Introduction
Back when League of Legends was released back in 2009 the game had just 40 champions, now this number is 163. This means that in 14 years the number of playable champions has gone up by 4 times and a bit more.
Naturally this means that game balance is a very important topic of discussion when talking about League of Legends. With many players believing that there are certain champions that are straight up broken on release, it’s natural to ask yourself Who Is the Most Broken Character in League?
Let’s dive right in and talk about some of the most broken champions ever released!
Gwen
Starting out our list is the top laner Gwen. This champion was so broken on release that many players simply described the experience as “miserable” and “unfun”. Back then Gwen dealt percentage health damage with her auto attacks, she also had a shroud that moved with her while also protecting her from damage abilities.
Gwen also had a dash, gained damage based on her health, was un-targetable, had a 50-ability cooldown refund and so on… Players facing Gwen were faced with an overloaded, over tuned bruiser that had more damage than every other bruiser with the survivability to match.
Thankfully riot quickly realized their mistake and nerfed her quite hard in July of 2021, after she officially had become the most banned champion in the game.
Zoe
Here we have not only an overpowered champion but an annoying one at that. Her annoying voice lines and girly voice added to the suffering already caused by her overloaded kit.
On release Zoe had the ability to one shot players from extremely long range, coupled with the ability to literally steal summoner spells.
She stayed broken for quite a long time but eventually she too was nerfed, but unlike Gwen, Zoe is still kind of busted.
Irelia
After her gameplay and visual overhaul Irelia quickly became one of if not the strongest champion in the game for a long time.
She had insane mobility coupled with damage reduction, complete damage block, scaling hybrid damage and just all around great everything.
She also made her mark in professional play, becoming a mainstay in top lane and has even seen play in mid lane even to this day.
Eventually she was nerfed, but just like Zoe she still remains broken in specific matchups were it can feel overwhelming to even step up into the lane versus her.
Viego
Another similar story, back when released Viego was a monster in the rift. His unique mechanic consisted on him straight up punishing opponents for doing well. Viego possessed opponents champions becoming capable of using their abilities and then finishing them with his own.
As a jungler his sustain was also massive, being capable of healing himself in every stage of the game.
Eventually he was nerfed by reducing his auto attack range, camouflage radius (oh yeah I forgot this one), and his build path was shifted more towards crit and not bruiser items.
Akali
Another rework turned broken champion, Akali was in some ways League’s first assassin and always had a weird trajectory.
While her rework was mostly well received in regards to her voice lines, special effects and lore. Her gameplay left a lot to be desired by making Akali the most overloaded assassin in the game for months.
Not only did she do just as much damage as your average assassin, she did it safely too. By using her shroud she could dodge and hide from enemies and it even made her invulnerable to tower shots (yeah).
Eventually Riot came to their senses and removed things like her shroud’s tower immunity and made her ult only able to be casted by targeting a specific champion, oh her numbers were tweaked too.
Darius
Darius has always been a strong laner, a capable team fighter and a “Penta kill friendly” champion ever since his introduction, but all of these traits were turned up to eleven back in 2015 with the juggernaut update that changed most top laners entire kits.
Overnight Darius became capable of taking massive damage and dealing it back in return, coupled with his insane laning and the potential for executing at least half the enemy team it was a bad mix.
As always riot eventually fixed it by reducing his numbers and making it much more fair for the enemy team, but honestly, he is still kind of broken in my opinion.
Ryze
Oh Ryze, if you had the opportunity to play League of Legends since the early days you know how broken Ryze has been thought League’s history.
Ryze was released back when the game was first released and he quickly became one of the strongest champions in the game, he combined the best things from assassins with the scaling and tanky stats of a modern battlemage even back when that term didn’t even exist.
Since then Ryze has received multiple reworks and yet he has been a staple pro pick for years and years, making him one of the most broken champions in the game.
Xin Zhao
Now we’re getting to the good stuff, on release Xin Zhao defined what a broken champion was. Unlike Ryze who had periods where he was useless and some where he was broken Xin Zhao was different, on release he totally dominated the game for just 2 weeks before he started receiving nerfs.
While these nerfs helped he still was the strongest champion in the game for most of season 2. To get an idea of how strong he could be, it was not uncommon for him to actually literally 1v5 the enemy team, his stats were so high he could lane anywhere and excel.
Eventually he was nerfed to the ground and became balanced but not before leaving a lot of us with PTSD.
Kassadin
Similar to Ryze, Kassadin has seen large periods of dominance followed by even longer periods where he is just bad. The thing that makes him different is the sheer scale of his first rampage back in season 3.
Unlike Xin Zhao Kassadin remained in this state for longer and was consistently more impactful in the pro scene, plus his strengths made him a no brainer for mid lane.
He had many of the strengths most assassins have today, high damage and low cooldowns, but he also was tailor made to counter mages in the mid lane, and back then there were barely any champions that mainly did physical damage that could even stand up to him there.
And even then, those who relied on physical damage were still on a timer because he was constantly scaling and would 1v5 after 30 minutes easily!
Riot eventually nerfed him but he still becomes broken every 3 or 4 years for an entire season so you could definitely argue on him being permanently broken.
Aphelios
Alright we saved the best for last, Aphelios was released back in 2019 and single handedly broke the game, not only was he super strong he was also extremely frustrating to play against.
Most dedicated Aphelios mains knew what all his different guns did, but for the general population it was a different case, most of the time no one really knew what he was doing, with 5 different guns to switch to he was extremely versatile and unpredictable.
Overall, Aphelios’ kit had a combination of versatility, damage, and range that made him an incredibly strong champion at release. He was eventually nerfed multiple times to bring him back in line with other champions, but his legacy as one of the most broken champions in League of Legends history remains.
Conclusion
We hope you enjoyed taking this trip with us. League of Legends is more balanced than ever in 2023, but every once in a while, another “200 hundred years of design experience” champion pops up.
If you think about it, Riot has some clear weaknesses in champion design that constantly let them down, their inability to connect “fun to play” with “fun to play against” is the main reason why they constantly release broken champions in my opinion.
Riot have tried to change the way they release champions by trying to not rely on releasing broken champions and then after that nerfing them, they apparently understand how frustrating that is to the players, so we can only hope that this trend remains for the foreseeable future.
Whatever the reason it is, broken champions are terrible for the long term of the game, and nowadays there are not enough bans to ensure any of these champions show up in your games sadly.