Senna actually seems somewhat balanced and actually Underpowered in some ways

MrEnds·Nov 12, 2019·10 votes·2,956 views

From my experience of having her played in my games she seems to have a VERY rough laning phase and becomes viable late-game, I have yet to play a game where she has done even remotely well on both my team and the enemy team. Her average KDA in the games I've played with her in it is around 0/7/3 or something relatively close to that. I know that a lot of people are complaining about her being to strong because of her kit but she actually seems underwhelming if played at a relatively normal level. If she is played correctly I would expect her to preform just as well as any other support played correctly and in some cases (thresh, Pyke, and some other candidates for overtuned sups...) worse than if the other supports were played just as well. Tell me what you think about this in the comments, I'd love to read what you guys think!

Update: this seems to be a very split topic based on the comments and up vote to down vote comparison, very interesting!

44 Comments

Chainman3Nov 12, 20193 votes

Let me ask you, how many times have you played against senna?

GilxeNNov 12, 20193 votes

{quoted}

Let me ask you, how many times have you played against senna?

I played against Senna, one CC and she pops like a bubble, no escapes anything she have to outplay around.

BrokenRayquazaNov 12, 20192 votes

Except you know dodging the super slow moving cc she has that also has a cook timer

MrEndsNov 12, 20192 votes

{quoted}

Except you know dodging the super slow moving cc she has that also has a cook timer

its basically a hard to land zilean bomb, that comes out as slow as a skarner E, and gets interrupted by minions like an aatrox W, its pretty shitty tbh.

DelifoxNov 12, 20191 votes

Fun fact is that you can actually use minions to proc the AoE root and create a zone that opponents can't walk through. But yeah her escape tools are very limited if not basically non-existent compared to most other recent champions.

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Let me ask you, how many times have you played against senna?

like 5-10 times?

Chainman3Nov 12, 20192 votes

From what i can see only 2 times from your match history, but you could have another account

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

From what i can see only 2 times from your match history, but you could have another account

I do

Chainman3Nov 12, 20193 votes

of those 5-10 sennas how many of them actually knew how to play senna?

ThingamajigNov 12, 20192 votes

people are building like trash on her so i think we should just wait until we want to perma ban her

MrEndsNov 12, 20192 votes

{quoted}

people are building like trash on her so i think we should just wait until we want to perma ban her

what do you think she should build?

ThingamajigNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

what do you think she should build?

definitely not the IE rush i seem to be witnessing at the moment

she has a shield and 2 heals doesn't scale with atk speed and has anti crit scaling when people realize that the 200 ghouls dream isn't really attainable they will start building her right

i'd imagine black cleaver being core after that probably ardent and athene to boost the healing of her R and Q as they both scale with AP and max out the cdr as well we don't have marksman support items and until we do have them i don't see her built full marksman

might be wrong about the cleaver core but athene and ardent currently hold highest win rate items

Doge2020Nov 12, 20191 votes

For a support build I see that working, but lets say somebody takes Senna to the ADC spot. What do you think would be the most optimal build for ADC senna? From what I have seen in this discussion, lethality and Bork/on-hit might be the better build than crit

ThingamajigNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

For a support build I see that working, but lets say somebody takes Senna to the ADC spot. What do you think would be the most optimal build for ADC senna? From what I have seen in this discussion, lethality and Bork/on-hit might be the better build than crit

lethality seems fine i think but i don't see her scale well as other marksman and you would be fighting the clock

Jennifer17Nov 12, 20192 votes

so far i played a total of 18 senna games and played against her 4 times.

my personal opinion is that she has to play very agressive to get the soul stacks early which gives her a lead. i had the biggest problems vs stuff like blitz/nauti that would just stand between me and my mist and would hook me if i get too close.

itemwise im not sure what to build yet, i tried crit first, i tried botrk, i will soon try lethality. in almost all games i did the most or 2nd most damage of my team/everyone. i really enjoy her.

playing vs senna i always way very agressive early on, trying to force her out of lane. and she always ended up not doing much at all.

https://puu.sh/EDGZU/5fe63b5b4f.jpg (maybe a bad example but i just finished a game against her)

i wouldnt call her op... but then again i didnt play vs a senna yet that had free time to stack up her mist so i cant tell.

all i can say is: crit isnt as strong as some people claim it to be. i felt like i had much better results getting botrk first than ie/er.

DelifoxNov 12, 20191 votes

Lethality build definitely seemed to work best from what I've tried in practice tool. With basic support lethality build like pyke has and infinity edge, I was able to do nearly as much damage as way more expensive full crit build.

