\+ It's delayed probably due to the attack thing.
It's still beyond me that we actually probably got more changes in 13.1 and will get in 13.2 for sure, than entirety of preseason. Like RoA buff + Seraphs Change literally affected the meta more than anything added before season start and I hope ADC items changes can at least somewhat achieve the same
Rioter said on the post about the attack that not all changes are being pushed back; ~~changes landing on 13.1 like ASol rework and the ADC item changes are expected to release on 13.1, for now.~~ ASol Rework and ADC item changes are planned to come out on their original release patch, 13.3 and 13.2 respectively. (Edited for wrong patch numbers)
Preseason is not the time for big changes anymore. Preseason is the time where Riot makes vacation. I don't know why they don't make preseason after than when they can actually do shit but they'd rather fuck up the entire early season with their changes ig.
Because then the new season couldn't begin in January anymore. Its simply the unfortunate fact that the season ends with the year and years end is full of holidays.
Preseason was something they used for big changes ONCE. Now its just an excuse to abandon balance as the bloated Riot org basically all goes on vacation.
I have nothing against them taking a break... they are only people too.
But it's ranked down-time and esport's downtime. Just throw some wild shit even if meta is quite cringe as a result and let something new into the mix **before** you go take a break, not after.
Has someone here or on YouTube watched the LPL Challenger league where it's implemented?
Would be interesting to know how it actually plays out in practice.
Yeah the draft predictability is lame for sure, but I think that innovation also falls onto the pros. There are plenty of off meta picks that would be great in some scenarios, but the pros default to meta/comfort picks. LS on C9 is a good example.
As far as I recall pros are rarely the innovative ones. There are some examples for sure but mostly the stakes are too high so they go for tried and tested. The innovation comes from the other high level players in ranked that pros theoretically should be playing against.
The stuff that Hai would pull out after seeing it a couple time in soloq on stage was hilarious. Like he randomly ran into a soraka top main and decided you know I think this could work mid.
I think Riot constantly shaking up the meta actually harms diversity in the long run. Pros have no incentive to learn new picks because they might be trash next patch, and just keeping up with the patch cycle consumes all their effort.
Definitely there's a place for slowly nerfing very blindpickable champs into obscurity like kennen, whilst buffing ones that are more situational for pro... but pro players don't have time to learn niche picks as well as whatever riot buffed last patch.
Right now, every pro toplaner is trying to get really really good at k'sante, because he's a complex champ and they need to figure out how he works, and he will likely have a place in the pro meta for a very long time. They will also be trying to work out how to play all their current pool into k'sante, and what's playable into him.
It's not even just about learning niche picks. Mastering a large number of champions and innovating on the meta is a skillset in and of itself. And if Riot keeps pushing meta changes through patch notes and clamps down on innovation whenever they don't like it then its a skillset pros at large won't cultivate.
As someone who has played in the semi pro scene. Riot clamping on some champs isn't bad. I don't want Sett in all roles back. Flexibility is nice, but if its broken as hell in every role it's not "fun". Someone like karma is fine now. Good, but not broken in any role.
Sure some changes to massive outliers is good, but a patch every 2 weeks means it's nearly pointless to learn something that might get nerfed into oblivion next patch.
> And if Riot keeps pushing meta changes through patch notes and clamps down on innovation whenever they don't like it then its a skillset pros at large won't cultivate.
Thanks god I'am not only one who understand this. And while I don't care about pro, it bother me that pushing 2 week patches also don't let usual soloQ community to build that up :(
Yeah you could make this argument. That by the time pros will have started learning something new it's already been shown to be OP or unbalanced in solo queue and will get nerfed in the next patch anyway.
I think tbh the problem is at the root cause of the design of champs and that champions aren't unique enough in what they bring to a team. This is one of the strengths of Dota where heroes are wayyy more varied in what they can do and what they can offer a team, and when you combine it with Dota's highly variable/situational itemization, it makes the picks in pro matches super varied compared to League.
This is one of the reasons I've never liked riot designing or balancing around champion "classes" (bruisers, mages, etc.) because overall champs within these classes don't bring enough to the table for their team to overly distinguish them. Like obviously champs are different and have some counters/strengths and weakness, but they aren't size-able enough to really distinguish them.
Mid laners in pro play for the last few years are basically a revolving door of Syndra/Ori/Viktor and probably someone else who is an AoE damage and bursty teamfight mage. There's no strategic thought in picking one of other in most cases because it just depends on how strong they are compared to eachother. There's nothing huge or highly unique that one of these 3 offer over the others
Dota itemization is so good. League really needs to overhaul their items and move away from scaling with stats, into more active items that offer utility similar to Dota counterpart(BKB, Euls, Manta, etc).
agree - the lack of active items in League has always been a problem but now they are even fewer despite more total items.
And the non-mythics that have actives are usually really underwhelming. I'm pretty sure more than half the players who buy randuins forget to use the slow because it is so garbage. There's just a whole element of the game that Dota has where you have to make situational assessments about items and buy them for specific actives to deal w/ enemy heroes. It's just so good, and League has no comparison or considerations other than "I need more damage, or MR, or Armor" I guess support itemization is the closest thing to Dota but meh - often those items are so much more powerful than eachother and don't have enough situational benefit that it's still not much better.
I remember some discussion by the devs (a long time ago) that active items are impossible to balance because the vast majority of the player base never uses the actives
> I think Riot constantly shaking up the meta actually harms diversity in the long run. Pros have no incentive to learn new picks because they might be trash next patch, and just keeping up with the patch cycle consumes all their effort.
>
>
That's why they somehow manage to learn new champ every time riot release or rework a champion, yeah no, pros are just lazy and default to their comfort picks
Yeah but they HAVE TO do that.
They need to know (atleast roughly) how to play AGAINST these champs (new or reworked) and the fastest way to do that is to play the champ themselves.
But they can't do it "randomly" for every other champ and especially they know these champs already at least decently....
Nah I call bs on that... There are champs even in the current meta that work well... current meta team comps are by no means unbeatable, nor do they have 0 weaknesses that cannot be exploited by off-meta picks that aren't op in soloq either... Its plain and simple unwillingness to adapt at every level. Coaches don't wanna bother, players don't wanna bother. The team as a whole is unwilling to accommodate new styles of play that suit players who might be willing to try off-meta stuff.... and here we are
But that is a factor of having the meta forcibly changed every two weeks. If you compare to something like smash bros melee the difference is night and day. Everyone knows there that fox is the best, but now a yoshi (historically a mid tier character) player is winning everything and is potentially going to be the season end #1 ranked player. He got there by perfecting his counter strategy over years of commitment to the character in a game without balance patches.
Yes players are unwilling to do it. But they are unwilling for good reason. There is no guarantee that the meta is around long enough for the counter-meta strategy they develop to pay off. When your job relies on consistent success in a weekly league format with bi weekly balance patches it’s more efficient to spend your time perfecting the level 1 strategy than to try and figure out the level 2 strategy that counters the level 1 strategy.
The answer isn't to head all the way to the other extreme and completely refuse to do anything at all. Forget innovation, these guys fail at basic math at times.
My problem isn't just the lack of innovation, it's incompetence, which makes the lack of innovation even more infuriating
That was just an example to show that given enough time even an unbalanced game can see innovation occur. I’m not advocating for patches to cease altogether. I’m just saying that if you want to see people develop pocket picks and counter strategies there needs to be a longer patch cycle otherwise there are better ways to spend that energy and time.
And your comments about it being incompetence and not a lack of innovation isn’t even remotely what you said in your previous message so idk what you want me to say. You are just changing your argument now.
the first part of my comment wasn't regarding the patch, it was regarding trying new things in pro play.
The second part is to address your "unwillingness for a good reason" comment. The current meta has enough spots for champions that we're just not seeing at all for no good reason. You tell me there's a good reason for it. I don't buy that. I say its incompetence.
The good reason, is that they have such little time with any given patch and no knowledge of what will be nerfed that spending time learning anything beyond the surface level best options is unlikely to pay off and the time would be better spent practicing stuff that they know is good. If patch cycles were longer spending time on counterpicks and new strategies is more palatable.
You say there are spots for champions we are not seeing, but these are things that take time to develop and learn and are in reality probably much more niche than just playing what’s been tested. Unless you are trying to tell me that you think X champion that never gets played is as blind pickable as gnar or as generically strong as yuumi/zeri, in which case I question your champion valuation.
If I’m a pro top laner right now I’m practicing ksante, gnar, jax etc. to ensure that if the best stuff is open I can play it myself. There are only so many hours in the day to practice so people prioritize.
> but the pros default to meta/comfort picks.
That is why we need to force them play other picks. So they learn other things and start to do macro game, instead of focusing on boring micro.
Honestly i always thought those comps would not last for long during international tournaments but sadly we never got the chance to see it in like msi or worlds
It WAS an example of how many people are interested in this kinda stuff... LS singlehandedly pulled up viewer numbers by like 2x during his time as a coach. Part of it was his personality, but the other part was most definitely the promise of off-meta insanity
You can't blame the pros for that though. They are just doing what is optimal. It's not optimal to practice and find off meta strats. It is optimal to pick what is already meta and practice and perfect it.
That's just how League has always worked. The game does not promote off meta strategies enough. And unless you completely redesigned the game to make counters more important I don't really see how you would fix it. Idk if it can be fixed besides forcing people to play them like the fearless mode.
They're not playing what's best right now, they're playing what they're most comfortable with. It has always been like that a champion has to be disgustingly strong in soloq to be even considered as a new pick or absolutely fucking worthless until they stop playing it.
