An open letter to Riot Games

Lazzy·Nov 11, 2017·88 votes·2,818 views

Why did you change the IP system? Have you ever heard the phrase "If its not broken, don't fix it". The entire blue essence system was a mistake. IP after every game should've stayed but you should've also added uncapped leveling to the plate just given different rewards. Maybe a skin shard every 5 or 10 levels. You didn't have to rework the entire fucking system to get your precious "blue essence" running. Logically it doesn't even make sense to incorporate a currency into shards that you get for leveling up. Level Up -> get box -> open box -> get champ shard -> disenchant shard -> go to store -> buy champ. How fucking dumb is that? This entire game feels unrewarding now. Its kind of like when you get lower priority queue for x amount of games. It is just an fucking grind to get that shit off your account. Please for the love of god just revert this patch and let us back into the game we once loved.

73 Comments

Dirty BastardNov 11, 201718 votes

Agree, the game is unrewarding on many levels now. None of the champs feel the same. Everything is a giant noodle fight unless you pick one of the 10% of champs who actually benefit from the new rune system.

I want my old runes back, the game imo is now to generic and too tame and boring as snails. I am seeing games go longer now then they did before. I do not see how this change improved the game, it only crippled 90% of the champs and roles.

EternalSaiyanNov 11, 20178 votes

Riot only cares about making more $$$$[zombie-nunu-hearts] $$$$ nothing more nothing less

ResolutionNov 11, 20172 votes

{quoted}

Riot only cares about making more $$$$[zombie-nunu-hearts] $$$$ nothing more nothing less

There a business; what business exists not to make money? When I started playing in 2011 the only free item in the game was Rocket Tristanna. Now you have free skins, ward, icons, champions ect. Yet people are still unhappy in a F2P of all things... that you're not forced to spend a dime in.

Every year they make more free content, but alright.

dandudespacemanNov 12, 20174 votes

You know, if it's a business, why do they fucking change the good parts to shit constantly? eh?

Umbra IoniaNov 12, 20172 votes

DotA 2 give you all the heroes for free and they also care about the money so...

RaveolutionNov 11, 20176 votes

Absolutely no chance they will "revert the patch", you should actually be asking them to just add BE per game, which is what they should have been doing from the release of the new system and it's absolutely ridiculous that they haven't.

AcexXXVNov 11, 20175 votes

Personally i will only play 1 game a day now just for the exp....... no incentive to play more since no BE is rewarded per game....... Sona

CochoNov 11, 20173 votes

for fun? lol

AcexXXVNov 11, 20173 votes

Some of us out there still want to get something from a game..... win or lose.... there are still champs i want.... i need BE to get them..... can only get BE via lvl up and d/e champ shards Sona

The ExillicNov 11, 20174 votes

{quoted}

Some of us out there still want to get something from a game..... win or lose.... there are still champs i want.... i need BE to get them..... can only get BE via lvl up and d/e champ shards

It's literally a paradox

You don't have the BE so level up to get a box to dissenchant into not enough BE to get a champ you want or unlock the shards you get, so level up so you can get more shards that don't give you enough BE to get the shards they give so level up..... and on and on. (until you can of course, but it's a dumb system that wasn't thought through and only effects new players really.)

Milamber69Nov 12, 20173 votes

This is true, the BE side doesn't affect me at all. I own all the champs, but I want my rune versatility back. I don't give a damn what they do with these new "masteries" cause that's all they are, I want runes back.

SturmPioniereNov 12, 20171 votes

The "rune" portion is in the path rewards which everybody seems to overlook. If you want ap, pick Domination or Sorcery or Inspiration with Domination or Sorcery second, etc. The only thing you can't do is min/max the shit out of it with different types (spoiler: that's the point) which was unhealthy for the game to begin with.

Even then you can still spec into a lot of what was there-- if you find yourself desperately missing those move speed quints for example then take Celerity for almost the same amount of ms in a single rune PLUS ad or ap on top.

