I strongly dislike the state of dragons right now.

Succubús GF·Feb 27, 2017·88 votes·3,622 views

It feels like, if the enemy team gets three infernals, it is an automatic win. The reason this is so frustrating, is that while I understand they SHOULDNT get three, sometimes it is too hard to contest. I feel like infernal should be one of those dragons that is REALLY good at helping a lesser team comp, do better, but rather it is, a roflstomping team comp that is maximizing it so that they just stomp even harder, personally ive never been a fan of these new dragons, but I feel like it shouldn't really be rng, as in like there shouldn't be a possibility to get three infernals (+24% ap and ad) like what? That's just throwing free stats to champions who are already doing well in their lane, I don't know, I just feel like it shouldn't be so readily available to snowball even harder

50 Comments

alfavhunterFeb 27, 201728 votes

how to change infernal drake

increase damage done to minions by 15/30/45%

it changes from a combat stat for snowballing into a farming stat that makes wave clear better

it would also make gettting 2+ infernal drakes a way to counter baron buffed minions by grabbing elder as the enemy takes baron making it a 60-90% bonus damage to minions so you can still effectively wave clear them even with them being baron buffed minions

the idea of this change is to make it a direct benefit for objective control like the other buffs instead of the 'we snowball better' buff

this would make ALL dragon buffs directly related to benefiting objective control effects of sustained siege/ anti siege (water) roaming to objectives (air) taking objectives (earth) and pushing waves to reach /protect objectives (fire)

the only drake causing issues is infernal drake, the others have benefits that don't help snowballing or '1 shot' issues, the proposed change would fix that

FireDrizzleFeb 27, 20179 votes

{quoted}> the only drake causing issues is infernal drake, the others have benefits** that don't help snowballing** or '1 shot' issues, the proposed change would fix that

No, Earth drake is only good if your winning, if you're pushed in its useless. It definately encourages snowballing.

alfavhunterFeb 27, 20178 votes

{quoted}

No, Earth drake is only good if your winning, if you're pushed in its useless. It definately encourages snowballing.

earth drake helps u take objectives by doing more damage to the objectives infernal is the only drake buff that directly helps you hurt enemy champions

earth drake can be useful for split pushers even on losing team

example, your team is losing but has decent wave clear, you have a tryndimer top

he stays top and split pushes all game forcing the enemy to send people to deal with him

with earth drake buff he takes down towers and inhibitors 10/20/30% faster due to the bonus damage he gets vs them

im not saying every drake will always be useful, but infernal is the ONLY drake that purely has you 'deal more damage to everything'

by focusing it purely on minions it keeps it in line with other drakes and has the potential to give a higher % value in the damage bonus

every drake buff can help a snowballing team, but infernal is the only buff that directly helps you snowball harder while the rest help you when you are already snowballing sure, but one infernal drake can turn an assassin who was doing decent into a monster, and 3? goodby adc who built a defensive item just to survive the assassin, he needs 3 defensive items now to live for 3 seconds, that is the problem with infernal its a direct damage to EVERYTHING buff, this even makes TANKS a damage threat if they get enough infernals

FireDrizzleFeb 27, 20171 votes

{quoted}

earth drake helps u take objectives by doing more damage to the objectives infernal is the only drake buff that directly helps you hurt enemy champions

earth drake can be useful for split pushers even on losing team

example, your team is losing but has decent wave clear, you have a tryndimer top

he stays top and split pushes all game forcing the enemy to send people to deal with him

with earth drake buff he takes down towers and inhibitors 10/20/30% faster due to the bonus damage he gets vs them

im not saying every drake will always be useful, but infernal is the ONLY drake that purely has you 'deal more damage to everything'

** by focusing it purely on minions it keeps it in line with other drakes and has the potential to give a higher % value in the damage bonus**

every drake buff can help a snowballing team, but infernal is the only buff that directly helps you snowball harder while the rest help you when you are already snowballing sure, but one infernal drake can turn an assassin who was doing decent into a monster, and 3? goodby adc who built a defensive item just to survive the assassin, he needs 3 defensive items now to live for 3 seconds, that is the problem with infernal its a direct damage to EVERYTHING buff, this even makes TANKS a damage threat if they get enough infernals

Earth drake situationally can be good for the weaker team, yeah. A fire drake should do a lot more for you when losing than a earth drake. If you're ahead its fact you can work on neutral objectives easier, ergo Earth drake is a snowball encouraging dragon, 100%. With earth drake captures giving a decents % winrate I bet it helps snowball even more than fire.

