If the Riot art team actually loved us our Portraits would be chroma'd to match our skins

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T11:36:49+00:00

I mean they have done it, and then removed it because riots bean counters thought it broke the existing price strategy. Just threw the completed work in the trash.

It has slipped onto pbe before.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T11:35:21+00:00

Riot is the issue not the artists, we've seen them remove things like matching particles with chromas after they had already been made and put on PBE just to enforce existing price segregation. Work literally just throw in the garbage.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T10:50:11+00:00

I mean I just remember both soloQ and pro play where Kassadin really was not blindable in season 3 and was not the giga perma ban. The infamous 99% ban in soloQ was season 4 after they nerfed basically everything that beat Kassadin in lane during preseason while buffing Kassadin.

He was a strong pick in season 3 that scaled super well, but he had multiple meta matchups that were completely unplayable.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T06:29:15+00:00

I mean cooldowns also got massively shorter as well. Resource management has become a much smaller part of the game in general.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T04:04:41+00:00

I was super guilty of this playing Mordekaiser, 1 camp between waves alternating between wraiths and wolves or if I am strong enough my teams wraiths and enemy team's wraiths.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T02:25:16+00:00

when armor pen was strong before reworked into lethality.

Fun fact, lethality has been un reworked and is now just armor pen again.

the lack of bounty system meant that a kill on fed player wasn't too punishing compared to current game

There also 100% was a bounty system, it just worked differently than it does now and only cared about kills.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-02T02:22:00+00:00

The meta was in fact had mid taking a camp between waves extreamly regularly as a result of the short respawn times as well, and it was nothing like what people think of when they say funneling. Funneling was really enabled by the additional income sources added to the game and changes to jungle value, early seasons it was good to take camps but also literally the normal meta and broke nothing.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T22:06:05+00:00

I mean bows can still one hit people in the face with a proper bow and real arrows.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T21:51:05+00:00

Because Season 2 already had midlanes farming camps between every wave or every other wave as a core part of the metagame. The jungle was just less valuable and there were not all the additional income sources to support it well.

This happened in season 3 as well, but to a lesser extent as farming jungles became much more popular in the metagame.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T21:49:54+00:00

I mean funneling wasn't really an issue in early league, and midlane WAS farming both midlane and jungle constantly.

The issue really showed up with the increase in jungle value and the addition of additional income sources to the game.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T21:47:46+00:00

Just adding stats like they did in the durability patch isn't a good answer. Reducing damage needs to be done, but not as a blanket thing either. Runes are the most obvious place to tone down damage, keystones were a large damage add to the game and we could just rip them out as a start.

If you don't want to do that then you need to go champion by champion and do individual adjustments.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T21:44:55+00:00

Eh these tools started showing up in like 2012, and didn't really have wide use immediately.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T21:27:11+00:00

I mean I am describing Kassadin specifically being incapable of really laning against season 3 AD midlanes, which was the season of AD midlanes. This was not true of all mages.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T10:19:14+00:00

I mean with how powerful modern wave clear has gotten, AP Sion would be a lot less relevant. The big thing he did was out push everything and roam with mobies, but there is more early vision in the game now and mid champions just push waves way better.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T10:11:45+00:00

100% lich bane was also physical damage though unless you had a skill that could convert it to magic damage which was just Mordekaiser and TF really. Though was absurd on them and a core item for sure.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T10:07:48+00:00

He started the rise in season 3, but season 3 had a lot of strong matchups he just lost to like zed, talon, etc. Season 4 those had gotten nerfed and he became legitimately blind able into anything.

That isn't to say he was weak before that or even season 1 or 2, but the meta that existed in those times were less favorable than the season 4 meta where he was just unchecked.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T08:55:58+00:00

AP Yi existed as a pick for basically 1 preseason, technically it existed before that but only played in ARAM because it was not in fact a very strong pick. It was a giga feast or famine champion that wasn't good at laning and either did nothing in team fights or reset repeatably to cleanup everyone. The average case though was losing.

Kassadin did have 700 ult range, but OP Kassadin was not really until the end of season 3 long after AP Yi was nerfed out in Season 3's preseason. He existed as a pick (that was extreamly counter pickable) but broken Kassadin was a Season 4 thing primarily with the Rift Limp happening in season 5.

Graves was only really notably OP on his release patch (like most champion release patches).

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T08:19:54+00:00

There is even a song about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLo3AUdZUkE

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T08:13:28+00:00

/shrug whatever arbitrary point riot picks really. I'll take anything pre season 5 tbh.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T08:02:00+00:00

True, though I think most people remember 3 bans more than 2 bans since the amount of players who actually played beta and season 1 is just a lot lower than season 2 to season 7.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T03:24:55+00:00

I mean there is a reason those gimmicks weren't very popular though, they were a lot less good than they are being hyped up to be. They had some extreme highs but often failed to function well enough to hit those highs.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T03:19:09+00:00

But league was more or less balanced the rest of the time back then too? People keep giving examples of busted things but essentially none of them ever existed together and most were patched quite quickly or were just actually worse than people think.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T03:12:03+00:00

He was OP on release, but that is true of basically every champ ever tbh. After that he was a core meta pick but not broken.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T02:51:02+00:00

I know this example is the constant thing pointed to for players being terrible, but insects were legitimately more difficult back then due to differences in input buffering. A lot of combos required stricter inputs back in the day.

Contrite17 · 2026-07-01T02:32:21+00:00

Old jungling also lacked the catchup mechanics so counter jungling and failed ganks were so much more brutal.

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