Cover-Credits:
Riot Games announced that it has removed the newly added Chemtech Dragon from League of Legends until further notice. Just two weeks into the new season, the Chemtech Dragon, its dragon soul, and the map terrain have been disabled on all servers across the world. This new elemental dragon was introduced to the game during the 2022 pre-season and ever since its release, the League of Legends community has been pushing for heavy nerfs or its removal from the game, stating that it is overpowered.
It looks like the game developers (devs) are finally paying heed to what the players have to say about the game design as they have disabled the dragon for the time being.
Chemtech Dragon misses the mark
Acknowledging that it missed the mark with the Chemtech Dragon, Riot in a blogpost said, “When we introduced the Chemtech Drake, Soul, and Terrain in the preseason, we shared our intent for it to have a higher impact on games than the original four elemental drakes. Over the past few months, we've heard your feedback across social media and surveys that, even with this goal in mind, the Chemtech addition has just been too frustrating to play with—especially if you're on the losing team.”
On Twitter, Game Director Jonathan “Bellissimoh” Belliss wrote, “After looking at player feedback as well as global game data -- we've decided to disable the Chemtech Drake. Evaluating options that address your feedback. In the meantime, we'll be turning that drake off.”
The devs also announced that they would be working on a rework to ensure that the new dragon brings a sense of balance to the rift. Riot has not yet given a timeline as to when the dragon will make its return to the game. The blogpost read, “Our primary focus will be on the terrain. This may take time to do right, meaning there's a chance we won't bring the Chemtech Drake back for a while.”
Earlier, Riot had acknowledged the frustration around the Chemtech Dragon and announced significant nerfs to it. It also said it was ready for “higher scope changes” including reworks if the nerfs don’t work well.
League of Legends community react to disabling of Chemtech Dragon
The Chemtech Dragon has been considered overpowered as the team that captures the Chemtech Soul gains a passive to turn into zombies upon death. This means that the team with the soul can get resurrected, cast abilities, and attack foes for a brief time. Players claimed it was obnoxious that they had to kill enemies twice if they had the soul and demanded that Riot make changes to it.
Now, Riot’s announcement comes as music to the ears of the players. The community is all praise for the devs for considering feedback around the dragon and acting upon it swiftly.
One Twitter user wrote, “I won't lie I really respect Riot for going back on their game design with Chemtech dragon. Obviously, it was an absolutely ridiculous concept but they don't revert changes very often. Actually looking forward to what they can change about chemtech map when they reintroduce it.”
On Reddit too, players rejoiced at the disabling of the Chemtech Dragon and appreciated Riot for being receptive. A Reddit user commented on a thread, “They really do listen. People meme on them so hard, but they are some pretty feedback receptive devs. Remember Positional Rankings (which I personally liked)? A lot of work was put into it, and I think they could have tweaked it a bit more to get it right, but they ultimately listened to the players and got rid of it.”
Competitive leagues around the globe should also expect to see the removal of the drake moving forward. On Twitter, Mark “Caedrel” Lamont revealed that the Chemtech Dragon will not be in play in the League of Legends European Championship (LEC) this coming week.
According to Naver, the League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) will also be disabling the dragon from pro play starting 26th Jan when Patch 12.2 is applied.
It is unclear when the Chemtech Dragon will return to League of Legends. But for now, players can hope to see a much more balanced version of the dragon in the future.
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