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I wonder... does this game really need runes anymore?

SaltyToplaneGoat··12 votes·2,276 views

Because more than anything they appear like an IP trap for new players - sure they changed that a little bit, so it's not as atrocious as when I started league back then, but still...

League is a rather old game. Not really speaking in years, but speaking in how much it did change since its release. The rune system specifically seems more like an relict of olden times, something that doesn't really fit into the modern LoL. I personally can't even remember when I bothered looking at my rune pages last time. Sure, some are outdated and I never use them anymore... heck, I even still have a season 2 support page with Gold Gain Quints. Not even using that anymore, just standard armor and AP on my mage supports. Ah that old times where supports were the underpaid ward-packing mule and blame target for the entire team...

The thought behind the system is a rather simple, and by far not a bad one: "customize your playstyle with a wide varaity of runes!"

The sad reality is: "Use the established best standart or lose, unless you play something really, really specific that makes use of weird stuff like spellvamp runes, aka Vladimir - just picking AP Quints might be more wise tho".

It adds no real diversity to the game and feels more like a restriction to new players - not to mention the effects of the runes are completly to be ignored most of the game, apart from that really short time early on where they CAN EVENTUALLY give you an edge - but probably not, as your oppnent also uses the most standart optimized runes for his champ.

You might as well remove runes, buff up champions stats accordingly and increase the complexity of the mastery system instead to keep a certain level of customization.

Mastery points don't cost IP - and people are busy enough getting their champs together anyways (Unless they want to keep playing lame 450s forever).

There are two ways you could go about this: more mastery points per level, or rise the level cap. Level 30 is waaaaaay to early to start ranked anyways in my opinion. Someone who plays ranked for the first time gets a 1200 MMR, which equals silver 4 if I remember correctly - then they get smacked down hard into bronze. Not a pleasant experience, but only logical as a person that has never played a ranked is in most cases not on silver level.

A few more practice games for leveling wouldn't be bad, especially as you are playing with the reward in sight and can use your IP on champions you like, and don't have to grind games just so you are on the same level as everyone else with early stats.

Also, people who have already bought runes should get their IP back then. Just giving them nothing would be kind of unfair, but I can see possibilities with the new crafting system to recycle your (by then useless) runes into shards and other stuff...

Tl, dr: Should we get rid of this antique relict?

36 Comments

The Bearded Bard3 votes

The problem is, what am I going to do with the literal 400,000+ IP I've spent on runes and rune pages that they'll refund me?

DREADN0UGHT1 votes

Rioy isn't all too keen on refundibg things.

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

They'll have to in that case tho, or otherwise people would be really, really pissed. As it is not RP-Content I can see them being chill on that one tho.

The Bearded Bard1 votes

Sure they are. They gave me 6 total refunds, and on top of that, whenever they get rid of anything 'permanent' that people buy that they end up making non permanent. Dodge runes, legendary skins, etc.

DREADN0UGHT1 votes

They took legendary skins out?

The Bearded Bard2 votes

They put legendary skins on sale, which was unheard of at the time. There was this huge debacle of people being promised that a legendary skin would never go down in price, so everyone that bought it for the 1820 price got refunded the difference of what it was when it was put on sale. So if you bought Firefight Tristana for 1820 back in the day, you got 910 RP back when they put that skin on sale for 910. Cha feel?

DREADN0UGHT1 votes

That explains everything!

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

I think it would be the smartest to use the upcoming crafting system for that. Use X Runes for a free chests/keys/whatever they can come up with.

Zarkkast1 votes

They are already planning on a new IP sink with the new Hextech Crafting system.

But yeah, we old players need more IP sinks.

Faie3 votes

I consistently use around 5 different pages for all my adc's. The page I use depends on who I am playing, and who the enemy is playing. Without runes, I would have no way of taking extra sustain in lane through lifesteal quints, or that extra magic resist if they have a lux support. Or if they have no magic damage bot, then I will take a full page of attack speed, netting me a whopping 19% attack speed at level 1. Without runes all these things would be impossible.

43161549_DEL2 votes

Yo, so i am gonna be completely honest here. Runes are a HUGE thing for people, for their playstyles. I have a smurf that is now lvl 30 with REALLY shit scaling t1's and t2's from when the rune combiner was a thing and scaling runes were good....ANYWAYS. i took off all my runes on that account and just started playing naked (other then masts) and LET ME TELL YOU, that was a huge difference in being able to play my way, or how i felt my champion should be played. They are extremely underestimated in what they can do for people. If you dont believe me play 25 games with no runes. You will immediately notice a difference.

UB3R 1337 H4X1 votes

Respawn timer rune Karthus though.

43161549_DEL1 votes

{quoted}

Respawn timer rune Karthus though.

go and look for the account "brexNation" then look at its runes. you will then understand....

DunkinNoobs2 votes

If you don't understand just how big of a difference different rune setups can make on the same champion, then you just haven't gotten far enough for that to matter yet.

