Runes Corner: The One About the UI

RiotSparkle·Sep 19, 2017·1 votes·46,891 views

Hi hi! I’m Riot Sparkle, Experience Designer on Runes and welcome back to another Runes Corner!

We’re going to mix it up today. Instead of talking about any one particular rune, we’re going to talk about some of the UI that will accompany runes.

WIP DISCLAIMER: Runes (and their UI) are in active development. This means that names, numbers, icons, game rules, or pretty much anything you can see can change before release. Of course, if there’s anything that you really like in particular make sure to call it out.

So a lot of you have been asking - how am I going to keep track of all my new runes while I’m in a game?

https://i.imgur.com/g6TrIMm.png A dramatic re-enactment of me, juggling all these new runes

Sure, there are only 6 runes in your page, but all of them are more complex than a simple +1.0 Armor. If you don’t even know what you took on your “JUNGLE LUX BEST LUX” page, how are you supposed to judge how well they worked for you?

So, without further ado, let’s answer that question with the introduction of what some of you eagle eyed players have already spotted - the in game runes panel.

https://i.imgur.com/HfiGEQA.png No, the button won’t be a teardrop for launch. That’s WIP.

The runes panel is a new part of the HUD UI that you can use to remind yourself what runes you brought with you into game and track your performance with them. It shares space with the advanced stats panel, but savvy power users can use the already existing “C” hotkey to view both panels at once if desired.

https://i.imgur.com/95adnQO.png All the info at once

The panel is small, so we have a pretty strict limit on how much text can be in there per rune. We choose only one stat per rune to surface in the panel, but we recognize that some runes have more than 1 stat that’s important (ex: Perxie affects shielding AND damage).

https://i.imgur.com/TOyStzz.png Additional stats and info about the Sorcery keystone Arcane Comet. I cheated this screenshot for the example so you may notice some weirdness here ;)

That’s why you can also hover the runes in the panel to access more info to help you evaluate how something like Arcane Comet (formerly known as Meteor) is doing for you. You can see above that “290” is actually the damage done to champions with this keystone, but you can also see a host of other information that might be relevant to changing/ improving your picks for next time or your performance at the moment with a particular rune.

This aspect of personal evaluation is important for a concept we internally call “the feedback loop” in runes. Basically, this boils down to the following value: players should have enough information to learn about runes and decide if they want to change their runes or tactics for next time.

The in game panel is one place where surfacing this kind of info but the other natural place for this kind of self evaluation is the end of game screen. Now, spoiler alert, we’re currently working on the end of game screen for runes so it’s not as far along as the runes panel in game. We probably won’t have end of game stats ready for our PBE launch, but they should be along shortly after.

However, I can share an image of what some of it will look like, once we’ve put in all the work.

https://i.imgur.com/jqB9r4p.png This is a mockup, so all the names, numbers and icons are totally fake here

While this design only shows one stat per rune, just like the in game panel, we are hoping to eventually surface multiple stats per rune much in the same way that the runes panel does (hence the little expand arrow in the image above).

So, that’s it for now. Hopefully this gives you a better picture of how you’ll be able to track your runes and decide what’s working and what’s not. This is just a preview of the UI that's relevant to the feedback loop, but there's definitely more to see. See you in the comments!

You can check the previous Runes Corner posts here: Runes Corner: Runes Content Development Peek Runes Corner: Meteor Sneak Peek Runes Corner: Hunt of the Bloodmoon Sneak Peek Runes Corner: Domination Major Slot Sneak Peek Runes Corner: Stormlord's Mandate and Spellslinger's Surge Runes Corner: Guardian Soul Runes Corner: Summoner Specialist and Hextech Freezeray Runes Corner: Late-Game Focused Runes Runes Corner: More Precision Runes Runes Corner: Three More Resolve runes

115 Comments

HenzoAFSep 19, 201732 votes

What about showing Bard Chogath Nasus Sion Thresh Veigar Stacks At the end of the game screen?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 201723 votes

This is not something our team currently has planned at all (since we're doing Runes stuff) but I think this is a good idea for a quality of life change. I'll talk to some other Rioters about it. No promises though.

patmax17Sep 19, 20176 votes

Hi! I'm sorry sorry sorry to hijack the comment, but since we're talking post-game stats, can you ping some coworker about support stats recap? I would love to have a "damage shielded" bar, and IIRC there was talk about a "clutch saves" counter?

As for runes, I like the new UI, the alternative would be to crowd the buff bar, and this solution is a lot cleaner (and also looks way better since it's a UI with sleek sleek graphics (and I guess VFX snd SFX too) :D

Taylor McFreewinSep 19, 20174 votes

there could definitely be a lives saved counter just like phantom dancer has

HäxelSep 19, 20172 votes

what about Kindred and Rengar ?

