Boards›Gameplay

I hope Riot has learned valuable lessons from season 6, 7, and 8

Naalith··93 votes·17,245 views

This isn't a "shit on Riot post," and I actually think Riot has done tons of stuff of value in the last few years of League. That being said, basically every friend I had who played League with me since seasons 1-2 quit around Worlds patch of season 7. I still find playing alone pretty fun, but I desperately wish all my irl friends would return to League. Unfortunately when games lose players it's monumentally difficult to get them back.

The practices of season 6 (which went a little into 7) have basically been nixed. Ever since the disastrous Juggernaut patch class updates game every few months, basically always failing at their intended impact. Without the full VGU treatment lots of people felt it was unjustified that their champions got changed as well, and the balance impacts of reworking so many people at once lasted for years and still have impacts in many cases today.

In season 7, Riot basically outright refused to balance the game. Ardent Censor was added at the start of the year and was pretty crazy, was tinkered with slightly around midseason and that's also when everyone discovered it was actually batshit insane. Because Worlds was still MONTHS AWAY (aka soon apparently), Riot refused to change the item because they said it was too soon to 7.18. This was what broke my friends' will to play, and almost got me. The outright refusal to change anything when the game was dominated by bottom lane was clear favoritism for both the lane and for flashy bottom plays for pro play.

In season 8, Riot has taken the opposite approach of the previous season. Everything has changed every few patches this year to the point it is nauseating. A lot of it seems to be change for the sake of change, basically taking turns ruining every role. Mages got shafted, tanks got shafted, junglers not named Graves got shafted, bot got shafted, then fighters got shafted when their items were cancelled. I don't think Riot sat on a lot of these changes long enough. The universal dislike of the scuttle changes makes me wonder how the hell that patch was greenlit, bottom lane has more class diversity but only a handful of picks from each viable bot class can even be played and other people like crit ADCs are just being deleted. The rune changes at the start of the season should have been the primary balancing point, and I actually really like Runes Reforged because the old stat-based runes were boring and felt archaic to me, but rather than balancing the OP runes Riot went right into the big patch every month and midseason has gone by. Basically a bunch of things that need to be tweaked have stocked up and right now the game feels very gimmicky. Nothing wrong with diversity but Heimerdinger/Fiddle and Swain/Pyke feel very bullshit and unfun to play against.

Basically what I'm saying is that I think from now on, Riot needs to play whack a mole with balance until the game feels good again. Refusing to balance made the game boring and everyone left, then balancing it too hard every single patch has made it impossible for returning and new players to get back into the game. Preseason is a fine time to turn the meta on its head but considering the meta has been shifting wildly monthly this year I honestly think Riot just needs to stabilize the game and let it rest a while, while STILL balancing the crazy strategies unlike in season 7. I'll probably be playing this game for years to come still but I can't deny that my friends quitting and overall fatigue with my champions being deleted or brought to godly levels every few patches is just... too much. I find myself playing less or less, not necessarily because I don't want to play but because player retention has been nonexistent and the game itself is volatile. League is almost definitely my favorite game and I want to see it continue. For that we need a solid and stable release schedule, with enough changes to feel worthwhile but not so many that the game basically explodes in all directions with crazy op new strats every patch that take months to be reigned in.

81 Comments

KazaJhodo48 votes

This is happening because something happened to the balance team.

More than likely the masteries system has created a plethora of underlying issues.... or at least its a completely new thing to consider in balancing and perhaps they dont' know how to properly balance around it yet.

Or... perhaps it just straight up doesn't work.

Basically, champions used to have internal balances with runes and masteries. This allow us as players to balance our champions. Similar to how laners balance their champion according to how they play their lane. If you know you can't win the early levels, or easily lose them, you play back do your best to farm and survive. You are actually balancing the game by playing that way.

This allows riot to create champions that are stronger and weaker at different times in the game. These are good things.

Perhaps without that rune and mastery balance padding, its become far more difficult to balance the game. Perhaps it even may not work still and it hasn't been realized yet. Its a complex thing.

Either way, its obvious that he balance team, items, champions... whatever, is not balanced. I don't think its ok to balance the game over a season and constantly have the game in a crazy state where certain things are strong/weak. Its always been that way though. However there hasn't been a point where I think dmg was THIS crazy, in combination with other factors out of hand.

