Anyone else hoping the next champion has as much mobility as Patrick Star's pet stone?

Illâoi Evê Siôn·Mar 19, 2018·57 votes·3,104 views

They get places eventually, but it ain't flashy.

Edit: Some Mages, Marksmen, and Supports don't have uber flashy mobility either. Doesn't have to be a Juggernaut.

89 Comments

ViciousSummonerMar 19, 201823 votes

Bro that rock fast af tho.

Illâoi Evê SiônMar 19, 201815 votes

Only when you're not looking ;)

Automated RivenMar 19, 201817 votes

Now I want a champion that just moves like 1000 Ms unless he is in enemy vision range. To which it would drop to 200

Fack you BradMar 20, 20183 votes

Weeping Angels from Doctor Who, anyone?

Automated RivenMar 20, 20182 votes

[{quoted}](name=Fack you Brad,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EoQpEnY9,comment-id=0006000000000000,timestamp=2018-03-20T03:21:46.841+0000)

Weeping Angels from Doctor Who, anyone?

Yuss

ZackTheWaffleManMar 20, 20185 votes

I want a champion that can ONLY move through abilities.

Karn BishopMar 19, 201810 votes

does this make you feel better or worse?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fZiMNo5-uo

Illâoi Evê SiônMar 19, 201820 votes

This thread is in response to the new female Yasuo, yes.

HammermancerMar 19, 201817 votes

We're running out of ban slots

DesolationKaizerMar 20, 20183 votes

...Wasn't that irela from before when utilizing bladesurge's passive by lasting hitting minions/champions?

lc0291Mar 20, 20187 votes

Yeah but she has a new reset ability, from the mark thingy I believe

NinjaFiferMar 20, 20182 votes

Yeah, but she couldn't use it in teamfights. Now if you get marked she can repeatedly dash at you since it resets every time she dashes to a marked enemy, and it doesn't consume the mark.

KaìjuMar 21, 20182 votes

In addition, it states that her Q deals extra damage to minions and monsters so it will be harder to fuck up the Q and therefore the enemy has less opportunities to punish her. Failing Q was a skill hurdle that bad players would be punished for. Adding bonus damage to minions and monsters lowers that hurdle.

ChaddyFantomeMar 21, 20181 votes

{quoted}

In addition, it states that her Q deals extra damage to minions and monsters so it will be harder to fuck up the Q and therefore the enemy has less opportunities to punish her. Failing Q was a skill hurdle that bad players would be punished for. Adding bonus damage to minions and monsters lowers that hurdle.

True, but to play devils advocate, that largely depends on her Qs base power compared to the old one.

KaìjuMar 21, 20181 votes

Very true, but I think it will be similar, just a hunch.

RaiyzaMar 20, 20187 votes

Rocky goes when he feels like it.

KuraSeiMar 19, 20184 votes

They even gave Urgot's fatass a dash lmao

ChaddyFantomeMar 21, 20181 votes

{quoted}

They even gave Urgot's fatass a dash lmao

To ne fair. His Ult was already technically mobility in the same vein.

HammermancerMar 19, 20184 votes

I want new artillery

we need an artillery jungle

so we can get that sexy team comp

Jayce Xerath Varus Velkoz and mr new guy

Unless you count jhin.... jhin jungle?

Tahu the FierceMar 20, 20181 votes

yes, more artillery please

full AP Kai'sa jungle could work for this purpose (not sure that is actually possible, tbh), or ya know... Nidalee

Jayce has been played jungle occasionally

ArakadiaMar 20, 20182 votes

Nidalee is pretty bad for artillery because so much of her power budget forces her to go cougar form when she does land a spear.

redniwediSMar 19, 20183 votes

Another Juggernaut? I wouldn't be opposed, but while we wait and find out whether that or the heat death of the universe comes first I'm just going to hope for some quality of life changes to the current set of Juggernauts.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20182 votes

This is a good point. Juggernauts are a subclass full of potential, and we have some examples of them working well (namely with Urgot and Darius, at least most of the time), but the roster still has a very large set of problems that need addressing, as well as an uncertain place in today's CC- and mobility-heavy environment. Ideally, Riot should be able to design a juggernaut with strictly no mobility, but in such a manner that they don't just turn into Nasus, and become this thing that's horrendously unpleasant to deal with as a melee champion, but that still gets kited to death in most teamfights.

