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Why don't we just, dunno, get rid of Runes and Masteries alltogether?

SaltyToplaneGoat·9/11/2018, 3:00:06 AM·49 votes·29,599 views

The more complex a game, the harder it is to balance. -> Therefore: every element and system that ADDS complexity is primarely problematic, as it makes balance harder. -> However, the element is tolerated due to the benefits it offers. -> As a result we can conclude: Every single element that brings more problems than use to the game should be removed immedeatly to assure overall quality and an easier job for the balance team.

This is pretty much the basis on which my call to abolish the whole Runes/Mastery/Whatever-System stands on. Not revert to how it was before, not make minor changes, but get rid of it ENTIRELY. And there's good reasons for that!

1.) Runes need to be significant in power, or they are unnoticed and therefore useless. This however results in a conflict with the actual experience the game itself is trying to deliver as a power-fantasy specific to the champion you are playing.

2.) Offensive Runes are always the prefered go-to option as damage is the way of effectively winning the game - the other runes are just utility so either you can do more damage, the enemy deals less, or someone else on your team can do more damage thanks to you. But why jump through extra hoops when you might as well just take the damage-option, as this is what the game requires as a win condition? Combined with the fact that Runes need to be noticeable to function, this leads to inevitable power creep, noticable now given just how easy people can now delete each other starting at level 3.

3.) And worst of all: the existence of a Runes-System is a balancing nightmare, as a) no champion must be broken with ANY sort of rune combination and b) to not be a joke in of itself, there must be no "optimal runes" for every champion, or the whole idea of playstyle customization, the absolute primary reason we have this system in place to begin with, falls apart completly. Because what is the point in customization if all deviations from the norm are strictly worse in every single aspect?

So that was the problematic parts of the system, but what about it's benefits? In point three I mentioned "playstyle customization", and maybe in the early days of League that might have been an issue, you know, with only 40 champions and all, but in this day and age? When we have 141+ champions? If you do not like the playstyle of one, go play another, it's not like you have at least literally two dozend choices per position. Not to mention the diversity the item system was supposed to offer to begin with. So in this day an age, calling the Runes system "necessary" for this goal is downright wrong. I might have made sense in the past, but the game, with it's roster having more that tripled in size, has simply outgrown it - and at this point I have the feeling we are jzst sticking to the idea because of "we have always done it like this, so why should it be any different?", and that's not what the guideline for design should be.

I doubt many people would miss Runes in the long run, and so many issues could be fixed: damage creep, balancing troubles, champions could be balanced more directly, and the power can be put back into items and, much more important: CHAMPION KITS. This is a game about champions. Not runes, not items, but about THOSE CHARACTERS THAT DO COOL THINGS. And it sucks with the current system because as of right now it all just boils down to "who can abuse the strongest rune currently". You are not playing with "cool champions" anymore, but with generic "rune-proxies", mere vehicles for another system with no value or identity in of itself. And given that League IS undoubtetly a game about champions, that is A BAD THING.

So how about we just trim the hedge a little and cut back on the systems that do more harm than good? I mean, the balance team sure won't have any issues with this, as it effectively makes their job at least easier by a third. Instead of having to juggle Champion Kits, Runes, and Item-systems and their relation to another, they could now just easily drop one ball and make sure the other, much more important ones, fly well.

Also Riot, if you really wanna claim the casual crowd, as some on the boards here accuse you of doing, getting rid of that system will be more efficient than every single ingame design-decision. Because all the knownledge needed to work through optimize such a system for your champ, especially from a newbie perspective? Gone. League would become a simpler game focussing on the things it is supposed to do good, and it would smoothen out the learning curve a little. And all that without stepping on the toes of the self-proclaimed "non-casuals" as they probably wouldn't miss seeing the systems go as long as their champions can still function without it.

So no matter what perspective you see this from, the abolishment of the Rune-system has only benefits:

  • For the Dev-Side, balancing becomes way easier
  • For the New-Player side, the game becomes smoother to get into
  • For the "regulars" increased game quality

Benefits for keeping this outdated concept alive? None, unless you like having systems in your game that just annoy literally everyone, players, newlings, and devs alike.

