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You CAN learn from bots...

Top River King··36 votes·3,597 views

... and I'm tired of people insulting and laughing at me for suggesting such a thing. It's just a matter of keeping things in perspective.

For example, my skillshots used to be so poor that I'd avoid skillshot-reliant champs entirely. Anytime I would play Blitzcrank, I practically triggered PTSD-style flashbacks for my friends. Wanting desperately to improve, I started spamming Blitzcrank in bot matches.

But bots are easy to hook, I can hear you saying. Precisely, which is why they were such a natural starting place. If I can't hook bots, then what chance do I have against an actual opponent? Baby steps, people. Moreover, their predictability also allowed me, in a way, to practice the important part I was forgetting, that skillshots are just as much about prediction as they are about aim. Again, it was all about baby steps. With both bots and humans, you need to read their tendencies and exploit them. Against bots, I laid the foundation, learning the concept, then in normals I built upon it.

Ever since then, I've noticed my skillshots as a whole have improved since bots ingrained in me the basic principle that governs someone's ability to land them. Now all I have left to suss out regarding skillshots is their timing and hitboxes. This isn't to say I land every skillshot, but that I have confidence now in my ability to land skillshots when I need to, so long as I know those two things about the skillshot in particular.

In short, though you'll always learn more from facing real people, bots can be great for laying valuable groundwork if you go at them the right way. You can work on CSing, test out jungle paths/clears, get a basic feel for matchups, try out new things, practice combos, learn the ins and outs of a champion (their power spikes, limitations, etc.), etc. For me, this makes things a heck of a lot easier once I finally make the leap to normals or ranked because everything's easier once the basics are second nature.

56 Comments

HayRoss20 votes

Want to really practice skillshots? Try it on scuttlecrab. That thing is better at dodging than %90 of people in this game

Elbogen10 votes

plat 2, can confirm, scuttle jukes me more often than any player i vs.

TurquoiseYoshi1 votes

I can't find the video, but I know it's somewhere. It's of one LCS jungler, in an LCS match, completely whiffing a Nidalee spear at relatively short range on Scuttle.

Beacon 0F Light1 votes

There have been many "blooper reel" videos of LCS players completely missing scuttle. It's great. In one of them Lee Sin missed his Q, TWICE.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

I can't find the video, but I know it's somewhere. It's of one LCS jungler, in an LCS match, completely whiffing a Nidalee spear at relatively short range on Scuttle.

I believe that was Kikis.

TurquoiseYoshi1 votes

I think you're right.

CarameI Frappe1 votes

I main Elise and I can confirm I have to be close up to use cocoon or else the scuttlecrab will immediately dodge it. Thank god I have rappel to jump onto the bugger and claim my living ward.

Melledoneus3 votes

Whenever I play Shen and try to take Scuttle Crab, it dashes away. So, I naturally just dash after it.

...this is why I'm Bronze.

SpartenA79916 votes

Bots help team you the basics and for practice. Since I started league, I only played bots and bots exclusivly. I knew I had to keep practicing against them if I wanted to get to the big boy level. Never played pvp until i got to level 30.

Turel4 votes

Wow, that's some major dedication, good on you. I just pulled the normal stunt of play pvp immediately and get wrecked.

Dorans Shuriken1 votes

{quoted}

Bots help team you the basics and for practice. Since I started league, I only played bots and bots exclusivly. I knew I had to keep practicing against them if I wanted to get to the big boy level. Never played pvp until i got to level 30.

while i commend your dedication, i feel like its also alright just to learn as you go in pvp, as sometimes you get people willing to help (those rare gems of people hidden among the toxic sludge), and player feedback can be infinitely more valuable than playing bots

SpartenA79911 votes

I think I'd find more toxicity and would have just quit the game and uninstalled if the community is that toxic so early, that meant it would only get worse going upward.

Ariel the Cruel1 votes

Team builder. Tell them what you're trying to do before you lock in. Most teams will kick you instantly if you aren't LCS pro Plays Face roll FotM anyways. Once you get a team that doesn't mind, you can generally hitch a ride with most of them for another few games and get some constructive feedback.

Also, ask for feedback after games. Sometimes you get some really good feedback from the person that just finished dumpstering you in lane.

