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Mastery Tree -mechanics- suggestions, no full-on reworks inside.

JackYAqua··4 votes·940 views

Elloooo~ I'm Jinsey Loh-han!
Sorry, I lied ...

Jack here. This time I'd like to suggest some mechanics for the season 5 Mastery Trees.
Mechanics only, meaning I want to suggest how you could make the Mastery Tree system itself more interesting. I do not want to offer some full-on rework suggestion (though I might do that someday as well, too...).
Just read the suggestions^^, you'll get what I mean. Thanks :)

Suggestion 1 - Coin Masteries

These are masteries that have two effects, like two sides to a coin. You can only have one effect or the other.
They'd probably have a 1 rank maximum to make things simple. Once you put the point into it, you click on the mastery again to get the other effect.
Here's a picture:

http://i.imgur.com/fGxjPoP.png

I only used Vampirism as an example because it's hybrid.
If you clicked on it again the '+2% Spellvamp' would become white and the '+2% Lifesteal' grey.
It's a good way to save space, and it opens up some interesting paths in how Riot could design the next Mastery Tree :)
Out of all of my suggestions (more to follow) I actually like this one best. It's simple and cool :D

Suggestion 2 - Ranked Masteries

Currently almost all of League's Masteries follow a simple principle when ranking up. It's mostly 33/66/100% - like with Meditation, +1/2/3 MP5 - or 40/70/100% - like with Hardiness, +2/3.5/5 Armor.
A more complicated version of this would be 'Ranked Masteries' (stupid name, I know).
It works something like this (exaggerated):

Vitality
Rank X/3
Rank 1: +12 Health
Rank 2: +8 Health & 1 HP5
Rank 3: +10 Health & 1 MP5

Every rank grants you different bonuses, following no specific pattern. Depending on what effects you want you put more or less points into the mastery. A mana-less champion would only put two points into Vitatiliy, while one with Mana might put three into it, if they want .2 more mana per second.
It gives putting more points into a mastery with multiple ranks a greater reason than simply wanting a higher bonus.

No picture this time :(

Suggestion 3 - Timed Masteries

These redefine 'early game'.
They would offer really strong bonuses, but only for a given time.
Here's an example:

Adrenaline
Rank X/3
Grants 6 Health Regen per 5 seconds and 5 Movement Speed when in battle. You lose this effect after the 6/9/12 minute mark.

They're weird. They can make you into a complete lane-bully, at the price that you'll lose the bonus after a while. But that's still too risky, and so I suggest that this concept would only put into the Defense or Utility Tree, because they're intended to serve different purposes than making the strong stronger. Imagine you got counter-picked, hard, in ranked. You just know that Teemo is gonna ruin your laning phase and so you get this mastery to get over the laning phase.
Here's another example:

Scavengar (somewhere in the defensive tree) Rank 1/1
+3 gold each time a nearby enemy lane minion dies without you granting the killing blow.
This effect ends at the 12:20 minute mark.

This can help if you're against a lane bully, but it's also useful for supports, since they won't be near minions that much in the late game anyways.
(Sorry, this is a semi-rework. I just want to make the concept and its best uses clear.)

Suggestion 4 - Quests

This is fairly simple. Everyone knows them, League has a few of them. They're kind of the basis for a lot of video games.
I made a horribly-written thread about them a while back, here, if you want to take a look at it.
I'm not going to make any examples, I think Riot would know how to add quests.

That's all.
I hope you'll consider using these 'mechanics' for the Season 5's Mastery Trees. Thank you for reading,
Jack :)

6 Comments

Serpents Embrace2 votes

I don't see the purpose between having one mastery split up in to two mutually exclusive benefits. Most champions wouldn't care, but in the case of your example, someone comes along wanting to run hybrid and they don't even get the option.

The idea of losing benefits as you rank something up to a certain point would just feel bad for players who want both of those benefits.

Masteries and runes already play a larger part in the early game before players are able to purchase items. Giving them an exact fall off timer doesn't really help in any way, and would really just make champions who rely on them to have an exact time where they became useless - instead of the vague and extendable "early game" period.

More quests would be great, but Riot seems pretty reluctant to add them in retroactively. Or they're bidding their time. I remember reading that someone was interested in VUing Morgana and Kayle together - they would probably have some sort of quests if those are actually released in tandem. Which would be cool.

Pushover1 votes

As for 1, I think it could work, but at the same time, it's basically what the left and right sides of the offense tree are. I don't know if just splitting the two up is better, the way we have +armor and +mr masteries in defense, or +AD and +AP masteries in offense.

For 2, the higher ranks have to be better than the previous ranks. Plus, is it that big of a change to do something like: 1: +12 HP 2: +12 HP and 1 HP5 3: +12 HP and 1 HP5 and 1 MP5

Even if you made rank 3 only give HP and MP5, it would feel a little strange. Also, it's hard to name something like this and keep having it with flavor. Veteran? Been in wars, so you are a little tougher, so the champion has more HP. Scavenger? You find gold on the dead guys around you. Another problem is it will either make well crafted masteries more or less important. Either this is constructed in a way that I could randomly throw points into my masteries and get something reasonable, or the opposite, if I don't construct my masteries very well, I do much worse, and the correct way would not be as obvious due to the increased complexity of the masteries. Masteries right now are fairly straightforward. Need AD? Go down the AD side of the offensive tree. Need defensive stuff? The middle of the defense tree is a little confusing for many people, but the first 9 or 13 points are fairly obvious, as is the 21st. The utility tree is probably the most confusing, but you can still take 9 points fairly easily, and 16 or 17 if you are a support.

