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[Worlds P&B Stats] 59/120 champions were picked in S4 Worlds. 17 of them made 71% of picks&bans

Pyro··56 votes·13,999 views

Data by Redditors LoLstatsGG and playhacker. You can find their Reddit post here.

The following data is sorted by the % winrate and includes the tiebreaker games (total: 78 games).

  • Azir is not counted because he was not available to the players.
  • 61 out of 120 champions (50.8%) were picked or banned.
  • Gragas and Aatrox are the only champions banned but not picked.
  • 90% of picks and bans went to top 29 champions.
  • 71% of picks and bans went to top 17 champions.
  • 52% of picks and bans went to top 10 champions.
  • Five champions - Lee Sin, Kha'Zix, Lucian, Thresh and Janna - have been picked in over 50% of games.
CHAMP% P&BWON% WINPB% P% BKDAK/D
Alistar100.0%480.00%5736.41%93.59%3.920.77
Zilean96.15%646.15%136216.67%79.49%3.560.85
Lee Sin92.31%2455.81%432955.13%37.18%3.691.06
Maokai92.31%1762.96%274534.62%57.69%3.830.87
Ryze87.18%2259.46%373147.44%39.74%2.851.10
Kha'Zix84.62%2543.10%58874.36%10.26%3.031.16
Thresh80.77%2454.55%441956.41%24.36%3.180.24
Lucian78.21%2352.27%441756.41%21.79%4.112.02
Janna67.95%2862.22%45857.69%10.26%5.430.16
Rumble51.28%1352.00%251532.05%19.23%2.820.72
Tristana50.00%1237.50%32741.03%8.97%3.361.80
Zed48.72%947.37%191924.36%24.36%2.471.26
Twitch44.87%1770.83%241130.77%14.10%5.602.47
Rengar42.31%1285.71%141917.95%24.36%5.741.79
Orianna41.03%1451.85%27534.62%6.41%3.301.19
Yasuo38.46%1066.67%151519.23%19.23%4.441.79
Nami37.18%1038.46%26333.33%3.85%2.760.27
Fizz32.05%642.86%141117.95%14.10%3.251.68
Nidalee32.05%112.50%81710.26%21.79%0.950.43
Syndra32.05%535.71%141117.95%14.10%2.551.16
Corki28.21%1254.55%22028.21%0.00%4.001.75
Irelia26.92%1066.67%15619.23%7.69%6.102.14
Jayce25.64%758.33%12815.38%10.26%4.201.53
Jarvan IV23.08%635.29%17121.79%1.28%2.970.48
Kog'Maw21.79%743.75%16120.51%1.28%3.551.45
Lulu21.79%533.33%15219.23%2.56%2.030.49
Elise20.51%533.33%15119.23%1.28%1.660.44
Kayle19.23%538.46%13216.67%2.56%2.680.53
Twisted Fate17.95%337.50%8610.26%7.69%3.411.44
Ahri16.67%541.67%12115.38%1.28%3.161.39
Braum15.38%650.00%12015.38%0.00%2.530.02
Morgana15.38%650.00%12015.38%0.00%2.920.16
Dr. Mundo12.82%110.00%10012.82%0.00%1.580.55
Jinx12.82%228.57%738.97%3.85%1.570.40
Kassadin12.82%562.50%8210.26%2.56%4.451.75
Talon8.97%342.86%708.97%0.00%1.490.54
Aatrox7.69%060.00%7.69%
Xerath7.69%233.33%607.69%0.00%2.400.90
Vayne5.13%375.00%405.13%0.00%13.337.00
Blitzcrank3.85%0.00%303.85%0.00%1.320.21
Leona3.85%133.33%303.85%0.00%2.100.50
Pantheon3.85%133.33%303.85%0.00%1.731.00
Rammus3.85%2100.0%212.56%1.28%4.500.67
Sona3.85%0.00%303.85%0.00%1.170.08
Caitlyn2.56%150.00%202.56%0.00%4.752.75
Evelynn2.56%2100.0%202.56%0.00%15.003.00
Ezreal2.56%0.00%202.56%0.00%5.003.00
Graves2.56%150.00%202.56%0.00%3.801.40
Singed2.56%150.00%202.56%0.00%6.601.40
Akali1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%17.009.00
Fiddlesticks1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%3.751.25
Galio1.28%0.00%101.28%0.00%0.430.00
Gragas1.28%010.00%1.28%
Katarina1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%14.006.00
Lissandra1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%7.502.00
Nunu1.28%0.00%101.28%0.00%0.400.00
Riven1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%2.000.00
Swain1.28%1100.0%101.28%0.00%1.250.13
Varus1.28%0.00%101.28%0.00%1.001.00
Vi1.28%0.00%101.28%0.00%0.140.00
Ziggs1.28%0.00%101.28%0.00%1.670.67

