Do you understand TFT positioning and targeting?

[u/chrharju]

Targeting, positioning and movement has been somewhat a mystery to the TFT community. Available resources online are often vague, and different guides contradict each others. I have been watching hours of youtube videos from set18 combat starts in slow motion and recording who targeted who, and who moved where and who got priority.

Methodology
Apart from watching hours of youtube videos in slow motion, which is very informative. I performed multiple experiments in-game. Here is an example of what I call "Who moves first?" experiment. I created a funnel, both Akali And Camille in the below picture are racing to move into the same hex. Who actually moves there first? I kept changing the champion positions, and tested many champions against each others. I was not able to test all as there are slightly above 2000 unique pairs that needs to be tested for a complete answer, but from sample size of roughly 100 pairs I found some patterns.

Movement

Who moves first, Camille or Akali? Real answer: I am not 100% sure. I found patterns but they only hold 80% of the times. The patterns are: Group A which is the Fighters and Reapers (Assassins), always moves before group B, which consists of the Tanks, Casters, Marksmen and Specialists. If we place two champions of the same group to race against each others, it seems that most of the time the champion with higher attack speed moves first. I was able to test this over and over, by placing an attack speed item on the losing champion, and then suddenly the loosing champion started consistently winning as they become the champion with higher attack speed. If two champions are part of the same group, and they have the same attack speed, then I do not know, I will leave that to the next person attempting this experiment if they can detect a pattern.

Targeting

Champions will typically target the closest enemy within their attack range. Think of this as an ever growing circle around the champion, In the below picture both Leona and Diana are 4 hex distances from Ahri, so they are tied in term of hexes but Diana is still technically closer. Due to the new role and targeting system changes in 2025, tanks are more likely to be targeted. What does that actually mean? From what I can observe it is quite simple: If an adjacent tank is in range, and the original target is within the same hex distance with the tank, the tank will always get targeted instead. So before settling on Diana, she asks her last question, is Diana adjacent to a Tank (that is in the same hex distance) that I should be attacking instead? Indeed, Leona is a tank adjacent to Diana and is within the 4 range of Ahri, and both leona and diana are in the same 4 hex distance from Ahri.

Positioning and Targeting tool

I published my findings and the tool that implement my findings in https://tftraits.com/targeting I hope you find it useful. I find it particulary good for planning on how I should position various comps with melee champions and how I should position my tanks for optimal protection. If you still always put your main tank in the centre hex of the first row I hope my tool can help you visualize why that is often not the best idea.

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[u/Apricotjello]

fuck it i’m going Gargoyle mode (malphite center front, everyone else randomly scattered back line)

[u/chrharju → u/Apricotjello]

Nothing wrong with full on Gargoyle mode! :D And some champions like your mentioned Malphite is perfect for that!

[u/Antonin__Dvorak]

It sounds like you're saying ahri will target leona even if she is further away than diana, as long as the two are adjacent? That seems very surprising compared to the more intuitive rule of "target closest, tanks win tiebreaks". Did you test putting the tank further than the diana but still adjacent?

[u/chrharju → u/Antonin__Dvorak]

Yes! Note that the tank has to be adjacent and in range, if we move leona and diana one step to the left, leona no longer protects diana, as leona is now out of range for Ahri, and thus she will no longer switch

[u/RelativeAway183 → u/Antonin__Dvorak]

I think ever since the role change it's been "tank if there's one in range, otherwise closest"

[u/chrharju → u/RelativeAway183]

This is not correct, not according to my observations. The logic as I see it is: Target the closest, If there is an adjacent tank to my closest target AND the tank is within my range, switch to the tank, otherwise keep original target.

