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@Riot Solidify your Balance Philosophies

LankPants··21 votes·1,320 views

Riot's nerfs to champions often seem heavily misdirected, hitting champions who are not particularly powerful while constantly ignoring champions who have been top tier for years. As a note, win rate isn't the only correlation to power, it is correlated to power, but it's also correlated to things like pickrate and playstyle.

Often nerfs to champions like Sona and Skarner are questioned because Riot lacks a clear balance philosophy and just says to the community "trust us they are too powerful". The question is why should they be trusted at this point? They continue to allow problem champions like Lee Sin and Thresh to run rampant while nerfing champs that almost no-one else view as a problem.

I'd like to see a thread stickied on the gameplay and balance boards explaining what kind of metrics Riot uses to nerf champions. I'm not asking for the metrics them selves to be released, just an idea of how they are weighted when considering balance. all they said is that Sona's gameplay is not the healthiest for bot lane, how do they define what is the healthiest for bot lane? I find it much more un-fun when Ali head-butt/pulverises me and I instantly explode, why isn't that more unhealthy for bot lane? It was never explained by Riot.

These are the decisions that Riot needs to explain and be constant on. If the community feels Riot are breaking their philosophies with a change they should have a list of them to argue with. More to the point Riot needs to start listing to their community if they do make a change and a large portion of their community feels they break the philosophies.

27 Comments

Kowe The Ewok9 votes

Riot Metric: "I don't like that champion." "I like that champions." Why Lee Sin is not getting nerfed. He's Phreaks favorite champion..

zane yalgir2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kowe The Ewok,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=968FVhtO,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2015-01-08T07:03:41.290+0000)

Riot Metric: "I don't like that champion." "I like that champions." Why Lee Sin is not getting nerfed. He's Phreaks favorite champion..

yup and i dropped raka after the rework she became to annoying

Cynicatt7 votes

how do they define what is the healthiest for bot lane?

Sona's not Thresh so she's not healthy for bot lane. Lol.

zane yalgir4 votes

im implying they dont have a nerf policy and that nerfng is stupid by default instead of nerfing just buff the others

anyways i hear the word nerf in this game and cringe knowing the champ will become unplayable

LankPants5 votes

that nerfng is stupid by default instead of nerfing just buff the others

I'm sorry but I don't agree with that, nerfing champs is needed to keep the game's balance in check. Continually buffing champs would result in a scenario where damage was so high that anyone not a dedicated tank would not survive anything, since you would have to be buffing every champ who wasn't A or S tier, even those just behind them.

What Riot needs to do IMO is balance towards a central point. What this means is they pick a champ who is considered average for each role, for example Karthus as a mage and try to balance every champion with them. Nerfing champs above them and buffing champs bellow, theoretically clustering the champs closer together.

zane yalgir2 votes

{quoted}

I'm sorry but I don't agree with that, nerfing champs is needed to keep the game's balance in check. Continually buffing champs would result in a scenario where damage was so high that anyone not a dedicated tank would not survive anything, since you would have to be buffing every champ who wasn't A or S tier, even those just behind them.

What Riot needs to do IMO is balance towards a central point. What this means is they pick a champ who is considered average for each role, for example Karthus as a mage and try to balance every champion with them. Nerfing champs above them and buffing champs bellow, theoretically clustering the champs closer together.

you realize that maps can buff nerf champs right? kinda liek this shit beta map jungle? your assuming we are buffing damge out put and you are assuming we dont factor insanity like

was so high that anyone not a dedicated tank

What Riot needs to do IMO is balance towards a central point = is my point in a nut shell they just keep nerfing and nerfing cuase the lower teir cant keep up with the upper teir there should only b a base line

LankPants2 votes

anyways i hear the word nerf in this game and cringe knowing the champ will become unplayable

You seemed to want no nerfs at all here, I'm sure you can understand my confusion.

Raptamei3 votes

Skarner was when the community first revolted against Riot.

Riot said "permaslow is unfun".

The community said "permaslow is less unfun than another boring and useless champion".

Riot won,paying customers lost. I

Angry Monster2 votes

Riot is worried about power creep that they have reverse power creep in the game. Take Irelia

She was nerfed heavily season 1 and 2, do to her oppressive game play. I know first hand what she was doing, i suffered through it. So they consistently nerfed her to the ground. 2 years go by and we do not see her, but other champs are slowly hit. Now she is back in play.

