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Years of changes, reworks and reverts later LeBlanc, Rengar and Fizz are STILL fundamentally broken.

Holgranth·8/15/2018, 7:07:02 PM·63 votes·15,106 views

I've been here for almost every single change to LeBlanc and started playing before Fizz and Rengar. Hell I named my cat Rengar right after his release. At no point in the history of league have these champions felt good to play and good to play against. It might be time to admit that you cannot balance their current play styles.

Probably needs to be reworked as a skirmisher with an extended play pattern of engage/disengage instead of an assassin. Making him a healthy assassin would require removing or reworking his passive, Ultimate and Troll Pole to the point where it alienates Fizz mains. Needs a massive overhaul including but not limited to a real ultimate with a real cooldown. Either needs a massive rework to all abilities to be a healthy assassin or needs to become a skirmisher instead.

We can keep nerfing and buffing these champions and continuing the cycle of abuse or we can actually make major changes and fix the bastards.

64 Comments

chipndip18/15/2018, 10:25:57 PM17 votes

{quoted}

I've been here for almost every single change to LeBlanc and started playing before Fizz and Rengar. Hell I named my cat Rengar right after his release. At no point in the history of league have these champions felt good to play and good to play against. It might be time to admit that you cannot balance their current play styles.

The problem is that people that play these champs won't admit it, so if you change them, they get hate for a justified change.

Linna Excel8/15/2018, 9:10:12 PM13 votes

I'm starting to wonder if the concept of an assassin is inherently bad for mobas. I think that in order to do their jobs properly they need tools and burst that makes them balance nightmares.

Khristophoros8/15/2018, 8:55:30 PM9 votes

Yeah I agree with everything you've said here.

Unfortunately Riot always nerfed the fuck out of Fizz skirmisher builds when people figured it out. Those builds were always tanky and Riot wants him to be squishy but personally I think it's a fair tradeoff for having low burst.

VG Crows8/15/2018, 8:46:05 PM7 votes

I still can't get my mind over who thought reverting LeBroken was a good idea. The moment I saw her GU I thought "finally it's somewhat less cancer", she even showed up less in games and there was finally more room to breathe in between all the BS mobility/assassin trash

But then they made a revert and I instantly had all the fucking Vietnam flashbacks of LeBitch oneshotting me at levels 2 onward... disgusting kit, disgusting champion

Fízz v28/15/2018, 7:34:21 PM6 votes

Making him a healthy assassin would require removing or reworking his passive, Ultimate and Troll Pole to the point where it alienates Fizz mains.

and changing his class to fighter/skirmisher wouldnt? lel

Helmight8/17/2018, 1:55:32 AM5 votes

I've been saying that Rengar needs to be rebalanced as a diver for years. He already fits that profile, all he'd need is a bit more durability and a bit less damage. Having so much of his burst come from targeted abilities just makes him frustrating when built full assassin.

LeBlanc has never played up her theme of being an illusionist or deceiver and needs a full VGU in order to get anywhere close to balance. Q-R-W doesn't provide nearly close to the amount of counterplay an assassin should have.

I've never personally had an issue with Fizz tbh, so I won't comment there. He feels reasonable to me, other than the fact that getting hit with the fish is a death sentence. If he whiffs the ult, Fizz rarely kills anyone.

deadlychuck8/15/2018, 9:58:19 PM4 votes

LB problem comes more from damage being so high. Back when she needed to combo you like 3 times to kill you it wasn't bad, because it was easy to tell where the danger zone for health was.

MLDzXnRRR8/15/2018, 7:57:46 PM4 votes

How good is Rengar without OP runes ( mainly electrocute, dark harvest - too good on him) and stormrazor/duskblade? It's other factors that break him. Noone likes to play against him when he is fed, but without his R and bushes, he is immobile champ; I found the reworked version that got cancelled to be way stronger even after he was nerfed to the ground, because you actually had AOE teamfight. Now you have to be fed or useless. Fizz - annoying champion, but he is a champ that has to commit everything. There are some nerfs this patch. Kassa and Ekko are stronger when played properly with better teamfight, because of their ranged abilities. Zed and Yasuo feel stronger and more annoying to play against than Fizz. LB - make her a mage. Ranged assassins with strong laning phase will never be balanced (or make her AP DPS??? - AD ranged assassins are DPS aside from Quinn and Jhin). The biggest problem is that she uses W + R (maybe gunblade too) and can delete squishies. It's just too easy.

