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Mobility, Stealth, and CC at Worlds

AmazingGoat··25 votes·4,454 views

In looking at the champions played at World's, one thing that jumped out at me is how valued mobility was. To try to capture this with numbers, I went ahead and classified each champion as having:

(i) High mobility (e.g. having two plus mobility abilities or an ability with a reset) Lee Sin Kha'Zix Yasuo Tristana Fizz Zed Kassadin Riven

(ii) A flexible dash/leap/blink (e.g. non-targeted) Lucian Corki Nidalee Jarvan IV Ahri Caitlyn Vayne Lissandra Vi Ezreal Gragas Graves

(iii) A targeted dash/leap/blink Maokai Irelia Thresh Braum Elise Ziggs (I'm counting this as targeted because he doesn't really have enough mobility to warrant being in the next tier up) Rengar Akali Katarina Pantheon

(iv) A team movement speed buff Orianna Lulu Sona Zilean Jayce Kayle

(v) A self movement speed buff Rammus Singed Blitzcrank Janna Ryze (no one would really consider him high mobility but he's strong for different reasons anyway, and I do think the mobility on his ult helps him a lot).

I put each champion into only one category, with higher categories getting preference.

Champions in the first category were picked 190 times during Worlds, while all champions that did not fall into one of these categories were collectively only picked 165 times total. Of these 165 picks, 25 of them were Rumble, 24 of them were Twitch, 26 of them were Nami, and 12 of them were Morgana.

Further, of the champions who did not fall into one of these categories, the only champions to have a positive win rate were:

Rumble - That ult. Twitch - Has stealth and a movespeed boost in stealth. Morgana - That snare. Evelynn - Played twice; has stealth and a movespeed boost in her kit. Fiddle - Played once; that ult. Swain - Played once.

Further, of these immobile champions who didn't have a positive win rate, for the most part they weren't even close to having one. Kog'Maw came the closest with a win rate of 43%, with Talon not far behind at 42%. After this it drops all the way to Nami at 38%, and it gets truly bleak after that.

It gets even worse than that though, because the categories I've made obviously aren't all equal in terms of mobility. The champions in the movement speed buff categories mostly have negative win rates as well, with some notable exceptions. The only champions in these categories with a positive win rate are:

Orianna - Win rate of 51%, with a large part of her power coming from her ult combined with her utility. Jayce - Win rate of 58%, with acceleration gate being used WAY more for poke than mobility. Janna - Enough said. Ryze - Enough said. Rammus - Played in two games. Singed - Played in two games.

There were 78 games played at Worlds. There were 10 champions played each game, thus there were 780 champion "plays" during worlds. Of these plays, 435 of them, well over over half, were champions with high mobility, a flexible dash/leap/blink or a targeted dash/leap/blink. Thus, on average, in any given match, between five and six of the ten champions in play had at least one dash/leap/blink.

Add in Janna, Ryze, and Mao and it's not hard to figure out why melee champions weren't played, or got destroyed if they were (hi Mundo).

50 Comments

AtheosisX23 votes

Yeah I think mobility has gotten a little out of hand in this game. Increasing cooldowns and/or resource costs are how I would address it but I think Riot thinks it's okay for all low mobility champs to be second class citizens.

Essilyn2 votes

In the competitive scene, mobility and CC and to an extent stealth will always be heavily valued, because teams at those level have the synchronicity to utilize all of it and punish their opponents with it.

Especially at Worlds, where teams can only theory-craft about international opponents until they actually go to the Worlds location to scrim against them. The focus for the most part ends up being on mid game spiking high mobility champions, so they can get to where they need to be fast and end the game before the "winner of the last team fight auto takes the nexus" phase.

It isn't Riot making low mobility champions second class citizens. It's professionals doing that, and Riot doing nothing to help low mobility champions succeed.

Sagee Prime1 votes

That's a horrible way to deal with it. You should give the low mobility champions ways of properly dealing with mobility not punish otherwise pretty well balanced mobile champions.