Increased damage to minions will be impossible to push against, certainly without baron or a comp with far more waveclear.

In my earlier post I mentioned that stacking drakes is broken.

Most tanks wont get much of a damage boost from infernal, because its % ap and ad not % damage boost.

5000000000000000Feb 27, 20171 votes

What if Earth drake made your minions more durable? It can be implemented in several different ways, such as AoE damage mitigation, spell shield, or having an additional minion (earth elemental?) that doesn't provide gold. Now it's useful for both winning and losing teams (either useful for siege, or countering siege by being able to pressure map). Fire dragon can take the Earth dragon's spot for doing more damage to structures, maybe as a DoT.

DepressedAhriFeb 28, 20171 votes

Or instead of making earth dragon changes, revert the entire RNG Elemental Drake spawn changes and slightly buff the 5th dragon from the old version to make it more similar to Elder Drake, to make dragons still seem viable, but not cause an infernal drake at 8 minutes cause an insta loss.

PB4UAMEFeb 28, 20171 votes

A fire drake should do a lot more for you when losing than a earth drake. If you're ahead its fact you can work on neutral objectives easier, ergo Earth drake is a snowball encouraging dragon, 100%.

How do you figure this? I'm entirely baffled as it's completely the other way around. Infernal only increases your AD and AP. It does not affect base damages, and for any fighter, diver, bruiser, or tank, they are getting less than a 2% increase in damage per infernal.

No, Infernal is only good when you have AD and AP items. These are carry items primarily, and they all cost a fuckton of gold.

Say you have 150 AD, and get an infernal, you get +12 AD, for 162 total. Say your ahead enemy gets the next infernal but they already have 250 AD. Well, now they get +20 AD or 66.67% more from the same buff than you do. How exactly should infernal ever be better when behind?

FireDrizzleFeb 28, 20171 votes

{quoted} How exactly should infernal ever be better when behind?

When you are pushed in everywhere it is infinitely better than moutain. I didnt say its better for you when behind than when ahead.

PB4UAMEFeb 28, 20173 votes

Ever seen a Yorick splitpushing with an earth dragon or two while the rest of his team runs in and dies?

I've taken 2 towers and an inhib in less than 2 minutes with Maiden before around the 30 minute mark. In 5 minutes I can clear a whole lane of towers, or push from an inhib tower through to the nexus (including both nexus towers) and take the nexus in less than that.

I have won from behind multiple times as a split pusher through mountain drakes.

FireDrizzleFeb 28, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Ever seen a Yorick splitpushing with an earth dragon or two while the rest of his team runs in and dies?

I've taken 2 towers and an inhib in less than 2 minutes with Maiden before around the 30 minute mark. In 5 minutes I can clear a whole lane of towers, or push from an inhib tower through to the nexus (including both nexus towers) and take the nexus in less than that.

I have won from behind multiple times as a split pusher through mountain drakes.

I have mastery 5 on Yorick and could have 6 if I wanted so I know he destroys towers easy.

It is easier to splitpush with a moutain when you are winning though. Like if they have 1 person really fed they can wipe you out if you push. Or your team cant hold them off the base without you.

QuiverMeTimbersMar 1, 20171 votes

woah WOAH! did you just say 45% to minions. i know we already have waveclear by third dragon. but siegeminions do have kills. and u wld be tilting them with 45% additional damage to them.

alfavhunterMar 1, 20171 votes

{quoted}

woah WOAH! did you just say 45% to minions. i know we already have waveclear by third dragon. but siegeminions do have kills. and u wld be tilting them with 45% additional damage to them.

