Thoughts From a Level-capped League of Legends Player

Why yes, the recent patch did get me thinking…

Due to this job of mine, it’s rare for me to play a game over the course of an entire year – MMOGs not included. Not because nothing pulls me in, but because I am often forced to move on by the ever-flowing stock of video games the industry creates. Once a formidable FPS player, my skills are sorely out of touch. A 4X player with hundreds of unconquered scenarios. An above average RTS player with atrophied micro muscles.

I played the crap out of StarCraft II, Medal of Honor and BlOps during their respective release windows. Only to put them aside, I give them a sideways glance now and then. Yet, somehow, League of Legends, a F2P game, continues to see my attention week in and week out. Through my personal experiences as a normal and ranked player, discussion and research, the game still has a few feature requests to address from its hungry playerbase.

• Interface to Web – The pre-game interface has made leaps and bounds since its launch, but you still get sent to the website for a variety of things. I’m not sure if this is a marketing ploy, getting their website popular or something, but it’s annoying.
• Weapon builds – Creating ever more-powerful weapons is the basis of most DotA clones. If you want to view the recipes out of game, you have to head to the website. Cool if you’re bored at work, stinks if you’re already in the client.
• New download client – I’ve recently installed LoL on a few different computers. The initial download is surprisingly small, making it a quick stopgap. Then you get hit by patch after patch after patch, making the install triple in length, probably more in size. A new pre-patched client is desperately needed.
• Character customization – No, I don’t mean skins or facial reconstructive surgery. I mean customizing the “Recommended Items” bar when shopping. It’s a good feature for newbies, but few players, newb or not, ever build out that exact list. Let us change it per character to fit our general builds for each champion. Or so we can suggest a build to a friend and she doesn’t have to write it down or memorize it. Adding a search for the shop wouldn’t be a bad idea either.
• Ugly, disgusting characters – Listen, I know sex sells but come on. Between Misfortune’s boob-based physics engine and Sona’s busty Dominatrix skin, it’s getting ridiculous. Even when not anatomically impossible, the new females tend to be quite attractive. Urgot, although he sucks as a champion lately, was a good start. Now apply that to females. A Champion along the lines of Princess Theradras would be awesome. Fart ultimate, ftw!
• Rune pages & masteries – Three rune pages is simply not enough. The Champions are so diverse that you have to pigeonhole your pages to very specific roles, cover a breath of possible roles or waste one on a specific champion. Far from ideal. There are now pages for sale, which is fine, but the base should be lifted (again) from three (originally two) to five. Respeccing runes constantly gets bothersome quickly and you can’t do it on the fly during champion picking (takes too long). Occasionally, you’ll be left selecting an unoptimized page for a match. Multiple mastery pages would be nice too. Again, I’d be willing to drop some Riot Points on either of these.
• ELO update – The ELO system is good for large pre-mades. But put your toe in the ranked solo or two-person arranged team and you’ll be lucky to get it back. More often than not the teams end up as garbage, causing endless infighting. I finish the match then stop playing when that crap happens. Heartbourne points out just how complex ELO systems are, so there’s no magic wand here. I just hate not being able to play ranked because friends are fed up with the teams themselves and I would get placed in.

Nothing too fancy, but I think the changes would make the game more accessible. Isn’t that the number one requirement for a free-to-play game?