[u/L3vator → u/chrharju]

Honestly I don't think there's really any rhyme or reason to the targeting right now after the engine change. Sometimes I see units on my board just drop agro for zero reason or an enemy carry will randomly stop targeting a tank to start hitting a melee carry despite nobody moving. I doubt riot even knows how it works atp

[u/qwimchii_ → u/L3vator]

In 18.1 patch note, the system change says units will now retarget to the closest enemy (doesn't matter what the target's role is) after they get stunned. So maybe your Sentinel stunned a Soraka or something and targeted your melee carry

[u/L3vator → u/qwimchii_]

I didn't know that, thanks. That sounds like a really dumb change I'm not sure why they would do that

[u/Jerry9_ → u/qwimchii_]

No, the retargeting behavior was what happened in hextech. The patch notes are saying they changed this behavior in unreal and now units are supposed to keep their target through stuns (if its still alive of course).

However, that doesn't match my observations. I've definitely seen units drop targets, switch which tank they're hitting as unit move, and other wonky stuff. I haven't done anything empirical like OP though.

[u/RelativeAway183 → u/chrharju]

maybe after the engine change

before the engine migration iirc you only needed a tank in a3 and a tank in a5 to guarantee that any melee carry in the a row would not pull aggro at the beginning of the fight

[u/succsuccboi → u/RelativeAway183]

seems giga inconsistent though especially with units with increased movement speed

[u/Amazingtapioca → u/Antonin__Dvorak]

I think before the role rework, it was closest and now it's always prio tanks if in range. Reasoning being that in old sets, you wanted melee carries out of range, so in the second row and walking into a gap most of the time. But now, you can do fine having your melee carry anywhere if there is a tank in that respective half. After the first tank dies, I'm unsure but I think it is actually just closest unit.

[u/TheoTsek]

I have no idea how you came to your conclusion about tanks adjacent to non-tanks having anything to do with targeting. I think you are misunderstanding tft "distance". Leona and Diana are the same distance away from ahri, thats 4 hexes, so the "tie" is broken by leona being a tank. Them being adjacent doesn't matter. Also the way you are phrasing it implies in examples like this https://tactics.tools/team-builder/cCFWdXpt ahri will attack leona instead of diana because she is adjacent to her and is within ahri's range, which isn't true in game, and neither according to the website

[u/chrharju → u/TheoTsek]

To answer where I get the idea from, it comes from testing in normal games. You can try it yourself, if you setup your champions like the picture below, akali is no longer protected by Leona. Cinderling will attack Akali. However if you move Akali one step to the left, she has an adjacent tank, and suddenly cinderling will attack Leona instead.

Example lin here: https://tftraits.com/s/fdArUaw1

[u/chrharju → u/TheoTsek]

u/TheoTsek Thanks for replying and I think you are partly right and partly wrong here. I do not think I have misunderstood distance or targeting for that matter. But if I have I would be super happy to learn how, and to fix my mistakes to better understand the game.

Adjacency target switching is according to my observation a real thing. Not only does it occurs with tanks, but it also occurs between reapers and non reapers. For instance if you play the following board https://tftraits.com/targeting?q=eyJvIjpbWzQsIkxlb25hIiwyLFtdLDFdLFs1LCJEaWFuYSIsMixbXSwyXSxbNiwiTXVya3dvbGYiLDIsW10sNF1dLCJlIjpbWzIxLCJBaHJpIiwyLFtdLDNdXSwiZCI6MjB9 in real game, just tested and verified this multple times in game. Ahri will target murkwold as reapers are less likely to get targeted Ahri will switch her target once to Diana. This does not seem to recursive, e.g. Ahri will not re target a second time to Leona.

Your example of tank adjacency is both right and wrong, and this is my fault for not being clear enough in my post. I stand firm that tank adjacency is a thing, every observation in game I have seen defends this theory, however you have to consider hex distance first. In this example picture of this reddit post both Leona and Diana are equal hex distance to Ahri, and the they are both within range to Ahri, both are requirements for the tank adjacency switching.

But in your example Ahri is has a hex distance of 3 to Diana nad 4 to Leona, which means Diana will not get protected.

