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@Riot The Issues of Karma’s Passive and a Suggestion how to “fix” them (constructive :) )

Warden Karma··64 votes·3,764 views

#Hello Community and Member Riots :) I am glad that you decided to read this and hopefully leave a Comment ^^

http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/6/68/Gathering_Fire.png

Every now and then a Thread pops up on the Gameplay and Balance Board: A Suggestion to change or (re)move Karma ’s Passive. Thus, the frequently asked change seems to has its reasons. Lets take a look why people feel that Karma’s Passive is ineffective or unsatisfying:

#First a Glance at what her Passive does: > Reduces the Cooldown of Mantra by 2/ 2,5/ 3 Seconds each time, Karma damages an enemy Champion with her Abilities (half for autoattacks).

While it is a nice Passive to reduce the Cooldown of her Ult, I believe that without a Passive like that, Karma ’s Mantra would become quite useless.

#So lets look at what the Passive has:

  • It only provides CDR if an enemy Champion is damaged
  • It only provides CDR if Mantra is on Cooldown

#So far so good, but these issues become a "real pain" if you take a look at Karma ’s Kit and Ability Sequence: In fact her Passive and Ultimate are created to go hand in hand, emphasizing Karma's Mantra concept. Unfotunately, Karma's Kit seems not to support this; in contradiction its even "playing against" this "Harmony", forcing decisions often to be either doing the right Mantra or using the Passive at its best. This outlined especially after her "soft rework" some Patches ago, where the additional Damage was removed from RW and RE.

  • (1) The Passive is only supported by a part of her kit (only 3 out of 6 Abilities), these 3 Abilities will always be preferred above the other 3, especially “only” the Mantra’d Q. * (2) This means that the Passive does not reward for making the right decisions for your Mantra or Abilities, instead you feel bad because you know that you lost lots of CDR from your Passive for casting your spells in the right order or for making the right decision (e.g.: Normal Combo for Karma is E-W-RQ, meaning you loose ~6-9 Seconds CDR or RE to save your Team).
  • (3) Looking at the example above (and the points under it) it gets clear, that the Passive “counters” itself more or less.
  • (4) Since you only gain CDR from the Passive when Mantra is on Cooldown, you want to spam it as soon as possible out, whether the moment is right or the decision is.
  • (5) This also means, that Karma has no Passive if Mantra is Off Cooldown.
  • (6) In Addition to this, a Passive like this is normally moved to the Ability associated to it (here the Ult).

#How can these issues be fixed?

There are two ways (I guess): improving the actual Passive so that it feels good or move the Passive to the Ultimate and give Karma a new one.

To be honest I would prefer it, if the issues on Karma’s passive are fixed, as this is simplier than to implement something completely new I believe:

Fixing Issue 1 and 2:

Inspire and Defiance reduces the Cooldown of every allied Champion shielded by 1,50/ 1,75/ 2,00 Seconds. If Renewal roots an enemy Champion, the Cooldown of Mantra is reduced by 4/5/6 Seconds.

Fixing Issue 3 to 5: Karma can store up to 4/6/8 Seconds of Gathering Fire, applying instantly after Mantra goes on Cooldown.

#All in one, Karma’s improved Passive would look like this (fixing Issue 6):

Reduces the Cooldown of Mantra by 2/ 2,5/ 3 Seconds each time, Karma damages an enemy Champion with her Abilities (half for Autoattacks).

Inspire and Defiance reduces the Cooldown of every allied Champion shielded by 1,50/ 1,75/ 2,00 Seconds.

If Renewal roots an enemy Champion, the Cooldown of Mantra is reduced by 4/5/6 Seconds.

Karma can store up to 4/6/8 Seconds of Gathering Fire, applying instantly after Mantra goes on Cooldown.

Note: The shield only reduces the Cooldown if an ALLY is shielded, the root only when the Ability is Mantra’d AND actually roots the enemy Champion (to keep the “risky” part of that Mantra). Example Numbers which most probably work without making her OP: (The numbers must not necessarily rise with the Champion Level, they can be static as well) Damage: 2 to 3 Seconds Ally Shields: 1,5 to 2 Seconds Healroot: 4 to 6 Seconds Storing: 4 to 10 Seconds (these should be scaling with Level)

OR moving her current Passive to her Ult and giving her a new Passive:

Example: New Passive: Balance

Everytime there is Damage dealt from Champion to Champion, Karma stores 3/6/9 (1/2/3 for AAs) AP, saving up to 3 (+6 per Level) AP (9 AP at Level 1; 111 AP At Level 18) If Karma was not hit be the Damage, she stores 4/8/12 AP (1.35/2.70/4 for AA's) instead. (~1000 Range) Using an Ability will reinforce it with the full amount of Stored AP, but karma will loose 35% of her Storings and will not be able to gather AP for the next 2 Seconds.

