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Can someone honestly tell me how Zed is OP

Guy Fox Teemo·May 31, 2016·10 votes·10,607 views

Look I main Zed so maybe that makes me biased or whatever. But from all the data on Zed I honestly don't see how he's broken the only thing that stands out is his ban rate and play rate, which are generally both subjective stats rather than actual balance.

Like the only thing I hear is BS he does this or he does this BS, blah blah blah, but like if he does all this shouldn't his win rate be higher? His win rate for experienced players is barely 55% which is average across all champions. I would really like to see some actual stats on what makes him broken, because spouting that he's annoying and frustrating because he is good at CS'ing or being a lane bully doesn't seem like a very good argument to me, or his "safety" in kills.

This is a legit question; How on earth is Zed considered OP, not frustrating but OP in the fact that he wins games just by being picked, like release malzahar rework with a 60% winrate, I honestly don't see any stats supporting Zed is OP besides Banrate which is extremely subjective and tends to skewed heavily.

Why is Zed considered OP? Legit question.

28 Comments

SlythionMay 31, 20167 votes

It's rare to see some one use this logic on the boards... +1 to you comrad

...hopefully it'll help buffer the onslaught of downvotes you're about to get from biased board-users that hate Zed because...well...others hate Zed

MalfiniMay 31, 20166 votes

Zed is not OP but an annoyance just like Zyra .

LuggMay 31, 20166 votes

Let's look at his kit. First off he uses energy, which means he doesn't have to manage mana which is a HUGE advantage early game since he can spam abilities at will.

Contempt for the Weak: Zed's basic attacks against targets below 50% of their maximum health deal 6 / 8 / 10% of their maximum health as bonus magic damage.

Honestly one of the very strongest passives in the game and he doesn't have to do anything but AA someone below half health. Plus it's MAGIC damage, so it makes it harder to itemize against him.

Razor Shuriken: Ranged ability for poking lane opponents or farming that can be double fired from his shadows making it harder to avoid and doing more damage if both hit. The main reason he lanes so strongly and well since the CD is so low.

Living Shadow: Another great poke and farming ability that gives him great safety. He can literally swap over at any time making it very hard to predict your skill shots against him. Let's not even get into the free passive he gets that increases his bonus AD by up to 20%!

Shadow Slash: AoE damage that lowers the CD of Living Shadow for EVERY champion hit. Plus it has a slow component as well.

Death Mark: The most hated Zed ability. He becomes untargetable, so he can avoid CC, skillshots, tower shots, etc. Gets a free Ghost for 3 seconds. Can swap back to his initial cast spot with no range limit. All damage he does during the duration does up to 45% of the damage done PLUS 100% of his TOTAL AD! The kicker is that his passive usually gets applied during the mark so end up with a huge extra chunk of damage from that as well.

So you can see Zed has a pretty loaded kit that synergizes very well with itself, further amplifying its power. Plus his counterplay potential is thru the roof and one of the very best in the game. With all the Armor pen available now and the gutting of QSS, it's easy to see that no one wants to deal with him.

Guy Fox TeemoMay 31, 20162 votes

But what data supports himb eing strong? Anyone can word something making it sound OP.

LuggMay 31, 20165 votes

You have to realize that his win rate is at 50% overall despite him being banned 87%. This means that the best Zed players aren't even being allowed to play him. Otherwise his win rate would be so ridiculous that even you Zed mains would agree that he needs gutted.

WoonStruckMay 31, 20164 votes

Its more that his win rate is 50%, and the games he's not banned he's likely playing against a counter, because the Zed pick is assumed.

So he's got a 50% win rate despite commonly facing counters.

Meanwhile anything that isn't a counter he gets a completely free laning phase.

CaítlynMay 31, 20165 votes

[{quoted}](name=Guy Fox Teemo,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=E48AtF5c,comment-id=,timestamp=2016-05-31T03:10:40.321+0000)

Look I main Z-

Downvoted

Guy Fox TeemoMay 31, 20165 votes

That seems to be the logic most people have that hate Zed , "He mains him so he's 100% biased and a shitty person."

