Patch Chat with the Playtest Team: 6.17, the Pre-Worlds Patch

RiotAesah·Aug 24, 2016·1 votes·135,674 views

Hey guys! Welcome to Patch Chat, a Dev Corner thread we make to talk about the new patch every two weeks.

I'm Aesah on Riot's Playtest Team, a group of Diamond+ players who play with the new champions, reworks, balance tweaks, items, and map updates before they are released. It's our job to the test the changes that our designers come up with and ensure that we're introducing positive changes to LoL in terms of both balance and fun. We'll be around for the next few hours to answer as many questions as we can.

In 6.17, we're nerfing a few champions that have had an overbearing presence (pick/ban rate) in professional play. Specifically, S-tier junglers Gragas and Rek'sai who have been crowding out other options are both taking a hit. In the ADC role, Ashe/Sivir/Jhin are losing a bit of power while some other ADCs get minor buffs to bring them more in line with each other. Finally, Gangplank and Trundle are getting nerfs as well- Gangplank in particular taking a heavier hit due to how strong of a pick he has been for awhile. These powerhouses have been making teams uninterested in other choices when they've been available, so we hope that taking them down a notch will allow teams to feel comfortable picking a wider variety of champions and bring some new dynamics on to the Rift.

All of us on the Playtest Team are avid gamers so feel free to talk to us as fellow LoL players!

Adam "Afic" Cohen Preston “Hinder” Bunker Ben “Cezium” Burkhardt Shawn “I Am The IRS” Currie Don “Aesah” Ding Nicolas “Gleeb” Haddad Dan “Penguin” Hardison Miles “Daydreamin” Hoard Bao “Bao” Lam Robert “RobertxLee” Lee Nicholas “Nickwu” Smith Blake “S0be” Soberanis Trevor “ThEntropist” Thernes

578 Comments

adidasAug 24, 201676 votes

The shen nerfs are completely unjustified. Even Meddler himself said he felt pretty unappealing to play sometimes.

The sad part is, with around 170 games and mast 7 on Shen on my other account. its pretty freaking sick how i was already considering dropping Shen because he already feels like trash to play sometimes. His ult is great but other than fighting riven and poppy you are bullied out of lane so much. Shen doesnt deserve any nerfs at all in fact i was thinking he needs buffs before i play him again in ranked. 18 Second E 18 second W at level 1 and you max those after Q. Shit shen even loses to teemo.

Its pretty sick how you guys are completely moving a champion to ''Only play him if you're in the lcs'' type because in normal play hes now considered heavily nerfed and probably a horrible pick.

Honestly its extremely frustrating that i have shens' skins but hes going straight from ''balanced'' to ''horrible tier''

I'd honestly wouldnt mind a refund because essentially you guys are excuse my language. Fucking over your whole playerbase, because of 100 players.

InTheoryAug 24, 20169 votes

[deleted]

CommanderCAug 24, 20166 votes

agreed

CommanderCAug 24, 20167 votes

and i dont even like shen

CarameI FrappeAug 24, 201613 votes

item 1051 I'd bump your fist because of how painfully right you are sir. +1 vote.

Im SupaHotFireAug 24, 20166 votes

{quoted}

The shen nerfs are completely unjustified. Even Meddler himself said he felt pretty unappealing to play sometimes.

The sad part is, with around 170 games and mast 7 on Shen on my other account. its pretty freaking sick how i was already considering dropping Shen because he already feels like trash to play sometimes. His ult is great but other than fighting riven and poppy you are bullied out of lane so much. Shen doesnt deserve any nerfs at all in fact i was thinking he needs buffs before i play him again in ranked. 18 Second E 18 second W at level 1 and you max those after Q. Shit shen even loses to teemo.

Its pretty sick how you guys are completely moving a champion to ''Only play him if you're in the lcs'' type because in normal play hes now considered heavily nerfed and probably a horrible pick.

Honestly its extremely frustrating that i have shens' skins but hes going straight from ''balanced'' to ''horrible tier''

I'd honestly wouldnt mind a refund because essentially you guys are excuse my language. Fucking over your whole playerbase, because of 100 players.