Amumu, Anivia, Annie, Ashe, Brand, Cassiopeia, Cho'Gath, Darius, Diana, Draven, Fiora, Gangplank, Garen, Gnar, Hecarim, Heimerdinger, Jax, Karma, Karthus, Kennen, LeBlanc, Lux, Malphite, Malzahar, Master Yi, Miss Fortune, Mordekaiser, Nasus, Nautilus, Nocturne, Olaf, Poppy, Quinn, Renekton, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Sion, Sivir, Skarner, Soraka, Taric, Teemo, Trundle, Tryndamere, Udyr, Urgot, Veigar, Vel'Koz, Viktor, Vladimir, Volibear, Warwick, Wukong, Xin Zhao, Yorick, Zac, and Zyra have not been picked or banned in this Season's World's Championship.

Some personal comments:

  • From the top 10 picks, Alistar and Maokai have been nerfed since patch 4.14 (also small nerfs to Kha'Zix and Lucian).

  • High winrates on champions like Twitch are related to the preference of this champion by Imp from the winning team Samsung White. It doesn't mean Twitch isn't strong, it's just correlation, not necessarily causation.

  • Aatrox was a target ban against Freddy from SK Gaming, hence his 0 picks / 6 bans status.

Data from the previous Worlds:

  • Season 2: 58 out of 102 champions picked in 31 games.
  • Season 3: 62 out of 116 champions picked in 63 games,
  • Season 4: 59 out of 120 champions picked in 78 games.

115 Comments

Nausicäa 25 votes

The problem is that Riot tends to completely ignore the many weak champions that dont need reworks but rather small numerical buffs.

They also tend to massively over nerf 'op' champions causing them to never be played again. Recent examples include Gragas and Shyvana. All this does is cycle out the top tier picks and does nothing to improve champion diversity.

Riot needs to seriously rethink their balancing strategy because its clearly not working very well and there has been no improvement to pick diversity across seasons.

Finally Riot has a pretty terrible track record of following up on their reworks. There are numerous reworks released in weak states and just never touched again.

Sailor Mint15 votes

Overall, the fact that exactly half of the champions are not competitively viable should probably raise some questions.

How large are pro player champion pools? Fairly small with little variety outside of mid and some niche ADC picks.

Including Flex Picks: 17 Top 11 Jungle 16 Mid 12 ADC 9 Support

Picked at least 5 times: 8 Top 5 Jungle 12 Mid 6 ADC 6 Support

It's consistent with what we've known for a while. Mid lane has a varied champion pool. Jungle has the smallest.

Burungeru17 votes

Because of the fact that only a few champions tend to be viable at any given time, there's no reason that pro players would have diverse pools. It's not an issue that individual players have small champion pools, but the fact that everyone basically gets forced into the same champions.

NeroUS5 votes

Also, since each team only has 3 bans, it is hard to ban players off their pools. It's really shocking when you think about it that a professional player like Hai can be banned off his pool.

I mean, out of 120 champions, a pro can play less than 1/40th of them at the competitive level in his lane?

Rawrful4 votes

If you watched SSW at worlds you would realize that is terribly, terribly flawed reasoning, even though most pros pre-worlds would have agreed with you. Most pros came in with something like 2 "mains" and 3 "flex" picks that they were confident on. 5 champions felt more than good enough pre-worlds because at worst the enemy is going to target ban 3 of your champs, then first pick one of them, then you get the last one.

