Hey all,
Statikk here. I'm a designer on the live gameplay & balance team, but in the past I've also handled reworks for 
, 
and
. These days I'm focused mostly on the changes we make to the live game, so whether you’re wondering how champs are picked for modifications or you want to talk about recent changes we've made (or haven't made), feel free to ask here.
Edit: The Q&A is now over. Thanks for the questions everyone!
-Statikk
"Oldschool" mages such as 
or even the newest 
are pretty much nonexistent in middle lane, especially in competitve play. This has been the issue for years. Is there anything you guys are willing to do about that?
EDIT: It's not about what the current meta favours. Ziggs, Lux and Xerath, for example, are just as skillshot based as the ones on my list, but have absurdly high range and utility (stun/snare/Satchel Charge, AoE slow) that works okay, and therefore can surface again from time to time. Xerath is already frequent in EU LCS, and NA will quickly catch on.
Brand, Malzahar and Cassiopeia are season 1 mages. Let me list the midlaners released after Brand: 
. Every single one of them but Viktor (who joined the "bad mages" club) either shits on combo mages like Brand and Cassiopeia in lane (just look at their mobility), roams better, picks people off better or outranges the "old squad".
It's not like S1 mages have a low winrate - their raw damage is quite high - but at competitive levels of play, they are outclassed by everyone else. The point is that when a champion is so reliant on hitting their skillshots and has no mobility, all the initiative is given to the enemy who then can make the "flashy plays". In coordinated teams it's even easier to break the channeled ultimates (Malazhar, Vel'Koz) or spread out in a way to deny AoE ultimates (Brand, Galio). And it takes only one good play (Zhonya, Flash, Fizz trollpole, Windwall, Braum's Unbreakable, the list goes on) to break the whole Pyroclasm chain.
Suggestion: All the popular mages build the holy trinity of midlane items: 
, while the "oldschool" mages, especially Cassiopeia, Malzahar and Brand, make a great use of Liandrylai 
combo. The problem is that Liandrylai provides zero mana regen and way too much health (800 HP, 130 AP). Maybe reworking those two items could be the way to broaden up the midlane champion pool? Rylai could have a tier 2 component with its passive, a 1800 g blasting wand + sapphire crystal item. Or even blasting wand + chalice. Crystal Maiden (Rylai from Dota) has mana regeneration in her kit as well as slows ;)
Oldschool mages are getting screwed over by the mobility creep. New champions have the tools to outplay the old ones, but old champions don't have the tools to outplay the new ones. I wonder if there is any way to give the oldschool mages their own niche?
Could you address Kha'zix and Hecarim's current state?
With Kha'zix
, you guys literally contradicted your mission statement after you gut him(which in itself is a contradiction of your desire for balance to begin with)
By loading 99% of his damage onto his EVOLVED Q...and ONLY when it's against opponents dumb enough to isolate themselves you...
a) Made it 100% mandatory to evolve his Q...not because it's any good, no, but because he does no damage other wise.
b) There is ZERO decision making in how to evolve him. His Q is mandatory by necessity, his E is mandatory by being the sole worthwhile evolution, W and R do not offer anything significant at all.
c) In his initial rework in which he dealt % damage regardless of isolation, you made it very clear that people avoided evolving his Q because it was far too situational, because it was completely useless unless the opponent is isolated.
And now? You completely ignore all the threads pointing out all of the problems with Kha'zix. Your attempt to bring him back to any bit of fun at all was to give insignificant love-taps. Your attempt to make W less worthless was a whole bunch of pointless "buffs" that has no impact.
As for Hecarim
, this is simple. His late game is pretty strong. His early to mid game is REALLY weak. Why does his mana costs have to be so ridiculously oppressive? Why must Blue Buff be so essential for a champion so easily counter-jungled?
Why does his W and E have over 20 seconds of cooldown? Especially when his W serves such a vital function to his existence? He NEEDS his W to stay alive in a fight against champions. But at the same time, he needs his W to stay health while jungling.
You nerfed every part of his kit because you felt he was too strong. You nerfed him without hesitation. Yet with Lee Sin
, you treat him like a precious baby and you're trying so frustratingly hard to retain his strengths, you're trying so UNFAIRLY hard to keep Lee Sin FUN to play for Lee Sin players.
