Let's slow down on these talks of buffing Kayle

HateDaddy·Jun 23, 2015·40 votes·3,504 views

Let's remember why she's in this state in the first place. First it was full AP Kayle nuking you with Q then cleaning up with E. That got nerfed. Then it was the more on-hit style maximizing the potential of her E and that got nerfed. There actually isn't really any gameplay to Kayle. She stands back and presses buttons on you and if you dare to attempt and dive her, she presses R on herself that makes her invulnerable from any damage, which also costs zero mana and has a stupidly low cooldown.

You need to understand something, and if you play Kayle and want her stronger, understand I'm not calling you out or attacking you, you cant just buff her. it's the same with Syndra, you can't just buff them. You're going to push them back right where they were before, extremely oppressive lane bullies with incredible late game scaling. That's never good. And while Syndra can just stand for power shifts in her kit then buffs, you need to look at Kayle from an entirely different perspective.

For starters, I'd argue Kayles identity is her ult. It's a cool and unique ability and I think I'm many ways, you can work with it and keep it in her kit while still having a heathly feel to it. Her E and Q are pretty absurd, not to mention her passive. In particular, I actually like her E because it's one of the few abilities in the game that toggles a ranged auto attack. I think building around this is a good idea. Her W is lackluster and may as well not exist, they can probably honestly just remove that for something better. I don't pretend to know what to do with her overall, she's an ancient design but these are some things to take away from what I'm saying. You can't just straight up buff her.

I don't know if she's in riots scope for a rework, there are candidates in much more need. In particular, I don't think Kayle is necessarily terrible either. Minor buffs are one thing, I wouldn't mind that but again let's keep in mind why she's here on the first place. It's uncommon for older champions to be in a state such as this, as a Nasus player I realize that if a meta ever unfolds where he becomes extremely weak, straight up buffing him is a mistake. Powershifts in kits and small reworks are often the way to go with older champions and Kayle is no exception.

Just keep that in mind, that's all I'm saying y'all.

58 Comments

AbyssphereJun 23, 201510 votes

I agree with a lot of your post but you need to be a lot more careful when you say stuff like "X champion literally can't be buffed". Like, the comparison to Syndra is ridiculously bad here. Kayle is hard to buff because there is absolutely no way to outplay what she does, it's nothing to do with her power curve because that's a very easy thing to change. Syndra's most recent nerf made it so that she is incapable of bullying the vast majority of mid laners - why on Earth would you find it impossible to buff her right now? Please don't dump fair champions into the same basket as "rework or bust" champs like Kayle.

HateDaddyJun 23, 20152 votes

{quoted}

I agree with a lot of your post but you need to be a lot more capable when you say stuff like "X champion literally can't be buffed". Like, the comparison to Syndra is ridiculously bad here. Kayle is hard to buff because there is absolutely no way to outplay what she does, it's nothing to do with her power curve because that's a very easy thing to change. Syndra's most recent nerf made it so that she is incapable of bullying the vast majority of mid laners - why on Earth would you find it impossible to buff her right now? Please don't dump fair champions into the same basket as "rework or bust" champs like Kayle.

I did a poor job on elaborating on this, let me explain

I'm only mentioning Syndra because people ask for buffs for her a lot, much the same way they do Kayle. The difference is, Syndras kit isn't inherently flawed - meaning buffing her only makes her feel like more stats and killing you by clicking on you. Syndra has plenty of gameplay involved, the issue I see with her is maybe her burst being a little too upfront when she's good. There's not much required here to address her when she's perceived as weak, small power shifts in her kit and then numerical buffs easily making buffing her a less scary prospect. The only concern you have is when she's good, she's an extremely oppressive lane bully that scales incredibly well into late game as she has one of the highest single target burst potential. That's not a good thing, you don't want a massive lane bully having an automatic ticket to late game as a great scaler. You either take away lane power or you take away late game burst. You can't grant her the best of both worlds. There's a reason why morello once referred to her laning as "bullshit" because it was.

AbyssphereJun 24, 20152 votes

{quoted}

I did a poor job on elaborating on this, let me explain

I'm only mentioning Syndra because people ask for buffs for her a lot, much the same way they do Kayle. The difference is, Syndras kit isn't inherently flawed - meaning buffing her only makes her feel like more stats and killing you by clicking on you. Syndra has plenty of gameplay involved, the issue I see with her is maybe her burst being a little too upfront when she's good. There's not much required here to address her when she's perceived as weak, small power shifts in her kit and then numerical buffs easily making buffing her a less scary prospect. The only concern you have is when she's good, she's an extremely oppressive lane bully that scales incredibly well into late game as she has one of the highest single target burst potential. That's not a good thing, you don't want a massive lane bully having an automatic ticket to late game as a great scaler. You either take away lane power or you take away late game burst. You can't grant her the best of both worlds. There's a reason why morello once referred to her laning as "bullshit" because it was.

But my point is that Syndra is not forced into being an oppressive laner with a strong late. Syndra's been an oppressive lane bully with a strong late in the past because her numbers allowed her to be that, but there are a lot of numbers you can change in her kit. Riot don't need to give her the best of both worlds in making her better - they could buff her utility, her late game damage, her mana costs... anything. There's no reason her early game has to be oppressive at all, they just need to load more power into other areas rather than giving it back to her laning.