MorganFreemanBotMar 19, 20186 votes

{quoted}

This is a good point. Juggernauts are a subclass full of potential, and we have some examples of them working well (namely with Urgot and Darius, at least most of the time), but the roster still has a very large set of problems that need addressing, as well as an uncertain place in today's CC- and mobility-heavy environment. Ideally, Riot should be able to design a juggernaut with strictly no mobility, but in such a manner that they don't just turn into Nasus, and become this thing that's horrendously unpleasant to deal with as a melee champion, but that still gets kited to death in most teamfights.

Nasus and Darius have 0 mobility enhancing effects, and are widely regarded as highly 'unpleasant' for melee to deal with.

Illaoi and Garen are also pretty damn close; Illaoi has a SUPER short ranged dash, and Garen merely has a speed boost. Both, again, pretty unpleasant for melee to deal with.

Teridax68Mar 19, 201816 votes

I don't think lack of mobility is specifically what's causing these juggernauts to be unpleasant to deal with as a melee champion. Rather, the issue is that their counterplay almost exclusively revolves around not being in melee range of them: if they're not in range of their opponent (which their short range also contributes to), they can't do anything, but if they are, they can basically mash all of their buttons and get practically all of their power out that way. Darius is better-designed in this respect because his Q can be dodged in some form and he needs to trade for an extended amount of time in order to access Noxian Might; Nasus, by contrast, has no real way to optimize his play pattern at melee range, besides using his Q auto reset properly. As a result, champions like Nasus or Garen are basically at 100% power every time they're in melee range, which isn't so good for melee champions who have a chance to mess up. This is also why these champions can often become irrelevant if they fall behind, because there's no real way for them to catch up using their own skill. Effectively, the way to go shouldn't simply be to give juggernauts mobility, but to give them better tools for affecting targets irrespective of distance to them, while also giving them proper counterplay against melee opponents.

redniwediSMar 19, 20183 votes

I find it a little odd that you say Garen is at 100% power every time he's in melee range. I'm a Garen main, and I definitely do not agree with this.

Before the Juggernaut update Garen had a pretty decent early game. He had great base stats, to the point that he could get away with scaling defensive runes instead of flat runes for a larger advantage in the mid game. The Juggernaut update took a decent amount of that power and locked it behind stuff like his E scaling with level and his W.

The W is the main thing people seem to forget about. It's a very powerful ability, and in the early game, before CDR hits, it has a 24 second cooldown. It's also the last ability Garen will level up, so it keeps that cooldown for quite some time. His W is the majority of his early trading power, so baiting out his W and using your own damage while it is down is a very important part of his counterplay, regardless to whether you are melee or ranged.

I'll be the first to admit Garen's W might need to be a little easier to notice. All it does is make his armor shimer for a few seconds, which can be pretty easy to miss. If he is hit by CC during his W there is a little message saying the disable was reduced, but if regular damage is reduced it says nothing.

This doesn't just go for Garen though. Every Juggernaut has little bits of hidden power like this that need to be telegraphed better, if only because playing around them is incredibly important to their counterplay. When it comes to melee vs melee counterplay they mostly have enough already, it just needs to be easier for their opponents to see.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20181 votes

I don't think we're arguing the same thing. You're talking about power spikes and cooldowns, whereas I'm talking about how Garen's power interacts with range. My point is that, when you are in melee range of Garen, there is very little you can do to mitigate his power, because his abilities work in combination to let him reliably apply his full damage and CC at that point. This is in contrast to someone like Darius, whose Q can be mitigated. I am not saying Garen is overpowered, nor am I saying that he has no skill expression; my point is simply that he lacks counterplay when playing a melee champion against him, because there's little the latter can do to generate variance in his power.

Critmaster GarenMar 19, 20182 votes

{quoted}

I don't think we're arguing the same thing. You're talking about power spikes and cooldowns, whereas I'm talking about how Garen's power interacts with range. My point is that, when you are in melee range of Garen, there is very little you can do to mitigate his power, because his abilities work in combination to let him reliably apply his full damage and CC at that point. This is in contrast to someone like Darius, whose Q can be mitigated. I am not saying Garen is overpowered, nor am I saying that he has no skill expression; my point is simply that he lacks counterplay when playing a melee champion against him, because there's little the latter can do to generate variance in his power.

he has giantass cooldown windows you can abuse.

you can easily fight him head on with anyone when his spin is on cooldown. and you can play around your own cc or mobility to move in and out of his threat range.

garen has for most of his existence been one of the weakest champions, exactly because hes to easy to play around and to counterplay.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20181 votes

Okay, but how exactly does one force Garen to put his spin on cooldown? What exactly prevents him from simply holding onto it for when he wants to trade? How exactly is this different from literally any other champion with a cooldown? I can agree that Garen's counterplay is excessively binary, which is what has made him weak in higher elos (he's stomped lower elos for years, on the other hand), but I absolutely do not agree with the claim that he has good counterplay.

