Re: Kalista's Kit and a Possible Terrible/Great Idea

I was glancing through some old posts and I wanted to repost this one from over a year ago as I think it's neat. I've updated sections of this as the game has developed a lot since season 6.

Warning: Wall of Text. This started out as a response to a different thread but I got carried away and came up with this idea while typing.

Let me start off by saying I don't play too much Kalista but I do feel I know her strengths and weaknesses. I'll address two complaints that have been thrown around the boards before I address the real issue as I need to explain why these complaints do not solve Kalista's real issues.

The first complaint is that she is more gated by her support than other markspeople. Kalista gains attack speed when next to her bonded ally as well as her reliability to deal that juicy % health damage when both support and her attack the same target.

There have been arguments for both the removal of this as well as those who advocate for more restrictions on Kalista through her support. I'll address both.

Making Kalista more dependant on her support helps to give her some more identity as a marksman. It is also a good way to gate a decent amount of her upfront power and unintended strenghtswhich has certainly been an issue in the past as she used to be able to split push and kite away safely while solo. I'd personally like to see it stay as it adds more uniqueness to the marksman roster. If you want a marksman that can dash all over and duel people then you've got Vayne and Lucian for that niche. Adding a third marksman like this just brings out the same problems riot has had when balancing similar champs when they all do the same thing but one always ends up just being better than the others. Some uniqueness is necessary and this one isn't too bad.

To those who advocate for more restrictions on Kalista I will post something from my old thread.

Their (main) comment: How to fix Kalista: Revert most of her nerfs except ulti-wise and finally give passive a real condition of only being enabled when near her oathsworn. If her oathsworn is dead but she's near the body she can still use her dashing.

My response: I'm not sure that truly fixes Kalista as you'd still be left with a Kalista who can kite like no tomorrow as long as her support is nearby. I know you said that if her Oathsworn dies she can still dash while around their body but fights don't always stay in one spot. Also, bodies disappear once they respawn and that could get pretty awkward if I'm expecting to dash and suddenly I can't because my Lulu just came back to life. But overall I don't want to be completely useless if my support happens to die somewhere in a teamfight but we need to rotate to defend an objective. It also will probably be much less fun for the support since a change like that will inadvertently limit their roaming options and force them to always have to stay right by her side. Kalista is already gated by her Oathsworn because 1. Kalista cannot use her ult without them 2. she loses attack speed from their lack of presence and 3. she is much less able to proc her % damage from her W. Whether or not she needs to be gated by her support even further is a conversation that I am open to and should be addressed but I disagree with your proposed change.

The biggest issue I have with making Kalista more reliant on her Oathsworn is something I didn't discuss in my original post: the burden that Oathsworn can put on a support player if Kalista becomes too reliant on them being around.

Remember when Riot made those champion updates to Fiora and Gangplank? They added mini-games to both of these champions that were meant to be interactive, meaningful, and add depth to both fighting as and against them. The problem? Their opponents didn't want to play these mini-games. They didn't sign up to play that, why are they forced to play this mini-game? They wanted to play against Gangplank, not his barrels. They wanted to play against Fiora, not themselves. These mini games still exist but they were downplayed and nerfed and those champions ended up being compensated elsewhere in their kits. Draven still has his axes and a meaningful mini-game in them but he is the main player of the game. Opponents can play and are encouraged to play but it's not the end-all be-all aspect to playing against Draven, it's the end-all be-all to playing as Draven. The Draven player is the one who signed up for it and that's why his mini-game works.

Kalista sort of brings this own form of "I didn't sign up for this" feeling/mentality but she inflicts it on her own teammates. Currently, Kalista is certainly weaker without her Oathsworn than with and this is okay. She's dependable alone but not so dependable that she is a sitting duck without. Taking away even more of her kit and linking it to her lane opponent, especially a part of her kit like her ability to dash without her Oathsworn nearby, will make support players feel forced to stay next to Kalista the entire game. Leaving a Kalista in lane to go ward or gank mid is leaving a Kalista who can't dash, proc her W, or even ult would be leaving half a champion alone and a decision a support player won't feel they can make. If people are still proposing more restrictions on Kalista through her Oathsworn then this can unintentionally create an unfavorable and nearly forced condition on a support player. The Kalista player is the one who signed up for this and so they should be the main focus.

