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if team-oriented tank/support items are gonna stay this strong

Big Lincoln··57 votes·2,113 views

Then we need selfish alternatives that are equally powerful

right now tanks and bruisers can any combination of item 3190 item 3193 item 3083 item 3109 and have ridiculous amounts of durability AND offer big benefits to their team. In fact right now I'd say you're a fool if you don't buy item 3083 item 3190 on the majority of fighters, especially if you're jungling, because that massive shield you can pop when you initiate, or when your team gets initiated on, is literally game-changing.

item 3053 offers a comparable shield to Locket, but with no base shield (only bonus hp) and decays only .5 seconds slower. Doesn't help your team in any way, and you have no control over when it activates, so the enemy can pop it and then leave, which screws you out of your shield for when they immediately re-engage.

item 3143 USED to be the standard of bruisers for a defensive armor item. It's now a niche buy that's best reserved for 2 crit champions on the enemy. item 3742 is not as good as it used to be.

What's equally 'problematic' is that a lot of these items will cap you off with similar stats, or they have similar stats on one item (Knight's Vow vs DMP/Randuin), but the overall build is cheaper. So you're getting your items quicker, you're about as tanky, and you can also share that tankiness with your team. So there's really NOT a reason to not be buying at least a couple of these items, because they're just so much better than anything else right now. This is kind of an extension of Riot nerfing a bunch of health off these items, so these support-y items have roughly the same stats after all the tank item reworks.

I don't want to 'gut' this team-oriented build. If you want to build around maximizing your team's power in teamfights, to be able to pull off clutch Lockets, that's fine; that's your prerogative and that playstyle shouldn't be removed. What I want is for the selfish builds -- the old fashioned bruiser builds, or the old "big wall" tank builds -- to be better. To be on equal terms, which means that I should be MUCH tankier if I opt to make myself very durable at the expense of being able to protect my team like I could if I chose to buy Locket, or Vow, etc. I want to at least have the opportunity cost between these items be more meaningful than it is right now. Because right now, there really isn't one, and I think you guys are gonna realize this soon.

68 Comments

Sir Fuzzi9 votes

A lot of these new items satisfy a lot of build too, having mana and Eternity on Abyssal Mask is lovely.

Morgan le Fey2 votes

Yeah, that was really smart. I missed having a tank item with Eternity terribly, and the new one is much more broadly useful than RG ever was.

kasfas7 votes

Please please please.

I can't take playing this game anymore. I'm so frustrated with my inability to play the game for fun that I'm raging at my irl friends.

Doing no damage and taking a bunch of damage regardless isn't a fun play style. I can't even enjoy playing the game anymore, it's become self inflicted torture to play the champions I love in the way I like to play them.

I don't want to be a secondary support toplane, IM A FUCKING SOLO LANER LET ME DO DAMAGE.

The Ecdysiast1 votes

Unfortunately he's only advocating for a buff to tank items because it's now possible to fight juggernauts.

What we really need is more abilities that scale armor and MR.

Big Lincoln1 votes

? there has never been a point in time where this many juggernauts were strong picks

The Ecdysiast1 votes

Yes, because many top laners have been weakened by the items. However, juggernaut strength against champions that already countered them is down, which why we need the tanks themselves to scale better with the items, not give the items buffs.

kasfas2 votes

I'm talking about tanks, specifically sion.

I don't even know how to play him anymore, and it's not fun to do so.

He was my main for 2 years and I thought I had him figured out, but I actually can't play him anymore, neither to be competitive or for fun. It seems that he does no damage and even when you buy a bunch of resists you still get shred right through them.

Bob the Toastr6 votes

Will never not upvote this. We need better late game tank items.

Salson3 votes

Power to price ratio for support-tank items and solo-tank items should be the same, but solo-tank items should be more expensive (thus stronger).

