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Quick Gameplay Thoughts: July 25

RiotMeddler·7/25/2017, 4:01:58 PM·1 votes·72,387 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 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

7.16 Balance Changes

A couple more things that should be hitting PBE soon, or are being worked on for 7.16:

  • Fiora - Hit too hard. Giving her some of the movement speed we took off her passive back (ult still doesn't grant movement speed just for being near an ulted target however).n
  • Yasuo - Exploring weaker shield and more frequent windwalls early game. Goal there is to test shifting defensive power so he's similar or slightly stronger against ranged match ups and weaker against melee, making it clearer how to deal with him if he gets picked/give him situations where he's a better choice without just being a better generalist. We're still looking to do larger work on him at some point too, this is initial investigation, not a comprehensive set of long term changes.

Udyr and other smaller updates

Context for anyone wondering why Udyr changes keep getting onto the PBE and then never making it into a patch. At this point we'll be holding off on any updates, such as Udyr's, until after 7.18. Some of that's a desire to keep the next few patches more stable, a lot of it's also that people who are working on Udyr, LB, Azir etc are also generally on a fair bit of other work as well during these patches, so development and testing time's limited. 7.19 onwards we'll get more focus back on those, likely release order is probably Udyr, then Azir, then LB.

Skin Specific HUD Portraits

For anyone that hasn't seen it, Ququroon put up some details yesterday about how we'll be doing skin specific portraits on the in game HUD. At present you'll see a picture of the base champion there when using a skin, which can sometimes feel pretty weird (e.g. I'm Zombie Brand, why am I seeing fire dude instead?). After this change that portrait should reflect the skin's loading screen art instead. Important to note that this is only the HUD portrait that no other players see. Tab Screen, Minimap etc will still use the default icon (really important those are obvious at a glance).

Thread with more details:

https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/story-art/AEAHb3XZ-adding-skin-portraits-to-all-skins

Personality Types and New Champs

We see a lot of discussion around new appearances, powers, weapons, backstories etc for new champs people are interested in. Personality tends to get less of a focus though. Would love to hear what you folks would like to see that we haven't done in that regard yet (e.g. Draven as the self obsessed, fourth wall breaking showman, Tahm Kench as the smooth talking manipulative glutton etc). Anything particularly come to mind as missing, or that you've always wanted to see?

683 Comments

Ars Arcánum7/25/2017, 4:03:55 PM98 votes

You're considering buffing what may be the most toxic part of Yasuo's kit? Lol

IxtaliKing7/25/2017, 4:30:45 PM65 votes

Well, this game is missing an old "Hag" type character. I'd imagine a personality similar to Lady Olenna from GoT, cynical, curt, brutally honest, yet humorous. Could be a matriarch of some sort.

ModCaptainMårvelous7/25/2017, 6:56:28 PM28 votes

I want a support who talks down to his/her adc. A support that is some form of military commander who is essentially trying to grab the ADC by the scruff of their neck and shove them into the fray.

"FOCUS." "If I'm being hit, you're free to attack so FIRE." "WAKE UP. You're needed." "I am your shield so focus on doing damage!"

etc. We don't really have a traditional support who is brutal and aggravated.

RiotMeddler7/25/2017, 4:13:33 PM26 votes

Oh, one other note - I'm out of the office today so responses will likely be short and/or infrequent, apologies (on a phone and busy at a workshop/discussion event).

DJ Reverb7/25/2017, 6:05:40 PM24 votes

Disclaimer Sorry for the wall of text, I just really enjoy the personality of champs in LoL and love reading therir Bios.

So for personality ideas, I was thinking making champs for specific roles with a twist (meaning top laners are seen as in your face, brutes, and instead making a shy, tease you into fights tank)

So like:

Support: They are normally very helpful personalities. Seen as defenders and rescuers. Instead creating a personality that drudges the idea of saving someone, a hero that doesn't want to do the job but has to because hes the only one.

ADC: Marksman love to kite and be ridiculously over confident. MF, Ez, Draven, Jhin, all of these champs love to talk about their skill and how great they are. Give a personality that says "This looks tough.. Idk.. Im unsure." or "Am I really this strong? Oh Boy did you see that damage! hey mom look! get the Camera!"

