Question for the design and balance teams: Who are the most/least successfully designed champions?
I'm not asking you to call out a fellow RIOTer, of course, for poor execution, because, after all, it's a team job, and something that looked good at first might have turned out unexpectedly.
I would like to say that I was looking at a "whole package" view as well. And, while my view isn't that of a RIOTer, I'd like to provide examples of what I am talking about.
I think a really WELL designed champion is Morgana. Her theme is excellent; she looks like a corrupted champion, and she plays like one with a spell-casting kit filled with disables and damage over time. Not only is her design cohesive with her kit, but her kit is cohesive with itself and is a paragon for counter-play in league. Her Q is a long-range, blockable, single-target skill-shot, but the reward for landing it is nice damage and a long-duration root. Her W is a nice AoE DoT, but it isn't "free" damage unless you can land a Q first. Her E excellently counters certain enemy abilities if used well, but it can also be countered itself by waiting it out, switching targets or simply bursting through it, and her ultimate has a very heavy potential payoff but it can be walked out of and has many synergies and antisynergies that make it a rich ability that adds a lot to team fights.
In contrast, Irelia is a really poorly executed champion who LOOKS like a telekenetic, ranged blade wielder but ends up being a rather build-agnostic generic beefy brawler with built in sustain, true damage and a large duration targeted stun. In addition to her kit not really being cohesive with her image, it offers very little counter-play which has made her a perennial competitive pick despite very little "special" gameplay contribution.
Of course there's a slew of champions in-between like Tahm Kench who completely lacks counterplay when fighting a fragile melee champion, but whose design is overall cohesive. Or Evelynn who's actually relatively balanced, but, inexplicably tends to build as a beefy brawler despite her design seeming to indicate that she's a fragile assassin.
Anyway, I framed this question to RIOTers, but anyone can feel free to add their 2 cents.
Are probably some of the best designed champions in the game. They have solid kits that are quite effective and they are never really bad picks despite changes to the meta. They have required very few changes since release aside from Ahri.
Just gonna leave this here