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The Decline of Nasus

HateDaddy··12 votes·1,211 views

Before I get into this, let me start by saying I don't think Nasus is particularly weak right now, granted he's not very strong either. In terms of balance, I'd actually say Nasus is fairly balanced but keep in mind leagues balance has been haywire this season so that isn't saying much. To also give you another piece of information here, I've got thousands of games on Nasus since I started in s2 and I've spent most of my time talking with a lot of good Nasus players about his builds/spikes/etc over the years like Hyfe, Steeleye and natekiller (most of these guys are oldies people wouldn't recognize today but just know Hyfe is the guy who came up with the CDR build on Nasus way back s1).

Nasus is in a strange spot right now, it's been something I've felt slowly build up since last season's juggernaut patch but it's just gotten to a point where it feels as worse as it's ever been. It's not about his balance, it's just that quite frankly, in today's league of legends, Nasus just isn't that satisfying to play. You spend much of the early lane phase having keyboards, computer desks, monitors, dead cats and kitchen sinks thrown at you when all you're trying to do is farm. If you get decent farm and don't die a bunch, you can start bodying people but you have to balance this out with farming Q/scaling so there's a fine balance. Then you get to late game where he's supposed to be this God and quite frankly, he's just average late game because of how easy he is to kite and melt. So the end result is, he just doesn't feel satisfying to play and the risks don't feel like their justified with such a pipe dream of a reward.

Honestly it's not too surprising, nasus' kit is fucking ancient. He's one of the first 40 champions and one of the few to not even be considered for a rework yet. But frankly he needs it because most of his gameplay is actually pretty unhealthy and binary. He does teach some good basics to new players but no champion should remain a "noob champ" and stay bad for just that purpose, even Garen got reworked and he WAS THE noob champ.

His identity doesn't even fit him anymore, many other big beefy bruisers are better in almost every way than he is and outperform him at every phase of the game. I've been over this a lot but really what has hurt Nasus is the evolution of this game in mobility and raw power behind spells that Nasus simply can't keep up with. Factor in that armor values and tank items have been nerfed across the board (which is something Nasus has always depended on hugely) and he doesn't even fit the tank role very well anymore. His natural steroids that should help him survive are easily avoided or mitigates and he has no way to deal with any of the problems he's presented, which goes back to my point about him being binary.

Believe it or not, there was once a point where getting farmed on Nasus meant carry city. But that doesn't happen anymore, you just become a gimmicky split pusher that's easy to collapse on and punish. I'd rather play champs like Jax or Trynd who can pressure and get away from collapses and waste time as opposed to Nasus who just gets collapsed on and kited to death when he tries to fight anyone.

I'm just at a really disappointed point with Nasus and honestly that sucks. I continued to play this game because of him and he's the reason I was able to get diamond and improve in this game to the point I have and it's just awful to play him and feel so worthless now with no real ability to make a consistent impact like so many champions do now.

I could go over potential solutions and changes that could make him healthier but there's no point because nothing will happen. I'm just a long term Nasus main who hates where he's at right now and I'm sure there's some Nasus players who feel the same and probably some who may feel differently. But it's frustrating to feel this way about him and I wish there was some support behind the idea of changing him for the better while making him a much healthier champion.

Thanks for reading loves

32 Comments

Sasogwa5 votes

Let me try to explain why Nasus isn't a carry champion lategame anymore

  • Damage creep. Lategame damage dealing is pretty insane also most damage dealing keystones are not good on Nasus who has damage thanks to his Q mostly, while other picks rely a lot on the keystone to have free damage, unaccounted for.
  • Mobility creep, CC creep. Most of the CC is gradually being changed, for "counterplay" (aka adc whining), from being reliable targeted/ranged CC to shorter range spammable cancer CC. Basically, whenever you come close to a support like Braum Nautilus , hell even Bard or any guy with item 3116 kites you to death easily, while not being that great for CC'ing carries from range. Well right muh counterplay, but you can't really dodge CC from melee range and those CC are terribly punishing, so it's basically impossible to reach the backline if you're not an overloaded assassin.

What does this imply? Nasus can not go for his favourite targets anymore, aka squishy carries that he absolutely crushes in 1v1 if they're not protected. Huge flat (by that I mean not in % health) damage with triforce procs and 40 flat arpen on E (it's like item 3142 + item 3147 + item 3156 for the amount of arpen) ? Squishy killing dream. Well great, but you can't reach them, if they're not completely stupid they get behind their protection. So this means the people Nasus fights in a teamfight is the frontline. Yet, Nasus is bad at it. He has his ult that deals a good amount of %health, but it's over an incredibly long duration and with the damage creep, it's not that great (despite the values looking pretty high). But he was completely ignored in the juggernaught rework. Before they were reworked, juggernaughts were just basically lane bullies that falled off incredibly hard and only relied on base damages. Now they have item 3071 which is insanely good for melting tanks/helping their teammates melt tank, they have great HP+AD items added and they can actually do their job. Nasus meanwhile is a juggernaught with the scalings of a utility tank. He loves CDR, resistances and sheen procs. He has a very hard time proccing item 3071 so that's not an option for him (It could actually be one if his E did physical damage and become much more of a juggernaught. Yet the stats are still meh for him, you really want resistances tied to your CDR items early and you'd rather have item 3078 or item 3025 ).

