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manaflow band got nerfed at all levels but why this is especially bad for enchanters...

JarodDempsey··3 votes·1,094 views

So ive done numerous tests with a couple mana dependant enchanter supports and this is what ive found: using the same build and while they have similar manapools: Support 1: primary mana drain = 80/100 (lvl 6/18) Support 2: primary mana drain = 60/60 (lvl 6/18)

average mana gained per min from mfb:

lvl 6: S1 old: 88 new: 40 S2 old: 76 new: 43

lvl 18: S1: old: 130 new: 91 S2: old: 98 new: 85

Why is new manaflow band bad? Average decrease in mana output: 35% Average decrease in mana output at level 6: 49% Average minimum cost to unlock passive: 375 mana (about 6 shields/heals worth of mana) Absolute minimum time to unlock passive: 2.5 minutes after reaching level 2 (functionally about 4 old mfb's worth of time minimum = 330 effective mana) Comparable effective average minimum cost to unlock passive: 705 mana (an entire mana supply in early game!)

Between the mana cost to unlock the passive and the lack of effective generation before it is unlocked youre effectively loosing an entire mana bar's amount compared to old mfb. This in addition to the effectively halved mana output of new mfb in early game is why new mfb is so terrible, especially for mana dependant enchanters who need it the most in early lane. In addition to all of this, it incentivizes using mana for pokes which as an enchanter is extremely wasteful and dangerous.

TLDR Old mfb did its job of giving players a rune choice to address some of their mana sustain problems before they were able to build items to compensate for it, new mfb completely fails at this for those that need it the most when it is most needed.

22 Comments

UnboundHades6 votes

good they have to actually manage their mana now like it should be

Azadethe2 votes

The OP is actually wrong..... because.... well.... you know..... it takes into account no actual MANA items. Most supports who use it buy item 3003 , and some build item 3100 .

It also ignores the fact it increases the pool by 250 mana, meaning there's 2 -3 more casts per pool, and faster recovery on ocean drakes.

JarodDempsey1 votes

lmao what suppports build lich bane, i also never see supps build archangels either. Also i didnt ignore the 250 increase in my calculations, had i done that the old mfb stats would be about 20mana higher per min than they currently are.

meowwow71 votes

Sona and Lux (even though she is primary mage she can still support)

Azadethe2 votes

Sona Lux build Lich.

Nami Morgana Lux Sona Zyra Karma all viably and reliably build item 3003 (20% CDR, massive shield, massive sustained mana, massive AP to compensate low AP support items)

meowwow71 votes

for the low amount of ap in support items i just combine item 3174 and item 3107 and leave it at that unless it's zilean support

Azadethe2 votes

Most supports who are built around healing almost ALWAYS scale better heals and map presence on going AP based than going a Redemption. The math puts Redemption builds at about the SAME heals overall as an AP build, but it gimps their DAMAGE, SPEED, and overall utility.

Nami's Passive is a godsend if she goes AP as is her E, and her Q and W don't do weak damage if she as AP. Furthermore, her W hits multiple times, and only if you go AP does it scale well on the amplification. On Near full builds, my Nami W's do regularly around a 26% per bounce bonus. That's 52% on bounce three, meaning on AP her third bounce heals will heal FAR more than a redemption. Namis who go Redemption tend to die about 2 more times per match than AP builds.

Sona and Janna's % move speed boosts also scale to AP, as does their damage boosts. An AP Janna's additional AD to her barrier target can get up to 80 on an AP build. It sits around 40 on a non AP build. Her move speed on an AP build can get over 580. Move speed on a Redemption buid might hit 530.

There's HUGE sacrifices to always going Redemption. There's one other major side effect of it: It gets you in this habit of playing too passive and not properly representing in your game. You may heal well, and have a semi map aware presence, but you are less likely to attempt to control the game, and less likely to be the team leader, and often redemption splits your attention. You might globally heal someone, but you don't see the Shaco or Rengar coming up behind you and killing you.

