Analysis: the Feats of Strength Boots win rates and the Pavlov’s Dog theory

The Feats of Strength Boots are a hot topic lately within the League of Legends community, especially for being too "broken." But before diving into this analysis, let's understand what these new updates were on the boots and what they changed in the game.

According to the DPM LOL, a profile of statistics, the Feats of Strength Boots had over 70% win rate in a 300k games sample, except for the Gunmetal Greaves (the item has the wrong icon). Players feel unhappy and have been expressing their thoughts on these boots. They describe them as "too game-changing," making the game more one-sided and unbalanced.

The LoL community has been very vocal about this win rate and the characteristics of the new boots. People talk about people inting the game as soon as the three first objectives are not accomplished.

Some said Riot Games should do a pre-season to try out these types of drastic changes instead of putting them in a new season without feedback. Others claimed the game is "too complex" because it forces junglers to work harder and maintain a higher pressure all the time.

However, some players agree with the new need to do early objectives and adapt to a team strategy because that always made a difference in the game, people just didn't care as much.

Besides what many people think, Pavlov's Dog theory was not created by a psychologist. Ivan Pavlov was actually a physiologist. This theory says that people can react when stimulated by something without having to rationalize. It's a natural response. How can this theory be associated with League of Legends and the Feats of Strength Boots?

In low elo, players are not used to playing as a team. A sense of individuality was very strong, everyone was working for themselves. The game felt more like a farming simulator. For long periods, there weren't fights outside of the respective lanes.

Those who actually had more mobility were the junglers since they could create new plays and gank. Aside from some rotation due to farming and objectives, there wasn't a perspective of forcing team plays.

Now, the new season brought a new stimulus for the players: the three objectives. This mechanic forced players to think about what they should do to gain an early advantage in the game. Whether was it a first blood, a first turret, or objectives.

Players didn't need to "learn" how, they simply knew. That was within them as soon as they understood the basics of the game. The thing with this new change is that players are stimulated to play in a team-focused strategy to make sure they can take full advantage of the rewards.

This was already happening before. The difference is people were as much stimulated to play as a team. But did the new upgrade on the boots make a difference? Yes, they did, especially in the team's mentality. Can't this update also have a psychological perspective aside from the strong update?

RiotPhroxzon, the Lead Gameplay Designer for Riot Games, shared on X some insights and statistics after two days in the 2025 season. "Each of the other major objectives like Inner Turret, Dragon, Rift Herald, etc. are also ~the same as the previous patch," he wrote. "Based on what we were seeing, we don’t think snowballing in the new season is much higher than the previous season, if at all," RiotPhroxzon continues.

He keeps going, "However, the perception is that snowballing is higher and the visibility of the Feats reward makes it feel like the game is more snowbally which can cause mental to collapse. It’s hard to argue with how players feel."

As for the First Blood, it will also get some changes either on patch 15.2 or 15.3. "Currently though, even if the actual game impact is reasonable, it’s clear that First Blood is causing too much friction for the satisfaction & clarity of gaining it. As a result, we’re going to change it either in 15.2 or 15.3," he says.

This problem was addressed by Riot Games with an emergency patch to decrease some of these boots' stats. You might be feeling the difference since this emergency patch was launched on Jan 10. This doesn't mean that the boots aren't a winning condition, it means they probably won't be as much game-changing as before.

That's all for now. Stick around for more League of Legends news and updates on esports.gg.