Dont smash Kalista's face in with a Nerf Bat. Break her Knees.

Bârd·Jul 3, 2015·128 votes·6,055 views

90% ad on basic attacks is just stupid on so many levels. For fucks sake guys, CLARITY. If you must do that, just have it reduce her total AD by 10%, then up her ratios to compensate.

However, I would like you to stay away from % damage reduction built into basic attacks. It is just irritating.

Do any of these things (but for fucks sake, no ALL of them) -Nerf her base health to 498 from 518 -Nerf her attack range to 535 from 550 (She has SO much mobility, she should have to get close-ish to hit you. You would have to up her movespeed from Anivia levels if you did that though) -Nerf her base attack speed to 0.600 from 0.658 -Change the mana cost on E to 80, and have the mana refund per unit kill be 30, so that she is always losing mana when she casts it -Remove the Slow on E -Nerf the Ratio per spear to 30% BONUS ad from 30% total -Nerf the %hp damage on sentinel -Lower her Q's AD ratio to 90% AD

See? There are SO MANY ways you can nerf kalista WITHOUT Olafing her (Which is def what this does. It is the disadvantage Yasuo has on his crits, except if Kalista crits, it is doubled, since Kalista's reduced damage is done before the crit) edit: holy shit that's a lot of people

91 Comments

LegacyDAPJul 3, 201546 votes

I fucking love this post, not only do I agree that she needs a nerf, but what the fuck Riot don't pull a Yasuo on Kalista. 90% of AD. Are you going to do this with every mechanically broken champion so you can keep LCS plays?

A Miss FortuneJul 3, 20156 votes

I don't see how you compare Yasuo to Kalista, they both are overpowered but for different reasons. Yasuo is just overloaded, either you're going to go up against that project skin Yasuo who wind walls in the opposite direction and goes 0-20, or you're going against someone who understands his kit and goes 20-0. Kalista is overpowered for a different reason, she's overpowered by her entire concept I think. The entire design was a flaw to begin with. She has infinite mobility that allows her to outscale every ADC in the game due to her Rend, and on top of that she has two forms of hard CC. I'm not sure many people realize it but I also think Kalista's sentinel passive lets her and her support do 20% of a target's health on auto attack when they attack that same target. Yasuo and Kalista are both quite unbalanced despite the community's myth a guy with like 10 different passives, an ability that invalidates all projectiles in the game, infinite dashes through any enemy/neutral units, and 100% crit chance at 15 minutes into the game is just oh so weak and how dare Riot EVER give him a real skill base. But anyways, they're unbalanced for very different reasons.

Mandang0Jul 3, 20158 votes

I think a big reason Yasuo tends to be feast-or-famine is because his double crit steroid is a huge snowball mechanic that's much stronger when you're doing well and have more crit than when you're behind and have less.

Kalista is just as overloaded as Yasuo, and the parallels between the two are easy to draw (both CertainlyT champs, so that's not surprising). Both have heaps of mobility, steroids to inflate their damage, and utility spells that would seem more fitting on a support kit.

A Miss FortuneJul 3, 20155 votes

With Yasuo a good player will definitely try to get ahead in kills and then basically outscale everyone else in the game since he already had 100% crit chance pretty early on with most standard builds I think and if not he will just abuse the fact you can be blind and stupid and still get 400 CS by the end of a 35 minute game with Yasuo and still sort of outscale everyone else in a similar way.

I don't think people are right for defending Yasuo, nor really any CertainlyT champions. The designer has proven totally incompetent to actually make good, balanced champions and I would be totally fine if every champion made by him with the exception of Zyra was nerfed. Zyra is a really handicapped mid laner (I just got Level 4 with her so I have fair experience with her mid.) and probably the only champion CertainlyT ever made that is underpowered. HOWEVER, she was probably one of the most overpowered champions on release. She had more damage, lower cooldowns, larger range, more damage, more damage, more damage and basically it was harder to lose with her than to win with her.

Mandang0Jul 3, 20154 votes

Well, Zyra wasn't really a CertainlyT champion. Skribbles started her design, then CertainlyT joined and worked with Xyph/Morello/Coronach on it.

A Miss FortuneJul 3, 20154 votes

Wellllppppp, prepare to get downvoted to oblivion by the "CertainlyT is the best designer to exist and all of his champions are balanced" bandwagon fanboys.

Mandang0Jul 3, 20152 votes

Eh, I'm used to it by now.

Too hard for people to consider the game as a whole instead of their personal experience. All the focus on how it feels to play the champ or how novel their signature skill is rather than how it feels to play against the champ or whether that signature skill belongs on a different role.

AnidanJul 4, 20152 votes

In fairness, there are not many champions that most people don't hate the very thought of, CertainlyT champions or otherwise, so even that thought has less weight than you would think it should. Take Nasus mains for example. It feels great to get that mid-game powerspike and snowball from there, but to the enemy he feels like a bullshit champion that you can barely push out of lane and have to babysit for the entire game. Then you've got Lux mains who enjoy her laning supremacy, picking power and mid-game teamfight dominance, and yet to the enemy it feels like a champion you can barely approach without risk of being blown up from so far away you can't properly react. Then you have the poster-boy for "balanced" and "healthy" in this game right now: Vel'koz. His mains love his controlling playstyle and early-mid-game team eradication capability, and his detractors hate that a good Vel'koz can make you feel literally helpless against him, especially if you're melee.

Playing against a champion will rarely ever feel fun in the hands of a competent player, just like if you're doing well with a champion everyone will hate your champion. So play Fizz, or LeBlanc, or Yasuo, or whatever, because, well, they're here and they won't be going anywhere. All we can do now is balance them because discussing whether or not their signature move would be more apropos elsewhere, well, it's only discussion after the fact because the action that permanently determined that move's fate was already made. Reworks can only accomplish so much, and if they're used too much they'll simply be viewed as a balancing crutch - and you should never have to rely on a crutch when you're perfectly capable of walking unaided.

This is not to say I like or support CertainlyT's champions, because I friggin' hate them. But how it feels to play against a champion doesn't count for as much as you'd hope in a competitive game.

Mandang0Jul 4, 20153 votes

OK, I'm not trying to say that if a champion is EVER complained about, that it's an indicator of whether they're healthy for the game. However, in all of the examples you listed, I can point to real weaknesses and real counterplay that leaves players who get beaten by that champion feeling like they can do something better to win the next time around. CertainlyT champions are very bad in that regard. For Lux, you dodge her skillshots. For Nasus, you force him to teamfight & then kite him. For Velkoz, you dodge his skillshot & even if you didn't dodge the first, you dodge the subsequent ones to avoid taking damage from his passive.

