top and bottom half of the Jungle, which refers to the Top and Bot Lane. The Red Side Jungle is mirrored on the Blue Side – this refers to the side where you and your team start. The ‘Red Side’ has the nexus in the upper right corner, while the ‘Blue Side’ has the nexus in the lower left.
There is also a river running through the middle of the map, which bisects the map. In the upper half of the river lives the strongest neutral monster – Baron Nashor. The Baron spawns after 20 minutes and the team that kills him gets a temporary buff.
There are also other neutral monsters in the Summoner’s Rift that buff you. It’s the Jungler’s job to clear the Jungle and farm gold and XP before getting to the lanes to gank – that is, help kill an enemy on the lane.
Killing monsters like the Blue or Red Buff rewards the Jungler – or any other champion – with a buff that makes you a little stronger for a period of time. There are so many other little monsters that the Jungler can kill before he gets to the lane.
Some of the strongest and most useful buffs in League of Legends you get from the dragons. At this point, there are four different elemental dragons – also called Drakes – in League of Legends. In – Season 12, Riot will bring two more new dragons to the Rift.
What is the Elemental Rift?
In 2019, just before – Season 10, Riot Games introduced the Elemental Rift, which refers to LoL’s changing landscape depending on which Elemental Dragon spawns. To explain dan simply, we first need to look at the four current dragons as well as the two new ones from – Season 12:
- Infernal Drake
- Cloud Drake
- Ocean Drake
- Mountain Drake
- Hextech Drake
- Chemtech Drake
Each dragon killed gives the team a buff that lasts the rest of the game. The first three dragons that spawn on the LoL map are random. Each dragon after that is the same as the third.
Let’s look at an example. The first dragon is the Cloud Dragon and the second is the Mountain Dragon. Neither of them will spawn a second time. The third dragon in our example is the Infernal Dragon – meaning that every dragon after that will be the Infernal Drake.
How long does this go on? Until a team has killed four Drakes. After a team has done that, the Elder Dragon appears. This dragon – similar to Baron – gives the team a short-term buff that expires after a few minutes.
The Dragon, spawned third, will also have an effect on the map by changing the terrain. These effects currently exist:
| Dragon | Dragon Buff | Dragon Soul | Elemental Rift |
| Cloud Dragon | Grants 10 / 20 / 30 / 40 percent Ultimate Cooldown Reduction, ignoring the CDR limit. | Grants 10% bonus Movement Speed, increased to 50% bonus MS for six seconds after casting an Ultimate. | Cloud Rift creates whirlwinds in the Jungle and Dragon Pit that grant 20% Movement Speed. |
| Infernal Dragon | Grants 4 / 8 / 12 / 16 percent AD and AP. | Creates an explosion around the target when a champ does Damage via Ability or Auto Attack. It deals 80 + 22.5% bonus AD and 13.5% AP and adds 2.75% bonus Health. | Infernal Rift opens the map around the Dragon Pit and Jungle Camps by burning terrain and bushes. |
| Ocean Dragon | Restores 2.5 / 5 / 7.5 / 10 percent of missing health every 5 seconds. | Heals by 160 when a champion deals damage to enemies, restores 80 mana, 36% bonus AD, 22.5 percent AP and 9% bonus Health. | Ocean Rift grows bushes in the Jungle and Dragon Pit. New Honeyfruit plants, as well as Puddles that can be used by Waterwalkers, are also created. |
| Mountain Dragon | Grants 6 / 12 / 18 / 24 percent Armor and Magic Resistance. | Grants a Shield for 200 plus 18% bonus AD, 13% AP, 13% bonus Health. | Mountain Rift creates additional walls around the Jungle and Dragon Pit. |
| Hextech Dragon | Grants Attack Speed and Ability Haste (additional 5 Ability Haste and 5% Attack Speed per stack) | When a team gets the Hextech Dragon Soul, it gains a unique ability: Chain Lightning Slow on Basic Attacks and Abilities with a moderate cooldown | As the terrain changes for the Hextech Dragon, pairs of Hextech Gates appear on the map, allowing champions to travel quickly from one location to another. The Hextech gates activate after a short channeling time (which can be interrupted by stuns and damage) and quickly transport players to the corresponding second Hextech gate on the map. |
| Chemtech Dragon | Grants bonus damage against enemies with more current life (up to 5% increased damage per stack) | When a team obtains the Chemtech Dragon Soul, they receive a buff that grants them a brief second life after they die | When the terrain changes for the Chemtech Dragon, smog zones appear in four locations in the jungle. Champions within these smog zones are cloaked. The cloaked enemies are not revealed by normal eyes, but are revealed by control eyes, seer flowers, and other things that make invisible units visible. |
What is the Fog of War in Summoner’s Rift?
Fog of War refers to the darkness on the map. The Jungle of Summoner’s Rift is dark and players only have a certain range of vision in it. Of course, you can get around this darkness by buying Wards and placing them on the map.
Wards provide visibility where before there was only darkness. It’s important to know this if you’re afraid of ganks and always want to keep an eye on the enemy jungler or mid laner. They might be roaming your lane.
Why is Map Awareness so important?