NocaNoha8/16/2018, 12:09:24 PM4 votes

Just throwing some ideas to discuss. I always start going along the champion theme.

Leblanc - More illusion spells not amplifiers, less burst more tricking/mind games for free damage or punishment for being greedy. A mage, not an assassin. Think of Rumble's harpoon, just you can choose which of the two is the real one and which one is fake. Or Shaco's clone, just you can switch between which one will you use. Currently, only her passive is a real illusion, what the hell.. Rengar - A lion goes for weak or isolated targets.. doesn't dive into the crowd. Steal kha`s passive, he is a praying mantis.. he should go for an attempt to get a hold of his target and then deal massive damage, the isolated target fits Rengar better. His roar could be a debuff to the enemy and not a forgiving buff to himself, a thing to terrify/demoralize.. not to convert him into frog-fish known as Tahm Kench. Focus towards ending the game early before the hunter becomes the pray. You lose power in the numbers.. Fizz - I like his kit, I think they should play around the numbers. For example Trickster - Slightly lower cooldown but way less "hang" time [0.25s] and less damage? More about timing the trick rather than worrying if you are able to perform it or not. Passive maybe towards tenacity, a slippery fish, not reducing damage. Trident connected to landing the ultimate, amplified by the fish you got [3 levels of fish/buff to the trident] - If you land it, you deserve the kill. Otherwise, Trident could be used just as a waveclear tool. So a troll to keep you in the lane, and eventually assassinate you if a mistake is made.. not a thing that is trolling and killing you xd

Lil Homie busta8/16/2018, 3:07:07 PM4 votes

Assassins concept doesn't work on league. This has been proved many times over the years wih BS like season 4 Kassa, lethality introduction, Fizz.

Seigsss8/16/2018, 8:54:34 PM4 votes

I was just saying this the other day. Fizz is so unfair it's ridiculous. his cooldowns late game are stupid. He is impossible to land on if he uses Playful Trickster correctly. One shark and a q and you are dead. No counter play. You could buy stopwatch, but he will just jump you when stopwatch runs out.

Moons of Jupiter8/16/2018, 8:14:29 AM3 votes

It is never going to happen. These champions will never, EVER feel balanced to play against even if they may statistically be the most lukewarm balanced champions in the game, or even weaker than balanced.

It's not going to happen unless Riot completely changes hands and adopts an entirely new design philosophy that prioritizes viable design over unique design.

Right now, every toxic and anti-fun mechanic and factor is protected by "muh unique identity". So when Riot tries to approach the fixing of the flawed designs, they do everything except fix what inherently breaks the design because its "identity". Chances are everything that feels really fucking awful to play against would be preserved by Riot at all costs and would be described by them as something they "love" about a champion. To name a few things that they "love" regarding "identity": The trollpole, Annie's one shot combo, and Vlad's pooling.

Automated Riven8/15/2018, 9:04:38 PM3 votes

I have to disagree with your premise. The reason they are 'flawed design's is because riot removed banchees veil and forced adc's and squishier champions into full damage builds.

Oh. And riot pushed for a shorter game which just happened to fit right in assassin's power spikes.

flibitydoo8/16/2018, 12:42:52 AM3 votes

They've been losing players.

https://dotesports.com/league-of-legends/news/riot-strained-relationship-tencent-declining-players-mobile-games-information-32079

Straight up been surveyed. It's established that the game isn't growing, it's shrinking.

But they have strategies to "bring back players". One of them is probably the reverting reworked champions (leblanc and rengar), who had large fanbases that quit when they got reworked.

In my personal opinion though, all they did was bring back one set of toxic players in exchange for making everyone else who plays the game suffer. Which is a terrible decision. The ideal game is one where everyone is viable and you don't have cancerous assassins rolling everyone.

TheUltimateSpear8/16/2018, 2:21:29 AM3 votes

Well, they were fine for a while until they got basically full reverts...

Malak8/16/2018, 7:50:27 PM3 votes

From the ones you mentioned, the biggest one that needs to go is Leblanc. God how I miss the days when she was reworked and didn’t “interact” with me by 100-0ing without items

DarkKatalyst8/16/2018, 8:34:32 PM2 votes

Some kits just don't work with the game, and should be reworked out (AKA soft-deleting a champion). I understand that some players who love these champions will be upset, but they need to understand that the alternative options do not benefit the health of the game overall. If anyone likes a champion's kit because they can abuse it and they don't care about the health of the game, I think their opinion should have less weight.

