Can we talk about Varus's passive?

Hochelaga·Aug 15, 2016·24 votes·1,981 views

He's one of the few adc's that doesn't have any gap closer or adrenaline spell that can make him continue and be dangerous ..

I mean, his passive doesn't even fit in his playstyle.

You either play him as an AD mage on mid lane and go for big dmg with CDR, or go for the ADC role.

In both case, his passive seems a little bit weak and boring ... It doesn't stack, doesn't scale on level, doesn't have any fancy animations and the numbers are so small it barely makes any difference on a teamfight.

I'm suggesting to change his passive with something that actually fits his theme.

Varus gain bonus attack speed based on his missing health scaling from

1% to 30% at lvl 6 1% to 60% at lvl 11 1% to 90% at lvl 16

Or ! Make it stack-able like so

Can stack up to 2 times at level 8 Can stack up to 3 times at lvl 16

53 Comments

ParoeAug 15, 201623 votes

Why do people want varus to be changed completely when all he needs is; W and passive to be swapped.

Blighted quiver needs to be his passive, and his W needs to be an on demand attack speed steroid whose duration is made longer by killing enemies.

Hayaishi2Aug 16, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Why do people want varus to be changed completely when all he needs is; W and passive to be swapped.

Blighted quiver needs to be his passive, and his W needs to be an on demand attack speed steroid whose duration is made longer by killing enemies.

We want his passive changed, the change you proposed is fine as well but what truly bothers people is Riot's lack of communication about it they never answer in Varus' threads and there have been many discussing how his kit feels incomplete due to his passive being useless. Specially when they buff champions like Riven who has always been strong and ignore the issues champions like Varus have.

ParoeAug 16, 20161 votes

{quoted}

We want his passive changed, the change you proposed is fine as well but what truly bothers people is Riot's lack of communication about it they never answer in Varus' threads and there have been many discussing how his kit feels incomplete due to his passive being useless. Specially when they buff champions like Riven who has always been strong and ignore the issues champions like Varus have.

the problem is they want him to be 'unique' and not just a mashup of MF and ashe.

VolcanuzAug 16, 20161 votes

As someone who loves Varus.. this is such a good idea!!

Not only will it give his W a use. It will also mean early trades are more viable!

NineTailedMysticAug 16, 20161 votes

It will also mean early trades are more viable!

Something he doesn't need mid lane.

VolcanuzAug 17, 20161 votes

Thing is people want him more viable for his major role which is ADC so who cares what it will do for his mid lane.

Also the better way to make him for mid lane is the Armor pen build not AP which he scales horribly with anyway. I too have tried the AP build and it works kind of.. but it is still horrible and brings jack all to the team. AP Corki is more viable mid over him, or even Ez.

NineTailedMysticAug 17, 20161 votes

I never said anything about AP, mid lane Varus builds AD anyways. An on demand AS steroid would let him out trade any mid laner until they can 100-0 him if they don't get poked down without retaliation.

VolcanuzAug 18, 20161 votes

Like most champions.. mid varus will only need one point with the new W change OP said.

It would be more useful for him later in team engagements letting him put more stacks on targets before speed Q or E'ing the targets.

Right now his passive brings NOTHING to a trade, and nothing to a team fight, it hardly even helps on killing towers like jinx's does.

Either a swap of his passive and W is needed or give him a new passive out right is what us Varus lovers want.

ParoeAug 17, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Thing is people want him more viable for his major role which is ADC so who cares what it will do for his mid lane.

Also the better way to make him for mid lane is the Armor pen build not AP which he scales horribly with anyway. I too have tried the AP build and it works kind of.. but it is still horrible and brings jack all to the team. AP Corki is more viable mid over him, or even Ez.

Indeed. His main role is marksman, just like ashe's main role is marksman. Keeping the capacity for it is fine, he desperately needs changes regardless of his secondary.

Im still sad ashe can no longer support. support ashe was so much fun.

VolcanuzAug 18, 20161 votes

Cait support works real well still in lower ELO. I guess Ashe supp still works too, to a point.

