Once again, Thornmail lets me down because Vayne got Mercurial Scimitar...

darkdill·Oct 6, 2016·35 votes·3,500 views

This time I reach +500 armor as Malphite, Vayne doesn't have good lifesteal, and how much damage does she take from Thorns? ZILCH.

And before you say "Thorns aren't late-game", then at what point are they ever GOOD? You get them early-to-mid game, you don't have enough armor to make the thorns strong. Get them late, they get countered by MR, lifesteal, Death's Dance, and/or Phantom Dancer.

So WHEN IS IT a good time?

(Match history doesn't seem to be working right now, but we lost the match because Cho'gath D/C'd and didn't come back.)

EDIT: To address any misinterpretations, I was not expecting the 500 armor to help me SURVIVE Vayne's damage (nothing works against Vayne). I was, however, expecting that the Thorns damage would seriously hurt Vayne, but she ended up taking nothing from it. THAT is what's pissing me off.

76 Comments

CommbustionOct 6, 201611 votes

Thornmail is late game. She wasn't taking damage because she is a bitch.

HopeslayerOct 6, 20169 votes

too bad no item counters vayne

build hp? oh she does % hp build armor? oh she does true damage

Civet10Oct 6, 20164 votes

Frozen heart and randuins

MelledoneusOct 6, 20161 votes

The attack speed slows are insignificant because they hardly hit attack speed at all. 15% attack speed reduction? Cool. 15% Attack speed reduction only when focused? Double cool. Doesn't stop Vayne from lifestealing off of me and chunking my HP, nor does it force her to focus me instead of critting my allies to death.

But Vayne is child's play compared to Graves. No matter how much armor and HP you build against that fucker he still bursts you down.

KingKong2350Oct 6, 20161 votes

Attack speed slows will always be more effective than attack speed items. FYI

MelledoneusOct 6, 20161 votes

I disagree. Unless you're playing Malphite, attack speed slows don't feel impactful in a teamfight where you need it most.

KingKong2350Oct 9, 20161 votes

I mean that attack speed items add to your base attack speed, where as attack speed slows take away from your total attack speed. The math means that the slows will always do more damage than AS buffs

5000000000000000Oct 6, 20163 votes

It reduces lifesteal and DPS by 15%, so I think that's a pretty big deal.

NineTailedMysticOct 6, 20161 votes

Randuin's AS Slow isn't active. It's the Cold Steel passive off of Wardens that slows AS by 15% when attacked on top of Frozen Heart's Aura.

MelledoneusOct 6, 20161 votes

Randuin's attack speed slow passive has a CD.

NineTailedMysticOct 6, 20163 votes

"When hit by basic attacks, reduces the attackers Attack Speed by 15%. (1 second duration)"

I don't see a CD here.

MelledoneusOct 6, 20161 votes

I stand corrected. Hard to read in the sun when you're on mobile.

PermabannedGarenOct 6, 20168 votes

If people want thornmail to be a good item late game that counters lifesteal in a bigger way then they should have to pay more than 2,350 gold for it lol.

darkdillOct 6, 20167 votes

I'd be fine with that. At least Thornmail wouldn't be a POS item that requires too many stats to actually work (kinda like Spell Vamp).

CommbustionOct 6, 20169 votes

2,350 gold because it only gives armor and the passive. No other stats not effects. That's the reason it costs low

RocketRelmOct 6, 20161 votes

To be fair, if one wants to make thornmail the "halp the enemy adc has 20% life steal and deals over nine hundred damage every hit" item, they could just give it anew passive that makes life steal and lifesteal-like effects on autoattacks (ex: Hextech Gunblade, Death's Dance) have halved effectiveness (stackable multiplicatively with grievous wounds).

You could lower the reflected damage amount to compensate for this kind of passive, but it would give thornmail a real niche spot as an item.

PermabannedGarenOct 6, 20161 votes

{quoted}

To be fair, if one wants to make thornmail the "halp the enemy adc has 20% life steal and deals over nine hundred damage every hit" item, they could just give it anew passive that makes life steal and lifesteal-like effects on autoattacks (ex: Hextech Gunblade, Death's Dance) have halved effectiveness (stackable multiplicatively with grievous wounds).

You could lower the reflected damage amount to compensate for this kind of passive, but it would give thornmail a real niche spot as an item.

