Are mastery and rune systems really needed?

P1zzaman11·Oct 18, 2014·5 votes·1,317 views

I know I'm going to get a lot of "just go play Dota" flack for this thread, but it has always been an issue I have had with playing league. Why have such a complex underlying system with a game already relying on players knowing champion skills? Not only do I have to know what to do if I am up against champ A, but also memorize over complicated background of stats that add nothing to the game's feel except for confusion. Many usually say with this argument that its part of the skill level to realize what masteries/runes someone is taking and how to counter it, but overall it is detrimental to mechanical freedom and balancing. Masteries and runes represent everything that is RNG, about League's current state. Players should not need to have to sift through a players spreadsheet at the beginning of the game to understand how that champion will play. Moba's thrive on the design choice of making champions gameplay be fully represented by their appearance and abstracting that more with background stats just confuses the player. Let the designer design how a champion is supposed to play like, and the player should only need worry about how to use the champion's strengths to the current situation in game.

Not only would the designers have more control over the type of champions that could be made, but also it would actually make you feel as if you are playing a unique champion with unique strengths. For example instead of encouraging players on their own to create good rune and mastery pages for Sion, why not give Sion a unique stat pallette that plays to his tankiness making the opposing champion actually think "oh I'm playing against a Sion in lane, so he'll be hard to fight against early but he scales less later thus I should do strat a.". As opposed to "Oh i'm against a sion and his runes/masteries make him tanky, but I have the same runes so I am basically the same champ early game with slight differences". This will not only give more communication to how a champion plays to new players (as gameplay is represented by the champion, not in hard to reach spreadsheets and rune pages), but also give each champion more personality as a champion like Sion will actually always feel as if you are playing an undead juggernaut, not after you give him rune pages and masteries to make him play as an undead juggernaut. Items already do a wonderful job of allowing for champion customization, League does not need more.

I know that the reason behind runes in particular is as an ip sink (and thus more implication for buying rp), but I would much rather have champion in general worth more ip if it mean't to have champions feel more unique and fun to play. I don't know for sure, but I 'd be willing to bet the profit margin for making league more fun and balanced would be much greater than the money made from buying rune pages.

I'm not sure if I made my point 100% clear (never was to great with writing stuff down lol), but I'd love to hear what other's have to say and I'm open to change my mind if I see a good pro mastery/rune argument, but atleast how the system is now... there needs to be some sort of big design change.

17 Comments

The Storm DragonOct 18, 20146 votes

No, I agree. Runes and masteries distort the game by covering weaknesses and introducing strengths that weren't properly accounted for and serve no purpose other than to give people who've played the game longer a statistical benefit over those who haven't, even though there should already be a skill difference to begin with. (For anyone who thinks I'm whining because I don't have runes, I have 14-ish full rune pages and tons of IP left over by this point).

WorgslargOct 18, 20143 votes

Runes and masteries allow you to augment your playstyle for some champion beyond simply ingame items. For this augmentation, base stats are lower than needed.

I do agree, runes are too limited by ip cost.

The Storm DragonOct 18, 20145 votes

Runes and masteries allow you to augment your playstyle for some champion beyond simply ingame items. For this augmentation, base stats are lower than needed.

I do agree, runes are too limited by ip cost.

The problem with that is that there is usually an 'ideal' set of masteries/runes that are most effective in the greatest number of circumstances (IE armor runes before S4, flat health after). The customization aspect is undermined by the fact that there will always be an optimal build,

P1zzaman11Oct 18, 20143 votes

This exactly was the point I was trying to put across. Why have runes and masteries when items can do the same thing as well as being easily identifiable by the enemy team. If you want to be tanky early just get a doran's shield, why have to worry about getting the right pages?

DG AshabelOct 18, 20145 votes

That's how it should work in theory, but it doesn't work that way in practice.

The reason Blizzard removed mastery trees from World of Warcraft was because they spent six years tweaking the things in order to encourage personalized builds, but a very tiny number of players actually used them. Everyone flocked to the exact same build that was considered to be optimal in terms of min-maxing stats, with only the most hardcore roleplayers running personalized mastery pages. In the end, it was much easier to integrate the optimal tree's stats into the character because nobody was running other setups.

And with how much League community idolizes pro players, you'd better believe that everyone runs the pages used during tourneys and nothing else.

SalidfingersOct 18, 20141 votes

I would agree if it was blind pick.

EXAMPLE:

Olaf vs AP: Armor per level runes, and solid magic resis Olaf vs AD: Magic resis per level, and solid armor or If i want to go ham pure AD quins if i want to split push depending on make up run speed quins, Man i like my split pushing. Won the split pushing game against 2 diamonds in normal's yesterday.

P1zzaman11Oct 18, 20142 votes

True, but look at it from a design perspective. Why does the champion need to be augmented? Customization can be good, but look at a game like Call of Duty compared to Counter Strike. Sure, Cod has more customization but it lacks game feel due to the mechanic bloat, while counter strike sure has less customization, but every choice in match has much more substance and each gun has a complexity with its mechanics. In Cod's case augmentation is detrimental to its design, in the same way I feel League's rune/mastery system.

QuephaOct 18, 20143 votes

I think mastery pages work well since the power there is relatively minor but still interesting and there are a few choices (mainly in defense and utility trees, there's very little wiggle room in offense) that really come down to preference. also the power of masteries is kind of level from early game down to late.

But I hate runes. HATE. they are almost exclusively used for early game advantages, they're all raw stats so it's difficult to tell which ones are making the biggest effect on your character, and the IP cost for experimentation or even just copying what people think is the best page is INCREDIBLY RESTRICTIVE.