BârdSep 19, 20174 votes

Since Rengar caps out at 5, he doesn't really fit.

BobaFlautistSep 19, 201715 votes

Will you be able to swap runes in the practice tool? As things are now, not being able to is a massive limitation.

warpenguin555Sep 19, 20177 votes

I see meteor got renamed to Arcane Comet. Cool name, i like

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20175 votes

Oh good, glad you like it. We wanted to make it feel a little more "Sorcery".

BaconSep 19, 20171 votes

Will you be changing the VFX to go along with the name as well? The initial sneak peak said it was WIP so I was hoping this would be the case.

A big fiery ball coming from most Mages like Syndra just seems a bit weird to me. So I was hoping the finalized version would look a bit more like Master Arcanist Ziggs' particles.

All the 'magics' or League have always been blues/purples if you look at items/masteries/etc. so I just figured it would be more visually cohesive if all the new runes communicated clearly that "these are rune effects", especially considering Arcane Comet is a Sorcery Keystone. Or are you guys making a shift with the new Runes system to have it more 'elementaly' with the fires/ices? That's ok if that's the case I guess, it just seems foreign to me in the context of League atm.

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20175 votes

{quoted}

Will you be changing the VFX to go along with the name as well? The initial sneak peak said it was WIP so I was hoping this would be the case.

A big fiery ball coming from most Mages like Syndra just seems a bit weird to me. So I was hoping the finalized version would look a bit more like Master Arcanist Ziggs' particles.

All the 'magics' or League have always been blues/purples if you look at items/masteries/etc. so I just figured it would be more visually cohesive if all the new runes communicated clearly that "these are rune effects", especially considering Arcane Comet is a Sorcery Keystone. Or are you guys making a shift with the new Runes system to have it more 'elementaly' with the fires/ices? That's ok if that's the case I guess, it just seems foreign to me in the context of League atm.

Yes, the VFX have already been changed to match the name more since the last time we showed the keystone.

ShadòwSep 19, 20177 votes

But what about being able to track what other players took as their Runes?

Will you still be able to only see the keystone of other players?

Knowing the full Rune page of your enemies could be important information with this new impactful Rune system. Will there be anything official implemented or do we need to look up our enemies Runes on 3rd party websites?

Dron1111Sep 19, 20176 votes

and what about spectators? will spectators able to see what runes players are using?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 201710 votes

Spectators won't have all of the information that you have shown here. We will be supporting spectator mode with some additions though.

World EnderSep 19, 201711 votes

Branching off of this, what about viewing enemy runes? I suppose we'll still be able to see their keystones in the loading screen and on the scoreboard, but what about all of the other runes that still have game changing effects like Ruined King's Tribute or Overheal? WIll there be a way to view these in game somehow, or will we most likely have to resort to third party API sites to do so?

SteelflameSep 19, 20178 votes

As TheProjectionist asked, what about seeing enemy runes in game? Considering we are locked to 6 runes total, what about using the same TAB UI that we use to see the ally and enemy team's items to check runes too? There are plenty of non-keystone runes that massively change how a person would play, such as that channeled flash rune and how it would open up gank routes for X champion.

Making it so that you could toggle between items, runes, and perhaps skill ranks too? There is no reason to hide skill ranks in game from the enemy, it is very helpful to know and would help set up explanations of exactly why X champion did so much damage with Y skill, when normally Y skill doesn't do damage when you play vs them.

SpideraxeSep 19, 20175 votes

Hey Sparkle I'm not sure this is the proper one to talk about but what about spectating for like LCS, do you have plans for that?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20175 votes

Yes, the production team for LCS has plans to support runes. They've been running their own playtest to keep up with what we're doing and be able to talk in depth about runes for matches too. :)

SpideraxeSep 19, 20175 votes

Can you pass this idea along? Phreak's Runes Corner where he makes rune puns and raps before each match. And congrats on the wedding

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20176 votes

Hey, thanks man. And I don't think I need to tell Phreak to make puns haha

KloqdqSep 19, 20175 votes

My biggest concern is keeping track of what my enemy has. Right now on live it's fairly easy to tell what a person is running but with this there is 6 options that will vary (Ideally) between game and 5 players all having different things. That is a lot of information to keep track off. I am sure once you learn all the major runes it won't be too bad but this kind of information overload is going to be an issue for some players I imagine.

From 1 keystone on 10 players being about 10 major things to remember (Current runes are just stats and only matter early) . To a large number of 6 powerful and specialized runes across 10 players meaning you have about 60 major things to remember.

