Aatrox Rework

With quite a few champions recently getting their kits reworked or fixed up, I'd like to bring to the table one of my favorite champions: Aatrox. Quite frankly, he's seen better days. To say that there's anything wrong with his kit isn't quite true, it's synergetic and effective. However I think that might have be one of his biggest weaknesses when it comes to getting some love on the buff train. Whether he NEEDS a buff is a different question.

He has difficulty suiting any meta really. The devourer meta breathed new life into him but he was hardly the most feared or banned when it came to picks. Yi, Kayle, Tryndamere, Jax, Udyr, Vayne, Xin Zhao, I even have a friend who plays sated devourer Braum. There's just better picks, and most of them are either more fun to play or are much better at carrying a game and closing it out. He CAN carry, just not reliably. I don't expect to be playing with Dyrus every time someone locks in Aatrox on my team. And when you do get a really good game, odds are you could have played anyone else and done the same if not better. He doesn't suck, there's just people who do his job better than him. You need hard engage/cc? Maokai or Malphite are much safer picks. You need someone who afk farms the jungle and then split pushes for victory because your team lacks a hard engage, do they also need to be able to outduel anyone on the enemy team, Yi and Trynd are tailor made for that one. That's the bulk of my rant really. There's nothing that makes him stand out above the rest. With the loss of grievous wounds via executioners last season, he could sit in lane and just farm up and hit you with a sack of gold. With it's resurgence, his days are numbered. These are just my opinions though.

I believe the reason he has never really been in the lime light is because his kit is rather unhealthy. Sustain champions have always grinded some gears, they just aren't fun to play against. Vlad and Yorick come to mind. They merely frustrate their opponent and win via attrition. This one thing that they do very well has made them utterly loathed, but has also doomed them. To quote youtuber Stonewall008, they're examples of 'gimped' champions. That aside, Aatrox is no exception. I like Aatrox as a champion, his lore is really badass, and he looks pretty badass as well.

To reiterate my major points: he doesn't suck, his job is just done better and more reliably by other champions, and his synergetic kit and built in sustain make it hard for one to say that any particular part of him needs to be buffed. He's neither innately tanky, nor reliably bursty.

My Ideas:

Q- Dark Flight: On a list of importance from 1-4, 1 being the highest, this skill is a 2. It's utility is invaluable. Someone mentioned before the idea of giving it charges. I personally don't like that idea as it would gimp him further, he'd neither be too strong nor too weak, just annoying and hard to deal with. Q- Dark Flight-revamped: Larger cone of impact, with rippling effect similar to Naut's Riptide that would deal additional damage to units outside the outer ring, but not knock them up, all units inside lose a flat % value of their armor/magic resist per rank. Additionally, Aatrox heals based on the number of champions/units hit. -Alternatively: Aatrox dashes/jumps a fixed distance cleaving a path as he moves displacing and damaging champions he collides with, and knocking back all champions at his destination. The idea being that when Aatrox enters a fight, you notice. He's supposed to be an imposing and powerful warrior.

W- Blood Thirst/Price: On the list of importance, this skill is definitely number 1. This IS Aatrox, nothing really needs to be said. W-Blood ???/??? revamped: ever 3rd strike respectively Aatrox either heals based on how long he has been in combat, in the form of a stacking buff that caps out at 9-10 seconds, or causes each auto attack to contribute to the blood well and increase the damage of his auto attacks by a percent via the same stacking buff. Aatrox would still be able to switch at will to maximize their usefulness, however switching from blood thirst to blood price and vice versa would consume half of the stack healing or filling the blood well a flat % of his maximum hp. I figure if you have an unhealthy mechanic already, you might as well get more mileage out of it seeing as it's so important to his kit. -Alternative 3: Passive: slaying an enemy unit heals aatrox for a flat amount, killing an enemy champion yielding a much more potent heal as well as a burst of attack speed. Active: Aatrox's pays a % health cost to gain a burst of attack speed Aatrox's attacks shred armor. -Alternative 4: Passive: Lifesteal effects are X% stronger. Active: Aatrox deals and takes reduced damage and all health lost contributes to his blood well. The idea here is to make him harder to kill to fill the role of a tank better. Additionally: The cooldown of Dark Flight is reduced by .5 seconds for every attack while Blood Price is active. -More Alternatives: Classic Toggle: Every third attack against the same target heals Aatrox for an increasing amount to a cap. Blood Price Toggle: Aatrox's auto attacks consume health but deal increasingly more damage to a cap. I feel like this one changes his W the least and would perhaps make buffing different aspects of him more feasible. However, it also does the least to address his current problems, the less this ability changes, the more his overall kit can so it's a tradeoff.

E- Blades of Torment: On the same list, this skill is easily tied for number 3 with his ultimate in terms of importance. However as it's his only means of poke, it's the one I'd be least willing to part with of the two. E- Blades of Torment revamped: Aatrox slashes the ground creating a rippling blade that knocks minions and other monsters aside and if it hits an enemy champion it erupts briefly stunning them and slowing them. Another sort of gateway ability, if you take away the knock up from his Q, this allows for him to retain a form of hard CC. Options are good, speaking of which... -Alternative 2: Passive: Aatrox's basic attack's deal bonus magic damage on hit, scaling on AD and AP. On cast: no change. I actually like this ability a lot, and giving him mixed damage on his auto attacks makes him an even more potent duelist.

R- Massacre: Easily the coolest sounding ultimate in the game, but far from the most powerful. This ability has to take number 4. This ability has some of the best utility however, it fills Aatrox's bloodwell based on the number of champions hit, gives him more range on his auto attacks, is an AoE nuke, and grants him up to 60% attack speed on top of his blood well's attack speed. The range of the nuke is decent, but the increased AA-range seems to slow Aatrox down more than it should, as you'll often be stuttering behind your opponent if they're running, and if they aren't then it's almost pointless. R- Massacre 2.0: Aatrox marks damages and marks all enemy champions in range, attacking marked champions heals Aatrox for a flat amount, and deals bonus magic damage upon consuming the mark. If a marked unit is killed, massacre's duration is refreshed and Aatrox receives a flat heal. Aatrox is easily ignored if he doesn't build any damage, this makes his presence in a teamfight something you have to watch out for. Massacre 3.0: Aatrox damages, and pulls in all enemy champions in range, additionally killing a champion will reset Dark Flight's cooldown. Resets are nothing new, but the utility is always nice. Frankly the benefits of a reset on Dark Flight could easily be it's own discussion.

Passive- Blood Well: All abilities are written with blood well in mind, thus changing blood well in any way would directly influence every other ability of Aatrox's. However, gaining bonus AD/attack speed based on missing health is an option. However, there's really nothing functionally wrong nor inconvenient about this passive.

If you've read everything up to now then I thank you for your time would love feedback, or if you have different ideas as to what can be done with Aatrox. Alternatively if you're tired of reading the word alternative and you think Aatrox is fine as he is and I'm just bad, that's also an option.