Yi's Doublestrike passive interaction with Guinsoo is unhealthy and needs to go.

Jobriq··33 votes·12,608 views

Everyone's talking about Yi+Taric as the new Yi+Kayle cheese. I think Master Yi will never be a healthy champion with the current Guinsoo's Rageblade with the way his passive currently works. The second hit of his passive counts as the first hit towards the next double strike, and since his passive counter is considered on-hit, this means with a fully stacked guinsoo, he'll be double-striking every other attack. So in 4 attacks, he'll have 6 hits, meaning with guinsoo he applies on-hit affects 9 times. Any other champion will apply on-hits only 6 times in 4 attacks with guinsoo. In other words, Master Yi is doing 50% more on-hits.

That's his E's true damage, Bloodrazor's 4% max health as physical damage, Guinsoo's own on-hit (which imo is overtuned. it's 5=10% bonus AD and 5=10% AP, but since each guinsoo stack gives additional bonus AD/AP this at 6 stacks it's 12.4% bonus AD and 12.4 AP), if Taric buys ardent censer then there's 5-20 extra magic damage on-hit, and if you haven't already forfeited, Yi will be getting Botrk so that 8% current health on-hit.

Guinsoo is pretty much the reason Kog'maw's W was nerfed and more recently Varus' W on-hit. The "extra on-hit" passive was introduced way back in like S5 on Sated Devourer and it's been a balance nightmare ever since. I think it's time for Riot to get rid of it so champions can have innate on-hits that aren't nerfed to hell.

If not they should at least remove the guinsoo feedback loop with Yi's doublestrike.

They could change it so the on-hits applied by doublestrike's second hit do half damage (except Yi's E since it's true damage). It would be a smaller nerf than he needs right now but it would at least be something.

53 Comments

Morgy Morgy11 votes

i just wish sated devourer would completely leave the game already. all they did was just put it on guinsoos. it's fucking retarded. there's a reason there was such an uproar with sated devourer. rather than removing it completely, they just put it on another item (an item that is just as fucking cheap and requires no farming jungle creeps) and the same champs are doing the same shit, moreso in fact with the on hit magic damage it grants.

Z3Sleeper2 votes

It’s a cool concept i think the numbers is all that needs tuning. If Guinsoo’s phantom hits did 50% on-hit damage it wouldn’t be anywhere near as ridiculous while still being a strong item on on-hit users.

LordGeovanni1 votes

Guinsoo's itself doesnt need More fine tuneing beside removing the % ad and ap buff they put on it for no reason. The double hit passive is fine Just that item 3153 's % current hp vale is too high itself. Id like to see it quartered but halved is also good.

Z3Sleeper2 votes

They made Urgot W deal 30% on-hit damage and he isn’t broken with on-hits cuz of it. Do something similar to Guinsoo and the on-hits won’t be ridiculous.

LordGeovanni1 votes

again although that may be easier for champions like kog maw that would Dumpster it on the original Guinsoo's user (not like changing it from its effects at 50% hp didnt hit him hard enough) like Jax. Again In my opinion not just Blade of the Ruined King but Nearly every instance of % hp damage in the game is too high. Im fine with Urgots W doing full damage if riot ever actually nerfs crits and on hits (and Urgots shot gun knees do too much damage to people who build armor with or without black cleaver built) Juggernauts should be fighting squishes not ripping tanks they are supposed to be good versus tanks but not make them useless because armor pen magic pen and % damage like riot likes to give everyone.

Z3Sleeper1 votes

A juggernaut attacking a tank is a juggernaut that's not attacking a squishy. That's the trade-off.

Juggernaut's are limited by target access but in return they are able to kill any target they can reach. That's the intent of the class.

LordGeovanni1 votes

This is not a matter of what they can reach but rather of what they want to attack.

Zane Zephyr5 votes

The reason sated got removed from the jungle because all it did was cause people to jungle and do nothing but farm until it was fully stacked

Red Wreckage4 votes

and recently we had people crying all over teh place about how strong early game junglers are camping their lanes at 3 minutes.

and we got new scuttle and jg camp exp changes. to counter early ganks.

so first riot removed jg farming style of gameplay, that lead to early gankers coming up on top, and now they are trying to nerf it again. it seems they/players themself don't know wtf they want

Madsin251 votes

What?

How can you even blame the players? that is actually sickening. Players will abuse what is in the game and it is RIOTS JOB to design and make it fun, not the players.