I don't understand the idea that champions will always have the identity they used to have. Syndra has been an oppressive lane bully with a decent late in the past, yes, but that does not mean she will always be like that because there's nothing about her kit that intrinsically makes her impossible to lane against, it's only ever been strong early numbers. If you are concerned that buffing someone will lead to them having the same problems they had before then you just don't buff what those problems are. If Syndra needs buffs but you're worried she'll do too much damage early again... don't improve her early damage. Improve literally anything else in her kit and you make her better without causing trouble.

You get the same thing when people talk about Elise. "If you buff her she'll go back to blowing people up with her base damages while building full tank". Don't buff the base damages then, or even buff her while further nerfing her base damages. With a champion like Kayle where the problem is as intrinsic to her kit as all of her issues, it's difficult to think of ways to buff them without causing trouble. Essentially you need to rework a champ like that in some way. But when a champ's problem is linked to their numbers (i.e. "In the past Syndra's Q has done a bit too much damage for having such a short cooldown") it's not difficult at all to change stuff in a healthy way.

Like I said I agree with your points on Kayle but no champion should be declared "impossible to be buffed/a champ that can't be good" when their issues are entirely related to their numbers. Unless there are mechanics inherent to their kit that are unhealthy, every champion can be good. It's just a case of where you distribute the power. Unfortunately for Kayle it's difficult to find a mechanic in her kit that IS healthy (I'm curious as to how she's not up for a rework?) but with Syndra everything else is fixable by moving her numbers around.

(sorry for the ridiculously long essay, I don't know how many words spilled out of me)

HateDaddyJun 24, 20154 votes

{quoted}

But my point is that Syndra is not forced into being an oppressive laner with a strong late. Syndra's been an oppressive lane bully with a strong late in the past because her numbers allowed her to be that, but there are a lot of numbers you can change in her kit. Riot don't need to give her the best of both worlds in making her better - they could buff her utility, her late game damage, her mana costs... anything. There's no reason her early game has to be oppressive at all, they just need to load more power into other areas rather than giving it back to her laning.

I don't understand the idea that champions will always have the identity they used to have. Syndra has been an oppressive lane bully with a decent late in the past, yes, but that does not mean she will always be like that because there's nothing about her kit that intrinsically makes her impossible to lane against, it's only ever been strong early numbers. If you are concerned that buffing someone will lead to them having the same problems they had before then you just don't buff what those problems are. If Syndra needs buffs but you're worried she'll do too much damage early again... don't improve her early damage. Improve literally anything else in her kit and you make her better without causing trouble.

You get the same thing when people talk about Elise. "If you buff her she'll go back to blowing people up with her base damages while building full tank". Don't buff the base damages then, or even buff her while further nerfing her base damages. With a champion like Kayle where the problem is as intrinsic to her kit as all of her issues, it's difficult to think of ways to buff them without causing trouble. Essentially you need to rework a champ like that in some way. But when a champ's problem is linked to their numbers (i.e. "In the past Syndra's Q has done a bit too much damage for having such a short cooldown") it's not difficult at all to change stuff in a healthy way.

Like I said I agree with your points on Kayle but no champion should be declared "impossible to be buffed/a champ that can't be good" when their issues are entirely related to their numbers. Unless there are mechanics inherent to their kit that are unhealthy, every champion can be good. It's just a case of where you distribute the power. Unfortunately for Kayle it's difficult to find a mechanic in her kit that IS healthy (I'm curious as to how she's not up for a rework?) but with Syndra everything else is fixable by moving her numbers around.

(sorry for the ridiculously long essay, I don't know how many words spilled out of me)

No, don't apologize at all, that was a fantastic read and you're 100% correct. I'm literally not in disagreement with anything you said, specifically about Syndra. Everything you suggested is right, you don't just buff her damage (like people have suggested), you shift power around in her kit or focus on improving other areas because Syndras Kit allows you to do this, Kayles really doesn't without reworking abilities or her in general. That's the point I was making, I'm sorry if that wasn't clear.

AbyssphereJun 24, 20151 votes

{quoted}

No, don't apologize at all, that was a fantastic read and you're 100% correct. I'm literally not in disagreement with anything you said, specifically about Syndra. Everything you suggested is right, you don't just buff her damage (like people have suggested), you shift power around in her kit or focus on improving other areas because Syndras Kit allows you to do this, Kayles really doesn't without reworking abilities or her in general. That's the point I was making, I'm sorry if that wasn't clear.

Thanks a lot, that's nice to read. No problem regarding point clarity on your end either.

I know (think?) you're part of the GD crowd so you generally get people complimenting your threads anyway, but as someone who doesn't really know anything about GD I just want you to know that I always do enjoy your threads in this particular forum. You have great game sense and I can always look forward to arguing with you :)

Mandang0Jun 24, 20153 votes

Honestly, I think Kayle's healthier from a gameplay standpoint than Syndra.

If the complaint about Kayle is that her range advantage is oppressive, it's the same way with Syndra if she lanes top, she just doesn't go there often. Melee jumps on Syndra, Syndra just knocks them back. Kayle slows the melee, Syndra slows the melee with a little less reliability. Syndra presses R and nukes you without counterplay, Kayle presses R and gives someone invulnerability which can be countered by waiting. Not gonna say Kayle's R is weak by any means, but the other side of this is Syndra. The comparison is at least fair, and I thought it was quite apt.

HateDaddyJun 24, 201513 votes

{quoted}

Honestly, I think Kayle's healthier from a gameplay standpoint than Syndra.

