Why was the Orange Essence gain lower by half?

Takaray·Nov 9, 2017·244 votes·7,638 views

As stated in the title why was the Orange Essence gain from disenchanting skin shards lower by 50%? There was no change to either the cost of upgrading skin shards or the ways in which we can obtain skin shards. This seems like a bigger travesty that the changes the Blue Essence(which in my opinion averages out to about the same gain just at milestones instead of a constant stream). I mean there is no logical reason, nor has it been stated by Riot on why this decision was taken, can a Rioter shine some light on this decision?

78 Comments

ŠternbergNov 9, 201766 votes

Everything is done to make players purchase more rp, just think about everything they brought in.

HexaDecimelNov 9, 20175 votes

Hextech......wait that allows us to collect keys and chests to get free content (don't need to pay for it). Honor.......no no that gives us the occasional honor capsule and also plays a part in end of season rewards for more free content. Oh and don't forget the end of season rewards which rewards players based on their achievements. Or the reward every time we level up now. And all the free game modes, champion updates, reworks.......

TakarayNov 9, 201732 votes

Sure that's all nice, but it does not explain why the value of SKIN shards was lowered, the only real way to get them is by purchasing them with real money and a negligible amount obtain in Mastery Chest(which btw are different from RP Chest and have a lower rate for skins). The change to Orange Essence feels wrong, people paid money for those skin shards and they are losing value for no stated reason, it just is, I can tell you that I personally won't purchase anymore Hextech crafting loot, it's mathematically inefficient to do so compared to purchasing what I like, before it was random, sure, but mathematically you were getting marginally more than you would by picking and choosing what to purchase specially in special events.

HexaDecimelNov 9, 20174 votes

Honestly I don't understand why anyone would pay for Hextech loot. The reduced value to Orange Essence is probably my only complaint. And I am sure that if its a big enough problem Riot will adjust the numbers. Just tired of the constant hate towards Riot.

Sure they screw up sometimes, but they actually offer quite alot to players for free. This is a business and the whole point is to be profitable. So as long as I can load into a match have fun and slowly grind to get more free stuff I will be satisfied.

Dont get me wrong, I am sick of the way micro transactions and dlc work in games these days. I miss the times when I could buy an awesome complete game and just enjoy it. Now half the stuff is locked behind loot crates, dlc that comes out the day of the main release. It sucks. But League is little different, you aren't forced to spend. Anyway there is my rant lol.

TakarayNov 9, 201713 votes

Then you agree with me, my only complain is Orange Essence reduction, that seem explicitly made to make Loot Boxes less RP efficient which seems crazy to me, they SHOULD(and were) be more RP efficient than outright buying what you want, because you're getting random stuff and are not guaranteed to even get something you like. I purchased A LOT of Hextech crafting stuff and obviously I disenchanted everything I didn't like before the patch, so the changes didn't make me lose any current value however I can assure you the changes will discourage me from buying anymore. Which is kind of my point, it feels like a change design to make people purchase more loot boxes than they would otherwise need but business wise I can't see this working out the way Riot seem to expect.

PlacentasNov 10, 20174 votes

I agree with you.

As someone who owns and plays a lot of champions, the hextech skin shards were perfect for me. Basically much cheaper skins and I like collecting random skins especially if manage to get them for cheaper.

However, as you stated, if you purchase the orbs or boxes, it's even harder to then even be able to enchant those shards. Where as before you could spend like 20 bucks on 10 orbs and still easily profit in orange essence shard worth. Now that isn't possible due to such a low amount of Orange Essence gotten from the shards.

I was in support of shards/orbs/boxes, but I will not be spending more money on them if the orange essence isn't reverted back to normal. It's simply not worth it anymore.

Tesla EffectNov 9, 20174 votes

{quoted}

Everything is done to make players purchase more rp, just think about everything they brought in.

Runepage limitation encourages pay-to-win purchases of rune pages. Level up system is unenjoyable and slow, encourages people to purchase champions with money due to not getting a continuous amount of BE. Orange essences obtained from shard is halfed, which encourages people to purchase skins since now its even more of a slog to get champion skins in such a big fu kind of manipulative way.

The new system is manipulative, and overall feels less enjoyable if you arent giving real money to make it more enjoyable.

Porphyry GreenNov 10, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Everything is done to make players purchase more rp, just think about everything they brought in.

Fact: Riot used to care for people now they care only for money.

TL;DR: Riot's objective: Money > Life

Fisher No ChainsNov 9, 201725 votes

The reason, according to Riot, is that you can now get more shards if you grind for level capsules.