There are some videos by people smarter than me by far, explaining riots model of constant change and never actually balanced. Its just more out of control than it ever has been perhaps.

If nothing else it FEELS completely out of control.

Nenthos5 votes

On point. And you don't need to be "smart" to see what works and doesn't. The old rune system balanced the game in so many ways and made it possible to play champs in different roles by covering up weaknesses or emphasis on strengths. For example if Riot nerfed Garens movement speed you could still use movement speed quints on him. If a champ was to squishy you could put in defensive runes. If you wanted an early game champ to scale you could use scaling runes and so on. They allowed for every champ to be viable. Now that the old system is gone the game has been significantly less fun, creative, strategic, and balanced.

KazaJhodo2 votes

{quoted}

On point. And you don't need to be "smart" to see what works and doesn't. The old rune system balanced the game in so many ways and made it possible to play champs in different roles by covering up weaknesses or emphasis on strengths. For example if Riot nerfed Garens movement speed you could still use movement speed quints on him. If a champ was to squishy you could put in defensive runes. If you wanted an early game champ to scale you could use scaling runes and so on. They allowed for every champ to be viable. Now that the old system is gone the game has been significantly less fun, creative, strategic, and balanced.

Right. Even more-so you could have a variety of different pages prepared specific to matchups. Allowing you to survive matchups that were difficult, or even bring more mr or armor in runes if the enemy team was stacked ap/ad.

Game balance was also just better in general. There was a curve, now the game is very extreme- champs seem to be ultra strong or nonexistent.

I think when things are in an extreme state, its a sign of lack of control in regards to balance.

Look at the current patterns of the game. Lots of reverts, lots of extremes. This tells me that decisions are being made where the result is no where near what was expected; or the changes are more far-reaching into unexpected areas. Perhaps it simply became far more complex.

Do I need to mention how they murdered the adc role recently? I don't think they would seriously do that intentionally. If it was intentional, whoever is leading that think tank should be canned. You don't take something that finally became an insanely huge hit, the first of its kind, and then change the core formula that got it there.

Or maybe you do.

There is a thing with businesses that once they get so big, they think they can start calling the shots. They forget they became big by catering to their market, not by bossing it around.

If the game isn't fun, I don't play it. I also don't watch my favorite players streams or play in the lcs. I no longer have in common with them the love of the game.

I love this game, but matchmaking is such shit that I can't stand playing it. It just stresses me out to lose because of fucking morons. Especially in promo games, holy fuck its restupid.

deadlychuck31 votes

The problem is that riot redesigned their game to be incapable of shifting without oversight. Previously the game had enough depth and complexity that, if left alone for a few months, the meta would shift on its own as players started to figure out necessary counter measures to lock down something that is OP. The game is just to shallow for that to happen now, which results in riot needing to walk a thin line between changing everything too often and letting too many of the problems fester.

They defined so many of the play styles and created such a power gap between intended play and unintended play, that when something gets OP, there's no amount of niche counter picking that can actually successfully counter the OP thing without completely throwing the core objectives. Riot themselves have to step in to resolve the issue or provide an explicit counter.

I don't want to hate on CertainlyT, but the leniency and positive feedback he gets from actually breaking the established rules of the game aren't helping riot, because they've blatantly caused a significant amount of the power creep (of all forms) to occur. Though it doesn't help that riot also seems to have no issues with removing things, or champions, which have the potential to act as the niche hard counters when a champion gets out of hand... Malzahar item 3140

Riot fucked up, but it's not the kind of fuck up that happened because of patch X.Y, it's the kind of fuck up that took years to build up and is now a colossal mess. They built the game up so much, but did so without regard for how the next layer could be supported and without periodically reinforcing the old layers. And no reinforcing the old layers doesn't mean swapping them out because you can't think of how to make the new shit work based on how the old layer is designed. If you've got that kind of conflict occurring, then you've clearly built far too off center and the correction needs to be made on the design of the new content not the old. The old evidently works, and while it's necessary to go back with a fresh coat of paint periodically, you can't change the base without taking down the whole building, intentionally or otherwise.

Verxint6 votes

This is actually the biggest problem. Everything is optimized around intended highs, and odd or unorthodox power combinations are usually nerfed because they get in the way of those intended "optimal play" highs.

