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Quick Gameplay Thoughts: August 8

RiotMeddler·8/8/2017, 4:07:34 PM·1 votes·77,577 views

Hi folks,

Usual Disclaimers

These posts will often contain talk about future work we're doing, or planning to do, that isn't yet guaranteed to ship. The nature of the work could change or, depending on what we discover, projects mentioned may get put delayed or even stopped. If you'd like to see a Tweet whenever a new one of these posts goes up: https://twitter.com/RiotMeddler

Azir

We're still working on the Azir update, with a focus on reducing his ranges to give him more meaningful weaknesses, especially during the laning phase, and then putting power elsewhere. That's looking promising, and still feels very Azir like, though we've got some concern it may not necessarily go far enough. Next step is getting a bunch of really experienced Azir players in to the office for some testing, see what their experiences (and the experiences of people playing against them) are like.

Kayn

There's a change in 7.16 that makes it so that DoTs don't stack Kayn's passive extremely fast, which was allowing him to access his transformation much quicker than intended. That will probably have a minimal effect on jungle Kayn, but might hit lane Kayn pretty hard. If that's the case we'll be going back soon and taking a look at lane Kayn and whether we should be giving him some power in some other way. We've always expected Kayn to be a good pick as a jungler given the way much of his kit works, from what we've seen so far laning Kayn also looks like it might be balanceable alongside jungle as well though. Can't make any promises yet, but going to be digging into that more, especially if the fore mentioned change has a large impact.

7.17 Balance changes

Brief context on a number of upcoming changes. Note there's other stuff as well coming for 7.17 too of course.

  • Draven Nerf - Currently looking at the passive, in particular considering more stacks being lost on death (greater difference in performance between a Draven who's cashing those in well and someone who's dying more).

  • Hecarim Buff - Testing having the R fear duration scale with distance traveled, rewarding longer and riskier R casts. Something like 0.75-1.5s, rather than the current flat 1s.

Leona Buff - Trying Sunlight dealing more damage, but having a shorter duration. Leona struggles especially in higher MMR games, so looking at something that rewards good allied coordination. Also looking at a Q CD buff.

Janna Nerf - Removing overall power and looking to add a bit more skill expression to her kit. At present we're trying higher CDs, with W reducing CDs/restoring mana on champion hit to reward more aggressive/risky use of that. Not yet sure if that'll be the final direction though.

Zed Buff - Zed's underperforming a bit, with the exception of periods where any of his core items are overtuned. His damage is still pretty solid though, so we're looking at other buffs instead, with a W duration increase (4.5s to 5.0s) currently on the cards.

Ornn's Upgraded Items

Brief note on these. Any team should get some decent value from having Ornn's upgraded items available to them, some combinations of champions will certainly benefit more than others though. That's something we believe's appropriate with Ornn. All champs have synergies with others, and in Ornn's case some of the 'who do I want to pick in combination with Ornn' decision revolves around those upgraded items. We'll likely adjust which exact items get upgraded at various points, and what stats they give, goal isn't to add enough so that every single champ can get a really good choice for themselves though.

500 Comments

Sposker8/8/2017, 9:23:45 PM30 votes

While Janna is very strong right now, I would argue that the meta is almost perfect for Janna. I think she's more or less balanced as a champion considering she spent half a season at or below a 50% winrate and received only one balance change in 7.9 which gave all ranged champions MR/lvl. Look at Lulu, she only lost a small amount of shield strength but the meta shifted and she's now really struggling in higher elos. Full details are below but as a tl;dr Janna currently benefits from excellent synergy with meta team comps and builds, great meta support matchups, good ADC picks and ADC build path, and of course strong synergy with coin being the best support item. All stats below are taken from op.gg.

Janna So what changes made Janna so strong?