Ahris1 votes

Yeah I think mobility has gotten a little out of hand in this game. Increasing cooldowns and/or resource costs are how I would address it but I think Riot thinks it's okay for all low mobility champs to be second class citizens.

The thing is most of mobility champs have less damage than champs with mobility. So, if you increase the cool downs of those champs than they also deserve to have higher damage since they will also have limited mobility. Moblility champs come with non toxic way of killing the target. For example ahri has to be fed and land charm to do damage. However, champs like anivia, with one item can dish out monsterous damage while being behind.

AtheosisX2 votes

The thing is most of mobility champs have less damage than champs with mobility. So, if you increase the cool downs of those champs than they also deserve to have higher damage since they will also have limited mobility. Moblility champs come with non toxic way of killing the target. For example ahri has to be fed and land charm to do damage. However, champs like anivia, with one item can dish out monsterous damage while being behind.

That really doesn't seem to be the case much of the time. Fizz, Lucian, and Tristana are high mobility and have tons of damage, and that's just the worst offenders.

Sire Hippington1 votes

The problem is not more in how punoshed low mobillity melees are, which wouldn'T change by nerfing mobillity. The problem is that u NEED the mobillity to get onto a important target as melee agains all the cc, especially slows, that are around in clashes. U also NEED mobillity at toplane, or alot tankiness + cc, otherwise u can't put on any pressure without feeding due jungler ganks.

The Problem is that melees need the mobillity to ever do something, unless they get stronger mechanics to avoid cc. Low ranged adc also need some form of mobillity to function, otherwise long ranged carrys and mages will wreck them.

long things short, mobillity is desperatly needed to overcome ranged disadvantge, MS-buffs get hardcountered by slows and cc in generall, so gapclosers are mandatory to even if ur enemys have a range advantage.

The only option to reduce mobillity creep would be attacking cc-creep(mostly slows/knockbacks) first, so no-gapcloser champs have a chance to become usuefull.

DrCyanide16 votes

Rumble has a self move speed boost on his Scrap Shield. Nami's Passive is a move speed buff.

But yeah, mobility is definitely a highly valued stat. See Flash.

BlazingSalvo2 votes

And Thresh can Q over walls to camps. :^)

Jamnon6 votes

This is a buisness plan. They need champions to make flashy plays for their esports.

Any champion which shuts this down / makes it less fun / de-incentivizes flashy plays (see Cass remake) gets changed.

DaCush8 votes

Huh? Since when were flashy plays only fun by watching esports? I have a lot more fun on a champ that can make flashy plays. Flashy plays are usually more difficult to pull off as well. I really don't mind the mobility. Riot just needs to balance around it.

Feathermane5 votes

The problem with mobility is, no one pays for it with damage. Remember when Kassadin had damage? That's how Lucian is at the moment.

Reazale1 votes

This guy knows... mobility its TOO CHEAP in balancing a kit, champs like zed, fizz, ahri, etc. can and WILL outdmg champs whitout mobility even when missing skillshots (happened to me that ahri missed her charm and her Q and still killed me [i was veigar and i missed my stun , but so she did half of her skills]).

FebruAhri3 votes

how the f did she do more dmg than a veigar with only W and R??

just DFG+R should do 75% of her hp alone..

Gaminon4 votes

Mobility is a huge strength in League, a game that's 90% about positioning. Riot (by their own admission) was a little slow on picking up on that and balancing champs around it. And I still think there are some cases where a champion is overpowered because their mobility adds a ton of extra power to an already strong kit.

That said, don't hate on mobility too hard. Mobility makes for big plays, impressive moments, and high level strategy. If every character was immobile, team fights and skirmishes would be a whole lot more boring and a whole lot less conclusive, especially at the highest levels of play where people are good at escaping when they're low.

chumbler5 votes

Mobility is a huge strength in League, a game that's 90% about positioning. Riot (by their own admission) was a little slow on picking up on that and balancing champs around it. And I still think there are some cases where a champion is overpowered because their mobility adds a ton of extra power to an already strong kit.