For Kalista? You're near-forced to take a point-and-click CC, you're prevented from trying to contest a smite without killing the enemy team, you're at a ridiculous disadvantage if your team is immobile, etc. The game you lose to Kalista as a fed Udyr or fed similar champion, you don't feel like there was anything you could've done short of choosing a different champ. The game you lose to Yasuo feels just as helpless if you're a champion with power invested in projectiles (perhaps even your ultimate) and Yasuo just negates it with a non-ult spell. But even that still feels like you had a chance if you timed it differently - the rest of Yasuo's kit is what feels worse. The stupid mobility, the long range engage, the steroids... there's playing against someone and not enjoying it because you're on the losing end, and then there's playing against someone and not enjoying it regardless of which end you're on. The latter was why Yorick got nerfed into oblivion, and it's why I despise Yasuo. Darius is equally unhealthy for a lot of top lane melee matchups.

There's a reason people make this claim of CertainlyT champions and not of the rest. Very few people complained about new Sion being unfun to play against, very few complained about new Ashe, very few complained about Velkoz or Braum. I could get into the differences, but that's been beaten to death elsewhere.

BlueThingamajigJul 3, 20154 votes

Wait, there are other people on the "We hate CertainlyT's champion designs" boat?

Can I like, hate Darius (No interesting gameplay mechanics) and Thresh (could deal 0 damage and still be almost viable) also?

Ariel the CruelJul 3, 20153 votes

Interestingly, Zyra's kit was considered to be "incredibly overloaded" when she was released. That's why she has a revenge passive. They consider it "free power", since it's only useful when behind (and even then, still a bit weak).

Sadly, It seems CertainlyT misinterpreted that lesson. :/

Mandang0Jul 3, 20156 votes

Yea, and look at Zyra's kit through the lens of today - it hardly seems overloaded compared to recent releases. Hell, the only thing in her kit that even looks like a CertainlyT mechanic to me is her ult's interaction with her plants. Everything else is fairly straightforward, and she gives up a spell in order to get plants, so the complaints about her plants need to be taken with a grain of salt.

SaiannaJul 3, 201516 votes

I dislike Kalista. I dislike her very much.

Even though this nerf makes me smile, I'd agree on your proposed nerfs. They seem more though trough.

LockensterJul 3, 20152 votes

dont hate her too much. save your hate for the teemo Teemo

ZrimaJul 3, 201514 votes

I hate kalista but my problem with her is not solely her mobility.

I hate her E be cause it's Twitch 's Expunge but way stronger, and it can be used to take the dragon way too easily.

I hate here as a character, because she's Shadow Island Varus . Just the same thing as Varus. They're all guilty and I'm the Vengeance! UGH!

SoMNiaJul 3, 20152 votes

Kalista WE are vengeance!

So how does that work?

Teridax68Jul 3, 20154 votes

Kalista is the collective embodiment of all the betrayed souls she made a pact with. The army general who originally was Kalista is but one of those souls, and each new pact causes her to lose what little individuality she has left. Of course, you wouldn't know all this because Kalista's in-game personality has all the depth and expressivity of a bird bath.

TheXtractorJul 3, 20156 votes

Another person who is better at balancing the game than riot is. Like any of these options make way more sense than putting her damage on basic attacks at 90%. its like they are just trying random things and seeing if they work without actually trying to change things in her kit.

Teridax68Jul 3, 20156 votes

My dream Kalista changelist:

Allow her dashes to be affected by crowd control: stuns, roots and suppresses should interrupt her dashes, and slows should slow them down (though she'd still be able to attack mid-dash if that happens). Kalista is effectively immune to slows while in combat right now, and can dash while under the effects of most hard CC, which I find particularly egregious considering she's already good at dodging most CC-laden abilities. This is also why I feel she's super-unpleasant to deal with as a melee champion, because what crowd control melees rely on to stick to her just doesn't work well most of the time.
**Remove the Black Spear's stun/death animation, and allow its targets to refuse the pact. **The fact that the Black Spear's pact is unconsensual deeply irritates me, and its death pact thing even more so, as I think it brings little flavor and instead, at best, delays an ally, and at worst stuns them at a really inappropriate time. I guess it might be bad for an ally to refuse the pact and cause Kalista to try again, but even so, if nobody wants to bond to Kalista there are deeper issues at hand than her personal loss in power.
Remove Kalista's global soundbites when making a pact or calling back her Oathsworn ally with Fate's Call. Many Rioters on the effects teams constantly mention how global visual or sound effects occupy space and make it more difficult to add more of those, because too many would clutter the game and call unnecessary attention. Neither Kalista's pact nor her ultimate are relevant enough to warrant global sound effects, in my opinion, as neither carry any immediate global threat. I'm also fairly salty that she gets to have global effects when can't even do the same when casting his ult, which already carries global visuals and sound.
Remove Sentinel's mana cost, make the sentinels' movement speed scale with Kalista's, and increase the number of laps they can perform per rank, as well as the ability's maximum range. Let's be honest, mana is never a real gate to Kalista's W active, nor does that ability need to be gated by anything other than its long recharge time. I feel like Kalista's sentinels are fairly underused overall, too, and deserve to be activated more readily for target-hunting and objective guarding. Utility is also a facet of Kalista I feel is heavily underdeveloped, and buffing her unique vision contribution would allow her to shine in a unique way without stepping too hard on other champions' toes.
Remove Rend's slow and mana restoration and cap its damage versus monsters, but reduce its mana cost to 40 / 35 / 30 / 25 / 20 and add an indicator over targets that will be killed upon activating Rend. As an ability that is made specifically to execute targets, Rend absolutely does not need a slow, which I feel is redundant in many ways: she doesn't need more kill potential on an ability that is itself designed to secure kills, and whose success is meant to be a hard yes (target's dead, Rend refreshes) or no (target's alive, Rend goes on cooldown), and she doesn't need more sticking or kiting power when she has on-demand infinite dashes. I dislike its unlimited damage against monsters because it allows her to out- junglers and exert far too much control over objectives, and I dislike the mana restoration because it's mostly a not-too-visible bonus effect designed to let her clear waves more easily, when a simple mana cost reduction per rank would do just as well. I'd rather she had more power placed into stuff like her extended damage, unique utility or Oathsworn interaction than extraneous effects like these.
Reduce Rend's initial damage (to something like 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40 (+ 40% AD), for example), but have Kalista's Oathsworn ally apply spears with every basic attack, and have each additional spear deal the same damage as the first. Kalista's interaction with her Oathsworn often feels downplayed outside of her ult, and I feel it would make sense for her ally to contribute to her damage by participating in extended trades with her. I also think smoothing out her damage would shift her poking power (which isn't too big a thing on her) towards her Q, which also feels a bit redundant in her kit, and would allow her to work even better with attack speed builds overall.

Who's on board with this?

ijustlikejuiceJul 4, 20154 votes

You've convinced me man.

Teridax68Jul 4, 20155 votes

Thank you! I completely agree with your post, too: as unpleasant as Kalista may be, I think reducing her autoattacking power via a nerf to her AA scalings is ugly and clunky, and would likely just make her feel less satisfying to play while still being just as frustrating to deal with. In general, I feel her kit is fairly bloated as is with conditionals and variables that add little depth to her gameplay, and really want to streamline her kit (perhaps a bit too much) rather than pile on even more unique passives, even if they're maluses (she, Yasuo and Thresh are the only champions I know who have had universal mechanics expressly nerfed on them, along with perhaps post-rework Ashe and her inability to crit on her first basic attack).