Riot suffers from looking at one hand and not knowing what the other is doing. The problems is that riot is not a 2 handed person but a beast with 100 hands.

LankPants1 votes

The odd thing is, she isn't that bad at the moment. At least IMO she feels less oppressive than champs like Ryze or Gnar. I will openly admit to being biased as hell here since I've played Irelia non-stop for two and a half years or so.

Angry Monster2 votes

That is my point. We have nerfed everything down to about her level. I am not saying that she is OP. I am saying that is now viable when you would of been laughed at playing her season 3 or early 4. We are/were in a system of heavy consistent nerfs.

The supposed Rene bar that was introduced late season 4 is already getting changed. He is getting a buff. Does he need one? I have no clue. But buffing Rene changes the measurement metric swore they were going to use. So now that riots measuring device says everything is broken they change the device?

Just proves they have no system of rules/metrics when balancing the game. they might as well spin a wheel and say ok we are going to hit this.

LankPants1 votes

Eh personally I think they set the bar slightly to high with Rene, buffing everyone up to top tier (which he was at the time) seems like a dangerous move to me. I do like the idea of a bar for each class but I think they should mostly be set at around the mid point of a classes balance, with tanks somewhat higher and assassins somewhat lower. I think that good champs to balance power levels around would be

  • Ashe
  • Karthus
  • Amumu or Sej
  • Jax
  • Sona before the freaking nerfs go through
  • Talon (although not his design, that's absolutely terrible)
Angry Monster1 votes

Actually you have to choose only one champ and let everything flow from there. Each class does not work cause you can have class issues arise.

LankPants1 votes

Balancing from one champ brings it's own problems though. How do you compare Ashe's power level to Thresh's? You need to balance around 1 champ for each class and leverage class power trough itemisation.

Angry Monster1 votes

that does not work cause items are shared across classes. any on can build a BF, tri ect.

LankPants1 votes

I've found my Infinity Edge Syndra build to be quite effective recently.

While anyone can build any item they don't, most items have a fairly defined class and those are the ones you should use to leverage characters. AP bruisers to strong? nerf Liandray's and ROA. Mages to strong? Athenes and Morelo's. These are the two classes with the most overlap in itemisation but even still you can find nerfs that effect one class disproportionately to the other.

Angry Monster1 votes

Support APs can build AP items though.

Brusiers build tank and AD

I did not mean all items are shared across every class. Only that there are huge cross overs.

Yasu0 is dog1 votes

Yes, please balance all ADC around the character who created mobility creep.

Chromatic Eagle1 votes

To be fair, you could argue that whatever it is they've used in the past has changed with experience.

Angry Monster1 votes

Are you saying that as time moves on the bar needs to change? Well that would be power creep or negative power creep. Not saying that is right or wrong but defeats the point of a bar. You are never supposed to change your reference point.

Its not even 6 moth since the idea of this champ is the measurement of its lane. And the game has not changed over the last much as far as the top lane is concerned.

slippykitten2 votes

Balance philosophy? Are you implying they have one at all? They just take a look at the pros and then nerf or buff whatever they think will make the game flashier to watch.

I mean, they openly said that they don't use numbers when deciding on balance. They literally said science and math do not apply..... what more do you want?

zane yalgir1 votes

bump for jsutice as is its only listen to the whiny low elo cry babies and ive beaten darius with kha so i know im bronze but its not me that put me there

http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/1690210565/211846831?tab=overview

^perfect example of why im bronze

4 roams mid morg still fed and a rek feeding 10 kills i dont understand this was he nerfed? i dont think so but O_o

LankPants1 votes

I'm not quite sure what you're implying but thanks

exiledFromBadmen1 votes

Aren't they bots?

zane yalgir1 votes

{quoted}

Aren't they bots?

what? im so lsot

MECHAMALEK1 votes

I dont know how true this is but a friend told me once a champion has a global win rate above 60%, they consider nerfing. What i want to know is, did Draven get a ninja nerf over the last month or so? I'm trying to find patch notes but I dont see anything but somehow my main feels incredibly weak early... (which btw his early damage is what makes draven, draaaaaaven).

zane yalgir1 votes

the nerfs arent very good there either nerfed agian or slightly buffed

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