Can we talk about Skarner?

Píllow·Oct 11, 2016·12 votes·1,081 views

Now that reworked Skarner has been a thing for a while and most frustrations about him have probably been vented already, I want to hear the rest of the community's input on him, and would even like a rioter response on the matter.

I used to play Skarner a lot back when I started in Season 2, and played him fairly actively as one of my main junglers until the first rework. When I first heard about Skarner being reworked, I was rather shocked to say the least. I had almost never heard anyone say Skarner was unfun to go against, and the few times I did, it was from a raging enemy laner during a match. Outside of that? Never. Regardless of my surprise, I stayed open-minded and figured "I'm sure he'll still be fun afterwards. Maybe even more fun!"

But boy, was I wrong. Even after one rework, and another subsequent rework later on, Skarner is still just clunky and completely unsatisfying to play. What was once a simple kit is now just a mess. Skarner had a clear weakness and strength - at close range, he was a menace, but he had to work for that. For anyone paying attention, they could most likely avoid Skarner with wards, and all the mobility skills everyone has nowadays. If Skarner wanted a 'cheap kill', he'd have to burn Flash for it during a gank to close the gap and ult.

But now, if I get close to anyone as Skarner, I still have my ult but no means to actually stick to them once the ult wears off, save for a shitty 1-second stun. Oh, and it's now tied to his E which is STILL feels incredibly clunky. Why was a hugging-range permaslow "toxic" on a champion with no means to close the gap outside of Flash, but it's alright on let's see... Frozen Mallet, Olaf, Ashe, Gnar, Mundo, Rylais, Nasus and probably some others I'm forgetting. Why is it okay for THOSE to have a permaslow, all of them having a ranged permaslow, but it was oh-so-toxic for Skarner to have it on a melee-range ability? I really don't like this about you, Riot folks. Your reasoning for removing/reworking things is always so inconsistent and there's signs of favoritism everywhere. I was honestly expecting Ashe, a ranged ADC, to lose her permaslow with her rework because, hey, it was toxic on a melee champ so it's probably even more annoying on a ranged champ in Riot's eyes! Oh, wait, she got to keep it? What the fuck?

His passive went from a simple CD-reduction on each basic attack to a stupid minigame which is no use to me outside of taking my buffs and contesting drake and baron. I didn't pick Skarner to jungle so I could play goddamn Dominion on Summoner's Rift. What if I want to lane? Oh, no, wait - you gutted his laning, that's right. Let's remove sustain from his E, that was always an issue with him, right? Having sustain on a simple skillshot, oh, the horror. Surely there are no other forms of sustain on champions even today that are way more annoying and don't require them to use a hefty amount of mana each time they want to use said sustain. No sir.

His W is just a shittier version of what it once was. Not much else to add here. It was just made worse for no reason whatsoever. The only thing he could use to get to someone slightly faster was nerfed. Good job, Riot. Real good job there.

All in all, I am absolutely flabbergasted to this day about Skarner's rework. What was once a fun champion to play with clear strengths and weaknesses is now someone who feels unsatisfying, unfun and clunky to play, with shining examples of awful design choices all over his kit and possibly the stupidest minigame passive in the entire game. "Oh, buy you can buy Iceborn Gauntlet/Frozen Mallet to stick to enemies!". Oh, so now we're removing features from champions and making them buy certain items to get them back? Boy, I have a whole fucking lot of suggestions for you if you want to do that.

@Any Rioter, the following question has no malicious intent behind it, just sheer curiosity: Do you actually consider Skarner's rework to be successful? To me, it seems like he's just worse off than he was before any reworking was done, and even less people play him now. Don't quote me on the last part, as I haven't checked any statistics, but I haven't seen Skarner in forever since the first two weeks or so after his latest rework, whereas I used to see him occasionally every now and then back before you even considered reworking him.

22 Comments

Ravenous HowlsOct 11, 20163 votes

Riot really went overboard with the whole "mini game" theme. Gang Plank's Barrels, Fiora's weak spot farming, Shen's Spirit Blade (though I think they succeeded largely with the rest of Shen's kit personally). But the Spires for Skarner are worse than all those b/c it forces Skarner into the jungle only and gives him an arbitrary source of power that hew can not control on his own. That and most people are not stupid enough to engage Skarner in those zones because they know he's strong within the radius so they will force fights away from his source of power.

By an large the biggest failure is placing a champions strength on the map as contestable objectives and not within the champion. It was a really poor and not well thought out design choice.

