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The Difficulty in Balancing Diana, Scorn of the Moon

Ars Techne·5/8/2016, 7:02:57 PM·2 votes·951 views

So Diana since release she has been in this weird place where she was suppose to be designed as a bruiser mage. She was near immediately nerfed due to the amount of damage she was able to do going full AP. Now she sits in this weird place still in that she is either incredibly effective or not at all. But let's look at the relevance between her and her AD counterpart, Riven.

Diana/Riven Similarities

  • They both have a movement enhancing ability, for Riven her Q and Diana her R, that does damage.
  • They both have a CC ability to control a dual, Riven's W and and Diana's E.
  • They both have an on demand shield that scales.
  • They both have a ranged "nuke". Though Riven's is actually an execute as Diana's is meant for harass and ult.

This kinda shows that Diana was actually designed to mirror Riven in game play but as AP. So what went wrong? Quite simply, AP doesn't translate to basic attack damage. Though Riven does do quite a bit of damage with her abilities, just like Diana, the kit is actually designed to control a fight, just like Diana's. But in the efforts to allow defensive items to be built for a bruiser style the damage scaling had to be increased to allow relevant damage. Counter intuitively though, this increase in scaling made her more effective as an assassin.

This balance decision made Diana a very awkward champion as her kit was always torn between controlling a fight and just blowing someone up. So can it be fixed? I think so. But lets step back and examine what she was meant and designed to do. First, she was advertised in mid lane which is notorious for mage and assassins and so having a bruiser option would of seriously diversified how picks, bands, and plays would of worked. So we are looking at a mage champion with a bruiser play style that can hold up in the middle lane. Second, her mana pool is one of the worst in League of Legends, starting with 297(.2), which is 4th worse for mages, and a growth of only 40, again that bottom of the list for mages. So she wasn't meant to ever last is extended fights, making her very anti-team fight and more split push 1v1. Not saying that she can't team fight, but that after 2 combos she is dry which isn't exactly great for multiple targets (remember, E has an 18 second CD, so you're probably only going to group them once with it). Third, her kit is designed to control a fight against a few targets at most.

So to recap

  • Advertised as a Mid-Lane Bruiser to diversify gameplay
  • Tiny mana pool relating more to that of tanks and fighters
  • Control oriented kit

So what needs fixing?

  • Passive - Ambient Attack speed and cleaves every third strike for extra damage heavily based on AP. This is perfectly fine as it is as it rewards the third melee strike within a couple seconds. This allows healthy play/counterplay based on basic attacking.
  • Q - Can deal decent AOE damage and marks the target so the Ult has an instant CD and granting vision. The damage on this is the only problem as the sight allows for healthy bush play for Diana that is dodge-able and reinforces the desired repeated use of the ult. So I would say have 50% of Q's damage activate on ult hit, this rewarding the melee range game play more and allowing more counter play.
  • W - Granting an on demand shield that can be doubled and does decent damage in small AOEs. With the near melee range of this ability it reinforces the melee style play, but with the shield and damage scaling off of AP in the way it does reinforces glass cannon builds. Simple fix, shield more damage less. Her game play revolves around hitting them with her sword more that nuking, so her shield shouldn't add much to damage. On the other hand, she is diving into a fight whether it's one target or the enemy team. So how to balance this in both cases? Extra shield per orb per enemy champion hit I would say. This means that 1v1 she cant get a godly shield but when diving a team she doesn't die immediately. This would require the shield AOE to be increase a little more, but remember the damage scaling on AP should be halved at least. This would also allow control synergy with Rylai's, a tankier AP item.
  • E - A large AOE displacement toward's Diana that slows. I would say this ability is perfect as it is, with the reduce range from release allowing counter play dashes. Riot did good on the changes to this.
  • R - A moderately long range dash that deals damage. Overall, this ability is perfect too. The current combo leaves the ult in an odd spot as the Q does just as much damage and that the target is usually dead by the second Q anyways making it so you technically only needed to ult once anyways and therefore only Q ahead of time to cycle the spell faster. This allows for more interaction and less, "by the way, you're dead," game play.

Quick Recap

  • Passive - is fine
  • Q - 50% damage triggered by ult to encourage more play/counter play
  • W - Bigger AOE and Shield per Champion hit, but drastically less damage.
  • E - is fine. Nice work Riot
  • R - is fine.