Except SSW rolls up with someone like Looper. Why did Looper do so well? He is proficient on all the strong meta tops, so teams have to watch out for them. He is also proficient in the hard counters, meta or not, to all of those meta champions top. Add to that another pool of flex champions that are strong at different timings in the game, so he can build for late game OR early game OR mid game. Oh, and add to that ANOTHER pool of flex champions that allow him to fill gaps in any team composition with anything from team fighting ability to split pushing to hard tanks to assassins.

With a champion pool that is huge when they have first pick, they can target ban out a player then pick whichever champion in the game they feel counters whatever the remaining picks that player can use. This forces them onto something they aren't confident with or forces them to counter-pick themselves.

Add to that if they want to take their time, they have a strong counter pick to every champion planned out. And if they don't feel like counter picking top lane? They could use Looper's huge champion pool to fix holes in their team comp due to flex picks in other lanes. Or use his flexibility to counter-pick the enemy teams strategy.

Really, SSW's dominance came from a lot of places, but having at least one player with a GIGANTIC champion pool allowed themselves to win in the pick/ban phase almost every game they played. I mean, come on. Game 2 SSW vs TSM most pros would have picked Ryze into Maokai because, whatever, they can't really kill each other in lane and Ryze scales super hard and is really strong in general. But Looper picks Singed and Proxie Farms. Maokai's sustain is based on lots of skills getting used in lane, so no enemy means bad sustain, means hard to tank minions. Longish cd abilities means it is hard to farm under tower early. Perfect, glorious counter pick. BUT, it also fit his teams need for a tank, and the proxie aspect with a hyper-aggressive Kha'zix jungle pick also allowed them to punish Amazing's J4 jungle super hard.

So, by having a gigantic non-meta champion pool Looper managed to: Pick a hard counter to one of the 'best' meta tops. Managed to pick exactly the role his team needed. Pick a champion and playstyle of that champion that allowed his team to follow through with their plan to target TSM's jungler.

tl:dr Worlds proved the 'small pool of meta champions is all you need' theory to be wrong in a terribly embarrassing way. Pros NEED huge champion pools so they can counter pick enemy laners, counter pick enemy team comps, and set up plans and team compositions of their own that counter standard play super hard.

Burungeru1 votes

I'm not suggesting that it should be the case that pros have small pools of meta champions - I'm saying that it is the case. A single player that has a significantly more diverse pool doesn't really mean anything when the majority of players are all picking from this tiny pool of meta champions. That's just the conclusion I'm arriving at when 71% of picks and bans go to the top 17 champions (when there's a total of 16 bans/picks per game).

Rawrful2 votes

"there's no reason that pro players would have diverse pools" sounds like a suggestion that they should have small champion pools to me.

Burungeru1 votes

Then you don't understand the difference between what is the case and what should be the case, because they're very different things.

RuGu9 votes

It isn't that the champions who were not picked aren't viable. They just aren't as strong as some of the others. A lot of it comes down to mobility as well. Most of the unplayed champions are just not mobile.

You have to have a really good reason to play a non-mobile champion.

Mannysmoker6 votes

Jesus that's a big list. thnx for the info.

Matthias91196 votes

Overall, the fact that exactly half of the champions are not competitively viable should probably raise some questions.

I'm not sure that 78 games involving a relatively small pool of players is enough to declare that every champion on the "never picked/banned" list is not competitively viable.

There are definitely some that are -- although a number of those are either slated for reworks or have already received buffs since the Worlds patch. Gnar was also new enough that pros just didn't trust him yet. Also several of the most dominant champs from that patch (notably Alistar) have been nerfed, which would have opened up more picks/bans.

Pyro13 votes

OK, I guess we need some comparison then.

Season 2 Worlds: 58 out of 102 champions picked in 31 games (!).

Season 3 Worlds: 62 out of 116 champions picked in 63 games,

Season 4 Worlds: 59 out of 120 champions picked in 78 games.

