Just Some Thoughts About ARURF

Alright, so, I have a few things to voice about ARURF.

The first thing is I'd like to mention is I enjoy URF. In fact, it's my absolute favorite game mode, but I don't remember having nearly this many frustrations about the game mode in the past. Now I'm not sure if it's because this game mode is now being treated as "All Random" or what.

Now I'm not sure if this was luck of the draw, but I found myself consistently going against the power picks. And I can't believe I'm saying this, but I flat out did not have fun in a good portion of the games I've played this year because of the constant oppression from the following (just to name a few): Sona, Varus, Shaco, Xin Zhao, Ezreal, Malzahar, Swain, Annie, Fizz.

Let's talk about some of these picks and why they're frustrating. Okay, I get that it's URF. I get that people are SUPPOSED to spam their abilities, but I also get that people are supposed to have fun. And more often than not, when people are playing against these champions in these games, they voice their frustrations, and all say the same thing: "How is this supposed to be fun?"

Varus. Varus might be the worst. He outrages (and outranges) literally everyone and their cousin, ok. I'll put it this way. I was playing Syndra. I'm mastery 6 Syndra, and I know how to play this champion effectively. I think I had, like, a mastery 5 Orianna laning with me. The Varus basically 1v2ed. The other person laning with them didn't do much. I couldn't ever walk up and do anything. Neither of us could. The guy spammed Q after Q after Q. If I wasn't careful, half my health would be gone from a single arrow. It didn't matter that Ori had a shield. No, of course not, because his arrows shredded that shield. It became so bad that we were shoved under tower constantly, and we were being taunted by the Varus warding under our tower (basically saying, "I dare you to take the ward out") and shooting Q's like he was a nuclear bomb in the form of a machine gun. They took our tower within maybe 3-5 minutes. Eventually, the game got slightly better after I reached 6, but it's only because Ori and I literally said, "Fuck this lane," and moved on. 2 or 3 landed Q's usually were enough to take us out.

Xin Zhao. Xin. Zhao. It's a problem if a champion can successfully 1v5 if the person playing Xin has never played Xin before. It's a problem if the Xin can heal through damage from people with grievous wounds items. First of all, I think it's a little sad that we even have to buy grievous wounds items in URF. URF. Second of all, to tear through grievous wounds like they're a small papercut? Seriously? Come on.

Sona. Her skillshot-less poke. Need I say more? Oh, I do. Because she has a heal too. Like Xin Zhao, grievous wounds honestly don't mean shit because they're strong enough to begin with, and YOU CAN SPAM THEM. AND she has a speed boost. AND A HEFTY DAMAGING AOE STUN THAT IS LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO MISS WITH AN EXTREMELY LOW COOLDOWN. I don't remember the exact cooldown of her ult in URF, but it's insanely low and further decreases the cooldown of each ability as you level the ultimate up. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. All of this combined with a Lich Band. It's like a magic trick where I'll make your health bar disappear without you even noticing. I felt utterly disgusting the one time I got Sona this go-around. I was so oppressive that we ended the game at maybe, like, 13-15 minutes into the game. That's a problem.

Shaco. I sincerely hate this champion, but he's even worse in URF. Can you PLEASE put a maximum amount of boxes that Shaco is allowed to put out, like Jhin or Nidalee traps? Doesn't matter if I had a sweeper or a control ward to clear the traps (which by the way, I find it sad that I feel forced to do this in a supposed-to-be-fun game mode), because as soon as I'd clear them out, Shaco would whip out like 10 more. There was one game where I was literally feared to death by Shaco boxes level one as Ahri. It wasn't fun. Only got worse from there. Not to mention, this guy basically becomes an Eve in this game mode, because he basically has a permanent stealth at his disposal. Does it matter if he's in combat? Nope, because stealth just came off cooldown for the millionth time, and he can use it again.

Malzahar is another champion I felt disgusting playing. I felt bad for the enemy team, because I could 100-0 anyone I wanted as early as level one if I wanted. I 1v2ed as Malzahar once, actually. And the enemies were Tahm Kench and some other tank with a shield. Their shields didn't even matter. If they went in on me, it didn't matter either, because I had a silence, and my voidlings would kill them before they could say, "Oops." Still killed them with ease. I could easily solo any dragon, and I even soloed Rift Herald once. That's...a problem.

Annie is the last one I have time to talk about for the sake of time and my sanity. Pre-6 isn't too bad as Annie in URF because of how short her range is, but when you reach 6 as Annie in URF... By the time Tibbers dies, you can already summon him again most of the time. Initiation isn't a problem because you can use Protobelt every, like, 10-15 seconds, and you can flash every 60 seconds. Protobelt + Rylai's + Liandry's = not a fun time for the enemy. By the time Tibbers is done stunning the enemy when he's been summoned, Annie can spam her spell rotation and stun the enemy again before they have time to even react. If the Annie's reaction time isn't fast enough, that's okay, because Tibbers' burn will slow the enemies constantly with Rylai's, so you can just catch up to them and stun them again as many times as you need to mercilessly assassinate them with ease. Doesn't feel too fair to me. At most times post-6, I could 1v1 Irelia, Tryndamere, Katarina, Poppy, and even a Varus to name a few. That...feels like a problem.

Second of all, just a PSA... ARURF games are not your Challenjour promos, so STOP TREATING THEM LIKE IT. Some of the people haven't played certain champions they receive, so you need to calm down. Stop your ? pinging because I muted you a long time ago, and quit acting like a poor sport, because if the oppressive power picks weren't bad enough, if I'm playing someone like Kindred (whom I have only played like twice before), you bet your ass I'm not gonna have any fun at all against a Varus, so you taking this game way too seriously and being a poor sport is only going to make it worse.

Lastly, for the love of God and everything good in this world, please do not intentionally feed in these games. It ruins the experience for everyone. I totally get if you don't know how to play a champion, so just try your best, okay? I think getting ROFLstomped is okay knowing that we all at least tried our best. The one thing I ask you not to do is intentionally walk under their towers and give them free kills for whatever frustrations you may have. Just...don't act selfish. Let me put it this way... If you were playing a champion you loved, and you have a teammate or an enemy doing things like walking under tower on purpose not once...not twice...but like 15 times, how would you feel? 20 minutes of your time was wasted, no?

Hopefully I'm heard, because I'm sure I can speak for a lot of people.