Some mini-nerfs to item 3190 and item 3109 would be good. Then if you couple it with item 3068 item 3193 item 3742 buffs + price increase the imbalance should be fixed.

kasfas4 votes

No.

item 3193 needs to be removed altogether. It's a toxic item that holds all of a tanks power budget in its stupidly designed incredibly broken active, that makes it impossible for anyone to actually get to a certain level of baseline tankiness anymore, which makes it no wonder why tanks feel like ass to play.

I hate everything about this item and have come so very frustratedly to the point where I want whoever thought the implementation of the item was a good idea to be fired.

Honestly if it were just nerfed to be a 50% health boost, in fact even a 75% bonus health boost, and the damage reduction was reduced, I would be happy enough. Then we just need to buff the solo tank items and I can finally play this game for fun again.

Salson3 votes

You really hate it huh.

Well makes sense, while the idea itself isn't bad, the execution is terrible. Personally, I like the way CoC works make a lot more.

I hate everything about this item and have come so very frustratedly to the point where I want whoever thought the implementation of the item was a good idea to be fired.

If it's the same person who make S7 Jungle you have my support.

kasfas3 votes

Riots been going on about windowed power for quite a while, yet the one class they decided DIDNT need windowed power is adcs.

It's not like tanks needed more protection from burst damage, which is what stone plate is actually good at, they needed more protection from sustained damage and damage over time. Instead they decided to reduce the ability of tanks to take damage ALTOGETHER and shove all of that into ONE ITEM ACTIVE.

So yes, I hate that bullshit, idiotic item. Most importantly, i want tanks to not just be tanky, because that means they can't be played toplane. Tanks need to do damage, at least those ones in the toplane, and not rely on a crutch like sunfire or thornmail (which they can't anymore because neither do enough damage to be useful anymore).

Salson1 votes

Riots been going on about windowed power for quite a while, yet the one class they decided DIDNT need windowed power is adcs.

We will see, that Berserk rune seems to be going in that direction. Maybe Rito learned something.

On damage, well idealy they have most of it in one/two abiities. Like Sion Q, Poppy Q, Galio Q, Shen Q ... mostly Q. It lets them trade and potentially win the laning phase, though it also means they have to group by lvl 11 and second point in R.

I'm also a fan on %hp damage on tanks, it empathizes consistensy, doesn't snowball but doesn't do scratch either.

kasfas1 votes

I don't think they understand that you can't have everything be windowed. Here needs to be some kind of general baseline effectiveness to be fun and effective.

Dengeden3 votes

Mogs and Stoneplate couldn't possibly get more selfish.

LankPants1 votes

They're selfless items right now because of their interaction with Locket. (Base HP+800)x2 is a lot of extra bonus HP to add to the shield on Locket, at the max 36% scaling assuming 2200 HP from base/runes you add about 1440 to the Locket shield.

Dengeden1 votes

Firstly Bork. Secondly tank stats fall off late, which makes what these items do individually more impactful, imo.

LankPants1 votes

How does BotRK change anything? Infact the HP+Locket build is highly effective VS %HP damage since the shield from Locket doesn't increase the damage you take from %HP damage but still absorbs it.

Also tank stats fall off late game because there's an expectation that you'll have Stoneplate. If that item didn't exist then tank stats could actually be decent again.

Dengeden1 votes

Oh, fair point about Locket but...

Are you serious? Stoneplate is the most tanky of tank items.

Tank stats fall off period. Or become less efficient, if you prefer that use of words. Unless it's season 2 and there's no Vayne.

