Can people stop overglorifying previous seasons?

SaltyToplaneGoat·Aug 28, 2015·102 votes·5,272 views

Because it seems that nostaliga is making you blind.

Sure, balance right now is not in it's best state (although they had a really good run during the tank meta), but I would still prefer it over the times when Kassadin had like a 100% Ban rate, Xin Zhao outclassed every other jungler by default, the horror of release Zyra; Le Blanc still having her silence while dealing even more damage, Jayce being completly obnoxious, etc etc.

All you complain that you can't play "out of meta" - well guess what, you actually can. Ya all are way too Meta-Sheepish to actually try things out. Play Lulu jungle with a Runeglaive and wreck them with polymorph ganks. Fulltank Seju not cutting it? Focus on HP/AP + MPen and your AOE damage can eradicate entire teams while you are still tanky. And those are just examples from my experience and I'm sure there is still a ton of champs out there than can work somehow.

Stop letting LCS and esports dictate how you play on your Bronze/Silver/Gold games (or hell, even plat). Solo Q and 5vs5 preamde esports are two completly different universes and what might be unviable in one might be completly strong on the other.

So stop complaining now, go get into teambuilder and try weird shit out! AP-Blitz Jungle with a Runeglaive, a RoA and a tear. Nami top or mid. Sion support! Whatever. JUST FUCKING DO IT. And when it works, try it in ranked and faceroll those meta-morons who will have no clue how to react to your pick!

135 Comments

GuiltyGeckoAug 29, 201529 votes

I have to somewhat agree. People talk about how great other seasons were, but as a Support Main myself, I have no desire to go back to S2 and be a ward bot that only gets philo stone and HoG.

Angelofchaos16xAug 29, 20153 votes

Ohhhhh god, please no, not that shit again

RoMzAug 30, 20153 votes

I don't main support but I do like playing it when I don't get mid in solo queue and i personally preferred S3 support carrying through vision is what I found fun about it. Having only 3 wards and 1 pink down at a time is kinda lame

Tails DollAug 30, 20151 votes

Thank god I'm not the only one. I loved getting 10 wards on the map, knowing that I would always have full vision of the enemy team. Plus having an oracle all game long baby. Sure, it wasnt flashy, it wasnt LCSBIGPLAYS. But it was effective, it was fun, and it was awesome. Now I can barely cover all entracne to bot lane :S

Hypochondria9Aug 30, 20151 votes

In season 1 there was no support mains, ADC went mid and the rest was pretty open to play whatever. You didn't even have a jungler every game, I remember playing ranked games with no jungler. My friend and I use to play whatever combos we wanted to and no one ever cared. There was still rage if you did bad but never for your pick, there wasn't any overloaded "I'm good at everything" champs.

EnosetcAug 28, 201513 votes

it's not exactly nostalgia goggles when you consider the fact that the last four times riot tried to rework champions they made the game noticeably worse

we had a bit of a "golden age" back when you could just ban sej and grag in draft and be sorta okay. now there's just ~~tumors~~ juggernauts everywhere

SaltyToplaneGoatAug 28, 201516 votes

Well 40-50% of their reworks kinda fall flat. Sion was awesome, Karma was a fail, Gangplank was perfect, Juggernauts are a disappointment. Fiora on the other hand was good again.

Well, the tank meta was kinda fine, but then sated devourer came out...

TurquoiseYoshiAug 29, 20152 votes

Gangplank was a good rework, but needed some numbers changes. Critplank is a bit too strong.

Ming the PandaAug 29, 20153 votes

Darius isn't that bad. He isn't as bursty as he used to be but i definitely feel like he has more impact late game

SaltyToplaneGoatAug 29, 20151 votes

Still they kind of failed. The heal just feels awkward to use and to play against, they lost the change to turn his W into an actual ability that is not some empowered attack and the passive... 5 stacks for one hit? That's too much. They just should have made it so that he applies 2 stacks per hit when in bloodrage. Would work a bit better now I think...

Left Hook LarryAug 29, 20152 votes

Why did Riot give sustain to a lane bully champion that only weakness in lane was no sustain

AutoreactiveCD4Aug 29, 20153 votes

Maybe its just me, but I feel like he isn't really a lane bully anymore. The delay on Q, reduced damage and the bleed not being magic damage anymore. Maybe that's just me, though.