Yeah I feel your pain. I was a Shen main of over 300 games played. I had to quit him. The rework was a complete failure. The dodge mechanic is clunky as hell. Took out his sustain and just added nice base damage and stats to make him "Competitive". The theme is just the last nail in the coffin. A ninja that just drags a non-ninja sword behind him. Can't throw or swing it. I mean wtf were they thinking.

RiotAesahAug 24, 201628 votes

We're looking at nerfing Shen due to his extremely high pick/ban rate in pro play. I would expect the Shen nerfs currently on PBE to drop his normal/ranked winrate by a couple percent so he'd still be completely playable for anyone (I would expect Shen players to lose 1 more game out of every 50 games on average, which is not particularly disastrous especially considering his normal/ranked winrate is reasonably close to 50% right now).

I'd advise against using hyperbole because when someone thinks that a medium-sized nerf to 1 champion qualifies as "fucking over our entire playerbase", it's very hard to respond to that in any meaningful manner except "no, it doesnt?" but that just feels like stating the obvious to me.

World EnderAug 24, 201634 votes

It's not a medium sized nerf though, it's a huge one. His Q is literally the only thing in his kit that he can use to deal damage (and even then the damage he deals falls off incredibly hard outside of lane phase). I can understand nerfing the percent health damage, but nerfing the damage to minions and monsters is incredibly ridiculous. Most Shens don't even buy a single damage item, so now you're cutting the damage on his Q to minions by over 25% at rank 5? If that's not huge, I don't know what is.

Also, if you want to disrupt his impact in pro play, why are you nerfing his damage, instead of the actual reason why he's picked? Shen is not picked to be a lane dominant champion or to carry out of top lane like someone such as Riven or Fiora, he's picked for his ultimate and his taunt. Nerfing his damage is akin to having a hole in a ship, and instead of fixing the hole, you make another one so that the first is no longer your focus. He will still be picked in pro play, he will still be pick/ban, and meanwhile the people outside of competitive will have to deal with atrocious waveclear and damage. It's hard enough as is to do well with Shen (especially in lower ELO where your teammates run away as soon as you ult them or don't stand in your W) and now the only part of his kit that allows him to actually do a little bit of damage and survive on his own is being nerfed?

Also, one more thing I'd like to discuss while you're here is the sheer difference between competitive play and normal play, and how so many champions (Rek'Sai, Gragas, Nidalee, Gangplank, Sivir, Azir, and now Shen, and the list goes on and on and on...) are nerfed because of their near constant use in the LCS. To me, this is something that is not only unfair to people outside of competitive, but also indirectly deceptive and malicious. The fact that many of these champions are only most effectively utilized in the highest tiers of play and are nerfed for the rest of the playerbase to compensate facilitates and emphasizes the discrepancy between what is seen by the average player in LCS and what the average player actually plays. This is unhealthy for the game, plain and simple. I shouldn't have to feel that a certain champion is not viable in my ELO simply because the pros abuse and min/max the champion in ways that I cannot. This will always be a problem unless either somehow professional League undergoes major changes, such as imposing limits in some way to what champions can or cannot be played or the entire balance system having a Plat+ balance and a Gold- balance. The fact that League is balanced around the top 5% of all players mean that, for the other 95%, the game has the potential to become unbalanced. Obvious, yes, but it seem like the balance team never addresses this, even though it's probably one of the most important issues in the game.

In summary: I should not have to suffer Shen nerfs that are aimed at professional play when I'm in a vastly different tier, playing what feels like a completely different game.

RiotAesahAug 24, 201613 votes

Another thing to keep in mind is that while you guys are free to ask questions about anything, this is Patch Chat 6.17 where we haven't touched Shen. The PBE is a PBE for a reason; not all of the changes on it necessarily go through- the changes you see to Shen there aren't final.

That being said, I'm pretty sure we're going to be handing him a nerf, just not sure of the extent.

