Legends of Runeterra - Card game by Riot Games

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Valderen

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I find it odd also, and to some extent concerning that it doesn't seem to be picking up any steam, quite the contrary. Used to get 15K or so on twitch a few weeks ago, and it's rarely getting above 7K now.

There doesn't seem to have much support beside a few sites, no active forums anywhere that I've seen,

That said, it has more viewers than MTG:A on twitch and that game is doing well. Hearthstone is just a monster in the genre right now.

It's also still in beta, some people don't play beta games, mobile client isn't out yet, and has been announced so I'm sure some people are just waiting for it.

It doesn't have a competitive scene yet. I'm sure when Riot decides to organize a few tournaments and throw big cash prize that the pro scene will take a look at it, especially with how little RNG there is in the game, it means most games are decided by skills which I think will be good for the competitive scene.

While I like the business model personally, I don't think streamers do, not the big ones anyways. They would most likely prefer to throw money at the game, and be able to play lots of different decks which is probably better for their viewership.

I haven't seen a big marketing push yet either. We'll see how Riot handle stuff when it comes out of beta, and they are ready to get a competitive scene going.

I said before I hope it does well, because I'm totally enjoying the game. There's still a bit of the game being new, but I feel it's just a solid game that has addressed my issues with HS, while still keeping the fast pace.
 
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Ravishing

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I'm not concerned at all.
Good games will grow a base slowly.
The big one-hit wonders that throw $$$$ at streamers to 24/7 their game seem to flop quickly.
A lot of the top games on Twitch didn't get there overnight.
Also consider streaming #s on twitch seem to be plateauing, maybe due to other platforms taking people?

Between 2016 - 2018 Twitch viewers doubled from 500K to 1M viewers.
2018 - 2020 it added 300K viewers.

Not a good trend for Twitch imo, and the top games all have fairly low #s every time I look there.

Twitch isn't a good gauge of interest.
 
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Valderen

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This sucks, I was in an expedition, had just lost a game, I was easily winning the one after so I would continue, game froze, and I had to shut it down. Came to almost no life and my turn ending, lost on the next round...ended my expedition at 4. :(
 

Valderen

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Finished Freljord xp path. :)

Starting Piltover & Zaun for now, I already have 3 Ezreal, 3 Jinx and 1 Teemo, I need more Teemos and Heimerdingers as both are fun to play with. :)
 

Ravishing

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Just used this deck to finally get out of Gold II, am Plat IV now.

Yasuo deck by M0gwai

Pretty strong, isn't hard countered by much that I see atm.
Only couple losses came from bad opening hands, no 1 or 2 drops in 2 diff games even with a 3 & 4 card mulligan. Most of the time the early game is strong though.
 

Valderen

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I wanted to try that deck but I’m missing a few cards, namely 2 Yasuo. Actually a lot of decks I want to try. I do have 6 champion Wildcards so I can do a few things. I’m going to wait till the balance patch just in case something major happens.. I doubt it, and I doubt it will affect the decks I want to try...Yasuo, Teemo and Heimerdinger in particular. Everyone seems to think, elusive and shadow isles are going to receive some nerfs. I’m more curious to see how Riot will act as it will give us an idea of their philosophy on game balance.
 
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Voldeth

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Just used this deck to finally get out of Gold II, am Plat IV now.

Yasuo deck by M0gwai

Pretty strong, isn't hard countered by much that I see atm.
Only couple losses came from bad opening hands, no 1 or 2 drops in 2 diff games even with a 3 & 4 card mulligan. Most of the time the early game is strong though.

I absolutely love playing Yasou stun decks. Mine has some minor changes (more stuns rather than recalls) but it's a really satisfying deck.
 

zzeris

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Solid list of some top decks for anyone who wants to use for rank or testing. I don't see Rhasa escaping some kind of nerf but lots of variety in the list no matter how they update.
 

Ravishing

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I don't think Rhasa is too much of a problem really. He's strong, but I only ever see him once every 5 or 10 games maybe.
I think buff cards are a little strong.
The "meta" that I see at Plat II/III is decks that rely on Burst cards a lot.

Heimer, Ezreal, Frostbite, Elusive... All have a lot of burst spells, this means Deny becomes a dead card for opponent, and it also means your Buffs act as "Deny" since you can use them without counterplay to save a unit in reaction to a removal card. It does add to the strategy though, but when you see a lot of decks with like 10 units and 25 spells, I think there's an imbalance in the card strength.