So interestingly enough the cheaper build seems to work for her way better. I honestly didn't like her crit mechanics at all, it felt like biggest waste of money ever and I'm going to hate anyone who tries to justify Crit Senna as ADC. Because it just does nothing compared to more standard Crit ADC's.

You can however get close to 90% life steal if you play around a little, not that it really matters because she already has really good sustain by default and her default damage is pretty weak so even with 90% life steal she would heal way less with auto attacks than Caitlyn and co.

Jennifer17Nov 12, 20191 votes

my main problem with crit senna is, i dont know how her crits hit with ie.

i finished one game a few min ago where i went duskblade and ghostblade then ie and runaans and it did work decently. but then again i had 120 souls/mist so my range was 725 lol.

nm1010Nov 12, 20192 votes

48% winrate in plat+ on release is never a good sign in terms of balance. Nobody even understands how to play her and she is nearly at 50%, that is only going to go up with time.

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

48% winrate in plat+ on release is never a good sign in terms of balance. Nobody even understands how to play her and she is nearly at 50%, that is only going to go up with time.

she was in pbe for a while ...

nm1010Nov 12, 20192 votes

There have been numerous champions that released on ~40% or lower winrates that went on to become major balance problems.

ArkainNov 13, 20191 votes

{quoted}

48% winrate in plat+ on release is never a good sign in terms of balance. Nobody even understands how to play her and she is nearly at 50%, that is only going to go up with time.

She's a support though... not like she's extra hard carrying most games. She isn't pyke giving hundreds of gold to the allies lol. Nor is she yuumi, being completely useless/afk a lot of the time. Just a normal support :)

I Have No FutureNov 12, 20191 votes

yeah I've played like 15+ matches with / against / as her - every single time she was a liability bot lane rather than an asset. I think this is mostly because people haven't quite figured out how she fits in yet. However, that ONE time... wow, she DESTROYED bot lane and then everyone else, legit carried the team, went like 16-2 or something crazy, and because of that match i feel mildly worried that once people get a good feel for her she will be very strong. If she gets a full combo off on you, definite damage.

AccurateYeetNov 12, 20191 votes

This seems like more a case of someone with practice on Senna vs a bunch of people who don't really understand her or know what she does. She's not super strong in my limited experience, but she is annoying especially if you're still in the dark about how her abilities work.

SukishooNov 12, 20191 votes

Match I had as her last night I was 3/2/9 and actually doing better than my ADC early game (where I was 3/1 at that point). So, I find her fairly balanced at the moment.

Played her jungle the day before, do not recommend. And it was still decent early, but fell of fast as you have to be a hard ganker if you want her to work there. Duo laning, is definitely the better choice for her.

BrokenRayquazaNov 12, 20191 votes

Try playing her top without farming, with spellthiefs and also running klepto. Don't farm just focus on getting the money from klepto plus supp items. Promise you won't regret it's so fun

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Try playing her top without farming, with spellthiefs and also running klepto. Don't farm just focus on getting the money from klepto plus supp items. Promise you won't regret it's so fun

ill try that later today

WoonStruckNov 12, 20192 votes

{quoted}

Try playing her top without farming, with spellthiefs and also running klepto. Don't farm just focus on getting the money from klepto plus supp items. Promise you won't regret it's so fun

You dont get anything from the spellthiefs line without an ally champ around.

BrokenRayquazaNov 12, 20191 votes

Haha I get it

I Have No FutureNov 12, 20191 votes

Any strong cc/engage seemed to wreck her, she doesn't have an escape. Thresh, malphite, alistair, leona, they all dumpstered her. One thing I am VERY happy about with Senna, I will say, is that it dramatically reduces how awful it can be to play against a good caitlyn as a support (especially when your adc has no clue how to trade dmg or just doesn't have any range). Finally the support can shoot back a bit - i do like this. Previously the only way to do this was with xerath support (or nidalee but that sucks).

