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Don't get me wrong, new champions are nice...but when are you going to focus on balance?

WoonStruck··207 votes·6,927 views

There are so many unused champions, and each release lately just makes them less and less likely to be used.

We have so many outliers on the top and bottom in terms of strength, most of which don't even need reworks, just number tuning...how many champions are you going to release before you realize that only ~15% of the potential pool (~20 champions) is commonly played because they're blatantly over-tuned relative to the rest of the cast. That's not to say other champions don't see use, just that the top 15% are SO insanely common that you rarely see alternative champions when they're open. Only 38/130 champions are between a 5-10% pick rate, which is where everyone would be in a perfect world.

Stop using the 'they are/aren't meta' or 'they're just niche' excuses and bring the top end back in line, while bringing the bottom up.

We don't need all of these stylistic reworks (ones that resolve 'toxic' kits are entirely justified) that alienate people from their formerly favorite champions. We just need a competent balance team to focus on balance for a season instead of intentionally fucking the meta up just 'to keep things fresh'.

So many people are dissatisfied with season 6, without even factoring in Dynamic Queue vs Solo Queue...Are you going to take the hint, or keep this up until you don't have a dedicated playerbase anymore?

Funny how you guys did a better job when you were all inexperienced. Vlad/Irelia/Xin are still better releases than Azir/Ekko/Kalista, etc, health-wise.

164 Comments

EndlessSorcerer41 votes

Different teams are responsible for balance and champion design.

WoonStruck57 votes

The balance team has to determine the numbers for new champions as well.

To counter your argument, Riot is like a network. Each team is not isolated. They all interact with each other, and in many cases one project is touched by more than just one team.

Adding to that, new champions shake up the meta more often than not. At some point they need to put champion releases on hold, indefinitely, and fine tune the game before moving forward with releases. The current state of the game is a pretty good indicator that they're LONG overdue for such an action.

The fact that they haven't done that once, and especially due to enforced massive preseason changes, shows that Riot does not want their game to be decently balanced. They just don't want any one specific thing being blatantly unfun for everyone or auto-winning.

The problem with this is that in many cases, only the outliers can compete with the other outliers. Champions on the bottom end are often unfun because they cannot realistically compete, and Riot refuses to address that without reworking champions, which, again, shakes up the meta, preventing any decent fine-tuning.

Smithney11 votes

{quoted}

The fact that they haven't done that once, and especially due to enforced massive preseason changes, shows that Riot does not want their game to be decently balanced.

Omitting the "decently", you would be right. Riot don't want LoL to be balanced. They cling to a design philosophy called "cyclical imbalance", which is core to its longevity. Having a perfectly balanced game seems nice on paper, but game like that wouldn't remain enjoyable for a long period after you pick it up. I personally prefer the ever-changing wheel of FotM, even despite its obvious inconveniences.

I disagree that Riot are doing nothing to fine tune underplayed champions. Look at Urgot for example, the poor guy has serious core gameplay issues that make Riot want to keep him low. If he was allowed to be strong, it would be at the cost of his enemies' fun in game because of his oppressive kit. So they save resources for a big VGU, but meanwhile they share a little love through the likes of the Ulti change Urgot received in March.

editted

WoonStruck22 votes

Cyclical imbalance is not core to its longevity, or they wouldn't feel the need to make massive preseason changes to improve its longevity each year, which is generally all that rotates that 'cycle' anyway.

What they're doing is far from any idea of decent balancing, even cyclical imbalance. The top 15% is balanced against each other, and everything else is left gathering cobwebs, and the bottom (barring intrinsically 'unhealthy' champions slated for reworks) never ends up reaching the top, like true cyclical imbalance.

FotM isn't FotM when those champions are blatantly better than the rest of the cast. FotM implies they're popular just because they're popular, not because they're significantly stronger.

One example of a champion waiting for a rework doesn't excuse the other 70 or so under-used champs that don't need reworks to be healthy and haven't been popular for years. So much for 'cyclical imbalance'.

NeoBrawler8 votes

{quoted}

Omitting the "decently", you would be right. Riot don't want LoL to be balanced. They cling to a design philosophy called "cyclical imbalance", which is core to its longevity. Having a perfectly balanced game seems nice on paper, but game like that wouldn't remain enjoyable for a long period after you pick it up. I personally prefer the ever-changing wheel of FotM, even despite its obvious inconveniences.