I even have a direct example. I had a specific Sion runepage for dealing with people who play incredibly aggro champs and constantly try to fight. Instead of trying to fight them back, I made a page with a combination of flat armor and HP regen. In the end I had 7 hp/sec at the start of the game. I gave up any offensive stats from runes or masteries for it. I made a tradeoff to use a different strategy than my opponent and beat them that way. Now the only real strategy is "fight them better" which isn't actually strategy, thats just outplaying.

Glîtchy25 votes

these are the same guys who think rework Akali avoiding turret aggro while under turret is ok, I doubt they'll think about the seasons past, plus they made graves into the bullshit he is now along with the creation of the most anti fun item in history, item 3095

Horse Grenades9 votes

{quoted}

these are the same guys who think rework Akali avoiding turret aggro while under turret is ok, I doubt they'll think about the seasons past, plus they made graves into the bullshit he is now along with the creation of the most anti fun item in history, item 3095

I think you meant to show Duskblade

Glîtchy9 votes

[{quoted}](name=ApocaIypse Meow,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=dWRvcHlx,comment-id=00020000,timestamp=2018-07-30T04:25:17.425+0000)

I think you meant to show Duskblade

No I meant stormrazer

tho if you mean S7 duskblade then you're right.

Naalith12 votes

So I won't lie, I actually like that new champions break the rules of the game and add new mechanics. I've played and own every champion in the game, and at this point big VGUs and new releases are the most exciting thing for me. Sometimes they come out imbalanced and once they are in the hands of the balance team rather than the team who created them they either get ruined or stay insane, which is more indicative of the balance team than anything to me. Assassins will always get hate 100% of the time from the boards because they're not fun to play against, but honestly new Akali looks exciting to me as someone who plays every lane and every role. I can't blame a designer for numbers being screwy after the champ is out of their hands.

As for Stormrazor, yeah I agree. Frontloading ADC damage should have never been an idea in the first place, especially with guaranteed crits one item into your build that also gives AS. ADC is supposed to be a sustained damage source when they are powered on, but Stormrazor is basically an admission that an insane punch has to be thrown up front for a champ to be viable.

It also shouldn't stack with Duskblade. I think Duskblade is justified despite the hate because it's meant for assassins who are the up front punch class, maybe the ward killer passive is a bit overtuned though. I honestly think they should've made Stormrazor an item that works like Ashe's passive, where ADCs can opt into cutting their crit damage by spreading it out over all their attacks.

deadlychuck16 votes

I just left this as it's own comment, but i'll reiterate it here.

I actually like that new champions break the rules of the game

This isn't a maintainable design. It will work for some time, but as you start to move too off center, to the point that the core design of the game can't support this breaking of the rules. Then one has to give. Either the old or the new. But the old is what gave you the flexibility to build the new, if that gives, everything comes down. If the new gives, it's a setback, but not unmanageable. I think that riot fails to considered how much these issues have been stacking up and went unresolved, simply because they were within the bounds of flexibility that the game had.

Even some of the classes which got introduced later are called into question. In many ways assassins shouldn't exist from a design prospective, but they can if you have the proper foundational design to support them, which the game doesn't still. That said, if they change the foundational design of the game in order to properly support the assassin class, then should it even be the same game at that point? It'd make more sense to split the community, if the large chunk of the edges can't coexist, then you've either got to accept losing them or split the community to accommodate both independently.

Wolfeur4 votes

the creation of the most anti fun item in history, item 3095

No one can take you seriously if you think Stormrazor is more anti-fun than Deathfire Grasp…

D4M2X011 votes

season 1/2/3/4/5 every season was better then the last and season 5 was my favourite.

season 6/7/8 things become forced and people quit such as dynamicQ, refusing to nerf botlane all of season 7 and now in season 8 its just assaassins. season 7 was just OK when twitch/rageblade abusers werent picked and they could be banned out thank fuck.

flibitydoo10 votes

I don't think it's just the balance. While the balance feels like some guy at Riot keeps fking up and their manager keeps patting them on the back and telling them they're okay and to stop feeling bad and to stop listening to the community and that they will greenlight their ideas, there's a bunch of other changes from the other teams that honestly make the game feel bad.

