Coming straight out of Demacia is Garen.  We’ve had Pirates, Ninjas, more Ninjas and chubby boozehounds but it’s time for the Might of Demacia to take to the Fields of Justice and dole out a good old fashioned kicking.

Phreak over at Riot provided the following spotlight so you can get a better look at our latest Champion!  Satisfaction Garen-teed*!

Garen, The Might of Demacia
Garen is a physical, melee DPS champion who excels at dishing out punishment in spades. He brings a lot of fun mechanics to various fights: Silence, a damage-reducing shield, and an execute-style ability to help secure yourself some kills. The build used in this spotlight focuses on his area of effect spell, Judgment

Because Garen has no AP ratios, no mana, and a lot of bonus health regeneration as a passive, it’s easy to build Garen towards physical damage, critical strike, and armor penetration. Because of this I always try to rush towards the new item, Youmu’s Ghostblade before working towards Last Whisper and Infinity Edge. Additionally, he has really strong synergy with the other new item, Randuin’s Omen because he naturally gains a lot of armor and magic resist.

Garen’s playstyle is pretty forgiving. You can initiate first with Decisive Strike, Courage, and Judgment; follow up after a tank; or even enter a battle late to score a kill with Demacian Justice.

Ymir

*original “Garen-tee” spoken by Phreak, don’t blame me for such a shameless and wanton act of wordsmithery.

There exists an ancient order originating in the Ionian Isles dedicated to the preservation of balance. Order, chaos, light, darkness — all things must exist in perfect harmony for such is the way of the universe. This order is known as the Kinkou and it employs a triumvirate of shadow warriors to uphold its causes in the world. Kennen is one of these shadow warriors, entrusted with the sacred duty of Coursing the Sun – tirelessly conveying the justice of the Kinkou.

Kennen was born in Bandle  City and it is said that in his first living moments he bolted first from the womb and second from the midwife who delivered him. His parents had thought that he would outgrow his boundless energy, but as he matured, his energy found no limits and was matched only by his unnerving speed. Despite his astonishing gifts, he remained unnoticed (or at least uncaught, as he was quite the prankster) until, on a dare, he ran straight up the great outer wall of the Placidium. When word of this feat reached Kinkou ears, Kennen was quickly and quietly brought for an audience. He found that the role of the Heart of the Tempest suited him, frenetically delivering both the word and the punishments of the Kinkou across the realm. He now works with his fellows Akali and Shen to enforce the balance of Valoran. This hallowed pursuit has unsurprisingly led the triumvirate to the Fields of Justice.

The Heart of the Tempest beats eternal…and those beaten remember eternally.

Abilities:

*Similar to the champion Shen, Kennen uses an energy system, as opposed to mana or health, to cast abilities. This system caps the maximum amount of energy Kennen can have, and regenerates Kennen’s energy very rapidly.

Thundering Shuriken:
Kennen throws a lightning shuriken to a target location, dealing damage and adding a Mark of the Storm debuff to the first enemy it hits.

Electrical Surge:
Passive: Kennen’s weapon becomes charged every few attacks, dealing extra damage and adding a Mark of the Storm debuff on his next attack.
Active: Kennen deals damage and adds another Mark of the Storm to all nearby enemies who currently have a Mark of the Storm debuff on them.

Lightning Rush:
Kennen turns into a pulsating ball of lightning for several seconds, moving incredibly fast and gaining the ability to pass through units.  Any enemy unit he touches in this form is dealt damage and receives a Mark of the Storm.

Slicing Maelstrom (ultimate):
Kennen creates a storm of shurikens and lightning around himself, summoning down a powerful energy bolt to a nearby enemy champion every half of a second, dealing damage and adding a Mark of the Storm with each strike.

Mark of the Storm (passive):
Kennen’s abilities add a Mark of the Storm debuff to enemies.  Upon reaching 3 stacks of the Mark of the Storm debuff, the enemy is stunned and Kennen receives an energy boost.

Now, we’ve been releasing some pretty revolutionary champions lately with some pretty radical mechanics. If you thought that Ezreal, Mordekaiser, or Shen were edgy you’re in for a treat, because this next champion is borderline shocking. He really rocks the boat. Now, history teaches us that even the most peaceful and lethargic of creatures can be inspired to feats of great valor under the proper set of circumstances, and this courageous sea cow is just such a beast. Mightily armed with fish and spatula, Urf the Manatee stands ready to represent his fellow ocean borne herbivores in honorable combat on the Field of Justice.