The only thing that's really missing is up front flat pen (pen is still available but is much more conditional) but even that is heavily offset by the fact people can't spec a bunch of free resistances in their runes (which, spoiler: pretty much everybody did because it was almost always the most efficient choice) so... Largely, you lost pen that you only had to get through resistances people only took because you had pen.

Milamber69Nov 13, 20171 votes

Where's the less death timer, where's the crit chance and damage . . . there is alot that isn't there. They've cut options and choices. You have 5 things to choose from and then you get a secondary. How much option is that when before there were 30 slots to fill with anything x the mastery page. We don't get to be diverse, nor do we have many options.

SturmPioniereNov 13, 20171 votes

More than half those options were literally noob traps (which punishes lack of player knowledge with a bad experience, doubled when it cost IP to boot (looking at you, death cdr)) or were otherwise simply suboptimal. Another small subset were deeply abusable in very specific situations. I'll grant you that there's no crit any more but that was always a rune that led to toxic gameplay when it was good, or was useless.

Crit damage and a few others are missing but these all fall back to the same problems listed above. 30 slots is a lot of possible combinations, but only a very small amount of useful ones where the rest just set you back ip for even trying. Three ms quints and a handful of ad reds or ap blues being condensed into a single lesser rune in the new system is a prime example of how you haven't really lost any power-- you just have to make ACTUAL choices now.

So many people are getting upset they don't have totally obvious choices now while also complaining that the old system of obvious choices involved more skill. How? These are mutually exclusive.

The ExillicNov 13, 20171 votes

{quoted}

This is true, the BE side doesn't affect me at all. I own all the champs, but I want my rune versatility back. I don't give a damn what they do with these new "masteries" cause that's all they are, I want runes back.

I feel like this change has impacted the whole game, I wish these skill trees were longer with more versatility. Or with even more options or letting you have a third tree.

I personally feel that the game has been evened out. But I do see your point.

Chembaron YamadaNov 12, 20171 votes

You get EXP for win and loss. So you will play 1 game per day to get the first win EXP, but refuse to get more EXP by playing other games?

That's not different than in the past. You got more IP for your first win of the day, then you got less for every win and loss after that. By your logic, you should have stopped playing after your first win back then too.

AcexXXVNov 12, 20172 votes

The way the system was i used to play more than just the 1 game per day, it's just a bummer no BE after a game. lvl 31 gave me 5 champ shards!! 5 with a d/e value of 810BE Sona

SturmPioniereNov 12, 20171 votes

Uh. Every match does effectively give you BE. It just doesn't do it immediately.

Also, five shards with a total of 810be? Were they all 450/1350 champs? And what if you got two shards you actually wanted?

pressxtodoubt.jpg

AcexXXVNov 12, 20171 votes

Yea 3, 450 champs and 2, 1350 champs, owned 3 of them. 2 i didn't have were 450 champs. Maybe i will get something better next lvl up :)

WDG DevourNov 11, 20174 votes

This logic is really flawed. Just because you don't get BE every game doesn't mean there is no incentive. In fact there is more incentive to play the game in order to level up and get a ton of BE when leveling up.

I really don't understand why players are crying over this change. Even if you get BE after every game it doesn't mean you can buy the champ you want instantly, you would still need to wait till you had enough BE to purchase the champ you wanted....

However I own all champs so maybe I'm missing something???

THE D1CNov 11, 20175 votes

I also own all the champs (at least that I want) but I think that peoples issues are. What if you have 5400BE and you level up. You get all excited because you’re ready to buy Yasuo because you played him free week and you decided you loved to be a douche. Now you DE the shards you got and you get 890BE for a total of 6290-10 short. Instead of playing 1 more game now you have the deal with the cops because you got so angry you had to beat your girlfriend.

