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Team Builder roles

Examples of champions and their assigned classes.

Every champion in League of Legends has an assigned class, with a limited number also being considered in a secondary class. Classes and their interactions with one another influence gameplay pacing and decisions.

The available classes are as follows:

Definitions[]

Four distinct terms may be applied to champions when referring to playstyle:

  • Class: A predefined set of patterns and capabilities that inherently stems from a champion's statistics' and spells' numbers (range, damage, duration, etc.)
  • Attribute: A capability that a champion may have when compared to other characters in the game, which usually stems from their Class. For example:
    • Being able to unleash devastating spells in a very short time frame defines "burst", whereas performing multiple rounds of damage defines "dps" (from "damage per second"); etc.
    • Higher durability defines "tankiness", whereas lower durability defines "squishiness"
    • Unusually long-range spells define "poke combat", whereas unusually low-range spells define "close combat"
    • The presence of movement spells defines "mobility", their absence defines "immobility"
    • and others.
  • Role: The practical embodiment of a champion's attributes in a game at a given time. For example:
    • Caitlyn Caitlyn can perform a lot of poking during the earlier stages of the game in the laning phase, but can later upgrade to a nuker, due to Headshot's Headshot's and Ace in the Hole's Ace in the Hole's multipliers.
    • Kai'Sa Kai'Sa is a sustained damage carry when she buys Marksman icon Marksman items, but can transform into a flanker by utilizing Killer Instinct Killer Instinct aggressively to pick off important enemies.
    • Malphite Malphite can assume the role of a frontliner, a champion that soaks up a lot of damage and disruption from the enemy team, or a team-wide burst champion, depending on his itemization.
    • Yasuo Yasuo can be a powerful duelist due to his mobility and spell combos, but he may also dive into teamfights with his Last Breath Last Breath.
    • etc.
  • Position: The usual or default location that a champion may start the game in, determined by the metagame rules and agreements at the time. Most commonly in Summoner's Rift icon Summoner's Rift, there are currently 5 selectable positions within a drafted team: Top icon Top, Jungle icon Jungle, Middle icon Mid, Bottom icon Bottom Carry, Support icon Bottom Support, along with a 6th archaic Roamer icon Roaming "position". Due to each position hosting a subset of all champions that have certain attributes, positions usually inherit certain roles that champions may sustainably have. Common combinations of positions and classes include: support enchanter or controller; botlane carry marksman or sustained-damage mage; midlane burst mage or slayer; Toplane tank or fighter; Jungler fighter or slayer.

Interaction[]

Counters

Class diagram shows their typical properties, counterclasses, strengths and weaknesses

The classes' attributes and counter-play correlations can be summarized in a weighted graph:

  • Arrows are labelled with a key attribute.
  • A class' attributes are described by its adjacent edges (the single preceding and the single succeeding arrow).
  • A class' role counters are generally described by the two preceding classes.
  • Controllers have a special position in the middle, because they are typically not designed to fight 1-on-1; however they are placed closest to tanks because tanks usually also present high controlling capabilities.
Example: A Tank's characteristic properties are toughness (tankiness), control, and some sort of typically high-downtime mobility or gap closer. Tanks can easily deal with the burst from slayers and mages, but struggle against the sustained damage of fighters and marksmen.

The mutual counterability of all classes naturally leads to class diversity in gameplay, as balance dictates that a superclass cannot exist that dominates all others. Every competitive team, especially in higher-level of play, is thus incentivized to build up and distribute its team composition with these classes in mind.

If this is not the case, as it often happens in non-competitive or recreational games (for example a team chooses to set up a heavy assassin composition), the game result can be determined by an enemy adapting and deploying the dominant class' natural weakness by picking them as a response during drafting and/or by choosing proper items and summoner spells to do so. Hence, understanding and adapting to these inter-class relations is an advantageous skill to have as a player.

Other Attributes[]

While unofficial, the following attributes are often still used to describe and classify champions, even by members of Riot Games:

  • Bully: A champion that has either exceptional range or exceptional strength during laning that they can utilize to seriously threaten, or bully, their opponents and force them to play defensively. Typically, this term describes champions who can harass or engage on their opponents during the early stages of the game with relatively little fear of retribution. Hallmarks of bully champions include ones that are given very high base statistics, especially health and attack damage; cheap, long-ranged damaging spells; and mobility that increases with nearby units. Most bullies tend to be fighters, who often present several or even all of these features, but members of other classes may also qualify as bullies.
  • Carry: A champion who becomes powerful enough in damage as a match progresses so as to be able to seemingly win games single-handedly, thereby "carrying" the rest of the team on their back.
    • Hypercarry: A more extreme version of a carry, a hypercarry is a champion whose late-game strength is assumed to be so powerful that they eventually eclipse any other non-hypercarry in power.
  • Damage-dealer: A champion who has the means to deal a larger share of the team's damage to enemy champions in a shorter amount of time during fights, in a vacuum. This definition excludes Tank- and Controller-Class champions, since due to their innate attributes they require significantly more time to deal the same amount of damage that damage dealers can ideally put out.
    • Primary damage-type dealer: A champion specialization based on which damage type—physical or magic—they deal most, sometimes exclusively one or the other. This is relevant for team composition, as a team that skews toward either type of damage dealt on their carries can be more effectively countered by armor or magic resistance, respectively. The terms "Attack Damage Carry" and "Ability Power Carry" derive from this definition, as traditionally attack damage scales physical damage and ability power scales magic damage, although in modern usage the terms are synonymous with certain classes.
  • Jungler: A champion who can successfully thrive on the jungle's resources. While more of a position, the jungler attribute is dependent on certain champion characteristics, such as innate durability, sustained early damage, self-healing, mobility, burst, crowd control. Not all of these traits are required, but all successful junglers possess several of them.
  • Pusher: A champion who is effective in both waveclearing and taking down Turret icon turrets, thereby "pushing" their lane towards enemy structures and enabling their destruction. Pushers typically have area of effect damage, rapid attacks or abilities that are also able to target turrets, and occasionally, pets.
  • Recommended: A champion who is exceptionally easy to learn, and thereby recommended for newer players. Recommended champions are also exceptionally cheap to purchase, each costing 1350 BE 1350 or less.[1][2] Each free weekly champion rotation usually includes at least 1 recommended champion.

Development[]

As of V3.10, a champion's primary and secondary tags are now listed separately in the client's champion overviews. However, the in-client Summoner Profile and champion select only feature filters by primary attribute. The official champion list will use both primary and secondary indiscriminately when filtering by attribute.

On April 14th, 2016, Riot announced the intent to rework Champion Classes[3]. The full list of champions was released on June 1st, 2016.[4] At this time, a small number of champions are unclassified.

Most notably, the changes include:

  • The renaming of Assassins into Slayers, and Supports into Controllers.
  • Adding subclasses to all classes but Marksmen.
  • Substantially fewer champions that have a secondary class.

On May 24th, 2017, Riot followed up with a final draft of the intended changes.[5] At this point, the League of Legends Wiki updated to using this new class structure.

Changes include:

  • Disruptor subclass of Controller removed.
  • Catcher subclass added to Controller, with a substantial rearranging of "support" champions.
  • Unclassified was formally recognized as a class, conjecturally referred to on the Wiki as Specialist. This class absorbed many of the former Disruptors.

While not yet active within the client or on the website, Riot employees and shoutcasters now actively use the new class system.

After nearly 4 years without any formal implementation of the new class system by Riot, in January 2021 the League of Legends Wiki reinstated the legacy class system alongside the revised one. This is so that the information provided on the wiki matches the information that most players have access to.

See More[]

Trivia[]

  • Four champions currently contain a Class within their title: The Undead Juggernaut The Undead Juggernaut, The Crystal Vanguard The Crystal Vanguard, The Rogue Assassin The Rogue Assassin and The Chain Warden The Chain Warden. The only champion correctly named as their implied class is Akali.
  • The given Class only represents the role that a champion was explicitly designed to fulfil, and their recommended items will be geared toward fulfilling the role. However, players are free to explore whatever variation they desire—such as Mage icon Artillery Kog'Maw Kog'Maw.
  • Before the classes and subclasses restructuring, there were very few champions with just a single class and most of those were either mages or marksmen. As of December 28th, 2023, only 15 champions feature an official secondary class. Notably, Rakan Rakan was the first "support" champion released with Controller icon Controller as their only class, whereas before him, all other champions typically assigned to the "support" role had a secondary class.
  • Jayce Jayce and Varus Varus are the only physical-damage champions to have ever been classified as Mage icon Mages. During the development of the class rework, Gangplank Gangplank was briefly classified as a Mage icon Burst (mage).
  • Prior to the class rework:
    • Nidalee Nidalee was once classified as an assassin and controller.
    • Kayle Kayle was once classified as a fighter and controller.
    • Urgot Urgot was once classified as a marksman and tank.
    • Ashe Ashe was once classified as a marksman and controller.

References[]

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