Mid: (I am a mid main so Ill be a little long on this one) For the most part there is quite a variety in the mid lane. From Emperors to Queens, Robots to simple wizards, Crazy bomber to excited rock thrower. But all of them have one goal in common, to control the flow of the game. They ooze with the need to be the dictator of how the map should be run. Let's get someone who is looking for direction, lost. He/She is confident in their ability to do what is necessary but is always looking for direction. Like an Annie but who isn't pretending to be innocent (damn that devil child). A Mage who isn't the take charge and control you. But almost invites the enemy in as a "friend", "why must we fight?" but can do what is necessary when directed or left with only one option: to beat the opponent. Some might say Lux fits that description but if you listen to her lines she's quite ferocious and a fearsome enemy. OR for an Assassin, simply make a personality that is similar to Dr. Jekel and Mr. Hyde complex. He is always curious of why there must be war, but when the fight ensues, it ignites a switch and he becomes overcome with the need for blood shed.

Jungle: Junglers are a plenty. I don't have much to offer here. I did have an idea way back in S3 that I use to talk with my friends about, how a jungler would become a friend of the forest....well Ivern took that idea haha. But If I had a personality to offer here it would be a champ that loved to play hide n seek. (I get shaco is kinda that feel, maybe we rework his personality and to fit that thought more). But my thought would be like this huge monster (Like Sully from monsters inc.) Sneaking around trying to surprise his opponents. Just a thought. Not really a jungler... that places scares me.. WE NEED MORE VISION!!! THIS IS JUST DARKNESS.. THIS IS ADVANCED DARKNESS!!!

and finally

Top: Oh the Top lane. Like I said earlier, Brutes. The whole lot of em. Nasty, ugly brutes. Except our beloved Fiora and Riven. But all of them either are Dark, quiet sentinels that seek to protect the team, or they are merciless warriors with an itch to be in the fray. Let's get a personality that is so Shy and odd that it's unbearably cute. Think of hearing this in the team fight "You.. You want me? In front of you? Tanking that? oh no no no..." This Champ doesn't realize how beefy they really are. Needs encouragement to stand up for the team. Kinda of how Poppy is looking for the real hero to wield the hammer, but she still knows how strong she can be and is confident in her mission.

The thought behind this is that people choose champs in league a lot based on how they view themselves or want too at least. Tyler1 picked Draven... Well.. yea. But people choose champs based on personality a lot. I say offering a new, directly polarizing personality will bring people into positions they normally wouldn't play.

Would love Feedback!

6FlagsFunnelCake7/25/2017, 4:38:45 PM21 votes

We have various characters that focus on the use of their beauty and sexual attraction for malicious deeds Evelynn Elise Zyra Ahri etc. Can we have any males that do something similar? An Incubus personality, if you will. (Though this doesn't relate to a new Champion, I like the idea of reworking Vladimir to have a rework to his voicelines and lore personality to reflect this as well)

Mableye7/25/2017, 5:35:59 PM17 votes

I'd love to see something like a Shamwow kind of character. You know this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwRISkyV_B8 A mage who travels (I imagine him with some Salvador Dalì moustaches and a huge backpack) around the world to showcase his magical spicesand trinkets. However, everyone thinks he's a fraud so he fights to prove the quality of his items. So when he uses these skills, he's like he's trying to convince you to buy his stuff. So sometimes he goes like "Let's see how this customer feels about -insert thingy-. Oh my, apparently he's dead!" or "Instant deflagration of your enemies at half the price, only for today!" or "This one comes in with FREE Poro Snax box!" Pls rito notice me Amumu

Chromatic Eagle7/25/2017, 5:11:26 PM15 votes

A diplomat. A ruthless, if not evil, Demacian. A more gentler Noxian (make people strong instead of survival of the fittest) A thief (TF and Graves don't act like that in game) A flirtatious man (Eve might be the female version now) More manipulative, sociopath-like characters A teacher/student duo, or more characters like Xayah and Rakan who banter with one another.

HalcyonDweller7/25/2017, 4:12:54 PM10 votes

Can we get your thoughts as to why Caitlyn's traps are being preserved in their frustrating state (subjective, I know) while her power and satisfaction to play are taking heavy hits in other areas?