If the complaint about Kayle is that her range advantage is oppressive, it's the same way with Syndra if she lanes top, she just doesn't go there often. Melee jumps on Syndra, Syndra just knocks them back. Kayle slows the melee, Syndra slows the melee with a little less reliability. Syndra presses R and nukes you without counterplay, Kayle presses R and gives someone invulnerability which can be countered by waiting. Not gonna say Kayle's R is weak by any means, but the other side of this is Syndra. The comparison is at least fair, and I thought it was quite apt.

Kayles gameplay is not healthier than Syndras, not by a mile.

Kayle doesn't have skillshots, she's all point and click. This isn't always a bad thing, there's plenty of point and click champions that are fine by design because they're particularly weak at certain stages of the game, their prone to being blown up, they can be itemized against, etc. Kayles entire existence goes against this. You can't blow her up, she's not weak early (in fact she still has some of the dumbest cheese early), itemizing against her is incredibly difficult because of her passive and she has a one way ticket into late game relevance with her ult alone.

Playing against Kayle is like playing against Akali, there isn't gameplay. It's mash buttons on the keyboard and kill your opponent before they kill you. With Kayle, there's very few champions who can out-tank her through ult and still kill her. Even if she's outranged, she has tools to close small gaps and stick into targets and those long ranged targets are going to be squishy and easy to kill. And you can't burst her back. It's a matter of meaningful choices and when facing Kayle, you are left with the feeling often times that you didn't have any real option other than kill her or die trying because you won't have more than one opportunity.

Syndra, on the other hand, has abilities that can be dodged. Syndra can realistically be itemized against (and DFG removal made her overall less bullshit than she once was). She is gated my mana, by cooldowns and you can leave with a feeling of knowing there was always an opportunity to outplay her. Currently, without any changes, she still feels a bit lacking but that's because she received numbers nerfs that needed to be done. But one exchange, her kit allows her the flexibility to shift things around to put her in a good spot without it feeling like it's complete and utter bullshit. There's no way you can do that with Kayle unless you buffed her W a ton and tried focusing on her utility some more and that would be a huge mistake on such a scrambled kit in the first place.

Mandang0Jun 24, 20157 votes

Your comparison to Akali couldn't be further off. The counterplay to Kayle is that she lacks what Akali has in spades - mobility and target selection. Dodging skillshots is great in a ranged matchup against Syndra, but ranged champions also have little problem with Kayle. However, you were speaking to melee matchups, and I bet I can hit Syndra's stun awfully reliably when the target's right on top of me.

Your 'no gameplay' argument still rings hollow and is little more than personal grudge against champions who rely on autoattacks/sustained damage rather than the flashier stuff of #LCSBIGPLAYS. Where you see low gameplay, I see low threat. She can't burst me (no, she can't), she can't gapclose to me, she can't disable me, she doesn't even have an ult that deals damage. She has one damaging spell and right clicks. Everyone else has the latter, and they likely have more of the former. Hell, I think autoattack-focused champions are among the healthiest in the game (whole game, not just laning phase that everyone tends to focus on), as they need to stay in the fight to deal their damage and allow the enemy team to react. Throw in the fact that some of these actually still don't have gapclosers and you have a game where positioning actually requires half a thought.

Your bit about Kayle laning against longer-ranged champions holds just as true for shorter-ranged champions laning against Kayle, especially if they have actual gapclosers as opposed to a movespeed steroid that can be removed by any of the (increasingly common) slows in this game.

HateDaddyJun 24, 20157 votes

{quoted}

Your comparison to Akali couldn't be further off. The counterplay to Kayle is that she lacks what Akali has in spades - mobility and target selection. Dodging skillshots is great in a ranged matchup against Syndra, but ranged champions also have little problem with Kayle. However, you were speaking to melee matchups, and I bet I can hit Syndra's stun awfully reliably when the target's right on top of me.

Your 'no gameplay' argument still rings hollow and is little more than personal grudge against champions who rely on autoattacks/sustained damage rather than the flashier stuff of #LCSBIGPLAYS. Where you see low gameplay, I see low threat. She can't burst me (no, she can't), she can't gapclose to me, she can't disable me, she doesn't even have an ult that deals damage. She has one damaging spell and right clicks. Everyone else has the latter, and they likely have more of the former. Hell, I think autoattack-focused champions are among the healthiest in the game (whole game, not just laning phase that everyone tends to focus on), as they need to stay in the fight to deal their damage and allow the enemy team to react. Throw in the fact that some of these actually still don't have gapclosers and you have a game where positioning actually requires half a thought.

Your bit about Kayle laning against longer-ranged champions holds just as true for shorter-ranged champions laning against Kayle, especially if they have actual gapclosers as opposed to a movespeed steroid that can be removed by any of the (increasingly common) slows in this game.

I'll tell you what happened in a game last year, a diamond ranked game. I was Nasus and someone picked Syndra top. I stacked MR and literally all-in'd her over and over once I hit 6 and bought spectres cowl and she had no answer. Take Syndra top and any bruiser is literally going to do this. The moment Syndras stun is down or you dodge it, unless she has flash, she's fucking dead. Syndra top doesn't work because of immobility and being incredibly squishy while being relatively easy to itemize against. Kayle has a spammable point and click slow, AAs you to death from range and has just enough slipperyness pre 6 to never be in danger (not to mention most bruisers get absolutely mauled by her early).

