League Of Losers

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Tue Nov 19, 2013 5:22 am

League of Everything Changes... season 4...

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Wed Nov 20, 2013 7:38 am

I'm super psyched for brush changes and trinkets.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Wed Nov 20, 2013 4:08 pm

Given the amount of time I spend playing support I'm really hyped for actually being able to have some dang money. My one concern is that with the ward limit it's going to be harder to carry teams that don't ward at all, like you find in bronze, but that's a small price to pay. Does anyone know if Sightstone and Trinket wards will count towards the three ward limit?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Nov 20, 2013 4:57 pm

Korgan0 wrote:Given the amount of time I spend playing support I'm really hyped for actually being able to have some dang money. My one concern is that with the ward limit it's going to be harder to carry teams that don't ward at all, like you find in bronze, but that's a small price to pay. Does anyone know if Sightstone and Trinket wards will count towards the three ward limit?

Sightstone and trinket count for the limit.

My problem with the warding limit is this: fuck you guys. You can't tell me I have to rely on my team for warding, but not give them a viable way to ward.

Six item characters are not going to be able to ward. This means that late game, only the support and maybe 2 trinket wards will be on the map. That is retarded.

It would be so easy to make an 8th item slot that was just for wards or sightstones (sightstones would have to cost less and lose their HP). Or they could just make it so the fucking trinket ward gave you the max number of wards. And probably make the warding trinket the only trinket, or something, because you still have to choose whether you want something like Oracles or something like wards.

And this fucking bullshit where they just pretend Eve won't be super OP is absurd.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Wed Nov 20, 2013 10:37 pm

Trinket is going to make the game League of Fuck Early Ganks (top, mid and support or ADC [one bot laner will get the anti-ward one, or possibly farsight] will be taking the ward trinket...always) at every skill level now. Sure, good mids bought at least 1 ward per back and put it in/around the wraith camp to neuter early ganks before, but level 1 wards aren't that common right now. That ward will be there in practically every game now starting at level 1. Sure you can time it out pre-9, but it's going to shut down early jungle pressure hard.

Other than that, unless new items get crazy as fuck the changes are largely awesome. New masteries are much, much better (oh look utility is no longer shit, and the CDR mastery is a sensible 5% instead of fucking "you will either not hit max CDR or always waste points" 4%). Lots of support for hybrids, slightly more gold for supports (though pickpocket is harder to reach so who knows if it'll be that significant aside from the ward limit making you spend gold on not-wards), and they're going to change runes so you have to waste IP buying new ones.

Generally good stuff.

I suspect the biggest meta change that might happen (aside from supports that don't scale well with gold being ditched, so Taric gets even worse) is duo lane mid/top becoming better, since mid-late baron will not be the only neutral objective people care about. The reason bot lane was the common duo was you only cared about early-mid dragons, so you wanted to keep 2 people down there to take the first one, hopefully snowballing your lanes, and then try to take mid/top. Now you can rush other map control, give up the first dragon, and then rotate down and take 2 more valuable dragons before Baron becomes feasible and come out ahead instead of merely even.

New season should be cool except for being even more reliant on team members to ward and possibly blowing 10k+ IP on new runes because Riot wanted to make you buy RP for champs balance things.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 3:16 am

Traditional supports got pretty neutered. You need 150+ AP on all the old supports to be as good as you were before the pi patch. Leona/Fiddlesticks/Annie/Thresh are going to be even stronger than they were before. Shyvanna is probably going to be a top tier jungler in S4. Proxy farming got hit with the nerfbat, but honestly if the enemy team can't force your hand after being fed 3/4 kills the enemy team deserved to lose anyways. Biggest thing I'm looking forward to is the new singed running animation.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 4:20 am

ubernoob wrote:Traditional supports got pretty neutered. You need 150+ AP on all the old supports to be as good as you were before the pi patch. Leona/Fiddlesticks/Annie/Thresh are going to be even stronger than they were before. Shyvanna is probably going to be a top tier jungler in S4. Proxy farming got hit with the nerfbat, but honestly if the enemy team can't force your hand after being fed 3/4 kills the enemy team deserved to lose anyways. Biggest thing I'm looking forward to is the new singed running animation.

Biggest thing I'm looking forward to: Tryndamere/Olaf carry jungle with Wriggles into six items that aren't Wriggles.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 4:23 pm

Sona survived mostly unharmed since all they did was reduce the AP ratio on her Q and R and fiddle with her E a little bit, thank goodness. I'm definitely looking forward to carry jungle Jax, as well as perhaps Panth support.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 7:59 pm

Taric got a lot better out of nowhere...relic shield + let him last hit all cannon minions (and a melee minion for other waves) = good gold and that passive rework is fucking ridiculous. Sure he's shit vs double AP comps, but he always was. He's dangerous in lane again, particularly against squishy supports. Really surprising damage even late.

