Friday, July 10 is our first Factions Friday of this arc. We’re encouraging everyone to come by for some pick-up matches, and to recruit some friends to join in. This is, essentially, an effort to make match organization easier by designating a particular day. Specifically, members of matchstaff are planning to be around starting at 7 Pacific to organize games and introduce new people to Factions. Come by if you can! Let’s see how many matches we can get going.
If you’re new to Factions, the first step is to decide whose side you’re on in the present conflict, which centers around Shuriman independence. Then, I’d recommend you hit the in-client chat:
and say hello. (If it’s full, try Factions2.) There’s also a forum where you can kill some time while waiting for a match.
Join your faction’s “ready” chat (“NOXUS”, “PILTOVER”, or “SHURIMA”, as appropriate) so that people who are organizing matches can find you. Other than that? Just clamor until someone gets a match going. There should be at least a handful of veterans around who’ll know how to do that.
The only quirk to keep in mind is that, while teams generally do not get bans in Factions matches, Noxus and Piltover do get one ban against Shurima. (This is part of their partial early victory. Shurima was stomping so hard to start with that we paused to give them a big story gain—League recognition and sovereignty—and then resumed with some balancing nerfs.) Azir and Sivir are immune, as members of the imperial household.
What’s this about?
For people who are brand new, and have no idea what Factions is or why they’ve just been linked this page, here’s a very concise version of the What’s Factions? introductory page.
A screenshot of the first match of Mirrorwater.
Factions is a community game mode in which Summoners declare for a faction, like Noxus or Piltover, and then fight matches (organized as custom games) using faction-specific Champion lists. It’s a bit like Riot’s original Noxus versus Ionia match, only configured so that anyone can start or join a match anytime. Each match is worth points, with the winning faction gaining points and the losing faction losing points. (We use a skill-adjust algorithm based on observed winrates to keep things fair, no matter the rank compositions of the two teams.) We keep track of how the matches go, and use the outcomes to determine the course of a developing storyline. We break the story up into “arcs”, each lasting about three months, and each featuring a different set of playable factions.
There have been six prior storylines since Factions started about two years ago. We’re now on our seventh: Lines in the Sand.
The current arc is Lines in the Sand. Azir has raised the Sun Disc from the ruins of his capital and proclaimed a new Shuriman Empire, sparking a war that the League of Legends is now struggling to contain. (The current combatants are Shurima, Noxus, and Piltover; the League is doing everything it can to keep other factions from entering the fray and making matters worse.) Shurima’s early victories have secured it recognition as a League member state, but the fighting continues.
To answer a very common question: no, you do not have to stick with the same faction forever. Your declaration of allegiance ends when the current arc does, leaving you free to fight for whomever you like in the next arc.
Helpful Links
Matches are generally organized from the Factions chat in the client:
You can also join your faction’s specific chat room (e.g. “NOXUS”, “PILTOVER”, “SHURIMA”) to make it easier for match organizers to find you.
Finally, you may want to send friend requests to one or more members of matchstaff:
- Matchstaff Lead: 501st Big Mike
- Matchstaff Lead: Porkchopz
- Assistant Staffer:
Twilight ShroudKawaii AsunaAsk KonataWistfulKwon Ri Sae
- Assistant Staffer: insaiyanbacca
- Assistant Staffer: Shiisaa
- Assistant Staffer: XalkXolc
—CupcakeTrap
Caitlyn, you monster.
FACTIONS 
[…] Here are the July 10 recruitment results, just in time for Factions Friday. […]