However, what everyone seems to forget is that emotes can now drop from chests and capsules, lowering their value and making it even harder to get orange essence or decent skin shards.

wyvern011976Nov 10, 20177 votes

Are skin shards even in level capsules? I though it was just champs.

Trias000Nov 10, 20173 votes

No, they aren't. Only champ shards and, after milestone levels (50, 75 etc.) - emotes. But you also get a chance for a gemstone.

Hella KaiserNov 9, 201725 votes

"Because f*ck you, that's why" -Rito Gaems

ToppienNov 9, 20177 votes

{quoted}

"Because f*ck you, that's why" -Rito Gaems

"beacuse FK U gimme money" - riot

Dorans PantsNov 9, 201723 votes

Wow now after cutting my essence gain in half without any justification (besides money that is) I'm absolutely inclined to buy more rp to make up for it. Heck maybe they should also fuck up my blue essence gain so I'm more inclined to buy champs with rp. the possibilities are endless.

EternalSaiyanNov 9, 201715 votes

Because Riot didnt think that unfathomable amounts of money was enough of money and so they designed season 8 to make even more. Champions will take way way longer to earn, masteries have been renamed "Runes" in order to lower the default page number from 20 to 2 so they can charge for more pages, and the free skins a year will be reduced to maybe 1 or none at all. All of this just makes a very sneaky yet in your face paywall to force you to buy RP. Just wait till we are level 200 and it will take 400+ games to earn 800BE and then players will start to really notice.

FutureCreatorNov 10, 20171 votes

They said that leveling doesn't infinitely scale. Something like the increase in XP required stops growing at around level 70.

nGioNov 9, 201710 votes

{quoted}

As stated in the title why was the Orange Essence gain from disenchanting skin shards lower by 50%?

So new players can have free runes. Because new client. Some other bullshit. We'll never get a legitimate reason for the bad decisions or the insulting ones. At best, we'll just be told that we are actually getting more now and we're too stupid to understand it, followed by bad math to back it up that would have a 4 year old scratching their head.

PB4UAMENov 10, 20176 votes

EVERY. GODDAMN. MOTHERFUCKING TIME. ITS BECOMING GODDAMN CLOCKWORK AT THIS POINT.

WrÆthNov 10, 20179 votes

https://t3n9sm.c2.acecdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/650_1200.png is royally fucking the League community. This might actually be considered rape.

ToppienNov 14, 20172 votes

{quoted}

https://t3n9sm.c2.acecdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/650_1200.png is royally fucking the League community. This might actually be considered rape.

tencent is the reason every big developer nowdays is using this gambling system, i think they own blizzard, activision, EA, etc

xelakerNov 9, 20178 votes

So you buy more rp. Honestly that is the answer to 90% of the changes preseason lol

LeonerdoNov 10, 20177 votes

To make up for essence drop rate changes, we'll tune the way loot boxes work to increase the amount of skins you'll get from them. We'll also add "bad luck protection," so you won't ever go on long streaks without getting a skin shard or a gemstone from chests.

-- Source

FutureCreatorNov 10, 20171 votes

Hope those fucking odds are doubled cause otherwise it's going to take like 6 shards (assuming they're all of 975RP skins) to get a 975 RP skin shard upgraded.

VexingRavenNov 11, 20176 votes

Wait, what the FUCK Riot?! The warnings mentioned lowering the Blue Essense rate, nobody said a god damn thing about Orange Essence. So now I'm sitting on a bunch of fucking skins shards, half of which I literally just bought from the Worlds Orbs, and they're all worth so fucking little I can probably get two skins out of?

Go fuck yourselves. That will be the absolute last penny you ever see from me. You're scum.

YouremyboyBleuNov 9, 20175 votes

Aren’t you supposed to have a greater chance of getting boxes now?

HexaDecimelNov 9, 20178 votes

I think its because now we will receive rewards for leveling up and there is no cap. Just need to grind.

RainbowIceeNov 9, 20172 votes

correct that's what they said. Sounds pretty good on paper but in reality people that don't grind will get lucked out, it doesn't mean much though at least to me. I always get a champion shard from the boxes anyways the chances of me getting a skin seem low, even lower for a skin i would be interested in.

TakarayNov 9, 201713 votes

You mean the boxes from Mastery? Because as far as I know those are the only way to get skin shards without paying money. They did not, it is still cap and 1 per week and once per champion each season which is honestly irrelevant to me anyways(and I am sure for most people as I am an average player) I get them as they become available and have 31 in stock because the key fragment gain is so low it can't keep up lol

McsquzzyNov 10, 20175 votes

to spend rp

Critmaster GarenNov 9, 20174 votes

they said something about extra skin shards from high level capsules. no idea if thats going to come close to compensating for the reduction.

