Riot Games, the company behind the insanely popular League of Legends MOBA game, has announced a big shake up of the way it handles champion purchases. The system itself will remain the same, but its pricing structure will be overhauled. From now on champions will progressively be dropped into cheaper categories the older they are, making them an easier buy for everyone.
This will begin with the oldest current top price heroes: Ezreal, Vladimir, Renekton, Nocturne, Lee Sin, Brand and Vayne. These champions will from now on cost just 4800 IP/ 880RP. However that's not all, every time a new hero is released, the oldest 6300 IP champ will also drop into the 4800 IP price bracket and every third champion release, one 4800 IP character will fall into one of the lower ones again. This should mean that gradually the more expensive heroes become cheaper and therefore a more viable purchase for even casual players.
However, to offset this general reduction in champion pricing, newly released ones will see their price jacked up to 7800 IP / 975 RP during the first week it's on sale.
For anyone annoyed that they spent a load on champions just recently, don't worry. "As with all permanent price reductions, we’ll automatically refund the difference for anyone who’s purchased one of these champions up to two weeks prior to today," reassured Riot. "These refunds will likely take at least a few days to fully process."
This isn't the only update though. Riot has also announced that as part of this restructuring, champions will be released more slowly, about one a month from now on. This is to allow them to polish the characters more - read: playtest them against the multitude of champions already available - and to allow gamers to build up more IP between releases.
Does this sound like a good idea to you guys?