For Kha'zix , mind if I throw in my suggestion? I've seen your balance team's track record, and I have come to the conclusion that** AD Assassins are a lost cause.** AD Assassins have always been the worse in terms of balance. So, for Kha'zix, why not make him a jack-of-all-trades champion that can literally switch role depending on combination of evolutions? This will give Kha'zix two things.
A unique niche that literally no other champion has, where he is an adaptive champion that switches as the game goes on depending on what his team needs. A tanky bruiser, a squishy assassin, a backline caster, etc.
It would thematically fit him, this you can not disagree with as evolving to adapt is his entire schtick, but as you can CLEARLY see, was a theme he has been struggling to fit as his evolutions have always been badly balanced.
For Hecarim give his E a QoL buff by showing an indicator to tell players how much distance it'd let him cover ala Nocturne/TF's ultimate.
Or...how does this sound? Take his Q's CDR mechanic, and extend it to his W and E too?
PS - I know this sounds a little too impassioned, but when I look at Kha'zix's horrible treatment and Riot's silence over such extended period of time, and then I look at how Lucian
was changed into a ranged AD Kassadin after his own supposed nerf, and then compare how hesitant you all are at nerfing Lee Sin...well, it's very hard to not see some serious favouritism in your balance team.
I am confused about recent inconsistent balance decisions regarding marksmen.
Ezreal 
was nerfed (V1.0.0.150 V1.0.0.152 V1.0.0.154 V3.01) because he was the most mobile marksman. The balance team made a big point to say that it didn't seem right that a high mobility carry with good poke could do decent damage or provide utility so you guys hit his attack speed, movement speed, ult damage, w damage, w width, passive duration, and completely removed the slow of his w.
When the balance team tried to solidify Ezreal as a mobility chracter they nerfed his movement speed to the lowest possible (325) and made sure not to touch his incredibly low health at what is the fifth lowest in the game and the lowest of any marksman (350+80) and also relatively low attack (47.2+3), yet when Riot made Lucian an even higher mobility character with a ridiculously low cooldown dash that removes slows (that also is the fastest speed of any dash) you guys BUFFED Lucian's movement speed (335), health (420+80), and damage (49+3). Both are considered caster carries yet Lucian has higher mobility (14-10 seconds, 425 range, no start of time, remove slows, -2 seconds per hit vs. 19-11 seconds, 475 range, .25 second start-up time, -1 per mystic shot hit) attack speed, attack speed per level, health, attack, wave clear, stronger trading, and a greater reward in his passive for hitting skills while Ezreal has an extra 50 range and better poke.
Ezreal has sat at a 46-47.5% win rate since his nerfs. Would it be safe balance wise to give him compensation buffs like Lucian got, but buffs that would fit Ezreal's kit? His kit is fine, the only issue is that his power level was made too low. Ezreal's low health and unreliable wave clear are understandable tradeoffs since he is meant to be tricky and quick, but right now compared to Lucian he does not feel that way. It would make sense to revert the movement speed nerf (Meddler recently stated that it is safe to increase movement speed on marksmen with dashes/blinks) and implement a change to his ultimate since Ezreal is all about his range and mobility. A few years ago there was an incredibly popular suggestion that Ezreal's ult fall-off should be reduced by his AP, but a Rioter named Morello said it would be too confusing for players. A while later, Riot did big support changes and did that very thing to Nami's 
Ebb and Flow. Clearly it would not be too confusing to implement so would it be possible to put that in? I know that change is more suited for AP Ezreal but I don't understand why it hasn't been put in.
Why does Lee Sin continue to dodge nerfs or changes?
Statikk,
I have a question about Garen. He's both underwhelming (completely a non-factor in both S3 and S4 competitive play) and there's not that great of a difference between his skill cap and skill floor compared to other toplaners like Riven or Shyvana. No skillshots, no resource management, relatively simple combination management . . . there's just not a lot of mechanical difficulty to Garen. There are some nuances with timing his skills and using his skill rotation properly, and of course there's learning how to use his ultimate, but there's not a lot that differentiates a fantastic Garen player from a mediocre one.