A big thing that changed Nasus power status lategame is the slow nerf, and I can't stress it enough. It used to be a 35-95% aka 65% average attack speed slow ! Now it's 32.5 % average attack speed slow. Barely even noticeable. And item 3222 exists, item 3140 no longer builds into nothing (god item 3139 was a huge mistake). That's a huge part of his power budget lategame gone, and even if it's not necessarily healthy to basically say f*ck you to an AA based champ, it was most of Nasus teamfighting power.

Nasus actual big strengths are still there and it's possible to carry a game with him. It is basically "be better than your opponent (hope he's not master material) hard farm for 20 minutes and carry the game while it's still midgame and people don't have too much items (hope that the game has a low amount of kills else they will already have a good amount of items) and then end the game before you become irrelevant in a teamfight. This is not what we want. This is not the Nasus fantasy, or what you wish for when playing as Nasus. The whole purpose of playing Nasus apart from being the doge is the lategame infinite scaling. Now who cares about your 1000 stacks when you get melted and crushed in teamfights, and splitpush is in a bad spot? Nasus lategame teamfights are terrible and that sucks for the iconic infinite scaling guy, it's just sad.

Currently, ironically enough, Nasus works better against what countered him in lane than what he countered in lane. I'd rather face a Riven Renekton Irelia than a tank, because I know they don't have as much CC and tankiness come lategame so I'll have an easier time outright killing them or doing some work in teamfights. It's actually not a great idea anymore to pick Nasus into a tanks because thanks to keystones they actually have damage and they're more useful in a teamfight. Also some have hardengage, denying your splitpush if they group.

But since we're here to discuss solutions, these are some of the options I have thought through :

-> Since Nasus fights mostly tanks in teamfights, here are some possibilities to make his kit better at fighting them while soaking damage

  • E flat armor shred -> % armor shred instead.
  • Magical -> physical? Idk about this, I'm not sure BC would be optimal with that change also it is sad that it kills Nasus AP.
  • Passive lifesteal is based on opponent's armor. You lifesteal pathetic amounts against a very high armor target. Solution? Make it not lifesteal but some true steal that ignores armor, slightly reduce the values -> Nasus is even worse earlygame and in lane, since you lifesteal off low armor minions anyway, but is actually more relevant in lategame where he can really become harder to kill.
  • What if E granted Nasus bonus resistances while inside the circle? It would fortify Nasus identity as a zone control juggernaught that is hard to kill when he is inside his zone, it does not help him so much in chasing because he's gonna be out of the circle at the beginning or the end. Thought of something like 5/10/15/20/25% bonus resistances. Compensate with slightly lower values on either the armor shredding or the base damage of Nasus E.
  • Buff the attack speed slow? Ofc not up to the really insane values it once had but we could make it a bit more noticeable, especially since the counterbuilding is really available now summoner 1 item 3140 item 3222 . For reminders it's at max rank 17.5 to 47.5 % used to be 35 to 95% I suggest something like 20 to 60 % which is really really not a huge buff and far from the original values.

These are suggestions, and do not come in a package. Consider them separated one from another (choose whichever, think about it, come up with your own ideas)

HateDaddy3 votes

{quoted}

Let me try to explain why Nasus isn't a carry champion lategame anymore

  • Damage creep. Lategame damage dealing is pretty insane also most damage dealing keystones are not good on Nasus who has damage thanks to his Q mostly, while other picks rely a lot on the keystone to have free damage, unaccounted for.
  • Mobility creep, CC creep. Most of the CC is gradually being changed, for "counterplay" (aka adc whining), from being reliable targeted/ranged CC to shorter range spammable cancer CC. Basically, whenever you come close to a support like Braum Nautilus , hell even Bard or any guy with item 3116 kites you to death easily, while not being that great for CC'ing carries from range. Well right muh counterplay, but you can't really dodge CC from melee range and those CC are terribly punishing, so it's basically impossible to reach the backline if you're not an overloaded assassin.

