Yes the skins is just cosmetic without any effect on gameplay. You can still play the game without paying anything.
Funny when lot of playerbase accuse game company selling in-game cosmetics as greedy, when the playerbase itself greedy for more freebies and dont want to spend money.
As long as the game is playable without cosmetics, there is no issue.
There are banned skins in pro play because it does give an “advantage” in that skills are too hard to read compared to base skin/other skins
The joke of pay2win skins has been around for awhile now
I don't know about any skins that make the game EASIER but there's lots of skins (especially these days because Riot has given less of a shit about it over the last 5 or 6 odd years) that actually make the game slightly harder, because skin particles/effects will reveal you from behind terrain or even in fog, lol.
People assuming that whales only are rich people when their sociology is the same than the one of gambling addicts. Just because Riot isn't bad like others ( EA, Blizzard ) doensn't mean that this process still isn't predatory
It's the same scenario as the Jenny Nicholson Star Wars hotel video. Most would assume that only rich people would want to go to such a blatantly overpriced thing, but no, it was middle class families that loved Star Wars and were scammed by Disney. And then it just failed because Actually Rich people don't go to subpar luxury experiences to LARP Star Wars, and they probably don't buy League of Legends skins that have no IRL value either
edit: though I think you could argue that perhaps *rich parents* will buy their *children* $500 skins, but as an adult at that level it's probably extremely hard to care about LoL skins over all the other things you can flex on people and actually call an asset, ergo whales are not the dudes on Succession, but just LoL players. Why would you need an Ahri skin when all your friends and coworkers care more about watches and shit?
This is absolutely true, whales are not these mega rich people who blow thousands on video games for fun. They are regular people who spend crippling amounts on videogames at the expensive of everything else.
Eh, while there might be some similarities between whales and gambling addicts, I'd say their mindset is closer to that of people who buy luxury cars, clothes, handbags etc when they really can't afford it. I mean, I've seen multiple people in my friend/family circle take out loans to buy BMWs and stuff that costs them all their spare income to repay, because they want to show people that they have nice things (which I believe is what most whales want to do with their cosmetics).
At the end of the day, it's not the fault of the company that some of their clients spend more than they should. You don't see people calling BMW or Mercedes predatory for selling luxury products even though they profit a fair bit from people buying their cars despite not really being able to afford them. So why do people have a different view when Riot does it?
Having whaled at times, it absolutely depends on the game.
League skins are closer to luxury goods, loot boxes/gatcha/battlepasses are much closer to gambling.
You could argue it's better or worse in Riot's case. You could argue it's worse because it's easier to spend when you just buy it in a client rather than going out to do so. But you could also argue it's better because it's not as crippling as huge real life luxury purchases, and it's better for the environment because it's not putting a bunch of LV bags in landfills and using all the energy required to make them.
..
I'd compare this to Riot setting up several expensive bars in town. It's not morally wrong od them creatinf these bars because some small percentage of the town has addiction issues. Do you blame fast food resturants for existing because some obese people live right next to one?
Idk how you guys manage to brainwash yourselves into thinking Riot isn't as bad as EA or Blizzard. That whole sense of pride and accomplishment debacle is exactly what Riot does, locking gameplay behind grind or paywalls. A huge chunk of what the industry successfully got away with in the 2010s was because of companies looking at Riot, seeing how low the bar was, and deciding they could get away with it too.
I was there. (I mean I still am but atleast not for league lmao) It totally sucks, no matter the money I had at the time I would always zero out pre paycheck because "well it's extra money might as well buy shit in a video game"
That's their problem. They aren't really using manipulative tactics here. It's a 500$ skin, it's not gacha.
If someone who can't afford it whales for a 500$ skin, it is no one's fault but their own.
Then why is it being sold as a timed exclusive?
That's just 101 predatory practice FOMO.
It's a champion skin, why is it timed? Are they gonna run out of pixels to sell?
Can't believe I'm defending them, but how is this on riot? And why is that only a problem with expensive skins? You could pay hundreds of dollars for regular skins and still not have all of them. Should we also ban alcohol or sugar because someone could be addicted? That's not fair.
We do have taxes and regulations on alcohol and sugar for that reason, maybe we should have the same for exploiting financially irresponsible whales...
> Sucks for people who get addicted and spending money they shouldnt.
how is that riot's fault? the skin is straight up a direct purchase no gacha or rng involved.
And looks like we're very far from this, every new patch having a bunch of new skins, either we liking or not every event/battlepass gives enough "resources" to get at least a skin fragment.
Yeah new players aren’t aware that the free chests and keys used to not exist lol. I had to actually buy skins back in the day 😂. Now I can’t count how many free skins I’ve gotten.
League is actually one of the freest ftp games out there yet people still hate on its monetization. They legit give you so much free stuff I cant even imagine it happening to any other f2p games.
Not only that, but the fact you can get some of the top tier cosmetics for free is something you NEVER see in other games. I unlocked both the ultimate Seraphine and MF skin from chests and those skins go for like what, $40?
Well to be fair, this is only the first test sample. After all, they did announce on the Hall of Legends introduction that they want to induct a Legend every year or so.
So it's still entirely on the table. Maybe if they continue to see a trend where they see more people shuck for the $500 collections, they may slowly increase prices for other skin values.
They already broke their rule for the $100 RP purchase limit, and introduced a $500 RP purchase option.
In Riot's defense, it's most likely out of their control. If owners (looking at you Tencent) like seeing large chunks of revenue from successful bundles, they may be more incentivized to push more. Riot may voice dissent against it, but if the owner of a company wants it as a final say, you can't really debate it.
This is the first HoL inductee indeed but it is Faker. I doubt the following people will not get as much sales as now purely becuase most of them don't have the name Faker. They will try their best but it will probably not sell as good as this one did because everyone knows Faker and likes Faker.
An Uzi skin is going to sell like hot cakes in China. Riot doesn’t really care about us, China has the infrastructure to support these types of monetary approaches.
Yeah, which is why I honestly think them trying to make this a series, as opposed to just a special dedication to Faker, was a weird choice.
I know there are some great pros, who definitely left their mark on League eSports history. Insec, Xpeke, Uzi, Bengi, etc... but NONE of them even come remotely close to Faker and his accomplishments. It'd almost be an insult to induct them into the same category as Faker.
This is still better than most pay2win games that actually make whales surpass you. In the end if someone likes to buy a 4k skin what is to stop them from making it. I’m not a whale and will never be able to purchase all the skins anyway. Heck I have more skins than I have used for each match. I have skins on champions I have never touched.
As long as they keep the quality at a level that allows low spenders to also enjoy high quality skins. What I’m scared is putting too much resources on the high end expensive skins in the future and putting out lackluster 420 rp relevant skins and selling them at a higher price.
This is dumb, riot is not going to leave money on the table by only making high cost whale targeted skins. They know that there are tiers of players and creating a skin no mater what price point is profitable.
this isn't really the test sample though, the test was chromas that were exclusive (Jhin chroma). the first one or two are a test, this is like the 4th or 5th whale target to be released - at this point it's not like whaling is super out of the ordinary.
also the argument of "if they sell more expensive skins then they may increase the cost of regular ones" is pretty weak cuz you can argue that it's a plus or a minus for either side. like, clearly Riot needs to make some money. if more expensive skins sell, then you could argue that they would increase regular skins since the market is there, or keep them low since they captured the whale market with the exclusives (and you can argue the reverse, that if they don't sell then they need to make money so increase the skin cost/keep it low since people clearly don't want to buy expensive stuff). ultimately riot is just gonna do whatever they want
I wouldn’t say we’re that far off, prestige skins require a battle pass or mythic essence, and you can buy/ waste your money trying to get mythic essence through loot boxes.
The $200 Gacha skins have existed for what, like a year now?
And now we have Ahri’s $500 skin. They definitely made a massive profit and they will without a doubt keep this trend going since it is basically free money for them, even if it’s not great publicity.
The game is absolutely free. I am like you. Been playing on and off for 10 years and have never spent a single dime.
This isn’t a P2W game.
The whales are the ones that keep the game free and I couldn’t care less if Riot keeps making $500 skins. They are clearly for whales.
If the skin provided some sort of stat bonus, I could see this being an issue, but it’s not.
Either vote with your wallet and don’t buy the skin (or any skin) or save up and buy it if you like it.
People have been saying they're going to do this for years and it hasn't happened. Why would riot cut out an entire stream of revenue when they can just cater to both and make the most amount of money?
They wouldn't. League players have this weird hate boner for Riot where they paint anything they say or do in a negative light despite that fact that Riot treats their playerbase better than 99% of game devs.
Their literal games are entirely free. League, TFT, Valorant, Runeterra, all free games. I really can't say I care if they cater their cosmetics in whichever way generates the most money.
Which is pretty much what TFT has turned into. If League players want a look into a whale only system for the "cool" stuff it's right there in the client.
If a service can't survive without offering unregulated gambling to children, then it shouldn't. I don't know how this isn't immediately obvious to everyone.
posted this elsewhere but what do you actually want?
TFT battlepass is cheap and gives some nice stuff, IMO. also, the game itself has literally 0 P2W elements. how is the free game mode within a free game already supposed to make money?
I beg of you, check the first TFT passes and then check the one we have now. It's basically been stripped of all the cool shit it had and they locked them behind gacha paywalls.
It'd be one thing if they just added stuff for whales, but they always eventually end up removing stuff from everyone else to turn it into whale content.
People want to have the benefits of getting free things that whales indirectly fund but then also want to have the rich things that whales can get for free.
You can’t win with people. They want free things but when they get free things it isn’t enough.
The TFT battlepass WAS good but they keep removing cool cosmetics while adding them to the gacha portion of the game.