Kariu Rena2 votes

Support itemization isnt a problem just nerf adcs then support itemization will balanced xd -every bronze and silvers on gameplay board

Big Lincoln10 votes

no reason to be a rude boy in this thread

this is a place of love

Critmaster Garen17 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kariu Rena,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2017-07-20T20:43:04.754+0000)

Support itemization isnt a problem just nerf adcs then support itemization will balanced xd -every bronze and silvers on gameplay board

adc specifically became a problem because of strong support itemization.

the other classes didnt nearly benefit as much from the extra durability. so yea, it showcases an issue with adc.

generally we want less fast and bursty fights that are resolved in a matter of 5 to 10 seconds. so overall increased tankyness in the game is desirable. strong support items should provide this benefit to everyone on a team equally.

but we also dont want invincible marksmen getting shielded from everyone on their team and being able to facetank assassins, divers and mage burst with their own anti burst items and lifesteal and kill everyone as a result of their sustained dps + crit burst outperforming every other type of carry.

i still stand by my opinion that support items arent the issue. the issue is, that riot has been giving out ad/defensive items to adc like candy and theyre able to stack them on top of their support protection.

item 3026 item 3046 item 3812 item 3072 item 3139

Big Lincoln2 votes

making fights last longer could easily be resolved by making people generally tankier or reducing damage for most of the roster

maybe it's just me but i don't feel like resolving the issue by making really big shields commonplace is a good solution

Critmaster Garen8 votes

[{quoted}](name=Big Lincoln,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=000100010000,timestamp=2017-07-20T21:11:56.132+0000)

making fights last longer could easily be resolved by making people generally tankier or reducing damage for most of the roster

maybe it's just me but i don't feel like resolving the issue by making really big shields commonplace is a good solution

my guess is riot went specifically with this method, because shield active still have a gameplay component to it compared to upfront higher defensive stats on items.

instead of everyone being able to take a tibbers to the face more easily, they probably rather wanted to give supports an active to get their team a window of tankyness, that has the option of failing when mistimed.

which at the same time allowed them to make the windowed effect really fucking powerful. item 3190 item 3107 item 3193

im not sure if its the better solution. but im pretty sure, if supports keep their strong team oriented defensive items, marksmen should lose their damage mitigation mechanics from their own offensive items to make up for it.

remove bloodthirsters shield mechanic remove lifesteal from mercurial remove the damage reduction from pd revert g.a. to pre tank update nerf deaths dance damage delay to like 20%

the problem is, marksmen got the opposite treatment of everyone else.

they reduced everyones ability to build more tanky in general and redistributed this power into support itemization and gargoyle stoneplate to create windows of tankyness.

but at the same time they made marksmen generally more tanky upfront through their itemization. this is the part i dont understand. why was this neccessary?

Rexxiee3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=0001000100000000,timestamp=2017-07-20T21:17:57.872+0000)

my guess is riot went specifically with this method, because shield active still have a gameplay component to it compared to upfront higher defensive stats on items.

instead of everyone being able to take a tibbers to the face more easily, they probably rather wanted to give supports an active to get their team a window of tankyness, that has the option of failing when mistimed.

which at the same time allowed them to make the windowed effect really fucking powerful. item 3190 item 3107 item 3193

im not sure if its the better solution. but im pretty sure, if supports keep their strong team oriented defensive items, marksmen should lose their damage mitigation mechanics from their own offensive items to make up for it.

remove bloodthirsters shield mechanic remove lifesteal from mercurial remove the damage reduction from pd revert g.a. to pre tank update nerf deaths dance damage delay to like 20%

the problem is, marksmen got the opposite treatment of everyone else.

they reduced everyones ability to build more tanky in general and redistributed this power into support itemization and gargoyle stoneplate to create windows of tankyness.

but at the same time they made marksmen generally more tanky upfront through their itemization. this is the part i dont understand. why was this neccessary?

Yep lets make it so adcs are 100% reliant on those stupid op support items intead of nerfing the actual broken supp items.

Jesus some ppl here are way too biased to be taken seriously, you just want adcs to be shit so you can play bruisers bot and abuse the broken items.

Critmaster Garen15 votes

{quoted}

Yep lets make it so adcs are 100% reliant on those stupid op support items intead of nerfing the actual broken supp items.