I disagree that Riot are doing nothing to fine tune underplayed champions. Look at Urgot for example, the poor guy has serious core gameplay issues that make Riot want to keep him low. If he was allowed to be strong, it would be at the cost of his enemies' fun in game because of his oppressive kit. So they save resources for a big VGU, but meanwhile they share a little love through the likes of the Ulti change Urgot received in March.

editted

I thoroughly disagree. TF2 as a prime example of having being balanced forever and still being fun. Cycling balancing States from one class to the other makes the people that love the other class feel underpowered comparatively to the new focus of the game and leave. Cycling makes people leave.

Chaos68916 votes

Escuse me? Irelia and Vlad are HEALTHY?

WoonStruck15 votes

I didn't say they were healthy, I said they were healthier than Azir, Ekko, Kalista.

Chaos68916 votes

{quoted}

I didn't say they were healthy, I said they were healthier than Azir, Ekko, Kalista.

Oh ok. Lol I guess I misread that... yeah Ekko was really toxic, but I think Azir and kalista were too skillcapped to be bad...

WoonStruck10 votes

'Health', as far as champions go, doesn't actually relate to game health. It relates to player experience. Can a player enjoy playing X champion without people playing against X champion having a bad time?

Vlad was fine for game health. It was player experience that made him unhealthy. People didn't like how Vlad did damage+healed on a point-and-click and there was little-to-nothing you could do about it. It was uninteractive.

The same goes for Azir. What he is isn't bad for the game...However, nobody likes playing against Azir. He's one of the least interactive champion in the game, from the enemy's viewpoint.

Kalista is the same way for just about any melee champion, or anyone with skillshots. Nobody really likes fighting a decent Kalista.

All of these champions are unhealthy in their own way, and you will definitely agree if you've ever played any champion with relatively low mobility into them.

Spoofghoul4 votes

azir isnt nearly as skill capped as people make him out to be.

hes hard to learn true, but still alot easier then people think

Erockandroll4 votes

{quoted}

The balance team has to determine the numbers for new champions as well.

To counter your argument, Riot is like a network. Each team is not isolated. They all interact with each other, and in many cases one project is touched by more than just one team.

A Network, but not a Democracy.

The people who have a stake in the company, are the ones who will be pushing for new content. They will ensure that the champion design team does not slow down. Cause that's a new champ and a new skin for them to sell. The champion design team literally can't slow down for the balance team. And yet, Chances are, they can't just throw more resources into the balance team. These teams are already at capacity, where throwing more talent into that department would be a waste.

Also, Balance and design, don't need to work that close together. With the exception of a handful of problematic kits, Balance is mainly a Numbers issue, not something that the design team can really offer that much input into.

Critmaster Garen15 votes

{quoted}

We don't need all of these reworks that alienate people from their formerly favorite champions.

the entire point of those reworks is exactly what youre complaining about. sometimes they are successful, sometimes they arent. sometimes they are successful, but champions end up with overtuned or undertuned numbers at release.

either way these kit and gameplay changes are usually there to give them their own clear strength and give people more of a reason to play them.

aatrox for example has nothing about him that separates him from any other auto attack bruiser. hes just a worse version of jax, bruiser yi and other bruisers.

to just buff him until hes really strong would just mean to push out other bruisers who have the same playstile as him. so theyd need to do the same with him as they did with garen and darius. they changed them to be much more distinct from one another. and that can only be accomplished with a kit rework.

woodvsmurph2 votes

False -- Aatrox has passive item 3026 , no mana costs, sustain from auto's like Irelia . He is unique enough and isn't worse than jax or yi if you know how to play him. Abusing his passive and his lack of need for mana is key -- if you don't capitalize on this, then yeah he sucks. Mordekaiser is sad. He wants most of his old kit back. New dragon pet was nice, but rest of changes had no change on kit or made him worse. And he is actually less diverse of a champ now. Before you could play him any lane, now it's just side lanes where he can stand decent chance of being effective.

The Deckowner11 votes

I dont understand why rito is releasing all these kits which could have been considered broken and unhealthy way before it is released.

for example kindred, extremely strong early game, broken late game scaling, 10man tryn ult, full hp jg clear, %hp dmg onhit, spammable mobility, etc etc.

When champions are repeatedly nerfed yet still have high win rate and pickban rate in both solo dynamic queue and pro play, there is obviously something extremely wrong with their kit.

(remember the first week of LCS when kindred was enabled, where kindred oneshoted a same level lee sin with e, and then everyone started banning them.)

Photos of Ghosts2 votes

...bug...

The Deckowner2 votes

it wasnt a bug just that kindred's E had very high numbers

VentusDragoon5 votes

That one was actually a bug...