WDG DevourNov 11, 20171 votes

You can never be left to have to wait for a champ because your 10 BE short. Why? Because now you get 50 BE everyday with your first win of the day bonus. So the max you will have to wait is one day/potentially one winning game.

THE D1CNov 11, 20172 votes

You think future Yasuo mains have 22 hours to wait? They can barely make it through lunch without a reason for domestic violence.

BolwinkelNov 11, 20173 votes

The problem people have with it, is that Riot made it sound like we'd be getting exponentially more Blue Essence, than we were getting IP before. I don't want to have to play ~15 games, just to level up and get 900 BE, when I could've played the same amount of games on the old IP system, and gotten 1300-1400. Also, you could be 10 BE short of buying a champion, and you have to play ~15 games just to level up so you can get the god damn 10 BE. Riot's entire purpose with this update was to make it harder to get BE to buy things, so that people would get tired of grinding, so they just buy RP instead. I don't know about any of you, but if I play 15 30-40 minute games, I should level up more than once.

WDG DevourNov 11, 20171 votes

You can never be left to have to wait for a champ because your 10 short. Why? Because now you get 50 BE everyday with your first win of the day bonus. So the max you will have to wait is one day/potentially one winning game.

Tired of grinding? This isn't an MMO where you need to grind to reach max level to be 'powerful'. The leveling system is not there to grind to max level (there is no max level even...) the leveling system is great for game like this that will go well into the future. Any game with super long longevity has a levelling system. How Riot waited till Season 8 to introduce a leveling system to their game which will go well in to the future is beyond me.

Nevertheless the system is here and it is not to be grinded, it is simply a novelty for those who can show they have been playing the game for a while or a lot and help people know when they will receive their big chunk BE. It is far more rewarding to receive a chunk of BE in a levelling system than to be drip fed BE every game. They need to make leveling up feel rewarding and it is. Every other game with levelling system involves receiving something upon leveling up. Levelling up every 2nd or 3rd game would not feel rewarding or special.

I really doubt Riot introduced this system to make the game feel like a grind (but if you feel that way FeelsBadMan) especially when you consider their giving us more BE than we were getting IP before.

BolwinkelNov 11, 20172 votes

Source for getting 50 BE from FWOTD? Because I'm still getting only 575 xp from it
A new player is going to have to reach over level 300 if they want to own every champion in the game. Source. Don't tell me this isn't a grinding game when we have to grind a hell of a lot more to be able to purchase champs now. There wasn't a leveling system before because there was no point to one. The ONLY thing we get from leveling up is BE, Champ shards, and possibly a skin every 25 levels. We don't get that stuff after each game anymore.
For me, and a lot of the people I've talked to about the new system, it feels better to slowly gain the currency after every game, instead of having to play ~15 games and get a chunk of ~900 BE. On the old system, I could get easily get 900 IP after 10 games, now I have to play ~15 just to have a chance at getting that much. There's a small chance I'll get more, but there's a better chance that I'll get less. The grind for being able to purchase a 6300 champ was bad before, now its even worse.
You're right. Riot didn't introduce this system for it to feel like a grind. It was likely introduced because they would rather have people get tired of having to grind for the new currency, and they just buy RP instead to save time. If someone plays and enjoys a champ during free week, they're going to want to buy it as soon as possible. They're not going to want to have to play 50+ games in order to get them.

CaveslothNov 11, 20171 votes

{quoted}

This logic is really flawed. Just because you don't get BE every game doesn't mean there is no incentive. In fact there is more incentive to play the game in order to level up and get a ton of BE when leveling up.

I really don't understand why players are crying over this change. Even if you get BE after every game it doesn't mean you can buy the champ you want instantly, you would still need to wait till you had enough BE to purchase the champ you wanted....

However I own all champs so maybe I'm missing something???

It removes the addictive "just one more game" element from play. Say you just level up and your 50 essence away from getting the champ you want. You can't go play just one more game to get that champ, you have to play a whole friking bunch more games, so its better just to wait for tommorow's daily win.... and the next days and the next and so on.