70 Comments

Carnicore9/15/2018, 7:18:26 PM33 votes

I think something closer to the Augments system would be much better. Instead of having 15+ keystone runes for every champion in the game to choose from, you could have 3 keystones that only your champion could choose from. So you wouldn't have to worry about Ezreal ruining your Kleptomancy Yorick build, Fiddlesticks would have Keystone runes to choose from that make sense for him, and assassins wouldn't just be running Electrocute in 90% of games. As we can see in Odyssey, runes designed for just one champion have an incredible variety of possibilities.

QancerClown9/16/2018, 11:32:14 AM7 votes

I would just bring back old runes and masteries that were actually working.

ModUlanopo9/15/2018, 2:35:08 PM5 votes

Two questions for you:

  • How do you address the idea that without some form of customization beyond items (which are just as susceptible to solved optimization as runes/masteries) the game itself becomes solved on a larger level?

  • What would be problematic about a simplified runes/masteries system as opposed to junking it entirely?

DeathBurst9/17/2018, 2:50:03 AM5 votes

OK, you make the case for the removal pretty well, but please refrain from blatant hyperbole like that last paragraph.

Benefits for keeping this outdated concept alive? None, unless you like having systems in your game that just annoy literally everyone, players, newlings, and devs alike.

This is simply factually wrong. I'm not gonna detail everything, but just off the top of my head, here are a few benefit from the Rune system:

  • Customize a given kit to your personal playstyle. Going Predator VS Electrocute VS Press the Attack on the same champ will totally change your game plan, for instance. It allows more people to play the same champion if they like it, with different playstyle.
  • Adapt yourself to the circumstances, especially for One-Tricks. If you can only play one champion well, the flexibility in the Rune system lets you fit into more team comps, and versus more match-up. A Diver like Vi for instance can go heavy damage to carry, or invest into Resolve to serve as a front-line for her team if she has no other Tank with her. Or Juggernauts can use Predator to have kill pressure against Ranged match-ups, or even Phase Rush against other less dominant Melee.
  • Similar to the previous point but also important, it lets you adapt the same kit to different role/position. You wanna go in lane and bully your opponent? Take Aery+Domination. You need to Jungle? Go Aftershock+Precision for faster clear speed and durability for safe ganks.

Your whole argument relies on the above points not happening in practice, because people always go for the "optimized cookie-cutter build with tons of damage", but again, that's simply not true. People at the highest levels, even in Master, use various Rune builds in various situations. Just from the streamers I personally follow, Ristiu, Singed420 and SirchEz always mix-up their Runes. And Dong Huap often do videos on "off-meta" builds that reach Master/Challenger, and why they work.

The problem is, even if you make a very good argument for one side, if you just dismiss the other side entirely, that's still not an interesting discussion, that's just you posing your (well-informed) opinion as facts, and that's not cool...

So, if you really wanna convince me to ditch out Runes: you don't need to convince me that a simpler game is better, I already agree with that. You need to convince me that all the above points I made are not worth the cost of the Rune system.

Power Cosmic9/20/2018, 8:35:17 PM3 votes

It is great that you took the time to think this through. I agree to a point but the most important thing for me personally as a gamer is depth; and I'm sure there are a lot of people like me. Now that I am thinking too, I do not like the concept of Keystones, yet I'm heavily in favor of stat manipulation. There would be favorable ways to go (a meta) with stats, but the vast majority would ideally not be game breaking, and would open the door for plenty of experimentation and personalization. In summation, basically bring together the old runes and the present system to have deeper but less potent customization options.

Gramps699/19/2018, 8:16:42 PM3 votes

@OP Bless your heart, this post really sums up a lot of feelings I've had since the season started. It doesn't really feel like I'm playing champions anymore, I'm only playing a vessel to best exploit X rune, or Y item. Champions that can't abuse these runes or items are inherently weaker (i.e. Amumu, one of my favorites from past seasons), and some runes grant True Damage, that thing that had been restricted to a summoner spell and about 6 or 7 champions throughout every season til now.

Really big fan of the idea of removing the current runes system. I wouldn't mind seeing some kind of flat-stats/scaling stats options to choose pre-game, so that an Orianna that was counter picked by Zed can grab some extra armor to survive lane phase, or an off-meta jungler can get some more armor for their early clears.

Umbral Regent9/15/2018, 9:47:00 PM3 votes

I want to focus on your third point a little here, 'cause I feel like you're pointing out a problem that has surprisingly minimal impact on the system itself; the problem being that Runes (as any system) gets generally "solved".