Hardstuck G45 votes

It was a bug, Riot even confirmed it...

ModCaptainMårvelous11 votes

Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

Oh my god are you actually implying that Vlad/Irelia/Xin/Zyra/etc. are better releases than things like Bard/Kench/Kalista/Azir/etc? This isn't just rose-tinted goggles, this is Advanced rose-tinted goggles.

Nameless Voice7 votes

Any champion is better designed than Kalista's toxic kit, to be fair.

magic pole10 votes

We don't need all of these reworks that alienate people from their formerly favorite champions.

still getting over the death of Malzahar

really questioning continuing playing this game in general when my best and main champion is destroyed :/

sir d wreck6 votes

Agreed. Malz was my go to ranked champ, one of the only ones I felt comfortable first picking into anything... and now he's banned 100% or if there is a shooting star of a chance I get to play him people rage at me for picking FotM champs, even though I been playing him steady since S3.

magic pole6 votes

it's not even the same champion

Q and E are so nerfed bc of the new gimmick W he feels like total trash

stealthfox945 votes

I think it might take the cake for worst and most pointless rework.

magic pole4 votes

so pointless. all talk about cementing identities and all they did was gut his pushing and tank busting identity for i dont even know what you pick him for now.

because he is overtuned and OP maybe, but i dont know what his new strategic niche is supposed to be.

Dealth5 votes

They are always balancing and haven't stopped since day one. And right now is one of the most balanced states it's ever been in, so I don't really know what you are complaining about. Do you have any specific champion in mind?

WoonStruck5 votes

Always balancing, but never properly.

Otherwise more than ~15% of the roster would see common use at any given point.

Dealth11 votes

In order for every champion to have equal play, they would need a 7.7% play rate. Right now there are 59 champions above a 7% play rate. Which is over 40% of the roster not 15%.

woodvsmurph4 votes

common and equal are not the same thing. Some champs are naturally going to be played more because their kit is easier or harder, or more fun to use, or their splash art and skins are cooler. When players who clearly have less skill can consistently beat a player with more skill despite the player with more skill being ahead in items and/or levels and the champ played by the more skilled player would have won every season before this one, there is a problem. Yes change can be good (change is good Khazix ), but there needs to be some level of reasoning behind changes. A champ shouldn't be better in all situations than another champ that plays the same role.

GayFluffyUnicorn3 votes

most balanced states? So tankko, tankali,tankyasuo are healthy and balanced?

56552559_DEL5 votes

Gee i suggested this in place of the "increase our bans" but got downvoted into oblivion.

The fact is that the reason people keep using all these "op" champs is because A) they got buffed so much that its all anyone wants to play and B) because they left all the other champs by the wayside and didnt feel like tuning them to make them able to compete with the other champs.

Maybe its because they look more at the LCS and what the players use and when that fad kicks in then that is when Riot will actually look at the champs considering that is how they get publicity and want more people to play. Which is just plain stupid.

I dont know what the balance teams thought process is but its obvious they are not doing much. And im not blaming them entirely because they ARE being told what to do by the higher ups, but this shit needs to stop.

What is the point in champ variety if everyone is sticking with all the most popular champs? And they cant use the ones being ignored because those champs cant hold their own due to multiple buffs on the current popular champs.

Its part of what makes this game unfun to play now.

Lucifer4 votes

You had me until you said Xin was healthy on release. Looooooooooooooool

WoonStruck7 votes

I never claimed he was healthy. Read again.

Lucifer4 votes

{quoted}

I never claimed he was healthy. Read again.

"Funny how you guys did a better job when you were all inexperienced. Vlad/Irelia/Xin are still better releases than Azir/Ekko/Kalista, etc, health-wise."

Straight up not true. Anyone who was actually around for release Xin knows there's never ever been an abomination like that again.

WoonStruck10 votes

Being over-powered on release is a number issue, not a general health issue.

I'm not talking about the power of the champions on release. I'm talking about how shitty it is to play against them in general. All of those champions have been problems as far as balance at some point. But Vlad, Irelia, and Xin are less frustrating to play against than Azir, Ekko, and Kalista.

woodvsmurph2 votes

because I rewound time and made you forget about tank Ekko . Maybe xin was worse, but you can't deny there are more champs today who come closer to release xin than at other points in the past.

Shenmue3 votes

lol stop adding champion is the only way the balance team would be able to catch up with the creation team

Chaos6891 votes

BTW I'm gonna bet right now that Rengar is one of the first ten called "OP". DOn't get me wrong, there are MANY champions that ARE overpowered, but Rengar isn't one of them. 12% of all nerfs in League were to him, and he has far too much counter play (or jsut coutners) to be OP.

