The Gaming Den

Got a penta on Quinn yesterday!
TBH not my finest hour, no kills until that point. Just being carried by a poke comp, but the enemy all got too low, grouped up and I ult'd into the middle of them. Still!

A penta's a penta. Good job.

I am now Silver 2. Slowly climbing my way back to Gold.

..

So I tried Veigar after months playing just support and holy hell, Riot did ruin him. Sacking DFG and having his Q becoming a skillshot were bad enough, but what really ruined the experience for me was the E not being instant anymore. Stunning fools with E and then making them fold like paper was the best part of Veigar. Now I have to watch as everybody just dodges it.

In other news, I picked a shitty common team in solo queue and ended up without a route (some stupid guy entered the room last, called for support and immediately locked Blitz, when I had entered the room first, called support and then locked Lulu after the three other players picked their roles). Long story short, Lulu went jungle with support runes and masteries and without smite and ... it did suck much less than I thought. The first 4 levels were frustrating and slow as fuck, but then I got a BotRK and then nothing but attack speed items. By level 14 I managed to machine-gun LeBlanc to death and then did it again by level 16 or 17.

People are complaining about Veigar the way they complained about Rengar and Sona when they were reworked. I'm just waiting for someone to figure out a good strategy and suddenly we will have Veigar QQ all over the rift.

He still works pretty well on CC-heavy teams. Anyone with a good slow is enough for him to land his stun in late-game teamfights, or at least force the enemy to use an actual escape to get out of the way. I've been playing Ashe ADC while my friend takes Veigar mid, and by midgame just about anyone in range of us at the same time is dead. He brings so much burst to the table that taking a utility-focused ADC hasn't seemed to hurt us. The change definitely made Veigar more vulnerable to mobile assassins and sustained poke, but as long as he doesn't get completely dunked every two minutes in the laning phase he can carry hard.

Then again, I'm maybe low silver judging by my teammates in normal games (Bronze 1 via ranked team I haven't actually played in...), so that might not fly at higher ELOs.

I don't really feel Veigar is ruined. Honestly, at this point I feel like they need to take the nerf bat to Annie next because I'm sick of someone losing mid to Annie and then I have to suffer as she basically kills me right away without me being able to do dick about it. I don't main Veigar myself but I've played him a bit and the changes don't feel all that bad to me.

MGuy wrote:I don't really feel Veigar is ruined. Honestly, at this point I feel like they need to take the nerf bat to Annie next because I'm sick of someone losing mid to Annie and then I have to suffer as she basically kills me right away without me being able to do dick about it. I don't main Veigar myself but I've played him a bit and the changes don't feel all that bad to me.

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I first ban annie every single time I'm banning. It is hellish when she just instantly shits you to death 100-0 while stunning anyone who might have been near you.

Veigar needed to be changed so he could get buffed. New Q is better (it hits two targets and has actual range now!) and he's now fun to play against instead of a range check that instantly kills you if you fail it.

New meta is so tanky that Annie may not end up needing to get nerfed. She's a bullshit range check when her flash, stun, and ult are up, but she doesn't hurt tanks or else she loses the stun and gets killed before she can cycle through her spells. The ultimate counter to Annie is a team with two tanky people that have CC.

That said, I don't think Annie is fun. She's got a super predictable pattern and either gets shit on or wins the teamfight. There's no middle ground with Annie because her spell range is so short and everything is either instant or targeted. She has the old Ryze problem of being almost impossible to fuck up as and very powerful. Annie will lock somebody down with an instant stun from 700 range (+ flash) and then deal $TEXAS damage with a 99% success rate.

Annie played by somebody with two brain cells to rub together will be an effective Annie, and Annie is fucking strong. It's not like Ahri, Leblanc, or Zed (squishy champions who need to get into range and are open to counter attack during that time) where they have to be good to win, they just need to not be bad.

