League of Legends analysis: how helpful is it to one-trick?

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League of Legends. Photo Courtesy of Riot Games. /

What does this mean?

The fact that there are almost twice as many one-tricks in Challenger (26) than there are in Bronze (50) seems to indicate that one-tricking may be overrated. However, we must note that Challenger is such smaller division relative to Bronze (Challenger is only 0.03% of the ranked ladder, while Bronze is 18.26% of all ranked players). This indicates that, one-tricking is by no means a surefire way out of low elo, it certainly is not without benefits.

In fact, the data shows that one-tricks are significantly more likely to climb relative to the rest of the player base. To illustrate, here is how the ranked distribution is currently situated, worldwide (the percentage is of all players on the ladder, not percentile):

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"Challenger – 0.03% Grandmaster – 0.06% Master – 0.05% Diamond – 4.05% Platinum – 11.79% Gold – 27.2% Silver – 35.57% Bronze – 18.26% Iron – 2.99%"

But here is how that distribution would look if we based it only off the top ten one-tricks of every champion in the game:

"Challenger – 1.61% Grandmaster – 9.92% Master – 5.21% Diamond – 24.61% Platinum – 24.18% Gold – 17.85% Silver – 12.65% Bronze – 3.10% Iron – 0.87%"

If this data is even remotely reflective of the one trick player base overall, it would imply that a one-trick has better odds of getting Master or higher (16.74%) than being Silver or lower (16.62%). Just about two-thirds of the players in the top ten ranked games played for their champions were Plat or higher.

The evidence is quite overwhelming that one-tricking is far more advantageous than playing multiple champions, although it is by no means a sure thing. As long as you have a high amount of game volume on your one-trick, statistically you are going to give you a much better chance of climbing. The question, though, is which champions should you one-trick?

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