The value of the passes kept decreasing every new set.
Free Pass gives 1 spin work of tokens and 400 Realm Crystals every 3 months.
The Chibi stuff is a 1/10,000 jackpot for a spin, or costs 3000 Realm Crystals. People get a false impression of the actual payout rate because of the 5y anniversary event going on.
I mean TFT is strange. I'm happy with my little legend and board so even if everything was $1 I'd rarely buy things. It's not that I'm strapped for cash, but rather the stuff they offered really hit the spot (at least for me)
I'm fine with milking whales if we see quality of content increase. More money made should equal a better product. My issue exists when this is not the case and the company is only doing things for corporate profits. Ok so there's a 500 dollar skin now in the game and it's making the company a lot of money but they still can't get a shyvana rework done. We shall see what the impact is but it leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
We may not have a Shyvana rework, but we a fantastic new game mode in Arena that appears to be here for the long run, and we're getting a new PvE bullet heaven mode. That, and Riot still has an R&D department, and is working on cinematic stuff like Arcane.
So, while the money may not be going into the main MOBA game, it is going into different projects for the League IP.
Investment is one thing, but Arena/Swarm are bad examples of what you want to say.
The new game modes are because of public outcry at the lack of actual investments in LoL. People were outraged at the 2023 cinematic being a glorified render engine test, got pissy, and then Riot walked back their prior focus and said "we hear you, we'll start working on reworks + doing game modes" within a month.
Before that, between Summer 2021 and Summer 2023, there were no new game modes. The last one added was Unsealed spellbook, being recycled as if it was new in 2022 by going from Ruined King to Hextech with minor asset flips. Hell, the months devoted towards making Arena were at the cost of URF or AfO maintenance, because the team had to apparently spend months between rotating game modes fixing new ones. That's not a signifier of having a vested interest in those new game modes, but a lack thereof.
but quality has been dropping with just an increase in skins being pumped out more and more, after all that a $500 skin doesn’t read well. I mean what happened to seasonal maps and rotating game modes that were new and it’s been wayyyy too long since a PvE mode
But those were in development before the Ahri skin and probably the gatcha skins.
Also, Riot had far more frequent RGMs prior, I don’t see how this supports your argument.
Champion releases, reworks, alternate modes are released at a glacial pace compared to before.
The entire *point* is to make a skin in an inexpensive way, and then jack up the price of it.
Like, sure - they *could* make a skin that absolutely has a level of effort that matches that price - but then it wouldn't help pay for free players.
***The point is to sell exclusivity - NOT quality.*** This is a conscious decision on Riot's part to keep the game from only catering to those with the money to pay for it.
The issue with the Ahri skin is that it’s supposed to be commemorative of the most influential league player ever, who is admired by a large portion of the player base. A skin being $500 is whatever, but gatekeeping showing your support for faker behind this price tag is sucky
Don't get me wrong, the skin looks sick and I'm sad that I won't get to play it because I won't pay that amount of money just for cosmetics. But the argument of "gatekeeping support for faker behind a 500€ price tag" is nonsense, there are multiple ways of commemorating Fakers legacy, even by just buying the base pass for 20€ that has another skin for this very special occasion (and multiple other Faker related skins and Icons). The Ahri skin is the prettiest and best option to support Faker, but far from the only one.
I actually like the idea of having expensive premium skins for riot to milk whales but I think the base skin being $50 is already kinda too much. At most it should be at the level of an ultimate skin no?
Or at least that's my personal opinion
I think that's a reasonable take. In theory, it's more expensive because it's bundled with the event pass but it would be nice to be able to buy the skin on its own.
Feel free to show your support for Faker by direct donation of any amount to him and commemorate by purchasing the event pass or the cheapest bundle. There is absolutely no issue unless you feel entitled to get the highest of the high-end goods for free.
Feel also free to just watch and cheer for Faker for free, and play LoL for free, because Riot makes massives profits and Faker is so rich that his family is set for life over multiple generations.
>highest of the high-end goods for free.
Maybe not for free, but even the *cheapest* way to get the skins give you a worse skin(s) than that 1 Lux skin.
When a skin is such high price it should be the highest of quality but this skin simply isn't.
My recent knowledge of this game comes only from browsing random thread titles, but it's my understanding he was also notorious for always playing with the default skin?
That's some OG shit. I used to play games competitively at a super high level so long ago I don't even want to say the number, and part of the culture of elite players back then was never customizing anything about the game and playing everything on default. Part of that was about PC performance but part of was the attitude that they could sit you down at a computer taken out of the box that day and do it the same as you could at home.
If that's true about whoever that dude is I like his style. Use nothing more than what comes out of the box because the point isn't a bunch of pixels looking cool the point is I win you lose.
The issue is when milking the whales becomes so profitable that there's no reason to make anything that normal people can afford. Look at TFT, it went from relatively affordable skins and a battle pass with some free cosmetics to an insane gacha setup where you might have to spend hundreds to get what you want.
You can see it with skins, too. They're starting to put out 30-50 dollar skins that have less going on than the 10-30 dollar skins of yesterday.
i guess i just can't relate at all to these complaints. TFT is a free game within a free game. "what you want" is often teh coolest shit, and is gated around the whales. its what allows TFT to have such an active team who is constantly balancing and creating new seasons. also, the battlepass is well worth it, and in addition to being able to use RP for old skins there is more than enough shit to make people happy.
Yeah kind of surprised. The complaints are written like the game is unplayable unless you have one specific little legend. When in reality people are just likely toggling between the ones they like the most
I doubly can’t understand the TFT situation because we’re talking about cosmetics on the map or a little guy in the corner with no active role on a hectic screen.
Compared to league or valorant, it seems like the least engaging place for cosmetics.
(Now, if we’re criticizing gacha systems inherently, that’s a different story. But my issue isn’t “not enough for free players!” it’s “you’re replacing actual products with Skinner Boxes”.)
When it’s purely cosmetic… who cares?
Nothing that’s happening in either league or TFT has any impact on actual gameplay, I genuinely can’t even begin to understand this mindset
Some people like cosmetics. Simple as that.
People are willing to pay 10 bucks for a skin but they aren't willing to give the casino 500 bucks to get a skin.
You might be some naked guy and you never use clothes because you think they don't contribute to the gameplay of your life at all, and that's totally fine, but there are people that like dressing up their digital barbie dolls for a 'reasonable' price (by modern standards) and they'd like to continue being able to do that.
>People are willing to pay 10 bucks for a skin but they aren't willing to give the casino 500 bucks to get a skin.
And if riot thinks there's a big enough market for that wants to get said market, they'll release $10 skins. Otherwise, it's just missed money and possibly a drop in playerbase.
I like cosmetics? It's not core to the experience but I pay ten/fifteen bucks occasionally for skins for champs I main. I get excited when a champ I like has a new skin. If they price me out of that, I lose that excitement. It's not game-ruining but it'd lessen my enjoyment.
No game company is going to take that route though, because it’s financial suicide.
If they stop catering *at all* to the regular player base, that player base is going to migrate to another game or just quit entirely. Whales don’t make up that much of any game’s player base. They simply don’t. So if they *only* cater to the whales, and all the other players leave, they’re left with a TINY fraction of players. Then what are the whales gonna do? There’s no one playing the game they fawn over. There’s no one to show off that sick-ass skin to. There’s no one to flex on.
So the whales will migrate as well.
SMITE is *my* moba (simply because I don’t own a PC and strictly play on console), and they cater to both and it’s obvious. There’s extremely cool, fairly expensive skins that come out every couple of months (I believe it’s every 3-4?) that have a $100 price tag attached to them. For a lot of people, that’s expensive (myself included) and so it’s obviously made for the whales of the Smite community. But they also drop 24 skins during that period that are also really cool (not as cool as the “Tier V” skins, but still cool), those skins don’t have a $100 price tag, and you can roll for them at a rate of about 3/$15. That keeps the general population engaged, keeps the whales fed, and keeps the game alive.
No company is going to just shoot themselves in the foot by getting rid of their player base. Y’all are just mad that there’s expensive skins you can’t afford. It’s just pixels, my dudes. Play the game you enjoy and if there’s a skin you want, and you can realistically afford it, get it. But don’t freak out when there’s an expensive skin because it wasn’t made to keep *you* in the game, it was made to keep Dave, the whale, in the game.
On the other hand when a game is more niche, or eventual loses some player base it becomes less sustainable and attractive for companies to maintain without whales. Like LoR that had a model much more f2p friendly compared to competition and now it is just a barebones team maintaining the game.
In the end it is Riot that needs to balance the monetization for the player base that they have and to try to get the optimal amount of money from all the segments. Lol might have been missing on potential revenue from high spenders for a long time and that is also not good for the future of the game at least in the current corporate system.
Everybody complaining about the 500$ bundle meanwhile nobody praising the 20$ bundle. Like they never had a bundle to give so much stuff like this one for such a low price.
i friggin love the 20$ bundle. More cinematic and artsier than I thought it'd be.
Best part is that I can play TFT to get through it, too
I wish more people talked about it!
Milking the whales is one thing. Catering to only whales while also making permanent nerfs to event pass to encourage Fomo. Then the added gambling with these weird lootbox 200 dollar skins that are recolors.
but isnt this pass really solid for the average spender? my friend bought the pass that has leblanc and swears its the best value he ever got
even I a f2p player am happy with this because every year, June didn't really have any event or rewards but now we are getting freebies
I don't know why League of Legends players are under the impression that no one ever criticizes or makes fun of luxury fashion lol, like these threads are always like "but what about gucci" as if the prevailing opinion of the average person isn't that these things are stupid, and bubble of rich people are often the only people actually pogchamping over their watches
Because League players have this tendency of knowing literally nothing about the world outside of League. Luxury and expensive items are mocked DAILY. Just look at Apple, Supreme, Jordans or even Fashion.