For 2,350 gold with the same stats?

RomtheguyOct 6, 20161 votes

No, of course not! Perish that silly thought

AazzlanoOct 6, 20161 votes

Wtf? It has 85% gold efficiency for the stats.

Meanwhile Youmou's is 155% gold efficient with the active. But no Thornmail is a problem and can't be buffed

PermabannedGarenOct 6, 20162 votes

{quoted}

Wtf? It has 85% gold efficiency for the stats.

Meanwhile Youmou's is 155% gold efficient with the active. But no Thornmail is a problem and can't be buffed

Youmuu's is being changed to be less problematic, if you'd let go of your bias for a minute and research this shit you might know that.

And yes, an item that literally punishes an ADC for having the audacity to try to do their job is a problem.

AazzlanoOct 6, 20161 votes

I'm aware of that. I'm also aware that it has not been nerfed for an incredibly long time now. My point is that if that item can remain that incredibly broken for that long, warping the entire game singlehandedly for no reason, why should Thornmail be stuck with shit gold efficiency? Makes no sense.

Executioner's Calling shows that Grievous Wounds on-hit is 'worth' 275 gold. If you added that effect to Thornmail, it would have 2275 gold worth of stats/effect before the damage reflect active. That's still not gold efficient. Considering the passive is also terrible, it still wouldn't make the item worth the gold or more importantly, the item slot.

And lol Maw punishes Mages for trying to do their job. All that happens is that you give your opponent a bunch of free stats. Considering Maw is also 142%+ gold efficient with the proc, why is that item allowed to exist then?

RivuoOct 8, 20161 votes

{quoted}

I'm aware of that. I'm also aware that it has not been nerfed for an incredibly long time now. My point is that if that item can remain that incredibly broken for that long, warping the entire game singlehandedly for no reason, why should Thornmail be stuck with shit gold efficiency? Makes no sense.

Executioner's Calling shows that Grievous Wounds on-hit is 'worth' 275 gold. If you added that effect to Thornmail, it would have 2275 gold worth of stats/effect before the damage reflect active. That's still not gold efficient. Considering the passive is also terrible, it still wouldn't make the item worth the gold or more importantly, the item slot.

And lol Maw punishes Mages for trying to do their job. All that happens is that you give your opponent a bunch of free stats. Considering Maw is also 142%+ gold efficient with the proc, why is that item allowed to exist then?

No idea what games you are playing.

Thornmail completely voids an adc from hitting the person who bought it for the first 20-30 minutes of the game.

You sell it late game.

Because you bought item 3075 the adc now has to rush item 3036 and item 3139

RogueWillOct 9, 20161 votes

item 3075 doesnt work with its gold efficiency. the item that works is item 3110 because it sits at 103% gold efficiency, but if you don't need the mana is back to 80% and that's why only tanks with mana issues buys it, since only on them is gold efficiency is worth the time.

Tanks now a days are better off buying juggernaut items than true tanks items because of how they underperform.

RivuoOct 9, 20161 votes

{quoted}

doesnt work with its gold efficiency. the item that works is because it sits at 103% gold efficiency, but if you don't need the mana is back to 80% and that's why only tanks with mana issues buys it, since only on them is gold efficiency is worth the time.

Tanks now a days are better off buying juggernaut items than true tanks items because of how they underperform.

You do realize that just because a website says an item is x % efficiency doesnt mean its x % effiency for all given situations...

Thornmail completely voids an adc from hitting you until they get merc scimitar and lord dom so..

RogueWillOct 10, 20161 votes

I play tanks a lot and I can tell you that item 3075 is close to useless since there is no real good time to get it. It needs at least another heavy armor item to work (or two smaller ones) so you can't get it early and late game the adc will lifesteal out of you regardless since it will be close to full build.

item 3742 item 3143 will yield better results than item 3083 item 3075 . The fact that the items needs another heavy armor item with it also interferes with your item slots for magic resists.Since its passive is close to useless I have to rely on its base stats to see if it is worth my time.

