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Quick Gameplay Thoughts: October 3

RiotMeddler·10/3/2017, 4:26:54 PM·1 votes·56,750 views

Hi all,

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 put 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

Scoreboard Pings

In the 7.19 patch notes we mentioned 'You can now ping everything on the scoreboard, so knock yourself out'. As a bunch of people have noticed, that's not the case though. It's also not what was originally intended, with miscommunication resulting in a misleading patch note, our bad there. What is in, and was intended, was that you can now ping any item on the scoreboard, regardless of player or team. That seemed like a useful communication tool to offer, being able to repeatedly ping someone's KDA by contrast for example, not so constructive.

DFT uses and Runes

We've talked about this in some threads already, seems to crop up a lot as a question though so figured was worth giving our thinking a bit more visibility. There's not a direct replacement for DFT in the new Runes system and that might mean some champs have a bit of a hard time as a result. We looked at various options for something that filled the same niche, but didn't find something we felt was both helpful when it comes to balancing champs and had at least some gameplay to it. What we'll be doing as a result is looking at current DFT users and seeing how they perform once the system goes out. A lot of them should have good options already in the new system, with Phase Rush being particularly appealing on some. If some champs don't find good fits though we'll then look at a combination of individual champ buffs (if only a couple meaningfully affected), at prioritizing a new keystone that meets the needs of the champs not having their needs met, or a combination of the two.

Janna

Janna's changes in 7.19 added quite a lot of power to her and as a result we micro patched nerfs out twice. We're also testing further nerfs on the PBE, odds are high though that those don't ship. They're being tested in case we need them, current estimate at time of writing at least though is that they likely won't be necessary.

Azir, Xin Zhao, Caitlyn

Touching on the other larger changes from 7.19:

  • Azir - Is looking pretty strong, though for the first time his performance isn't extremely skewed between average and high skill players which is a good sign, since that suggests mastery as him and mastery playing against him may be scaling appropriately together. Suspicious we've made him too strong, still watching to see if that's actually the case or not though.

  • Caitlyn - Looks to be about the right spot power wise, too early to say much more.

  • Xin Zhao - Also around the right ballpark power wise. Seems to be performing quite well for an updated champ, normally there's a relearning period for a while and we're not seeing as much of that here. Might suggest he's on the strong side, could just mean he's still a fairly accessible champ as intended so that relearning period's not as rough as some.

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

370 Comments

Redesignated10/3/2017, 5:48:13 PM23 votes
  • Are we ever going to see another item 3802 upgrade? It's long overdue. At least, could we separate Grievous Wounds from item 3165 and put it on an item that you need to consciously build toward, rather than an item that is the de facto best first choice on the vast majority of mages? If Grievous Wounds is going to stay in the game, mages should have access to it somewhere. That "somewhere" should not be in their core item.
  • Are we ever going to see Grievous Wounds shifted to have different amounts of healing reduction (possibly with a stacking effect from reapplication for lower-value reductions), instead of the only variable being the duration of healing reduction? A flat 40% with time applied being the sole balancing factor turns it into a really easy win-more stat.
  • Any improvements planned for item 3222? It might be gold-efficient (barely), but it doesn't feel like a useful item to have. The active has a monstrous cooldown for not even being as effective as item 3140, which is cheaper and builds into an item that feels far more useful to have. Slow immunity and some bonus Movement Speed is nice, but not even being able to get rid of a Malzahar R with it is not, and having the person you used it on immediately being caught by any number of other stuns, roots, knock-ups, or displacements that any well-rounded team is going to have feels even worse. Whenever the anti-shield item gets added in, it'll basically devolve to joke status.
  • On that note, improvements for item 3107 at some point? Repeated nerfs have made it terrible to get as a first item, which lead to item 3504 becoming problematic as enchanters had to get it first instead. With how bad Mikael's is, and Redemption having 750g of its price allotted into Mana Regen with an active that's barely noticeable until you have multiple Heal/Shield Power modifiers, Ardent Censer only really has item 3174 as competition for a first purchase, and it's not exactly good on most enchanters — especially not as their first item. Mikael's and Redemption need to be buffed so there's any reason to get them before Ardent in almost any situation.
  • Supports need more item choices. Even a role with as little variance as AP mage has more choice than support. Windspeaker's Blessing is getting removed, so shields are losing the bonus Armor and Magic Resistance they were previously applying through it; how about two new Forbidden Idol upgrades, with one giving the Armor and the other giving the Magic Resistance? It lets you build against mono-type damage teams and gives you something to think about in how you build. Tank supports desperately need more options as well — Zeke's is too unruly and unreliable; Knight's Vow is getting poached by non-supports who can use it better due to having better health and defenses; Locket feels bad to buy early because its active scales off HP but doesn't give any of its own, making the AR + MR it gives less effective, when support tanks will invariably have less of and less access to all three stats than solo-lane tanks…
Mr Wind Up Bird10/3/2017, 4:43:42 PM18 votes