Critmaster GarenMar 19, 20182 votes

{quoted}

Okay, but how exactly does one force Garen to put his spin on cooldown? What exactly prevents him from simply holding onto it for when he wants to trade? How exactly is this different from literally any other champion with a cooldown? I can agree that Garen's counterplay is excessively binary, which is what has made him weak in higher elos (he's stomped lower elos for years, on the other hand), but I absolutely do not agree with the claim that he has good counterplay.

by poking at him and force him to open a trade.

unless youre playing 1 of the 2 champions in this game who have a shorter threat range than garen.

even Olaf has his axes.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20181 votes

How exactly does poking Garen make him want to use his close-ranged ability? If you're forcing a trade to get Garen to use his E, and are therefore getting in range for him to use it, aren't you doing the very thing you are trying to avoid?

Critmaster GarenMar 19, 20182 votes

{quoted}

How exactly does poking Garen make him want to use his close-ranged ability? If you're forcing a trade to get Garen to use his E, and are therefore getting in range for him to use it, aren't you doing the very thing you are trying to avoid?

because he either responds or he eventually gets poked out of lane, or zoned from cs.

you can open up a trade against him aswell. if he uses his spin, you immediatly disengage and then reengage during the cooldown window. youre not supposed to run right on top of him, but just close enough to not eat more than 2 or 3 spin ticks.

if he holds it, like you said, youre just going to get a bunch of free damage off on him. kindof win win.

i guess it doesnt make sense to make a generalistic statement. youd have to look at the specific matchup. i mean early game there are a bunch of champions who can literally just stand in his spin and outtrade him with auto attacks, ebcause the thing deals less damage than his own basic attacks until lvl 3 or 4.

redniwediSMar 19, 20182 votes

I can kind of see what you're saying, but I'm not sure I agree. The way you mitigate his power is by choosing when to fight. Maybe it's just an issue with how I view things, but I view power spikes as a part of how champions interact, and how you mitigate what an opponent can do to you. I don't really see these things as separate at all.

Top lane melee matchups, at least before one side begins their snowball, are a constant dance where the advantage shifts back and forth based on ability cooldowns, minion wave management, and lane position. It's all interconnected, with different champions having different amounts of counterplay tied to each part of this dance. In a straight up slug fest some champions will win, some will lose, and some will be impossible to deal with, but that sort of fight ignores very important parts of the lane phase.

Maybe I'm just misunderstanding, but this is my take on it.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20181 votes

{quoted}

I can kind of see what you're saying, but I'm not sure I agree. The way you mitigate his power is by choosing when to fight. Maybe it's just an issue with how I view things, but I view power spikes as a part of how champions interact, and how you mitigate what an opponent can do to you. I don't really see these things as separate at all.

Fair enough, but if "choosing when to fight" means not fighting Garen at all for entire portions of the game, that isn't exactly great counterplay either. Every champion has their own power spikes as well, so Garen is in no way unique in this regard either.

{quoted}

Top lane melee matchups, at least before one side begins their snowball, are a constant dance where the advantage shifts back and forth based on ability cooldowns, minion wave management, and lane position. It's all interconnected, with different champions having different amounts of counterplay tied to each part of this dance. In a straight up slug fest some champions will win, some will lose, and some will be impossible to deal with, but that sort of fight ignores very important parts of the lane phase.

Maybe I'm just misunderstanding, but this is my take on it.

I largely agree that cooldowns, wave management, positioning, etc. all have an impact on laning, but that is applicable to literally any champion in any lane. You cannot simply take this very general aspect of laning and hold it up as Garen's greatest instance of counterplay, and if you do, that underlines all the more how much he lacks counterplay of his own. That, in the end, is my point: for sure, Garen isn't immune to the general forms of gameplay one can find in the laning phase, but he doesn't present all that much beyond that that constitutes unique counterplay of this own, particularly not when at melee range, and as a result he tends to lack counterplay when playing a melee champion against him.

redniwediSMar 19, 20182 votes

Does he need a unique form of counterplay outside of the basic forms and the forms that all Juggernauts deal with (kiting)?

