Road to Pre-Season: Practice Tool in the Works

Riot has announced pre-season is set to also include a brand new PRACTICE TOOL where players can train in an environment where they can set infinite gold, reset cooldowns, and more!
Continue reading for more information!

Table of Contents

• Road to Pre-Season: Practice Tool in the Works
• Discussion
• [Comment Section]

Road to Pre-Season: Practice Tool in the Works

From the original announcement Road to Pre-Season: Practice Tool in the Works by Riot Aeon and L4T3NCY:

"Wait, what? 

A year ago, we shot ourselves in the foot with our first attempt at Riot Pls, where we talked about the things we were and weren’t working on. Back then we said that a practice tool—an environment where you could train solo, without restraints—wasn’t something we wanted to do. You disagreed, and we heard you. 

Six months ago, we walked back on our decision to nix a practice tool, but also realized we needed to make more progress on the client update before we could invest in developing new features. So, we said we’d give an update when we began tangible, focused work. 

Here’s an update. 

A tool to master and improve your skills. 

If you haven’t noticed yet, Season 2017 is about us getting good at delivering on long-awaited promises so you have the right tools to step up your game. Work’s just now kicking off on a practice tool, but we’re ready to talk broad notes. 

Our initial approach with a practice tool is going to be low-scope, simple, and straightforward—close to a punching bag and weights for practicing execution. We are doing our best to make this tool inclusive to people at every level. Everyone from Bronze to Challenger should see value in a single-player training mode to practice mechanics and map movement, but we’re currently not looking to develop a multiplayer training tool for organized team drills or pro-play specifically. Once we get the first version out, we’ll pay close attention to see if we missed anything in terms of how to become better by yourself. 

With our vision for League to be a global sport that lasts for generations, we want you to be able to train more efficiently without having to wait 5 minutes at a time to practice a core skill. Practice tool is League’s version of sparring with a punching bag: the extra training you can do with a mechanically unfamiliar champion so you can enter the Rift with more confidence. 

Here are some of the things Practice Tool will let you do:

• Infinite Gold
• Reset your Cooldowns
• Lock your level
• Freeze minion spawns

We’re still figuring out the full list of features, but future additions will be similarly focused on helping you practice more effectively by yourself and polish your mechanical abilities. Prototype work on practice tool has just begun, but stay tuned for updates as we keep working throughout pre-season!"

Discussion

[Will update post with additional comments and red posts!]

When asked about running different "training programs" in a feature like this, L4T3NCY commented the current focus is jungle practice, item builds, last hitting, etc:

"Quote:

-Training "Programs" : Similar to the tutorial that you play in the very beginning when you make your account, will there be specific training programs for teaching specific things I.E. Creeping? 

-Multiplayer Practice Games : I know, you emphasized "by yourself" a couple different times. However I do hope you will expand this to include multiple people, sometime after your release. Even now when I use custom games to practice, it's me and my bud in there together

Training programs like you describe do sound pretty cool, although they'd be further down the list for us compared to "Let's get the basic tool functionality working first." Similar with the Multiplayer, our main focus right now is individual player's champ mechanics (EG: jungle practice, item builds, last hitting, etc). 

Remember this tool is not set in stone once it releases either. For example, if Practice Tool was around during Season 6, we already would've had to add support for the new Dragons. We'll be listening to feedback from you guys and plan to iterate (EG: 'Plants' are now a thing), but I'd rather have something cool in your guys' hands sooner than hold off releasing it for ages because we're trying to do too much for initial launch."

L4T3NCY  continued:

"Hopefully! Our goal is to make something that everyone can find some value in using. It shouldn't be just for players trying to go from Diamond to Master on Lee Sin insec plays, we want Bronze players to maybe make it into Silver too after practicing how that Rumble ulti works (I can never get it right... -_-)."

When asked if you'll be able to reset your cooldowns, L4T3NCY explained:

"Quote:

Infinite wards would be nice too. Currently as a support main using customs to learn the more specialized warding strats, I get 6 attempts to find a setup and then have to go back to base for more wards.

You'll be able to reset your cooldowns, so this should work with the trinkets (I think). We might be able to raise the ward cap, but would still need some sort of limit (else filling the map with wards would wreck your PC). :P"
As for being able to reset jungle camps to try clears and routes,  L4T3NCY commented:

"Quote:

Being able to respawn camps on top of this would also be helpful. Junglers, like me, who like to try out different things and see how they can get out of the jungle more quickly or healthier without having to exit game several times would be so incredibly helpful.

This one is planned. I agree, being able to respawn the camps on command would be super helpful for Jungle practice."

When asked if they plan to be able to switch runes or masteries while in the practice mode,
L4T3NCY noted:

"Quote:

Make us able to switch masteries and runes from within the practice tool!!!

Hmm that one could be tricky, but def worth calling out. We have a long list of functionality to bake into the tool, and we'll just need to start at the top. The goal is for it to be a living tool though, so there's room to iterate in the future."