Has Vlad been nerfed into a "noob-friendly" Viktor?

He does no damage now if you build Spirit Visage or Zhonya early on. Actually, I don't think you can afford to build these items at all now.

You HAVE to go full AP and even then you're just squishy as hell and your damage is... EH.

I mean, basically, you are now this "trollish" mid laner who sustains in the lane (but can't make any plays) until you get 1 or 2 AP item. And then you just wait for a fight to start, Ghost in, deal some AOE nuke damage and better pray one of their carries dies because you yourself can't take any punishment in retaliation if they survive.

Sounds like a squishy Viktor type character (except with a get out of jail Pool card) who is more noob friendly (don't have to aim lasers, I can just click Q and E when I go in).

I feel like without some tankiness, the Sustain he has is more or less just cosmetic. Its cool how he can get portions of his health back (after casting E too) but does the enemy really care? I mean without the option to build a Visage, 1 combo still more or less kills you.

I feel like his sustain (outside of early laning) is largely just cosmetic now. He's really just become a Viktor type glass cannon burster, an "AOE assassin" type dude with huge potentials for messing it up (I ghosted in... OOPS he flashed my E after I Ulted, I'm dead now).

I don't know... what the hell is Riot thinking...