His most unique and important counterplay is just baiting out that W, and if you can do that successfully he basically loses every trade in a pure melee matchup. He needs that damage reduction early on, so if you deny it you just kind of run all over him. How you do it is different for every champion, since you mainly do it by risking hard CC or a burst of damage against him.

I'll use Riven and Irelia as examples, but if you have a champion you specifically want me to touch on feel free to say so.

Riven usually has a very predictable combo. You either slowly use your Q, and then E - Q in, or you Q - E - Q onto your opponent and burst between your stun and knockup when you want to be aggressive, and if you want to be passive you slowly use your Q, hit the knockup, and then E away. The goal for Riven is to save as much of your mobility as you can while making it look like you're going to do a full combo. You make it look like you're going in, and if he uses W you use the rest of your mobility and CC to disengage. The moment your cooldowns are up you go in again, because Garen's W will still be on cooldown. His E doesn't do high damage early on as it's damage ticks scale with level, so try and save your shield for his Q.

Irelia has an easier time (pre-rework in case anyone from the future is reading). She just uses Q on a minion near Garen, auto attacks him, and then uses Q again to get away. Sometimes you use a regular auto, and sometimes you use your E. Honestly most Garen players are not particularly smart, and can easily be forced to reflexively use W when you charge in. You just wait it out, and if he doesn't back off you can full combo him for an easy early kill.

This is the sort of play you're supposed to have against him. Bait out his longest cooldown and primary defensive tool, and then go all in. I'm not really sure what other kind of counterplay he is supposed to have. He has no mobility to bait out, no range to manage or conditional damage boosts (not counting Villain of course). Other champions have unique counterplay because they have unique mechanics that require this counterplay, but Garen just runs at you and yells, and honestly when I lane against him the basic forms of counterplay that effect everyone seem to be more than enough to handle him, so long as you bait out that W.

I didn't mean for this to turn into a full on discussion into Garen, but if you're fine with it I'm fine with it.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20182 votes

{quoted}

Does he need a unique form of counterplay outside of the basic forms and the forms that all Juggernauts deal with (kiting)?

Yes. He absolutely does, because his relationship to kiting is clearly far too binary for him to be healthy, let alone successful in higher elo. If nothing else, he needs more than just the basic counterplay that comes with literally any League of Legends champion, which is the counterplay you have brought up so far for him.

{quoted}

His most unique and important counterplay is just baiting out that W, and if you can do that successfully he basically loses every trade in a pure melee matchup. He needs that damage reduction early on, so if you deny it you just kind of run all over him. How you do it is different for every champion, since you mainly do it by risking hard CC or a burst of damage against him.

And how exactly does one bait out his W as a melee champion? Again, I am specifically talking about melee combat here, not about the entirety of Garen's counterplay in all matchups.

{quoted}

Riven usually has a very predictable combo. You either slowly use your Q, and then E - Q in, or you Q - E - Q onto your opponent and burst between your stun and knockup when you want to be aggressive, and if you want to be passive you slowly use your Q, hit the knockup, and then E away. The goal for Riven is to save as much of your mobility as you can while making it look like you're going to do a full combo. You make it look like you're going in, and if he uses W you use the rest of your mobility and CC to disengage. The moment your cooldowns are up you go in again, because Garen's W will still be on cooldown. His E doesn't do high damage early on as it's damage ticks scale with level, so try and save your shield for his Q.

Okay, but if you do this, Garen can silence you and use E, in addition to blocking the larger part of your combo with his W (which isn't really baiting it out if he's using it properly). Garen is notorious for countering Riven in lane, so I'm not quite sure how that is meant to illustrate how he can be outplayed in this respect.

{quoted}

Irelia has an easier time (pre-rework in case anyone from the future is reading). She just uses Q on a minion near Garen, auto attacks him, and then uses Q again to get away. Sometimes you use a regular auto, and sometimes you use your E. Honestly most Garen players are not particularly smart, and can easily be forced to reflexively use W when you charge in. You just wait it out, and if he doesn't back off you can full combo him for an easy early kill.

Again, if Irelia does this, she gets within melee range, which is plenty enough time for Garen to silence her. Moreover, if Garen uses W against a single autoattack, then that Garen has made a mistake, that isn't a case of Irelia forcing a play. Additionally, because this kind of combo costs at least 30 mana to Irelia, and can easily be healed off by Garen, it's not exactly a winning situation for her either.

