League patch 12.15 and limit for new champions?

There’s a limit to League of Legends’ ever-growing champion pool. Riot Games developers are already discussing a timeline when they will no longer design new characters in order not to alienate new players. When will the last champion be released? Also, the patch notes 12.15.

League of Legends stands alone in the modern gaming world with its 161 champions. Other titles can only pay respect to Riot’s MOBA, including Mortal Kombat with 97 fighters and Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. with 80 characters. League’s archrival Dota 2 boasts 123 characters, while titles like Apex Legends (23) and Overwatch (32) can’t even compare. Riot’s shooter VALORANT has currently a growing pool of 18 characters, so it will be interesting to see how big the roster grows over the years.

When is the last champion coming?

Riot’s thirteen-year-old franchise holds its throne with fairly regular character releases — four this year. However, those good times will eventually end, says Riot. At least that’s the discussion League of Legends teams are already having, according to the Lead Designer of the League Balance Team Matt “Phroxzon” Leung-Harrison.

In a recent episode of the Broken by Concept YouTube series, Phroxzon admitted the League team is already considering an “endpoint”, where the champion pool will meet a big red stop sign. In all likelihood, that endpoint will be reached when Riot can no longer add intuitive characters.

“We’ve still got a lot of flex to go because there are a few things that make a lot of champions unsustainable. One is if champions are unintuitive ⁠— let’s say I run into Thresh and he throws a hook, and it looks like a hook, but it just goes over somebody. You’d be like: “What the hell is that?”

“If we make unintuitive champions, then making more of them is an issue because it massively multiplies the number of things you need to understand to play the game properly.”

Luckily, there won’t be a cap any time soon. In fact, the Riot development team is as eager as ever to design new characters for their title. The devs firmly believe that “part of the magic of League lies in the never-ending championship curve.” It’s what keeps players coming back for more.

Patch 12.15: Rework, Nerf

Next up are revisions. Udyr’s kit and design will be reworked to bring him into the modern league. Aurelion Sol gets a much-needed update, and two AD carry champions will get nerfed in Patch 12.15. — Sivir and Kalista.

After the mid-scope update was pushed to the live servers with patch 12.13, Sivir experienced massive hype and was followed by a series of hotfixes to reduce her damage. The goal was Boomerang Blade (Q) and Ricochet (W) cooldowns, but it’s unclear what nerfs will be applied to Sivir in the upcoming patch.

Currently, she is the most popular champion in solo queue at platinum rank and above, with a pick rate of over 20%. According to League of Graphs, she has the eigth highest ban rate of any champion in the game and the second highest of any AD carry, behind Nilah.

Aside from champions, one item and one rune will be nerfed in patch 12.15. Both First Strike and Divine Divider. Since this rune and item are versatile, several picks in the Rift could be indirectly affected by these nerfs. Patch 12.15 will be released on August 10.

Header: Riot Games