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Quick Gameplay Thoughts: August 15

RiotMeddler··1 votes·106,466 views

Hi folks,

Usual Disclaimers

These posts will often contain talk about future work we're doing, or planning to do, that isn't yet guaranteed to ship. The nature of the work could change or, depending on what we discover, projects mentioned may get delayed or even stopped. If you'd like to see a Tweet whenever a new one of these posts goes up: https://twitter.com/RiotMeddler


My role at Riot and these posts

As you might have heard a few weeks back Ghostcrawler has moved to a new role at Riot (Head of Creative Development for Riot) and I've taken on his previous role as Design Director on LoL. My day to day work has changed noticeably, my intention is certainly to keep doing these posts however. They'll probably change at least a bit though. The first thing is that there'll be at least the occasional post from others instead of my regular ones, RiotScruffy who's taking over as Gameplay Lead especially. The second is that I'm going to try and find chances to talk at least a bit about things we're working on, or thinking about, that aren't just in game gameplay. Might be some other changes as well, will see how things go and keep you folks in the loop about it.


Judging Success in Nexus Blitz

As you've probably seen by now we're trying something new starting this patch, with a playable Alpha for a new experimental mode. It's a prototype, rather than a polished release, so some things will look pretty rough or repurposed (e.g. Mecha Sion ult graphics reused as an explosive cart you push into enemy towers). https://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/game-updates/features/play-nexus-blitz-alpha?ref=rss

We're putting it out like this as an early test to help figure out if there's an audience for a mode like this before we sink lots of time into making it. Assuming there is an audience, we also want to gather a lot of feedback around which bits particularly resonate, and which players aren't excited by. Initially at least we're planning a 4 week run, during which we'll assess whether to keep working on Nexus Blitz or look at other possible experimental modes instead. To do that we'll be considering things like:

  • How many people try Nexus Blitz
  • What proportion of people who try it stick to it
  • Survey feedback from people who've played it
  • Whether it scratches a different itch to other LoL modes (do people feel it's providing a slight variant on existing experiences like SR/ARAM, or something meaningfully different enough to be worth spending ongoing development time on?)
  • How much better we think it could become (based heavily on feedback from people who play it during the trial, including to some updates we'll make to it over the course of the trial)
  • Etc

We've had a lot of fun developing and testing Nexus Blitz. At the end of the day though what matters is how you folks find it. Really interested to find out over the next few weeks.

Working on some Co-Op versus AI fixes

Not sure when it'll be done yet, we're looking into some issues with Co-Op versus AI bots not functioning properly though. Biggest issue involved is bot AI logic breaking, normally after an update to the base champion's gameplay, resulting in the bot just freezing and staying on the summoning platform.

http://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/6.24.1/img/champion/Ziggs.png

232 Comments

Stylish Monkey29 votes

Hey meddler,

Any thoughts about my girl Diana? She has been in a pretty rough spot for a while and with the nerfs to electrocute, she will be hurting even more. Even just taking a look at fixing the bugs that currently plague her would be a great start! (her q hitbox is inconsistent and her e sometimes pushes people away instead of towards you).

Thank you!

saking19 votes

Hey Meddler, Any chance you could look at Ashe , right now she is the only crit adc that can't build a stormrazor to offset the infinity edge nerfs, and is being pigeonholed into rushing bork as her first item despite not having synergy with it.

Thanks Meddler!

Kagusutchi14 votes

Hi Meddler ! Here's a little question that was in my head for quite a while :

During your last post, you've mentioned that next season we would be able to choose the bonus stats that runes give us. As a result, I wanted to have a little more information about the variety of choices that we'll be able to access to ! By the way, will we be able to choose magic penetration and lethality ?

RiotMeddler4 votes

Early days yet, so nothing's confirmed. What we're currently testing is the current rune tree stats (AD/AP, AS, HP) plus a couple of extra defensive options (Armor, MR).

RenanRein14 votes

Meddler, please, can you talk about Diana? She's been bugged and having identity crisis for a long time. After Lissandra new passive can you guys please take a look at her? She's a very good candidate for a pure gameplay update, since her splash/theme/textures are ok, but her kit has so much problems.

ggplayer25012 votes

Hey Meddler, you mentioned a liandry’sitem 3151 change back a few posts ago. Are you still planning to ship the change?

RiotMeddler4 votes

We'll look at that again as a possible 8.17 thing. No guarantees, but we do have a bit of time aside to assess it.

RiotMeddler11 votes

Quick note: Posting this earlier than usual before I run off to something for a few hours. Back to respond to comments a bit later!

FafliX10 votes

Fun fact: Most bots start working properly again once you kill them in spawn even if they were frozen before that.

