League of Legends

[CookingOkasan]

Yeah I'd say 'burden of knowledge' is what makes niche picks so good in league. If you're playing like Urgot top against someone who's literally never seen urgot then they're not going to know how to handle you. I'd say it's unfair, or stupid but champion and lane matchup knowledge just comes with experience I guess.

 

[KarlaKGB]

But Riot can't get away with that, because of their business model. They can't tell someone who just got their ass kicked by Urgot that "it's your fault you don't know how to counter a champ you have no access to", because that's basically saying "you're losing because you don't know what Urgot can do because you're not paying us enough, so go buy him or wait 5 weeks for him to rotate in. but you can't play him now and it's not our fault, go deal with it."

 

[Riiiiptide]

There is a death recap by the way.

 

[Alienfish]

Well you can always look at videos about urgot or read the tips so they don't really get away with you dont know that either : p

 

[KarlaKGB]

It's still no substitute for playing the champion yourself. A lot of dealing with a champion is not simply knowing what their spells are, but also being able to put yourself in their shoes and think what would you do in that situation.

 

[Riiiiptide]

Of course. If you want to master the finer nuances of the game, then you should be playing every single champion. When I was mastering middle lane, I made it a point to play all the meta mid laners and be familiar with their combos, cooldowns, damage at each level etc. so that I can react faster on the spot and know when I will out trade and when I need to back off. However, to play the game at an acceptable (silver/gold/platinum) level, that is completely unnecessary.

 

[Alienfish]

Well, true but unless you really want Yorick most are on rotation and to an extent watching it gives you a good picture of it. And true, the other team is pretty much different every time you play so yes you should learn how to counter but then again I doubt all players have every champion anyways.

 

[KarlaKGB]

Which brings me back to the point that Riot have constrained their champion design options because they need to make players feel competitively viable without needing to own every champion.

 

[CookingOkasan]

^ I don't understand your argument on that ^

You don't need to own every champ. Owning every champ doesn't make you any more or less competitively viable. Riot making every champ free from the start wouldn't make you any more or less competitively viable. I just don't get what you're on to with this, honestly. You don't have to know what a champ does in order to lane against them. You just need to be able to alter your playstyle to compensate.

 

[Riiiiptide]

Which brings me back to the point that Riot have constrained their champion design options because they need to make players feel competitively viable without needing to own every champion.

Do you seriously believe that they have actually "constrained their champion design" when you consider the plethora of champions, meta possibilities, strategies, playstyles etc. seen on both the professional and solo queue levels across all leagues though?

I believe your original point was a post by Morello which you then used to attack champion design. There's really no point defending what Morello says. I agree he's kind of an idiot in terms of public statements and is frequently seen to contradict himself (I hate healing, buff Soraka). I believe that the game does a great job of catering to both casual and professional players. Especially when you consider that both play on the same platform and so Riot has to balance things around both types of audiences. Not exactly a small feat.

 

[Alienfish]

^ I don't understand your argument on that ^

You don't need to own every champ. Owning every champ doesn't make you any more or less competitively viable. Riot making every champ free from the start wouldn't make you any more or less competitively viable. I just don't get what you're on to with this, honestly. You don't have to know what a champ does in order to lane against them. You just need to be able to alter your playstyle to compensate.

This, which makes Dota 2 even more "elite" because you have everyone, and therefore, sure you can pick one and adapt to it but it doesn't make you a better player just because you adapt to few with or without similar traits. I personally prefer getting them as time progress rather than having 100's of guys to choose from from the start and find those I like without having to pick between everyone(Well, I don't believe Dota 2 has ARAM unless you really do it yourself). It's easier for me to focus on a few I have rather than going noob nuts with whomever.

 

[KarlaKGB]

^ I don't understand your argument on that ^

You don't need to own every champ. Owning every champ doesn't make you any more or less competitively viable. Riot making every champ free from the start wouldn't make you any more or less competitively viable. I just don't get what you're on to with this, honestly. You don't have to know what a champ does in order to lane against them. You just need to be able to alter your playstyle to compensate.

That's exactly the point I'm making. You don't need to own every champ. But WHY is that the case? Why can you get away with never having certain champions in your lineup pool? Because many champions are just carbon copies of each other.

Do you seriously believe that they have actually "constrained their champion design" when you consider the plethora of champions, meta possibilities, strategies, playstyles etc. seen on both the professional and solo queue levels across all leagues though?

Well yes, the fact that the laning meta is so set in stone. The fact that having a scaling AP system means you can't have champions that vary in power at different stages of the game because you will end up with an even bigger snowballfest. Can you honestly say League champions are hugely diverse in their skillset and utility?

 

[Alienfish]

I wouldn't say they are carbon copies in League just because one bunch has, i.e stun or snare even though I can agree quite a lot has them. And for owning or not owning that is a preference I suppose. I mean, if I would want everyone on LoL sure I could have gotten all the 1,3 and 3,1 for all I wanted.

 

[KarlaKGB]

This, which makes Dota 2 even more "elite" because you have everyone, and therefore, sure you can pick one and adapt to it but it doesn't make you a better player just because you adapt to few with or without similar traits. I personally prefer getting them as time progress rather than having 100's of guys to choose from from the start and find those I like without having to pick between everyone(Well, I don't believe Dota 2 has ARAM unless you really do it yourself). It's easier for me to focus on a few I have rather than going noob nuts with whomever.

I don't see how having the full hero pool unlocked makes any difference to wanting to unlock them with time - you can just play one hero at a time, with the option of being able to pick up any hero that looks cool, rather than waiting for that 6000IP grind.

