League of Legends Moves Away From Big Patch, Small Patch Cycle

The patch process for League of Legends is shifting away from cycling between large and small [...]

The patch process for League of Legends is shifting away from cycling between large and small patches as Riot Games reverts to the previous patching strategy.

Early in the year, Riot Games announced that the League of Legends balance team would implement changes in a cycle that moved between larger updates and smaller ones. The former would include things like item overhauls while those in between the larger updates would fine-tune champions, items, runes, and outliers that needed attention before the next big patch.

"As previously mentioned we're going to be trying a test this year where we alternate between patches with a larger number of gameplay changes and those with a smaller number," Riot Meddler said back in January. "We're interested in whether keeping the game a bit more consistent for 4 week blocks like that results in more development of strategy and interesting play since there'll be a more stable state to explore/optimize in. We're also hoping it will allow us to get more done solving bigger picture issues (e.g. item overhauls, adding missing runes, kit updates etc), since less time will be spent on short term balance adjustments."

After using that new patch cycle process throughout this season, Riot Games says that it's now going to release patches in the same way that players experienced prior to this year's experimental plan. In the same way that the first strategy was announced, Riot Meddler informed players of the post-midseason change. In the same way that patches have worked in previous years, Riot Meddler said on the League of Legends boards that the bigger changeups will instead be found during the midseason and preseason patches.

"We've been trying alternating big/small patches this year, with more systemic changes in the big and mainly balance tweaks in the small. As mentioned recently we're looking to reduce the amount of change over the rest of the year though, focusing on follow up to midseason, polish and balance instead. That means we won't be doing the big/small alternation, and will instead go back to a regular patch approach like in previous years, with systemic changes concentrated more in midseason and preseason patches again too."

A new patch is scheduled to come this week with contents that Riot Games has already been testing on the PBE, so following the release of this next one, players should see the results of the reverted patch process as the rest of the updates come out throughout the year.

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