That said, don't hate on mobility too hard. Mobility makes for big plays, impressive moments, and high level strategy. If every character was immobile, team fights and skirmishes would be a whole lot more boring and a whole lot less conclusive, especially at the highest levels of play where people are good at escaping when they're low.

Mobility makes for none of those things and actively contributes to making fights less conclusive, but nice try. Easy escapes and mobility creep are literally the worst thing in this game. Riot gives lip service to understanding this, but their actions clearly show otherwise. Whether it's because of indifference or idiocy is up to interpretation.

Vellich0r1 votes

escapes are not the worst thing in the game, nor is mobility creep though it is an issue. there are many issues that are much more severe than mobility.

Orbv3 votes

I'm pretty sure the 2 worst issues in the game are Mobility and CC

Too many champs have Mobility with Damage Too many Offensive Champs have CC.

How do you compete against someone who can move a lot, stop you from moving and kill you?

Sagee Prime1 votes

Champions are normally balanced around several statistics including but not limited to Durability, Utility, Damage, Reliability, Mobility, and Crowd Control. Champions are normally made good at three or more of these and weaker at the others. You'll see this reflected in champion designs when you look at specific champion archetypes(this may not seem to hold true for some unless you consider that a few champions like to overlap with archetypes.

Plus there is the added balancing factor of base values plus scaling. Early game vs late game.

The balancing process is very complex.

Orbv3 votes

Although completely true to everything (reliability is a bit of a stretch..), the other key factors are not cause of alarm during the present time.

Assuming CC cannot be incorporated into Utility, then that only reflects shields/heals/buffs. In that case the majority of statistics use numbers that can be adjusted, base values, in regards to stats, they could be seen as being irrelevant really (if you look at the top 10 highest base value champions, they are not champions who do well. Adversely those with the lowest have really high success). Meanwhile base values of abilities should be incorporated more than present, as many abilities maintain similar damage values across the board per role typically.

Balancing SHOULD be very complex, but the biggest deterrent is that you can't put any real value on the ability to move from point A to point B at will.

Kassadin has seen drastic changes but still sees play. Leblanc lost some of her utility but she still maintains as one of Faker's favorite champions. Ahri lost a lot of her damage a year ago, yet she's still chosen to assassinate. Katarina has absolutely no CC but receives constant stats changes because of her refresh on her Shunpo.

You can change stats A LOT, but when a champion has mobility it actually reduces how important those stats are. Honestly would Mordekaiser or Urgot be where they are if they had a single 425 range dash? Not at all.

Sagee Prime1 votes

Reliability is definitely not a stretch. Although you may not notice it as much. Combo skills are a reliability balance. You don't get the bonus effect from certain skills unless you combo them. Brands stun on Sear for instance, the bonus damage from charm, Soraka's snare, and then you have skillshot projectile speed and other things like spellshield duration. Skills with reliability gaps allow counter play and are a part of balancing a champion although not every champion has them.

CC should probably be part of utility but honestly Utility branches off into 3 parts. Self Utility, Shared Utility, and Crowd Control.

Self utility being self skills/buffs like trist rocket jump, Nidalee Primal Surge, and Sion's soul furnace.

Shared Utility being things like Janna's shield, Nidalee's Primal surge again, and lux's Prismatic barrier.

Crowd Control should be self explanatory.

Didn't realize that post was downvote worthy?

RevyUp2 votes

I'm pretty sure the 2 worst issues in the game are Mobility and CC

Too many champs have Mobility with Damage Too many Offensive Champs have CC.

How do you compete against someone who can move a lot, stop you from moving and kill you?

Seems like all the new champions have been getting knockups and tenacity doesn't work against it

Kuroi861 votes

A game without any mobile champs would rely a lot more on seige and catching people out. Less on out plays and trying to force fights in your teams favor.