What does this imply? Nasus can not go for his favourite targets anymore, aka squishy carries that he absolutely crushes in 1v1 if they're not protected. Huge flat (by that I mean not in % health) damage with triforce procs and 40 flat arpen on E (it's like item 3142 + item 3147 + item 3156 for the amount of arpen) ? Squishy killing dream. Well great, but you can't reach them, if they're not completely stupid they get behind their protection. So this means the people Nasus fights in a teamfight is the frontline. Yet, Nasus is bad at it. He has his ult that deals a good amount of %health, but it's over an incredibly long duration and with the damage creep, it's not that great (despite the values looking pretty high). But he was completely ignored in the juggernaught rework. Before they were reworked, juggernaughts were just basically lane bullies that falled off incredibly hard and only relied on base damages. Now they have item 3071 which is insanely good for melting tanks/helping their teammates melt tank, they have great HP+AD items added and they can actually do their job. Nasus meanwhile is a juggernaught with the scalings of a utility tank. He loves CDR, resistances and sheen procs. He has a very hard time proccing item 3071 so that's not an option for him (It could actually be one if his E did physical damage and become much more of a juggernaught. Yet the stats are still meh for him, you really want resistances tied to your CDR items early and you'd rather have item 3078 or item 3025 ).

A big thing that changed Nasus power status lategame is the slow nerf, and I can't stress it enough. It used to be a 35-95% aka 65% average attack speed slow ! Now it's 32.5 % average attack speed slow. Barely even noticeable. And item 3222 exists, item 3140 no longer builds into nothing (god item 3139 was a huge mistake). That's a huge part of his power budget lategame gone, and even if it's not necessarily healthy to basically say f*ck you to an AA based champ, it was most of Nasus teamfighting power.

Nasus actual big strengths are still there and it's possible to carry a game with him. It is basically "be better than your opponent (hope he's not master material) hard farm for 20 minutes and carry the game while it's still midgame and people don't have too much items (hope that the game has a low amount of kills else they will already have a good amount of items) and then end the game before you become irrelevant in a teamfight. This is not what we want. This is not the Nasus fantasy, or what you wish for when playing as Nasus. The whole purpose of playing Nasus apart from being the doge is the lategame infinite scaling. Now who cares about your 1000 stacks when you get melted and crushed in teamfights, and splitpush is in a bad spot? Nasus lategame teamfights are terrible and that sucks for the iconic infinite scaling guy, it's just sad.

Currently, ironically enough, Nasus works better against what countered him in lane than what he countered in lane. I'd rather face a Riven Renekton Irelia than a tank, because I know they don't have as much CC and tankiness come lategame so I'll have an easier time outright killing them or doing some work in teamfights. It's actually not a great idea anymore to pick Nasus into a tanks because thanks to keystones they actually have damage and they're more useful in a teamfight. Also some have hardengage, denying your splitpush if they group.

But since we're here to discuss solutions, these are some of the options I have thought through :

-> Since Nasus fights mostly tanks in teamfights, here are some possibilities to make his kit better at fighting them while soaking damage

  • E flat armor shred -> % armor shred instead.

  • Magical -> physical? Idk about this, I'm not sure BC would be optimal with that change also it is sad that it kills Nasus AP.

  • Passive lifesteal is based on opponent's armor. You lifesteal pathetic amounts against a very high armor target. Solution? Make it not lifesteal but some true steal that ignores armor, slightly reduce the values -> Nasus is even worse earlygame and in lane, since you lifesteal off low armor minions anyway, but is actually more relevant in lategame where he can really become harder to kill.

  • What if E granted Nasus bonus resistances while inside the circle? It would fortify Nasus identity as a zone control juggernaught that is hard to kill when he is inside his zone, it does not help him so much in chasing because he's gonna be out of the circle at the beginning or the end. Thought of something like 5/10/15/20/25% bonus resistances. Compensate with slightly lower values on either the armor shredding or the base damage of Nasus E.

  • Buff the attack speed slow? Ofc not up to the really insane values it once had but we could make it a bit more noticeable, especially since the counterbuilding is really available now summoner 1 item 3140 item 3222 . For reminders it's at max rank 17.5 to 47.5 % used to be 35 to 95% I suggest something like 20 to 60 % which is really really not a huge buff and far from the original values.

These are suggestions, and do not come in a package. Consider them separated one from another (choose whichever, think about it, come up with your own ideas)

Hey thanks for the response. I was debating on breaking it down like this but I kind of just vented more frustration than rational thoughts but this is spot on. Nasus doesn't have a late game fantasy anymore, just hope the enemy team allows you to farm free for 20 minutes in a high CS, low kill, no pressure game and then you have about a 5 minute window to have an impact.

Everything also gets 40% CDR now which make spamming slows, CCs and mobility spells more frequent whereas Nasus has always capped CDR so this isn't new for him individually.

In reality, Nasus arguably has received more indirect nerfs than any champion in the game and his indirect buffs simply haven't let up.

Great Ozymandius1 votes

Nasus doesn't have a late game fantasy anymore, just hope the enemy team allows you to farm free for 20 minutes in a high CS, low kill, no pressure game and then you have about a 5 minute window to have an impact.

So sad but completely true.

Great Ozymandius1 votes

Bingo, I agree with pretty much everything you said.