{quoted}

This is the sort of play you're supposed to have against him. Bait out his longest cooldown and primary defensive tool, and then go all in.

Okay, but again, how is this different from literally any other champion? Literally any champion has at least one cooldown in their kit, which can be "baited out" through various means. That is standard. That is not something you can associate as Garen's highest form of counterplay, not without implicitly admitting that his counterplay is simply not in a good state.

{quoted}

I'm not really sure what other kind of counterplay he is supposed to have.

I have shown multiple examples in this very exchange. Darius's Q is a good example of an ability with counterplay, because his opponent can get close to him to disable the ability's bonus damage and self-heal against them. Urgot's innate is a great form of counterplay, because his opponent can outmaneuver him and fight him around whichever legs are on cooldown. These are both unique forms of counterplay that give players genuine ways of mitigating the power of those champions, no matter what kind of kit they personally have.

{quoted}

He has no mobility to bait out, no range to manage or conditional damage boosts (not counting Villain of course). Other champions have unique counterplay because they have unique mechanics that require this counterplay, but Garen just runs at you and yells, and honestly when I lane against him the basic forms of counterplay that effect everyone seem to be more than enough to handle him, so long as you bait out that W.

Okay, but that's literally my point: Garen lacks unique counterplay because his core design is so basic and binary that it offers no real way for melee champions to outplay him. I'm not bashing on Garen, by the way, I am criticizing his binary counterplay because I want to push for him to be a viable pick at all elos, not simply a pubstomper in Bronze and Silver. What this means is that Garen should way more agency, including the ability to impact on games even when he gets kited, in exchange for better counterplay at melee range, so that his opponents can have real means to outplay him even up close.

redniwediSMar 19, 20182 votes

Okay, but if you do this, Garen can silence you and use E, in addition to blocking the larger part of your combo with his W (which isn't really baiting it out if he's using it properly). Garen is notorious for countering Riven in lane, so I'm not quite sure how that is meant to illustrate how he can be outplayed in this respect.

Garen hasn't been a true counter to Riven since the Juggernaut update. His Q lost a full second off it's silence in that update, and ever since then the matchup has been a skill matchup, with the better player winning instead of the stronger champion.

Right now Garen has a 52.5% win rate against Riven, which is higher than a perfectly even matchup but is definitely not out of line. Most of that, I would assume, is just from lower rank Riven players not knowing the matchup very well. Garen has no mechanics, so a good Garen player uses every bit of knowledge he can to his advantage. Counterplay isn't about outplaying your opponent, it's about knowing how to win and being able to put those actions into practice. A skilled Riven can do just that.

Again, if Irelia does this, she gets within melee range, which is plenty enough time for Garen to silence her. Moreover, if Garen uses W against a single autoattack, then that Garen has made a mistake, that isn't a case of Irelia forcing a play. Additionally, because this kind of combo costs at least 30 mana to Irelia, and can easily be healed off by Garen, it's not exactly a winning situation for her either.

Irelia has never really cared about Garen's silence, not before the Juggernaut update and not now. You have in combat sustain, and can easily itemize for items like Blade of the Ruined King, which is very strong in this matchup. Garen's pre-11 passive does less than a health potion, and forces him to sit away from minions for an extended period of time. Irelia is fantastic at capitalizing on this.

I would honestly suggest playing some Garen here. The best way to learn a champion's weaknesses is to play them and have an experienced player show them to you the hard way. Both Riven and Irelia can dumpster Garen, which is partly why I mentioned them in particular. He has binary counterplay because his binary strengths do not need anything more, so I challenge you to play a decent amount of Garen to see for yourself.

Also there are people who play Garen at high elo. People above diamond playing him is rather limited, but up until very high diamond there are a number of Garen mains and one tricks who have great success with him. Part of why people bother to do this is because of how basic his kit is. Garen has agency in most matchups right now, but it takes a fair amount of time to learn exactly how to pull it off.

My personal favorite matchups for Garen are Quinn and Gnar. I can win lane if I play it right, and have on many occasions. If I mess up I am heavily punished. This is an aspect of Garen I and others truly enjoy. You should head over to the Garen Mains subreddit sometime, I'm definitely not alone here.