Daoist10 votes

Hi Meddler, any plans for AzirAzir and KalistaKalista ? They’ve been struggling for a while.

Rayjay Redfang9 votes

For the bots portion

  1. Will the AI fixes include bots in custom games?
  2. Will there be new AI bots added?
True Garen5 votes

Ah, the Co-op vs. AI bug isn't champion based. It's role-based. The second top (who would normally be in the jungler position) remains on the platform, regardless of which champion it is.

I'll add to requests for bots for the rest of the champions, and for more difficult AI modes.

To those who referred to Co-op as a learning tool... if you are teaching a friend to play, Co-op is probably not the best. There's usually a much more experienced player in the game who pushes it, and the games usually last about 15m. Instead, make a custom AI game for your friend, and they could have a meaningful chunk of time to learn the champion mechanics.

xXDaBoozeXx9 votes

Meddler,

These electrocute nerfs + nerfs to champions really gutted a lot of champs, any plans to compensate buff?

Zoe in particular seems very very hurt from these, and you mentioned plans to make her less annoying to vs on top of all these nerfs, any fear she will end up liek azir?

FafliX5 votes

I'm still scared for Quinn, Fizz, and Taliyah. They all got double nerfed with their core runes getting hit, as well as champion specific nerfs. And to top it off, they are all champions who struggle against tanks. Taliyah and Quinn are mostly viable because of the lack of tanks, so if those do end up coming up back they will have a lot more problems anyway. And Fizz wasn't even that problematic, especially compared to Akali. I just hope Riot doesn't forget about them for months or longer and leaves them in really bad spots if they do end up weak.

meteorbreaker5 votes

For Fizz, this was correct, perhaps it was not worthwhile to nerf W, but the nerf of the ultimate is fully justified.

RiotMeddler5 votes

We'll see where champs land before considering possible compensation buffs. Those who were struggling beforehand and being propped up by Runes burst might be good candidates. I think it's unlikely Zoe's hit harder than most though so would be surprised if she fell into that category.

Work aimed at making her a less frustrating opponent's still being looked at, no specifics or timeline yet though.

dome0258 votes

I think one of the problems with Zoe is that she plays similar to an artillery mage but with sometimes insane burst which she can spam. Her kit encourages her to stay out of range and get into a danger zone as little as possible.

She shouldn´t be a burst mage/assassine but rather a true artillery mage with her kit.

Reign of Squid7 votes

Any thought on Sivir, are you satisfyed of her state atm ? She feels like a lack of something

Kyunsei7 votes

Hail of blade could get a reset after you get a kill or an assist, and it might be great if it "recharge" after 4 seconds of not attacking, instead of being out of combat.

Buying Death's dance with Hail of blade prolong your Hails of blade reset to 7 seconds, instead of 4s.

Behind That Mask5 votes

Hello Meddler

can we see liss and karma changes this patch or the next patch?

and sorry for asking over and over every week but I love these champions so much and I want them to be good again

have a great day :D

RiotMeddler2 votes

Both are still a way out. Visual effects work on Liss has started, but is a rough draft. Once that's done we'll then need to get some audio done too to go with it.

Karma's still at the testing different possibilities stage, so will be further out again. Expect we'll share details about Karma plans before they're live once we've got a direction we think's promising.

Spideraxe5 votes

Also have you guys found a new Lead Champion Designer with Scruffy as the new Lead Gameplay Designer, I heard he was still monitoring the team but it isn't sustainable, are there any current designers who can fill his shoes like CertainlyT, August or SolCrushed?

FafliX2 votes

If CertainlyT fills that role the community would riot. I don't get the hate he gets, but he does have a tendency to make champions with really broken kits that are fun and difficult to play, but offer little counterplay to their opponents.

Spideraxe5 votes

Honestly I think the community might be actually end up happy if Certainly becomes lead champion designer as he himself won't be making anymore crazy kits, the guy is a pretty smart designer from what I've heard and a lot of designers actually aspire to design like him, so if he's in a guiding role I think it might end up really good

RiotMeddler2 votes

We're still figuring out who'll eventually take on the Lead Champ designer spot. For a while it should work fine with Scruffy wearing two hats.

LexZan5 votes

Good morning or afternoon Meddler! I got a question: are there any plans for Gnar or changes that will come sooner or later? I am just wondering. Have a great day!

Glory to God5 votes

Any other immediate plans on lowering damage overall?

RiotMeddler5 votes

Short term we'll see where 8.16 lands and assess. Don't want to swing so hard we go to a low interaction, slow lanes, one decisive team fight with baron only meta.