Now, I've used Garen on multiple occasions as the trainer champion to teach my friends how to play League. He's manly, forgiving, straightforward, and he drops a giant sword on his enemies. How badass is that? Pretty awesome.
Are there plans to rework Garen? If so, is preserving his low skill floor a part of that while also giving him more of a skill ceiling? Thanks!
Hello Statikk,
it's been a year since we last spoke through a public channel. I hope you still remember me. To refresh your memory (if necessary):
I only play 
since her release on 11th May 2010, > 5000 games. Akali is the reason I play League of Legends. My level of play is around low Diamond I (0 - 40 LP).
In the past, we've discussed Akali balance in the following threads:
We have come to the following conclusions: Akali has little individual counterplay. Instead, her counterplay revolves around team coordination: Grouping, focus firing, peeling for allies. This situation creates a disparity between high and low ELO. Hence, when Akali is balanced for competitive play, she becomes unhealthy for the lower levels since her counterplay depends on teammates not screwing up. After all, Akali punishes mistakes severely.
To resolve this problem, Akali's skill ceiling should be increased, which in turn would allow for more individual counterplay and balance the disparity.
However, in our discussions it also became apparent that finding a great solution, one which preserved the identity of Akali, respected player attachment and allowed for significant gameplay improvements, was very difficult. Indeed, only a senior designer would be able to execute such a demanding project up to our high expectations.
Furthermore, we can not view Akali in isolation. Riot has a responsibility to all 119 champions in League of Legends. Akali is definitely in no state like Sion, Poppy or similar champions requiring a full rework. Akali is the 36th most popular champion. Her popularity and win rate have been stable for a long time. Also, her ban rate is quite low (ca. 1%). Thus, she requires no immediate action and every change needs to weighed in terms of benefits and disruption created.
Given these priorities, a change to Akali should be small in scope, at least in terms of necessary resources, or coincident with a larger project.
Since our initial discussion the game has changed quite extensively. Oracle's Elixir was removed and replaced by Oracle's Lens. Vision wards became visible and permanent. Supports gained a lot of impact and at least 12 champions have received a gameplay update, among them Master Yi and Kassadin. On the horizon are reworks for Sion and Fiora. Beyond, Diana has also been identified as a champion in need of work, but no actions taken so far.
I bring up these changes specifically because they either defined the season as a whole, modified a champion in a similar position to Akali or impacted Akali directly.
Master Yi, Fiora and Akali belong to a class of squishy melee champions, which have been difficult to integrate into the game in a healthy fashion for all levels of play. From your experiences with the Master Yi rework and the upcoming Fiora gameplay update, can you share any new insights regarding the intended position of these champions in League of Legends or any new ways of skill expression and individual counterplay in the squishy melee design space? For example, RiotSeb posted on Champion Updates that you plan on making Fiora more mechanically intense, giving her more depth.
when is the poppy rework she looks like a butt
What's your view on Quinn?
I mean this both in terms of balance and her role in the game.
With almost all summoners using 
as one of their two Summoner Spells, what stops Riot from taking it and turning it into a base ability available to everyone? It frees up a spot for another ability of that player's choice. And if having access to three Spells is overpowered, then what keeps Riot from fixing it into D or F and giving access only to one other Spell?
Jumping from there, is player choice a factor that fits in Riot's vision of how League changes over time?
A lot of questions and inquiries here.
and even 
seem to be looked over in favor of more versatile supports such as 
, even 
.
