We played the first games at Legends of Runeterra, the great bet of Riot Games in the genre of cards with the League of Legends lore.
The genre of CCG -collectible card games- does not pass for its best moment. Bethesda has halted the development of new content for The Elder Scrolls: Legends, CD Projekt has done the same with the Gwent console version –Thronebreaker was originally intended as an expansion for this card game-, and the undisputed leader, Hearthstone, has required a very aggressive strategy of Blizzard to be revitalized, something that remains to be seen if it is achieved. Along the way there have been others such as Eternal, Faeria, Fable Fortune and the most striking case, Artifact, for having nothing less than Valve behind, and all of them have passed without penalty or glory. That said … Is it the best time for Riot Games to launch Legends of Runeterra?
If Blizzard's attitude towards Hearthstone is considered aggressive, it is no less that of the creators of the very popular League of Legends, who far from accommodating themselves in the success of their MOBA, have proposed to expand through the launch of various titles. One of them is this Legends of Runeterra, which relies on the lore of what is surely the most famous game in history in the professional competitive field, but surely this is not enough to succeed. Few genres and few platforms will be left to play, but it is this game that occupies one of the pillars on which Riot Games will support its expansion. Do you have what it takes to succeed?
The RNG, decreased as much as possible
The RNG is nothing but the random factor inherent in any card game, but it has to be present in its rightful measure. It is something that Blizzard did not know to control, which in his intention to make Hearthstone more accessible to all, practically turned it into a roulette game where anything was possible and any game could be ruined by the designs of the fortune goddess, good or bad Since then, the intention of all those who have ventured into card games has been to reduce this random component to the slightest expression, and fortunately, and at the moment, Riot Games seems to have succeeded in Legends of Runeterra.
Obviously, as always, luck will always count, but it is necessary that a game does not depend on luck other than at the moment we steal a card without knowing what this is going to be. From there, the ideal is to leave the destination of the game in the hands of the skill of the player, and that is where LOR is right, demanding that he take part every few seconds and not leaving him more than a few seconds of mental rest. As always, you have to do each movement with the next one that we are going to do in mind, but this is something continuous, since the structure of shifts to which we are accustomed changes radically in Legends of Runeterra.
What we find on this occasion, instead of turns in which each player plays his cards and attacks the rival nexus – with 20 life points -, are turns in which one player attacks and another defends. These in turn are divided into phases in which the player can play a card – which can be character or spells – with the mana limit or pass. But beware, playing a card does not mean that it will necessarily participate in the round. We explain ourselves.
Once all the phases of each round have been played, it is time to attack and defend, the player attacking the link being the first to mount his offensive. This consists of choosing the cards that will attack from among those that he has previously played, something to which the same process happens on the part of the rival, but on the offensive, being able to choose how and with what cards he will block, with exceptions. In short, it does not follow a conventional turn structure in which one player acts and another watches for 1 minute, but is more action-reaction, demanding slightly more agility and mental speed than other titles of the same cut.
That said it may seem complex, and at the beginning it is. The card game player usually makes the mistake of believing that knowing how to play one will not be difficult to master others, but it is not always the case. In fact, it is almost never like that. Playing the Legends of Runeterra tutorials seems essential, and moreover, some of us may even need to play them more than once, due to their differences with the games we know so far. Also, why not say it, gives us the first rewards, something that is obviously very welcome …
One of the most peculiar aspects of Legends of Runeterra, and which we liked the most, are the Champion cards, based on the popular heroes of League of Legends, with some such as Yasuo, Jinx, Lux or Darius, for example, and being able to carry at most six of them in our deck. It is a positive aspect because they all have a mechanic called Improvement, which increases their attack or life attributes, or can also have some additional effect or ability. This only adds another layer of strategic depth when setting our goal in each game, and base the creation of mallets based on it. Likewise, the edition of mallets is based on the combination of different regions of the League of Legends lore each having characteristics depending on whether they are aggressive or control decks, they are based on Followers – thus the LOR is known to the minions – or Spells , etc … In this way, we find the Islands of the Shadow, Demacia, Noxus, Freljord, Piltover and Zaun, and Ionia.
Of course, the multiple keywords that represent different skills in each letter are not lacking. Overwhelming, which causes the remaining damage to hit an enemy unit is inflicted on the rival Nexus, Elusion, which can only be blocked with other cards with the same function, Endeble, who die at the end of each round, Last Breath, being a term that we already know and it is not necessary to explain… In summary, there are common aspects with other card games that we have surely tried, but Legends of Runeterra has its own identity and virtues to establish and succeed whenever you do things right and listen to the community, something that has proved essential in this genre – well Blizzard has learned. For now, some of the best card players in our country such as Akawonder, Evangelion or Dalesom have already shown interest in the game, but it is Riot's sole and exclusive responsibility that can be enshrined through frequent content and an ideal balance to be accessible for new players while deep for veterans.
