The new runes brought with them a lot of new ways to play League of Legends. The old runes became a pretty boring meta that everyone followed – this many AP quints, that many regen seals – but the new runes are about playstyles. Unfortunately, some of the runes are more about what is optimally the best – like a free zhonya’s that you can also sell. That’s how League of Legends has become known as the League of Stopwatches, and how one rune is helping ruin competitive play.

One of the best things about League of Legends is that it is constantly evolving, but Stopwatch isn’t the kind of evolution anyone was asking for. While there is plenty of debate around primary runes – does the movement speed from Predator make it more worthwhile than the damage from Electrocute? – the debate around Stopwatch is much less nuanced, and it mostly boils down to free money and protection from ganks, which is the opposite of exciting gameplay. There is a reason that Riot named their web series The Penta and not The Hour Long Game – one is exciting, one is frustrating.

This is especially confusing given some of the recent reworks and changes. Evelynn was changed to be a much scarier assassin, and the new Rengar rework (or revert since he is much like he used to be) turns him into a much deadlier burst champion. And while we saw MikeYeung pull out Evelynn to large success, it was 15 minutes before he took his first kill, Akaadian’s Rengar was a tank, and Svenskeren’s Jax a meat bag. Even when Akaadian did go Kha’Zix, his first kill was at 16 minutes, and it was hardly a snowball. The fact is, with so many shields and tanks in the game and the added threat of Stopwatch, assassins simply aren’t as viable, and the reward isn’t as present.

This not only makes the game less exciting to watch, but it makes these less exciting games last longer. TSM’s match against OpTic was over an hour long and ended with TSM scoring just 11 kills. There was a stretch of 10 minutes and a stretch of 15 minutes where not a single person died in the match, which hardly sounds like engaging content.

And it isn’t as if this hasn’t been coming for a while. The top lane used to be home to deadly bruisers and split-pushers. CLG was famous for unstoppable 1-3-1 pushes, and Huni is known for his ability to play carry top lanes, but these games are few and far between. Instead, games devolve into Baron dances, team fights, and slow whittling away at one another’s bases.

Riot can make all the changes they like to assassins, but with runes like Stopwatch in the game, the only message being sent is to play it slow and steady – taking chances gets you killed, and it might just be killing the excitement of the game as well.