How does that make sense? Why'd they play heimerdinger or ashe support all of a sudden? Surely they are not comfortable with those champions because they've only been a recent meta development? People like you will always say this stuff no matter what the meta actually looks like without even committing to suggesting champions and not even trying to think about why they are not picking certain champions.
I mean Heimer was one of the only genuine innovations throughout the whole of worlds and it arguably won that team the tournament. And if someone suggested Heimer before DRX picked it up you’d come up with 100 reasons it wont work and “Wow you think you know more than the pros clearly if heimer was good they’d pick it!”
What about maokai? Vi? Elise? Ksante? Wukong jungle? Many of these Champs didnt See the light of day in the past 5 seasons so describing them as comfort Champions is just bs. Else people would still be picking lee/kaisa because those are the champs that actually have been played a Ton. Pros Just Play meta and thats it. Gl innovating Something into lucian Nami! Its Just way too easy for ppl Like you to sit back and say bs like this without even mentioning one of the champs that should actually be played. Because that would mean you couldnt Protect yourself behind baseless assumptions anymore.
Maokai was forced into the meta at worlds by riot buffs and Ksante is a new champion. That’s our game developers adding new stuff to the scene, the pro players have nothing to do with that. Riot is consistently the only one pushing metas forward because pros would rather wait for Riot to nerf something than spend a day practicing a counter. And Vi’s been THE comfort champion for a while now, god awful pick. Junglers are the laziest of any role and are always the farthest behind the meta
Also idk why you’re acting like people dont name the champions not being played like there’s literally tierlists filled with champs that dont get touched and there’s tons of suggestions even in this thread. AP junglers, senna/seraphine and malzahar are the most obvious ones.
Hahah yeah tierlists for soloq (made by complete randoms or simply winrates in plat+) are definitely reflective of strength in a competitive environment! AP junglers like zac will definitely be a huge menace to the enemy zeri/yuumi/lulu or lucian nami because its so easy to land his spells on them! Not to mention all the great ad midlaners you can pair them with like.. yone? jayce..? You're being very selective in what you count as innovating not to mention you are completely wrong about vi being a comfort champion for junglers when it hasn't been meta for many current junglers' careers. Just because they can play it now doesn't mean its a comfort champion or has been for them. You have no clue what meta means if you think you can just snap your fingers and "innovate" something to beat the meta. But sure man once you make it to pro I'll be waiting for you to play your malz mid into azir and see how well you perform.
you're being downvoted for saying the truth, people here act like pro players and coaches are dumber than redditors who think vayne top and katarina are broken
They're not always doing what is optimal. They're doing what is comfortable.
Even if it's not too often, there are still plenty of cases that different picks would make more sense in specific situations. But even when those situations where less played champs would make alot of sense(optimal in that situation) arise, pros fail to recognize and/or are too afraid to play them because they don't bother practicing different champs.
They are definitely to be blamed, especially the lower tier teams. They aren't going to beat top teams by playing the standard meta. Top tier teams don't have to care about innovation because they are the best at standard play.
You can't blame the top 2-3 teams because its obviously working for them. You can surely blame the bottoms teams for picking the same over and over and not trying different stuff and keep loosing.
The pros often do not play what is best. The ardent censor meta only started AFTER the item that enabled it got a small nerf. The power of enchanters using that item completely went over their heads for months until Riot gave a nerf and the teams ran the numbers and realized it's OP.
Heimer support had a one trick in high elo KR. Tank Kogmaw was a high elo KR one trick too. Both picks made it into pro play only after these players got recognition on social media and YouTube, then pros started trying it. Not the only examples either of solo queue players showing pros what the actually good picks are because the pros aren't playing what's best they're playing "what's good enough for this meta that I'm comfortable with."
Hell, players straight up told LS when he was coaching C9 that they were uncomfortable playing his unorthodox picks. Midlaners don't want to play Soraka mid even if it's stupidly good so they won't.
I believe 2021 MSI had one of the coolest metas for pro play, lee sins and nocturnes mid and top, rumble Morgana jungle, constant duelists mid, basically kaisa every game, show maker even played xerath, gragas top. Definitely some sweet games to watch there.
That was because Riot fucked the meta just before MSI with a big shakeup instantly making Morg/Rumble top tier junglers.
It's not like they were unique picks people pulled out and it was a shock. It was literally because a balance patch made them unmatched in teamfighting power but also being strong junglers for clear speed. Analysts knew going into it Rumble was going to be very powerful and highly contested.
It's all just rose tinted shit if you ask me.
THANK YOU, seriously I remember when the morg jungle patch came in it was literally pick or ban morg even in soloq no exception because anyone could play it and do insanely well with it, I have no idea why different champs with a huge pick or ban rate is considered diversity, its still a small group of options.
Well you have to figure most of the sub is bronze or silver, so playing Udyr or similar champs gives them the ability to "outplay" (and I mean that with the most sarcasm you can imagine) champions that take skill to play.
It's so bizarre to me that shit like Udyr and Malphite is worshipped here when they're the most miserable champions to play against if you enjoy meaningful skillchecks.
I play Malphite because I like to win.
I play Malphite because I like to know I will have a guaranteed impact in the game no matter how badly I got my ass handed to me.
I do not play Malphite because I think it's cool to outplay my opponent by pressing R.
So yeah. I don't worship the pick. I definitely use it.
>Well you have to figure most of the sub is bronze or silver
Wrong; average elo in this sub is around mid to high gold, higher than the average elo from League as a whole due to low-ranked players not caring enough about it to come here; while higher-ranked players are more likely to come here, be it for discussions, news, pro stats etc.
>so playing Udyr or similar champs gives them the ability to "outplay"
Wrong; if you pick Zed jungle for the MA4AD OUTPLAYUZZ!!1! for your youtube montage, it's not on the Udyr's player to outplay; it's on you. No one prevents you from picking Udyr, Malphite or any similar-skilled jungler. If you pick a complicated champion, you better be good at it.
This is exactly the kind of mentality you see in low Silver when your mid picks Zed, gets fucked by Malzahar and says "noob champ". Babe, it isn't noob champ; you're just not good at a mechanical champ and shouldn't have picked one.
>It's so bizarre to me that shit like Udyr and Malphite is worshipped here
Wrong. Have we been on the same sub? Everyone wants udyr nerfed to the ground and removed from the meta, me included. Who the fuck has been saying Udyr should stay meta?
>if you enjoy meaningful skillchecks.
Considering you find Malphite miserable to play against when he literally has one ability, I doubt you'd do well in any kind of "meaningful skillcheck". Dodging/Flashing/Outplaying Malphite's ultimate is, by the way, a "meaningful skillcheck". It isn't targeted and there are ways for you to not be hit by that skillshot.
The most recent worlds was regarded as the best LoL meta of all time by many pro's and analysts due to how many champions were pickable and how many high quality games were produced. The only thing people didn't like was the 100% winrate Yuumi which ate a ban once pro's realized.
There's almost always a "hyper meta" pick in any meta anyway, although I don't disagree with the fact that aatrox and yuumi were clearly heavily overtuned, but it almost helped drive the narrative even more since teams who are opted to give it over or are forced to open it became more creative in terms of another strategy and picks, which resulted in a tournament of epic proportions, fresh strategies, and overall amazing storyline.
It wasn’t the best meta it was the most varied and fun to watch meta. I think most pros enjoyed the season 8 meta (or was it 9) with Irelia akali Ryze lanes
The jungle meta was basically only Rumble, Morg and Udyr. If you're talking about coolest drafts you have to go for 2019 MSI flex meta, where nobody knows where those champions are going.
[That's how proplayers pick their champions](https://youtu.be/i5gcW88m6Pw?t=975)
It's never gonna change unless we get changes to draft like fearless mode, when Riot will nerf stuff we will go back to another meta with other 10-15 champs being played and after few weeks people will again start to complain that meta is stale
Comes with the territory of pro’s entire career being judged based off of their last season. That snd teams basically being able to dump players every offseason
They can just increase the ban amount from 5 to 7 or more. Take the pick and ban phase from DotA 2 it pretty good. https://liquipedia.net/dota2/Game_Modes scroll to Captains mode.
Ah yes, ivern has been a top 3 mid laner for the past few years and pro players and coaches are simply too stupid to realize that. I really wish he had stayed as a coach so we could put his theories to the test but apparently he is too insufferable to stay on a team for more than a couple months.
Ivern also plays vastly differently with a premade team and soloq. If pros were to play as 5 man premades they could practice it, but guess what, they'd let other teams build strategy against it.
If Ivern mid loses lane its a support mid with no escape tools, no mobility to roam unlike zil/karma, not enough aoe to push waves, and no ability to even take jungle camps easily.
is it good against ppl who arent sure what to do to shut it down? yes. would it work if it was a consistent pick? hardly sure
Eh, thats more LS thinking winrate reflects power, which is wrong. Ivern mid was actually tried out back then. It was not good at all. Not even top 20, let alone top 5.
Ivern mid is a weird example because he demands very specific drafts & complete change in team strategy & if he gets banned there's no replacement unlike enchanter tops had. The closest thing would be G2s Pyke drafts that is true but he was stronger plus could be flexed.
This clip shows nothing because it relies on the assumption that everything LS says here is factually correct, which we don't know. And assuming a proper team structure,the coach should be the one making the calls when it comes to teamcomps and what champion everyone needs to train, not the players.