Zane Zephyr1 votes

Just because something is popular doesn't mean it's "abuse"

Like with the case of sated, it resulted in the game being either a 5v4 or a 4v4 until the jungler(s) stacked their devourer, and when they did they either became unstoppable or useless because their team got behind partially because they never ganked and the entire thing was just unfun for one team because they were essentially handicapped. It was really feast or famine and although I enjoyed it, it wasn't really too healthy for the game in general

AirKingNeo2 votes

except Sated Devourer was broken when old rageblade was in play, so now you just have a 'Devourer'.

WukongMain5 votes

you just have to crowd control him and he is useless---change my mind

KVbqbFsC8e5 votes

In a perfect world, sure. But its not always possible to CC Yi especially if its one who knows how to use his Alpha strike. As far as the Taric + Yi cheese, there is no counterplay other than picking Yi/Taric when you see the enemy team first pick either of them.

Rathar Dashing2 votes

You could also ban them. Or maybe Kindred ult would work against it, might have to try that out.

Pika Fox4 votes

Taric ult takes time to use before it procs, so if you see it coming down you can hard disengage with a disengage champ like janna or poppy or the like. Then youre good for like 100+s. Its not like Yi can just run in THEN taric ults.

Jobriq6 votes

[{quoted}](name=Pika Fox,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=LQqyl1o0,comment-id=000100000001,timestamp=2018-05-30T01:15:12.485+0000)

Taric ult takes time to use before it procs, so if you see it coming down you can hard disengage with a disengage champ like janna or poppy or the like. Then youre good for like 100+s. Its not like Yi can just run in THEN taric ults.

Tell that to the challengers in China that are losing to taric/yi

Red Wreckage5 votes

I thought challengers would know to pick cc heavy comp if Yi is meta. But its chinese challengers

Jerry SeinfeId2 votes

n a perfect world, sure. But its not always possible to CC Yi especially if its one who knows how to use his Alpha strike.

i mean you still have like a 50% chance to hit him while he's in alpha.

LordGeovanni1 votes

Yet people will blame tanks for cc when CC doesnt kill anyone damage does cc stalls for time. If you have a problem have a problem with the fact that a bunch of damage is done to you while you are cced.

Dead flag blues4 votes

{quoted}

you just have to crowd control him and he is useless---change my mind

I'm ok with an hyper carry "hyper carrying" a game by getting super fed early game. I'm not ok having a 0/4 MasterYi getting item 1419 item 3124 and killing me in 0.000000000000001sec with no counterplay

KZ Engel3 votes

that's only when he has guinsoo and conq already fully stacked. jump him between waves while he's split pushing and he's fucked

AirKingNeo1 votes

Great exaggeration. Fitting for the boards.

Rysophage4 votes

you just described every champion in the game. that isnt counterplay.

5050BS4 votes

Yep

But Riot does not make good choices so they will nerf Taric not Yi or Rageblade.

Jobriq3 votes

{quoted}

Yep

But Riot does not make good choices so they will nerf Taric not Yi or Rageblade.

I feel like Taric could use a mini-rework to make his Q less gimmicky with the way it's charges and mana costs work, but he definitely doesn't need a nerf.

OatheSworn1 votes

{quoted}

he definitely doesn't need a nerf.

Taric presses a single button and in 3 seconds allows his team to win any team fight guaranteed.

Riighhhtt....

DracosKasu2 votes

The reason is because that Taric doesnt even need item to work well overall which why the cheese work, he will still be tanky even if he give all is mid CS. On the other hand if Yi cant get all the early CS that he gain because of the cheese, he will not be as oppressive.

ModWulf Helhammer4 votes

So, in my opinion, the problem isn’t inherently the double on-hit strike.

The problem is Guinsoo’s stacking damage.

For most of its life, Devourer was only a problem for low elos, people that didn’t know how to stop a Yi. It was a bit of magic damage, with the big ticket being the double strike, offset by the farming time required.

It wasn’t until Season 6, where we got the updated Rageblade with stacking damage in an AoE and Titanic Hydra that the problems started. This was the beginning of the super damaging bruisers that could outtank your entire team’s damage output. Why? Well, because the only damage item they required was Rageblade, as the AoE and stacking stats combined with Devourers passive made them bring insane levels of damage. Combine it with the cleave on Titanic Hydra, they had more then enough to wipe a whole team, and could then build straight tank and HP afterwards (which also made their Hydra even stronger). It got to a point where champs like Olaf were building Rageblade, because it was just that stupid (oh, this also broke Kog’Maw. Triple on-hit mixed damage hitting in an AoE, with 5 AS. That’s balanced).