There is definitely room for improvement, and I would love to see some additional skill expression added in with small nerfs to shift some of his low elo win rate into the higher elos, but I will say that I think you wrong on Garen not currently having enough counterplay for opponents to use when playing a melee champion. The only melee champion that doesn't stand a chance against an equally skilled Garen right now is Wukong, and that's simply because Wukong is weak. Every other top lane melee has a method of beating him.

As I said with my two examples before, if you want me to try and explain a particular champion's path of counterplay I'd be happy to try.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Garen hasn't been a true counter to Riven since the Juggernaut update. His Q lost a full second off it's silence in that update, and ever since then the matchup has been a skill matchup, with the better player winning instead of the stronger champion.

Riven's average win rate against Garen is 46.5%. Garen still counters her, and the reduction to his silence does not equate to its removal.

{quoted}

Right now Garen has a 52.5% win rate against Riven, which is higher than a perfectly even matchup but is definitely not out of line.

I got 53.5%, not 52.5%. Where exactly did you get your statistics? Even if it were only 52.5%, that is still well over the middle.

{quoted}

Most of that, I would assume, is just from lower rank Riven players not knowing the matchup very well. Garen has no mechanics, so a good Garen player uses every bit of knowledge he can to his advantage.

And Garen's kit lets him use general game knowledge better than the average League champion... how?

{quoted}

Counterplay isn't about outplaying your opponent, it's about knowing how to win and being able to put those actions into practice. A skilled Riven can do just that.

Counterplay, by definition, is the ability to play against something. It is about outplaying your opponent. The only thing you are saying here is that Garen's skill expression is inferior to Riven's, which does not play in Garen's favor.

{quoted}

Irelia has never really cared about Garen's silence, not before the Juggernaut update and not now. You have in combat sustain, and can easily itemize for items like Blade of the Ruined King, which is very strong in this matchup. Garen's pre-11 passive does less than a health potion, and forces him to sit away from minions for an extended period of time. Irelia is fantastic at capitalizing on this.

Okay, but literally all you're talking about here is Garen's power relative to Irelia's. Where is the talk about his counterplay? Perhaps she can resist his silence, but he still ends up using QE on her in this situation, so even if she is naturally strong enough to win hard against him, she isn't really outplaying him or mitigating his power through skill here. Again, you are diverting discussion away from Garen's counterplay at melee range, which is what this debate is supposed to be about.

{quoted}

I would honestly suggest playing some Garen here. The best way to learn a champion's weaknesses is to play them and have an experienced player show them to you the hard way. Both Riven and Irelia can dumpster Garen, which is partly why I mentioned them in particular. He has binary counterplay because his binary strengths do not need anything more, so I challenge you to play a decent amount of Garen to see for yourself.

Except I have been asking you, a self-proclaimed Garen main, to give me even the most basic explanation of what his counterplay is at melee range. I'm still waiting for an answer, and instead of providing one you've attempted to pivot onto matchups, power levels, and a whole bunch of other irrelevant fluff. This, to me, is clear evidence in favor of my point that Garen does not, in fact, have meaningful counterplay at melee range, and that you not wanting to admit this implies you yourself are uncomfortable with this fact. Garen does need more than binary counterplay, and until he does he will never be competitively viable, or even good at any level above Gold.

{quoted}

Also there are people who play Garen at high elo. People above diamond playing him is rather limited, but up until very high diamond there are a number of Garen mains and one tricks who have great success with him. Part of why people bother to do this is because of how basic his kit is. Garen has agency in most matchups right now, but it takes a fair amount of time to learn exactly how to pull it off.

There are also people who play AP Vayne, that does not mean that's a thing. Garen's total play rate at Plat and above is 2.3%, which I hope you'll agree is not great. Just because there happens to be one unicorn among Diamond players, or the Garen equivalent of Annie Bot, does not mean Garen is viable at high elo, and the very fact that you yourself are admitting that he's unviable at high diamond is itself an admission that he is simply not made for higher-elo play.

{quoted}

There is definitely room for improvement, and I would love to see some additional skill expression added in with small nerfs to shift some of his low elo win rate into the higher elos, but I will say that I think you wrong on Garen not currently having enough counterplay for opponents to use when playing a melee champion. The only melee champion that doesn't stand a chance against an equally skilled Garen right now is Wukong, and that's simply because Wukong is weak. Every other top lane melee has a method of beating him.

As I said with my two examples before, if you want me to try and explain a particular champion's path of counterplay I'd be happy to try.