This is creating a troubling trend. I'm not even bringing up here Dota 2, which had all but 8 heroes picked in The International 4.

although a number of those are either slated for reworks or have already received buffs since the Worlds patch.

Old champions are getting obsolete as the new/reworked champions appear. The problem is much more complex than "well, let's just fix the bad champions". The problem is that at any given time half of the champion pool is competitvely unplayable.

Shyvana has been nerfed with nothing but bugfixes, to the point where she's at 45% winrate in solo q and she disappeared from the competitve scene. The problem in here is that she's nothing but a brick wall of burning damage and there's nothing particular the she can do which other champions could not. Unless buffs to her raw laning power and tankiness pushes her to the FotM status once again, she will remain unpicked. And this is just one example.

Raptamei10 votes

Old champions are getting obsolete as the new/reworked champions appear. The problem is much more complex than "well, let's just fix the bad champions". The problem is that at any given time half of the champion pool is competitvely unplayable.

The problem is that MOST CHAMPIONS ARE ALMOST IDENTICAL. So instead of picking the ones that fit your strategy the best (Dota 2) you just pick the ones that are 1% better than the rest.

And since you can't possibly balance down to 1%, I guess that's it for competitive variety.

Why would you make a game with no hard counters, only one viable meta, five roles... and 120 champions??

BastionKross6 votes

OK, I guess we need some comparison then.

Season 2 Worlds: 58 out of 102 champions picked in 31 games (!).

Season 3 Worlds: 62 out of 116 champions picked in 63 games,

Season 4 Worlds: 59 out of 120 champions picked in 78 games.

So basically, more champions to pick from, and more games played, but LESS variety. Cheers Riot, you've defied the odds and made this season's worlds even less diverse than the last. I don't know whether to be depressed or amazed at the incompetence of your balance team. Right now, it's a little of both.

This is creating a troubling trend. I'm not even bringing up here Dota 2, which had all but 8 heroes picked in The International 4.

I think it's fair to bring up Dota 2 here, it's League's direct competitor after all. Most of the heroes of Dota 2 all have their own unique uses, their own niche. Their own situation where they shine bright. League can have multiple champions be very similar to each other in the role they fulfill, with one being a clearly superior choice. Gotta diversify the champion niches, Riot.

Dryditch3 votes

Gotta diversify the champion niches, Riot

+1 for inadvertently making me think of this

BastionKross2 votes

That's what I was thinking when I wrote it!

Sailor Mint6 votes
  • LoL's meta shifts have always been patch driven, Worlds were played on an old "figured out" patch (4.14).
  • 56/59 were picked during the first 3 days.
  • Koreans have never been known to innovate, they refine and perfect things other people discover.

If you want to blame something, blame the format. Blame the major organized leagues (LCS, OGN, LPL), making it impossible for teams to hide strats. Regions aren't isolated anymore. Teams like Moscow 5 showing up to a LAN with crazy strats is something extremely unlikely to happen again.

koalaknight5 votes

To be fair, Dota 2 has 10 bans each game, and at International 4, there was the initial round robin where every team played every other team where teams had to play against more play styles and strategies and can't really rely on certain heroes since they will likely be banned. Double elimination bracket also made it so that teams sticked around longer and played more games and could adapt and play different heroes, whereas in League, teams that dominate with certain champions / play styles will stick around and just keep on playing those. Feels like the structure of the picks/bans as well as the tournament structure kind played a big role in the lack of diversity. And for this particular tournament, I feel that the strong early / mid game comp are favored that made some champions that takes time to scale up such as Shyvana not work that well.

While I do agree that there is a big problem with the lack of variety, but I don't think there is an easy way to fix it. Most people will not have access to every champion, where if there are hard counters or champions who are really, really unique, people with larger champion pools will have huge advantage over people with smaller champion pools in certain roles; with how every champion will have to be unlocked, it can lead to more of a pay to win scenario where people who use RP to unlock champions will have a significant edge, and it may also have the consequence of people focusing solely on a specific role since they will have to get as many champions for that role as possible to stay competitive, where they will be even less prepared for other roles.

