Concerning balance and winrates

DREADN0UGHT··1 votes·234 views

I'm not here to complain about Yasuo's kit or Riven. I just have some legitimate questions concerning balance and winrates, or rather how they influence one another.

I'll take Gnar as an example. I play him quite alot, I have other 200k Mastery points on him. And to be quite frank, I enjoy his current state alot! Despite his Winrates in Plat+ being amongst the lowest in all 132 champions, even in elite elo, he still feels like a very relevant pick. Personally, I pick him into immobile juggernauts like Darius or Illaoi.

I know Rito looks at winrates, pickrates and banrates, and I believe they take a look into pro play aswell to determine champions states.

My real question is: When does Riot start watching a champion's performance, considering they aim for 50%ish winrate?

Is there an accepted deviation of 5%? Say a champion is considered balanced if he stands between 45 and 55% winrate in Plat+?

Gnar sits at approximately 46-47% winrate in all high - elite elos. Yet, his pickrate in pro play is remarkably high. Is he considered balanced? I think so. But does Riot think so? I don't know.

Of course, as I mentioned, Gnar is but an example here, there are plenty of champions whom have sub 50% winrates. I am just curious as to how Riot selects champions to be reviewed.

3 Comments

venomous frost1 votes

High winrates such as 54-55% are acceptable if it is known that the champion is almost exclusively played by one trick ponies.

Meaning the average players for those champions statistics will have 100s of games with said champion.

That being said, i think an example was aurelion sol ( or still is idk), only sol mains played him, but he was a little too strong when mastered so they still nerfed him, despite nobody playing him

Shadòw1 votes

Winrates mean almost nothing.

Hard Champions have lower winrates overall, but are still viable picks in the right hands (Ryze Azir Zed)

50% winrate isn't always balanced, esp. when a Champ that should be hard has 50%+ (Yasuo)

hadre1 votes

whats not ok is when EVERYONE is playing 1 champion and has a huge win rate. If 90% of games has champ pick or banned and that champion still has a 55% win rate that's not ok because that means anyone is picking up said champion without really practicing and still performing well.

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