League of Legends new Champion Smolder is a dragon in training

With 2024 underway and the latest season of League of Legends coming, we’ve finally got our first look at the first new character to come to the roster this year: Smolder The Fiery Fledgling. Smolder is a young dragon that was stolen from his home as a hatchling and raised by humans, but his mother has since found him and now he’s learning what it means to be a dragon. In fact, he’ll be learning in real-time as you play him in matches, acting as a ranged caster that will gain strength as you continue to use his abilities.

Smolder was revealed by Riot Games in a special look at League of Legends’ 2024 Season this week. As mentioned above, Smolder is a dragon, but he doesn’t have that whole “being a dragon” thing downpat since he was stolen from his kind. As a result, Smolder is learning on the fly (sometimes literally). Hitting Champions with his abilities or killing anything with a particular ability will let him gain stacks of Dragon Practice that increase his basic ability damage and even change some abilities over the course of a match. That means he can become a very dangerous force by the end of the game.

Smolder's Q ability, Super Scorcher Breath, will grow in strength as you gain stacks of Dragon Practice, making it a devastating move by the end of a match.
Source: Riot Games

Here's the full rundown of Smolder’s abilities, as shared by Riot Games:

Passive - Dragon Practice: Hitting champions with Abilities and killing enemies with Super Scorcher Breath grants Smolder a stack of Dragon Practice. Stacks increase the damage of Smolder's basic Abilities.

Q - Super Scorcher Breath: Smolder belches flame at his enemies. This Ability evolves with stacks gaining the following:

25: Damages all enemies surrounding the target.
125: Sends explosions behind the target that deal 75% of this spell's damage.
225: Burns the target dealing max Health true damage over 3 seconds. Enemy champions that drop below a total health threshold while burning are killed instantly.

W - Achooo!: Smolder lets out an adorable flaming sneeze, damaging and slowing enemies hit. Hitting champions causes an additional explosion.

E - Flap, Flap, Flap: Smolder takes flight, gaining Move Speed and ignoring terrain for 1.25 seconds. While flying, Smolder attacks the lowest health enemy.

R - MMOOOMMMM!: Smolder's mom breathes fire from above, dealing extra damage and slowing enemies in the center of her fire. Smolder's mom also heals her son if she hits him.

We don’t have an official release date for Smolder yet, but League of Legends Season 2024 is set to start on or around January 10, 2024, so we’d suggest keeping an eye out for the little dragon then. For more information, be sure to check out our League of Legends topic for all of our latest coverage.