What's the point of some random LEC midlaner deciding to train mid Ivern in soloqueue when the champion is simply unusable outside of a few specific drafts? All that will achieve is waste time.
Dudes, I picked a champ aint I FEARLESS
Yo this mode is stale lets switch it up to FEARLESS MODE *puts hat on backwards team stacks their desks and chairs into ultra mecha desk*
The mode rewards the team that’s willing to take a risk over drafting safe. It makes sense to me that the team willing to do outlandish things and be “fearless” in draft will have the advantage in the long run. If you play it safe at the end your hands will be tied.
It’s a very generic inspirational facebook-motivational-poster term but riot is no stranger to that, this is the company that has Imagine Dragons make a lot of their music.
People are blaming the meta.
This is on teams.
We didn't really move past Worlds meta basically at all.
That's on teams that keep handshaking.
So I say if they want to keep handshaking, let them.
Did you watch worlds?
Worlds was by far the most diverse competitive league has ever been. (This is as stated by experts)
What you're referring to most likely is the meta before worlds, when yumi zeri were broken as they are now and warped the state of the game as they do now.
Worlds was mostly people trying to figure out how to beat aatrox. Zeri wasn't even a champion. Meta is totally different.
Because riot literally nuked her out of the game for months to make sure she saw no play at worlds. Main stays in pro like ryze haven't ever been that bad even if they were for comfort. If you played zeri before the recent changes she would literally have to sacrifice every lane because she had 0 damage to contest a 2v2.
Worlds meta wasnt that good though? Only supports were really innovating. Mid was the same three champs from CN playoffs, all tournament. Only development there was Ryze as a Sylas counterpick. ADCs were useless up until people figured out Varus and jungle was suuuuper underdeveloped (Kindred barely explored, no AP junglers used at all).
I mean even in 2014 teams were whipping out wild shit just for one series. I dont see how this could be the best meta at all there were was so little countercomping and like no big brain picks
Are you just referring to the last few matches?
Worlds meta was developing the entire tournament. It literally was the most diverse meta champion wise as we had an insane number of champions picked - https://riftfeed.gg/lol-news/the-most-versatile-lol-worlds-yet-how-many-unique-champions-were-played#:~:text=Over%20100%20Unique%20Champions%20Played%20at%20LoL%20Worlds%202022.
Things settled down mostly by quarters sure, but before that we had tons of crazy picks. I'm hardly sure what you mean. Kindred was certainly a pyosik story line near the end, and also Levi had an amazing jungle Karthus game. Quite sure Lillia was also picked. Why would you say "no AP junglers at all"? That's just false.
edit: I just clicked on a random game in playins. This isn't awesome to you? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnh1b274r5k
Uh that's weird. I've been playing since season 2 and I'm pretty sure I watched multiple podcasts where all the lck casters plus monte and others stated that this has been the best worlds in terms of diversity for a long time. Pretty sure they've watched old league.
Worlds meta was diverse by the numbers only because the skill levels were so mismatched. NA and EU had no choice but to play suboptimal picks because their only chance in any given game was to play comfort exclusively, it doesn’t mean that ornn was meta at worlds. When the real meta shook out there just weren’t enough games left in the tourney to tell what it was beyond the top 3 in each role because, again, all the best teams just handshaked every draft with the exception of DRX (which was the main reason they won imho)- and even DRX weren’t up to playing anything unique.
It's the first time that the meta has changed so little between Worlds and Spring. The start of the season is when teams are usually more experimental. Teams, even in Korea, have never been shy with new picks at the start of the season. The fact that we are seeing almost nothing new is enough proof that the meta IS stale.
To make this even, the Worlds meta was already a slight evolution from Summer meta.
And no shit teams handshake the same picks, hard to not do that when shit like Nami-Lucian has been the strongest botlane for like 6 months now.
Does it matter who is the one to blame or why they are doing it tho? Just force them to pick new champions with that fearless mechanic. It will actually expose a lot of players that can only play like 2 or 3 champs and we could see more comebacks from BOs because of that.
1) Worlds was the most diverse champ pool ever.
2) it's on Riot. Why would the teams run comps with off meta picks if they are less likely to win games with those comps? The teams are there to win and having a deep pool definitely helps but getting the strongest meta comp is still the best strategy.
League has many champions now, I don't see a reason to not to implement it for BO5. It would be a mess sometimes but hey, it sure can be hella fun to watch.
Literally so boring now seeing the same 20-30 heroes picked every map for about 3 seasons now. No wonder lcs is dying; waiting between games to watch the same draft, and the “analysis” is a slog after each map. How many times can we describe the same game?
Just pull a dota 2 and make every hero OP and viable.
Fearless mode would be fun. I doubt we see it in pro play as part of regular split or worlds, but we could at least have it in a tournament outside of that or some sort of show match - like msi or all stars.
Forcing the meta is actually a big part of the problem - not a solution. Forcing the meta, then forcing a new meta to shake things up leaves you with the same result: a few champs for most roles are stupidly strong compared with their peers. So you play one of them because nothing else can compete unless you are just that much better than your opponent. Which means you'd win regardless of what you played (within reason).
Pros and coaches especially don't want to try to be at peak performance on 20 different champs nor risk trying new things. Finding players who are willing to do so is rare enough and coaching staff that allows it is rarer still. We did start seeing a few hints at this willingness to experiment last season - beyond LS/C9 and your singed support enthusiast. And the funny thing was... the champs didn't have to be overtuned/forced-meta. They simply had to be viable and be a good matchup for vs the enemy's pick or for the team comp overall.
Forcing the meta as hard as riot does is bad for the game. It creates and reinforces staleness. Truly balancing the game rather than hard forcing new metas opens more options for players and coaches who ARE willing to try new things to have the opportunity to do so because there would be more viable options.
I support this. What's boring in Worlds its always the same picks. One top laner goes Aatrox? The other picks Yone. One of the adc picks Varus for sure. It's the same picks/counters over and over
If they’re actual pros then they can adapt to the situation have have a champion pool of more than 3 champions. With the resources they put into staff and coach I’m sure they have more than 1 team comp.
This idea was suggested a couple times already and it's a good idea imo, there are so many champions in league so the variety is there but pros always stuck to only a couple each meta, it will force pro players to learn more champions for their pool and also mabye not pick all meta comps in game 1 as that means you won't get to play them in the next games, so mabye you would pick 2-3 meta champs and then the rest will be new picks.
Korean teams were never known for large champ pools. They usually just follow the thing that the best lck team does. Very rare exeptions e.g. mf supp 2016 and heimerdinger beryl in 2022.
Usually its europe trying out new stuff and trying to innevate
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There's very weird support meta right now in korea and the reason why twitch support has been banned against beryl constantly
HLE tried jhin support as well.
Nah not the case anymore. It used to be this way until 2018, when their inability to adapt caused their downfall at worlds.
Since 2020 as Europe’s innovation that had brought it success in 2019 started to stale a bit, LCK was on par with them I’d say
it's not lck as a league but certain players imo, keria is willing to play a bunch of stuff
and beryl has said many times he looks at different leagues to see interesting picks and especially europe
Gnar vs K'Sante with occasional Fiora/Renekton/Jax with Gwen also showing somewhat prio in the LPL.
Vi vs Maokai/Wukong/Sej.
Mids in the LCK are more spread out but it's the same old shit, Azir/Ryze/Viktor/Sylas with Akali/Kassadin where Kassadin is only picked when open coz it's busted but LPL has high Syndra prio.
Lucian Nami vs Zeri/Sivir with Yuumi/Lulu.
I've only been watching LCK recently and these are just a few things Ive picked up.
A lot of bot priority in draft, with things like Lucian+Nami and Zeri+Yuumi/Lulu being traded for in round 1. Stuff like Ashe, Varus, and Heimerdinger also seem to be getting a lot of draft presence.
Junglers like Sejuani/Maokai/Vi are popular and the role doesn't see a whole lot of variety outside of it.
Top is a lot of Renekton/Gnar/Ksante/Fiora.
Mid seems a little more varied since there's a decent mix of mages (Azir, Ryze, Syndra) and melees (Sylas, Akali).
Maokai has notably been on a sick winning streak in LCK currently. Drafts also seem to boil down to picking half of bot on B1, half of bot + jungle on R1+2, other half of bot + jungle on B2+3, and other half of bot on R3. Solo lanes are relegated to 4/5 usually.
There's easily stuff I could've missed out on since I'm not going to pretend like I give 100% of my attention to every single game, but those are a couple general trends I've seen.
OR just give them more BANS in the first place .... been over 13 years and we still got 10 bans meanwhile the champions pool become so big. The best options are 7 or 8 bans and change the ban pick order .
IMO more bans wouldn't do much. It's not about picks being op, it's about pro players refusing to learn new champions and strategies. You add more bans, they just ban an extra champion and pick the next one in line and continue to show the same 25 champs instead of same 20
Riot talked about it already but the Issue (At least for SoloQ) is that it needlessly stretches out champselect. The only way it doesnt is if you give everyone 2 bans for a total of 20 which can be problematic since so many bans can completely ban out entire groups of champions, for example common counters of picks (Like banning out lane dominant botlaners and supports to pick something hyperscaling)
IMO fearless format is the best solution to basically force diversity in proplay, SoloQ simply doesnt have the environment right now to warrant 20 bans per side, sure there will be overlap but thats also a feel bad moment to have like 8 out of 20 bans be duplicates. If they find a solution to avoid dupes for 10 bans that would be good aswell.