World EnderAug 24, 201623 votes

I recognize and understand that. I was simply looking for some context as to why Worlds balance somehow circumvents balance for the rest of the playerbase, but I guess I won't find that answer here.

adidasAug 24, 201622 votes

[{quoted}](name=Riot Aesah,realm=NA,application-id=A7LBtoKc,discussion-id=FTNhAQKr,comment-id=000a0003,timestamp=2016-08-24T21:21:44.161+0000)

We're looking at nerfing Shen due to his extremely high pick/ban rate in pro play. I would expect the Shen nerfs currently on PBE to drop his normal/ranked winrate by a couple percent so he'd still be completely playable for anyone (I would expect Shen players to lose 1 more game out of every 50 games on average, which is not particularly disastrous especially considering his normal/ranked winrate is reasonably close to 50% right now).

I'd advise against using hyperbole because when someone thinks that a medium-sized nerf to 1 champion qualifies as "fucking over our entire playerbase", it's very hard to respond to that in any meaningful manner except "no, it doesnt?" but that just feels like stating the obvious to me.

'' ensure that we're introducing positive changes to LoL in terms of both balance and fun.''

By fun and balance you mean ''LCS strictly'' Correct?

I dont understand, You claim to be diamond+ players yet you guys jump on Shen.

I got a better idea, how about we delete this fucker Ekko ? Ekkos been plaguing this game for how long now? Why are we focused on shen because he gets some nice picks on teams now?

CLG vs TSM game, Where was shen? You claimed he was pick/ban state yet he was not picked Nor banned

C9 vs IMT game, Where was shen? You claim hes in a pick/ban state yet he was not picked Nor banned.

These are Semi-final games, IF he was remotely close to being pick/ban he wouldve been.... Picked or banned but he wasent.

Its honestly horrible that he was even looked at for that HP regen nerf which made no sense,

Champs like Gnar whom are 100% plaguing top lane, Has % health W % health E Energy Q poke that slows and loses half the CD if grabbed again then his passive he gains about 700 health like 70 total free armor and MR then has a line up Stun on the W boulder slow toss on his Q that lowers the CD by far and his fucking amazing ult that allows him to 100-0 mostly any champ if landed on and an E jump and the a lot more shit he has including his OTHER passive at 100% rage that makes him into a mini hulk from the free attack speed he gets for a few seconds

But no.... Shen needs nerf because he has good global presence.

ok....?

Since global presence is an issue, Lets see Soraka nerfs

her ult is a 150/250/350 that scales off i think 60% AP? Then its increased by half if someones below 40% to every teammate on the map.

You know why i like Shen?

So Olaf ( Which is a champ whoms only counterplay is ''kill him fast'' ) doesnt run to my fuckin adc and 100-0 them in 1 second

Or you know? The fizz that completely whiffed his ult, used his playful trickster to GET to my adc without actually hitting them, then used his Q to actually hit my adc and then pressed W and boom their dead, from only 2 hits.

Or how about my personal favorite? When akali builds a sunfire cape with like half a fuckin AP item and bursts my adc in 2 seconds

Oh that doesnt happen? Really? http://plays.tv/s/Kvs_p54FGeMY

I love shen because im able to protect my adc because i know how much retarded damage is in the game now. I'd be fine with the shen nerfs if thunderlords + fervor was completely removed from this game that way Bard doesnt throw a Q at anything with less than 100 AP and proc thunderlords for about 25% of their health.

I love playing shen, i love his design, i love protecting my teammates, But i aint ever touching him again. And no this aint a ''omg nerf olaf and akali rant'' at the end of my sentences but its more like ''this is bullshit to anyone who plays shen because even the people who mained shen for YEARS have already quit the dude after his horrible rework.

RiotplaytestpenguinAug 24, 201621 votes

Ekko requires more changes than just simple numbers tweaks.

That's all I feel comfortable saying.

KeevalroyAug 24, 201610 votes

So...Riot finally admits Ekko's design is problematic and might need something other than number changes?

I...love you.

adidasAug 24, 20167 votes

{quoted}

Ekko requires more changes than just simple numbers tweaks.

That's all I feel comfortable saying.