I've been playing support since Season 4. I've tried all, and I think they got it right the first time: AP scaling is there for a reason.

meowwow71 votes

I get all of it except the bonus ms due to the item 3174 turning the mana regen from item 3092 item 3107 and itself into a good 60 ap, and that's not counting base ap from it, and the eye. that's only 3 items so you can grab that a pair of boots, and still have the 2 item slots for item 3040, and item 3100.

Azadethe1 votes

Transcendence / item 3174 do make them semi more viable and I'm not knocking that, but realistically item 3003 affects a game more than item 3107 when taken early, and it's likely you won't get to 6 item games often. And in a 6 item game, you always have items like item 3165 or item 3110 or item 3504 or item 3089 which result in better outcomes.

A ~800 AP Nami will beat any other build of enchanter support.

Nut on my Butt2 votes

No support is competitively building those items except for some Sona players.

Lux players don't even build Lich when going mid. Lux doesn't want to be in auto range.

Azadethe1 votes

Sona Lux build Lich.

Nami Morgana Lux Sona Zyra Karma all viably and reliably build item 3003 (20% CDR, massive shield, massive sustained mana, massive AP to compensate low AP support items)

P.S. Just did my first Nami game since change: Dominated:

Presence of mind healed over 4700 Mana, and healed over 3900 from Mana Band, and my mana was literally 100% capped at all times even though I was spamming skills to proc my passive, and I only had:

item 3096 item 3040 item 3047 item 3113 item 3114

The results are hard to ignore:

  1. I outdamaged the entire opposing team, because i went Cut Down (they had a tank support so super easy damage stacks). Outdamaged 2 on my team

  2. I almost Outhealed the opposing team combined.

  3. Perma capped Mana

  4. I cancelled something like 237 seconds of Ultimate cooldowns (almost 4 minutes) out of a 24 minute game.

What I gave up:

Ravenous Hunter (Means I have to play slightly safer) and Eyeball Collection (I get 8 more AP out of the item 3003 because of Manaflow band, so oh.... what the hell)

5/4/21 score.....

Frontline Fury2 votes

«Nerf» HA HA HA HA HA.

Ah, low level players.

Alright, so maybe you actually need to play the game to utilize manaflow band properly. But a straight up nerf? This rune essentially gives you a free 250 mana as well as 1% TOTAL mana regen every 5 seconds. This also scales both with itself and with any mana items you build.

Basically a free ocean drake. That scales with future ocean drakes.

The only catch is you have to throw a spell at your opponent once in a while rather than sit under your turret spamming them on minions. You are forced to actually participate in the pvp aspect the entire game is built around to properly utilize the rune.

I realize this is a huge hit to weaker players that have a hard time competing against another human, but if you wanted to play PvE you should not have been playing League of Legends - i warmly recommend Path of Exile or Diablo 3 instead, those games are a lot of fun for more casual players - and they let you go at your own pace.

Try to look at this from the other side of the spectrum - think about your most hated mid lane matchups and the fact they likely suffer from this just as much as you do.

Azadethe1 votes

lmfao @ Path of Exile being for low level players. You're sending them to their RIPs :) It's like the one Nintendo Hard game still in existence.

JarodDempsey1 votes

it gives you 250 free max mana, which does next to nothing for mana sustain which is what mfb's original purpose was. It doesnt give 1% total mana, it gives 1% of missing mana per 5 seconds which have very diminishing returns unless you run around with like 1/3 of your max mana.

The entire tone of your post is just condescending and not appreciated at all, you literally dont even know what youre talking about as evidenced by the corrections i mentioned above. Also enchanters arent just sitting under tower, idk where you get that from, we are right behind our adc's with our shields/heals on cooldown almost all the time. Especially the heavily manadependant ones dont have any to waste on their comparably useless damage skills and encouraging them to do so is counterproductive.

Frontline Fury1 votes

{quoted}

it gives you 250 free max mana, which does next to nothing for mana sustain which is what mfb's original purpose was. It doesnt give 1% total mana, it gives 1% of missing mana per 5 seconds which have very diminishing returns unless you run around with like 1/3 of your max mana.