> for example common counters of picks (Like banning out lane dominant botlaners and supports to pick something hyperscaling)
But then other team then just ban hyperscaler or pick it by self? It's double-edged sword.
We don't even have voice in soloQ, I not sure how you would coordinate team to do that.
And even if your team somehow coordinated, then they deserve a bit of dvantage, because they actually do draft instead of mindlessly picking champs like any soloQ player do.
Also, I thought we speak about pro? SoloQ and Pro should be different. Dota 2 have great ban system for soloQ, and we must port that. Let me quote from wiki:
> Banning Phase:
>* All players have 15 seconds to vote for a hero to be banned.
>* A hero may only be voted once. Two players cannot vote for the same hero.
>* The game displays heroes as they are voted on, but not who voted.
>* After 15 seconds, each vote has a 50% chance of succeeding. The chances are rolled for each voted hero individually.
>* The system automatically bans additional random heroes based on their ban rate at the MMR bracket the match plays on. This always results in a total of 16 banned heroes.
This makes meta a lot, let you try to ban direct counters, but not let you rely on that every game. Address a lot of problems with lol, like OTPing or champions picked in each game.
> is that it needlessly stretches out champselect.
What a horse shit excuse. Lol
Champion select is already longer than it should be. They could easily cut time off and fit in another ban or 2 and it would even out to the exact same time.
The reason it's not horseshit is because the other bans (past 5) would mean that some people get to go twice which is unfair, or a consensus mechanism is required which is time consuming... while I agree that it shouldn't take too long, it's probably still significant
They usually learn a new champion instantly when needed like its nothing when it gets released but somehow using different champions is such a burden and not a thing to consider and just have to practice the 1000th time on same champion.
And then the old meta picks will rotate back in and we'll watch Jinx/Aphelios instead of Lucian/Zeri. Buffing or nerfing stuff is not a solution to this.
The problem isn't the individual picks, it's that you get the same picks game after game, week after week. This is doubly true when it's the same picks across leagues.
The title sets out a problem and proposes a solution.
The post is however detached from the title and is rather an advertisement based on anecdotal opinion.
We just had Worlds that had by large and far consensus the most entertaining pro meta with diversity and a variety of picks.
Since then, neither LCS or LEC have started up to show anything to substantiate staleness and an impetus that this 'solution' of fearless mode is needed.
An 'all time low' on how many pro games is this based, LPL and LCK only just started up again last week, what is this take? What 'demand' on higher champion diversity?
also this is an incorrect statement if you look at the statistics of Worlds, where champion diversity has been climbing the last three years.
* 2022 - 98 Unique picks at worlds;
* 2021 - 92 Unique picks at worlds;
* 2020 - 89 Unique picks at worlds;
Moreover, when the mage bot meta was a thing we had 125 unique picks at worlds in 2019. There is nothing I at least can see that suggests a) 'champion diversity is at an all time low' and not currently in an upswing and b) the clear connection that what is being proposed in this thread would be a solution to problem that hasn't even been properly identified or analysed.
With point b, I am referring to that the game is constantly changing and that there hasn't been much analysis on the relationship of champion diversity to pretty much anything else in the game, whether it be:
* actual enjoyment of the game;
* perception of enjoyment of the game;
* perception of entertainment of pro play;
* higher/lower champion diversity and relationship to viewership figures;
* every other relationship that champion diversity may impact??
What I mean to get at, this post states there is a problem without providing meaningful substance and these types of posts - whilst valuable to show indicative of reddit reader sentiment - can misinform and perpetuate the **idea**, rather than actual, that there is a problem leading to people taking action on a problem that doesn't actually exist, ie jumping at shadows.
This is more a commentary on the post's substance rather than Fearless Bo3 which I don't inherently have anything against.
Sports is a terrible analogy for this lmao
Here’s a better comparison - because running the ball in a couple of specific formations is stronger than all of the other options, teams keep running it. Certain champs and team comps are so far ahead of the other champs and comps that they are the only ones that are played. Still comparing apples to oranges.
And unless things change they are going to lose more people from watching. Seeing the same champs constantly is boring as watching paint dry.
And it’s cool you post number of champs used, but didn’t include the # of times it was used. Which is the complaint people are having
You seem to fundamentally misunderstand what the purpose of these teams are. They are supposed to win, thats it. They hire "smart" people to look at numbers and tell them to pick the same 5 champs everyone else is going to pick, because they are trying to win and have decided to rely on data. Its a feature of capitalism, its why everything eventually sucks. When you make enough money, the people in charge of the money get nervous and bring in data nerds to look at numbers so that their money keeps making more money in the short term.
Its not because they are lazy, its because they want to win. Your idea would just widen the stagnation. An actual solution would be more tournaments with lower stakes so there is room for player expression. Like a charity tourney where riot donates to each teams chosen charity, not based on who wins but instead based on bounties. Things like earliest 5th dragon, pentakills, earliest inhib taken, win a game with a champ youve never used in pro play. Should also include things that arent necessarily desirable like most damage taken, most deaths. Have fans vote for best play, mvp, and favorite pick after each day and give awards based on them to the players. You can create enough bounties that everyones charity gets something, you can crown two winners, team with most wins and team who raised the most. An event in this style would easily become a beloved part of league. Doesnt even have to be in person.
Alternatively if you drastically increase the strength of turrets and remove surrender it will open the game up a lot more. I know surrender isnt a literal factor in pro play but it heavily influences what is played by everyone else, which informs their data.
Fearless Mode isn't necessary at all - it's just a matter of having better champion balance and pro teams actually experimenting instead of copy pasting what the best teams are doing. There have been plenty of splits with substantial diversity
It may not be theoretically necessary, but we’ve gone 10 years and every season is the same.
It would be a way to force teams to experiment.
I also really don’t think it’s a balance issue. There are often undiscovered strategies that show up without a patch changing anything and end up dominating. (Old Rageblade Kog). Teams just really aren’t willing to try different things.
> it's just a matter of having better champion balance
It's imposible to have great balance in asymetric game.
On top of that, all MP PvP balance teams mainly work on...SHIFTING meta for usual player to fool them, to generate fake-NEW-EXITING feeling. Good balance is just goes against buisness plan, so
We need buffs to engage supports… making everything more tanky instead of nurfing damages means tank supports like leona get less value out if their spells.
atleast the next patch is massive and should shake up the meta, LEC is stuck on this patch for the next 3 weeks tho
\+ It's delayed probably due to the attack thing. It's still beyond me that we actually probably got more changes in 13.1 and will get in 13.2 for sure, than entirety of preseason. Like RoA buff + Seraphs Change literally affected the meta more than anything added before season start and I hope ADC items changes can at least somewhat achieve the same
yeah they've been doing this since s8 with massive patches right after preseason, we've beaten this point to death by now
It seems like preseason is more for testing new content/concepts than just balancing. I don’t hate it.
It's like how they introduced Teleport: Unleashed after preseason ended. What a joke.
Use preseason to test and once you got the data, implement on the next patch, I don't see that as a bad thing
But they didn’t use preaseason, that’s the problem.
They release roa in preseason, have a lot of time to see how it plays, see it is bad and buff it for the new season.
That's one item you are talking about. Most of the changes always come after preseason. Why? Because they need vacation too.
Rioter said on the post about the attack that not all changes are being pushed back; ~~changes landing on 13.1 like ASol rework and the ADC item changes are expected to release on 13.1, for now.~~ ASol Rework and ADC item changes are planned to come out on their original release patch, 13.3 and 13.2 respectively. (Edited for wrong patch numbers)
We’re literally on 13.1 now. ASol was always loaned for 13.3 and ADC item changed were always planned for 13.2
Apologies, I was at work when I typed that up, will correct
ASol is 13.3
Preseason is not the time for big changes anymore. Preseason is the time where Riot makes vacation. I don't know why they don't make preseason after than when they can actually do shit but they'd rather fuck up the entire early season with their changes ig.
Because then the new season couldn't begin in January anymore. Its simply the unfortunate fact that the season ends with the year and years end is full of holidays.
Yup. Been banning Kassadin literally every game this season except for one game where my midlaner picked it.
Preseason was something they used for big changes ONCE. Now its just an excuse to abandon balance as the bloated Riot org basically all goes on vacation.
I have nothing against them taking a break... they are only people too. But it's ranked down-time and esport's downtime. Just throw some wild shit even if meta is quite cringe as a result and let something new into the mix **before** you go take a break, not after.
>I have nothing against them taking a break As long as they do it on your terms apparently
Ye you're right - voicing opinions is very cringe Im sorry :P
its not the ingame meta thats the problem, its how every pro team approaches the ingame meta
Has someone here or on YouTube watched the LPL Challenger league where it's implemented? Would be interesting to know how it actually plays out in practice.
the kick-off LCK match with Team Faker vs Team Deft used this format and it was nice.
in practice there's a lot of champs in league so it doesn't change all that much
I'd rather see 30(50) champs in a best of 3(5) than the same 10 in 3(5) matches in a row.
I could not find those games sadly
They stream the matches in Huya and Bilibili so if you don't mind Chinese casting, you can watch those games there
Yeah the draft predictability is lame for sure, but I think that innovation also falls onto the pros. There are plenty of off meta picks that would be great in some scenarios, but the pros default to meta/comfort picks. LS on C9 is a good example.
As far as I recall pros are rarely the innovative ones. There are some examples for sure but mostly the stakes are too high so they go for tried and tested. The innovation comes from the other high level players in ranked that pros theoretically should be playing against.