Left Hook LarryAug 29, 20151 votes

The hotfix made his q way better than before and it barely uses mana

AutoreactiveCD4Aug 30, 20151 votes

Didn't know he got hotfixed. Ignore me until I check this out.

Left Hook LarryAug 30, 20151 votes

He got hotfix buffed while they hotfix nerfed Skarner on the same day

GorgannanAug 29, 20152 votes

Darius is too weak, then too strong, but once they get the balance down I think he'll be a success.

BeldoriAug 29, 20151 votes

New Darius is way too feast or famine now,he is weak but if he snowballs at all he quickly becomes stupidly hard to kill due to the heal on his Q and insane damage ratio on it as well. If he gets too big a buff he will become fotm just for what damage he can do quickly

GorgannanAug 29, 20151 votes

Buff his bases, nerf his scaling and heal.

Perfect.

BeldoriAug 30, 20151 votes

Too bad they are buffing his base heal with his base damage as well so he is gonna be strong, also I've learned from playing him that his new auto range is ridiculous during lane phase

Spacesuit SpiffAug 29, 201512 votes

"The game was perfectly balanced in the season i started playing" -people who dont realize that when they started they werent familiar enough to talk balance. Hell i thought nunu was the only good jungler until sunmoner level 15.

"Now is the worst time for balance in leagues history!" -chicken little. To these people its always the worst time, the sky is always falling, the apocalypse of thrir religion of choice is always within the next 30 years

Thats like a quarter of the front page on any given day right there.

AutoreactiveCD4Aug 29, 20153 votes

Lack of knowledge, experience, and the nostalgia factor really does cloud ones judgment. I'd say the worst balance period I've played through was when Lee, Elise and Eve were THE junglers (was this season 4?). These three basically defined who you could and couldn't play anywhere. After almost an entire freaking season they did something about it. Elise got gutted, eve got a few changes and indirect changes made Lee less desirable. Also fuck the assassin meta (season 3).

My favorite time in balance recently when the tank meta was calming down a bit, cinderhulk wasn't as ridiculous but still strong. Immobile champs could do things, assassin's could do things but had to be smart, and ADCs needed to get to late game to bust through these tanks.

5000000000000000Aug 28, 20158 votes

Back in my day, you couldn't get extra base AD from items. Man, 5.15 were the days.

ReshiKillimAug 28, 20154 votes

People seem to have forgotten Warkitty days.

SaltyToplaneGoatAug 28, 20158 votes

Ah yes, Nida spears with a fatter hitbox with EVEN MORE damage... one of the most obnoxious midlanes to play ever...

AuryielAug 29, 201511 votes

item 3089 MasterYi

SaltyToplaneGoatAug 29, 20152 votes

enters flashback of traumatic memories

Oh god those were dark times...

DorkunedAurasAug 29, 20151 votes

how to AP yi: QQQQQ PENTAKILL At least Kat has to mash her face across 4 buttons instead of one.

encyclopedeaAug 29, 20153 votes

Hey, you forgot that ap yi wasn't always mashing buttons. Sometimes he pressed W and went for a coffee break

DorkunedAurasAug 30, 20152 votes

There should've been a thing with AP yi where if he gets 1000 AP and presses W, the mario starman theme plays.

SEKAIAug 29, 20154 votes

Shit or diarrhea argument.

S2 had less BS than all the seasons following after it, what's there to not like about that?

The only major horror back in S2 was metagolem and that's mostly it.

When a huge group of people are having the exact complaint/opinion, the thing you should do is to verify that whether or not this is due to hivemind mentality or really being the case, instead of simply brushing everything off using a strawman "you're a sheep" argument.

You can tell people that they don't have to play by meta for all eternity, but the reality is that while yeah you DON'T HAVE TO but you DO NEED TO if you don't want to intentionally handicap yourself in this game, which shouldn't even be the case in the first place.

I think just reading the LoL's balance history should already speak volumes about how pedestrian some of the Riot's staffs are, especially the newer ones.

These are why people are thinking that previous seasons are far better even when they were in actuality, not so great back then. Shouldn't that already rang a few alarms to how screwed up this game's current situation is atm?

JustMyBassCannonAug 29, 20153 votes

The only problem with S2 was metagolem.

Which literally meant that there was zero build variation.

Because there was only one good way to build any archetype of champion in all games ever.

That and the fact that there were a handful of 100%-banned champions because the metagolem didn't know what the hell they could do about them.

SEKAIAug 29, 20152 votes

{quoted}

The only problem with S2 was metagolem.

