The short version: League of Legends is a five-on-five game where each player takes one of five roles (Top, Jungle, Mid, Bottom or Support), and what separates winning beginners from losing ones in the first ten minutes is minions, not kills. Land the killing blow on every minion in one lane until the 10:00 mark and you collect about 2,240 gold, roughly seven champion kills’ worth. That’s my arithmetic from the official wiki’s numbers, and it’s laid out below. Ranked opens at account level 30 with 20 champions owned and 10 Swiftplay or Normal Draft games played, and Riot’s last-hit indicator, the training aid that shows when a minion is killable, works in every queue on the way there except Ranked.
Everything here is checked against patch 26.20 (Riot’s notes are dated October 6, 2026) and Riot’s own support pages, read between October 7 and 9, 2026. The gold arithmetic is mine. I haven’t played ranked for this guide, so the role advice is reasoning from Riot and wiki data, not a tier list. This hub covers the roles, the gold model and the unlock path; the setup side lives in our best League of Legends settings and low-end PC settings guides.
Quick start: your first week in League of Legends in 8 steps
- Sort your settings before your first game. A stuttering client costs you last hits, so run through the FPS and performance settings, or the low-end PC version if your machine is old.
- Start with the tutorial and Co-op vs. AI. Riot’s unlock page says Co-op vs. AI and custom games are open from the start, with Teamfight Tactics available at level 1.
- At level 3, move to Swiftplay. That’s the shorter Normal Summoner’s Rift queue. ARAM opens at level 3 too.
- Check that the last-hit indicator is on. Riot calls it Last Hit Indicators and says it is “off by default” in Swiftplay, Co-op vs. AI and Normal Draft, so look in the in-game settings rather than assuming.
- Pick one role and two champions for it, and stay on them for ten games. Before level 11 you get a separate new-player champion rotation.
- At level 9, use the Practice Tool to drill last-hitting with nobody punishing you.
- At level 10, queue Normal Draft. The rules are slower and standard here, and the indicator still works.
- Work toward Ranked: level 30, 20 champions owned and 10 Swiftplay or Normal Draft games played. The champion count is the one to plan early.
What are the five roles in League of Legends?
The five roles are Top, Jungle, Mid, Bottom (the carry) and Support, one player each on a team of five, spread across Summoner’s Rift’s three lanes and the jungle between them. The official wiki calls them positions. Don’t mix them up with champion classes: Riot’s champion-picking page sorts champions into six classes (assassin, marksman, fighter, mage, support and tank) and warns that many champions straddle two, using Vayne (marksman with assassin burst) and Leona (support with tank durability) as its examples. A marksman usually plays Bottom, but nothing forces it to.
| Role | Where you play | Where your gold comes from | Main job |
|---|---|---|---|
| Top | Solo lane in the upper corner, far from early jungle objectives | Minions in your lane | Win your own lane without help; later, Teleport in to team fights |
| Jungle | The monster camps between the lanes | Jungle camps, using Smite and a starter jungle item | Take Dragons, Rift Herald, Baron and Voidgrubs; gank lanes |
| Mid | Solo lane through the centre, the shortest lane | Minions in your lane | Clear waves, then roam to help side lanes |
| Bottom (carry) | Shared lane with the Support | Minions, with the Support steering gold your way | Farm safely and grow stronger as the game goes on |
| Support | Shared lane with the carry | Little from minions by design; an exclusive item (World Atlas) adds income | Protect the carry, set up vision across the map |
The takeaway: four of the five roles earn their gold from minions or camps, and only the Support is built to go without. That’s why the next section applies to almost everyone you’ll play with.
Which role should you start with?
Start in a solo lane (Mid or Top) if you’re learning alone, because one opponent and one lane makes every missed last hit your own and easy to spot. If you’re playing with a friend, Bottom and Support is the natural duo. If you like timers and map reading more than mechanics, Jungle is the optimiser’s role. These are my recommendations, not a Riot ranking.
| If you are… | Start with | Why (my reasoning from the wiki’s role descriptions) | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
| A new player, solo | Mid or Top | One opponent, one lane to learn. Mid is the shortest lane; Top is isolated, so there are fewer moving parts around you | Top is far from help, so a lost lane stays lost for a while |
| A casual player with a friend | Bottom + Support | The two roles are designed to share a lane, so you can duo from your first Draft game | The Support earns little gold on purpose; agree who takes the minions before the game |
| An optimiser who likes numbers | Jungle | Your income is camps and your impact is objective timing, so the whole role is routing and decisions | You farm camps, not lane waves, so the lane last-hitting the next sections drill matters less in this role |
In the Swiftplay lobby you choose a primary and a secondary role before the game, so you can queue with a fallback role already chosen.