TeemoXNidalee1 votes

They should make them like masteries: all free/unlocked and can be changed while in champ select.

TheThundersRoar1 votes

To be honest there isn't much customization involved.

Two runepages cover every single champion in the game, unless you wanna main and specialize, or are at a very high Elo.

I've seen people hit Plat with just the two AD and AP rune pages. I hit Gold with just the two.

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

Well, the basic idea was customization. The fact that you say there's barely any involved just shows how bad this system actually is...

TheThundersRoar1 votes

Exactly :P

DREADN0UGHT1 votes

Although I agree that runes are somewhat outdated, i feel like there could still be a place for them in the game.

The way I see it is Runes affect your raw stats directly while masteries (the new ones) have active effects that shape your playstyle.

A good example is having low skill at last hitting and wanting to play ap mids usually means using either AD reds to help, or mana regen blues to offer more ability usage in lane.

Then again, you arr probably right.

SaltyToplaneGoat2 votes

We might as well have extra masteries for raw stats then - oh wait, we already have. You level them to get your keystone masteries. No matter how I think about it, there is nothng runes really do what a well crafted and expanded mastery system couldn't do better.

DREADN0UGHT1 votes

You make a good point. I'm thinking they could either combine masteries and runes into a single system of seperate the two of them with obvious differences. Runes: Raw stats, and masteries: style adaptive

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

Or just have two different mastery sheets then - one for the active gimmics, one for the raw stats. But I'm sure one can combine that into one mega-sheet to keep things easier to use.

Ravvynfall1 votes

hi there, new-ish player here. everything you've stated in this whole thing, pretty much fits everything that my substantially more experienced friends have said as well. everyone pretty much tells me that the rune system is "janky" and doesn't really do anything to substantially help the game, and just functions as an IP sinkhole.

as for personal experience, as far as i can tell, regardless of the rune configurations i use, my matches end up a matter of skill rather than "having the best rune setup". we either beat the other team by being better, or we get our asses handed to use because the other team was better, not because of runes.

would be cool if there were better options to actually help out, but i can't personally offer any suggestions better than yours since i lack proper experience and knowledge of the game generally speaking to be any help.

i definitely would like to see something new and useful in the future though :)

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

That's the problem with runes: they don't really matter - but without them your early game is pretty much hell against an opponent with runes.

So the only way runes can impact a game is negatively, as all positive effect go by completly unnoticed. Why is something like that even in the game, I wonder...

But good to see that a newbie (not meant negatively) agrees with that. After all my newbie-time is some years in the past now...

UB3R 1337 H4X1 votes

To be honest the only time they are mandatory is for Junglers as there are A LOT of junglers that need them for clear no.1.

Jhin UItd JFK1 votes

inb4 rito reworks the rune system and comes out with unique keystone runes and one of them is thunderlords on a rune :^)

SaltyToplaneGoat1 votes

Pshhhh! Don't give them any weird ideas! <_<'

Zarkkast1 votes

I agree runes should be removed. They're more of a noob trap than anything else, specially when 90% of them are not even viable (not even considering below tier 3 runes).

Riot needs to rework this into something different and add a different and more functioning IP sink into the game.

Z Statistic1 votes

"Viable" is a funny word. Energy regen runes not useful in pretty much any given scenario on any given champion because they are just not that effective.

Flat MR quints can be very useful on certain champions whose name isn't Galio depending on the matchup. There are certain runes that are just mandatory for various roles like flat armor seals on junglers, botlane, and top. But a lot of runes depend on the champion you're playing, the champion(s) you're facing, and how you and your enemy play.

RogueWill1 votes

I like runes, once you get to understand them you get a slight edge over standars runes with your personalize ones. I agree they might need some sort of rework thou since most of them are unviable under most circunstances

UB3R 1337 H4X1 votes

Well to be fair, at least they dropped this shit.

Quepha1 votes

Runes should be deleted and/or rolled into the mastery system with the ability to spend IP on them completely removed. I wouldn't even be mad if they decided not to give refunds for them although I understand why other people would be mad if they didn't.

They aren't fun, they don't add strategy, they are especially confusing and unpleasant for new players and a huge reason why it's difficult to get new players into the game.

They suck.

ayNigerianPrince1 votes

i like runes

GhastlyGhoulMan1 votes

Eh it depends. I really like to play a safe lane so that my scaling cdr runes alone get my Veigar to 30% cdr... That way I can build PURE DAMAGE and still be casting an ult every 45 seconds. Also, sometimes I'll go pure armor runes (like, all of them) when I'm against an all AD team, just to make their laning experience as miserable against me as possible.

So yeah, I think there's still good uses for runes, just need to break out of people's comfort zones to make better use of the diversity that's there right now.

LithiumWednesday1 votes

Well you have to get that +40% crit damage on Yasuo somehow, right?

resumed1 votes

@title no.

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