Nasus has always had problems with being kited but damage creep means he dies much much faster while kited. For the last season and a half I have almost entirely avoided teamfights as nasus. It is better to force the enemy team to split up to try and stop your splitpush than to group for a 5v5. In 5v5's you always get stuck on the enemy frontline. You don't tank as well as the enemy frontline, you don't have any hard engage, you can't put your cc on the targets that matter, you can't get good value from your lifesteal, and you don't do much damage versus high armor targets. Pretty much you are a meatshield and a bad one at that.

I also agree that I would rather face a panth/riven/ than a nautilus as Nasus. Sure, I might farm better versus the nautilus, but I'd rather have the opportunity to outscale riven than be forced into bad 5v5's.

Nasus is no longer a late game champion. He is a midgame champion. If he isn't threatening the enemy inhibitor by 30 minutes, he's lost the game and he needs to be carried by his teammates.

A change I thought of would be:

After 400 stacks, activating q (not autoing with the q) also gives him a movespeed bonus, which scales with additional q-stacks. After 800 stacks, activating q removes slows.

This would give him more ability to get to the enemy backline in teamfights, would add to his scaling fantasay, and would retain his weak early game.

I liked your suggested changes to his lifesteal, spirit fire, and wither.

khorney2 votes

the only real nasus counter is riven

LBB4121 votes

TeemoTeemo

HateDaddy1 votes

{quoted}

the only real nasus counter is riven

not really

You outscale her pretty quickly if you avoid dying 1-4 and manage to farm up glacial + sheen

khorney1 votes

Not saying much avoid dYing. She should be playing aggressive against you. People are like what about teemo . Teemo is easily beaten .

HateDaddy1 votes

{quoted}

Not saying much avoid dYing. She should be playing aggressive against you. People are like what about teemo . Teemo is easily beaten .

And her aggro automatically shoves the lane and if you're smart and trade between her cooldowns; you'll whittle her down and have the lane frozen at your tower during your most vulnerable stages. I'm not saying Nasus counters riven, I think it can go either way and it's one hell of a snowbally matchup. But saying riven is a Nasus counter? Nah

KVbqbFsC8e1 votes

The only real Nasus counter is Pantheon.

CerealBoxOfDoom1 votes

nasus is strong when his counters get shoved out of the meta nasus is not strong when his counters are not actively being shoved out of the meta

HateDaddy2 votes

{quoted}

nasus is strong when his counters get shoved out of the meta nasus is not strong when his counters are not actively being shoved out of the meta

This has very little to do with his actual strength as a champion tbh

Like I said, he's not really weak right now. He just feels unrewarding to play and isn't able to really do anything on his own anymore. Remember, he used to be considered one of the absolute best late game carries, he's not even close to that anymore.

CerealBoxOfDoom1 votes

{quoted}

This has very little to do with his actual strength as a champion tbh

Like I said, he's not really weak right now. He just feels unrewarding to play and isn't able to really do anything on his own anymore. Remember, he used to be considered one of the absolute best late game carries, he's not even close to that anymore.

... that sounds great

except the unrewarding part. What exactly does he need to be rewarded [more] for do you think

HateDaddy4 votes

{quoted}

... that sounds great

except the unrewarding part. What exactly does he need to be rewarded [more] for do you think

You can get stacked to the moon and back but be completely useless because the enemy support exhausted you and used one slow/cc and in that time, you've completely melted. The consistent and best course of action is to afk split push and teleport into fights or flank but flanking in solo queue is so hard because vision control rarely happens and teleporting into fights is too risky now with the increased channel time, by the time you get there it's over. Considering this and his weak early game, it's not rewarding at all but it has to be this way because his stacks scale infinitely and even though his stack amounts almost never win games, they have to be balanced like they do because if he had mobility, huge durability naturally or insane base stats, it would matter and he'd be a balancing nightmare (if he isn't already)

Now as for what I'd do? Personally, many Nasus players since s2 have basically said if he ever gets reworked, we'd prefer for his Q to be capped or have diminishing returns so he can have strength in other areas. Wither has to go, it's just not a healthy spell and chain withering made him toxic as shit in s3. Spirit fire is cool, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with that spell. I'd focus on making it an actual zone control spell that slows after a certain duration or grants him some sort of buff. His ult is fine as is, a fairly straight forward ult but god damn between Fury of the Sands and Dominus (renektons ult), these two ults fit their fucking champion characters down to the T. So I'd probably cap his Q at around 400-500 stacks or give it some sort of scaling with farm if it's kept infinite so it never gets out of control and I'd give his W and E an interaction between each other where his W stuns a target if in his E for X amount of time and his Q consumes this debuff and reducing all his basic ability CDs signs target can fight back.

