Here you’ll learn about everything you need to know, to get started playing this new and exciting game mode. Swarm is a PvE mode where you face off against hordes of monsters trying to survive until the very end where you will then fight against the Boss Monster for that level. You can either stand alone in Solo play, or you can have up to three players join you in the fight against the Primordian invaders.
Choosing Your Champion
There are 9 different playable champions in Swarm, but you will have to complete several different tasks to unlock all of them. For your very first game, you can choose to play as Jinx or Seraphine. You and your teammates can play the same champions, so don’t worry about not having enough different champions for everyone.
Each champion has unique abilities featuring:
A Passive Ability, a Basic Ability, a Powerful Ultimate Ability, and an exclusive weapon.
Facecheck Recommendation:
For your first game, we suggest starting with Seraphine as it is easier to survive longer when playing her thanks to her basic ability granting a large shield for when you are in danger, and her ultimate granting her Invulnerability as well as crowd controlling all enemies in a large area around her. Seraphine’s passive helps considerably when you’re new to the mode as it will cause any projectile weapons you have to have a 25% chance to attack twice.
Maps & Gameplay
Swarm features 4 distinct maps that can be played at 3 difficulties:
- Story
- Hard
- Extreme
To unlock the next difficulty you first must beat all 4 maps on the current highest difficulty. Each map features a unique map mechanic, monster waves, and a specific boss you will fight if you survive for 15 minutes against the progressively stronger hordes of enemies.
Map One: Warehouse District
- Map Mechanic: Healing Fountain
- Map Boss: Primordian Rek’Sai
- Difficulty: 1/3
Map Two: The Outskirts
- Map Mechanic: Ion Cannon
- Map Boss: Primordian Briar
- Difficulty: 1/3
Map Three: Subterranean Lab
- Map Mechanic: Freeze Bomb
- Map Boss: Primordian Bel’Veth
- Difficulty: 2/3
Map Four: The Beachhead
- Map Mechanic: Commander Fortune
- Map Boss: Primordian Aatrox
- Difficulty: 3/3
Taking Control
From the moment you get in-game, swarms of increasingly stronger monsters will begin appearing to attack you.
Why Isn’t It Working?
The first major differences that you will notice are you move your Champion with the WASD keys, and your weapons fire automatically at enemies with a cooldown between each attack. Your weapons not only fire automatically but can be toggled to either, fire toward your cursor, or to automatically target the closest enemy to your champion. There are benefits to both so try to get used to switching when you need to focus on a particular enemy or direction.
Gaining Levels
As you kill enemies they will drop orbs of experience on the ground for you to collect. After your team collects enough experience all players will level up and be offered 3 choices of either a new Weapon, a new Passive, or an additional level up in one of their existing Weapons or Passives.
You can only equip up to 5 weapons, with 1 being automatically chosen for the character being played. For your first game there will only be 3 Passives for you to choose from, but you will also only have 3 Passive slots. There are 12 Passives in total and the maximum number of Passive slots is 6, so as you progress you will have to decide what Passives you want for your Champion and those you do not.
How’s That For Firepower!!
Your character in Swarm uses their weapons to help them fight off and defeat enemies. There are 20 generic weapons that can be used by any playable Champion, and there are 9 Weapons that are exclusive to one champion that they always start the game with.
Each Weapon comes with different strengths and weaknesses and can be empowered, or “Evolved,” into a much more powerful version of itself if the player possesses the corresponding Passive for that Weapon. Additionally, the amount of damage a Weapon deals can be increased by obtaining any of the designated Passives that are displayed in the Weapon’s tooltip. When selecting a Weapon if you currently possess that Weapon’s Passive to evolve, it will be shown below the Weapon.
To Evolve a Weapon you must first put a total of 5 levels into that Weapon, and then collect an Access Card, these are collectible drops that are dropped on the ground after the players take down an elite enemy or after succeeding at one of the various randomly selected bonus events that are offered if the players are up for the challenge. When picked up, each player is offered a single option to choose from being either an available Weapon Evolve or a level up for one of their currently selected Weapons or Passives.
Facecheck Recommendation:
When you first start playing the game you won’t be able to find every Weapon or Passive that a Weapon may need to evolve. Try to focus on Weapons that upgrade with Passives you have access to early on, these include Weapons such as Statikk Sword, Radiant Field, and Iceblast Armor.
Persistent Upgrades
Unlike other game modes, you can also spend the gold you earn from playing to purchase a similar increase to your champion’s stats that you would with selecting a Passive in the game. These will help make your character stronger and help you grow in strength even when you are unable to beat the boss at the end of a game.
Each Upgrade has its own cost and number of times it can be purchased. Every purchase increases the cost of purchasing that upgrade. Most upgrades must first be unlocked by completing quests before they can be purchased.
Objective Complete
Players have a list of missions or objectives that the player can accomplish to start unlocking the majority of Swarm’s content; such as new Weapons, new Augments, or new Characters. The majority of missions are fairly simple or straightforward but grant powerful rewards, but some are more challenging and provide a lot of fun as you try to complete them.
Who Doesn’t Love A Challenge?
Yuumi Quests
Once you complete the mission to defeat 15000 enemies, you unlock in-game Yuumi quest events. Every few minutes these events will appear for you to finish in time. These are minigames that will reward you afterward with a powerful augment that lasts for the entire run. Many Augments come with both a downside and an upside or if they have no downside they will only grant a limited amount of power compared to other Augments.
Bel’Veth Trials
After surviving for at least 5 minutes on hard mode you will unlock in-game Bel’Veth trials. These are challenges that make the game significantly harder for a short time but if you are successful will reward you with a ton of gold as well as experience plus an Access Card for Evolving one of your Weapons if you max it out from the Exp.
Matchmaking island
Once you have finished all the maps on Story difficulty, you gain access to Matchmaking Island, which is a queue type for Swarm, that will group you into a team of 4 players using you and and any party members to form a team. You will fight on a random map on the Hard difficulty.
Closing thoughts
Swarm promises to be a fun and entertaining way to relax with some friends who also love the league universe with none of the usual competitive stress and frustration that can be felt when trying to play Summoner’s Rift. We hope that this guide helps you prepare yourself to start enjoying this fun new game mode.