I don't think: Have a lot of HP is effective counterplay against a champ. She needs a nerfing and I'm sure riot knows that. When they are going to address it is the real mystery.

The problem is that she's supposed to be a simple character. She's (I think) the only 450ip mage and its probably tricky to make something that's got counterplay but is still intuitive. Of course the Soraka and Yi reworks didn't go in that direction, so I could be wrong.

Annie is also crushed by Banshee's veil.
Burst champions are all countered by having a tank and that is not a bad thing. Getting mad that Talon is killing everyone on your no-tank team would be stupid. You can lose the game in champ select and that's fine, make a team comp that isn't shit. Talon is an almost 0-counterplay piece of garbage (counterplay vs Talon is "have vision of Talon"), but if he's killing people the tank either doesn't exist or everyone is fucking up. It helps that Talon's damage is kind of low for an assassin, and I think that's because he has such a stupid play pattern. Talon will rarely 0 out a squishy from 100%.

Having no counterplay isn't fun though. Burst champions should wreck squishies, but the squishies should at least be able to move while they die or react in some way that could potentially save them. Zed jumping on Ashe is a dead Ashe (assuming she doesn't have a QSS, and even then he can fucking kill her), but Zed had to close the gap and Ashe can still fight him until she pops. Annie jumping on Ashe means Ashe dies with 0 available counterplay except Ashe flashing first or having enough health/a banshee's veil. All Annie has to do was get within 700 range of Ashe, also known as "out of every single champion's standard auto attack range" and she only needs to get within 1100 range of Ashe if her flash is up.

Annie's a problem because she bursts you with no chance of retaliation since her stun is instant. Syndra isn't a problem because you can dodge her stun and it isn't instant. Zed isn't a problem because you can fight him during his combo and his burst is delayed. Burst champions will always murder a squishy who hasn't built a counter item if they play it correctly, but Annie is impossible to fuck up and does it in a boring way. Old Veigar did it in a boring way too (though he could still fuck it up).

Annie is shitty design. Instant stuns are pretty much shitty design across the board, but hers is AoE. Her counterplay is teamcomp based which is kind of not cool, and even then she's effective at zoning and is either completely useless in a fight (gets CCed and killed, doing nothing) or crushes it (gets to nuke a squishy/all the squishies). Is that worth nerfing? Kind of. She's not overwhelming in the competitive scene, but that does not mean she is healthy for the game.

tl;dr: Instant stun + burst mage = bullshit. That's the reason everyone hates Lissandra too.

URF is back and the minute it came back so many people were getting on to play it my gf, who had to close down the game, couldn't sign back on last night. Here's hoping Rito actually listens to fans and keeps it this time.

I wish it would at least come back more than once a year.

My favorite urf character taric lost his permastun, so I've been trying to do make Warwick work (12s CD on ult) but he gets wrecked so easily against anyone with decent tank stats. Is full AD a good idea?

...You Lost Me wrote:I wish it would at least come back more than once a year.

My favorite urf character taric lost his permastun, so I've been trying to do make Warwick work (12s CD on ult) but he gets wrecked so easily against anyone with decent tank stats. Is full AD a good idea?

You could run Mpen Warwick and be the ultimate sustain tank. His Q has crazy base damage and heals him a ton. Just run wit's end, sorc shoes, void staff and then 3 tank items, maybe 2 tank items and an abyssal if the mres is really a problem. Tanks won't build enough mres to stop your Q from beating them down and you can just ult anyone with the dps to kill you (note: not many people have this if you've got a target to Q). Ignite and kite fuck you over, but that's just classic Warwick. Kite is less bad because as you mentioned, 12 second ult CD.

You also offer your team a permanent attack speed boost, which is a nice bonus.

I'm back in gold!

Also, I have concluded that warwick just isn't good enough in URF. Poke champs are too much.

Congrats on gold.

I tried WW in URF as well and yeah, he just gets slapped by poke champs in the end. Can't sustain without somebody to fight.