I partially blame lack of power and utility(Or at best, limited utility), as well as a bad or un-tweaked kit. But I also think they are just tarnished. And I don't think stat tweaks are what will fix them. When you compare someone like Alistar to someone like Thresh, It becomes apparent that Thresh is just better in most situations. Both are tanky, both have cc, but Thresh also has lockdown-cc, a shield(that out-scales Alistars heal in short fights and bursts, which seem to be the current meta) very strong area denial, and one of the most powerful mobility-utility spells in the game. When comparing someone like Zilean to someone like Lulu, it's almost always a no-brainer. Lulu has better poke and a slow combined in one, a haste, an extremely powerful cc, a shield/steroid and a very powerful "heal" and disengage tool. Overall, we see about 4 Thresh's per Soraka and even more per Zilean. in particular has become near Sion-levels of old and almost useless(This doesn't mean he IS useless, this means that Taric will most of the time have a huge disadvantage in both helping and defending(which, for a gem paladin, he does very little of...)). Taric's main problem is that he's meant to be like one of those aura champions like what Sona was, but the current iteration of the game is too far ahead for something like that and even if it worked properly, it would merely come out as seeming op or unfair. I think he needs a rework. A complete rework. If he were reworked into a true gem aura paladin, is a passive that actually incentives aura items by making them gain extra aura stats and range if he buys them viable***?*** Do you think that a mere stat-tweak is not enough***?***
Is bad. There are only two Zilean's, ones that make it anti-fun for the enemy team and ones that make it anti-fun for your team. Both can be found on either team. The only real reason anyone ever takes Zilean is because of his ultimate. Basically the ultimate means Don't hit me if you don't have the advantage to follow up for 7 seconds because then I'm just going to get a short period of invulnerability and then get a lot of HP back but if you do have the advantage, then I'm pretty much dead anyway. This is not a disengage unless your team can follow up or you are deep under a turret. And if it is left unused or the target survives without popping it, it feels like a massive waste. The bombs are also very broken. Simply being near a Zilean has the potential threat of getting bombed by something that cannot be countered in any way other than standing away. Its like a constantly active but less powerful Urgot E-Q combo. In my opinions he should be up there with Sion in terms of how badly he needs a rework. People often emphasize that he should have the time-mage aesthetic. How much of this is in your hands to change and alter***?*** In general what are your thoughts on Zileans current condition***?*** And has anyone considered making his ultimate literally an ability that rewinds the game back a few seconds, erasing all actions made(This would not be the "soraka heal" problem, as merely information is exchanged between the teams)?
seems to me like a decent champion that simply has rare situations where he is truly needed. I have taken him against people like Lee Sin, Morgana, Xin Zhao and Zed to simply keep them away from the ADC. But one thing that always seemed weird to me was the Headbut-knockup combo. Why does the combo(which is technically a glitch?) exist and why is it allowed to exist***?*** On a side note, his heal seems very mana costly and weak unless you build some form of ap. Do you think the heal has a thematic basis to even exist in his kit***?***
Than
According to the website lolking.net, the least played champions are
What can be done to make these champions more viable and more equally played?
I have a bundle:
Would you consider Galio a high, low or unknown for priority of a gameplay rework?
How's the 'Renekton Bar' going? Specifically, who's being looked at first for in regards to fighter balance and how have the recent surge of top-lane marksman and mages affected your approach?
Are there going to be any more tank jungle changes in the future? I would love to see Rammus and Shen Jungle get some love :)
What champions do you feel are current sleepers and are on the rise? (i.e. Tristana)
Obligatory: "any hints at the new champ?!?"
Is there any update on the 
rework; is it still happening? If so, about how high is he on the list of champs needing to be reworked?
Hello Statikk, Big time fan of yours here as I absolutely loved the Sivir and Kassadin "Reworks". The way you preserve a kit's identity while simultaneously breathing in new life is astounding!
Anyways...
My question for you since you're on the live balance team now is this:
In your personal opinion, what are the top 5 champions in dire need of a rework?
How do you feel about the potential over-abundance of CDR on support itemization? It seems to me that with 10-20% CDR on 
/
/
and an easy additional 10% CDR from going 9/0/21, supports can generally only manage one or two more support-oriented items, pushing out other neat things like 
, 
, and 
because they're already near-capped.
Is there any chance we could get 
on SR? I really like the passive/active and we haven't had a real mana+MR item since 
got reworked in S3.
Main Question: Do you still believe that the nerfs that were made to Akali in 3.5 patch are still solid changes? After 1 year since those changes a reflection could be nice to see if you would have done anything differently.
Context: In S3 Akali got a minor QoL change to her passive requirement that made it so she didn't have specific runepage and masteries just to operate with, that caused a FoTM for Akali and she was supposedly deemed OP and she was soon quickly nerfed harshly even though she was not recognized at all in competitive play.