There is very little gameplay with her, it's that simple. And don't pull the "ermehgerd LCSBigPlays" card because for much of season 3 and season 4 she was pick or ban. The issue with your statement about her being sustain damage is that prior to nerfs, it was sustained damage - sustained damage that melted you in 2-3 auto attacks. Prior to that, it was full AP Kayle that absolutely nuked you. Could riot focus on making her more of a sustained combat champion? Absolutely, then get rid of her passive so you can actually itemize against her.

And you're right about the range match-ups but you're failing to realize how good Kayle is at shoving you in early and still applying pressure via wave control. And very few champions who out range her are going to match that power early, specifically when she's good. As of now, of course that's still a thing but it's lacking compared to what it used to be because she's been nerfed and she needed those nerfs.

Kayles kit is a mess, there's some cool parts to it (like I said her E and R) but her W and Q are just random filler that are there. She's a poorly designed champion that's incredibly frustrating to fight that leaves you feel like you have any real choices when in combat against her. It's that simple.

Mandang0Jun 24, 20156 votes

So what separates her from other ranged auto-attack-focused champions? Forgive me if I seem to be belaboring the point, but in today's league of oprah voice "everyone gets a slow!", I'm not really sold on Kayle's W being the gamebreaker here.

Is it the cleave that lets her shove too well? Then nerf the cleave. Is it the on-hit damage that scales weaker than ADC champs' autos? Then nerf it (again?!). Is it the one damaging spell she gets? I guess nerf it if 1 damaging spell is too many. I don't buy for a second that her kit can't be balanced through numbers.

I for one think it'd do the game a favor to reign in league of mobility and actually have more champs have to position to deal their damage and stick around while doing it. The current tank meta does an OK job of this, but league of mobility and league of Xerath/Nidalee before this were terrible in this sense. The whole 'low gameplay' argument bothers me because it seems to argue that any ranged autoattack champions are bad for the game, which is patently wrong.

I don't care about Kayle specifically, nor do I care about this anecdote or that or what happened 2 seasons ago. I care about what sort of arguments people make that might be pushing this game into the trash. Seeing the string of recent releases, I actually wish Riot would tone down their kits, back toward a kit like Kayle's where I can explain what she does to someone and not get lost halfway through "well, he licks you a number of times and his spells change and when he does it to his allies it's different than when he does it to his enemies and... etc"

HateDaddyJun 24, 20155 votes

{quoted}

So what separates her from other ranged auto-attack-focused champions? Forgive me if I seem to be belaboring the point, but in today's league of oprah voice "everyone gets a slow!", I'm not really sold on Kayle's W being the gamebreaker here.

Is it the cleave that lets her shove too well? Then nerf the cleave. Is it the on-hit damage that scales weaker than ADC champs' autos? Then nerf it (again?!). Is it the one damaging spell she gets? I guess nerf it if 1 damaging spell is too many. I don't buy for a second that her kit can't be balanced through numbers.

I for one think it'd do the game a favor to reign in league of mobility and actually have more champs have to position to deal their damage and stick around while doing it. The current tank meta does an OK job of this, but league of mobility and league of Xerath/Nidalee before this were terrible in this sense. The whole 'low gameplay' argument bothers me because it seems to argue that any ranged autoattack champions are bad for the game, which is patently wrong.

I don't care about Kayle specifically, nor do I care about this anecdote or that or what happened 2 seasons ago. I care about what sort of arguments people make that might be pushing this game into the trash. Seeing the string of recent releases, I actually wish Riot would tone down their kits, back toward a kit like Kayle's where I can explain what she does to someone and not get lost halfway through "well, he licks you a number of times and his spells change and when he does it to his allies it's different than when he does it to his enemies and... etc"

That's because no ranged auto attacker has a huge ap scaling slow with an invulnerability ult and a shread passive. You can't compare her to other champions for the sake of being ranged, it doesn't work like this because that's not how she functions entirely.

And you can't balance her in terms of numbers, her numbers are shit as is because they've been nerfed. Buffing her numbers back isn't going to change that or the fact that her kit is a cluster fuck of randomness.

Riot is making new champions with deeper gameplay and better overall mechanics for the game. Are some of them overtuned on release? Absolutely but the champions released now are much healthier for the game than what Kayle could ever be or will ever be with her current kit. I'm sorry you don't like kits being more complicated and having more depth, maybe league isn't the game for you.

Mandang0Jun 24, 20154 votes

Well forgive me for assuming, but I'm used to seeing many seasoned posters on the forum complain about range advantage in any shape and form, and I assumed you were leaning toward the same. My apologies for lumping you in w/ the hashinshins and falcons of the world.

You've misunderstood my entire problem with new kits. Depth is important, yes, but complexity isn't. You can have depth from kits that don't require 3 passives and a push-the-envelope mechanic every release. I also think it's a hard sell that the game is significantly better balanced for all the more complicated kits than it was before every champion looked like CertainlyT designed it. You might be right about the last part, but the sad part is that league was the game for me in earlier seasons. Tank meta's great, but 2 more yasuos from now, 2 more ekkos, 3 more threshs... I don't really want to think about what that game looks like.

HateDaddyJun 24, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Well forgive me for assuming, but I'm used to seeing many seasoned posters on the forum complain about range advantage in any shape and form, and I assumed you were leaning toward the same. My apologies for lumping you in w/ the hashinshins and falcons of the world.