This Passive is close to her old passive, BUT provides counterplay such as focusing Karma or waiting till she casted an Ability. In generell Karma needs some time to "charge". Also you do not have to run at low Health all the time since your stacks are not effected by your health.

#But wouldn’t this make Karma super OP?

First of all, these changes would make Karma more “round”, more rewarding and fixes many issues of her Passive and Kit. With these changes you do not need to feel bad for the “wasted” CDR because you just used RE to save your team, instead you feel good and you are rewarded by your Passive for doing “the right thing” rather then being punished by it sometimes. This means if played right, no matter for which Mantra you go, if it was a right/good choice you are rwarded – and not only for casting RQ. It would also separate the “good” Karmas from the “exellent” Karmas. Furthermore this change is usefull in every Lane, be it as a Mid, Top or Support: all these roles can take advantage of these changes, but Supports the most I guess.

Indeed with those changes you will get a lot more CDR from your Passive, as intended. How far this overextends the Balance of Karma has to be determined – all numbers are of course exchangeable. I want to emphasize at this point that I do not want Karma to be OP, I just want that she feels good and that her Kit is in harmony, she should have her strengths and weaknesses. One is for sure: it will make Karma stronger, yes, but not necessary OP.

#As my final words to this I would say: I believe this is a change Karma needs.

Please, Riot I know (new) Karma has only a small Fanbase under her feet so this Thread might not get the attention, upvotes or amount of Comments as another Thread with a more popular Champion or Concern, But I ask you to discuss this and bring it at least to the PBE and hear what Players think about how much better (or worse?) Karma feels with those changes. I am sure many Karma Players will support this change and be happy with it :)

#Thank you for Reading and partipicating on this.

67 Comments

LycopolisKing18 votes

I completely agree that Karma's passive should be integrated into her ultimate. Champions have default abilities that have cool down modifiers, it makes no sense that Karma's is in her passive instead of in the ultimate itself.

Warden Karma4 votes

I added an example of a new Passive I have been thinking long about:

New Passive: Balance

Everytime there is Damage dealt from Champion to Champion, Karma stores 9% (3% for AAs) of her maximum bonus AP, saving up to 6 (+6 per Level) AP. If Karma was not hit be the Damage, she stores 12% (4% for AA's) instead. (~1000 Range) Using an Ability will reinforce it with the full amount of Stored AP, but karma will loose 35% of her Storings and will not be able to gather AP for the next 2 Seconds.

Gathering Fire --> Mantra: Reduces the CDR by 2 Seconds via enemy hit.

This Passive is close to her old passive, BUT provides counterplay such as focusing Karma or waiting till she casted an Ability. In generell Karma needs some time to "charge". Also you do not have to run at low Health all the time since your stacks are not effected by your health.

Abyssphere4 votes

{quoted}

I completely agree that Karma's passive should be integrated into her ultimate. Champions have default abilities that have cool down modifiers, it makes no sense that Karma's is in her passive instead of in the ultimate itself.

Agreed. Even if Mantra is core to her kit, no champion's passive should interact exclusively with one ability they have.

l Helios l1 votes

That aspect may stem from Karma just being an older champion. Gnar has cdr in his ult passive but he is quite new. Moving it to her ult is a good idea

Maximum Morde6 votes

I absolutely hated losing the damage off RW and RE. It makes it feel like those two mantras are just inferior choices, and usually they are. It's risky to be running low to be able to utilize RW and RE is incredibly situational. As far as I'm concerned they killed her Mantra diversity. I'd be interested in seeing the numbers for how often each Mantra is actually used. Anyway, the problem is she is not in a bad spot from a balance perspective right now so any tweaks have to be done super catiously.

Kitten of Evil1 votes

They really did kill her Mantra diversity. They actually removed flexibility rather than adding it.

CanadianFarmer1 votes

Who in their right mind would RE instead of RQ.

That's what we are at with the removal of the dmg....

Baron of Bread2 votes

As someone who plays a lot of support Karma, I use RE in fights way more than RQ. RQ for poking before the fight, RE for starting/avoiding/surviving a fight. I think if I can save my carries with an RE then it is better than an RQ.

RisenDarkKnight1 votes

RE is usually way more useful in 5 v 5s if you are support. The team speedboost is really nice, and the shield on the main target is enormous. Mid Karma has no reason not to go RQ though.

Weasel Kensei6 votes

I always felt that if Karma were relesed today, with the champs as the are, her passive would have been on R, and she would have a real passive.

After all, her passive ONLY interacts with her Ult, and her Ult is just a modifier to her abilities.

It would be like if Heimerdinger didnt have increased regen for him and nearby allies/pets as a passive, but some some weird interaction with his Ult... its just weird.

So many champs with 3 passives now, and all Karma has is the one that is an interaction cooldown for her modifier ability.... Karma basically dosnt have a passive.