Last year you response-ed in 2 mega threads on Akali's balance and the direction you guys want to take on her, regarding on her counterplay and skill ceiling but one year later nothing has happened at all to this champion.
Akali currently still lacks counterplay especially when shes ahead, shes also not that difficult to use either, have you guys abandoned the idea of a **mini **rework on Akali? Recently you guys have posted a new design philosophy for S4 and after reading through it Akali violates every single one of those points especially when it comes to counterplay.
Akali is not fun to play as when behind = famine Akali is not fun to play against when ahead = feast
I always felt like those nerfs made in 3.5 could have been easily avoided if Riot design team didn't remove some of Akali's levers, for example making E detonate Q was bad for counterplay in lane ,removing that trigger would have been better than just nerfing her numbers because currently Akali still does not have counterplay in terms of her E detonating her Q from range. At the time in Season 2 ,2012 it felt like a random QoL buff to Akali that she didn't really need.
Another one is her passive requirement removal, I could quote you if I want but I saw you state that Akali had access to "free spellvamp", that was only true because Riot balance team removed the passive requirement in order to unlock it, so therefore was it a solid change to remove it? Akali has had it for 3 years and alot of Akali players (myself included) was attached to it, not only did it felt fun to unlock it in a weird way but it also had better gfx animation than currently it has now (Glowing hands) and a unique awesome sound trigger upon start of the game. I really miss the passive requirements to her passive...any chance to add it back in?, it felt like a unique design for Akali and she has had it since 2010 May.
I'd like to ask a question about . Cass has been my most played champion since I've started playing this game. She carried me to mid Diamond 1 so far and I'm still climbing. I definitely don't think she needs buffs as she is extremely strong in the right circumstances.
My concern is that you guys will entirely rework her someday to make her more viable as you have done with other less popular champions.
As somebody who literally plays almost exclusively , I think the following QoL buff would be pretty decent without making her OP:
1.) The CD of Twin Fang is not .5 seconds unless you are point-blank melee range. In reality, it's .5 seconds + the travel time of the Twin Fangs. Thus the closer you are as Cass, the more damage you do, even though her entire kit encourages kiting the enemy and keeping yourself out of their grasp.
2.) If your poison from Q or W kills a target while Twin Fang is mid-air, you won't get the CD reset, which means you will wind up being useless (in a teamfight) for a few seconds.
Do you guys think this is a fair change? If not (or even if you do), what else are you guys thinking of doing for to make her less risky to pick up?
When are we gonna see some BIG NEWS (new champ, new VU/REALAUNCH, new event)?
was released almost 4 months ago.
Thank you :D
How much time does the balance team spend playing the game?
What is your view on champions that have repeatedly seen high competitive play? What are you looking for when you measure the 'strength' of a champion? Lee Sin is the flavor of the month for discussion, but there are many other picks that are seemingly in every game. A major one that seems to get little attention is Thresh. Since his release, he's seen about an 80% pick/ban rate across all competitive play. Does the balance team even view that as a problem? If so, why does it take them seemingly so long to act on those issues?
I have loved playing and watching League since season 1, yet I can't help but notice that I'm getting less interested in both. Seeing the same 5-6 champions be in a "pick or ban" state for so long is just making it less interesting for me. I think I'll keep playing the game for a long time to come, but I'd just like it to feel more exciting and less predictable as far as team comps go.
Hello and good day, Static. My question is one that I've asked many times before, to multiple reds and multitudes of forum goers, yet it has ne'er gotten a response from anyone who can comment on the subject.
Mayhaps you'll be different.
The quandary is on spellvamp, a stat that's very dear to me as my favorite champion by far is one . It is a stat that is currently in a horrible situation, being present on few items, most of which are exceptionally weak or useless on most champions.
This, as far as I can tell, is due to the fact that when spellvamp is on any powerful items, or items that can be used by champions other than , it becomes exceptionally overpowered on the few champions that can use it well.
If this were the case with ability damage, you would be able to nerf a champion's AP ratios to solve the problem quite handily.