I do think Elusive is just too powerful atm, too... I think a change you could do is make elusive similar to Fearsome, but with a twist: Can only be blocked by units with a higher Cost.

So Fearsome is restricted by <3 attack.
Elusive would be >Cost, which means you're not going to have elusive decks that focus on 1-4 cost elusives + buff cards. Empyrean/Jae/Windfarer would see more play, and buff cards don't insta win games as easily.

It would F-over Teemo & Ezreal though. So maybe Elusive Champion cards have to be blocked by Champions that cost more? idk.

In any case, the game is pretty good. Frustrating at times, but that's the nature of card games. It's definitely very strategic and has a lot of room for outplay. I'd say most of my losses come down to something I could have done differently, as opposed to RNG.
 
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zzeris

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I don't think Rhasa is too much of a problem really. He's strong, but I only ever see him once every 5 or 10 games maybe.
I think buff cards are a little strong.
The "meta" that I see at Plat II/III is decks that rely on Burst cards a lot.

Heimer, Ezreal, Frostbite, Elusive... All have a lot of burst spells, this means Deny becomes a dead card for opponent, and it also means your Buffs act as "Deny" since you can use them without counterplay to save a unit in reaction to a removal card. It does add to the strategy though, but when you see a lot of decks with like 10 units and 25 spells, I think there's an imbalance in the card strength.

I do think Elusive is just too powerful atm, too... I think a change you could do is make elusive similar to Fearsome, but with a twist: Can only be blocked by units with a higher Cost.

So Fearsome is restricted by <3 attack.
Elusive would be >Cost, which means you're not going to have elusive decks that focus on 1-4 cost elusives + buff cards. Empyrean/Jae/Windfarer would see more play, and buff cards don't insta win games as easily.

It would F-over Teemo & Ezreal though. So maybe Elusive Champion cards have to be blocked by Champions that cost more? idk.

In any case, the game is pretty good. Frustrating at times, but that's the nature of card games. It's definitely very strategic and has a lot of room for outplay. I'd say most of my losses come down to something I could have done differently, as opposed to RNG.

Elusive reminds me of shadow in MtG back in the day except, as you mention, buff cards weren't nearly as good. Deny is worthless in so many matchups now that people understand the mechanics better. I agree burst is really powerful and those decks are a lot of fun to play, not much fun against so I need to get those cards lol.
 

Ravishing

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I don't know where this guy is finding win rates, but here's a decent Meta video:
TL;DW: Elusive as a whole is the most prominent archetype, but with differences in supporting cast.
Fearsome is 2nd.
SI/I fearsome is the most played complete deck though
Heimerdinger/Ez has the highest win rate (61.5%) (13min in video)
Elusive with Fiora variant is right behind (61.1%)
Fearsome is also right there (60%)


Nerf predictions:
Black Spear down to 2 damage
Rhasa cost 8
Shadow Assassin cost 4
Inspiring Mentor gives +1/+0

Buff Predictions:
With <6 champ decks almost everywhere and also some "Championless" decks, I would think they would want to buff some champions since they are the key flavor to the game.
Stuff you rarely see:
Vlad, Draven, Senna, Lucian, Kalista

However, I'm more inclined to believe they are ultra conservative and do no buffs this time around.
 
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zzeris

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I don't know where this guy is finding win rates, but here's a decent Meta video:
TL;DW: Elusive as a whole is the most prominent archetype, but with differences in supporting cast.
Fearsome is 2nd.
SI/I fearsome is the most played complete deck though
Heimerdinger/Ez has the highest win rate (61.5%) (13min in video)
Elusive with Fiora variant is right behind (61.1%)
Fearsome is also right there (60%)


Nerf predictions:
Black Spear down to 2 damage
Rhasa cost 8
Shadow Assassin cost 4
Inspiring Mentor gives +1/+0

Buff Predictions:
With <6 champ decks almost everywhere and also some "Championless" decks, I would think they would want to buff some champions since they are the key flavor to the game.
Stuff you rarely see:
Vlad, Draven, Senna, Lucian, Kalista

However, I'm more inclined to believe they are ultra conservative and do no buffs this time around.

