New Champions too complicated? Riot losing sight?

[Duilliath]

Yes, a new player playing a complicated hero will be at a disadvantage. However, that is why there are champions that are much simpler like Ryze, Yi, Ashe, ect, the noob-friendly champs. A new player shouldn't just hop into a game and try to be a master of Zed or Ekko.

People keep mentioning Ryze.

All it does is show that people really have poor understanding of what 'simple' and 'complicated' means. Or rather, why the one is a good thing and the other not so much.

Ryze is actually one of the champions new players do exceptionally poorly with. His combo based spell casting is easy to mess up, leading to a drastically lower damage output. His build is completely unlike other AP carries, meaning they often build him wrong. Even now, more advanced players still rush Frozen Heart on him, despite the fact that the CDR is completely wasted on him.

[Thelxi]

The playerbase is also getting better and better though. I always find myself catching up to my mmr whenever I take a few month break from the game.

[docterfreeze]

Jinx, braum, and vel'koz are the most recent simplistic champions.

But if new champions didnt bring new mechanics to the table then the game would grow stale for some people.

[Zantos]

Well, they have to do something. Each new champion has new moves and a unique theme. They have to work somehow.

[Deleted]

A game with 4 buttons and a handful of items to complement it is too complex.

I wonder what the average IQ for humanity was again.

[Mamut]

I dont know if its something with complexity but I must admit I have more fun with old champions like Nunu, Ashe, Annie, Miss Fortune, Vlad etc than with the newest like Ekko, Jayce, Reksai etc. Its hard to describe but for me they are too much, hmmm, "flashy"??

[Yvaelle]

Probably the flashy-ness problem more than complexity there Mamut.

I think if you make every champion too flashy, you make the game less visually enjoyable generally.

All the ones in your first list make sense in what they are doing - but when you have even a champion like Jayce where watching him is like, "Ok now he knocks someone back, then he leaps in the air, he turned into a glow ball, then he explodes, now he's a ranged, he's attacking fast, what's that laser?, he shot a lightning ball across the map, now he's a melee again" - try explaining that to a beginner.

Even as a veteran, it's a lot of stimulus to read for one champion - and most of it is less meaningful to the flow of the battle.

By contrast, all of Annie's stimulus is meaningful - she's not teleporting around and exploding in different effects - she walks places, she has a shield, she has a fireball and a fire wave, and she beardrops people. Her positioning matters, her contributions to teamfights are clearly defined/visible, she's pretty quickly comprehensible.

Then go look back at Ekko - I've played him in ranked and I still hardly understand what exactly he's doing at any given time. Is he poking? Peeling? Engaging or disengaging? It's just an endless explosion of mostly meaningless visual over-stimulus.

Where that kind of complexity / confusion is done perfectly IMO - is champions like LeBlanc - her whole game is deception and confusion - and so her teleporting around and splitting in two, and having non-obvious spell combos: that matches her character / personality. Riven's another good example - she's constantly flipping and spinning and dancing and prancing - because that's who she is, it's how she moves: but note that she never explodes with energy or turns into a ranged or lobs weird projectiles (except her ult, which is made more meaningful visually because it's so rare from her).

You can tell she's serious when her sword starts glowing. Her finishing moves in teamfight is dramatic because it's a big green wave - when we have been watching martial arts up until that point. If everything is super-saiyyan explosions and effects - it cheapens the visual experience and meaningfulness of the parts that matter.

That's what flashyness is to me - and it's okay to have flashy champions like LeBlanc and Katarina and Riven - it can be done right - but it can also be overused (Ekko, Jayce, Reksai, etc).

[Simulacrum]

Eh, I don't find Jayce, Rek'Sai or Riven especially flashy. They have kits that lend themselves to very easy to understand movements. They don't instantly teleport across the entire screen, or just as instantly change position 3-4 times during the same teamfight, the way that zed, lb, ekko, or even katarina can do. Honestly, when I watched Bjergsen play Ekko, I barely understood what was going on half those fights. But I always understand what's going on with heroes like Jayce, Rek'Sai, Riven, etc.

[Yvaelle]

That's kind of what I mean though Simulacrum. Ekko is too many lights and sounds and teleports - it's incomprehensible. LeBlanc is kind of the same but she's supposed to be that way IMO.

Riven is flashy - high mobility - lots of movement and animations - but she's comprehensible (which is a good thing). Jayce is lots of visual animations and movements (not teleports or leaps, but poses and stances and gestures) - and not all of them are meaningful: a lot of it is him just fidgeting about and glowing.

Look at Jayce from the perspective of a new player - all the different glows and abilities are confusing and they do non-obvious things: a lot of them don't really matter so we tune out the inconsequential motions with our experience. Riven has lot of movements, but what they do is obvious: they move her around: her stun is the least obvious motion she makes. Ekko has lots of movement and none of it is obvious: hard to watch.

[Khaza-R]

Its hard to make unique mechanics when you have an inventory of 125 champions. So at this point, new generally translates into more complex.

All in all, I rather like their new champion designs. They're never boring at least.