45% to JUST minions is better than what it is now (balance wise)

KaiokoFeb 27, 201711 votes

The only real dragon that causes issues is Infernal which will get toned down the more damage is reduced and the more the game goes back to favoring tanks. Attack speed champions will become more and more needed to take down the shift in meta and naturally don't scale as well with them.

SinlaireFeb 27, 20177 votes

I literally just posted this comment on a thread a couple rows up from this one. so i'll copy and paste it.

Riot provided numbers about 2 months ago showing with their own data gathered, infernal drag actually places about 3rd in most influential dragons in the game.

behind ocean and wind drake. it tied with mountain drake and elder took last because its spawns too late and gets taken too infrequently to give it proper comparison. meaning it fell middle of the pack and really wasnt even close to best drag in game.

Infernal looks good on paper, but look at it like this. Infernal drag boosts % AP and % AD. but if you are using a non auto attack based champion, then most of your AP and AD are only relevant in your skills.

lets say your Q has a 60% ratio, your W no scaling, your E a 60% ratio, and your ult a 60%+60% ratio. then that means You will only get 60% of the infernal drags buff on your Q and your E, no effect whatsoever on your W, and 120% of the dragons effect on the ultimate. That's it.

some champions have scalings as low as 20 and 40% in some areas while other champions may have their damage scale on things like health and mana pool ( ). making it so that blue boy is only getting half benefit from red drake as only half his AP scaling is tuned around him having actual AP.

The red drag is a trap in that everyone seems to THINK that the %BOOST it gives to stats is how much every champions damage goes up, but it isn't. since there are little to no kits in all of league of legends that 100% scaling anywhere outside of their ultimates. meaning other than auto attack based champs who can use the AD boost for better autos, everyone has to rely only scaling giving them a watered down buff that isn't nearly as effective as they thought it was.

So i repeat. infernal drag IS NOT the strongest dragon right now.

ProfDrDeathFeb 27, 20173 votes

You have a logical error in your calculation.

Ignoring base damages, an 8% increase to a scaling stat (be it AP or AD) will result in the damage from the scaling being increased by 8%.

For example, take someone with 100 AP and a 1.0 and 0.5 AP ratio on an ability with no base damage:

The damage of the 1.0 AP ability goes from 100 to 108, an 8% increase. The damage of the 0.5 AP ability goes from 50 to 54, which is also an 8% increase.

Such an ability with no base damage and 1.0 scaling is your regular auto-attack. Thus, 8% increased AD equals 8% increased damage from auto-attacks.

It gets muddier when base damages are included. Let's say our ability deals 100 base damage.

The damage of the 1.0 AP ability goes from 200 to 208, a 4% increase. The damage of the 0.5 AP ability goes from 150 to 154, which is a 2.7% increase.

SinlaireFeb 28, 20171 votes

{quoted} You have a logical error in your calculation.

It gets muddier when base damages are included. Let's say our ability deals 100 base damage.

The damage of the 1.0 AP ability goes from 200 to 208, a 4% increase. The damage of the 0.5 AP ability goes from 150 to 154, which is a 2.7% increase.

Im sorry but im lost. since every ability DOES in fact have a base damage, wouldnt your numbers presented here actually be in fact a proper representation of what happens in game? infernal dragon 8% damage increase affects no base damages in game. meaning the only thing it helps is scaling.

a base damage of 100 will remain a base of 100 before and after dragon. With a 1.0 scaling and 100 ap it will do 200 damage. after dragon 8% bonus it will do 208 damage. the bonus damage provided from dragon at this point wasn't 8%, it was 4%. all of these numbers you have pointed out. so tell me where i went wrong in stating that infernal drag doesnt provide the full 8% to nearly anyone at any point in time?

yes. infernal gave you 8% MORE STATS. it did not and will not however give you 8% MORE DAMAGE. which everyone seems to confuse.

infernal dragon is MILDLY snowbally at best due to this mechanic. not the end of the world everyone makes it out to be.

TeCoolMageFeb 28, 20171 votes

What's even worse is that believing an auto is 100% AD scaling is misleading.