And so overall, I would think this rework would move away from the unhealty no counter 100-0 assassin play and move her back to where she originally was meant to be, A Fighter Mage. And retouching on the Keys of what she was meant to be, I think this lines up with a lot of it. She would be more melee based but not impossible to hold out in mid. Her mana use would be more rewarded in combos and damage mitigation. And the control play style is maintained. If nothing else, it's a start.

12 Comments

TyroneWatermelon5/8/2016, 7:50:03 PM4 votes

No,Diama has Nothing to do with Riven,you came with this bs out of you ss didn't you? It is common phenomenon that a champion's playstyle and most overpowered are better than their desgined role,Riot focus on the strenght,weakness and recently "muh uniqueness" on the champion's kid with the desgined role,not as an off meta role. Pure examples: Vi-desgined to be a top laner,sucked so much and performed about 200% better in the jungle. Ekko-desgined as an AP assassin,yet his spells are hard to land and not rewarding as an assassin so he is better played as a tank Blitzcrank-desgined as top laner and literally played 99% of the time as a "support" Gnar-just like Ekko,desgined as a squishy shape shifting role changing,relying on his mini form for kiting,but he sucked so much that Gnar is forced to rush tanky items and go tank(yes,black leaver still brings 300 health) Gragas-designed to be a mid laner Mage,yet just like Vi he goes only jungle(and builds tank though) [Note:Don't confuse between playstyle and role change between Item abuse,such as the molester tank Yi]

I'm very intrested in knowing how Riot will take care of Ekko,though I doubt they will do something,they don't care about the game anymore

blfUvZ8Ybu5/8/2016, 9:34:56 PM1 votes

Yes.I agree.This idea would be nice.

Zaghyr5/9/2016, 2:51:09 AM1 votes

"This kinda shows that Diana was actually designed to mirror Riven in game play but as AP." . . . . What? I'm sorry but this post confuses the hell out of me. You start off by comparing Riven and Diana and then jump into Diana changes to make her a mirror of Riven. The only way you can compare Riven and Diana, even slightly, is by the play style and role. Riven is a sustained, aoe, dps champion with good burst potential. Diana is a sustained dps champion with good burst potential. The play styles match but the problem is how the kits allow this. Riven has an ability/auto weaving play style that jumps between her damage/defense and her mobility. Diana has a much more all-in style and has a kit that allows her to stick and deal constant dps through autos. Additionally, Diana's defense is also an offensive tool and she has an ability that unique to her between her and Riven, her Moonfall. Lastly, Riven's mobility is tied in with her defense and damage so there is trade-offs, as well as the mobility only being is short bursts. Diana has mobility on a high damage spell with reset potential that travels a moderate distance almost instantly. I can see how their play styles are similar in some ways, but there is just not enough there to say that they are mirrors of eachother.

Jumping into the changes. I do agree that changes need to be made to push Diana into the dueler she was designed to be, but some of the changes don't seem right. Her passive is half good, and half bad. The third strike is amazing and needs to stay, the flat Attack Speed needs to be removed so her base attack speed can be raised to appropriate levels. The only reason Rito even added the attack speed was so they had an excuse to keep her base atk speed low so her builds wouldn't be based around atk speed. If you want a dueler Diana, she needs to have the access to that atk speed build option. She especially needs it if your Q suggestion is what I think it is. Correct if I'm wrong, but the way I read your Q change made it into a mark similar to Akali's and Leblanc's Qs. If this is the case she is losing a very large amount of damage if she misses the mark or cannot readily ult the target. You would also HAVE to ult them if you wanted any meaningful damage. If you meant that the 50% of the Q's damage is applied again on Ult cast then there are even more problems. Your suggestions for the Q, and especially the way you worded, don't make much sense and don't seem practical as a balancing option. The W changes I entirely agree with. The E just needs a radius adjustment. It is too easy for enemies to walk out of it during the cast time and the pull/hit box is a little off. The ult I'm not sure what needs done.

Overall, I agree that Diana needs to be better advertised for an intended play style and needs changes. However, some of you arguments either didn't make sense logically or grammatically, or they were just weak. Comparing Riven and Diana is a stretch, especially with the changes you proposed.

Quepha5/17/2016, 11:59:26 PM1 votes

Diana's a diver. All divers have balance problems, the class drastically needs an update.