You are 100% right. So why with every champ whos kit is 100% fundamentally overly done ekko kalista and azir we've only been doing hard number nerfs? of course kalista had other shit in the beginning but you get the point. Ekkos numbers should be reduced a looooot more right now becausehes still fucking the game. That way nobody will play him

RiotplaytestpenguinAug 24, 201613 votes

Because figuring out how to change champions fundamentally is something that takes a large amount of time and isn't taken lightly. There's a lot of questions to ask:

Do these characters need a full scale rework? Or just small scope stuff (think Annie or the lesser Mid-Year Mage updates)
Do designers want to support multiple playstyles for champions? Or pidgeonhole them into one direct build? (This is something that is debated constantly because it's a player pain point when fun builds are basically destroyed, even when they're pretty clearly unhealthy for the game (Tank Yasuo/Tank Ekko/Triforce ekko)
Players typically respond horribly to removal of features, even when these features make champions overbearing. Think original Azir who had way too much in his kit. Remove his E knockup and he's still too good? Can designers just remove mechanics without murdering the original identity of the champion?

etc etc

and I'm just on playtest -- the designers talk about all of this & more constantly. It's an unending conversation.

adidasAug 24, 20169 votes

{quoted}

Because figuring out how to change champions fundamentally is something that takes a large amount of time and isn't taken lightly. There's a lot of questions to ask:

Do these characters need a full scale rework? Or just small scope stuff (think Annie or the lesser Mid-Year Mage updates)

Do designers want to support multiple playstyles for champions? Or pidgeonhole them into one direct build? (This is something that is debated constantly because it's a player pain point when fun builds are basically destroyed, even when they're pretty clearly unhealthy for the game (Tank Yasuo/Tank Ekko/Triforce ekko)

Players typically respond horribly to removal of features, even when these features make champions overbearing. Think original Azir who had way too much in his kit. Remove his E knockup and he's still too good? Can designers just remove mechanics without murdering the original identity of the champion?

etc etc

and I'm just on playtest -- the designers talk about all of this & more constantly. It's an unending conversation.

Thats not what im talking about though.

If shens whole ''broken too much presence and impact '' because his ult, why are we nerfing his Q..? His wave clear is so horrible that i legit think vayne has more until you get a tit.hydra or sunfire even then its ''ok..'' at best...

Nerf his ult, Not his Q. Nerfing his Q just shows that the people who vouch for it never actually played shen. His Q damage is horrible after the 10 minute mark.

RiotCeziumAug 25, 201611 votes

Because we're targeting his weakness, not nerfing his strengths. When we start nerfing champions strengths they begin to homogenize as they lose their strategic identities. If we nerfed Shen's ult, players wouldn't pick Shen for the global pressure he brings - they'd just pick him if his ball of stats was greater than someone else's.

Now this of course ends up with the question of how do you nerf something who's niche is so powerful in competitive and leads to hitting his weaknesses. By nerfing his Q and in essence damaging his waveclear, there's now a tradeoff for having such a powerful global ultimate. You are no longer capable of splitpushing like a monster while simultaneously providing the best global pressure in the game.

Comrad BlackAug 25, 201610 votes

While I appreciate the clarification regarding the thought process behind the nerf, personally, it doesn't seem like a terribly effective way to balance him. The vast majority of Shen's waveclear is purchased. Sunfire's the big one, but there's also Titanic Hydra, Zz'Rot, and even Banner of Command. Anything that lets him effectively splitpush is purchased, not tied to his Q.

(There's also he semi-meta issue of "Well, if he can't push waves, what's the point of him being on his own, and in turn, having a global ult?" but that gets a bit complicated/speculative).

If him being able to CS early on is an issue, make it completely unable to damage minions, force my little low-elo Shen soul learn how to CS properly. I'd rather be able to do any damage to my opponent early on then have a csing/waveclear crutch. It would completely kill jungle Shen, but the nerfs as they are do that anyway.

It's just a mix of frustrating and concerning, reading what Riot's trying to actually achieve with these changes, and how they think it will impact him. Removing 15-20% of a Shen's single target damage against champions, so he has worse waveclear, is an extremely brute force solution that will hurt solo players far more then the pro niche it's targeted at.

