17-year-old Nick “Crane” Turberville pens an exclusive opinion piece on competitive UK League of Legends, sharing his thoughts on it as a young player new to the scene and how reputation is key to success…
September 2016 marked my arrival into the UK League Of Legends esports scene, and since then I have learnt many of the ins and outs associated with this playing field, having first-hand experience of being a high level UK player.
My name is Nick Turberville, but most know me as Crane. I’m an ADC (Attack Damage Carry) main and I’ve played under three teams within the UK scene: Team Sublime, Doxa Esports and most recently The Gosu Crew.
My first experience within the UK scene was at the Red Bull 5G Tournament which took place in October 2016; I competed with Team Sublime where we made it to the Regional Finals to face Perilous Void. Unfortunately we lost to them at the LAN event in Manchester, but since then I’ve competed in both the UK Masters and the ESL Premiership.
Although my experience in the UK scene could be seen as somewhat brief and lacklustre, there are a few details I’ve come to notice and some thoughts I’ve acquired along the way.
Having a strong reputation is a major key to finding success in the UK scene. From my own experiences I’ve come to learn that having the right connections and a good reputation will carry you a million miles. I found it quite a struggle to find a team to begin with as I was considered a “no name random”, with only my solo queue ranking plastered on my profile to give people an indication of my skill.
It wasn’t until I made a couple of friends/contacts that I was given the opportunity to try out and then later play for a team. Having a good reputation can be applied to any scene and is applicable even in work outside of esports, but in the UK League scene, having a good reputation can be a necessity.
“When I sent out my first tweet announcing myself as a player, a prominent UK player replied with a picture of my profile and said: ‘Interesting ADC, wouldn’t want someone like this on my team’.”
Having a strong reputation can apply in other ways as well. Your reputation isn’t only limited to your skill and experience, there is also a reputation associated to the type of player you are on the rift.
First impressions can mean everything in the League esports scene (especially in the UK)! If you start out as a “one trick pony” or an “off meta player”, that reputation will follow you throughout your entire career like a shadow. This almost happened to myself when I first came into the scene, as my top three most played champions in terms of mastery points were Vayne, Amumu (pictured) and Graves.
When I sent out my first tweet announcing myself as a player, within minutes a prominent UK player replied with a picture of my profile attached, saying something along the lines of: “Interesting ADC, wouldn’t want someone like this on my team.”
On this occasion I was saved by our beloved ginger Ben “Draggles” Forbes who chimed in saying: “That’s not a nice way to treat a brand new player.”
Somehow my reputation as a player with an odd champion pool didn’t stick, but I happened to be a lucky one! The same cannot be said for others however.
Reaching the next level
Over time the UK’s LoL scene has made a reputation for itself, and to some extent it’s a good one! Our scene’s reputation can be attributed to many things, but most attributes come from within.
The phrase ‘UK XD’ is one we’ve all heard. Although it’s a meme, the meaning behind it is certainly true. The UK League scene is the runt of the family when it comes to other national leagues, despite having great tournament opportunities and seemingly good infrastructure. There are three major factors that bring about this reputation: organisations, players and backing. Over time these could be listed as the three main reasons why the UK scene has the reputation it has.
The UK LoL scene is notorious for having some unscrupulous and unreliable organisations. There are a number of exceptional UK orgs, but sadly you could count them all on one hand. This can be put down to multiple reasons: the first of which is failure to pay players. This has happened a number of times, where players have been promised money for transport to LAN events and then the org would then never reimburse the player following the event.
Poaching is also rife within the scene. Whilst ESL have tried to influence and enforce rules to stop this, we rarely see a season pass without some form of impromptu player transfer occurring (although with the mid-season ESL Prem transfer window this split may be different).
To outsiders this can make the UK scene seem hostile and unwelcoming with its organisations seeming untrustworthy. Suffice to say, this isn’t far off the mark in some cases – organisations have been a significant influence on the UK scene’s reputation, however they aren’t the only factor.
Contracts within the UK scene rarely exist, with very few organisations enforcing them or players agreeing to sign them (I’ll touch on this later). However, as a result of this – players aren’t legally bound to stay with a team for designated periods, thus causing instability for rosters.
“The UK LoL scene is comparable to a teenager – it’s still learning, growing and maturing. We have no one to guide us on this path, we instead have to guide ourselves.”
With a contract, you would have to stay playing under the team you’re contracted to until it ends (contracts should be binding for both organisation and player, pending any breach of contract that could result in a player’s release). In the UK however, hypothetically there is practically nothing (in terms of rules) stopping a player from hopping between teams should they choose to do so. There is also little money, which means no wages and nothing to really tie a player down to a contract.
Tournament organisers have stepped up allowing a limited number of in-season subs but this still leaves room for uncontracted players to switch mid-season. This could mean that a player participating in the ESL Premiership could essentially leave their team with little to no repercussions.
This point isn’t quite cut-and-dry as making these moves as a player can tarnish your reputation or could hinder your participation in other leagues. This subject is one that is heavily debated and can be interpreted in many ways and there are multiple opinions around it.
Getting behind the scene
Finally let’s touch on backing for the UK scene, or rather how little of it there seems to be. Riot will occasionally put the ESL Premiership on the client, but since the 4 Nations Tournament back in 2014 and League Fest in 2016 at i58, there has been little else from them.
We need to look at this objectively where possible, Riot do help out with the ESL Premiership but they don’t have too much involvement with leagues outside of ESL – meaning the competition for the ESL Premiership can be stagnant with no growth.
To make a scene truly vibrant there needs to be healthy competition between all tournament organisers within that scene. We sometimes see promotion of UK leagues on the client but this appears to be few and far between. With EUW being such a huge server with multiple national leagues to feature, Riot cannot be seen to show favouritism.
However there are other ways to help a scene without promotion. The last truly Riot-sanctioned tournament was the 4Nations in December 2014 – there have been no other Riot branded tournaments since then – is it a pipe dream to ask for a return of these types of tournaments? To most of the professional players in our scene, the answer seems to be yes.
“Over time the UK’s LoL scene has made a reputation for itself, and to some extent it’s a good one! But there’s a lot of room for improvement.”
The UK League Of Legends scene has a lot of room for improvement and there are many ways to do it. However, the players and organisations within the UK have to take the first steps. With no contracts, unreliable players and organisations, investing in the UK LoL scene would be a risky business decision for potential investors.
Building a long term team brand for a UK League team seems an ambitious task. The UK LoL scene is comparable to a teenager – it’s still learning, growing and maturing. We have no one to guide us on this path, we instead have to guide ourselves.
There is great potential within the UK scene and I believe within the near future we will be on the level that other national leagues are (such as Spain). Once the scene matures, investments will happen, more sponsors will come and potentially, Riot will clear away the dust they have left us to settle with.
Perhaps one day ‘UK XD’ will be something of the past, but only our commitment and hard work can make this happen. Only time will tell.
You can follow Crane on Twitter here
Parted ways with my team, 17 y/o current D1 ADC peak Master 70LP ADC LFT in starting position or sub. DMs open 🙂
— Crane (@CraneLoL) February 8, 2017
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
