League of Legends has been a free-to-play title since its release and costs nothing to play. However, like any other company, Riot needs to make money, and they do this by selling skins or other optional items from the shop. With almost every update, it is common for new skins to come to the LoL shop. Now, Riot is forgoing your money to fix bugs.
What is happening with League of Legends? As early as spring 2025, Riot released their new battle pass model, causing significant criticism from the community. While they have removed the free Hextech chests, most of the new skins have been exclusively integrated into the battle pass. The first skin series for the pass was called “Black Rose”.
Why is LoL forgoing your money for the first time in 4 years? After the skins from the “Black Rose” series were criticized by players due to their quality, Riot decided to break a 4-year tradition.
With the new patch 25.11, scheduled for release on May 28, 2025, there will be no new skins for the first time since 2021 (via League of Legends). Instead, Riot plans to focus on reworking the “Black Rose” skins of Elise, Vladimir, Renata Glasc, and Samira to bring them to an acceptable quality level.
In the video, you can see the cinematic trailer for the first season of LoL 2025 and appearances of the “Black Rose” champs:
The community is proud of this decision
What are the community’s reactions? The YouTube channel SkinSpotlights has already uploaded a comparison video of the skin series on YouTube. The revised versions are already available on the test server. In addition to the improved champion models, there are also adjustments to the ability effects.
User ammarturky5402 is happy that a skin finally looks like it was advertised and writes the following on YouTube: “Finally, Elise looks like she does in the cinematic!”
In another comment under the video (via YouTube), NaueTV speaks positively about Riot and hopes that they will continue and also give other skins, like the recently criticized Ivern skin, a chance to receive an update: “I am absolutely speechless about this move from Riot. Honest applause! Hopefully, they will do the same with the current Spirit Blossom skins. Poor Ivern.”
“Finally something good. I would prefer if they did this more often instead of releasing mediocre skins every two weeks,” writes user IttzMawi (via YouTube), hoping that Riot continues with this behavior.
After already getting the Hextech chests back, this is another step to rebuild the trust of the community. The “Black Rose” skins are not an isolated case of mediocre quality, as Riot deleted an entire skin when players became vocal: Champion gets a new skin in LoL after 4 years, but it is so bad that Riot deletes it
