Let's talk about spell vamp

Mommy Eve··3 votes·953 views

So today we're going to talk about spell vamp, or rather the lack of spellvamp. Now before you say anything about items, I want you to go look at item sets or go in a custom game and check the 2 item's that most likely come to mind when you think Spellvamp. These items are: Will of the Ancients item 3152 and Hextech Gunblade item 3146 , yes these use to give spell vamp, but sometime I'm not sure when they stopped, as of right now only 1 item actually gives spellvamp, this being Hextech Revolver.

Now you're probably writing "But they heal based on damage dealt" That's great and all but that's not spellvamp, and even if that was acceptable, go look at the amount of items that give true lifesteal, there's 7 legendary items alone, and 2 building items. So my question is: Why is there only 1 spellvamp item in the game that's not even a legendary item? Some people might say the healing on damage dealt still does the job, but as someone who used to build both Will of the Ancients and Hextech Gunblade on Evelynn I can confirm: It's not as good nor does it do the job. And let's not forget Morgana whose passive is literally made useless by this, for those of you who don't know her passive give's her spellvamp based on her level up to 20%. Now while she still gets some benefit from this if she builds enough AP it's still drastically nerfed compared to what it used to be when we actually had spellvamp.

TL;DR: There's 1 spellvamp item and 9 lifesteal items and I'm a salty AP champion main.

12 Comments

EfficientDynamo1 votes

Spell vamp will not be buffed or significantly altered anytime soon. Putting aside the strong arguments against having mages sustain while lobbing artillery, Vlad has broken the mechanic. Unfortunately, Riot will not touch the mechanic until Vlad is reworked (at minimum).

PhantomGG1 votes

{quoted}

Spell vamp will not be buffed or significantly altered anytime soon. Putting aside the strong arguments against having mages sustain while lobbing artillery, Vlad has broken the mechanic. Unfortunately, Riot will not touch the mechanic until Vlad is reworked (at minimum).

Most people actually blame Ryze imagine what he would do if he had it.

Lyndris1 votes

{quoted}

Most people actually blame Ryze imagine what he would do if he had it.

ooohhh that could be fun. also maybe cass?

Bodkins Odds1 votes

Cass is already good with Spellvamp because her E is single target and she spams the hell out of it.

Lyndris1 votes

That is what i was getting at

The Voids Call1 votes

I don't think mages sustaining while lobbing artillery is the problem, if they are doing that chances are they basically at full health.

I'm pretty sure spellvamp just got caught in a situation where riot didn't want to rework or target nerf champions who could abuse it, so rather they just removed it's effectiveness from all champions who might have liked to have some.

Bodkins Odds1 votes

Actually, they're updating Vlad during the mage update. So it's quite possible that Spell Vamp will be buffed.

Sire Hippington1 votes

Technically, WotA and Gunblade give spellvamp, and deaths dance for physical damage. They heal you based on damage done with abillitys, just as spellvamp.

The main problem with spellvamp is that riot keeps the items rather undertuned, and mostly the horrible reduce for aoe spells, makeing it feel bad on most champs as most skills are flagged as aoe. Same problem with the deathfiretouch masterie.

Mommy Eve2 votes

I understand that they heal for abilities, I already talked about how it's not as good as spellvamp was nor does it help Morgana passive. My main problem is the fact that theres literally 8 life-steal items but only 1 actual spellvamp item. It feels very unbalanced IMO when it comes to sustain and just overall feels like AP champions are getting the short end of a stick, however apparently mage's as a whole are getting an update soon so I'll just have to see what that does to help. I just hope it doesn't do something to ruin AP Evelynn.

Sire Hippington1 votes

They work exact the same way as spellvamp, just that they do even more. they are actually soellvamp items. They are added ontop of morganas passive just like spellvamp. There literally is NO difference, besides that wota heals based on damage dealt pre-mitigation, which is far better than the usuall post mitigation stuff, and Gunblade heals off ALL damage, not only of thos abillitys that proc on-spell, so again just from the mechanic it is superior to spellvamp in any way possible. The reason why those items might feel worse than befor is that the numbers are lower, but that has nothing to do with the mechanic, if they still had spellvamp instead with the same numbers as now they would be even worse.

i don't disagree that spellvamp is lacking, but saying hextechrevoler is the only spellvamp item is plain ignorant.

LXII1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Don Pavoni,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=LP0UxYLh,comment-id=000100000000,timestamp=2016-02-24T16:10:37.831+0000)

They work exact the same way as spellvamp, just that they do even more. they are actually soellvamp items. They are added ontop of morganas passive just like spellvamp. There literally is NO difference, besides that wota heals based on damage dealt pre-mitigation, which is far better than the usuall post mitigation stuff, and Gunblade heals off ALL damage, not only of thos abillitys that proc on-spell, so again just from the mechanic it is superior to spellvamp in any way possible. The reason why those items might feel worse than befor is that the numbers are lower, but that has nothing to do with the mechanic, if they still had spellvamp instead with the same numbers as now they would be even worse.

i don't disagree that spellvamp is lacking, but saying hextechrevoler is the only spellvamp item is plain ignorant.

Pretty sure this is accurate. I've been reading your whole argument and trying to see a way where healing based on damage wouldn't be as good as spellvamp, but there just isn't one.

Nekusen1 votes

I think its because AD champs use lifesteal to get more hp while AP build hp directly.

What makes the existence of Steraks Gage as rare as spellvamp.

More from Gameplay