Warden Karma3 votes

I guess if Karma were reworked today... she still would have Fans as her weapon and most of her old Kit...

Kitten of Evil4 votes

They need to add something back into her kit. It feels like they've just kept taking things out and making her more and more bland -- RE overshield damage and RW extra damage -- now Mantra's only offensive power is on RQ.

I like this idea because it would give her a bit more flexibility, but I'm not that excited about a "reduces cooldown" taking up a whole passive slot even with these changes. Just think of other champions: Tristana basically has Gathering Fire on her Q and her E along with a full reset on W, Taric has AA cooldown reduction on his heal, Graves on his dash...

Champion Skin2 votes

Taric has AA cooldown reduction on his heal

What?

Taric heal Heals taric and an ally or only taric for an increased amount (and it scales with AP and bonus health)

Taric passive Gives Taric a sheen like effect which scales with armor and reduce his cooldowns with 2 seconds when used

Evenstar4 votes

Hi @Shyndora, I've been monitoring this thread for Karma-related discussions for the past few months and wanted to hop in to the discussion when I saw this thread last night. I had trouble accessing to the boards because I'm not from any of the regions provided by Riot (I'm from South East Asia, ran by Garena), so I was lucky that my friend lent me his account to participate in this discussion.

Without further ado, let me get in to discussion, starting with my opinions on your changes

  1. I like your proposed changes, but I think it is a bit too complicated to implement
  2. While the changes are look good, it suffers from clarity issue, players/opponents can't gauge well enough when dealing/playing with Karma
  3. Even with the passive changed, it wouldn't make her any more appealing, because her kit is another part of the problem

Now, let's take a look at her **weaknesses **

  1. Falls off late game
  2. Has low benefit to use abilities
  3. More or less confined to support role because trade offs for playing Karma mid/top is too big.
  4. Looks good on paper, but when applied practically, suffers from reliability and consistency.
  5. Despite Riot's intention to solve her pre-rework issue, post-rework, the issue still persists (Karma is still team dependent to win games)

Let's go in to why, I think even after the passive has been changed, that she will still suffer from being weak. No doubt, the passive will make her stronger, but it wouldn't necessarily make her any more appealing/consistent... Also, I will say that Karma's rework is Riot's first attempt of attempting to provide a rework champion with overloaded kit, and it didn't go so well.

Q/R->Q: 25/50% slow for 1.5 seconds, 785+150% AP slammed in to R->Q, easily body blocked, neglected. Unclear radius explosion, even when aimed from an angular shot, can sometimes be misleading. Also, Karma's Q's hit window can sometimes be a bit off, I suspect Riot didn't look well in to this when reworking her. For most parts, Q in terms of value and ratio is fine, R->Q however, suffers from having huge numbers dumped in to one ability, this means Karma has little room for mistake, especially for those playing AP Mid and AP Top. The problem with Q/R->Q is its slow, for most part, people can argue that it has low slow duration and % because Karma can spam it, but the problem with this ability is that it is a skillshot, which means that half of the time, people can easily dodge and render this ability useless for the next 4 seconds. R->Q's second component of damage (350+60% AP) is also easily dodged/blocked/soaked too, which renders Karma useless if she doesn't make good use of her R->Q. Compare her slow with the other AP champions too, some who trade higher percentage/prolonged duration of slow, they tend to perform better compared to Karma's spammy slow.

W/R->W: The ability that I keep questioning on Karma. It is a 2 seconds tether that applies 260+90% AP damage. To start, no AP champions these days have 90%AP on a regular ability, by Riot's books, it would have been nerfed because it gave too much damage. However, it's not happening because this ability has low benefit to use, and half of the time, people break off the leash with relative ease. This ability is the only ability that I as a Karma main question because it provides the lowest benefits even after successfully proc-ing the snare, I endanger myself to get a leash off and on top of that, cannot do anything else for 24 seconds until my next charge of mantra comes up. The 20% upfront Heal, while nice, isn't helpful when dueling with champions who are burst/AS oriented. This ability is even more unattractive when 5.10 changes hit Karma, mega root didn't make this ability anymore attractive than it is. Another problem with this ability is that it falls out late game, it's a tool for Karma to abuse early game but then it suffers horribly late game, you will be throwing more Qs and Es than Ws. You will also not be using the mega root most of the time because as it stands, there are better options for Karma with better rewards.