Chogath Sejuani Maokai Vangaurds like these three are currently dominating the jungle meta after the tank item reworks and Janna benefits on both ends. Even tanks without great engage can fulfill the role with the purchase of Righteous Glory. This means that Janna usually has both a great target to shield at the start of a fight (shields are flat HP which is stronger on a tank with more resistances) as well as a target with somewhat telegraphed engage she can disrupt. Simply put, her team can get buffed up to jump in while Janna remains behind to peel the backline. Your tanks do not need to worry about peeling so much if they have a Janna, meaning they can be more disruptive to the enemy while your backline safely deals damage.

item 3123 item 3076 item 3165 Healing debuff items are plentiful and Janna can adapt to them better than any other enchanter support. Janna has balance in power between her heals and shields meaning that a grievous wounds component item doesn't hurt her like it would Soraka . If the enemy doesn't invest gold into these items your ult, ardent, and Redemption will heal a massive amount. If they do get healing debuffs, you can skip redemption for Locket (which still benefits from the percentage shield power passives on ardent and windspeakers) and use your shields on targets affected by the debuff. Unlike Soraka who can basically only heal, Janna is flexible.

Zyra Malzahar Karma Janna benefited from poke supports leaving the meta when Doran's Shield was updated to be a viable starting item for ADCs. While many people think Janna would fair well against poke, she actually has a reasonably long shield downtime early in lane which allows the enemy to play around her cooldown. Notice that her two worst statistical matchups are currently Soraka and Sona, two meta champions that have short cooldowns on their Q and can find windows to harass the enemy ADC.

Thresh Nautilus Blitzcrank Janna also benefited from nerfs to hooks--ranged engage or engage that can't be instantly disrupted with a tornado. are the three champions that best fill this role. Thresh recently received a bugfix and his winrate dropped back down to about what it was before the bug was introduced in 7.9 and Nautlius received some nerfs aimed at his strong presence in top lane. With these two nerfed, enchanters can now ban away Blitzcrank and effectively avoid this playstyle, as evidenced by his 58% banrate. When she does have to play these matchups, meta items favor Janna more than the hook support, but more on that later.

Tristana Twitch Caitlyn Current ADC picks synergize well with a passive playstyle from Janna, emphasis on passive. Most meta champions are happy to farm in lane and reach their 3 crit item spike. The notable exceptions are a) Lucian who only has an 11% playrate with a poor 47% winrate and b) Draven who only has a 3% playrate but a solid 52% winrate. However if the ADC is good at his champion they make excellent use of Janna's shield if she is willing to enable them to play aggressive. It's not that Janna synergizes poorly with any adc, but it is easier to play her as a passive support and that is currently just fine for meta ADCs.

item 3031item 3094 item 3087item 3504 The meta ADC buildpath is excellent with supports who build Ardent Censer, including Janna. Ardent has been good on Janna all season but let's consider what ADC changes lead to it being so good now. Early on, around patch 7.4, lethality was meta and ADC's did damage with spells more often that autos which obviously doesn't synergize with Ardent. When lethality was nerfed around 7.6, Bork was buffed and became meta. Ardent was decent-- Lulu was top tier at this time and she often built it first-- but because Bork gave attack speed and lifesteal ardent was a bit redundant. When crit was reworked midseason, the meta shifted to rushing IE and crit items like Shiv and RFC. This buildpath has almost perfect synergy with Ardent because the attack speed multiplies the AD and crit from IE while the on hit life drain makes up for having no lifesteal early in the build path (masteries and dorans blade usually offer enough.) We've probably all heard how Janna's shield with ardent is worth nearly 4.5k gold, but it's foolish to try to put a value on a skill. What's the gold value of a well timed shield versus a poorly timed one? Or for a more dramatic example, whats the gold value of a beautiful thresh hook or lantern? Ardent currently has great synergy with adc items and if you can find a way to give those stats to your adc it doesn't mean your skill is broken or overpowered.

item 3301item 3303 Finally, let's talk about Coin and how it's made Spellthief's completely useless. Coin enables a passive playstyle as you earn gold and mana for doing almost nothing in lane. You earn so much gold that you reach your item spikes faster than any other support item while undertaking little risk. You get so much mana that you can spam your shield in lane to keep healthy. There was a time where Janna would take Spellthief's and AD marks into melee match-ups so that she could harass with autos, but now the reward for doing so is less gold and mana than coin and it obviously comes with more risk. This isn't just a Janna problem; as of last patch many supports who used to primarily build Spellthief's have a 3-5% win rate difference based on choice of starting item, always favoring coin (Sona: 51 vs 56, Nami: 47 vs 50, Lulu: 47 vs 50, Morgana: 47 vs 51). Note that there is a mana regen nerf in today's patch notes but this does not do enough to create a meaningful choice between Spellthief's and Coin.