I'm not asking you to explain Garen's interactions in specific matchups, I'm asking you to provide clear, concise examples of how any melee champion can outplay Garen. Once again, the example of Darius and his Q is one such case of clear counterplay, because any melee champion can move into the inner ring and mitigate its empowerment. What you have been telling me is that Garen's kit is so basic that it offers no room for unique counterplay, which proves the original point I made that you had tried to contest, so unless you've decided to change your argumentation on this, I don't think you're going to be saying anything new or convincing.

redniwediSMar 20, 20182 votes

I'm not asking you to explain Garen's interactions in specific matchups, I'm asking you to provide clear, concise examples of how any melee champion can outplay Garen.

You're asking for something that by your own admission I can't give you. As per your Darius example you want me to tell you some way you can get around Garen's abilities. Garen's abilities are not balanced around that, and were not designed that way.

Except I have been asking you, a self-proclaimed Garen main, to give me even the most basic explanation of what his counterplay is at melee range

I gave you that. What you want is something unique to Garen, which just isn't going to happen. Abuse his cooldowns and there's not a single melee champion that isn't inherently weak that can't beat him. His counterplay works very well, is meaningful, and is something every champion can do, melee or not, but he doesn't have anything unique only to him.

I got 53.5%, not 52.5%. Where exactly did you get your statistics? Even if it were only 52.5%, that is still well over the middle.

I usually use LoLalytics or League of Graphs.

And Garen's kit lets him use general game knowledge better than the average League champion... how?

If you're interested I know of a video or two that talks about it, but to boil it down the simpler a champion is mechanically the less effort a player has to put into their micro play, and the more effort they can put into macro play. This is what champion mains typically get out of the time they put into their chosen champion, being able to play their mechanics without thinking, but a champion like Garen gets that by default. He's not the only one, but he is a good example of a champion that lets his player focus on non-mechanical parts of the game.

Counterplay, by definition, is the ability to play against something. It is about outplaying your opponent.

Counter play is most definitely the ability to play against something. That said outplaying an opponent is not counter play. Counter play is something specifically added into the game to help balance out a champion and their capabilities, where as an outplay is between opposing players and has very little to do with their champions. It's more likely on mechanically complex champions, but ultimately is about the players.

Riven's average win rate against Garen is 46.5%. Garen still counters her, and the reduction to his silence does not equate to its removal.

Riven's win rate in general is at a low point. She's not great right now for a number of reasons, and most of her skill matchups are not doing well.

What you have been telling me is that Garen's kit is so basic that it offers no room for unique counterplay, which proves the original point I made that you had tried to contest, so unless you've decided to change your argumentation on this, I don't think you're going to be saying anything new or convincing.

Perhaps he doesn't have room for unique counterplay, that very well might be the case. What I'm still not convinced on is that he actually needs it. You're very attached to the idea that he absolutely needs counterplay, but I've been able to play against him just fine on a number of melee champions. I know the ins and outs of Garen from both sides, maybe not as well as some of the higher ranked Garen mains out there, but more than enough to deal with him effectively.

Maybe I can't convince you of anything here, but maybe you can convince me. Why exactly does Garen need more counterplay in melee matchups? What do the current set of melee top laners lack that keep them from playing against him in a meaningful way? What part of Garen is strong enough to keep people from using universal methods of counterplay against him to the point where he needs something else working against him?

What makes this sub-50% win rate champion require the amount of attention Riot would need to give him to add in a unique form of counterplay? What sort of additional counterplay would make sense for him and wouldn't shove his win rate any lower? Would/should there be compensation for said counterplay?

There are also people who play AP Vayne, that does not mean that's a thing. Garen's total play rate at Plat and above is 2.3%, which I hope you'll agree is not great. Just because there happens to be one unicorn among Diamond players, or the Garen equivalent of Annie Bot, does not mean Garen is viable at high elo, and the very fact that you yourself are admitting that he's unviable at high diamond is itself an admission that he is simply not made for higher-elo play.

Until very recently Garen has been growing in popularity at higher ranks. A Garen one trick actually reached masters a few patches ago, but then Garen's win rate took a dive. Things were improving for him, but other changes to the game have already started to indirectly effect his ability to compete in high level play.

There are a long list of champions that are not typically viable at the diamond 1+ ranks, and out of all of them Garen should not be high on the list. I want him to be competitive up there, even if it is only by one tricks and mains, but the direction League has been going in the last few years has ruled this out. Garen would have to have a full rework, and that's just not something he needs.

