Red Post Collection: Quick Gameplay Thoughts for September 22nd, Star Guardian Event Ending Soon, Behind the Scenes of Legends Never Die, & More

This afternoon's red post collection includes Meddler's gameplay thoughts for 9/22, a reminder the Star Guardian event is ending soon, a look behind the scenes of Legends Never Die, legacy esports skins in the shop, and more!
Continue reading for more information!

• Red Post Collection: Worlds 2017 Missions & Loot, Origins: Ahri, September Bundles, Ask Riot & More
• September Early Sales [9/22 - 9/25]
• 9/22 PBE Update: Soaring Sword Fiora Skin Tweaks, Splash Tweaks, & More

Table of Contents

• Quick Gameplay Thoughts: September 22 
• September Early Sales: 9.22.17 – 9.25.17
• Star Guardian event ending soon 
• Making of Legends Never Die | Worlds 2017
• Quick Hits
• Reminders

Quick Gameplay Thoughts: September 22 

"Morning all, 

Usual Disclaimers 

These posts will often contain talk about future work we're doing, or planning to do, that isn't yet guaranteed to ship. The nature of the work could change or, depending on what we discover, projects mentioned may get put delayed or even stopped. 

If you'd like to see a Tweet whenever a new one of these posts goes up: https://twitter.com/RiotMeddler 

Adjusting Summoner Spell Levels Slightly 

With the changes to leveling coming in pre-season we'll be adjusting which levels players get summoner spells at slightly to distribute different things that unlock (summoner spells, new game modes, ability to customize runes etc) a bit better. We'll also be shifting a couple of spells so that they're introduced to the player at more appropriate times as well. That'll overall look like Cleanse at level 9 instead of 6 once players are a bit better placed to assess its value, Flash at level 7 instead of 8, Snowball at level 6 instead of 1 etc. 

We're not making all Summoner spells available at level 1 however because we've seen that be a worse experience for new players, given they're focused on learning the basics of the game and Summoner spell usage, let alone Summoner spell choice, isn't very important at that point. Ghost and Heal are offered because they're the two with the easiest targeting (just push the button) and for a lot of new players that's a really meaningful thing. Leaving some spells, Flash and Smite especially, till later levels does tend to frustrate players making additional accounts somewhat, that's a trade off we think's appropriate though, especially given we're not looking to encourage smurfing more. 

Urgot W and damage reflection 

In 7.20 we're planning to make a change where Urgot's W treats damage reflection as an on hit as well. That means that, in addition to reducing Urgot's on hits on other to 1/3, his W will also reduce damage reflection he takes to 1/3. That means Bramble Vest, Thornmail, Rammus W and any other possible damage reflect sources won't excessively murder him after he pushes that button. 

Balance stuff we'll be looking at in 7.20 

A lot of our focus, even for the folks normally putting a lot of time into patch to patch balance, is on pre-season at this point. There'll still be some balance changes in 7.20 though. Thoughts on what's likely:   

• Ongoing work that didn't make it into 7.19 - Sterak's buff, Brand buff targeted at mana restoration for CSing Brands, probably an Ornn buff (might still make it into 7.19 though). 

• Monitoring of bigger 7.19 changes - Janna, Azir, Xin Zhao, Vayne and Caitlyn all have some likelihood of needing some follow up work 

• New changes planned - Buffs likely to Graves, Karma 

• Investigating, but might still leave unchanged - Do we need to nerf Twitch before pre-season hits and upheaves the state of balance for a bit anyway?  

Streaming some runes stuff on Monday 

We'll be doing a stream where we talk about some runes stuff this coming Monday, looking at both some previously announced ones and some new ones. We'll be using a pre-recorded recent game from one of our internal playtests for that, so while this won't be live streaming of a game it should be a pretty good look for anyone interested at how Runes behave during normal LoL play. Recommend giving it a look if you're interested in seeing some of the system in action before it's on PBE."

Meddler talked more about Karma changes:

"Quote:

Are you just doing generic buffs for Karma or are you trying to address any issues with the changes you're going for?

Likely just basic power, given we're so close to pre-season and most of our time has to go there. Larger work to fix some of her issues will be a later thing."

Meddler continued:

"Quote:

Hey Meddler, a few questions regarding Karma:

• Are you only planning number buffs at this point?
• If so, are they just bandaid buffs until you are able to work on her properly early next year like you said before?
• Lastly, if you are going through with larger work on Karma next year, how do you feel about some of her older mechanics being updated and brought back to her? The Karma community are seeking reconciliation between the 2 player bases created by her rework.

Yep, likely just a bit of power for now and some mechanics changes next year. 

I think looking at some of her prior mechanics to see if any of them could be made to work well on her is worth a try. Wouldn't want to make any promises as to what we'd re-add, or even if we'd find we were able to re-add anything, but would definitely look into it. Which particular mechanics would you folks be most interested in seeing us at least experiment with?"

As for the timing on the Runes livestream, Meddler replied:

"Quote:

Live stream: Will it be at a reasonable hour for European people?

I believe we're aiming to start at 12 (noon) PST in part to make it easier for a range of timezones to tune in."

On Yasuo, Meddler commented:

"Quote:

Are the changes for Yasuo from the PBE last month going to return soon?

Possible, but not particularly likely before pre-season at least at this point."

As for Aatrox, Meddler replied:

"Quote:

Hey meddler what are your thoughts on Aatrox right now? Will he receive a rework soon? If so how soon? And what changes is he likely to receive from now till his rework(assuming he will have one).

