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@Riot what's your opinion on Akali's current state? Will she be receiving any tweaks soon?

Are·1/10/2017, 7:55:43 PM·2 votes·658 views

Hi everyone. Despite how it may not seem so, Akali isn't in the best state right now. Her current winrate is 46% on OP.GG which isn't really optimal. After her mini-rework she lost a lot of survivability, damage, skill depth, and feels really bad to use.

Shroud was supposed to be the main defensive tool she has, but honestly, it isn't cutting it. She lost a lot of things in order for her to have this nice new shroud that doesn't get as easily countered. R got nerfed all around, no damage (does less than an auto), longer CD. Her healing comes in burst which makes it harder to survive in fights which is a shame considering her escape (blink) is really situational and R CD was increased so she isn't as quick on her feet.

Old W had a lot more skill depth, but because it now places itself directly on top of Akali now, it lost a lot of skill depth. You use it to blink (really small blink), stealth, and in very, very rare cases, to slow. With old shroud, you could use it for vision, play mind games, slow people down (cast over them), to speed up, use it to wall hop (hop to jungle monsters). It lost a lot of outplay potential.

She doesn't feel as fluid anymore either. Having the passive damage apply on the second auto feels bad, and R's CD feels really restrictive.

Are there any plans to buff Akali? I personally think that if R is completely reverted, she'd be decent again.

5 Comments

dakota saturn1/10/2017, 8:10:54 PM2 votes

TBH, I'm going to be a little controversial - I think Akali is actually a lot stronger than before.

The fact her healing is a burst rather than a slow heal over time makes her seem a bit stronger than before - even though its on the first auto. It gives her lane sustain much more reliability since she just has to hit once to get a lot of healing back. Since they buffed the 2nd hit to work on turrets now, she is a lot stronger than she was right after the rework.

Also, she has more escape options than she used to, when she'd have to ward over a wall and R to a minion while praying the enemy doesn't drop a pinkward and CC her before she can do it, AND her W is now completely uncounterable besides skillshots and aoe.

As for her damage, every Akali I've seen past the first few weeks of the rework has actually done a hell of a lot more burst than I ever remember her doing unless she was disgustingly fed.

I think the low winrate stems from the fact that a lot of Akali mains stopped playing her after the rework (go to r/akalimains and you'll see), and a lot of people playing her only played her for a few games and gave up. She has a different playstyle now where her damage isn't all in her Q -> R to proc, but she now has tools to stay in fights longer. If you play her for a good 70+ games and get used to her new niches, I think she's a better, more reliable champion overall now. I find her a lot scarier to play against than before, and I almost always play LeBlanc into her, who is a supposed counter.

She scales so hard into mid and late.

But yeah, old Akali mains will probably downvote this.

Jefftiffy1/11/2017, 1:46:13 AM1 votes

The only problem I have with the current Akali is her spike is 6. Yet basically all it does right now is give mobility. 150 damage over the course of 3 ult charges is kind of pathetic. The change I see coming is 50/100/150 + 25% AP to 75/125/175 + 30% AP. It would give her back some of her level 6 strength to make up for her abysmal lane phase.

The biggest problem Akali has is her new shroud is centered on her combined with her ult damage being low. Her passive is in a good spot and so is her Q and E. The first change I see is making her ult actually doing some kind of actual damage early on and scaling better. The second change I can see is keeping the mobility on shroud as long as she casts it on herself (basically make it like the old one but with a dash if she uses it defensively).