AuurunMar 20, 20182 votes

I have to agree with teridax on this one. Garen does not have enough counterplay. He has enough weaknesses, but not counterplay. Ultimately healthy champion is a one that is outplayable even when in range and have abilities ready. Maybe was fine back when that basic amount of counterplay was a standard for every champion, but nowadays he feels unfair to more skillshot reliant champions even when he's weak. Also Wukong you mentioned... If Garen had enough counterplay then even wukong should be able to win with the one playing him is skilled enough. If he can't that means Garen's counterplay is not applicable by all champions. It just so happens that most champions are capable of countering him cause he's kept weak, maybe not as weak as Wukong but still and both of them are kept weak exactly because of lacking counterplay. When I think counterplay I think something that can be applied by any champion. But here we see that others are simply overall stronger than him and weak does not equal having enough counterplay.

And I don't want to be rude, but although opinions of champions mains is important opinions of those forced to play against them is just as important if not more since if champ is fun he's fun for that one person playing him during game, but if he's also toxic and frustrating to play against he destroys experience of at least few other people during that game.

MorganFreemanBotMar 19, 20183 votes

{quoted}

I don't think lack of mobility is specifically what's causing these juggernauts to be unpleasant to deal with as a melee champion. Rather, the issue is that their counterplay almost exclusively revolves around not being in melee range of them: if they're not in range of their opponent (which their short range also contributes to), they can't do anything, but if they are, they can basically mash all of their buttons and get practically all of their power out that way. Darius is better-designed in this respect because his Q can be dodged in some form and he needs to trade for an extended amount of time in order to access Noxian Might; Nasus, by contrast, has no real way to optimize his play pattern at melee range, besides using his Q auto reset properly. As a result, champions like Nasus or Garen are basically at 100% power every time they're in melee range, which isn't so good for melee champions who have a chance to mess up. This is also why these champions can often become irrelevant if they fall behind, because there's no real way for them to catch up using their own skill. Effectively, the way to go shouldn't simply be to give juggernauts mobility, but to give them better tools for affecting targets irrespective of distance to them, while also giving them proper counterplay against melee opponents.

I think we're making the same point.

I wasn't saying that Nasus and Darius are unpleasant due to being immobile, but that they're unpleasant to deal with because they can brutalize melee due to their immobility not really mattering.

I also agree with your assessment, and believe that Nasus and Garen are poor juggernaut designs compared to Darius and, to a lesser extent, Illaoi.

Illaoi because her counters are abundant at simple: If you walk away from her, she has to kill you (without having any form of CC) before you get out or else she won't be killing you at all. Her trading depends on landing a thick skillshot which creeps can easily block. Her massive damage source can be killed by two autos and is hugely visible, meaning she has to 'prep' the area ala heimer.

Her biggest strength is when you try to all in her; she WILL win that scenario, but she can only be all in'd because she lacks the tools to effectively do it to others.

Teridax68Mar 19, 20182 votes

I very much agree with this, and I do think we were making the same point in the end. The fundamental problem with juggernauts is that they're so binary relative to whether they're being kited or not, that they tend to dominate other melees simply because kiting is not a factor at all, whether that comes from a lack of range, mobility or both. I also agree with your assessment of Illaoi, though I also feel her own design is a bit excessive: one of her fundamental problems is that she's mostly strong if the fight comes to her, but there is so little reason for that to happen that she can usually be safely ignored in organized play. She only really succeeds when the enemy team messes up and dogpiles her, and outside of those rare situations where she gets to one-shot crowds at a time, she's not really all that strong. In general, juggernauts only really succeed when the stars align and a good situation is handed to them, but otherwise aren't that great, and often lack the tools to make those situations happen (Darius being an exception, thanks to his pull). Giving juggernauts more agency overall, and still allowing them to excel outside of those unicorn scenarios, could be one step towards making them more present at all levels of play.

Critmaster GarenMar 19, 20184 votes

{quoted}

Nasus and Darius have 0 mobility enhancing effects, and are widely regarded as highly 'unpleasant' for melee to deal with.

Illaoi and Garen are also pretty damn close; Illaoi has a SUPER short ranged dash, and Garen merely has a speed boost. Both, again, pretty unpleasant for melee to deal with.

Yorick was spot on for a juggernaut, and the most recent one if im not mistaken. wasnt his big VGU after illoi?