So here's the continuation, I guess.
In League of Legends, the map is perfectly symmetrical aside from the fact that Baron Nashor is always in the top river, and the dragon is always in the bottom river. I believe this is why teams always go to the same lanes with the same types of champions every time. Well, at least what started it. Nowadays I believe most people aren't even aware this is how it started (at least I think this is how it started!), and just do it because "it's the meta", without any consideration as to why they're doing it aside from the fact that it's how you're supposed to do it.
So I've considered a few different options that might force players to mix it up, hopefully eventually making ADC and support at the bottom lane less mandatory.
Keep in mind these are just my speculations and anything before they'd have to be done would have to be tested thoroughly before even considering actually using them in a real game. Sadly, I can't really test these things seeing as... I don't work for Riot.
Removing Baron Nashor and Dragon entirely.
Yeah, no. It's an option. Sure, it is... but both of them is an important part of the game in 5 vs 5 matches, and simply removing them would be more damaging than helpful. I have other ideas, other better ideas, but I just needed to say this for sake of saying it. But no. This isn't something that should be done.
Turning them into a summoned monster in the middle of the map.
This idea... is a bit more complicated, and by nature it'd be much more difficult to discuss the balance around it, but the gist of it is that they're removed from their current locations from the map (which might be replaced with new neutral monsters or something, I dunno). And at every 10-15 mark or so, an item is stocked up in the store (one for each team), that can be purchased to grant the ability to summon one of these beasts at the very center of the map. In the middle of the... middle lane.
This would encourage better map control around the middle of the map, and depending on how much this mystical summoning item would cost, it would mean one team having to spend a significant sum they gained from getting in lead to kill the dragon/Baron Nashor, but since the kill of it isn't guaranteed, it's a gamble. Spend some of your gold to potentially make your team stronger... or have it backfire and you lost the gold and the enemies get stronger instead.
There would have to be a lot of discussion as to how this would actually work, but this is the basic idea for it. I don't know if it could work. Maybe? Maybe not? I'm going to lean towards 'It's a possible change that could be done, but it's too big of a change for the game to implement.' or something like that.
Here's my favorite idea, though.
50/50 chance of Baron Nashor and the Dragon swapping places.
As I said, the only static difference between the perfectly symmetrical map are the two giant beasts who each spawn at a specific location. This wouldn't matter if they were equal in strength, but they aren't, so it is a problem.
I suppose this is the easiest change to implement, and I'm more hopeful for it than the other ones (which to be honest, I was just building up to this idea).
I believe the Dragon spawns at the 2:30 minute mark, and has a 6 minute respawn time, and Baron Nashor spawns at 15 minutes with a 7 minute respawn time.
Basically? My idea is that when the Dragon first spawns, theres a 50/50 chance it can spawn in either location of the river. As long as the Dragon is still up and Baron Nashor is attempting to spawn, it would spawn on the other side of the river. If the Dragon was just killed and Baron Nashor is up the next minute, its location would also have a 50/50 chance.
This is a small change, but I think it really would help mix the game dynamic up a lot more, since always sending your carry and support to the bottom lane would be a gamble at this point. Certainly, people would probably keep sending their carry and support to the bottom lane and /hope/ the Dragon spawned there early, but if it didn't, it's up to the top laners instead to duke it out with your jungler and middle laner.
I don't think this change would do anything right away, but eventually I hope that once people realize there's no constant benefit to always playing League of Legends the exact same way every time (solo top, duo bottom at least) they'd be more willing to mix things up a bit.
So...
Thoughts, anyone?
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