Zyra... help this champion

Bârd·Jul 6, 2015·32 votes·2,612 views

Base stats: 325 movespeed. Real? Passive: Hard to hit, low damage even if you do Q: Numbers too low W: Bad AI on plants, combined with low damage E: Numbers too low, stops movement for too long

32 Comments

manbearswineJul 6, 201522 votes

Look,there's one simple flaw in your logic:

Zyra buffs=more variety in bot lane=less thresh=not gonna happen.

Virgin RayJul 6, 20153 votes

=Less LCS hook plays

I Miss CannonJul 7, 20151 votes

But Zyra can also make plays..

OverpoweredSoapJul 6, 20155 votes

I'd settle for a new passive first.

Her passive is just.

Annoying? I guess. I mean if you play well, then there's really no use for it. If you play bad, you're probably already too behind for it actually hurt anyone.

ponkzyJul 6, 201511 votes

at least with kogmaw if you die you'll blow a flash or something most of the time. with zyra it's just ridiculously easy to dodge

Ariel the CruelJul 6, 20153 votes

I mean if you play well, then there's really no use for it.

That's actually the entire point behind it. They addressed this when they released her.

They considered Zyra's kit to be incredibly overloaded when they developed her. They also consider "revenge passives" to be "free power", since their value drops the further ahead you are.

(Sadly, CertainlyT apparently misinterpreted that lessen to mean that champs need to become even more overloaded.)

SaiannaJul 6, 20154 votes

Her passive doesn't deal LOW damage. No.

It's true damage, straight line that pierces trough targets. Deals quite decent chunk of HP to anyone hit.

Only thing that's bad about this is this 1s ~ before you can activate.

Q - damage alone might not be too great, but thankfully Ludens Echo covers this up prety nicely. W - here i gott agree, plantss are too dumb and too weak. Fixing this might help Zyra ALOT. E - It's meant more as CC not as damage source. Its CC is fine. She needs it for her full combo. Her melee plants should have alot different textures tho. They look too similar. Also melee plants should have different damage stats than ranged plants.

I Miss CannonJul 6, 20154 votes

Zyra is in a good spot right now, picked her up mid and now playing her a lot. A good placed ultimate really decides how a teamfight turn out, she does so much AoE damage and she has one oft he best hard initiations of a midlaner/support, especially with Zhonyas. Already had two 1v4 Quadras with her and carried multiple games hard, i honestly don't see how she's in a bad spot. She has a pretty hard time against assasins so i ban the ones out who can dive easily (Fizz, Zed) and against the rest i just farm and prepare myself for teamfights. Meanwhile she beats so many low-mobility mages because she just plain outdamages them. Her plant AI should be fixed so they don't only attack targets who are rooted but other than that, she's fine. I also don't see how she has low damage. Her base damages and her scalings are okay and she benefits pretty hard from early magic penetration.

The LovelessJul 6, 20154 votes

Her speed is low because Riot wanted players to be able to catch her amidst all the rooting and knockups. Unfortunately it's been two years and there are champions and items that can zip around and gib her without much retaliation.

I think she would be fine if she could function as a bruiser/somewhat tanky. Unfortunately she isn't effective unless you try for pure dps. Otherwise, you're a root-bot every 7 seconds with the occasional knockup.

Mana is also an issue with her. It's so fucking annoying how mana gated she is on top of having MULTIPLE weaknesses and lacking the strength to compensate. I'm gonna give her a try when RoA gets up to 100 ap next patch and see if I feel any better about her. Currently, it's a bad goddamn idea to go squishy early game since flash won't always help you escape another episode of ganks and gap closers.

Darth Pixy MisaJul 6, 20153 votes

Karthus and Sion have a similar passive, but theirs is way better.

Instead of one hit Sion goes into a Bezerker rage then attacks as long as he has hp left Karthus ignores his death for 7 sec.

Zyra's passive could use a revamp, perhaps it could be changed entirely. THere has to be a passive that would be better for a mid /support mage.

Ariel the CruelJul 6, 20152 votes

They gave her that passive because it was "free power" on an already "overloaded" kit. (Remember, this is back when second passives took up an entire skill slot!) So I don't see it going anywhere. I wouldn't mind if it hot a little faster though. "Hey look, I died. You now have 2 seconds for your 5 second cooldown dash to come back up. Or to just run into a bush. Or walk out of range. Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere.

PartholonianJul 6, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ariel the Cruel,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=GI06XYUQ,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2015-07-06T04:56:38.690+0000)

They gave her that passive because it was "free power" on an already "overloaded" kit. (Remember, this is back when second passives took up an entire skill slot!)