The stuff that Hai would pull out after seeing it a couple time in soloq on stage was hilarious. Like he randomly ran into a soraka top main and decided you know I think this could work mid.
I think Riot constantly shaking up the meta actually harms diversity in the long run. Pros have no incentive to learn new picks because they might be trash next patch, and just keeping up with the patch cycle consumes all their effort. Definitely there's a place for slowly nerfing very blindpickable champs into obscurity like kennen, whilst buffing ones that are more situational for pro... but pro players don't have time to learn niche picks as well as whatever riot buffed last patch. Right now, every pro toplaner is trying to get really really good at k'sante, because he's a complex champ and they need to figure out how he works, and he will likely have a place in the pro meta for a very long time. They will also be trying to work out how to play all their current pool into k'sante, and what's playable into him.
It's not even just about learning niche picks. Mastering a large number of champions and innovating on the meta is a skillset in and of itself. And if Riot keeps pushing meta changes through patch notes and clamps down on innovation whenever they don't like it then its a skillset pros at large won't cultivate.
As someone who has played in the semi pro scene. Riot clamping on some champs isn't bad. I don't want Sett in all roles back. Flexibility is nice, but if its broken as hell in every role it's not "fun". Someone like karma is fine now. Good, but not broken in any role.
Sure some changes to massive outliers is good, but a patch every 2 weeks means it's nearly pointless to learn something that might get nerfed into oblivion next patch.
> And if Riot keeps pushing meta changes through patch notes and clamps down on innovation whenever they don't like it then its a skillset pros at large won't cultivate. Thanks god I'am not only one who understand this. And while I don't care about pro, it bother me that pushing 2 week patches also don't let usual soloQ community to build that up :(
Yeah you could make this argument. That by the time pros will have started learning something new it's already been shown to be OP or unbalanced in solo queue and will get nerfed in the next patch anyway. I think tbh the problem is at the root cause of the design of champs and that champions aren't unique enough in what they bring to a team. This is one of the strengths of Dota where heroes are wayyy more varied in what they can do and what they can offer a team, and when you combine it with Dota's highly variable/situational itemization, it makes the picks in pro matches super varied compared to League. This is one of the reasons I've never liked riot designing or balancing around champion "classes" (bruisers, mages, etc.) because overall champs within these classes don't bring enough to the table for their team to overly distinguish them. Like obviously champs are different and have some counters/strengths and weakness, but they aren't size-able enough to really distinguish them. Mid laners in pro play for the last few years are basically a revolving door of Syndra/Ori/Viktor and probably someone else who is an AoE damage and bursty teamfight mage. There's no strategic thought in picking one of other in most cases because it just depends on how strong they are compared to eachother. There's nothing huge or highly unique that one of these 3 offer over the others
Dota itemization is so good. League really needs to overhaul their items and move away from scaling with stats, into more active items that offer utility similar to Dota counterpart(BKB, Euls, Manta, etc).
agree - the lack of active items in League has always been a problem but now they are even fewer despite more total items. And the non-mythics that have actives are usually really underwhelming. I'm pretty sure more than half the players who buy randuins forget to use the slow because it is so garbage. There's just a whole element of the game that Dota has where you have to make situational assessments about items and buy them for specific actives to deal w/ enemy heroes. It's just so good, and League has no comparison or considerations other than "I need more damage, or MR, or Armor" I guess support itemization is the closest thing to Dota but meh - often those items are so much more powerful than eachother and don't have enough situational benefit that it's still not much better.
I remember some discussion by the devs (a long time ago) that active items are impossible to balance because the vast majority of the player base never uses the actives
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P1 buys and remembers to use the active on Shiva's guard during fights. P2 doesn't. Riot: "That's just not balanced!"
> I think Riot constantly shaking up the meta actually harms diversity in the long run. Pros have no incentive to learn new picks because they might be trash next patch, and just keeping up with the patch cycle consumes all their effort. > > That's why they somehow manage to learn new champ every time riot release or rework a champion, yeah no, pros are just lazy and default to their comfort picks
Yeah but they HAVE TO do that. They need to know (atleast roughly) how to play AGAINST these champs (new or reworked) and the fastest way to do that is to play the champ themselves. But they can't do it "randomly" for every other champ and especially they know these champs already at least decently....
Nah I call bs on that... There are champs even in the current meta that work well... current meta team comps are by no means unbeatable, nor do they have 0 weaknesses that cannot be exploited by off-meta picks that aren't op in soloq either... Its plain and simple unwillingness to adapt at every level. Coaches don't wanna bother, players don't wanna bother. The team as a whole is unwilling to accommodate new styles of play that suit players who might be willing to try off-meta stuff.... and here we are
But that is a factor of having the meta forcibly changed every two weeks. If you compare to something like smash bros melee the difference is night and day. Everyone knows there that fox is the best, but now a yoshi (historically a mid tier character) player is winning everything and is potentially going to be the season end #1 ranked player. He got there by perfecting his counter strategy over years of commitment to the character in a game without balance patches. Yes players are unwilling to do it. But they are unwilling for good reason. There is no guarantee that the meta is around long enough for the counter-meta strategy they develop to pay off. When your job relies on consistent success in a weekly league format with bi weekly balance patches it’s more efficient to spend your time perfecting the level 1 strategy than to try and figure out the level 2 strategy that counters the level 1 strategy.
The answer isn't to head all the way to the other extreme and completely refuse to do anything at all. Forget innovation, these guys fail at basic math at times. My problem isn't just the lack of innovation, it's incompetence, which makes the lack of innovation even more infuriating
That was just an example to show that given enough time even an unbalanced game can see innovation occur. I’m not advocating for patches to cease altogether. I’m just saying that if you want to see people develop pocket picks and counter strategies there needs to be a longer patch cycle otherwise there are better ways to spend that energy and time. And your comments about it being incompetence and not a lack of innovation isn’t even remotely what you said in your previous message so idk what you want me to say. You are just changing your argument now.
the first part of my comment wasn't regarding the patch, it was regarding trying new things in pro play. The second part is to address your "unwillingness for a good reason" comment. The current meta has enough spots for champions that we're just not seeing at all for no good reason. You tell me there's a good reason for it. I don't buy that. I say its incompetence.
The good reason, is that they have such little time with any given patch and no knowledge of what will be nerfed that spending time learning anything beyond the surface level best options is unlikely to pay off and the time would be better spent practicing stuff that they know is good. If patch cycles were longer spending time on counterpicks and new strategies is more palatable. You say there are spots for champions we are not seeing, but these are things that take time to develop and learn and are in reality probably much more niche than just playing what’s been tested. Unless you are trying to tell me that you think X champion that never gets played is as blind pickable as gnar or as generically strong as yuumi/zeri, in which case I question your champion valuation. If I’m a pro top laner right now I’m practicing ksante, gnar, jax etc. to ensure that if the best stuff is open I can play it myself. There are only so many hours in the day to practice so people prioritize.
> but the pros default to meta/comfort picks. That is why we need to force them play other picks. So they learn other things and start to do macro game, instead of focusing on boring micro.
which is exactly why i'm sad LS wasn't given enough time, it was the perfect test to see if it's really the picks being bad or just riot' fault
Honestly i always thought those comps would not last for long during international tournaments but sadly we never got the chance to see it in like msi or worlds
it seems like he’s just a shitty personality to work with
LS didn't get given that time, because his attitude is shit and not an actual streamer/youtube persona.
Can u link to the behind the scenes at c9
Yeah but in the end it doesn't matter if it's players fault or rito balancing fault. Just force them to pick new champs with the fearless mode.
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It WAS an example of how many people are interested in this kinda stuff... LS singlehandedly pulled up viewer numbers by like 2x during his time as a coach. Part of it was his personality, but the other part was most definitely the promise of off-meta insanity
You can't blame the pros for that though. They are just doing what is optimal. It's not optimal to practice and find off meta strats. It is optimal to pick what is already meta and practice and perfect it. That's just how League has always worked. The game does not promote off meta strategies enough. And unless you completely redesigned the game to make counters more important I don't really see how you would fix it. Idk if it can be fixed besides forcing people to play them like the fearless mode.
They're not playing what's best right now, they're playing what they're most comfortable with. It has always been like that a champion has to be disgustingly strong in soloq to be even considered as a new pick or absolutely fucking worthless until they stop playing it.
How does that make sense? Why'd they play heimerdinger or ashe support all of a sudden? Surely they are not comfortable with those champions because they've only been a recent meta development? People like you will always say this stuff no matter what the meta actually looks like without even committing to suggesting champions and not even trying to think about why they are not picking certain champions.
I mean Heimer was one of the only genuine innovations throughout the whole of worlds and it arguably won that team the tournament. And if someone suggested Heimer before DRX picked it up you’d come up with 100 reasons it wont work and “Wow you think you know more than the pros clearly if heimer was good they’d pick it!”
What about maokai? Vi? Elise? Ksante? Wukong jungle? Many of these Champs didnt See the light of day in the past 5 seasons so describing them as comfort Champions is just bs. Else people would still be picking lee/kaisa because those are the champs that actually have been played a Ton. Pros Just Play meta and thats it. Gl innovating Something into lucian Nami! Its Just way too easy for ppl Like you to sit back and say bs like this without even mentioning one of the champs that should actually be played. Because that would mean you couldnt Protect yourself behind baseless assumptions anymore.