It honestly the niche woudl be a full AD team and you get it as third item, that is the only time I woudl see it fissile to get it and even then I woudl just rather grab a item 3110

RivuoOct 10, 20161 votes

{quoted}

I play tanks a lot and I can tell you that is close to useless since there is no real good time to get it. It needs at least another heavy armor item to work (or two smaller ones) so you can't get it early and late game the adc will lifesteal out of you regardless since it will be close to full build.

will yield better results than . The fact that the items needs another heavy armor item with it also interferes with your item slots for magic resists.Since its passive is close to useless I have to rely on its base stats to see if it is worth my time.

It honestly the niche woudl be a full AD team and you get it as third item, that is the only time I woudl see it fissile to get it and even then I woudl just rather grab a

Anyone who says thornmail is trash has no game knowledge.

1 800 Top LaneOct 6, 20166 votes

I tend to agree, I'm not sure about your position with Vayne but I do feel thornmail is very weak at this point in time. There is no drawback to the idiotic ADC steamroll games we have right now. I remember having over 400 armor on malphite, and I died to a lucian, who was actually outhealing the thornmail effects with just right clicking. It makes the item pointless.

darkdillOct 6, 20162 votes

To be fair, the Vayne was good. Unfortunately, we were 4v5 and a late-game Vayne isn't supposed to be survivable. Though it was certainly a b!tch to see her not seriously hurting herself when attacking me.

JackMcSnipeyzOct 6, 20163 votes

Lucian build usually has good armor shred, AND just because you buy thornmail doesn't mean no ADC can fight you, life steal counters thornmail, if thornmail would outdamage an ADC with life steal tanks would br unstoppable. I think a good suggestion was to add grevious wound to thormail when it's being attacked - that way it will reduce the healing but you wont outdamage ADC by getting hit.

Arcus DiabolusOct 9, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Lucian build usually has good armor shred, AND just because you buy thornmail doesn't mean no ADC can fight you, life steal counters thornmail, if thornmail would outdamage an ADC with life steal tanks would br unstoppable. I think a good suggestion was to add grevious wound to thormail when it's being attacked - that way it will reduce the healing but you wont outdamage ADC by getting hit.

Life steal does NOT counter Thornmail.

JackMcSnipeyzOct 9, 20161 votes

Life steal DOES kinda counter thornmail. A tank with thornmail against an ADC without life steal can outdamage the carry with CC and his items (sunfire, frozen fist w/e). If the ADC has lifesteal, he can outheal the damage of the thornmail making it almost unfelt, so it does counter it.

PermabannedGarenOct 6, 20167 votes

[{quoted}](name=1 800 Top Lane,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=7uvfEWL3,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2016-10-06T05:24:01.485+0000)

I tend to agree, I'm not sure about your position with Vayne but I do feel thornmail is very weak at this point in time. There is no drawback to the idiotic ADC steamroll games we have right now. I remember having over 400 armor on malphite, and I died to a lucian, who was actually outhealing the thornmail effects with just right clicking. It makes the item pointless.

So you're saying that your 2,350 gold item couldn't completely negate his 3,700 gold item?

Huh... whoa, weird.

MatezoideOct 6, 20164 votes

> 2016 > Buying Thomail

LUL

darkdillOct 6, 20162 votes

4/5 physical?

DarkRitualOct 6, 20164 votes

Still better off buying a second Randuin's Omen instead of Thornmail. Or GA. Or Zz'Rot. Or Warmogs if you already have two armor items.

Oh yeah, Frozen Heart is also pretty good against Vayne, and the passive stacks wth Omen's to boot. Vayne prioritizes Attack Speed for the true damage procs, so hitting that stat hard hurts her damage output a lot.

Tumble proc also doesn't get damage reflected, since it's an ability's damahe, not damage from a basic attack. Ranger's Focus is similar.

Thornmail is actually just complete garbage this season. If they made it reflect some of all physical damage (rebalanced with that effect in mind obviously), it would actually be a decent item.

Guy Fox TeemoOct 6, 20162 votes

Having Armor and no health doesn't mean shit, especially against vayne who does TRUE DAMAGE. She probably took damage, but you most likely died before it mattered. Also Armor and Magic Resist have a soft cap at around 350 , which after that theres no real reason to build most resists.

darkdillOct 6, 20165 votes

Well, when you're Malphite, going over that soft cap still helps because it makes Ground Slam and Brutal Strikes hurt more. Also, if you have super-high armor, it makes item 3036 item 3033 item 3035 item 3071 ineffective against you because even after they reduce your armor, you'll still have a large amount left over that overpowers the ArPen effect (unless the math mysteriously doesn't work like that).