PandaTabuMay 31, 20164 votes

I think zed is balanced. Never really had a problem with him. QSS not removing his ult kind of made him not as balanced, but I never really see a zed having any more effect on the game as other mid lane champions.

Agree with you 100%, and I rarely play Zed. Plus I main mid.

Ozag the MightyMay 31, 20164 votes

Agreed Zed isn't OP at all every Zed player I've seen goes all in on the ADC yes he may secure the kill but he's killed shortly after.

RealrMay 31, 20164 votes

Hi! I used to play alot of Zed (been playing Azir <3 lately)

Currently I can't bear to see people call Zed overpowered. I attribute alot of the complaints to low elo (yup I'm low elo too) players not knowing how to play safely against him. Now you're thinking: "well there is no safe way to play against him etc etc, but listen.

With definitively skilled elo players (Plat+, Ranked) he has a 49.7% win rate. That ranks 34th, right behind Lissandra (and I mean we ALL know how super duper op Lissandra is right now). Yet weirdly he has around an 87% ban rate.

Recently he's been hit with nerf after nerf (the increase on his W cooldown hurt pretty badly) yet people keep asking for more nerfs. His win rate has gone down 3% since around patch 6.7 and 6.8.

One of the more annoying parts of Board conversations about Zed is people chiming in with a "he takes no skill, he's so easy wtf rito." He's definitely not as hard as Azir, who is one of the hardest champs to play well, for example. But having the mechanics and awareness necessary to properly duel with your shadows and outplay your opponents is really hard. I played Zed for months on end and that was something I always had problems with.

Sure his ult is click and point, but look at Nautilus, Vi, Caitlyn, Annie, Lissandra, Garen, Warwick, Malzahar, Veigar with their "click to win" ults. But certainly Zed is the OP champ here. Nevermind the fact that 7/8 of the champs I listed (poor Caitlyn) have considerably higher win rates than Zed right now.

I also think a large brunt of complaints come with the fact that he's an assassin. His quick kills (all assassins have them) tilt players. Meanwhile, Swain is sitting at a 55% win rate but is only banned 4% of games. I mean seriously, Kassadin has a higher mid win rate than Zed right now people.

CircuitryOct 2, 20174 votes

Zed is banned a lot because he wrecks everyone in lane. A good zed player can beat any champ in lane. Pretty much no one actually counters zed. No one wants to play against him because it just means they don't get to play at all but just sit there under turret waiting to die. Not because he wins games but because he's no fun to play against and your always going to lose against him in lane regardless of who you take.

NyhverMay 31, 20163 votes

He's overpowered in the sense that he's stronger or easier to do well with / be a threat than most picks middle right now, this wasn't always the case, he wasn't nearly always a 100% pick/ban, there was even periods where people thought Zed was undertuned trash that lost games- was just sort of 'there' but look where we are now with other mids being nerfed/changed, item changes and the QSS change, too.

For most of where people play at, (not diamond or high diamond+) fighting a Zed actually doesn't matter, because Zed won't be consistently played well by lower mmr players typically, so he's just sort of there most of the time.

I mean, hell, man, I'm an experienced Zed player who knows all of his tricks, has a good feel for his numbers, use to be amazing at laning, (not quite as much anymore but way past gold mmr) but up until recently I had a negative winrate on Zed...