You've misunderstood my entire problem with new kits. Depth is important, yes, but complexity isn't. You can have depth from kits that don't require 3 passives and a push-the-envelope mechanic every release. I also think it's a hard sell that the game is significantly better balanced for all the more complicated kits than it was before every champion looked like CertainlyT designed it. You might be right about the last part, but the sad part is that league was the game for me in earlier seasons. Tank meta's great, but 2 more yasuos from now, 2 more ekkos, 3 more threshs... I don't really want to think about what that game looks like.

Not every champion has to be extremely complex, full of random passives and present brand new mechanics to the game. But there has to be potential to outplay them or exploit weaknesses, whether its early, mid or late. Rek'Sai is a perfect example of this. She's relatively new, but she's extremely easy to understand, basic in mechanics but actually incredibly difficult in achieving her goals (making good use of her ult, sustain and dive).

VekknaJun 24, 20151 votes

The solution to Kayle is to have her E damage and Q damage scale off AD only. Her W scale only off AP and Q slow scale off AP.

There. Fixed. Hybrid Kayle now fucking sucks, and you have either a mid-range AD bruiser (similar to Vlad mid-range AP bruiser) OR you have an AP support that's basically poke-less hybrid of Janna's W, Sona's W, Karma's E, and (post-6) has an actual answer to hyper-bullshit supports like Annie and Leona.

VexatiouslyJun 24, 20151 votes

lol AD kayle's pretty fun, a full 3 seconds of invicibility, e splash, runnan splash

Imo i would love it if her e and q scaled fully off of ad, ether focus me or the actual adc (and i get to chose one of us to be saved while both chunk the opposing team)

This of course is full ad squish kayle (which hurts a lot now) but yeah kayle would be problematic with any change

PartholonianJun 24, 20151 votes

{quoted}

There is very little gameplay with her, it's that simple. And don't pull the "ermehgerd LCSBigPlays" card because for much of season 3 and season 4 she was pick or ban. The issue with your statement about her being sustain damage is that prior to nerfs, it was sustained damage - sustained damage that melted you in 2-3 auto attacks. Prior to that, it was full AP Kayle that absolutely nuked you.

You do realize that a lot of that was prenerf Lichbane, right? She was one of the biggest abusers. Her ult frees her up to build pure damage and that crazy added ratio was, well, crazy.

A Miss FortuneJun 24, 20151 votes

The thing with Syndra is that if she's ahead, then the game can be over. While it isn't easy to get ahead with Syndra, it definitely has rewards considering you can basically one shot people with your ult and nuke entire teams with 2 - 3 spells if used appropriately.

With Kayle, it's much easier to shut her down. She does have a heal and her ult of course, but the heal isn't that strong to save her from an ambush and her ult won't last long enough usually to sustain an entire teamfight or something. Plus her damage is significantly less than Syndra's. Kayle can be shut down much easier, whereas Syndra can bounce you off her and chasing her is just asking for her to Q all over your face.

I think Kayle has more healthy gameplay, it's easier to shut her down and even when she's fed she's not that scary due to how she has to sustain all of her damage and almost no burst aside from her Q which is single target, Syndra on the other hand if fed can just spam her Q and one shot your carry with her ult.

FastAsHeckJun 24, 20151 votes

its true that there are champions that cant be buffed. do you think that yasuo can be buffed as long as his w states "stops all projectiles" and his passive "double crit"? hes not op, but you cant buff him.

Mandang0Jun 23, 20158 votes

As far as 'isn't really any gameplay' - how is she different here than other autoattacking top laners? She's different than Jax because she _doesn't _ have interesting skills to use? Different than Irelia because Irelia gets a stun and Kayle doesn't? I know she was very strong before, but I'm honestly trying to understand the 'no gameplay' argument, because to my eyes it looks like a kit that should be fairly easy to deal with - don't have to worry about hard CC, gapclosers, or even a nuke ult.

That said, I don't really care so much about her getting buffs, though I am excited to see how new Rylai's/Nashor's feel on her. Then again, I don't think she's only weak because of this meta - she wasn't doing well before tanks took over either, and she's seen many nerfs since the days when she was top tier. I don't think it's unlikely that Riot went a bit too far w/ her ratio nerfs.

HateDaddyJun 24, 20158 votes

{quoted}

As far as 'isn't really any gameplay' - how is she different here than other autoattacking top laners? She's different than Jax because she _doesn't _ have interesting skills to use? Different than Irelia because Irelia gets a stun and Kayle doesn't? I know she was very strong before, but I'm honestly trying to understand the 'no gameplay' argument, because to my eyes it looks like a kit that should be fairly easy to deal with - don't have to worry about hard CC, gapclosers, or even a nuke ult.

That said, I don't really care so much about her getting buffs, though I am excited to see how new Rylai's/Nashor's feel on her. Then again, I don't think she's only weak because of this meta - she wasn't doing well before tanks took over either, and she's seen many nerfs since the days when she was top tier. I don't think it's unlikely that Riot went a bit too far w/ her ratio nerfs.

Irelia and Jax are both bad design too, Jax not nearly as bad because there's still some outplay potential with him (meaning he doesn't instantly stin you for 2.5 seconds).

When I say no gameplay, there really just isn't. She clicks Q on you and proceeds to chunk the living shit out of you from range with her E. You can't really fight back because of her ult, you can only hope to be long enough ranged to outrange all of the above (and never get into range of her or risk death) or you out-tank her and kill her. It doesn't feel like gameplay, it feels like combating stats and waiting for her to fuck up. What amplifies this is her being ranged, which is why Jax is significantly less of a bad design than her (but Irelia is just as terrible). As melee, the burden is always on you to make a move, especially against ranged champions. With Kayle, that's never much of an option since her E barely has a downtime.