Placing wards and having good jungle awareness is fundamental in League of Legends. Pro players often claim that constantly watching the mini-map significantly increases their own skill level, helping players read situations better and know when to get in or out of a fight.
You accomplish this by placing Wards in the Jungle and at the entrance of Lanes. This way you escape ganks, stay alive and can keep killing minions. You can gain experience points and level up longer, making you more effective in the Late Game when you want to destroy the enemy Nexus.
The Howling Abyss
The second map in League of Legends is Howling Abyss. The fights here take place on a single lane and the map is specifically used by the ARAM game mode. In an ARAM, each player is randomly assigned a champion – eliminating the need for selection.
In this game mode, players also cannot return to base to shop or heal. Only when they are dead can they buy items. However, there are small healing pods available on the side if a player is low on life.
The Howling Abyss is located in Freljord, according to League of Legends lore. There was also once a small Easter Egg in ARAM, whereby players could listen to a one-minute monologue from Lissandra. Unfortunately, Riot has removed this Easter Egg from the Abyss.
Nexus lightning
Then there’s also the Nexus Blitz map, which is used for the Nexus Blitz mode of the same name. For the first time, this game mode was added in 2018. In 2020, it was brought back and the map was revamped with new visuals.
Nexus Blitz is really fun and a match usually only lasts about 20 minutes. In those 20 minutes, players have to destroy the enemy Nexus while completing specific tasks. These are different in each game, so Nexus Blitz is not a repetitive game mode.
However, the map and game mode are not permanently available and are only included in the League client for a short time.
Why doesn’t League of Legends have more maps?
League of Legends used to have more maps than just these two. One of the most famous maps that used to exist in League of Legends was Twisted Treeline. It was also the only other game mode that had its own ranked ladder.
What made Twisted Treeline so unique? The map was designed for 3 vs. 3 matches. There was also only one top and bot lane with a jungle in the middle. Just unique and still competitive.
Another map that was part of the League of Legends client is the Crystal Scar map, which was used for Dominion mode. From 2011 to 2016, this map was included in the game. With this map, there was another environment for players to practice their champions in real conditions and learn how to defend a base.
Why was Twisted Treeline removed?
Although Twisted Treeline was quite popular and had a loyal fanbase, Riot decided to remove the game mode in 2019. It was, until then, a legitimate way for players to earn End-of– Season Rewards and move up in rank. However, for Riot, the mode was not popular enough to keep it alive longer.
In addition, Riot explained that the game mode spawned too many bot accounts. This bot problem was another reason why the map was removed from the game and players have only been able to play two maps and modes since then.
Why was Dominion removed?
Can anyone still remember this mode?Dominion mode was removed by Riot Games back in 2016. This map was introduced in the infancy of League of Legends, when the identity of League was not yet clearly defined. Originally, the developers thought that new players could use Dominion to get a first feel for the mechanics of League of Legends.
In 2016, they eventually decided that the mode would be retired and used more as a short term mode similar to Nexus Blitz, URF, and Summoner Spellbook. For this reason, Crystal Scar has been disabled in the client.
Will Riot Games add new maps?
It is very unlikely that Riot Games will introduce new maps to League of Legends in the near future. In the past few years, they have often taken unique game modes and maps and used them again and again in different patches. So players will only be exposed to the maps for a short period of time at a time.
Other quite popular maps, such as Twisted Treeline, have been removed completely. It was said that they would be brought back into the cycle as normal game modes, but that hasn’t happened yet either. We’re still waiting for it, Riot!
Will Riot introduce unique LoL maps like Desert and Battlefield?
In past years, Riot already had different map skins. However, since the gameplay change with Elemental Rift, they have failed to create unique map skins like the Snowdown Showdown map. Riot justified the lack of map skins with the map change and the effect of the Elemental Rift. Therefore, it is quite unlikely that maps like Desert or Battlefield will be around again.
Maps in other MOBA games
The map in Wild Rift
The Wild Rift map is almost identical to Summoner’s Rift. For mobile, Riot has redesigned the map almost 1-to-1. The biggest difference is that when players play the game as ‘Red Side’, they are on an inverted map.
Accordingly, the terms ‘Top Lane’ and ‘Bot Lane’ do not exist in Wild Rift. Instead, these lanes are called ‘Dragon Lane’ and ‘Baron Lane’. Otherwise, there are no real differences in Wild Rift.
The Map in Dota 2
The map in Dota 2 is also very similar to Summoner’s Rift. Much of Summoner’s Rift is the same as the original Dota map, since the original creators of League of Legends started playing Dota. For this reason, there are some similarities between the maps.
In Dota, there are also towers that protect from enemy champs and a river that goes through the map, dividing it into a Red and Blue Side – However, in Dota, the Blue Side refers to ‘Radiant’ while the Red Side would be ‘Dire’.
Dota also has an epic Jungle Monster. It resembles Baron Nashor in League of Legends and is called Roshan – who sees the anagram? The monster drops the Aegis – which is also the Cup that Tl winners take home – which buff the team.
Looking at the map design, there are a lot of similarities between Dota and League of Legends. Could be due to the close connection of the two Battle Arenas, of course.
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