SpiritOfOdysseusNov 10, 20174 votes

It sounds like its time to switch games. And after playing since season 2, its hard to hear myself say that.

But the facts are blatently obvious.. Riot doesn't care about anyone that isn't a "pro" player. And even now, even the definition of "pro" is changing from a guy that played league so much that hes better than pretty much everyone to whatever organization can pay people to compete in league like this new NBA BULLSHIT they have in store for us. Its not the same... and it all started with the micro-transaction CANCER. The world needs to understand that capitalism is the bane of humanity, everything that capitalism touches eventually implodes in itself. We as humans have evolved past simple ground travel, we have been to the moon- its time we as humans evolve past MONEY as our only means of self worth.

jama655Nov 10, 20173 votes

people were getting skins to easily boom answered ur question

TengrichanNov 10, 20172 votes

This.All these changes are about forcing out more RP from the players.

FlyinguillotineNov 10, 20173 votes

I just got elementalist lux from a chest. At first I was excited, but then I realized im gonna have to save for like two years to unlock it. So I guess I'll be really excited in two years.[sg-janna]

SukishooNov 9, 20172 votes

You can gain skin shards the higher you Level Up. So, yeah .

ForFoxSakesNov 9, 20173 votes

Possibly only at milestones like 50, 75 100.... so you need like what, 200 games to open up a bonus skin shard all the while you're taking reduced orange essence gains? Even less incentive to buy the hextech chests when the DE value is dropped

Skins ProjectNov 10, 20171 votes

They added bad luck protection, along with increased % chance for skins/gemstones.

Bad luck protection ensures you get gemstones/skin shards every X boxes.

RiddarnNov 10, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Skins Project,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=bUzyB4iK,comment-id=000400000001,timestamp=2017-11-10T05:31:06.821+0000)

They added bad luck protection, along with increased % chance for skins/gemstones.

Bad luck protection ensures you get gemstones/skin shards every X boxes.

Where did they mention this about increased % chance of skins/gemstones?

I know about the bad luck protection, but don't remember seeing anything about increased drop chances.

Mysticman89Nov 9, 20172 votes

It's from 33% of the shards value to 20%, so not quite half.

Theres bad luck protection on chests now (ensuring you can't get a string of champ shards, you're assured skin shards or a gemstone within X chests), plus we're in theory going to be getting more as a side effect of leveling.

mental defisencyNov 9, 20171 votes

Hopefully it works for honour capsules as well. I have a video on my phone of opening my second honour capsule only to get a nunu champion shard. My first honor capsule had a Garen champ shard, but I didn't get that one on video

ModAcademy KaynNov 9, 20172 votes

I got two key shards in my first Honor capsule, then Grey Warwick in the next, so consider me lucky.

Ariel the CruelNov 10, 20172 votes

then Grey Warwick in the next

You lucky bastard. I got Medieval Twitch last month. Trade? XD

Mysticman89Nov 10, 20171 votes

Honour capsules are only supposed to contain key fragments and champ shards, with the rare chance of grey warwick/medieval twitch, so bad luck protection wouldn't really make sense for them.

edit: That said, there is bad luck protection in actually getting honour capsules in the first place, so if you're honour 3+ you'll be guaranteed to get one after a certain time period.

mental defisencyNov 10, 20171 votes

Thanks, I thought you actually had a chance of getting skin shards, but I guess not. Good to know.

ThilmerNov 9, 20172 votes

I have Heard that we are going to get skin shards when reaching certain levels, but unless we get skin shards every 3 levels or something like that it doesn't compensate the lost of orange essence.

Also, I don't remember Riot saying anything about the orange essence when they explain this thing about the PI and the blue essence.

ForFoxSakesNov 10, 20171 votes

Milestone capsules will just include more champ shards and chance for gems, NOT skin shards. The only possibility for skin shards would be to craft that gemstone into a box and chest :/

if you hit special milestone levels, you'll earn special rewards like gemstones or rare emotes. https://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/game-updates/features/level-beyond-30

V DNov 10, 20172 votes

I wish they would have made this much more clear before preseason came around, because now the value of my skin shards , that I spent RP on, has been cut by 1/3. Unfortunate. [cass-cry]

FutureCreatorNov 10, 20171 votes

They put a notification in that blue excelmation point thing next to your play button. It said that all shards would have reduced value, if I remember correctly.

V DNov 10, 20171 votes

{quoted}

They put a notification in that blue excelmation point thing next to your play button. It said that all shards would have reduced value, if I remember correctly.

When did they put it as a notification? I hadn't been on for about 3 weeks prior to the preseason start.