Red Post Collection: Esports icons now available, Find Your Lunch Table blog, LotPK in RGMQ, and more!

Continue reading for more information!

• Red Post Collection: Nidalee Bundle + Legacy skins in shop,  LCU: Profile & Collection, Patch Rundown 6.11, Subclass list, & more
• Champion and Skin Sale 6/3 - 6/6
• EU LCS Summer Split Week 1
• Lucha Libre Skins Now Available

• 6/2 PBE Update: Icons & Tentative Balance changes
• Red Post Collection: Your Shop is back, Ask Riot #3 - Yorick, Mastery, & Chroma, Champion Shards for IP, & more!
• NA LCS Summer Split Week 1
• 6/3 PBE Update: Dark Star Thresh login theme

Table of Contents

• Esports team icons return 
• Find Your Lunch Table: Which Champs Are Friends?
• Legend of the Poro King returns in the RGMQ!
• Tryndamere on  DevelopmentRanked and Communication
• Reav3 grab bag on Champion Updates
• Helmet Bro: The Animated Series - Reverse Annie
• Reminders

Esports team icons return 

With the regional leagues starting back up, a huge set of esports team summoner icons are now available in the shop! Each icon is available for 250 RP each or you can pick them up together in large region bundles. These are all available through September 5th,

"With the winners of the 2016 Mid-Season Invitational crowned, we’re heading into another exciting split of local esports action. Cheer on your favorite pros by unlocking a team icon or support an entire league with a bundle. 

Summoner icons are available individually for 250 RP and as regional league bundles until September 5. 

Icons for the following teams will become available in the next patch including Pheonix1 (NA LCS), Team Evy (NA LCS), and Team Mist (LMS). TCL regional icons will be available with the 6.13 patch. While some regional league bundles will be delayed to the next patch for the final icons, the rest of their regional icons will be available unless listed above. 

Bundles of Icon Bundles 

The following bundles will be available from June 3 - September 5.

• 2016 EU LCS Summer Icons - 20% off at 2000 RP
• FC Schalke 04, Fnatic, Giants, G2 Esports, H2K, Origen, ROCCAT, Splyce, Unicorns of Love, Team Vitality 

• 2016 LPL Summer Icons - 20% off at 2400 RP
• EDward Gaming, Game Talents, I MAY, Invictus Gaming, LGD Gaming, NewBee, Royal Never Give Up, Oh My God, Saint Gaming, Snake Esports, Vici Gaming, Team WE 

• 2016 LCK Summer Icons - 20% off at 2000 RP
• Afreeca Freecs, CJ Entus, Ever, Jin Air Green Wings, KT Rolster, Longzhu Gaming, MVP, ROX Tigers, Samsung Galaxy, SK Telecom T1 

• 2016 LAN Summer Icons - 20% off at 1200 RP
• BrawL eSports, Galactic Gamers, Just Toys Havoks Gaming, Lyon Gaming, Revenge eSports, Zaga Talent Gaming 

• 2016 LAS Summer Icons - 20% off at 1200 RP
• Furious Gaming, Hafnet E-Sports, Isurus Gaming, Kaos Latin Gamers Movistar, Last Kings, Rebirth Esports 

• 2016 LJL Summer Icons - 20% off at 1200 RP
• 7th Heaven, Black Eye, DetonatioN FocusMe, Rampage, Scarz, Unsold Stuff Gaming 

• 2016 LCL Summer Icons - 20% off at 1600 RP
• Albus NoX Luna, Gambit CIS, Natus Vincere, Team Empire, Team Just.MSI, TORNADO ROX, Vaevictis eSports, Vega Squadron 

• 2016 OPL Summer Icons - 20% off at 1600 RP
• Abyss Esports, Avant Garde, Chiefs, Dire Wolves, Hellions, Legacy, Sin Gaming, Tainted Minds 

• 2016 VCSA Summer Icons - 20% off at 2000 RP
• An Phat Ultimate, Boba Marines, Cantho Cherry, GIGABYTE SuperHype, Hanoi Fate, Hanoi Skyred, HaiAnh T Team, Saigon Jokers, Tora 269, ZOTAC United 

• 2016 CBLOL Summer Icons - 20% off at 1600 RP
• BIGGODS, CNB e-Sports, INTZ e-Sports, KaBuM, Keyd Stars, paiN Gaming, Operation Kino, Red Canids 

After the next patch, these bundles will be available until September 5:

• 2016 NA LCS Summer Icons - 20% off at 2000 RP
• Apex Gaming, Cloud9, CLG, Echo Fox, Immortals, NRG eSports, Phoenix1, Team Liquid, Team SoloMid, Team Envy
• 2016 LMS Summer Icons - 20% off at 1600 RP
• ahq e-Sports Club, eXtreme Gamers, Flash Wolves, HongKong e-Sports, J Team, Mid Night Sun, Machi, Team Mist

After patch 6.13, the following bundle will be available until September 5:

• 2016 TCL Summer Icons - 20% off at 1600 RP

Find Your Lunch Table: Which Champs Are Friends?

