Ziggs Hexplosive Minefield

There are a bunch of things that could be done with Ziggs to bring him back in line a tad.  Mana costs, CDs, base damage.  But I think that one of the best ways to make his kit less powerful is the nerf the duration of his Hexplosive Minefield (E).  Right now, the minefield lasts 10 seconds.  That's a really freaking long time.  It's so long that with 40% CDR you can actually have 100% uptime on the mine field (9.6 second CD at 40%).

So, to tone down his zone control without changing the spammy AoE aspects of his kit, change the mine field to last less time, somewhere between 5 and 7 seconds.

Essentially, this will give champions and players more opportunities for counterplay against his mines.  They can wait them out before making moves instead of simply needing to run through to get past.  There will be downtime on the mines that people can use to make plays, as they should be able to.

Fixing Targon's Items

I'm all for supports having more gold income.  It's awesome for a support player like myself to be able to buy more items and not have to spend so much gold on wards.

But Relic Shield, Targon's Brace and Face of the Mountain shouldn't be so strong that they make jungling less preferable to a duo top after buffs.  ADCs shouldn't be getting it with regular consistency to make their supports have almost carry level income.

I don't think that the item should get nerfed by itself, it's a fun item and very interesting to use.  But getting two Taron's in lane shouldn't be a viable option.

So, I propose that if you have a Targon's item, you cannot benefit from the Spoils of War passive that Targon's have.

In other words change the item description from this:

UNIQUE - SPOILS OF WAR:  Basic attacks execute minions below 200 (+100% AD) health. This effect requires a nearby allied champion to trigger. Recharges every 30 seconds, up to a maximum of 2 charges. Killing a minion while Spoils of War is available heals the nearest allied champion for 2% of your maximum health and grants them gold equal to the kill plus 5.

To something like this:

UNIQUE - SPOILS OF WAR:  Basic attacks execute minions below 200 (+100% AD) health. This effect requires a nearby allied champion to trigger. Recharges every 30 seconds, up to a maximum of 2 charges. Killing a minion while Spoils of War is available heals the nearest allied champion that doesn't own a Relic Shield, Targon's Brace or Face of the Mountain for 2% of your maximum health and grants them gold equal to the kill plus 5.

This keeps Targon's items as a viable support option without making double Targon's lanes so strong, or even viable.

Cho'Gath Vorpal Spikes Tweak

I would like to make a small change to Vorpal Spikes.

Instead of this:

TOGGLE: Whenever Cho'Gath performs a basic attack, he will launch spikes dealing magic damage to enemies in a line in front of him.

I would like to change it to something like this:

TOGGLE: Whenever Cho'Gath performs a basic attack, he will deal on-hit magic damage and launch spikes dealing magic damage to other enemies in a line in front of him.

Essentially, I want Vorpal Spikes to do on-hit magic damage and the spikes launched to not affect the target that you are auto attacking.

I want to make this change because when CSing as Cho'Gath you can actually auto attack a minion that has low enough health to die to your auto attack and spikes but because there is a small window between the damage of your auto and the damage of your spikes, you can lose the CS to other sources such as your own minions.

While one could argue that this isn't a problem if you're careful, I think it's a pointless increase in skill required to CS as Cho such that there is a health level where you will lose the CS in between two ranges of health where you would get the CS.

This change won't affect his balance in any meaningful way.  It will mostly be a quality of life change for Cho players enabling less problematic CSing.

PSA: Janna Winrate

There are a lot of theories about why Janna's winrate is so good.  Some of them rely on random chance.  Some think Janna is strong.  Some rely on solo queue being a strange place where weird things happen.

Here's my take on Janna's winrate.

It all has to do with the role she plays and the algorithm that measures effectiveness in terms of skill.

(Nerdy math take at the bottom!!)

What do people play Janna as?  A support (except Zekent hue hue).

What is the least loved role?  Support.

What role is therefore played the most with the least emphasis and practice?  Support.

What I mean by this is that support is generally the least loved role and is therefore practiced the least by most league players.  This state of the game equates to a general lack of practice and therefore skill when it comes to the person playing the support role.  

So, support champions that have a low skill floor excel as supports overall in solo queue because there are a lot of people forced into playing support that don't practice the role.

It's the reason that Taric had such a high winrate before his nerfs and remake etc.  Taric has an incredibly low skill floor but his effectiveness was incredibly high.

And while Janna isn't nearly the same, the same idea applies to her.  Compared to other viable supports currently, the skill required to play Janna and get some effectiveness out of her is fairly low.

As a high elo support player once told me, being a good support is all about being less detrimental to your team than the other teams support.  And when it comes to solo queue, being less detrimental as Janna is simple in a lot of ways.

Janna is fast, her passive and her W let her move quickly.  This means you get caught less and feed kills less frequently, not to mention it's easy to re-position.

Her one skill shot is very wide and easy to hit when being pursued.  And while her ultimate can ruin games used incorrectly, as long as you sit next to your carry it's generally pretty easy to get some sort of good use from it.  Most of the time Janna ults gone wrong come from trying to make plays instead of just peel for your carry.

This is not to say that Janna has a low skill cap.  There are a ton of small things that separate good and bad Janna players like when to shield, using your ult to the optimal efficiency and maximizing tornado effectiveness.  But because Janna is a support these things matter much less towards her overall winrate because the nuances which make her harder to play aren't what the majority of supports using her have to worry about.  Because as long as you're shielding your carry and peeling for them to some extent (which is quite simple on Janna) you are doing quite a good job at your role already.  You might not be carrying your team but you are minimizing your detriment.  Essentially Janna is a good support to get carried as.

What I meant above about the algorithms:

f(x) = effectiveness and x = skill

Take a simple champion with a general lack of complexity but high return on low skill.  They might look something like this:

f(x) = x + 10

Now take a champion that is pretty much getting what you put in.  At lower levels you get less out but at higher levels you can get more.  That might look something like this:

f(x) = 5x

Now let's take a champion that without at least a good amount of skill isn't very effective but you get very high returns if you're skilled.

f(x) = x^2

So if we were to look at these three champions, the first would be most effective at a skill level of 1 or 2.  The second would be most effective at a skill level of 3 or 4.  The third would be on par with the second at 5 and superior at all other skill levels. 

Spectating "Insert Name Here"

When a friend of mine is spectating a game, lots of the time it's fun to use the spectate of spectate function that was recently added and watch the game they're playing.

But one of the things that kind of bugs me is that you can't see who your friend is spectating before you hop into the game with him.

I think it would be a really nice if when you spectate someone, call the person you're spectating Friend X, your own friends will see "Spectating Friend X" instead of "Spectating."

There are a few reasons to do this.  One, it might help you decide whether or not you want to spectate off of their spectate.  If the person they are spectating is really cool, you can jump right in.  If it's someone you both know and you're not really interested, you can avoid it and save some time.

Like some of my other suggestions this one isn't really about balance, and is therefore not all that important, but I think it would be a nice change to see that shouldn't take much work.

If You Want To Help The Cause :D

Hey everyone.  I know a lot of you that read this blog get the links from other sources, meaning that what I am about to say is repetitive, but if anyone just reads this for itself:

If you could go here:

http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=3957360&highlight=harook

And give it a relevant bumb and a +1, that would be amazing :D

And a big shout out + thank you to everyone that already has :D

<3<3<3

(Just another attempt to get some notice from Riot so that I can go work for them :p)

Duo Queue - Part 2 of Explain the Ladder

A lot of people like to duo queue.  A lot of people hate to duo queue.  People duo queue for plenty of different reasons.  I'm gonna give a bit of a low down on duo queue.