RiotCeziumAug 25, 20168 votes

Well for one it has hurt his waveclear based on the playtests we've run. I didn't think it was going to make much of a difference, but I definitely felt the weaker waveclear. In addition, in competitive play he's not buying most of the other things beyond Sunfire until much later in the game. Part of the goal for these changes is to force more of his itemization purchases towards waveclear.

But it is possible we do need to focus more of the bonus damage to minions, although that likely disproportionately effects low elo than high elo (who are generally much better at cs'ing)

Comrad BlackAug 25, 201614 votes

That's... encouraging? Probably the wrong word. Lessens my feeling of Riot blindly stat-smashing.

To combine this with a response with one to another reply you made to me about him not being about the damage: Sure, he's never been about the damage. He's arguably not really about being a tank, given that his base stats are 1-2 rune pages worse then most other tanks. He's about those moments when your macro play is on point, you ult someone who's getting 3 vs 1 dove under a tower, and you turn a certain death into a triple kill for your team. You get the joy of like an entire match playing support for a good team condensed into your team mate going "SHEN GOD! FUCK YEAH!".

But those are moments. Laning makes up a ton of actual gameplay by time spent, and Shen's got so many losing match ups in lane right now. So many people building Black Cleaver, or dealing true damage, or spamming 15 dashes when he's only got one (hi Yasuo), or they're just simply a ranged champion. One of the only ways you can deal with that is, bluntly, to outplay them - to score the pull through, to hold on to your dash for the perfect moment to taunt them into taking tower shots. etc. Nerfing the sword pull through in particular is really concerning to me, since it reduces the reward for outplaying your opponent, and in turn makes his laning phase even more of a slog.

(Doesn't matter if Q can 1-shot minions if you have to eat a full skill rotation each time you try to do anything other than cs under tower, since you deal zero damage)

I wouldn't mind it if any of his skills functionally scaled with stats, but they don't, so it's not like I've really got the recourse of "Well, you can build aggressively! AP Shen mah brutha!" if these nerfs go through. (Some) folks at /r/Shen have had some luck basically just slapping AD assassin/bruiser items on him, but that seems like such a depressing failure of design if I've got to build a BF sword to do more that 3% of someone's health in lane. At that point it seems like you're far better off just playing Tahm Kench to (functionally - I realize it's based on Kench's health) get Shen's Q damage as a passive, a methadone version of his ult, and far better base stats.

RiotplaytestpenguinAug 25, 20163 votes

If shens whole ''broken too much presence and impact '' because his ult, why are we nerfing his Q..? His wave clear is so horrible that i legit think vayne has more until you get a tit.hydra or sunfire even then its ''ok..'' at best...

That's important, otherwise his intended strategic identity is just too strong to be in the game. Champions should have weaknesses. Nerfing Shen's ultimate would nerf the main reason he's actually picked and what makes shen cool.

World EnderAug 25, 201612 votes

Yes but if you nerf him to the point where he's nothing but an ult bot, what then? The same thing has happened to Rek'Sai, she's literally just a vision/knockup bot now. Don't ruin a champion because they are too strong at the competitive level. That's not a good philosophy and is unhealthy for the game as a whole.

Yuumi or LoseAug 24, 201614 votes

Any changes on Heimerdinger and Ohmwrecker?

Is Heimer going to get another rework? He seems to be untouched. He doesn't see competitive play and rarely even gets played in ranked or norms.

And I saw something happening on PBE about ohmwrecker but it got pulled. What's up with that?

RiotCeziumAug 24, 20163 votes

He might, but I have absolutely no context on that. I think he has a pretty niche playstyle that most people aren't really going to enjoy and because of how it plays out usually the kit involves more not fun for those playing against than fun for those playing as. I'd love it if we found a way to make Heimer more fun, though, so here's to hoping something might happen in the future.

Haven't seen anything about Ohmwrecker.

DarklightningAug 24, 20167 votes

Well Riot typically makes things a lot more complicated so that mastery of real world things like painting are more in reach than mastery of champions... why not make it so that his turrets do more damage, but "break down" so that Heimer has to "work on them". The more recently he has worked on them, the stronger they are. This keeps him engaged on the turrets and gives windows of opportunity to the enemy... separating the good Heimers from the ones that have no life...