Crit - 200% IE - 250% Let's not even get started with the ADCs' abilities. (I'm looking at you 350%+ Jhin and Caitlyn)

SinlaireFeb 28, 20171 votes

cough 435% with Q and IE Draven cough

KaiokoFeb 28, 20173 votes

{quoted}

The red drag is a trap in that everyone seems to THINK that the %BOOST it gives to stats is how much every champions damage goes up, but it isn't. since there are little to no kits in all of league of legends that 100% scaling anywhere outside of their ultimates. meaning other than auto attack based champs who can use the AD boost for better autos, everyone has to rely only scaling giving them a watered down buff that isn't nearly as effective as they thought it was.

So i repeat. infernal drag IS NOT the strongest dragon right now.

Your logic is incorrect -- 8% extra scaling is an extra 8% regardless of whatever base it starts out. In your example if I had 500 AP and a 60% AP scaling I would deal 300 bonus damage to my spell. Add in infernal and suddenly I deal 324 damage more which is indeed an extra 8%. It's true that if you factor in base damage you get less than 8% however that's the nature of AP and AD scalings in general.

As far as the dragon being inefficient your data might have been correct at one point but it's no longer now with the current roster of OP champions.

Let's take a look at Varus an arrow that deals 160% extra damage,

Miss Fortune with her 100% passive + 100% second Q + 50% Q kill damage or her ult that deals 75% AD damage PER WAVE and has 16 waves.

Jhin who deals increasing damage with missing health where being at 50% health already pushes his ratio to 145% AD PER SHOT

Talon with his 200% AD ratio passive or his multiple blade ultimate that 80% per blade getting 5-7 blades through is easy

Kha Zix where 220% AD ratio on a Q isolated with passive is absolutely normal.

The list goes on and on and all of these don't go attack speed, they go lethality and infernal only serves to magnify their power.

MrHaZeYoFeb 27, 20177 votes

People just favor the idea of Infernal because they see the AD/AP% but Cloud and Earth and to some extent Ocean are all good as well.

Cloud allows for great map movment and Earth allows for easier Drags/Barons/Structures.

xeviFeb 27, 20175 votes

Yea, I think infernal is a bit overrated. Three of any dragon is really strong, especially when you're already ahead.

StillnameFeb 28, 20171 votes

Ocean is my favorite tbh. People underestimate how good it is to be able to stay out on the map doing things while the other team is backing.

JefftiffyFeb 27, 20177 votes

My question is why did we go back to 8% on infernal drake. What was so weak about 6%?

Tyrone LannisterFeb 27, 20175 votes

Well one change id love to see is when a drag gets taken, it cycles them so as you dont stack. Though maybe a bit of tweaking to this concept would help

SinlaireFeb 27, 20171 votes

dragon spawns are RNG. First drag is random, followed by the game doing a lotto on which 3 dragons will be permitted to spawn that game. that way you can actually stack dragons and not get a hodge podge, but the game also makes all following dragons after each dragon is killed is random as well.

it sets the 3 you can get, then randomly selects from the 3 every time the dragon dies. if a dragon comes back after death it's because of a 1 in 3 chance and not some code.

Tyrone LannisterFeb 27, 20171 votes

I would like it so its not the same drag right after. Idk though

MannnyFeb 28, 20175 votes

The same could be said for any dragon. If a team has more dragon control than you it's most likely because they are better than your team so it's not just dragons.

IA9hRfpP5qFeb 27, 20174 votes

LOL trying to be Dota2 and failing.

The best dragon is the passive move speed one, that shit is op

Sun Wu RyuumokuFeb 28, 20171 votes

The best dragon is the passive move speed one, that shit is op

yeah... during early-mid

AeszarckFeb 28, 20172 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ryuumoku no koke,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=E3L0BWsE,comment-id=00050000,timestamp=2017-02-28T00:05:11.671+0000)

yeah... during early-mid

Wait hell no, it is so good lategame. Lategame is all about map pressure and how you can adapt quickly to changes in the map. Roaming is big in the lategame.

DonatellaVersaceFeb 27, 20174 votes

Boo hoo. My team wasn't paying attention and now the enemy took three dragons. If you were more diligent, your enemy wouldn't be stacking. The problem isn't the dragons nor is it the enemy team, its you

AimléssFeb 27, 20174 votes

You're ignorant and wrong at that. If your team is losing they can't contest dragons, so basically, the infernal becomes a commodity only the winning team can afford. And as a result, it snowballs their lead even harder instead of giving the team who's behind a chance of a comeback.