SoMNiaJul 4, 20151 votes

Slows affecting her passive: No. Martial Poise already leaves you tethered to your enemies. If she's not in attack range, she has to walk, and she's incredibly slow. The entire point is that she has great mobility as long as she stays in combat. It's kind of reverse Boots of Mobility. Slows are to chase or to escape. If she's using her passive, the combat has already started. Stuns and roots are to lock someone down or disengage. I keep getting this feeling that people want a melee champion with no gap closers and no stuns to be able to chase her down and unload all their damage on her, and...that's just not reasonable.

Yes, Rend needs a slow, for the same reason its mana cost refund can be triggered more than once per cast. It's meant to be stacked on multiple targets, and is expected to only kill some of them. Furthermore, if Rend doesn't get the kill immediately, Kalista has no means to re-engage without that slow, AND she loses a large chunk of her damage in the near future. Every other ADC has some form of crowd control, and most also have a target-independent dash that they can use from outside their attack range. Kalista can kite and move about only while still in combat. She has no other means of engaging unless her support is around to answer Fate's Call.

As for damage against monsters, objective control is a significant part of her identity in terms of mechanics (the other being unrivaled kiting ability), but she still has to work for it. In order for her to really "out-smite smite", she needs to have been committed to attacking dragon/baron for a significant stretch of time. If you let her have that much access to objectives without challenging her, you don't deserve to reliably just walk up and steal them with smite (and also you're not doing your job as a jungler). A summoner spell is not a substitute for playing the game. There are dashes that arguably outperform Flash on a shorter cooldown, too, and a few champions who can easily out-heal a Heal spell or out-shield a barrier, or cleanse themselves frequently. And she's not the only champion who, given proper setup, is able to deal a large chunk of damage with a single move. Cho'Gath eats dragons for a snack between teamfights, and his "better than smite" move needs no setup time at all. So many people keep complaining that she can secure dragon if you let her sit there and attack it for 20 seconds, and I am just baffled as to why anyone would let her do that, and expect her NOT to get the dragon, or think it's unfair that she does. Kalista does not steal dragon or baron. She has to earn it.

Making Rend work like Braum's passive would be horrifyingly oppressive and un-fun to play against, even if you didn't boost the damage per additional spear. Please, no. It would be so much extra damage. D: Don't let her build Rend stacks without actually attacking. Please, please no.

Overall, I'm just not feeling this. Trim her attack range, maybe. Reduce the scaling on Rend, and make crits grant extra stacks. Take some of the damage out of Pierce, and give it back plus a little more only against targets with Rend stacks (since you're supposed to kill them with Pierce to transfer the stacks, but how often does that happen?). Pull some levers here and there, but don't strip out the things that make playing her what it is.

Teridax68Jul 4, 20153 votes

{quoted}

I keep getting this feeling that people want a melee champion with no gap closers and no stuns to be able to chase her down and unload all their damage on her, and...that's just not reasonable.

Because clearly, it would be ludicrous for a champion like Olaf or Rumble to so much as try to fight her. That wouldn't be reasonable at all.

{quoted}

Yes, Rend needs a slow, for the same reason its mana cost refund can be triggered more than once per cast. It's meant to be stacked on multiple targets, and is expected to only kill some of them.

I feel like the whole multiple-stacking scenario only makes sense in the context of wave clear. Outside of it, bar screwy item 3085 shenanigans, Kalista's only going to be focusing one target at a time.

{quoted}

Furthermore, if Rend doesn't get the kill immediately, Kalista has no means to re-engage without that slow, AND she loses a large chunk of her damage in the near future.

Well that would suck. If only she had a means to close the gap between her and her target...

My point is, Rend is meant to have a clear success and fail case, and Kalista doesn't need padding to that ability to make sure she wins even when she fails to execute her target. I would rather give Rend a kill indicator to facilitate executions than give her CC she doesn't need.

{quoted}

Every other ADC has some form of crowd control, and most also have a target-independent dash that they can use from outside their attack range. Kalista can kite and move about only while still in combat. She has no other means of engaging unless her support is around to answer Fate's Call.

Every other ADC doesn't have a perma-dash, though, so that point is moot, and Kalista already has a free-targeted dash in the form of her Q, as well as a knockup with her ult. I also feel making her completely independent of her Oathsworn ally, when she has this whole set of mechanics that put power into interaction with them, sort of defeats the point, and makes her weaknesses less meaningful. Sure, Kalista would be weak without her Oathsworn, but that's sort of the point, and part of her identity as an ally-dependent marksman.

{quoted}

A summoner spell is not a substitute for playing the game.

That's not what I'm saying. summoner 11 is critical to a jungler's identity, far more than Kalista's objective securing potential (which I think can be argued to be more circumstantial to her identity than her kiting power or ally-mancing), and its power is what allows junglers to make clutch steals or secures. Kalista completely invalidates that with Rend, and effectively guarantees that her team will secure an objective if allowed to sit on it for long enough, which completely goes against the idea of clutch steals. Junglers have to earn their objectives too, and even other effects like Cho's ult or Nunu 's Consume don't invalidate smite steals in the same way. If Kalista's picked only for her ability to sit on Dragon/Baron and guarantee its capture, then I think she'd need a new identity.

{quoted}

Making Rend work like Braum's passive would be horrifyingly oppressive and un-fun to play against, even if you didn't boost the damage per additional spear.

Why? It would only add more interaction between her and her Oathsworn ally, which is a good thing. There is nothing oppressive in focusing targets as a team, and I feel her ability to out-smite junglers and auto-win against certain champions, both of which you defended, is an order of magnitude more oppressive than this could ever be, particularly since an effect like this could be balanced with number tweaks.

{quoted}

Pull some levers here and there, but don't strip out the things that make playing her what it is.

Kalista's identity is that of a master kiter who trades off a lot of personal power in exchange for supremely awesome synergy with a specific partner, and I think the changes I'm proposing would only strengthen that identity. If the only things that make her worth playing are mechanics that aren't fun to have around, then I would rather strip those away completely and give her a new identity. Thankfully, she still has a really interesting playstyle, and has a lot of contributions to make even without her total objective control or under-the-hood CC resistance, so that would likely not be necessary.

SoMNiaJul 4, 20151 votes

"Because clearly, it would be ludicrous for a champion like or to so much as try to fight her. That wouldn't be reasonable at all."

Alone? If she didn't start top lane, and she's built as an ADC with decent attack speed? I'd say no, it wouldn't be. It's not actually their job. And BEFORE she's got that attack speed, if she's their lane opponent? Well, that's a different story. I'd say go for it. If she rushes attack speed, she won't actually be able to hurt them much, and they can poke and farm. If she goes damage, she's squishy, and they can kill her. She needs both before she can fight them. If she has both, yeah, they're screwed. But it's not unheard of for one champion to be considered another's counter, or for people to start roaming because they lost their lane and don't want to feed.