How does duo affect your MMR?

When two people duo queue their MMR is averaged out and then raised.  It's hard to pin this down because MMR is hidden but from what I've seen it's generally around 1-3 divisions.

How does duo affect pick order?

Generally one of three things happens, the last of which is almost always at very high elo only.

1 - One of you is first pick and one of you is last pick.  If your MMRs aren't super close, this is usually what will happen.  The person with higher MMR will be first pick and the person with lower MMR will be last pick.

2 - You are 4th and 5th pick.  If your MMRs are close this will happen a good bit.  Because duo queue raises your average, if you're both close the average will be above both of your MMRs making you 4th and 5th pick.

3 - You are 1st and 2nd pick.  This only happens to people at high elo usually, where a duo queue can both have very high MMR and have troubles finding games with people at their inflated duo MMR so they are matched with people who are lower than them after being in queue for a while.

Other combinations can occur but they are generally rare and require odd combinations of teammate MMRs.

What are the advantages of duo queue?

Obviously if you duo queue you get to play with someone you know.  He or she is going to take your side if something goes down.  He or she will easily be able to swap champions.  General things that comes with playing with someone that you know who can talk with you outside of champ select.

If you're in Skype with your duo partner you can communicate more effectively.  You won't need to take time to chat in order to let him or her know things.  If you're duo bot you can talk about your lane strategy much more easily.  If your duo partner is a jungler or you are you can set up ganks etc.

Basically what duo brings you is guaranteed synergy.  You get to play with someone who you know you work well with.

When should I duo queue?

You should only duo queue when the synergy that you and your partner have more than makes up for the increase in MMR you get from duo queuing.

What I mean by this is that if the advantage in your team's strength because of your communication and synergy isn't worth the challenge increase of your raised MMR then you should NOT duo queue.

Think of it like this:

You are duo bot.  Both of you are less skilled than the enemy laners because of your increase in MMR.  So, the other laners play the lane slightly better than you.
However, because you and your partner have amazing synergy, you can make plays 2v2 more easily than they can and get ahead in the lane.
This would be an example of where duo is worth it.

Now think of being ADC yourself with your friend in Top lane.  If he only splitpushes all day and you never work together then you're both essentially increasing your MMR for no real reason.  You both are fighting better players in your lane without any real advantage to show for it.
This would be an example where duo isn't worth it.

MMR - Part 1 of Explain the Ladder

So one of the questions I always see people asking is how MMR works.  It's not always a direct question about MMR but the questions they ask can be answered with an understanding of MMR.

First off, let's answer the basic question:  What is MMR?

MMR stands for Matchmaking Rating.  Essentially, it is a hidden number that goes up and down as you win and lose that determines who you play against.

The next question, which is much harder to answer is:  How does MMR work?

The point of MMR is to attempt to pit you against opponents that you should go 50-50 against.  That means that MMR tries to put you in games with people that over time you would win half of the time and lose half of the time.

Obviously as you get better, get worse, go on win streaks or loss streaks, your MMR can change quite a bit.  Your MMR is the rating at which you should go 50-50 at that specific moment, so if you go in a win streak your MMR will start going up and reflect that.

Something people don't generally understand is that MMR is more fluid than LP or the old ELO.  If you were at your proper LP/Division/Tier for your MMR and you start winning game after game, your MMR will inflate more quickly than your LP/Division/Tier.

The reason they do this is because they want games to be balanced based on skill but they don't want people changing divisions quickly.

Let me explain this a little more.

First off, they do not want you to climb through the ladder very quickly because they don't want someone to get lucky or unlucky for that matter and see a massive change in their place in the ladder that they cannot sustain.
So, they make it so that unless you consistently are winning over and over like a pro would on a smurf, gains are generally smaller unless you just got into the ladder.

At the same time, they don't want this careful approach to ladder placement to ruin games.  If you are in fact good/bad and not simply lucky/unlucky they want to put you into games accordingly.  So, they make your MMR move at the pace your ladder placement would move if they could safely assume that no luck was involved in games.

A secondary benefit of this system is that since your MMR is moving up/down, if you're winning you start to play with better people to see if you can handle it or if you're losing you play with worse people to see if they are more your skill level.  All the while your actual ladder placement isn't going haywire.

Common Seemingly Contradictory Placements, Gains and Losses.

I went 5-5 in my placements and got Bronze 3 but my friend did the same and got Silver 4!  What's the deal?!

There are actually multiple logical answers to this question depending on the circumstances.  These are just some of them:

1 - Your friend was doing his placements for the first time, while you were doing yours after being in Bronze last season/during pre-season.
If your friend was doing placements for the first time and went 50-50 against Silver 4 players, it makes perfect sense for him to be put into Silver 4.  And at the same time if you did your placements against Bronze 3 players because of your previous season/pre-season MMR it makes perfect sense for you to be in Bronze 3.

2 - Your friend won his games earlier on in his placements while you won yours later on.
This seems unfair, but it's really not.  If you lost your first 5 placements you played against Silver players and only started winning against the lower Bronze players you got as your MMR crashed then your wins won't matter for much.
On the other hand if your friend won his first games against the mid to high Silver players but started to lose later in his placements against the low Gold players then his wins will have counted for much more.

3 - Your friend was simply put against better players because that's who was in queue.
If you went 50-50 against weaker players while he went 50-50 against better players, again, it makes sense that he will be put into a higher place in the ladder.  It can be a bummer that you didn't have the chance to play against better players in your promos but if you played worse players you Should have been doing better than your friend anyway.

Me and my friend are both Gold 5 but he gets 20 LP for wins with -15 for losses while I get 15 LP for wins and -20 for losses, how is this fair?  He can climb so much more easily!!

There is one really simple explanation for this.

Your MMR is lower than Gold 5, probably around Silver 1 or 2, while his is higher than Gold 5, probably Gold 4 or 3.
Most likely you have been in Gold 5 for a while where as your friend is new to Gold 5.  Another possibility is that your friend has recently been winning more games than losing while you have done the opposite.
Your wins count for less because you are playing worse players than he is.  In order to climb, you have to start winning more than losing against people that are at your current ladder placement, not against people that are lower than you.  In order to play against said people at your rating, you need to raise your MMR by doing well against the people you play currently.

In other words, you are probably in this position because it is impossible to drop Tiers in the ladder but it IS possible to drop tiers in your MMR.  You are essentially at the MMR of a Silver player while still Gold in the ladder.

I was getting 5 or 6 LP for every win and all of the sudden I got 20!  I'm not mad but this must prove the MMR system isn't logical!

Actually that isn't a logical assumption to make.  Once again, there are quite a few possibilities for why this happened.  Here are a few.

1 - You played against a team that is much higher MMR than you or even what you normally play against.
If you beat a team that should have beaten you, the system will take this into account.
Think about it, if you were beating a bunch of Silver 3s and getting 5 or 6 LP then all of the sudden you beat a group of Gold 5s, logically you Should see a higher gain in LP and MMR.

2 - You went on enough of a winning spree that your MMR has become more fluid and has finally started to rise quickly again.
MMR for accounts that have played a lot of games is still more fluid than LP, but has become less fluid as games keep getting played.
However, going on a streak, good or bad, will start to make MMR change more quickly like when you first started plying ranked.
So if you were seeing low gains but you kept winning over and over most likely your MMR has finally started to move quickly again and you will see higher and higher LP gains until your spree stops or clams down.

These aren't all of the common questions but I feel like this covers MMR fairly well.  In other parts of "Explain the Ladder" I'll be covering duo queuing as well as a few other topics people ask about.
Feel free to comment any other scenarios you'd like me to try and explain or things that you'd like me to blog about!