As there are no such ratios for spellvamp, you have in the past resorted to heavily nerfing spellvamp items, and the champions who use them(Namely 
), which doesn't seem to address the problem and only causes spellvamp as a whole to be pushed out of validity in its entirety.
So, my question is, would it be possible to add spellvamp ratios to abilities?
So that if ever or become too dominant because of an otherwise balanced spellvamp item, you can nerf their strength with spellvamp instead of nerfing something completely unrelated to the problem and making them weak without the specific item or nerfing the item itself and making it useless on every champion other than those who're problematic?
Because AP champions and AD casters are sorely lacking in terms of sources of sustain that works for them, and I feel that spellvamp could very easily be modified to fix that in a balanced way.
Hello Statikk!
To what extent has the live balance team looked towards overall game speed and momentum?
Playing League and watching the LCS/OGN, there seems to be a slowdown of a lot of games this season, and not just for lack of knowledge of how to close games out. It feels like there's a handful of issues sticking out right now:
There's been a "waveclear creep" that's snuck into the game, where newer champions (or reworked older ones, ala Xerath) have fantastic, long-range abilities that can quickly or instantly clear large minion waves with little danger to themselves. This removes a lot of the protection against skillshots that minions afford during pushes without forcing the opponent into a dangerous position in trying to get rid of the waves.
There are few sources of hard initiation in the game as a consequence of tanks generally not doing well in most of the current lane matchups. Most initiation in the professional scene (and even in normal games like the ones I play) comes from long-range pick abilities like Elise's Cocoon, or displacements like Gragas' Exploding Keg. There's a real dearth of tough, tanky folks in the game who can get into the enemy team and cause havoc without exploding instantly, leading to constant standoffs.
The ubiquitous nature of warding and the lack of strong ward clearing ala old Oracles can lead to lags in gameplay. Having too much knowledge of the enemy team's movements (along with heavier waveclear) can make it difficult to push in any non-monster objectives due to how easy it is to (accidentally) telegraph your movements to the enemy in advance.
Do you think that the speed/length of gameplay is alright as it is? If not, what sort of changes have you been looking at?
First, What are you guys willing to do about the mobility meta?
I mean, a lot of champs don't see much play just because they arn't mobile: Sion, Morde, Galio, Ashe, Vlad, Veigar, Taric and ect... A lot of them even have fairly strong kits if played properly, they just can't seem to keep up with champs that can either outmaneuver them, or even just out move speed them.
Second, Can you guys do more with the items like Atmas?
It could fill a lot of really cool ad-tank champ niches that just don't have proper itemization right now.
Ashe has quite a bit of problem. Her stats are low but she got low damage potential. She's forced to max Volleyshot but due to her bad auto attack motions and weak slow of 'frost arrow' in early game, it's difficult kite enemies. Her passive is useless that i can actually count how many times i've used full focus stacked attack to enemy champion in a game. Her hawkshot is in same stance as her passive: its bonus gold is too small when consider Draven's passive and duration for sighiting when used is short that it doesn't help you getting away from ganks(and long cooldown really makes Ashe vulnerable from gank)
If she's got low damage potential, than why did Riot make her very vulnerable that its difficult to mend the loss that she got from ganks?
I mean Kog, Lucian and Ms. Fortune, they can still kick ass when ganked but Ashe cannot because she got neither strong damage nor an escape skill. Shouldn't she at least given an escape if early level frost arrow and hawkshot is useless? She's not that strong in lane phase as well, so she deserves some mobility instead of high damage, or more CC so that it can cover up her lack of mobility at least.
Another question, Why is it so hard to have ap bruiser champions in league, the closest is ryze, swain, and vladimir which are all ranged. Would it be extremely hard to create and balance melee ap bruisers/ fighters? Like diana except more bruiser less assassin.
I have a question.
Why don't you guys ever just throw some of the weaker champs a bone?
like give 
5 more ad every 2 week until his win rate goes from 45 to closer to 50? i understand some champions need to be reworked and not just tweaked. but champs that are noticeably weak you could give them almost small insignificant buffs and strong champs small nurfs, instead of breaking out the nurf bazoka, which lets face it 
are pretty sore from.
I am just curious to how it cant be more incremental.
Thank you Sir