As for 3, it could work, but runes/masteries are mostly taken for the earlygame. Some exceptions are the later points in the tree, some like Executioner are good all game. But armor, flat HP, etc are just much better in the earlygame. Adrenaline, for example, would become a must-have on most toplaners, not just a bullying thing. If you are a bully, you won't pass up the even GREATER ability to bully, and if you are being bullied, you won't pass up the ability to get bullied even less. Scavenger's best use is fairly clear as is, you spend the most amount of time in lane during the early game, and being in the middle of the utility tree means that mostly supports will be considering taking it.

With 4, we somewhat have them already in items. Seekers Armguard? Kill a bunch of things. Feral Flare? Kill 30 large monsters. Tear of the Goddess? Cast a lot of spells.

JackYAqua1 votes

Thanks for the feedback, I honestly hadn't thought about some of the stuff. However (this just bugs me a little) 1 HP5 = 36 Gold ; 4 HP = 11 Gold ; 2 HP = 5 Gold ; 1 MP5 = 60 Gold.
The mastery would actually get better the higher its rank :D And also, the whole point of making different ranks offer different strengths is to make the players choice seem more impactful.
-> You don't want rank 3's MP5 because you don't have mana problems, but rank 2's Health is lower than rank 3's and you want that extra Health. Do you spend the point or not?
You see what I mean? In reality it doesn't seem like that much of a deal, but whether or not you know it, you do think about this while picking your masteries.
I mean, having 2 more or less HP5 doesn't seem like a big deal either right? Masteries aren't that strong to begin with.
And I did give it a cool name! Vitality! :D

Then, you said masteries are pretty straightforward, but I must disagree having seen some pro-player and Korean mastery trees. The things they skill and the way they justify it ... wow.

Lastly, that's why I think Timed Masteries should only be above 12 points in the Defense or Utility Tree. So they don't become must-haves.

Thanks again! :)

Pushover1 votes

With slightly changing the amount of health a mastery provides, to me, it means nothing. Between rank 1 and rank 2 is effectively the difference between +12 health and +12 health and 1 HP5, 4 health barely makes a difference (20 seconds to match it with 1 HP5). I would not put the 3rd point in with regards to the higher health, it would only be because of mana. 2 HP is 10 seconds at 1 HP5. Also, with masteries, you are already choosing one mastery over another, I think masteries need to be more complicated by choosing how many points to place in a mastery over another.

You could make a more meaningful choice by accentuating the differences, for example rank 1 of a mastery is +1 HP5, rank 2 is +2 MP5, and rank 3 is +3 energy/5. The small amount of health provided shouldn't deter someone from taking the other effects, and so rather than making it a little more confusing by changing the health numbers around, emphasize the differences.

There are a few mastery tree points that provide a big boost or good value, and some of them are not too obvious. Reinforced Armor, for example, is a quite powerful mastery, especially against a champion like Yasuo and an ADC. It can be a ~5% damage reduction against their basic attacks if they have 30% crit, and as it goes higher, it gets more value, but lots of people don't take it. Perseverance took a little while before people realized how strong it was. Early individual points in a mastery tree do not make for much, but if you have ever taken the wrong mastery page to a lane, you can feel how much weaker you are.

Part of making masteries not change what they provide is you don't want players making the incorrect choice because they look too heavily into the downside. In this case, someone might consider not taking the mastery because it gives less health. No math involved.

I don't know what rank you are on your main account, but I know some people in lower ranks who have some very questionable logic when it comes to masteries. One is Silver 5, his ADC mastery page is 25/5/0, with the 5 points in defense including Bladed Armor, and he opts for 5% CDR over 6% armor/magic penetration. No doubt he would justify it by saying that he does golems/wight as ADC, and that he would be penetrating only like 10 armor against a tank. There are a number of 'obvious' choices that are not so obvious to other people. I would say that masteries should have meaningful choices, but there should not be so many choices as to become overwhelming.

Can you provide and example of some of the Korean mastery trees? I play a few weird ones, 4/13/13 Nasus is good, I have a friend who plays 5/4/21 with Ryze (and is one of the best NA Ryze players for solo queue, although I would play 4/5/21 with that page...)

JackYAqua1 votes

Using the pre-season calculator I've seen this on Marksmen and AD-Assassins.
(Just adjust the points to the current Mastery Tree).
It's a bit weird, but I've tried it on some champions and it works for a lot of them.

(Thanks again for the explanation. It's nice to see things from another (but not opposite) point of view :D)

Pushover1 votes

I can see the justification for AD assassins mid, as they would want to roam, and +1.5% movespeed helps there. Potion masteries help if you don't get lifesteal (each potion gives 35 more HP and 10 mana). I could also see it justified on ADCs who do not want to build a vamp scepter early, yet still need the health regen.

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