Has Fearless Draft improved champion diversity in League?

The League of Legends professional circuit used to have a drafting drawback, however has Fearless Draft truly modified that?

Up to now, you would end recreation 1 of a best-of-five, load into recreation 2, and see half of the identical champions once more. Possibly they swapped sides or banned a precedence decide, however as a rule, you might be principally watching one other model of the identical draft.

Even at Worlds, issues may get stale by the point we reached the knockout stage. Groups find yourself handshaking drafts, and all of a sudden, we’re watching the identical boring Corki vs. Azir matchup in mid lane again and again. Fearless Draft was supposed to vary that.

On paper, the format inevitably creates selection. If a best-of-five collection reaches recreation 5, 40 champions have already been eliminated by way of the earlier picks earlier than the common bans even start. However that raises a extra attention-grabbing query:

Has Fearless Draft created genuinely totally different methods, or are groups merely being compelled to make use of weaker variations of the identical compositions?

Fearless Draft — at the very least in its present format – is described by Riot as “an evolution of the normal decide/ban system.” It follows one easy rule: as soon as a champion is picked by both staff, it can’t be picked once more for the remainder of the collection.

Riot standardized the format throughout its tier 1 leagues in 2025, following earlier experiments with totally different variations of the format. In a Mar. 16 blog post, Riot stated they wished to create larger game-to-game selection whereas giving gamers extra alternatives to reveal deeper and extra uncommon champion swimming pools.

These tournaments are significantly helpful as a result of they convey collectively totally different groups and meta tendencies from each main area. They had been additionally related sufficient in dimension to permit for an inexpensive comparability.

MSI 2024 was performed earlier than Riot rolled out Fearless Draft, recording 78 video games and 86 distinctive champions. MSI 2025 was roughly the identical dimension with 80 video games, however Fearless Draft was energetic, and the variety of distinctive champions grew to 107. At MSI 2026, solely 71 video games had been performed, but groups nonetheless picked 101 distinctive champions.

The rise from 86 champions in 2024 to 107 in 2025 means 21 extra champions appeared, reflecting roughly a 24% improve, regardless of the match having solely two extra video games. Even MSI 2026, with seven fewer video games than 2024, nonetheless featured 15 extra distinctive champions.

Importantly, this isn’t a wonderfully managed comparability.

Stability patches, new champion releases, collaborating groups, and the broader match meta can all have an effect on champion variety. However, seeing the identical sample throughout consecutive worldwide tournaments makes it tough to argue that Fearless Draft hasn’t had an impact.

Nevertheless, whereas having extra distinctive champion picks is a transparent indicator of extra various video games, which may not be essentially the most attention-grabbing metric.

Trying once more at MSI 2024, Ok’Sante was picked 51 instances in 78 video games. Which means he appeared in round 65% of the video games performed on the match. Equally, Kalista and Senna each had a 91% decide/ban presence, whereas Ok’Sante was contested in 80.8% of video games.

Now, let’s examine that to the Fearless Draft period.

At MSI 2025, the most-picked champion was Rell with simply 18 picks throughout 80 video games, that means she appeared in 22.5% of video games. At MSI 2026, Ryze topped the listing with 19 picks in 71 video games, which works out to a couple of 26.8% decide price.

So the most-picked champion at MSI went from showing in 65.4% of video games to 22.5% and 26.8%, respectively — and that is the place Fearless actually wins.

A few of that decline is an unavoidable consequence of the foundations, as even a near-universal precedence decide can’t accumulate something near Ok’Sante’s 51 appearances in 2024. However that’s exactly the purpose.

Groups can place huge worth on the identical champions, however viewers not have to observe them seem repeatedly all through the collection.

So, it’s not nearly getting some random champion performed as soon as throughout recreation 5 and growing the full variety of distinctive picks. The larger change is that viewers not see the identical six or seven champions each recreation, even when these champions stay central to the broader draft technique.

And we now have a very good instance of why this issues from the LEC.

