Riot Games’ magnum opus, League of Legends, has had success after success this middle part of 2011.  And recently, word has slipped of a very special addition set to be released in the next few months– League of Legends: Dominion.

One thing that the fans have wanted for a long time was another map, and Riot Games has answered us not only with a brand-spanking new battleground, but an entirely different way to play! This newly introduced ‘Dominion’ mode brings new elements into play: Teams vie for control of numerous spots on the map, and must defend them from the enemy, whilst trying to attack points controlled by the opposing team. The concept isn’t unfamiliar to other genres of competitive gaming, but its implementation is a fresh new change to the MOBA.

Looking over the Dominion map, The Crystal Scar, it seems a lot more open than Summoner’s Rift or Twisted Tree-Line. This should add a new dimension to the combat, making battle lines a little less easy to draw, and may bolster added strategy to the game. The battles are said to be a lot shorter (around 20 minutes).  One normal game of LoL can last anything close to an hour, so this new addition is a godsend to those who can’t afford to sacrifice huge amounts of time for a couple of games. From the small bits and pieces we have seen, characters have been given special animations to seal points around the map. As you can see from the screen-shot below, each ‘node’ has two paths surrounding it.

League of Legends is an incredibly competitive game, and from my experience, there has been nothing like this implemented in the genre to date. This unfamiliarity is something good for the world of LoL players, as the game slowly moves itself away from the title ‘DotA-clone’ and settles itself more into the title ‘MOBA’. The traditional 3-lane DotA map has been used a sickly number of times, but is easily the most popular map choice in the genre. Maybe, however, with the introduction of Dominion, late night LAN parties will become more diverse, as 5-man teams aren’t stuck playing with the same old map over and over again.

League of Legends continues to grow, with every little bit of good news stretching my smile ever so wider. Also, the newest addition to the League of Legends roster is going to be a bad-ass scorpion made of crystals, whose release should be accompanying the new patch. I’ve been really bad this lately and have been quick-locking Jungle Amumu basically every match, so all this change could be good for me.

More information about Dominion will be shown at Gamescom, which according to my clock is only a week away, but over in Europe is a tiny bit longer.