What is considered an acceptable win rate? And what are the factors you have to account for?

only zhule··1 votes·285 views

This one has been bothering me for a while. Depending on who you ask, you get a different answer. A lot of this comes down to each players style and how they think the game should play. Is a champion "balanced" if they have a 60% win rate, BUT only in games that go to 40 mins or longer? What if that champion had a 30% win rate in games that ended around the 20 min mark? Is a champion "too weak" with a 47-48% win rate, but a 30-35% play rate for their role? Is a champion "too good" if they manage an average of 54% win rate BUT only have a 1-2% play rate for their role?

Clearly their will be champions that thrive at different points in the game. But the question remains, how "good" is a champion allowed to be if they have a "bad" point in the game? How much does the meta effect those numbers? Clearly in a meta where champions are some combo of tanky and very self healing, a champion that needs to do constant chip damage to win, is going to have very bad numbers. In an engage meta Janna is considered strong. If the meta is the only thing that changed, does Janna need to be nerfed because her win rate at all points of the game is now 53-54% with something like a 20% play rate? Or is she fine, since her % was something around 49-50% before the meta shift?

Another thing to consider is how "hard" the character is to play. Can an "easy" champion be allowed to average a high win rate? How high or low can a champions win/loss % go based on difficulty of playing the character? Is a champion who averages a 38% win rate with players just picking them up, too weak even if that champion averages a 52.5% win rate with players what have played them in dozens of games? How do you "balance" a champion with a 56% win rate in pro play but only a 44% win rate in Solo Q? What about the opposite, a champion that dominates in Solo Q where few people understand how they work, but is considered garbage tier in pro play since everyone knows their weaknesses and how to exploit them.

I personally think that some characters, like say Sona , are in a bad spot because they have points in the game where they are so weak that they are an actual burden on their team... BUT also have points where they are monsters to fight against, thus ending with an average win rate around 51-53% which most people would argue is good - maybe a bit strong.

6 Comments

FullmuteAll play1 votes

Imho in ranked there is only 1 acceptable winrate >=50% Obviously you don't want to fall.

only zhule1 votes

{quoted}

Imho in ranked there is only 1 acceptable winrate >=50% Obviously you don't want to fall.

Going to assume you missed the point. I meant acceptable win rate for a champion. Do you base it off over all win rate or win rate at certain points in the game

FullmuteAll play1 votes

if you are talking about it from the balance point of view, I don't have enough knowledge to discuss it.

Kivolan1 votes

I base "acceptable" on two rates:

  1. Overall
  2. Games Played

An acceptable overall really depends on the play rate of the champion. If the champion has a high play rate, an acceptable win rate is anywhere between 48-50%. Medium play rates are acceptable between 50--52%. Low play rates are around 52-54%.

Games played (or mains of the champion, as another way of looking at it) should be at around a 55-56% win rate at 100+ games on the champion. Much more than that and the champion is overpowered.

only zhule1 votes

{quoted}

I base "acceptable" on two rates:

  1. Overall
  2. Games Played

An acceptable overall really depends on the play rate of the champion. If the champions has a high play rate, an acceptable win rate is anywhere between 48-50%. Medium play rates are acceptable between 50--52%. Low play rates are around 52-54%.

Games played (or mains of the champion, as another way of looking at it) should be at around a 55-56% win rate. Much more than that and the champions is overpowered.

How do you feel about outliers? Like a champion that falls into that range overall but falls well outside it at certain game lengths

Kivolan1 votes

[{quoted}](name=only zhule,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=gWM8k27h,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2018-03-06T02:06:54.937+0000)

How do you feel about outliers? Like a champion that falls into that range overall but falls well outside it at certain game lengths

Like Warwick?

They're acceptable within reason, but with the game being so heavily skewed to early game right now, champions like Warwick need some power trimmed from their early game. His kit is, for the most part, fine, but his numbers need some tweaking.

My main issue is with his current W's mechanics. It needs to scale off of the opponent's missing health and not just be a flat amount at 50% and 20% health. As it stands right now, Warwick has such a terrifying early game because falling under 50% health forces you to back.

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