I'm back in mid-diamond 4, after having reinvented myself as an adc/support rather than mid/support player.

New Tristana is so bad that it makes me sad, no matter how well I do on her she just lacks that big carry potential she used to have. If rapid fire isn't up you aren't out DPSing anyone, and if it is up your DPS is merely "pretty high." They need to buff her bomb or revert some nerfs to make her a viable pick again. If you compare her to Jinx she's got less range until 17, roughly the same dps (unless Jinx is getting her AoE on more than one person, in which case Jinx is just out DPSing everyone forever), and both have that reset style where they can steamroll a fight off a kill. Trist has a knockback but...that's about it.

The list of viable adcs (in solo queue) is short and sad. Sivir, Lucian, Graves, Jinx, Corki, and maybe Vayne or Kog if they're going triple tank or some other bullshit. Half the champions who fit that role aren't viable, and that is disappointing.

I have no idea why Tristana was given such an extensive and bizarre rework. She's definitely fallen off for me personally. It just seems so gimmicky and you don't even do as much damage as you used to for all the added gimmickry.

They're really pushing the idea of lots of viability and new champs being picked and used but the ADC role has been static for an eternity.

Given I started playing in season 2 where the list of viable adcs was Graves, Ezreal, Corki I think this is an exciting era of champion diversity .
I've seen Kalista occasionally, she seems decent in the hands of someone who can play her, but maybe the skill cap is a little high and if you master it then the reward is merely on-par performance. Same with Draven. And Urgot has had something of a comeback.
So who's on the outer? I'm thinking Ashe, Ezreal, Twitch, Trist, Varus (Does Quinn count?). I think Twitch is ok, played him twice today and he still has his niche of ganking adc. Varus isn't too bad AFAICT. I'm waiting to see him mid thanks to UoL.
I don't think adc is in that bad of a position. The basic issue is that you will rarely see an adc ban and why would you pick something other than the 1 or 2 absolute best champs?

Blasted wrote:Given I started playing in season 2 where the list of viable adcs was Graves, Ezreal, Corki I think this is an exciting era of champion diversity .

Season 2 had far fewer adcs. Jinx, Lucian, Draven, and Kalista weren't around. Season 2 was bad for champ diversity in general and the current season is great...everywhere except for adc. ADC is the least diverse role right now by a landslide.

Blasted wrote:I've seen Kalista occasionally, she seems decent in the hands of someone who can play her, but maybe the skill cap is a little high and if you master it then the reward is merely on-par performance. Same with Draven. And Urgot has had something of a comeback.
So who's on the outer? I'm thinking Ashe, Ezreal, Twitch, Trist, Varus (Does Quinn count?). I think Twitch is ok, played him twice today and he still has his niche of ganking adc. Varus isn't too bad AFAICT. I'm waiting to see him mid thanks to UoL.

Kalista works in cheese comps (she can sometimes work outside of them, but she forces your support to pick somebody who wants to be in their face and thus isn't common), but that's like saying Urgot or Quinn work. They're used in hyper-specific scenarios (or as a different lane altogether) that solo queue won't see outside of a duo or bizarrely coordinated team select. Urgot mid is beast, but it means your top and jungler are fine with picking higher damage AP champs or you're doing a shred comp (or you're trolling and don't care about ruining the comp).

Blasted wrote:I don't think adc is in that bad of a position. The basic issue is that you will rarely see an adc ban and why would you pick something other than the 1 or 2 absolute best champs?

This is the problem. adcs don't draw bans, but if you aren't playing one of the four viable adcs your team is at a disadvantage (you'll also notice the viable adcs are strong laners except for Jinx, who's an OK laner and can also play safe).

You can pick a non-meta top and your team won't automatically be worse off for it. Mundo is still a good champion in a lot of scenarios. Same with Wukong. When would you ever pick new Tristana? How about Miss Fortune? What is Draven bringing to the table that Lucian or Graves isn't? When there's the option of picking "like X, but better," X might as well not exist.

