The League of Legends World Championship is one of the most important events in esports, which annually brings together the 24 best teams in the world, in search of crowning the new kings of the Rift.
That's why every year Riot Games makes sure the game is in tip-top condition and each character works properly, which is why Viego was not available during MSI 2021 in Iceland, and why Akshan, the most recently added champion, will not be available in Worlds 2021.
Although Akshan is currently enabled in the current competitive patch, Maximilian Peter Schmidt, Head of Esports for Riot Games in Europe, has reported the Rogue Sentinel will not be eligible for the top League competition. This announcement came shortly after he was banned from the LEC playoffs as well.
To decide on Akshan's induction into the LEC playoffs, the teams took a vote. The reason behind their refusal to bring the champion into play was cautionary; although the champion has not been particularly well-received, the risk that pro players could find ways to use the Rogue Sentinel and make it a mandatory selection or ban was too much of a risk to take.
Now, although it was previously mentioned Akshan would be available for Worlds 2021, the plans changed due to the champion's limited competitive exposure, which has made it difficult for Riot Games to balance.
JK, Akshan will also be disabled at Worlds.#LEC teams simply 5head. https://t.co/XHUEcgJEob
— Maximilian Peter Schmidt (@RiotMAXtheX) August 1, 2021
We should remember Riot also has a rule that disables new champions at a competitive level to avoid these situations, in which a champion could be broken even though they had a poor performance in solo queues.
Since Akshan joined League of Legends in Patch 11.15, it has already suffered two hotfixes due to its low solo queue win rate. The first of these was even applied the day after its release on the official server.
The lack of concrete data has made Riot's decision to withhold Akshan from Worlds an easy and sane choice,
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