Next up we have a new data driven Clairvoyance blog looking at the what the champions you play says about you and the other champions you might be likely to play based on your main!

[NOTE: Be sure to check out the article on the LoL page for best results!]

PICKING YOUR CHAMP IS A BIG DEAL. A champ can motivate you to play, it can carry you to challenjour, it can say something about you (for better or worse) even before you load into a game. More often than not, the other players in the game don’t even call you by the name you’ve given yourself, but by the name of the champ you’ve picked—hopefully preceded by adjectives like “amazing,” “godlike,” or “super fed.” 

For us (hi, we’re Jeopardy & Bilby), a champion can reflect how you connect with the game: Jeopardy came from a fighting game background (WHEN’S MARVEL), so he instantly clicked with Riven's combo-heavy playstyle. Bilby, meanwhile, started playing Fizz because he’s a Moby-Dick nerd, and Tundra Fizz had a whale ult. 

There are plenty of perfectly valid ways to pick a champ, but what do those choices say about you? And, once you've found one that clicks, which other champs are you also likely to play, and what ties those champs together? Do they split into cliques, like kids in a cafeteria? If so, who would sit together? Thanks to data that we gather during every game, we've found some answers.  

HERE'S WHAT WE ANALYZED  

JEOPARDY'S DATA CORNER: We sampled from the population of all players who played at least 25 games during the first half of March this year. The key stat we looked at was "number of games played on each champion" for each individual player. 

In the data we gathered, two champions are correlated if players tend to play those two champions together—if many players play Riven and Azir, then Riven and Azir would have a higher correlation. If many players play Riven but proactively avoid playing Malphite for whatever reason (perhaps because you perceive him as too easy and binary and rewarding for being passive in lane, for example), then Riven and Malphite would have a much lower correlation. 

Node and Edge

To help us better understand these champion correlations, we created a network visualization of the champions, which you can explore below. We call this handy tool the CHAMP FRIENDSHIP COMPATIBILITY DEVICE (CFCD). The CFCD network graph consists of nodes and edges: a node represents a single champion, and an edge is a line that links two champions together. The edges of this graph are undirected—a line from Annie to Olaf is treated the same as the line from Olaf to Annie. For the network graph, we filtered out all correlations that were below a certain threshold, so only stronger relationships would appear in the visualization. 

Cluster and Correlation 

CHAMP FRIENDSHIP COMPATIBILITY DEVICE 

For your research and entertainment, here is the tool we used. You can explore the champ groupings (sorted by color), or look at individual champs and their strongest correlations to other champs (shown at the bottom, in order). Maybe you'll find a new champ to try out!

HERE'S WHAT WE FOUND 

We analyzed the modularity of the network to sort champs into communities based on playrate correlations. Modularity measures the strength of a community within a larger network—high modularity means that communities are well-defined, such that nodes within a community correlate stronger with each other than with nodes from other communities. We also factored in edge weights: stronger correlations were weighted heavier toward defining tighter communities, and weaker correlations were weighted less. 

Okay class, are you still awake? If you wanna stretch and walk around for a little bit, that’s cool. Here we go: Segmenting a larger population into groups like this is useful when you’re trying to identify similarities and differences between data points—in this case, we can look at the clusters to find relationships between champions based on play rate. Long story short: if you play a champ in one cluster, you’re more likely to play other champs in that cluster than ones that aren’t. Here’s where they fell:

• “I FORGOT SMITE/TP” (Top/Jungle). This group consists of top lane fighters (Shen, Renekton) combined with champs that usually play both top and jungle (Hecarim, Trundle, Pantheon). Some jungle-exclusive champs get caught in here (like Amumu). 

• “LAST HITTING IS HARD” (Supports). There are two subgroups: Supports are split into a Soraka-Nami-Sona-Janna quadrant on one side, with Thresh, Tahm Kench, and Brand on the other. Unlike his self-proclaimed title of “Best Bard Riot,” Riot Blaustoise’s research into Banana-Burn Index and Rovals actually holds up here, with support players preferring to play either Babysitters/Caretakers or Playmakers. 