Why last-hitting out-earns kills: the gold math
A champion kill pays 300 gold once, while a standard six-minion wave pays 102 gold, every 30 seconds, all game. In the first ten minutes a lane sends 19 waves, so the minions are worth far more than the kills most beginners chase. Gold only drops for the player who lands the killing blow. According to the wiki’s last-hitting page, a dying minion splits its experience among nearby allies, but its full gold goes to the champion who dealt the last hit, from any range.
| Source of gold | Pays | Notes (Summoner’s Rift) |
|---|---|---|
| Melee minion | 20 gold | Cut from 21 in patch V26.01 and no longer grows over the game. Three per wave |
| Caster minion | 14 gold | Three per wave |
| Siege (cannon) minion | 50 gold, +1 per upgrade | First arrives with wave 3 (1:30), then one every third wave for the first 14 minutes. Upgrades every 90 seconds |
| Champion kill | 300 gold at levels 1–6 | Rises to 420 at level 18. First Blood adds 100. An assist pays half the kill bounty, capped at half of 300 |
| Passive income | 20.4 gold per 10 seconds | Starts at 1:05 and is identical for every champion |
Those numbers come from the wiki’s pages on the melee, caster and siege minions, plus champion gold bounties and gold income. Here is what they add up to by 10:00, using the wiki’s maximum-CS chart (CS, “creep score”, is one point per minion): 19 waves have spawned, which is 120 minions in one lane.
| Gold by 10:00 | Amount | In kills |
|---|---|---|
| Passive income, 1:05 to 10:00 | about 1,090 | 3.6 |
| Every minion in your lane last-hit (the ceiling) | at least 2,238 | 7.5 |
| Half of those minions last-hit | about 1,119 | 3.7 |
| One solo kill (levels 1–6) | 300 | 1 |
So half a farm is worth more than three kills and the ceiling is worth about seven and a half. The “at least” is there because I left out the +1 per upgrade on siege minions. The practical rule falls out of the wave size: three plain waves are 306 gold, so every 18 minions you miss hands away roughly a kill’s worth of gold. A plain wave is three melee (60) plus three caster (42), and a siege wave is 152.
Where the farming math stops being the whole story
The 2,238 is a ceiling, not a target. Minions also die to turrets and to each other, and the wiki’s own chart is titled “maximum/perfect CS”. Kills still matter too. A kill is 300 gold in one hit, and the wiki notes that a laner who isn’t in lane “may fall behind in experience and gold” because their wave dies to enemy minions or a turret, which is exactly what a death does to the player who dies. The game also leans against runaway leads. According to the wiki’s bounty rules, gold from minions raises your bounty by 1 for every 20 gold (1 for every 7 while you’re behind), so a farmed lead makes you worth more dead.
Two more caveats. The Support is the exception to all of this, since their role is built on low minion income. And the numbers above are the standard Draft and Ranked rules. Co-op vs. AI and Swiftplay run accelerated rules: champions start at level 3 with 1,400 gold, and gold and experience rewards carry multipliers that grow as the game goes on, according to the wiki’s Swiftplay page. Your first games feel richer than a Draft game, and that’s by design.