TomiMan75 votes

If you guys are looking into Coop vs AI you guys should invest some time into it, making it an actual 1-1-1-2 game not a duo top. Noone plays duo top. It is fustrating to new players to practice jungleing since the toplaner has to 1v2 or 1 bot just AFKs. Also the AI itself is just plain stupid. Noone plays like the bots( chasing the enemy through minionwaves just to hit them once) Its about time to make some changes to it. Tutorial was updated, though still leaves some room to improve.

Waffle Champion3 votes

On a similar note, I think Smite should be unlocked earlier. As far as people who play bots know, Jungle doesn't even exist, it would help their growth a lot if all five roles were acknowledged. Also, I don't think Jungle is mentioned in the tutorial either (Please correct me if I'm wrong)

Mysticman894 votes

Out of curiosity, will there be any rewards for playing in the nexus blitz alpha?

Both in terms of end of match rewards (XP/mastery points), and extra rewards (icons/BE/etc.)?

I'll probably play it for a bit regardless, and adding unique rewards might bias the number of how many try it, but it's possible the extra incentive(s) could result in more data as people who didn't think they were interested discover they actually do enjoy it.

RiotMeddler2 votes

We want to get a read on interest in the mode for its own sake, so we're staying away from other incentives to pull people to it. We know those can help a mode become more popular, so we'll account for that when looking at who tries it and who sticks around.

PapaGreg214 votes

Do you think Sejuani will be able to succeed with a 17 second cooldown on her dash? This feels terrible to play with currently. I wish there were some cd reduction for using it without champion interaction.

Salvor Hardın4 votes

Any plans regarding the "45% winrate champions", eternally nerfed by their use in competitive?

Maybe a sort of "micro-reworks"

Bad Dreeam4 votes

What about the practice tool? Is it in your radar, are you planning to improve anything in it? It hasn't been touched at all since its release.

Kyunsei2 votes

Having jungle camp give +100 exp on the first clear is really unhealthy, that's one of the reason everyone was taking smite, as it give instantly level 2.

Have you considered reducing the early difficulty of camps, and remove the fact that you get level 2 from first camp ? That way you'll hit level 2 on second camp, around the same time solo-laner get their level 2.

DeathBurst7 votes

Problem with that is that clearing two camps, especially the second one alone without a leash, with only one ability is extremely hard for a lot of champions.

Pastor Yorick2 votes

Hi Meddler,what are your thoughts on this doggo named Nasus ? Should a tank be able to spam an ability that deals atleast 500 damage over and over? And can we earn Hextech crates on Nexus Blitz,if not why?

DeathBurst5 votes

He's not a Tank, he has no hard CC. He's a Juggernaut, in the same category as Mundo, Darius, Garen, Illaoi. Plenty of champs who all have massive damage.

SlashStriker2 votes

When will Spear of Shojin and Atma's Reckoning become available for use?

RiotMeddler2 votes

Potentially in preseason. We're interested in getting them out, will want to assess them again to make sure they still make sense for the state of the game at that point though.

OmegasisX2 votes

Garen

Hi Meddler,

Does increasing Garen's early level sustain sound like something you guys feel Garen could use? I know Garen's in a pretty decent spot right now. I just feel like he could use a little bit more to get him where he really needs to be. It would look something like this:

Passive - Perseverance Garen regenerates 4% of his maximum health per 5 seconds after not receiving damage for 8 seconds, & the regeneration increases to 8% maximum health per 5 seconds when he is below 25% health (from levels 1-10). Levels 11-18 unchanged.

Garen's main issue right now is his inability to reliably stay in lane against constant harass or melee champions who out-damage him. Yes, a Garen player can take Grasp of the Undying, but that alone is not always sufficient to remain in lane. An increase in EARLY level sustain would be invaluable to him.

Thank you.

Daddy Ants2 votes

MissFortune nerfs when?

Draven nerfs when?

Nami nerfs when?

Jhin could do with a slight nerf as well. 52% WR with 33% play rate is disgusting.

Kyunsei1 votes

Have you ever considered buffing Tryndamere Attack range to 175 ?

He's really auto-attacker dependent and that would really improve the quality of life of this champion.

Chyuae11 votes

This change would made him unstopable. Please, do not.

Sharpest glasses5 votes

Aatrox Tryndamere my greatest creation

Kyunsei1 votes

Tryndamere R could work this way : You press R, you get a buff for 8 seconds that stays until you get fatally wounded. If you get fatally wounded, you get the current 5 seconds undying effect. If you don't, your ult goes on 20 seconds CD.

That way Tryndamere could go on teamfight without fearing of being suddenly bursted.

paisy30 votes

No thanks

Space Raccoon 171 votes

I just hope this game mode doesn't kill off ARAM :/

RiotMeddler6 votes

I'd be amazed if it pulled so many people from ARAM the queue struggled. There's some overlap in audiences certainly, but I think they're offering pretty different experiences overall.

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