Can I get Riot context as to why Ranger's Trailblazer was removed?

Curling Veigar·Nov 20, 2015·33 votes·3,759 views

The AOE smite helped a lot with weak clearers, and it also was a pretty niche item with some champs building it (fiddlesticks to name one) and removing it in my opinion only makes diversity a bit smaller. I actually messed around in normals (and even ranked on a smurf) playing Veigar jungle and it was only possible due to Trailblazer, and honestly his clear with trailblazer smite + runeglaive is really good. But that's not the point.

anyways, I'm not crying or anything, I just generally want to know why Ranger's was removed specifically. The patch notes state the items removed were "restrictive, incomplete, and not well supported, or some simply weren't worth the effort". It's kind of vague :U

tl;dr why did trailblazer get removed

23 Comments

BluePolarizerNov 20, 201518 votes

Lee Sin and Elise don't need trailblazer to clear.

Curling VeigarNov 20, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Lee Sin and Elise don't need trailblazer to clear.

;( Fiddlesticks

moomeratorNov 20, 20153 votes

fiddle can solo dragon at level 4... he'll survive

A Miss FortuneNov 20, 20156 votes

I mean, he'll be fine if:

-There's no wards in the river -Support doesn't roam -Mid doesn't roam -Jungler doesn't gank from river or even look in the river

KaeblenNov 20, 20155 votes

wut? you don't play bronze?

AbyssphereNov 21, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Lee Sin and Elise don't need trailblazer to clear.

Your joke is... why it was removed. Champs like that didn't need it to be clear and yet often took it anyway to double down on their fast clears and sustain, meaning it provided basically no advantage to the champions with crappy clear.

They got rid of it because it didn't actually do much of anything to close the gap between junglers with crappy clear and junglers with good clear. Either the enemy jungler took a combat summoner and was better at fighting people than you, or the enemy jungler took it and kept their health/clearing advantage.

And before you question it, that's exactly the context Riot gave.

BluePolarizerNov 21, 20151 votes

Riot has given questionable justification before. See, let me put it this way:

Let's rank junglers on a relative clearing scale of 0 to 100, 0 being unable to kill a single camp without dying and 100 being able to full clear without losing even 1 HP at the end.

Eve was something like a 15 while Lee Sin was 70 and Elise was 90. Let's say that Trailblazer makes every jungler clear twice as fast. Well now Eve is a 30 and Lee Sin/Elise are still just 100's since you can't clear better than clearing with no HP loss. The relative gap between them has shrunk from Lee Sin/Elise being 5x better, to merely 3x better.

AbyssphereNov 21, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Riot has given questionable justification before. See, let me put it this way:

Let's rank junglers on a relative clearing scale of 0 to 100, 0 being unable to kill a single camp without dying and 100 being able to full clear without losing even 1 HP at the end.

Eve was something like a 15 while Lee Sin was 70 and Elise was 90. Let's say that Trailblazer makes every jungler clear twice as fast. Well now Eve is a 30 and Lee Sin/Elise are still just 100's since you can't clear better than clearing with no HP loss. The relative gap between them has shrunk from Lee Sin/Elise being 5x better, to merely 3x better.

When I mention Riot being the ones to say those things, it's not to say "This was definitely a good idea". It's just "This is what Riot will tell you and have told you". In a thread asking for Riot's context on removing Trailblazer's, I gave the context Riot will give. Whether or not you disagree with it is something to argue with a Rioter, not me.

moomeratorNov 20, 20158 votes

I think it's because it was being abused by champions like elise, nunu, and diana to make good clears into unholy ones. The new hunters potion helps weak junglers survive (which was trailblazer's intention) but only makes sustain better rather than making clears faster. This means that it can get the champions who need it through the jungle without being abused for speed.

SpinnerMaskNov 20, 20151 votes

This right here is the only reason I can see it being removed for that was actually good. Even though I often got it... It was my favorite jungle upgrade, i got it when ever i did sejuani or leona jungle.

Weasel KenseiNov 21, 20151 votes

{quoted}

I think it's because it was being abused by champions like elise, nunu, and diana to make good clears into unholy ones. The new hunters potion helps weak junglers survive (which was trailblazer's intention) but only makes sustain better rather than making clears faster. This means that it can get the champions who need it through the jungle without being abused for speed.

Yes, I actualy liked using it on Udry. If smite was up, and I had a item 3074 with Devourer, Id walk up to a camp and delete it in 2 seconds flat mid game with Tiger stance and Trailblazer.

Early game camp stun plus bear stance, with turtle meant low damage too. It was fast and ganktastic times... now Udry has more painful clears...

SaltyKrackaNov 20, 20153 votes

Nobody ever actually kept it, it was just a crutch for weak junglers.

Troy242621Nov 20, 201512 votes

{quoted}

Nobody ever actually kept it, it was just a crutch for weak junglers.

Rengar Nocturne Evelynn Rammus any jungler with sustain issues, any jungler with slow clear speeds and any offpick jungler was likely to make use of it.

SoMNiaNov 21, 20154 votes

You just restated exactly the same thing, without the acerbic tone: "weak junglers".

SukishooNov 21, 20151 votes

Evelynn ?!! I never used it on her. If you know how to kite around she did fine without it.

ADepressedLeonaNov 21, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Nobody ever actually kept it, it was just a crutch for weak junglers.

Sejuani would like a few words with you.

BHI2u9UxWANov 20, 20151 votes

FowusNov 20, 20151 votes

I have problems with my khazix clear now :(

PartholonianNov 21, 20151 votes

Then they should buff Kha'zix (which in fact they are doing), not make him dependent on a jungle item that locks him out of the champion smites and providing vision.

All junglers should get the same level of monster-killing power baseline and choose how they want to contribute to ganks/fights/utility; then they should be adjusted as champions so that the level of monster-killing power they get from the standard jungle items is enough for them to clear at a reasonable pace and health loss.

PartholonianNov 20, 20151 votes

I think they didn't like the idea of a tradeoff between clearing ability and fighting ability. Either your champion is so bad at clearing that they can't clear without Trailblazer, in which case they're not really a viable jungler at all, or they can pick a champion smite and contribute more to ganks and fights.

Fighting ability vs. utility is a more interesting tradeoff.

TJFishNov 21, 20151 votes

Malphite Says "wtf RITO!" in the Jungle.

SoMNiaNov 21, 20151 votes

It stopped certain junglers from taking "real" enhanced Smites by being mandatory for their clears and/or sustain. Now, this functionality has been moved into the Hunter's Talisman (this is what showed up under player builds in match history before 5.22 went live, if you built a Trailblazer) and Hunter's Potion. The only remaining enhanced Smites are for use against champions, and not needing Trailblazer frees champions to take either of these, or the new Tracker's Knife. The AoE jungle clearing power and sustain being folded into the base jungle item means that everyone has access to it, regardless of which Smite (or jungle Sightstone) they'd rather have.