E/R->E: Potentially the most controversial change among Karma mains. Damage/shield component was Karma's iconic ability as a champion. With 5.10 changes, this ability has been reduced to a shield, and aoe shield, more shield value with movespeed boost. Problem with this ability, its all over the place. Move speed for 1.5 seconds, and shield duration for 4 seconds. AoE shield is negligible on secondary targets in teamfights because in teamfights, damage rack up and the secondary shields can easily be destroyed in 1,2 seconds. In fact, I don't think AoE shield is necessary on Karma, right now, you're trading off her damage component for a buffed up shield for one target, 410+80%AP, when in her old ability, you get 280+80% shield + damage. Thing is, 80% AP on a shield is good enough, you don't even need to buff the values. Right now, I'm using Mantra to just to get an additional 40% AP on a shield and on top of that, I can't do anything for the next 20+ seconds because my damage component on E has been removed. Also, no ability has haste/shield combined together, which makes this ability messy. One can argue it is a mini shurelya/coin, but I can assure you that even shurelya/coin or even other champion's haste like Sivir's ult is much more useful than E's haste, because while they provide lower duration for move speed, they have it for extended duration, which makes it much more useful for engaging/disengaging, and perform more reliably compared to Karma's 1.5 MS boost. Furthermore, other AP champions who have shield provide a better shield as a regular ability, with higher values and ratio.

R: Revert this to a two mantra charge, that's all I'll say. There are many reasons why Karma is so underwhelming now, one being that Mantra is tied to her passive, which then leaves little room for more helpful stats to be implemented, the other being it's only limited to one charge. The question I'll pose is, why do I need a CDR passive when I can buy CDR and have innate CDR from masteries (or runes), it'd be better off if you gave me two charges of mantra back and my old passive.

FYI, I wrote a longer, detailed post but accidentally lost the draft when I pressed "Back" on my keyboard. I'm sorry if everything seems jumbled and confusing because I'm making a second effort to write all over again. But Shyndora, I'll gladly clarify my words if you ask..

Now, Shyndora and the rest of ya'll, I notice that some of you talked about Old Karma. As with the rest of you, I agree Old Karma may not come back, BUT.. I will say this, a lot of Riot staffs are beginning to open up about what they feel about Karma, and most of them have (in their words) said "We definitely f*cked things up." So its definitely becoming clearer that Riot regrets their direction taken with Karma. I will however say this, you guys have a board to talk about Karma, and if you guys really want to bring some attention to her, its best you guys start forming a group to talk about Karma, document the changes and arguments you guys have collated over the year and bring it to attention, make your demands known, no matter how small the fanbase may be. At least you guys have a way to reach Riot, imagine those at Asian servers not being able to reach out to the Riot boards at all, lmao.

Also, to finish off my comment, since we're doing a bit of theory crafting with Karma's kit as well, I went to dig up her old stats and kit.

Old Base stats Damage: 53.3(+3.3 per level) Mana: 300(+60 per level) Movement Speed: 335 Armor: 18.5(+3.5 per level) Magic Resist: 30 Health Per 5 Sec: 4.7 Mana Per 5 Sec: 6.8 Range: 425

New Base stats

Damage: 53.3(+3.3 per level) 
Mana: 340(+50 per level)
Movement Speed: 335
Armor: 13.8(+3.8 per level)
Magic Resist: 30
Health Per 5 Sec: 4.7
Mana Per 5 Sec: 6.8
Range: 525

With talk about her old kits, I was thinking about her old passive.. What if we tuned it in something similar to Kalista's passive?

  • Inner Flame Karma gains 0.3 / 0.5 / 0.7 / 0.9 / 1.1 / 1.3 bonus ability power for each 1% of her missing health. However, Karma receives 90% AP when purchasing AP-related items.

This will accentuate the play on her passives more, and gives us room to make certain changes to her base stats..

Range -> 525 Mana -> 320 + (50 per level)

  • Heavenly Wave Active: Karma sends forth a wave of hidden blades from her fans, dealing magic damage to units in a cone in front of her.

    Magic Damage: 70 / 110 / 150 / 190 / 230 / 270 (+ 60% AP)

-Mantra old Mantra bonus: Heavenly Wave will also heal Karma and her allies in the cone by a base amount plus 5% (+ 2% per 100 AP) of their missing health.

Heal: 35 / 55 / 75 / 95 / 115 / 135

Range: 700 --> 850

  • Soul Shield Active: Karma summons a protective shield on an ally or herself that absorbs damage for 5 seconds.

    Shield: 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240 / 280 (+ 80% AP)

-Mantra old Mantra bonus: From the Soul Shield bursts out a surge of energy, dealing magic damage to enemy units around her target.

Magic damage: 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240 / 280 (+ 80% AP)

Range: unchanged

  • Spirit Bond Active: Karma creates a beam between an ally or enemy unit for up to 5 seconds. The beam breaks if the bonded target is stealthed.

Allied anchors move faster and enemy anchors are slowed and dealt magic damage. The beam applies the same movement speed modifier anchors receive to any champion it passes through for 3 seconds.