Tl;dr

It's a lot of mumbo jumbo now but I thought about this a lot back in the day. I just went a bit too far with all the shit I'd do but in short, I'd kill wither, make his sustain healthier and change his Q by capping it or giving it scaling with farm in some mechanic to keep it from going crazy

CerealBoxOfDoom2 votes

{quoted}

You can get stacked to the moon and back but be completely useless because the enemy support exhausted you and used one slow/cc and in that time, you've completely melted. The consistent and best course of action is to afk split push and teleport into fights or flank but flanking in solo queue is so hard because vision control rarely happens and teleporting into fights is too risky now with the increased channel time, by the time you get there it's over. Considering this and his weak early game, it's not rewarding at all but it has to be this way because his stacks scale infinitely and even though his stack amounts almost never win games, they have to be balanced like they do because if he had mobility, huge durability naturally or insane base stats, it would matter and he'd be a balancing nightmare (if he isn't already)

Now as for what I'd do? Personally, many Nasus players since s2 have basically said if he ever gets reworked, we'd prefer for his Q to be capped or have diminishing returns so he can have strength in other areas. Wither has to go, it's just not a healthy spell and chain withering made him toxic as shit in s3. Spirit fire is cool, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with that spell. I'd focus on making it an actual zone control spell that slows after a certain duration or grants him some sort of buff. His ult is fine as is, a fairly straight forward ult but god damn between Fury of the Sands and Dominus (renektons ult), these two ults fit their fucking champion characters down to the T. So I'd probably cap his Q at around 400-500 stacks or give it some sort of scaling with farm if it's kept infinite so it never gets out of control and I'd give his W and E an interaction between each other where his W stuns a target if in his E for X amount of time and his Q consumes this debuff and reducing all his basic ability CDs signs target can fight back.

Tl;dr

It's a lot of mumbo jumbo now but I thought about this a lot back in the day. I just went a bit too far with all the shit I'd do but in short, I'd kill wither, make his sustain healthier and change his Q by capping it or giving it scaling with farm in some mechanic to keep it from going crazy

I think his Q already effectively has diminishing returns even if it doesn't really. Based off game pacing.

But something I think nasus should get is this

remove his passive, give him a new version of Cassiopeia 2.0's passive

when you get to 100 stacks you get...

when you get to 200 stacks you get...

when you get to 300 stacks you get...

and it shouldn't be something like spellvamp, in fact don't even give him sustain. He could have something cool or at least CDR. Anything that contributes more to fun than sitting in a lane all day.

Evewynn2 votes

Can call the passive Aspect of the Doge

A Basic Island1 votes

Define what you mean by unrewarding

Like, do you mean even if you do well it wasn't fun?

You felt like you cheesed it?

If i were to say, backdoor the nexus, that would feel very rewarding

Only Play Darius1 votes

It's not just his counters that are screwing him (although most meta top laners right now either fuck him or do his job better than he does).

The game is now about early game dominance and snowballing, both of which Nasus cannot work with as his early game is trash and he scales poorly with gold. He also doesn't work well with many of the juggernaut items such as Titanic and BC so is stuck with shitty itemization as he is the only juggernaut that builds exclusively tank items save for triforce (and said tank items were nerfed repeatedly due to the way they stacked with juggernaut items)

Great Ozymandius1 votes

I'd rather face his "counter" like riven or panthon than face tanks like malphite or nautilus. Against a riven or panth I can deny kills and know they won't add that much to the enemy teamfight, allowing me to more effectively splitpush.

The problem isn't his laning. It's that he can't teamfight at all anymore, particularly in lategame, which means his win condition is to farm extremely well for the first 20 minutes then take the inhibitor by 25-30 minutes. If he hasn't done that, then he falls off a cliff and he needs his team to carry him if he is to win.

Marshbouy1 votes

Wow, this is a great post. I hope a rioter pays attention to it.

Neo Metalsonic1 votes

Nasus is very weak in competitive play. Its like picking gangplank but without the global dominance ultimate.

You're making it a 4 v 5 until 20 minutes in and a lot of games get decided before that point.

Incognonymous1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Neo Metalsonic,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=8XJVbqiK,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2016-07-15T05:30:36.741+0000)

Nasus is very weak in competitive play. Its like picking gangplank but without the global dominance ultimate.

You're making it a 4 v 5 until 20 minutes in and a lot of games get decided before that point.

Counterable? That's acceptable. Weak early game? Nonissue till 20 minutes? Let's be real. Siphoning Strike + Spirit Fire + early game life steal IS a problem and early game Nasus IS a problem. The myth of hyper carry weak early games is well documented.

Only Play Darius1 votes

I'm really starting to think Nasus needs a moderate rework similar to Garen that helps him out in the meta without changing his core gameplay. I can't win with Nasus anymore this season i've switched to Darius who may not be as good at splitpushing but can do everything else you pick Nasus for without any of the crippling weaknesses that are so viciously abused by people who know how to play against Nasus. And it's only getting worse, I just want my doge back.