Riot’s last-hit indicator: where it works and where it stops
The indicator works in Co-op vs. AI, Swiftplay and Normal Draft, but not in Ranked, and I found no Riot decision on it since June 2026. The tool is simple. According to PCGamesN’s report, it shows a darker segment on a minion’s health bar marking the last-hit range, and the bar changes colour once the minion drops below it. In the patch 26.13 notes, Riot said the feature “has been live in Swiftplay & Co-op vs. AI for a while” and that it had “seen it result in new players being more successful at last-hitting than before”. Riot published no numbers behind that. The same notes admit that experienced players “are disabling it, as they find it more distracting than helpful”.
| Queue | Opens at | Last-hit indicator | Gold and XP rules |
|---|---|---|---|
| Co-op vs. AI | First game | Yes | Accelerated, same as Swiftplay |
| Swiftplay | Level 3 | Yes | Accelerated: start at level 3 with 1,400 gold |
| Normal Draft | Level 10 | Yes, since patch 26.13 | Standard |
| Ranked Solo/Duo and Flex | Level 30 | No, “continued testing” | Standard |
The takeaway is that the training wheels come off in two steps, not one. You learn in an accelerated mode with the indicator, move to standard-speed Draft with the indicator, and then reach Ranked without it. Patch 26.13 first announced indicators for Ranked too, then Riot reversed within hours. As PC Gamer reported, Riot said it wanted “more data and feedback” before deciding whether to make them an option in Ranked.
One source conflict to know about: Riot’s wording is that the indicators are “enabled, but off by default” in the non-Ranked queues. A third-party news report I found says new accounts get the setting switched on, but I couldn’t open that page to confirm. Check the setting yourself in the first game. I also couldn’t verify what the current in-client tutorial teaches about last-hitting, so I’m not claiming it either teaches or skips it.
How I’d use it (my plan, not Riot’s)
Keep the indicator on in Swiftplay and Draft while you learn, then switch it off for your last ten or so Draft games before level 30, so Ranked isn’t the first place you farm without it. To measure progress, read your CS off the scoreboard at 10:00 and divide by 120, the wiki chart’s ceiling at that point. It’s a rough check, not a Riot benchmark. A farm percentage that holds with the indicator off is the signal that you’re ready to queue Ranked.
The path to Ranked: level 30, 20 champions, 10 games
Ranked Solo/Duo and Flex open at level 30, once you own at least 20 champions and have played 10 Swiftplay or Normal Draft games, according to Riot’s unlocking-game-modes page (updated May 29, 2026). The page lists what opens at each level but not that the rules change between queues, which is the part the table below adds.
| Level | Opens (Riot) | What to practise | Move on when (my checkpoint) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Co-op vs. AI, custom games, Teamfight Tactics | Movement, abilities, where the lanes and jungle are | You can walk to your lane and last-hit without looking for the minions |
| 3 | Swiftplay and ARAM | One role, two champions, indicator on | You hit 40–50% of the 120-CS ceiling by 10:00 in two games running |
| 9 | Practice Tool | Last-hit drills with no one hitting back | You can last-hit with abilities as well as auto-attacks |
| 10 | Normal Draft | Standard-speed gold, picking and banning, indicator still on | You keep your farm percentage with the indicator switched off |
| 30 | Ranked, if you own 20 champions and have 10 games | Indicator off, one or two champions you know well | — |
The wiki’s ranked page says the 10 games must be Normal Summoner’s Rift games, which differs from Riot’s “Swiftplay or Normal Draft”. I went with Riot because its page is the newer, primary source. If you play Draft for your 10 games, both versions are satisfied.
How to reach 20 champions without wasting currency
The level takes care of itself while you play; the champion count is the gate you plan for. Your options, all from Riot and the wiki:
- Free rotations. Before level 11 you get a separate new-player rotation of forgiving champions, per Riot’s support page, and the wiki’s rotation page puts the weekly pool at about 10% of the roster. Free champions are for trying, not for the 20 you need to own.
- Blue Essence. The wiki’s Blue Essence page says the free Battle Pass pays out a total of 9,000, the capsules it gives hold champion shards worth 810 to 1,260 Blue Essence each, and new accounts get bonus missions across levels 1 to 30. Upgrading a shard costs 60% of the champion’s store price.
- Prices are lower than old guides say. Patch 25.05 cut the Blue Essence cost of all champions by 50%. A guide quoting prices from before that will overstate them.
Fail-safe: if you hit level 30 with fewer than 20 champions, you simply can’t queue Ranked yet. Spend Blue Essence on the cheapest champions in the roles you play and keep playing Draft. Nothing is lost, you’re just waiting on currency.