WDG DevourNov 12, 20172 votes

Buy just waiting for the next bonus your slowing your own BE gains. If you're playing this game solely to grind BE then that is not a good state to be in to enjoy the game as it will definitely be a grind like any other F2P game. You should just enjoy the game whether its focusing on improving, climbing the ranked ladder, premading with friends or even if you just enjoy progression and levelling up.

It's your choice how you play the game though, if you want to go after daily wins only thats fine but you are slowing your BE gains, but the player that's playing a lot more daily in the long run will be rewarded more BE faster.

Also you may have earned the champ shard for the champion you wanted saving you a bunch of blue essence so you don't need to play 10 more games to get that champ always.

CaveslothNov 12, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Buy just waiting for the next bonus your slowing your own BE gains. If you're playing this game solely to grind BE then that is not a good state to be in to enjoy the game as it will definitely be a grind like any other F2P game. You should just enjoy the game whether its focusing on improving, climbing the ranked ladder, premading with friends or even if you just enjoy progression and levelling up.

It's your choice how you play the game though, if you want to go after daily wins only thats fine but you are slowing your BE gains, but the player that's playing a lot more daily in the long run will be rewarded more BE faster.

Also you may have earned the champ shard for the champion you wanted saving you a bunch of blue essence so you don't need to play 10 more games to get that champ always.

Oh I'm not saying for me, I was making a generalization. My addiction was the mastery boxes for skins and the mastery system in general, though since they nerfed that, not sure if I can stay addicted to this game. Especially given out of my last 6, 5 have been frikin champ shards, and now they'll also drop the useless emote garbage. Not to mention the mastery upgrades are expensive as hell.

WDG DevourNov 13, 20171 votes

Yeah the mastery upgrades are expensive as hell which I don't like but it doesn't bother me that much. I'm in no rush to get mastery so I'm more than willing to be patient and wait for the champ shard to drop for the champ I want to give mastery to, then I will use that shard as a token for upgrading the mastery of the champion I want instead of spending the insane 3900 BE.

Mastery boxes are nerfed, think they want to make money from events and missions for skin boxes. Some missions are free meaning they're giving us free skin shards that as well as free shards through honor system as well. They lowered disenchant rate on shards because their giving out more shards through reward systems (Missions/Honor Capsules) Also to offset this decreased rate they also introduced the chance to get two drops in one chest or a chest inside a chest as well as bad luck protection so you won’t ever go on long streaks without getting a skin shard or a gemstone.

Lintu PuckNov 12, 20172 votes

actually the "just one more game" element is still there, just not as noticeable before the "Just one more" was to get that last bit of IP, but now it is focused on your level. Say you have been playing a bit without looking at your current XP. Then at the end of a game you happen to look and see that it's say 100 points away from your next level and thus the next loot box. There is where the "just one more game" would be now. For a better understanding of what the "just one more game" thing, here is a video from the people at Extra Credits. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8ma4QM2tyE

Nik NikersonNov 11, 20172 votes

You were actually playing the game just to get IP before? You were spending your time grinding a fake currency?

LordBrascaNov 11, 20173 votes

Problem is also that the higher the level you have the more the xp is required to level up, if i can't level up in a reasonable amount of time then how am i going to buy the champs i need?

Lintu PuckNov 11, 20172 votes

they have already said why they changed the system. older accounts had shit tons of IP and nothing to spend it on, be it runes or champs, so to fix that and mix things up a bit they gave us this new system.

AcexXXVNov 11, 20174 votes

Yea the people with a ton of IP as it used to be have all the champs....... so they will always play. pvp or for fun.... but some of us that grind game after game so hard to get those champs that we love so much..... we have to rely on lvl ups and good shards to D/E i like the runes system but i just hate no reward after a game win or loss Save Sona!! Sona

Lintu PuckNov 11, 20175 votes

actually just because a player has all champs does not mean they will keep playing, it just means they grinded enough to get them.