Atanchan1 votes

Something that could help massively I'd imagine is giving his ultimate either a self-purge on cast ( ala Alistar's ult ) or flat-out giving him CC immunity - probably not for the entire duration, but just 2.5 seconds or something after activation to allow him to claw himself through the enemy team and onto the priority target would be a massive help.

Wither could probably be given Spirit Fire's armor shred, scaling over the duration and lasting at maximum power for a bit - maybe upon reaching maximum power, a short but powerful slow occur over the remaining duration? So Nasus could still have a powerful CC skill, but one heavily delayed and just long enough to give him some strong ground on his target. Alternatively, I like your idea with giving Spirit Fire a slow, so it could probably build up a slow each time it damages an enemy, perhaps relative to the damage dealt ( but not scaling with it ) so hitting someone with the initial burst would start them more slowed than if they just walked into it for a split second.

Frankly, I don't need think his Q really need any sort of cap, hard or soft. It already pretty much has one due to game pace, and Veigar shows that Riot has no issue at all with a champion that increases the power of all his ranged damaging abilities and his tower-pushing damage infinitely just by hurting enemy champions - a single melee ability that requires Nasus to get farmed scaling infinitely really shouldn't be an issue.

One thing that could definitely use helping, though, is the consistency and visual power of his ultimate. "But Atan! His ultimate's super-consistent and obvious, it gives him health instantly and gives him a free Sunfire as a small bonus!" Well, here's the deal with that; that free Sunfire not only is percent health-based, but it also increases his AD by a percent of the damage dealt. So that damage is actually super impactful, but how much so fluctuates wildly between him barely scraping low-max health high-MR enemies with it and sitting in the middle of an entire health-stacking enemy team - and further more so by how much he can attack near the end of the duration. And at the same time, how many people know that he gets AD from it? How many Nasus players know that? How many people period knows it deals percent health damage?

I love the concept of sucking away nearby enemies' life and turning it into strength, but damn if that's not conveyed in the slightest.

HateDaddy1 votes

{quoted}

Something that could help massively I'd imagine is giving his ultimate either a self-purge on cast ( ala Alistar's ult ) or flat-out giving him CC immunity - probably not for the entire duration, but just 2.5 seconds or something after activation to allow him to claw himself through the enemy team and onto the priority target would be a massive help.

Wither could probably be given Spirit Fire's armor shred, scaling over the duration and lasting at maximum power for a bit - maybe upon reaching maximum power, a short but powerful slow occur over the remaining duration? So Nasus could still have a powerful CC skill, but one heavily delayed and just long enough to give him some strong ground on his target. Alternatively, I like your idea with giving Spirit Fire a slow, so it could probably build up a slow each time it damages an enemy, perhaps relative to the damage dealt ( but not scaling with it ) so hitting someone with the initial burst would start them more slowed than if they just walked into it for a split second.

Frankly, I don't need think his Q really need any sort of cap, hard or soft. It already pretty much has one due to game pace, and Veigar shows that Riot has no issue at all with a champion that increases the power of all his ranged damaging abilities and his tower-pushing damage infinitely just by hurting enemy champions - a single melee ability that requires Nasus to get farmed scaling infinitely really shouldn't be an issue.

One thing that could definitely use helping, though, is the consistency and visual power of his ultimate. "But Atan! His ultimate's super-consistent and obvious, it gives him health instantly and gives him a free Sunfire as a small bonus!" Well, here's the deal with that; that free Sunfire not only is percent health-based, but it also increases his AD by a percent of the damage dealt. So that damage is actually super impactful, but how much so fluctuates wildly between him barely scraping low-max health high-MR enemies with it and sitting in the middle of an entire health-stacking enemy team - and further more so by how much he can attack near the end of the duration. And at the same time, how many people know that he gets AD from it? How many Nasus players know that? How many people period knows it deals percent health damage?

I love the concept of sucking away nearby enemies' life and turning it into strength, but damn if that's not conveyed in the slightest.

His ult is incredibly powerful and 1-2 years ago when you could stack resists + sheen item and sit in the middle of a team and fight for 5-6 seconds, you'd notice his ults %maxhp damage and bonus ad from his ult would really start hitting hard. Now you get into the middle of a team just to say "I'd like to die now please."

Incognonymous1 votes

{quoted}

His ult is incredibly powerful and 1-2 years ago when you could stack resists + sheen item and sit in the middle of a team and fight for 5-6 seconds, you'd notice his ults %maxhp damage and bonus ad from his ult would really start hitting hard. Now you get into the middle of a team just to say "I'd like to die now please."

You still can notice that damage, the trick is using it against neutral monsters with high HP. Same with spirit fire since monsters eat the whole duration.

The Yetii Rider1 votes

Nasus is a champion I think that needs the Grounded debuff. Maybe halve the MS slow on Wither and add Grounded. Or maybe his E applies Grounded.

