Alarming Trends in Champion Release
Can we look at the recent release of champions?
Since I started playing mid way through season 3, the release of new champions always excited me. Riot always has done a fantastic job teasing out the release of their champions, giving them hype and excitement for when the champion comes to the rift. But the majority of the champions follow a common pattern.
Bard, 2015
Has a passive which allows him to gain fairly predictable speed boosts as he traverses through the rift and an ability that allows him to move through walls.
Axir, 2014
Has an ability which allows him to essentially have a flash up when has the ability up if combo'd right.
Braum, 2014
Has an ability which allows him to leap to an allied champion
Gnar, 2014
Has an on demand hop, which if landed on a target, doubles its length as well as an ability which allows for a speed boost if a single target is damaged in a span of time.
Kalista, 2014
Has a built in passive which allows for innate orb walking ability which scales with attack speed.
Rek'Sai, 2014
Has an ability which allows for him to make tunnels which allows for reuse after a short period. This also combos with an ult which allows for him to teleport across the map to said tunnels.
Aatrox, 2013
Has an ability which functions as a leap as well as a knock up if landed.
Jinx, 2013
Has a passive, which if she gets either a kill or assist on a champion or structure, gains a large movement speed boost.
Lissandra, 2013
Has an ability which allows her to blink across the screen as a choice, not mandatory.
Lucian, 2013
Has a dash which procts his passive.
Quinn, 2013
His ult gives a massive speed boost on his bird form.
Thresh, 2013
If he lands his chain, he gains the ability to travel to the champion or target he has attached to.
Yasuo, 2013
He has an ability to dash about enemy targets and an ultimate to blink to targets who are displaced.
Zac, 2013
Has an ability which allows for him to leap a large distance once finished channeling.
My point is this: 14 out the last 15 champions released in the past 2 full years have built in mobility, with the one exception being the release of vel'koz. In fact out of the total 91 of out the total 124 champions have either some form of built in speed or mobility. The majority of these mobility based champions have come in the later half of League's lifespan.
Now Riot always talks about counter play, and how every champion needs to have counterplay, but where is counter play to hyper mobility meta? There are only 3 items in the game which lead to a decrease in movement speed:
Randuins Omen
A primarily tank item
Iceborn Gauntlet
A primarily... I am not sure who actually builds this. Occasionally Ezreals and maybe a Nasus?
Frozen Mallet
I think Gnar built this in the LCS once, but an item no one builds due to its ridiculous stats associated with it.
The problem is, there is no counterplay to hyper mobility. What does Riot need to do in order to reign in on the high levels of mobility which seem to be the common trend among new champions?