Ward Charges - Ruby Sightstone Buff

While this won't have much affect on higher levels of play, especially the LCS and tournaments, I think it would be nice if you could actually buy ward charges on Top of sightstone baseline charges that pretty much counted as normal wards.

Let  me explain this a little:

Essentially, a Ruby Sightstone has 5 charges and can keep three sightstone wards on the map at once.  I think there should be a new consumable, perhaps called a Ward Satchel or something, that you buy and it puts 5 extra charges on top of he baseline 5, giving it 10 charges.  Every ward you place 10-6 will be a normal ward, not attached to the Sightstone once it's placed down.  At 5 charges the Sightstone will act as it always has.

What this will do:

As of now, supports are basically shoehorned into buying a sightstone and keeping vision on the entire map.  There's no real way to keep vision on the map with only 3 wards at once, so they must also use an item slot for normal wards.  I think this kinda sucks.

If a support has enough income to keep the map warded, buy an oracles, and still get items, they should be able to do this.  They shouldn't have to use 1/3 of their item slots just to keep vision on the map.

This ward satchel idea would allow supports to have a Sightstone but not need an extra slot for wards.  They would still need to buy them, but they could have a 5 item build instead of 4.

Follow Up - Ward Radius

A while ago I posted about how I would love to see a ward radius when you're setting down a ward.  And I still think that would be a really nice thing to add Riot!!!  Plz.

But the other day I was thinking about a different addition to wards that I would love to see.  Basically, if you've placed a ward, when you mouse over it, you should be able to see the vision radius.  Now some people will say you should just Know the vision radius.  To them I respond that it's the same idea as smartcasting spells.  Just because you have a very good grasp of a spell does not mean you should never normal cast a spell, even pros do it all the time.

The reason I want to see this in-game is because there will be plenty of times where you will have vision of the area that a ward covers through other means than the ward.  For instance, if you or a teammate is standing near a ward, or you have two wards close together.  You shouldn't have to leave a wards area to see it's radius.  And other than instinctively knowing the radius, you won't be able to distinguish between two wards radii.

But what's the actual point?  Good question!  True sight.  If one of these hypothetical wards is a pink ward, you'll want to know what area it actually covers before you leave it or before any wards close to it expire. It's also nice to actually know what you can see and what you can't if your video settings aren't the best.

Cutlass/BotRK Nerf

BotRK is incredibly strong on a lot of champions.  It provides flat damage, % current health damage, lifesteal , attack speed and then an active that not only does damage and gives you a speed boost but slows down the opponent as well.

I believe that BotRK simply does too much.  It actually gives you More damage than a BT at many levels of health even without the active.  When you throw in the burst heal, burst damage, and kitting ability of the active, BotRK is simply too strong in my opinion.

Another problem is that BotRK has pushed other items aside.  It had pushed aside Trinity until the buff, it still pushes aside items like Wit's End as an on-hit and Gunblade as another cutlass option most of the time.

So, I suggest that the slow and speed up on the active of BotRK should be removed, at the Very least for ranged champions.  This would make BotRK into a damage/healing item instead of a damage/healing/kiting item.  (Removing the slow/speed from BotRK would necessitate the slow being removed from cutlass).

By making BotRK do less, other items can have a chance to shine without needing changes of their own like Trinity.

Change Sheen or Trinity Color

This isn't a balance change or anything like that but it's something that's been bugging me ever since Iceborn was made an item.

Iceborn is blue.  Lich bane is purple.  Sheen is red.  Trinity is red.  Notice something?  Yeah, two of the items are the same and the rest aren't.

Either Sheen or Trinity should have the color on the passive Spellblade changed.  Yellow, orange, green, whatever, one of the two should change.  If it were me, I would make the observation that Trinity is a yellow item and that we already had a yellow particle for Lich bane so that shouldn't be too hard of a change to make.

IP Multiplier - Good Behavior

This is an idea that I've seen thrown out a few times.  If you behave well in game, you should be rewarded with higher IP gains.  There are plenty of ways this could be implemented but this is how I would do it myself.

Everyone should have a new bar, call it Influence perhaps.  This bar would be similar to the bar that shows you how close to rerolls you are when playing ARAMs.  Only instead of going down once you get to 1 reroll or after using a reroll, this bar will go up and down depending on how you act in game.

Essentially for every game that you aren't reported, your bar will go up a small amount.  Every game that you get honor, your bar will go up even more.  More honors can be higher gains.

On the other hand, if you play a game and get reported, your bar will not go up at all, and if the tribunal gets enough reports then your bar will be pushed back down to 0 or perhaps lowered by a high amount.

There will be a bunch of things to contain common problems.  For instance if multiple people in a premade report you then it will only act as if one person reported you.  If your friends or premade members give you honor it will count for a very very small amount compared to randoms.  If reports turn out to be bogus in the tribunal, gains you would normally have gotten will be returned.

I'm sure this system would require a lot of minutia, planning and coding but I think it would address a lot of issues.

It would reward people for good behavior, resulting in less toxicity.  It would also fix the problem of low IP gains which a lot of people complain about it.  But it would do it in a way that doesn't simply give more IP.

TF - Pick A Card Change

I think that TF is weak enough after his recent slew of nerfs to make a change that I've wanted for a long time.

TF should have a baseline card and card rotation.  In my opinion it should be Blue - Red - Gold.  Every time.  Not only would this remove RNG from the game (Yay!  Yay!  Yay!) it would make the change to his W lock time much more reasonable.

Another added benefit of this change would be that TF would not be able to luckily draw a gold card out of nothing.  He would have to wait through at least two card changes in order to get access to his hard CC.

And while this would certainly lower the skill needed to play TF (not something that I normally advocate) I believe that the removal of RNG is entirely worth the skill floor and cap being lowered.

Oracles - A small change/buff

Hey everyone, sorry I've been so lax on posts but I have a bunch of them in the works.  I did want to post this one though because I think it would be a really solid change, especially because of the effect it would have on balance Right Now.

Oracles is in my opinion pretty well balanced.  It has strengths and weaknesses that are both realistic.  A short range so that clearing wards isn't super easy and safe.  It has a duration so that you can't use it to snowball games like you used to be able to do.  It survives through death meaning it isn't necessarily a huge lightning rod for the enemy team to strike you.

While I think all of these things are great, I believe that there should be a small change added to Oracles.  I think that while the radius for seeing wards and shrooms and things like that should stay small as it is, the radius for seeing stealthed champions should be widened considerably.  With the current strength of Vayne and Rengar being so high right now, I believe that increasing the range that oracles gives you vision of them during your stealth so you have more of a chance for actual counterplay to those mechanics is not only reasonable but would go a long way towards helping to balance those champions.  You could put down pinks fairly easily for Vayne when you see her ult but Rengar can come stealthing/ulting from a huge distance away.  It would even be good for handling Twitch assassinations later on.

And while these champions are balanced to an extent around being able to pull these plays off, there should exist more realistic counterplay than there is.  And I believe that this change to oracles will provide that.

Your Guardian Support

Alright guys, I got another song that I tweaked.  It's Your Guardian Angel by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.  Tweaked the words so that they fit for a martyr-like support.