Jesus some ppl here are way too biased to be taken seriously, you just want adcs to be shit so you can play bruisers bot and abuse the broken items.

oh dear. a class thats supposed to be susceptible to burst and squishy loses their defensive mechanics on their batshit crazy offensive items. how terrible.

lets instead nerf the class thats designed around empowering other champions and make them feel worse to play, when theyre already not very popular.

at least gameplay wise, supports are doing what theyre supposed to. cant say the same for adc when they they can survive way too much shit from their own items alone.

Kariu Rena2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=000100010000000000010001,timestamp=2017-07-20T21:58:52.785+0000)

oh dear. a class thats supposed to be susceptible to burst and squishy loses their defensive mechanics on their batshit crazy offensive items. how terrible.

lets instead nerf the class thats designed around empowering other champions and make them feel worse to play, when theyre already not very popular.

at least gameplay wise, supports are doing what theyre supposed to. cant say the same for adc when they they can survive way too much shit from their own items alone.

Holy shit youre actually so delusional and have 0 idea about game balancing. Im glad the balancing team havent reached this level yet

Morgan le Fey5 votes

I'm curious - why do you think that? I'm afraid I haven't quite seen any points you might've made yet. I've only seen you talk about how wrong other people are. Why are they wrong? What do you think is right? What is your opinion, aside from "you're wrong"?

Kariu Rena1 votes

lets nerf another classe itemization because one class itemization is broken and make them totally dependent on their teammates

Do you seriously not see how ridiculous this logic is? Do i actually need to explain how dumb this is?

Morgan le Fey6 votes

The argument they're making is that it isn't support itemization that is broken, but ADC itemization. ADC itemization's strengths just weren't evident until support itemization was in a better position, because ADCs didn't have the support they should.

In other words, support items were underpowered, but now are not. ADCs are overpowered, but since they didn't have the support they needed, it wasn't evident.

In even fewer words, the meta is changing, and ADCs are too durable in the new meta.

(I'd also argue that ADC damage is too low for the new meta, but that's not what they're arguing - that's just me.)

Kariu Rena1 votes

WOW I DIDNT KNOW locket, stoneplate, knights vow, redemption is op because of adc itemization instead of support/tank itemization being overtuned. NICE LUL

From that flawless logic mage itemization should have all their cdr and arm and mr taken away because locket and redemption can save them too

Morgan le Fey5 votes

They are arguing that none of those items are op. You're one of only a couple of people saying that they are.

Kariu Rena1 votes

Which is why theyre wrong because those items are extremely overtuned. Literally top 10 winrate junglers are tanks already build these items how long is it going to take bronze and silvers to catch up to this? 2 months like the lulu status?

Morgan le Fey3 votes

But I'm looking for an argument as to why they're overtuned, not a "they're wrong" or "just bronze and silver". So: why do you think that support items, specifically, are overtuned?

Morgan le Fey2 votes

{quoted}

Yep lets make it so adcs are 100% reliant on those stupid op support items

ADCs being reliant on supports is the idea. The whole point of the role is a hyper-scaling setup where you need help just to survive early-game but become an extreme-damage monster by late-game. That fantasy isn't there atm, because 1) ADCs have too much durability to rely on other people and 2) ADCs have too much durability to get up to those levels of extreme damage without being utterly broken. ADC durability needs a nerf, and ADC damage needs a buff, but neither of those things can happen without the other unless you want them to be totally broken or dumpstered (the latter of which I don't think anyone outside of a few salty skirmisher mains actually wants).

Critmaster Garen4 votes

{quoted}

ADCs being reliant on supports is the idea. The whole point of the role is a hyper-scaling setup where you need help just to survive early-game but become an extreme-damage monster by late-game. That fantasy isn't there atm, because 1) ADCs have too much durability to rely on other people and 2) ADCs have too much durability to get up to those levels of extreme damage without being utterly broken. ADC durability needs a nerf, and ADC damage needs a buff, but neither of those things can happen without the other unless you want them to be totally broken or dumpstered (the latter of which I don't think anyone outside of a few salty skirmisher mains actually wants).