So, rather than seeing Janna get hit directly with nerfs, I would address the issues she highlights with some of the following changes:

item 3301 Embrace the passive playstyle the coin line affords but reduce the rewards; nerf the gold generation while buffing regen stats to create an identity for coin that it allows you to survive harassment at a cost. Buying coin should indicate that you want to try to go even and outscale after laning ends or trade skillfully to create an advantage through sustain. You would have no offensive or tank stats from the item. You would be weak to all ins but strong against harassment. Coin and the talisman line could have a 5%-10% heal and shield power buff instead of CDR and an increased combine cost for Eye of the Oasis to give it 10% CDR upon completion just as Eye of the Equinox was changed for tank supports.

item 3303 Empower Spellthief's to be a viable alternative for aggressive trading playstyles. One suggestion is mana restoration upon procing a tribute stack to encourage aggressive use of the item, but slightly increased damage could also work. Buying Spellthief's should indicate that you intend to trade in lane and force the enemy to recall or possibly kill them if they don't have the sustain to stay in lane. You would have no health Regen or tank stats from the item. You would be weak to sustain but strong against champions who want to all in if you can poke them down.

Sun Wu Ryuumoku8/8/2017, 4:45:23 PM21 votes

Just a reminder, MonkeyKing didn't receive any change (balance wise) since 4.5

Meep Man8/8/2017, 4:44:50 PM19 votes

If Ornn would upgrade any more items without making him a universal pick, I would say make it: item 3151 and item 3142 .

Liandry's and Youmuu's are both fairly simple items with easy tuning for the upgrades. They also make it so Assassins can make use of Ornn's itemization. This may broaden the table a bit, but I think excluding an entire class of champion from the upgrades isn't ideal and currently there aren't any Assassin items with an upgrade. Liandry's would also be a neat item that Ornn himself might even build for a fun AP build due to his W and Brittle interactions. It would also support AP Bruisers.

IxtaliKing8/8/2017, 4:18:38 PM19 votes

If you guys are going with the reduced range option for Azir, please make E feel good to use on enemies again. The spell itself has felt hollow ever since the knock up was removed.

If I may ask though, what made you decide to go with the reduced range option? More people seemed to want to keep his range and get rid of the shuffle because it was more thematic.

Whulfmon8/8/2017, 4:15:15 PM17 votes

I dont think a Zed buff is needed at all, though the w buff is small enough that it seems fair

Traazp8/8/2017, 4:21:52 PM11 votes

Hello Meddler.

Thoughts on Lissandra ? and is there any thing planned for her passive?

waiting for WoW8/8/2017, 4:28:05 PM9 votes

Are there any planned changes for Tristana? She is suffering from the same problems that Caitlyn had before her nerfs.

Tristana is currently too safe in lane, and still scales far too well late into the game to justify having so much safety and turret shred.

UtopiaZ8148/8/2017, 4:43:52 PM8 votes

As a janna main, i like the idea of adding more skill expression to her kit but can you leave her ult and shield alone please, as i feel those abilities has already been touched enough and i think those 2 abilities are as fine as it is now.

Thank youJanna

UnclearMotives8/8/2017, 4:21:28 PM8 votes

About Azir, is there a posibility of seeing an ability replaced or drastically changed (like Rek'Sai's ult or Tristana's E) or will we see changes but keeping the core of the skills similar or the same to what we already see on live, mostly just curious. Also have to say, really apreriate these post and any other similar ones since it sparks so much disccusion among my friends and adds another element through which we engage with the game.

Galiö8/8/2017, 4:36:33 PM6 votes

Any thoughts on tweaking poppy, nidalee and ivern?

TheGreyBotanist8/8/2017, 4:43:14 PM6 votes

Any plans for Miss Fortune? Her strength is still tied to lethality, but it feels like you'd prefer her to build crit.

The Last Ballad8/9/2017, 10:45:04 PM5 votes

Although a skill expression update on Janna needs to be done, and the nerf too, the current changes are not the way to do it.

Lets look at Garen's skill expression update. Before the update, a bad Garen would use his q to charge as soon as he decided to go in, w at some point while taking damage, e when he got near the champ, and ult when the champ got low. A good Garen used his q to clear slows when he engaged, but other than that everything else was the same(because there was no other use).