Magic Damage: 80 / 125 / 170 / 215 / 260 / 305 (+ 70% AP) 

Movement Speed Modifier: 10 / 12 / 14 / 16 / 18 / 20%

Mantra old Mantra bonus: The Spirit Bond is strengthen, doubling the effect of the movement speed modifier.

Movement speed modifier: 20 / 24 / 28 / 32 / 36 / 40%

Change ~ Move speed remains the same, allies are provided with defensive stats (10/12/14/12/18/25) MR/Armor boost, whereas tethered enemies receive 60/80/95/110/140 + (70%AP) over 5 seconds (28+14%AP per second). Enemies who pass through the tether receive the damage instantaneously, at half of the damage dealt. (cont.)

Evenstar2 votes

Allies who passes through the tether receive 20 MR/Amor, but only for 2 seconds.

CD changes... most likely 15 / 14 / 13 / 12 / 11 / 10 ---> 14/13/12/11/10/9 should put it at a reasonable spot.

Old Mantra will not be changed, it'll be at two charges, 2 ranks to increase. The rest of the ability will retain 6 ranks. But perhaps, there is room SOME CDR.

  • Every time Karma uses her ability to damage an enemy, Mantra's cooldown is reduced by 1/2/2.5 seconds (thinking of whether 3 is too strong on her). What changes is that basic attacks no longer apply CDR, and CDR is applied per ability used to hit enemy than number of enemies hit. If people insist on basic attacks, I would personally only give a static 0.5 CDR, we may have have to bump up the cooldown in her mantra in that case.

The only thing that I personally think can be changed completely is her W.

But basically, I'm going back to a simpler concept, where each ability has one utility/cc (although I did add some stuffs later on after writing this, just in case some people felt like the old kit just won't cut it) instead of cramping two in to one and create confusion. CDR will probably be a much needed stat on her once more, but not so much about a part of her kit. Also, this will go back to her "we stand together and fight" kind of theme, that powerful yet gentle nature as a champion.

Also, there will no longer be any linear colliding skillshots, its back to her cone skillshot, one simple click on ability and the same E. I also wanted to talk about why E is no longer an AoE shield.. by removing the aoe shield component, we won't have issues balancing her in fear that aoe shield makes her overly strong if her ratios and damage components are given back. Furthermore, making E a singular target shield increases the skillcap and decision making on Karma, meaning she has to assess the situations carefully and decide who is in need of the shield the most (expand two mantra for shield or expand second mantra for healing?). In this case, while AoE shield is no longer given, she can commit fully to protect a particular teammate with her 80% Shield.

Some other things to consider here is the stealth reveal on W, perhaps 2 seconds of reveal if target beam is broken?

Also going back to passive, I wanted it to retain its purpose of being a real Inner Flame, not some inner flame that can be expanded and stored like energy.

P/S: If aoe shield is really wanted, I'm considering (120+30%AP) to secondary targets PP/S: In any case, could I get in touch with Shyndora? I'd love to talk to you about Karma, as with the rest who want to talk about Karma. We should have a group or something.

Warden Karma2 votes

I just wanted to work a little on Karma with this Thread as I know Riot is not known for liking to change Karma towards her former from... I know Karma's Kit is "problematic" and needs work.

@Vesivian I will ad you to my friendslist. Lets come together and discuss :)

Evenstar1 votes

Sorry for the late reply. The owner of this account (Vesivian) contacted me and told me you approached him on the clients. I've already provided my skype contact to the owner so that he can pass it to you :D. Looking forward to talking to you about Karma.

Voluug131 votes

Well, to be fair most of the reasons they provided where either: complete BS, or are by now extremely outdated (burden of knowledge). The only thing that needed to go was her old passive, and even there it was only ''problematic'' to squishy divers, aka assassins.

runedara4 votes

Still take Karmas passive over Zyra's. Zyra's sucks.

Ownke4 votes

I may be a minority here but I love Karma and have thought about her ult. What if they made it to where her ult made you change 'stances' so to speak?

Her initial set that does dmg primarily and the second defensive or evasive. They could even have it to where you chain them in a certain way to do fun a new things? Just spit balling. Sounds somewhat like brand but they could spice it up Im sure.

Sassmast3r1 votes

Whoa I actually really love this idea! I think they wouldn't actually do this though, since Udyr is kind of that one champion with stances in his kit already. But if Udyr didn't exist, this would be a fascinating idea to test out! :D

HalcyonDweller3 votes

I used to be a Karma main before the rework, love your ideas, this might actually get me to play her again if RIOT implemented it.

Warden Karma3 votes

Lets be honest, Karma will most probably never be again like she was before (but maybe we will get a similiar Champion someday?).

Old Karma <3

CanadianFarmer2 votes

I came around in s3 and never was able to play old Karma. Even though I like her atm and she is the champ I have the best win ratio with, I feel like I missed something good :((

Also, i just love saying in game "Karma is a bitch

HalcyonDweller1 votes

Ye olde tower baits. Best in the game, old Karma was hilariously awesome to bait tower dives with.