i dont agree with that 100% either tbh.

marksmen already deal enough damage mid and lategame. and while they are supposed to scale into lategame carries, their purpose isnt to generally outscale other carries in dps.

marksmen dont trade squishiness for more damage than everyone else. they trade squishiness for reliability.

the difference between marksmen and other lategame scaling carries like Darius Nasus is, that they can go intoa fight and upfront start dealing damage, while these melee carries have the disadvantage that theyre much easier to completely wall out of a fight and entirely deny them their ability to deal damage. marksmen have more freedom of positioning due to their auto atatck range, which makes it incredibly harder in comparison to completely zone them out of a fight and deny them their ability to carry.

the difference between marksmen and ap carries like Azir Ryze Cassiopeia is that these champions are skillshot reliant and have to constantly keep hitting their abilities in a fight to maximize their dps. while marksmen can dps reliably thanks to relying on direct targeted attacks. its impossible to miss an auto attack on Caitlyn while you can outplay Cassiopeia by dodging her q, which denies her most of the damage on her e spam.

there are only a few exceptions in the marksmen group like Draven Ezreal who have similar unreliability in their ability to carry. ezreal has to consistently keep hitting his q in a fight in addition to his auto attacks to maximize his dps. draven has to keep catching axes.

however practically all other marksmen at the end of the day only have to keep auto attacking to dps.

Morgan le Fey1 votes

I agree... partly. I do think a handful of marksmen really should have top DPS (definitely not burst, though) late-game. Kog'Maw's really the main one, there. Otherwise, your assessment is more accurate than mine, yes.

Sire Hippington1 votes

the problem is, marksmen got the opposite treatment of everyone else.

they reduced everyones ability to build more tanky in general and redistributed this power into support itemization and gargoyle stoneplate to create windows of tankyness.

but at the same time they made marksmen generally more tanky upfront through their itemization. this is the part i dont understand. why was this neccessary?

Immo the bigger issue here is that tankiness gets hard windowed, but damage isn't. Even casters barely have windows with the oberabundance of CDR, while marksmen always reached a state of sustained burst later on. Why is it that one is only allowed to be tanky for aorund 4sec when your oponnents never stop with their absurd dps? In case of marksmen, there isn't even a way to aovid that dps, you get in range, you eat damage, that's all.

Kariu Rena3 votes

adc specifically became a problem because of strong support itemization.

the other classes didnt nearly benefit as much from the extra durability. so yea, it showcases an issue with adc.

??????????????? Isnt the obvious solution is to nerf the op support items? You act like Locket only works on adc instead of the entire team LUL

Critmaster Garen4 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kariu Rena,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=000100010001,timestamp=2017-07-20T22:29:43.833+0000)

??????????????? Isnt the obvious solution is to nerf the op support items? You act like Locket only works on adc instead of the entire team LUL

because its not a problem on the entire team. its only a problem on one specific guy.

the item itself might still be overtuned, but i already explained. they made everyones defensive builds less effective to redistribute that power into support actives and gargoyle stoneplate.

everyones, except marksmen who for no reason are the only ones who got additional upfront defense on their items.

like what?

how about just reverting all these defensive mechanics on marksmen damage items instead to make the type of champion who is supposed to be squishy actually less tanky on his own?

Sire Hippington2 votes

To be hinest, support items are still to fault at some extend. A squishy getting 1k shield from locket(yes, that's not an unrealisic number come to lategame) increases his effective hp by 50%, a tanky champ gets only 20-33% increase. Why not base such effcts atleast partially on the targets max hp? This would allow supporting non marksmen more effectively without granting marksmen absurd survivabillity.