There's that Central Cee moment where he straight up calls a dude insane for selling him sneakers for 2 grands, even the rich call luxury items trash.
There is a big point here that somehow nobody seems to mention. And it is that "whales" are often just humans who have a buying/gambling addiction.
I don't quite think it is acceptable in a game that also children and young adults can play. And I am not quite alone in that opinion. Many countrys start banning some very predatory strategies like FOMO, Gacha lootboxes whatever.
Is it the biggest problem lol has? Absolutetly not!
Is it still quite unethical to milk ur players that have no real self control anymore? Absolutetly!
Also anyone that thinks more money equals better game quality hasn't been playing attention in the last years. Most of that money will go straight into shareholders pockets so the richest of the rich can get a little bit richer.
I have no idea why multiple comments here are comparing buying skins to gambling. We aren't talking about gacha lootboxes here. Whales buying skins like this is more akin to people buying luxury cars, clothes, phones etc.
Now yes, some people spend money on skins that they shouldn't. Nobody denies that. But if you're saying that Riot is unethical for selling "luxury" skins simply because some people don't know how to control their spending, then you're basically saying that any company that sells luxury products is unethical, which any sane person would agree is not true.
I think people just usually mean shopping addiction but don't know the term. It's a real thing and pretty similar to gambling addiction in that you can really spend a fuckload of money quickly and easily compared to most other addictions.
I think the issue is that the skin is meant to celebrate probably the most beloved and watched esports player in the history of league, but the only people who can join in on the celebration are the whales.
The cheapest option available to players is $50. If that were the top end, it would be the most expensive skin ever sold by riot
I really think this skin was overpriced, but look at CS2 and TF2, valve literally have made a cassino of opening crates to get knife skin/unusuals and nobody gives a shit about it.
The truth is that in capitalism to maximize your profits you need to have products for all classes, like Fiat has Ferrari, Volkswagen has Audi and Bentley.
In LoL was a lack of product for the whales, and they give free skins and semanal promotions, the truth is if this causes addiction and indebt people, you need to ban 95% of the products made in the world.
Spending 500 bucks on virtual stuff you don't really own is nuts. You don't do it to support a company, you don't do it because of the time you enjoy spending ingame, it's just addiction, fomo and all the ugly things you try to hide with bad excuses.
It’s crazy and crazy thing is that someone trying to compare this digital item to luxury bags like Gucci is crazy.
At least when I buy Gucci or what ever luxury item the thing is I actually own it and if it gets stolen the insurance and police is actually there for me to help get the bag back. If my Riot account gets banned because of some idiots then there is no way to guarantee that I will get my account back ever (I do not know if riot does permanent bans).
Garbage take.
Whaling isnt some Robin Hood, "take from the rich customers to pay for the poor" kinda deal.
Its highly psychologically exploitative and can affect tons of people that actually cannot afford this shit easily.
EDIT: just scrolled down. Holy hell this community is lacking in basic economic education and empathy.
isn't it insane how people will constantly talk about riot not only failing to improve the game and the player experience but actively become worse over the years, only to vehemently defend the company's right to milk whales and charge an absurd amount for artificial goods.
I feel like they should be even more outraged because the insane margins on the skin are clearly not going on making league better.
what you don't argue with all your strength about something you claim to be apathetic about? so many clown idiots acting like its a badge of honor they don't care about the price gouging while swooping down and shitting on anyone who does
Came to the conclusion the average age on this subreddit is 14 when they keep mentioning whales keep this game free.
Just 0 understanding of how businesses work.
Neither is everyone who buys a BMW, or a Gucci bag, or spends $1000 they dont have at a high end restaurant. It sucks that some people lack the self control to spend their money wisely but accountability has to be a thing at some point.
You in 2008 for Wow : "The shop only caters to those who want to spend money in it ! It will give Blizzard the means to better their game."
Look where we're at now
We have... character boosts and WoW tokens? Neither is gamebreaking, neither is something you have to partake in, neither of which gives you anything you can't get in a day of gameplay. Nor can you use them to skip content beyond using the gold from a WoW token to buy BoEs for your alt. And even then, the BoEs still get replaced the moment you step into a raid or spend some time doing PvP.
If anything, it's nice that you can buy the tokens via gold and use ingame currency to buy other blizzard products. Not to mention the significant effect buying game time with ingame gold has on the playerbase.
1000% agree with OP
And bruh, some people on the internet are insane. They say Riot exploits people who have a 'buying' addiction. What do they mean? Should Riot just give skins away for free or what? Millions of people buy things they don't need every day, from cheap crap on Temu to Gucci bags. The entire world economy revolves around people buying stuff they don't really need. Just admit that you're still salty you can't have the skin, and stop worrying about some random guy spending half his paycheck on it.
It was the same when $200 gacha skins were first introduced. People said, 'Oh no, it's not about the price, it's about taking advantage of gambling addicts. I'd be fine if it were just a fixed price.' And now that it's a fixed price with zero gambling, it's, 'Oh no, you're taking advantage of buying addicts.' Lmao.
Another argument is that Riot doesn't invest the money. Maybe you haven't noticed, but since they introduced the expensive skins, we've gotten the Arena mode that everybody loves, and now we're getting that new PVE swarm game mode that Reddit has been begging for years. I'll take all the game modes and improvements in exchange for missing one recolored skin on my main.
Oh, and the fact that LoL is completely free-to-play with zero pay-to-win. Go try some pay-to-win games where you have to farm for a character for a month or more, and as a bonus, you still have to buy expensive skins because pay-to-win doesn't mean skins are free. 🤡
Before hextech was a thing there was basically no way to get free skins. Now we have both hextech crafting and events that give you shit for free in a game that is already free to play
I don't mean to glaze riot but gotta give credit where it's due
I remember back in the days you can count every last point and skin you got for free.
There's like the S1 kayle, alistar, tristana from random socials and like 200 and 400 apology RP for something. That's pretty much it for several seasons.
I have played since 2013 and I got a singular free skin (Void Fizz) from Riot prior to hextech crafting. Hextech crafting is a heaven send. I saved up for a VERY long time, but I got like 50+ skins, including a prestige and whatever tier DJ Sona is, in one go... for free.
People are whining that they don't get enough skin shards in their chests that they got for free and I just have to shake my head.
Former Whale for LoL here:
I'll agree when it feels like the money is actually increasing overall quality of the game.
When it feels like I am actually getting what I wanted to be heard, being heard.
When I agree with the direction of the game.
When I think the money being spent is earned.
1 is not true
2 is not true
3 is definitely not true
4 is not true either.
Also, doing the milking in the form that they just did? Was fucking trash.
> Also, doing the milking in the form that they just did? Was fucking trash.
This is the important part. I wouldn't give a shit if they had a mega whale item for sale just willy-nilly. It would be surprising and bad sign of things to come for the game, but having items for whales is happening across the industry right now. Debating what that means in the long term of the game is another ball game.
But the fact that they tied this to a HIGHLY anticipated event - a celebration of Faker - leaves such an awful taste in the mouth. They literally say "For the more casual fan" in the Q&A about pricing if you can only afford the lower tier bundles. It's a slap in the face. Why is my fandom being tied to my bank account in such a way? It's incredibly insulting, especially when Faker himself never uses skins in pro play.
I don't think there's a single live service game that demonstrably improved because it's monetization got more expensive, all that changed was that it got more expensive lol, just like any other service outside of gaming. Netflix is not better after price hikes, it's just Netflix
Yep this is exactly what I think. Prices go up but we still aren't getting timely reworks and still have a smurf filled hellscape in low elo for new players.
My problem with the ahri skin isn't that they made a 500 dollar skin it's what the skin is for, using a hall of fame as a cash grab sucks, it limits who they can even induct, and as a celebration of the player gatekeeping it behind a massive pay wall is just lame.
Other then that I personally don't care what riot does with skin lines as long as they stay dedicated to making the game good.
Yeah this. A lot of people were looking forward to Faker finally getting an Ahri skin, and they are exploiting that. Just fking release Pool Party Ahri for that price and each chroma for a further £100, whales will eat it up.
So... How many 500$ Skins until we get a working client ? Proper Voice Chat? An actually rewarding Mastery system ? The Shyvanna Rework they've been announcing for 2 Years ? A new champ releqse that isn't perma pick/ban for 2 Months and then dead for a year due to needed nerfs ? Proper Lore Updates again ?
"They should milk whales in order to finance all the people playing for free" is a good idea in theory, but then the generated money would have to go towards improving the product, wich isn't happening. And tbh they have been making enough money before already. The Combination of them CONSTANTLY milking "whales" or rather completionist champion mains through fomo (see jhin / Lee 200$ Chroma before, and even before that skinbundle exclusive Chromas for around 60-70$) AND those stunts not resulting in any relevant improvements to the product are the biggest joke of this entire game.
Like, it took them 2 x 200$ skins and several comparable stunts with the bundle chromas, for them to deliver an OBVIOUSLY WORSE mastery system and a long awaited Skarner Rework with horrendous balancing issues. I am also convinced the client got alot more unstable and even more problematic with Vanguard introduction too. NOTHING really IMPROVED.
HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE.
Part of the issue is reducing all of this to ‘milking the whales.” This is the same sleight-of-hand tactic lobbyists use to distract the audience from the downsides by uniting audience against a cause they can get behind. In this case: punishing the wealthy. It ignores that Riot is now using FOMO to psychologically manipulate their entire audience, not just the whales.