Like the rework team completely removing aatrox's old identity and old kit and just outright deleting his core champion designs that people appreciated and played. Same with Irelia. Same with Akali soon. Just straight up zero champion identity preservation. Which btw, actually is one of the hardest ways to get people to quit the game. People play league for the champs, and when their favourites no longer exist, they leave. Simple. Also the fact that a bunch of previously reworked champs are basically as dead popularitywise as they were pre-rework like Urgot or Yorick or Galio or Poppy. Mostly because they got nerfed and shoved aside and forgotten. What happened to "reworks add balance levers" that stops them from being balance nightmares?

Or the skins team making the 5th "ultimate" skin another adc. When everyone expected and wanted a top laner. And I know that there's a 125+ champs now, but like they make multiple skins per patch and there are champs that are going 1000+ days without getting a skin;even basic things like chromas don't even go to them, and this is a consistent complaint that's been happening for years (which is plenty of time to respond and react) that the community has been complaining about that still hasn't been fixed. Instead we get things like Pulsefire Riven, which is a skin I have literally never seen in any of the games I played since it's release- because no one owns it, because the riven mains who would buy it already own arcade/battle bunny/dawnbringer/warring kingdoms which are already good skins for the champ, so why would they buy it? Oh and Early sales system. and the new "pay like 500 more rp (5 dollars) to get an icon and border with your skin".

Or the lore team who have been making content... except none of that content fixes the gaping hole in the lore with the institute of war and summoners being retconned and a large roster of champs having functionally no true lore because of it. "what's the story behind Ionian boots of lucidity?" "well there was this showmatch that was won by- "oh right, summoners don't exist and that match is no longer a valid explanation and the lore team still hasn't made a replacement story to fix it. And the lore that is getting put out is for some reason, all of it, is just community homogenization. People joked and laughed at Riot when they retconned like half the roster into being from the Frelyord during the 3 sisters event. That joke has since spread to every other faction. Shurima retconned so much stuff to build the empire of Azir. Galio literally changed all of Demacia when they changed his story.

Or I don't even know who this team would count as, but my goodness does just ending a match feel unrewarding. Getting only exp is awful and getting 50 BE from first win of the day feels awful too. Cracking open level up capsules is always disappointing and the hextech chest system, the shards you get from them, for working hard to get an S rank to get a chest and being non-toxic to get the keys, the amount of effort you put in to get the rewards, they have all been de-valued and feel bad to get too. (frequent) Missions which were supposed to be the compensator that held the new system together and made us feel rewarded don't work. They feel like complete garbage because 90% of them seem to be focused on awarding icons or ward skins that players are drowning in, instead of BE or exp or champ shards.

Win or lose, I no longer ever feel like pressing the "play again" button in postgame. I just want to close the client and play something else. Most of my games, there's at least like 3 people (and I occasionally am one of them) who has this mentality of "get. me. out.".

GayFluffyUnicorn3 votes

Rip Kled and Camille. No skins since their release.

saltran4 votes

{quoted}

Rip Kled and Camille. No skins since their release.

Something something A Sol manis crying in a corner

Athenes Lulu9 votes

Is it petty that I left the game also because unpopular champions basically get ignored in terms of who gets skins and whatnot?

All those awesome ideas for unpopular stuff, only to be slotted for more popular champs who already have a multitude of skins.

GrãñðmãstêrShãçø3 votes

Got to make that dolla' dolla'

Unstoppable Monk7 votes

It's somewhat balanced, but most people think it's bullshit when they haven't learned the meta at all while pointing fingers at the obvious anti-fun. Zoe

This season punishes a player's other teammates for their mistakes pretty hard though.

SugeMinPikk7 votes

I dunno I was pretty ok with 6 and 7

Naalith5 votes

6 was definitely on a down slope but was still really amazing because of how League was at its height, imo. The second half of season 7 and up to right now it's kind of bottomed out though.

Need Gold 4 Tent7 votes

What they did wrong was trying to slap more damage onto tanks, while nerfing their ability to... you know... tank. Look at the state of tanks now, they die in 2 or 3 seconds. But you know what? You step too close to one as a squishy, and you suddenly lose half of your HP and pretty much cannot move until you die. That is not what a tank is supposed to do. The wet noodle fights were boring but THAT was balanced. At that time at least, the tanks while they couldn't kill stuff, they could actually tank.