So Riot realizes this, and changes Rageblade to remove the AoE effect, instead giving it stacking AD, AP, and AS, but with Devourer removed as well, they decided to move the double strike to it. It stays under the radar for a while, until on-hit ADCs make a resurgence (I believe this might have come with some buffs to the item either in stats or gold cost. Not at my PC so I don’t have access to the stats). They run rampant for a while, until Riot realizes nerfing them individually isn’t fixing anything, and hits the item, changing the way the stats work. This didn’t really change anything.

So what’s the central feature here, in every single balance issue instance?

The stacking damage.

The only people regularly using Rageblade are ones who can stack it fast, and itself allows it to stack faster by stacking AS. This makes the users of it not the slow buildup the item is supposed to represent, but a slightly-slower-than-instant nuke, with mixed damage that can’t be easily itemized against. The big ticket feature of Devourer isn’t even the highlight of Rageblade. It’s just a little cherry on top that makes them a bit stronger relatively compared to the immense power the stacking stats does.

Red Wreckage4 votes

All the problems associated with Yi are caused by:

trash wood elo players, who can't play against even trash tier champs like Yi.

Rysophage4 votes

Cowsep is in challenger in multiple reigons as a yi one-trick.

Sdars2 votes

Hm no?

He's hardstuck D2/D3 in Philippines. lol

Red Wreckage2 votes

being a challenger has very less to do with what champion are you playing. overall game knowledge and champion's weakness/strenghts/decision making is what matters. There are probably one tricks of every champion is high elos. Does not make the champion OP in any way.

Also Cowsep was high elo before sated/guinsoo days I think.

AirKingNeo1 votes

congrats? Aatrox can be played into Masters by Hashinshin but Aatrox still sucks.

Salson4 votes

Yi's kit is unhealthy and he needs a mini-rework like Xin, Ahri and Rek'Sai got.

La Bello3 votes

everything about Yi's entire kit needs to go

passive doesnt really have counterplay. It just boost damage occasionally (unlike Lucian who actually gets his gameplay ENHANCED from his passive because the player has full control over when it goes off). now in lane this passive might introduce a interesting trade pattern but when is Yi EVER played in lane?

Q is point n click. not a lot you can do about that. Yi however can use this ability to outplay YOU! so yeah...great fun.

W only has counterplay if you have a CC in your kit that stops it so champions like Gangplank/Illaoi/Jhin for instance cant really stop him from healing due to only having soft CC's.

E is just a steroid. no real way to play against this except "loool just dont let him hit u 4Head"

R is just a steroid. no real way to play against this except "loool just dont let him hit u 4Head" (this is pretty hard to do when he has a MS steroid AND gapcloser as mentioned before)

Yi needs a complete gameplay overhaul that makes his kit more interesting to interact with and less feast or famine statcheck cancer. All the arguments like "just CC him lol" or "just keep him from farming" and "just focus him as a team when he goes in" are some of the most half-assed bogus arguments ever and are TERRIBLE examples of the sort of counterplay you ever want players to resort to using."Just CC him" for instance is a wack ass argument because 1. not EVERY champ has hard CC in their kit 2.getting CC'd to death is always extremely unfun for one party just look atMalzahar no way anyone can possibly think revoking your opponents ability to even play the game until they're grey screened is healthy 3. It creates extremely binary engagements where you either have CC and are all but guaranteed to win OR he has a way to deny your CC and beat you anyways.

"Just camp him in his jungle" for instance implies that you literally just dedicate your entire game to camping this guy and making his life a living hell so he cant ever reach the powerspikes needed to properly participate in the game. This argument more of less is "Just dont let him play the game". Because essentially this is what you are doing.

the potential to make a visually flashy speedster swordsman is totally there. Riot just has to look for the right inspirations! Yi is probably number one on my list for Visually fine champs in dire need of a Gameplay update.

https://youtu.be/jwHWEkqJ4Bc?t=158

Fourth Shot IV3 votes

the entire champ is unhealthy , but yes this is the most busted thing in the game guinsoo plus that passive

AR URF3 votes

so many people defending yi when he's way more of a pain to deal with than yasuo. Don't forget yi is played as a jungler so it's even worse.

Aekami2 votes

Yi+ Kayle never was a things to begin with, merely two high-elo players smurfing who picked a hard-snowballing champion and a hard-peeling champion. It just so happened that videos were made about it and it became popular, but it isn't a "godlike broken synergy". My point is, two challengers smurfing will have the same win ratio. They are smurfs. This won't work at whatever elo you're at.

