Proposal: Shyvana mini-rework

What's Wrong With Shyvana?

So, if you've been paying attention to the PBE, you might see that Shyvana has some tentative buffs:

Shyvana

• Twin Bite (Q) cooldown reduced to 9/8/7/6/5 from 10/9/8/7/6
• 0 Burnout (W) now deals 20% bonus damage to monsters.

While its nice to see that my favorite dragon lady is getting some attention, I don't think plain numbers buff will make her viable without breaking her. If anyone remembers the height of her popularity in early season 4, she wasn't very well liked. She did the damage to kill things while building only BoRK for damage, resulting in angry ADCs and APCs and jealous tanks. Since her last mini-rework in 3.9 she has received a plethora of nerfs, both to her damage and her itemization. BoRK's sticking power was decreased, Sunfire's damage was lowered, Randuin's slow was removed, her W and E got damage nerfs, and she got a bigger hitbox, making her, well, easier to hit. Because of these nerfs she has been lackluster for the second half of season 4. With the new jungle changes, specifically the introduction of Devourer, Shyvana has the damage once again, and recklessly buffing her might not do so well.

Now, if you go back to her original release, her intended playstyle was slightly different than what many in the community view her as. While many are under the illusion that Shyvana is supposed to be a tank, her original release billed her as an attack speed heavy damage dealer, almost an mADC:

Simply put, Shyvana is for players who like any of the following:

• Offensive, aggressive playstyles
• Melee carries or fighters
• The idea of being a super-rad dragon

This is the original playstyle I fell in love with, and the one I would like to see any changes to Shyvana geared toward. Now, this "I attack fast and am melee" is not a complete identity, especially since Udyr and Yi exist, so Shyvana is going to need some special strength to make her different. So we go back to her on live - what makes Shyvana different? The thing I notice first is how much AoE damage she does, and as an extension onto that, how the majority of her damage is magic damage. This AoE magic damage also makes her teamfighting much stronger than melee carries.

My Take on a Shyvana Mini-Rework

I believe that Shyvana needs a two things to become truly unique and fun:

• a new passive that encourages aggression and offers more gameplay
• a improved ultimate that is a greater buff for a shorter time

Her passive should not be a stat-stick, nor should it be one that encourages passive play or tanky builds. Ideally, it would be one that rewards Shyvana for trading with her opponent and not passively farming. Here's my take (this is just an example, there are tons of potential passives that could be done, and this one is probably a little UP):

• Dragon's Rage: After taking damage from an enemy ability, Shyvana's next basic attack deals bonus magic damage equal to 5% of the damage taken, and heals for the same amount. This amount is doubled if she is attacking the champion who attacked her. (this passive would have a short cooldown)

This would encourage Shyvana to retaliate against harass, and it would give Shyvana some much needed sustain in lanes where she is behind. While this passive wouldn't help her in the jungle, it could be extended to also apply to large monster attacks. Good Shyvana players will realize that this passive could be used to its fullest extent in a teamfight during her ult, allowing you to soak a hit from a mage then Q multiple enemies with this bonus damage.

Now for her ultimate. I like the core of the ability - descend into their team as a dragon and do massive AoE DPS. This core idea stays the same, but to make her ultimate much more significant, and to make her feel like more of a 'raid boss', this is what I would do:

• Fury decay rate increased to 10/second from 5/second
• During her ultimate, Fury gain on AA is tripled against champions, but removed against minions
• Dragon form can now be cancelled by pressing R while she is under half fury - (this would mean she could cancel it after a fight ends to have it up again sooner, but she couldn't cancel it mid-fight to prepare a second dash)
• Shyvana now takes 20% reduced damage in Dragon Form (this is mainly to compensate for the loss of armor/mr from her passive, and the double armor/mr that she would have got before while in Dragon Form)
• At level 11, she is immune to displacement during the dash part of her ultimate
• At level 16, she gains some tenacity during her ultimate

Ultimately, these changes are designed around making her feel like a significant threat in teamfights without flat out buffing her damage.