Blue Essence (BE) - Acquisition, Curves and Opinions

With update 7.22 came the new runes and a revamp to the game's non-premium currency system; the removal of IP and rework of Blue Essence (BE). As of now, Blue Essence can only be acquired through champion shards, which are obtainable through champion capsules and loot boxes.

Champion capsules can only be acquired by leveling up, granting you a random amount of champion shards with all varying rarities/prices. There are already some glaring issues in this:

• BE gain comes in chunks, as opposed to IP's linear gain
• BE acquisition is R.N.G. (Luck) based, as you are not guaranteed specific amounts
• BE has diminishing returns, EXP requirements rise with your accounts level

Blue Essence and Capsules

Capsules are gained through account levels, granting you variety of champion shards; which can be either disenchanted into BE, activated to rent the champion for 7 days, or upgrading to permanent by spending BE. An issue players may face, is that since BE is acquired through chunks, if they find themselves short of a couple BE (e.g.: My friend who's 24 BE away from buying a champ he wants) then they MUST gain a whole new level to gain a champion capsule, just to gain the small amount of BE needed, as opposed to playing one game and gaining IP required. . Although it will seem easier to gain the entire champion roster via upgrading shards for permanent champions, players will find a harder time getting specific champions they want. Something that I personally dislike is that Blue Essence directly ties Loot Boxes/Orbs to the in-game currency. Meaning, if some unlucky sop opens a chest only to receive champion shards it makes Loot Boxes/Orbs feel all the more worse to purchase/open.

R.N.G. Doesn't Feel Good

Don't get me wrong, when you get those lucky critical hits in-game with a low critical hit chance it feels great and when you don't it's "whatev", but when it comes to the progression of your account and your ability to buy champions, it doesn't feel good at all. When you grind out levels and open up a capsule, with some luck, you'd get good chunk of BE gain. But you can also be extremely unlucky and get champ shards worth 90-270 BE, which in total probably doesn't add up to the amount of IP you would have gained from the amount of games it took you to level up. . I'm unsure if Riot has implemented any pseudo-R.N.G. to the capsules (i.e.: bias the rolls so that there isn't a lot of variance upon opening capsules) as well as the "rules" capsules have when revealing the amount of: shards; BE variance; champions you have (un)owned. But I'm willing to give Riot the benefit of the doubt there.

Diminishing Returns of BE/EXP

Since capsules are only gained by levels, the amount of BE you gain per game diminishes, as the EXP required per level rises (as far as I've seen, unsure if there's an EXP cap). This makes veteran players, like myself gain a lot less BE in the long run as compared to the original IP system. Makes me hesitant to buy the Gemstone + Gem(poro) Icon, as it requires a good chunk of my BE reserve, which seems would be harder to regain in it's current iteration. Although I don't need to use my BE to buy runes anymore, I do still need them for my champion masteries as well as the acquisition of new champions.

Opinions and Conclusions The new Blue Essence system is a step in a good direction (making the game more friendly to newer players and simplifying how the game works beyond meta/matches) it still has it's issues. Some solutions I felt could be good is the introduction of The Win of the Day bonuses to game types allowing you more chances at the EXP bonus as well as an introduction to an EXP cap (if there isn't one yet). Other things that could be implemented would be a pseudo-R.N.G. to champion shard gain as well as BE per game (though I could see BE gain per shard being adjusted accordingly).

Though I cannot fully express my dislike how the non-premium currency is now directly related to the premium, that is through Loot Boxes and event Orbs.