For now these items won’t be permanent, but they might come back for future events. And Mariner’s Vengeance would have to be specifically adjusted to avoid some really odd interactions with champs like Kled and Shaco. Ghostwalkers would likely need some large improvements to make sure it was much more clear where the person using them was. But we don’t think they’re great for the long-term health of the mode. For example, Mariner’s Vengeance and Ghostwalkers thematically fit Butcher’s Bridge and made this event’s ARAM feel more distinct from the main-stay Howling Abyss. Now that we’ve done mini-ARAM events twice, we’re convinced that new items are great for adding some unique flair to the mode for a short time. For now though, we think this is the right call.Įxperimental Items: Mariner’s Vengeance and Ghostwalkers How will these impact ARAM over the next few months? Once we see a bit more of that long-term effect, we can take another look at bans in ARAM and go from there. We’d like to give players some time to play ARAM with the balance changes and see if they feel that these ban-worthy champions are still qualified as such.īy removing bans, we can also get a better look at how the things we decided to keep affect ARAM over a longer period (champ balance, runes adjustments, anti-poke, etc.). A lot of the champs that were frequently banned (Brand, Veigar, Lux) have now been adjusted, making them more fair to play against. Finally it also adds another 30 seconds to “getting into game” time, which is something we want to keep quick for this mode. Our goal isn’t to change what ARAM is to most players, and the bans almost took away the whole purpose of it to them. For players who just wanted to reroll for those champs, and didn’t care about having a perfectly balanced experience, it now felt like they were never available. But the bans were so targeted to a select group of champions that we saw an overall decrease in champion diversity. ARAM has always been the less competitive mode for players to enjoy League characters in a slightly more chill setting. This was especially true before the balance changes (which we’re keeping), since certain champions were just so far out of line in terms of power.īut it also had some side effects. Bans provide a real feeling of satisfaction and reduce frustration by helping you feel like you’re in control of your destiny, especially when you can remove that one champ you just don’t want to face. Removing bans was a really tough decision that we discussed a lot internally. Now that the event is over, it’s time to go over how the changes fared and which ones are coming back with us to the Howling Abyss based on your feedback and our data. In our Nexus article last month, we outlined some experimental ARAM changes we wanted you to try out during our “Back to Bilgewater” mini-event.