[2023] Patch 13.20 is Amazing

I am actually able to have multiple teamfights per game in Gm/Challenger lobbies. We would be lucky before this patch to have even 1 teamfight per game. Before this patch, high elo was soloq was basically just decided by which team got the first few kills in a game. Now it feels like I can actually get to a part of the game where I can teamfight and have a chance to win. IMO riot knocked it out of the park on this patch. It genuinely feels so good to be able to teamfight in League of Legends again

Kinda crazy how teamfighting in a 5v5 game about teams fighting is so much fun.

With plates/baron/dragon stack all giving less value, game slows down a bit, and this naturally leads to game states where all players can participate in teamfights because teams dont gain as much strength for doing one single objective

Before, the team that got objectives/kills early would just be skyrocketed so far ahead that there was barely even an opportunity to teamfight because the ahead team could just force some suboptimal skirmish and power through it and get kills no matter what due to snowballing

Now they actually have to think when they go for plays because they aren't quite as far ahead since snowballing is reduced, meaning that there is a higher likelihood as the game progresses that we get 5v5 teamfights over objectives

Edit: certainly agree that there's some op stuff like hullbreaker but my point was that overall games going to teamfight phase more often feels good

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Originally posted by JinxVer

Looking at Data the "Average game length" hasn't really changed drastically, around 20ish seconds.

13.20 vs 13.17

On average, High Elo games still end in 25-ish minutes

And low elo games still 30-ish.

~~If snowballing was significantly reduced, i'm guessing we'd see a perceptible increase in "Game length"? But that doesn't look to be the case~~

Nvm, Phreak just stated otherwise, and he has the full picture, so he's likely correct.

Changing average game time by 20 seconds is significant movement.

Also the feel of the game is more important than the length of the game. Late game means more than early game already: Kills leave you dead for longer and they're more likely to lead to a Baron, Inhibitor, or another valuable objective.

Of course if it goes too far, it makes the game feel like nothing matters until 20 minutes. Some amount of the game must snowball to be fair.

Anyways, this is all to say snowballing appears to be substantially down without a huge increase in game time, which are both pretty desirable outcomes.

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