RiotMeddler

You'd want to keep an eye out for Insights roles on our website in this category:

https://www.riotgames.com/en/work-with-us/jobs#craft=insights

Balance team, or related work also using stats, would have 'Gameplay' or 'Summoner's Rift' in the description somewhere

We do. I'm not familiar with that hiring pipeline myself, you'd want to watch out for roles in the 'Insights' category on our website though:

https://www.riotgames.com/en/work-with-us/jobs#craft=insights

Example job:

...

Required Qualifications: 2+ years of experience as a game design manager 5+ years of experience as a game designer, at least some of which has been on PVP game(s) Senior Design craft ability across Mechanics, Systems, and Metasystems design Demonstrated expertise in competitive games having delivered genre leading designs Demonstrated managing other designers leading to promotion and substantial positive improvements in their work Leadership experience resolving conflict within and across teams, and when needed offering difficult feedback with respect Has been a leader on teams who built a healthy culture and higher performance Builds strong relationships with leadership from a range of disciplines to multiply their quality and output Demonstrated ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously, keeping them on track and providing the essential feedback they need to succeed

More details at:

...

Stuff like that certainly helps

This one's a very senior role, hence that minimum requirement. Entry level roles do get posted fairly regularly, normally just with the title 'Game Designer' and are good fits for people without existing industry experience but other relevant qualifications (relevant degrees, modding experience, game jam work etc).

Emphasizing a portfolio of things you've worked on in a cover letter is really valuable. That doesn't have to be full games necessarily, could also be things like mods, student projects, theorycraft blogs/videos etc.

I believe we require people either be currently studying at a university/college or have just graduated in order to be eligible to apply for an internship. I'm not the expert there though, so there's a chance that's wrong. When internships are posted on our website they will outline the required qualifications

At present it's fairly hard to get inexperienced international candidates visas so they can work in the US, since most of the visa programs require demonstration of expertise in your field. Not impossible, so worth applying when a role is open, but challenging.

Not at present at least. Given the way the industry as a whole is moving towards more remote work who knows though in three years?

It's a combination of management, strategy development and just plain design problem solving when needed.

Significant game design experience is essential for this one. While we're very open to people from other fields getting into design that needs to happen in more junior roles, not one with this degree of oversight. Expectation is this person will help mentor other designers to grow their craft, so they need to have a strong history of design themselves.

Rather than having a single team that does game stats work we have one or two people as part of the teams that work on different parts of the game (e.g. the SR team that does balance has an analyst, the teams that make skins and other cosmetics have a couple, TFT has a couple etc). It's a role we're often looking for more people for too, so definitely opportunities there!

Ok, I'm convinced. Everyone - turn up at the office on Monday.

Having said that, if anyone at all is missing, deal's off.

It's a demanding job at times, speaking from experience (I used to do this job myself) it's an awful lot of fun too though :)

We're a big company and growing, I'm confident we'll have design roles open in a year :).

For recent graduates the ones with the title 'Game Designer' are generally ideal, they're aimed at people with college qualifications and/or some relevant professional experience. We don't have any currently open I can link as an example but we do open them up pretty regularly!

It's an important role certainly, but at the same time LoL doesn't succeed or fail because of a single person IMO. Like other leadership at Riot this role isn't about dictating exactly what to do to the teams and people on them, but instead about building a strategy for the teams, helping people grow their skills, reviewing work etc.

I have such faith!

On a somewhat related note - if anyone's got serious questions do feel free to DM me here! I don't have DMs open on Twitter but happy to chat here though

Appreciate the feedback. Those surveys can feel a bit weird to fill out. They are a really effective method of generating a ranked list of things like favourite champions, points of frustation, motivations to play etc. A single person's responses can be misleading, aggregating thousands together however produces a really useful result though.

Instakill - your unit is gone Mind Control - your unit is gone from your team and helping kill the rest of their team

Details matter a lot of course, so it's not really that simple, that was what the experience felt like playtesting it though

I think Shyvana does need a VGU. Only question for me is how to prioritize her versus other highly in need champs like Udyr for example. I wouldn't consider a VGU that didn't strongly support a fighter playstyle as appropriate given her history and fantasy.

Agreed. Can't make any promises on timeline, but at some point I'd like to expand Champ Mastery a bit more as a system.