Here you are:

When I see your champ
Tears roll down my face I can't replace
And now that I'm strong I have figured out
How this game turns cold and it breaks through my soul
And I know I'll find deep inside me I can be the one

I will never let you fall (let you fall)
I'll stay bot with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all (through it all)
Even if saving you sends me to respawn

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.
Seasons are changing
And waves are crashing
And stars are falling all for us
Deaths grow longer and games grow shorter
I can show you I'll be the one

I will never let you fall (let you fall)
I'll stay bot with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all (through it all)
Even if saving you sends me to respawn

Cuz you're my, you're my, my, my carry, my whole life
Please don't throw that away
Cuz I'm here for you
Please don't walk away and
Please tell me you'll stay woah, stay woah

Use me as you will
Kill my wards just for a thrill
And I know I'll be okay
Though my screen is turning gray

I will never let you fall
I'll stay bot with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saving you sends me to respawn
[to fade]

Shaco Boxes - Fix Plis

This isn't a super big deal, but I think that the coding behind Shaco boxes is honestly kind of terrible.

If you were to go into a game right now, you would find that Shaco boxes not only block skill shots, invisibly, they don't take any damage doing so.  I think this is downright stupid.  Either Shaco boxes need to NOT block skill shots, like Teemo shrooms, or they need to take damage from the skill shots like Zyra plants in the fog of war.

There's really no reason they should work like they do and I'm honestly surprised they haven't been changed yet.

Ready Button - Remove Lock In

So what's the point of having the lock in button?  It's to let your team know that's the champion you're going to be playing and to be able to start a game early if everyone is ready (or go to the next round of picking in draft), saving time.

What are the cons of the lock in button?  Trolls can force teams to pick around them even if others picked/called before them.  You can accidentally lock in a champion.  You can lock in something you thought you needed but actually didn't.  And I'm sure there are many other situations made worse by a lock in button.

So, how do we get rid of the cons while preserving the benefits?  Make locking in reversible, make it a ready button.  Yes, it takes away the finality which a few people might like but overall this change will result in less trolling, less accidents in champ select and less toxicity.

QoL Change To Queue

So this is just something that I would really love to see added to the client.  Add, into the options, a keybind for taking the queue.  Then you can set it as shift enter or something so that you can accept quickly without having to move your mouse from what you're doing.  This option could also have a secondary option that once you've accepted it minimizes League.

Obviously this isn't any super important change but I think that there are definite advantages without any real cons.

Doran's Blade - A Tad Too Strong

I think that it's cool that Riot was able to move the game away from everyone and their grandparents starting boots 3 pots.  I like what they did to Doran's Blade to make it better in lane and less effective late game.  I think it was the right direction.

But now we see pretty much every ADC starting Doran's Blade, heck top laners and even junglers are starting with it.  And is that really any better in terms of options than everyone going boots + pots?

Doran's Blade is simply too good as a starting item.  It gives you sustain, extra health and damage.  Not only does it give you so many things, what it gives are is also strong.  There's no way to get more AD than a Doran's Blade out of the fountain.  You can get equal AD with a long sword but you won't get the health and depending how much you AA you won't even get more sustain (health pots vs. the Doran's heal).

So, I suggest that the AD on Doran's Blade be lowered slightly.  Perhaps bring it to 7 or 8.  This way it's still good, it still helps you last hit and trade, but it doesn't give you as much damage as someone starting a long sword.  It makes starting with other items more of a realistic option.

This would also fit with Doran's Ring vs. Amp Tome comparison, where Amp tome gives more AP while Doran's Ring gives you more than Just AP.  Or Doran's Shield vs. Ruby Crystal.

Ward Placement - Vision Radius

So one idea I've been kicking around is the addition of a vision radius while placing wards.  

What I mean by this is that if you normal cast a ward, not only can you see the radius where you can place the ward, but you can also see the area which the ward will give you vision of.

Right now casting a ward is like this:

I want it to be something more like this,

insofar as I want there to be a second radius that you can see when casting the ward.

This change won't make warding any harder.  Smartcasting wards will be the same.  The only difference is that if you Want to place a ward with precision focused on vision, you can.

New To Jungling - Some Tips For Beginners

So a few people I've seen have said they find jungling to be a problem so I figured I would make a blog about a few things that I found that helped me out.

Keeping Track of Neutral Monsters - Buffs like Blue and Red as well as bigger objectives such as Dragon and Baron can all be timed.

Blue and Red respawn 5 minutes after their camp is cleared.

Dragon respawns 6 minutes after it dies.

Baron respawns 7 minutes after it is dead.

A good way to keep track of everything is to type things in chat.  Use your own time stamps and small words that let you know what you're talking about.  Say you kill Blue Buff in your jungle at 2:05.  You would type into your chat:  "7:05 ob."  7:05 being 5 minutes from when your Blue Buff died, so the time it will respawn, and ob standing for "Our Blue."  Or stands for our red, tb means their blue and tr means their red.  

Time any objective you see die, even the opponents buffs.  It will not only help you to possibly counter jungle but if you don't see them on the map when one of their buffs is coming back up you'll have a good idea what they're doing - getting that buff!

Choosing a Jungler That is Right For You - While playing champions that are at the peak of their strength can be useful, some junglers won't fit your playstyle.

I would say that there are probably three main types of junglers that most champions fall under.  Early game monsters.  Late game carries.  Counterjunglers.

Early game monsters are there to get their lanes kills, snowball the game super early and win it before the other team has a chance to catch up and outscale you.  They tend to get a few buffs and then just gank lane after lane, forgoing farm in order to get teammates rolling.  Champions like Lee Sin and Xin Zhao are good examples of early game junglers.

Late game carries are champions that although they're jungling, if you let them stay relevant they will crush you late game.  These champions tend to be very vulnerable to counter jungling and although they can sometimes do very well early, that isn't the norm.  Champions like Nasus and Sejuani are good examples of late game carry junglers.

Then we have counterjunglers, the most hated group of junglers.  These junglers excel at screwing over their counterpart on the other team.  They have kits that are very good for dueling, setting traps or stealing camps.  Champions like Shaco, Nunu and Shyvana are examples of counterjunglers.

Now of course some champions will be outside of these groups.  Some will be part of one and part of another.  But generally these are the three things junglers will focus on most.  So try out a few different types of junglers and see what you like to do about them.  Then, once you figure it out, practice junglers that are good at what you like to do.  (So if you enjoy counterjungling, practice Shaco.  If you like to constantly gank, try Lee Sin).

COMMUNICATION - This one is super simple.  It's also super effective.  Talk to your laners.

Ask them where wards are.  Ask them what CDs they have.  Ask them what CDs the enemy has.  Ask questions, get information.  Information is power.  If you know that the enemy Ashe doesn't have flash up as jungle Volibear then you can confidently come in fast and flash flip her to your teammates without worrying about her flashing your flash.  You can use CDs effectively without wasting them.

Ask For Help - Laners at low elo generally are not going to come on their own to help you.  As a jungler it is part of your job to help dictate how the game plays.  Use assist pings, warning pings, talk in chat.  Do what you need to do to get your laners to do what they need to do.  Should they know better?  Yes.  Does it really matter whose fault it is when you're dead and a buff down?  Not really.  The fact of the matter is that these things happen and it's in your best interests to try and make sure they happen less.  don't play the blame game, be the general on the battlefield and direct your troops so there is no blame to be had!

What You Want to be Doing - I wish that this was simpler but unfortunately it isn't.  Jungling isn't black and white, especially in the high level meta.

Here are some of the things that you CAN do:

Farm - Kill creeps in your jungle

Hold Lanes - Last hit minions in a lane while your laners are dead/back

Push Lanes - Push with or without your laner, depending on the situation, so that your minions hit the enemy tower and deny the enemy laner CS.