A New Champion Approaches: Urf, the Manatee

Lore:

Despite the traditionally peaceful ways of his people, Urf the Manatee idolized the strength and prowess of champions in the League of Legends and strived to become one. Of all the League’s champions, there was none that Urf admired more than Jax the Armsmaster. Since the introduction of the arena, no man has forced the League of Legends to revise their regulations more often than Jax, and the self-proclaimed “Grandmaster at Arms” rattled off a streak of consecutive wins 152 long. In order to compensate for the extreme power of this champion, the League created special sanctions for Jax: He is only allowed to fight with weapons the League deems suitable. For now, that list includes a lamppost, a chicken’s foot, a spatula, and a fishing rod.

In his admiration and pursuit to become a weapons master like Jax, Urf has equipped himself with the two great symbols of his Manatee heritage as his weapons: a fish (to symbolize the bounty and providence of the sea) and spatula (to pay homage to his people’s age-long pursuit for culinary mastery). Urf now begins his aquatic journey as the League’s first Manatee champion, hoping one day he will have the opportunity to cross fish and spatula with chicken’s foot and lamppost.

Abilities:

Flippy Floppy: Urf switches weapons between fish and spatula to accommodate the needs of his team. Attacks with fish deal damage over time, while attacks with Spatula deal instant damage

Poseidon’s Gaze: Urf calls upon the powers of the Manatee god, Poseidon, to notify his allies of a position on the Fields of Justice. Poseidon’s Gaze does not remove Fog of War.

Flop Strike: Urf flops onto an enemy with massive destructive force. Urf must be directly next to an enemy to successfully execute this skill.

Omnisplash: Urf calls upon the elements to bring forth a destructive deluge of water. All nearby enemies take water damage and are briefly impaired in movement

Big Blue Watery Road (Passive): Urf is naturally faster and more agile in bodies of water.

We want pictures of the Twisted Treelines critter contingent, be it a wolf stalking the brush or Ebonmaw roaring from his lair! The more imaginative the better, the main rule is it must be a creature found on the Twisted Treeline and as always be work safe, we don’t want sexy dragons!

So grab your tablets, brushes, graphite or good old fashioned MS Paint and get scribbling for a chance to win one of these awesome prizes:

First Place:

• 25€ in Combat Points
• One champion of choice
• One Skin of choice (only normal skins)

Second Place:

• 10€ in Combat Points
• One Champion of choice

Third Place:

• One Champion of choice

The requirements:
• Submissions should be posted in this Thread.
• Submissions must be sent BEFORE April 6th 2010 12:00 noon. Original artwork only. Feel free to include a small signature!
• Up to 800 x 600 pixels, jpeg, gif, bmp. These are the only versions we’re going to accept!
• The creature depicted must be one of the Monsters found on Twisted Treeline.
• Feel free to use and modify in-game graphics and already released material, but keep in mind we’re ultimately looking for original artwork.
• Must be work safe and not contain Homophobic, Racist or Xenophobic content.
• No language-specific content, please.
• We don’t transfer prizes to other game versions.

Judging:

• The winners will be chosen by the LoL-Team
• Decision on the winner are based on: Overall quality, originality and artistic talent. All decisions are final.

Designed for quicker games 3vs3 games, Twisted Treeline has just two lanes, one straight and one curved. This creepy forest literally teems with dark and bloodthirsty monsters who want nothing better than to devour weak champions… or conversely give them nice runes when they die trying!

You can now earn experience and influence points by slaughtering your enemies in 3sv3, so sharpen your blades, revamp your tactics and get ready for some new action.

Enjoy,

The LoL Team!

How a Patch is Born.

A quick introduction: my name is Udyr and I’m an Associate Producer for League of Legends. My primary role is acting as the Release Manager for all of the patches that we release. You can catch me on the Release Notes threads, in the Server Status and Test Realm forums, and around General Discussion from time to time.

Given our breakneck cadence for releasing new patches, I wanted to explain how we decide what goes out in a given patch. Before I get into how everything comes together, here is a general breakdown of what a patch will contain:

Balance Changes: Bi-weekly changes to even out the power balance between Champions
League of Legends and PVP.net features: Anything new that you will experience on PVP.net or in the game

New content: New or remade Champions, Items, or Skins

Bug Fixes: Both from the forums and internally
Backend/development changes: Technology or configuration changes that go on behind the scenes

Now that we’ve established what a patch usually consists of, let’s get down to how everything comes together.

As soon as a new patch goes out, I begin forming the structure of the next patch. We have a ton of different teams working on a variety of different features, some of which that have been in development for weeks or even months. In order to know what we can push out in a patch, I need to know which features are finished being developed and are ready to be released. I talk to all of the producers and understand what is ready, so I can create a set of mock release notes that represents the patch.
Every day throughout the next two weeks, all of the producers and relevant contributors get together early in the morning to talk through all of the items that we want to push out in the next patch. It’s about 15 minutes each day to get status updates about the progress that the teams have been making, as well as to talking through any changes that don’t appear to be ready. Although new features and content have usually been in development for a while, new bugs can arise that prevent them from being released. QA also participates in this daily meeting to give updates about what features and content has been verified and any bug fixes that are important to track.