IxtaliKing3 votes

I like the idea of her current passive being moved to her ult to free up a slot for a more interesting passive. However I really wish they would put some damage back on her R+E, the skill feels naked and hollow without damage. Even if they made the damage 50% of the shield value I'd be happy.

Jingerbeardman2 votes

do people not realize karma has some of the highest ap ratio abilities in the game... there has to be a tradeoff somewhere, and her passive is not even a tradeoff. Her passive is so insanely awesome you can get mantra back up in no time and use it 3 times in a single team fight... why would you want to change that?

Voluug131 votes

Per ability? Only one: RQ. And then if you compare her total ratios to everyone else hers is worse that TF's.

And her massive CDR in teamfights was thanks to RE's damage, which was removed. She no longer can get those massive amounts of CDR on Mantra in teamfights.

Jingerbeardman1 votes

incorrect. They modified her passive to scale and reduce your mantra cooldown more as the game progressed. While an easy QE no longer gives you another mantra (depending on the situation) it does refresh faster than it used to with each spell hit and auto attack on enemy champions.

As for your comparison on ratios... are you forgetting the fact that karma has one of the highest base damage and scaling abilities in the game. Yes I am repeating myself, oh and I forgot to mention that she has them at level 1.

I was one of the most prolific karma players for the majority of last year. While I still consider her one of my mains, the meta-game has shifted in a way that has made karma top far less effective than it was in the past. I only really enjoyed playing her top.

While losing the bonus damage on QW and QE was unfortunate they made up for that in making Karma as a whole far less reliant on CDR than she was. That is a major positive and opens far more starting options for her.

Besides all of that... Karma has one of the best passives in the game, she has her ult available to her at level 1 and an additional passive that helps reduce its cooldown so you can use it even more. Heimerdinger has a comparatively similar ultimate in the way it functions but has to wait till level 6 in order to unlock it, just think about that for a moment and let it sink in.

Ionian StarChild2 votes

I do hope they'll eventually change her current passive as her ult's passive and give her a proper ult, one that affects every aspect of her kit, not just her mantra. I'm all for the suggestions about boosting the damage component of her other skills. I never understood why they remove the bonus damage on her W plus the damage aspect of her shield. It opened up several combos for her not to mention numerous options of damaging her opponent other than spamming Q.

The way I see her is that either Riot returns some of the needed damage on her W and E or give them more utility/crowd control effects. I feel like for her W to give her an incentive on snaring the target the ability needs to apply a damage reduction debuff on the target when mantra-ed. That effectively gives her the ability to control the outcome of a fight by hindering her target's damage output. It would also lower the risk of putting herself in danger when she uses the ability by shutting down the main damage dealer of the enemy team. This gives this ability a tactical use rather than just snaring whoever is closest to you.

As for her shield I'm still disappointed that they removed the damage component of the ability. I mean, not only for the reasons stated earlier but just visually the spell looks like it's supposed to affect everyone around the main target when mantra-ed. If they do not give back the damage aspect of the ability, I suggest they give the ability a secondary effect, one that affects enemies since allies are already getting the haste and shield. I like the idea of having the explosion knock enemies back/up slightly. When I said slightly, I meant it in the form of Riven's Q and its soft CC. This would give the ability a tactical feel as well for it not only would it do what it does now but it will also aid in improving the current offensive/defensive use of the ability. With that soft CC, her teammates can effectively catch fleeting enemies and also boost their chances of being able to survive close encounters when getting caught and afflicted with hard CC, which is something Karma's kit lacks currently. Additionally, this suggestion would give her tools against some of the abilities for which she currently doesn't have a counter/answer for, like Kat's ult for instance.

I feel that this change, together with the suggestion for her W (if Riot does not give them back their damage components), would make Karma a solid pick as a support. As for a potential new passive, I would like to see something that allows her to heal her teammates/allies. That is one of the main things I miss about old Karma; her ability to heal her allies. Reading up on other great suggestions on this post, I've come up with this idea;

Gathering Fire: Karma gains essence of yin and yang whenever she uses an ability. Using an offensive spell gives her yin while defensive spell gives her yang. When either essences obtained reached max amount of charges, Karma's next ability gains an additional effect depending on which essence is currently active.

Yin, when maxed out, changes the passive into Heavenly Wave

Heavenly Wave: Karma's next defensive ability will heal up to X amount of target's missing health

Yang, when maxed out, changes the passive into Spirit Fire

** Spirit Fire**: Karma's next offensive ability deals additional damage based on target's max health

These are just some of my ideas on how to make Karma "unique" and complete. I wouldn't say she's in a bad state, but she currently does feel incomplete. I think that's why some of us do find her bland. She lacks some options that should've been there to make her be able to compete and stand toe-to-toe with other solid/viable picks in the game. I'm not saying all should be considered, but I hope to see some aspects of them being implemented. Thanks for reading :)

Voluug131 votes

The problem of reworking Mantra is that thatis Karma's identity.