I feel that the current system, where while champions are very similar to each other in certain role and a rather rigid meta, works in that almost every champion will be viable for most of the player base. A champion does not have to be played at the highest competitive level (Worlds, OGN, LCS, 5 vs 5 teams) to be considered viable, where those champions excel in that environment where you have well organized team with good communication, but that would not mean that those champions will be good (unless they just have too much raw stats / utility and are low risk but high reward) for solo queue and normals. And champions that are strong in solo queue will not necessarily be good for competitive play. There may be a lack of variety at the highest level, but for the other levels at which most people play the game, the champions will be similar enough where most of them are viable and will not put the player at too much of a disadvantage.

And the rigid meta makes it so that people won't be at significant disadvantage for not having large champion pools, since they only need a few champion for each role / lane.

In terms of things that may help improve the diversity, having more bans could provide teams with more incentive to play more champions and prepare more strategies. Maybe changing the meta, maybe with things such as encouraging sustained AP dps rather than forcing teams to play AD carry such as having Azir / Cass be the late game carry. I feel that the way that SSW played the game was very fun to watch, where they did a lot of cool things with the early roaming, squishy assassin comps, where they kind of played different from the usual meta.

Earl Eulrich2 votes

To be fair, Dota 2 has 10 bans each game, and at International 4, there was the initial round robin where every team played every other team where teams had to play against more play styles and strategies and can't really rely on certain heroes since they will likely be banned. Double elimination bracket also made it so that teams sticked around longer and played more games and could adapt and play different heroes

I think this really is the important difference. Dota is not really more balanced on a Champion to Champion-basis, but the meta-environment is just better at forcing/bringing out more diversity - specifically the much better pick&ban-phase + double-elimination.

xJLx MCHammer4 votes

Old champions are getting obsolete as the new/reworked champions appear. The problem is much more complex than "well, let's just fix the bad champions". The problem is that at any given time half of the champion pool is competitvely unplayable.

Shyvana has been nerfed with nothing but bugfixes, to the point where she's at 45% winrate in solo q and she disappeared from the competitve scene. The problem in here is that she's nothing but a brick wall of burning damage and there's nothing particular the she can do which other champions could not. Unless buffs to her raw laning power and tankiness pushes her to the FotM status once again, she will remain unpicked. And this is just one example.

This is pretty much the problem. Champ B offers nothing that Champion A offer. Shyvana is just like you said a champion running around tanking and doing damage with her burnout/auto attack. She is either extremely weak or strong. Riot decided to take her out of competitive play and nerfed her 4 times in 3 patches. Now she doesn't offer nothing that any other champion doesn't already, except, other champions offer good CC/slows/..etc; she doesn't

Their rework kind of tries to address this like with Sion. Yet, witch each new release, they contradict themselves. New champs tend to have mobility, %hp dmg, some type of cc, and dmg. The rework champs don't.

Guess which tends to be better; the new champs who have overloaded kits

Raptamei6 votes

Amumu, Anivia, Annie, Ashe, Brand, Cassiopeia, Cho'Gath, Darius, Diana, Draven, Fiora, Gangplank, Garen, Gnar, Hecarim, Heimerdinger, Jax, Karma, Karthus, Kennen, LeBlanc, Lux, Malphite, Malzahar, Master Yi, Miss Fortune, Mordekaiser, Nasus, Nautilus, Nocturne, Olaf, Poppy, Quinn, Renekton, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Sion, Sivir, Skarner, Soraka, Taric, Teemo, Trundle, Tryndamere, Udyr, Urgot, Veigar, Vel'Koz, Viktor, Vladimir, Volibear, Warwick, Wukong, Xin Zhao, Yorick, Zac, and Zyra have not been picked or banned in this Season's World's Championship.

So now we have a list of troll picks. Warm up your report button, bronzies.