Which literally meant that there was zero build variation.

Because there was only one good way to build any archetype of champion in all games ever.

That and the fact that there were a handful of 100%-banned champions because the metagolem didn't know what the hell they could do about them.

I could use the exact same argument OP used and tell you that,

"You don't have to build metagolem to play in S2", yeah see how stupid it sounds yea?

But the thing is, metagolem only hindered build variation in the bruiser section and affected almost virtually nobody else in terms of item sets.

When I said that metagolem was really a big deal in S2, I wasn't referring to it somehow killed the item balance because it really didn't. It was a problem because a team could have 5 bruisers with the exact same build and tear the enemy team apart so brutally it's not even funny.

But that got nerfed rather quickly anyway, if my memory serves me correctly.

In terms of the general balance in S2, I would say it really was kinda great, though push comp has probably been more dominating than others. But within 1 season alone, S2 had several meta come and gone and it really was nice seeing people puzzling all sorts of crazy ideas/themes into their teams instead of matching roles like thesedays and have it work, as evident by the S2 Worlds which imo is the craziest and enjoyable championship yet.

S2 was definitely not the best thing ever, true, but I don't think that it being generally remembered by a lot of people as LoL's best season is really wrong at all.

JustMyBassCannonAug 29, 20152 votes

{quoted}

I could use the exact same argument OP used and tell you that,

"You don't have to build metagolem to play in S2", yeah see how stupid it sounds yea?

Except you can't, because the metagolem was quite literally the best way to play by a massive margin. It wasn't a slight difference between meta and non-meta play, the meta ruled the damn game for everyone.

But the thing is, metagolem only hindered build variation in the bruiser section and affected almost virtually nobody else in terms of item sets.

There was no item variation in any archetype that wasn't pure tanks (which were overshadowed by bruisers) or support (which didn't have near as many useful tools as they do now).

When I said that metagolem was really a big deal in S2, I wasn't referring to it somehow killed the item balance because it really didn't. It was a problem because a team could have 5 bruisers with the exact same build and tear the enemy team apart so brutally it's not even funny.

But that got nerfed rather quickly anyway, if my memory serves me correctly.

It was nerfed gradually, piece by piece, until near the end of the season when it finally died with Atma's. Then assassins had their time to shine for the rest of the season.

In terms of the general balance in S2, I would say it really was kinda great, though push comp has probably been more dominating than others. But within 1 season alone, S2 had several meta come and gone and it really was nice seeing people puzzling all sorts of crazy ideas/themes into their teams instead of matching roles like thesedays and have it work, as evident by the S2 Worlds which imo is the craziest and enjoyable championship yet.

S2 was definitely not the best thing ever, true, but I don't think that it being generally remembered by a lot of people as LoL's best season is really wrong at all.

Each season has had its bullshit. I can agree that Season 2 was probably the least obvious about it, but they all have issues. They've all been controlled by a meta, although I'm still sticking with the idea that later seasons are less meta-dictated, if mostly because the champion pool is over triple the game's starting count, and that diversity leads to more counter-meta potential.

If it was your favorite, cool, w/e. If not, w/e. Personally, I'm less in the Season and more in the mindset of understanding yesterday's data, today's problem and tomorrow's changes.

encyclopedeaAug 29, 20151 votes

the metagolem was quite literally the best way to play by a massive margin.

Remember Moscow 5? Mid evelynn? AP Yi? Counter-jungle top Shyvanna?

The metagolem got rekt quite a number of times (before it started absorbing things and that's how we got to where we are today, except with a few nerfs from Rito to make sure that people didn't play as much weird stuff).

JustMyBassCannonAug 29, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Remember Moscow 5? Mid evelynn? AP Yi? Counter-jungle top Shyvanna?

Yeah, I remember seeing those.

I could be recalling incorrectly, but weren't they also either nerfed or nearly perma-banned when they happened?

encyclopedeaAug 30, 20151 votes

They were after a little, but the point still stands that teams (ok, maybe just Moscow 5, everyone else was too busy farming til 50 min back then) COULD break the meta fairly easily back then.

Also, the other thing about off-meta builds back then is that Riot didn't consider them/didn't balance for them, so when people DID discover them, they tended to be quite unbalanced.

SaiannaAug 29, 20153 votes

Best META was long before season 1. Looong before ranked games. When everyone had no idea what he's doing.

I miss those times more than anything..

