@Riot: Oracle's Lens is okay, but why was a "Dust of Appearance" item rejected?

darkdill·Apr 20, 2015·2 votes·637 views

For the unfamiliar, Dust of Appearance is an item in Warcraft 3 that, when used, caused all enemies in an area around the user to be revealed, rendering invisibility useless. It's essential when your enemy has a Blademaster.

Now, while Oracle's Lens is good, some Champions like Shaco can still get away from an Oracle's range, and their stealth is still super annoying pre-level 9 (when Oracle's is off-limits). Against mass-stealth compositions, that level 1-8 range can be brutal.

While I'm certain Riot will not add a consumable that works like Dust of Appearance, I'd like to know some reasons why it wouldn't work in LoL.

5 Comments

JevelFaithfulApr 20, 20151 votes

Do you mean a consumable or a trinket?

But I think the answer is along those lines : Because League is meant to be less about strategic planning than DotA (because I think there's an item like that in DotA). Stealths are weak in league because they're meant to be fought without such items. That's why there's no perma-stealth champion in the game (Eve has perma-with-a-twist).

That item jsut straight counter something which already has a counter built in it. As well as either being in competition with the trinket ward (if a free trinket) or being another mean of snowballing and lane dominance (if a consumable). That last point is not something riot likes, again a design choice in league more than being simply a bad thing. In other words : Because design aesthetics.

5000000000000000Apr 20, 20151 votes

You mean vision ward?

darkdillApr 20, 20151 votes

Vision Wards can't reveal someone if they flee over a wall and you chase.

StoningtonApr 20, 20151 votes

Oracle elixir was a thing before season 4. But it was deemed too snowbally as the winning team would get an oracle elixir and deny the enemy all vision starving them out. They were totally right. I used to abuse it so hard to the point I would snowball a win off of 2 items.

Teridax68Apr 20, 20151 votes

True sight is a hard counter to stealth, and hard counters aren't good at providing rich or interesting gameplay. While item 3364 does operate on true sight, it at least only provides it for a short window of time, whereas Oracle's Elixir could have a permanent uptime. Back when Oracle's Elixir still existed, champions like Akali , Teemo and even Twitch were practically unplayable in higher elos because their biggest source of utility got easily and permanently countered with an item. Even now, those champion struggle in higher-level play, due to organized teams using Oracle's Lens and item 2043 to counter them, but at least they have windows where they get to access their power.

With that said, though, stealth itself is not in a very good spot, namely because it hard-counters normal vision. In the worst case, it operates like prolonged untargetability, and the tools to deal with stealth are counter-intuitive, binary and non-immediate (they're something you have to purchase, rather than something everyone can access reactively). Stealth-dependent champions need changes to make their stealth deeper and more interactive, which would also allow them to have more power ( Evelynn got seriously nerfed because of her stealth allowing her to dodge item 2044 , for example).