Spicy Rice3 votes

The problem was, at the height of the tank meta, people were complaining about tanks being unkillable while also outputting respectable damage.

So riot in their infinite wisdom nerfed tank items while increasing their damage, instead of just reducing their damage to manageable levels

3TWarrior1 votes

unfortunately, not the whole truth. The problem at the time was that a team could make itself out of tanks and a marksman, then turtle the match to finally just steam-roll over towers. The opposing team could do nothing to stop them when it happened

it was only at like one point that this actually happened though and I forget what the reason was

Need Gold 4 Tent1 votes

sounds like typical tsm banking on doublelift scaling to lategame

Praetor Notorias1 votes

A tank that does 0 damage is no threat and is ignorable. A tank that is ignored will take 0 damage and tank nothing.

AmWhaleIRL2 votes

{quoted}

I dunno I was pretty ok with 6 and 7

I would be too if I was an ADC or ardent censor main.

SugeMinPikk1 votes

I I was maining Jax in season 7. Don't remember when Rengar was reworked. Might've been maining Rengar in 6. I just know that I stopped playing Rengar altogether after patch 7.3.

Don't think I've ever mained ADC..

AmWhaleIRL1 votes

{quoted}

I I was maining Jax in season 7. Don't remember when Rengar was reworked. Might've been maining Rengar in 6. I just know that I stopped playing Rengar altogether after patch 7.3.

Don't think I've ever mained ADC..

Didn't mean to direct the statement at you, I was more so just making a general statement at the state of the game in Season 7 when Riot straight up refused to balance bot lane.

Cavesloth2 votes

Even as a support main I hated it.

AmWhaleIRL1 votes

{quoted}

Even as a support main I hated it.

I Can relate to that. I'm a Kha'Zix main and when Kha'Zix still had his busted perma-stealth evolved R I hated how op he was.

Asgerith7 votes

I do want to play my favorite game again, but there's just so many changes to my favorite roles,(JG and bot/ Supp) that I just don't feel useful. The scuttle changes, the jg XP changes, the funneling strat, Swain and Vladimir bot (I don't mind the diversity, they are just very anti-fun to play against..), Uninteractive lanes of Pyke and Fiddlesticks(interchangeable for Swain)or Soraka Veigar (I need some counseling after that stuff.. Afk farm and be bored or risk being trapped in two circles while rengar jumps at you, or die trying to do something..) item 1056 not doing what I'm used to it doing.. It's just too much. Riot needs to slow down and work on what they have. Fix the problematic stuff(looking at youTalonitem 3077 and item 3147summoner 14for some,and fix the bug for summoner 32) Don't think I forgot about electrocute, I just cant use a very convenient picture like everything else.. (riot get on it!) item 3073

Saibbo7 votes

Season 9, we need more damage, 20 min gare are still to long, we need true movement speed/true slows/true armor/true attack speed,we need new type of cc for every new champion, we want even more jungle interaction so we'll put the red and blu in the river. Perfection.

Cavesloth2 votes

Stop giving them ideas you monster!!!!

Glory975 votes

They can't even see the problemes this game has to begin with. They change things just to change something "to keep it fresh". Riot keeps believing that their game changes can make the game more attractive for new players and that all the veteran players will keep playing despite how frustrating it feels to see what the game turns into.

I mean have you EVER like anywhere seen a rioter admit that the direction the game has headed from season 5 onwards is not good? Have you ever heard some rioter say that shorter games are less fun then a long-game meta (like S5)?

For them we the players on the boards are just a vocal minority. 0.1% player base that wines like little kids about anything. While the rest of their player base is supposedly satisfied...

Even though it feels hard and frustrating, you have to let go of the dream that this game can become great again. Riot isn't going to learn a single thing from the last 3 seasons, because in their eyes there is nothing wrong about the game to begin with. And the longer you keep holding onto that dream of the past seasons, the more frustrated you'll get.

Nea1042 votes

I fully agree. Also, no competent company would ever allow such a long series of awful changes; instead, even if many players pointed out that things were wrong back in NOVEMBER, eg. crazy damage, Riot made its own game even WORSE patch after patch. And we are now in AUGUST.

