Red Post Collection: Email Verification Rolling out, Lemondogs & LCS Rule Update, and more!

Verifying your email will help you have better control of your account as we continue to release new features (like SMS protection on PBE). Currently, if you verify your email, you'll be able to authorize any account credential changes from your verified email. This should help prevent account theft as the thief would need to know your verified email address' credentials in order to make changes to your account.

We wanted to give everyone who does this a 4-win IP boost as a thank you for taking the extra step to secure their account :)"

You can verify your email and earn a four win IP boost by login into your region ( if it was noted as being available above ), clicking your profile name up on the top right, and following the prompts.

Update on Lemondogs & LCS Rule Changes

With the LCS a week away, Riot has released a statement on the Lemondogs roster situation and announcing a few of the LCS rules changes regarding  LCS teams "buying their way in" and roster changes.

Here's the LoLeSports post from RiotNickAllen:

"Summoners, 

We wanted to update you on two situations that have created confusion and speculation in the community: the Lemondogs roster for the 2014 EU LCS Spring Split and our rules regarding acquiring LCS team spots and bringing on new players. 

With respect to Lemondogs’ participation in the 2014 Spring Split, we have attempted to work with Lemondogs management over the last few weeks to get the documents and information – such as a verified roster - required by every team that participates in the LCS. Unlike the other teams, Lemondogs failed to identify a valid roster to us, and as a result, have been given a final deadline of 11:59pm CEST on January 8th, or they will face removal from the LCS. If they fail to meet this deadline, we will hold a qualifier for the open 8th LCS spot with the three teams that lost in the Promotion matches (Ninjas in Pyjamas, Meet Your Makers, and Supa Hot Crew), pending those teams’ ability to submit a valid roster that contains 3/5s of the lineup that played during Promotions. 

Additionally, many of you have been discussing the rumors surrounding Lemondogs’ potential roster and rumored sale, so we’d like to clarify our philosophy on how teams enter the league. We created the Promotion mechanism to ensure that the best teams are represented in the LCS. While we want to preserve a lot of the rights of those teams (such as the freedom to change their roster in order to field the best team possible, or selling to a new, passionate owner), we don’t want to let those rights marginalize the competitive integrity inherent in the Promotion mechanism. 

As we’ve examined our rules, we realized that they do not completely match our intent. Below are a set of rules that we’re adding to the LCS rulebook in order to prevent teams who failed to qualify for the LCS from buying their way in; a situation we saw as quite likely and one that we believe is contrary to your interests as fans of the LCS. 

Here are the rules that we are adding to the LCS rulebook, and why we think they are necessary: 

• In section 3.1: No Team Member on a team who played in either LCS region and/or any aspect of the Challenger Series (including play-in) may purchase or otherwise attempt to own/control an LCS team without a complete Split having taken place since their last point of participation in the LCS or Challenger Series.

Rationale: Per the philosophy above, we do not want to marginalize a team’s efforts and successes in the Promotion matches simply because another owner has deep pockets and wants to buy back into the LCS.

• In section 3.1: Changes in Ownership may only occur between Splits, meaning after the most recent Playoffs and Promotion Matches but before the start of the following Split.

Rationale: We think that mid-Split ownership changes are confusing to fans and not beneficial to the Players, so we want to limit those changes to the All Star break or the offseason. 

• In section 3.2: No team may have on their roster more than two players at a time from any single starting lineup of a different team that played in either region of the LCS and/or any aspect of the Challenger Series (including play-in) in the last two completed Splits.

Rationale: While we want to preserve the ability of teams to pick up new players and change their roster, we do not want them to pick up entire existent lineups and essentially drop in a new team (and we consider a team to be 3/5 or more of the starters). This will prevent teams who lose in the Promotion matches from being picked up in their majority or entirety. Taken in conjunction with the restriction on owners’ ability to purchase a team, this rule should prevent immediate buybacks in their entirety. 

• In section 4.2.1: Per Section 3.2, no team may trade for more than 2 players of another LCS team.

Rationale: Just a clarification based on the updated rule in Section 3.2."

Over on reddit, Riot Magus expanded on the Evil Geniuses situation by saying:

"EG is the title sponsor of Velocity, no sale took place. Going forward with the updated rules, an LCS team like Velocity will not be able to pick up 3/5 members of a LCS/Challenger team from the previous two splits. We won't enforce this rule on any player moves prior to this rule update."

Riot Chopper also added in:

"The rule only affects past players who are now trying to buy an LCS team. If a player starts his own team and qualifies for the LCS (like HotshotGG), that's perfectly permissible, as is owning and playing on a team (like Reginald did last season). We simply want to prevent players who don't manage to qualify from buying their way into the LCS."

Gangplank PBE "Change"

As you may have noticed, the 1/7 PBE update included an update to Gangplank's R tooltip that said it's duration was reduced to 6 second at all ranks from 7.

Gypsylord commented on this "change", saying:

"This is not a GP nerf. The tooltip was bugged. Cannon Barrage has always lasted 6 seconds. The tooltip now displays the correct duration."

Xelnath Tidbits

As we've grown accustom to, Xelnath mentioned a few interesting tidbits during his most recent late night discussion thread.

When asked if he had any comments about the current state of top lane, Xelnath replied:

"This is a good question - when we went into Preseason 4, we had a priority list of things we wanted to resolve. A deep-dive on the state of toplane was one of them - We made some initial stabs when we realized there's a lot of work to be done there.

Scarizard, CertainlyT and a couple other designers were working together on it, but it became quickly clear its a big issue we can't tackle in a single patch."

When asked for some updates on Ao Shin, he replied:

"Pretty sure we don't have any details worth sharing - but I know we had some issues and needed to take him back to the shop a few times - totally business as usual here. "

In response to a snippy comment about "What will Morello nerf next:", Xelnath commented:

"Ryan hasn't demanded a specific nerf in the entire time I've been at Riot. Its other people closer to the characters who made those changes - and they seem to be doing a pretty damn good job at the moment. "

When asked if the timely production rate of ultimate skins means not every champion will get an ultimate skin, Xelnath noted:

"Yep, I think that's accurate - its unlikely every character will have an ultimate skin. Ultimate skins are about an amazing concept that just grips the team so hard that we know players will want to try it! It's about an amazing inspiration that just sweeps you off your feet and go "I gotta have this"

That said, I'm floored you love our skins so much you want more of them. I know that alone makes our art team beam with pride. Just wait till you see the next few champions - WOW!"