ParoeAug 18, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Cait support works real well still in lower ELO. I guess Ashe supp still works too, to a point.

Ashe support WORKED pre-rework. it was a very potent harass support; get above 1.0ASP, and it was 35% perma slows. it was a lot of fun and took some skill to pull off.

Lord DesertAug 16, 20162 votes

I think there might be a problem, because his w does to much dmg to be a passiv(as Ap varus and yes its awesome and not a troll xD). I would love to see some love for varus, but a simple swap, even thou its a great idea in the right direction, would shift his strength balance to much.

Vistha KaiAug 16, 20161 votes

Why would it be a problem?

Instead of scaling with an ability rank, it'd scale with levels.

Lord DesertAug 17, 20161 votes

And having the %s scaling with level, destroys AP Varus, or atleast nerfs him really hard early/mid(where hes already weak xD 15%blight dmg at level 9 vs level16..... BIG diffrence!

Look at my answer to the guy below for more information

ParoeAug 16, 20163 votes

[{quoted}](name=Lord Desert,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BuqZQaeg,comment-id=00070002,timestamp=2016-08-16T14:02:23.346+0000)

I think there might be a problem, because his w does to much dmg to be a passiv(as Ap varus and yes its awesome and not a troll xD). I would love to see some love for varus, but a simple swap, even thou its a great idea in the right direction, would shift his strength balance to much.

You have to understand that theres no difference between the passive slot and additional passives from an ability besides one uses level scaling and the other doesnt. BONUS MAGIC DAMAGE: 10 / 14 / 18 / 22 / 26 (+ 25% AP) turns into 10/11/12/13/14/15/16/17/18/19/20/21/22/23/24/25/26/27+0.25AP Stacks of blight will do: 2/3/4/5+2% per 100AP increasing at levels 6/11/16.

By changing his attack speed boost to an on-demand boost (20/25/30/35/40%, increases by 1s whenever varus kills a unit) you give him a much more streamlined kit that simply feels better. Theres no real change to varus except making him feel better to play, which IS a step in a direction riot needs to go.

I dont know if youve realized, but riot gives reworks to people to remake them into THEIR vision, not making the original vision of the champion balanced or better balancable. By pushing for an actual rework or even just larger scale changes youre running the risk of riot doing to varus when they did to shen and malzahar. stripping him of his identity and original vision in favor of a soft relaunch.

Lord DesertAug 17, 20161 votes

To make it clear: Im talking about advanced stuff, above the "just nerf/buff x" typ. Let me give you a short example: We could swap Vaynes W with her passiv, scaling with levels etc., But this does not feel right! A PASSIV should never be main source of dmg! But it should make the kit feel somewhat round. And yes im mostly talking about ApVarus the ADVarus doesnt care much for these changes. But i hope you get what i mean. (And having the %s scaling with level, destroys AP Varus, or atleast nerfs him really hard early/mid(where hes already weak xD 15%blight dmg at level 9 vs level16..... BIG diffrence!))

Next: I would like to give insight on some other things too, I call those Leona, Sona, Annie etc. "reworks" only "Updates". I consider a Rework only at the scale of changes like Sion or Taric! But theres no real line at where you can divide those, I just use them for clearification. So I would suggest only an "update" scale for Varus, I dont think he needs a full rework.

After all that information talk lets get to the changes: His W as a passiv doesnt feel good enough, theres no Rage or vengance in it and it doesnt feel right as a passiv. So lets assume we dont touch the W and only talk about passiv changes! Its clear that he needs to get AS, but he should only get it after something happend! Some possiblitys are(no real numbers just some ideas):

after x(~4ish) kills(minions etc.) he gets something like darius passiv only with AS instead of AD.
If he or his allies(maybe minions too) get attacked he gains +AS for some seconds, and refreshes the duration if he AAs an Enemy champion.
if he gets 3 stacks on someone and procs them he gains x AS for some seconds.
He gains X AS for Attacks on the same target, stacking to up y. OR he gains AS vs targets that have stacks of blight or are in his E/R
If a ally dies he goes beserk, getting AS,AD,AP etc. (so kill him first or die if you touch his allies xD)

A simple AS steroid ability may be simple and effectiv, but there are already to many and its boring, so lets mix it up a bit :P I would want to change his E, so it has the grounded effectiv too, maybe a bit smaller range and maybe R speed down a little too(~50range & -100 speed maybe). Varus is imobile af so giving him the grounded debuff would be super awesome! But thats only on a side note.