Their main purpose seems to be to make people more likely to buy champions with RP and I would argue that they do this in a way that is more likely to turn away new players than it is to do anything else. The way most people play with runes is to get the minimum number of pages together to do "fine" in every role so they can play ranked and then very rarely buy them again, opting to spend their IP on champions they like. So new players start playing the game and look at what stands between them and playing ranked to test their skill: attaining level 30, 16 champions, and rune pages so they can compete. level 30 just takes time and they understand that's to get them more experienced with the game, they WANT to buy champions and 16 is not a difficult goal if you're looking mainly at the 450 and 1350 level, but building rune pages is unfun, expensive, and they have to make an incremental choice between "do i want to spend a smaller amount of IP and only have two rune pages that are sort-of not bad for most champions, or do i want to spend another month's worth on a rune page, and ANOTHER month's worth on runes to fill it so that i am slightly closer to good for a slightly higher percent of my champions" what's the exchange rate between getting punched in the gut or kicked in the ass? the answer is play DOTA (or HotS or smite or strife or...) And the players who decide to muscle through the rune grind? they're done buying runes, it's not an IP sink anymore.

It already takes just under a month to save up 6300 ip for one of the champions in the most expensive pool and there are THIRTY TWO OF THEM. out of OVER ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY TOTAL. It would take a player well over 3 years to afford all the champions without spending money and none of that even matters because your business model also involves selling us ward skins, summoner icons, and champion skins that have totally ingrained themselves in the culture of the game.

SalidfingersOct 18, 20142 votes

I like the system, but my only problem is tier 1 and teir 2 runes. It is such a trap for new players.

I take full benefit of the runes, I think on 1 champ i play i have 3-4 different rune setups vs certain champions

junglerboy16Oct 18, 20141 votes

Yes^ Tier one and two runes need to be removed, they make no sense in the game. The game already has a built in gating system on how strong your runes can make you at low levels (you unlock them with each level, so buying a bunch of them with RP won't help you much), and having multiple tiers really is a n00b trap (when I was level four I spent a bunch of IP on runes that were awful in their slots and are completely useless to me). The tiers of runes unlocking at different levels actually punishes newer players until 20 when they can get tier three, because it is so NOT worth it to buy tier one or two that most players avoid them until then, or they waste their IP/RP on useless runes.

JChaosMasterOct 18, 20141 votes

I like the mastery system but not the Runes. I do agree with Sali but more then that. I like the Masteries because they come with some effects that Items just don't nice mini effects particulery under the utility and attack trees. It would be cooler if you could mix and match a bit more but its still nice. A lot of mine have like 15/4/6, I'm not doing math just a example. I will lose the +2 ap to get the +1.25 point speed boost.

I Dislike the Rune system because again teir 1 and 2 are pointless but also because the Runes themselves are pointless. I read once their were only like 5 of them that are any good. I mostly only use the cool down ones anyway because I cant always count on my champ getting a item with them. But over all the stats they provide are a joke. I would get a Full book of just AP scaling runes and a Dorren's ring still gives me more then they will at 18. Mostly I play with the ap/ad pen reds, scaling cool down blues and heal per sec yellows along with the life steal or vamp. just because I play mostly hybred champs so the pen allows me to not worry as much if they rune against it or lets me stay in line with there natural stats

So besides the purple ones Over all I think runes bring Very little to the table compaired to Masteries.

P1zzaman11Oct 18, 20141 votes

But couldn't those "little effects" that you enjoy in masteries easily be used in items to make some boring items have more flavor. Why does there need to be a seperate page to add these effects in game?

JChaosMasterOct 19, 20141 votes

I wish I could say yes but I cant. Because then I would have to pay a extra 400 gold for the "Little effects"

SpecterVonBarenOct 18, 20142 votes

While I agree that runes are somewhat pointless, I feel masteries are fun and useful for what they do. I really don't think masteries fall into the trap of one optimal build. And even my problem with runes is more because they're gated behind needing lp to get them.

RoyaiChaosOct 18, 20142 votes

Masteries: Yes, Runes: Meh As a support main, I NEED that extra gold at the start.

junglerboy16Oct 18, 20141 votes

I personally like the Runes+masteries setup league has, it provides motivation and acts as delayed gratification which incentivizes continued play for new player while leveling up to unlock ranked and other cool aspects of the game. It also provides a really cool level of customization to the game, (you can play such and such champ, but I can do this with my runes and make us play completely differently). While it certainly isn't a perfect system and could use updates to how it works, I think it is actually a very subtle but extremely core aspect of playing this game.

ValyrianBladeOct 18, 20141 votes

As a player who's yet to reach 30, I find both runes and masteries to be a huge motivation to keep going. There was a sense of thrill each level from 1-19 where I'd go look at my 2, 3, .. Now 6 mastery pages and see what new skill to add to each. I was lured in to the noob trap of lower Tier runes for levels 1-9 and at 10 couldn't see what rune slot unlocked (thought the Quint was just decoration) so I Googled it and immediately saw all the advice to wait until 20. So I stopped after spending only under 1k ip on Tier 1 runes and was ecstatic to hit 20 with about 15k ip Saved up and splurged on attack damage and magic pen marks, armour seals, magic res (flat and scaling) glyphs and movement speed quints (I know MS isn't standard but I really like them and since quints are expensive didn't want different ones for each page for now). Now, every level it's still the same excitement of what mastery to get (the fact that I know what runes I'm going to buy already sort of negates that excitement). I'm about to hit 26 now, which makes me excited for ranked but also finally getting complete mastery pages and rune pages is almost as exciting. Even if most do the same thing, I feel like it makes me more immersed in the game, gives me a greater influence on my champion.