League of Legends’ The new Arena mode has been out for about 24 hours, but a meta is already starting to grow. A champion, however, stands out as a living, breathing outlier.
Shaco may be one of Arena’s most popular champions, but his win rate doesn’t reflect his popularity at all. Shaco holds a pick rate of 11.2%, which is the third highest on the roster, as well as a ban rate of 24.0%, which is the highest of any champion. Yet even with those astronomical numbers in mind, Shaco is monstrously underperforming; his win rate in the first day of Arena’s lifespan is 23%, the 72nd highest of any champion, according to League statistics website Blitz.gg.
While a 23% finish rate at the top of your lobbies isn’t the worst thing in the world – there are champions whose win rates are in the low teens – it’s pretty hard to sit with that kind of number when your popularity is so high. To Shaco, this makes the high pick and ban rates seem relatively unjustified.
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The most reasonable explanation for why Shaco’s ban rate is so high, but his win rate just doesn’t complement it, is because of the notion that the champion is GOOD, but doesn’t have as much power as the community thinks. Alternatively, there could be players in the Arena player base who could believe that Shaco is a “must have” champion, and every time he do pass the ban phase, you must select it if you want to have a chance of winning. Obviously, that’s not true.
If players choose Shaco every time he passes, the champion is likely being piloted by players who don’t have too much experience with him and choose him solely on the basis that he is “OP”. When inexperienced players take on a champion who is supposed to be the “flavor of the month”, it should come as no surprise when they inevitably lower that champion’s win rate. We’ve seen something like this happen in Summoner’s Rift for the past 14 years, so why shouldn’t it happen in the Arena as well?
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If there’s one champion with a ridiculously high pick-ban ratio who truly deserves it, it’s Heimerdinger. The key thrower was banned in 21% of matches, which is just behind Shaco, and selected in 8.3% of them, seventh overall, according to Blitz.gg. Beyond his popularity, however, Heimerdinger has finished in first place in 38% of Arena matches, which is the third best overall rating in the game. He also finished at least in the top two in two-thirds of his games (66%), which is the best of this mark.
The riot will probably be fix and make changes to Arena Mode continuously for the near future, as well as throughout the game mode’s existence. Until any heavier buffs or nerfs are created, we might recommend staying away from Shaco until the meta has stabilized a bit more.
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