• “YOU CAN’T SIT WITH US” (Unpopular Champs). This is an interesting group because it seems to be directly shaped by the meta. We’ve got Urgot, Mordekaiser, Galio, and Yorick in here. (Are you all still beautiful and unique snowflakes when you’re in a group together?) 

• ADCs. These stick together; it’s a tightly correlated group. 

• AP MAGES. Like ADCs—another expected cluster. Ryze, Kassadin, Viktor, Azir, LeBlanc, etc. 

• “/all OUTPLAYED” (Assassins and Mechanically Difficult Champs). This group spans multiple roles (mid, top, jungle) and consists of champs that are generally considered very difficult to master or have high skill ceilings. Riven, Fizz, Lee Sin, Ekko, Rengar, Yasuo, and Zed sit here. These highlight montages ain’t gonna record themselves. 

• “I SAW IT IN LCS” Here we’ve got mostly team-oriented top laners and junglers that seem to do better in pro play than in our own ranked games: Gragas, Kindred, Rek’Sai, Gnar, etc. Teamwork sold separately; batteries not included. 

• “GAME SENSE IS MY MECHANICS” (Starters and Mechanically Straightforward Champs). So you've got no jungling experience, but you have a working R key? Try Warwick. First time toplane? Pick Nasus and attack-move through your lane while mashing Q for the next 45 minutes. 

A FEW FUNNY THINGS THAT JUMPED OUT IN THE DETAILS 

While poking around the CFCD, we found some other interesting groups that we wanted to share. 

• THE RIGHT CLICK CLIQUE: For the majority of champions, you have to play around and respect their ultimates. But for these champions, the button to respect is their right click—and sadly the cooldown on that is only 0.3 seconds late in the game. Prepare to get outplayed by Tryndamere, Jax, Master Yi, and Xin Zhao. (Maybe they don’t have keyboards?)  

• JUST THE WORST: We expected Heimerdinger to be buddies with other minion/turret masters (hi Zyra), but his closest pals are Teemo and Blitzcrank. We guess these players just enjoy seeing people suffer?  

• TANK COMMANDERS: If you’re playing Nautilus, you’re probably also playing Braum, Malphite, Alistar, and Tahm Kench. These champs put the “skill” in “you don’t even have to dodge skillshots.”  

• I WAITED IN LINE ALL NIGHT: Illaoi is highly correlated with Jhin, Ekko, and Tahm Kench. Our best guess is that these players prefer shiny new champs.  

• ONE OF THESE THINGS IS NOT LIKE THE OTHERS: There are a couple champs appearing in unexpected clusters. What’s Irelia doing with the AP Mages? Is she the go-to top laner for mid mains?  

• DUO TO GOLD V 0LP STARTER PACK: Sona correlates with Soraka, Janna, and Nami. We’re just kidding about the starter pack thing! Please keep healing us. 

WHAT DID WE LEARN? 

Unsurprisingly, it does seem that a champion’s role has a high impact on which group they fall into, which makes sense as players get better in specific positions and start to specialize. But it’s also clear that a champ’s kit isn’t the only thing that matters. There are clusters that span roles like the high-skill-ceiling club, or ones that seem to be based on a champ's (un)popularity. Looking at this data gives a great window into what different types of players are out there, but the reasons that a specific champion resonates with a player seem to be as diverse as players themselves. 

What did you find when playing with the CHAMP FRIENDSHIP COMPATIBILITY DEVICE? Let us know in the comments below."

In the comments of the article, Bilby noted:

"Quote:

This is actually extremely accurate towards me. When I looked up my main on here, which happens to be , every champion that I love to play and play regularly, aside from Fizz, popped up. This is actually pretty cool and I can't wait to see what you guys come up next with at Rito.

That's awesome! We had a lot of fun working on this. When anybody here saw the tool for the first time, they just started plugging in their own favorite champs, so it made a lot of sense to include the tool in the post so everyone could play around with it & see whether or not other __ mains had similar champ pools. Glad you enjoyed it!"

When asked about links between what players play and lore relations, Bilby commented:

"I was REALLY hoping we would find a good lore one & there were a couple that made some sense, but they all seemed like a stretch in the end. I remember when we first ran the data it was for NA only, and I think Caitlyn/Jinx had a correlation with Vi, but that went away when we ran the global data :("

Legend of the Poro King returns in the RGMQ!

Legend of the Poro King has returned this weekend in the rotating game queue!