WoonStruck8 votes

Nobody can complain about a champ having too much counter-play until they main Vlad. Especially the new Vlad.

Yaskamasandwich17 votes

{quoted}

Nobody can complain about a champ having too much counter-play until they main Vlad. Especially the new Vlad.

Sion

WoonStruck6 votes

Fair enough. Vlad and Sion are basically in the same boat atm.

At least Sion's overly abundant counterplay is disguised in cool thematics that feel powerful when he's successful.

Vlad's is kinda just tacked on everything, without any significant power anywhere in his kit past early game.

Troll for Trump3 votes

Illaoi

You picked a ranged champ top? Annnnnnnnddddd I'm useless.

Shonjl3 votes

Good, since if you pick melee into her, they now have an awful laning phase because hurr durr, play muh mini game!

Illaoi is trash and should remain that way til they get rid of that stupid spirit pull and just make a new ability for her. All its good for is pissing the enemy off and once they reach a certain tankiness, they can literally ignore it and just eat your face while you try to defend yourself with an ult that you walk a inch away from and is now worthless lol...

SkyBlade794 votes

The minigame is gone. Now, it just lasts for 12 seconds, and killing tentacles doesn't negate it.

Serika Zero7 votes

you picked anything that has mobility or even better: you can dodge 1 second wind-up skills

annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd she's useless

Spoofghoul6 votes

Sion fuck what am i gonna do if they can dodge 1 second windup skills

Ave Machina1 votes

Wait, really? Vladimir?

I thought everyone complained that Vladimir didn't have any counterplay.

And he's a top laner with a costless point-and-click damage spell that heals him, in a hyper-cautious meta where anyone can snowball. You can't protect yourself from him by hiding under tower, and he can turn untargetable while damaging everyone around him, while moving, for two seconds.

What counterplay does he even have? I'm legitimately asking.

ShatteredSkys3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ave Machina,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ZyEL4I5H,comment-id=000200000002,timestamp=2016-05-13T20:11:47.908+0000)

Wait, really? Vladimir?

I thought everyone complained that Vladimir didn't have any counterplay.

And he's a top laner with a costless point-and-click damage spell that heals him, in a hyper-cautious meta where anyone can snowball. You can't protect yourself from him by hiding under tower, and he can turn untargetable while damaging everyone around him, while moving, for two seconds.

What counterplay does he even have? I'm legitimately asking.

You non-stop aggro on him, Vlad Q has a fairly decent cooldown until level 9 and for the most part it's his only damaging skill for a long time. If you're picking versus Vlad take somethingl like Panth, Renekton, Riven, someone who can nonstop all in. Whenever Vlad Qs a minon or with the rework uses his empowered Q all in him. he doesn't have the damage to match yours early and if he pools you win the trade, it take 20% of his current hp and has a ridicuous cooldown down just all in him again. If you chose someone passive let Vlad push, it should be easy if he Es it'll shove toward you and freeze the lane in front of your tower. Ask your jungler to come and it should be a fairly easy gank, Vlad's only mobility is his pool which if most junglers can keep up with.

if we're talking out of lane; don't clump kind of something you have to keep in mind with all AOE champs but yeah hemoplague and his E hurts. try Executor's Culling, grievous wounds him help shut down Vlad's healing. otherwise you have to shut him down early becasue Vlad is a champion that scales heavily with items. if you deny him he'll be fairly useless but if you don't......good luck......

ForeverLaxx2 votes

Vlad was my main, back during his initial release. I had to explain then, and I guess explain now, that Vlad is exceptionally weak to aggro in the early game. The cooldown on his Q is so horrendously long that Vlad would only win the lane phase if the opponent psyched himself out. There was a reason I developed an Auto > E > Q > Auto harassment pattern with him, and that was to inflate the amount of damage I was capable of in order to get my opponent to back off instead of engaging. Any player that knew he was weak for his first 7 levels generally had no issue forcing Vlad to his tower.

The complaints about Vlad are after he has around 11 levels under his belt, the lane phase is over, and he's skirmishing people to death. Unfortunately for Vlad, that image was transposed over his lane and people just assumed that he was that way 100% of the time. Once his already abysmal laning phase kept getting nerfed because of his late game, I had to stop playing him. He was already weak, and he was basically made unplayable simply because people assumed he was strong the whole time.

Kalarepa2 votes

Seriously, I don't know how can Riot look at Vlad, then look at Ekko and say "I think, they're on similar power level".

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