FlameHalbrdOkido8/18/2018, 6:54:28 AM2 votes

u dont hear as many complaints about these assasssins when it purely comes to how quick they take out targets or the dmg they deal, the delays they have make them feel fairer to play against, it makes it feel more like u got outplayed and not just nuked.

Now not every assassin needs some sort of delay and I am not sure what makes an assassin NEED a delay except for those that many complain about bursting them down 2 fast like Rengar and Fizz, and also Zed, because apparently Kha doesn't get that many complaints and he doesn't have any delays in kit...in fact i think he's the only assassin who doesn't have a delay who doesn't get complained about as much.

Zed's and Fizz's delays on their ults are meaningless because in both cases its extremely likely that the target is already dead or is soon to be dead. Shaco doesn't get alot of complaint but his Q delay is also meaninless because its attatched to invisibility and can be used outside of combat where an opponent can't react.

So as we can see meaningful delays in most cases except for Kha are critical for healthy assassin game design

Hemulen Magi8/16/2018, 5:32:40 AM2 votes

{quoted} Probably needs to be reworked as a skirmisher with an extended play pattern of engage/disengage instead of an assassin. Making him a healthy assassin would require removing or reworking his passive, Ultimate and Troll Pole to the point where it alienates Fizz mains. Needs a massive overhaul including but not limited to a real ultimate with a real cooldown. Either needs a massive rework to all abilities to be a healthy assassin or needs to become a skirmisher instead.

I think the assassin, skirmisher, diver, and burst mage classes need to all be rethought.

Assassins should be primarily a trickster/illusionist class that specializes in stealth, mind-games, traps, cc, and borders with catchers in team role, as opportunity-makers/map-controllers more than damage carries.

Mobile fighters that offer too much damage to fit into that Assassin definition should be grouped together with the skirmishers and divers, which are pretty blurred together anyways. These mobile fighters should offer plenty of counterplay to their dive attempts.

Neither class group should offer 100-0 burst without counterplay as its identity.

A fed/skilled trickster should be able to reliably pop straight into the enemy back line, burst 30-50% of the hp on a squishy carry and get out freely without much counterplay, but they should lack the damage to ever take someone down in a fair fight from from 70%+ hp in one attempt, no matter how fed the trickster is. If a squishy carry wanders into a Trickster's traps or becomes so far out of position that the Trickster has time to make several assassination attempts before the carry can get to safety, then the Trickster should win the fight, but it would be delayed into either multiple hit-and-runs or would include the trap prep/setup time on the Trickster's side to make it fair. So Tricksters would be all about finding/creating opportunities and map control.

Skirmishers should have the damage to close in on and stick to a squishy carry and 100-0 duel them over a couple seconds (none of this 0.4 second bull shit), but they should be visible enough that they lack the element of surprise and can be coordinated against to CC them in a teamfight. Skirmishers should have trouble reaching a back line without the help of an allied tank to engage for them. To be fair, ranged carries such as mages and marksmen shouldn't be 100-0'ing fighters within <2 seconds either though, so the game as a whole needs to be rebalanced.

Rengar Fizz Talon seem to fit right in-between these two roles, so they should probably be able to dive in and kill a target at around 50% hp, but they should have a harder time disengaging and should have less map control than a more pure trickster assassin (who shouldn't be able to duel) like Shaco, Leblanc, and Evelynn. Fizz Rengar Talon should be able to outduel a squishy carry in a prolonged fight if they get the opportunity, but it should be stretched out into something like 50% of the enemy's hp in up-front burst and the remaining 50% over 5 seconds of continued skirmishing, so they'd really only be able to "burst" assassinate if a target is already low on health.

Ranged burst mages who don't have an assassin identity that can be divided into either Trickster or Skirmisher groups should be reclassified as whatever the magic damage equivalent of a marksman is. Burst vs DPS doesn't seem like a valid division to define a class, especially since how bursty/DPS oriented someone is depends so much on their particular build and how fed they are. A lot of marksmen are pretty bursty too, but there isn't some arbitrary class division of "burst marksmen" and "regular marksmen" or "CC marksmen". I think some of the burst mages could have their burst toned down a bit and could be reclassified as controllers too.