"From the original clone-tastic One For All to the frenetic manatee magic of Ultra Rapid Fire, featured game modes provide unique spins on the classic League formula. We’re kicking off the next game mode in the rotation: Legend of the Poro King is now live! 

As a refresher on the mode, let’s go over the basics:

• When you jump into a Poro King match on the Howling Abyss, you’ll be joined by two poro pals in your quest to call forth and aid your poro majesty
• The Poro King is a mega-classy super minion that heals your team, regenerates mana, and deals AoE damage while handing out royal beatdowns to enemy towers
• The King will serve as a sieging dynamo for you until he is killed by the enemy team in a regicide most foul
• Activate Poro Toss once to toss your teeny poro pal across the map, if the lil fella hits a target, you can reactivate Poro Toss to Poro Dash, which will send you soaring towards an unlucky enemy
• Land 10 Poro Tosses as a team and the Poro King himself will plop down to begin his royal wreckery
• Once you or your team has summoned the Poro King, activate To The King! To transform into one of the king’s loyal (fluffy) subjects and fly to his side

Just as in any rotating queue game mode, we’ve specially tuned Champion Mastery so you can earn points in the mode. You’ll also be able to earn keys for your wins and loot chests for your (or your premade’s) S­-, S, and S+ games. Unlike other Champion Mastery-enabled queues, rotating game modes DO NOT reward mastery tokens towards levels 6 and 7. 

Legend of the Poro King is now available and lasts through the evening on Sunday (we’ll shut it down early Monday morning--usually between 1:00 AM and 3:00 AM).

We’ll be trying out different things with the rotating game mode queue over the next few months, such as potentially turning it on longer depending on how popular it is, changing the mode cadence or what modes are available. We’re looking for your feedback as we go, so let us know. GLHF, and we’ll see you on the snowy battlefield of Legend of the Poro King!"

As mentioned at the bottom of the post, be aware that rotating game modes DO NOT REWARD MASTERY TOKENS TOWARDS CHAMPION MASTERY LEVELS 6 AND 7.

Tryndamere on  DevelopmentRanked and Communication

Following the heated discussions regarding the recent Dynamic Queue and the future of League announcement, Riot president Marc "Tryndamere" Merrill posted on his personal blog  to share more on Riot's philosophy on the game, ranked, and communication:

"Wrote a blog re: our philosophy around development, ranked and communication. May help contextualize DQ vs SQ. http://tryndamere.blogspot.com/2016/06/the-tldr-on-solo-queue-vs-dynamic-queue.html"

Reav3 grab bag on Champion Updates

"Quote:

Can you give an idea of who is on the high priority list for next year?

Sure, not sure who will get to on this list but champions that are high for us right now are Galio, Swain, Urgot, Cho'Gath, Irelia, Evelynn, Mordekaiser, Pantheon, Rammus, Dr. Mundo, Nunu, and Akali. 

We obviously won't get to all of these next year, and there will probably be others that get added to the list overtime. There are probably others I'm not thinking about right now as well. But since u asked I through some up."

Reav3 continued:

"Quote:

I can see some would need complete updates and others would be included in some batch updates, in that group where would you put the champs listed in each group. I'm more curious to see where ya'll think each champ lies.

This was actually a list of champions that need full VGU's, if listed all the champs that would also be good for roster projects the list would be massive.
Also I realized that I forgot Shaco, Volibear and Tryndamere on that list."

He continued::

"Quote:

Is Swain  still on the list of Full Visual & Gameplay updates?

He's on the list to do one day for sure. He is not being actively worked on atm though"

When asked about his thoughts on a possible Aatrox update, Reav3  noted:

"Quote:

What about poor Aatrox ? :(

I have mentioned this in other posts but Aatrox is probably better suited for a Roster project then a full VGU as his Art is pretty high quality. Most likely when we get to Divers."

As for how the larger project to update yordles is going,  Reav3 commented:

"Quote:

Is the Yordle-unification process still ongoing?

Just curious to know if  Teemo, Corki, veigar, Kennen, and Rumble will still get some love in regards to a visual update someday soon? Tristana, Poppy and Heimer were all made much more popular since their reworks and would be nice to see how the other Yordles will fair as well.

On day we will most likely get to those. I can see Corki and Kennen making it onto the full VGU list in the next couple of years. Overtime champions that look good now start to look more and more dated, so it's hard to say who will be on the list 3-4 years from now."

When asked what factors into champion updates and the list, Reav3 commented:

"Quote:

Does the model quality have any factor in the decision making. For example, skins team have said it is harder to make skins for champions with old rigs, so they try to stay away from it. Especially for Eve, Galio, Urgot, Morde. Most of the others have received skins.