Cressilia1 votes

Didn't start until level 17, got totally wrecked (It was like you put a baby in high school I was scared, confused, and cried a lot) Binged on YouTube on how to play PVP (meta, builds, etc.) then started back up at level 19 or so But seriously my first match I went Nid top, built terribly, had no clue what CS meant and even now I'm scarred from playing top ever

SpartenA79911 votes

I still remember my first game because I was playing like an idiot and didn't understand why towers kept shooting me. (minons all died too fast >.>)

SpecterVonBaren3 votes

Same, though my reason was more due to anxiety over playing with other people, I waited till I got a lot of experience with bots before I went anywhere near pvp.

FlowBlade1 votes

Doesn't that get boring? Ever since iv'e started playing from Season 3 I haven't played a single bot match other than the tutorials because in a MMO, it's just too boring for me to play against bots. The whole point is to play with other people IMO.

SpartenA79911 votes

Thats why you play different champs. Not just one. XD

Ariel the Cruel1 votes

Beat intermediate bots with AP Riven and an AFK. Liven things up a bit.

Trylobyte6 votes

I play bots almost exclusively simply because I'm one of those people who endures toxicity very poorly and bots are as nontoxic as League gets. But in the few times I do get dragged into PvP I've been able to use that basic foundation of skill to have some serious fun at the other team's expense. There are some good concepts you can learn from them, if you look.

  • Bots are hyper-aggressive in lane. Playing against them is a fair way to learn why this is a bad thing for you to do and how to punish people who do it. I've fought gold-ranked Riven mains to a standstill in lane simply because I'm so used to bots being lane bullies and I know how to capitalize on it.

  • Intermediate bots dodge most skillshots like they were Plat-Diamond tier. If you can reliably land Thresh hooks on the bots at range you're amazing, because they can and will dodge a pixel out of its hitbox at a 90-degree angle every time. This makes bots great for practicing skillshots against.

  • Bots also aim their own skillshots very well and are actually pretty good at predicting your movement. One of my biggest laughs was in a custom game with a few friends testing builds, watching Ashe Bot become a reliable source of kill assistance due to her uncanny ability to land her Crystal Arrow across enormous distances on enemies, including players, I just knew would get away. And Lux Bot will quite happily snipe you at max range with her laser if she has line of sight.

  • Bots chain CC and execute wombo combos with inhuman speed and precision. You can very quickly learn how to abuse timing gaps and avoid the wombo when you're fighting them, especially when the bot mid is someone like Annie, Veigar, or Brand. This makes player wombos and CC chains easier to get out of.

Sure there's a lot you don't learn (there's no need to ward, bot aggression makes learning to CS difficult, there's never an enemy jungler, etc) but it's not a worthless game mode like some people think.

TheHobbits2 votes

Yes you CAN learn from bots. You CAN learn a champions kit. You CAN learn how their abilities work.

I learnt how how get a Quadra kill as adc soraka... how well does that translate over to real life matches?

Top River King8 votes

How many times must I repeat it's about laying the groundwork? You know why I got to be so successful with Garen on my other account? I played him so damned much, whether it be bots or ranked or 3v3, that I could be facing a Teemo or down 0/3 in lane and my experience and familiarity with him would be enough to best whatever I went up against. Because of him, my approach with any champion I'm taking seriously is to spam the heck out of, match type be damned, from bots to ranked. Thanks to this approach, I've improved immensely as a player. It used to be that I would write off certain champions entirely as not for me, but now no champion seems insurmountable because I've laid so much groundwork.

Bots isn't the final lesson. It's the introductory material without which you'd be lost. Take Thresh's hook, for example. Thresh used to be one of the most daunting champions in the game for me. But then I learned Blitz's hook, starting out small by practicing it against bots, then graduating to real opponents. From there, it just became a matter of getting a feel for its unique delay and hitbox.

This is how I learn the game. I start simple with things that can be practiced against bots, like CSing or certain combos (ex. the Shurima Shuffle), and then work my way up from there, bit by bit, until a champion like Orianna, who I'd written off without even trying, somehow feels familiar despite having never played her because I can find the parallels between her and Lulu.

And there's a huge difference between what I'm advocating and your silly "ADC Soraka" example. What I'm talking about is using it as a testing ground for things that would serve as a barrier for me if I were to try it first in a normal match. Had I not played a bot match with Shaco before I tried him that one time in team builder, I would've probably done poorly enough for my team to report me for unskilled and/or intentionally feeding. Because, for the majority of that bot match, I was clueless and, well... confused. I'd do things without really knowing how I did them or what exactly was going on. But, since they were bots, I wasn't spending most of the match dead as a result of this, and by the end of the match I had a basic idea of how Shaco worked. In short, I learned more from that one bot match than I would've learned from hopping into a normal and spending half the match dead. I doubt I would've had anywhere near enough time to pass that "what is going on!?" stage, and I would've had people raging at me the whole time.