BlazingSalvo3 votes

Except solo queue is different than competitive. Akali and Talon were rocking their 56%+ win rates in solo queue before being picked even a single time in LCS or Worlds. Also, some champions like Viktor or Gnar were reworked or buffed.

But yeah, in general, I still feel uneasy every time someone picks garbo champions like Warwick, Xin, and Garen. :^)

RoyaiChaos4 votes

I've been carried by Warwicks, Xins, and Garens, and also lost to them as well. A good "trash champ" can beat a bad "OP champ". A lot of it depends on skill, but if both are equally skilled, I admit that the more "OP" champ would be more likely to win.

Proving Facts5 votes

Hypothetical situation: Riot makes every single champion completely balanced

  1. You have a small pool of players who master ~1-3 champions
  2. Even if every champ is balanced, players are going to choose certain champions for different reasons
  3. To dumb this down even further, if EVERY CHAMPION had EXACTLY THE SAME SKILLS, the coolest looking champ would get picked.

There's no reason for every champion to be played in competitive, because pros can only master so many champs, and only ten champions in a game determine victory.

chumbler10 votes

Hypothetical situation: Riot makes every single champion completely balanced

  1. You have a small pool of players who master ~1-3 champions
  2. Even if every champ is balanced, players are going to choose certain champions for different reasons
  3. To dumb this down even further, if EVERY CHAMPION had EXACTLY THE SAME SKILLS, the coolest looking champ would get picked.

There's no reason for every champion to be played in competitive, because pros can only master so many champs, and only ten champions in a game determine victory.

If people can get by at the highest competitive level by only having to learn 2-3 champions, your game isn't balanced for shit. The main problem is how degenerate champion kits are and how there is approximately one viable strategy in the game and Riot does everything they can to keep it that way.

Your hypotheticals are also completely irrelevant because this game isn't even close to that.

Raptamei2 votes

Hypothetical situation: Riot makes every single champion completely balanced

  1. You have a small pool of players who master ~1-3 champions
  2. Even if every champ is balanced, players are going to choose certain champions for different reasons
  3. To dumb this down even further, if EVERY CHAMPION had EXACTLY THE SAME SKILLS, the coolest looking champ would get picked.

There's no reason for every champion to be played in competitive, because pros can only master so many champs, and only ten champions in a game determine victory.

If people can get by at the highest competitive level by only having to learn 2-3 champions, your game isn't balanced for shit. The main problem is how degenerate champion kits are and how there is approximately one viable strategy in the game and Riot does everything they can to keep it that way.

Riot does this because they want League to be a fighting game even though it has the form of a strategy game.

chumbler4 votes

Hypothetical situation: Riot makes every single champion completely balanced

  1. You have a small pool of players who master ~1-3 champions
  2. Even if every champ is balanced, players are going to choose certain champions for different reasons
  3. To dumb this down even further, if EVERY CHAMPION had EXACTLY THE SAME SKILLS, the coolest looking champ would get picked.

There's no reason for every champion to be played in competitive, because pros can only master so many champs, and only ten champions in a game determine victory.

If people can get by at the highest competitive level by only having to learn 2-3 champions, your game isn't balanced for shit. The main problem is how degenerate champion kits are and how there is approximately one viable strategy in the game and Riot does everything they can to keep it that way.

Riot does this because they want League to be a fighting game even though it has the form of a strategy game.

Except it's a terrible fighting game.

Proving Facts2 votes

I see that you're set in your opinion so I won't resolve to change that, but here's what I'm saying... It isn't that people can "get by" by mastering 2-3 champs. It's that they have to. If you were a professional player, would you attempt to master every champion for your role? If you support professionally, would you master ten champions, or 2-3 so that if the enemy team bans you out, it costs them all three of their bans? I feel that there's always more than one way to achieve a victory in LoL. Also, I don't exactly feel that competitive is the best way to measure game balance. That's a really small test pool that doesn't represent a large player base.