We're buffing Aatrox a bit in the next patch, he's been struggling more recently especially with Bramble Vest giving him a pretty rough time in lane. We're still planning a gameplay update for him, that'll be sometime next year.

On Graves, Meddler commented:

"Quote:

Also curious would this change to Graves be a lane or jungle Graves buff

Hopefully both, not sure what we'll be doing yet though."

When asked what other changes they were considering for Brand, Meddler replied:

"Quote:

Did you guys consider to put the mana restore effect on Brands E? You almost always last hit with E. Also reducing the mana cost on E as You guys looked at 7.16 could work to push Brand back to mid lane.
Another question:Are you guys looking to update Brands kit in the NEAR future to more closly represent this AOE dmg dealer or only his passive (and some of his lacluster E) will do this? 

Also chaning his R so it could bounce back to him would make wonders.

We've talked about E mana restore, my concern there is that while it feels great when using W+E to clear casters it feels somewhat limited or awkward in many other circumstances given you're not maxing E (and, given its play's less interesting, wouldn't want to make Brand do so). 

Next version's probably going to be that units killed that are already Ablaze restore some mana. Captures that W+E case but also allows a few other cases to be used as well."

When asked about Ryze, Meddler commented:

"Quote:

meddler are there any plans for ryze? 

i enjoyed seeing him in ranked last year even if only for a short time,is there a chance we will see him reach playable winrates next season?

We're looking at some balance changes aimed to help Ryze perform a bit better in solo queue without being really dominant in organized play. Might have those out before pre-season."

When asked about the tentative changes on the Frost Queen like of items, Meddler replied:

"Quote:

Could you talk a bit about the reasons why CDR rather than gold generation was chosen when buffing the Spellthief's line? Is it intentional that choosing Spellthief should mean giving up massive amounts of gold compared to choosing Coin even when you're getting Spellthief procs consistently as fast as the item allows? If so, what's the rationale behind this? And if not, is there any plan to look at the items' respective gold generation levels to bring them more in line with each other?

We wanted to distinguish the support items more, rather than always giving them similar effects. That meant pushing Frost Queen's line towards more combative stats (CDR in this case) and in a way that leaves you happier sitting on it at Tier 2. Coin by contrast's then got more gold generation but less in combat power, and has a stronger argument for upgrading it earlier."

September Early Sales: 9.22.17 – 9.25.17

The September Early sales are up now through 9/25! Check out the announcement post below, and for a full preview check out our site post. Here's Riot Evaelin with more:

"The September Early Sale is officially here! To kick things off, the following non-Legacy skins from the past 4-6 months are going on sale from September 22, 2017 12:00 a.m. PT through September 25, 2017 11:59 p.m. PT!

Star Guardian event ending soon 

The Star Guardian event is burning out quickly, and will end on 9/25. Here's a reminder of the things you can still do and purchase before the star burns out:

"The Star Guardian: New Horizon event ends on 9/25/17 at 11:59 PM PT, and with it go...

• Invasion game mode missions, though you can transform Starlight Tokens into the New Horizon Icon and New Horizon Ward until 10/16/17 at 11:59 PM PT.
• The New Horizon Set, First Star Edition bundles, Burning Bright Bundle, and Familiar Friends Bundle. You receive First Star loading screen borders for Star Guardian Ahri, Miss Fortune, Syndra, Soraka, and Ezreal only by purchasing the New Horizon Set or First Star Edition bundles.

Don’t forget to watch Ahri’s magical transformation in A New Horizon, discover which new team member you align with, and explore the Star Guardian Universe, where you can read the short story “Starfall,” take to the skies in a 360° viewer, and study up on bios. 

For more information, go here or visit the event in client. Thanks for participating!"

Making of Legends Never Die | Worlds 2017

Here's a look behind the scenes at the making of Legends Never Die, this year's Worlds anthem!

Making “Legends Never Die (feat. Against The Current)” 

The 2017 League of Legends World Championship begins September 23rd. 

For more information visit http://www.lolesports.com 

#Worlds2017 

************************************************
"Legends Never Die"
Featured artist: Against The Current
Written by: Riot Games Music Team, Alex Seaver of Mako, and Justin Tranter
Produced by: Riot Games Music Team, Alex Seaver of Mako, and Oliver
Mixed and mastered by: Riot Games Music Team Vocals performed by: Against The Current
Vocal production by: Riot Games Music Team, and Colin Brittain
Additional vocal production by: Alex Goot

http://www.atcofficial.com/ https://www.youtube.com/againstthecur... https://www.facebook.com/againstthecu... https://www.facebook.com/WeAreMako

Here's the full track:

Quick Hits

• RiotSephyre commented on Reddit about the intentional feeder system:

Put simply the current intentional feeder detection system is bad. We're working on a new way of detecting intentional feeders that is a couple of patches away. That won't be a 100% solution though but it will be an improvement. The update is focused on detecting the obvious intentional feeders that run it down mid from level 1. The biggest help to addressing intentional feeding in general is in-game reports, as it validates what we detect, helps us tune the system and in extreme cases helps Player Support investigate.

• The Esports legacy skins are now in the shop, including Championship, Challenger, and team skins! 

Reminders

• The Star Guardian content is now available! Check out our coverage of the release, and make sure to get in a game of Invasion, the newest game mode released. It will be available through 9/25 at 11:59 PT!