One of the readers here pointed me toward some very interesting information regarding the Renekton release. Apparently he was nerfed after the Champion Spotlight was recorded, but they still posted the video without mentioning the changes. Now I understand why he doesn’t feel quite right.

When I was watching the Spotlight, I was initially shocked by how much Renekton could heal with his Q. If you watch the video at the 3:30 counter, you’ll see Phreak hit level four, dash into a pack of minions, hit Cull the Meek to heal for something like 250 hp, and dash out. I’ve tried that same move probably 40 times in my games with him, and it has never healed for that much. Well, that’s because they nerfed it.

Here’s what Xypherous, an Associate Technical Designer, had to say about the change:

What happened was that, very late in development, we decided to take a gamble to make his kit more cohesive. It paid off, because his abilities are now better, but the normal process of balancing took a major hit so his numbers were in a state of super flux. 😡

So yeah, we decided to sacrifice a lot of things to make a solid champion a better one. I think I lost something like 40 hours of sleep the last week due to it. ~.~

While I don’t think the nerf killed Renekton – he seems okay for melee, but definitely not the beast he could be – I do think it bred some bad blood between Riot and a lot of the community. Obviously I play the game a decent bit, so I usually have enough IP to buy whatever champ releases without spending real cash. For a lot of players, though, that’s not an option, so they wait on what information Riot gives prior to the champion release to make a decision about spending Riot points. There’s a big difference between the way Renekton looks like he’ll play and how he actually plays. He requires a very cautious touch, or a strong lanemate to be successful. Without those things, he’s going to struggle to stay on top of a game. That’s definitely not a champion I would spend $8 on.

I’m not saying he should have been released as some crazy whirlwind of doom, rather that Riot should have either taken the time to change the Champion Spotlight, or delayed his release by a week in order to balance the champion. It would have been really easy to add a note to the YouTube video describing the changes in the appropriate place. Would it have looked as nice as the current video? Probably not, but it would have been an accurate representation of a product that people will spend money on. That’s really not so much to ask.