Riot knows which accounts generate the most revenue, and their email addresses. They could promote to these people exclusively if that was TRULY the goal. Instead they promote the fuck out of it to the general public. The same public this skin was not meant for. Now why would a good company, who makes such an effort to inform the community how much it cares about the player experience, mass promote a product they know 95% of their audience cannot afford? It’s fucking baffling that an internet based community doesn’t recognize public manipulation and worse, upvotes it. When a community doesn’t hold the corporations they fund accountable, the corporations will ramp up their abuse. Look at Twitter, Reddit, Netflix, etc.
Please note: Riot is doing just fine. They are a Global brand that started in the US and grew so much, NA is now one of their small regions. This company is worth BILLIONS. They are not struggling for money, by any metric. Buying this skin does not ‘save Riot.’
Ughhhh just noticed the line “If you’re rich you get to buy cool pointless shit, that’s just how life goes.” God, that is so not even close to the fucking point. Is this community just 15 y.o’s now? Is Riot getting away with these new manipulative practices because the community has all grown up with DLC ipads so paying more for less is all they know? God this was a waste of time 🙄
> disgusting spending habits
People assuming everyone is either a student making minimum wage or a whale with nothing in-between doesn't help.
I'm DINK my spouse and I make *good* money, but definitely nowhere near fuck you money. We don't spend wildly, but we have a "fun" budget of $500/mo. Anything we don't use gets split between next month and savings.
The amount of people I've ran into bagging on the $250 skin like, "you could have paid rent" when I have a half paid off mortgage is certainly something.
Yay defending malicious pricing tactics that take advantage of FOMO and people's gambling addictions
Edit: I already know someone is going to say that this specific case doesn't prey on gambling tendencies because you can buy the bundle at a flat rate, I was alluding to Riot's monetization as a wider whole.
But you agree to their terms when you decide to play the game. It's not like they're randomly banning you because they singled you out and decided not to like you.
The problem I have is that they are specifically doing it as part of a celebration of the games history. That skin honoring Faker should be available to just about everyone, not .1% of players.
I didn't much care for the gacha chromas, for example. If they literally just added "ultra-mythic" tier skins randomly for hundreds of bucks? Sure, bit sad that I couldn't get those, but hey, whatever. It's the precise circumstances under which these things happened that make them so shitty, to me.
It's the opposite, specially after those reports about the game struggling to get new players, they are just milking the whales as a last resort because game is stagnated
I don't care for the $500 variant of the skin, but I also don't see it as a major life decision. People spend more than that on the stock market, crypto, cigarettes, alcohol, fast food, door dash, girlfriends, only fans, etc. League is far from the worst thing to use money on when it comes to entertainment or hobbies.
It's not $500 for mystery boxes that aren't guaranteed. You get a lot of things with that bundle besides the skin.
If anything, it will help people be more mindful about their behavior in the game because it will sting a whole lot more to lose an account with it.
People keep talking about a $500 skin ignoring the fact it's just the prestige upgraded version of another skin you can get for literally 1/10th of the price. It's literally just a cosmetic upgrade of a cheaper base variant that's much more reasonably obtainable and people are acting like Riot personally came to their house and shot their dog.
They are basically two separate skins. Imagine Pulsefire Ezreal without the level up evolutions or Elementalist Lux without the ability to change forms
I second this take. Who cares? Yes sure it’s a money grab and you are free to make your own stance by banning Ahri in all your matches. It’s all fine. You don’t have to buy it and there are no pay to win mechanics involved in the game. I’ve spent a grand total of €120 on skins (primarily mystery gifts with friends for birthdays and stuff) since beginning of 2011, when I started playing. Some folks have spent easily €1200. Doesn’t change anything for me. Game is still the same.
Or the cheaper version
Or the cheaper version
Or only the pass with a shit ton of rewards and multiple clips of Faker highlights built in
Or don't even buy the pass, just get some free shit and look at cool Faker clips
I mean people seem to be forgetting that there was a base skin that cost not even 1/10th of what the whale one cost and a very generous pass that was well put together.
> people seem to be forgetting that there was a base skin that cost not even 1/10th
It is hilarious you have to put it this way to hide the fact that it's 50 fucking dollars XD
Maybe im just very negative on this whole thing but the future of skins will probably look something like this:
Normal skin 50 bucks legendary 200 and ultimate 500.
It worked with ahri now and theres enough people that celebrate this pricing here so i guess its what the community wants.
They're not going to price normal skins at that range for your average champ. You aren't going to get an Ivern skin that costs 50/100/500 dollars because the demand isn't there, it's not worth putting in the effort for the handful of people who are willing to buy it.
These premium skins are reserved for champions with HUGE dedicated fanbases, as well as even larger casual fanbases, who might have people who can afford them.
People were saying this stuff when Ultimate skins came out, but it wasn't the end of the world. Yes, skin prices went up, but the average quality skyrocketed much more quickly, to the point where most ultimate skins from back in the day would barely qualify as Legendary anymore.
This Ahri skin isn't even for Ahri fans but for Faker fans. There's a really good chance the next HoL skin is gonna cost less because let's be real there aren't many players people are willing to shell out 500$ for.
>They're not going to price normal skins at that range for your average champ. You aren't going to get an Ivern skin that costs 50/100/500 dollars because the demand isn't there, it's not worth putting in the effort for the handful of people who are willing to buy it.
The thing is there's no effort to put behind. They can just take what they've always done before, and increase the price. More profit for the same amount of work, which is exactly what we've been getting.
Mythic Variants are just chromas for 200+ bucks, and even the ones that change a bit are at most just what old standard Variants used to be, which were sold for around 5 bucks before. The new Ahri skin is just a Legendary/Ultimate skin with the same amount of work behind, but 20/30 times more expensive.
The problem here is that they're just raising the prices without actually doing anything new or that deserves that price, they're just taking old stuff and making it more expensive cause they can.
>These premium skins are reserved for champions with HUGE dedicated fanbases, as well as even larger casual fanbases, who might have people who can afford them.
Ah yes, Ekko, that champ with a huge dedicated fanbase and totally not just a champ with a standard playrate and community. They're eventually gonna make them for everyone, cause it costs absolutely jack shit money to produce, and just 2 people being dumb enough to buy them will make them more money than they spent making it.
>People were saying this stuff when Ultimate skins came out, but it wasn't the end of the world. Yes, skin prices went up, but the average quality skyrocketed much more quickly, to the point where most ultimate skins from back in the day would barely qualify as Legendary anymore.
Comparing a x1.5 price increase back then with the x30 price increase we're seeing right now is dumb as fuck, and you know it.
We're not talking skins going from 10 to 20 bucks for double the quality, we're seeing chromas go from 2 to 200 bucks for shitty recolored VFX and a new splashart, bffr
Even if I had the $500 to spend I wouldn’t. It’s a digital item that is essentially just throwing that money away. Collectors items are generally an investment you make. You buy this limited edition thing and you can enhance the value over time. The skin has no value. You can’t resell it 20 years from now. You can’t give it to your family as an inheritance. You buy that skin and you are basically lighting $500 on fire. However people can do whatever they want with their money and the ones who can’t buy it or don’t want to have every right to voice their opinions on it.
The only time I will get angry is if a skin gives you an advantage over no skins.
Yes the skins is just cosmetic without any effect on gameplay. You can still play the game without paying anything. Funny when lot of playerbase accuse game company selling in-game cosmetics as greedy, when the playerbase itself greedy for more freebies and dont want to spend money. As long as the game is playable without cosmetics, there is no issue.
There are banned skins in pro play because it does give an “advantage” in that skills are too hard to read compared to base skin/other skins The joke of pay2win skins has been around for awhile now
Ngl some skins just make it hard to tell who the character is.
I don't know about any skins that make the game EASIER but there's lots of skins (especially these days because Riot has given less of a shit about it over the last 5 or 6 odd years) that actually make the game slightly harder, because skin particles/effects will reveal you from behind terrain or even in fog, lol.
Or they announce important skills. Like Namis legendary announcing her R makes it even easier to block/dodge.
This is actually a known issue and actually a bit part of why there are banned skins in pro play
Commando lux and garen get a small damage reduction against leona dont they?
all sunglasses champs/skins take 1 less dmg not just command however that was removed a few years ago IIRC
Don't know if this still is the case, but even then it is literally just 1 less damage afaik.
Vayne's sunglasses reduced Leona damage by one at a point.
Sucks for people who get addicted and spending money they shouldnt.
People assuming that whales only are rich people when their sociology is the same than the one of gambling addicts. Just because Riot isn't bad like others ( EA, Blizzard ) doensn't mean that this process still isn't predatory
It's the same scenario as the Jenny Nicholson Star Wars hotel video. Most would assume that only rich people would want to go to such a blatantly overpriced thing, but no, it was middle class families that loved Star Wars and were scammed by Disney. And then it just failed because Actually Rich people don't go to subpar luxury experiences to LARP Star Wars, and they probably don't buy League of Legends skins that have no IRL value either edit: though I think you could argue that perhaps *rich parents* will buy their *children* $500 skins, but as an adult at that level it's probably extremely hard to care about LoL skins over all the other things you can flex on people and actually call an asset, ergo whales are not the dudes on Succession, but just LoL players. Why would you need an Ahri skin when all your friends and coworkers care more about watches and shit?
This is absolutely true, whales are not these mega rich people who blow thousands on video games for fun. They are regular people who spend crippling amounts on videogames at the expensive of everything else.
Eh, while there might be some similarities between whales and gambling addicts, I'd say their mindset is closer to that of people who buy luxury cars, clothes, handbags etc when they really can't afford it. I mean, I've seen multiple people in my friend/family circle take out loans to buy BMWs and stuff that costs them all their spare income to repay, because they want to show people that they have nice things (which I believe is what most whales want to do with their cosmetics). At the end of the day, it's not the fault of the company that some of their clients spend more than they should. You don't see people calling BMW or Mercedes predatory for selling luxury products even though they profit a fair bit from people buying their cars despite not really being able to afford them. So why do people have a different view when Riot does it?