Observations based on a few diamond ranked games: Early ganks are... difficult to do. The only successful early ganks I've seen were done against pushed people or by stealth champs. This makes lane strength more important, and really buffs one of my old favorites (Brand!) since he can play pretty aggressively and spot out ganks.

Carries seem to deal more damage in general thanks to new masteries. I was strictly playing Brand and I just felt like I killed people faster than usual (as well as died faster if I got jumped on by another carry).

Dragon control is more important throughout, but a pre-10 dragon doesn't damn you as badly as it did before.

A turret dropping in a lane is a pretty big snowball for that lane. So yeah...split pushers getting stronger?

Bonus jungle camp and better dragon makes wave clear more important since there's more shit to take when lanes are pushed. That's good, less farmville, more shoving and fighting.

Fewer wards in general means traps work better. You should def still buy a real ward every back as a mid laner, because you need that map control since there's more stuff to take now.

Supports have more gold, but they still blow most of it on wards because pinks never last and ward sweeping got easier for junglers. They can afford a real item or two by end game now, but they're never going to have a full build.

Junglers rush jungle item, further weakening early ganks. Farming junglers get beefy, and fighting over the jungle happens more often because the jungler can be shut down. Duelist junglers feel more viable since ganks are more difficult.

Also, people forget trinkets sometimes. Remind your team to get them.

Edit: Forgot to mention blue buff got nerfed to 10% cdr, it used to be 20%. Random slap in the face to caster junglers and several mid laners, but at least it makes the buffs more equal in power.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 11:05 pm

Am I correct in thinking that a support with a ruby sightstone and a pink trinket only needs to buy wards if some of their wards get swept?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Thu Nov 21, 2013 11:18 pm

Korgan0 wrote:Am I correct in thinking that a support with a ruby sightstone and a pink trinket only needs to buy wards if some of their wards get swept?

Yesish. Technically 60 out of 180 seconds you won't have a pink up. You probably never need to buy stealth wards, because the stone gives 5, so you can put three and if any are swept, you can put two more and then go back.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 5:35 pm

Korgan0 wrote:Am I correct in thinking that a support with a ruby sightstone and a pink trinket only needs to buy wards if some of their wards get swept?

The issue is wards get swept early and often. Bot lane should have somebody with a sweeper trinket to try and enable ganks (and get free gold from swept wards), and the jungler definitely has a sweeper. Camping the duo lane is now super effective as well, since it generates more gold than other lanes due to the new support items. A successful gank on the duo lane sets the other team really fucking far behind.

Also, new strat seems to be AD + support starting relic shield. It essentially gives the lane 2 melee minions worth of bonus gold per wave (+ double the gold of every cannon minion), which is far more guaranteed gold than the other gold gen items offer. The duo lane is seriously generating 30%-35% of the team's gold now. If your jungler is not camping the duo and the other one is you are straight up fucked unless both solo lanes snowball.

Making one lane generate ~130% of the gold of a normal lane leads to it being the only lane worth ganking unless another gank is a sure thing (and it probably isn't because wards). It's more profitable to gank the duo (after your initial clear) than it is to farm the jungle until a better strategy than the double relic shield comes around. Too bad relic shield kicks ass, with health, regen, gold gen, and a healing passive (and enough gold to get pots!).

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 6:52 pm

Warding is crazy-weird, the jungle is like Russa in WWII, but Support Items seem to be the most important in the League of Relic Shield.

Seriously, double relic bruiser top. Jungle hath died.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 8:31 pm

Who would have thought adding SUPER POWERFUL ITEMS as a fix for a role was a dumb fucking idea (see: League of warmogs, League of cleaver, League of lanterns)?

Prediction: Relic shield is removed or given an additional bit where "you can't receive the passive effect of another relic shield if you have a relic shield."

Then the lane will be AD with relic shield and support with a different gold gen item, but still better than relic all day.

I don't see jungle being useless though, since a jungler with both jungles can get big. That and the jungler needs to camp the duo. You can't let double relic lanes stay alone because they fucking snowball. It's stupid, but league of relic shield is also funny as hell with the sheer amount of focus on the duo lane.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 4:37 am

So now Twitch.tv is doing this:
http://gyazo.com/6c9ddf3f64018fb7aa67f2241bd512f1.png
25 second delay on every single stream before you can even see if the streamer is in queue/playing/doing stupid subwars. Twitch was laggy enough as it is before with there being actual content. I'm just not going to bother with any streams til adblock fixes this shit.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 5:34 am

ubernoob wrote:So now Twitch.tv is doing this:
http://gyazo.com/6c9ddf3f64018fb7aa67f2241bd512f1.png
25 second delay on every single stream before you can even see if the streamer is in queue/playing/doing stupid subwars. Twitch was laggy enough as it is before with there being actual content. I'm just not going to bother with any streams til adblock fixes this shit.

