Preseason Overview - Communication and UI
Alongside a slew of gameplay changes, the UI has been updated and communication wheel expanded to allow players more ways to coordinate plays with their team.
Ping Wheel
The ping wheel has been an essential tool for players since League's inception, and it's now been expanded. The originals are still in the same place (danger, on my way, assist me, and enemy missing), but 4 more have been added in the diagonal spaces:
From top right to top left, the new pings are push, all-in, hold, and bait. It will take some time to adjust to the new pings, but once players have gotten used to them they'll be able to quickly communicate more sophisticated plays to their allies.
Additionally, a new vision ping wheel has been added:
From left to right, the pings are vision cleared, enemy vision, and need vision. If you send a 'need vision' ping, it will leave an indicator that lasts for 1 minute or until a ward is placed nearby. You can only have one indicator at any given time, so sending another 'need vision' ping will replace your previous one.
Vision Updates
Pinging out enemy vision is now more important than ever. If you ping an enemy ward you've seen within the last 10 seconds, a red indicator will appear for all allies conveying the ward's location and its time remaining:
The indicator will also appear if you damage the ward.
This is a huge change for the vision game, as accurate pings means you'll always know whether it's possible to pull off a surprise roam or gank. Furthermore, it's now easier to clear wards effectively with sweepers and pink wards.
On the minimap, new indicators have been added to highlight when an ally ward is close to expiring:
Ability Suggestions
Every time you level up, a visual indicator will now recommend which ability to level up next:
This recommendation is based on the most popular choice made by players, and will be updated with each patch.
Objective Voting
Objectives are one of the most important aspects of League, but require team coordination to successfully take. You can now ping an objective to start a team-wide vote to decide whether your team should contest it or not:
The Jungler's vote will count for 2, given their increased influence over the objectives with Smite.
Competitive Systems
The last set of UI updates are to competitive systems. Unless you are queueing with somebody else, your teammates' summoner names will be now be anonymous and instead appear as Ally 1-5. This deters players from seeing whether their allies are on a loss streak and forcing dodges in the lobby.
Next, if a player is detected as AFK in game, you can now surrender the game from the 3:30 minute mark instead of from 10 minutes. This reduces the amount of time players are wasting in games that are ruined by an AFK player.
Finally, if a player hasn't left the fountain for 90 seconds before the 3 minute mark, their team can initiate a remake. At 45 seconds, that player will receive a chat message telling them to leave the fountain. At 70 seconds, the player will then receive a pop-up message telling them to leave the fountain.
Summary
Most of these changes will be welcome improvements and make for a smoother in-game experience. However, the most contentious change is the new enemy ward indicator, as it provides too much valuable information for such a simple input. Time will tell whether Riot reconsiders the utility of this indicator.