Twitch is more of a victim of the meta shift, as he can't assassinate Graves/Lucian very effectively and isn't that great against a strong tank line or assassins. I could see Twitch into Jinx, but probably not into Sivir, Lucian, or Graves.

I think the biggest problem is how narrow the marksman niche is. Supports can tank, peel, catch... jungle can focus objectives, or gank, or counterjungle... mid and top are wonderfully flexible... but every marksman is just supposed to take deal lots of consistent physical damage from safety. I think that role needs a "tactical diversity" overhaul like what happened to jungle in S5 and supports in S4.

...You Lost Me wrote:I think the biggest problem is how narrow the marksman niche is. Supports can tank, peel, catch... jungle can focus objectives, or gank, or counterjungle... mid and top are wonderfully flexible... but every marksman is just supposed to take deal lots of consistent physical damage from safety. I think that role needs a "tactical diversity" overhaul like what happened to jungle in S5 and supports in S4.

Honestly, one of the biggest problems with adc tactical versatility is probably the current strength of tanks. As long as you can have a tank who can 1v4 every non adc for 3 minutes, and can 1v1 the adc, you are basically committed to the adc role as "doing damage while being peeled for"

Kaelik wrote: Honestly, one of the biggest problems with adc tactical versatility is probably the current strength of tanks. As long as you can have a tank who can 1v4 every non adc for 3 minutes, and can 1v1 the adc, you are basically committed to the adc role as "doing damage while being peeled for"

Fucking Cinderhulk.

Note: The following is about adcs in the role of adc, not as caster mids.

ADCs have a bunch of roles they fill in the same way mids have a bunch of roles they fill. You can be a poke adc, a duelist adc, a burst adc, a peel adc (though you really just end up self peeling all day), an assassin adc, a tank buster adc, or an aoe adc. The issue is not only are tanks very strong right now (but that's part of the problem, tanks being strong means nerfing or even just changing adcs at all could fuck up the game), but the best adcs are a ton of different things at once. Jinx is a poke aoe adc who can also burst via ult and tank bust fairly well. Graves is a burst aoe adc with a side of duelist (because of the burst on a tanky chassis). Lucian is a burst duelist self-peel adc with a giant poke ult. Sivir is...a support aoe adc?

Look at Cait, she's just a poke adc, maybe a tiny bit of peel as well. Twitch is just an assassin adc who can also be an aoe adc for 8 seconds. If you focused the adc champions so they fit into certain niches better you'd have way more diversity. If I want a bursty adc I'll pick Graves, but I'll also pick Graves if I want to pair with an aoe teamfighting comp (which is what MF was supposed to be good at). MF doesn't fit anywhere because her role was taken away from her by an adc who already fit another role (and her ult could stand a buff). Lots of adcs don't fit anywhere because one of the meta picks does what they do, but better or in addition to other things.

Congrats, Riot, you destroyed Ryze. Cuz he was such a problem, right?

Turning Q into a skillshot is enough to put him in the garbage bin. That does not work in this game. Rune Prison got across the board nerfs, even on its AP ratio.

For Jinx, she wasn't even a top 5 ADC I don't think but her Super Mega Death Rocket ultimate didn't get nerfed, it got killed. It literally does a 5th of the damage it used to.

I don't understand most of these changes, really. I'll have to let them sink in.

Insomniac wrote:Congrats, Riot, you destroyed Ryze. Cuz he was such a problem, right?

Turning Q into a skillshot is enough to put him in the garbage bin. That does not work in this game. Rune Prison got across the board nerfs, even on its AP ratio.

For Jinx, she wasn't even a top 5 ADC I don't think but her Super Mega Death Rocket ultimate didn't get nerfed, it got killed. It literally does a 5th of the damage it used to.

I don't understand most of these changes, really. I'll have to let them sink in.

Jinx ult got ultra-nerfed just when used from close range.