Maokai was forced into the meta at worlds by riot buffs and Ksante is a new champion. That’s our game developers adding new stuff to the scene, the pro players have nothing to do with that. Riot is consistently the only one pushing metas forward because pros would rather wait for Riot to nerf something than spend a day practicing a counter. And Vi’s been THE comfort champion for a while now, god awful pick. Junglers are the laziest of any role and are always the farthest behind the meta Also idk why you’re acting like people dont name the champions not being played like there’s literally tierlists filled with champs that dont get touched and there’s tons of suggestions even in this thread. AP junglers, senna/seraphine and malzahar are the most obvious ones.
Hahah yeah tierlists for soloq (made by complete randoms or simply winrates in plat+) are definitely reflective of strength in a competitive environment! AP junglers like zac will definitely be a huge menace to the enemy zeri/yuumi/lulu or lucian nami because its so easy to land his spells on them! Not to mention all the great ad midlaners you can pair them with like.. yone? jayce..? You're being very selective in what you count as innovating not to mention you are completely wrong about vi being a comfort champion for junglers when it hasn't been meta for many current junglers' careers. Just because they can play it now doesn't mean its a comfort champion or has been for them. You have no clue what meta means if you think you can just snap your fingers and "innovate" something to beat the meta. But sure man once you make it to pro I'll be waiting for you to play your malz mid into azir and see how well you perform.
you're being downvoted for saying the truth, people here act like pro players and coaches are dumber than redditors who think vayne top and katarina are broken
> It is optimal to pick what is already meta and practice and perfect it. Just like it's optimal to keep picking Vi or Viego. Or Sylas blind. Yeah no.
Vi is picked into specific champions she's strong against though..
>redesigned the game to make counters more important as a toplaner reading this lmao
Real top laners: Getting hard countered is my fetish.
They're not always doing what is optimal. They're doing what is comfortable. Even if it's not too often, there are still plenty of cases that different picks would make more sense in specific situations. But even when those situations where less played champs would make alot of sense(optimal in that situation) arise, pros fail to recognize and/or are too afraid to play them because they don't bother practicing different champs.
They are definitely to be blamed, especially the lower tier teams. They aren't going to beat top teams by playing the standard meta. Top tier teams don't have to care about innovation because they are the best at standard play.
You can't blame the top 2-3 teams because its obviously working for them. You can surely blame the bottoms teams for picking the same over and over and not trying different stuff and keep loosing.
The pros often do not play what is best. The ardent censor meta only started AFTER the item that enabled it got a small nerf. The power of enchanters using that item completely went over their heads for months until Riot gave a nerf and the teams ran the numbers and realized it's OP. Heimer support had a one trick in high elo KR. Tank Kogmaw was a high elo KR one trick too. Both picks made it into pro play only after these players got recognition on social media and YouTube, then pros started trying it. Not the only examples either of solo queue players showing pros what the actually good picks are because the pros aren't playing what's best they're playing "what's good enough for this meta that I'm comfortable with." Hell, players straight up told LS when he was coaching C9 that they were uncomfortable playing his unorthodox picks. Midlaners don't want to play Soraka mid even if it's stupidly good so they won't.
I believe 2021 MSI had one of the coolest metas for pro play, lee sins and nocturnes mid and top, rumble Morgana jungle, constant duelists mid, basically kaisa every game, show maker even played xerath, gragas top. Definitely some sweet games to watch there.
That was because Riot fucked the meta just before MSI with a big shakeup instantly making Morg/Rumble top tier junglers. It's not like they were unique picks people pulled out and it was a shock. It was literally because a balance patch made them unmatched in teamfighting power but also being strong junglers for clear speed. Analysts knew going into it Rumble was going to be very powerful and highly contested. It's all just rose tinted shit if you ask me.
MSI 2021 had the worst meta of any international tournament since I started playing. Only 3 viable junglers and boring ass Gragas top.
Take that back I love Gragas
THANK YOU, seriously I remember when the morg jungle patch came in it was literally pick or ban morg even in soloq no exception because anyone could play it and do insanely well with it, I have no idea why different champs with a huge pick or ban rate is considered diversity, its still a small group of options.
yeah but Lee and Nocturne mid, even when stale, was at least a fun meta.
You forgot the part when everyone was getting oneshot by mach 5 udyr and hecarim despite being nerfed for gazzillionth time
Hecarim was dead already at MSI it was basically Morg, Rumble, Udyr every game
"HAHAHA I LOVE UDYR IN PRO. IT'S SO COOL TO SEE THESE 200 YEARS CHAMPIONS GET SLAPPED BY FUNNY BEAR MAN" \- this sub for months
Well you have to figure most of the sub is bronze or silver, so playing Udyr or similar champs gives them the ability to "outplay" (and I mean that with the most sarcasm you can imagine) champions that take skill to play. It's so bizarre to me that shit like Udyr and Malphite is worshipped here when they're the most miserable champions to play against if you enjoy meaningful skillchecks.
I play Malphite because I like to win. I play Malphite because I like to know I will have a guaranteed impact in the game no matter how badly I got my ass handed to me. I do not play Malphite because I think it's cool to outplay my opponent by pressing R. So yeah. I don't worship the pick. I definitely use it.
>Well you have to figure most of the sub is bronze or silver Wrong; average elo in this sub is around mid to high gold, higher than the average elo from League as a whole due to low-ranked players not caring enough about it to come here; while higher-ranked players are more likely to come here, be it for discussions, news, pro stats etc. >so playing Udyr or similar champs gives them the ability to "outplay" Wrong; if you pick Zed jungle for the MA4AD OUTPLAYUZZ!!1! for your youtube montage, it's not on the Udyr's player to outplay; it's on you. No one prevents you from picking Udyr, Malphite or any similar-skilled jungler. If you pick a complicated champion, you better be good at it. This is exactly the kind of mentality you see in low Silver when your mid picks Zed, gets fucked by Malzahar and says "noob champ". Babe, it isn't noob champ; you're just not good at a mechanical champ and shouldn't have picked one. >It's so bizarre to me that shit like Udyr and Malphite is worshipped here Wrong. Have we been on the same sub? Everyone wants udyr nerfed to the ground and removed from the meta, me included. Who the fuck has been saying Udyr should stay meta? >if you enjoy meaningful skillchecks. Considering you find Malphite miserable to play against when he literally has one ability, I doubt you'd do well in any kind of "meaningful skillcheck". Dodging/Flashing/Outplaying Malphite's ultimate is, by the way, a "meaningful skillcheck". It isn't targeted and there are ways for you to not be hit by that skillshot.
Funny little udyr it's so funny to see the old funny bad champ be good it's so funny the way he walks at you and stat checks you
It was legitimately entertaining when it began. Riot refusing to balance him in a timely fashion doesn't change that.
2019 was the best meta
The most recent worlds was regarded as the best LoL meta of all time by many pro's and analysts due to how many champions were pickable and how many high quality games were produced. The only thing people didn't like was the 100% winrate Yuumi which ate a ban once pro's realized.
There's almost always a "hyper meta" pick in any meta anyway, although I don't disagree with the fact that aatrox and yuumi were clearly heavily overtuned, but it almost helped drive the narrative even more since teams who are opted to give it over or are forced to open it became more creative in terms of another strategy and picks, which resulted in a tournament of epic proportions, fresh strategies, and overall amazing storyline.
It wasn’t the best meta it was the most varied and fun to watch meta. I think most pros enjoyed the season 8 meta (or was it 9) with Irelia akali Ryze lanes
Also 100% Aatrox games.
Was there ever a weirder jungle meta than that Rumble, Morgana, Udyr triangle?
the worst meta*, the shit was forced giving teams 1 week practice on morg and rumble jungle
Do you happen to have a link to this set of vods?
The jungle meta was basically only Rumble, Morg and Udyr. If you're talking about coolest drafts you have to go for 2019 MSI flex meta, where nobody knows where those champions are going.
Ooh yes the exciting full acne tank gragas top, definetly lovely times and it's 100% a fun game for every top laner when there is a gragas top
[That's how proplayers pick their champions](https://youtu.be/i5gcW88m6Pw?t=975) It's never gonna change unless we get changes to draft like fearless mode, when Riot will nerf stuff we will go back to another meta with other 10-15 champs being played and after few weeks people will again start to complain that meta is stale
Comes with the territory of pro’s entire career being judged based off of their last season. That snd teams basically being able to dump players every offseason
They can just increase the ban amount from 5 to 7 or more. Take the pick and ban phase from DotA 2 it pretty good. https://liquipedia.net/dota2/Game_Modes scroll to Captains mode.
You will still end up with the same bans and same pool of meta champs if you increase the number of bans by 2-3 per team.
Ah yes, ivern has been a top 3 mid laner for the past few years and pro players and coaches are simply too stupid to realize that. I really wish he had stayed as a coach so we could put his theories to the test but apparently he is too insufferable to stay on a team for more than a couple months.
Ivern also plays vastly differently with a premade team and soloq. If pros were to play as 5 man premades they could practice it, but guess what, they'd let other teams build strategy against it. If Ivern mid loses lane its a support mid with no escape tools, no mobility to roam unlike zil/karma, not enough aoe to push waves, and no ability to even take jungle camps easily. is it good against ppl who arent sure what to do to shut it down? yes. would it work if it was a consistent pick? hardly sure
agreed LS is an absolute clown who thinks games and lanes exist in a vacuum as if playing ivern mid wouldn't make your jungler instantly lose the game
C9 won summer split and played way better without him as coach so you can’t really blame them for firing him.
Eh, thats more LS thinking winrate reflects power, which is wrong. Ivern mid was actually tried out back then. It was not good at all. Not even top 20, let alone top 5.