My hypothetical shows that wether or not the game is truly "balanced" (whatever you subject balance to be) preference, favorability, and popularity are all inherent to human nature and to professional champion picks as well.

chumbler7 votes

I see that you're set in your opinion so I won't resolve to change that, but here's what I'm saying... It isn't that people can "get by" by mastering 2-3 champs. It's that they have to. If you were a professional player, would you attempt to master every champion for your role? If you support professionally, would you master ten champions, or 2-3 so that if the enemy team bans you out, it costs them all three of their bans? I feel that there's always more than one way to achieve a victory in LoL. Also, I don't exactly feel that competitive is the best way to measure game balance. That's a really small test pool that doesn't represent a large player base.

My hypothetical shows that wether or not the game is truly "balanced" (whatever you subject balance to be) preference, favorability, and popularity are all inherent to human nature and to professional champion picks as well.

If it were actually valuable to have a diverse champion pool, people would (see dota). It's not valuable, so they don't. Instead they just play what is currently good and straight up say as much, because doing anything else is putting yourself at a disadvantage. By basically any metric you choose, lol's balance is a joke.

Proving Facts4 votes

You definitely make a really strong point there. There's absolutely zero incentive to having a large champion pool in professional. As to whether there should be incentive or not, I have no clue. It would definitely be cool to see every champion get played to watch all the matchups on a professional level, but that's painfully unrealistic in this meta and game model. LoL is the only MOBA game I've played so I can't compare it's balance to Dota 2 other MOBAs, but I've always heard that Rito's balance methods can be questionable.

Raptamei2 votes

Hypothetical situation: Riot makes every single champion completely balanced

  1. You have a small pool of players who master ~1-3 champions
  2. Even if every champ is balanced, players are going to choose certain champions for different reasons
  3. To dumb this down even further, if EVERY CHAMPION had EXACTLY THE SAME SKILLS, the coolest looking champ would get picked.

There's no reason for every champion to be played in competitive, because pros can only master so many champs, and only ten champions in a game determine victory.

In Dota you have multiple strategies and counterpicks so pros know a ton of heroes. League isn't a strategy game though so you just pick the best champ.

Kingsgrave4 votes

Honestly tho, the game isn't rock paper scissors or completely counterpick oriented like other Mobas, mainly Dota 2 is referenced by this, so I don't expect for a new champion to be picked or banned every single match. It seems mostly impossible for all 121 of the champions to be picked or banned.

Pyro8 votes

I think the greatest controversy here is in the LoL's F2P system. In DotA, more heroes are viable, AND you have them all for free. In LoL, you have to buy champions with your time/money, only to find out later on that they've been nerfed to ground, reworked, or fell out of meta.

RoyaiChaos3 votes

Name any champions that is completely unviable and not in the line for a rework. There's a few I'll admit, but a majority are still viable, although maybe a bit tricker to play.

If you are a true champion main, you will stick with that champ no matter what nerfs/buffs they are given and you will continue to win with them. (again, with only a few exceptions)

Otherwise it's your own fault for only buying champions that are considered "OP" and not spending the time to truly learn and master them.

But yeah, Cass needs a little love :c

NeroUS1 votes

Urgot was unviable for how long?

RoyaiChaos2 votes

Urgot is in the line for a rework.

Nirc2 votes

lol no, Dota is no more counterpick oriented than league is - and they should be counterpick oriented, to some degree

There are no picks in dota or league that will make you 100% useless, but there are dis/advantageous picks of varying degrees... League's system is just worse because it deprives you of picking strategically (or grind/pay to do it)

Kingsgrave2 votes

but that doesn't exist in high level which is what we are talking about in this thread.

PlushBores4 votes

Alistar 100% ban Damn

ULTRAF0RCE3 votes

Riot knew that Sion was unviable that is why they did the rerelease, Viktor, Soraka and Cassieopia were reworked to in theory become better. (not going to talk about cass more than that) Fiora, Poppy, Yorick, and Warwick are all supposed to be reworked. Can't say much about most of the others except that Gnar is still new and slightly unreliable and teemo and heim are one trick ponies

What Is Smite2 votes

The thing about Fiora is that she only needs a rework for her kit and not much else same with the other 3 but then again it's all up to people who understand the kits better than normal players who just pick Fotm. In short I believe normal players should not have a say in kit reworks but the people who main those champs or played a significant number of games on that champion should have a say in helping with reworks. I think that many people in the Cass player base can agree that if they were allowed to help with the rework then she would be more balanced than what stashuu gave them.

futuresight233 votes

Here are some things that jump out at me.

