Are their high popularity only used for selling skins? They're incredibly weak despite having many players, yet the developers insist on not buffing them.

With the new season upon us, Summoners are once again caught in an endless cycle: rank resets, data analysis, and adapting to the new version. While news about Season 43 skins is scarce, the upcoming May 5th Friends Festival in a month promises to bring surprises. Whether it's a collaboration with an IP or a re-release of skins from overseas servers remains to be seen. Therefore, for now, let's focus on comparing hero strengths. Choice is more important than effort. The beginning of the season is like this: facing a bunch of streamers and top-ranked players in the Chinese server, it's a dog-eat-dog world. One wrong step, and your rank will drop instead of rise.

Hero and equipment balancing is a common feature of the new season. With over a hundred heroes, achieving true fairness is practically an impossible task; there will always be slight imbalances. Other classes are promoted, and heroes neglected for years are revived to boost their popularity. Popular heroes, however, are not overly emphasized and are appropriately nerfed to continue selling skins. Discussions about weakening or buffing heroes are rampant on forums, especially at the beginning of the season, when overpowered heroes flood the market. Seeing their favorite heroes being nerfed inevitably upsets players, affecting a large fanbase, leading to online outcry. Guess which hero will be affected this time?

Lü Bu

I didn't pay much attention to his strength usually because I remembered his high pick rate—nine out of ten matches saw him picked. Naturally, I assumed he was a formidable fighter. But how did he actually perform? Getting a gold medal was incredibly difficult. Undeniably, he's very popular. But if you observe closely, you'll notice teammates hesitant to pick him, fearing he'll be targeted. In the past, he was immune to all poisons, his true damage crushing all tanks. Now, picking him first causes arguments and disputes. Experienced players familiar with the meta know Lu Bu has lost his peak form. His pick rate across all ranks is 16.4%, with a 47.68% win rate; in the 1350 peak ranking, his pick rate is 13%, with a 45.76% win rate; and in top-ranked matches, his pick rate is 16.9%, with a 46.1% win rate.

Therefore, the higher the level, the worse the experience. It's simple, but brutal. The win rate is the lowest, and the heroes are weak. This is not just a problem of one version. Unfortunately, there seems to be no intention to buff them. Tanks are in a difficult situation. No wonder summoners aiming for the top rank in the national server all choose pure warriors and damage-dealing builds in the top lane. They completely outclass tanks who are just there to take hits. Let the support do the job of absorbing damage.

Image source: Internet