First thing's first, like Ulanopo mentioned, Items are just as susceptible to being solved as Runes - although I'd go a step further and say they're more solvable, even though that hypothetically isn't true. Both are open-ended systems that rely on the player's intuition of their playstyle and how their Champion operates, but, as with any game, players will get the core systems down to a science just to win better.

Runes, though, I feel are less-so solvable (and for that matter, solved) than item builds. Sure, runes are way more limited than items, and greater breadth means more options to puzzle out, but let's look at it this way:

The runes are primarily designed to be small but impactful bonuses that you can take with you into matches. Whether that be reduced damage on the first three attacks that hit you, bonus ambient vision and a damage boost from having it in enemy territory, or the ability to spend more gold than you actually have.

Between those and the keystones, which are built to be the centerpiece of your Rune builds - which, are fairly diverse, no less - there is at least some room for personalization in your rune builds.

To try and better get my point across, I wanna bring up a few Champions who can actually run a decent variety in Rune setups. Master Yi, for example, can work reliably with Press the Attack, Lethal Tempo, Conqueror, Dark Harvest, and Hail of Blades, and can probably even get some niche use out of Electrocute, Grasp of the Undying. Sure, his other runes in those trees are pretty set-in-stone (Triumph, Legend: Alacrity, Coup de Grace, for example), but that is a fair amount of options to work with in a given match.

Similarly, Shen can run Aftershock, Hail of Blades, Press the Attack, Grasp of the Undying, Guardian, or Conqueror, as well as some niche use of Predator, Kleptomancy, etc.

And, just for one last example, let's use a more recent Champion; Pyke. Albeit this is kind of cheating since Pyke is a Catcher-Assassin hybrid. He can use Guardian, Aftershock, Dark Harvest, Electrocute, Predator, with some potential niche use of Kleptomancy or Glacial Augment.

And, of course, nearly everyone can adopt a rune page using Unsealed Spellbook if they like, though that speaks more to the versatility of that keystone than anything else.

That is a fair bit more depth and choice than I'd get anywhere else.

Also, you mention the fact that the Rune system is a whole hell of a lot more stuff piled onto the list of things that newer players have to learn...And, you're right, that is. But new players are going to be spending more time learning the game as a whole, and they do have preset Rune pages to help give them less mental work to do.

They have a Press the Attack build for Marksmen and Skirmishers, an Electrocute build for Assassins, an Arcane Comet build for Mages, a Grasp of the Undying build for Juggernauts and Tanks, and an Unsealed Spellbook + survivability rune page for general use. With those five rune pages, they can set aside figuring out the Rune system until they figure out a few Champions for themselves - and, when they feel they better understand the systems they're working with, can devise a rune page to fit the Champion they play.

Granted, the wordless, "we'll let you find this on your own" nature of runes tends to make it more front-loaded info you have to consume, but the preset pages are a decent way to mitigate that immediate confusion.

That was a whole lot of rambling for all of two counterarguments, but, I hope they at least prove to be solid enough points to consider.

Hilsun9/27/2018, 7:29:48 PM3 votes

I mostly agree with the OP here. I think damage-creep is a real problem, and it has been for years, even before the remastered runes. I do like that they provide slightly different ways to play a champion, but I think the way they did it was TOO influential. I know one of their big reasons for redoing it all was because they wanted to make a runes/mastery system that felt meaningful, but I think they flew past "meaningful" and went straight to "game-defining." I think too many of their keystone runes offer too much damage without changing anything about gameplay (adding Electrocute as a keystone, for instance, changes nothing about how a Zed or Talon perform their combos over if they were to take Conqueror or Dark Harvest even).

Judah Bot11/9/2018, 6:02:41 AM2 votes

The way that Riot has been moving the Runes around in their rows... what was once presented as logical, has shown itself to be arbitrary in the end anyway. The runes aren't particularly arranged in any sequence of power or conflict. They should just say here: Pick a Keystone and any three, and done with it. I don't see any two runes currently in the same row that are broken if taken together. Actually, the runes that would stack, tend to be in different rows anyway.

Unflinching wasn't nerfed when they moved it down, and Bone Plating isn't getting nerfed by going down in position either.

Tanks with Shields now get to take Bone Plating AND get Stronger Shields.