A couple of things that feel a little bit strange to me about item 3802 :

  1. It seems like the best mana item for most mages, often by a wide margin.
  2. It only has one upgrade path.

This results in an awful lot of item 3165 . How big of a problem is this? Any ideas/plans to address it?

Raxistaicho10/3/2017, 4:28:04 PM10 votes

Now that Eve is coming out, are we going to see another Champion Roadmap this month?

420 grams10/3/2017, 4:28:41 PM9 votes

Any thoughts on Urgot right now? His e is a movespeed loss since the beginning animation is so long and it makes him feel really clunky to use because of this.

Sw4de10/3/2017, 5:31:28 PM8 votes

With % Pen being removed from masteries after so many years in the game, will items such as void staff and last whisper be buffed to compensate?

Vekkna10/3/2017, 4:37:41 PM7 votes

Runes:

  1. How are mages doing without starting pen? How are the outliers doing (Zyra, Brand)?

  2. Have you considered a DFT replacement that reduces damage by X% and applies 2X damage as a rolling dot similar to Ignite on WoW fire mages? Depending on the value of X, it could open up really cool new builds and play patterns for some champs.

IxtaliKing10/3/2017, 4:50:45 PM7 votes

Hey Meddler, are you able to tell us what other buffs were considered for Karma before you settled on that passive buff?

Also, how likely is it at this point that these current buffs will be shipped to live?

supercoolisaac10/3/2017, 4:57:09 PM6 votes

I understand not being able to ping literally everything on the scoreboard but surely being able to ping keystones would be helpful in some cases?

JimmyRevSullivan10/3/2017, 5:42:07 PM5 votes

Any plans on DrMundo ?? I think he deserve a VGU,the MR buff was pretty cool but he feels outdated in gameplay because he's too much of a stat check champion(Health Regen,Bonus Ad,Tenacity,MR) and his visuals are very outdated... He's the same for years and years Anything is planned for him in the next year?

PS: English is not my main language,sry if i misspelled anything

XxxLumberJackxxX10/3/2017, 4:30:18 PM5 votes

Can you give some thoughts on how you choose champs? As a xin player I just can't fathom how he got work before Volibear

Kloqdq10/3/2017, 5:42:03 PM4 votes

Hey Meddler what are your thoughts of a rune that converted a turned active ability costs into HP costs after they run out of mana or meet some kind of requirement? Something to allow aggressive players to keep using abilities when they are low on mana/energy/etc but at the cost of health. Do you think something like that could work or nah?

Also can you give me a hint on what Twisted Treeline ranked rewards will be??? :)

kullehh10/3/2017, 4:51:50 PM2 votes

let me ask this question for 5th time , what about be victorious post , meddler i am sure you can give us a hint

Fütanari10/3/2017, 4:59:25 PM1 votes

I don't see any vayne buffs From you olafing her

HenzoAF10/3/2017, 4:44:55 PM1 votes

Lethal Tempo used to let you transcend the Cap as a passive effect, but you updated it so the transcendence only occurs during the attack speed bonus, why did you do that? This isn't fun anymore!

Star Of Love10/3/2017, 4:29:46 PM1 votes

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Rayjay Redfang10/3/2017, 5:55:21 PM1 votes

Would you ever consider adding new runes or branches if you felt it was needed for some champions. I've asked this some where before but don't remember the response. And what direction will you go with future missions. I have not been liking the newer missions as much.