SwiftKitten88May 31, 20163 votes

ok so you play zed... have you ever had to FACE zed as an AP midlaner?

as an AP mid laner the FIRST item we WANt o buy is something to give us mana so we dont need to keep backing.

zed on the other hand has energy and will never need to leave lane due to lack of resources

again the same issue is zed can use his abilities to farm freely where as when fighting zed we have to consider how much mana we can spend on killing minion

zed is also an AD champ so he can last hit minions very easily where as it is MUCH harder to last hit with autos as an AP much

zed can apply pressure and farm from safety, and is next to impossible to gank because of his shadow. again this is possible with AP champ but we need to watch our mana.

next is itemization

zed's first item vs an AP champ will be item 3155 which gives him a HUGE advantage

what an AP champ WANTs to get is a MANA item,, but we are forced to get item 3191

which even after we complete it we need to stack it, and even fully stacked it pales in comparision to item 3155 because of the passive.

zed will ALWAYS hit six before we can finish item 3157 AND the cooldown has been increased. so even if we use it to save ourselves once.. zed will have his ulti back before we can use it again.

what makes zed overpowered isn't just one large issue.

its not like he is broken because he has one thing that is completly OP.. (such as fizz's troll pole)

its that fact that he is basically best or second best in EVERYTHING.

i know this is a horrible example but its the only one i can think of at the moment

say we have stats like pokemon do hp attack defense special attack special defence speed

now each one of these categories there is one pokemon that is the best

its not like zed has a absurdly huge margin in one stat it that he comes in first second or third place in EVERY stat

its everything COMBINED that makes him op.

he doesn't need one big nerf to any single skill, he needs multiple small nerfs to all of his abilities to bring him in lane with other champs

Guy Fox TeemoMay 31, 20163 votes

This seems to be more of a frustration problem, then him actually being OP, i wanna see stats supporting it, not just people thinking he's OP from a players perspective.

AnomanderMay 31, 20163 votes

Zed is REALLY REALLY OP at being disliked..... it's not that he is OP or even strong...... He is just disliked. People hate the perception of his safety/poke/wavecleare/lack of counter play.

It's not that he isn't at a appropriate winrate... the problem with zed is he is just unfun to play against. This doesn't mean he can't be countered or beaten. It just isn't going to be fun for those playing against him most of the time.

TractMay 31, 20162 votes

Meanwhile my poor main Azir also defies the statistic you use. Huge playrate at high elo's, yet is under 49% winrate, yet is a total monster once he gets only a few items. I love my Azir and have stuck with him since release, even when he was weak as hell, so il be riding this bumpy nerf phase out once again :P

Guy Fox TeemoMay 31, 20161 votes

But the thing is Azir is generally suppose to sit at a 45% win rate, due to the difficulty of the champion, thats where he's been for most of his time in League, and has been competitive basically his entire release, the fact that it increased by 4% since the mage update is a cause for concern, while someone like Zed stayed stagnant at the same stats despite the Qss "indirect buff".

Maybe Azir could boast around a 47% win rate as people have gotten more experienced with him over the time he's been out, but 4% on one patch and being almost picked every single game in the LCS is a bit much for the bird.

Irelia BotMay 31, 20162 votes

Biggest issue is that he is hard to get down and keep down in laning due to having a kit that is great for farming through Q and his passive while enemrgy keep him fro mhaving mana limites on his wave clear early to mid game.

If he was able to be denied creeps more effectively he would not feel like a threat that you can't do much about.

Guy Fox TeemoMay 31, 20162 votes

Well the issue is lane is due to Zed just being a strong laner, thats one of his main strengths. Zed needs to snowball and snowball quickly or he falls off very hard, if his early game strength lacks, he doesn't snowballed, be forced to roam, let the mid laner farm more, get behind even more if he isn't successful with a roam if people are smart and ward, fall off even harder since he isn't a great team fighter, etc etc.

Without his strong laning power Zed suffers heavily which is why I think the next patchs "nerfs" are going to be quite a hit to any player below 100+ games on Zed, as their easy harass in lane for kills will suffer quite a bit in fact, even with the buffs to the QW combo.

Now I'd also argue he's quite easily denied creeps, as are every other melee ranged laner in the mid lane, just because he has good waveclear, doesn't mean he can farm well, as it doesn't translate to much when its under tower if you can't one shot teh wave, it might hurt in fact since the tower will kill the minons in one hit. Poking Zed under tower should be quite easy in fact, since he'll have to be using melee hits to take all the minons since his Q wont be up in time, making a Lux or Azir have teh time of their loving constantly poking him, but thats very much up for debate i'd say.