In bots, there are no stakes, especially since it can be 60-20 in their favor and you can still win just by split pushing (I've done it; my teammates were horrific), and so it's rare that you see someone raging at a teammate for doing poorly. Sure, a bot is a different beast than a human opponent, but sometimes you're better off working things out against a bot first.

LankPants2 votes

There are things you'll never learn in AI. For example no matter how many bot games you play you're probably never going to learn to roam or ward properly.

That's not to say there's nothing to learn, bots are great for practising basic mechanics against. Them not punishing fuckups becomes an advantage since you'll still know you messed up (IE Blitz hook missed) but you'll also be able to try again without too much risk.

I'd say I learnt my skillshots mostly from AI, dodging mostly from ARAM and awareness mostly from SR.

Singing Lark2 votes

I played exclusively bots till around level 12.

As a new player, I knew it made no sense to jump into PvP when I was struggling even to do well against intermediate bots. Even though there probably would be people who were just as bad as I was, I don't think I'd be improving upon anything playing vs people who were just as bad as I was.

Plus, you can't get flamed for feeding in bots because everyone knows that bots can't pressure an advantage and eventually lose out regardless.

Earl Eulrich2 votes

yea, lots of people have been crying for a sandbox-mode to practice - but botgames already do a really good job with that. I always test out new champs in custom-botgames before taking them to the rift to adjust to their mechanics without pressure. and if you want "real" practice - 1v5ing intermediate bots is still a difficult Challenge on most Champions...

Blue Moon Wolf2 votes

actually, bots can dodge skill shots pretty well. Sure the don't flash out of the way, but bots tend to be able to read when you attempt a skillshot faster than a human and without the miscalculation that most human players suffer from when dodging. So bots are a great place to practice skillshots outside of PvP.

Celeste Benal2 votes

Bots are NOT easy to land skillshots upon. They literally have a dodge script built in. Don't believe it? Try. If you can land a skillshot on a bot, you are literally LCS material.

Reaper Soraka1 votes

Only on times when they try to dodge. the script doesn't try to every single time. :P

TurquoiseYoshi2 votes

I like doing it so that there aren't those "First time X champion" moments in PVP. I just like figuring out what the abilities are and generally how to use them.

King Trixo III 2 votes

Well, I definitely think people underrate bots as a learning tool.

Had a friend who exclusively played bot games leveling up, he finally hits level 30 and in his first season obtained Diamond.

CrisisEchoes2 votes

honestly i think people should be sure they can get 200 cs by 20 in botmode before they even consider ranked. bronze would become a very empty tier...

FakeGravity2 votes

Not to mention the perfect mechanics and use of cc and reactions bots have 0.1 seconds after you hit them from a bush you are stun and hit by them

Clint Orris1 votes

The thing is that people don't behave anything like bots. Trust me, there are too many times where I overestimate my opponents mechanics which fuck me over in the long run. Just need to be comfortable with adapting to your opponent's movements and skill level.

Top River King4 votes

See, I don't have that problem. I know the differences between bots and humans. When I went from bots to normals with Blitz, for instance, I didn't go at my opponents the same way as I did the bots. I used the same basic principles, focusing on my aim, timing, and prediction (by reading their tendencies), only I applied them to a different opponent.

And, as I said in a reply to another commenter, laying that groundwork was much easier in low-pressure bot matches than in a normal match where your team is liable to flame you every time you miss a hook. That's another benefit of practicing things against bots first.

ThatHaleState1 votes

Actually, if you are trying to practice skill shots you should DEF try intemediate bots. Its almost half impossible due to the fact that as you press the button their code makes them immediately attempt to dodge with the fastest reaction they can. If you can consistently hit intermediate bots then you could probably hit anything on anyone. you might even over predict and have to dial back lol

Top River King2 votes

I can confirm: intermediate bots dodge (and land) skill shots better than a lot of people I've played against. I think I miss the most skill shots on people who surprise me by not even trying to dodge.

Catastrop2 votes

{quoted}

I can confirm: intermediate bots dodge (and land) skill shots better than a lot of people I've played against. I think I miss the most skill shots on people who surprise me by not even trying to dodge.