BlåbæretNov 11, 201721 votes

You do realize that they could've just added rewards for IP? They didn't have to change the entire system into something this illogical lmao.

Lintu PuckNov 12, 20173 votes

actually we would of ended up with the same thing we have now whether or not they turned IP into BE or not. This system makes sense to me and it makes sense to those that work at Riot. What I fail to understand his how other don't understand this stuff even after it was explained.

KicksAndSnaresNov 12, 20172 votes

[deleted]

BlåbæretNov 12, 20175 votes

{quoted}

This patch was complete fucking bullshit and Riot fucking knows it. They ruined the game. That's the bottom line. Years of hard work and they fuck it up in a single blow. It was bad enough they made Xin half retarded, but this "patch" just took the cake. No more of my time or money riot. I'm washing my hands of you. You fucked over your investors and now you will reap what you've sewn. Uninstalling as we speak.

Preach, brother.

Lintu PuckNov 12, 20172 votes

wooooow such hate a vitriol, and on a preseason patch. Chill out, Riot always makes big changes at the preseason and this is the biggest shift yet. Of course this patch will be rough, change always is. Give it about 2 months and a few patches and a majority of players will of gotten used to it by then and it will be back to business as usual. Also, if you and everyone else on the boards in the last few days who have said they are leaving really are, it still won't matter to much. Even if a 100 to 500 players left it wouldn't even be a drop in the bucket given the player base for this game is at least a few hundred thousand.

SturmPioniereNov 12, 20172 votes

Millions. Daily. It was 27 million daily even back in 2014 and the game has grown since then.

Lintu PuckNov 13, 20171 votes

thank you.

SpoofghoulNov 12, 20172 votes

it was changed for new players primarily

i don't think the new system is all that bad, it needs more work though personally i don't give 2 cents about levels and shit as long as i have the option to just play and get my stuff that way without it going any slower then before ill be fine

I mean i only need sion skins anyway and he doesn't have chroma's yet so im sitting on a gigantic pile of BE until he gets chroma's since i got nothing else i want to spend it on anyway

The runes on the other hand are hot garbage we have like 0 choices half of them are useless and the remaining ones only a handful synergize with your champion if you are lucky fun times

SturmPioniereNov 12, 20171 votes

Really don't understand this complaint about the runes. Even with just Sion, Grasp is even better than before and lets you opt into the bonus percent health and demolish. Aftershock is possible. Summon Aery if you like to play E-poke Sion. Glacial Augment let's you even more easily train people down or land Q's. You can even take Dark Harvest or Electrocute or even Phase Rush if you really wanted. The only tree that doesn't really offer anything is Precision but if you play AD Sion then Fleet Footwork is still possible and the lesser runes make a good splash anyway.

How many keystones could you center a viable playstyle around before with Sion? Like two?

SpoofghoulNov 13, 20171 votes

{quoted}

How many keystones could you center a viable playstyle around before with Sion? Like two?

almost all of them

That being said keystones aren't the only runes out there, just because i like grasp doesn't mean i want iron trash

There are significantly less options for tuning your champion and playstyle and you wont synergize with all of them it's inevitable i'm disappointed with a few of the new runes as well as the lack of choice or diversity

SturmPioniereNov 14, 20171 votes

So don't take Iron trash. Take Conditioning and buy an earlier cloth to make up the distance while having way more late game tankiness than you would before. Etc, etc.

Teriyaki BukkakeNov 12, 20173 votes

I would think one of the most profitable and successful gaming companies in the world could afford to spend some money on a team to make specific items made for purchase with ip, rather than overthrowing a working system as to make the game more of a grind and increase the incentive to buy things with rp.

It's less of a fix and more of a money grab if anything. Infact it isn't even a fix, because it doesn't adress the problem that was there originally anyway, so yeah.