LittleBlastJun 24, 20151 votes

I have to agree w/ you on irellia being horribly designed. When she is strong she bursts you down hard, while dealing high sustained damage and being nigh unkillable if not focused hard or behind.

But at the same time when she is weak she is awful. Just my opinion tho and im a s5 scrub :)

DJ Di0Jun 24, 20153 votes

People tend to forget the reasons why said champions were nerfed in the first place (Kayle, Poppy, Taric, Ryze, ); instead of straight buffs just hope for a rework (or a good one that /actually/ adresses the champion's issues item 3070 Sona )

{quoted}

I have to agree w/ you on irellia being horribly designed. When she is strong she bursts you down hard, while dealing high sustained damage and being nigh unkillable if not focused hard or behind.

But at the same time when she is weak she is awful. Just my opinion tho and im a s5 scrub :)

That's usually the case with older champions. They're pretty simple, so there's not much you can move around because most of it is just numbers.

She's on the radar for a rework (eventually) that will incorporate her 'Telekinetic sword' theme more into her gameplay, which I'm looking forward to; I just hope they keep her Q-surfing, though.

HateDaddyJun 24, 20154 votes

[{quoted}](name=DJ Di0,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EmKWMiey,comment-id=0002000000000000,timestamp=2015-06-24T04:06:17.395+0000)

People tend to forget the reasons why said champions were nerfed in the first place (Kayle, Poppy, Taric, Ryze, ); instead of straight buffs just hope for a rework (or a good one that /actually/ adresses the champion's issues )

Precisely. Look at Elise, the changes are basically a small rework, I don't care how riot puts it. Buffing her numbers is just going to return her to her old self: land E, Human Q/W, Spider W AA + AA Q, where'd your health bar go? You're not going to suddenly have this style of play disappear when you buff numbers alone. And there's a reason it's in shit tier to begin with when it was once dominant.

DJ Di0Jun 24, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Precisely. Look at Elise, the changes are basically a small rework, I don't care how riot puts it. Buffing her numbers is just going to return her to her old self: land E, Human Q/W, Spider W AA + AA Q, where'd your health bar go? You're not going to suddenly have this style of play disappear when you buff numbers alone. And there's a reason it's in shit tier to begin with when it was once dominant.

Totally unrelated but I finally see why you hate Lulu so much. I was Raka with a WW on my team and he ulted Cait. I put the E field on her to make sure she'll be snared afterwards.

NOPE!

Lulu ult let Cait miraculously flash away even though there was a silence field below her..... This went on a few more times, even with a Vlad at one point.

Fuck Lulu

/rant

HateDaddyJun 24, 20153 votes

{quoted}

I have to agree w/ you on irellia being horribly designed. When she is strong she bursts you down hard, while dealing high sustained damage and being nigh unkillable if not focused hard or behind.

But at the same time when she is weak she is awful. Just my opinion tho and im a s5 scrub :)

Irelia has never been "weak"

There's been times where wasn't played much competitively, but the only time I felt Irelia was anywhere close to the neighborhood of being weak was early-mid season 3 when trinity had just gotten nerfed. Even then she was still fine.

SpecterVonBarenJun 24, 20156 votes

"chunk the living shit out of you from range with her E"

HAHAHAHAHAHA!

And isn't what you're saying exactly what I could say about Jinx, or Ashe, or Draven or Miss Fortune? Bro, Jinx just presses w and then chunks you from range with rockets, Ashe just presses w and chunks you with q, Draven just hits you with E and then chunks you with Q's, Miss Fortune just throws E on you and then chunks you with w?

The Bardic GayJun 25, 20151 votes

You're talking about entirely different lanes here. All of those champions are almost exclusively taken bot lane on any serious level of play, and for a good reason. Sure, they have an fairly oppressive pre-six, but when other champions hit their level 6 powerspikes, they are incredibly susceptible to getting pounded by an all-in because their defensive tools are jank. Comparatively, the only way to abuse a level 6 all in against Kayle is by hitting level 6 before her, and no Kayle in their right mind is going to get anywhere near someone who has the level 6 advantage until she has intervention, so she can safely be brought to top and mid since she has the oppression tools and isn't afraid of all ins after 6.

on top of that, all of the carries you mention have a particular flaw in their play patter that Kayle doesn't have which allows her to do it with more confidence. Jinx being able to do that with rockets requires her to hit a pretty telegraphed thin skillshot that can be minion blocked, Draven loses his primary disengage, while also having to hit a skillshot, and MF loses her only true defensive tool, and by autoattacking you, risks losing her passive to minion aggro. Ashe is admittedly a lot safer in using this than the others, but she can still be minion blocked quite easily, and she has the worst defensive tools in earlygame of all of the champions listed, and is the most susceptible to a pre-6 all in.

ADCs having these play patterns are a lot more acceptable than mids and tops because, well, first off, it's a 2v2 lane. There's a lot more dynamics that go on there. You can't just use these harass patterns willy nilly and not expect retaliation from the support, but it through heals or an all in, which all of the champions you listed have limited answers to. It's even more obvious in the case of discussing kayle top, since she has the range advantage 90% of the time.

Apples to oranges bro.

KögâJun 24, 20154 votes

{quoted}

extremely oppressive lane bullies with incredible late game scaling. That's never good.