I've seen a lot of people upset about the traps making it impossible to farm under tower, and on the other side of things Caitlyn players are really frustrated with the nerfs making her feel worse to use.

Is this about preserving Caitlyn's identity?

Elf Princess7/25/2017, 4:12:47 PM10 votes

What about a rich girl champion who looks down at everyone else because they're commoners?

Pyro7/25/2017, 6:21:36 PM8 votes

As far as personality is concerned, League might be described as overflowing with "edgy" characters. Even Ivern, the happy peaceful treant, has the backstory of a crude barbarian. His new character was sort of forced upon him, it's not a story of a repenting villain. He's also a bit too eccentric.

What's definitely missing is the "Old Saint" and/or "Crone" archetypes. Zilean is an old man, but not really - he's a prideful, eccentric timelord, so the age doesn't really apply there. Swain is an old man with a cane, but he's closer to a Dark Mage type, and those don't really feel frail or capable of dieing of old age.

We need a good-spirited character who's old and calm. The type of person who everyone looks up to. The Gandhi/Mother Theresa type (yes, I know both of them are extremely controversial people, I'm talking about the myth side of them). A character who's not grandiose, not jovial, not cynical, not shouting. A character you'd want to drink tea with and learn life lessons. Someone a bit like Uncle Iroh.

Old Saint: Skillset-wise we're talking about a character who's ready to lay down their life to save the young ones. This should feel like being Gandalf in the mines of Moria. Perhaps an effect that rewards your action that results in getting your ally away to safety, not necessarily resulting in your death. Your enemies should feel bad about killing you while your allies survive, and good about finishing you after you've failed to protect them. And of course the greater the silence, the more shocking the storm: the ultimate should embody the saying "fear the wrath of a calm man".

Crone: A different approach would be Granny Weatherwax type, an old wise woman who's seen everything and scolds the people around her into behaving nicely. This is still a similar "heart of gold" calm personality, just with a colder outward attitude.

There's also the Hag archetype, but I feel like a cynical old person full of disdain is something too close to what we've already have. Crone/Old Saint first. Hag second.

ThunderSkelett7/25/2017, 4:56:13 PM7 votes

I would like to see a champ thats just super stupid and dosen't know what he is doing all the time.

KyriaTheMystic7/25/2017, 6:59:23 PM7 votes

Alright, since you want to talk personalities and not powers/appearance (and REFUSE to give us a true dinosaur champion for some reason) I'll give you the two personalities I think are genuinely missing from League and would like to see on a new champ.

A true matronly supportive character. She would be a character who is genuinely caring to others, wanting to see the best in them and support them in their endeavors. Someone who would look at some of the twisted, antagonistic characters and instead of revile them would want to meet them and try to understand how they became the way they are. (Maybe give them a hug and a cookie.) I'd want this character to bring the kind of cozy warmth I felt when I went to watch Kiki's Delivery Service this weekend with my friend, where I was eating a warm soft pretzel in a nicely cooled mid 40's-50's Fahrenheit room on a electric reclined chair on a Sunday afternoon. I know it's more personality than anything and such a character could be seen in any role, but I'd LOVE for this to be used for a support character.

A genuinely, unapologetically greedy character who is obsessed with gold to the point of absurdity. I'm talking full on Tamatoa and Goldmember levels of 'Look at how glorious and shiny I am.' They fundamentally believe that to have more wealth is to have more power, more success, and that everything looks better when it glitters like gold. They believe that wanting to go after such earthly wealth is what can truly spur people to find what they are good at, creates competition, and is more tangable than silly 'morals' or 'honor' that aren't as real to them as solid gold. Heck this could even translate into them having magical powers attuned to gold or liquid gold. We have gluttonous characters, wrathful characters, vengeful characters... but I want a character so greedy and vain they would walk around in full gold armor with a gold weapon and want to make the whole world in their ideal image of gold and greed.

Oh God Sorry7/25/2017, 6:48:08 PM7 votes

With Galio and Maokai's recent changes in VO, there really aren't any sad champions left (save Amumu). I can understand it's not exactly a huge demographic that you may not be excited to touch upon, but morose, depressed, remorseful, and sad feels like a very underserved market.