RiotCeziumAug 24, 20168 votes

That's a cool idea, and ideas like that are definitely things we think about when starting to work on champions!

No promises on it making it into the game though lol

StarlighteAug 24, 201611 votes

Why is Lissandra getting nerfed? Who thinks her power is out of line?

RiotAesahAug 24, 201611 votes

I quickly browsed the top 4 rated recently played pro matches on reddit (G2 vs UOL, CLG vs TSM, C9 vs IMT, ROX vs KT) and Lissandra was featured in all 4 series - sometimes in multiple games per series. As mentioned in the OP, when champions have such high presence that other champions are overshadowed by them we tend to take them down a bit.

She isn't in a crazy problematic state or anything, so the nerfs are fairly minor.

KeevalroyAug 24, 201610 votes

It's our job to the test the changes that our designers come up with and ensure that we're introducing positive changes to LoL in terms of both balance and fun.

Wow, that sounds cool, when does this start?

Cynicism aside, why does Riot spend so much time and effort on the pro scene rather than the rest of us? I was under the impression that as a player-focused company, the game the regular players play should be placed at a much higher priority than what spectators see on the big screen.

Over the last few seasons since the LCS started, Riot has seemed more and more invested on what the game looks like rather than what it feels like, often creating and forcing overloaded, flashy, hyper-mobile champions into the spotlight, and pushing "boring" picks to the side. In addition to the "boring" picks, whenever the LCS is stale, Riot appears to nerf and buff just to have something new show up, even when non-professional games have a stable meta with for the most part, healthy picks in decent spots.

Tl;dr - Why punish standard players for what happens in the pro scene if Riot claims to be player focused?

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 20167 votes

I would say on average we spend more time balancing around solo queue than we do around pro play. The few exceptions are when we are leading into a major event and want to put a bit more focus on pro play so that the patch that will be played competitively won't be horribly imbalanced for 2 months. After 6.18 I would expect almost every change to be based on the ladder. There is just windows in time where looking at competitive play is important.

redfeenixAug 24, 20165 votes

You balance for solo q ? Well I guess that means you only balance for diamonds and above since the rest of us plebs are getting denied solo q again next year.

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 201610 votes

Balance for the ladder*, but I'm pretty sure you knew what I meant.

redfeenixAug 24, 20169 votes

I hope we get to see more than 20 champions at worlds this year.

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 20167 votes

Same

redfeenixAug 24, 20163 votes

WELL BALANCE HARDER !!! Nah kidding aside do you guys have internal metrics on wanting to make champs competitive?

Who chooses which champs should be buffed and nerfed for competitive.

For example Yi ... We haven't seen him in pro plsy in years. Is this kn your teams radar? To somehow get him to a point where he is viable? Or volibear for example.

With a few tiny buffs maybe you can change these guys from being troll picks to competitive picks. I would love to see new champions every year at worlds ... But somehow it's always Shen gp irelia and corki ezreal etc.

I'm just wondering if you guys are actively trying to get all champs viable for competitive, or its just whatever is on your plate that day

RiotI Am The IRSAug 25, 20166 votes

"Who chooses which champs should be buffed and nerfed for competitive." "do you guys have internal metrics on wanting to make champs competitive?"

This patch I'm working on the team that does this, it's our Live Balance team. We have a meeting at the beginning of every patch to talk about what we think should be worked on for the following patch. We use data pulled from competitive games and ranked games along with information from various high Elo players, people from our eSports department, other designers and sometimes pro players.

"With a few tiny buffs maybe you can change these guys from being troll picks to competitive picks. I would love to see new champions every year at worlds"

That's a large part of what we are trying to do in patch 6.17 and 6.18. We aren't trying to force a champion into pro play, but if they were on the edge of being picked we are looking to make them slightly more appealing.

