Lets Talk Annie Compensation

TLDR: Annie buffs

Tibbers moves faster or Tibbers is effected by buffs or Tibbers has unique buffs based on annie spell useage or Tibbers is tanker or Tibbers auto attacks are now single target spells or Tibbers is re-purposed as a bodyguard or Molten shield gives ms buff when hit or Molten shield on allies or Molten shield defensive buffs . .

With the recent reveal of the removal of DFG in the next patch many champions are losing a large portion of their damage as 20% damage increase is a multiplicative increase and Riot has stated that they are removing it because they want to move away from 100-0 insta-burst play styles. Because of the removal of an item that anyone can buy they can now buff individual champions that energized with the DFG in ways that the they couldn't before. So as such just giving damage buffs to all of these champions would not be in line with their reasoning for removing DFG in the first place and would just be counter productive. . . While many of the champions that bought DFG could use compensation buffs, I am here to talk specifically about ways we could compensate Annie as she is one of the only DFG users that I play. Besides being an Annie player I was also drawn to making a through topic on compensation Annie buffs due to Rioter Jea's statment that they are looking for ways to make her not so dependent on "drop Tibbers, cast spells, enemy explodes" pattern play style. . . While a lot of these suggestions may not be enough on their own and could synergize with each other, each suggestion is present independently of the other suggestions also note that I am leaving out direct base damage and ap ratio buffs. . . First off Tibbers buffs because Riot said they were looking into ways to make tibbers dealing damage more interesting. . .

1. More move speed for tibbers. Right now tibbers can keep up and deal damage to immobile champions only and only before they buy boots as he only has 350 ms. A movement speed buff would allow tibbers to deal more damage over time causing him to be more of a threat on the field without raising Annies total insta-burst damage.

              1. Flat ms buff to tibbers: This is the most strait forward and my least favorite solution. This would cause tibbers to be much more of a threat early when he can already keep up with immobile mages, maybe even oppressively if especially if you caught someone away from their turret.
   
               2. Tibbers ms is effected by Annie's boots: This would allow tibbers to more reliably deal dot damage throughout the game as apposed to 1. where all the benefit is gained early game. This opens up an extra option for Annie to build early enchanted boots to deal more reliable damage. He could even be effected by enchantment is bought. The bonus doesn't have to be the same as the boots Annie has, it could be more or. less.
   
   
                  3. Tibbers gains a portion or even all of Annie's bonus moment speed: This is very similar to 2. but opens even more options as team members can now buff tibbers ms by buffing annie's ms. Much better chasing after an initiation for teams with team wide ms boosts. 
   

2. Literally buffs for tibbers. Allow all buffs that Annie has also effect tibbers. Imagine Annie with sunfire cape (40 aura damage is equivalent to 200 ap at 20% ratio) with Mordekaiser's shield and molten shield and maybe a thornmail walking toward your adc. This could make tibbers more of a temporary front line ally for the team rather then just a meat shield as he is already a damage threat with just his aura but now Annie's team mates can draw attention away from them by making tibbers an even bigger threat.

3.  The most important buff though would be allowing tibbers to benefit from Annie's molten shield giving more tankyness and making him more of a threat to the class that usually just 3 shots him from outside of his threat range while healing, adcs. Adcs would now have to kite around him while attacking your team, well for 5s at least, as Annie's molten shield does a lot of damage late game. It would also force Annie to think more about when to use her molten shield, surprise 3 stack stun or use it after for the effect on tibbers?
   

4. General tankyness buffs for tibbers. Tibbers does a lot of damage if he gets the chance to just sit on the enemies, but he is easy to kite/run from and when he does get focused he gets blown up. Now that Annie nolonger has maybe tibbers can be allowed to sit on the enemy longer before he is blown up and be allowed to soak more of the enemy teams resources. With this suggestion they still have the ability to easily run away or kite him and his threat range is still small.

5. Unique buffs for tibbers based on Annie's last used spell. This is a much more unique way to allow more thought on Annie's part while allowing tibbers to deal more damage. This also adds more interaction after Annie throws tibbers onto the field has has to back off and play from the back. Q: If q was last used Tibbers auto attacks deal significantly more damage and/or have more range. This is for when you are fighting a single target that can't get away. W: If w was last used Tibbers aura has a significantly larger range and maybe some more damage. This is for clumped team fights. E: Tibbers gains the effects of molten shield for its duration or until another spell is used. Similar reasoning as before as to why this is good. . . Alternatively the buff could be permanent for that summon based on the spell used directly after, or just before, tibbers is summoned for less active interaction but more rigorous decision making.
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6. Make tibbers auto attacks proc as a single target spell: this is mostly for Rylia's Crystal Scepter but would also effect spell vamp. Tibbers has the issue of trying to keep up with enemies to deal his damge from early-mid game onward even with a Rylai's the enemies can easily get away and tibbers trying to auto attack a target usually get him farther behind but a 35% slow would allow him and annie to keep up with at most 1 target. It's also important to note that this would only apply after she got a Rylai's which right now is regarded as an luxury 3rd or 4th item but with this it may be a good option to get one early against more mobile champs. This one is just a small tweak but I think it could be an important one. . .

