Over the course of the last few years, botting has become an increased issue for League of Legends players due to the number of people looking to sell accounts once they hit a certain level in the game. Riot Games has been battling against these sellers for quite some time, but now, the developers are stepping up their game in the fight against bots.
Riot’s anti-cheat manager Matt Paoletti has confirmed that although the team has completed several successful ban waves against these botted accounts, they are still going to step up their efforts to help rid lower ranks and unranked play of this problem in the foreseeable future.
“I don’t usually tweet about anti-cheat plans, [since it’s] easier to be effective when bad actors can’t prepare, but I understand the impact botting has had on some players in League,” Paoletti said on social media. “It’s a time of large transition for our team currently, but we’ll get the resources to help address the issue.”
In League, players are only able to access specific features and game modes once they hit a certain account level. To play normal five-vs-five blind pick Summoner’s Rift games, for example, players must hit level three by running games against AI. To unlock ranked, however, an account must not only hit level 30 but also own 20 champions to boot.
This process takes a lot of time and effort, especially for players who are simply looking to create a secondary account. As a result, hundreds of people have started to sell pre-leveled accounts that have been botted to level 30, so that the buyer can jump into ranked play right away. It’s also a way for banned players to return to Summoner’s Rift as well, making bots an issue for both unranked and high-ranked players alike.
