Riot Games aims to bring some complexity to League of Legends bot games by introducing a new system that will see bot characters make decisions more in line with a human player, according to the latest blog post.
The new system is being called Threat Evaluation and will see bots determine how strong they are compared to their enemies. In the previous system, bots based their reactions on how much damage was recently received to determine future threat. While this style of gaming may work in first-person shooters, it works less well in League of Legends.
"Our previous systems used a method that is very common in games, especially first-person shooters," reads the post. "The bot looks at how much damage has recently been received and uses that to determine future threat. In an FPS, this makes a lot of sense. If a bot walks around a corner and takes a bunch of damage, it'll probably keep taking that damage if it hangs around, so it's best to back off.
"League of Legends works a bit differently. If Veigar unloads all of his spells on a bot, and the bot survives, that isn't the time for the bot to run. That's the time for the bot to destroy that evil little @$!#!. Veigar has almost no damage potential while all his skills are on cooldown, so why not get a few shots, or maybe a lot of shots, in while he's vulnerable?"
Bots will now begin looking at both health and how many spells the bot and nearby enemies have available. Additionally, the update will make it possible for bots to dodge skill shots.
Riot hopes to introduce wall jumping and jungling bots at a later date; however, this poses a number of technical problems for now. As bots aren't programmed with an understanding of the map or of walls within the map, the game would require changes to both its pathing and terrain systems before this could be possible.
No launch date is available just yet for this new update; however, it is expected "soon."