@Riot: Some Alistar tweaks

Alistar is getting a VU right now (It looks great!) and that has really piqued my interest in him as a champion. He seems like he has so much potential as a champion, but it doesn't seem quite fully realized. He is right now sitting at a 44% average win rate (this actually really surprised me considering he was pick or ban at worlds). I know win rate doesn't determine everything about whether a champion should be buffed or nerfed, and your probably have more accurate internal statistics on him, but 44% is still really low. Alistar has once again fallen off in the competitive scene, but also across all levels of play (he is at even lower percentages the higher you go with him). His balance always seems to be rather tenuous (A single nerf to how sheen works with his combo and he falls out of the meta in only a month) so I am proposing some cautious buffs for him. These buffs are targeted at helping tank alistar and support alistar. They may be slight nerfs to full AP Alistar, and they probably will not affect AD Alistar much at all. Right now, these changes are designed to help Alistar to stop being a one trick pony (W+Q combo bot) and make his other abilities more exciting/useful. I personally like to ensure that champions are not limited to a single role "because meta", so these changes should benefit a solo lane Alistar some as well, just not as much as in support.

1st change: Trample. I love this passive, it just screams "I'm a giant man cow and you're gonna get crushed!" (cuz that's what he does essentially...). It fits into his kit very well and makes sense with who he is as a champion. However, vs champions, the damage is totally negligible and only good at scoring assists (unless built full AP, then it hurts a bit). Right now the damage is 6+(1xlevel)+(.1 AP) per second for three seconds (deals 100% bonus damage to minions). At 18, that is 24 damage per second to champions without any AP, less than buying a sunfire cape at level 1. Anyone with more than 100 MR won't even be able to tell that it is hurting them at all. I propose making the damage scale like this: 6+(1/2/3xlevel)+(.1 AP) per second for 3 seconds (deals 50% bonus damage to minions). At 18, this will now deal 42 damage per second to champions without any AP (still not a huge amount, but now actually noticeable). over the course of the game, it is and increase of 18 damage per second, but Alistar really could use it right now. If you are concerned about the damage to minions going up, then yes it is higher come late game (if you have less than 300 AP) but early game the damage to minions is actually a touch lower. Another way to do this is instead of scaling at +1/2/3 per level, it could scale at a flat 2 pre level. this would get to the same 42 damage late game, but it may make his early game a touch strong (If any of you at Riot are concerned about jungle Alistar (I will address this topic later in the thread), never fear, because the base damage change will still do noticeably less than when his trample passive dealt double damage to monsters. If it is changed to +1/2/3 per level, he would not gain any clear power over live until after 7, and if he got the +2 per level scaling, he would still deal 6+(.1 AP) less damage at all levels to jungle monsters than the double damage used to be). These changes actually help support Alistar a lot since trample would be less likely to steal creeps from the ADC at lower levels, but allow him to contribute more damage in late game team fights.

Headbut and pulverize both seem to be in good spots right now in terms of damage, cool down, CC power, mana costs, etc., so I am not going to suggest any change with those two spells right now. Both are incredibly iconic moves that make a lot of sense where they are right now.

Triumphant roar, however, does feel strange in his kit. Triumphant roar is a great tool for topping up allies mid fight, and is great for triggering trample and keeping it active, but the heal itself is mediocre. I understand that it is AOE and relatively spammable, but unless built AP, it heals for a measly 90 hp at max rank. I propose changing the scalings on it to help reinforce Alistar's strength when playing as a tank/tanky support. Right now the scaling is 60/90/120/150/180+(.2 AP) (30/45/60/75/90+(.1 AP) to allies) and 40/50/60/70/80 mana, I would like to see 60/90/120/150/180+(.2 AP)+(4% bonus HP) (30/45/60/75/90+(.1 AP)+(2% bonus HP) to allies) and 50/55/60/65/70 mana. The reason for this is that generally Triumphant roar is hardly noticeable except when, like trample, it scores you an assist. Adding the bonus health scaling would help Tank Alistar and Support Alistar, who usually cannot build enough AP to make the scaling noticeable. The reason that I changed the mana cost is that early game, these changes would make his heal stronger as a support if he built relic shield, so this will help prevent obnoxious hyper sustain, while also helping him not to run himself oom as quickly late game when he is trying to heal up his allies.