An Enemy Sutando8/16/2018, 10:33:27 PM2 votes

Yeah, good luck. If you paid attention to the Rengar & LeBlanc communities pre-revert, both couldn't stop complaining about how the rework was garbage, Riot didn't care about the playerbases of these champions, that they didn't know what they were doing, etc.

Any changes that deviate too much from their current states to these champions, especially the latter two, will result in a massive backlash from either of those communities. I don't know if Riot wants to take their chances at doing something like this again, considering what happened last time.

kargish8/16/2018, 3:04:15 AM2 votes

Please Stop with these "these champions have NEVER been good to play as or against" posts, it's literally just your opinion. I won't trade the Rengar revert/re-rework for anything, it's some of the most fluid and fun gameplay I've experienced ever since I started maining him in season 2. Yes I think it's stupid with his item 3147 item 3095 interaction, but that's a problem of its own that affects multiple champions.

There is no such thing as a healthy assassin, these champions received a revert because the rework that made them bearable for non-assassin players just fucked over the actual assassin players. Now that we're back to them being proper fun for the player, all the non-assassin players come back and talk about this non-sense called "healthy assassin design".

The issue isn't assassins themselves, it's the fact we have 2 group of people that view assassins from completely different perspectives, and neither can understand the other.

Raiyza8/16/2018, 4:41:22 PM1 votes

I feel like only Rengar is broken. It feels SO BAD to get instakilled with his ultimate.

At least with Fizz and LB their skills are dodgeable.(Aside from LB's Q which is STILL A POINT AND CLICK)

Hemulen Magi8/16/2018, 6:23:03 AM1 votes

As a whole, I'd classify all of the different classes something like this:

Front-line (melee): Tanks (utility >> damage) Fighters (damage > utility)

Fight Disruptors (mixed): Slayers (damage >> utility) Tricksters/Catchers (utility > damage)

Back-line (ranged): Controllers (utility >> damage) Artillery (damage >> utility)

Top: Front-liners (Fighters >> Tanks) Jg: Front-liners (Tanks > Fighters) / Disruptors (Tricksters-Catcher > Slayers) Mid: Disruptors (Slayers > Trickster-Catchers) / Back-liners (Artillery > Controllers) Sup: Back-liners (Controllers) / Disruptors (Trickster-Catchers) / Front-liners (Tanks) Bot: Back-liners (Artillery >> Controllers)

FlameHalbrdOkido8/20/2018, 5:13:28 AM1 votes

I feel like Fizz would be better if his passive only became active for a short duration after casting an ability

Śhunpo8/17/2018, 10:42:46 AM1 votes

I mean if we're being real their reworks were appalling. Changing assassins into extended fight duelists isn't the way to go about it. But I suppose the existence of low reaction 100-0 kits is simply due to the mobility creep, CC creep and utility creep in the game. If they didn't exist who would deal with the Kai'sa in the backline for being out of position?

Sergeant HbA1c8/18/2018, 8:40:05 PM1 votes

{quoted}

I've been here for almost every single change to LeBlanc and started playing before Fizz and Rengar. Hell I named my cat Rengar right after his release. At no point in the history of league have these champions felt good to play and good to play against. It might be time to admit that you cannot balance their current play styles.

Probably needs to be reworked as a skirmisher with an extended play pattern of engage/disengage instead of an assassin. Making him a healthy assassin would require removing or reworking his passive, Ultimate and Troll Pole to the point where it alienates Fizz mains. Needs a massive overhaul including but not limited to a real ultimate with a real cooldown. Either needs a massive rework to all abilities to be a healthy assassin or needs to become a skirmisher instead.

We can keep nerfing and buffing these champions and continuing the cycle of abuse or we can actually make major changes and fix the bastards.

The part that really irks me is that Riot nerfs is ratios thinking that will fix him. If you shut down Fizz, he still has agency. He won't go insta-burst, but he will go item 3100 , item 3157 , and item 3102 . This allows him all of the burst of an assassin and minimal (if non-existent) risk that comes with it. If you really want to nerf a champion, remove their utility.

Force them to turn around an unfavorable situation with the tools they have.

Don't make them revolve around one particular skill or item.

That separates good players from bad ones.

i cant move wtf8/18/2018, 8:44:17 PM1 votes

Stay the fuck away from Leblanc