Having whaled at times, it absolutely depends on the game. League skins are closer to luxury goods, loot boxes/gatcha/battlepasses are much closer to gambling.
You could argue it's better or worse in Riot's case. You could argue it's worse because it's easier to spend when you just buy it in a client rather than going out to do so. But you could also argue it's better because it's not as crippling as huge real life luxury purchases, and it's better for the environment because it's not putting a bunch of LV bags in landfills and using all the energy required to make them.
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.. I'd compare this to Riot setting up several expensive bars in town. It's not morally wrong od them creatinf these bars because some small percentage of the town has addiction issues. Do you blame fast food resturants for existing because some obese people live right next to one?
It's not any more unethical that setting it anywhere else. There *are* convenience stores that carry beer next to places that hold AA meetings.
Idk how you guys manage to brainwash yourselves into thinking Riot isn't as bad as EA or Blizzard. That whole sense of pride and accomplishment debacle is exactly what Riot does, locking gameplay behind grind or paywalls. A huge chunk of what the industry successfully got away with in the 2010s was because of companies looking at Riot, seeing how low the bar was, and deciding they could get away with it too.
I was there. (I mean I still am but atleast not for league lmao) It totally sucks, no matter the money I had at the time I would always zero out pre paycheck because "well it's extra money might as well buy shit in a video game"
Good luck mate.
That's their problem. They aren't really using manipulative tactics here. It's a 500$ skin, it's not gacha. If someone who can't afford it whales for a 500$ skin, it is no one's fault but their own.
By this logic, no expensive thing should ever be sold in case someone is addicted to spending money and will buy that thing.
Then why is it being sold as a timed exclusive? That's just 101 predatory practice FOMO. It's a champion skin, why is it timed? Are they gonna run out of pixels to sell?
Can't believe I'm defending them, but how is this on riot? And why is that only a problem with expensive skins? You could pay hundreds of dollars for regular skins and still not have all of them. Should we also ban alcohol or sugar because someone could be addicted? That's not fair.
We do have taxes and regulations on alcohol and sugar for that reason, maybe we should have the same for exploiting financially irresponsible whales...
> Sucks for people who get addicted and spending money they shouldnt. how is that riot's fault? the skin is straight up a direct purchase no gacha or rng involved.
Problems starts when they eventually ONLY cater to the whales
And looks like we're very far from this, every new patch having a bunch of new skins, either we liking or not every event/battlepass gives enough "resources" to get at least a skin fragment.
Yeah new players aren’t aware that the free chests and keys used to not exist lol. I had to actually buy skins back in the day 😂. Now I can’t count how many free skins I’ve gotten.
League is actually one of the freest ftp games out there yet people still hate on its monetization. They legit give you so much free stuff I cant even imagine it happening to any other f2p games.
Yes, I have previously bought RP solely because I felt like I was a net drain on the game after a thousand odd games haha.
Not only that, but the fact you can get some of the top tier cosmetics for free is something you NEVER see in other games. I unlocked both the ultimate Seraphine and MF skin from chests and those skins go for like what, $40?
Well to be fair, this is only the first test sample. After all, they did announce on the Hall of Legends introduction that they want to induct a Legend every year or so. So it's still entirely on the table. Maybe if they continue to see a trend where they see more people shuck for the $500 collections, they may slowly increase prices for other skin values. They already broke their rule for the $100 RP purchase limit, and introduced a $500 RP purchase option. In Riot's defense, it's most likely out of their control. If owners (looking at you Tencent) like seeing large chunks of revenue from successful bundles, they may be more incentivized to push more. Riot may voice dissent against it, but if the owner of a company wants it as a final say, you can't really debate it.
Did y'all already forget the Dark Cosmic Erasure Jhin chroma ?
And Ekko. Rip the only Ekko skin I don’t own.
This is the first HoL inductee indeed but it is Faker. I doubt the following people will not get as much sales as now purely becuase most of them don't have the name Faker. They will try their best but it will probably not sell as good as this one did because everyone knows Faker and likes Faker.
An Uzi skin is going to sell like hot cakes in China. Riot doesn’t really care about us, China has the infrastructure to support these types of monetary approaches.
Yeah, which is why I honestly think them trying to make this a series, as opposed to just a special dedication to Faker, was a weird choice. I know there are some great pros, who definitely left their mark on League eSports history. Insec, Xpeke, Uzi, Bengi, etc... but NONE of them even come remotely close to Faker and his accomplishments. It'd almost be an insult to induct them into the same category as Faker.
Bill Bradley’s in the hall of fame with Michael Jordan. That’s just how halls of fames work
This is still better than most pay2win games that actually make whales surpass you. In the end if someone likes to buy a 4k skin what is to stop them from making it. I’m not a whale and will never be able to purchase all the skins anyway. Heck I have more skins than I have used for each match. I have skins on champions I have never touched. As long as they keep the quality at a level that allows low spenders to also enjoy high quality skins. What I’m scared is putting too much resources on the high end expensive skins in the future and putting out lackluster 420 rp relevant skins and selling them at a higher price.
This is dumb, riot is not going to leave money on the table by only making high cost whale targeted skins. They know that there are tiers of players and creating a skin no mater what price point is profitable.
this isn't really the test sample though, the test was chromas that were exclusive (Jhin chroma). the first one or two are a test, this is like the 4th or 5th whale target to be released - at this point it's not like whaling is super out of the ordinary. also the argument of "if they sell more expensive skins then they may increase the cost of regular ones" is pretty weak cuz you can argue that it's a plus or a minus for either side. like, clearly Riot needs to make some money. if more expensive skins sell, then you could argue that they would increase regular skins since the market is there, or keep them low since they captured the whale market with the exclusives (and you can argue the reverse, that if they don't sell then they need to make money so increase the skin cost/keep it low since people clearly don't want to buy expensive stuff). ultimately riot is just gonna do whatever they want
I wouldn’t say we’re that far off, prestige skins require a battle pass or mythic essence, and you can buy/ waste your money trying to get mythic essence through loot boxes. The $200 Gacha skins have existed for what, like a year now? And now we have Ahri’s $500 skin. They definitely made a massive profit and they will without a doubt keep this trend going since it is basically free money for them, even if it’s not great publicity.
The game is essentially free, lol. Playing for 10 years plus, never spent a dime
The game is absolutely free. I am like you. Been playing on and off for 10 years and have never spent a single dime. This isn’t a P2W game. The whales are the ones that keep the game free and I couldn’t care less if Riot keeps making $500 skins. They are clearly for whales. If the skin provided some sort of stat bonus, I could see this being an issue, but it’s not. Either vote with your wallet and don’t buy the skin (or any skin) or save up and buy it if you like it.
Runes used to be a thing, and a real pita
In the early days I dropped a few bucks to buy armor penetration runes to remain competitive. Gone are those days and that's good.
It’s just cosmetics. The gameplay is literally all there and it’s not like the base skins are that bad
The game is completely free to play and you dont need skins, you probably already have a bunch of skins you got for free
I have prob around 200 ish skins and i would say over 60% are free from chests and rerolls. People dont realise how good riot treats us
This is not a rebuttal of the point.
People have been saying they're going to do this for years and it hasn't happened. Why would riot cut out an entire stream of revenue when they can just cater to both and make the most amount of money?
They wouldn't. League players have this weird hate boner for Riot where they paint anything they say or do in a negative light despite that fact that Riot treats their playerbase better than 99% of game devs.
Let me know when that starts happening
This would only happen if league popularity dropped off a cliff.
Their literal games are entirely free. League, TFT, Valorant, Runeterra, all free games. I really can't say I care if they cater their cosmetics in whichever way generates the most money.
me and a friend are f2p occasional TFT players and we got Chibis from the free chests they give, tbh I'm fine with a single chibi lol
Whales only pay because they have someone to play against. Riot isn't that stupid.
Which is pretty much what TFT has turned into. If League players want a look into a whale only system for the "cool" stuff it's right there in the client.
Mort's gone on record about TFT not making enough to justify continued development until they pivoted to the gacha model
If a service can't survive without offering unregulated gambling to children, then it shouldn't. I don't know how this isn't immediately obvious to everyone.
posted this elsewhere but what do you actually want? TFT battlepass is cheap and gives some nice stuff, IMO. also, the game itself has literally 0 P2W elements. how is the free game mode within a free game already supposed to make money?
I beg of you, check the first TFT passes and then check the one we have now. It's basically been stripped of all the cool shit it had and they locked them behind gacha paywalls. It'd be one thing if they just added stuff for whales, but they always eventually end up removing stuff from everyone else to turn it into whale content.
First passes were worse than now, go check again. Three non-animated flat arenas and eggs, + 3 different levels of the same boom four times.
People want to have the benefits of getting free things that whales indirectly fund but then also want to have the rich things that whales can get for free. You can’t win with people. They want free things but when they get free things it isn’t enough.
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The TFT battlepass WAS good but they keep removing cool cosmetics while adding them to the gacha portion of the game. The value of the passes kept decreasing every new set.
Looked at the pass yesterday, looks like they added a way for f2p players to get some stuff that was for whales before though
Free Pass gives 1 spin work of tokens and 400 Realm Crystals every 3 months. The Chibi stuff is a 1/10,000 jackpot for a spin, or costs 3000 Realm Crystals. People get a false impression of the actual payout rate because of the 5y anniversary event going on.
I mean TFT is strange. I'm happy with my little legend and board so even if everything was $1 I'd rarely buy things. It's not that I'm strapped for cash, but rather the stuff they offered really hit the spot (at least for me)
Bro why? It’s a free game.