Version notes and where the sources disagree
- Checked against patch 26.20. I found nothing in patches 26.14 to 26.20 that changes the last-hit indicator or the unlock levels. Re-check after the next patch, since Riot said it would update players on the Ranked decision in Dev Updates.
- Ranked game count: Riot says 10 Swiftplay or Normal Draft games, the wiki says 10 Normal games. I used Riot.
- Indicator default: Riot’s own wording says off by default. A third-party report says on for new accounts. Unverified, so check in game.
- Wiki lists: the wiki’s free-rotation lists are marked as out of date on the page itself, so I used it only for the mechanism, not for champion names.
FAQ
What level do you need to play ranked in League of Legends?
Level 30, plus 20 owned champions and 10 Swiftplay or Normal Draft games. The level is the easy part. Champions are bought with Blue Essence, so the roster count is the requirement to plan for early.
Which role should a beginner play?
Mid or Top if you’re alone, because one opponent and one lane make every missed last hit visible. The trade-off is that solo lanes have nobody to share the learning with, so if you have a friend, Bottom and Support is the better route.
Should beginners use the last-hit indicator?
Yes in Swiftplay and Draft, with a plan to turn it off before Ranked. Riot says it helped new players last-hit more, and it also says experienced players switch it off because it distracts them. Both are true at different skill levels, and you’ll hit the second one sooner than you expect.
Is last-hitting in League easier than in Dota 2?
One critic thinks so. PCGamesN’s writer says League’s last hitting is “already a little more generous than in other MOBAs like Dota 2”, though that’s an opinion piece, not a measurement. If you want to compare, our Dota 2 beginner guide and Dota 2 settings cover the other side.
Will my PC run League of Legends?
Our low-end PC settings guide covers older machines, and the best settings guide covers frame rate on everything else. Frame drops make last-hitting harder, because you’re timing a killing blow to a fraction of a second, so it’s worth a few minutes in the settings before you queue.
What this guide covers, and where to go next
This hub covers the five roles, the gold model, the last-hit indicator and the unlock path to Ranked. Deeper role, champion and drill guides will link back here as they’re published. If you are choosing a first champion, see our best League of Legends champions for beginners: ten picks, two per role, ranked by how forgiving they are and checked against Iron–Bronze win rates.
Sources
- Riot Games Support. Unlocking Game Modes: unlock levels, ranked requirements. Updated May 29, 2026. Riot Games
- Riot Games. League of Legends Patch 26.13 Notes: Last Hit Indicators section. Riot Games
- Riot Games. League of Legends Patch 26.20 Notes: current patch, dated October 6, 2026. Riot Games
- Riot Games. Patch 25.05 Notes: 50% Blue Essence price reduction. Riot Games
- Riot Games Support. Choosing the Right Champion: champion classes, new-player rotation. Riot Games
- League of Legends Wiki. Position (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Position): the five roles. Fandom/Weird Gloop
- League of Legends Wiki. Last hitting (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Last_hitting): last-hit rules and perfect-CS chart (updated V26.01)
- League of Legends Wiki. Melee minion (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Melee_minion), Caster minion (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Caster_minion), Siege minion (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Siege_Minion) and Minion (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Minion): gold bounties and wave timing
- League of Legends Wiki. Gold (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Gold) and Champion gold bounties (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Champion_gold_bounties): starting gold, passive income, kill and assist bounties
- League of Legends Wiki. Ranked (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Ranked), Swiftplay (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Swiftplay), Blue Essence (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Blue_Essence) and Free champion rotation (wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Free_champion_rotation)
- PCGamesN. Riot walks back putting League of Legends’ controversial ‘last hit indicators’ into ranked play, for now. PCGamesN
- PC Gamer. Riot delays ‘last hit indicators’ in League of Legends ranked mode after fan response. PC Gamer
Illustrations in this guide were created for editorial purposes and are not in-game screenshots; the minions and champions shown are generic fantasy figures, not League of Legends characters. League of Legends is a trademark of Riot Games, Inc.
I've been playing video games for over 20 years, spanning everything from early PC titles to modern open-world games. I started Switchblade Gaming to publish the kind of accurate, well-researched guides I always wanted to find — built on primary sources, tested in-game, and kept up to date after patches. I currently focus on Minecraft and Pokémon GO.