I know not all of those suggestions are good, some are only there to show you a bigger extend of options. My favorites are: getting beserk if allies dies and gainig stacking(!) AS vs the same target/with W debuff.

This would be my way of changes Varus, specially his passiv, to make his gameplay closer to his theme and give if some love taps too ;D

THE RlVER KlNGAug 16, 201610 votes

That passive is a carbon copy of Olaf. All Varus needs is for W to be his passive and an active steroid on his W.

HochelagaAug 17, 20161 votes

I never played olaf XD . Actually I was thinking about a variation on Karma's old passive which increased her AP based on her missing health %

WrongloveAug 15, 20166 votes

scrub play him ap and quit youre bitching

DynikusAug 15, 20165 votes

How does missing health fit his theme? and making it stack would be somewhat broken since he can get it off minion kills. I think he just needs a completely different passive honestly.

HochelagaAug 15, 20161 votes

Why wouldn't it fit his theme?

His passive is called Living vengeance. Hurting him would make him more powerful in battle because he's doing some vengeance!

ArakadiaAug 15, 20165 votes

I've had a few ideas. Something like this:

Double Knock: Every 10/8/6 seconds Varus knocks a second arrow which will deal X% his AD and applies on hit effects. Killing an enemy automatically reknocks an arrow.

This synergizes with his Blight too.

Another idea:

Paroe (NA) - about 2 hours ago Why do people want varus to be changed completely when all he needs is; W and passive to be swapped.

Blighted quiver needs to be his passive, and his W needs to be an on demand attack speed steroid whose duration is made longer by killing enemies.

I had another but forgot it.

BhagswagAug 16, 20161 votes

That's like old Ashe and Quinn's passive.

ArakadiaAug 16, 20161 votes

I don't see how its like old Ashe passive at all, old ashe passive crit, was only out of combat, and couldn't be reduced. Idk what quinn's passive was like.

BhagswagAug 16, 20161 votes

The idea is that you wait a certain amount of time and then do extra damage on your next shot. It's been done before.

Quinn's passive was similar to her present passive. Harrier marks a random target every so often, and the next shot deals extra damage to that target.

Great MutaAug 15, 20164 votes

Varus needs a rework. He's like a worse version of older Ashe.

ShadowParkerAug 15, 20169 votes

Just because he's immobile doesn't mean he needs a rework.

BhagswagAug 16, 20161 votes

Correct. He's my comfort pick ADC. I wish I could play Ashe but she's too slow for me to play well. (I know she's good, I'm just bad). GG.

XonraAug 16, 20162 votes

{quoted}

Just because he's immobile doesn't mean he needs a rework.

You are correct, but in saying that, he DOES need a rework. Just not because of being immobile.

XonraAug 16, 20162 votes

[{quoted}](name=Great Muta,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BuqZQaeg,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2016-08-15T18:48:47.874+0000)

Varus needs a rework. He's like a worse version of older Ashe.

Not sure why this got down voted. He does.

I wouldn't pick him over literally any adc right now.

Ashe Lucian Corki Vayne Twitch Jinx Jhin Caitlyn Ezreal Kog'maw Sivir Kalista MF Draven

Yes even Urgot

I would rather have any of those or play as any of those on my team.

Not sure if I should name Quinn or Graves since they aren't really "adcs" in the bot lane sense anymore, and Kindred is a jungler

CeexSettAug 16, 20161 votes

I'm not sure i want a kalista as well.

Hayaishi2Aug 15, 20164 votes

Worse passive in the game but Riot buffs Riven.