Gank - Attempt to kill enemy in a lane from river/tri/sides of the lane

Lane Gank - Attempt to kill enemy through the lane, coming through brushes

Counterjungle - Kill creeps/enemy jungler in enemy jungle

Lane - Literally lane with one of your laners (This is usually only in cases of lane swaps where one of your solo lanes is dealing with a duo)

What you SHOULD do in any specific situation is going to depend on a lot of factors.  If you're behind, if you're ahead.  If the lane you're considering ganking could 2v3 or 1v2 you.  If you could gank bot or top.

I believe that there is one question which really decides everything.  Which of your options helps your team as a whole the most?  

Think of the game as a whole work in progress.  If you go top for an extended gank will you open up the possibility of a free dragon if the other team makes a play for it?  If you hold mid while he backs are both of your bot laners going to die in a dive because you aren't there to help?  A lot of these questions you'll only learn the answer to through experience but some you can figure out with simple logic.

If you can gank a lane with a hypercarry who is having some issues or gank a lane with a weak late game champion that's simply been pushed in for a wave it's a pretty easy decision if both ganks have the same chance of success right?  You go with the hyper carry.

In general this is something along the lines of what I find works with the average jungler:

Get both buffs.  Gank a lane that is either in need of help or the enemy is over-extending with no wards.  If all of your lanes are pushed, farm your jungle.  If your lanes don't need help but one of them wants to back, hold it for them.  If you get a kill on a laner, help your teammate push any minions to turret so that they can back and force the enemy to lose CS.

If a pathway is warded, go a route that has no vision.  For example if you're ganking bot or top and the river is warded, try going through the tri-brush.  If the side of mid is warded, come from one of the jungle routes.  And if every path is warded and a lane truly needs help, invest in a pink ward.  Place it to clear a route so that you can gank.  It's not fun having to do your teammates job but it's necessary sometimes if you want to win.

Learn From the Best - If you have the time and care enough, watch high elo junglers!!  Watch what they do, watch how they play.  Watch the decisions they make.  If you go to twitch and the LoL streams you can usually find at least one high elo jungler on the front page.

Diana Skin - Thunder Goddess Diana

I don't usually come up with skin concepts or complete champion ideas but when the new Ultimate skin was still up in the air I was hoping that it would be for Diana.  I kept thinking to myself how cool an Ultimate skin for her would be and this was one of the concepts I came up with.

It doesn't take that much imagination to get a pretty good picture of what the skin would look like.  Her Q would be a curved lightning bolt with the tip at the end.  Her W would be small balls of electricity for the damage component and perhaps a lightning cloud for a shield (similar to Astro Nautilus W perhaps?).  I think that her E would be like a small vortex in a storm or perhaps she could even be struck by lightning and the pull is from magnetism or something.  Her ult would essentially be what it is now except be yellow.  Perhaps there would be streaks of lightning involved.

There's no concept art as of now but if someone wants to make some, feel free :p

Blue Buff - A Longer Leash

As of now the leash for Blue buff is very short.  Unless you force it to move past it's leash range with a spell such as a blitz hook it will not reach the bushes, and invisibility, in almost every instance.  I think there are two reasons this needs to change.  This first is simply for balance with Red buff.

Red buff will not only go into nearby bushes, it will leash past those bushes entirely to the other side of the buff area without a spell at all.  It only needs to be attacked and it will walk there around the terrain.  So why is it that Blue buff won't even reach the first set of bushes?

The second reason is for balance with the game.  Being able to pull your buff into the brush is an important mechanic, especially in the early game and especially with Nunu in the spot that he's in.  It allows you to position yourself so that counterjungling isn't as low risk.

Here's a little video explaining how this change would affect counterjungling, specifically with Nunu in mind:

Now this won't fix the problem completely, but it will help and it also simply makes sense to put Blue on par with Red.

Random Paint Stuff

So the other day I realized I was only 47 RP away from purchasing Thresh on my smurf.  So I figured I would do what a bunch of people do and draw a picture and beg for RP.

I did just that, got Thresh too :D.  And here was the picture I drew for it:

After I felt the need to draw more so I drew this:

#randomstuff

Vladimir - QoL Buff for Tides of Blood

If we were to look at Vladimir and the spot he is in, I would say that it's underwhelming.  He isn't awful in lane by any means, nothing like say, Poppy, but he isn't a laning monster either.  He's still fairly open to ganking in top lane and has some issues with being heavily outraded with mid match ups.  He does have a pretty solid 1v2 in terms of CSing because of his Q and his range but once his pool is down he is very very killable.

His pick and win rates are both lower than average in general.  He's almost never banned and I find him to be generally considered a weaker pick.  He has good AoE damage and survivability with items but he has no CC and unlike other champions that lack CC he doesn't have huge ranged poke or massive burst to kill a carry.

Taking all of these things into account, I believe that a small buff to Vladimir's E wouldn't be out of line.  So, I suggest that the cast time on Tides of Blood be removed.

How this would help:

One of the major influences on laning strength and honestly champion strength in general, is the ability of a champion to kite.  By kite, I mean their ability to do damage while making distance.  Champions like ADCs are usually very good at this because they can do a lot of damage with the auto attacks they can fit in while running from an enemy.  As of now Vlad isn't terrible at kiting but because of the casting time on Tides of Blood he has a lot more trouble than he could have.

By removing the cast time on Times of Blood Vladimir would be able to retreat while doing damage much more easily.  It would help him handle ganks, especially ganks more towards mid game where he already will have spell vamp and Tides can actually heal him despite it's health cost.

It's also a very realistic change.  In fact, most of the abilities that work mechanically like Tides of Blood (Such that it's a champion centered ability that does damage within a certain radius of the champion) already have no cast time.  Zac's W Unstable Matter, Ahri's W Fox-Fire, Diana's W Pale Cascade, Katarina's W Sinister Steal and many others don't have cast times already.

But putting all of this aside, this change would make Vladimir less clunky in general.  It will make it much easier to move through his other abilities before pooling which I've seen even Diamond players mess up with.

Adjustments To Tear + Archangels/Seraphs + Manamune/Muramana

Right now the Tear items are as a whole very strong.  They have low costs for their output and the only "downside" to them is the fact that they require "stacking."  By this I of course mean that in order to get the stronger active abilities of the final items, you need to use abilities etc to get the static mana up to + 750.

Now while this is a unique mechanic to league I believe that it leaves something to be desired.  One one hand, I believe that Tear is too easy to stack on some champions such as Jayce, Karthus and Nidalee, while being much harder to stack on others such as Dianna, Blitzcrank and LeBlanc.  So for those who can stack a tear with ease the upgraded versions are too strong while for those who have trouble stacking their items the upgraded items are on the weaker side.

It could be argued that this difference in relative strength is fine, that it's one of the factors in choosing to go down these build paths.  And there is some validity to that.  But it's my personal opinion that one should choose an item because of how it affects a champion's kit, not because of how the champion's kit affects it.

So, I believe that we should change Tear and it's associated upgrades into something closer to Rod of Ages. That is, the items should stack over time instead of when a champion procs the passive.  This would equalize the items strengths on champions so that the stats and usefulness of the items is what matters and not how quickly or cheaply a champion can stack them.

Then, in order to make sure that the Tear itself doesn't stack too quickly, but give incentive to buy the stronger items, the mana passive could be much slower on the Tear and much faster on Archangels/Manamune.

This is the passive on Tear of the Goddess currently:

Unique Passive - Mana Charge: Each time you cast a spell or spend mana, your maximum mana increases by 4 (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +750 bonus mana.

Manamune:

Unique Passive - Mana Charge: Each time you attack, cast a spell or spend mana, your maximum mana increases by 4 (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +750 bonus mana.

Archangel's:

Unique Passive - Mana Charge: Each time you cast a spell or spend mana, you gain 6 maximum mana (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +750 bonus mana.