ChargeItDownMidAug 29, 20152 votes

[deleted]

ModCaptainMårvelousAug 29, 20151 votes

Metagolem or reported.

Crowe StalkerAug 29, 20152 votes

Honestly in my experience the Meta for Season 5 has been the best I've ever seen (then again I started around the time of Jinx ) I've never seen so many options for absolutely everyone going anywhere. Sure, there were metas, but pretty much everything (that wasn't absolutely retarded) worked. Of course, then Riot released item 3931 and now the only people I want to play are Rammus and Malphite because literally anyone else will get their asses handed to them by 20 minutes.

KarKzzAug 29, 20153 votes

My two favorites meta used to be : The one with the "Spirit" jungle items, and the cinderhulk (the one before the last patch).

Tanks meta are generaly the best, ADCs can not die in under two second if the support is not here, Tank can tank and hit those sweet game changing ultimates. Assassins have to use their brain to succefully do their job, support can do other things than "throw everything when the assassin jump in" in assassins metas, midlaners have more choices in their build, and since there is less "hurrdurur rollface assassin", they can, you know, have fun.

AutoreactiveCD4Aug 30, 20151 votes

By Spirit jungle items do you mean season 3? The assassin meta gives me flash backs man...Season 4 seems to be blocked out of my memory entirely. But I know there was a jungle trinity that just would not go away.

Maybe I remember these incorrectly. It's kind of interesting that you'd pick 2 almost complete opposite metas. If i'm wrong just feel free to correct.

KarKzzAug 30, 20151 votes

S4. If i remember right, they nerfed assassins in that season ? not sure. I loved tank , because they were quite not played, but were still pretty good, just "off meta". I like the pre-devourer meta the most, because it was the most balanced between roles to me. Well, even if the other enchant were pretty meh. I think the "balance" and "fun" goes downhill since the devourer patch.

It only was a small nerf to the cinderhulk to, but i just straight up hate the devourer. It's just so fucking boring to play agaist those, since most of it's users are "right click and annoying to counter" champion. I think that instead of nerfing a bit the cinderhulk, they should have made warrior better/more interactive, and the devourer less strong. It nearly have the same power of the warrior early, and once you have sated, you become beast, even if you only build BOTRK then full tank.

LudovicoAug 29, 20151 votes

I don´t overglorify anything...

I just miss Karma and Xerath, and am thus more critical to changes Riot makes.

JustMyBassCannonAug 29, 20151 votes

As someone who played both the old and new versions of Karma and Xerath, I vastly prefer the newer versions. They actually feel effective, instead of either helpless or overwhelming depending on your opponents.

LudovicoAug 31, 20152 votes

Well that´s the cool things about opinions - they differ.

Karma: Yea her new kit is effective. I like playing it too - she´s currently my best ranked champion. But she just doesn´t incorporate ANY theme whatsoever. The fact that she is still named "Karma" makes me want to puke.

In the old version every ability was part of the "karma" theme.

The passive - dropping low on hp equals in a higher ap.
Q - Healing vs. Dmg
W - Her best ability considering the theme: Slow/speed your enemy/ally + mantra effect on units that touch the connection. There was just so much gameplay!
R - 2 Mantra boni, giving you CHOICE. Combos are possible.

The new one?

Passive - don´t even know what the passive is... no kidding.
Q - Generic skillshot. Like Lux e with unit collision.
W - point and click Leblanc e. Mantra bonus? Longer snare. Wow.
R - 1 bonus effect.

No ability even remotely has anything to do with karma. Just generic abilities that are effective on other champions.

Xerath: Yes Xer is also effective. I dislike playing him but still have a 70 % ranked winrate on him (just stating so you know, that I just blindly complain without knowing anything about it^^). But there´s nothing besides his ult, that was improved by his rework.

Q - Just a clone of Varus Q. Yay for recycle. The really funny thing is, that Varus can do everything Xerath can - just better and more reliable. W - Kinda reminds me of something... Varus E maybe? Veiger W? Or maybe... oh just scrap it. E - Elise E? Just in lightning. Pretty sure after Tarics rework his stun will be 100% the same.

And before? His whole kit had a kind of synergie. Basic combos such as e + q that required skill to land. Combine them with the increased range on w (which CC´ed yourself, making it rly easy to engage on you). There was a tradeback to almost everything you did.

