Taliyah - Rock Surfing/Worked Ground Buff/Rework suggestion (long)

Hi, in this post i would like to talk about Taliyah´s passive rock surfing, why i think its too situational and what could be done to improve it. Also some QoL buffs and changes. It will be practically a rework. Sorry in advance for the wall of text but i hope it will be an interesting read for all.

I think taliyah is a pretty cool champ, with an interesting concept, but that has irregular results in her performance because some issues that a lot of people have talked about already but ill comment on it anyways. IMO her damage is ok (to an extend, more on that later) but as a control/utility mage she is a tad behind. part of it is because she has some weird mechanics in her skill and the interaction with them is not well defined. Also that her passive is simply not good enought.

The changes i suggest are mostly utility changes around her passive, skills and above all, worked ground, making it the focal point around Taliyah´s gameplay. Notice im not touching her AP ratios because im oriented to utility changes in this post. Ok, Lets begin:

First of all, i would suggest a mana cost reduction across the board for her. Right now she is incredibly mana intense..this limits her A LOT.

Worked Ground (WG): This mechanic is weird , because this acts as almost a debuff on taliyah instead of something that could and should be useful or interactive to her gameplay in someway. Taliyah zones herself practically, when using a threaded volley skill and worked ground is proc, because her Q weakens considerably and enemies know when she is not a treat around her worked ground. The worked ground last a lot and until that time, her safest poke is nerfed. Yes you can move and cast it from another side but soon you will find urself surrounded by worked ground and unable to cast ur full poke. The bonus speed it gives is not noticeable enought to be relevant when it matters ( ie. getting closed down by a melee, you die anyways if you fluff your E).

Suggestion: Rework WG , make it Taliyah´s standard passive , and send rock surfing to her ultimate as a passive. (More on that in the ultimate section). Rework: Instead of being how it currently is, make worked ground interact with every skill of taliyah, making it a zone where she can make her presence felt and to make the enemy wary of the area she is working. My idea is to make every skill of taliyah be able to work the ground, and once worked, the skill used in that area will have a slight change in favor of Taliyah (more on this on skills). The speedbuff on worked ground remains on and scales of levels (1-18) instead of her Q level.

Q- Threaded Volley: (TV): Currently, it fires the full 5 stones on normal soil, works the grounnd and slings one stone on worked ground with less mana consumption. I suggest a rework. Rework: TV on normal soil will fire 3 stones, working the ground and having low mana consumption. When TV is used again on **worked ground **, it will fire the 5 pellets instead of 3, but with a higher mana cost. My logic is that because the soil is worked already, it will become easier for Taliyah to pick up the broken stones, resulting in more pellets thrown. This will give her power when standing on WG but at the expense of burning her mana if used irresponsibly. Also, this will balance the damage it does because right now...going from 5 volleys to only 1 on worked ground is overnerf for her. The interval between the last 3 volleys should be lessened a bit because right now is pretty hard to connect them all against any sentient enemy.

W- Seismic Shove(SS) : This skill would remain mostly intact, but the difference would be that when casted on worked ground (the cursor being on the WG), it will have a slightly wider AOE, making it possible to get more enemies propelled. Also, If Taliyah is on top of a WG soil, ** SS** range will be increased a bit, making her able to catch unaware enemies. IN summary, when taliyah is on WG, she gets more range on the skill. On top of that, If the skill is poped on top of a WG, its AOE is slightly larger. If the place where the skill pop is not worked, the skill will work the ground.

Last but not least...remove the "mute" debuff on Taliyah when casting this skill. Is very annoying to have to wait for it to be casted, to be able to do other skill.

E - Unraveled Earth (UE):: Lower its mana cost a little, as i think its too mana intensive for Taliyah. This skill remains practically the same... but changes a little with WGs interaction. The change would be that when an enemy is standing on worked ground, and is hit by the initial part of the move (the cast), they will get rooted by 0.75 seconds. Right now, the skill doesnt impede dashers and blinkers to get on Taliyah´s face and burst her down. This option will let her have a small window to act if the enemy is caught offguard on** WG.**. if they are not caught on WG while the cast is done..they will dash thru it and pop the explosions as usual.

R - Weavers Wall (WV):

Active: Taliyah will cast the wall like she always does. You can choose to ride on it or simply cast it. The ground where the wall passes will be worked (WG) at both sides of the wall. **At the end of the skill duration, the wall will break causing damage to any enemy close to it (same dmg as UE´s second phase).**

Passive: Rock surfing:: As it is right now , this passive is kind of situational and weak because of the requirements to proc it. You must be near a wall for some secs and also it has a cooldown when on battle.

_Rework: Im including this skill as a passive of her ultimate. When unlocking her R at lvl 6, Taliyah will be able to rock surf again. This time, on top of being able to surf near walls and towers, she will be able to surf also on Worked ground.. making her utilize her passive at its max. You could leave trails of WG and use it later as escape routes if things go south on battle and you are far from a wall. This skill will be able to be used in battle as long as you are near a wall or on WG, but casting a skill or getting hit will make you cancel the move. The skill will have 2 secs cooldown once the animaton is cancelled, for it to be procsed again.

Also, every skill slotted on her ultimate, will make her rock surfing more resilent. What this means?, it means that at lvl 1 ult WV , she will be able to start rock surfing even when being hit during one second after the skill animation started...and at lvl 3 she will be able to surft without it being cancelled by 1.75 secs after the animation started.

In other words, as long as she is near a wall or on WG, she will be able to ride the rock without being interrupted by 1.75 secs(lvl 3 ult) after the skill animation started. After 2 secs, getting hit by any source of dmg (autos, skills, multihit skills like morgana´s W or poison in general), will cancel the skill AND will increase the "resilent" cooldown to 6 seconds before it can be applied again to rock surfing. This way, if you are caught in rocksurfing and hit enought to be interrupted, you will have to find another way of getting out of danger until 6 secs have passed to be able to start surfing again protected._

Thanks for the read and ill wait for your feedback :)