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Any strong cc/engage seemed to wreck her, she doesn't have an escape. Thresh, malphite, alistair, leona, they all dumpstered her. One thing I am VERY happy about with Senna, I will say, is that it dramatically reduces how awful it can be to play against a good caitlyn as a support (especially when your adc has no clue how to trade dmg or just doesn't have any range). Finally the support can shoot back a bit - i do like this. Previously the only way to do this was with xerath support (or nidalee but that sucks).

so yea she has clear counterplay unlike some champs... Pyke , Yuumi .... (edit: the only CLEAR counterplay to yuumi is mordekaiser's ultimate)

Sephi51Nov 12, 20191 votes

NOt for RIot Games. When she is balanced, they either buff or nerf her. THat is how limited the people working there are

PumpedheroNov 12, 20191 votes

I feel like they need to buff her E. its almost practically useless except for running away (Even then, its still useless it doesnt really do that job too well).. I feel like it should be NEARLY instantly, not entirely instant, but currently takes too long for her to go into E, it should give better move speed, give it a higher CD, make it like a mini sivir R with camo.. I love her R the most, the funnest thing in her kit is the R. Q is a bit wacky since its ratios are kinda bad. but its still a really good move late game. Maybe give her E a mini version of Kayn's E, but it would consume mana as u go through wall etc.. idk, somethin.

Baby GhoulNov 12, 20191 votes

She's designed well in the sense that her power is kept firmly in the support position.

I've seen a lot of people try their hardest to play with her outside of support, and I'm sure that will never change, but she's most effective in the support role.

She's certainly not going to be the next top ADC, but she is a top support right now. I'd say she does a little too much damage for how utility heavy she is. The reason why I say she's not the next top ADC is because that damage isn't a consistent stream due to her slow auto-attack animation.

You can't rely on her to melt an enemy team's sustain like a traditional ADC, and she's just as vulnerable as most ADCs, maybe even more so. She's weak against hard engage champions like Nautilus and Blitzcrank, and their ridiculous hitboxes still keep them at the top of the support meta. I'll still be banning them over Senna.

It's kind of too soon to tell though. Everyone wants to play her everywhere but support, and it's going to take a while for other lanes to hard counter her and make her irrelevant outside of support except for specific matchups. When she's more focused in the support role we can get a better idea of how powerful she really is and what people can do with her.

ImTheJuggernautyNov 12, 20191 votes

I think she's overpowered based on my experiences. I haven't laned against her, but of the two games, she went 13/4 in one, and I don't recall her score in the other (something more average). While that's not statistically significant in any way, i'm worried because she was only released like two days ago. Once senna players get good, watch out. Like, why is no one worried about the insane levels of permanent range and crit boosts she gets from passive? Or the fact that she has hard cc, a near instant dual function ult, or the fact that she not only has insane range, damage, and solid utility, but she gains a certain percentage movement speed from the enemy she's attacking. That alone seems to push her over the top imo due to the safety of her range.

MrEndsNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

I think she's overpowered based on my experiences. I haven't laned against her, but of the two games, she went 13/4 in one, and I don't recall her score in the other (something more average). While that's not statistically significant in any way, i'm worried because she was only released like two days ago. Once senna players get good, watch out. Like, why is no one worried about the insane levels of permanent range and crit boosts she gets from passive? Or the fact that she has hard cc, a near instant dual function ult, or the fact that she not only has insane range, damage, and solid utility, but she gains a certain percentage movement speed from the enemy she's attacking. That alone seems to push her over the top imo due to the safety of her range.

didnt mord get insane kda's once his rework came out and also pantheon's rework?

ArkainNov 13, 20191 votes

{quoted}

I think she's overpowered based on my experiences. I haven't laned against her, but of the two games, she went 13/4 in one, and I don't recall her score in the other (something more average). While that's not statistically significant in any way, i'm worried because she was only released like two days ago. Once senna players get good, watch out. Like, why is no one worried about the insane levels of permanent range and crit boosts she gets from passive? Or the fact that she has hard cc, a near instant dual function ult, or the fact that she not only has insane range, damage, and solid utility, but she gains a certain percentage movement speed from the enemy she's attacking. That alone seems to push her over the top imo due to the safety of her range.

Range safety can only do so much when ANY amount of engage destroys you. Her crits are actually negative (35% less damage), and she has a hard cc sure, that is slower than morg q- and can be blocked by minions. She is countered HARD by melee champs (makes her E useless) and she is squishier than adc's. She NEEDS the movement speed part because she literally stands still to charge up an auto.. Her damage/range don't even scale up until you have around 60+ mist imo after playing her a bunch.

DelifoxNov 12, 20191 votes

Her damage is for sure extremely underpowered.. I tried in training tool every build I could think of and no matter what I did, she just doesn't do good damage, her scaling is extremely abysmal.

But one thing that is most broken about her is her ridiculous sustain.. You can solo kill baron with relatively under geared character, it just takes very long time but she could definitely tank it for someone else for 20 minute baron takes.