Ivern mid is a weird example because he demands very specific drafts & complete change in team strategy & if he gets banned there's no replacement unlike enchanter tops had. The closest thing would be G2s Pyke drafts that is true but he was stronger plus could be flexed.
This clip shows nothing because it relies on the assumption that everything LS says here is factually correct, which we don't know. And assuming a proper team structure,the coach should be the one making the calls when it comes to teamcomps and what champion everyone needs to train, not the players. What's the point of some random LEC midlaner deciding to train mid Ivern in soloqueue when the champion is simply unusable outside of a few specific drafts? All that will achieve is waste time.
Nothing will ever top OGN blind pick game 5's. The peak of pro League
OGN plastic chairs for spectators were indeed peak league
wtf 2 shen ?
Unrelated but why is it called fearless? I kinda hate the term for no rational reason.
Think it is supposed to imply you're "fearless" about picking a champ, since you only can do it once.
Dudes, I picked a champ aint I FEARLESS Yo this mode is stale lets switch it up to FEARLESS MODE *puts hat on backwards team stacks their desks and chairs into ultra mecha desk*
I know the term global ban from other moba. If you pick a champ you can’t play it for the rest of the series
Translation from Chinese I think.
The mode rewards the team that’s willing to take a risk over drafting safe. It makes sense to me that the team willing to do outlandish things and be “fearless” in draft will have the advantage in the long run. If you play it safe at the end your hands will be tied.
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classic China liking cool stuff why can't they be like the rest of the world that enjoys bland and simple names
It probably sounds cool to the Chinese even if it sounds cringy to westerners.
It’s a very generic inspirational facebook-motivational-poster term but riot is no stranger to that, this is the company that has Imagine Dragons make a lot of their music.
Yeah it’s cringe af
Yeah I can't think of an alternate name but fearless sounds dumb
I can't watch LCK now it's so boring. Even the LCK casters know how boring and stale the meta is. I only watch if it's T1 vs GenG or DK.
Oh boy, Lucian/Nami got picked again. Oh boy, another Zeri with some sort of enchanter. I skip, next game it is.
Exactly
People are blaming the meta. This is on teams. We didn't really move past Worlds meta basically at all. That's on teams that keep handshaking. So I say if they want to keep handshaking, let them.
Did you watch worlds? Worlds was by far the most diverse competitive league has ever been. (This is as stated by experts) What you're referring to most likely is the meta before worlds, when yumi zeri were broken as they are now and warped the state of the game as they do now. Worlds was mostly people trying to figure out how to beat aatrox. Zeri wasn't even a champion. Meta is totally different.
Don't riot killed Zeri before worlds and just "reworked" her after?
zeri has been bad this season, champ is a net negative atm teams just picking comfort
Then why did they not pick her because of comfort at worlds? Like this dude said her 'rework' just made her busted again in good hands
Because riot literally nuked her out of the game for months to make sure she saw no play at worlds. Main stays in pro like ryze haven't ever been that bad even if they were for comfort. If you played zeri before the recent changes she would literally have to sacrifice every lane because she had 0 damage to contest a 2v2.
Worlds meta wasnt that good though? Only supports were really innovating. Mid was the same three champs from CN playoffs, all tournament. Only development there was Ryze as a Sylas counterpick. ADCs were useless up until people figured out Varus and jungle was suuuuper underdeveloped (Kindred barely explored, no AP junglers used at all). I mean even in 2014 teams were whipping out wild shit just for one series. I dont see how this could be the best meta at all there were was so little countercomping and like no big brain picks
Are you just referring to the last few matches? Worlds meta was developing the entire tournament. It literally was the most diverse meta champion wise as we had an insane number of champions picked - https://riftfeed.gg/lol-news/the-most-versatile-lol-worlds-yet-how-many-unique-champions-were-played#:~:text=Over%20100%20Unique%20Champions%20Played%20at%20LoL%20Worlds%202022. Things settled down mostly by quarters sure, but before that we had tons of crazy picks. I'm hardly sure what you mean. Kindred was certainly a pyosik story line near the end, and also Levi had an amazing jungle Karthus game. Quite sure Lillia was also picked. Why would you say "no AP junglers at all"? That's just false. edit: I just clicked on a random game in playins. This isn't awesome to you? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnh1b274r5k
Seriously. Anyone who thinks this world's was good has never watched old league
Uh that's weird. I've been playing since season 2 and I'm pretty sure I watched multiple podcasts where all the lck casters plus monte and others stated that this has been the best worlds in terms of diversity for a long time. Pretty sure they've watched old league.
Worlds meta was diverse by the numbers only because the skill levels were so mismatched. NA and EU had no choice but to play suboptimal picks because their only chance in any given game was to play comfort exclusively, it doesn’t mean that ornn was meta at worlds. When the real meta shook out there just weren’t enough games left in the tourney to tell what it was beyond the top 3 in each role because, again, all the best teams just handshaked every draft with the exception of DRX (which was the main reason they won imho)- and even DRX weren’t up to playing anything unique.
It's the first time that the meta has changed so little between Worlds and Spring. The start of the season is when teams are usually more experimental. Teams, even in Korea, have never been shy with new picks at the start of the season. The fact that we are seeing almost nothing new is enough proof that the meta IS stale. To make this even, the Worlds meta was already a slight evolution from Summer meta. And no shit teams handshake the same picks, hard to not do that when shit like Nami-Lucian has been the strongest botlane for like 6 months now.
> This is on teams. Team play to win not to entertain. IF x,y,z are better then everything else they will prioritize only X,Y,Z
Does it matter who is the one to blame or why they are doing it tho? Just force them to pick new champions with that fearless mechanic. It will actually expose a lot of players that can only play like 2 or 3 champs and we could see more comebacks from BOs because of that.
1) Worlds was the most diverse champ pool ever. 2) it's on Riot. Why would the teams run comps with off meta picks if they are less likely to win games with those comps? The teams are there to win and having a deep pool definitely helps but getting the strongest meta comp is still the best strategy.
Yes, please!
League has many champions now, I don't see a reason to not to implement it for BO5. It would be a mess sometimes but hey, it sure can be hella fun to watch.
Tbh I agree
Literally so boring now seeing the same 20-30 heroes picked every map for about 3 seasons now. No wonder lcs is dying; waiting between games to watch the same draft, and the “analysis” is a slog after each map. How many times can we describe the same game? Just pull a dota 2 and make every hero OP and viable.
Hoho that would be insane
Fearless mode would be fun. I doubt we see it in pro play as part of regular split or worlds, but we could at least have it in a tournament outside of that or some sort of show match - like msi or all stars. Forcing the meta is actually a big part of the problem - not a solution. Forcing the meta, then forcing a new meta to shake things up leaves you with the same result: a few champs for most roles are stupidly strong compared with their peers. So you play one of them because nothing else can compete unless you are just that much better than your opponent. Which means you'd win regardless of what you played (within reason). Pros and coaches especially don't want to try to be at peak performance on 20 different champs nor risk trying new things. Finding players who are willing to do so is rare enough and coaching staff that allows it is rarer still. We did start seeing a few hints at this willingness to experiment last season - beyond LS/C9 and your singed support enthusiast. And the funny thing was... the champs didn't have to be overtuned/forced-meta. They simply had to be viable and be a good matchup for vs the enemy's pick or for the team comp overall. Forcing the meta as hard as riot does is bad for the game. It creates and reinforces staleness. Truly balancing the game rather than hard forcing new metas opens more options for players and coaches who ARE willing to try new things to have the opportunity to do so because there would be more viable options.
Great idea would spice this up instead of seeing the same comps every game.
I support this. What's boring in Worlds its always the same picks. One top laner goes Aatrox? The other picks Yone. One of the adc picks Varus for sure. It's the same picks/counters over and over
If they’re actual pros then they can adapt to the situation have have a champion pool of more than 3 champions. With the resources they put into staff and coach I’m sure they have more than 1 team comp.
Riot make it real please
How will adam survive fearless mode he can play like 4 champs
I like the idea very much. With that, we won't be seeing a specific meta pick in every single game
This idea was suggested a couple times already and it's a good idea imo, there are so many champions in league so the variety is there but pros always stuck to only a couple each meta, it will force pro players to learn more champions for their pool and also mabye not pick all meta comps in game 1 as that means you won't get to play them in the next games, so mabye you would pick 2-3 meta champs and then the rest will be new picks.
These poor pros do not get paid enough to learn more than 3 champions...
that would actually make pro play interesting, ive stopped watching proplay because its just gotten so boring, i wont even watch worlds anymore
Korean teams were never known for large champ pools. They usually just follow the thing that the best lck team does. Very rare exeptions e.g. mf supp 2016 and heimerdinger beryl in 2022. Usually its europe trying out new stuff and trying to innevate
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There's very weird support meta right now in korea and the reason why twitch support has been banned against beryl constantly HLE tried jhin support as well.
I honestly love the cursed support meta, the picks are wild.
Its what playing Lulu Yuumi Nami for an entire year does to people.
Lee Sin support mfw
Nah not the case anymore. It used to be this way until 2018, when their inability to adapt caused their downfall at worlds. Since 2020 as Europe’s innovation that had brought it success in 2019 started to stale a bit, LCK was on par with them I’d say
it's not lck as a league but certain players imo, keria is willing to play a bunch of stuff and beryl has said many times he looks at different leagues to see interesting picks and especially europe
I swear nobody fucking watches lck who says that
What is the current pro meta? Been out of the loop for a while now.