GibberwattFeb 27, 20173 votes

That's where this crazy thing called "sneaking" comes into play. Its where you "sneak" the dragon, while there's a teamfight/standoff going on. I do it all the time.

OMGSoAnnoyingFeb 27, 20173 votes

Or you have 3 people head towards Baron so the enemy thinks you're doing Baron... while you take the dragon.

Early game, sneaking a dragon is an art form, especially if you can do it pre-level 6.

ValyrianBladeFeb 27, 20174 votes

The issue with dragons is that some are so much better than others.

Oh, you get 3 early infernals when you're winning? Can't possibly throw that game. Oh, you get 3 early mountains when you're winning? Going to be pretty tough to throw that game.

Oh, you get 3 ocean drakes when you're winning? Laning phase will be a breeze but come late game they're only a minor advantage, could easily throw. Oh, you get 3 cloud drakes when you're winning? You may take a couple extra towers but after that they'll be nearly worthless and there's nothing to stop you throwing.

Why is it that one game I'm winning and get clouds/oceans so it's hard to close out despite playing well, then the next game I'm losing and the enemy team gets infernals and despite making lots of mistakes we still can't come back on them - is beyond me. There's no need for this extra luck in the game.

It's like, we've seen pro games in seasons 4/5 where a team goes too heavy on the early game power and then gets outscaled and loses because of it. Now if you go heavy on early game power versus a late game teamfight comp, if the dragons are infernals/mountains you win, if not you lose. Completely decided by RNG (hypothetically).

FireDrizzleFeb 27, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Afk Warding,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=E3L0BWsE,comment-id=,timestamp=2017-02-27T20:00:38.003+0000)

It feels like, if the enemy team gets three infernals, it is an automatic win. The reason this is so frustrating, is that while I understand they SHOULDNT get three, sometimes it is too hard to contest. I feel like infernal should be one of those dragons that is REALLY good at helping a lesser team comp, do better, but rather it is, a roflstomping team comp that is maximizing it so that they just stomp even harder, personally ive never been a fan of these new dragons, but I feel like it shouldn't really be rng, as in like there shouldn't be a possibility to get three infernals (+24% ap and ad) like what? That's just throwing free stats to champions who are already doing well in their lane, I don't know, I just feel like it shouldn't be so readily available to snowball even harder

I made a thread saying that you shouldnt get 2 dragons of the same element spawning in a match and got downvoted. But stacking dragons is obviously broken. I would rather have 2 infernals than 1 of the other 3 each for example.

You say you dont like dragons helping snowball but I think that is the point of them. If dragons are worth taking than they will favour snowballs because the neutral monsters tend to go to the team thats ahead. I dont think individual dragons could do with a nerf. Stop elements stacking and I think they will be in a decent spot.

Succubús GFFeb 27, 20172 votes

I can agree with this

ModKnightsKemplarFeb 28, 20173 votes

Man, if the enemy team gets three of ANY drake, you in trouble. It's not just infernal.

Iźuku MidoriyaFeb 28, 20173 votes

Well the first thing is it feels like one person posts on the boards about Dragons and then everyone starts going off about them and making posts but if you get lucky or unlucky enough for three infernals to spawn then thats a rip. Out of all the games ive played its only happened once. The game is all about objective control hence why people often will say kills dont matter and it is true. Once the enemy team starts to snowball there isnt much you or your team can do. Sure the Dragons can attest to this but its not just the dragons. The enemy team may have had a small lead but because your team wasnt grouping up or warding dragon you lose big for it and thats where you need objective control, map pressure, things like that which allow you to contest dragons

UnboundCreatorFeb 28, 20173 votes

Wow the game rewards people who play well and doesn't reward people who play poorly???? what a surprise!

raffleszFeb 28, 20172 votes

I dont like how rng is still basically what makes them broken.

say your comp is poke plus raka. its worth getting aced if you can get an ocean. air a distant second that only the jungler should die trying to steal. Fire/mountain? pass.

now say you got fiora and zed. now you dont care about air/ocean but you want mountain/fire.

then again the whole point of the different drags was differing strengths and synergy so maybe they are working as intended...