RióSep 19, 20175 votes

I'm incredibly happy to see some of the tech from item stat tracking brought to Runes as well.

What is in the pipeline for viewing what runes other players (including the enemy) have equipped? The scoreboard seems like the right place for this (ala current keystones).

Linna ExcelSep 19, 20174 votes

I think you should totally keep the tear drop icon just for people who accidentally the wrong runes.

BubbaVSep 19, 20173 votes

Looks great! Ought to give some good clarity.

BlasterboySep 19, 20173 votes

Love that you guys are working to included it in the UI at launch. Please don't forget about Spectator though, we never got any way to see Keystones officially supported.

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20175 votes

Yes, we plan to support keystone runes in spectator.

AsamasSep 19, 20173 votes

I love the idea of swiching between stats and runes like shown. If i get it right you can click on the small button with the "water drop" thing or the helmet to switch between the two things and yes C for showing everything. That is my fave thing.

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20173 votes

Yes, you are correct :)

PhoenixlickerSep 20, 20171 votes

So it shows the runes stats as well when you press c if you have the base stats selected, or do you need to have the rune tab selected?

RiotSparkleSep 20, 20172 votes

{quoted}

So it shows the runes stats as well when you press c if you have the base stats selected, or do you need to have the rune tab selected?

C will open all the panels at once - so advanced stats & runes, no matter which one you started on.

Leon EtoileSep 19, 20173 votes

I think it's more important to view what the opposing team is running. Are we able to see that? B/c it appears we won't be able to.

FlemmanSep 20, 20173 votes

so, will the death recap be update to include all these new source of damage?

is there something planned to be able to see witch rune the ennemy has take (new ennemy window)

BârdSep 19, 20172 votes

Coup de Grace?

What does that do?

AtanchanSep 19, 20175 votes

gives you +30% - 250% bonus crit damage while your crit chance is 15% or lower

5000000000000000Sep 19, 20173 votes

So this must be the "1% crit rune" equivalent

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20176 votes

That's not what that does...

BârdSep 19, 20175 votes

Does it also apply a blood spray effect when you crit, and cause non-crits to steadily increase your crit chance?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20177 votes

GUYS PLS

Yandere YandereSep 19, 20172 votes

I dont understand/know all these references, so please enlighten me. (Altho assuming its from SMITE)

BârdSep 19, 20177 votes

DOTA, Actually.

Phantom Assassin's ultimate, Coup de Grace, passively grants a 15% chance to crit for 230/340/450% damage (on a pseudo random distribution, so the more you don't crit, the more likely you are to crit).

Ares FordwinSep 20, 20174 votes

DOTA aside, Coup de Grâce means "blow of mercy" - killing someone or something to end their suffering. So while it makes sense in the context of DOTA to increase crit chance and crit damage in order to deal a last blow, it could be a combination of the current Merciless and Battle Trance.

It would make sense, since the name implies it would be a finishing blow, so you want to deal increasingly more damage to your target and end their suffering fast. But that's just a theory - a rune theory.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND CUT

nhentai177013Sep 20, 20172 votes

BUT HEY THAT'S JUST A THEORY!

A GAME THEORY!!!!

Thanks for watching!

La BelloSep 19, 20172 votes

Does Jungle Lux actually work?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20177 votes

Normally I would say "Follow your dreams" and all that, but I was actually making a joke there. Soooo...no. :D

La BelloSep 19, 20174 votes

I mean... Ezreal and Lulu both worked so I figured it was at least worth a thought :/

war composer 2Sep 19, 20171 votes

not sure if this is the right place but with all the new runes will games snowball faster or no?

RiotSparkleSep 19, 20173 votes

Playtest team's current evaluation is that the meta won't actually shift that much from the live game with the new runes (so no). Ofc, it's always possible that when millions of people play with them, we'll come to a different conclusion and react accordingly.

La BelloSep 19, 20172 votes

when will Runes hit PBE? or when will you guys released the little theoretical rune theorycrafting website you talked about? I cant wait anymore

Black T PoisonSep 20, 20171 votes

Will we be able to change our runes in champ select? I usually only use one mastery page and change it in champ select, it gives me a feeling of reassurance that everything is 100% the way I want it to be. I would be sad if that was taken away from me ;(

RiotSparkleSep 20, 20176 votes

{quoted}

Will we be able to change our runes in champ select? I usually only use one mastery page and change it in champ select, it gives me a feeling of reassurance that everything is 100% the way I want it to be. I would be sad if that was taken away from me ;(

Yes you will be able to create or change rune pages in champion select