Unbreakable will is already a very strong spell, and I don't have any immediate ideas for it. I would say that it doesn't really feel like it can combo with any of his other abilities, and that contributes to the "One trick pony" feel that Alistar has sometimes. The damage reduction and AD are both fine in my opinion, they are great steroids for team fighting and appropriately don't scale with his other abilities in an OP way (as opposed to something like Galio's bulwark which makes all his other spells stronger from the MR gained).

In my opinion, Alistar is a fun champion for a few reasons. It can be extremely satisfying to get your W+Q combo off repeatedly. It is fun to be tanky as heck with his ult. It is fun to just charge through enemies with your passive. It is fun to feel like a supernatural bodyguard. He has enough utility to go into any role except ADC and do well... except jungle.

I personally have always wanted to jungle Alistar (I jungle almost anybody, JUNGLEDINGER OP!), and while I cannot make you all at Riot change your minds, I would like to make a case for why Jungle Alistar is not toxic and should be at least useable, if not necessarily strong. Alistar jungle was strong in season 2 (before my time), and then was nerfed for his overpowered gank potential, understandable and appropriate. Since then, though, numerous other champions with equally potent ganks (or even stronger, like Nautilus) have been added to the game. In addition to this fact, the majority of champions now have some form of escape, making his ganks comparably less potent. They are by no means weak, since a well timed W+Q combo is very similar to Malphite's ult in terms of power and lockdown (I should know, Malphite is one of my favorites). But a key thing that you MUST remember about Alistar is that aside from his passive giving him a little extra damage after his combo, he has no real way to follow up on his ganks after his combo because of his cool downs. Malphite has a slow, several nukes, and a strong steroid after he ults. Alistar does have access to his combo as early as level two (he is not alone in terms of strong level two gankers, notably Riot's golden boy Lee sin), but in the new pre season 5 jungle, he would be insane not to take his heal before then, or else likely die in the jungle before getting to gank at all.

The new jungle is currently in a spot that I think with proper balancing would make Alistar a well balanced pick. The gold income is low enough that without clearing some camps for his bonus gold off of machete and co., he will fall behind, meaning he cannot simply chain gank lanes endlessly. this is amplified by the fact that early level assists give reduced gold. Alistar would be a great addition to Jungler diversity, and strong ganks are not toxic when combined with poor clear (Except when you are Lee sin or Pantheon, who get both?). Alistar jungle could be viable and balanced due to several trade offs he must make, namely the necessity of taking heal level 2 now and not being able to gank as early, getting reduced gold from chain ganking without clearing his jungle, and trading slow clears for hard hitting ganks. If he does become totally overpowered (which I sincerely doubt will happen) then you could simply nerf away trample's bonus damage to monsters again. I know that Alistar is a little touchy when it comes to balance (minor buffs made him OP in top lane for example, and then one nerf took him out of that spot again), but if you used my suggestion for how his passives damage scales and made it deal bonus to monsters again, he would still have less clear power than he used to until later in the game (9+(1.5/3/4.5xlevel)+(.15 AP) vs monsters with my idea as opposed to the old 12+(2xlevel)+(.2 AP) vs monsters) which would insure that he doesn't clear jungle AND gank hard, just enough clear to jungle at all.

Obviously I am biased in favor of Alistar jungle (why else would I be arguing that he should be made viable again), and I understand if Riot decides not to buff him in that direction, but please consider the buffs I suggested for his passive and E to enhance his gameplay in the support and tank roles beyond W+Q combo and tanking turrets. He certainly likes some of the new preseason items (Righteous glory is great, and I expect Zz'rot's portal to also be pretty good for him) but he needs a little more help than that right now. Thank you to anyone who got through my wall of text, I have a tendency to say a lot of things in my posts :D.

If you read all the way down to here, a +1 would be appreciated since the boards are stilted towards popular threads, not new threads. Thanks!