Champions are WAYY too expensive for how inconsistent and of how low value Blue Essence is

I know this has probably been said a million times, but I just got back into this game, mainly play ARAM, but holy shit what is this system. The new champion is 7800 Blue Essence...7800. Maybe this would be justifiable if we got Blue Essence after the game like we did with IP as opposed to literally roll the dice to get it after leveling up. Is there some other way to obtain Blue Essence other than random drops in level up capsules? On top of shafting old players with the "rune refund" this is just icing on the cake.