Yeah, it's true, some just stand there and AA while I throw a skillshot only for it to completely whiff because the person just stood there. Then your teammates that saw are just there judging you XD

Excitidly Insane3 votes

I almost despair vs Intermediate because I try to lead people on with a Thresh hook and every damn time it just flies past whoever was in front of me because they stay perfectly still.

item 3070 Thresh

Catastrop2 votes

you might even over predict and have to dial back lol

This. You know how many times I've thrown skillshots where I thought they'd move only for the human player to just stand where they were? Ridiculous, they just stood there instead of moving and died even faster. Sometimes when I see this I'm just like, "You're just gonna stand and AA? Have you just accepted death?"

T RexHasTinyArms1 votes

I think two things are true about learning from bots but are generally disregarded for very specific reasons:

  1. While normal bots are pretty much below anything you can possibly think of, the intermediate bots are probably about the same difficulty as low bronze PVP. However, no one tends to call that learning bc being able to mechanically beat bronze IV isn't nearly as difficult as being able to deal w/ the lack of team work and high amount of rage that exists in such low elo (plus bronze is the bottom 30% of the server, so intermediate bots preps you MAYBE to beat the bottom 10% (low bronze) of the server in terms of difficulty)

  2. Intermediate bots isn't a place to practice something you can play, but it's a great place to practice something you have no idea how to play. If I buy a new champ I usually play a game of intermediate bots before I go pvp so I'm not looking at my skills to figure out if CD goes down for each one when I rank it up, or what each one does for scaling etc. Yeah I could do that same thing by reading the wiki or something, but I wouldn't get a feel for the hit box of skills or range of the skill (I play on smart cast so getting a feel for the range is important). I have the bad habit of only playing ranked for the most part, so bots are an important mode bc I can learn a hit box or range for a new champ picking up first win of the day when I don't have time for a real game and then I will at least know a little before I play the champ in ranked.

Basically you can learn stuff, but the things you learn are so basic they are what you would use sandbox mode for. You don't learn anything in terms of strategy/game knowledge, but you can learn mechanics stuff just fine. The issue is that everything you can learn in bots could probably be learned in sand box mode more easily (IE no cd on blitz pull and 3-5 champions just set to walk around in lane and not fight would teach you those same basics but faster bc that's all you focus on and there's no cd), so bots isn't a place to learn so much as it is the only option currently. If you bring out sand box mode there will be a better place to learn then bots and bots goes back to just being for fun when you want an easy 150 IP and to play ADC Annie.

Top River King1 votes

I think it can help you practice things you know. If you play a champion enough in bots, the range of their abilities, their damage output at different stages (and with different items), etc. becomes so ingrained in you that matches become entirely about your own performance. For me, that is the main barrier to overcome, knowing a champion's kit inside and out, and bots help me with that.

Also, many new players would find themselves better off if they played bots almost exclusively to practice like some in this thread mentioned doing. It's a safe environment, with losing virtually impossible and toxicity virtually nonexistent. And, while you really only learn the basics, just learning those basics is what made me improve the most at this game.

If I were coaching someone new to the game, I'd just advise them to play bot matches for a while, but to be sure to work on warding, CSing, etc., which I'd send them video examples/lessons for. I would have progressed much faster had that been my approach from the start.

T RexHasTinyArms1 votes

I think if we're speaking in context of a brand new account then it should be obvious to everyone that bots is a great way to learn. The roommate who introduced me to the game taught his GF at one point and I think she made it to level 10 on her account before she learned how to tell when she started tanking tower. Hell for the first few levels she just died a bunch to towers every game bc she walked too far forward and couldn't figure out why she was dying. For ranked though no one is learning stuff like that anymore.

I think learning the basics is definitely a good use for bots bc we don't have sand box, but (and maybe this is just bc I don't adapt it well) I think things like power spikes are harder to learn in bots than they are in ranked. I can't tell you how much damage I'm going to take based on my armor, and I can't tell you the exact number on what my damage will be, but I generally have a good feel for it relative to my opponents. That last part is important. Shyv damage has a huge spike when you finish botrk and get sated, but if you do that at 12-15 minutes (which shouldn't be too hard vs bots) compared to 20-25 minutes (a game where you get behind, which won't happen in bots) that spike looks really different. Add in that the spike looks different again if you get the early items but one opponent on the enemy team gets fed and has damage + a finished defensive item, and it starts getting more variables to a power spike really fast. For me, I don't find enough use out of memorizing the exact numbers of how much damage I do w/ x, y, and z items, as I do in learning relative strength of "if I'm fed early I can do X, but if the enemy gets big then I can only do Y." It's an important distinction bc being able to solo dragon is important, but if you can't survive a hit or two from the enemy should they show up and you need to run, then you had better make sure you weren't seen and have a really safe escape route just in case.