This is something along the lines of what I would change it to:

Tear:

Unique - Mana Charge: This item gains 4 bonus mana every 15 seconds.  Bonus caps at +750 bonus mana.

Manamune/Archangel's:

Unique - Mana Charge: This item gains 4 bonus mana every 5 seconds.  Bonus caps at +750 bonus mana.

Champions that want what tear items have to offer would still get tear/the upgrades.  Only now champions that might be a little hesitant to by it simply because it stacks so slowly for them can purchase it as well.  And champions that got it because they could stack it at basically no cost will perhaps think twice before getting it.

There will still be an incentive to get Tear early, and now there will be an incentive to purchase the upgraded versions before they are fully stacked.

New Item - Invulnerable Ward

This is a concept I've been thinking about for a few days.  I'm not sure of the exact costs, durations or limits of it yet but I thought it would be interesting to have a third kind of ward to make something like Rock - Paper - Scissors.  Essentially, an Invulnerable Ward would last it's full duration in the spot it's in no matter what.

The idea would be that Sight Wards counter Invulnerable Wards because they do the same job at a lower price.  Vision Wards counter Sight Wards because they can see them but the Sight Wards can't see the Vision Wards.  Invulnerable Wards would counter Vision Wards because Vision Wards wouldn't be able to kill them at all, making the Vision Ward a waste.

There are a few different ideas I had for Invulnerable wards to balance them.  They could either cost a lot of gold, have a lower duration and/or could have a team limit (meaning the team as a whole could only have a certain amount on the map at once, maybe even only one).

I really like the idea of a trinity of wards for a few reasons.  One, it would give more ward counter-play options.  Instead of having to fight fire with fire (magical sight vs magical sight) you could avoid the fire altogether.
Another reason is that it gives guaranteed vision.  While many might think this is a bad idea in itself, I think that guaranteed vision allows more options for teams to play well.  If one team is incredibly far ahead, can afford vision wards and oracles and consistently clears the other team's wards, the team that is behind is going to have an increasingly hard time turning the game around.  And while many might say this is fine, one of the reasons that I like LoL is that turn-arounds are so possible.
Just think about the mechanic of inhibitors.  Yes, they make your lanes push and help you to siege turrets, but they also force your own minions to get to the other team at the same time.  And if you aren't actively using them for siege purposes it actually helps the other team to get gold/exp without having to overextend into lanes.
Invulnerable wards would help in somewhat the same way.  They would give a team vision despite being outdone in terms of magical vision.  They would allow for a lot more playmaking when you're behind.

Obviously this idea would need a lot of tweaking and tuning but I believe it could be a very good addition to LoL.

New Mechanic - Physical Shield

Today I was watching a league game and noticed a Morgana spell shield.  I liked that it wasn't just a normal shield, that it stopped disables and only absorbed spell damage.  I liked that it wasn't white on the health bars but green.  So I started thinking to myself, "What other kinds of shields could there be?"

And I thought up an idea of a new kind of shield, similar to a Morgana shield, but instead of magic based, it would be physical based.  The color on the health bars could be a different color as well, I was thinking perhaps green orange or red.  And instead of stopping disables, it would stop a different brand of debuffs, such as resistance reductions and vision debuffs.  Instead of absorbing all damage or just magic damage, it would absorb physical damage.  This new ability could be given to a new champion or perhaps an old one during a rework.

Here is the description of Morgana's shield:

ACTIVE: Places a shield around target friendly champion for up to 5 seconds, absorbing magic damage and preventing disables while the shield holds.

Here is what the new move might look like:

ACTIVE: Places a shield around target friendly champion for up to 5 seconds, absorbing physical damage and preventing vision/resistance debuffs while the shield holds.

This kind of mechanic wouldn't be game breaking in any way.  In fact if you were to compare it to Black Shield it has a much smaller impact.  However it's something new that might be interesting, especially if it was given to a support.

Hungering Strike - The Chomp Treatment

As of now I would say that Warwick isn't a strong champion, especially as a jungler which is really what I believe to be his main purpose as a champion.  His pre-6 presence is almost non-existant and his post 6 presence is only dangerous is his ult is ready to use.  And unlike champions like Diana his post 6 ganks won't all be with his ult ready to go unless he ganks very infrequently.

However, because of how he works, between his sustain, damage and his skillset, I don't think it would be wise to buff him in too significant a manner.  But one change that I think would really help to give him at least Some pre-6 pressure would be to give his Q, Hungering Strike, the same treatment that Trundle's Q, Chomp got.  That is, give it a significant slow that is very short in duration.

This would essentially give Warwick a little bit of pre-6 CC without making him imbalanced.  And in specific it would help him in getting to a target in order to apply red buff which is a major problem he has.  The cooldown isn't short enough that this change would cause major problems and it isn't a big enough buff to push him over the top in any way.  Essentially it would give him that little extra kick in order to no longer be an almost non-factor.

The change could look something like this:

ACTIVE: Warwick swipes at a target enemy, dealing magic damage for the greater value between a flat minimum amountor a percentage of the target's maximum health (if the target is a champion), plus additional bonus damage based on his ability power and slowing his target by 75% for 0.1 seconds. Hungering Strike can only deal the flat damage to minions and monsters.

Warwick heals himself for 80% of the damage dealt (after reductions).

Quinn - Vault

This particular mechanic might be working as intended, but I don't believe that it should work the way it does.

As of now, Vault interrupts channels and casting, which is fine, I think it's a good mechanic for Quinn ot have considering her kit.  However, also as of now, if Quinn is kitting and uses vault to make distance, champions can have casts ready such that the moment she hits them, she gets hit by those spells.  The main problem I have with this mechanic is in regards to spells like Flip from Singed.  Using your kit as Quinn to kite actually gets you thrown into the enemy team, which in my opinion is kind of silly.

At least with other abilities that Flip overrides, they are in a position such that they would be flipped had they not used their ability.  Vault is different.  You are actually outside of Flip range before you use it, but you use it in order to make more difference.  The tool that Quinn is given to kite shouldn't work against her just because of what I believe is an unfortunate mechanic.

So I suggest this change.  When Quinn is using Vault on an enemy champion, she cannot be targeted by the champion she is vaulting towards near the end of her leap.  This leaves counterplay by other members of the team to stop her.  Which I think is fine, some counterplay is always a good thing to have.  But to have your major kitting skill be hardcountered by certain champions without any actual thought involved seems a little too much.

Item Sets - A Small Tweak

Item Sets are both a very cool and very useful addition to LoL.  I like them a bunch and they're the answer to a lot of different problems that people had with baseline builds and having to waste time searching the shop.  

However that doesn't mean that I believe there is no room to improve.  There is one small change that I believe would be very nice for Item Sets.  And that's a Buy All option.

What I mean by this is that you should be able to toggle a button on any section of your item set, or perhaps even have different kinds of items sets that have this option, which would enable you to click this new button and buy everything that is in the set.

Example:

You have an item set for support Thresh.  The first "Block" which is your starting items has rejuv beads, two green wards, one pick ward and two health potions.  Now suppose you have enough gold to buy all of these items (which I would were I to run Thresh since I run extra starting gold).  If you have the gold for these items, the button which I suggest be added would be clickable.  And if you were to click that button, it would buy all of these items instantly.

If you did not have enough gold to buy all of these items, the button would not be clickable, it would be as if you were trying to buy anything else in the store that you didn't have the gold for.

Essentially this change would make getting out of the starting area easier for champions that have to buy a large amount of items.  It would even the playing field on getting to important destinations quicker against champions such as ADCs who many times only need to buy a Doran's Blade.

