You can spend money League
You don't have to empty your wallet on it. You can still obtain some things from in-game currency. But if you really want a champ or skin then just buy it. It's not like you need every champion anyway. I own them all and once I start ranked back up won't be able to play like 120 of them anymore except in ARAM and normals.
If you buy champs on sale you can stock up pretty fast without really burning through that much cash, at least on the older ones. I get the argument with the BE thing to an extent, but you guys just sound cheap/broke af and that's really not Riot's fault or problem.