TricolorStarOct 11, 20162 votes

Bring back Crystallizing Sting 2k17

PredatoratorOct 11, 20162 votes

I agree with most of what you wrote here. I think Riot found a problem when the tanky, dps Skarner got also a permaslow, which can offer not a bad amount of utility. This was also their argument for the "Skarner vs Ashe" permaslow topic (as in, ashe is squishy). I'm not defending that, just giving context. I also noticed almost none complained about Skarner's permaslow. I think right now Skarner 1 would be more fair, especially because of how mobility and CCs got inflated till now. Some things that i'd like to have back are sustain, and build flexibility overall. Skarner ap was so viable during those times!

I don't have much to complain about Riot's intent of increasing skarner's difficulty: skarner never was a mechanically-intense champion, and maining him since late s3, i can tell that the most of skarner's mastery is about map, matchup, and itmes knowledge. Adding some depht to his kit sounded good, wht's bad is the way they did it.

His W actually got good: the ramping speed is something easy to get used to, but the %max hp scaling was a very welcomed buff I actually like the new E tho, feels rewarding to chain E and R and then another E, but that's it, there's nothing else that good in his actual rework.

Here's my stance on Skarner, and what can possibly de done to improve him, while waitng for the full VGU, if You wat to share Your opinion, you're more than welcome =) : http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/EUpnP2Gs-my-stance-on-skarner-and-what-can-be-possibily-be-done-to-make-him-feel-better

Big LincolnOct 12, 20162 votes

skarner was never interesting

I think riot is doing him a disservice by giving up on him as a juggernaut; he certainly looks like someone who should be a damage threat

RequiemsfireOct 12, 20162 votes

When I first picked up Skarner, I thought he was really strong and the niche he filled as a jungler was very effective. Now I wasn't proven wrong but what I realise is that his kit is so binary in that it functions and his abilities feel so un-impactful that you kinda feel bored playing him when your ult isn't up.

No, he's not weak but he doesn't feel exciting or fun to play. Sure, you might use him to climb because he's a very strong pick in burst compositions but when your ult isn't up, you're not really going to make plays.

PredatoratorOct 16, 20161 votes

I have to disagree with one point: the E can be so usefull if you pull it right tho.

RequiemsfireOct 16, 20161 votes

I wasn't saying his E wasn't good, or wasn't useful, rather I was just stating that at least to me it doesn't feel as impactful as it should.

PredatoratorOct 16, 20162 votes

Got it, no problem =). What do you mean by "as impactful as it should"? How shold his E be to feel impactful to you?

Because to me it's alright: given it's not even an ultimate, it's pretty powerful, if not overloaded, but not as braindead to make it work right. If you aim well you can turn around a fight, locking down carries, for example =)

EmojayOct 11, 20161 votes

O-O u wrote this? How long did it take?

PíllowOct 11, 20162 votes

{quoted}

O-O u wrote this? How long did it take?

Dunno. 5-10 minutes, maybe. Paid less attention to time and a whole lot more to the thing I'm passionately typing about.

EmojayOct 11, 20161 votes

Wow. You are a lot better at this stuff than me. I usually just quote Dunkey or something.

PíllowOct 11, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Wow. You are a lot better at this stuff than me. I usually just quote Dunkey or something.

Were it any other champ, my post would've been a lot smaller. Skarner was my first love in League, though, and I just want to see him good and fun to play again :c

LordGeovanniOct 11, 20161 votes

Skarner 1 and 2 were great this one not so much

PredatoratorOct 11, 20163 votes

Skarner 2 was his worse iteration: he still needed to stick to a target in order to deal any damag, but he had no cc apart of his E and R. That meant that iceborn was mandatory in order to make him funcion. plus his E lost the sustain, so bye skarner top. Skarner 3 was the best, with his passive to allow him to stick to his opponents, without the "so hated permaslow". it als made him escalate as the fight/chase endured. That was fun to me.

LordGeovanniOct 12, 20161 votes

I played the most skarner top with his second version he was a lane bully and he was a hybrid god. he had mana problems build at a hybrid fighter but i built item 3070 first item when i had mana regen and my second item and first finished item was item 3124 giving me lots of dueling potiential and sustain builds looked like item 3040 item 3042 item 3047 item 3065 item 3075 / item 3143 (when it wasnt shit) Eleisa's miracle item 3072 / (when it wasnt shit) Eleisa's miracle

PredatoratorOct 12, 20161 votes

By second version you mean his first rework, the one happened with the Xerath rework? Yeah, i agree that by that time he still got the ability to be built hybrid and still wreck faces. Also his damage was high. The biggest flaw of that first rework, which led to another rework, was the absence of a way to stick and apply said damage tho.