(I swear I'm not still bitter about changing Galio from a sad character into a demacian macho man)

UltraRow7/25/2017, 5:19:19 PM6 votes

When it comes to Personality Types and New Champs I think league is lacking a scaredy cat character who is afraid of everything, when you look at the roster of champs nobody seems to be concerned or afraid that they are surrounded and facing off against murders, psycos, war vetarins, monstsers, living dead, demons, and gods.

I understand wanting a badass champ and one of the ways of being a badass is not being scared of anything but I think there is room in league for a champion that's not so brave in the face of danger but still does what she/he needs to do. I think Riot has the tools and more importainly the talent to create a champion that's cool and fun to play despite being scared of his/her own shadow, maybe a passive that makes you run faster away from enemy champs, or a play dead passive which is kinda like guardians angel, but when he gets back up he/she is cc immune and gets a lot of movement speed.

I would really like to design champs one day (hopefully) and it would mean a lot if any of you cool dudes from riot or from the leauge community could give me feedback or told me what you thought about my idea/opinion, sorry if this statement looks like I'm just seeking attention

zippyHD7/25/2017, 4:06:29 PM6 votes

I think that the creator of Yasuo said, that he didn't like him being played as a toplaner. Are you then aiming to make Yasuo more as a midlaner?

Killaburn7/25/2017, 4:53:23 PM6 votes

I hope to see a girl with a long hair hime cut who is always bored, has a bored expression even is she kills a person and very slothy. Next is a Multi Personality Disorder champ that has a unique personality in each persona. Another is small(not actually small but petite woman) but terrible girl, has a kuudere personality(doesn't show emotions) especially when it comes to fighting, a psychopth maybe. and lastly, a happy go lucky male( like lux) in the outside but sinister and evil in the inside.

btw, he need a hairmancer in leaugue

example is in my thread, i hope you could see this : https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/story-art/X1PfGqc9-can-we-have-a-new-champ-that-uses-her-hair-as-skills?

Keeper of Trees7/25/2017, 8:25:33 PM5 votes

One thing I have noticed recently is that Noxus seems to be getting pushed back into just being a bunch of evil people who will do whatever they can do obtain power. I know in the past Riot has said that they wanted to give each region a unique identity with good and evil characters, but all of the "good" Noxus related champions, Riven (kind of), Alistar, Xin Zhao, etc., are not actually from Noxus, have defected from Noxus, and/or have such old lore that none of it can really be trusted anyways. Urgot's new lore only strengthens this issue. One of my favorite parts of the new Demacia lore was that Demacia now has the rather extreme fault of being super racist (or magist?). Demacia is still lacking in evil characters (Vayne is the only one that I see as even being close), but at least a lot of the characters have new faults. Garen is afraid of his sister being a mage. Fiora is somewhat narcissistic. Lux has self confidence issues. Galio can forget that he's supposed to protect people when he's in the heat of battle and leave soldiers to get slaughtered by magic. etc. Meanwhile, in Noxus we have a power hungry tyrant, his right hand man, some assassins who were related to one of the last leaders and don't like the new one, a vain snake lady, a narcissistic executioner, a seductive spider lady, an illusionist seeking power, a betrayed, exiled executioner who now wants anarchy, an insane Yordle who wants everything, a blood mage, an undead titan who is inhumanely used as a weapon, and a betrayed soldier who left when she realized that she was on the wrong side. I get that Noxus is supposed to be all about the strong surviving by crushing the weak, but I'm sure someone could figure out a way to get a good character over there. Maybe a character who is strong, but was once weak and so they sometimes take the weak under their wing and train them to be strong. Or really just anything that isn't, "So wait, if I hurt this puppy and baby you will give me 5 bucks? Done." A focus on strength doesn't have to mean strength at any cost.

WizZarD7/25/2017, 4:09:40 PM5 votes

Hey Meddler,

Are you exploring more changes to Yasuo? What else are we to expect? When is the new champion coming? Is he coming after or earlier than patch 7.20? Are there any more explorations in patch 7.16?

