In League of Legends’ upcoming preseason, Riot Games is planning to add another comeback mechanic called objective bounties, further incentivizing play around neutral objectives.
Not a lot of details were given out by Riot about the new system, besides the fact that it will give teams “more strategic options to get back in the game through taking objectives,” providing another avenue for players when things aren’t looking too hot on Summoner’s Rift. This system will likely encourage more play around dragons, Rift Herald, and Baron for both teams as one squad looks to find a way back into a match, while the other tries to snuff their opponents out.
In League‘s ninth season, Riot introduced champion and minion bounties as a way for players to even out a losing game by gaining extra gold whenever they kill enemy players who have big leads.
Game length is a concern that Riot is already considering. This objective bounties system could cause matches to drag out even longer since players won’t be directly forced into conflict with the enemy team. But the devs feel that average game length is “in a good spot,” so they don’t want to make any changes that will cause an adverse effect to that.
The system is still being tweaked so that skill gap isn’t invalidated by these changes. “If you’re just that good and dominating your lane opponent and snowballing the game, that advantage shouldn’t just disappear altogether,” Riot said.
More information will arrive as we get closer to the end of the year. Balancing will be a huge part of the new bounty system since this could upend the current game flow in place. The developers will look to find the sweet spot when it comes to giving more chances to mount a comeback, while also ensuring that League players can still finish off a game in decisive fashion.
Make sure to follow us on YouTube for more esports news and analysis.