However i've only started to play skarner top only during his second rework, so your experience got me kind of curious. However eleisa's miracle was removed by the time skarner got reworked the first time, so i don't know how you built it. You might have built it before Skarner got reworked =)

Seems overall an expensive build, or was it always accessible? also, what do you think about building a sheen item? it got great synergy with Skarner

LordGeovanniOct 16, 20162 votes

I found this one to be better i never had a problem sticking because no one ever ran from me before i got fed at the time rage blade was cheaper and had a diffrent effect . and no one ever ran from me because i duels we would trade even or i would even lose even with my sheild be no one accounted for the extra stats and lifesteal rage blade used to give at 50% hp so we would fight even until 30% where i would take over and by time they realize that they cant beat me they already blew all of their spells and cant escape. used to do the same thing with jax but they reworked rage blade because it wasnt popular. sheen definately gave sizable damage but it was in chunks so it seems like its doing more but it couldnt compete with the constant damage and the constant damage also didnt scare away potiental kills

PredatoratorOct 16, 20161 votes

Got it, thank you =). From the jungle's perspective, the first rework was a fail because the only way skarner could contribute in a gank was his E. If you didn't have an iceborn at the time, there was no way you could encourage a fight on your own: if the opponent wanted to leave, he left. That didn't happened always, as i eventually got more and more experienced. But still if you ask me, i wouldn't want Skarner to be reverted to his first rework, ever.

LordGeovanniOct 18, 20161 votes

skarner in his first rework still had lots of damage (which more than made up to to loss of cc) and his stun was still there. people talk about cc but treat raw damage the thing that actaully kills as if its nothing when its actually the main thing in every formula they also ignore speed boosts as if that doesnt contribute to mobility

WoonStruckOct 16, 20161 votes

Sometimes sheen items are out of the way and you're better off going Black Cleaver.

Depends on what you're fighting. Build him pretty much the same as you build Olaf, but sometimes with Trinity Force or IBG in there as your damage item.

If you're against a lot of beefy champs, Black Cleaver can often serve you better than Trinity Force, and your ADC will always appreciate it.

PredatoratorOct 16, 20161 votes

I'm so attached to sheen as skarner, i almost always build it as 3rd item, after smite and mercs. Yeah, IBG+BC is my go to when building tanky, because you hit a good compromise between damage, tankyiness, utility. However sometimes i build Righteus glory instead of bc, if i need to get tankier and/or need to deal with hard-to-catch-carries Sterak is nice too, it synergizes with the sheen procs,Q scaling, and makes you burst-resistant, but i just can't define myself a guideline for when to buy it instead of the above mentioned items x)

LordGeovanniOct 12, 20161 votes

Idk how riot thinks but i believe that riot thinks because melee champions without a dash only have to press on their target once and they will walk to them (eventually ) so they keep their kits low damage and low utility. But they give champions with dashes and mobility, high damage and lower cooldowns same with ranged champions. because they are supposedly squishy but never seem to consider their superior damage build paths the saftey in their range that allows them to be aggressive for free or their mobility that allows them to be aggressive and get out before you can deal them damage back. Ranged carries are supposedly rewarded with more damage for kiteing when the amount of damage they have allows them to not need to kite. not to mention they also get sustain but ultimately dont need it because they are at the absolute back of their team getting blocked for by their other members. Same way RoA gets a passive to give and mana for fights on top of the stacking stats passive but rightious glory cant have the passive that comes from the same item they are built out of the same item and Tanks need items to help them survive in battle and keep their mana topped off far more urgently than a mage. Adcs dont even have long cooldown spells but get item 3508 reworked into an item only for them for lower cooldowns on their already low cooldown spells and bruiser class champions were useing the previous versions far more than marksmen were who barely touched the thing Cooldowns low, dont take damage in the first place, longer range than you, faster than you if you melee and cant build their damage items that have free movement speed, never run out of mana, high mobility on most of them, medium to strong cc Sustain on the off chance they do take damage their damage items out scale any possible defensive items you get their items have synergistic passives while defensive items or bruiser items dont (black cleaver being 1 exception Steraks being another but no where near as much as mage or adc items. Every nearly every mage is a battle mage by time they get 40% cdr by time they throw their second spell out their main one is up. especially 'poke' mages there is only enough down time on high damge spells to move back a bit before they can an do throw it again