Utility is too available; the strongest balance offenders have access to it

Recently, it seems that the biggest balance offenders in this game are the champions that can do incredible things while being harder to punish than other champions. Safe champions have always existed, but in recent cases it's less because of "this champion has a dash or a specific ultimate" and moreso because of huge unnecessary utility. In a perfect world, high utility would be a good thing. However as of late, even the champions that are incredibly powerful in duels have access to gamechanging utility, often for no reason at all. The cases I am talking about are the cases where said utility can either cover up a weakness or win a fights on its own.

Utility/damage offenders: Ekko got buffed numerous times and eventually this made him appear as this crazy guy that could get away with anything. You need to play his game, and during the time period he was played as a tank he was just so powerful he'll either find a way to either escape or just win outright. His damage was good enough to whittle away at anyone in the top lane, and he was able to clear waves safely just in case there was a situation where he was at a disadvantage. This is bad enough on its own, but there's also no reason why his W shield should exist; it's there to save him when he misses his ability, which is a quality no other champion ability in the game has!

New!Graves popped out after his rework and he was so strong with his excellent passive scaling and free resistances™ that he became this absurdly powerful pick in both jungle and top lane. He was respected in pro play because he was one of the few junglers that could take a moment out of his clear to kick someone's ass should they invade him even as the strongest invaders. While scaling incredibly well.

• His new E was designed in this way because he was supposed to build damage and crit, so why hasn't this been followed up on? Things were so much worse when he could build shields to mitigate any potential counterplay via working around his Resistance stacking plus his (passive enhanced!) Lifesteal. I'm not sure why this wasn't removed; Graves often wins fights or dies before his stacking comes into effect since he's a burst champion, but when it does kick off it can cause some really stupid undeserved victories.

Maw/Steraks. This one is in a similar vein; you build damage, yet get access to a powerful shield that can save you from danger and/or win a fight. For Steraks I'd like to point out that whenever it's classified as a strong item, it's often on champions it's not even designed for. For Maw's case, it's worth mentioning that it's one of the best assassination items in the game thanks to its armor penetration while also reducing any options that an AP midlaner can have to fight against them. Remember, Mages don't have access to an item like this since Zhonyas can often shut you down as much as your opponent.

• Kindred's time of dominance is now over, but I'll say this. Her ultimate, while being very good in design and thankfully being an ultimate, creates an immediate impasse that can allow for those who should rightfully win a fight to fall flat on their face. Is that bad? Not entirely, it's a good thing that Kindred can work around even the strongest of foes should be play well enough! I think that there is a problem with how it can be used as a panic button that allows her to search for an excuse to not to be punished. It can potentially fix bad positioning and enemy catches, as well as proper duels and entire losing teamfights. But, she isn't a big offender now and this is just an honorable mention.

I think that making a champion's gameplay itself forgiving is fine; however a champion that is simultaneously powerful and highly forgiving is something that needs to be treated with care. This is especially the case when it comes to champions that scale into lategame. Should a champion be powerful early, be hard to punish and deny, AND scale to lategame well? No. They really shouldn't.