Even tho we complain a lot about league you guys gotta admit

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Bullshit it's not like that.

Skins get wins baby.

You aren't an elite if you don't waste your money on superficial extravagances.

Dat Dragon Trainer Tristana is unfair as heck

Pulsefire =/= wins

Can't wait for Gravelord Azir. Just gonna be the biggest, blackest cock the mid lane has ever seen :D

"You shall not harm me"

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That's true, but then there's the Dragon tristana death animation. qq

And the Commando Lux skin where you can barely see her Q and ult, nevermind the completely misleading hitboxes :o

Even if it happened, they would never word it like that. Unfortunately, I've seen games ruined by pay-to-win.

It would start off slow with something like a raffle with prizes that include IP-only items, like runes. Everyone would receive some free raffle tickets just for playing, but extra tickets would be for sale for RP. After this, they would add a permanent feature, like Mystery Gifts, with IP-only rewards and unique (but minor) in-game advantages.

Before you know it, we would then have "Premium" champions that can only be purchased with RP or "early access" to new champions for RP. Riot may even begin to sell "get-out-of-jail-free cards" to remove punishments against banned/muted players (I've seen exactly this happen in another MMO). As the playerbase would begin to abandon the game due to pay-to-win lash back, Riot would begin to panic and add more and more pay-to-win micro-transactions to extract more income from the shrinking playerbase. Likely, players would also begin to have their emails flooded with League promotions and the game would become filled with constant advertisements for pay-to-win features, further driving away players.

Eventually, the dust would settle and the game would continue to quietly decay. The remaining smaller playerbase would be those that were most tolerant of pay-to-win and even those who favored pay-to-win, but it would become virtually impossible to attract new players. Riot would realize their mistake, but would be unable to reverse it for economical reasons at that point.

The game would only remain financially viable by continuing to gouge their few remaining high-paying players. Over time, even the few remaining players would wake up and smell the decay, and would begin to spend less and less as the game became less competitive. Many would realize how much they had invested in hollow pay-to-win and would become disgusted. The most talented Riot staff may also begin to jump ship in horror at the sinking game.

Riot might try to save themselves by gradually abandoning League and attempting to produce new games. Unfortunately for Riot, their reputation would be so bad at this point, that they would find it extremely difficult to attract players even if the new game(s) did not have pay-to-win features. They might keep their games going a long time on life support, try to auction them off to some bigger gaming company, or simply pull the plug at this point. In any case, the glory days of Riot would be gone and League of Legends would be prematurely dead or dying.

I've seen that exact scenario above play out in a different game, so I truly hope that Riot never starts going down that road. Never forget the previous game to hold the title of "most popular free-to-play game". It's a harsh lesson and doesn't need to be repeated. I actually came to League of Legends originally to escape growing pay-to-win in the previous game that I played.

For a measly $20 per month you'll get an added 15% true damage to EVERY CHAMPION YOU OWN.

They kinda did add something like that but nothing resembling that. Certain skins make your champs 10% smaller. Gotta read them patch notes baby.

Free users now only have access to 1 ability, 3 inventory space, non-legendary items and 15 mastery points. Runes are now a pay feature only.

Hearthstone is, to a point, ish.