Zyra's doesn't. But I assume you're referring to something like Varus or Vayne?

BârdJul 6, 20159 votes

hmmm. What if it turned her into a giant version of her Q-Plant for a few seconds on death (more damage/range)

I Miss CannonJul 6, 20151 votes

Zyras passive is a big amount of true damage and i turned the tides of some teamfights multiple time with it, i honestly can't see what's wrong with that passive.

HamburgerJuniorJul 6, 20153 votes

I personally think Zyra's still pretty good. If Sated Devourer comes out the way it is on the PBE (In which case i will quit playing. Immediately) Zyra will have a place in the meta. But i do agree with with plant AI thing. And if Zyra's passive weren't based on her level, that'd be great. Cause if you die before like, level 4? You're dead for free. That damage is helping nothing and the fact it's so obvious that it's coming doesn't help matters at all. But the plant AI needs fixing, for sure. It's almost unbearable. Bad plant AI has cucked many people out of many kills and i don't feel like i should be punished for casting my plants in a wave of minions.

I Miss CannonJul 6, 20156 votes

Can you explain what sated devourer has to do with Zyra?

OrbvJul 6, 20152 votes

Zyra gets absolutely nothing from sated devourer.....

I also don't think that you should be rewarded for casting a plant in a wave of minions and expecting it to target champions...Just aim it at champions and try to not wave clear and bully at the same time. Treat her like heimerdinger

VDc0zCqe0wJul 6, 20153 votes

buff her

Mandang0Jul 6, 20152 votes

Zyra's not in that bad of a place right now, and too large of buffs WILL get her nerfed sometime later.

Of your list, I'd prefer Riot fixed her plant AI first. I also don't think her E's CC duration is too long - it's the weakest hard CC in the game and you need to put ranks in it to get the duration up from 0.75 seconds. As far as complaints about her damage, most times I see a support Zyra who builds decently, they're near the top in damage dealt to champions. That's a support Zyra.

If you're having trouble doing damage with Zyra, I'm sure people can help you with your build.

P0IS0N IVYJul 6, 20152 votes

Zyra's fine. Just fix the AI on her plants.

Zair UmbrasJul 6, 20152 votes

The only actual issue with Zyra is her plants stop firing at enemy Champions before they leave the circle sometimes. What a lot of people DON'T know is that if you AA a champion, the plants will fixate on it, much like a Malz minion on an E'd champion. That's just how that one works though. The AI on it isn't bad, most just don't realize if you AA a minion after poking with your plant, your plant will automatically focus on the fricken minion, or worse when you drop plants and then AA the enemy TANK so your plants hit the TANK instead of the backline. Rule of thumb, don't AA things if you don't want the plants to hit it. She has 575 AA range, so you can easily hit the target you want if need be.

Her E isn't that bad. It has a very long range and the missile speed actually isn't all that bad. It moves much quicker than a Lux Q or Morg Q.

Her Q does pretty heft poke damage, as she's meant to be a DPS mage, thus the low CD. It's a 5s CD with 210 base plus .65 scaling, spawning a plant that'll do another 20% of her AP.

Her W has free CDR. It used to give 20%, but that had support Zyra far too crazy. She had 30% from just it and masteries (5% in support tree, 5% in offensive). Now she gets 30% with it, masteries, and the support item.

Her R is a HUGE and does a moderate amount of damage, but also steroids her plants and more importantly, knocks champions up.

All in all, she's fine damage-wise. Her passive is kinda iffy, but so is Fiora's, Kog's, and Mundo's. Best thing she could use is the plant's focusing on a single target thing reduced to 25% instead of sitting at 50%. As is, if you use two plants and they hit the same target, it's the same as only having one plant, which is useless since plants will always target the same target.

FastAsHeckJul 6, 20152 votes

passive is usseless, unless you get dived and they dont know what it does. karthus, sion and kog all have better passives (though kogs could also be changed). she also has huge mana issues, her e is really hard to hit with the mobility creep, her plants dont attack for the first 3 seconds. yup she needs fixing ^^

BorblandJul 6, 20151 votes

Just revert the stupid nerf of her W CDR (From 20 to 10%)

As a big Zyra player, that's what hurted her most, I got to 40% earlier with only runes, masteries and this. (I was playing her mid and in the jungle)

Now she's playable, but she clearly lacks damage early where Ziggs or Xerath already have some, and she's only useful late game.

At least I hoped the Rylai would proc a 40% slow on her plants in 5.13, but Riot changed that apparently that pets have a reduced slow....

