Skarner Rework idea revival

Shahamut··2 votes·463 views

Had some decent feedback on this several months back, thought I would revive it and see if people still like this idea. Regardless, I still feel like Skarner needs reworked, and can't wait for RIOT to get rid of those spires.

Passive: Crystal Energy- Skarner's resource is Crystal Energy. As Skarner engrosses himself in combat, he gathers Crystal Energy which fuels his ferocious tearing of limbs. Max 100 Crystal Energy. For every 2 crystal energy Skarner has, he gains 1% increased attack speed. Skarner gains 1 point of crystal energy per auto attack on non-champions and 3 per auto attack on Champions.

(Q) Crystal Slash: Skarner Lashes out at all targets around him dealing /25/30/35/40/45% AD physical damage. As long as Skarner has at least 1 point of Crystal Energy stored, this attack deals additional magic damage equal to the physical damage it deals. The cooldown of this ability is reduced by .5 seconds per auto attack (double vs champions) and gather's crystal energy for each enemy hit. (1 per non-champion, 3 per champion, does not function on structures) At rank 5, the amount of Crystal Energy he gains from auto attacks doubles. (2 on non-champions, and 6 on champions.)

(W) Crystal Exoskeleton: Skarner's armor is powered by his crystal energy and he can consume a portion of his energy to supercharge his body, gaining movement speed and healing wounds. Passive: Skarner gains 1% increased Armor and Magic Resist for every 5 crystal energy he currently has. Active: Skarner consumes 20 Crystal Energy to gain a decaying movement speed buff over 5 seconds, starting at 35/40/45/50/55% and decaying to 15/20/25/30/35%. During this time he regenerates 1/2/3/4/5% of his missing health per second.

(E) Fracture: Skarner consumes 30 Crystal Energy to blast a beam that passes through targets, dealing magic damage equal to 80/120/160/200/240(+30% AP), slowing them by 40/45/50/55/60% for 2.5 seconds and filling their body with energy for 5 seconds. If Skarner manages to auto attack a target charged with energy, he stuns them for 1 second and recovers an additional 1/2/3/4/5 crystal energy and reduces the cooldown of this ability by 1 second.

(R) Crystal Stinger Passive: Every 5/4/3 strikes, Skarner uses his tail to inflict a poison on his target that deals 1/2/3% current health magic damage per second and slows their attack speed by 10/20/30% for 2 seconds. Multiple instances simply reset the duration. The tail attack does not generate Crystal Energy.

Active (Impale)- Skarner roots his target for .25 seconds before striking down with his tail, dealing 100% AD Physical damage plus 100/125/150(+50%AP) magic damage, suppressing the target for 1.75 seconds. While they are suppressed, Skarner instantly gains Crystal Energy (10/20/30) and can drag his opponent around. At the end of the duration, they take 100/125/150(+50% AP) magic damage.

3 Comments

OceanicEyes1 votes

Think the ideas are neat, not trying to be rude here, but this seems really overloaded. Extended fights give him bonus offensive stats (attack speed, Q dealing magic damage equal to Q physical damage, R passively giving on hit % health damage and slows), W passive let's him get even more free stats in extended fights, and this would make him basically free to spam abilities (no mana, and energy and cooldowns are returned for using the abilities which cost energy in the first place).

I prefer giving him shields to mitigate damage rather than sustain tools, so not a fan of removing the W shield to give regen. That and an instant speed buff (especially with the kit your proposing) would be pretty oppressive to deal with, so I'd much rather we keep Skarner's speed ramp up on W as it makes Skarner have to decide on shielding earlier and potentially wasting some duration in order to reach a target with the speed.

Another problem I see is he gets all of these free stats for using abilities, meaning after getting his first leash in jungle, he'll basically be able to bulldoze his jungle. That, and giving him energy makes helps him lane by avoiding the problem of him going oom in lane, yet requires him to perform well in melee matchups, meaning that against certain matchups top lane Skarner wouldn't even get enough energy to W or E without getting harassed to hell.

Not a huge fan of the spires myself, but giving Skarner 3 passives seems like a bad call to me.

Again, not trying to be rude, just don't think these changes would be the best idea. Honestly, I was happy with his pervious iteration (after removing the Q slow). The crystalizing venom passive worked well enough, and let Skarner decide between stunning and dealing more damage with his hard cc ult.

Of course, I'm biased and prefer tanky Warden Skarner, but these are just my thoughts.

Shahamut1 votes

I appreciate the thoughtful reply:-) I will reply in kind when I'm not at work.

Shahamut1 votes

Ok, so for starters, I am definitely a fan of pre-juggernaut skarner. It was my favorite version thus far.

As far as the overall theme of the rework, Skarner (at least for me) was supposed to be good at extended fights. So the idea of him getting stronger and scarier the longer the fight went on was intentional.

3 passives isn't really that big of a deal when you think about it. His innate gives him attack speed as he remains in combat, and his W just adds to that passive giving him defense. Using his W or E will trade their benefits for energy, meaning he loses some combat stats when he spams skills. The Ultimate passive I tacked on mostly because he has a big scary stinger and rarely uses it. Thought it would be cool if the scorpion used his tail more. I can think of plenty of champs with more passives and or just straight combat stat buffing so I don't think I over did it in that department. The sting doesn't slow their movement speed, just attack speed, which means it is good vs things like Udyr/Yi, but not so much vs things like Renekton/Riven. % hp dmg is current health, and is magic damage, meaning its more impactful at the very beginning of the fight, and less so later on, its also relatively low amount, mitigated by resist, and at later levels every 3 strikes. I really don't think Im breaking anything here, but the nice thing is the kit has plenty of levers with which to balance him.

Skarner's Q in my kit has less overall damage potential than live since it lacks any AP scaling. (its otherwise identical) but becomes an important skill for him to max since it helps him generate his energy, making Q (not E) his bread and butter max this first skill.

As far as the shield vs the regen, I think that Shields are stronger, and since I was removing the ability to completely stop his speed steroid (his only way to gap close without flash) I wanted to have it roll the other direction. Unlike the pre juggernaut skarner and live skarner, he also has no other speed steroids in his kit, so I felt that not having the ramp up but rather burst and then slow down would thematically feel better as a scary predator. All that being said, I went for a regen that was based on missing health, so it had a strong use situation (low health) but wasn't nearly as strong or consistent as a shield.

And a slight misinterpretation on your part, he only gets his free stats from using Q. His other abilities remove his free stats, and by a good amount too, since he has a max of 100 energy. So at max energy, using your shield and your E (say in a gank) you would go from 100 energy to 50 (that would be -25% attack speed, and -10% bonus resists) and now has to build that back up via combat. One potential lever of balance if needed could be to add an out of combat decay to the energy, though I have no idea personally how to make that a good mechanic, since I cant actually test how quickly he could gain it back.

I don't believe your post to be rude and I appreciate the well thought out reply. :) Feel free to continue the conversation if you wish :)

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