League of Legends announces pricing update for champions
Riot Games has announced plans to improve the pricing model for champions in League of Legends. Whereas every playable character in fellow free-to-play MOBA title Dota 2 is freely accessible to everyone, players have to purchase champions in League of Legends.
The pricing of these is primarily based on how long they’ve been in the game, which is a model Riot Games is no longer happy with – “a bit archaic”, the studio called it. Age still plays a role in the new pricing system, but is no longer defined by how many champions have come out since a certain character was released. Instead, Riot is focusing on how many seasons a champion has been out for.
“We plan to keep the existing flow of new champions having an initially higher price point and being discounted after a week with an additional discount after two seasons where they’ll be placed in a tier based on the data we see with new and returning players”, Riot explained.
New League of Legends champion pricing tiers
Riot Games has revealed the following price tiers included in the new pricing structure:
- 450 BE / 260 RP – Champions that are awesome for new players. These have a strong fantasy and an approachable kit that our data suggests helps folks find success early. Examples include Malphite, Miss Fortune, and Yuumi.
- 1,350 BE / 585 RP – Champions that are a bit more complex than the lower tier, but still approachable for interested folks. These will have more nuanced skill checks in their play patterns, but maintain reasonable skill floors and have proven to be fan favorites. Examples include Yasuo, Lucian, and Sett.
- 3,150 BE / 790 RP – Champions that have a larger degree of difficulty or specialization in their play. These will often have steeper learning curves to climb before one sees consistent success with them. Examples include LeBlanc, Shaco, and Yorick.
- 4,444 BE / 880 RP – Only perfection and beauty are allowed at this tier.
- 4,800 BE / 880 RP – The majority of the roster will live here.
- 6,300 BE / 975 RP – Champions that have come out in the past two seasons, after which they will move to the tier above after the next season starts.
- 7,800 BE / 975 RP – Champions that have come out in the past week.
A series of champion bundles covering several gameplay roles within each tier will also become available, providing another cost effective way for players to stock up their roster. Riot stated: “Without discounts, this equates to a reduction of 140,606 BE and 14,905 RP for our champion catalog!”
Singed, Kayle, Twisted Fate, and Ryze are exempted from this system, with their BE prices rising to 4,800. Their RP price stays at 260. “They’re awesome champions that many players enjoy today, but we do not think that new players are likely to find success with them, and the data we’re seeing supports this as well“, Riot said to explain this decision.
All of these changes are planned to go into effect with patch 13.5.
Cadence of new champions to slow
Riot also announced that it would release new champions at a slower rate in 2023, as it’s putting more focus on updating the models of older champions to bring them to the same level of visual fidelity as the more modern parts of the roster. Lee Sin and Teemo are next on this list.
Lee Sin concept art, which is still work in progress.
Riot Games
The studio is also porting some skins from Wild Rift, a mobile League of Legends spin-off, into the main game, including Star Guardian Seraphine, Redeemed Star Guardian Xayah, and Redeemed Star Guardian Rakan.
Teemo concept art, which is still work in progress.
Riot Games
Additional server capacity and upgrades to cloud infrastructure should positively affect player experience throughout the year in several regions, the studio announced.