The 2024 LEC Winter Playoffs recorded 59 distinctive champions throughout 40 video games. By comparability, the 2025 Winter Playoffs, utilizing Fearless Draft, had 39 video games and… 59 champions performed once more.

For those who solely checked out distinctive picks, you would say Fearless achieved completely nothing. However Azir, the most-played champion throughout these two playoff samples, went from 23 picks in 2024 to solely 13 in 2025. Each playoffs contained 14 collection — that’s a drop of roughly 43%.

Fearless doesn’t all of a sudden make all champions in League equally sturdy, both. At MSI 2025, Varus nonetheless had a 68.8% decide/ban presence, recording 14 picks and 41 bans, whereas Twisted Destiny was sitting at round 66.3%. At this yr’s MSI, Vi had a 71.8% presence, together with 38 bans, whereas Jayce reached 67.6%.

Let’s say Varus is taken into account fully damaged. Underneath the previous system, he can nonetheless get picked in recreation 1 and, until any person bans him, picked once more in the remainder of the collection. Underneath Fearless Draft, as soon as you utilize him, that’s it. From that time on, that you must discover one other reply.

And if the collection retains going, finally, each groups will attain deeper into their champion swimming pools.

That is the important thing distinction. The accessible information reveals conclusively that Fearless has diversified the champions showing on Summoner’s Rift. It doesn’t essentially present that groups have stopped agreeing on which champions are strongest or that the underlying composition archetypes have turn out to be equally diversified.

As a lot as followers like Fearless Draft in League, there’s a truthful criticism of the format: it takes some time earlier than it actually turns into Fearless.

Nick ‘LS’ De Cesare, a distinguished League analyst, co-streamer, and former coach, has been one of many format’s most vocal critics. Though he considers Fearless an enchancment over the previous system, he believes its impression is overstated as a result of uncommon drafts usually don’t arrive till video games 4 and 5 — and plenty of collection by no means attain that stage.

Earlier than Fearless Draft grew to become the usual, LS complained about conventional drafts repeatedly biking by way of acquainted compositions, saying:

That sentiment stays a part of his criticism of the draft system right this moment. In best-of-threes, particularly, groups can nonetheless cycle by way of the identical small group of meta champions.

His resolution is one thing known as “Ironman Draft,” which takes the fundamentals of Fearless Draft and makes it way more excessive. Picks nonetheless disappear after being performed, however bans also carry over between video games.

As an alternative of eradicating 40 champions earlier than the sport 5 draft, Ironman would take away 80 (40 picked, 40 banned). League has greater than 170 playable champions, in order that would depart roughly half of the roster accessible earlier than the common recreation 5 bans.

On the similar time, the variety of competitively viable champions inside every function can be significantly smaller.

One other drawback is that you would additionally find yourself with variety for the sake of variety. By recreation 5, groups may not be choosing champions as a result of they’ve discovered some genius counter or artistic composition. They may merely be enjoying the seventh-best choice as a result of every part else has been eliminated.

I believe the reply is fairly clearly sure, however it will depend on what we imply by “variety.”

The MSI numbers present that the general champion pool has certainly widened. We went from 86 distinctive champions in 2024 to 107 in 2025 and 101 in 2026. Extra importantly, the most-picked champion went from showing in nearly two-thirds of all video games at MSI 2024 to roughly 1 / 4 of video games within the Fearless period.

That’s the half that issues most.

Fearless Draft hasn’t eradicated the meta, nor does this information show that groups are producing solely totally different composition archetypes. In some circumstances, they could merely be changing an unavailable meta champion with the next-best different.

What the format has unquestionably modified, although, is the quantity of repetition viewers expertise per collection.

It might have some flaws, and a drafting format alone can’t manufacture one other all-time nice second like ROX Tigers pulling out Miss Fortune assist in opposition to SKT in 2016. Nonetheless, the upsides of Fearless Draft clearly outweigh the downsides. There’s nonetheless room to push the thought additional, however for now, Fearless has solved one in all professional League’s most boring habits.

Editor’s word: All match and champion statistics had been sourced from Games of Legends and are correct as of Aug. 25, 2026.