  1. Tristana's 37.5% winrate. I imagine that is the stat I look at and wonder if we have seen the last of the Tristana nerfs. To go further, Tristana was 2-5 in the quarterfinals, semis, and finals including the two games the Samsung teams lost to TSM and C9. They played Worlds without the nerfs/slaps on the wrist to her Rocket Jump, Buster Shot, Rapid Fire and attack speed per level. Her teams tended to fall behind by significant margins early and lose before she could hit her final form.

  2. Late game champions in general tended to struggle assuming their strength early game was not up to par with the opposition. Tristana's poor win rate is covered here, as well as Mundo's unfathomable 1-9 record. No one attempted to play Karthus or Jax.

  3. Rengar's 85% winrate 12-2. The only other champion that has even a 70% winrate with more than 10 games played is Twitch. Granted Dandy inflates this winrate by a fair bit but it seemed to be a mistake to anyone get Rengar who could play him.

Pyro4 votes

I think the problem with lategame champions was with how one-sided most of the games were. Once a better team got a lead with early-to-midgame champs, there was no possibility of comeback.

Even if the series in playoffs were close, the particular games most often were not.

BlazingSalvo2 votes

I'm still disturbed that Gnar was available for Worlds (or was he?) - 0% pick or ban? Really? He had to be disabled right?

Dyrus didn't even know what he did on stream today - suggesting no one played him in scrims or tested him at all, and after a few games called him "OP as balls" - Gnar has a 52% win rate in Diamond+ by the way. Gnar's strong. Why wasn't he at worlds? Not even banned?

If he wasn't disabled, are pro teams really that incapable of exploring new things that they couldn't play Gnar in a single game?

EDIT: A friend brought back to my attention that Gnar had actually recieved QOL buffs to his Q, etc., after the Worlds patch. Fair enough, although I'm still surprised Dyrus hadn't even scrimmed against Gnar or considered him for testing, and he saw zero picks or bans. He didn't change that much in the QOL patch, and he's strong right now.

RoyaiChaos2 votes

No one wanted to risk something new like that for such an important event which they had probably already created team comps and stuff for.

OwlMechanic3 votes

Pro's were skeptical of his rage being uncontrollable and telegraphed, when every .5secs of trade/teamfight can be win or lose with the stakes so high they aim for consistancy over all other factors when picking a champion. And he struck most of them as just straight up too risky when they needed absolute control over their champs. I only say this after watching a couple of interviews and in stream commentaries.

That said people have since figured out that his weaknesses when form changing aren't exactly weak, and he can be relied upon somewhat for transformation when needed but I still don't think he'll see play at the highest possible tier of play because he isnt 100% controllable and the surprise factor is significantly diminished against hyper aware/reflexive opponents, who don't have the same built-in counterplay components on other champs.

Overly Manly Man1 votes

I think that's ok...

Some champs are not made to be competitive (like Garen, Ashe...), they are made to be noob friendly! =)

Like, if all the champs were complex like Zed, or Kha... Noobs would be totally lost! And if all champs were simple like Garen... Competitive game would not be fun at all...

Sorry for my bad english! =)

Pyro7 votes

It's okay for 10-15 champions to be "noob-friendly".

It's a problem when 50 champions are not an option in a tournament.

Wisdm1 votes

Really nice stats, but i do not understand your point, having 50% of champs picked in world is actually a huge %, what would the best % be for you? 100% you would like to see alll champs on worlds?

Dehorn9 votes

Really nice stats, but i do not understand your point, having 50% of champs picked in world is actually a huge %, what would the best % be for you? 100% you would like to see alll champs on worlds?

in the dota 2 international, 98 out of 108 heroes were picked at least once. thats 90%.

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