A Miss FortuneJul 6, 20151 votes

Zyra has the ability to do well, but I think she's "gimped" I guess, by the fact that on release she was probably one of the most overpowered champions in history. Now I wasn't there for it fortunately, but I've heard more than enough stories where she basically had lower cooldowns, higher range, much more damage, and she was just unstoppable with over 63% winrates. She was so bad that 2 days after her release, she was nerfed and repeatedly nerfed after.

Currently my main issue with Zyra is there is absolutely no reason to not dodge Zyra's abilities with the exception of being ambush. The abilities are ridiculously easy to dodge, and the mana cost is no joke. The cooldowns are pretty low but not low enough to excuse how slow they are. If you want to buff Zyra, take .5 secondds off of her Q cast times and give her Q more damage on top of fixing her plants. The plants should be able to instantly attack enemy champions, if they're attacking minions and an enemy champion steps into the circle, the plant should immediately attack him/her.

Zyra's damage isn't that bad nor her plants, but her Q needs a bit more since I know for a fact some Zyra mid laners level up their E, which does a bit less damage over her Q. However nobody can really tell a difference since they're both easy to dodge and don't do a lot of damage.

ChaoticPineconeJul 6, 20151 votes

I think she is fine. I play Zyra support when im in tryhard mode.

20 Magic Pen runes, 9-0-21 masteries, and Liandries+Rylai combo and you outdamage many of your carries. Round out your build with Voidstaff+GA against tanky compositions or Locket + Randiuns against Assassins. (21-0-9 does more damage, but you lack the income + mana regen from the utility mastery. Your rely too much on snowballing the early game, and you have to fit a Morello or keep the Frost Queen Claim in your build for the mana).

The only complaint i have is the AI on the plants. Her numbers may be low, but (for some reason - i think its due to the plants) her damage is fine. Her CC is great, but telegraphed - it puts some counterplay in her kit. Squishy, yes, but zoning mages tend to be (or used to be). She does have low movespeed, but i dont know if buffing that would change her playstyle much. She isnt going to turn into an engager just with 10 or 20 more movespeed. Her passive is okay - its not the greatest, but not the worst for a support. I would rather have Zyra's passive than Morg's passive.

1999 01 17Jul 6, 20151 votes

zyra's passive blows but she's still a good champion so it doesn't matter

PhifeJul 6, 20151 votes

Her damage is actually believe it or not, really really high. Its just her E is slow and her plants are mental patients and her passive is slow.

DraykowJul 6, 20151 votes

I like playing Zyra. Her movement speed is low, but she has a longer-than-normal attack range.

Her passive feels incredibly underwhelming, maybe just increase the scaling or make it scale more as it levels up. Also her passive takes 2 seconds to activate, maybe scale this down to 1.5 seconds or 1 second?

Her plants sometimes take forever to pick a target if you are not already attacking one, so maybe make them search for a target every .25 seconds until they're affixed on one?

Her E is super powerful and I like it as it is. Increasing the numbers would make Liandry's even more broken on her.

cool165Jul 6, 20151 votes

the only thing i want buffed is her plants they feel worthless are so damn fragile for something that only lasts a couple seconds. increase their damage and health, or just have the health scale with ap.

PaulerwayJul 6, 20151 votes

Plus her mana costs are outrageous

VekknaJul 6, 20151 votes

I've had a lot of success playing Zyra mid and support (until last week's out-of-nowhere losing streak from hell).

The mana issue is a big deal, especially when you're against a sustain pusher (like Malz) or somebody without any resource to manage. I've started going 15/0/15 to get the added movement speed, mana, and regen from the utility tree.

Zyra is also gated heavily by CDR, especially when heading into mid game team fighting. Scaling CDR runes plus the 5% from damage tree gives you a passive 20% over the span of the game.

Another (controversial) option on mana and CDR is to rank W first for the seed CDR and passive CDR. You won't be doing a lot of damage with Q or E until mid game, but your plant damage doesn't scale from Q/E rank at all. In lane, you can safely poke and farm with plants very frequently at a very low mana cost.

This setup also gives you a lot of added safety in having seeds off CD quickly for vision as needed, which is especially good as support.

Since you don't need the CDR from Athene's, you just build tear right off the bat and let your utility tree do the regen for you. Not having to spend thousands of gold early on for CDR and regen lets you rush Guise and Rylai's early, which gives you enough hp to not be an early/mid game insta-kill on sight for mobile assassins.

MissMikasaJul 7, 20151 votes

Sona has 325 MS, but doesn't have the weaknesses as Zyra or as many forms of CC. I still think Zyra needs her plants AI fixed, her snare duration increased, MS increased, and I wouldn't be opposed to more damage on her ult, like after it does initial damage and knocks up, does more damage again (kinda like Morgana, who does initial damage when she presses R, then once they are rooted it does more damage).