InTheory9/15/2018, 9:04:07 PM2 votes

Jumping in to give my two cents here:

  1. I'm not sure how many players use them but the fact that there are pre-set rune pages might case a noticeable part of the casual players to not really use the rune system as a customization tool in the first place but as a mandatory self-solving part of the game which contradicts the existance of the runes reforged in the first place.

  2. The fact that Riot sold rune pages for real cash currency (RP) in the past was a curse they are now stuck with. They can't get rid of runes reforged as they'd have to get rid of rune pages for that. Truth is, they already got rid of old runes for the most part and just renamed their mastery system as runes to pass on the problem with rune pages. Thinking about removing rune pages must always come with solving the problem how to handle rune pages.

Pika Fox9/17/2018, 3:15:34 PM2 votes

Balance =/= fun. Why not just have 1 champ everyone plays?

Awf Meta9/18/2018, 12:44:11 AM2 votes

You are assuming Riot is striving for a sort of "equilibrium"?

I think Riot wants to shape a constantly evolving meta. Kind of like Magic the Gathering.

Irelia Bot9/20/2018, 12:34:46 PM2 votes

Honestly would be fine if Riot removed runes/masteries and put some of the more interesting ones on items. Then again some have something comparable on an item already be it Rightous Glory has predator or nullifying orb being comparable to hexdrinker/maw.

Kazoo Soloist9/20/2018, 5:43:08 PM2 votes

I doubt many people would miss Runes in the long run...

I for one would.

I still feel gypped by Riot switching over from the old rune system without properly compensating players, but that's a separate issue.

Point is, I think that the crowd that feels similarly to how I do is larger than you imply with this statement.

Most of the people I talk to like having a rune / mastery system, but wish that there were either more (or more meaningful) mastery choices. I don't think I've met a single other person who's said. "We should abolish runes and masteries."

Shinjusuke9/26/2018, 12:04:58 PM2 votes

Design is almost always about a balance of the cost of complexity in order to add depth.

For almost any game, you're seeking to add as much depth as possible at the cost of as little complexity as possible.

On that premise, I'm not convinced that the Runes system needs abolished completely, but I believe that all the non-keystone runes should be removed and that each player should be able to select a single, powerful, playstyle-warping keystone before the game, much like they do for Summoner Spells.

Runes have the potential to add a high degree of depth with little complexity, but that possibility isn't (and realistically, probably cannot) being realized by systems where you have one major effect and 6 minor effects. It's just a bunch of complexity and those 6 minor effects don't add a significantly noticeable amount of depth.

Summoner Spells are basically a "solved" mechanism in League. Unless one of them is extremely overpowered at the time, generally speaking you take Smite and Flash if you're Jungling and your name isn't Shaco, and otherwise you take Flash and a different spell dependent on your lane (typically Exhaust/Ignite for Supports, Barrier/Heal for ADCs, TP for Top Laners, and Mid is mostly champion-based).

Keystones could add a lot of depth, if Riot abolished all the other minor effects and put all that power and design space into several really compelling keystones targeted at specific groups of characters outright. ESPECIALLY if they successfully made it a choice that mattered every game based on matchup.

The current system is, in my opinion, far superior to old runes and masteries from a general game design standpoint, but I strongly feel that really, the best version would just be selecting one playstyle-warping keystone and that's it, and focusing on balancing those specific things such that every champion has at least 2, hopefully 3, viable options.

And it provably works. Not to get into a HotS vs League topic, but the HotS talent system allows for significant variance in playstyle for quite a number of characters because they allow talents to fundamentally change how a character plays the game. And it makes those characters more interesting, and to my knowledge most HotS players praise the talent system. If I'm playing Abathur (don't hate me, HotS players), the way I play a game is very different based on which Ultimate I take.

I'd very much like to see Keystones go down that same road, where players actually care about their keystones and their opponents keystones, and choose based on playstyle preference, much like how a lot of players care what Summoner Spells their lane opponent brings.

At the moment I really don't give a rats ass whether Yi has Hail of Blades, Press the Attack, or Lethal Tempo, because it doesn't actually change anything. If all the minor runes were removed so that the Keystones could vastly change how a champion approaches situations, I'd care whether the Master Yi has X keystone or Y keystone.

TLDR: The whole system isn't a bad idea and doesn't need removed entirely, but I strongly feel the best version would be to make single, very powerful Keystones that fundamentally change how you approach playing a character.

