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Bringing Karthus Into The Meta

Lunar Sanguis··2 votes·588 views

**Hi, this is going to be my first attempt at this. I'm not going to be posting numbers because that's not my forte. Please bear with me! **

I've always admired and loved the idea and concept around Karthus, as he is my favorite champion. The other two of my favorites being Leblanc and Lissandra. However, the thing about Karthus is that this isn't Season Two anymore. Nearly every single champion in the game as a form of CC, disrupt, knock up, blink, or dash. Karthus only has a slow, granted a damn good one once the game hits around 30 minutes when you max it out. That's my problem with him, games BARELY last that long anymore. Most of my games last 25-28 minutes.

Here are some changes that would hopefully bring him into the meta. Now, some of these might be overbearing but keep in mind I'm not posting numbers(as in damage numbers, except for his ultimate).

Death Defiled -- Passive

**Possible Change **-- As the duration of Death Defiled increases, Karthus floats into the air increasing all of his skill ranges by insert number here

Now this might be weird conceptually, but it would be pretty efficient. As those 7 seconds go down, Karthus would be able to shoot off farther and farther Qs, also increasing his W and E ranges, allowing him to still be a terror(even though he is already as his enemies run further and further away and not have to rely and sniping with his ultimate to effectively get kills.

Possible Change -- Karthus' skills during the duration of Death Defiled will do 20%/30%/40% of it's damage in true damage.

The reason I went with true damage rather than missing health is because I wanted to create scenario where he would deal more damage to tanks, allowing his teammates to fight on him, rather than MY ULT DOES MORE DAMAGE NOW WHEN THEY'RE LOWER.

Lay Waste -- Q

Possible Change -- Unchanged

Can't really think of anything I'd do it it without making this overbearing. Maybe increase it's radius a little bit, but it's fine as it is. Hard skill to master and anticipate your enemies movements, rewarding in it's own right as a skillshot.

Wall of Pain -- W

Possible Change -- Enemies hit with Wall of Pain are unable to use dashes for the duration, slow duration reduced by almost half at all ranks.

Honestly, this is much more impactful than the slow in this meta. If Poppy can have one, granted this version is better than hers, it keeps in line with Karthus being a late game Lich of Death. Could use some more tweeking but I will bring back our Lichking overlord!

Defile -- E

Possible Change -- Those affected by Wall of Pain will receive addition damage by Defile(POSSIBLY also inflict Grevious Wounds).

The way I vision it, think of Karthus' own personal Liandry's built into his Defile. It's not a lot of damage, but something to help him trade with the current Assassin/Sustain/Safe mid lane we have going right now.

Requiem -- R

_Little pet peeve I have with this skill. Please for the love of everything allow Karthus' ult VO to be heard by everyone. It may be long lines, but the reward is ever so satisfying for the Karthus player, and more intimidating for those on the enemy team. _

Possible Change -- If Requiem kills a champion, the remaining damage left over will be unleashed in a small AOE.

Possible Change -- _If Requiem kills a champion before Karthus' Death Defiled expires, he will return back to life. _ (It will still count as a death for Karthus, also any bounties collected or gold will still be collected by the enemy team)

Possible Change -- _If Requiem is interrupted, a small % of it's cooldown is refunded. _

Possible Change -- Reduce the cooldown from 200/180/160 to 150/120/90

Now these may sound really overpowered, especially the second change but it really isn't. Not all of these changes HAVE to be implemented. The first change is just a better Luden's Echo, with the possibility of a Luden's Echo also. The third is something he drastically needs. The fourth is reducing the cooldown by 50 seconds at all ranks, only because games don't last that long anymore and it really wouldn't matter even if the cooldown was just a minute flat at all ranks.

Now the second change might be alarming, but all it really is, is just a built in Guardian Angel, but without the reward of having no death or not giving a kill over to the enemy. Also, it's not like the enemy team can't kill him again and they'll get the gold again.

So yea these are my changes. I really like them personally, and I don't see a lot of reason why they would break the game if Karthus became Meta. Not saying all these would help him be meta, but it would be a hopeful start.

4 Comments

blackcat13001 votes

How about his Q dose double damage to champions and jungle mobs in aoe damage and triple damage to single target champs and jungle mobs.

know MAGIC DAMAGE (MULTIPLE TARGET): 40 / 60 / 80 / 100 / 120 (+ 30% AP) MAGIC DAMAGE (SINGLE TARGET): 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240 (+ 60% AP)

Patch 5.5 MAGIC DAMAGE (MULTIPLE TARGET Minions ): 40 / 60 / 80 / 100 / 120 (+ 30% AP) (Champs and jungle Mobs): 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240 (+ 60% AP)

MAGIC DAMAGE (SINGLE TARGET Minions): 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240 (+ 60% AP) (Champs and jungle Mobs): 120/ 180/ 240/ 300/ 360 (+ 90% AP)

Know when you hit a champ for single target damage you get rewarded and this punishes champs for staying to close to the mions to neff your Q damage. This also prevents Karthus from having any better wave clear then he already dose and allows Karthus jungle Karthus to be a solid second role.

HIS ULT COULD HAVE ROLE OVER DAMAGE. So if your team is a head Karthus keeps you a head by dealing the damage that would get delt to 5 champs to the renaming ones. So their is only 1 champ left booom!

Also it would be nice if his ult did % of life burning damage during the channel to inflict grievous wound so spell shields would have to be timed to prevent the ult. I like the idea that lethal on death defied could revive him that would be cool and since it is so situational having to be his ult it makes for a death defying feet.

His wall is so useless his passive needs to do something

blackcat13001 votes

But riot doesn't like Karthus he is odd and morbid so they don't want to patch him to make him more balanced.

blackcat13001 votes

. So I would like the to add a stacking passive to defiled. Passive each kill give you a stack, max 5, each stack gives 2,4,6,8,10 per cent spell vamp. Active when toggle on defiled he gets bonus 1/2/3/4/5% per stack to all of his abilities. You loos all stacks when you toggle off defile or at the end of death defied.

You gain life to negate burst damage and you deal bonus damage wile defile is on with stacks so it give you the ability to also prevent turret dives when at full stacks but makes you weaker after you have used defile and have to farm the stacks back with out using defile.

Give the wall damage over time equal to the number of stacks.

His wall could go back to scaling an extra 5% mr and armor every level. His ult could inflict 5 seconds of damage over time when you star to channel it.

Make his ult do more damage the more ail champs that are dead. Max 5 due to death death-defied.

or increase his base mana by 361 + 85 per level.

AyRe CoNteMpT1 votes

karthus is one of the top 5 strongest midlaners since about 2 years now. lol. there is literally zero need to buff or change him in any way.

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