Holy fuck, is that what that shit is. Goddam, I had it on a stream I have never seen before, but I thought it was unique to that stream, and I haven't gone to any other streams yet. But seriously, shitty.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Mon Nov 25, 2013 7:07 pm

Taric is so fucking good right now. You can shatter twice in 4 seconds starting at level 3, letting you proc your passive 4 fucking times. That means, in an exchange where you get to melee somebody pre-stun, you can deal 180% of your armor in bonus magic damage (2 shatters and 4 passive procs) to that poor soul. Keep in mind at level fucking 1 Taric should have over 50 armor, and with level 1 shatter at 3 it's more like 70. Level 3 Taric can and will solo your AD carry/support if he gets into range pre-stun.

My only issue is I'm not sure whether to max Shatter or Dazzle first now, since they're basically equally good to level up. That, and at level 9 with maxed Dazzle and a Frozen heart (mandatory item for Taric now) you can Dazzle twice in a full combo for 3.2 seconds of targeted stun goodness. Assassins diving on Taric-protected carries, you are dead and you don't even know it.

Taric's passive will, unfortunately, get nerfed because of how damaging he is now. Either his passive or Shatter's CD, because casting it twice quickly is very, very strong. Oh, and the armor reduction scaling with his armor is fucking crazy. God if closing wasn't so hard for Taric he'd really be OP, but he'll get nerfed anyways. Riot hates Taric.

Korgan0 · Post by **Korgan0** » Mon Nov 25, 2013 7:41 pm

I played one game with Taric and despite being terrible at him absolutely stomped my lane, partly because the relic shield line is so absurdly good on him. I can see Frozen Fist being amazing on him too, although I can't really see any reason to max Dazzle, honestly. The cooldown reduction isn't a big enough deal to make a difference in most trades/engages, and unless you're up against a hard engage lane like draven/blitz you're going to be landing max range dazzles most of the time, so maxing shatter straight-up gives you more base damage, on top of the bonus armour plus armour reduction.

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Mon Nov 25, 2013 7:47 pm

Now may be the last time in a long time that taric can go top.

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Mon Nov 25, 2013 8:03 pm

Taric is still a kinda crappy top. Too mana hungry to trade often and such crappy movespeed for a melee. Could probably counter Riven, though.

Also, you max dazzle for the CD and stun duration. .1 sec per level might not sound like a lot, but shatter only gives you 40 damage, 5 armor and 5 armor reduction. 1 sec CDR on stun + .1 sec duration is a lot, especially with Taric's passive where casting more = more CDR.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sun Dec 01, 2013 3:50 am

Just won my first Solo Que 5 vs 5 as Kayle ever, thanks mostly to Teemo and myself carrying the team; which sounds more impressive that it actually is when you realize we are all level 6 and suck at life and league of legends. But we sucked less, and that's all that mattered.

User Name: Daniel Hicks

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Sun Dec 01, 2013 4:22 am

I've decided I'll play again when they make the jungler an equal and worthwhile member of the team. Since this is Riot Games we're talking about, I'm basically not going to play again.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sun Dec 01, 2013 4:50 am

Surgo wrote:I've decided I'll play again when they make the jungler an equal and worthwhile member of the team. Since this is Riot Games we're talking about, I'm basically not going to play again.

Season 4 man, more gold, Carry Junglers. You are totally an equal member of the team. Now supports on the other hand: still shit on.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:50 am

Surgo wrote:I've decided I'll play again when they make the jungler an equal and worthwhile member of the team. Since this is Riot Games we're talking about, I'm basically not going to play again.

With the fact that they hit tanks with a gigantic fucking nerf bat with the mastery changes, carry junglers are in a great place. Everyone dies easier, so carry junglers are stronger, jungle income got buffed, smite is on a lower cooldown, so you can farm harder, less vision because nobody actually buys real wards any more (the trinket has downtime, and sweeper trinket can kill their ward to help with camping).

Kaelik wrote:Season 4 man, more gold, Carry Junglers. You are totally an equal member of the team. Now supports on the other hand: still shit on.

Unless you're playing one of the "nontraditional" supports that benefits from relic shield and didn't get nerfed into the ground. Annie and leona are in a pretty strong place right now. Support only sucks if you played one of the support champions that got specifically nerfed. Your gold overall went up, and you're less of a ward bitch than last season.

The gigantic nerfs to sona/nami/lulu/etc all the babysitter supports were a kick in the nuts to support players and went way too far. But you totally can play support annie/fiddlesticks/leona/insert CC spamming champion here to greater effect than last season.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:56 am

ubernoob wrote:Unless you're playing one of the "nontraditional" supports that benefits from relic shield and didn't get nerfed into the ground. Annie and leona are in a pretty strong place right now. Support only sucks if you played one of the support champions that got specifically nerfed. Your gold overall went up, and you're less of a ward bitch than last season.

I'm not disputing that for many supports it is better than season 3. But better than season 3 does not mean not shit on and explicitly told you are not worth playing in the game.

Supports are still explicitly that class that isn't even supposed to have as much gold, and they are still the class that is supposed to build sightstone every time. They are still the shit classes, even if they are less the shit classes.

Not that that stops me from Annie/Leona/Zyra fucking people.