Critmaster Garen2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Sire Hippington,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEwilncz,comment-id=000100010003,timestamp=2017-07-21T15:36:06.678+0000)

To be hinest, support items are still to fault at some extend. A squishy getting 1k shield from locket(yes, that's not an unrealisic number come to lategame) increases his effective hp by 50%, a tanky champ gets only 20-33% increase. Why not base such effcts atleast partially on the targets max hp? This would allow supporting non marksmen more effectively without granting marksmen absurd survivabillity.

this is an idea i actually like.

make the % number itself based on the wearers health, but the shield value based on the targets health.

if that sounded confusing, then i mean something like per bonus 100 health, locket increases its shield by 1% of the allies max health.

so a Leona with 2k bonus health and locket would shield all allies by 20% of their max health on the locket active.

but a squishy without bonus health at all and locket would shield allies by 0% of their max health.

plus the current 38 + 22/lvl base value

ProfDrDeath1 votes

Is Warmog's really a team-oriented tank item? I'd think not, unless you build it with Locket...

Other than that, Locket warrants a nerf, plain and simple (item too stronk). Meanwhile, Knight's Vow is purchased, imo, because it offers tanks something they did not have access to previously - in-combat sustain. Bruisers could buy Lifesteal/Spellvamp for that purpose (and still can), but Vow's sustain effect doesn't require you (as a tank) to give up a whole item's tankiness for it.

Thinking about it, if you want stronger selfish items, they cannot be utterly self-sufficient (as a single item), or offensive champions will pick them up as their only defense item.

EDIT:

In the end, I agree with you that League could use one or a pair of lategame tank items, in a price range of 3.2 - 3.3k gold. The issue is, how to prevent these items from being too strong too early, or being too strong when not in the context of a tank build?

Kloqdq1 votes

I mean they only need minor buffs to their actual stat line. Since more tanks are gaining some form of scaling defensive power, that small buff would add them in general while also buffing their scaling stat.

I also would like to see riot play with the idea of scaling items but that would be hard to do I'd imagine.

LankPants2 votes

Knight's Vow is purchased, imo, because it offers tanks something they did not have access to previously - in-combat sustain.

Right now it's purchased because it's 600 gold cheaper than DMP with a better statline and active.

DMP: 60 Armour, 425 HP Knight's Vow: 60 Armour, 400 HP, 10% CDR.

In the end, I agree with you that League could use one or a pair of lategame tank items, in a price range of 3.2 - 3.3k gold. The issue is, how to prevent these items from being too strong too early, or being too strong when not in the context of a tank build?

Make them like Deathcap. Items that scale up with your other items. Just throwing an idea out there

item 3024 + item 1031 + item 1011 + 700 (3400) 400 HP 300 Mana 65 Armour 10% CDR

Unique passive: Gain a shield equal to 40% of your bonus HP, refreshes with HP regen when HP is full (including spawnpool regen)

This is an item that every tank would want in the late game, but that's only really useful once you have other items. Get it too early and you don't have the HP to make the shield useful, so the items own stat inefficiency (the stats are only worth 3051 gold, 420 of which is the mana) would become a problem.

It also has some special synergy with other cheaper items you'd likely want first, for example Warmogs gives it the second highest boost to shield out of any item at 320 and allows the shield to recharge decently off of the spawn pool and Cinder can potentially give more shielding than any other item. It obviously also synergises very well with any HP item.

KoKoboto1 votes

Yeah the only issue I see with buffing tank items is that bruiser/assassin builds one tank item and is THAT much tankier. Aside from this I'm all for buffing tank items, it would be a step away from this 10 minute game is over meta.

Big Lincoln1 votes

i don't see any issue with getting rid of glass cannons

KoKoboto1 votes

Some people like playing glass cannons so that's kinda an issue. Seeing people build doran shield and ninja tabis so often was also pretty bleh. Seeing squishies build tanky and still do alright is pretty bleh.

Big Lincoln3 votes

glass cannons are really hard to balance though. i think small measures of defense are healthiest for everyone

you could have the choice to go that but i don't think it should ever really be a champ's main or only build

KoKoboto1 votes

I guess we kinda have stuff like that anyways. Zhonyas, Banshee's, Edge of Night, Maw so it would be alright overall.

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