---

What I don't get is why Riot needs to force its meta and its idea of how the game should be played, onto the players. Take last season, you had lane swaps, fast pushes, poke comps, hard engage comps, lvl 3 tower dives and deep lane wards to see how the enemy have distributed their lanes. Riot in response basically say if you want to laneswap you're ****ed. If you want early drake you're ****ed. If you want first blood, you get half the benefits with the same risk. Taking options away from players. Like a while ago when people realised they could dual lane top and push the tower quickly, in exchange for sacrificing bottom lane presence and dragon. Instead, Riot buffed tower armour for top and mid lane only, just to stop that.

 

[CookingOkasan]

I do agree that they go about their buffs and nerfs incorrectly. They always focus on who is OP and how they're going to nerf them instead of balancing out some of the weaker champs. That is... when they're not completely castrating random champs that aren't even op (here's looking at you rengar).

either way I wouldn't say that champs are clones... That's definitely untrue

 

[Alienfish]

I suppose you are right in a way but I prefer the other then I guess. I like getting them rather than having 9385 in a bunch from the beginning but as I said that might just be me.

About the lanes you can pretty much play them how you want regardless of buffs so really there is an option regardless how those players and/or Riot makes it and which champion you play. Obviously if you go low-def on them you will lose if the others go tank.

 

[Riiiiptide]

That's exactly the point I'm making. You don't need to own every champ. But WHY is that the case? Why can you get away with never having certain champions in your lineup pool? Because many champions are just carbon copies of each other.


Well yes, the fact that the laning meta is so set in stone. The fact that having a scaling AP system means you can't have champions that vary in power at different stages of the game because you will end up with an even bigger snowballfest. Can you honestly say League champions are hugely diverse in their skillset and utility?

I addressed exactly that in my previous post: you don't need to master every champion to play the game for fun, but if you want to play the game at a pro level, you do. Similarly, you don't need to hit every free throw to play basketball for fun, but if you want to play it professionally, you should.

Now to encompass the other half of your post and also preceding posts regarding Riot attempting to enforce a meta:

That's the ironic thing. Riot attempted to enforce a meta yet it backfired on them. Their attempts to force players to play a certain way actually enabled a greater variety of playstyle. Lane swaps became part of the meta despite Riot's best attempts to reverse that and in the most recent changes, they have accepted that as reality and eased the previous changes attempting to address it. The lane swap itself has evolved to become far more complex than any of the 1/2/1 standard laning could boast.

"The fact that having a scaling AP system means you can't have champions that vary in power at different stages of the game"

This statement is just 100% wrong and misinformed. Consider the recent OGN Finals Najin Black Shield vs. Samsung Galaxy Blue where they ran an Irelia top lane. That is a perfect example of a champion that has ONE and only one power spike and in order to capitalize on that, it is crucial that you do not fall behind and miss that power spike. There is plenty of room for champions that have different power spikes, for compositions that have different power spikes, champions and compositions that excel at various things. To say otherwise when it has repeatedly been proven to be diverse is just false.

I feel like these arguments are being made by reading on paper what Riot is doing without considering what the actual effects are. The game and the environment is far too complex for that. If you want to enjoy the game itself, you need to immerse yourself in it: play it, watch it, analyze it, discuss it, etc. If you are not already, I highly recommend watching OGN. You can do so at twitch.tv/ongamenet

The strategies and plays are very high in the Korean region and the casters (namely MonteCristo) are well-equipped to break down and analyze the deeper meanings behind the map movements. It should address your concerns far better than any post that any of us can make.

 

[Aran]

That's exactly the point I'm making. You don't need to own every champ. But WHY is that the case? Why can you get away with never having certain champions in your lineup pool? Because many champions are just carbon copies of each other.

Isn't that kind of contradicting your first point? If most champions are just carbon copies of one another, then is the burden of knowledge so oppressive? If champions A, B, and C are so similar to each other regarding skillset, I don't need to own all three to know how to play against each individual champion; I just need one to know how to play against three.

And going back to your first post regarding the matter - that champion design has become stale as an attempt to alleviate burden of knowledge - I have to disagree. Look at how much hate developer CertainlyT gets for his work on champion kits (for reference he designed Darius, Thresh, Zed, Zyra, and Yasuo). Thresh is an interesting example of a champion difficult to nerf - one of the most overused statements brought up whenever Thresh's strength is put under scrutiny is something along the lines of, "You could take all the damage away from Thresh's abilities and he'd still be strong". There's a fine line between uniqueness (because there's no doubt that Thresh is unique) and introducing gameplay elements that are too difficult to really balance. With the most recent champion designs I think they've overloading kits with a combination of old and new gameplay elements, which is far from stale to me (but also not good).

I agree with you that Riot's cycle of nerfs and buffs is more hit than miss. Did Riot really need to nerf the various strategies that cropped up and dominated professional play until they were nerfed? Look at the 4v0 push tactic. IIRC it was first used in OGN, was then used in almost every other North American LCS game... and when C9 tried that tactic against SKT K in All Stars, it backfired so stupidly because some teams devise ways to defeat that strategy instead of blindly following it in every game.

Not to say that the best route towards overall balance is to leave the game alone and let people take months to evolve and figure out new things. Some things are clearly broken and in the end I do prefer a changing meta over a relatively static one that takes some brilliant players to 'break'.

edit: oh man OGN was brought up now I need to add in an obligatory declaration that SKT K is going to come back and win Champions Summer; I BELIEVEEE

 

[Alienfish]

Yes their nerfs and buffs goes up an down and you don't have to like it.. I didn't like many of them but I still play. And regarding their turret stuff I agree, it was way too easy soloing a turret regardless of lane.

And if they are so many carbon copies, do we need all the champions AT ALL? Just because A-E has stuns doesn't mean their skillsets are the same.

 

[Alienfish]

Also the coming sale, come on lol like people dont have morgana and lulu...