After the meeting, we move into our company playtest off the daily 9am build. Everyone in the company participates and plays the game, focusing on the new changes that we are pushing out in the patch. We’ll run several simultaneous games, and then break out into groups to gather feedback and bugs. After I have the compiled feedback, I’ll go though and figure out which bugs need to be fixed or need further investigation. Bugs in the code will go to an engineer like Lima Beans or hohums while a new Champion bug would get passed to Coronach, Brackhar, Ezreal, or whichever designer is making that particular Champion. In addition to making sure that all of the bugs have someone designated to work on them, I work with the various producers to make sure that their features and changes are on track. For example, I might work with RiotJeffJew (the Content producer) to understand the status of the new Champions and figure out when any missing sounds or icons will be ready, or I might talk to Volibar about what remaining bug fixes from the forums we will be able to get in.

After the patch has gone through the internal playtesting and fixing cycle for a week, we push it to the Test Realm to expose it to a group of external users for supplementary feedback and testing. The feedback and bugs from the Test Realm are then fed into the daily fixing cycle to continue to rapid iteration. We update the Test Realm a few more times with the newest builds to get as much outside exposure as possible before release.

The Friday night before we plan to push out a patch is considered the cutoff date for any last minute changes. We do this to make sure that QA can verify all of the content against the running list of changes that we have made and to prevent any bugs from getting injected at the last minute. At this point, most, if not all, of the bugs have been squashed, all the content and features are ready, and we’ve made all of the balance changes we were able to complete within the patch window.
Over the course of the 2 weeks leading up to the patch, release notes are written by each team to describe the different features we are pushing out. These release notes are all compiled by me and then passed to QA to verify that the notes match what is actually in the patch.

After the patch is ready, and the release notes have been compiled, we schedule an internal deployment meeting. This includes representatives from Operations, Production, Engineering, QA, and anyone else who has a role in deploying a patch. We discuss and plan the different pieces of the downtime, deployment, and testing. This allows us to make a time estimate based on the total amount of work we need to do, which then determines the maintenance window. Once we have an estimated downtime, we compare that to our concurrency history to determine the optimal time for downtime so that it affects the smallest number of users.

At this point, we are ready to publish the downtime, post the release notes, start the maintenance, and release the patch into the wild!

Good hunting!

-Udyr

Source

Branches bend and creak, cracking under the weight of warfare waged within the heart of the forest. Bark blackens in the wake of momentous magicks and quivers in the aftershock of energies malefic, even as the sounds of combat shake creatures from slumber in the dark.

Ancient to Valoran memory, one beast watches the battle unfold. Afflicted with terrible hunger for those who traverse his domain; Ebonmaw. Talons scratch upon the bone strewn ground, wings unfurl and fangs expose themselves within a monstrous mouth in preparation for the feast to come. He is the Treelines master, and woe to those who forget their place in his kingdom.

Beneath the teeth of beats foul and the thrust of spell and steel, they will stand resolute; unbroken by blows that would fell a mere mortal. They are legends, and legends are not known for their cowardice. The victors are not chosen by fate, the outcome is not carved in stone, skill, strength, cunning and companions of equal stature will win the day.

The time has come for the League to expand, for Champions to step from sunlit Summoners Rift and enter the shadowed canopy, the time has come for the Twisted Tournament!

Welcome to our 3rd tournament! It seems only fitting that it takes place on the fantastic 3v3 map Twisted Treeline. Close quaters combat and rewards await those willing to take up arms as part of a trio and bring down their foemen in epic combat.

We had an amazing response to our previous tournaments, with over a thousand players involved in the Clash of Legends 5v5. We’re expecting a lot of interest as you gather your companions and fight for the right to be crowned as the first winners of a 3v3 tournament! People will carpet your every step with rose petals, attractive folk will try to woo you and Hollywood will be calling through the night to take your life story.

Eventually you’ll grow fat and rich and be carried through the streets past people who have long forgotten your mighty deeds on the Fields of Justice, and as you weep into your silk hankerchief you’ll remember that you did it for fun.

But enough of the far future, what of the now?

• Name: Twisted Tournament
• Date: 17/03/2010 to 29/03/2010
• Summoner Level: All
• Number of Teams: 256 teams

All prizes are per person.

First Place:

• 100€ in Combat Points
• 2 Skin of Choice (normal skins – no special skins)
• 5 Runes of Choice

Second Place:

• 75€ in Combat Points
• 1 Champion of Choice
• 1 Skin of choice (normal Skins – no special skins)

Third Place:

• 50€ in Combat Points
• 1 Champion of choice

• Registrations will open Friday March 12th at 18:00 UK Time (7pm Continental European Time)
• Emails received before this time will be discarded, please take time to prepare and arrange your team. Do not apply before Friday 6pm GMT.
• Registrations will close as soon as all spots are taken, or failing that, on Tuesday March 16th at 9AM UK Time (10AM Continental European Time)
• To register your team, please send a complete list to lolcontests@goa.com.Your Team Tag cannot be longer than 5 characters. For example if your team is called Hack’n'Slash:
  HNS12 = OK
  HNS 123 = NOT OK

  Please provide two Team Tags for us to use in your application in case there is another team using the same tag.