The reason he got trashed... recycled..., wait now I´ve got it: "reworked" - was because of the magic penetration of the W and the W+E+R combo. But instead of working with the cool idea and making it work (not making the ult proc e, or just change only the ult), Riot used already working parts of the game, and put them together like some kind of Frankenstein band aid.

And to your last point of either being useless/overwhelming. I was never useless against anyone with the old Xerath. The only ones that were a pain in the ass are the same ones that are annoying even today - Fizz/Annie/etc. And with the old kit, you even had MORE options to fight against them.

So I think the baseline is: Yea they are "effective". But in terms of uniqueness of the character/options to use the kit - they are horrible.

JustMyBassCannonAug 31, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Well that´s the cool things about opinions - they differ.

Karma: Yea her new kit is effective. I like playing it too - she´s currently my best ranked champion. But she just doesn´t incorporate ANY theme whatsoever. The fact that she is still named "Karma" makes me want to puke.

In the old version every ability was part of the "karma" theme.

The passive - dropping low on hp equals in a higher ap.

Q - Healing vs. Dmg

W - Her best ability considering the theme: Slow/speed your enemy/ally + mantra effect on units that touch the connection. There was just so much gameplay!

R - 2 Mantra boni, giving you CHOICE. Combos are possible.

The new one?

Passive - don´t even know what the passive is... no kidding.

Q - Generic skillshot. Like Lux e with unit collision.

W - point and click Leblanc e. Mantra bonus? Longer snare. Wow.

R - 1 bonus effect.

No ability even remotely has anything to do with karma. Just generic abilities that are effective on other champions.

...her old kit didn't really follow a theme of karma, either. There were dualities in her kit, sure, although most of them were able to have both effects at the same time. It was less a "karma" theme and more a "yin-yang bomb" theme. That is, having two opposed effects working in sync.

You didn't choose between one or the other, both effects happened unless you didn't have Mantra charges. I'd say that Lulu is closer to what you'd want in Karma's design.

Back to speaking about Mantra, the old Mantra sucked ass. Period. Instead of her kit feeling like a strong set of basic spells and an ultimate, it felt like her basic spells were hamstrung by your Mantra. Don't have charges? Too bad, pretty much every useful effect in your kit is locked behind that R cooldown.

Also, I'd like to point out that Karma still has her self-heal on her Mantra-W, which is a different way to implement her old passive's playstyle of baiting at low HP. Yeah, that old passive was cool, but you can still pull off a very similar shtick with the added bonus of actually having hard CC.

And that Karma's new passive is late-game scaling, basically. It gets stronger with %CDR, and it basically means you can use your Mantra more than once in a fight if you're actually fighting. Which is huge, because the new Mantra actually feels like an ultimate.

Xerath: Yes Xer is also effective. I dislike playing him but still have a 70 % ranked winrate on him (just stating so you know, that I just blindly complain without knowing anything about it^^).

I don't usually assume that of most people.

But there´s nothing besides his ult, that was improved by his rework.

Q - Just a clone of Varus Q. Yay for recycle. The really funny thing is, that Varus can do everything Xerath can - just better and more reliable. W - Kinda reminds me of something... Varus E maybe? Veiger W? Or maybe... oh just scrap it. E - Elise E? Just in lightning. Pretty sure after Tarics rework his stun will be 100% the same.

And before? His whole kit had a kind of synergie. Basic combos such as e + q that required skill to land. Combine them with the increased range on w (which CC´ed yourself, making it rly easy to engage on you). There was a tradeback to almost everything you did.

The reason he got trashed... recycled..., wait now I´ve got it: "reworked" - was because of the magic penetration of the W and the W+E+R combo. But instead of working with the cool idea and making it work (not making the ult proc e, or just change only the ult), Riot used already working parts of the game, and put them together like some kind of Frankenstein band aid.

Oh, so his new Q is just a clone of Varus' Q, but his old Q wasn't a watered-down Lux R? Frankly, Xerath's new W reminds me of Brand's W with a sweet spot added for accurate players. And...how many champions have skill shots that stop at the first target? Enough that Elise wasn't the first.

I'm pretty sure the reason for his rework was because they wanted to actually make a siege mage. His passive was a boring and strange stat conversion that did nothing against 2/3rds of mid-lane matchups, his W was "Hey look, I'm a Starcraft siege tank!" minus the actually-being-effective part, and most of his power was gated by his ultimate--let me rephrase that last one, he did jack %%%% without his ultimate. He could stun someone in a team fight, and that's it.

