"Adding Meaningful Choices to the Game" - Some Thoughts on the Current Mastery System

Before I start criticising, have to give Riot credit for the new mastery system they made. From being overly complicated yet at the same time extremely stale and full of must-take no brainers it changed to a dynamic system that allows you to make decisions based on your personal preference and adjust it to whatever kind of builds or playstyles you prefer.

Yet I think there are still a few things that make some of the choices in the masteries nobrainers, for example those that are just flat out better than others or some masteries that are too simular which removes the meaningful choice of it. While this is mostly fixed ( compare it to the days of Thunderlords only meta or when Tryndamere and Yasuo would be absurdly good with Warlord's Bloodlust ) I think there are some few edges that can be rounded.

First of all, here are some links so that you can follow my thoughts and compare them to what the current mastery system is: http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Ferocity_Mastery_Tree_(2016) http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Cunning_Mastery_Tree_(2016) http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Resolve_Mastery_Tree_(2016)

Let' start with one problem that has bothered me for quite a while. In the days of the Thunderlord's only meta it was not only that great because the other keystones were mostly underpowered but also because of another factor: the "Precision" and "Intelligence" masteries are much better than the "Battering Blows" and "Piercing Thoughts" masteries which makes investing into Cunning much more valuable than investing into Ferocity ( 5th row of Cunning and Ferocity ).

"Battering Blows" and "Piercing Thoughts" are extremely simular to begin with. The only factor that decides which of both masteries you take is simply what kind of damage you deal, you literally just have to look at a graph and not think about it - not a meaningful choice at all. Now compare that to the thoughts behind picking either Intelligence or Precision - Precision gives you a lot of early game damage and damage against squishies with the flat pen it grants you while Intelligence is a great investment in the lategame and grants you more damage against a broader varitey of champions. If you want more DPS you might want to take Intelligence, while Precision works really well on burst champions. You also have to look at the utility you have that won't profit from Precision so you might want to reevaluate your choices. These and many more factors make give it much more strategic depth than the equivalent masteries in the Ferocity Tree.

Then there is the problem of some champions dealing hybrid damage aswell as the keystones they take. Let's take Corki for example. The choice between Thunderlord's and Fervor of Battle, ignoring all other facts, is actually a pretty difficult, tactical and most importantly of all, meaningful choice to make - Do you want more DPS or burst? Do you want to bully in lane or invest into the lategame? Do you need to deal more physical or magic damage? ...? Yet the fact that Piercing Thoughts and Battering Blows only grant one kind of penetration while Precision grants both magic and physical penetration makes Precision much more appealing to Corki. He deals pretty much half physical and half magic damage so Precision has double the effectiveness of Battering Blows or Piercing Thoughts for him.

There are also some champions that deal one type of damage but the keystone they choose does the other kind of damage. A Kayle or an Azir for example want to have Fervor of Battle since it amplifies their damage greatly but since they can only take one type of penetration, which will obviously be magic, Fervor of Battle won't profit from it. This might also be partly the reason why Deathfire Touch is seen almost never on AD Champions even though some of them like Urgot could consistently proc it and use it to great effect.

To fix this problem, you would obviously have to combine both of the penetration masteries of the Ferocity tree into one that gives both 7% armor and magic penetration. That frees up another mastery slot. For this I have a suggestion though there are a lot of ideas you could implement here, I'm interested to see what you guys think. It would give 0.3 attackspeed that will go overcap, simular to the Intelligence mastery just for autohitters instead of spellcasters. For those we would just need some names, would love to see some suggestions on that.

The next problem is actually trying to be fixed right now. On the PBE Warlord's Bloodlust is getting reworked ( http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Vpbe, scroll down ). I think this is because the current Warlord's Bloodlust will do absolutely nothing for the first minutes of the game which gives it an disadvantage early on. On the other hand there are 2 champions on which it will ramp up extremely fast to the border of being acceptable for balance, this 2 being Tryndamere and Yasuo while it is mostly mediocre on other champions.

While I mostly like this rework idea I have 3 major criticisms. The first one is that it will work on minions. This will give it an unfair advantage against the other keystones and it already was a problem that had to be fixed several times before, like Fervor of Battle or current Warlord's Bloodlust pre-nerf which could also take advantage of minions and made them unfair in lane or between fights. The other problem I have that it is only lifesteal. It should heal for all damage dealt, including spells, on-hits, items and everything else. This way it will be good on every champion that focuses on dueling, skirmishing and staying alive in teamifights instead of only those non-on-hit focused autohitting champions and becoming too niche once again. Lastly I don't really know about the numbers of the new Warrior's Bloodlust, right now they seem to be restricted by the fact that it also applies to minions, on first glance they seem that they should be higher.

That's pretty much all I wanted to talk about.