There have been many game modes in League of Legends, and few of them survive long-term. A lucky few get entered into a rotation, showing up as short events for a bit of fun before being removed again. One game mode has been lucky enough to escape that fate; it’s now a stand-alone project that’s stepped out from League’s shadow. Teamfight Tactics turns 5, and the game mode continues to be one of Riot’s best bets so far.
Teamfight Tactics pits eight players against each other in a technically competitive but extremely chill battle. Players are offered units, which allow them to build basic teams that auto-battle it out — first against computer-controlled bots, and then against each other. As the matches progress, players have access to a shop and the occasional carousel of more units.
“Teamfight Tactics, when it launched as a game mode with a relatively small team, saw incredible reception from our players,” said Peter Whalen, game director for Teamfight Tactics, in a call with Polygon. “There were so many people that tried out TFT and then continued to stick with it.” Today, Teamfight Tactics has a monthly player count of approximately 33 million — not as high as parent game League, but certainly a respectable fan base.
For a totally new player who isn’t familiar with the genre or League itself, Teamfight Tactics can be confusing to pick up. There’s a high learning curve if you want to master all the intricacies, and if you’re not familiar with League’s vast cast of characters, it can be hard to recognize the potential strengths of the characters assembled at the carousel But there are a few key aspects of the game that are very easy to understand — if you get three of the same unit, it gets upgraded to tier 2. If you get nine units, that champion becomes tier 3, which makes them a game-changing presence in each battle.
Image: Riot Games
It doesn’t take a lot of know-how to take advantage of that stuff, but doing it feels great — and the matches are short enough that a loss rarely feels bad. “The game is structured so there’s lots of little victories,” said Whalen. “There’s lots of moments where you get a small win: You win a fight, you’ve got a three-star champion, you’re getting the perfect items, the perfect Augment, something amazing happens on the carousel. And those feel really good.”
The Teamfight Tactics developers change up the game’s roster and mechanics regularly with “sets” that rotate every four months. Each season has a specific theme. Dragonlands, for instance, has a host of dragon-related characters to pull from skins like Dragon Trainer Tristana, Dragon Guardian Galio, and Dragon Master Swain. Each new theme is an excuse to try a whole new set of mechanics built on the core game’s foundation.
“Each season is a new puzzle to solve,” said Whalen. “It really creates a novel and unique experience that has been one of the most successful things that we’ve seen with our players. People have really latched on to solving the new puzzles that TFT presents.”
I personally played, and enjoyed, Teamfight Tactics at launch. I eventually wandered away, switching to Hearthstone’s Battlegrounds mode for a bit before dropping my autobattler habit altogether. Years later, I absently clicked a Teamfight Tactics cinematic in my Twitter feed. It was so slickly produced that it was stunning, especially considering how goofy it was.
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League has been silly before, like the Pentakill music video where Mordekaiser punts Teemo, or if you want to go way back, the old-school Journal of Justice that shared in-universe articles written about the robot Blitzcrank’s dating service, or Veigar stealing a blimp at the Bandle City Fair. But Riot Games has also been building an entire multifaceted media ecosystem off the back of League of Legends, including Legends of Runeterra and 2XKO. Riot Forge, which was sadly shut down earlier this year, delivered a variety of indie games set in the world of League. The second season of Arcane is set to be released in November. Riot Games also has a whole music scene, debuting virtual bands like K/DA, True Damage, and Heartsteel. Teamfight Tactics is able to pull from all of that material and maintain its downright ridiculous tone — it can even add Arcane bad guy Silco, or a charming fellow like red fox brewmaster Kobuko.
Altogether, it’s a much friendlier and more welcoming environment than League of Legends, and it’s cultivated a community to match. The general vibe the team is going for is fanfiction, says Whalen. Silly little mascots like Choncc and Pengu are positioned around popular League characters, giving the vibe that when the League matches are over, the kayfabe drops and all the champions could be friends off set. Teamfight Tactics is able to liberally borrow from League’s expanding library of content, and that has led to the one-time novelty game mode splitting off into a project that truly stands on its own under the Riot umbrella.