Registrations:

Only teams with at least 3 members can subscribe for this tournament. Up to two optional reserve players are authorized. You may subscribe your team via Email for the tournament.
As you can see your team must consist of 1 Team Captain and 2 regular players and up to 2 optional reserve players. A total of 256 teams will be permitted to enter this event and they will be chosen on a first come, first served basis.

• Name of the Teams:
• Team Tag 1:
• Team Tag 2:
• spoken Language:
• Team-Captain:
• Player 1:
• Player 2:
• Reserve-Player 1(Optional):
• Reserve-Player 2(Optional):

Important: The team captain must have at least a basic grasp of English to facilitate communication between all teams. The CM Team will of course remain available for localized support, but the number of teams involved means that some direct communication between teams will be necessary.

You must get in contact with the opposing teams captain prior to the battle in order to agree upon a time. By applying, you give us the right to pass your email over to your opponent in order to facilitate this.

Result Reporting & Round Organisation:

After every match both teams must post a screenshot of the Game-Result Table in the Forum. The post must include the Name of both teams and the Date/Time when the game happened.
If a team fails to post their results by the end of the respective phase, they will be automatically disqualified even if they were the winning team!

During the first phases of the event a single game will determine the winner but in the Semi-Final you need to win 2 out of 3 games!

After the Semi-Final all four remaining teams will meet again. The two best teams will fight to determine who is crowned the winner and who is to take second place. Likewise the other two teams will fight for 3rd and 4th place. As in the Semi-Final the winning team needs to win 2 out of 3 games to claim victory!

To provide the community with replays and to make sure you can prove any kind of problem during match we suggest the use of Justin.TV (http://www.justin.tv/).
You have to create an account on their page and choose a broadcast account if you want to stream a game. Download the Justin.TV Software and then install the client. You have to change the choose game as stream source to avoid problems. To modify the preset setting click on Preferences if you want to.

If you use Justin.TV to make a match replay please provide us with the link to the replay.

Rules Summary:

1. If a Team doesn’t show up at the appointed time (+15 minutes) the other team will be declared the winner.
2. Every team must post the Result of each match they have participated in (a screenshot of the End-Result-Table). If a team fails to publish the results the other team will automatically be declared winner of the match.
3. The new matches for each round will be posted in the forum by us.
4. Each player/team can sign up only once.
5. All Champions are considered as valid for the tournament, as are builds, specs,Summoner levels, items and runes.
6. Any player/team who tries to cheat during an Event will be disqualified and banned.
7. The decisions of the CM in charge are final. Any discussion about CM decisions during the Event is not permitted. If a player wishes to contest a decision made by the CM, they should send the CM a PM when the Event is over.
8. If any player/team is unable to participate, they must get in touch with the CM in charge before the Event begins. Failure to do so will lead to disqualification
9. Backdooring and Creepskipping are considered viable tactics and not an exploit.
10. The same champion(s) can be picked by both teams.
11. Should the rules be changed during the tournament any alterations will be posted in the forum.

This is the first battle this year against the Adjudicators and more are sure to come as time rolls by!  Watch the video and see if you can work out who came out on top before the end of the fight!

Cheers,

The LoL team

Available now until the end of the Winter Games Celebration (March 2), you can clash on the snowy Fields of Justice amidst many Winter Games inspired map changes. There’s winter sports gear and country flags galore, with a bit of extra love for Winter Games host country Canada : ).

Also don’t forget that Double IP Weekend starts today. From Friday until Sunday, all League of Legends players will earn double IP. To get the most out of your boost, you can visit the Store to buy an additional boost, available for 20% off this weekend. This will stack with your free boost and quadruple (!!!!) your IP gain.

Enjoy!

The LoL team

This weekend you’re all winners as we’re going to give everyone Double IP by way of thanks for propelling us to the top of MMOSite’s Best MMORTS and Best New MMO Poll! From the 19th through to the 21st you’ll be getting double IP on every game played, have no fear if you have an active IP Boost or plan to pick one up as you’ll still earn Bonus IP from both.

We’re expecting much ownage this weekend so get ready to rock the Field of Justice for double the reward! Between melting face and toppling towers be sure to take a moment to make sure we come out on top of the Poll by casting your vote! Click on any of the links below to cast your vote in person at MMOSite!

Best MMORTS

Best New MMO

Best Gameplay

Enjoy!

The LoL team