So long story short: Just focus her down and don't fight her for extended periods of time.. She's kinda like Ezreal in that case, either you kill her fast or you don't. The only reason I can think of why people keep posting of games where she has ridiculous damage is that she either get's tons of free kills early and stacks her passive which can snowball a lot if you get her stacks past 100 early. Or people just let her poke them down without hard engaging her (spoiler alert: She has no escape tools.)

NaughtyWordNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

From my experience of having her played in my games she seems to have a VERY rough laning phase and becomes viable late-game, I have yet to play a game where she has done even remotely well on both my team and the enemy team. Her average KDA in the games I've played with her in it is around 0/7/3 or something relatively close to that. I know that a lot of people are complaining about her being to strong because of her kit but she actually seems underwhelming if played at a relatively normal level. If she is played correctly I would expect her to preform just as well as any other support played correctly and in some cases (thresh, Pyke, and some other candidates for overtuned sups...) worse than if the other supports were played just as well. Tell me what you think about this in the comments, I'd love to read what you guys think!

Update: this seems to be a very split topic based on the comments and up vote to down vote comparison, very interesting!

EL-O-FUCKING-EL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlRkW7AqLZU

Your horseshit champ needs a nerf.

DeνiruchiNov 12, 20192 votes

You're posting a BunnyFuFu video with over 200 mist stacks. He just plays on pbe normal matches against people with high ping and/or different ranks. His videos are also suspicious to always last 40+ minutes and having enemy champs randomly run into him ~~clearly not intentionally feeding the content creator.~~ Enemies that never surrender or push waves/end even if they wipe his team. Yep, not suspicious at all.

NaughtyWordNov 12, 20191 votes

{quoted}

You're posting a BunnyFuFu video with over 200 mist stacks. He just plays on pbe normal matches against people with high ping and/or different ranks. His videos are also suspicious to always last 40+ minutes and having enemy champs randomly run into him ~~clearly not intentionally feeding the content creator.~~ Enemies that never surrender or push waves/end even if they wipe his team. Yep, not suspicious at all.

It doesn't matter, the fact that a "support" is capable of that is testament enough. Can I build ANYTHING on say, oh I don't know, Janna and do what senna does? Even if I built full ap?

I'll save you the spinning and dawdling, the answer is No.

DeνiruchiNov 12, 20193 votes

It does matter. They're making him snowball building full damage into an infinite scaling champion. That sounds op until you take in consideration that it is not going to happen on a normal match. It is a rare exception that someone reaches 60 kills and 230+ mist stacks against enemies that aren't gifting you them for content's sake. Having both, yours and enemy team letting you farm stacks all match long. Tell me how many matches last 40 or more minutes under normal gameplay and pace. It's like saying Veigar is broken op because he can 1shot you with any skill at 2k~3k ap, yet matches don't last enough to stack that high. Even getting to 1k ap before it ends is already a miracle, now imagine if you had the enemy team constantly feeding you stacks.

And full ap Janna does hurt badly, even though not as much as an infinite scaling champion (that is purposedly allowed to do so) late game. Or ever heard of full ap Sona aswell?

MrEndsNov 13, 20193 votes

{quoted}

EL-O-FUCKING-EL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlRkW7AqLZU

Your horseshit champ needs a nerf.

lol a single game doesnt mean anything

I Have No FutureNov 12, 20191 votes

Yeah that one match I had where the Senna dominated she built Lethality with Dark Harvest. She definitely had the mechanics down very well. The interesting thing about it was that she wasn't really solo killing people, she was acting sortof like a passive adc, applying constant damage and picking up a lot of kills almost as a side-effect. When you think about it, she really would have a hard time solo killing because of her attack speed / low mobility. Most champs can find a way to get out of her way before she could finish them, but when she's firing from the back line behind tanks and whatnot.... seemed very effective

TerismichaelNov 17, 20191 votes

The truth is she’s underpowered cause of how easy it is to counter pick her. If you face something like a Janna support. She’s going to eat that lane alive, but most know to go hard engage cc against her. Leona is her worst nightmare, the hook champs in general. Anything with hard lockdown distance cc will get her. Builds are still being experimented. Klepto, hail of blades, fleet seem ok on her. Her q is a double tap, so on hit effects like black cleaver or back to the runes klepto work well for her. If you see a Senna though just pick a hard engage and let them over extend. She can’t take it. She needs buffed badly, but they can only buff her if they tweak other things because her kit has crazy potential. If they leave her as is she won’t get a lot of play next season once people figure out how to crush her. Most my xp on her is not on this account heads up. Getting to 200 stacks is going to be very rare. You can expect to see between 80-120 on avg.