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Opinions on Annie?

Crossette·7/17/2015, 4:43:14 PM·4 votes·1,630 views

So I asked Ghostcrawler (www.Ask.fm/riotghostcrawler) if he agreed that Annie's kit was (quote from the discussion) "a boring skill shot, shield, stun and damage steroid". Here's his reply;

"Pretty much. There is a little nuance with Pyromania and Flash Tibbers, but overall she isn't one of those champs with tons and tons of depth. In Annie's case, maybe that's okay. She doesn't feel as creaky as someone like Poppy. Would leave to hear more opinions. "

If I get a bunch of people's opinions here, I'll make sure it gets back to Ghostcrawler. I'll give my opinion first...

So Annie. Her Q? Point-click, not blocked by minions. High range and can stun if her passive is up. Speaking of her passive, that stuns enemies every 4 spell casts. This stun applies to her Q, W, and R. Annie's W is literally a simple cone of fire. It's the closest thing to a skillshot that she has. This ability has the potential to damage from one person to a whole team depending on where it is fired, and if her passive is up then everyone who is damaged is stunned. Annie's E is a shield that grants extra armor and magic resistance. This also reflects damage based on Annie's AP whenever she is AAed while the shield is up. Pretty lackluster, but gives a passive charge.

Annie's ult is where she really... Burns. Yeah, let's say that. Her ult is spawning a controllable minion named Tibbers. It's a giant bear with an immolate effect and that motherfucker HURTS. When spawned, he does massive damage and has the ability to apply the passive stun. The AOE from Tibbers spawning can trap a whole team in a 1.5 second stun. If she flashes and uses her stun Tibbers, you're pretty much dead if you have less than 1800 health. Her base ratios and AP ratios are pretty ridiculous in that remark, especially when she's played as a support and the enemy ADC can't farm due to constant fear of Annie. It's kind of sad that a little girl can win a bot lane that easily.

So yeah, leave your opinions down below and I'll yell at Ghostcrawler whenever this thread receives a few comments.

16 Comments

DrathTurtle3147/17/2015, 8:10:28 PM2 votes

I don't have a problem with Bannie, I have a problem with the counter engage that she brings to the table. I like to engage fights, so I'm going to have a bias against anyone who can instantly counter engage on me and my team, so I tend to ban her consistently. Honestly, I don't think she's broken OP, but she is strong when both teams want to fight and either she engages with a flash tibbers, or the enemy come in close enough to counter engage with tibbers without burning flash. There is a lot of power in her passive + ult, but that's okay in my opinion, I just don't like seeing her on my opponent's team.

Ravenhale7/17/2015, 5:21:16 PM1 votes

Well... at lvl 6 a support Annie should have built Sheen and Spellthief, so she probably only has 30AP + runes and masteries. She might have 60AP at best...? A Tibbers stun would hurt, since she will likely get an AA and a Q off before you can react. Tibbers also will get an AA off in that time frame and if she throws up her E, Tibbers will also deal a little flame damage. Annie's base AD is 61 at lvl 6 and sheen will double that for her AA after the stun. So 122 phys damage from Annie, another 80 phys damage from Tibbers, roughly 220 mag damage from the stun and another 200 damage for a lvl 3 Q. If she's running MPen runes she will get most of that 400 magic damage along with a good percent of that phys damage.

Guessing an average of 500 damage burst before you can do anything at lvl 6. I think Graves is the tankiest ADC and he runs at 880 health at lvl 6.

I think what seems the real issue with Annie is that she can be used as support thanks to her stun. That and it really takes no skill at all to be competent with Annie.

But how could you even start to fix her? Dumb down her ap ratios and she won't be viable for mid and she already lacks the utility the more traditional supports provide. Chunk her health and health regen stats?

Edit: Overall, I do think her kit is fairly balanced for her to be in the mid lane. As a support, her kit has only the stun as peel without any other form of boosting her ADC. The only argument is over how easy it is to play as her, but that argument could be made against so many champions.

TheRakkun7/17/2015, 6:01:35 PM1 votes

Ghostcrawler still works for this game? Oh god.

