Arena 2v2v2v2 Returns with Significant Changes: Everything You Need to Know
With Riots newest game mode Arena 2v2v2v2 being well received upon its initial release, Patch 13.23 in early December is set to reintroduce the mode with a host of updates, balance changes, and exciting new features, promising an even more exhilarating gaming experience thanks to feedback from players! Here's everything you need to know about the upcoming changes.
Expand Your Queue Squad Size
According to Riot's player feedback, one their most requested change was that players desired to queue up with more than one friend. And Riot is delivering!
In the re-release of area you can now expect to queue up in groups of 2, 3, and 4 people!
But that's not all, full teams of 8 will now be able to queue up and compete against each other in a completely private match. These matches will still be ranked however! So expect to get competitive with one another as your rank can still go up and down.
Revive your Ally
Unless you were running it down with a Zilean or rushed Guardian Angel, once you die - you were out of the match. And those 1v2's can be really rough, but now you have the opportunity to reverse the tide with the introduction of a new revive feature!
Once a player dies, a circular area will be spawned around the area that player had met their demise. Following a duration of time, that is still TBD, during which an ally remains within that circle, the downed teammate will be brought back into the fight.
Each team will be allowed only one revive per match, so consider picking up a durable champion just in case your teammate gets caught in a bad situation and you need to withstand a 1v2 for a set amount of time.
Augment Balances
One of the biggest issues of the initial release of Arena was that meta's with champions and their best augments were easily identified and obtained. Much like in TFT, players would play one dimensionally and roll for the augments they desired.
Riot plans to counter this playstyle by adding 60 new augments! Diversifying the pool of augments to choose from to allow for more unique games each time around.
On top of adding a larger selection, these augments will also be LIMITED. Each augment will be in a shared pool with all 8 players with 2 of each augment only. So once an augment is picked up twice, it won't show up for anyone else for the rest of the game!
The Ring of Fire
If your 2v2 match starts to take too long, the arena starts to "help" by closing in the map with a ring of fire.
Previously it would always just go down the center of the map... But not anymore.
Expect the ring of fire to close in on random places in the map, its all up to chance now!
Champion Cameos
Random champion drop-ins will remain a feature of Arena, with a few champions that you may recognize and a few new faces in the scene.
The Confirmed champions are: Sett, Pyke, Gwen, Sylas, and Thresh. Sylas and Thresh being the new ones.
Sylas will bring back the ultimate Spellbook gimmick that will take the place of your non-flash summoner spell, and replace it with a champions Ultimate.
And Thresh will roam the map, throwing his lantern randomly to provide a shield and an opportunity to grab the lantern and be pulled to him.
Riot mentioned that they will be looking forward to feedback from players to know if they would like cameos to be a continuing feature in area.
Champion Select Pick Order
On top of just one-dimensional augment picks from the first release of Arena, Champion duo's were also heavily abused (let's remember the many Shaco + Heimerdinger combos we faced). Often times one team would simply be incredibly one sided without any counter play available.
Riot plans to combat this by implementing a new form of champ select which will involve:
- Regular banning phase
- First teammate selects a champion in a blind pick
- Champion selection is revealed to all players
- Second teammate then selects a champion not previously selected in another blind pick
With this new champion select, each team will have the opportunity to have a first pick champion prio, and then a chance to counter pick against the other teams.
Rank Changes
Arena will once again start all players in Wood Division. However they felt the climb to Gold and Gladiator was too easy, and are looking to make it more difficult the 2nd time around.
All the rank tiers are the same as before so the climb will still be:
- Wood
- Bronze
- Silver
- Gold
- Gladiator
Hexgates
The only significant Map changes mentioned is that Hexgates will be added to the game to allow for escape opportunities for champions that require distance.
It is still unknown which maps will be receiving Hexgates specifically or if all maps will be containing Hexgates.
Release Date
Arena was released to PBE November 8th and is planned to be released in patch 13.23 in early December.
Arena will also include the Winterblessed skinline, which is planned to be released in patch 13.24 on December 6th.
Temporary or Permanent?
With Arena being one of Riots more unique and a large hit with its player base, Riot is still in consideration of supporting the game as a permanent piece for the future of League of Legends.
This release of Arena 2v2v2v2 will still just be a temporary game mode, as Riot explains that the game is still in the experimentation phase.
However, they are still exploring their options. In the meantime, they're hoping to get as much constructive feedback on the game mode's second release to help decide whether or not Arena will be a permanent addition to the client.
To conclude, a lot of effort is being put in to the games production in balancing. So if you play the game mode on its release, make sure to give your feedback on what you like and dislike if you hope to one day have this game added as a permanent feature!
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Featured Image Source: Riot Games