eSports

Riot shares some thoughts on the current state of LoL mages

February 21, 2023

Riot Truezy and Riot Phroxzon, the game designers of the LoL balance team, have shared some thoughts on the current state of mages within the game.

Image Credits | Riot Games

Riot Truexy opens up discussion on the state of LoL mages

The game designer shared the balance team’s thoughts on “what mages and mage subclasses need to do to feel special and exciting in modern League”.

Riot Truexy mentioned on his Twitter how HP was added to mage items in Season 12 as a “pseudo-durabiity” patch to LoL mages. The goal was to give squishy immobile mages breathing room and be more forgiving against assassins without getting one shot and potentially have the enemy snowball out of control.

“This was at a time when lane lethality was extremely high. Frankly, we taxed the AP on these two items, to the point where both the fantasy of high AP numbers and functional damage is/was below the bar. When the durability update in 12.10 hit, the problem was pushed even further. The mana to poke balance is something that is something that’s always on a knife’s edge. If mana is too inefficient to cast on champs, mages default to pushing the wave and scaling, if mana is TOO plentiful, the exact same thing happens.”

“The main point is that mages need to build damage to be relevant, but will eventually need both magic penetration and some defensive items to be relevant late game,” Truexy said in a Reddit thread about the topic.

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Potential buffs to mages items might come to LoL

He mentions how small items might receive buffs in the near future, as Hextech Alternator or Lost Chapter are undertuned, but the main issue lies elsewhere. The current dilemma the balance team is facing is giving a distinctive characteristic to mages. “If everyone can push fast, have CC, and burst, when/what should mages excel at?”

Truexy brings up Veigar and Zoe as examples and how they are drastically different in how they should be played to be enjoyable. But right now “they are all funneled into mana burst mythic into zhonyas + rabadons. And that’s sadge.”

“This funnels your build extremely quickly into the same items every game.” is what he said on Reddit.

While Riot isn’t providing a direction here, the designers wanted to discuss with its community how LoL mages can be improved over time, hopefully, “getting them in a better place as soon as possible.”