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Dear Riot: 5 Inspiration Runes to Replace Hextech Flashtraption

Zero Shingetsu··2 votes·448 views

Who named this thing anyway?

In any case, building a rune around an optional summoner spell? The hell were you guys thinking? This is a rune slot taken up by something I'll never be able to use because I don't use Flash. Here are five better concepts you could have put into this slot:

Planar Warp: Every 40 seconds, the next ability that hits you has its effects negated and its damage halved.

Karmic Mirror: When you take more than 30(-Champion Level)% of your maximum health as damage over a 2 second period, deal half that damage back to your attacker and gain Mirror Coat for 3 seconds. This effect has a 30 second cooldown. Mirror Coat: 10% of basic attack damage and 5% of ability damage you sustain is turned back on the attacker.

Prismatic Shield: Your shields and heals apply additional adaptive shielding worth 40(+10 per level) (+0.2 bonus AP) against the last damage type sustained by the target. This effect has a 15 second cooldown.

Second Skin: When you take damage from an enemy ability, a clone sheds off of you and runs in a random direction, persisting for 1.5 seconds. This ability has a 30 second cooldown.

Overburn: Up to five times per game, you can come back immediately after dying. Every time you do so, you gain a stacking penalty of -2% max health.

8 Comments

Final Spark Lux1 votes

Hey, fun fact. You aren't the only one who plays league, and thus aren't the only person who uses runes. Just because you don't take flash doesn't mean other people don't, and likewise, just because some of them don't use hexflash doesn't mean other people don't either. I'm all for new ideas, but there's no reason to replace a rune over adding an additional one just because you don't like it.

Zero Shingetsu1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Final Spark Lux,realm=NA,application-id=A8FQeEA8,discussion-id=kwndYy0Y,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2017-12-01T07:44:30.477+0000)

Hey, fun fact. You aren't the only one who plays league, and thus aren't the only person who uses runes. Just because you don't take flash doesn't mean other people don't, and likewise, just because some of them don't use hexflash doesn't mean other people don't either. I'm all for new ideas, but there's no reason to replace a rune over adding an additional one just because you don't like it.

It's not about not liking it. To be honest, I like the rune on a conceptual level. It's about the objective theory of developing a game mechanic around a theoretically optional choice. This would be like the NFL saying you get a single point if you can hit your receiver's visor with a pass of at least 30 yards. Riot made a conscious choice to make Flash an optional spell. I don't care if 3,999,999 players out of four million run Flash in every game. From a game design standpoint, you don't implement something at the macro level that relies on an optional tool.

Final Spark Lux1 votes

Kind of a really obscure comparison right there. The difference is taking this rune sacrifices your ability to use another rune, so there really shouldn't be any problem with riot adding as many runes as they want. They don't need to replace it. The fact that we have 9 secondary runes in each tree is completely arbitrary. There's quite a few runes that rely on other things to use, that a lot of champions either don't take / don't have.

Zero Shingetsu1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Final Spark Lux,realm=NA,application-id=A8FQeEA8,discussion-id=kwndYy0Y,comment-id=000000000000,timestamp=2017-12-01T07:57:41.690+0000)

Kind of a really obscure comparison right there. The difference is taking this rune sacrifices your ability to use another rune, so there really shouldn't be any problem with riot adding as many runes as they want. They don't need to replace it. The fact that we have 9 secondary runes in each tree is completely arbitrary. There's quite a few runes that rely on other things to use, that a lot of champions either don't take / don't have.

The comparison is perfectly valid. You're creating a game mechanic (the rune's effect/the points scored) around an optional piece of kit (the Flash/the visor) that a player may or may not choose to take. Let me be clear again: If Flash were literally mandatory, a part of the game's core framework that wasn't optional and every player had in every game, I really like the concept behind Hexflash. But that's not the case right now.

As for the rest of your argument, I disagree. There's a difference between synergy and forced choice. I like playing Rammus, so I take runes that synergize with Rammus. But Hexflash doesn't just synergize with Flash. It requires it. If there was a rune that said "While playing Rammus..." in its description, that would be absurd. Arbitrary or no, 9 secondaries is the number Riot went with. There is a limit, whether it's three or nine or twenty (and it's more like three when you realize each group of three are mutually exclusive choices). It feels like a waste for one of these limited slots to be taken up by a rune that requires the player to make a specific, unrelated gameplay choice.

Final Spark Lux1 votes

Maybe you missed the part where they said they'd be adding more regardless of what we have now. There is no limit. Riot can do what they want with their game.

Zero Shingetsu1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Final Spark Lux,realm=NA,application-id=A8FQeEA8,discussion-id=kwndYy0Y,comment-id=00000000000000000000,timestamp=2017-12-01T10:23:42.879+0000)

Maybe you missed the part where they said they'd be adding more regardless of what we have now. There is no limit. Riot can do what they want with their game.

I didn't miss it, but they picked this number for a reason. They're not just gonna tack on a random new option. They've decided, as a design decision, nine secondaries split into three groups of three, with each group being an exclusive choice. This was deliberate.

Chembaron Yamada1 votes

If you chose not to take flash, don't take this rune. It is simple like that. By your logic, we would have to remove Predator as well, since boots are optional.

Same for Perfect Timing and Magical Footwear. They give you optional items, which maybe don't give you much use since you don't plan to build the stopwatch into something for example.

You just pick the runes fitting your playstyle. If your playstyle doesn't use flash, don't take the one rune associated with it, it's not that hard.

Zero Shingetsu1 votes

{quoted}

If you chose not to take flash, don't take this rune. It is simple like that. By your logic, we would have to remove Predator as well, since boots are optional.

Same for Perfect Timing and Magical Footwear. They give you optional items, which maybe don't give you much use since you don't plan to build the stopwatch into something for example.

You just pick the runes fitting your playstyle. If your playstyle doesn't use flash, don't take the one rune associated with it, it's not that hard.

Fair enough, only it's a bit different. Perfect Timing and Magical Footwear actually grant you something during play. The choice is self-contained within the rune. "You want slightly faster boots that you don't have to buy? Take this rune. You want a mini-Hourglass, or plan to build it into something later? Take this rune." Hexflash relies upon a choice already being made. When there are plenty of other interesting ideas out there, as I've just displayed, it seems like poor form to waste limited rune space with a rune that's intrinsically linked to a spell you have to take before the game even starts. Even worse is that it makes the ability to swap summoners more pointless as well, as if you've taken Hexflash, you can really only swap the one spell without wasting a rune.

You see the difference? My complaint isn't that it's tied to something, but that it's tied to something you have to bring with you for the rune to have any effect whatsoever. It doesn't matter what I bring into a game with Perfect Timing and Magical Footwear. I'll get those extra items, and then I can use them, sell them, whatever. The choice of the rune is the choice to get those items; that's the option in that scenario. In the case of Hexflash, there is no option unless you've already made another option. It limits choice by expecting a second choice to be made alongside it.

And yes, now that you mention it, Predator should ideally be replaced or reworked as well. Sure, almost everyone buys boots, but sometimes you don't, and to have that as a keystone no less seems like poor design. I mean just look what they do with Cassiopeia. They literally make the choice for you if you happen to bring Predator into a game with her.

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