Hey everyone, Safelocked here on behalf of the League team.
We have a lot to cover today, including our plans for Preseason,
Challenges, and game modes.
But first, let’s talk about the state of the game.
Overall, we’re pretty happy with the state of League this season.
But before we get into the details
let’s dive into a topic that’s been pretty popular lately, which is new champion balance.
When we look at the data, we actually see that new champions
have been pretty balanced on release this year with the exception of Dr. Mundo.
That said, there’s more to healthy gameplay than just win rates
and we’re still hearing that new champions feel unfair to play against
particularly when it comes to complex abilities or overloaded kits.
If we’re being completely honest,
we don’t think our champions have overloaded kits overall.
But that being said, there have been times when we’ve given new champions too many tools
and had to pull back later to give them more clear weaknesses.
For example, Samira’s ability to dash to allies was removed because it provided too much safety.
Combined with her missile blocker, it made CC-ing her too difficult,
especially since that’s one of her main forms of counterplay.
Another thing we consider when we hear a champion feels bad to play against
is their intended complexity.
We try to make a healthy mix of high-, medium-, and low-complexity champions.
This way, whether you like mechanical skill expression, point-and-click simplicity,
or something in between, there’s a new champion that interests you.
For example, with Vex we wanted to create a champion that was fairly easy to pick up
and we’re happy to see she’s hitting that mark.
But beyond just how complex a champion is to play
there’s also how difficult they are to understand.
We want new champions to have unique gameplay,
but you shouldn’t need a wiki to know how to play with, or against them.
Learning counterplay is a skill test we do think is important,
but knowing what a champ can or can’t do shouldn’t be a part of that.
This clarity is something we haven’t always hit the mark on
especially with champions like Aphelios
who not only has a complex kit
but was also lacking UI clarity when he was released.
Designing new champions is a constant balance between making something that’s exciting,
has clear counterplay, and isn’t confusing.
We’re still trying to find that line,
but we want to get to a spot where new champions aren’t just numerically balanced,
but that you all feel they’re fair to play against.
Beyond new champion releases,
this season we’ve seen a wide variety of picks in every role.
We’ve also seen a healthy improvement in diversity of playstyles across roles
especially in jungle and top lane.
Some of this is due to direct champion changes, such as the kit adjustments that
enable picks like jungle Darius, Brand, and Morgana.
New items like Anathema’s Chains and Hullbreaker have also had a positive impact
especially in top lane where we’re seeing a ton of champion diversity.
And finally, we know that some champion classes have been struggling after the
item system update, and we’ve been working on some solutions to help them out.
And this brings us to our plans for Preseason.
With that, I’m going to hand things off to Brightmoon
who will go more in-depth on the upcoming changes.
Hey everyone.
I’m Brightmoon, the lead producer of gameplay on League of Legends.
League is like a house.
Sometimes we need to do a big renovation to keep it working well,
like when we overhauled the item system,
and sometimes we just need to add some new furniture.
For this year’s Preseason, we’re sprucing things up with improvements to
our existing systems, like items, runes, and the Elemental Rift.
Let’s start with our plans for items.
While some champions and classes have lots of build options,
we've still got others that don't feel like they've got
a Mythic or Legendary that really speaks to them.
So we’re going to be adding some new items and tweaking some others.
This will include two new Mythic items.
The first one is a support tank item perfect for champions that want to get
aggressive and charge into the middle of a fight.
When you immobilize an enemy champion, all nearby enemies will take increased
damage from your team for a short period of time.
The second new Mythic item is built for mages who are looking for a little more survivability.
It grants damage reduction that lingers for a few seconds after you get hit,
and while the protection holds, you'll also get Ability Haste.
We think it'll be particularly good for longer range mages who need a Mythic
that helps them survive a dive rather than pile on extra damage.
When we updated League’s item system, we wanted to give every champion
strategic choices in every game.
We still think that’s the right goal for Mythics
but our thinking has changed when it comes to Legendary items.
We think it’s okay if some champions build the same Legendary in most games
if it’s a perfect fit.
But we also want you to have plenty of options
which is why we’re improving Legendaries for mages, assassins, and tanks.
For example, assassins can look forward to a new Legendary item
that gives Ability Haste, and also refunds a portion of their Ultimate’s cooldown
with enemy takedowns.
Tanks that can never get enough mana will be happy with a new Legendary item
that grants bonus health based on total mana and also burns some of it
to create a shield whenever they immobilize an enemy.
And finally, mages who are tired of being denied their hard-earned kills can rejoice.
They’ll be receiving a new Legendary that grants magic penetration
against recently shielded enemies.
As for Runes, we think there are some good, targeted changes we need to make.
Most of all, we feel the Inspiration tree’s identity has been pretty unclear,
and we’d like to broaden its Keystone use cases.
For example, we’re reworking Glacial Augment to double down on its fantasy
of slowing down enemies.
We are also making some modifications to Lethal Tempo to lean into its
attack speed fantasy and give it a more distinct use case in the Precision tree.
Up next are bounties.
Champion bounties give teams who are behind a way to get back into the game
without being a straight shot to victory.
And this year, we’re adding a second way for teams to try and make a comeback.
