The ways they set to create a champion in League of Legends are actually more complex than most of people think.
Today, Riot Mark “Scruffy” Yetter – Lead Gameplay Designer of League of Legends shares a post on Twitter about their champion complexity philosophy and goals. You can read the detailed dev blog here.
These philosophies are what they are using to separate new champions or rework into 3 categories. This year, they are doing it pretty well, splitting new champions into lots of tiers in order to create a fresh experience for both high and low ELO players. There are some champions which are friendly to the new ones, and also some create enjoyment for old, well-played players.
Champion Complexity Philosophy
Before talking about their philosophy, let’s talk about their main goal when they create League of Legends’ champions:
- Say no to extremely high or low complexity champions. They don’t want to create monsters anymore.
- Make sure the complexity is similar to the champion’s theme. For example: If we are looking at the new player’s perspective, we will be able to dictate which champions we should try out at least for the few first games, Annie or Dr. Mundo look fairly simple, in contrast, Irelia or Akali are not great choices for someone who is completely brand new to this genre/game.
- For VGUs, they want to keep the same spirit. A Mastery 7 One Trick player should have the same feeling and perform equally compare to when that champion hasn’t been reworked.
- Avoid extreme complexity. This will make the players themselves and their opponents suffer to learn that champion.
The three Philosophy they shared:
- Mechanical Complexity: It means how hard and how much time it takes in order for you to learn this new champion. For low grade, Rammus is a highlight with straight forward spells.
- Knowledge Complexity: For example, after playing as a Jungler for quite a long time, how hard you will able to get used to when a new Jungle champion comes out. Does he/she have some similarity to all other champions that you have been playing? If you play Lux enough, then trying out Sona is a reasonable choice. In contrast, picking up Aphelios should take more time than you think.
- Playing with/against Complexity: This means how hard to really need to know “That” champion if you are playing against them. Playing against Ahri – an extremely high mobility champion, still easy to counter her if you manage to dodge her spells. Looking at Singed, he looks easy but kills him won’t completely neutralize him.
Because of this triangle, all players should feel comfortable when playing League of Legends. Low complexity champions like Dr. Mundo still able to serve at least sort of player bases who dislike assassins such as Zed.
They also show League of Legends’ champions that they have made in 2020.
