League Of Legends Defends Rune Changes, Says The Transition Costs Them Money

Issue: The Old Runes Are Leaving, New Runes Are Free

With the new Runes Reforged system, all of the runes that we have now in the game will be phased out, no longer able to be used. New runes will replace these, a set of runes that are expected to encompass around 60 different options, six of which can be brought into each game, as indicated in the work-in-progress rune page above.

Now that new runes are coming, players who purchased the runes with IP in the past have expressed frustration that the IP they grinded for is going to waste since the old runes are leaving, especially so if you purchased an IP Boost with real money in order to get the runes quicker. Depending on how long you've been playing the game, some players argue that those who purchased the runes long ago have gotten more than enough from their investment through games and games of powerful runes.

Issue: Rune Pages Won't Be Worth As Much

After it was confirmed towards the beginning of the Runes Reforged announcements that runes would be phased out, players then turned their attention to another vital rune component that can be purchased with RP as well as IP, the rune pages. A more solid answer on the rune page dilemma came from Riot yesterday in a runes post.

"The plan is for your rune pages to carry over into the new runes system, so prices on rune pages aren't being changed and they won't be refunded," said Riot Cactopus.

This didn't sit well with players who realized that runes will soon be able to be changed within champ select, meaning that you don't need all of these rune pages to prepare yourself for any situation. While those with 20 rune pages certainly have a slight edge over those with two when it comes to preparedness right now, it'll all be balanced out in the new system, and those with multiple pages will be stuck with them, even if they spent real money.

Again, plenty of players are pointing out through forums and other discussions that they've gotten plenty of use through their rune pages over the past years and never once considered they'd be getting a reimbursement at a later stage.

Issue: Older Players Won't Be Compensated For Investments

From those players who have stuck with the game since very early seasons or even the beta version, it's easy to imagine that you've got quite a bit of time sunk into multiple accounts, grinding for IP and perhaps even spending real money on rune pages and boosts. When it was announced yesterday that runes purchased from May 30 to an undetermined preseason date would be refunded, some thought that this plan didn't work out for the older players and only benefitted newer accounts that still need runes.

For those players who are worried that you won't be adequately compensated for costly runes purchased over the years, Riot has stressed more than once that you will absolutely be reimbursed in some way. The only question that remains is what form that reimbursement will be given out to players, be it by way of skins, a ton of loot exclusive cosmetics, or other content. Nobody is sure how the players will be compensated at this point, but regardless, the refunding of purchased runes from May 30 onward is not the end of the compensation; players will receive something for their investment into runes over the years.

Riot Cactopus' Response: Rune Changes Better In The Long Term

Away from the League boards where the Rioter's post about the rune refund window was being discussed, Riot Cactopus took to Reddit to respond in a thread about how the changes to the runes, specifically the loss of investment mentioned regarding rune pages, left players with a sour taste. Cactopus said that he heard plenty of the concerns loud and clear — the value of rune pages decreasing and players who feel slighted because they just recently bought rune pages being two of the main topics — and the Rioter offered his response on the issues in the following saying that they were better for the game and ultimately costs Riot money.

• The whole reason the marginal value of each rune page is going down is because we're raising the value of individual pages in the system (by letting you edit them in champ select). This is straight up an improvement to the system to make the game better.
• If you bought a rune page a few seasons ago, you've gotten a lot more value out of it than someone who bought one just recently. If we were to compensate players for their purchase it would have to take into account how much time and value you've gotten out of it already.

Back on the boards, the Rioter also addressed some of their concerns with compensating the veteran players who have invested in runes.

To some extent we want the rewards we come up with to take into account how much value you got out of the stuff you bought with your IP: if you got that s2 gold border using your crazy movespeed/attack speed page,on TF, you got some good use out of them. So you should still get recognized for what you spent to get those runes, but it probably doesn't make sense to refund them the same exact way we would with a rune you got a few months ago. Details still TBD on the full plan for rewarding players who've invested in the game, but we've made a bunch of progress on figuring out a plan and I think it'll feel fair for people.

Riot Ghostcrawler's Response: Riot Is Potentially Losing A Lot Of Money

Riot Ghostcrawler stepped into the discussion as well to provide some clarity on where Riot is positioned when it comes to the rune changes, agreeing with Cactopus' comments about it being better than the game and addressing cash grab accusations. The Rioter said that they do make indirect revenue from runes and rune pages that is invested back into the game to make improvements, and while money isn't talked about often from Riot's end, he felt it was important to open up the discussion about the topic.

This is indirect revenue, because it comes from players purchasing champions with RP since they don't have available IP to get those champions, since some of that IP goes towards runes. Freeing up rune IP (in the absence of any other changes) would let players buy a bunch of champions and spend less RP overall.

Now we are making some other changes to the system, but overall, Riot is losing money on this deal. Potentially a lot of money. This was something we had to talk about a lot internally, but everyone was ultimately behind the decision, all the way to Tryndamere and Ryze. I don't want to make too big of a deal out of this, but if we seem cautious with some of our decisions here, this is part of the reason why. (Another big one obviously is that we are taking a gamble by overhauling such a core part of the game for something that we believe will be better.)

We are making the new runes free because we believe 1) That it's the right thing to do for League and for League players, and 2) Our business model has always been to make a fun game that players want to keep coming back to year after year. Runes Reforged is a long-term bet on League of Legends (and Riot for that matter).

He also asserted that the rune pages system was not at all intended to be a cash grab, or else they would've gotten rid of it during the transition.

Where Does The Rune Discussion Go From Here?

After both of the Rioters issued their responses to consumer complaints about the runes and rune pages, they both expressed that they were 100 percent open to feedback regarding the so-far controversial topic. They continued their discussion within the boards' initial post that can be found here as well as the Reddit thread about expenses that can be read here, and even Riot Meddler addressed the topic in today's Gameplay Thoughts, though he mostly referred back to previous discussions.

For now, there's still quite a bit of time before the new runes system is rolled out during the preseason, and with every product that's been revealed so far being a work-in-progress idea, plenty of changes could come before we get a glimpse of the final rune format. A big runes announcement is supposed to come during early September, so players can certainly expect something then, if not before.