And to your last point of either being useless/overwhelming. I was never useless against anyone with the old Xerath. The only ones that were a pain in the ass are the same ones that are annoying even today - Fizz/Annie/etc. And with the old kit, you even had MORE options to fight against them.

You don't have to be level 2 to be a siege mage anymore, you don't actually need to build a lot of mana early-game to remain effective, and your hard CC doesn't require you to hit with basically everything you have.

But yeah, more effective at fighting your annoying lane opponents!

So I think the baseline is: Yea they are "effective". But in terms of uniqueness of the character/options to use the kit - they are horrible.

Because Xerath being a mage's attempt at Taric but gone horribly wrong is sooo unique. Because Karma being Heimerdinger without turrets or CC was sooo unique.

LudovicoAug 31, 20152 votes

You really got me to think and I completely agree with you on several things. Karma being more about dualities, and the comparison of Xeraths old q to Lux r being the ones I like most.

But I still think that there are points, that don´t rly stand strong.

Back to speaking about Mantra, the old Mantra sucked ass. Period. Instead of her kit feeling like a strong set of basic spells and an ultimate, it felt like her basic spells were hamstrung by your Mantra. Don't have charges? Too bad, pretty much every useful effect in your kit is locked behind that R cooldown.

Sure Karmas ultimate was a cornerstone of her kit, and was therefore crucial for teamfights. But having 2 stacks, you could manage very nicely in teamfights. There was the pressure on the enemy team (knowing how many stacks Karma has, engaging or not engaging [does Karma uses 1 stack on a shield and 1 on the q, or does she wait for 2 e´s?]), and I could go on for a while to list up all thinkable combos possible by the old ultimate. There was an enormous depth in that mechanic, which is now reduced to: R + Q to engage/disengage with little CC and "high" dmg, R + W for engage/disengage with high single target CC, or R + E for engage/disengage with a MS buff.

The new one is just... simple, straightforward and utterly predictable.

Also, I'd like to point out that Karma still has her self-heal on her Mantra-W, which is a different way to implement her old passive's playstyle of baiting at low HP. Yeah, that old passive was cool, but you can still pull off a very similar shtick with the added bonus of actually having hard CC.

After this got nerfed a couple of patches ago, it really isn´t worth mentionening anymore. Now her new W is all about the CC, nothing that concernes Karma (the champ).

I'm pretty sure the reason for his rework was because they wanted to actually make a siege mage. His passive was a boring and strange stat conversion that did nothing against 2/3rds of mid-lane matchups, his W was "Hey look, I'm a Starcraft siege tank!" minus the actually-being-effective part, and most of his power was gated by his ultimate--let me rephrase that last one, he did jack %%%% without his ultimate. He could stun someone in a team fight, and that's it.

They wanted a siege mage when they designed Xerath, when they reworked him, they wanted a healthy mage that could poke from a "long" distance. First of all his passive wasn´t boring. It fit really well to his old lore and was extremely nice in teamfights. Sure it didn´t provide much during the laning phase against Ap, but it did his job in every game. At least they removed "Flesh and bones, sooo fragile.", unlike Kassadins joke.

Oh and his W was a mechanic found in a different game? I couldn´t care less! It was a mechanic unique to League, and it´s magic penetration was one of the main reasons Xelnath stated as the reason the old Xerath was unhealthy to the game.

And he could do very well without his ultimate. Sure it was a huge factor, but the dmg from the rest of the kit was high enough (consindering that you could always hit the backline with W + Q). Many mages are "dependent" on their ultimates, and do not need to be reworked.

You don't have to be level 2 to be a siege mage anymore, you don't actually need to build a lot of mana early-game to remain effective, and your hard CC doesn't require you to hit with basically everything you have.

As if anyone cares for a lv 1 siege mage :D . Yay you can charge your Q at lv 1. Uncharged is enough to hit the whole wave.

And athenes was a recommended item (and still is, because the mana costs are so high), but you weren´t dependend on it. Intelligent mana usage made it often available to get a lv 3 kill, or at least force the enemy b.

Because Xerath being a mage's attempt at Taric but gone horribly wrong is sooo unique. Because Karma being Heimerdinger without turrets or CC was sooo unique.

I must´ve really said this wrong to let you get that impression. I meant that, IF they (Riot) reworks Taric (at the end of the year), they will change his E from a point and click stun, to a skillshot similar to Xeraths E.