"I'm just wondering if you guys are actively trying to get all champs viable for competitive"

We are trying to expand the pool of viable competitive champions but we currently aren't trying to get every champion into pro play.

pryda022Aug 24, 20167 votes

Why was tank Yasuo,frozen mallet and phantom dancer not nerfed?

RiotAesahAug 24, 201610 votes

We're looking into nerfing Frozen Mallet (indirectly nerfing tank Yasuo). Not sure about any plans regarding Phantom Dancer, I don't think it's very overbearing?

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 20169 votes

Most likely due to the fact that none of those are immediate concerns. Yasuo is strong but doesn't seem to be out of line other than a rising ban rate, frozen mallet I believe is being looked at for this next patch, and phantom dancer does not seem to be problematic at all to my knowledge.

RiotI Am The IRSAug 24, 20167 votes

Frozen Mallet currently has nerfs on the PBE that are scheduled for patch 6.18.

SaltyKrackaAug 24, 20167 votes

Well, I've got three topics I really want to talk about.

Firstly, do you think hitting two of Rek's cooldowns is going to disproportionately affect her in SoloQ games, or do you expect her and Gragas to show up in competitive games regardless?

Second, are none of you worried about buffing Riven and Jinx? There are a bunch of other champs you could have looked at that are suffering right now, and giving buffs to historical problem children like these two seems kind of...wrongheaded. Especially Jinx, seeing as how the only ADCs that were doing better than she is just got some heavy nerfs.

Third, as regards Nasus finally being able to stack GP barrels, a topic I've been bringing up again and again since GP's rework was first released...

https://gfycat.com/MiserableIdolizedDoe

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 20169 votes

I don't think they will hit her harder in solo queue, but I do expect to see them both still played. Hopefully it will allow some other junglers to pop in but I would be shocked if this completely removed either of them.
I was terrified of the Riven buffs during development. Still unsure if it is the best thing to do. I know some of the team also raised concerns but in the end the decision was to go forward with them. I have a huge bias versus Jinx, I just really really dislike the champion. So anytime we buff her I usually raise immediate concerns about the state of the game. I think she was already quite strong, but I also do not believe these buffs are major so I wouldn't expect them to move the needle much.
I don't play Nasus, I'm glad it makes you happy though

redfeenixAug 24, 20163 votes

How and why does hitting inanimate objects such as wards and gunpowder barrels siphon life force to add to his strike? The whole deal is that he steals the enemies life essence.... So idk if it should be stacking on inanimate objects like wards or barrels

RiotRiot ThEntropistAug 24, 201612 votes

Idk man.

redfeenixAug 24, 20161 votes

I like you..

Can you find out and paste the raw code below? Im really curious to know how nasus q is coded.

DecritAug 24, 20165 votes

Iiiiii think that is kinda illegal. I think.

SlashStrikerAug 24, 20164 votes

I cannot understand this ELO System at all

How can we judge player Skill if we are not including his Grade of Performance which should affect his Elo Gain and Lose at least a little bit

Why everyone want Solo Queue back but do not want their performance Grade to be included in Elo Gain / Lose?

Team 5v5 would be different story but

In solo Queue should be Players that score high grade - gain more and lose less Players that score low grade - gain less and lose more

RiotI Am The IRSAug 24, 201613 votes

The ranked system is not something my team works on and this is only my personal opinion. I hope performance based MMR rewards never happen in league of legends. If there was a system that encouraged players to make suboptimal choices to get more ELO as opposed to winning the game it would be a failure in my mind. A performance based MMR system could discourage aggressive plays, funneling CS/Kills onto scaling teammates, niche strategies such as proxy singed and many more interesting options that often are the "better" way to win the game. On top of this it could make some roles more or less desirable based off how they are evaluated.

redfeenixAug 25, 20167 votes

I agree with you sir.

The whole point of this game is to win. Not to drop the most wards, or get the most last hits. If these factors are introduced, it will pull the focus of the game away from winning and more towards maximizing individual LP gain / match ratings.

I agree with you on all points, thanks for sticking up for this.

That being said, it still sucks when you're 24/0/0 and still lose the game and the same amount of LP as the feeders. I'm really not sure what the correct answer is tbh.