@meddler Can we make olaf fun again?
This may sound like an opinion piece but, based off of riots own design philosophies i would like to think that olaf is objectively more fun (for the player using) prior to his rework. I think this is largely in part because of 2 reasons
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you could go ham in teamfights trample everyone and everything and be rewarded for it -Obviously this isnt healthy for the game and had to be changed in the rework and i think was largely successful in doing (albeit robbing olaf of an endgame fantasy in the process) so im ok with this going.
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the Q mechanics and how it contributes to the burden on the olaf player especially considering the w change to attack speed -Q is more clunky and mechanically challenging for less reward than before as well as lacking clarity. Currently when you throw an axe at an enemy perpendicular to there escape route you should be throwing at there feet however in every single other use throwing the axe past the enemy will grant you a larger slow reward and is often optimal. Basically this is less fun because it removes why axes felt so special. perfectly spacing your axes on the tip of your opponents hitbox for earliest pickup convenience as well as the current extra clicking to deal with the minimum throw distance adds alot more input required from the olaf player with less reward than post rework while adding no healthy features to the axe throw playpatter. ITS STILL A PERMA SLOW and only stopped axes from being thrown at feet for fringe abuse cases of olafs axe reset (which is a good thing that its gone but there were other means of getting rid of that.
-combined with the minimum throw distance and the extra clicking orb walking the constant animation interruptions increased by the large amount of attack speed he gained on his w olaf has to be constantly canceling his attack animations stopping his movement with attacks e and q and still be expected to pick up the axe within its minimum throw distance all for less damage when compared to prerework olaf. its just not fun and adds no depth to olafs play. Morrello has a bunch of statements on how extra mechanics does not add depth to characters, options do.
I think proceeding you need to revert some of the work the rioter who will not be named did.....
lets talk about this meddler or ghostcrawler or somebody please. I think the community needs to have some input on this
needs significant improvements to his gameplay, but if he does receive changes, I think they should go in the complete opposite direction of his early state. Back when he was wrecking faces in Season 2, Olaf felt powerful because he could deal increasingly larger amounts of damage as he built tanky, and past a certain point he could do whatever he wanted without the enemy team being able to do much to stop him. Unfortunately, that was also a big problem, since his very presence limited the enemy team's options (dealing with him head-on was difficult because he could out-duel most people and resist crowd control, letting him farm was bad because he could easily get out of control with a couple of items). Another big issue with him, which still persists even now, is that he's a ball of stats, and contributes little that is truly unique to him besides his ult. He has literally seven different stat boosts on his kit, and the end result is he doesn't really step as much out of the typical tanky DPS bruiser fare as he could. I would personally take out as many of his steroids as possible and try to give him something that makes him stand out (i.e. "This is what Olaf brings to the table that nobody else can", which would likely rely on his ult), while staying true to his identity as a berserker.