"bar screwy shenanigans"

DON'T bar them. That's considered a core item for her, for EXACTLY this reason.

"CC she doesn't need."

Like I said, she does need it. Her mobility is bound to her being in combat, and as soon as she's not, she loses it. Her movespeed is very slow when she's walking.

"Kalista already has a free-targeted dash in the form of her Q"

Which has a windup and short dash range that makes it almost useless for chasing if the target is already out of range and running away.

"effectively guarantees that her team will secure an objective if allowed to sit on it for long enough"

...Then don't let her sit on objectives. Duh. You should be creating sufficient map pressure that sitting on dragon seems like a bad idea. As for clutch steals, they're still possible. Not really any more difficult than if your opponents have double smite. The issue is that you have to respect her ability to secure objectives, and actually deal with her. And maybe you think only another jungler — only another summoner running smite — should be able to demand that kind of respect around the dragon or baron, but I don't. Being able to walk in and press a single button at the right time (a button that's unrelated to your champion, which literally anyone can press if they choose, regardless of their role) and call that a clutch play is honestly just sad. If you let her sit on dragon too long, then you need to stop her. That's fair.

"There is nothing oppressive in focusing targets as a team,"

Kalista can stack Rend on multiple targets. She already has the synergy thing with her W passive, and that ALREADY lets her casually chunk the health of both lane opponents with alarming regularity. If her support could also stack Rend on champions while she farms (or preps minions to reset Rend and immediately begin that process again), she'd never lose her lane. Ever.

Teridax68Jul 4, 20154 votes

{quoted}

But it's not unheard of for one champion to be considered another's counter, or for people to start roaming because they lost their lane and don't want to feed.

There is a difference between a counter and a hard counter. Vayne counters DrMundo because she's really good at whittling down his health and dodging his cleavers, but he still has plenty of different opportunities to approach her and kill her, or run away from her. Kalista, by contrast, offers no real opportunities for many champions to fight back against her, and consequently combat against her feels extremely lopsided. It often feels like you're just spectating her as she pings you down from out of range and eventually executes you, and that's not fun. The fact that she also partially or totally invalidates many kinds of crowd control for no good reason is also not a good thing.

{quoted}

DON'T bar them. That's considered a core item for her, for EXACTLY this reason.

But that's the thing: the only thing Runaan's brings to most fights is that it occasionally catches minions with her spears and facilitates target-switching. The end result is still that Kalista will be focusing targets one at a time, and Runaan's makes Rend's reset pop up more often. In any case, she does not need a slow for Rend to be impactful on multiple targets.

{quoted}

Like I said, she does need it. Her mobility is bound to her being in combat, and as soon as she's not, she loses it. Her movespeed is very slow when she's walking.

It isn't, though. On top of her free dash, she has the best sticking power in the game in combat, so it's extremely difficult to disengage from her even with a long-range dash. The fact that her mobility is mostly tied to combat is also a good thing, and in my opinion her out-of-combat power should be differentiated more by being significantly weaker than her in-combat mobility.

{quoted}

Which has a windup and short dash range that makes it almost useless for chasing if the target is already out of range and running away.

I didn't know having a dash on top of unlimited per-attack dashes was "useless for chasing". Many champions don't have a dash at all, and some, like MissFortune and Twitch , don't even have particularly strong CC. Kalista has both, even without her Rend.

{quoted}

...Then don't let her sit on objectives. Duh. You should be creating sufficient map pressure that sitting on dragon seems like a bad idea. As for clutch steals, they're still possible.

"I am not literally sitting next to both Dragon and Baron at the same time, therefore I deserve to have it taken by Kalista."

Less facetiously, though, my point isn't that Kalista is unhealthy because she has power over objectives, my point is that her power over objectives actively shuts down more interesting and risky plays. If Kalista were somehow able to steal objectives extremely well, that would be somewhat fine, if extraneous to her theme, but the fact that she makes Smite steals near-impossible dampens play. Even now, though, with an average build she can out-Smite a level 18 jungler in about a dozen autoattacks, which is really not that much.

{quoted}

And maybe you think only another jungler — only another summoner running smite — should be able to demand that kind of respect around the dragon or baron, but I don't.

"This champion chose a summoner spell and item dedicated to clearing and deriving power from jungle monsters, and one of their biggest functions is to exert control over major jungle objectives. That can't possibly be important in any way."

{quoted}

Being able to walk in and press a single button at the right time (a button that's unrelated to your champion, which literally anyone can press if they choose, regardless of their role) and call that a clutch play is honestly just sad.

Smite stealing is a fun and high-stakes maneuver, one that defines fights around objectives and creates lots of fantastic tension. You may find it sad, but typically Smite contests on major objectives are one of the tensest and most interesting moments in the game, as well as the most popular (listen to the reaction crowds get when someone attempts or succeeds at stealing Baron in competitive play).

{quoted}

Kalista can stack Rend on multiple targets. She already has the synergy thing with her W passive, and that ALREADY lets her casually chunk the health of both lane opponents with alarming regularity. If her support could also stack Rend on champions while she farms (or preps minions to reset Rend and immediately begin that process again), she'd never lose her lane. Ever.

To me, that just says she needs less personal power in order for that change to happen, which I don't think would even be necessary with the above nerfs. Again, not only is this something that can be adjusted via number tweaks, this is also a mechanic that would reward good play (i.e. focusing the same target), which Riot intended to happen from the start. I suggested reducing Kalista's poke, which would especially affect her in lane, as well as making her more vulnerable to CC, which would also allow supports to lock her down better, and even without those changes I doubt she would auto-win lane with an effect like this.

SoMNiaJul 5, 20151 votes

No, what Hurricane does for Kalista is more than double her damage output in teamfights, double the efficiency of her lifesteal, and give her crucial extra attack speed (the thing that lets her dump all over Olaf, y'know) relative to other options. It will be even more necessary now that there's a 20%+ AD nerf to her critical hits, which makes Phantom Dancer even less attractive. This exchange has been bizarre. "That only works if you build Hurricane." So build Hurricane. "Hurricane doesn't do much for her." Except what we literally just talked about. Come on. Kalista wants to stack Rend on multiple targets. Being able to do that without juggling primary targets for her attack is a MASSIVE boost to her overall damage potential. Almost every Kalista builds Hurricane, with good reason.

And yes, if you fail to maintain vision control and map pressure, such that your opponents can make a run at a major objective without you immediately knowing, you have let them take it and deserve that disadvantage. As for Kalista specifically, her objective control increases the longer she is allowed to pursue said objective unmolested. Steals might seem more exciting, but they are not inherently healthier for the game than proactive vision and map control, the latter of which tends to preclude the former ANYWAY. Making a run at an objective when you don't have vision is actually likely to result in a wipe when your enemies show up at full health and you're weakened from fighting dragon/baron, while having vision allows you to disrupt such an attempt and often get a couple of kills, too.

