Compare Riot Legends of Runeterra’s new card game with Hearthstone

If you missed the recent gaming news, Riot Games just announced a new game – a card game. It’s called Legends of Runeterra, and it takes place in the same world (and with the same characters) as League of Legends. Will LoR be as successful as the recent autobattler genre – Truth Arena? Let’s compare the new card game with Hearthstone.

First, you should watch the video below to understand more about the gameplay of LoR:

Looking at Riot’s new game, it seems a bit complicated. That’s why it makes many people recall Artifact. Both games try to move MOBA mechanics into cards. However, it must be said that after watching a few streamers play, LoR will be less complicated for new players (especially since Riot is against the idea of ​​bringing the “lane” system in). This is a great advantage in the competitive digital card game market. But more importantly, what are the main differences (and similarities) between it and Hearthstone?

One of the big differences is the turn-based system. In Hearthstone, players take turns playing – when you play, your opponent can’t do anything (Secret is the only way to interfere with the opponent on their turn). In Legends of Runeterra, turns are asymmetrical, but both players can join the action at the same time. When a turn begins, one player is the offensive side, and the other is the defensive side. In the next turn, the two sides change roles. Players can use ally (corresponding to minions in Hearthstone) and spells even though they are blockers, but it is the attacking player who decides how the turn plays out. The offensive player can always choose between playing cards and attacking – if a card is played, the defending side can counterattack using a card. When the attacker decides to hit, the defender can choose blockers (meaning you can’t use extra ally or slow). After picking the blocker, we go one step further allowing both of them to use part of their spell sets (like speed buffs, removal casts, etc.) to change the game.

Legends of Runeterra has a mana system very similar to Hearthstone. Both players start with 1 “mana block” and add 1 after each turn. It’s like Hearthstone, you have 1 mana on Turn 1 and 5 mana on Turn 5. The only big difference is that the extra mana can be carried over to the next turns. When you end your turn with an unused mana point, it turns into “spell mana”. The next turn, you can use that mana, but only to cast spells (spell) – not summon ally. You can have up to 3 mana spells at once – any mana above that level won’t carry over to the next turn. With mana spells, you can decide not to use all your mana and save some mana for the next turn, casting stronger spells.

Each player has a Nexus, like the Hero in Hearthstone. Both start the match with 20 health. To win, of course you need to bring your opponent’s health down to 0, but the game also has a few other win conditions – such as Mecha’thun for Hearthstone. There are cards that, if qualified, win the game instantly (the opponent must intervene and not let that happen). The combat system is more like Magic the Gathering (MTG) than Hearthstone, since attacking players can’t choose who they want to hit – you can only order attacks. It depends on the player whether to choose blocker or to be hit straight. The main difference is that it’s ally fighting 1v1 – you can’t choose multiple blockers for the same attacker like MTG. However, unlike MTG, and like Hearthstone, ally (minion) health does not regenerate after each turn. When you drag ally’s health low, it’ll stay at that level, making kills on the next Turn easier. An important difference between LoR ​​and the two games mentioned above is that Riot’s new card game can summon and attack immediately. Another point is that you don’t have to announce an attack – if they don’t feel like fighting, they can sit on the table and wait for the right moment. It might be a good idea to summon multiple allys over multiple turns and then launch a total attack when the time is right.

Of course, ally and spell have many different keywords and effects. Some are similar to what we’ve seen in other games – but we won’t go into that. Spell, will be divided into three categories – slow, fast and burst. Each item changes gameplay – slow spells can only be used before or after battle (not mid-match), fast spells can be used at any time, but will shift priority to the other player (so they can resist), and spell burst can be used at any time, without interrupting your turn – with burst, you don’t allow your opponent to react. These “fighting tricks” are very common and sometimes create a series of protracted back-and-forth moves. You can choose the blocker and buff that ally – the opponent decides to buff his ally – you spell the shield ally (similar to the divine shield in Hearthstone) – the opponent sees no way to win the fight and kill your ally with the finishing spell. Of course, situations like these require a lot of mana, and a lot of cards in the hand, but it happens for sure. It’s your chance to “outplay” your opponent and claim the ability to read your opponent’s hand.