WoonStruckMay 31, 20161 votes

Please see every other assassin ever.

Also, Zed is fine at farming under tower because both his E and Q are AoE, meaning either it will kill a creep, get it low enough for his passive to kill, or have it just high enough to take a tower shot without dying. If its not any of these three outcomes, it means you shouldn't have been using your skills to try to clear yet anyway.

Which means very easy, consistent farm under tower if you know even the slightest bit of what you're doing. Think ahead, perfect farm.

Same reason Vlad used to be so insanely strong under tower with his E and Q, despite having a 'weak early' in season 1 and 2.

WoonStruckMay 31, 20161 votes

His winrate is too high because any game he's in currently, he's fighting counters. Because its basically assured Zed will be in a game he isn't banned at this point.

A 50% winrate or more against his counters says something is up.

That said, Zed isn't the biggest issue either.

SwapShadowsMay 31, 20161 votes

There are so many actual broken/overpowered champions in the game that it's mind blowing that people can even have time to discuss anything related to Zed.

just this alone tells you the level of intelligence on people who discuss gameplay.

RealrMay 31, 20161 votes

Ok first off, I'm going to avoid the arguments that include the fact that the player complaining about Zed doesn't have the proper skill to play against him well. Low ELO is Low ELo.

His Q is a skillshot. His W has a high CD early on so his waveclear is eh, and his W is his only way to gapclose toward you. His E is fine. But skillshots are skillshots. I used to swear that Lux was OP, but then I learned to just dodge her BS.

Now his ult: point and click, then he has to attack you. If you're under turret, then he's under your turret attacking you. There's a time gap between when he ults you before he can go back to his safe shadow that's away from your turret. If you're getting ulted, auto'd, e'd, q'd and die under turret without him also dying, then you're doing something wrong. Sure he's a duelist but he's far from being overpowered.

Ok let's look at mid lane. Specifically, I'm looking at mid lane with high elo (Plat+, Ranked). Including Taliyah, there's now 51 champions that can go mid. Of those 51, 30 have winrates above 50%. Stop looking at 50% win rates like it's something every champion has, because it's not.

What I'm saying is that among experienced players that know what they're doing, Zed is merely less than average. He has a great laning phase but he has awful teamfights (he pretty much gets to throw out 1 W or a few Q pokes before its over) and he has an awful late game. Once it hits 35 minutes with a Zed that hasn't snowballed then it's over.

I currently main Azir, who gets countered by Zed extremely hard. But I win lane. Sure I use mana, but I use it wisely to CS and to poke. I don't even build zhonyas/armor first because I know how to lane safely. Zed can't apply pressure because he can use his Q once every ~10 seconds and after that he's left with skillshots that have eh range. Poke him, deny him CS, and shove his lane in (with proper vision ofc) and there's nothing to worry about. If he ults you, walk toward turret, pop potions, you're fine.

TwinBlade626Nov 5, 20171 votes

This is how zed is op. I play zilean first match 0/14/3 I get good on zilean 21/1/6 First match on zed 4/0/0 I get get good with zed a spec maybe 3, days 39/0/5 + non stop wins zilean takes tons of skills outplays and hard work and knowledge Zed w q e r r w with e auto.... With 0 thought into anything else....Zed is op if you don't understand how look at his stats abilities scaling game play and tell me is he balance in terms of two same skilled players 1v1 zed vs zill who would win....

And î oopDec 4, 20171 votes

some champs have win rate around 45% he is broken cause he can get everyone who is squishy without a problem and its to frustrating to play vs him. i main support and i cant count how much time zed just came and killed me in 1.3 seconds and i didnt have a chance at all

TurtleBrianSwagApr 2, 20181 votes

Zed can basically harass w/ his shadow from a distance, that makes him op.

TurtleBrianSwagApr 2, 20181 votes

win rates also depend on your team. one champion can't carry a whole team if the enemy is more powerful than your teammates.

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