I absolutely think that a summoner spell and a single item should NOT be more important than your choice of champion. They are supplemental. Bringing Heal and building Mikael's doesn't make you a healer. Bringing Flash and building Ghostblade doesn't make you the most mobile champion in the game. Bringing Barrier and building Locket doesn't make you Nautilus. And bringing Smite and building a jungle item doesn't make you the end-all, be-all of objective control. Is the jungler the big-shot in the jungle in the laning phase, as the name would imply? Yes. But when people start roaming and grouping? It's a team game, and everybody has their contributions to make.

One more thing. Gambit Gaming vs. Elements, around mid February. Diamond as Nidalee has dragon warded. Elements makes a run at it. He launches a ~700 damage javelin before jumping into the pit from blue side and smiting, and Edward Thresh lanterns him out. THAT is a proper steal. He was able to do it because he picked a champion that boasts significant objective control power as one of her strengths, he had vision, and he coordinated with his team. Smite is important, and has its role to play, but champion picks and strong play matter more than summoner spells. And they should. Also of note in that game: Gambit's Kalista couldn't even reach dragon. I'm telling you, the way to beat Kalista's objective securing power is to control her access to those objectives in the first place. She is NOTHING to dragon or baron if she shows up late at your attempt, OR if you show up early at hers. And here's the thing: if Rend is stacked high enough to kill the dragon, ANY other ADC would have killed dragon before you even showed up.

Overall, the changes you're suggesting rely on each other for any justification. Each one of them makes no sense in the context of Kalista's current identity. You keep saying how she "doesn't need" what she has, but she does, because of other things that she has, or doesn't have. There is a synergy between elements of her kit, and with certain items that she builds. There is a reason for all of it. You are asking that all of that be thrown away and replaced, because...you feel entitled, as a low-mobility melee champion, to be able to fight one of the highest mobility ranged champions? Because you feel entitled, as a jungler, to have a chance to steal objectives from her when you failed to zone away or disrupt her attempts at those objectives at any time until the very last moment, just because you're the designated jungler? Color me unimpressed.

Teridax68Jul 5, 20151 votes

{quoted}

No, what Hurricane does for Kalista is more than double her damage output in teamfights, double the efficiency of her lifesteal, and give her crucial extra attack speed (the thing that lets her dump all over Olaf, y'know) relative to other options.

This is what Runaan's does for every ranged champion, so that's not a valid argument. She's also not the only marksman who can multiply on-hit effects with it either, except she just gets disproportionately good rewards for randomly killing a minion during a fight. Again, no kit or build should completely invalidate the existence of another, and that's what Kalista does to melee champions when she's overly difficult to pin down with CC.

{quoted}

And yes, if you fail to maintain vision control and map pressure, such that your opponents can make a run at a major objective without you immediately knowing, you have let them take it and deserve that disadvantage.

There is a difference between a disadvantage and near-guaranteed failure. If Smite scaled infinitely with the jungler's attacks against monsters, Smite stealing would go completely extinct, and objective control would resume itself to who sat on Baron/Dragon first. Thankfully, that's not the case, except when there's a Kalista in a match.

{quoted}

Making a run at an objective when you don't have vision is actually likely to result in a wipe when your enemies show up at full health and you're weakened from fighting dragon/baron, while having vision allows you to disrupt such an attempt and often get a couple of kills, too.

That's my point. Smite stealing is a risky maneuver, made even riskier by good objective control from the enemy team, but it's usually never impossible, because Smite is a powerful enough spell to capture an objective by itself. Rend allows Kalista to overrule Smite's power and thereby make Smite stealing practically impossible: making a certain strategy more difficult is usually fine, but shutting a healthy and fun strategy down isn't, particularly when the reason behind it (champion X gets to deal more damage than a jungle-centric summoner spell at the press of a button) is not particularly exciting in itself.

{quoted}

I absolutely think that a summoner spell and a single item should NOT be more important than your choice of champion.

I believe choosing a champion should not be the be-all and end-all to game strategy, and item builds and summoner spell picks are crucial in establishing the contribution they can make. You cite lane-agnostic spells like summoner 4 and summoner 7 , but I feel Smite is different in that it is intrinsically connected to the jungle: it's a requirement to unlock items aimed specifically at junglers, and is only picked outside the jungle when those items become too generally powerful. By picking Smite, you are effectively choosing to be your team's jungler, with all the power and responsibility that entails.

{quoted}

One more thing. Gambit Gaming vs. Elements, around mid February. Diamond as Nidalee has dragon warded. Elements makes a run at it. He launches a ~700 damage javelin before jumping into the pit from blue side and smiting, and Edward Thresh lanterns him out. THAT is a proper steal.

I never said that wasn't. Also, arguing that Kalista's objective control isn't too strong when she can't reach said objective is like saying an guaranteed instant-kill spell isn't so bad when it's on cooldown: that's vacuously true, but ignores the critical issue of the effect itself being unhealthy.

{quoted}

Overall, the changes you're suggesting rely on each other for any justification. Each one of them makes no sense in the context of Kalista's current identity.

That is not true. I'm proposing to increase Kalista's vulnerability to CC because she ignores too much of it during combat. I'm proposing to remove Rend's slow because she already has phenomenal kiting power. I'm proposing to buff her Sentinels over time because they're seriously undervalued on her. While some of my changes build off of each other, most of them are independent, and the gameplay changes I'm proposing are intended to strengthen her identity. You, by contrast, are far too attached to the abuse cases in her kit, claiming them to be "her identity" when they're effects that should have, by all rights, been trimmed off her kit from the start.

{quoted}

You are asking that all of that be thrown away and replaced, because...you feel entitled, as a low-mobility melee champion, to be able to fight one of the highest mobility ranged champions?

I feel entitled to be able to fight any champion with any other champion and have a chance of winning. Even tanks have a chance to win against marksmen, as do marksmen versus assassins. As Olaf , I can fight against Ashe , who before Kalista was the queen of kiting, and I can fight against Lucian , one of the most mobile champions in the game, but I cannot fight Kalista simply because it is physically impossible to approach her in combat. Again, no mechanic should completely invalidate another, but Kalista's current kiting paradigm does just that.

{quoted}

Because you feel entitled, as a jungler, to have a chance to steal objectives from her when you failed to zone away or disrupt her attempts at those objectives at any time until the very last moment, just because you're the designated jungler?

As a jungler, I expect to have the dominant influence on my team over jungle-based objective control. I would rather preserve the identity and usefulness of the jungler role than have it upstaged by a champion who has nothing to do with jungling, but just so happens to invalidate most of the power of junglers on a technicality.

{quoted}

Color me unimpressed.