They aren't going anywhere, with the same people in the same positions.

3TWarrior1 votes

unfortunately there's a difference between a "competent" company and a "profitable" company

so long as it turns a profit, it can be bled dry, just like many many games before it...

Nea1041 votes

I agree. Luckily, not competent companies cannot make profit for long, and indeed they aren't going well...

That's why they are trying desperate things like the "do missions along with lev. 15 accounts", or the "let's unban permabanned accounts" :P

Blåbæret5 votes

You will soon learn that they didn't learn anything. Trust me.

KazaJhodo1 votes

{quoted}

You will soon learn that they didn't learn anything. Trust me.

Absolutely, this has gone from a fun game driven by its playerbase. To a game driven by a company, ignoring its playerbase. Hell, I don't even think the game considers its pros.

Even if they were listening... right now, I don't think they can actually reasonably manipulate the meta. I think balance is just a word used to label 'trying things'.

I don't expect them to listen to every stupid detail from every little moron that spews words. I do expect them to keep fun in mind. I do expect them to value the low elo as much as the high elo.

Tons of fans are low elo. Its not smart to ignore most of your playerbase, in regards to lcs fans and monetary.

If current patterns continue, all new champions will be able to do everything. It will turn from a skill based game into who can delete who first game. In a lot of ways its already there.

I don't think your statment is correct. Its not 'soon'.

This has already happened. We're past not learning, this is out of control.

BlueBilberry4 votes

[A bit annoyed that you ignored the fact that most supports got shafted in season 8, btw. :p]

Well, let's take this all in retrospect. (And incidentally the lessons could go back a few seasons further.)

The Ardent meta made supports actually useful and feel like they had a role in the game (unlike the Locket meta in season 5 which basically turned supports into a "use active on single item and wait about 90 seconds" before the support was useful again).

The fourth season had metas all over the place - the only thing consistent then was change. Tanks had a place. Assassins had a place. There were overpowered champs (Lucian, Oriana, etc.). There was even an odd support at mid meta (Soraka, Lulu, Karma).

Season 3 can be summed up in one item: item 3071 . This was, I think, the first real sign that balancing the game in any form is truly difficult - especially when one item can really ruin the quality of overall play.

Season 2 was the "let's break the sustain" meta or "we need a jungle" meta. Lots of "square pegs in round holes" to borrow the metaphor.

And so on.

Regardless, what we as players must realize is that if one player is going to be happy with the current state of the game (not using the term meta here), then another will be absolutely annoyed. A group of people right now want "botlane diversity" so they can play their Darius and Garen in botlane -when it will inconvenience a bunch of other players who want to play their Jinx and Miss Fortune. (Not using Lucian or Vayne because it seems that those players will play them anywhere anyhow ).

The game itself is a complex entity - any one change can have emergent properties that the devs didn't consider. Even though I am not happy with the state of the botlane right now as a support main, I know that any attempts to undo the mess that was created over the last 7-8 patches(!) is going to take a long, long time to undo.

Currently we can assume that the devs are basically taking steps to speed up the games - to compete with Overwatch, PubG, Battle Royale, Realm Royale and Fortnite. Sadly, their ability to communicate their intentions and the consequences of their actions has been poor. No, "thanks for sticking with us as we do X, Y and Z" - but instead some weak patch notes, some videos that don't outright tell us what they are trying to do, and attempts in pro league streams to sugarcoat everything and make it appear that everything is alright.

In short, Riot needs to pause, take a moment, look at what its doing and ask how can it best serve its clientelle - because currently, it is starting to lose sight of that.

LibroMastro3 votes

I really don't think so, judging by the PBE changes. I see buffs to a really mobile cancerous champ like Lee, buffs to thresh that is already one of the most played and best supports..nothing new

Vlada Cut3 votes

They didn't learn anything. At all. And neither they would in pre-season 9 and season 9 and future seasons, unless they actually grow up to balance a game BY PLAYING it. Geez do people get it's different when you watch a gameplay video and play the game itself?!

Pika Fox1 votes

.... Their playtest team are diamonds, masters and a challenger....

Vlada Cut3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Pika Fox,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=dWRvcHlx,comment-id=000e0000,timestamp=2018-07-30T13:31:57.948+0000)

.... Their playtest team are diamonds, masters and a challenger....