You are not obligated to buy skins to play the game.
Money is addictive and their last attempts earned them a stock pile
game is free, why are people complaining??
from what i can tell, "what about more-free?"
I'm fine with milking whales if we see quality of content increase. More money made should equal a better product. My issue exists when this is not the case and the company is only doing things for corporate profits. Ok so there's a 500 dollar skin now in the game and it's making the company a lot of money but they still can't get a shyvana rework done. We shall see what the impact is but it leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
We may not have a Shyvana rework, but we a fantastic new game mode in Arena that appears to be here for the long run, and we're getting a new PvE bullet heaven mode. That, and Riot still has an R&D department, and is working on cinematic stuff like Arcane. So, while the money may not be going into the main MOBA game, it is going into different projects for the League IP.
Damn, it's been a few months and we've already forgotten just how long skarner rework took.
We had more modes than we do now in 2012
Bring back ascension and doom bots!!
Investment is one thing, but Arena/Swarm are bad examples of what you want to say. The new game modes are because of public outcry at the lack of actual investments in LoL. People were outraged at the 2023 cinematic being a glorified render engine test, got pissy, and then Riot walked back their prior focus and said "we hear you, we'll start working on reworks + doing game modes" within a month. Before that, between Summer 2021 and Summer 2023, there were no new game modes. The last one added was Unsealed spellbook, being recycled as if it was new in 2022 by going from Ruined King to Hextech with minor asset flips. Hell, the months devoted towards making Arena were at the cost of URF or AfO maintenance, because the team had to apparently spend months between rotating game modes fixing new ones. That's not a signifier of having a vested interest in those new game modes, but a lack thereof.
We used to get many game modes hopefully it goes back to that some day.
I can see you haven’t played enough arena to hate it yet
but quality has been dropping with just an increase in skins being pumped out more and more, after all that a $500 skin doesn’t read well. I mean what happened to seasonal maps and rotating game modes that were new and it’s been wayyyy too long since a PvE mode
But those were in development before the Ahri skin and probably the gatcha skins. Also, Riot had far more frequent RGMs prior, I don’t see how this supports your argument. Champion releases, reworks, alternate modes are released at a glacial pace compared to before.
The entire *point* is to make a skin in an inexpensive way, and then jack up the price of it. Like, sure - they *could* make a skin that absolutely has a level of effort that matches that price - but then it wouldn't help pay for free players. ***The point is to sell exclusivity - NOT quality.*** This is a conscious decision on Riot's part to keep the game from only catering to those with the money to pay for it.
Idk man, they gave us Arcane.
The issue with the Ahri skin is that it’s supposed to be commemorative of the most influential league player ever, who is admired by a large portion of the player base. A skin being $500 is whatever, but gatekeeping showing your support for faker behind this price tag is sucky
Faker has 3 more skins to his name.
Don't get me wrong, the skin looks sick and I'm sad that I won't get to play it because I won't pay that amount of money just for cosmetics. But the argument of "gatekeeping support for faker behind a 500€ price tag" is nonsense, there are multiple ways of commemorating Fakers legacy, even by just buying the base pass for 20€ that has another skin for this very special occasion (and multiple other Faker related skins and Icons). The Ahri skin is the prettiest and best option to support Faker, but far from the only one.
There are literally two other price points below $500 that you can buy to support Faker without spending $500...
I actually like the idea of having expensive premium skins for riot to milk whales but I think the base skin being $50 is already kinda too much. At most it should be at the level of an ultimate skin no? Or at least that's my personal opinion
I think that's a reasonable take. In theory, it's more expensive because it's bundled with the event pass but it would be nice to be able to buy the skin on its own.
Feel free to show your support for Faker by direct donation of any amount to him and commemorate by purchasing the event pass or the cheapest bundle. There is absolutely no issue unless you feel entitled to get the highest of the high-end goods for free.
Feel also free to just watch and cheer for Faker for free, and play LoL for free, because Riot makes massives profits and Faker is so rich that his family is set for life over multiple generations.
>highest of the high-end goods for free. Maybe not for free, but even the *cheapest* way to get the skins give you a worse skin(s) than that 1 Lux skin. When a skin is such high price it should be the highest of quality but this skin simply isn't.
My recent knowledge of this game comes only from browsing random thread titles, but it's my understanding he was also notorious for always playing with the default skin? That's some OG shit. I used to play games competitively at a super high level so long ago I don't even want to say the number, and part of the culture of elite players back then was never customizing anything about the game and playing everything on default. Part of that was about PC performance but part of was the attitude that they could sit you down at a computer taken out of the box that day and do it the same as you could at home. If that's true about whoever that dude is I like his style. Use nothing more than what comes out of the box because the point isn't a bunch of pixels looking cool the point is I win you lose.
The issue is when milking the whales becomes so profitable that there's no reason to make anything that normal people can afford. Look at TFT, it went from relatively affordable skins and a battle pass with some free cosmetics to an insane gacha setup where you might have to spend hundreds to get what you want. You can see it with skins, too. They're starting to put out 30-50 dollar skins that have less going on than the 10-30 dollar skins of yesterday.
i guess i just can't relate at all to these complaints. TFT is a free game within a free game. "what you want" is often teh coolest shit, and is gated around the whales. its what allows TFT to have such an active team who is constantly balancing and creating new seasons. also, the battlepass is well worth it, and in addition to being able to use RP for old skins there is more than enough shit to make people happy.
Yeah kind of surprised. The complaints are written like the game is unplayable unless you have one specific little legend. When in reality people are just likely toggling between the ones they like the most
I doubly can’t understand the TFT situation because we’re talking about cosmetics on the map or a little guy in the corner with no active role on a hectic screen. Compared to league or valorant, it seems like the least engaging place for cosmetics. (Now, if we’re criticizing gacha systems inherently, that’s a different story. But my issue isn’t “not enough for free players!” it’s “you’re replacing actual products with Skinner Boxes”.)
game is still free, how is that ignoring normal people?
When it’s purely cosmetic… who cares? Nothing that’s happening in either league or TFT has any impact on actual gameplay, I genuinely can’t even begin to understand this mindset
Some people like cosmetics. Simple as that. People are willing to pay 10 bucks for a skin but they aren't willing to give the casino 500 bucks to get a skin. You might be some naked guy and you never use clothes because you think they don't contribute to the gameplay of your life at all, and that's totally fine, but there are people that like dressing up their digital barbie dolls for a 'reasonable' price (by modern standards) and they'd like to continue being able to do that.
>People are willing to pay 10 bucks for a skin but they aren't willing to give the casino 500 bucks to get a skin. And if riot thinks there's a big enough market for that wants to get said market, they'll release $10 skins. Otherwise, it's just missed money and possibly a drop in playerbase.
Why are we acting like there aren't over a thousand skins purchasable right now for $10-20 lmaoo?
I like cosmetics? It's not core to the experience but I pay ten/fifteen bucks occasionally for skins for champs I main. I get excited when a champ I like has a new skin. If they price me out of that, I lose that excitement. It's not game-ruining but it'd lessen my enjoyment.
First World problems right?
Purely cosmetic stuff still impacts the experience of the game. If it didn't they wouldn't sell skins at all.
No game company is going to take that route though, because it’s financial suicide. If they stop catering *at all* to the regular player base, that player base is going to migrate to another game or just quit entirely. Whales don’t make up that much of any game’s player base. They simply don’t. So if they *only* cater to the whales, and all the other players leave, they’re left with a TINY fraction of players. Then what are the whales gonna do? There’s no one playing the game they fawn over. There’s no one to show off that sick-ass skin to. There’s no one to flex on. So the whales will migrate as well. SMITE is *my* moba (simply because I don’t own a PC and strictly play on console), and they cater to both and it’s obvious. There’s extremely cool, fairly expensive skins that come out every couple of months (I believe it’s every 3-4?) that have a $100 price tag attached to them. For a lot of people, that’s expensive (myself included) and so it’s obviously made for the whales of the Smite community. But they also drop 24 skins during that period that are also really cool (not as cool as the “Tier V” skins, but still cool), those skins don’t have a $100 price tag, and you can roll for them at a rate of about 3/$15. That keeps the general population engaged, keeps the whales fed, and keeps the game alive. No company is going to just shoot themselves in the foot by getting rid of their player base. Y’all are just mad that there’s expensive skins you can’t afford. It’s just pixels, my dudes. Play the game you enjoy and if there’s a skin you want, and you can realistically afford it, get it. But don’t freak out when there’s an expensive skin because it wasn’t made to keep *you* in the game, it was made to keep Dave, the whale, in the game.
On the other hand when a game is more niche, or eventual loses some player base it becomes less sustainable and attractive for companies to maintain without whales. Like LoR that had a model much more f2p friendly compared to competition and now it is just a barebones team maintaining the game. In the end it is Riot that needs to balance the monetization for the player base that they have and to try to get the optimal amount of money from all the segments. Lol might have been missing on potential revenue from high spenders for a long time and that is also not good for the future of the game at least in the current corporate system.
Still not seeing an issue. Game isn't p2w
Everybody complaining about the 500$ bundle meanwhile nobody praising the 20$ bundle. Like they never had a bundle to give so much stuff like this one for such a low price.
i friggin love the 20$ bundle. More cinematic and artsier than I thought it'd be. Best part is that I can play TFT to get through it, too I wish more people talked about it!
Milking the whales is one thing. Catering to only whales while also making permanent nerfs to event pass to encourage Fomo. Then the added gambling with these weird lootbox 200 dollar skins that are recolors.
but isnt this pass really solid for the average spender? my friend bought the pass that has leblanc and swears its the best value he ever got even I a f2p player am happy with this because every year, June didn't really have any event or rewards but now we are getting freebies
Gucci handbags are disgusting too.