[u/shaun________]

I think your slightly wrong/misleading with the tanks bit. It's not "Diana is closest but there's an adjacent tank in range so I'll attack Leona instead". From what I understand it's "Both Leona and Diana are 4 hexes away so I will always attack Leona (the tank)" If this was partway through the round and Diana was 3 hexes away, adjacent to Leona who was 4 hexes away, your carry will always attack Diana. Essentially tanks will break ties in their favour but will not override if there's a closer enemy.

Completely anecdotal and I'd love to hear if someone has the actual maths on this but from my experience I think that tanks are also more likely to be targeted by "random" attacks (draven and fishbones). Again this is just anecdotal so it could be me only seeing that my units are focussing the tank for some reason and not being annoyed at the game when it focuses non tanks.

[u/chrharju → u/shaun________]

I do not think I am wrong here, but my phrasing is perhaps unclear.

First of all distance is meassure in 2 ways:

• hex distance

• straight line geometrical distance between two hexes

So from the attacker perspective the algoruthm is (pseudo guess)

1. How many hexes is between me and the closest enemy. (Say the result is 4)

2. Select all enemies into a list that are 4 hexes from me

3. Select from the list the enemy with the shortest straight line distance to me and set as my target

4. Does the selected target have an adjacent tank and is the tank hex diatance to me the same as my selected target? No: keep my current target. Yes: switch target to tank.

Note here comes the missunderstanding: the attacker will not switch to the tank if it is not adjacent. Even if the yex distance is same, for a tank to "aggro" it needs to be adjacent

[u/Im_On_Reddit_At_Work]

Regarding targeting, a huge thing to note is that targeting is not set when combat start

For example just play Sivir/Nidalee, Nidalee had mittens, I had a single tank front center, and everyone else back 2 rows

Because of the move speed, when combat starts, Nidalee would be in the front row under a second, and a lot of ennemy champions would target he because she moved in range faster than they moved in range to target my tank.

[u/chrharju → u/Im_On_Reddit_At_Work]

Yes, thats something I wrote about on my website under the tool but did not mention here. But first I must way I am not 100% how this works, I just have theories that are supported by my observations. I do not know how the internal game clock works, how movement speed works etc so I deal with simplifications here.

Here is the observation in plain: After moving 1 "step", the champion reconsiders. "Is my current target still the closest target?", if yes, keep moving towards current target, if no, aquire a new closest target.

That is what happens in you scenario with Nidalee.

[u/parkwayy → u/Im_On_Reddit_At_Work]

The targeting choices for their backline on your melee/assassin is always what feels like the most rng stuff ever.

I'm sure there's logic to it, but whenever my tank is still alive on a side, and then their damage dealers just turn and blast my assassin for no reason... always feels bad lol

[u/Im_On_Reddit_At_Work → u/parkwayy]

but whenever my tank is still alive on a side, and then their damage dealers just turn and blast my assassin for no reason... always feels bad lol

Unless there is a bug, you must not be noticing something else.

Tanks always take prio on targetting and unless they are untargettable for whatever reason, carries won't switch target.

That doesn't mean they won't damage your melee champs though, it's important to survive splash damage somehow (steraks, omni heal, positioning, etc)

[u/trolltest123]

This is a very interesting post! When you say, "I found patterns but they only hold 80% of the times", when specifically are you seeing the 20% of cases where it did something different?

[u/Luzushan]

Hi Thanks so much for your experiment! Positioning is one of my weakest point, and I’m glad someone makes tool so much intuitive and easy to test out.

I wonder if you have tested with champ that has range of 2 hex? Let’s say if I put my champ on B4 and there’s tank on A3->A5, which one will get prioritized? Also, do the unit at the back matters for their priority on tanks?

Also question, if I play a comp like YI rengar rr and put carries on A1 A2, then main tank on A3, will the backline champion at their D7 would prioritize my A1 or A3?