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Has runes reforged made the game better or worse? IMO runes are just causing balance issues.

Cat cafe·2/6/2018, 12:31:07 PM·10 votes·746 views

Instead of picking your own playstyle, it's picking the most optimal path your champ can abuse* Zed is just assassinating faster

  • I feel like the old rune system was clunky and outdated, but the new runes reforged is just power creep. As riot keeps nerfing runes, such as triumph, aery, comet, coupe de grace, now unsealed spellbook, it feels less impactful and only encourages a player to pick the next most optimal rune.

Stopwatch is annoying and slows the game. Aftershock is annoying. Fleetfoot work is annoying. Mana flow-band lets people spam abilities without punishment. Biscuit lets people stay in lane. I want to play league of legends where me being a good player isn't so dependant on runes and where my actions actually have consequences.

If riot completely guts the rune system (maybe add futures market as a quality of life change), then the game would just be better.

  • Riot can nerf/buff/rework champions easier w/o focusing on runes. This means Riot can fix Problem champions.

  • Certain champions will stop being able to abuse runes. Like vladimir w/ Unsealed spellbook all inning on flash cooldown, teemo proccing Aery twice, Leona w/ aftershock just dueling/tanking. Guaranteed Comet on Camille W/ nunu Q/ malphite Q. Hecarim/Garen w/ Predator.

Riot should just balance the game by buffing/nerfing champions and items. Runes don't do anything except make the game more complicated. DPS champions are DPSing quicker. Burst champions are bursting faster. Tanks tanking harder.

Runes have added nothing positive, and only benefit a few champions who can abuse them.

16 Comments

Teridax682/6/2018, 3:05:40 PM9 votes

I agree with this. At the end of the day, Runes Reforged was basically just another mastery system update, and after the dust settled and the two months or so of experimentation ended, the new runes fell into yet another solved game, one whose balance fallout Riot is still progressively dealing with.

Part of the problem with any kind of roster-wide customization system is that it's pretty much impossible to have both diversity and synergy at the same time: if a champion and rune combine especially well together, unless that champion combines just as well with another rune setup, they are always going to pick that rune, and that rune only. A system without any synergy would be perfectly diverse, but would also not feel compelling to use, since there would be no connection between the effect you're picking and the champion you're using (which is already happening right now for some champions with no good rune setups). This kind of system is doomed to stop becoming diverse once people figure out the best synergies, which is why I seriously doubted right from the start that Runes Reforged would address the problems of previous mastery systems.

Additionally, the issue with these kinds of customization systems is that, because they're made to function with pretty much any champion, they tend to offer only fairly generic kinds of power, namely raw damage, raw durability, gold, and so on. It's impossible to come up with a rune tailored to a single champion's functionality, because obviously every rune needs to make sense on more than just one champion. However, runes are nonetheless designed to synergize with certain subsets of champions, so this kind of system tends to be a very complex and difficult balancing act, one where every rune should be specific enough to have clear synergy for some champions, but also general-purpose enough to not be totally non-functional on everyone else. The end result, more often than not, tends to fail in truly adding enough depth of gameplay to justify its complexity cost. The original rune and mastery systems were already a nightmare for new players, but the new system also locks rune options that champions are balanced around for newer players, thereby both confusing them with a huge information dump from the get-go, and warping their appreciation of certain champions via awkward first builds.

Because of this, I'd personally support removing the rune system entirely: whatever bonuses are worth keeping could be transferred to items (and a lot of rune effects already copy itemization), and removing the rest could help remove a layer of complication to champion balance. Additionally, cutting out time spent tinkering on rune setups could help reduce lobby times, a goal Riot has been taking great pains to strive towards. Ultimately, I think if League wants to enforce better balance and greater diversity, it's going to have to move away from cover-all customization systems for its champions, and instead focus on more bespoke options and champion-centric balancing. Removing one of the main layers of balancing complexity could bring the game one step closer towards realizing this.

Nymzo2/6/2018, 3:12:21 PM2 votes

People already hate the Keystone back in season 6 for ruining the game. If you thought runes reforged would fix that shit, you are dead wrong since it's just a fancy version of it without the grind for runes (aka the only good thing who came out of that mess).

IvernBramblefoot2/6/2018, 2:47:08 PM2 votes

vladimir being powerful has nothing at all to do with unsealed spellbook, that's such a dumb idea that keeps getting perpetuated. he's strong because he's vlad.

Vistha D Reptile2/6/2018, 7:40:53 PM2 votes

I called it back when Masteries were updated with Keystones.

They are unnecessary balance problem that shouldn't be there.

Now everybody instead of having 1 key-stone has like 6 key-runes which are functionally identical, but individually stronger.

The JigSAW2/7/2018, 2:31:27 AM1 votes

I've found the new runes system to be significantly lacking and an overall step backward from the old system.

Mainly, your early game start is completely trashed. Before you had the ability to stock up on just about anything in small doses, including lifesteal or critical strike chance and amounts of armor and magic resist. Now? You basically get nothing outside a lousy 2.5% heal on abilities at the start with ravenous hunter and precision gives you bloodline for 8% lifesteal after killing enough creeps and monsters.

If I wanted to play a fighter, I liked to start with 5% lifesteal and damage with some resist and maybe health or regen. Now, I have to start doran's and a health potion if I want -any- ability to lifesteal whatsoever. As a mage I loaded up AP, a little armor and magic resist, and some cooldown but now I start with no cooldown and no mana regen.

Ultimately this new system only favors mana/resourceless champions and takes a lot of diversity in the options away from you, nothing more and nothing less. Then again this is the same company that says Yi and Tryndamere are too weak, and if that doesn't mean the balance team should be removed for incompetency I don't know what does.

yoshi27902/6/2018, 8:01:01 PM1 votes

Actually I find experimenting with it fun and I think that different combinations have different strengths. There is no 'one best page'. Each rune is strongest in a specific situation, the old rune system didn't have that. (at least not so much)

Done252/6/2018, 9:20:31 PM1 votes

Are there certain synergies that are too strong? Yes. (GP/Ez+Klepto for example) Does that mean runes are bad? No. They offer a very clear cut way to individualize your champions in the manner than pleases you the most. For example, with the Resolve runes you can take Aftershock to give you durability upon initiation to stop from being blow up, or you can grab Guardian on someone like Taric to help keep your ADC alive better. Each one has a valid reason to be picked. Some runes just need to be fixed/changed.

deadlychuck2/6/2018, 10:21:30 PM1 votes

I said this before they were released.

The way that they designed this system isn't sustainable, and actively gives you less choice in the long run. While most people saw it as this new shiny thing that would have a whole bunch of mechanics that you could try on different champions, in reality it's exactly because all of the runes are new mechanics that it will make them impossible to balance and then eventually stagnate far worse than the old system. Even with keystones there were signs of this happening, where a few champions abused a couple of keystones far better than other champions and that extra power was cemented on them, because riot isn't about to go remove mechanics from the champion to make them less mechanically inclined to benefit from the keystone.

The same is true for runes, except now it's for literally every out of match power decision you have.

Eventually, if you add enough mechanics outside of the match for champions to use, why not have just given each champion another passive tailored specifically for them?

Chromatic Eagle2/6/2018, 5:46:36 PM1 votes

How many seasons did mastery exist for? How many seasons did runes reforged exist? It takes time to balance things, even if they could do better.