See, this kind of condescension, along with the rest of your tone, does not lend well to productive discussion, and does not help your case when your line of argumentation is wildly inconsistent and heavily biased. You claim that I feel entitled for wanting to give some champions a chance of beating Kalista, but I feel your claims are themselves dripping with entitlement. Kalista already has massive privilege over every other champion by having unlimited free mobility, yet you also want her to have even more power against melee enemies trying to catch up to her, have better jungle objective control than an entire role for whom that is their prime contribution, and have tons of personal power when the crux of her gameplay relies on her interaction with a specific ally. The changes I am proposing emphasize Kalista's reliance on her Oathsworn, as well as her ally synergy and unique utility: these are what constitute her identity, not her abusive edge cases, and the fact that you'd rather ditch the former in favor of the latter does not suggest you have Kalista's best gameplay interests in mind.

SoMNiaJul 5, 20151 votes

No, item 3085 doesn't do that for every ranged champion. Only for those who have non-consumable on-hit effects that stack. Off the top of my head, only Jinx and MissFortune really fit the bill. Other ADCs, not so much. Another thing it does is allow Kalista's oathsworn to do % health damage to anyone she happens to clip with a stray bolt, which is also very important to her teamfight presence, and rather a unique case for the item. Braum, being melee, cannot use it this way for his passive, and nobody else really does this.

I was referring to the disadvantage of having ceded the objective to your opponent. If you let them get to and objective uncontested until the very last moment, you SHOULD lose it, unless you're bringing massive burst damage, yourself. If you don't have that burst...get there earlier. I have sympathy for those who fail to do so, but they still lose the objective. It's how the game is played. Don't ever give your opponents unchallenged access to objectives, or if you do, accept that you've lost them, unless you have specifically arranged to deal with that (say, by having a javelin that adds massive damage on top of your smite). Being able to unconditionally show up at the last second and press a single button to invalidate the advantage you gave them might make for a flashy and entertaining play, but it is NOT healthy for the game. You should need more than smite to attempt such a thing.

You feel that smite is inherently different and more meaningful to the game than other summoner spells? Fine. I don't. We're not going to get anywhere on that point.

Rend is not a guaranteed instant kill. It requires you to let her do whatever she wants unmolested. So don't let her. If you do let her, don't complain when it works as intended.

You want to not only make her more susceptible to CC, but remove the most reliable CC from her kit, thereby eliminating any possibility of her actually escaping anyone without sacrificing the life of her support, OR chasing anyone who's managed to escape her attack range for a moment. And you say this makes it fair for her to gain obscene levels of damage pressure, even in the early game, through tag-teaming with her support. So, yes, your suggested changes, even in YOUR estimation, rely on each other for justification. They are intended to strengthen the identity you think she SHOULD have, not the one she actually has. And no, the abilities she has that you've arbitrarily labeled "abuse cases" due to your own distaste are not automatically unhealthy because you don't like them. Kalista was designed to work the way she does, though not necessarily to the exact extent. For example, Riot even talked about her objective control as a prominent characteristic of Rend when she was unveiled (and so did a lot of other people, so don't think they don't know about this). That is INTENDED. They may change their minds, of course. Who knows?

"I feel entitled to be able to fight any champion with any other champion and have a chance of winning."

Fine. You like Olaf? Bring movespeed quints, Fleet of Foot and Swiftness masteries. Build these: item 3284 item 3110 item 3143 item 3071 item 3074 item 3046 The Frozen Heart aura stacks with the on-hit from Warden's Mail/Randuin's, and cuts almost 28% of her total attack speed, and therefore cuts her in-combat movespeed by the same amount. The rest is negotiable, but you really want both of those.

Edit: Actually, swap out item 3071 item 3046 for item 3078 item 3031 , probably.

"See, this kind of condescension, along with the rest of your tone, does not lend well to productive discussion, and does not help your case when your line of argumentation is wildly inconsistent and heavily biased."

Please. This, after you addressed me with such a degree of snark, sarcasm, and condescension for daring to suggest that Kalista's abilities, while improperly tuned, are not inherently improper for her to possess? If you wanted this exchange to be respectful, you would have shown ANY respect after my first straightforward response. YOU have set the tone. I simply acquiesced. Yes, NOW, I'm being snide and scornful, because I'm getting tired of this. But you're right to say that insulting each other is not going to be productive. Mayhap we should stick to the issues and dispense with ad hominem nonsense. I really don't enjoy being hostile, especially over something that doesn't justify it. It's stressful, and probably bad for my health.

My "line of argumentation", by the way, is actually entirely consistent. As for bias...you know, I WANT to like playing her, but the fact is that I'm really bad at it, so when I'm forced to ADC (I'm a support main, and sometimes I jungle), I play Ashe instead. I just don't have a problem with people playing to her strengths, nor with her winning against champs that are markedly weak against her best traits. I've also noted that her winrate is anything but out of control, and there is a lot of outplay potential in most of her kit at each stage of the game. She is pretty close to being balanced, which is why I'm weirded out by people wanting to gut her. People freaked out about Ekko, too, and frankly, he's fun, but not actually that strong.

"you also want her to have even more power against melee enemies trying to catch up to her, have better jungle objective control than an entire role for whom that is their prime contribution, and have tons of personal power when the crux of her gameplay relies on her interaction with a specific ally."

Nope. Nope nope nope. I have not advocated adding ANY power to her at all. She needs nerfs/slight rebalancing. But in a general sense, I have no problem with her having the potential, when fed/fully built, to outclass extremely low-range, low-mobility champions if she's not locked down, because kiting is kind of her thing, and anyone particularly vulnerable to being kited SHOULD lose to her. I have no problem with her being able to out-class a summoner spell (by itself, not counting the abilities of the champion who may be wielding it) in a specific case that requires her to spend such a long time setting it up that literally anyone else in any other circumstance would have considered even attempting such a play to be eminently punishable many times over. I have no problem with her having personal power, given it's already the case that the only engagement tool in HER kit requires SOMEONE ELSE to activate it, and a large chunk of her damage requires that same ally to be present (but mercifully does not scale with that ally's attack speed on top of her own, and is gated by an on-target cooldown, because it's actually incredibly dangerous).

Teridax68Jul 5, 20151 votes

{quoted}

No, doesn't do that for every ranged champion. Only for those who have non-consumable on-hit effects that stack. Off the top of my head, only and really fit the bill. Other ADCs, not so much.

No, Runaan's applies double lifesteal and triple on-hit effects for everyone. The stacking component is also completely irrelevant.

{quoted}

Another thing it does is allow Kalista's oathsworn to do % health damage to anyone she happens to clip with a stray bolt, which is also very important to her teamfight presence, and rather a unique case for the item.

