Riot, you can have your LCS balance OR you can have good overall game balance

Direwolfiez·3/2/2015, 7:52:32 PM·6 votes·1,068 views

You can't have both. Well, you can try, but you'll alienate your customers that don't play flashy LCS champs.

I'm really getting sick of hearing statements like, "We wants all champs to be viable, both in normal and pro games," and "We know Lee Sin is a problem," and "We're looking into ways to make him less imposing," only to see things like the Sona rework and the Morde and Veigar changes, and only hear promises about adding meaningful weaknesses to Lee's kit without ever seeing any real followup. Anyone remember the patch notes where Pwyff perfectly outlined why Zed is a problem right now? We've heard next to nothing about what's being done about his other problematic qualities, like his easy waveclear and his lack of real gating on his abilities. I'm not upset that some champs are stronger than others, I'm upset that Rioters say they're working on something and then proceed to give us either scarce updates, or none at all, or claim that a champ is getting buffed, only to find out that it's actually a nerf in disguise.

7 Comments

BluePolarizer3/2/2015, 8:54:43 PM2 votes

Riot doesn't seem to balance for LCS though. If Riot did, there would be far greater champ diversity in the LCS.

DOTA balances for pro play alone and I believe there were only 2 heroes that were unpicked in TI4.

If Riot balanced for LCS, you would likely see at least 60% of champs played in at least 1 LCS game.

LANWhale3/2/2015, 8:02:13 PM1 votes

Its a good question with a very hard answer.

Who do balance for?

The casuals or The pros

If they are able to pull of this equilibrium. No doubt they should be able to keep it. But its a matter of getting there first that is the real challenge. Over all good question but i don't think they have a decide response for you until much later in the future.

AHeroNamedHawke3/2/2015, 9:02:52 PM1 votes

Lee and Zed aren't even top tier anymore, J4/Vi and Kat/LB are better than them respectively

Pro play/high elo is the best place to balance around, because champion power becomes more important as less and less mechanical mistakes are made

Zazusha3/2/2015, 9:05:10 PM1 votes

if this game was 100% balanced, where every champ had balanced damage/stats/healing/etc, LCS would still be the same 16 champs, with a few niche picks.

The reason is, some champs just have better utility, and bring more to a team then most and fit in more compositions.