Top River King1 votes

As with everything else, I'm not saying your knowledge of any of these things will become perfect through playing bot games. But you do get some sense of them, and then you can fine tune those in actual games, which should be easier for you since you've already got some idea what you're doing.

Earl Eulrich1 votes

but to be sure to work on warding, CSing

for warding i really wouldn´t want to use botgames, they´re not nearly dynamic enough (also bots don´t really punish bad vision). For good warding you have to learn a lot about the makrogame so you can read your opponents and understand where you want to go next, so you can set up vision accordingly. That´s a really difficult thing to get right though and needs a lot of experience.

For CSing on the other hand botgames work incredible well - as intermediate bots really don´t care about CS, they instead try to go aggressive on you...so it´s a very good environment to learn keeping up CS while being under pressure.

So like you said, it´s very good for learning the basics (mechanics + CSing), but for getting a deeper understanding of the makro game it´s really not helping all that much (though if you play 1v5 you´ll learn a lot of the importance of wave-pushing and sidelane pressure)...which is pretty much alright. Equiped with good basics you can easily start out in high silver to low gold elowise and improve from there.

Top River King2 votes

I meant getting in the habit of warding. Bots don't really roam much, but if you start trying to, say, use your trinket whenever it's off CD, and you look up proper warding spots to help you decide where to place them, then it'll become sort of automatic in-game. I used to never ward, and I started by simply warding the river bush up top whenever my trinket was off CD, then moved on from there.

P.S. Would you believe I used to think that wards would only go invisible if they were in the water or a bush? Don't ask me how I ever got that idea.

ahferroin72 votes

Um, intermediate bots may have Bronze 4 like strategy, but they dodge shill shots WAY better tan even a lot of gold tier players I've seen.

Yormaughm2 votes

They also pull off insane last second escapes. I've been intercepted and shut down milliseconds before I hit someone with Nocturne's ult by bots before. Or sometimes you go for the flash kill to last hit, and Alistar bot headbutts or knocks you up instantly as soon as you flash. That's basically not gonna reliably happen outside of like Plat in a real game. I've even seen the bots pull off insanely coordinated combos that you'd never see in solo queue because it requires perfect teamwork/assessment of the situation. To me bot games aren't about "how many kills can I get" they're about "how can I avoid dying against mechanically superior opponents" which is arguably a better or at least equally important skill to hone.

I've had times where I've become friends with below level 30 players who only play PVP, and then we've played an intermediate bot match and they get destroyed. I've had people literally say "I'll stick to playing normals" rather than play intermediate bots.

Pykel1 votes

have you ever faced brand bot? that dudes broken :) never misses skillshots Brand

FDru1 votes

It's not that you can't learn anything in bot matches, it's that you can't get better at PvP in bot matches, so they aren't a good place to "practice". For purely learning basic things like ability cooldowns, ranges, autattack timing, jungle clear speeds and builds, etc they are great. And they are great for learning the mechanics of champs you haven't played before.

Top River King1 votes

"Learning the mechanics of champs you haven't played before" does help you get better at PvP. You can learn a lot about a champion in bots and set yourself up for more success than if you'd just jumped to PvP right away.

That's what I use bots for, and people still act like I'm crazy when I mention it in match. For example, on multiple occasions lately I wanted to do a simple 1v1 mid, called mid first... only to have some idiot on my team say "we'll go duo mid," then insult me when I point out that, no, I want to go solo mid to practice.

That by having a 2v1 in bots they were further reducing what I could learn. It made it almost impossible to get a feel for CSing, with them trying to CS as well. And, while I can get somewhat of a feel for a match-up when I'm going 1v1, figuring out what advantages I or my opponent would probably have in a real match (due solely to the match-up) based on how the bot and I interact, a 2v1 offers even fewer opportunities to suss such things out.

I even lost a 5v5 bot match for the first time ever because, one match, I ended up arguing with a couple people on my team all match about the worth of bot matches. These idiots went so far as to spend half the time critiquing my grammar... in a game where people generally type in lower-case and forgo proper grammar so as not to waste more time than necessary. I have never seen two people spend so much time nitpicking someone, and I can't believe I let them get under my skin so much... but I did. And we ended up losing because the 3 of us were too busy typing to out-do the bots when it comes to finishing a game. I even got my first ever warning, saying I'd been reported for negative attitude, I believe it was.

So that is why I'm so fed up and felt the need to make this thread. I wanted to prove to myself that I'm not alone in thinking like this.

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