Some players will do anything to master their favorite games.
We paid a gaming coach to teach us how to master League of Legends.
Thankfully, theres helpas long as youre willing to pay for it.
A lot of people will be like, Oh, you got a coach for a video game.
Thats very strange,' he says.
But then again, people get coaches for chess, Isles continues.
People get coaches for tennis, so whats the difference?
Still, professional video game lessons are a hard sell.
Can a few bucks and a couple hours of your time really turn you into aLeague of Legendspowerhouse?
The numbers seem to say so.
EveryLeagueplayer has a rank, which changes based on how he or she plays.
Winning games moves you up the ladder; losing knocks you back down.
Many claim that they saw immediate and measurable improvement in their game.
More than one booked additional training sessions right away.
Andres Lilly, one of Isles clients, reports even more impressive results.
That knowledge helped Lilly play better, and that translated into wins.
Its definitely effective, but only if you put in the effort on your own.
Professional coaching has a dark side, too, however.
Yu XiaoWeiXiao Xian, a popular professional player, oncereceived $1,300to boost another users account.
For customers, the allure of boosting is a little more complex.
Every year, Leagues developer Riot Games offers special cosmetic enhancements to players who reach Gold rank or higher.
Other players use boosting because they dont trust Riots ranking system.
Some people feel like the qualifiers dont rate them correctly, and turn to boosters to fix their rankings.
Occasionally, busy players use boosters to maintain their ranks when they dont have time to enter themselves.
According to Riot,boosting is cheating.
Den of Geek reached out to boosting services and clients who turned down comment for this story.
Requests to Riot for comment on its policies went unanswered.
As such, League Coachings staff focuses on spreading knowledge, not providing players with shortcuts.
A real coach doesnt play for his clients; he just helps them play better.
Anyone can sign up as a coach on League Coaching, and the site is designed to police itself.
However, this does not mean that theres no accountability.
Isles has been coachingLeague of Legendsfor about two years.
Before that, he was an aspiring eSports athlete.
Before long, he was a top-ranked amateur player.
While the bestLeague of Legendsplayers earn around$1 million annually, most arent that lucky.
That wasnt enough to live off, and Isles started looking for an extra source of income.
He signed up for League Coaching, and hasnt looked back since.
Signing up for a training session with Isles couldnt be easier.
Registering a League Coaching account and linking it to aLeague of LegendsSummoner Profile only takes a couple of minutes.
League Coaching handles the rest.
Payment is due via PayPal six hours before the lesson begins.
Naturally, I had to see whatLeague of Legendstraining was all about.
Im a beginner, but Isles took me through training as if I were slightly more advanced.
Based on my experience with other games, we settled on Lux, a light-wielding mage.
Along the way, he also dropped some general advice.
This also served as a brief introduction to Summoners Rift,League of Legends main map.
Each lane requires a different strategy to control.
Most of the time, what a coach does is help someone know what to execute.
Its up to the person to be able to do it, Isles explains.
He assigned me some homework, sent over the notes he took during our session, and said goodbye.
As a new player, the entire process was exhausting.
And yet, when I playedLeaguelater that afternoon, I had my best game ever.
Ive only played a handful of times since then, but I havent lost any of them.
Ive had more fun watchingLeaguegames too.
Isles didnt teach me any top-secret strategies or reveal any shortcuts, and everything he covered was fairly elementary.
Sometimes, thats all you need.
When I asked Isles what hed learned from coachingLeague of Legends, it all came back to the basics.
Ill have to re-do the basics for someone, and I realize that was my own problem all along.
Christopher Gates is a freelance contributor.
A version of this article appears in our print edition.
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