Viktor - Changing The Hex Core

As of now Viktor is the only champion that essentially has only 5 item slots instead of 6. I believe that it is this and not so much the rest of his skill-set, laning, end-game, etc that is the reason that he is so underplayed.

This situation is problematic for him because not only does it limit what he can build for endgame, it also limits what he can have on hand during the entire course of the game.  So he'd either have to go without buying a piece of a larger item or go without wards or pots when any other champion could do so.  It would be one thing if this were an option, but as of now the Hex Core cannot be sold back to the store.  So unlike someone such as Rengar with his Bonetooth Necklace, if Viktor wants traditional items he doesn't have that choice.

So my suggestion is that instead of making the Hex Core and any augment he gives it a permanent part of his inventory, make the Hex Core something along the lines of a reagent that can be used to augment an ability.

Here is the description of the Hex Core from Riot:

Evolving Technology - Viktor starts with a Hex Core that provides him with stats and can be upgraded in the store to augment one of his abilities. The Hex Core can only be upgraded once, and cannot be sold back to the store.

Here is the more detailed explanation from LoLWiki:

Evolving Technology

Hex Core: Grants Viktor 3 ability power per level

Viktor starts each game with  the Hex Core, an item that takes up one of his item slots, but provides him with stats and can be upgraded in the store to augment one of his abilities and improve its stats. The Hex Core can only be upgraded once, for 1000 gold, and cannot be sold back to the store.

I would like to see it changed to something like this:

Evolving Technology

Hex Core: Grants Viktor 3 ability power per level

Viktor starts each game with  the Hex Core, an item that takes up one of his item slots, but provides him with stats and can be upgraded in the store to augment one of his abilities and improve its stats. The Hex Core can only be upgraded once, for 1000 gold, and once upgraded disapears as the power is used to improve whichever ability he chose.

Basically the Hex Core starts as an item in his inventory as it does now.  But instead of upgrading it to a new item that helps one ability, it is used up in making one ability more powerful.  This keep his gameplay exactly the same, doesn't really mess with the idea of the augment choice but allows Viktor the same six item slots that everyone else has.

Evelynn - Agony's Embrace

I'm sure this suggestion has already been made elsewhere by plenty of other people but I wanted to make a post throwing my own opinion behind a change to this ability.

Simply put, it needs to have a base damage that it does if the % current health is too low.

The fact that Eveleynn can't use her ult and finish someone off at 10 health is to me ridiculous.  As far as I am aware there are literally no other abilities, let alone ultimates, which do only current health damage and have no base damage to speak of. So, I believe we should add something to Eve's ult so that it does some damage even if the enemies current health is very low

It could look something like this:

Agony's Embrace

• RANGE: 650
• COOLDOWN: 150 / 120 / 90
• COST: 100 mana

ACTIVE: Evelynn impales all enemy units in target 250-radius area, dealing magic damage equal to a percentage of their current health(100/150/200) damage minimum) and slowing their movement speed for 2 seconds.

• MAGIC DAMAGE: 15% / 20% / 25%(+ 1% per 100 AP) of enemies' current health
• SLOW: 30% / 50% / 70%

Evelynn siphons their pain, gaining a shield that grows in strength for each enemy champion hit and lasts up to 6 seconds.

• SHIELD STRENGTH PER CHAMPION HIT:150 / 225 / 300
• MAXIMUM SHIELD STRENGTH: 750 / 1125 / 1500

The underlined part is what I myself added to the ability.  Essentially it would be like a Mundo cleaver, that it does a base damage if the damage it would normally do is lower than the base.  It wouldn't affect the ability at higher health but would make it at do at least some reasonable damage when the target is very low.

I wouldn't say that this is a necessary change for Eve's viability so much as something I believe should be done in terms of spell balance.  An ultimate should not do 15 damage to someone just because they have 100 health left in my opinion.  And this change wouldn't buff her ultimate in other situations, just in the ones where it shouldn't do the low damage it does.

New Summoner Spell - Accelerate

So one thing I haven't seen since I started playing League of Legends is a new summoner spell.

So I figured I would come up with something that I think might be an interesting addition to the summoner spells we already have.

So let's take a quick look.  We have healing (Heal).  We have damage (Ignite).  Mana (Clarity).  Slower total map movement (TP).  Quick short distance movement (Flash).  Movement speed (Ghost).  Vision (CV).  Objective control/damage (Smite).  Revive.  Anti-CC (Cleanse). Slow/damage reduction (Exhaust).  Shield (Barrier).

These are the categories for items:

Attack:  Damage - Attack Speed - Life Steal - Critical Strike

Magic:  Mana - Cooldown Reduction - Mana Regen - Spell Damage

Defense:  Armor - Health - Health Regen - Magic Resist

Misc:  Movement - Consumable

One could argue that all of these are in some way shown to an extent except for one.

CDR.

CDR doesn't directly relate to doing damage, shielding, giving vision or anything specific because it is different to every champ.  It's pretty easy to say that Heal covers life steal, health, and health regen.  You could argue that Ignite covers damage, spell damage, attack speed and crit.  Clarity covers mana and mana regen.  Flash/TP/Ghost cover movement.  Shield could cover armor and MR.  But CDR could mean anything.

So what if there was a summoner spell that directly affected the cooldowns of your abilities?  We could call it:

Accelerate

Reduces the cooldown of all champion abilities with a baseline cooldown of less than 30 seconds by half of their current cooldown timer.

Obviously this wouldn't be set in stone and it would need extensive testing for balancing.  However I think this would be an interesting addition to our list of summoner spells.

QoL Change - Going Into Spectate/Games

This isn't a major issue by any stretch of the imagination but I think it's a realistic request that doesn't have any negative consequences.

As of now, if you enter spectate mode or a game, as far as I am aware, the respond function has no use until you are actually messaged from within that game.  What I mean by this is if someone messaged you before you went into the game, you could not type in /r to respond to them, you would need to whisper them normally.

I think that a nice little change would be that no matter when you start spectating/playing, as long as someone has messaged you while you have had LoL open during the current session, the /r command will respond to the last person to message you.

To put this a little more specifically, if you are using the client and talking to someone through PMs and then enter a game or start to spectate, no matter if they messaged you while you were in the game or not, if you type in /r and start typing, it will choose the person you are whispering to as the last person to send you a PM, as if they had sent that PM in the current way things are, during that game.

This change will make it so that if you were having a conversation outside of a game and enter into a game while the other person is waiting for a response you will no longer need to type in their summoner name to whisper them.  You would simply be able to type in /r and start typing your message just like if they had messaged you while you were already in the game.

Like I said, it's not a big deal, and the work around is usually pretty simple, but it would certainly make continuing conversations from the client into games easier.  It would be especially helpful in regards to people who have characters in their names that need alt codes etc.

Follow Up - Fixing Double Golems In Bot Lane

In my last blog post I talked about the need for some change on the map to make Blue less strong.

Since posting that I have had a new idea to help the problem that shouldn't have too many unforeseen negative consequences.

The solution is actually rather simple.  Make double golems spawn later than other minor minion camps.  Make them spawn at say, 1:55.

I don't believe that there is any jungler that starts at double golems and then heads to their buff so those routes won't be upset.  There's not really any way that a jungler will finish their buff before the golems spawn.  Doing the golems at their new starting time will make the laner get to lane quite late and miss minions mitigating any advantage they would have from doubles.

It won't fix positional issues such as where the Tri is located or getting to lane late because of helping the jungler but it will make it so that getting doubles early on won't be a problem and will fix it for both top side Red and bot side Blue.  Essentially from what I can forsee this change won't have any big affects on the game at large except to avoid early lane dominance based on which side you are on which is a negative aspect that I believe we will be better off without.