High mobility on a damage carry is popular because it means you can juke and rely less on your team for peel. While a more utility oriented carry will need more help from an ally to ensure that no enemies can stick to them without blowing all of their CC on a tank or bruiser.

xJLx MCHammer1 votes

A game without any mobile champs would rely a lot more on seige and catching people out. Less on out plays and trying to force fights in your teams favor.

High mobility on a damage carry is popular because it means you can juke and rely less on your team for peel. While a more utility oriented carry will need more help from an ally to ensure that no enemies can stick to them without blowing all of their CC on a tank or bruiser.

While it's true, it's very counterproductive to give a champion both mobility and damage, while the champion without mobility still has the same damage

Kuroi861 votes

Wouldn't it also be counterproductive to give a champion both utility and damage, while also giving the champion without utility the same damage?

Skoonie1 votes

Not really, since the guy with mobility will always have the advantage of pimping out if a fight doesn't go their way.

Kuroi861 votes

And the guy with utility can drop some CC and walk away.

Skoonie1 votes

Until the guy with mobility uses said mobility to catch up to you.

Kuroi861 votes

Aaaaand CC'd again.

AmazingGoat4 votes

To me I think the biggest risk is creating a system of haves and have-nots. Right now, champions with no mobility feel like second-class citizens absent a unique, powerful ultimate or a very strong overall kit.

AnomalousChimera3 votes

Kassadin should move down to the next category. He does not have two mobility abilities or a mobility ability that resets the cooldown after a kill/assist (or you could adjust the definition).

AmazingGoat2 votes

I had a length comment that my backspace button decided I didn't want to keep, so I will keep it short and simply say that I find it interesting that both (1) top tier competitive play seems to gravitate towards champions with mobility, and (2) Riot seems to be releasing more and more champions with mobility.

On this latter point, of the last twenty champions released, only five don't have some form of dash/leap/blink. These are Vel, Jinx, Quinn (arguably does), Nami, and Syndra.

Earl Eulrich2 votes

In looking at the champions played at World's, one thing that jumped out at me is how valued mobility was. To try to capture this with numbers, I went ahead and classified each champion as having:

Well, I think it´s even easy to find out why this is: most slows are designed to have a 100%uptime for some reasons...so if you don´t have a dash/step/blink whatever you´re not only immobile, but you´re likely permaslowed on top and will never reach anything in a fight. Slows are just too frequent with a too high uptime, keeping immobile Champions off the Fields, while leading to the massive mobility-creep.

AmazingGoat2 votes

Right now there are essentially three tiers of durability: (i) squishies who build pure damage (ADCs, mages, and assassins); (ii) Maokai and Alistar; and (iii) everyone else.

ceaselessphantom2 votes

As true as all this is what is the point of this thread? I am pretty sure everyone knows how much the mobility creep as got out of hand at this point. Though it is true people usually only thing of dashes or blinks when they think of the mobility creep. Poor Ashe even if it is largely her fault.

AmazingGoat1 votes

As true as all this is what is the point of this thread? I am pretty sure everyone knows how much the mobility creep as got out of hand at this point. Though it is true people usually only thing of dashes or blinks when they think of the mobility creep. Poor Ashe even if it is largely her fault.

The point for me was just to highlight trends in the game to try to start a conversation. I don't pretend to have enough knowledge of game mechanics to even say that this is a problem much less propose a solution, but I do think it's interesting and something that I hope to draw attention to so someone who does that knowledge can think about it and decide whether it's healthy for League.

CamaHa1 votes

Well it's been this way since start of S4. U could argue that it began in S3 with "HOLY TRINITY" of ADC AKA Corki, Ez and Graves. Yes, Graves was very popular at some time.

4nth0l0gy2 votes

I have to admit, though, I really like where Graves is at now.