Objective bounties will work like champion bounties, except you cash them
in by taking map objectives like towers or Baron.
They ramp up slowly when the enemy team lead grows, and the bounty is shared
with your whole team, regardless of who claimed it.
Taking objectives really is the best way to come back when you’re behind
so we want to help make that a clearer and more rewarding strategy.
That said, if a team is really far ahead, objective bounties won’t change that.
Being the better team should always get you a win
so we’ll be watching the new bounty system closely to keep things in check.
Finally, let’s talk about our biggest addition this Preseason: dragons.
We really like how each dragon creates unique terrain, grants powerful buffs,
and adds more strategy to the mid- and late-game.
So this Preseason, we’re adding two more.
Up first is the Hextech Dragon.
When your team defeats it, you’ll all gain additional ability haste
and attack speed.
And if you claim the soul, you’ll receive a chain-slow
that works kind of like Statikk Shiv’s passive.
When this dragon takes over the Rift, it creates Hextech Gates that can
transport you to set locations across the map.
The second dragon joining the party is Hextech’s darker sibling, the Chemtech drake.
When you slay it, your team will deal increased damage when your HP is low,
letting you turn around those close teamfights.
This Dragon Soul provides a second chance at life...well, sort of.
When you die, you’ll enter a “Zombie State” where you can still cast
abilities and continue fighting when you’d normally be looking at a gray screen.
And when the Chemtech Dragon putrefies the map, it creates camouflage zones
in fixed locations.
These dragons might seem more impactful than the current ones, and well, they are.
Our goal is to add more unique encounters and meaningful strategy to
the mid and late game.
That said, these are some pretty big changes, and we’re ready to adjust if
they’re making too much, or too little, of an impact.
You can expect to see all of these changes on PBE in a couple of weeks
And we’ll be looking out for your feedback in the months ahead.
Outside of Preseason, something we’ve heard from all of you is that you’d like
more ways to express yourself and your achievements in League.
For some of you, Ranked is how you define your progress.
And that's great, we don't want to change that.
But for those of you who aren't focused on the Ranked climb, there aren’t great
ways to express your own progress.
Champion Mastery and Eternals help you show off your skills on a particular champ
but they don’t tell the story of your broader League legacy.
The new Challenges system should achieve just that.
Challenges rank up over time, showcasing your increasing mastery and
legacy across a bunch of different systems, modes, and gameplay
making it a little different than just a standard achievement.
We want to highlight not just your rank and champion mastery, but also your
inventiveness, breadth of playstyles, collection, and everything else in between.
Want to showcase your knack for never dying in ARAM?
Or how great you are at killing minions in SR in the first 10 minutes?
Maybe you’ve collected over 100 champions or love participating in events.
All of this is now possible to track, and display your progress, with Challenges.
You’ll get the first glimpse of Challenges when they hit PBE next month,
and the full system will launch early next year.
That’s all I have to share with you today.
Thanks so much for watching, and here’s Safelocked again to talk about game modes.
When it comes to game modes, one thing we’ve been hearing from you all is that
you’d like more variety in the modes we bring back alongside events.
So let’s talk about it.
To start, we actually agree that the existing rotation of game modes can
make some of the most popular modes, like URF and One For All, feel a bit stale.
Some of you have asked why we don’t just bring back some of our other
older game modes, like Star Guardian Invasion or Ascension, to mix things up.
And the answer is that bringing back old modes isn’t as easy as flipping a switch.
League is constantly changing, which means all of our existing modes require
constant upkeep.
For example, when we released Yuumi, we had to figure out
how she'd function in One For All.
What happens when a Yuumi attaches to a Yuumi who is attached to a Yuumi?
Because of upkeep like this, we have to be very selective about the modes we maintain.
And right now, there are just too few popular modes that feel worth the
investment, compared to making brand new modes or updating more resonant ones for you.
We’ve mentioned this before, but we think the sweet spot for game modes are
ones that amplify champion fantasies and build on what you love about your
champs and Summoner’s Rift.
So moving forward, we’re focusing on adding more game modes that hit this goal.
And to that, let’s talk about Ultimate Spellbook.
First and foremost, you all seemed to really love this one.
It was one of our highest engagement modes ever, second only to URF.
And beyond popularity, we’re super happy with how long you spent making
oversized champions with Cho’Gath’s ult.
And by that, we mean the total amount of time you spent in Ultimate Spellbook
stayed high throughout the event.
That gives us confidence that it’s worth keeping around.
That said, there are some clear areas of feedback that we want to address.
Junglers were forced to take Smite and another Ultimate, which meant they
couldn’t choose another Summoner Spell.
They also missed out on a lot of exciting plays during the laning phase
because they were stuck clearing camps.
Beyond that, we also heard that games started to feel a little repetitive due to the
small number of available ultimates. And we agree.
So this winter we’ll be bringing back Ultimate Spellbook with a bigger ult pool.
We’ll also be making some adjustments for junglers to ensure your experience
in Ultimate Spellbook is just as fun as everyone else’s.
If you’d like to learn more about our approach to game modes, you can check
out the dev blog that’s coming out today.
That’s all we have for today.
Thank you so much for watching.
We hope you’re enjoying Worlds as much as we are, and for any pros watching:
Once again, please pick Amumu.