I'd be surprised if they reduce Black Spear or Mentor's buff especially since he can use it on champions. I agree with the other two. Assassin is the best draw in the game since it's also an elusive creature in the most popular archetype. In a vacuum, I think it's a perfectly well designed card but there are too many elusive creatures. I also agree about the buffs even though it's a shame.
 

Ravishing

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I'd be surprised if they reduce Black Spear or Mentor's buff especially since he can use it on champions. I agree with the other two. Assassin is the best draw in the game since it's also an elusive creature in the most popular archetype. In a vacuum, I think it's a perfectly well designed card but there are too many elusive creatures. I also agree about the buffs even though it's a shame.

My thing with mentor is you get him then the 2 cost guy way too frequently, to get a 4/3 elusive on turn 2. Nobody can deal with a 3 health elusive that early. If mentor isn't changed then the 2 cost guy maybe make 3 cost, but he can be a dead card already later on if you have nothing to recall, so imo 2 cost is about right for what's required to get him on board. The real issue is the mentor combo imo.

Edit: Also SI has the most removal in the game, Black Spear is a 3x in every deck. They can replace it with The Box & other stuff easily enough, but Spear is just way too good imo. Easy to trigger due to 1/1s everywhere, Glimpse, Ephemeral, etc... it's almost like it's not a conditional at all
 
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Valderen

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We will get the patch notes today at 11PST I think, so we will know soon enough how Riot will do things. As I said before I’m more curious to see how Riot will handle balance than the actual nerfs/buffs themselves.

Ravishing Ravishing , I tried watching that video earlier and couldn’t make it through, that guys is painful to listen too.

i doubt we’ll see buff also, because I think right now there are some issues with elusive, shadow isles and to some extent buff cards that are slightly overturned making champions who benefit less from those kinda u. If those get some nerfs, I think we might see the other champions more.

In general i think the balance is pretty good in the game. There is a few deck type that are too strong, and seen too often but once you get past those there’s a lot of stuff that’s viable or would be if those strong decks were a bit weaker.

I wonder how future expansion will affect their balance philosophy also. They mentioned already that they had 2 or 3 set already in testing basically waiting for art. For all we know, first expansion might have a keyword on units that allow them to block elusive without being elusive themselves solving the elusive issue, and any nerfs now would totally break elusive when that set comes out for example....but then do you allow something broken in the game now because you know the fix is coming later on.
 
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Ravishing

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A russian video was out there, seems down, and apparently didn't show everything... what people were able to see:

Here's a preview of the changes seen in the video:
  • Rhasa: 8 mana
  • Ledros: 9 mana, rounds UP. Now a 9/6
  • Kinkou Lifeblade: 2/2
  • Inspiring Mentor: 1/2 - Give a minion 1 Attack.
  • Lux: 4/5 levels to 5/6
  • Detain: 6 mana
  • Yasuo: 5+ units stunned.
  • Deny: 4 Mana
  • Scuttlegeist: Fearsome added.
  • Intimidating Roar: Now 5 mana. ( Assumed. May be wrong. )

Looks like they are making a lot more changes than I anticipated. A good sign?
Ledros changes make sense, "Rounds Up" is a very important change. Makes him much worse. Also +1 cost to him and Rhasa

So I'm right on Rhasa & Mentor changes, lets see what else .. should get the list in less than an hour

Also,
Yasuo buffed, nice.. I can play that deck again, I was being overrun by Elusive/Fearsome decks to continue on with it.
Deny 4 mana kinda meh, surprised they doing this tbh, since everyone is using Burst spells mostly. Maybe it means more Slow spells can see play though



The Russian page:
 
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Ravishing

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Official Notes:



I'm hearing the Lendros text "rounded up" means Damage is rounded up, NOT Nexus Health. So I think their attempt at clarity is actually a little confusing atm. (the effect hasn't changed). Not confirmed yet though.
 
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Valderen

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Interesting changes, and I think a good insight on Riot's philosophy on balance.

I like this section:

  1. New set of cards released.
  2. First balance patch: mostly “medium”-sized number changes based on our early sense of outliers.
  3. Second balance patch: Significant updates to underutilized cards, and the main patch where you can expect any major champion updates.
  4. Third balance patch: Limited number changes to stabilize any meta issues.
  5. Next set of cards released.