RISE Shlack123Feb 27, 20171 votes

I honestly don't even know why they ditched the stacking mechanic. That made every dragon important, and made it harder for a team to snowball off of RNG. The Elemental Dragon thing was so random, even more so than the plant system.

Sun Wu RyuumokuFeb 28, 20171 votes

tbh... in most game, when i (my team) loose 3 (or all) drake, the game is obviously loose.

Rito StaffFeb 28, 20171 votes

Personally I notice the other dragons aswell :P like the move speed and ocean one (the latter particularly once you stack 2)

The mountain is more try-hard oriented and maybe pros can take advantage of it better.

Fire drake, bronze Air drake, silver to gold Ocean drake, gold to plat (I srsly think this one is a bit weak with just one of it) Mountain drake is try hard. When the game is even and destroying towers is difficult

RacoonHunterFeb 28, 20171 votes

Air is probably the weakest of the 4.. hell, I would go as far as to say the only time people go and kill the air dragon is when they just want one of the other 3 to pop up.

I agree that infernal needs to be looked at. I get it dragons need to be a "point of interest" like baron, but they have to be balanced. I've won games from behind because of the infernal dragons. stomps with 3 infernals make the game a joke even moreso than stomps already are.

I would love to see the infernal toned down a tad.. maybe have its % bonus cut in half. it doesn't kill what it's intended to do, but makes it so that stomps aren't making you take a trip to player behavior because you're so frustrated that the enemies 2-15 yas two shots your tank because of 3 infernals...

VeltoxFeb 28, 20173 votes

Air it's nice on immobile champions and Rammus Hecarim Janna Warwick

SaelonFeb 28, 20172 votes

Also adding to that ranged champions like ADCs and Mages who need to stay out of the front line really benefit from Air Drake pretty well. Even if they are already mobile having passive movespeed to help them stay away/run away from a situation is really vital

MyrddinFeb 28, 20171 votes

If you're letting them take every dragon you deserve to lose....

the weeabooFeb 28, 20172 votes

It's pretty hard to steal if they got a broken ass jungler (cough Lee cough Zac cough) and their support is a Nunu/singed with Smite as well

Warlord ZudaneFeb 28, 20171 votes

What if the Drake cycled through each one every minute? 180 seconds of not being in combat and it changes into another type. Something that shows a glowing dragon pit that increases over 5-10 seconds so we can see the change coming if we have sight of the pit, otherwise just updates the HUD with the new type. And like the jungle respawn timers it can show a timer only if you saw it change or leave combat.

This would allow for the team to pick what drake they want, give some pressure to rush to the right one and give some balance to the drake. I get that it means easy stacks for the same type, but add something that drake deals 7.5% more damage and receives 7.5% less damage per stack of the same element. So first drake would have no change, but for your second mountain drake you would take 7.5% more damage and deal 7.5% less for your team, and a third drake would deal 15% more damage and take 15% less for your team, while the other team with no mountain drakes would receive no penalty (also makes it easier for a team without that drake to steal the kill). Any kill after the 3rd of one type of drake gives gold and exp but no buff.

To make it more interesting I think it should start with a random drake, then randomly cycle through until all 4 have shown up before restarting the cycle, again randomly. So using numbers to represent the drakes it could be 1 > 3 > 4 > 2 > 3 > 1 > 2 > 4. Or if they really want to keep it random then make it a random cycle that will not pick the current or previous drake, but I like my idea more. This would make it somewhat random and somewhat predictable, knowing that if the first drake is an infernal and it changes then you can't get back to the infernal for a minimum of 9 minutes. Although it also means that a champion could run up and hit the drake to make it not change, so if you know that infernal is next (mountain, cloud and ocean drakes have already shown) and it would benefit the enemy more than your team you could delay the change to prevent the enemy from getting it.

I think it would add a lot of fun and tactical planning while not really having to make changes to the drake's buffs.