The second thread that has popped up on the boards a couple of times is one where players have been asking for an execute indicator to be added for Kalista's rend ability. Even though this is not a numerical increase in dps this would be an insane buff and I'll explain why. Kalista's E is pretty hit-or-miss and it's balanced to be that way. As Kalista, you're always thinking "oh man can I rend now or do I need another 2-3 autos to make absolute certain". This adds to her skill; the ability to tell when to rip out all those stacked spears for an execute. If you pull too late you still kill your opponent, yes, but you've wasted valuable time that could have been spent elsewhere - you've traded uncertainty for time, less damage potential to your opponents, and more damage potential towards yourself and your teammates. Adding an execute indicator takes away these important moments of uncertainty and adds nothing but raw power through saved time and the near-impossibility to screw up. There is simply nothing interesting or exciting about a "kill them now button" that Kalista would have. Not to mention that if you added an execute indicator, you'd have to absolutely gut this ability because you just made it low risk/high reward. Doing so would be counter to her design. Kalista isn't about tons of damage through her auto attacks; she is all about stacking less-damaging auto attacks to lead to a huge burst in damage. This play style is very unique to League and something lots of people find enjoying and compelling about her. As soon as you give an execute indicator on this type of champion who resets their damage over and over you add too much reliability on a high risk/high reward ability and that ability will certainly be nerfed to compensate, resulting in a low risk/low reward ability. After that nerf, Kalista players will be forced to be more and more focused on making her auto attacks the main focus of their damage because she needs to get to that lower damaging (but guaranteed) execute point more quickly - thereby taking her further away from this unique marksman play style of repeated smaller damage which turns into a big burst of damage. We already have Twitch and now, to a similar extent, Xayah who press e to deal tons of damage to their opponents after auto attacking a bunch. We need to keep these champions distinct.

Anyone who is going to argue this point with "but Garen and Darius both have an execute indicator!" can remember those two are both juggernauts and not marksmen which means their executes are on immobile, melee-range champions and their executes are on their ults, while Kalista's is not.

Now for the real issue... Kalista's other passive: Martial Poise.

Martial Poise: Kalista cannot cancel her basic attack wind-up except by selecting a new target within range, and her basic attacks miss if she loses sight of her target before they hit. Additionally, her basic attacks only deal 90% AD physical damage. If Kalista enters a movement command while winding her basic attack or right after using Pierce, she dashes a short distance in the target direction, scaling with her boots tier. While dashing, her basic attack wind-up is only reduced by 0.66% per 1% bonus attack speed compared to the standard 1 per 1.

Kalista's biggest issue has been (and still is) that she can invalidate most melee champions in the entire game by making sure they simply can not catch her while simultaneously dealing damage against them. Before Kalista was even released people would all complain about mobility creep. After her release you know players were in a tizzy over the new super-mobile marksman and how this amount of mobility would not be healthy for the game. The issue becomes more clear when used in high level play as it always required a very coordinated team to kill her due to the incredible slipperiness her mobility provided. Kalista basically dictated which champions could and could not be played on the rift. When slows were allowed to affect her jump speed Ashe became her counter and was her lane opponent almost every professional game. Immobile top laners weren't viable against her. This extreme mobility dictated so much in the game and the resulting effects weren't fun for anyone and is the main reason why she is currently in the state that she is.

Attack speed is supposed to be the go-to stat on her considering her passive and attack speed scaling. Riot even said during the marksman update that "just as other marksfolk align with cooldown reduction or critical strike chance as a core stat, we're pushing Kalista to embrace attack speed as her primary scaling given her stand-out strengths as a bunny-hopping battle-banshee". Ignoring the argument regarding difficulty using her passive at high attack speeds is pretty challenging mechanically along with the fact that you cannot cancel your attack inputs the problem about building her with all that attack speed is that her jumps don't scale that well with attack speed (66% effectiveness) so you lose dps unless you are standing still; something long regarded as suicide for a marksman.

So whats that crazy idea you read about in the title? Keep Kalista's constant jumping and lack of aa canceling but double down on her attack speed when shes standing still. Lower her already low dps when she's jumping around but give Kalista bonus attack speed and even let her break the 2.5 attack speed cap when she is standing still!

Now, you may be thinking: "Isn't this exact thing just happened to Kog'Maw, an admitted failure of a rework by Riot"? "Why would they reinstate such a high attack speed champion again"? Well, here's a quote from Riot Axes on why Kog got reverted:

"His unique attack speed interactions undercut the core identity that we intended to reinforce. The items and masteries that scale best with his new direction provide early- and mid-game power rather than late-game power, warping his power curve. More importantly, the ability to move in between attacks is essential for him to serve as most of his team’s damage output. He needs to be able to keep up with a moving teamfight, or else his opponents simply avoid his range and his allies can’t rely on his damage output as the primary or potentially only major damage dealer on a team.”