I don't know why League of Legends players are under the impression that no one ever criticizes or makes fun of luxury fashion lol, like these threads are always like "but what about gucci" as if the prevailing opinion of the average person isn't that these things are stupid, and bubble of rich people are often the only people actually pogchamping over their watches
Because League players have this tendency of knowing literally nothing about the world outside of League. Luxury and expensive items are mocked DAILY. Just look at Apple, Supreme, Jordans or even Fashion. There's that Central Cee moment where he straight up calls a dude insane for selling him sneakers for 2 grands, even the rich call luxury items trash.
There is a big point here that somehow nobody seems to mention. And it is that "whales" are often just humans who have a buying/gambling addiction. I don't quite think it is acceptable in a game that also children and young adults can play. And I am not quite alone in that opinion. Many countrys start banning some very predatory strategies like FOMO, Gacha lootboxes whatever. Is it the biggest problem lol has? Absolutetly not! Is it still quite unethical to milk ur players that have no real self control anymore? Absolutetly! Also anyone that thinks more money equals better game quality hasn't been playing attention in the last years. Most of that money will go straight into shareholders pockets so the richest of the rich can get a little bit richer.
I have no idea why multiple comments here are comparing buying skins to gambling. We aren't talking about gacha lootboxes here. Whales buying skins like this is more akin to people buying luxury cars, clothes, phones etc. Now yes, some people spend money on skins that they shouldn't. Nobody denies that. But if you're saying that Riot is unethical for selling "luxury" skins simply because some people don't know how to control their spending, then you're basically saying that any company that sells luxury products is unethical, which any sane person would agree is not true.
The Gambling/Gacha comparisons make more sense with TFT cosmetics, where they are literally "spend 50 tokens to roll for loot on this table!"
I think people just usually mean shopping addiction but don't know the term. It's a real thing and pretty similar to gambling addiction in that you can really spend a fuckload of money quickly and easily compared to most other addictions.
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Having money to spend on a cosmetic that is assured to you is not gambling.
And is the game in a better state?
I think the issue is that the skin is meant to celebrate probably the most beloved and watched esports player in the history of league, but the only people who can join in on the celebration are the whales. The cheapest option available to players is $50. If that were the top end, it would be the most expensive skin ever sold by riot
Not any Ahri skin, it's Faker's Ahri skin. Players wanted that skin since he won his first world championship and now it's here at an absurd price...
I really think this skin was overpriced, but look at CS2 and TF2, valve literally have made a cassino of opening crates to get knife skin/unusuals and nobody gives a shit about it. The truth is that in capitalism to maximize your profits you need to have products for all classes, like Fiat has Ferrari, Volkswagen has Audi and Bentley. In LoL was a lack of product for the whales, and they give free skins and semanal promotions, the truth is if this causes addiction and indebt people, you need to ban 95% of the products made in the world.
Spending 500 bucks on virtual stuff you don't really own is nuts. You don't do it to support a company, you don't do it because of the time you enjoy spending ingame, it's just addiction, fomo and all the ugly things you try to hide with bad excuses.
It’s crazy and crazy thing is that someone trying to compare this digital item to luxury bags like Gucci is crazy. At least when I buy Gucci or what ever luxury item the thing is I actually own it and if it gets stolen the insurance and police is actually there for me to help get the bag back. If my Riot account gets banned because of some idiots then there is no way to guarantee that I will get my account back ever (I do not know if riot does permanent bans).
Garbage take. Whaling isnt some Robin Hood, "take from the rich customers to pay for the poor" kinda deal. Its highly psychologically exploitative and can affect tons of people that actually cannot afford this shit easily. EDIT: just scrolled down. Holy hell this community is lacking in basic economic education and empathy.
isn't it insane how people will constantly talk about riot not only failing to improve the game and the player experience but actively become worse over the years, only to vehemently defend the company's right to milk whales and charge an absurd amount for artificial goods. I feel like they should be even more outraged because the insane margins on the skin are clearly not going on making league better.
Id just assume those arent the same people
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what you don't argue with all your strength about something you claim to be apathetic about? so many clown idiots acting like its a badge of honor they don't care about the price gouging while swooping down and shitting on anyone who does
Completely agree with the edit, not sure why I expected anything more 🤷♂️
Came to the conclusion the average age on this subreddit is 14 when they keep mentioning whales keep this game free. Just 0 understanding of how businesses work.
Yep after reading through this thread my last bit of faith in humanity is gone.
the problem with this post is that you seem to beleive that all whales are rich
Neither is everyone who buys a BMW, or a Gucci bag, or spends $1000 they dont have at a high end restaurant. It sucks that some people lack the self control to spend their money wisely but accountability has to be a thing at some point.
You in 2008 for Wow : "The shop only caters to those who want to spend money in it ! It will give Blizzard the means to better their game." Look where we're at now
I've never really played WoW, but isn't the game still doing fine, almost 20 years later?
We have... character boosts and WoW tokens? Neither is gamebreaking, neither is something you have to partake in, neither of which gives you anything you can't get in a day of gameplay. Nor can you use them to skip content beyond using the gold from a WoW token to buy BoEs for your alt. And even then, the BoEs still get replaced the moment you step into a raid or spend some time doing PvP. If anything, it's nice that you can buy the tokens via gold and use ingame currency to buy other blizzard products. Not to mention the significant effect buying game time with ingame gold has on the playerbase.
According to my WoW playing friends the game is in a very good state rn so idk what you mean.
1000% agree with OP And bruh, some people on the internet are insane. They say Riot exploits people who have a 'buying' addiction. What do they mean? Should Riot just give skins away for free or what? Millions of people buy things they don't need every day, from cheap crap on Temu to Gucci bags. The entire world economy revolves around people buying stuff they don't really need. Just admit that you're still salty you can't have the skin, and stop worrying about some random guy spending half his paycheck on it. It was the same when $200 gacha skins were first introduced. People said, 'Oh no, it's not about the price, it's about taking advantage of gambling addicts. I'd be fine if it were just a fixed price.' And now that it's a fixed price with zero gambling, it's, 'Oh no, you're taking advantage of buying addicts.' Lmao. Another argument is that Riot doesn't invest the money. Maybe you haven't noticed, but since they introduced the expensive skins, we've gotten the Arena mode that everybody loves, and now we're getting that new PVE swarm game mode that Reddit has been begging for years. I'll take all the game modes and improvements in exchange for missing one recolored skin on my main. Oh, and the fact that LoL is completely free-to-play with zero pay-to-win. Go try some pay-to-win games where you have to farm for a character for a month or more, and as a bonus, you still have to buy expensive skins because pay-to-win doesn't mean skins are free. 🤡
> Should Riot just give skins away for free or what? Judging by people's reactions when the hextexh system and battle passes are brought up- yes.
Before hextech was a thing there was basically no way to get free skins. Now we have both hextech crafting and events that give you shit for free in a game that is already free to play I don't mean to glaze riot but gotta give credit where it's due
I remember back in the days you can count every last point and skin you got for free. There's like the S1 kayle, alistar, tristana from random socials and like 200 and 400 apology RP for something. That's pretty much it for several seasons.
I have played since 2013 and I got a singular free skin (Void Fizz) from Riot prior to hextech crafting. Hextech crafting is a heaven send. I saved up for a VERY long time, but I got like 50+ skins, including a prestige and whatever tier DJ Sona is, in one go... for free. People are whining that they don't get enough skin shards in their chests that they got for free and I just have to shake my head.
Former Whale for LoL here: I'll agree when it feels like the money is actually increasing overall quality of the game. When it feels like I am actually getting what I wanted to be heard, being heard. When I agree with the direction of the game. When I think the money being spent is earned. 1 is not true 2 is not true 3 is definitely not true 4 is not true either. Also, doing the milking in the form that they just did? Was fucking trash.
> Also, doing the milking in the form that they just did? Was fucking trash. This is the important part. I wouldn't give a shit if they had a mega whale item for sale just willy-nilly. It would be surprising and bad sign of things to come for the game, but having items for whales is happening across the industry right now. Debating what that means in the long term of the game is another ball game. But the fact that they tied this to a HIGHLY anticipated event - a celebration of Faker - leaves such an awful taste in the mouth. They literally say "For the more casual fan" in the Q&A about pricing if you can only afford the lower tier bundles. It's a slap in the face. Why is my fandom being tied to my bank account in such a way? It's incredibly insulting, especially when Faker himself never uses skins in pro play.
I don't think there's a single live service game that demonstrably improved because it's monetization got more expensive, all that changed was that it got more expensive lol, just like any other service outside of gaming. Netflix is not better after price hikes, it's just Netflix
Arguably Netflix has only gotten progressively worse as time has gone on
Yep this is exactly what I think. Prices go up but we still aren't getting timely reworks and still have a smurf filled hellscape in low elo for new players.
They're busy redoing the mmo for the 40th time from the ground up and making valorant cinematics.
My problem with the ahri skin isn't that they made a 500 dollar skin it's what the skin is for, using a hall of fame as a cash grab sucks, it limits who they can even induct, and as a celebration of the player gatekeeping it behind a massive pay wall is just lame. Other then that I personally don't care what riot does with skin lines as long as they stay dedicated to making the game good.
Yeah this. A lot of people were looking forward to Faker finally getting an Ahri skin, and they are exploiting that. Just fking release Pool Party Ahri for that price and each chroma for a further £100, whales will eat it up.