Can someone say riven?

NemeBroJun 24, 20156 votes

{quoted}

Can someone say riven?

Riven falls off late game compared to many other bruisers and every mADC.

metaworldpeace10Jun 24, 20153 votes

I agree with some points in this post. As a Kayle player who has played her for most of seasons 3/4 and a little bit of 5, I've seen the good, the bad and the ugly with Kayle. Her burst pattern back when her q had a 1.0 ratio/lich bane proc was horrifying and lacked significant counterplay. Her q nerfs, but buffs to the ultimate and W heal allowed for her to have the AS on hit build also turned her into a monster because how well her passive synergiezed with the AS. Now, with the ult CD nerfed, q nerfs, AS growth nerfed, and the e nerfs really put the nail in her. She still scales like a monster, but her early and mid game are pretty weak. If I were to work on Kayle, I would love to rework her q/w. Her e, ult and passive are the things I would keep in her kit.

The IllithidJun 24, 20153 votes

I haven't played Kayle much since her rework back in, I think, season 2. I did play a whole heck of a lot of her back in the very early days when there were still less than 45 champs (IE: from launch to about +6 months from launch). I just wanted to voice something about her kit, and specifically her ult, that I feel a large percentage of the League playerbase isn't likely to think about, given that the game has been the way it is for so long.

Kayle's ult is core to her kit and it is incredibly powerful. It isn't a problem by itself and it shouldn't be nearly as strong as it is. Back when I used to actually play her, Kayle's ult was nice, but not the be-all-end-all, even when it used to last for 6 seconds. That's because the game didn't used to be about every champion trying to hit every other champion with every ability within a 1-second time window. If they game actually had sustained damage champions that whittled people down over the course of 10 seconds, her ult wouldn't be much of anything. But, when 90% of the champions Kayle is against are going to try to press all the buttons at the same time to kill her and she can use one spell to completely negate the enemy for one full cooldown cycle, her ult is massively powerful.

I think we are where we are for several reasons that Riot isn't taking very seriously. I think mobility creep is causing us to need burstier champions, so that we can capitalize on the very brief windows of opportunity that the increasingly mobile champion pool allows. If you only have 5 seconds to kill the enemy champ before they are over the next wall, then you need to be able to 100-0 them in less than that amount of time. If you have a less mobile champ, then you need to be even faster with your kill combo because your window of opportunity is made shorter by the gap in mobility between your champ and theirs.

As a result of that mobility feeding burst cycle, tanks were almost not-even-a-thing for 3 seasons. And now, one tank a game who can actually soak up a full spell reel from a burst champ and live to run away with 5% HP means we are in the "tank meta".

I have been around long enough to see this cycle and I have spent some time playing other MOBA games (I played DotA before League was released and tried HoN as well). The mobility/burst game isn't the only way for the game to work, but it is the only game that League has embraced since midway through season 1.

And, for anyone looking at my rank and saying "Stupid bronzie, you can'y have any concept how this game actually works", look at my ranked games played. I'm at, like, 20 maybe. I don't play ranked much. I hardly even play normals anymore because I don't enjoy the direction this game has gone. old man voice back in my day, Rammus had one of the most overloaded kits because his rollout did damage, slowed, and knocked up while his taunt both taunted AND shredded armor. And that was enough. He was also considered highly mobile... and he couldn't even dash over a wall!

TL;DR: If the game was less about burst, then Kayle's ult would be good, but nothing that great. It is situationally good and the whole league right now happens to be the situation in which it is good.

OJ191Jun 25, 20152 votes

disagree that her W "may as well not exist" to quote from your original post, it (combined with Q) causes massive massive oppression when kayle is against immobile (even some with mobility when the range is short enough) champions.

CrettJun 24, 20151 votes

list of unbuffable champions Aatrox Darius Yasuo DrMundo Elise Evelynn Fizz Jax Kassadin Twitch Mordekaiser

PartholonianJun 24, 20152 votes

Several of those have been buffed in recent patches. Some were buffed in THIS patch.

YossarianSenseiJun 24, 20151 votes

Old champs with binary kits are nearly impossible to balance

Wait for a rework, in the meantime I'm fine with old champs being trash tier, otherwise they're just cancer

OyddAWqJ5rJun 24, 20151 votes

Note that it takes awhile to build these items and will not affect laning phase. Kayle's teamfighting phase isn't and has never been an issue so much as her laning is (thus why it is purposely kept weak).

The previous nerfs to Q and W were because they offered too much poke in lane and too much sustain, they had nothing to do with the lategame burst she had.

NorthernDruidJun 24, 20151 votes

I'd argue that Kayle's identity is her E rather than her ult.

At least that's what I want to do when I wanna play Kayle, hit people with fire from a burning sword.

Gameplay wise, her W is lackluster and her Q could probably stand being more balanceable, as long as it's still possible to use it to secure farm in the early game.

Maybe if her Q was more of a spell, didn't deliver on-hit effects and such, but stacked her passive twice.

SerBlaiseJun 24, 20151 votes

I would agree that her E is crucial to her identity...but I don't think it is well designed. Most Kayle's will get enough CDR so that it is almost always up, which defeats the point of having it toggle anyways. Melee as Kayle just seems like a weakened state of kayle. I'd prefer to see her get some bonuses and drawbacks for her stances, much like jinx's switcheroo.

NorthernDruidJun 25, 20152 votes

Making it a toggle would be interesting, as long as it's not too hard for her to build up enough mana sustain to keep it going in the late game.