Basically speaking, Kog was fine pre-rework and this change didn't actually solidify his character how they hoped. This was probably the biggest factor; Kog had a healthy and unique place in the marksman roster before his 5.22 rework. They also mention the problem with not being able to effectively move while attacking at these incredibly high attack speeds - Kalista can still jump and attack unlike kog so it would be less hit-or-miss in her case.

This change would give her the low dps kiter vs high dps immobile killer play style that players can work around and show their skill and decision making prowess of when to jump safely and when to throw spears at lightning speed. This low-risk/low-reward and a high-risk/high-reward split identity will be a unique one in the marksman roster and should be interesting to watch, to play as, and perhaps even to play against.

I'm sure there are still some concerns you readers may have so here are some reasons why this option could still work on Kalista compared to other champions.

1. Kalista hasn't had the amount of time that Kog had to completely solidify her identity and niche in the marksman lineup so a change like this wouldn't be as controversial to character as it was for him. Riot would have more opportunity to play around with this theme more and to change her kit in ways that would not be possible with Kog'Maw. Also, unlike Kog'Maw, Kalista does not have a healthy state she can or should be reverted back to; the only option is to keep tweaking her kit and divert power away from her mobility.

Kalista was in the dumpster for a long time til she got some quality of life buffs from riot and I think that was the last time they directly touched her kit. She hasn't been seen much in pro play either as far as I know so I'm standing by my previous statement of her identity still not being 100% solidified as of yet.

2. When Kog was running standing rampant with his on hit build he was strong because the old Fervor of Battle gave him more damage and because of that constant max hp shred he had while his w was running. Not to mention these damage numbers were eventually doubled after a few autos since Kog built Guinsoo's as a core item. This led to the ridiculous dps some of you may remember witnessing at the time. Kalista shouldn't have this issue though because Fervor was removed, Kalista does not constantly proc percent max hp damage, and Rageblade is probably really trolly on her.

3. This change gives us a possible way to keep the mobility of her passive. Many people say the only way to make Kalista fair is to remove the constant dashes she gets with every auto. She still keeps the ability to dash around a lot but simply won't be as effective at dealing damage unless she can find the time and positioning to stand still and let some spears fly.

4. This change would appeal to players who really enjoyed the incredibly high attack speed play style of pre-revert kog'maw.

5. Allowing Kalista to reach extreme attack speeds does not bring the inherent downside Kog'Maw had of being almost completely immobile. Kalista can still hop around opponents to not let a fight get too far away from her - thus avoiding the issue where "opponents simply avoid his range". Furthermore, the change also resolves the issue where "allies can’t rely on his damage output" because this damage isn't completely tied to an ability with a cooldown. Kog had all his power built around his bio-arcane barrage and enemies could walk away when the ability was activated and re-engage right when it went on cooldown. Kalista would not have this problem as her passive has no cooldown and is therefore always available.

6. This change would remove the extreme power imbalance at high levels of play. Do you remember Deft kiting with a Kog'Maw at 5.0 attack speed and looking like he was gliding backwards and forwards? The top marksmen players could overcome Kog's intended weakness with their superior mechanical play. There's no need to worry about that because movement commands issue a non-cancelable jump from Kalista that reduces her dps. You have to choose when to jump and when to let loose. It's impossible to do both.

Riot would obviously need to change some numbers in Kalista's kit to make this work out so I'll add some examples of possible tweaks that could go along with this change to make sure she isn't too strong

Rend damage lowered to compensate for more spears in your face

Kalista's max attack speed cap is 4.0 instead of 5.0

Her attack damage ratio is reduced to 85% from 90%

Her attack speed on dash is reduced to 60% from 66%

Reinstate nerf where if Kalista does not kill a target with rend, she cannot put more spears into a target until rend is off cd again.

Reinstate nerf where Kalista is only granted mana back on rend if it kills 2 or more targets.

After a jump, Kalista loses all bonus attack speed she aquired from standing still. She then needs to ramp-up her attack speed when standing still again. The attack speed bonus is restored over the next 3 auto attacks.

Only the most damaging of on hit effects is applied to Kalista's auto attacks

Cap the damage Rend can deal to Epic Monsters