The update had bad Garens doing the exact same thing, but the good ones had another tool they could use to help cancel any incoming attempt to peel them.

Now lets look at Janna.

Currently a bad Janna usually: A: Sits far behind their adc and occasionally presses e on them(sometimes too late to block damage, or ends up shielding when there is no attack to block) B: Uses q and w to poke, sometimes off cooldown, and never auto's and this leads to them going oom while having next to no pressure

A good Janna: A: stands next to(be that level, slightly ahead or behind, or in the bush) their adc, and shields whichever of the two is being targeted, and tends to shield just before the damage hits. But they also do this aggressively, with Janna shielding their adc as the auto connects, such as a Cait head shot, granting the attack extra damage while warding off return poke. B: holds their q's purely for blocking engages, never for poke. Though aggressive knock ups are done, it is usually a instant reactivation and during a gank or an allied all in. C: tends to hold their w for the passive movement speed. W use is restricted to team fight peel, chases, and when only 1 person is chasing you(and anyone near you), otherwise the passive is more useful as it allows you to be faster than your team, which helps in re-positioning to maximize your passive. D: auto's at every opportunity during lane, sometimes even shielding yourself to do so. Because of her 475 range, this is mostly reserved for melee supports and Morg/Thresh. these practices leads to having some pressure during lane(enough to prevent collapse on top of the adc)

And the "skill expression" changes do?

They reward bad Janna practices. With her w being of 0 mana cost, and rewarding mana and cooldowns, it will make it even easier for bad Jannas to justify spending 90-150 mana to do minimal poke damage. Not to mention, the cooldown reduction is to offset the increased cooldowns of the nerf, while doing nothing to address the reason people don't use it often, which is the ghosting and ms increase of the passive being lost upon use. You gain -2 seconds off cooldowns and some mana, but slow yourself and add minion block, while being within 600 range of your enemy(which is trivial for most adcs to cross the 50 range they need to attack you).

So not only are you "forced" to spam it off cooldown in order to keep your other cooldowns reasonable, but you also have to place yourself into a dangerous position to do so, and by using the skill you also remove your ability to get away. The choice used to be "keep your movement speed, or slow them as well as yourself?" which was a trade off. If the changes go through you will be punished no matter what you do.

I just fail to see how making it so that Jannas are punished for what used to be good practices is a acceptable direction for skill expression. The direction should be rewarding good use of Janna's skills, not punishing it.

Winterwings8/9/2017, 9:10:20 AM5 votes

The main problem with Janna right now lies in the fact that she simply doesn't have good incentives to make any aggressive plays. While this change may be a step in the right direction (The CD Refund is a bit underwhelming, not even enough to refund CD's to her pre-nerf state) I feel like the use of this new mechanic simply won't happen, or won't happen as much as you guys are hoping since the trade-off is terrible.

You lose the massive Move Speed steroid and are in 600 units range (Retaliation range for... pretty much everyone) with a paper champ to gain a bit of mana back and a very meaningless CD refund (IMHO) That % movespeed passive is her safety net, i don't see myself trading it in for some mana and cd refund, while putting myself at that much of a risk. Again, just my two cents.

Sidenote - Don't nerf item 3301 item 3096 , buff item 3303 item 3098
It isn't so much that coin is overperforming, it's that spellthief's is underperforming when compared to it. (But only so slightly, since the last thing we need is for it to be put into a state where mids can abuse it again.)

Korios8/8/2017, 4:10:27 PM5 votes

What items can Ornn purchase with his passive?

Gaghiel8/8/2017, 6:45:42 PM4 votes

Actually I think those changes will hurt jungle Kayn way more thank lane Kayn. I've been playing him a lot with different setups in lane and jungle and the difference is enormous due to the laner always having access to orbs via harassing his laning opponent(specially if hes melee). On the other hand, from my experience, jungle Kayn struggles to get a decent transformation time without deathfire touch unless he forces a lot of ganks/invades. Just my thoughts tho.

Solari Fortune8/8/2017, 4:13:44 PM3 votes

Really excited to see the Leona stuff in game. How long is the Q CD gonna be if you know? and also how much more damage we talking?

shakedblu38/8/2017, 6:10:35 PM3 votes

I see a lot of people have asked this in this thread but still hasnt gotten an answer, whats going on with the leblanc changes?