It seems we will see some fairly regular decent size balance patches, which should keep the game interesting.

On the changes for this patch. I think they went after what the issues seems to be with a decent amount of changes, some that could have pretty big impact.

Elusive has been hit pretty hard. I love why they nerfed those decks because when it's going well, it's fairly non-interactive which was probably my biggest gripe against it, especially in this game where much of the game is based on board interaction.

The nerfs to Shadow Isles are not necessarily huge on their own, but will add up I think. The raised cost of Rhasa and Ledros will slow down their decks quite a bit, and make them less flexible, that's 2 key cards that will come in a turn later, also leaves less mana to do something else at the same time. I think Shadow Isles will remain strong though.

Deny was predictable, although I don't think there was anything wrong with the card before. This will weaken it quite a bit though, since having to keep 1 regular mana on top of 3 spell mana will make a significant difference.

Inspiring Mentor nerf is probably the biggest nerf of this patch, and it's what affects elusive the most. Elusive having a lot of health was one of the issue with those decks. Inspiring Mentor with Navori Conspirator recalling him and replaying was a core strategy of a lot of elusive decks, it will also affect other decks too since he was a popular 1 drop in many decks.

Kinkou Lifeblade nerf in combination with the nerf to Inspiring Mentor will make it much easier to remove. He often came in at 3/4 which puts him out of range of a lot of removal that do 3 or less like Black Spear, Mystic Shot, Get Excited, Avalanche, The Box, Shunpo, Augmented Experimenter, Trueshot Barrage, and out of range of a lot of challengers that could not deal with him at 3 or 4 health but now can deal with him at 2 health like Fleetfeather Tracker, Stalking Wolf, Fiora, Laurent Protege, Rimefang Wolf, Laurent Chevalier, Silverwing Vanguard. So his nerf in combination with Inspiring Mentor, and the nerf to Deny to protect them .

I'm not sure what to make of the buff to Lux, not sure it really makes her that much more playable.

No major surprises really, every one expected Elusive and Shadow Isles and Deny to be nerfed, and that's what we got. What will be interesting to see, is what will become more competitive now that Elusive are much weaker, and Shadow Isle a bit weaker, but still pretty strong I think.
 

Ravishing

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Heimerdinger / Ezreal and the variant with Lux probably got boosted. I think Ill start playing Heimer.

Decks that utilize Stand Alone should still do fine even without mentor.

I think the main threat is still Fearsome/SI and also Heimer/Ez decks.
There are some super-Control decks lurking that might see more play due to Elusive nerf.

A Core power move for SI is Hecarim. People on Reddit are surprised he wasn't touched, and he's ranked as the #1 Champ in some unofficial polling.
 

Valderen

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Well this was a rewarding afternoon.

I had 2 Dailies that give 1500XP each. Did an expedition that got 5 wins, so decent XP along the way. But more fun, got 2 champions from the expedition, and got 2 more from the Piltover and Zaun reward path. So 4 champions for about 2 hours of play, pretty satisfying. :)
 
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Valderen

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So after my great day of getting Champions, I've looked at what I was missing for a few decks I wanted and crafted a bunch of stuff.

So my champions now:

Teemo: 3
Elise: 3
Lucian: 1
Braum: 3
Draven: 3
Ezreal: 3
Fiora: 1
Kalista: 1
Katarina: 1
Zed: 2
Ashe: 3
Jinx: 3
Shen: 0
Yasuo: 3
Garen: 1
Heimerdinger: 3
Karma: 2
Thresh: 1
Vladimir: 3
Darius: 2
Hecarim: 0
Lux: 2
Anivia: 2
Tryndamere: 3

So I have 49 Champions, and missing 23. Not too bad if I do say so myself.

I have 9 decks that I play, after going through all of them. Only 2 have cards that have been nerfed. One only has Commander Ledros in it and the second one has 3 Inspiring Mentor and 3 Deny, so that one might need a look at. I also have 1 deck using 2 Lux so that might be a bit better. All in all, I did pretty good with this first balance patch, I guess it pays off to not play the meta....of course my rank sucks. I don't think I played a single ranked game this week, so not sure why I am making all these decks. :)

Edit: Oh with the nerfs to expedition XP, I might switch to just 1 expedition a week and more Ranked play, so I guess I will make use of these decks after all.
 
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