Incognonymous1 votes

Nasus is a scary objective control jungle. Easy early dragons, solo Rift Herald at like 15 minutes, turrets fall at the mere mention of Siphoning Strike. Part of me wishes Nasus's reimagining as a Juggernaut was pursued further. Juggernaut itemization fits like a glove to Nasus's hand.

Swiftstrike41 votes

I have only played the game for a little over a year, but I do play a lot of Nasus.

I think against higher Elo players Nasus has too many issues with being kited. Good players can kite him and kill him. He has a garbage teamfight even when he has a lot of stacks. The amount of CC in some comps force Nasus to only split-push, which can be frustrating. A simple comp such as Braum Annie Malphite MonkeyKing and Caitlyn would make Nasus completely useless. Other frequently played comps could do that same, but one such as this would make so that nasus would HAVE to split push the entire game.

The absolute worst is when you finally get close to killing someone after spending 30 seconds to a minute to gap close and then they use a summoner to escape. It is why item 3800 and item 3025 are great items on him and see more use than they did in the past on him.

I do think Nasus' stacks have diminishing returns already. He can't afford to AFK farm after 20 minutes and in the late game most people have itemized in a manner to mitigate his damage.

I also think since the mastery changes his early defensive stats are pretty poor. Armor items have been nerfed slightly since I started playing and it is noticeable on Nasus. I remember on the old mastery page you could get 10% additional Armor or MR off you bonus Armor or MR. Now I think it is 5 or 6%. And since most armor items provide less armor than they use too Nasus can't simply build full tank and be unkillable while getting kited.

When merc treads were terrible with really low tenacity I think that was when Nasus was at an all time low in terms of his useability in Gold or higher.

I think Nasus' stacks should give him a bonus to his tenacity at certain thresholds. I think by making that simple change Nasus instantly becomes viable again for rewarding players that can stack effectively.

If they buff armor items at any point Nasus will also become a better champion than his current state.

I understand that a lot of opponents think Nasus is a ticking time bomb. They can't stand playing against him because most competent Nasus players CAN stack pretty well against high amounts of harrass. As long as they don't die he should be able to eventually out scale and kill him.

There are some champions that Nasus stinks against and typically losses lane too even if the skill of the players is pretty even. Hard Nasus lane counters include Fiora, Trundle, Teemo, and Olaf. Then there are other champions that counter Nasus with early pressure. These matchups are more skill-oriented, but the Nasus player typically has to play A LOT better to deal with these types of matchups and avoid early deaths in order to outscale (Darius, Garen, Jax, and Pantheon).

Then you have match-ups in which the Nasus can outscale and avoid the harass, but he has a really hard time killing these opponents due to their skills or their tankyness. He basically doesn't win or lose lane if he farms well Maokai Ekko Malphite DrMundo Poppy. These are pretty annoying match-ups because the longer the game goes on the greater the utility of these champions over Nasus. Nasus also can rarely kill a player that is well verse with that champion.

By the time Nasus can do damage the game may already determined.

Favorable matchups for Nasus exist, but they also are largely determined by him not dying at all. Champions such as Tryndamere Riven Irelia Illaoi Gangplank Singed Yasuo MonkeyKing Renekton Kennen Akali Jayce are all pretty good matchups for Nasus. But the condition is that he can not die to them really at all. Most of these champions see less play than others int he top lane due to their general weakness relative to other top laners.

I really like Nasus' kit, however, I do think he needs a greater reward for farming effectively since the strength of items really effect the strength of Nasus.

Stacking is easy, but making sure you don't die while doing so, not getting kited, positioning in teamfights, and knowing when to split-push and make decisions are all REALLY hard in higher Elo.

Nasus is amazing in lower Elo because their is no coordination to take him down. In higher Elo a coordinated effort can completely shutdown a Nasus, which is incredibly frustrating if you lane and stack well. I can't tell you how many games I stack well, win lane, and avoid early death, just to get chain CC'd in a teamfight and die instantaneously.

I will say storm raiders surge is a bit of a blessing and a curse for Nasus. Nasus gives up the tenacity from the resolve tree to get storm raiders, however, if a team has hard CC in their comp storm raiders is virtually useless.

TL;DR

His base stats need a buff since the mastery changes Grant bonus tenacity based on stacks (it would have to be a small % probably) Armor and MR items need buffs

Ravenous Howls1 votes

TL:DR- Nasus is viable and is a great pick if you optimize and build to fill in his weaknesses.

Nasus is hardly as bad or as good as many of you are making him seem. If anything he is probably 1 of 10 champs in the game that is completely balanced.

First off let's get something straight, split pushing is no longer a viable tactic for anyone Nasus notwithstanding. The game currently encourages high mobility, %health damage or true damage kits. Making it next to impossible to split push and not be melted by a 2v1 situation regardless of who you are playing unless you are incredibly fed for some reason.