Also, going super-high armor is supposed to give you a lot of Thorns damage from Thornmail, but it never works out in practice because you also require MPen, which tanks cannot allocate. It's basically the same problem Spell Vamp had; too many stats are required to make Thorns good.

I have to assume this is intended and that Riot thinks Thorns are toxic, but I'd love for them to prove me wrong.

And for reference, I did get a couple of health items against Vayne. Had item 1401 item 3110 item 3102 item 3047 item 3025 item 3075

But remember, her % true damage doesn't have a flat value anymore; it's just % of max HP. So even if I had 5k HP, she'd kill me just as fast.

RebonackOct 6, 20162 votes

Thorn has been pretty awful ever since Riot remade it. If Riot wants to keep it as a soak item, they should remove the silly bonus armor based damage, buff the damage return percentage, and add a Grievous Wounds passive that procs when you slap someone in the face. Maybe with a small amount of OnHit damage to go with it. Because lets be clear here. Shoulder-checking someone with a coat of spiked armor is going to mess them up.

DarkRitualOct 6, 20162 votes

Ii think making it reflect physical damage (and not just damage from basic attacks) is a better route. Rebalance the build/cost/stats around the damage reflection amount. Major mechanical change, that doesn't really change the need or "feel" for what the item is meant to do or who it's meant to be built against.

RebonackOct 6, 20164 votes

{quoted}

Ii think making it reflect physical damage (and not just damage from basic attacks) is a better route. Rebalance the build/cost/stats around the damage reflection amount. Major mechanical change, that doesn't really change the need or "feel" for what the item is meant to do or who it's meant to be built against.

So what you're saying is that you want to see Zed explode when his Ult pops?

I approve.

DarkRitualOct 6, 20162 votes

Or Jinx ulting to kill herself, that could be fun to see. Imagine the Worlds Casters going apeshit over a map-long ult missing a target and hitting a thornnail'd enemy instead and dieing from the reflection!

RebonackOct 6, 20162 votes

{quoted}

Or Jinx ulting to kill herself, that could be fun to see. Imagine the Worlds Casters going apeshit over a map-long ult missing a target and hitting a thornnail'd enemy instead and dieing from the reflection!

I had a nearly dead Ezreal kill himself by hitting me with a Mystic Shot the other day. It was absolutely hilarious. I would totally support seeing Lucian getting his Ult sponged by a Thorn user and him getting killed as a result.

RomtheguyOct 6, 20161 votes

A permanently-on Dota 2 Blademail? Sounds amazing! Maybe.

TrevorLikesMyUwUOct 6, 20162 votes

This is pretty sad hearing you complain about her not taking any damage because I'm assuming she bought Merc because you keep bringing it up which would negate the affects of thornmail but it costs a lot more. Also her burst comes from her q so armor would help a lot against vayne but you still want a lot of health. Lastly you aren't supposed to just walk up to vayne and let her auto you to death you have to lock her down and play around the third auto in order to not get shredded. However I do agree vayne is a little overpowered right now

ProfDrDeathOct 6, 20162 votes

How dare she counters your mighty 2350 gold item with a simple 3700 gold item?

And I bet that, given your Armor values, she was still utterly denied her Lifesteal when hitting you - which is the actual purpose of Thornmail.

WinTheWarOnPantsOct 6, 20162 votes

armor in general is very weak do to the massive amount of armor pen that is thankfully going to be taken care of in the pre-season(according to meddler). thorn mail was pretty terrible after the nerfs and now it's just completely worthless. there is no time you should buy thorn-mail right now. better to buy an armor item that has a useful passive/active like item 3742 item 3068 item 3143

The Yetii RiderOct 6, 20161 votes

Armor is significantly stronger against assassins and bruisers than it is against carries, because cooldowns.

Rush Thornmail against Zed. That's when it's good.

LaserDeathBladeOct 6, 20161 votes

Thornmail mitigates lifesteal

Late game LS on carries actually gives them an absurd amount of health, having a Thornmail makes a huge impact on their survivability.

SelegunOct 7, 20161 votes

Something I found out a while back so I'll pass it along. If you are going to buy a thornmail its a very good idea to invest in magic penetration. Try working an item 3001 into your build or take some marks to help beef up the damage.