League of Legends has added loot to the game several Seasons back. It has only expanded as time went on, with new ways of acquiring said loot being added to the game. After several revamps, we now have the definitive Hextech Crafting system meant to give us a ton of skins for basically no investment.
During the expansion of the system, Riot has added many things. One of them are the Masterwork Chests, which themselves have gone through a couple of stages. They’re an improved, or so they claim to be, version of the usual Hextech Chest.
Serving to give you more consistent and overall better drops, Masterwork Chests are often seen with a dose of confusion. The source of this confusion is a question of worth. Are they, or are they not, worth the money?
This is what we seek to answer in this article, and remark additionally on the overall state of the loot and crafting systems.
So, without further ado, let’s begin!
Also read: Is League of Legends Still Fun To Play?
What are Masterwork Chests?
Masterwork Chests are a higher quality Hextech Crafting Chest meant to give the player better chances at obtaining good loot. The drop rates are vastly better and different than those found in the usual Hextech Crafting Chests.
These Chests are rare, and scarcely obtainable without paying for them. They’re able to drop from Hextech Chests, but have a very low drop rate. With how rare they are and their seldom appearance in players’ loot, most are relatively oblivious to their existence.
This is what largely drives the confusion over them. They do offer better chances of getting Skins, that much is true, but do you really need to pay for a slight advantage? The Hextech Chests are readily available and free, so what makes these Chests special?
Let’s discuss that.
The Masterwork Milestones
The Masterwork Milestones have been introduced recently as part of a total rework of Masterwork Chests. For every five Chests opened, you’ll get some rewards. These rewards come in the form of Skin shards and Mythic Essence.
These Milestones are there to create an incentive for purchasing, and opening, Masterwork Chests. Since they can rarely be acquired through luck or drops, the Milestones are more or less the sole reason one would want to purchase these Chests.
The more Chests you open, the better the rewards get, with the ultimate reward being a guaranteed 1350 RP or better Skin.
Also read: Can You Get Banned for Leaving a Game in League of Legends?
Should You Buy Them?
Standing at 225 RP, the Masterwork Bundle is all but worth it. Compared to the infinite quantity of regular Hextech Chests and Keys that you can get by just playing the game, the Masterwork counterpart is completely overshadowed.
The primary reason for this is the obscene amount of money one must spend to get any meaningful rewards. The Skin shards in the Masterwork Chests aren’t ever guaranteed to drop, nor are any Skin qualities. You’d have to spend 4 to 5 thousand RP to reach the 1350 RP Skin, which is outright insane.
It defeats the whole purpose of the Hextech Crafting system. It was implemented to give the players a way of getting Skins and cosmetics by playing the game. Functioning as a system of rewards, it incentivized players to play more and play better. For each S ranking on a Champion you got, you’d get an additional Hextech Chest.
The same just isn’t true for the Masterwork Chests, which are ultimately there to be purchased, and not obtained. Thus, as they are built around taking money from you as much as possible, I’d say that they’re not worth it whatsoever.
If Riot ever changed their approach, made the Milestones more worthwhile or the Chests just more available, I could see myself updating this article. If not, and that seems to be the case, I must advise against ever sinking your money into this hole.
Also read: How to Take Screenshots in League of Legends?
Conclusion
Masterwork Chests are a failed experiment by Riot Games to make players spend money on their crafting system. Falsely advertising them as something so much better than the free alternative, Riot has tried to manipulate its player base once again. For the sole reason of generating profit, Riot continuously implements bad systems into the game. We can just keep our hopes up that they will eventually change their ways.
