League of Legends Maps
League of Legends consists of three main maps. Each have different terrain, objectives and victory conditions, as well as varied summoner spells and items. A fourth map, the Crystal Scar, was discontinued.
Summoner's Rift
Summoner's Rift is the most popular map in League of Legends. On this map type, two teams of five players compete to destroy an enemy building called a Nexus, which is guarded by the enemy team and a number of defensive structures called turrets, or towers. One nexus is located in each enemy base on opposite sides of the map, in the lower-left and upper-right hand corners. These structures continually create weak non-player characters known as minions, which advance toward the enemy base along three paths: top, middle, and bottom lanes. Players compete to advance these waves of minions into the enemy base, which allows them to destroy enemy structures and ultimately win the match. Between lanes are neutral areas of the map known as the 'jungle', arrayed in four quadrants. A shallow river divides the map between the teams, but doesn't actually impede movement; all champions can wade through it no differently than dry land.
Twisted Treeline
In the Twisted Treeline, two teams of three players compete to destroy the opposing team's Nexus, which is guarded enemy Towers. It is conceptually similar to Summoner's Rift, but smaller to account for three vs. three rather than five vs. five. Rather than Summoner's Rift 3 lanes of turrets and 3 inhibitors, Twisted Treeline has only 2 lanes and 2 inhibitors, with the jungle in between. The other differences are the addition of two "Altars", control of which grants the occupying team a variety of bonuses, and the replacement of Baron Nashor with Vilemaw, an evil spider deity. Living members of the team that slays Vilemaw are granted a temporary bonus, similar to the death of Nashor.
Howling Abyss
The Howling Abyss is used for "Aram" (All Random All Mid) matches, and is five vs. five. The difference between the Abyss and the other maps is that there is only a single narrow lane of Turrets and an Inhibitor, and no neutral jungle area. Thus, rather than skirmishes and hidden movement, the Abyss focuses exclusively on large team-fights in the sole middle lane. Players cannot return to their allied base to replenish health and mana or purchase items unless they have been killed. Aram was launched as an official mode in September 2013.
Crystal Scar
The Crystal Scar was used for Dominion mode, a discontinued game format where teams of five players competed to capture control points and hold those points for the longest possible period of time. The map consists of a circle with 5 control points. Each team controls a base known as a fountain, located at the bottom left and right hand corners of the map. Each team scores points by capturing and owning more objectives than the other team over time, which is then reduced from the other team's "life" total. These points count down from an initial score of 200. The first team to reduce the other team to 0 points achieves victory. Dominion was launched on September 26, 2011 and was retired on February 22, 2016, although the Crystal Scar is used for certain other rotating formats, such as Ascension.