I don't think that's particularly positive in any way. It's not expressly unhealthy, but I'd rather the focus of any champion's rewards be on deliberate plays, rather than accidents. If the only reason to buy Runaan's is so that you can accidentally activate Kalista's really powerful poke passive/E reset, then I don't think that's a strong reason at all. I'm not saying Runaan's is something she shouldn't purchase, and honestly I'd like the item to be way more popular, but I'd rather it became popular for the right reasons

{quoted}

I was referring to the disadvantage of having ceded the objective to your opponent. If you let them get to and objective uncontested until the very last moment, you SHOULD lose it, unless you're bringing massive burst damage, yourself.

But that's the point: Smite is massive burst damage, except it's also shut down by Rend. Also, why should anyone auto-lose an objective just because the other team started first? Again, you're advocating an extremely binary and stale framework as a substitute for one that has been critical to the game's health and entertainment value.

{quoted}

Being able to unconditionally show up at the last second and press a single button to invalidate the advantage you gave them might make for a flashy and entertaining play, but it is NOT healthy for the game.

Yes it is. As you said yourself, Smite stealing is a risky maneuver that usually entails the sacrifice of whomever is attempting the steal. It's a maneuver that requires huge amounts of skill in timing and control, is dependent on many more factors than just a button press (vision control and map awareness, for example), and creates huge amounts of positive tension on both sides. I think Smite steals and attempts are among the healthiest and most awesome events that can happen in the game, and I feel there are many more people who would agree with me on this.

{quoted}

You feel that smite is inherently different and more meaningful to the game than other summoner spells? Fine. I don't. We're not going to get anywhere on that point.

But that's the thing: your opinion is irrelevant here because that's the way Smite is genuinely being treated. Again, see how it integrates into the jungler role and its itemization, and take a look at Riot's posts regarding the role of junglers in Season 5.

{quoted}

Rend is not a guaranteed instant kill. It requires you to let her do whatever she wants unmolested. So don't let her. If you do let her, don't complain when it works as intended.

Again, Kalista can do whatever she wants unmolested in many situations because her kit offers very few opportunities for her opponents to play against her. I am not claiming Rend should be weak, or somehow suboptimal even in a success case; in fact, I want to strengthen its success and fail cases, but I do think Rend's rewards on jungle objectives are way out of proportion with the risk involved (which isn't much).

{quoted}

You want to not only make her more susceptible to CC, but remove the most reliable CC from her kit, thereby eliminating any possibility of her actually escaping anyone without sacrificing the life of her support, OR chasing anyone who's managed to escape her attack range for a moment.

Goodness, how can a champion capable of dashing on literally every autoattack possibly escape or catch up to melee opponents? It's like she's completely immobile or something.

{quoted}

And you say this makes it fair for her to gain obscene levels of damage pressure, even in the early game, through tag-teaming with her support. So, yes, your suggested changes, even in YOUR estimation, rely on each other for justification. They are intended to strengthen the identity you think she SHOULD have, not the one she actually has.

A nerf to her abusive power would allow her ally synergy to be buffed, but those two suggestions are nonetheless independent of each other. Kalista's kiting paradigm needs improvement, and she needs a bigger focus on ally synergy.

{quoted}

And no, the abilities she has that you've arbitrarily labeled "abuse cases" due to your own distaste are not automatically unhealthy because you don't like them.

That's why I'm not arguing on my own distaste. There are objective reasons out there why some of Kalista's mechanics are abusive, which I cited. If anything, your own line of argumentation thus far has been purely based on your own opinion.

{quoted}

For example, Riot even talked about her objective control as a prominent characteristic of Rend when she was unveiled (and so did a lot of other people, so don't think they don't know about this). That is INTENDED.

That is a given, but the extent to which that objective control extended likely wasn't intended. Even Riot's own casters saw Kalista's objective control as abusive when she first saw play, and so has the community.

{quoted}

You like Olaf? Bring movespeed quints

Pre-match picks should not determine the outcome of a match. My point isn't that picking Olaf against Kalista should lead to 50/50 chances of winning (Olaf is a terrible pick against Kalista), my point is that even in a situation that bad, Olaf should have some means of fighting Kalista.

{quoted}

I really don't enjoy being hostile, especially over something that doesn't justify it.

Considering your very first response was already extremely condescending, you clearly do seem to enjoy it. I may have been sarcastic, but never disrespectful.

{quoted}

I've also noted that her winrate is anything but out of control, and there is a lot of outplay potential in most of her kit at each stage of the game. She is pretty close to being balanced, which is why I'm weirded out by people wanting to gut her.

Because clearly, win rates are a good measure for a champion's gameplay health. Also, I'm proposing to shift her power in a healthy manner, not gut her. That you think it is my intention speaks volumes about your own attitude towards this discussion.

{quoted}

anyone particularly vulnerable to being kited SHOULD lose to her.

Why? I mean, she should definitely have an advantage, but why should any champion hard counter another? Hard counters are bad because they create overly binary situations and remove depth of gameplay, so why would Kalista be exempt from that?

{quoted}

I have no problem with her being able to out-class a summoner spell

Even Kassadin , whose ultimate replicates Flash, doesn't outclass it even in the best use cases, and has heavily limitations on top of it. Why should Kalista be different? Why should she be entitled to so much privilege over an entire role?

{quoted}

I have no problem with her having personal power, given it's already the case that the only engagement tool in HER kit requires SOMEONE ELSE to activate it, and a large chunk of her damage requires that same ally to be present

Why should the most ally-dependent marksman be able to function completely fine on her own?

SoMNiaJul 6, 20151 votes

"Considering your very first response was already extremely condescending, you clearly do seem to enjoy it."

No, my first response was very matter-of-fact. I addressed only the issues. I never insulted you. The fact that you think my well-justified and clearly explained disagreement is somehow inherently disrespectful speaks volumes. But I have no problems being hostile when someone is being sarcastic, condescending, and intellectually dishonest. My patience for that sort of behavior is very limited.

"I may have been sarcastic, but never disrespectful."

The fact that you make a distinction is disgusting. Willfully sarcastic and conveniently paraphrased mischaracterizations of someone else's words, designed to make their position seem more attackable than what they actually said — in other words, straw men — are extremely disrespectful. I don't need to tell you where you can stick your sarcasm. I gave you a chance to make this more productive, and you elected instead to pretend the moral high ground. I have no more time for your pretenses. We're done here.

Teridax68Jul 6, 20151 votes

Good to know this conversation was all about you, and not a discussion on how to improve Kalista. Why did you even start this argument again?

Sona PingJul 3, 20155 votes

Additional possibilities: -Add a stack limit to E (So at level 9. she can't outsmite a jungler who is at level 18 when she doesn't even have Smite) -Remove the refresh and refund effect, and/or double Mana cost (like Expunge.) -Make E not function with Runaan's Hurricane (like with Vayne) -Take her second passive's damage down from 20% max health.

HouseCat01Jul 4, 20151 votes

what would be wrong with adding a damage cap against minions?

Sona PingJul 4, 20151 votes

...I didn't imply there was anything wrong with that?

