its going to be a wash imo just like flex que/teambuilder was that will get removed give or take a season.
Riot keeps trying to invent new ways to get people interested in ranked on NA by making it more and more casual friendly.
Its honestly silly how unhealthily obsessed they are with this ONE mode of play.
I dont think preseason is going to reverse the damage this season did though.
Runes Reforged ultimately had a turbulent if not outright poor effect on the game that Riot is still scrambling to fix. Its hard to gauge its effects because Runes Reforged have turned some champs from zeroes to heroes (Electrocute Assassins including Wukong, Aery+scorch poke supports. Celerity+LTempo Nocturne)
Champion balance is questionable.Lots of reworks got reverted for better or WORSE and Still a ton of champs in need of VGU. For some Reason Meddler and the balance team has a fetish for buffing unhealthy champions (who asked for Garen,WuKong and Mundo to be meta? Why bring back Nocturne?who enjoys playing against Tryndamere yuck... cant say I miss these champs personally).
Itemization is still pretty bad. Just about every class has pain points with their itemization. Bruiser got their items iceboxed and are banking off of keystones to get by. AD Assassins feel too connected to the hip to Duskblade and EoN is still mediocre. Mages have realistically had no meaningful item choice growth. For some reason Riot just gutted their mana so they would all be forced to go 1 of 3 mana items (but lets face it 1 of 2 because GLP is pretty ass) besides that Void staff is still pretty mandatory most of the time. Supports items still has majority of their power in heal/shield modifier which reflects poorly on the class as a whole (supports should/could be MORE than just heal/shield slaves and Pyke proves that) also mass healing is detrimental to game health. Tanks currently aren't feeling it because there are simply too many answers to them in the game now. Marksmen got EVISCERATED by nerfs and are still on the long road to recovery (patch by patch they are slowly getting better though).
Besides all this there is still the whole RGM modes getting removed+Clash failing to launch over and over along with complete Silence about the status of experimental ARAM changes. players who liked to play ascension/bloodmooon/def not dominion are getting left in the dust instead having to settle for Urf.
so I mean yeah.
Riot has a LOT of work cut out for them that probably wont get finished anytime soon and would probably take an entire season to fix in the first place. Rather Instead they are going to unleash another workload monster (new ranked) so the gameplay will continue to suffer as Riot tries to sort that out in addition to everything mentioned beforehand.
sad to say but I honestly predict this will be another year of further overall decline of game health,quality and playerbase.
Riot just doesn't want to stop and eat whats on their plate. They just keep going full steam ahead unaware of the amount of passengers who are fed up with the ride and choosing to abandon.
. The new matchmaking system will probably help queues become more balanced and ranked play more enjoyable to play, but these current issues need to be resolved soon so the main focus can strictly be on the new system. Jungle variety (scuttle dominant junglers), Banner Of Command, damage creep, Runes providing base stats like armor (this one is a personal thought), and I'm sure you guys can go on and on what you feel is wrong with the game. So I feel since it's almost August and the season is starting to reach the end, these issues need to be tended too before they try and introduce another major project and just overlook the game in its current stance.
for 100% win rate are my hopes and dreams currently.
[sg-ahri-2]