Mantra needs to be better, simple as that. Sadly, its not possible to make it with the current overcentralizing RQ and the disjointed parts of her kit, like her haste in E.

CoolKnightST2 votes

To bad worlds is on right now so I don't expect any riot responses. I still hope they see this. We just need to keep the topic alive for a week or two. This won't be easy:

http://orig15.deviantart.net/db89/f/2013/245/8/b/karma_by_liieren-d6kt192.jpg

Warden Karma1 votes

Hope is the greatest ally :)

Aezanthya1 votes

Why not something like : whenever you shield an ally/your allies you gain a buff that boosts your offensive spells and whenever you damage an ennemy, you gain a buff that increases your defensive abilities (well in this case her only defensive ability is her E).

But yeah bottom line is : her passive should be her ult passive.

Warden Karma1 votes

So something like:

Karma's Abilities fill her with either White or Black Energy for 3 Seconds. Damaging an enemy with Karma's Abilities will fill her with white energy, increasing the Heal of Renewal by +5% of her missing Health and the Shield of Inspire by 15%. Healing herself through Renewal or Shielding a Champion grats her Black Energy, which increases Karma's Damage by +10%. Karma can only awake one kind of energy at a time and only 2 times every 10 Seconds.

The 3 Seconds Duration prevents the Passive to switch too often between black and white and the limited useage should prevent it from being too strong.

CanadianFarmer1 votes

This sounds really great and would definitively match her lore.

ModCaptainMårvelous1 votes

Here's my recommendation:

  • Make Karma's Ult 2 charges, albeit two charged in different ways.
  • One is charged by inflicting damage on enemies and getting kills.
  • The other charge is gained by shielding allies, as well as healing done to Karma herself.

The duality of Karma is something not really mentioned. She's forceful but gentle. Powerful yet humble. Yin and Yang. Her kit doesn't really emphasize the fact that Karma understands that both paths of war and peace must exist. A change like I proposed could let her not be constrained to a single Manta while also boosting her identity.

Although the idea I proposed is hardly as well thought out or constructed as yours.

Hupsis1 votes

I don't think buffing the current passive to include shields and snares would be a good thing. The reason why the cd reduction was increased from 2sec to 2/2.5/3sec based on level was because she lost the damagd part on R+E. Even with normal Q you will be able to reduce mantra cd almost as effectively as with R+Q. It makes her Q meaningful even if you max W and E first for some reason.

I believe however that she could use a new passive while the current one is moved to her ult. Mantra itself could have an addition where it gave Karma some mana if it was not used after activation.

I was thinking something small that wouldn't be overwhelmingly amazing but still made her a bit more unique: Karma can use her W to an ally once every 120 seconds to balance her and her ally health until both have the same %amount of health or Karma has 40% of her health left.

This would help her support role the most but in solo lane would allow her to give some health to the jungler when they need it. Since she already has a way to heal herself it would be nice if she could heal others even if it was on a high cooldown.

Karbuncle1 votes

Just throwing some Ideas out there since I doubt Riot will actually change things. Let's look at what Karma was changed to from her original kit, a poke q spamming,delayed snare,shielding engage mage. Lets look at mages that already had similar kits Lulu and Lux both are utility mages while Lulu focuses on utility and Lux focuses on damage. We have Karma who cant do a bit of both but will not ever be better than either of them.Let's look at their passives,conditional auto attack magic damage, simply adding extra magic damage to Karma's auto attacks will help immensely seeing as how her Q makes for the most awkward farming of any mage. Let's look at Karma's niche,being decent at everything, I propose at the start of the game Karma can choose to focus 1 of her 3 basic abilities so that they scale into late game and thus give her an identity by the time late game comes. Q-Make it so that it goes through Minions and explodes on monsters and champions only.Doing this will not increase her damage per say but will allow less opportunity for her main damage to be body blocked and not do any damage to her desired target at all. This Focus is designed for Solo Lane Karma W-Focusing on this skill is designed for jungle Karma,you could do many things to make changes to just this ability that would make jungle Karma viable such as,Dealing more damage to monsters,having an increased function on champions for ganks,allows Gathering Fire passive to be used on Monsters. E-Focusing on this skill would be designed for Support Karma,functions could include,extending shield duration to 6 seconds,extending speed buff duration,when Karma shields an ally she gets a shield for half on herself.

Other routes to buff her late game would be a Mirror of Syndra who is her Rival to unlock passives when she maxes her abilities

Pale Pirate1 votes

dayum son, teach me some online text editing.

Fude1 votes

I have a few ideas.