Vellich0r1 votes

i could live with a small buff on his passive, just so it lasts a bit longer.

4nth0l0gy1 votes

You do know that 435 of 780 is only 55% right? I think you're blowing it a little out of proportion. Mobility is strong, for sure, but it's especially strong on the professional scene, where split-second timing is so, so much more valuable than, say, a silver-level solo queue game.

chumbler4 votes

You do know that 435 of 780 is only 55% right? I think you're blowing it a little out of proportion. Mobility is strong, for sure, but it's especially strong on the professional scene, where split-second timing is so, so much more valuable than, say, a silver-level solo queue game.

Mobility creep also makes games boring, degenerate, and terrible, hth.

4nth0l0gy3 votes

That is an opinion, and I would disagree, given the inherent flashiness of heavily mobile champs. "LCS Big Plays" and all of that. I will give you this, it does prevent other champions with lower mobility from seeing pro play, and that is a balance issue. However, taking out high mobility altogether is not a good answer. There are definitely other, alternative answers that allow for all champions to retain their identities and style of play.

Champion Skin1 votes

Brand is an example of this... he will likely never be a good pick in pro play with his lack of mobility... his damage/CC just doesn't make up for it but if his damage did make up for the lack of mobility he might be incredibly broken

chumbler1 votes

Brand is an example of this... he will likely never be a good pick in pro play with his lack of mobility... his damage/CC just doesn't make up for it but if his damage did make up for the lack of mobility he might be incredibly broken

Their solution would no doubt be to put the most ham-fisted, incongruous mobility skill in his kit and call it a day rather than, you know, actually fix the problem.

forgottenfables1 votes

Something along the lines of replacing his Q with an ability called "Realization" with the tooltip being "Brand realizes that he is, in fact, on fire and freaks out gaining a movement speed increase as he tries to put himself out!"

NoMonku1 votes

Mobility is strong in general. Movement for free that comes from abilities just makes map movements so much stronger. This was a reason why Sivir received so much attention during Spring or Summer Season until she got nerfed and/or teams got better at rotating without her. Blinks/jumps are strong because they basically mean you don't need to flash. In general, it isn't the champions faults, its RIOT's fault for not having enough on there. As they've caught onto their mistake somewhat, they should eventually be able to fix it, but until its been fixed, there will still be plenty of champions who are just stronger/consistent.

Smoke Krug1 votes

wow dashes and gap closers are good on champions? thats crazy never new that thanks i make diamond

TeemoHunter13371 votes

you're also forgetting that twitch scales really well into late game and that could also be one reason they picked it.

mi ramfan1 votes

These categories are really strange. Rammus has a self cast movement speed buff on Powerball, Ryze has one on his ult, and Rumble has one on his W, yet Rammus and Ryze are in one category and Rumble is in the "immobile" category?

How do the numbers change with Rumble and Twitch added to the "one movement speed buff" category?

HavelDaRock1 votes

Lets look deeper at these choices, why would pro players choose stealth, mobility and cc?

CC Its pretty obvious, its crowd control, it allows for less ability to react and if you want to counter it, you are putting money into the defense as opposed to damage. Basically, it makes it so you can force your opponent to play a certain way, burn a summoner or ability to get away.

Mobility This is already been slightly touched on but it has to do with positioning, being able to set up the way they want and execute a play. Along with that I think another big thing that links back to why they'd choose cc is that mobility leaves for less reaction time, allowing a team to force the enemy to make a mistake or hasty move. At a pro level mistakes can be be heavily taken advantage of.

Stealth Again, allowing for better positioning and less time to react to changes in the fight or environment.

This season has had a huge stress on vision control and these mechanics are the best counter to it, its the way of giving the other team less information, as well as less time to react to what your team wants to do. In the pro level, a second is all a player needs to execute a big play or escape. These mechanics are used to make the small window of time less and less there or all together non-existent.

MotherChurch1 votes

Just be happy there is no portal key or blinkdagger in this game.

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