The entire tone of your post is just condescending and not appreciated at all, you literally dont even know what youre talking about as evidenced by the corrections i mentioned above. Also enchanters arent just sitting under tower, idk where you get that from, we are right behind our adc's with our shields/heals on cooldown almost all the time. Especially the heavily manadependant ones dont have any to waste on their comparably useless damage skills and encouraging them to do so is counterproductive.

The entire point of the rework was to force players to actually opt into mana regen items if they wanted mana regen. The new manaflow band rewards proactive laning and punishes sitting under your tower and spamming your spells all day.

I am all for this change because i feel that players should be rewarded for skillful play. Now you actually have to play well to succeed in lane - picking the right champion and brainlessly whacking your face into your keyboard will no longer win you your lane ######unless you're syndra######

Frontline Fury1 votes

{quoted}

it gives you 250 free max mana, which does next to nothing for mana sustain which is what mfb's original purpose was. It doesnt give 1% total mana, it gives 1% of missing mana per 5 seconds which have very diminishing returns unless you run around with like 1/3 of your max mana.

The entire tone of your post is just condescending and not appreciated at all, you literally dont even know what youre talking about as evidenced by the corrections i mentioned above. Also enchanters arent just sitting under tower, idk where you get that from, we are right behind our adc's with our shields/heals on cooldown almost all the time. Especially the heavily manadependant ones dont have any to waste on their comparably useless damage skills and encouraging them to do so is counterproductive.

Since when does enchanters not deal damage? Have you ever seen a Sona Karma Lulu Janna land their combos? They easily outdamage their marksman until level 6-7.

This may of course be different in the lower ranks. Not everybody plays in the middle elos (diamond+).

Dont think this rework didnt affect me at all. I used to run manaflow presence of mind taric support for literally unlimited mana in the early levels - now i have to build mana if i want to keep my marksman alive. On one hand this means a weaker early game, but on the other it opens up a couple new build options to me as i only have to buy one mana item rather than two.

JarodDempsey1 votes

Perhaps i should have been more specific in that i meant enchanters as their core playstyle eg those that rush a shield/heal skill and whos mana is primarily best spent on that skill. Karma is almost always built for poke instead of her shield so i wouldnt consider her to be much effected by the stack requirement. Sonas w has low cost assuming shes not rushing it but she uses it regardless to proc her passive so the stack requirement also has little effect for her. Lulu is a tossup, sometimes she goes poke other times she goes primarily shield though thats a bit rarer nowadays, if she goes shield then this new mfb will be somewhat detrimental to her though her lvl 1 q is only 50 mana and the range+passthrough will allow it to not be too much a struggle to stack. Janna suffers the most from what you mentioned since she rarely pokes and primarily saves either of her damage skills for engagements. Using q isnt as efficient or as realiable as w but it can be safer, in either case spending mana for poke is not ideal, especially since it puts her cc on cooldown.

In general if new mfb does anything it discourages people from playing the primary intent of the enchanter playstyle and thats to focus on enchanting their allies, which is disappointing to see since most other classes are already focused on attacking enemies.

Infernape1 votes

The problem is Manaflow Band negated mana management completely with little detriment to yourself aside from its cooldown. It did need changing.

PulsarPollo1 votes

I guess the free ability in some cases was a bit extreme so now they want to encourage good mana management instead of just spamming your high cost ability with MFB.

Toppien1 votes

well if only they could now do the same thing to assains...

MagicFlyingLlama1 votes

So enchanters got nerfed?

I thought this is what everyone has been screaming for.

Azadethe1 votes

They actually got mega buffed.

Try a Nami with:

Aery/Manaflow Band/Transcendence/Gathering Storm with Secondary runes: Presence of Mind + Legend Tenacity/Cut Down.

Gain 20% missing mana every time you get a takedown, get 10% ult reduction per takedown, recovers more mana than old Manaflow Band with item 3003 , plus all the old goodies she used to have. Her Ult is a cheesy way to proc Presence of mind all the time.

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