Miraweave7/17/2015, 6:11:44 PM1 votes

She's kind of annoying, but she's balanced. Given her range and the fact that she can't engage on you well without flash, you basically have to screw up to let her get to you. People don't like that because they don't like it when they have to think strategically instead of being able to mechanically get themselves out of every stupid decision they made.

Personally I'd like to see a bit less power in tibbers' nuke in exchange for an E that's actually useful, but she's pretty much fine as is.

RadioactiveWang7/17/2015, 6:42:02 PM1 votes

Annie is op Annie item 3027

Namamall7/18/2015, 12:03:29 AM1 votes

Just wanted to pop in and say that Annie's W has the exact same range as her Q.

Shroom Junkie7/17/2015, 5:01:16 PM1 votes

Her Q has a fairly low range. Its point-and-click but honestly compared to most champs with skill shots they can just kite her while they hit her with longer-ranged skillshots until they either get to safety or get her low enough to go in themselves. Though melee mid-laners get wrecked against her due to their low-range.

Her W is good waveclear and AOE damage so she's not just Veigar to lock down a few targets then get one and then just spam her Q here and there. You could argue that Veigar's W is AOE as well, but seeing as hers is a cone in front of her instead of a long-range skill shot its pretty balanced in comparison. though Veigar's W requires either a really stupid person, a stun, or body-blocking, due to the long-ass time it takes to land, so that's kind of eh.

Her E is kinda eh. For a mage, it makes her fairly tanky naturally. Combined with RoA and Rylai's she's pretty powerful. If she gets thornmail pretty much no ADC can hit her without dying when she retaliates(unless she's extremely low). This is pretty balanced, being a very weak defensive ability, especially comparing against other mages' defense like Viktor's Q or Cho'gaths natural tankiness and sustain through his ult health and passive.

Her R is pretty nice. I think its honestly pretty dynamic, to have your own minion to fight for you until your CD's are back up. Especially since he's such a threat and people have to focus either him or you, and if you stay safe its pretty hard.

Her passive I find pretty balanced. It takes several abilities to get up, and the stun is situated on what ability you use. If a team is smart they won't clump up even for a second least Annie flash-tibbers.

In my opinion, yes, she's pretty balanced. Maybe the base damages are a little high, since she can build pretty tanky and still be a beast, but if we're going there then we need to nerf Swain too(rito pls his ult drains my lp item 3070 ).

Summonerrr 17/18/2015, 6:41:27 AM1 votes

Is Annie balanced? In the current game state, yes. Is she broken? Also yes.

Elaboration: Annie is balanced because she's pretty much a pubstomper, someone who can wreck shop when you're more skilled than your enemy, but pales pretty hard against competent opponents. Although TACTICALLY SPEAKING there are ways to counterplay her, her skill ceiling is such that it's fairly easy to outplay her if you are of equal skill level with an enemy Annie .

Her kit really is THAT predictable and binary. Either she uses an ability or abilities and/or her passive for a very limited set of reasons or...doesn't. She doesn't really have a lot of choice and adaptability in how she'd be using her abilities like a champion such as Orianna or Syndra would, for instance. In that regard, she currently can't function to the full potential of what ALL players can use her as because as I've said before, one of her biggest stumbling blocks is skill ceiling.

With Annie 's mid-lane game pretty much nerfed to a crisp, and most viable supports seeing play mainly because of HOW MUCH they can do for a team or in how MANY ways, it's more about skill and gameplay than it is about matchups and raw kit power, which is the era Annie was conceived in, the Pre S3 League of Counterpicks.

Is annie still playable? Definitely, she's one of the most fun and enjoyable low skill floor mages to play, and has quite the potential to dominate matches in solo-que. The problem is that she isn't HEALTHY. You're pretty much stuck into a specific playstyle of how BEST to play her, and limited on how to itemize and work the metagame so that you get the most out of her, which is quite unforgiving and easily punishable at the higher ELO's.

So yeah, the TL;DR is her kit is balanced so to speak, but it's also painfully generic and grounded. That's great for people learning the basics of a MOBA, but horrible for those who already have the essentials on lockdown.