7. Team meat shield to personal bodyguard: Right now tibbers is mostly used as a meat shield and front line damage with his aura as he gets kited easily by the back line but on a thematic level it seems like he would be more of Annie's protector and bodyguard so maybe he should take that on in game. . . Tibbers has quite a large leash range right now but to make him a bodyguard shorten it a lot and give him the mobility to stick by Annie. From their he can be giving abilities that defend Annie. Maybe give him the ability to block projectiles like Yas's wind wall or Braum's wall. Of course tibbers would have to take additional damage by doing so as to not be a 45s mobile Braum wall or shorten his summon time or make the projectile blocking somehow only work for Annie as not to abuse it. Maybe allow all skillshots to be blocked by him but only allow targeted projectiles to be blocked if the target was Annie (includes auto attacks). For example most of a syndra ult or Miss Fortune ult should be enough to KO tibbers, tibbers is quite small and slow so it should be rewarding to position him and yourself correctly. . . Other bodyguard like abilities could be applied but I can't think of any right now. . . Also, as a personal bodyguard he still needs to deal damage so maybe the damage can be increased now that Annie has to be in danger to use it and/or give him ranged auto attacks to help out. . . Now moving away from focusing on tibbers, Annie has a skill that while quite good has very little thought and meaningful decision making to it, her E Molten Shield. It gives quite a lot of resistances when maxes, 60 armor and mr, for a decent amount of time, 5s, does decent damage late game, ~200 damage at 750 ap, but is not often useful against players as she can't take hits well meaning adc still shred her so it is mostly used to charge her passive and clear waves when safe. The decision making behind it is normally follows as such: Should I use molten shield? In lane: only for surprise stuns and reducing damage, otherwise q stacks the passive faster. For roaming: stun not up? yes. Stun up? doesn't really mater. . . Now with her burst reduced and Riot not wanted to just buff her burst damage this would be the spell to add utility and survivability, without DFG she may now need to be able to kite bruisers better. . .

8. MS boost when hit: We don't want to giver her better engage or chase for just using it and with such a low mana cost and high up time so a strait MS buff is a no go. So giving a MS buff when she an enemy champion hits her and procs the shields damage will give her better in combat kiting to wait for cds and control tibbers without making her super mobile. It also makes it so that it's the enemies decision whether or not she gets the MS boost. The MS boost would work well together with Rylai's against melee champions that she normally can't 1 shot without DFG and as such need some safety. It would also work well against those adcs that ignore her shield damage through lifesteal and because they 3 shot her, she would now be able to kite and run from them. . . This change would not effect her effectiveness much against mages and assassins as they don't use AAs much and don't really give you a chance to run in the first place. . .

9. Allow the molten shield to be used on allies. This could be very OP but it could work with some adjustments. Her molten shield damage is actually quite good, the only reason it's not is because she is not meant and can't take hits so allowing it to be used on team mates would give her a lot of utility and possible extra damage. Throw it on a tank that wants to dive an ADC especially one that has thornmail and watch the adc panic. Throw it on your ADC and now the enemy ADC is at a damage disadvantage in a duel against yours or even just to protect them from a assassin with the mr/armor. This opens up a lot more meaningful decision making on her part. . . 60 armor and mr is a lot though so maybe it needs to be reduced when used on an ally or maybe the duration shortened or the cd lengthened when used on an ally. Also, the cast range on it should be really short, about the same range or shorter then her q and w, so she has to watch per positioning even more in team fights. So you could throw it on your initiator with thornmail at the start of a team fight but then the cast range should be short enough that it would be quite dangerous to walk forward to reapply it but it would be rewarding to get it on that tank as the damage late game is good and the utility of a Rylai's, but then again maybe you should use it on yourself or other carry to protect them from diving assassins. . . AD heavy team comps are popular right now and tanks are not and this would be a good strategy against such teams (imagine 500 armor Ramus with thornmail and molten shield charging your carry). I am not saying that this would make all tanks 100% viable right now but it would add some team comp strategy against the right click kings. . .

10. Straight forward selfish defensive buffs to her shield. Longer duration or more armor/mr, 60 is already a lot but she might need more survivability now that she will no longer have DFG + 1 spell rotation send anyone that survives running. Boring option but it's not a damage buff. . . In addition to hearing what everyone thinks about my own suggestions I encourage everyone to share their own Annie suggestions (would really be awesome for a RED to take note of these as well). . . TLDR: Annie buffs

Tibbers moves faster or Tibbers is effected by buffs or Tibbers has unique buffs based on annie spell useage or Tibbers is tanker or Tibbers auto attacks are now single target spells or Tibbers is re-purposed as a bodyguard or Molten shield gives ms buff when hit or Molten shield on allies or Molten shield defensive buffs . . Disclaimer: Not all of these suggestions are 100% mine, some of them have been on the forums before. I am reposting them in my own words in an attempt to make a consolidated thread for all kinds of suggestions on Annie's kit due to the recent removal of DFG and my inability to find a current thread like this.