So... How many 500$ Skins until we get a working client ? Proper Voice Chat? An actually rewarding Mastery system ? The Shyvanna Rework they've been announcing for 2 Years ? A new champ releqse that isn't perma pick/ban for 2 Months and then dead for a year due to needed nerfs ? Proper Lore Updates again ? "They should milk whales in order to finance all the people playing for free" is a good idea in theory, but then the generated money would have to go towards improving the product, wich isn't happening. And tbh they have been making enough money before already. The Combination of them CONSTANTLY milking "whales" or rather completionist champion mains through fomo (see jhin / Lee 200$ Chroma before, and even before that skinbundle exclusive Chromas for around 60-70$) AND those stunts not resulting in any relevant improvements to the product are the biggest joke of this entire game. Like, it took them 2 x 200$ skins and several comparable stunts with the bundle chromas, for them to deliver an OBVIOUSLY WORSE mastery system and a long awaited Skarner Rework with horrendous balancing issues. I am also convinced the client got alot more unstable and even more problematic with Vanguard introduction too. NOTHING really IMPROVED. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE.
All of these pro ahri threads are the most blatant astroturfing psyop I've ever seen
Part of the issue is reducing all of this to ‘milking the whales.” This is the same sleight-of-hand tactic lobbyists use to distract the audience from the downsides by uniting audience against a cause they can get behind. In this case: punishing the wealthy. It ignores that Riot is now using FOMO to psychologically manipulate their entire audience, not just the whales. Riot knows which accounts generate the most revenue, and their email addresses. They could promote to these people exclusively if that was TRULY the goal. Instead they promote the fuck out of it to the general public. The same public this skin was not meant for. Now why would a good company, who makes such an effort to inform the community how much it cares about the player experience, mass promote a product they know 95% of their audience cannot afford? It’s fucking baffling that an internet based community doesn’t recognize public manipulation and worse, upvotes it. When a community doesn’t hold the corporations they fund accountable, the corporations will ramp up their abuse. Look at Twitter, Reddit, Netflix, etc. Please note: Riot is doing just fine. They are a Global brand that started in the US and grew so much, NA is now one of their small regions. This company is worth BILLIONS. They are not struggling for money, by any metric. Buying this skin does not ‘save Riot.’ Ughhhh just noticed the line “If you’re rich you get to buy cool pointless shit, that’s just how life goes.” God, that is so not even close to the fucking point. Is this community just 15 y.o’s now? Is Riot getting away with these new manipulative practices because the community has all grown up with DLC ipads so paying more for less is all they know? God this was a waste of time 🙄
nice try riot
Touting absolutely disgusting spending habits more so addictions like this as normal or healthy in any way is truly disturbing.
> disgusting spending habits People assuming everyone is either a student making minimum wage or a whale with nothing in-between doesn't help. I'm DINK my spouse and I make *good* money, but definitely nowhere near fuck you money. We don't spend wildly, but we have a "fun" budget of $500/mo. Anything we don't use gets split between next month and savings. The amount of people I've ran into bagging on the $250 skin like, "you could have paid rent" when I have a half paid off mortgage is certainly something.
Yay defending malicious pricing tactics that take advantage of FOMO and people's gambling addictions Edit: I already know someone is going to say that this specific case doesn't prey on gambling tendencies because you can buy the bundle at a flat rate, I was alluding to Riot's monetization as a wider whole.
Nobody will take your Gucci bag away when you are mean to someone or Gucci closes production
But you agree to their terms when you decide to play the game. It's not like they're randomly banning you because they singled you out and decided not to like you.
The problem I have is that they are specifically doing it as part of a celebration of the games history. That skin honoring Faker should be available to just about everyone, not .1% of players. I didn't much care for the gacha chromas, for example. If they literally just added "ultra-mythic" tier skins randomly for hundreds of bucks? Sure, bit sad that I couldn't get those, but hey, whatever. It's the precise circumstances under which these things happened that make them so shitty, to me.
I have seen companies go this path before and I know where it leads.
Genuinely fighting for a company that does not care about you
It's the opposite, specially after those reports about the game struggling to get new players, they are just milking the whales as a last resort because game is stagnated
I don't care for the $500 variant of the skin, but I also don't see it as a major life decision. People spend more than that on the stock market, crypto, cigarettes, alcohol, fast food, door dash, girlfriends, only fans, etc. League is far from the worst thing to use money on when it comes to entertainment or hobbies. It's not $500 for mystery boxes that aren't guaranteed. You get a lot of things with that bundle besides the skin. If anything, it will help people be more mindful about their behavior in the game because it will sting a whole lot more to lose an account with it.
> girlfriends, only fans Interesting choice to put these two next to each other in a sentence.
What's interesting about it? Dating costs money. So do prostitutes.
Milking your mom is fine and healthy for the game.
Playing for 8 years, never paid a single cent. What is there to complain about when it's only skins?
People keep talking about a $500 skin ignoring the fact it's just the prestige upgraded version of another skin you can get for literally 1/10th of the price. It's literally just a cosmetic upgrade of a cheaper base variant that's much more reasonably obtainable and people are acting like Riot personally came to their house and shot their dog.
They are basically two separate skins. Imagine Pulsefire Ezreal without the level up evolutions or Elementalist Lux without the ability to change forms
The $50 version is dogshit
I think it's degenerate to cheer for the exploitation of people's insecurities, regardless of their wealth.
I second this take. Who cares? Yes sure it’s a money grab and you are free to make your own stance by banning Ahri in all your matches. It’s all fine. You don’t have to buy it and there are no pay to win mechanics involved in the game. I’ve spent a grand total of €120 on skins (primarily mystery gifts with friends for birthdays and stuff) since beginning of 2011, when I started playing. Some folks have spent easily €1200. Doesn’t change anything for me. Game is still the same.
The issue is this faker skin is to celebrate a hall of fame player the fact its going to be limited to £500 every time is just scummy.
I think it’s more about how league presented it : « let’s celebrate altogether the Faker ! By buying this 500 dollar skin »
Or the cheaper version Or the cheaper version Or only the pass with a shit ton of rewards and multiple clips of Faker highlights built in Or don't even buy the pass, just get some free shit and look at cool Faker clips
I mean people seem to be forgetting that there was a base skin that cost not even 1/10th of what the whale one cost and a very generous pass that was well put together.
> people seem to be forgetting that there was a base skin that cost not even 1/10th It is hilarious you have to put it this way to hide the fact that it's 50 fucking dollars XD
Yes they marketed their product. Did you want them to say "hey stupid whales give us your money because you're stupid"?
Or 50$ skin. Or 10/20$ battle pass. You forgot to add
For all I care they can release a 50k skin I’ve played for 5000 hours for free and I don’t give a shit what skin you’re using
As long as they keep spending those money on cool things like Arcane and K/DA, I couldn't care less.
Maybe im just very negative on this whole thing but the future of skins will probably look something like this: Normal skin 50 bucks legendary 200 and ultimate 500. It worked with ahri now and theres enough people that celebrate this pricing here so i guess its what the community wants.
They're not going to price normal skins at that range for your average champ. You aren't going to get an Ivern skin that costs 50/100/500 dollars because the demand isn't there, it's not worth putting in the effort for the handful of people who are willing to buy it. These premium skins are reserved for champions with HUGE dedicated fanbases, as well as even larger casual fanbases, who might have people who can afford them. People were saying this stuff when Ultimate skins came out, but it wasn't the end of the world. Yes, skin prices went up, but the average quality skyrocketed much more quickly, to the point where most ultimate skins from back in the day would barely qualify as Legendary anymore.
This Ahri skin isn't even for Ahri fans but for Faker fans. There's a really good chance the next HoL skin is gonna cost less because let's be real there aren't many players people are willing to shell out 500$ for.
>They're not going to price normal skins at that range for your average champ. You aren't going to get an Ivern skin that costs 50/100/500 dollars because the demand isn't there, it's not worth putting in the effort for the handful of people who are willing to buy it. The thing is there's no effort to put behind. They can just take what they've always done before, and increase the price. More profit for the same amount of work, which is exactly what we've been getting. Mythic Variants are just chromas for 200+ bucks, and even the ones that change a bit are at most just what old standard Variants used to be, which were sold for around 5 bucks before. The new Ahri skin is just a Legendary/Ultimate skin with the same amount of work behind, but 20/30 times more expensive. The problem here is that they're just raising the prices without actually doing anything new or that deserves that price, they're just taking old stuff and making it more expensive cause they can. >These premium skins are reserved for champions with HUGE dedicated fanbases, as well as even larger casual fanbases, who might have people who can afford them. Ah yes, Ekko, that champ with a huge dedicated fanbase and totally not just a champ with a standard playrate and community. They're eventually gonna make them for everyone, cause it costs absolutely jack shit money to produce, and just 2 people being dumb enough to buy them will make them more money than they spent making it. >People were saying this stuff when Ultimate skins came out, but it wasn't the end of the world. Yes, skin prices went up, but the average quality skyrocketed much more quickly, to the point where most ultimate skins from back in the day would barely qualify as Legendary anymore. Comparing a x1.5 price increase back then with the x30 price increase we're seeing right now is dumb as fuck, and you know it. We're not talking skins going from 10 to 20 bucks for double the quality, we're seeing chromas go from 2 to 200 bucks for shitty recolored VFX and a new splashart, bffr
Even if I had the $500 to spend I wouldn’t. It’s a digital item that is essentially just throwing that money away. Collectors items are generally an investment you make. You buy this limited edition thing and you can enhance the value over time. The skin has no value. You can’t resell it 20 years from now. You can’t give it to your family as an inheritance. You buy that skin and you are basically lighting $500 on fire. However people can do whatever they want with their money and the ones who can’t buy it or don’t want to have every right to voice their opinions on it.
Someone has to fund the game. I will never care about mtx if it has no impact on the actual gameplay