A cap against minions&monsters is another possibility, it definitely is. I just wrote stack limit because it's better to bring it closer to Expunge; As of now, Kalista's E is pretty flagrantly designed to be "Expunge, but better", which it is in almost every respect, but it would be far healthier for the game for Kalista's E to be "Expunge, but different" and have interesting gameplay choices and consequences.

In terms of damage cap vs monsters versus stack cap, I believe that in regards to neutral monsters, a stack cap would be better. I think so because both would fulfill the same function in reducing max damage, but the stack cap would be more rewarding for the Kalista player because a player who succeeds, and gets ahead and chooses to buy AD with the earnings will be rewarded with a better Rend.

HouseCat01Jul 5, 20151 votes

sorry, i just noticed that no one had suggested one, so i was just wondering what might be wrong with it xD (thanks for the response)

Sona PingJul 6, 20151 votes

No problem. ; )

agbudarJul 3, 20155 votes

no offense "kalista main" but she will be closer to being actually balanced then the way she currently is.

its funny that you bring olaf in the mix who has it in his job description to slaughter adc seeing as he is a bruiser but CANNOT touch kalista.

news flash he will stil be unable to really touch a half decent kalista. kalista's kit is broken simple as that her rend and passive need to be switched period then you can start balancing her like give her martial poise charges or something.

SoMNiaJul 3, 20156 votes

No, she won't. This will only nerf her already weak late game. She'll still scale stupidly well with a rushed BF Sword, which is a problem they explicitly noted as a reason for making these changes. Yet they have done nothing about it.

I also don't recall anyone saying anything about being a Kalista main. Funny how you just assume anyone opposed to this totally hamfisted nerf must be abusing her strengths to win games. The reality is that these changes don't hit her where she is inappropriately strong, and therefore are NOT balanced.

Her passive...is a passive. And Rend has an active effect that is crucial to its function. You have to be able to push the button, or Rend does nothing. You CAN'T switch them. That's absurd.

News flash: even with these changes, she will STILL spank Olaf. So will Vayne. So will Caitlyn, and Tristana. This isn't because they're OP. It's because Olaf is trash. In fact, he's rather infamous for having been rendered such. Hence the people saying "don't Olaf her".

Avios1Jul 3, 20153 votes

Thing is though, Rend is only a problem due to its free smite ability to take drag/baron, and is extremely frustrating having it outscale YOUR smite as a jungler, and not allowing you to make a steal on baron/dragon. The only other champion I have been able to do more damage on a monster without smite other than kalista has been Full AP Cho'Gath, which isn't that bad, but his ult can only scale to about 400-500 bonus true damage on his ult, whereas Kalista can just keep on chucking spears at her target scaling over 1500 damage, AFTER resistances.

And Olaf isn't trash. I haven't played any single game with any champion which I have not been able to contribute to my team in some way. Olaf is moreso a counter champion vs people like Nasus and Riven, to deny farm and snowballing. Although, Vayne, Caitlyn, and Tristana also are affected by Undertow's Slow, which allows Olaf to be able to catch up to them and beat their faces in, whereas kalista has the passive in which undertow can't do shet, and his recent buff only lasts one second, where he can't really catch up to a quarter-decent kalista.

SoMNiaJul 3, 20152 votes

Okay, but Kalista can't STEAL dragon with Rend. She can only secure it, and only if she stays attacking it the whole time. If you're the jungler, and Kalista is determined to Rend dragon, kill her first. If she tries to fight you, she either loses all her stacks on dragon, or she tries to sneak in attacks on it to keep her stacks and ends up getting attacked by both it and you. Compare this to jungle Nidalee being able to toss a 700+ damage javelin just before smiting for the steal (or jungle Cho, for that matter). Not much you can do about that.

TwitchInMyPantsJul 3, 20155 votes

As much as I hate playing against kalista the last nerf was clearly a step in the right direction. Lowering her ability to hop away from melees made her so much more catchable. Personally I think the easiest to balance for kalista as well as the enemy team would be to give her the same weakness every adc has... cc. Make her hops get reduced by slows, let her keep her hypercarry damage. It'll let characters who have nothing but slows actually be relevant in setting up kills on her while letting Kalista be Kalista.

But nope instead we're going to nerf everything but the problem and repeat the mistakes we made with Kassadin.

plantersJul 4, 20151 votes

actually if you think about it allowing her to be effected by slows would probably gut her. She's already very fragile and if she gets caught it's almost a death sentence from what I know. Combine that with the fact that accessing a slow is ridiculously easy means that you will give everyone a hard shutdown on kalista. Think about it, almost every champ in the game has a slow. the only thing im pissed about is the fact that they wont get rid of the 20% health damage she can do in aa with her support. that is oppressive as hell in my opinion.

TwitchInMyPantsJul 4, 20153 votes

{quoted}

actually if you think about it allowing her to be effected by slows would probably gut her. She's already very fragile and if she gets caught it's almost a death sentence from what I know. Combine that with the fact that accessing a slow is ridiculously easy means that you will give everyone a hard shutdown on kalista. Think about it, almost every champ in the game has a slow. the only thing im pissed about is the fact that they wont get rid of the 20% health damage she can do in aa with her support. that is oppressive as hell in my opinion.

Um, that happens to any adc without an escape and it's often balanced by their range and abilities. Kalista has a slow, knockup, and jumps for as long as she stays alive and with her lifesteal, damages, and dodges she has the tools to lane much better than those types of champions while having similar utility. Her being just as easy to kill is a fair weakness and she can buy QSS to mitigate it.

plantersJul 4, 20151 votes

ill admit valid point. what im getting at is that making her more kill-able doesnt really help. Its not like she scales as well as a jinx or kog though she does spike harder than most adcs, earlier than most adcs. What I think they need to do is get rid of her utility in some way. removing her tank killing prowess would help, but also removing her slow, capping her spears on an object like dragon and baron, reducing the knock-up duration would all be better nerfs. In reality when they originally conceived her im surprised they didnt put her passive on a cd to give spikes of power like they did with ryze and tristana. However, when you take into account her playstyle relying more on kiting for extended periods to proc rend stacks than out right outdamaging enemies like a lucian bursting you, in my opinion, further nerfing the passive might not be a good idea. At least, thats where I was going with it.

Sona PingJul 4, 20152 votes

The thing you say would "gut" Kalista is the reality for every other Ranged AD champ; getting CC'd around a damage threat means you will likely be slain. When I actually thought about this, I realized that how Kalista is right now is how the term over-powered is defined in other games, "Common tactic for defeating characters in the game has far lesser effect on this character just because".

EvilMerodachJul 3, 20154 votes

I liked their original (or at least a pre-release stage) effect on her passive. Less damage when hopping away, 100% when hopping to side/not hopping, bonus damage when hopping toward enemy. Makes her more feast or famine, but, it at least makes her pay for her escape route with less dmg. Plus more logical, if she's throwing herself away at the same time as throwing a spear, part of the force is gonna be in the hop, so less is gonna be in the spear.

HouseCat01Jul 4, 20152 votes

newton's 3rd law of motion meets league