LS | The State of Balance in League of Legends ft. Riot Phreak and Riot Phroxzon

0:00 Intro
0:20 League is Balanced
4:34 What is Ideal Game Balance?
7:23 Do you intentionally chase a state of the game?
12:18 Balancing for Low or High Elo
18:21 Balancing around Ping and Regions
25:27 Balancing between Ranks
28:05 Balancing Assasins
34:36 Balancing ADCs and Metashifts
40:55 Decisions on Immediately Nerfing Champions
42:27 Overbuffing Senna Recently
45:46 Fearless Draft and Innovation
48:43 Is Season 15 going to be MASSIVE changes?
50:06 Collaboration within the balance team
54:24 Outro
55:41 Secret: Boring Patches and Massive Changes
1:00:20 Secret: Z-Tier and Tierlist Inflation

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[nutscream]

Can we get more of this? Like once a month? Thats good sh*t

[HienLeGia]

The fact that LS has worked with such diligence that most internal Riot devs are confident in doing this. Outside of PR strategy, this is both rare and may set an example for people in this realm of career(Coach/Analyst/etc)

[madara]

Really love the people at riot getting themselves out there and explaining their thoughtprocess behind things. It shows that they care, that they had a good idea even if it goes wrong and that they are just people trying to do a good job. Community can get really toxic at devs so these videos are amazing to help see the people working for you not against you.

[ichdu]

OMG Phreak ranting about powercreeping tier lists is so understandable considering his job description essentially reads "avoid powercreep" among other things xD

[wardenxenon]

It would be super cool to have LS do another one where he brings some serious "pitches" of balances that he thinks should/shouldn't happen and then they go through the whole process together, sort of brainstorming challlenges or avenues that could work to balance it. Sort of a mock up of what would happen in balance offices. It would help give the community more insight into the depth and breadth of possibilities of outcomes in game balance. Plus maybe LS could plant a seed or 2....

[nicolarobatto]

i really like the industry/academia discourse

i feel like ls is very focused on academia talk, with a broader and more long term view, while teams and pros are just industry that thinks in the short term. This contrast explains A LOT.

[NewUserNewUser]

LS is doing such a good job at not arguing and simply asking questions. Making sure to be able to have more discussions like these, wich are important

[Mancolol]

Riot gets sh*t on a lot whether it be devs or balancing or champs being "OP" - but they do a great job like this showing their true colors where they actually DO care and are knowledgeable.

W Riot W LS W League community.

[DynaOne]

I know NA is declining but it’s crazy to me as someone who just moved from EU to the west coast that there’s no NA West server, the ping is laughable for a competitive game.

[MrEvilsparrow]

The way both Freak and Phrox actively listens whenever LS is talking, is underated. They're both passionate and empathetic; love it

[Akiozumi]

Also Phreak apologized for Senna being buffed too much when he was just trying to see what happens if she gets buffed is ridiculous. I think he doesn't have to apologize at all his Idea and Goal is reasonable this is just how working on a champ looks like.

[Raiko]

"Im the guy that gives corki 3 ad" is such a funny way to put it

[MrLeothedrummer]

But when is Multiplayer Practice tool finally coming? It would increase the level of play like tenfold...

[aceguy]

I agree with Phreak so much about the Z tier inflation. I think S tier is an infrequently hit tier on its own. Like I'm not sure a single champion in the game at the moment should be considered S tier. There's no Meta Knight, there's no Lando-T, there's no Tearlaments...maybe Nasus at the moment seems overtuned but he's an inherently hamstrung champion. I get Z tier is like a branding thing at this point but it's very stupid, like Phreak said a Z-tier champion should mean like the Nexus explodes at the start of the game.

[NumberRobotic]

It's funny that a lot of times I do feel mad at the balance/design teams for how they handle the game and a lot of bone-headed decisions, and yet despite my instinct being to scapegoat Phreak for being behind them, every time he discusses balance and explains the context, he's always surprisingly cogent and understanding. I really do appreciate talks like this giving transparency for the inner workings of the game and the logic behind them -- even when I don't agree with them, it's always a treat to see folks behind this behemoth of a game attempting to surmount this unwinnable situation of "perfect balance" and learn what they're attempting to do to maintain it.

[AngelOfTraps]

the world needs more Phreak + LS content

[iamthemanhuehueheu]

I actually had so much fun this year in League. I really felt like you could play any champ in the right scenario. I think they don’t get enough credit on how good this year was. The map changes were super good also. And after playing some stuff in this third split it also feels pretty cool.

[vrlol]

It's important to add another letter to the tier list for every 100 years of Riots collective game design

[herpdiederper]

Fantastic video, love hearing the perspectives of Riot gameplay leads but also I would love to hear from other areas of Riot and other prevalent players. Please make more of these!

[strajke_ofc]

So basicly they didnt say anything relevant for AD assassins basicly they said we dont know, its hard, we dont care KEKW