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@Riot Champion Mastery is No Accurate Indication of Actual Skill

Woodakoodashooda··4 votes·384 views

I've recently read that champions with below average win rates who also have a large number of players who've "mastered" them are champions Riot looks to buff.

This is in reference to the reasoning behind Yasuo's buffs, which I could not care less about.

What worries me is the inherent reasoning behind them.

Mastery 7 is nothing more than a player showcasing their dedication to any single champion.

It provides them with an emote and a loading screen icon. That is the beginning and end of champion masteries.

All it takes to rise above mastery 5 is to have a few good games in any game mode against other players and with other players and then spend the IP...(oops, my bad)...BE necessary to unlock the masteries.

And you don't even have to play the champion well! Take any single champion into top lane, AFK farm, drop wards on anything whenever you can (maybe even buy SS just to guarantee your vision score sky rockets), and avoid dying more than 2-3 times.

I did this as an experiment with Keld (except the SS part). I built ADC crit Kled just to wipe out all minion waves I could and managed master 7 within the first week of having purchased the champion!

Mastery 7 is a joke, a novelty, a shiny sticker.

It is not, nor should it be, a reason to balance champions on a global scale!

11 Comments

LostFr0st2 votes

I've recently read that champions with below average win rates who also have a large number of players who've "mastered" them are champions Riot looks to buff.

This was in reference to champion mains of high-elo (D2--> Masters+), not with regards to champ mastery score.

Buffing for mastery score would be silly [slayer-pantheon-popcorn]

GigglesO1 votes

There could just be too many of that champions main's in high elo... Have you ever considered that some of them only got there because a champion was op, and they were just really good with that champion?

LostFr0st1 votes

Sometimes those champs haven't been in the "op" bucket in months, yet their mains remained in high elo. It was only after the Rune changes that the champions became harder to win with even with their extreme skill mastery of the champ and knowing all the champs lane matchups.

Due to the above, I find it hard to argue against buffing them.

GigglesO1 votes

{quoted}

Sometimes those champs haven't been in the "op" bucket in months, yet their mains remained in high elo. It was only after the Rune changes that the champions became harder to win with even with their extreme skill mastery of the champ and knowing all the champs lane matchups.

Due to the above, I find it hard to argue against buffing them.

Don't quote me on this, but I believe riot also said their goal wasn't to immediately get everyone to 50% winrate. I also find there to be no reason to rush these buffs out.

LostFr0st1 votes

Maple Nectar gave a pretty good argument for the Yasuo buffs at least. Apparently they have been holding these buffs for quite some time already.

There are more comments than the ones below but these are the most straightforward ones regarding the buffs.

[{quoted}](name=Maple Nectar,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=n3yYGLHe,comment-id=0006,timestamp=2017-12-08T23:00:08.254+0000)

Yasuo lost a fair bit of his power as we headed into the pre-season, and then got brought down further with Press The Attack nerfs last patch. Leaving him at 44-45% winrate feels quite awful for a champion that has one of the most dedicated playerbases, Not to mention the fact that he's a champion who drops off steeply in effectiveness the farther you climb. giving him even just some power back doesn't feel inappropriate. Referencing all of the things we nerfed on him in the past is somewhat misleading, since you're talking about a time before runes reforged, and he was sporting a winrate over 50% of his games. https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/n3yYGLHe-20-q-damage-200-range-ulti-buffed-mr?comment=0006

[{quoted}](name=Maple Nectar,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=n3yYGLHe,comment-id=000600000001,timestamp=2017-12-08T23:27:45.011+0000)

The statement of "only a few people play him" is actually quite incorrect. He's one of the more popular champions, who also happens to dedicate the most time to mastering him. We did a really cool (in my opinion) blog on appeal vs stickiness (breadth vs depth) of champions which might be of interest to you! You can check it out here! The charts halfway down would likely be of interest in particular!

He's a champion that stands the test of time in regards to popularity even when he's weak. Meaning that the number of people playing Yasuo before/after preseason is probably actually roughly equal, only the version they're playing after is far weaker. This translates to more games with a Yasuo in them likely translating to a stomp for the team with a Yasuo on them, because even when they've mastered the champion over hundreds of games, they're "reward" is still losing over half their games, which bucks the trend of what you would expect from a mastery curve. https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/n3yYGLHe-20-q-damage-200-range-ulti-buffed-mr?comment=000600000001

Specifically about holding the buffs:

[{quoted}](name=Maple Nectar,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=n3yYGLHe,comment-id=000600000001000000010000,timestamp=2017-12-09T01:18:31.493+0000)

I'm going to go ahead and just shut this right the heck down. I made the call for us not to ship a changelist that looked VERY similar to this before Worlds when we were doing our World's patches. At that point Yasuo was already winning >50% of his games, and while the changes were targeted more at making him viable in pro play, it was also undeniably a buff to him and did not feel responsible given he was already doing well on Live. Would it have been better if we saw Yasuo in more games at Worlds for "our bottom line", probably, but we explicitly made the call NOT to take the risk for the live game, and even if we'd shipped it, the reason would have been having a high skill expression champion at our largest event at the year, not to "generate sales". https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/n3yYGLHe-20-q-damage-200-range-ulti-buffed-mr?comment=000600000001000000010000

GigglesO1 votes

The fact that they considered buffing him for the worlds patches makes me sick.