Blue Vs Purple(Red)

All joking aside, all comments about locked camera aside, I think that map imbalance is something that really needs to be looked at.  

As of now, on Blue side, you have a few distinct advantages.  One is that for bot lane, you both don't have to leash at blue, you have the option of killing the double golems.  Essentially this means that for Blue side bot lane, you go into the lane with more experience/gold and a few minions ahead depending on how long the enemy laners helped their jungler.

Now one could make the argument that top laners have the opposite problem but there's a few big differences.  For one, top laners cannot do doubles nearly as easily because there is only one person.  They cannot juggle aggro and they only have access to one spell instead of two.  So taking doubles as a top laner is usually a large investment, forcing them to pop multiple pots instead of maybe just one.  Top laners also do not take as much of a risk heading to lane through river since they only have one person in lane against them. So, they can leash for blue and usually not miss any minions at all on Blue side.

A second major difference that gives Blue an advantage is that the Tri-Brush top side isn't on their side of the map.  In other words a jungler can come through Tri to gank Red side much more easily than it can be used to gank someone Blue side.

Again, you could make the argument that the situation is reversed for Bot lane but there are two important factst that make it less important.  The first is that bot lane has two people.  Meaning that any ganks are going to be 3 vs 2 instead of 2 vs 1.  3 vs 2 are much better odds than 2 vs 1 so jungler presence is going to usually have a lower significance bot lane.  The second important distinction is that bot lane has a support.  One of support's major jobs is to buy wards and get a sightstone.  So, bot lane will almost always have more vision than top because one person's job in the lane is essentially to grant vision.  These differences significantly decrease the effect having the Tri at your back has for Blue side bot lane.

One might still have the suggestion to change lanes.  Yes, this can be an option and it can make the differences swap to an extent, however there are two major problems with doing so.

If Red side switches top and bot to give their "bot" lane doubles and early laning dominance, they're essentially giving the advantage to the lane that is already going to get this advantage anyway.  2v1 lanes should always essentially be won.  Having that edge at the beginning isn't going to be a super big deal when you're already giving the advantage to both bot lanes.  And doing this essentially takes away a huge chunk of your dragon pressure.  With a 2v1 right next to dragon they can easily push, pink ward and take dragons.  This can't be said for Top since getting early barons is incredibly hard and usually takes a full and fed team.

Now aside from drastically changing Summoner's Rift there are still a few options that could make this situation better.  One is to make taking buffs at the start of the game less challenging.  If buffs didn't need to be helped on so much early red side bot lane could get to lane at a reasonable time before they lost the first few minions.

Another change that could be made is to make taking doubles harder for non junglers.  Perhaps what could be done is to make hunter's machete reduce jungle minion damage and then flat increase jungle minion damage by the same amount.  Then junglers would be able to jungle with the same effectiveness but taking early jungle camps for laners would be challenging.

I'm sure there are plenty of other options but I do believe that something should be done.

Taking a look at some win rates for both sides is somewhat troubling.

http://www.elophant.com/league-of-legends/charts/other?region=na&tier=all

Overall, for all tiers in NA, Blue side has a 10% higher win rate than Red side.  53% - 43%

Even looking at Diamond, nearly the highest level of play, shows a 10% win difference, 55% - 45%

That difference is far too big.  It needs to be made smaller if not non-existant.

Clairvoyance - A Small Change

Let’s take a moment to look at the summoner spell Clairvoyance.  It’s completely global, meaning it can be used anywhere on the map from anywhere else on the map.  It has no range limitations.  It has a low CD for a summoner spell, the lowest there is.  However, aside from giving you vision, it doesn't have any potential in combat.  It doesn't slow someone down or raise you and your teammates health.  It doesn't mitigate any damage or do any damage to the enemy.  In other words it’s essentially only useful in regards to utility.

While Clairvoyance has its benefits, it also has some major drawbacks when compared to the other summoner spells which is why CV almost never sees use in league.  I would like to change this.  I would like to see CV come back into play if only because it would be interesting to see the plays people could make with it.

So, my suggestion is that the vision given by Clairvoyance should be counted as assistance enough to be an assist on kills.  By this I mean that were you to use Clairvoyance on an enemy and were that enemy to die within assist timers, the person having used CV should get an assist on the kill.

To take this from a purely logical stance, this change makes perfect sense.  While vision can’t always change how a fight would go, it certainly Can change how a fight will go just like any other ability that gives players an assist.  Vision can allow you to see areas with Fog of War so that you don’t get juked.  It can allow you to properly line up skill shots into areas where there are Fog as well.   CV can give you vision of important objectives long enough to make plays into the area, especially if it’s  pinked or someone on the enemy team has an oracles and is constantly clearing your wards.

From a balance perspective, making this change would meet the goal I spoke about earlier, making summoner spells more on even ground in order to see more use of different spells.  If you could get extra assist gold from CV then it might be picked at least somewhat more often than it is now.  And doing so wouldn't change the game all that much.  Stacking CVs to get everyone assists would be pointless since assist gold is split between those getting it. 

It would also have the added benefit of giving the support, who would most likely get this skill, more incentive to be more observant and give them more reasons to fill the as-of-now least liked spot of supporting.  At the same time it would give supports more options in regards to vision without making them feel as if they are crippling themselves by not having exhaust or ignite.

Statistics - A Mathematical Approach to Ranked and Luck

Lots of people believe that they always get the rotten luck.  They say that they always get the leavers, they always get the trolls, they always get the feeders.  Now, for sure, there is a small possibility that they are in fact getting massively bad luck.  Anything is possible and there is a chance, no matter how small, that one person queuing a lot of games can get bad luck despite the odds.  However, for the most part, this belief that one gets only trolls, AFKers and generally bad teammates is flawed when it is confronted with simple logic.

Let’s take a moment to look at the math.

To begin, we’re going to have to make the assumption that the LoL matchmaking system is NOT actively working against you.  This is a fairly safe assumption to make considering that it’s a program and has no ulterior motive.  In other words, there is no reason to believe that the system is purposefully working against anybody.

If you are part of a team of 5, let’s call this Team A, that means that there are 4 random people who you do not know and yourself (assuming you are not duo).  The other team has 5 random people who you do now know which we will call Team B.

Let us take the chance that a random person will AFK/Feed/Troll as X in terms of a percent.

On the other team, the chance that they will have no leavers/feeders/trolls is equal to 100%*(((100-X)/100)^5). For your team, assuming you yourself do not leave/feed/troll, the chance you will have no leavers/feeders/trolls is equal to 100%*(((100-X)/100)^4).

We know that (100-X)/100 is going to be equal to less than 1 because 100-X will be between 0 and 100 which divided by 100 will have to be between 0 and 1.  So, this value raised to the 4^th will actually be greater than this value raised to the 5^th.  

For example, let’s say that the chance of someone leaving is 10%.

100 – 10 = 90

90 / 100 = .9

.9^5 = .59049

.9^4 = .6561

When we multiply these values by 100% we get the chances for nobody on the other team to be a leaver/feeder/troll is around 59% while the chances of nobody on your team being a leaver/feeder/troll is around 65% or 66%.   What this means is that not only are you not more likely to get a negative member on your team, in fact you are less likely to get one because you know that you yourself will not be the negative member.

Conclusion:  If you yourself are a positive influence on the game, over a long period of games in which random chance is negated by general trends you will always be more likely to have a positive team than those that you fight against.

The only people that will see negative trends in their games more than other people at their ELO are people who are themselves negative as long as they play enough games to negate random chance and they are not some incredibly small statistical improbability.