Responding to Feedback about the Zyra Update

Zyra is basically the only champion I play so I have been following the discussion about her potential update with avidity. I wanted to briefly respond to some of the ideas that have been floated about her: the main things being about her plants and passive.

1. I do NOT want more power loaded into her plants. This is an idea that I have heard often, and I agree that her plants are a very visible aspect of her kit. But this approach to making Zyra distinctive seems misguided.

• I'm not sure it would reward / encourage especially skillful play. Yes you spawn them, you can direct them if getting within auto-attack range doesn't mean instant death. But once spawned they do autonomous targeted damage and are rather un-interactive. It often feels like my plants are most effective because of enemy misplays--e.g. low health adc running past plants to support a jungle gank, enemy continuing to trade or take harass within plant range, etc. I would rather not have my damage output / power budget positioned in such a way that I am relying more on mistakes. Also, my opponent should probably be most rewarded for playing around my root cool down; it's not well telegraphed or easy to keep track of when I have seeds stored. Basically, I'm not a Heimer main and don't want to see Zyra moved in that direction. • Zyra's theme and lore offers so much rich potential that is significantly underutilized and could be developed in other parts of her kit. To me her biggest problem is that, as I think as somebody put it, 'she feels like a generic mage with a plant skin.' I would rather see creative tweaks or changes to the way she uses her Q/E/R that highlight her organic nature rather than 'moar plants.' • It would be nice to have an actual ability to use on W. Maybe a plant spawns when you intersect a Q and E to avoid getting rid of the art assets. But assuming her power were reallocated accordingly I wouldn't be sad if they were just taken out altogether. (RIP jungle Zyra.)

2. Her passive, for reasons I do not entirely understand, is commonly accepted as trash and in need of ditching. I don't find this to be the case at all.

• I actually find it quite consonant with her theme and lore, which is rather satisfying. • In a close duel mid lane it can mean the difference between trading 1 for 1 or giving up a free kill, and it can be incredibly decisive bot lane and determine whether your adc gets a double kill or you go down 0-2. • Yes, it's hard to hit and there's a delay that causes you to sometimes misfire in the heat of battle. But it's not impossible and the whole point of a skillshot is that it's not guaranteed but rewarding when you land it. • When I play champs who aren't Zyra I really miss being able to influence the battlefield after a death. It's kind of fun. Given that Zyra is one of the most killed supports on average its almost never useless, and is less about encouraging bad play than letting you interact after the inevitable.

3. Her core weaknesses of "slow, immobile, dies immediately if you get on top of her" should not be removed or mitigated. A number of people have suggested making her less squishy or giving her some sort of healing mechanic. No way. Her weaknesses are clearly defined. If she had that much aoe damage and CC and tankiness she would be broken. (Looking at you Poppy.)

4. At the same time, it seems that something could be done to enhance her ability to keep threats at bay. Given how fragile you are, how carefully you try to play around not letting enemies get close despite their many means of doing so, it feels rather unrewarding to land everything and still fail. You can get a long distance snare on somebody with a slow plant, build Rylais and continue kiting back with slowing Q+W plants, pop spooky ghosts, land your second snare when it comes off cooldown, and still die to the Udyr, who, without a gap closer, that whole time, was still just 'running at you.'

p.s. Please no cheesy tentacles / terrain interactions.