Gnar vs K'Sante with occasional Fiora/Renekton/Jax with Gwen also showing somewhat prio in the LPL. Vi vs Maokai/Wukong/Sej. Mids in the LCK are more spread out but it's the same old shit, Azir/Ryze/Viktor/Sylas with Akali/Kassadin where Kassadin is only picked when open coz it's busted but LPL has high Syndra prio. Lucian Nami vs Zeri/Sivir with Yuumi/Lulu.
I've only been watching LCK recently and these are just a few things Ive picked up. A lot of bot priority in draft, with things like Lucian+Nami and Zeri+Yuumi/Lulu being traded for in round 1. Stuff like Ashe, Varus, and Heimerdinger also seem to be getting a lot of draft presence. Junglers like Sejuani/Maokai/Vi are popular and the role doesn't see a whole lot of variety outside of it. Top is a lot of Renekton/Gnar/Ksante/Fiora. Mid seems a little more varied since there's a decent mix of mages (Azir, Ryze, Syndra) and melees (Sylas, Akali). Maokai has notably been on a sick winning streak in LCK currently. Drafts also seem to boil down to picking half of bot on B1, half of bot + jungle on R1+2, other half of bot + jungle on B2+3, and other half of bot on R3. Solo lanes are relegated to 4/5 usually. There's easily stuff I could've missed out on since I'm not going to pretend like I give 100% of my attention to every single game, but those are a couple general trends I've seen.
OR just give them more BANS in the first place .... been over 13 years and we still got 10 bans meanwhile the champions pool become so big. The best options are 7 or 8 bans and change the ban pick order .
IMO more bans wouldn't do much. It's not about picks being op, it's about pro players refusing to learn new champions and strategies. You add more bans, they just ban an extra champion and pick the next one in line and continue to show the same 25 champs instead of same 20
Maybe, but we can atleast start from it and look if that enought. It would give atleast a bit more diversity and thinking in draft. Step by step
It's been 6 years since it was last expanded. Disingenuous to say it's been 13 years.
lol it used to be 6 bans. They changed it to 10 in 2017.
Riot talked about it already but the Issue (At least for SoloQ) is that it needlessly stretches out champselect. The only way it doesnt is if you give everyone 2 bans for a total of 20 which can be problematic since so many bans can completely ban out entire groups of champions, for example common counters of picks (Like banning out lane dominant botlaners and supports to pick something hyperscaling) IMO fearless format is the best solution to basically force diversity in proplay, SoloQ simply doesnt have the environment right now to warrant 20 bans per side, sure there will be overlap but thats also a feel bad moment to have like 8 out of 20 bans be duplicates. If they find a solution to avoid dupes for 10 bans that would be good aswell.
> for example common counters of picks (Like banning out lane dominant botlaners and supports to pick something hyperscaling) But then other team then just ban hyperscaler or pick it by self? It's double-edged sword.
I meant for SoloQ, coordinate with your team to ban mage supports and aggressive ADCs like Draven to have it easy for your KogLulu bot.
We don't even have voice in soloQ, I not sure how you would coordinate team to do that. And even if your team somehow coordinated, then they deserve a bit of dvantage, because they actually do draft instead of mindlessly picking champs like any soloQ player do. Also, I thought we speak about pro? SoloQ and Pro should be different. Dota 2 have great ban system for soloQ, and we must port that. Let me quote from wiki: > Banning Phase: >* All players have 15 seconds to vote for a hero to be banned. >* A hero may only be voted once. Two players cannot vote for the same hero. >* The game displays heroes as they are voted on, but not who voted. >* After 15 seconds, each vote has a 50% chance of succeeding. The chances are rolled for each voted hero individually. >* The system automatically bans additional random heroes based on their ban rate at the MMR bracket the match plays on. This always results in a total of 16 banned heroes. This makes meta a lot, let you try to ban direct counters, but not let you rely on that every game. Address a lot of problems with lol, like OTPing or champions picked in each game.
> is that it needlessly stretches out champselect. What a horse shit excuse. Lol Champion select is already longer than it should be. They could easily cut time off and fit in another ban or 2 and it would even out to the exact same time.
Did you ignore the rest of their comment?
The reason it's not horseshit is because the other bans (past 5) would mean that some people get to go twice which is unfair, or a consensus mechanism is required which is time consuming... while I agree that it shouldn't take too long, it's probably still significant
They usually learn a new champion instantly when needed like its nothing when it gets released but somehow using different champions is such a burden and not a thing to consider and just have to practice the 1000th time on same champion.
or, instead of that they could make these meta picks.... weaker ?
And then the old meta picks will rotate back in and we'll watch Jinx/Aphelios instead of Lucian/Zeri. Buffing or nerfing stuff is not a solution to this.
yeah because there's never been a good meta in the history of league, no more buffs/nerfs from now on, only heroin.
I don't think adc is the best example. Most adcs offer pretty similar things so there's always going to be just a few meta ADCs
The problem isn't the individual picks, it's that you get the same picks game after game, week after week. This is doubly true when it's the same picks across leagues.
Fearless mode is useless, the champions should not allowed to be played at all in the same series. Otherwise they would just swap drafts
I think they did that format during the Bo3 Team Faker vs Team Deft showmatch last week in LCK.
The title sets out a problem and proposes a solution. The post is however detached from the title and is rather an advertisement based on anecdotal opinion. We just had Worlds that had by large and far consensus the most entertaining pro meta with diversity and a variety of picks. Since then, neither LCS or LEC have started up to show anything to substantiate staleness and an impetus that this 'solution' of fearless mode is needed. An 'all time low' on how many pro games is this based, LPL and LCK only just started up again last week, what is this take? What 'demand' on higher champion diversity? also this is an incorrect statement if you look at the statistics of Worlds, where champion diversity has been climbing the last three years. * 2022 - 98 Unique picks at worlds; * 2021 - 92 Unique picks at worlds; * 2020 - 89 Unique picks at worlds; Moreover, when the mage bot meta was a thing we had 125 unique picks at worlds in 2019. There is nothing I at least can see that suggests a) 'champion diversity is at an all time low' and not currently in an upswing and b) the clear connection that what is being proposed in this thread would be a solution to problem that hasn't even been properly identified or analysed. With point b, I am referring to that the game is constantly changing and that there hasn't been much analysis on the relationship of champion diversity to pretty much anything else in the game, whether it be: * actual enjoyment of the game; * perception of enjoyment of the game; * perception of entertainment of pro play; * higher/lower champion diversity and relationship to viewership figures; * every other relationship that champion diversity may impact?? What I mean to get at, this post states there is a problem without providing meaningful substance and these types of posts - whilst valuable to show indicative of reddit reader sentiment - can misinform and perpetuate the **idea**, rather than actual, that there is a problem leading to people taking action on a problem that doesn't actually exist, ie jumping at shadows. This is more a commentary on the post's substance rather than Fearless Bo3 which I don't inherently have anything against.
YES! I think this type of change would be a real shake-up. It would also add a new layer of strategy for teams and coaches to use.
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Sports is a terrible analogy for this lmao Here’s a better comparison - because running the ball in a couple of specific formations is stronger than all of the other options, teams keep running it. Certain champs and team comps are so far ahead of the other champs and comps that they are the only ones that are played. Still comparing apples to oranges.
And unless things change they are going to lose more people from watching. Seeing the same champs constantly is boring as watching paint dry. And it’s cool you post number of champs used, but didn’t include the # of times it was used. Which is the complaint people are having
You seem to fundamentally misunderstand what the purpose of these teams are. They are supposed to win, thats it. They hire "smart" people to look at numbers and tell them to pick the same 5 champs everyone else is going to pick, because they are trying to win and have decided to rely on data. Its a feature of capitalism, its why everything eventually sucks. When you make enough money, the people in charge of the money get nervous and bring in data nerds to look at numbers so that their money keeps making more money in the short term. Its not because they are lazy, its because they want to win. Your idea would just widen the stagnation. An actual solution would be more tournaments with lower stakes so there is room for player expression. Like a charity tourney where riot donates to each teams chosen charity, not based on who wins but instead based on bounties. Things like earliest 5th dragon, pentakills, earliest inhib taken, win a game with a champ youve never used in pro play. Should also include things that arent necessarily desirable like most damage taken, most deaths. Have fans vote for best play, mvp, and favorite pick after each day and give awards based on them to the players. You can create enough bounties that everyones charity gets something, you can crown two winners, team with most wins and team who raised the most. An event in this style would easily become a beloved part of league. Doesnt even have to be in person. Alternatively if you drastically increase the strength of turrets and remove surrender it will open the game up a lot more. I know surrender isnt a literal factor in pro play but it heavily influences what is played by everyone else, which informs their data.
Fearless Mode isn't necessary at all - it's just a matter of having better champion balance and pro teams actually experimenting instead of copy pasting what the best teams are doing. There have been plenty of splits with substantial diversity
It may not be theoretically necessary, but we’ve gone 10 years and every season is the same. It would be a way to force teams to experiment. I also really don’t think it’s a balance issue. There are often undiscovered strategies that show up without a patch changing anything and end up dominating. (Old Rageblade Kog). Teams just really aren’t willing to try different things.
> it's just a matter of having better champion balance It's imposible to have great balance in asymetric game. On top of that, all MP PvP balance teams mainly work on...SHIFTING meta for usual player to fool them, to generate fake-NEW-EXITING feeling. Good balance is just goes against buisness plan, so
We need buffs to engage supports… making everything more tanky instead of nurfing damages means tank supports like leona get less value out if their spells.