Armor and Magic Resist Nerfs only hit some of his original core items. Mainly Frozen Heart, Randuin's and Banshee's. These items used to be core but are really sub optimal on Nasus anymore. Especially FH it just doesn't feel as good on him over IBG. Randuin's can still be good if you have a critical chance lover but usually I don't need it. IBG into Thorn Mail against AA reliant match up's is insanely good rush right now. People want to poke you down before engaging typically and Thorn Mail really makes that hard to do without them killing themselves while you self heal. AP ranged tops are the real problem no MR item feels great to rush against them and this is singularly one of the hardest things to deal with as Nasus.

Proper Runes are a thing of the past. Everyone is rushing for AD reds instead of AR Pen or Hybrid Pen. If you can't last hit as Nasus without the extra AD then I personally think you need more practice. The very second you have over 100 stacks and sheen you will see a massive return with penetration runes. I've experimented both ways and I always do close to 5-6k more damage per game with these runes. This allows you better healing return from tanks and squishes alike. Typical set up are Marks- Hybrid Pen, Seals- Scaling Health, Glyphs- 6 Flat CDR and 3 Scaling CDR and Quints- Armor or MR depending on match up.

Damage items ARE good on Nasus. But only certain ones. You need a sheen item for sure. Arguably if you can get a Trinity you will not need another damage item. But if you get IBG then getting Titanic Hydra or Sterak's Gage is an awesome boost to Nasus. Obviously you won't buy either of these until 4th or 5th item and if you complain about "losing mah stacks bra!" from Titanic Hydra then you under farmed early. Titanic gives you a lot of damge on the front line, sustain and the ability to damage multiple enemies or push a wave into tower faster so you can join your team or create pressure. Another viable option is Maw but it far more situational and don;t ever buy with Steraks as their passives do not stack. By the time you have this item you should already have 400-600 stacks and be team fighting. If you are solely concerned with stacks all game then you will lose no and's, if's or but's about it.

Lastly, a good Keyestone is incredibly important to Nasus. Let's look at them all.

Ferocity tree

Warlords- extra life steal based on missing health. Benefit 50% vs minions and 100% vs champions. If we get poked down we still get bonus life steal to heal on minion without trading with enemy champion and pushing the lane.

Fervor- Extra AD stacking up to 6 times for trading with enemy champion. Gives us nothing early game as we do not want to trade early as Nasus.

Deathfire Touch- Adds burn to damaging abilities and AA for a % of AD or AP. Early trading or Spirit Fire spamming? No thanks.,

Cunning Tree

Storm Raiders Surge- dealing 30% of chmpions health gives you 70% SLOW ONLY immunity. Woopdiedo, if you get stunned, silenced, rooted, feared or some other horrid CC.

Thunderlords- 3 damaging strikes on the same enemy champion gives you a burst of damage based on % of AD and AP. Again early game trading and doesn't apply your stacked damage later so really worthless in the long run.

Windspeakers- Yeah we aren't a support so no.

Resolve Tree

Grasp- Excellent late game if we build enough health but sub optimal early as it encourages early trading. However it becomes good once you can trade around 10 minutes or so.

Strength of Ages- 300 health is awesome but it stacks somewhat slowly and the 6% max health heal on large siege minions and epic monsters late game is great but this does nothing for us early.

Bond of Stone- Not bad in a solo lane but in team fights you really don't want to to take extra damage for anyone else.

By taking warlords you improve your early survivability the most and still have it as a great benefit late game you just lose out the tenacity from the resolve tree. Grasp is great if you think you can survive an easier match up.

Sorry this turned into a long post but I thought it was necessary to give a synopsis of everything.

HenryDaHen1 votes

one thing that really bothers me about Nasus is his spirit fire ability. The mana cost is the same as Lux lucent singularity and the ap scaling is the same. However

  1. the range of the spell has lower range: 650 for nasus 1100 for lux
  2. the base damage is lower: 55-215 for nasus 60- 240 for lux
  3. The cooldown is higher: 12 sec for nasus 10 sec for lux
  4. the ability has no slow for nasus however for Lux the ability slows the enemies inside and for an extra duration when they exit the zone. In addition, when the spell is detonated, the enemy is slowed and will receive the illumination mark.

In summary the Nasus spirit fire is inferior in every way compared to Lux. This really needs to be changed either by

  1. lowering the mana cost significantly ( easy balance method) or
  2. give the spirit fire % armor shred at the very least or give nasus bonus resistances when standing inside the spirit fire. ( this was suggested by other players above)

If riot sees this at the very least the E spell of nasus needs to be changed immediately

LadyRenly1 votes

honestly my only issue is that his E is bloody freakin worthless.

It's just pointless damage and adds nothing to his kit, and unlike old malzahar, has no way to keep people inside his zone. I honestly max Wither before Spirit Fire because I find its more likely to score a kill and its good to frig with squishy assholes who hard shove lanes on me

Q is all I need to kill people with.

W is what makes Nasus for me

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