Alistar
According to statistics from the specialized site Metatft.com, Alistar currently has a pick rate of 26%, leading Teamfight Tactics. The main reason for Alistar’s popularity is that this character has an extremely strong and easily activated trait-system. Traits such as Brawler, Guardian, and Beast provide crucial effects and stats for the team as soon as 2 champions are present.
Additionally, the new Hero Augment of Alistar being very powerful also contributes to this unit being picked more often. Essentially, the Durable upgrade helps Alistar reduce 50% magic resistance of the opposing team, which is a perfect addition for teams centered around magic damage carries. Therefore, Alistar is likely to maintain a high pick rate until the current season of Teamfight Tactics concludes.
Ekko
Following closely behind Alistar is Ekko with a pick rate of 23.1% (statistics from Metatft.com). Similar to Alistar, Ekko’s traits-systems also have low activation thresholds, making them usable in various team compositions. Furthermore, the recent resurgence of Star Guardian teams has also led to Ekko being used more frequently.
Additionally, Ekko proves to be a quite effective counter to many strong carries in Teamfight Tactics currently. The crowd control ability from Ekko’s skill can change the targeting of abilities from Vex, Lucian, Draven… This allows players’ carries to deal damage much more safely.
Twisted Fate
With his addition to Teamfight Tactics in season 8.5, Twisted Fate boasts a pick rate of 19.9% (statistics from Metatft.com), which is quite understandable. Not stopping there, Twisted Fate is a very flexible unit that performs well in both Sorcerer and Duelist compositions. Thus, this champion is suitable for players who enjoy “shuffling cards” at the end of the game.
Similar to Alistar, the powerful Hero Augments that provide many resources also make Twisted Fate popular among players. The Into the Money upgrade grants attack speed to the entire team, increasing damage output. Meanwhile, the Increase Bet core provides a significant amount of gold for players to level up to 9 or shuffle for 3-star champions.
Conclusion
With their power and versatility, units like Alistar, Ekko, and Twisted Fate are currently holding an extremely high pick rate in season 8.5. Perhaps Riot Games should consider reducing the strength of the aforementioned units to create more “space” for other champions in Teamfight Tactics.