The act started already but icebox and lotus are still in game?? When do the supposed map changes go online?
Patch 9.08
Prob gonna be mid-late October based on the typical patch history timeline. They just announced this one with like, 2 months earlier notice than they have in the past. Which I think is a good change and hope it's the new norm, but they weren't clear enough about it, considering there's so much confusion.
Provided they make it a bit more obvious what the timeline is in the future, I don't really see any downside for continuing to do this.
Helps pro teams prepare -> Better product for viewers
Premier/Team play has more prep time
Even for ranked it's convenient to have more for anyone that cares to prep the returning maps
Only bad thing I can think of is people will have longer to complain about the changes, but considering the map pool is ALWAYS a huge complaint, that doesn't really matter.
fair
the big downside is basically what you said though -- i was fully convinced the new map pool was coming with this most recent patch alongside vyse release... i was so excited for pearl return
and again this all leads to many people's old argument that the map pool system is dumb and there are still not enough maps to justify having one
100% agree
It's totally possible to have a rotating map pool for pro play if they are set on the pool of 7 for pick/ban, while still having all 11 in ranked. Pros getting Fracture or Split as they mindlessly queue ranked isn't going to impact pro play when they're only scrimming and prepping the ones in the pool.