It's one factor for sure. We usually look at multiple factors when decided on our big VGUs. Model Quality, Narrative Quality, Design Quality and Player Sentiment are all factors. Player sentiment comes from our survey data. We have data from surveys world wide that show which champions players want reworked the most. 

We have recently added "Archetype Potential" to the list as well. This has to do more with how resonant a certain archetype is and what the potential of the archetype would be if we executed on it today. Warwick is a good example of this. Warwick's kit isn't as bad someone like Urgot or Swain (A bit boring certainly, but not as unhealthy) but the potential of a modern execution of the "Werewolf" Archetype felt like it had very high potential. Irelia is another one that is high on the list because of this. While her gameplay isn't super unhealthy or anything a modern execution of Irelia could be potentially really amazing."

When asked about the speed of champion updates, Reav3  commented:

"Quote:

Is there any plan to increase the momentum of Champion reworks?
There's a lot of characters that need attention, and few releases per year. At this rate we won't even get to see a dozen reworks by the time League is 10 years old.

I think you will find that we have been increasing the momentum by quite a bit. The time between Poppy and Taric was much shorter then previous VGU's. We have Ryze and Yorick in the pipeline right now as well. Even if we only got those 4 out this year that would be way more big VGU's then we have ever released in one year."

Reav3  continued:

"Quote:

So if we get about 4 full reworks this year? Can we expect an even greater number next year?

Not even sure if 4 will be the number this year. Could be more could be less. Different champions take different amounts of time. Yorick being a "Minionmancer" for example has a higher scope then most champions. Some champions like Gangplank or Ryze took less resources since we didn't feel as much needed to change. 

The point I'm making is attaching a number is hard since it's unclear how long/short different projects will take, just saying that we have a bigger team now and are trying to increase the cadence of our big VGUs."

Reav3  continued:

"Quote:

While that's true, I still remember a few years back when Riot got busy we got a new champion every two months or so(specifically remember the back to back releases of Kha, Fiora and so), and while that pace was definitely crazy and unsustainable, which I understand, the pace we get reworks and champions done now feels ridiculously sluggish, especially taking into account that Riot games grew in size and gained experience since then.
I guess what I'm asking is, why are the reworks so slow when even a few years back it seemed you could have done them faster.

Well in the last 7 months there has been, Poppy, Shen, Jhin, Aurelion Sol, Taric, Taliyah. 

Seems like that's a bit quicker then every 2 months if you count new champions and reworks together. 

Also I think we have tried to make champions of much higher quality recently. Part of the reason Champion Update exists is because of how fast champions were coming out before. Roster's entire goal is to go through older champions and give them unique strategic identities since they didn't get them the first time. I mean as you mentioned Fiora and Kha came out back to back, but Fiora already had to have a major rework. If we ever get to Assassins Kha would be a strong candidate for tweaks as well. 

Throwing more people at a problem doesn't always solve the problem either. I think these days we want to make sure the champions we release are strategically distinct and have cohesive art/design narrative. This takes more time. We might not always succeed with every new champion or rework but we put a lot more work into it then before."

As for if older voice actors will return to reprise their roles in future updates, Reav3 commented:

"Quote:

I personally feel you've got Morde nailed down pretty well in terms of general direction in terms of lore and appearance.
And hell, an tyrannic Wraith-King would look absolutely dope with proper animations. 

Just one thing I'd like to know; Are you going to be replacing all the older VA for these VGU's because I think Adam Harrington absolutely nails Morde.

Not sure. We usually have the old VA come in for auditions for the reworks as well as many new people. We would go with whoever we think does the best audition."

Helmet Bro: The Animated Series - Reverse Annie 

"TIBBERS THO 

Animated by ehlboy: https://www.youtube.com/user/ehlboy 

Effects by miccool: https://www.youtube.com/user/micshower 

In collaboration with Hyun's Dojo: https://www.youtube.com/user/hyunsdojo 

**Created in Collaboration with Riot Games*"

REMINDERS

Last up we have a few reminders!

• To go with her splash art updates in 6.11, A Nidalee bundle + legacy Snow Bunny, Leopard, and Bewitching skins in shop through 6/8!

• There is a Lulu bundle up in the merch shop through 6/8! This bundle includes a Lulu Plush, Lulu Figure, and an adorable cup cake for a discounted price!

• With the release of the Lucha Libre skins, the new El Tigre Braum summoner icon is available for 1500 IP through June 6th!