"I made the call for us not to ship a changelist that looked VERY similar to this before Worlds when we were doing our World's patches"

Things like this are why Riot's player base is so paranoid about changes.

" He's one of the more popular champions"

Things like this also make me wonder why we are trying to force a 50% winrate or higher on popular champions. I'm not actually really sure I understand why any champion with such a high playrate should have a high winrate.

It makes me feel like I should just start playing the most popular champ just to improve my own winrate. Why not play him?

I mean if almost everyone can get a 54-55% winrate (not refering to yasuo) why shouldn't I hop on the popularity train too?

LostFr0st1 votes

{quoted}

The fact that they considered buffing him for the worlds patches makes me sick.

"I made the call for us not to ship a changelist that looked VERY similar to this before Worlds when we were doing our World's patches"

Things like this are why Riot's player base is so paranoid about changes.

I think it counts that they didn't ship it. Makes me less paranoid, idk about others.

" He's one of the more popular champions"

Things like this also make me wonder why we are trying to force a 50% winrate or higher on popular champions. I'm not actually really sure I understand why any champion with such a high playrate should have a high winrate.

Yasuo has a large but dedicated. That's different than just a high playrate. He's basically in the dumpster like Azir was, but he's additionally still not viable in pro play.

It makes me feel like I should just start playing the most popular champ just to improve my own winrate. Why not play him? I I mean if almost everyone can get a 54-55% winrate (not refering to yasuo) why shouldn't I hop on the popularity train too?

That's a personal choice, but I think enough games on a champ while learning their matchups and kit nuances should mean I'd win more games and gain back at least what I might have lost while learning them. :/

GigglesO1 votes

{quoted}

Yasuo has a large but dedicated. That's different than just a high playrate.

I'm not really sure how to discuss this one. Because there is playrate/player and playrate/total lol players.

Yasuo has a high "breadth and depth" Meaning that he is likely to be played by both dedicated players and "just trying him out" players alike. Flat out "He's one of the more popular champions" (not even my words, its a quote from riot above). So his high playrate in this case likely isn't just One Trick Ponies.

If his playerbase was all OTP's and he was #7 playrate I would expect a good 60% winrate. However with a large Breadth and Depth I don't think that its just his OTP's are getting him up to #7 in playrate.

He is number 7 in games played for the last 7 days, #7 for the "today rank" http://na.op.gg/statistics/champion/

That's a personal choice, but I think enough games on a champ while learning their matchups and kit nuances should mean I'd win more games and gain back at least what I might have lost while learning them. :/

Yea, but if you look at pop up champions histories some champions don't even appear to need to know matchups to succeed. I would argue that the 54%+ champions with popularity in the top 10 (missfortune) are pickup-able within 5 games.

LostFr0st1 votes

{quoted}

I'm not really sure how to discuss this one. Because there is playrate/player and playrate/total lol players.

Yasuo has a high "breadth and depth" Meaning that he is likely to be played by both dedicated players and "just trying him out" players alike. Flat out "He's one of the more popular champions" (not even my words, its a quote from riot above). So his high playrate in this case likely isn't just One Trick Ponies.

I agree. It can't possibly be just OTPs. I don't think people trying him out can account for the rest of that number though, he's an addictive champ to play; even if they get rolled they'll still wanna play another game.

At least I would expect him to pop off late game as he used to (maybe not quite that strong^^"), but right now he just stays at a negative WR throughout the whole game.

If his playerbase was all OTP's and he was #7 playrate I would expect a good 60% winrate. However with a large Breadth and Depth I don't think that its just his OTP's are getting him up to #7 in playrate.

He is number 7 in games played for the last 7 days, #7 for the "today rank" http://na.op.gg/statistics/champion/

Yea, but if you look at pop up champions histories some champions don't even appear to need to know matchups to succeed. I would argue that the 54%+ champions with popularity in the top 10 (missfortune) are pickup-able within 5 games.

I both agree and disagree here. Many of the FotM champs are quite "pick up and go," but after the many tweaks to Yasuo over the seasons they seemed to have finally found a sweet spot (before runes) where people would complain but dismiss it at the same time.

Then runes happened.

Besides the cheesy Klepto build before it was nerfed, none of the current runes really fit what he wants (or can abuse like masteries historically). Maybe the new Grasp in 8.1 (if live) will change all that and he'll be busted though; I do worry a bit about that.

OniZetsu6661 votes

Okay maybe this doesn't apply to me but I just started less than a month ago and I feel like I can earn mastery scores really easy. I picked up Sona because her kit seemed really interesting and I bought her as my first champ and just about every game with her I do really well and my mastery has gone up pretty high. Same with other champs like Fiddlesticks,Orinna ,Tristana and Volibear. I am only level 16 and I have a level 19 mastery rating. I feel like it should be a bit harder to get these mastery ratings.

Malix Farwin1 votes

Maybe the Mastery Level but i have a hard time believing someone with a 300k+ point mastery on a champion at least does not have some kind of understanding of how it works. Mastery is mostly familiarity.

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