Option 1. Make her ultimate reset the cooldown on her last ability used. This will allow for either burst combos or other interesting options. Q, RQ burst combo. Double shield to save someone. W. RW slow on 2 different targets or possible chain slow root on a single target if played correctly.

Option 2. Give her W and E dual purposes like Lulu. W can now be cast on allies (or herself) to speed them up. Karma will have movement speed increase as well as long as tether remains. Sorta like old school Karma! E can now be cast on enemy units and does damage and also either reduces armor, magic resist, applies grievous wounds or lowers attack speed for a short time. Basically damage and some sort of debuff.

A Liberal1 votes

I agree, her passive really should just be part of her ult.

PotatoMine1 votes

A common misconception is that all passive's are created equal; They are not, and to try and do so is foolish balance team. Imagine slapping Brand's, Ryze's or Annie's passive on Karma. They don't fit, even though the passive has not changed the context that it is being used in has. Karma has a lot of moving parts and as such she has a weaker passive, but, being a Karma player myself, not a worthless one. I make great use of her passive. He passive fits her and though it could logically be moved to her ult if that was done she would have to give up power else where to get a new passive. Would you rather have a new passive that is only ok or a new effect on chains(Which I consider lackluster right now).

I do however like the idea of a storage system for her passive, but care needs to be taken so she cannot double tap people with mantra'd spells. You make a good point that it is has a negative relationship. If Riot wanted to buff Karma it seams like a good place to do it. But the shielding part and reduction on root I don't like, last time they messed with her passive they buffed it because it does not proc on shields, they'd have to undo that to balance it and that's not really to correct way to address this problem. He passive is about rewarding aggression.

StellarPrime1 votes

So, I recently just picked up Karma and I love her! After about two weeks of playing her as a mid lane Mage I discovered that she's way more effective with 40% cdr. I have to sacrifice some m-pen from sorc boots but the extra dps and more frequent ults are worth it; It just makes liandry's a must have for me every game. I wanted to throw the idea out there that we could try testing simply having her ult completely reset the cooldown on her basic abilities (while keeping her current passive and numbers the same). This might make her too oppressive? I don't know, but it would work for example like this: basic q an enemy, hit Mantra R, then q immediately again (with the Q still being empowered Soulflare). Any thoughts?

Evenstar1 votes

Hi guys, I spoke to Shyndora last night, and I'll leave it at this...

Shyndora is an awesome and the most dedicated Karma lover I've ever seen. He's done a lot of theorycrafting and iteration that I honestly think he deserves to have an AP item named after him, like Shyndora's Resolve (no joke). The fact that he's making an effort to improve Karma, you guys should really hop on the support train and give him some love if you will. So, I think the least you guys can do is keep this thread alive for a long period of time, at least until Riot has some constructive feedback to provide.

Bârd1 votes

Her passive has great potential as it stands, and any more could push her into the range where riot guts her.

Ok, with level 16 and max CDR, Mantra is on a 21.6 second cooldown and Gathering fire reduces its cooldown by 3 seconds per proc. If you tag two people with both phases of Mantra Q, you shave off 12 seconds (2 procs on 2 people, 4 total procs for 3 seconds each, 12 seconds) 9.6 seconds left W hits the target 3 times, so if you can land that as well, you shave a further 9 seconds off of it, and since it took a couple of seconds for the snare to go off, mantra is now ready to be used again. Since it can be difficult to land both Q phases on multiple targets, lets say you only land the first phase on two targets, or land both phases on one. This still leaves Mantra on a 6 second cooldown, which can be further reduced to 1.5 seconds if you autoattack while your W is on the target.

With the first set of changes proposed, Mantra will have a 13.6 second cooldown from the storage portion. If she uses W and lands the root, she will reduce the cooldown of mantra by 15 seconds, with 1.4 seconds of overflow (more if she hit anyone with a mantra-Q)

The second set could work, but it encourages Karma to sit back and follow a pattern of "RQ-wait-Q-wait-Q-wait" to maximize her damage output.

Tacking on an entire new ability onto a champion that is already strong (though largely underplayed for some reason) will get her gutted a couple patches later.

Zair Umbras1 votes

Honestly, I want the ability to have two charges of it. The reason the removed the two charges is because they wanted it to feel more 'ultimate-y', but considering they've reduced the cool down on it plus boosted her passive's CD reduc... I mean, it has almost no CD and she's balanced around that, so why not just make life easier and give it two charges and bring the passive back down to a 2s reduc.

CoolKnightST1 votes

Bumb, still no riot reply

http://stuffpoint.com/league-of-legends/image/205094-league-of-legends-karma-dd.png

Warden Karma1 votes

So its preseason and I wonder if Karma is included in the Mages Update...

Nekusen1 votes

riot already said they won't be making any abilities that reduce or increase the cooldowns on other champions.

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