EvewynnAug 16, 20162 votes

Better than talon's lol

Spizzle9000Aug 16, 20163 votes

It makes some sense thematically as he's seeking vengeance so he gets stronger and more furious as he kills his enemies but it doesn't fit that well.

But, I think we can all agree that Lissandra is one of the few to have a worse passive than Varus. I mean, they could literally remove her passive and just buff her mana regen and pool by a bit and it would be like they never changed a thing. What in her lore makes it logical to give her a passive where she can occasionally do more magic without any cost to herself? The fact that she's been given power by the Frozen Watchers? It's just a really boring and somewhat useless passive.

Lord DesertAug 16, 20163 votes

meanwhile Ez gets +30% As on his passiv, which he can stack and trigger 24/7 xD (total of +80%As) And Varus, on the other hand, has an onhit but doesnt get +AS before fights and even when its like 20% xDDDDD

R FLASH XDAug 15, 20162 votes

Now i realize I never even knew what his passive was lol

SiG DxDAug 15, 20162 votes

olaf passive?

XonraAug 16, 20161 votes

[{quoted}](name=SiG DxD,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BuqZQaeg,comment-id=0005,timestamp=2016-08-15T21:09:17.593+0000)

olaf passive?

Olaf's passive WAS really good, just not really that great in the current Meta with the heavy control jungler style and all he does is attack faster.

Sona x RubickAug 16, 20161 votes

why are you giving him olaf's passive?

XonraAug 16, 20161 votes

Agreed with your point that his passive is bad and doesn't fit his kit/theme.

Disagree far more about your suggested change because taht is just free stats for the sake of giving him free stats and also doesn't fit his kit/theme.

HochelagaAug 17, 20161 votes

I never played olaf XD . Actually I was thinking about a variation on Karma's old passive which increased her AP based on her missing health %

Craft ZeppelinAug 16, 20161 votes

would be fun if he can do those classic elf-style legolas mutlishots as an attack steroid.

IS3E531E3F964391Aug 16, 20161 votes

as it stands his passive is a way worse version of jinx her passive

SaiannaAug 16, 20161 votes

Varus has passive? Eh? What?

Blkninjar87Aug 16, 20161 votes

The passive would be too OP if it gave that much attack speed... Cause Blighted Quiver also has an onhit effect.

The only nice thing would be if they added to the passive activating on skills shots.... like a skill shot on a minion activates the less passive and a skillshot on a champ the greater.

Most other ADCS with Attack speed steroids don't have on hit effects without building it.... Also because Varus is very very very very versatile in his builds.... He needs a generic passive that will support all those build paths. Its not just AP and AD, There's On hit and Builds that revolve only landing Piercing Arrow and an auto lol.

DrugothAug 16, 20161 votes

So you want to give Varus Olaf's passive?

HochelagaAug 17, 20161 votes

I never played olaf XD . Actually I was thinking about a variation on Karma's old passive which increased her AP based on her missing health %

bleufromageAug 17, 20161 votes

Well in prepared for the instant flame but I feel like Ezreal passive is much worse. I don't think ez really needs an as steriod. However attackspeed is good on Varus and Varus does get a higher steroid if he kills a champ (and cannon minion I believe) so in that sense it at least scales a bit

TheDeviceAug 17, 20161 votes

People have been talking about Varus' passive for quite a while.. just not Riot.

I hate to say it but I don't think your passive fits his theme at all or would be a helpful replacement.

Varus is a sniper. snipers are not supposed to be taking damage. If you're taking damage it means you need to be kiting and gtfo.

i personally don't think the passive is as bad as people make it out to be but it's definitely a part of his kit to be criticized.

It should have some scaling involved as well as something that fits his sniper theme. This passive feels like its more of a skirmishers passive (more like a vayne or quinn who is involved in longer lasting fights)

Varus is somebody who is laying down heavy cc and keeping as far away from the fight as possible since his kiting is probably the worst in the game.

I don't think the attack speed is such a terrible thing but maybe if instead of granting him even more attack speed on champion kill/assist it increased his attack range on his basic attacks for the same amount of time.