Solanar7/25/2017, 4:24:51 PM5 votes

Context for anyone wondering why Udyr changes keep getting onto the PBE and then never making it into a patch. At this point we'll be holding off on any updates, such as Udyr's, until after 7.18. Some of that's a desire to keep the next few patches more stable, a lot of it's also that people who are working on Udyr, LB, Azir etc are also generally on a fair bit of other work as well during these patches, so development and testing time's limited. 7.19 onwards we'll get more focus back on those, likely release order is probably Udyr, then Azir, then LB.

Does this include the XinZhao Gameplay Update and Evelynn too?

some degenerate7/26/2017, 2:58:46 AM4 votes

Waaaay too many suggestions for human champions in this thread. So here are some non-human archetype suggestions for league.

  • A parasite support (maybe from the Void or Kumungu) who provides damage, healing or shielding buffs by attaching themselves to their adc/'host.'

  • Another bird-themed champion who isn't based off of a falcon/hawk/phoenix/corvid/eagle. Riot, if you're gonna keep making bird champions, then do something completely wacky and different. Like an owl. Or maybe a penguin, a crane, a parrot, or a swan. Just cool it with the eagles/hawks/falcons/generic bird of prey champs and etc already.

  • A vastaya who has a friendly and healthy relationship with humans, and actually respects them and is fighting to better the relations between humans and vastayah Basically a foil to Xayah and Rakan.

  • A true eldritch abomination that rivals Aurelion Sol, Bard and Kindred in terms of cosmic power. Ever since the newer lore retcons, the Void have moved away from being a Lovecraftian powerhouse and have more or less become Runeterra's equivalent to Tyranids or the Zerg. We need a new champion (or several) to fill that now-empty Lovecraftian gap.

  • Another cosmic & divine spirit-god champion, on par with Kindred and Bard. Kindred's the embodiment of death - so why not the embodiment of life? Or change/time?

  • A dinosaur-themed champion. It's actually kind of surprising that you haven't created a non-human champion that fills this gap already. Especially when dinosaurs are awesome and offer enough creative potential as it is.

  • More robots like Blitzcrank or fully-augmented humans like Orianna. I think an ADC or top lane role would be a perfect fit for another champion like this.

Marisa7/25/2017, 7:58:05 PM4 votes

I feel like we're missing a realist/pragmatist character - something like a mercenary who doesn't belong to any real side because he's aware that they are all imperfect. One of the thing about LoL characters right now is that everyone is very up in their own agenda and they lack self-awareness about their flaws. The idea with my suggested character would be a sort of self-awareness about how both sides have flaws and are less perfect than they make themselves out to be - he'd take himself and others less seriously than the rest of the cast and demonstrate that by having a sense of gallows humor aimed at pointing out people's and their home countries' hypocrisies. He'd treat being on Summoner's Rift as just another job rather than a battle of ideals and wouldn't be afraid to fight dirty.

I guess I'm looking for the joking bitter cynic, whose job it is in the narrative to be the realist that points out the problems in the ideology of the rest of the cast.

Dessem7/25/2017, 7:42:51 PM4 votes

Anything particularly come to mind as missing, or that you've always wanted to see?

Conflicted, anguished, angsty person who holds great power but wants to wield none of it? E.G. a person who wants to be a medic but finds their magic can only destroy.

Someone with actually low self-esteem? Not like Poppy's great humility, but someone who thinks they're garbage or something similar; so instead of Poppy's "A hero? Nah, just a yordle with a hammer." -> "A hero? Me? Haha... n, no, I could never be a hero."

andrew95147/25/2017, 9:07:46 PM4 votes

I think we could use a teacher character. Kinda like Jiraiya and he could have a mechaninc that to deliver his fantasy, he could "teach" a teammate stuff through the game and after a point he teaches his student a spell or something to indicate the class has finished. A tactician too but probably Swain will be feeling that spot.

Maybe the new champ will be a blacksmith but in the case he isnt, thats another archetype missing. He could gift items to his teammates, improve the ones they already have with coatins and enchantments or maybe interact with turrets in some way. He could buff turrets to make diving harder or better protect turrets in the late game.

A thief would be cool too. Maybe with some aspects of Garret from the Thief series.