Also about the main post, what is actually unhealthy and needs to go is the current guinsoo's passive. It is very difficult to balance around and generally bad for the health of the game. Remember when Kog Maw had a 5.0 AS max ? Riot undid that because it put too much strain on the on-hit items overall. The phantom hit passive puts a similar strain on balance. Which is why it was move from the Jungle item to an hybrid item that would be akward to build on most champions. That alone should make you question just how unhealthy this passive is, if you need to place it on an item that next to no champion would want if that passive wasn't there.

Another thing is that there is the fact it makes fed champions snowballing extremely hard as there is not much itemization available to whoever would like to buy defensive items against an on-hit build asides from Thornmail which indirectly is good due to its passive proq'ing often, but no thornmail will save you. On-hit builds generally have both flat-damages (wit's end, guinsoo's base on-hit dmg) and %health damages (Bloodrazor, Botrk) allowing to kill quickly squishies and tanks alike.

A last thing I'd like to point out is that very few champions actually naturally build this as a core item (Yi, Kayle, Varus, Kai'sa*) and it would be both healthier and simpler to remove that passive from the game, and introduce a better item/passive.

*No, Jax should not build guinsoo as a core item, only in very specific situations.

The Space Cowboy2 votes

So obvious yet nobody will change it.

Radiant Wukong1 votes

item 1419 item 3153 item 3046 item 3124 on any AS jglr is annoying, but Yi and Jax especially. Add Conqueror if they're going to be split pushing or Lethal Tempo for cleaning up team fights.

KZ Engel4 votes

[{quoted}](name=Radiant Wukong,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=LQqyl1o0,comment-id=000b,timestamp=2018-05-30T15:53:24.355+0000)

item 1419 item 3153 item 3046 item 3124 on any AS jglr is annoying, but Yi and Jax especially. Add Conqueror if they're going to be split pushing or Lethal Tempo for cleaning up team fights.

jax needs tank stats and never takes lethal tempo

yi gets either pd OR bork when he's going guinsoo

AirKingNeo1 votes

Yi can get both and both is good.

But Yi is statistically not good. Sub 50 winrate, sub 5 pickrate.

KZ Engel1 votes

it's the only thing making him viable rn lmao

Scuffproof1 votes

I've always said this, Yi needs to be weaker in terms of damage and gain more survivability to compensate for that. He is the prime example of a feast or famine champion either going full Pentakill mode without the enemy team being able to do anything or being useless and dying instantly. They need to remove damage from his E and make his W more reliable in teamfights. The fact that CC is able remove Yi's only option of survivability makes him a really inconsistent meme-tier champion.

Mokiller51 votes

In all honesty I am perfectly fine with on hit yi getting a nerf. as long as they bring back full reset Q yi like how he was in season 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQAlqQxvlu8 That first insta reset should have made your jaw drop!

Man those were the days. the exhilarating fast paced action of yi's alphas was amazing.

PB4UAME1 votes

Every single person back then absolutely hated Yi and AP Yi should never-a-fucking-gain see the light of day, ever. PERIOD. Absolutely FUCK that SHIT There is a goddamn reason he very specifically can no none of those things anymore.

"Oh wow I get free pentakills for doing over 2k damage per champ, and then instantly refreshing this on assists or kills"
"Oh wait, did I mention I'm invulnerable, untargetable and get free targeted gapclosers each time too, and the strongest damage reduction ability in the game that also heals back my entire health bar 4 times during a full channel just incase I actually have to wait for cooldowns for a second or two like every other champion in the game hehe xD"

Mokiller52 votes

I am guessing you were on the other end of my ap yi shinanigens LMFAO!, stay salty my friend! P.S: Ap yi 4 Lyfe!!!

AirKingNeo1 votes

Unhealthy? How is a basic damage boost unhealthy? Unhealthy things are point and click 2.25 second effective stuns because you don't get to do anything. Damage is just damage.

Also, Yi is still below 50% winrate and blew 5% pickrate in Diamond+. He isn't an issue.

Meep Man1 votes

I disagree. Every few champions has an item that was a "match made in heaven."

Brand and item 3151 Singed and item 3116 Yorick and item 3512 Darius and item 3071 Rammus and item 3075 Chogath and item 3800

and... MasterYi and item 3124

These interactions always need to have an eye kept on them, but just having them is not unhealthy. If Yi gets this interaction removed, we might as well just do the same for all these other guys that so called "abuse" these items.

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