And I don´t get where you get the Karma comparison... the only thing connecting them being the... ult?

JustMyBassCannonAug 31, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Sure Karmas ultimate was a cornerstone of her kit, and was therefore crucial for teamfights. But having 2 stacks, you could manage very nicely in teamfights. There was the pressure on the enemy team (knowing how many stacks Karma has, engaging or not engaging [does Karma uses 1 stack on a shield and 1 on the q, or does she wait for 2 e´s?]), and I could go on for a while to list up all thinkable combos possible by the old ultimate. There was an enormous depth in that mechanic, which is now reduced to: R + Q to engage/disengage with little CC and "high" dmg, R + W for engage/disengage with high single target CC, or R + E for engage/disengage with a MS buff.

The new one is just... simple, straightforward and utterly predictable.

So there's either Q+R and E+R, or two E+R sets. As opposed to Q+R, W+R and E+R all being viable for their respective situations.

At least you aren't one of the Karma players in denial that ever thought the old W+R was good enough to be mentioned outside of extreme niche scenarios.

After this got nerfed a couple of patches ago, it really isn´t worth mentionening anymore. Now her new W is all about the CC, nothing that concernes Karma (the champ).

It didn't get nerfed. It's still 20% (+1% per 100 AP) missing HP on both the start and the root. It's still a massive heal-bait mechanic.

The only nerf was that they traded bonus damage for rooting duration.

They wanted a siege mage when they designed Xerath, when they reworked him, they wanted a healthy mage that could poke from a "long" distance. First of all his passive wasn´t boring. It fit really well to his old lore and was extremely nice in teamfights. Sure it didn´t provide much during the laning phase against Ap, but it did his job in every game. At least they removed "Flesh and bones, sooo fragile.", unlike Kassadins joke.

Oh and his W was a mechanic found in a different game? I couldn´t care less! It was a mechanic unique to League, and it´s magic penetration was one of the main reasons Xelnath stated as the reason the old Xerath was unhealthy to the game.

And he could do very well without his ultimate. Sure it was a huge factor, but the dmg from the rest of the kit was high enough (consindering that you could always hit the backline with W + Q). Many mages are "dependent" on their ultimates, and do not need to be reworked.

As if anyone cares for a lv 1 siege mage :D . Yay you can charge your Q at lv 1. Uncharged is enough to hit the whole wave.

And athenes was a recommended item (and still is, because the mana costs are so high), but you weren´t dependend on it. Intelligent mana usage made it often available to get a lv 3 kill, or at least force the enemy b. Because Karma being Heimerdinger without turrets or CC was sooo unique.

A stat conversion passive is always extremely boring. Not to mention very convoluted for balance.

And since the range bonus for going into Siege Mode was pathetic, keeping the lock-in-place mechanic wouldn't have been a good idea unless they wanted to give him significantly longer range. Which could have been equally unhealthy.

There's a difference between an ultimate being powerful and a kit being pathetically weak without the ultimate. Old Xerath was a case of the latter, as more than 60% of his burst damage was his ultimate, and his other spell cooldowns had enough of a delay to make guaranteeing a kill without his ultimate extremely difficult.

Examples of the former would be Syndra or Brand. They have powerful ultimates, but they don't actually rely on them for kills. The new Xerath also follows this design pretty well.

I must´ve really said this wrong to let you get that impression. I meant that, IF they (Riot) reworks Taric (at the end of the year), they will change his E from a point and click stun, to a skillshot similar to Xeraths E. And I don´t get where you get the Karma comparison... the only thing connecting them being the... ult?

I don't really know what I was on about with those last statements.

LudovicoAug 31, 20152 votes

I like your way of debating! And you certainly have rly good points, which in some parts made me revice some thoughts I had.

...but I still can´t agree to points like "old Xer was weak without his ult", or that his passive was boring. The reasons for that are more personal, therefore not really viable in a debate thats objecitve like this^^.

Building AP and hearing Xerath say: "Magic? I´ll show you real magic!", getting tankier through the accumulation of magic and getting "Flesh and blood; so fragile!" ... it just felt so good :D .

And the amount of kills pre lv 6 I had, the snipes I made with W + Q (the range was only marginally smaller. I think 100 units less). I just miss it and don´t get the same feeling with the new one. I perform really well on the new one, but I just loathe playing it.

And Karma is IMO good, but way too simple in comparison to her old one. But at least I find it fun to play^^!