Regarding the build deck system, the game operates almost like any other CCG game. Instead of classes like Hearthstone or colors of MTG, the cards are dealt by countries/countries in the world of Runeterra. Each deck consists of 40 cards picked from up to two different zones (6 areas in total). That means you will have a little more freedom than Hearthstone (only can choose 1 class + Neutral cards to build deck), but not as diverse as Magic (allows you to mix 5 colors up to if you want, but choose all 5 then usually not a good idea). You can put up to 3 identical cards into the deck (this number for MTG is 4, Hearthstone is 2).

The important thing in the deck building process is the Champion and the leveling system. Champions are allys with strong skills and the opportunity to level up to increase their strength later. The leveling mechanism is similar to Hearthstone’s Quest, only shorter and easier. After the champion is on the table, you need to do a few things to level up the champion. Depending on the champion, it may require casting spells x times, killing x enemies, attacking the enemy Nexus x times, etc. Leveling up a champion plays an important role in many strategies. You can only level up to 6 champion cards in your deck, so you need to choose wisely to see which champion suits your strategy best.

Legends of Runeterra’s crafting system is a combination of Hearthstone and MTG: Arena. You have two ways of crafting cards – by Shard and Wild Card. The Shard is like Hearthstone’s Arcane Dust – you get it by discarding cards you don’t need. And Wild Cards are like MTG:Arena’s Wild Cards – you can turn a WIld card into a card of the same rarity (e.g. if you have a Rare Wild Card, you can turn it into any Rare Card). If tuned right, the combination of these two systems is very clever. Because they all have their own problems, but together will work very effectively.

This is a F2P (free) game – you don’t need to buy anything to play the game. Players unlock new cards by “leveling up” the plot (get XP for completing matches with related storylines to receive rewards) + weekly vault. The Vault seems to get bigger the more you play (the more active, the more rewards you get). Of course, players can still buy cards with coins – the in-game currency. The point where LoR is better than Hearthstone is that instead of buying the whole pack, the game allows you to buy a Wild Card and then craft the card you need. It’s like buying Dust (with a better chance of opening packs) directly in the Hearthstone store. To reduce the gap between F2P and paying players, the game limits the number of Wild Cards you can buy with real money each week. You can still buy unlimited decorations. This system limits the ability to buy all the cards as soon as possible and avoids the situation where the deposit player outstrips the F2P players.

We haven’t really experienced the game yet – it’s just entered beta so only select players (and streamers) can play. It’s also incomplete – for example, they announced a Draft format (similar to Hearthstone’s Arena) but not yet. The game doesn’t have a Rank yet, but of course it will be added soon (and most likely works like League of Legends or Teamfight Tactics). The first phase of testing only lasts 5 days, until October 20. Phase 2 will also be short and last from November 14 to 19. In early 2020, we will really enter the closed beta, with the official version. launch at a later time in 2020. It is worth noting that Legends of Runeterra will have a mobile version when it first launches. This is an area where some of Hearthstone’s competitors just can’t compete – Hearthstone’s strengths are that you can play on PC and mobile and the gameplay is synchronized for both. Not only competing in the PC market, the mobile version of LoR will also threaten Hearthstone on mobile.

So what does this mean for all Hearttstone gamers? There are three most likely scenarios:

• Legends of Runeterra doesn’t attract a large player base (or could fail like Artifact) and doesn’t affect Hearthstone at all.
• Legends of Runeterra exploded, Blizzard didn’t move to fight back and was stripped of a large number of Hearthstone players.
• Legends of Runeterra exploded and Blizzard was forced to improve Hearthstone to make it more competitive – like some features that players have long requested, or improve the crafting system, making it easier for players to get the cards they want. If Blizzard responds appropriately, both games will thrive.

Practically speaking, scenario 3 is the most profitable. Players not only have many choices about the game they want, but when there are many strong competitors, each game will have to constantly improve to survive.

What do you think of Legends of Runeterra? What was your first impression of the game and when watching the stream? Do you think it will recreate the success of the Truth Arena or quickly be forgotten like Artifact?

According to Hearthstonetopdecks