The Bad Touch9/27/2018, 10:56:11 PM2 votes

I would much prefer a revert to the old runes/masteries system. Or an even more complex one. I'll refer to WoW in this example. The moment that removed masteries the game started to die population wise. I play about 1/3 as much as I did before and go a week or 2 at a time without playing a single game. Where as when I owned all Runes I was ALWAYS capable of finding something fun to try in norms.

The primary reason I still play League is to try out weird builds. The new runes system has killed 80% of the reason I play.

Even Youtube content creators have mostly moved on because there is such limited ways to customize and at it's base the game gets rather dull to watch after a few hundred of the exact same champs with the exact same builds.

(Mind you I'm still salty as hell over the HUNDREDS of dollars I spent on buying champs with RP and IP boosts to unlock every rune... that I got basically nothing back for.)

Jetboost10/7/2018, 8:25:13 PM2 votes

A couple of points i want to make in defense of runes and masteries.

  1. Some people like complexity they like to puzzle with what they got.
  2. This connects with point 1. Some people like to play X champion in Y way. Runes and masteries allows them to play that way.
  3. Runes and masteries allows for more diversity in the game and thus makes it less monotone and therefore more enjoyable. 4.You say it is about the champion and its kit the problem with this however is that you would be forced to play champion X in role Y or otherwise being called out for trolling. As example i like Tresh and i wanted to get into jungling so i pick Tresh with the passive on his E it should be possible i thought but no you couldn't you are trolling they say. But having runes makes this more or less possible. (point 4 kinda connects with point 2).

So yeah balancing may take a lot of work (i am working on a game myself the spreadsheet i use on google for ballancing has allready crashed multiple times due to all the calculation i was even getting ad's for a MYSQL database i digress what i want to say is) i know balancing is a lot of work and takes a lot of time but it also gives a game more content and that is in my opinion worth the effort.

Rekkon10/7/2018, 8:34:08 AM1 votes

The only problem is that you literally start the game from 0, only counting on your base stats and starter items. This is a problem for AP champions, so there must be a workaround for that.

Also, as someone else said in a comment, having something like Augments specialized for each specific champion will indeed make a better solution.

DearPear9/17/2018, 4:02:55 AM1 votes

The more complex a game, the harder it is to balance.

That's quite wrong!

Glaricion10/13/2018, 2:53:28 PM1 votes

My only issue with augments is that it is another way for Riot to enforce their vision of how champions are to be played. Elise, Nidalee, Graves, Taliyah, Skarner, etc... have all been forced into the jungle, supports forced to be solely supports, etc... Would hate to see how many more champion-role combinations would be eliminated if augments were implemented.

edit: augment thing is from a comment I saw scrolling, not the original post

Power Cosmic10/22/2018, 6:05:20 PM1 votes

Another important thing is that most Runes used are offensive in nature (even the gold ones). So if you get behind they give you close to no value, and while ahead they are tremendously strong. If you hit someone with a comet or electrocute when behind it means nothing, while someone hits you with it from ahead it makes their lead that much more insurmountable. The runes need to be changed drastically. Someone is behind every game and to all them the runes do mostly nothing but bury them; hence the not-so-fun pace of the game.

Velasan10/23/2018, 11:58:37 PM1 votes

Hmmm I mean sure you could do other systems... but it ultimately boils down to a similar result. Either you are balancing champions around what they can take or having to alter the system by who can take what; same problem. Taking out the entire system completely is boring and doesn't reward strategic planning.

There are also other games that manage to have talent/mastery systems and not completely destroy their balance.

It's a fun idea to throw around, but probably wouldn't actually help the game as a whole.

oortoomeebreesuu10/3/2018, 2:23:55 AM1 votes

Something always bugged me about runes and masteries, they put a lot of effort into champions base stats and the damage and scaling of their abilities, only to go so far out of their way to ruin their own designs. All of these ABSURDLY niche picks like Aftershock and Kleptomancy that offer some champions absurd bonuses, then other champs like Urgot are like "Well i guess my best choice is free summoner spells" which is such a wildly random benefit, either a ghost or exhaust gets you the kill or you sit on an exhaust when you should have TP available for a roam and it throws the game, YAY!

Runes Reforged was the literal - and I've seen a lot - literal worst patch I have ever seen, in any game. They spent so long with total radio silence, not about that the problems were being fixed, but that they even knew what the problems were.