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[Opinion] Champion design is being limited by forcing them to fit into existing classes

redfeenix·11/29/2016, 12:01:45 AM·1 votes·1,011 views

Hey,

Riot's new champs are pretty interesting lorewise, and have great thematics. They look great and are often fun to play.

HOWEVER, these new champs lack innovation and do not push the boundaries of League. They are the same.... with Q and W doing damage and E providing mobility. Most champions follow this model.... they might look cool and be fun, but they do not bring anything different to the game.

I would like to compare to Blizzard's Specialists in Heroes. These guys are SO UNIQUE and I fear that Riot will never release cool or innovate champions like Blizzard due to their obsession with forcing champs to be part of an existing class. You cannot push the boundaries of the game by forcing champions to fit an existing class.

I will provide examples of specialists in Heroes. These champions can NEVER occur in League because they do not fit any class.

Abathur: A champion that has 100 HP and can NEVER fight anyone 1 v 1. However he can "infest" allied heroes and minions to aid them in battle by giving them shields or doing aoe DMG. He sits in base all game, and aids his team from afar. http://heroesofthestorm.wikia.com/wiki/Abathur

Lost Vikings: You control 3 characters at the same time! You can essentially play in all 3 lanes at once! While each of the toons are weak, he is very strong since he can be all over the map at once. http://heroesofthestorm.wikia.com/wiki/Lost_Vikings

Murky: A weird murloc with a 5s death timer. You are encouraged to suicide and just harass and irritate the enemy team. He is weak, but very very persistent. http://heroesofthestorm.wikia.com/wiki/Murky

Cho'gall: A huge raid boss controlled by 2 people. 1 player acts as the driver .... the other as the gunner. Its literaly a 4 v 5 when you pick him, but BOY is he strong af!

http://heroesofthestorm.wikia.com/wiki/Cho'gall

All of these heroes are really fun and PUSH the boundaries of the game. They are fun because they are so unique and different. However, I fear that Riot can never really push their creativity to the max because of the class restrictions. These above heroes cannot be created in League because they dont fall under any existing class.

Each new champion in League will be part of the existing classes. Therefore League will never have unique/ innovate champions that push the boundaries of champion design and gameplay. Riot is being constrained by their existing classes, and every new champ will be something we've seen before.

I would love to see some wacky/ awesome champs that really push the game forward. However all new champs are based on the current classes, so we wont really see anything innovative.

What do you guys think? Do you think these class definitions help champion creativity or limit it?

Edit: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/game-updates/gameplay/dev-blog-classes-subclasses

16 Comments

Maple Crusader11/29/2016, 12:03:39 AM2 votes

The problem I see with having a champ like Murky is that it would be ridiculously easy to feed the enemy team. He would be considered a troll character.

At the moment, Riot can only do singular champs (not made up of separate characters who can split up to do their own thing).

Dabrick0111/29/2016, 2:15:38 AM2 votes

There is a bit of an issue with all of this.

Classes are made to cover all possible roles a champ can fill. We have been seeing a bit of boundary pushing by Riot with Kindred as an ADC/Jungler and with Ivern as a Support/Jungler. Some of these ideas would not fit in anywhere and would just be so far out of place, that they would fail miserably and they would be coding nightmares.

Many people have been asking for a champ that infects other things, and that may be possible.

Death timers make this game what it is. If remove the death timer for one champ, you completely remove the opposite team's ability to capitalize on a won teamfight. Also Gold would be a massive issue for "Murky" as he would end up as a troll pick.

Do you understand how much of a coding and gameplay nightmare "The Lost Vikings" would be? I'm not even going to go into balance.

Having two people control a champ would make that champ not only another coding nightmare, but next to impossible to play. The only way to play that champ would be to Voice Chat (which they are not going to add). It would be a solo que nightmare as well. What if the person driving the thing decides to troll. What if the person gunning the thing decides to troll. WHAT IF ONE OF THEM DC'S

These are all ideas that have fit into other games and can fit into other ones still. League however is more refined. After tons of seasons, we have come to expect certain play patterns for certain roles, and certain archetypes to fulfill said roles. Riot tries to keep it's champ designs diverse, yet, with design standards.

Papa Slothy11/29/2016, 12:23:45 AM1 votes

all those characters sound a little, uh...

Unpaladin11/29/2016, 3:16:44 PM1 votes

Riot won't be able to do anything like this because it won't be easy to balance nor would it be worthwhile in terms of competitiveness. Classes are genuinely important for league. Also you actually say "toon"? Get out.

Ralanr11/29/2016, 3:30:07 PM1 votes

Blizzard is able to get away with such crazy hero designs in a short time frame because leveling in HotS is teambased and customization is different for each hero. They don't have to worry about if an item is too strong on one hero and how nerfing it impacts others.

League has experience being individual based and has an income for items to help empower a champion.

As for unique champions. Riot has said that when making champions in a desired role, they often try to have that champion break one of the rules of that role.

And even if they don't do that, we still have unique champions despite these "class restrictions". Poppy has an ult that knocks people back to their base no matter the direction and has a dash cancel zone. Kled has a mechanic that allows him to mitigate burst unlike any other champion. Ivern jungles without throwing a single punch. Tahm Kench eats people to protect them with his body. Ryze has a group teleport. Jhin is an ADC that has a fixed attack speed that can't be altered outside of leveling. Graves and Kindred are marksmen that function in the jungle. Talon can have unpredictable gank patterns due to his parkour. Zed has shadow clones.

There's a lot.

BluePolarizer11/29/2016, 12:54:14 AM1 votes

Do classes limit hero diversity in DOTA?

Because DOTA also has classes like assassin, support, melee carry, mid lane mage, ranged carry, tank, etc. and they have amazing hero diversity.

It turns out that most champion types can be classified into assassin, support, fighter/melee carry, ranged carry, mage, tank and most wierd champion interactions can be put on supports, fighters or mages.

TehNACHO11/29/2016, 12:19:30 AM1 votes

Abathur sounds dumb.

Lost Vikings sounds like a technology/control issue for League to recreate

Murky also sounds dumb

The moment you say "Raid Boss", I hear "Juggernaut". I will give you credit though, this is one concept that I can see working with LoL's control scheme AND actually sounds like a fun concept.