LoL Season 2025 Update: How the Changes Impact the Free-to-Play Experience Negatively

As League of Legends enters Season 2025, it has brought several enhancements aimed at providing players with greater value for their investments. However, the game’s free-to-play segment has suffered notably amid these changes.

Transformations in the League of Legends Battle Pass

This year’s overhaul of the Battle Pass system has introduced significant adjustments that appear predominantly positive. Instead of solely grinding for tokens and loot capsules, players purchasing the Battle Pass will now earn five skins by fulfilling the pass requirements.

Given that individual skins typically retail at over $10, and the Battle Pass itself is priced around $15, this improvement stands out. Nonetheless, a specific alteration introduced in the patch 2025.S1.1 has raised concerns.

The Struggle for Blue Essence

Completing the Battle Pass presents a challenge for free-to-play users—as they face difficulties accumulating Blue Essence. This issue is particularly prevalent for players who have not yet unlocked all champions available in the game.

While obtaining all League champions through the Game Pass is an option, many players prefer a fully free-to-play experience. Achieving this has historically involved a tough grind, particularly after initial Blue Essence rewards for new players are exhausted.

Currently, the revamped Battle Pass system only offers four champion capsules and 4,750 Blue Essence as rewards. According to Riot Game’s employee BarackProbama, players stand to earn a maximum of 24 champion capsules and 28,500 Blue Essence annually. While some champions can be acquired for as little as 450 BE, the newer, more sought-after champions require a hefty 6,300 BE.

Challenges of Earning Champions

If a player aims to obtain a new character costing 6,300 BE, the options are daunting. Once players have depleted historical earnings from previous milestones, they are left with a paltry 50 BE from drops beyond level 50 on the Battle Pass.

The Battle Pass offers limited rewards after reaching level 50.

Moreover, daily win challenges have been replaced by daily quests that contribute progress solely to the Battle Pass, further diminishing players’ means of earning Blue Essence. Estimates suggest that grinding solely through these rewards could take approximately 900 hours to accumulate enough for a 6,300 BE champion.

BarackProbama also commented on Reddit, indicating that a dedicated player could potentially grind their way to approximately 30 champions per year. However, this assumes efficient crafting and disenchanting of permanent shards, which may not be intuitive for newcomers.

Time Investment to Unlock Champions

As a result, a new player face the stark reality of needing around five years to unlock all champions, not factoring in the continuously emerging new champions added to the game annually.

Currently, the average addition of four to five champions per year could extend the overall grind to six or seven years for a purely free-to-play League player aiming to catch up.

Additionally, adjustments to champion mastery milestones have made it more difficult to earn Hextech Chests. This traditionally served as another avenue to unlock new champions and gather Blue Essence.

WHAT DO I EVEN HAVE THESE FOR??? XD pic.twitter.com/cWaOYDXsrB

— Enderspider (@Enderspider) January 9, 2025

While players can still earn keys for free, which can then be utilized to purchase chests from the in-game store with premium currency, the overall changes in the latest patch have undeniably made League of Legends a more challenging experience for new, free-to-play gamers.

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