In and of itself though I think it's one of the more interesting simple abilities in the game, just because of how much it impacts the gameplay of the champion.

Of course, you could go all out and just make it a passive but that also feels kinda silly to me.

If it's made a toggle having it drain mana over time instead of per hit would help keep the balance on the ability, and would prevent the ability punishing attack speed without mana regen.

I see the ability as something which Kayle grows into as she's able to keep it on more and more permanently and as she gets more attack speed and damage to go with it. Much like how Nasus grows into a powerhouse with his stacking, or Azir grows from being able to call up one or two soldiers to commanding a small permanent squad. These champions whos main gameplay, their true form even, is something which comes after a while rather than something they start out with, are really cool because of that aspect where in the early game Kayle (for example) is weak and can't keep up her signature firesword for long period of times, and also has to space it out to conserve mana. And then as she grows stronger, gets some cooldown reduction, some mana regen, some attack speed. She starts being able to have it on more and more permanently, until she hits that state where it's always on and she's pelting you rapidly, and won't suddenly go out of mana and become useless.

That was a way too bulky and poorly formatted paragraph, too bad I can't be bothered to do anything about it.

I still think there's value in it's current form however. The need for CDR and mana regen to keep it on permanently keeps it slightly curbed in the early game, while the effectively over time mana cost which needs an active toggle means you won't get punished mana costs wise for building attack speed. If it was turned into a straight toggle, it would be a lot harder to manage, and either a lot easier to play around in the early game as Kayle, or useless until you have the sustain to keep it going indefinatively.

In particular the time based mana drain (rather than a per attack drain classic WC3 style) is important, because otherwise you need mana regen to cope with attack speed.

I'm not sure how I feel about it as a per-seconds drain toggle either though, since a lot of it's ease of play function is that you don't have to remember to turn it off, you just have to keep turning it on.

SerBlaiseJun 25, 20151 votes

IMO any change would probably be an improvement. even if they gave the ability more clarity as to its duration, id be happy (at least a little happy). It's just so annoying to have to constantly be relighting the candle. The mana per second on toggle would be a start, but I still think she should have some bonus for keeping it off. Jinx's switcheroo has drawbacks and bonuses for both states; minigun has attackspeed and fishbones has range and aoe.

For kayle, I think a defensive/offensive mindset would be great, given what's already in her kit. while melee, kayle could gain modest bonus armor and MR and maybe have her heal strengthened, but she looses these bonuses and drains mana when she toggles to ranged aoe attacks.

NorthernDruidJun 25, 20151 votes

That's a very interesting idea. Something like that would be really cool.

Rico NastyJun 24, 20151 votes

She needs a rework, her kit is extremely gimped

Shac NorrisJun 24, 20151 votes

I actually played kayle support and she was still viable...

Biff ManlyJun 24, 20151 votes

I think the buffs to the AP items will really help her out. Being able to build tanky with that extra AP is gonna be great for her. Not so much for her attack-speed builds, but still not awful.

MLDzXnRRRJun 24, 20151 votes

Kayle's kit is boring and uninteractive (melee champions without gapclosers can't do anything vs her).

AuroramancerJun 24, 20151 votes

I like Kayle's archetype, and I feel like she's in the same position as Ryze; either at the top or at the bottom.

Something that I think would be good for her is if Riot reworked her according to her archetype: a lawful, angelic paladin(?). These archetypes tend to be more tank-ish and support their teammates.

What I think could be healthy for this is to keep her current passive, ultimate, and her current E, but allow the splash damage to apply her passive. Reduce her base attack speed and attack speed growth, lower the AP ratios on her spells, and change her Q and W into more AoE supportive spells. I think these changes would push her towards a tanky supporter who's primary role is protect a particular ally with her ult, while shredding the resistances of the enemy team for the sake of her teammates, not herself.

Xela SyabJun 24, 20151 votes

The issue with Kayle is that she's a jack of all trades, literally you can put her any lane or jungle and she does well. She's both an anti tank and anti assassin. She has good clear, limited mana problems, she can heal, and ranged on click cc. I used to main her and climbed out of bronze with her, the as nerfs and ap ratios hit her hard. That said, she needs to be brought up to Lulu's level who has the same jack of all trades issue that kayle has (except jungling?) I don't know how they would buff her without sending her over the line again.

DirkTarTarJun 25, 20151 votes

HateDaddy - Well put and +1

JChaosMasterJun 25, 20151 votes

I like the idea of it being toggle accept when she turns it own she would have to reignite just like she always does. Durring this time she could not use any skill or attack allowing people a chance to attack. One of kayle biggest Powers is the secret power of items. Because her E deals magic damage on hit she can effectively use almost any item with a on-hit effect.

But she had TWO massive thing Kayle really cant over come. Yes in the lane she is annoying, and can chunk people but that's easy to solve. CALL the Jungler. Ekko would be a good example, because without flash there is almost NO way Kayle is getting away from that gank. After 6 she does get the shield but "Chunking" become less viable as the BURST champs start getting going. Even shielding herself they just have to be smart enough NOT to dive her unless they know what there doing.

Second BIG weakness is role, "What is she/can she be."

With summoner 12 item 3085 item 3087 she could be a pretty nasty split pusher when it comes to clearing waves. the few times I played her I would play support until the lane finished then build those and start pushing lanes. If left unchecked she could do bad things. and get worst once she could roam hard.