And? Look where the game is now. In a terrible state with it's even terrible community.

PaladinNO1 votes

I hope Riot has learned valuable lessons from season 6, 7, and 8

If they have, then I won't be there to see it. I've given them ample chance these past couple seasons, but they have only made it worse as far as I am concerned as a "casual" player (playing ARAM each day, and not caring about ranked over easy Gold V).

The tactical element that drew me to this game in season 3 is completely gone now - if I want a fast-paced game to pace my nerves, I'll go play Quake or something.

3TWarrior1 votes

try blacklight retribution if it's still got enough players

it's a fast-paced shooter with a ton of strategies and customization

PaladinNO1 votes

Actually, I don't really like online games at all. LoL is the only one I've ever been playing. I prefer by FAR single-player/PVE games.

There is Counter-Strike, of course, but only in LAN mode and between 1.3 and 1.6. Same with StarCraft - stopped when SC2 came, and again, only single player or LAN mode.

I simply cannot stand games with an always-online requirement (so everything through Origin, Steam or Battle.net etc. are out - offline modes or not).

If I am to list my own games:

Age of Empires II (Age of Kings, The Conquerors, Forgotten Empires) Alien - Isolation Crysis (1, 2, 3) Darksiders 2 Diablo 2 (Lord of Destruction + various mods) Doom 3 (Resurrection of Evil, BFG Edition) Doom 4 Dying Light (recently installed this one) eDuke32 (Duke Nukem 3D high-res mod) F.E.A.R. Platinum (all expansions) F.E.A.R 2 (as a Playstation port...RUBBISH game!) Far Cry (1 and FC 3 - Blood Dragon) Half-Life 1-2 (plus all expansions) Need For Speed 3: Hot Pursuit Portal 1-2 Red Alert 2 (with high-res mod, + expansions) SpellForce Platinum (all expansions) Star Wars (Dark Forces/Jedi Outcast) StarCraft 1-2 (+ SC2: Mass Recall) System Shock 2 Turoc 2 Unreal Tournament 1999 Warcraft 3 Emulators: NES, SNES, N64, GBA, Sega Mega Drive, Wii, Gamecube, PS 1-2

See much from the last decade here? ^^

And it got nothing to do with my system specs either: https://boards.eune.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/off-topic-en/fQOqgEgz-show-your-set-up?comment=0001

...I just prefer games from back when they were good. And actually owned the games - not merely rented them :)

https://severusgames.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/totallyunplayablebuggybland410hourgameswithanassloadofdlc_005b946402d32849b5aff67830057fa9.jpg

3TWarrior2 votes

If you want to mix it up with Red Alert 2 , there's a good mod for it called Mental Omega

Blacklight is a free game like league

you can try Battle for Wesnoth (another free strategy game but it's turn-based)

if you like RTS , try Warzone 2100

PaladinNO1 votes

Thanks for the list. :) First off, I'm actually impressed you knew about, well, any of the games I got - most people just go "what's that?" (even WC3, I kid you not - "i've only tried WoW", they say).

I've looked at most of them - Mental Omega does look interesting, but it gave the impression of changing so much, the original game behind felt somewhat lost in it all (look at me talking, not even tried the mod yet...).

But mostly because I got some RA 2 mods already (such as the high-res mod), I fear installing additional ones may break any or all of them. Not given it a whole-hearted look-see though.

Blacklight did seem outright exciting (considering any such shooter that I like are long abandoned by the local gaming community - like C&C Renegade), but as an online game, I won't touch it.

Battle for Wesnoth did remind me very much of Heroes of Might And Magic. Don't know if that's an accurate comparison, considering I haven't even tried HMM (any of them - shame on me, I know), but while I don't mind turn-based games (I like chess), I know it won't be a sort of game that will be given much attention. So it would be mere pass-time.

Warzone 2100 did give me a StarCraft/Red Alert 1 feel, but as such, I think, well, StarCraft does it better. Most of the reason why I really dislike SC2 - did the campaigns once on Medium and then shelved the games - is the camera distance, which is WAY too close.

