Chapter 342

VG is the club with the biggest moves this transfer season; not only do netizens have expectations for their performance next year, but industry insiders are equally curious about what target VG will set for its spring split. Therefore, this linked-mic live stream attracted countless netizens to watch, and the live chat also harbored many industry insiders.

Liang Yan said the goal for next spring split is to avoid relegation; those who know understand he's joking, like Gao Jun secretly watching his own team's players stream in the office.

But those who don't know are somewhat half-believing, half-doubting.

EDG Ji Di

"Holy shit, WE and VG! Next year's pressure is huge, brothers."

"WE's fine; mainly it's VG……"

"Is WE okay? They bought a new support from IG, oh, I feel their Xia Lu is strong, and Su Hanwei is also playing well now."

"I'm not afraid of WE, but VG is really tough to deal with……"

"Hahaha!"

Second Prince Ai Luoli suddenly burst out laughing, scaring everyone.

"Ai Luoli, you idiot, you scared the hell out of us!"

"Haha, hahaha…… holy shit, haha……"

"What's so funny?"

"Haha, leg bro… no, Jiao Shen, damn VG's crew is streaming, puff, he said VG's goal for next spring split is to avoid relegation!"

"... You're joking, right."

"Exactly, what's there to laugh about."

"Isn't it funny? I think it's pretty hilarious; their roster this year is estimated at around thirty million, spending thirty million just to avoid relegation—isn't that funny?"

"But I think VG really is toxic; maybe they'll actually get relegated!"

Everyone suddenly fell silent.

"Will VG get relegated?"

"Don't say that; after thinking, everyone felt it actually might happen!"

"One reason is that VG's team itself is toxic."

"Second, Riot is clearly going to tweak the jungle position, which can be seen from several preseason patches."

Although it's the off‑season, every team still closely watches version developments; teams ambitious for next year's results even try to predict next year's meta by studying version trends to build their rosters, and even if the starting lineup is locked and unchangeable, they will pick up one or two key‑position substitutes as insurance in case the starters can't adapt to next year's environment.

Thus, most teams have conducted some research on the several version changes during this period.

Simply put, since the game version entered the S7 preseason, the game environment has undergone earth‑shaking changes, the most important of which stem from the 6.22 patch; aside from the usual preseason mass rework of hero skill mechanics, the major changes are the adjustment of the armor‑penetration system and the overhaul of Ye Qu, especially the latter.

Ye Qu's plant system went live,

Monster spawn and respawn timings were adjusted, and the Smite buff was removed,

The small monsters in the red and blue buff camps were removed,

F4 became F6,

The Stone Armor Beetle gained a splitting mechanism—one becomes two, two become four…

Each of these updates would be a major, environment‑shaking change in a normal patch, yet Riot packed them all into one version; the impact was nuclear‑bomb level, rendering the jungle players' familiar tactics, habits, and experience almost completely useless.

Plus the rune system tweaks, post‑6.22 LoL was unrecognizable compared to earlier versions—practically another game—leaving players feeling alien and many pros unable to adapt.

Patch 6.23 only reworked Dragon Girl, with no other major changes; players and pros breathed easy, believing the S7 heavyweight updates were finished and no further tough tweaks would come—then 6.24 hit.

In the 6.24 patch that officially opened the S7 season, designers not only introduced a mechanic‑monster, Blue Steel Shadow, but also overhauled the whole game system: red and blue buff durations were cut and their effects weakened, the blue buff's AP bonus was removed, and so on…

Also, a hotfix was rolled out mid‑6.24 that nerfed the monster healing from Smite, though the Chinese server never announced it.

Luckily, Liang Yan felt something was off in ranked, deliberately climbed the firewall to check Riot's update post, and only then found that Smite's healing had been reduced by 30.

Following 6.24 came an emergency patch, 6.24+, which added the missing note on the Smite healing nerf and also tweaked several champions' strength.

The so‑called 6.24+ was chiefly a nerf to Blue Steel Shadow; the rest were just side effects.

Moreover, Riot explicitly stated in the patch notes:

Camille's debut performance exceeded our expectations; although her lane dominance was as we anticipated, her outstanding jungle play surprised us greatly.

A hero capable of ganking across more than two thousand units of terrain is too strong; her strength far exceeds our design threshold.

Therefore, we slightly tweaked Camille's stats to reduce lane pressure against her, while also weakening her healing and jungle clear speed, to bring her back to her intended position.

It's obvious that Liang Yan's recent jungle Camille ranked performance was wildly exaggerated, thus drawing the balance team's iron‑fisted punishment.

The top‑lane players hit by this out‑of‑the‑blue nerf are both furious and depressed.

They had just picked up this super fun hero, hadn't even enjoyed it for two days, and suddenly it got nerfed!

And it wasn't nerfed for some random reason—who could tolerate that!

Players complained, flooding Riot's official accounts with anger, but to no avail; Riot stayed silent, and Chun Li—who had just appeared in the LPL spring season group draw—posted a Weibo shifting the blame eastward.

Extreme cases are also something our balance team must consider, since nobody wants a hero to be overpowered only in one player's hands—such matches would be boring.

Netizens replied:

Just ban the player outright!

Exactly—if the player is strong, restrict the player, not us!

But many agreed with Chun Li, e. g., jungle Blue Steel Shadow: if Riot didn't nerf her AOE and healing, she'd obviously become a must‑ban for every team facing VG by the spring split.

That really is still pretty unfair…

Some flooded Liang Yan's stream to vent, blaming him for ruining their fun with Blue Steel Shadow.

Liang Yan was speechless; as the complaints piled up, he just spread his hands.

"I'm just playing for fun; who expected Riot to take it seriously."