If I may recommend you a game, I can only urge you to try SpellForce. The original trilogy anyway - Spellforce 2 and 3 (recently released) were quick to turn away from the "rune hero" concept that I enjoyed so much with the first 3 games.

The game itself is an RTS/RPG combo, offering various maps with both a 3rd person view and overhead camera option (can just scroll between them at any point). On some maps, you control just a single character, a whole army, or just you and the up to 5 rune heroes. It's your typical beast and magic game, with 6 races available (Humans/Elves/Dwarves - Dark Elves/Trolls/Orcs), each with their own units, buildings and technologies.

At game start, you select your avatar which will be the single unit you control the whole time, and customize as you want (figher/warrior/archer/elemental-/white-/black- or mind magic sorcerer). Honestly, I have played this game on and off frequently since the original release back in 2003, and I still haven't tried all the varieties. Not that that says much - I still haven't tried Barbarian or Necromancer in Diablo 2 either.

So far, only tried the broken things (warrior and ice elemental/healer-enchanter/death magic combo mage), so the actual balancing leaves something to be desired. Game has long since been left by the devs though.

3TWarrior1 votes

well, aside from the large download(only about a gig or more but don't remember exactly. Comes to just over 2 gigs when installed), the only thing you need for Mental Omega are a few of the base-game files. You just create a new folder, drag them into it and install mental omega in that folder (it gives instructions as well at least somewhere, probably on the mentalomega website )

if you are worried about gameplay changes, well, yes, there are quite a few. Overall, the game is really good, though it is much faster than the original game. I would recommend that you try it though and consider it from the perspective that things have been reimagined and rebalanced. For instance, there is an entirely new faction (the one you probably saw) Called the Foehn (if that's how it's spelled) , a faction all to itself that's tired of the eternal war between the west and the east (probably a bad memory for that description but that's what I took them to be)

each faction also has subfactions with things unique to them

#blacklight retribution

I'm not sure what to comment on blacklight but if you can play league, you can play it and it has a lot of crazy, fun tactics you can use. IT DOES HAVE player versus environment though if you are online with other players. It's a simple zombie mode that gets progressively harder the further in you get. I forget which difficulty it is, but it makes it where zombies can only be harmed by melee weapons and headshots XD. It's rather unique, but I assume you're starting to look for stuff that works entirely offline

#Batle for wesnoth

Battle for wesnoth has a small but dedicated community to it. It's entirely free and is actively or was actively developed (not sure now, haven't updated in a long time) it's good for playing with friends if you have spare time, as matches can get quite long

Warzone 2100

if you tried it, it's almost entirely unique to itself because every player except AI controlled raiders has access to the same technology(if researched), but you can change your playstyle on the fly by alterring your forces and what you build. As another interesting mechanic, damage is based on an accuracy/projectile system, so depending upon what it's shooting with, it may be less effective or more effective against something There aren't too many designs for it, but there are a lot of things you can do in it and matches can go between VERY SHORT and RIDICULOUSLY LONG

if the games are commercial content, I probably won't get them on a limited budget, but I'll try writing them down(well, added to steam wishlist XD )

It sounds really interesting, but I'm pretty much limited to offline, RTS, and turn-based stuff (if the RTS even work XD)

then whatever games I have otherwise

More from Gameplay

3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay764 comments
7,167
votes
3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay156 comments
3,510
votes
UPVOTE FOR URF
Gameplay606 comments
2,440
votes
Yes plz.
Gameplay456 comments
1,721
votes
3 Refunds per season, up vote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay114 comments
1,716
votes
When is ANYONE at riot going to address the awful new player experience?
Gameplay634 comments
1,383
votes

More by Naalith

PSA: don't buy Little Legends when TFT releases, this pricing model is scummy even by Riot standards
Teamfight Tactics132 comments
327
votes
Riot, just make a new Collection tab for Eternals. The new champions tab looks terrible
General Discussion77 comments
234
votes
Ahh hell yeah man, I got a rare and elusive honor capsule!
General Discussion37 comments
195
votes
Mage changes are confirmed to be a result (in part, at least) of mage dominance in pro play. Really?
Gameplay138 comments
157
votes
I am so disappointed in how Riot handled Clash
General Discussion71 comments
111
votes
I have no clue how ADC mains play this role with any regularity.
Gameplay178 comments
109
votes