long story short i got really fed after only getting two kills on top and mid during a fight, and kicked the other team's teemo's ass throught the rest of the game. but then their team started screaming how op irelia was. my question is irelia op (better nerf irelia) or just hard to counterplay once she is ahead or what (or the teemo might just have been bad)
She is very difficult to counterplay because the more you beat her down, the more she can stun you. If you're both at full HP and a minion hits her - bam, you're stunned and she has assassin-style burst attacks, so then you die while stunned. Without a stun or a silence of your own, 1v1's against her become very one-sided very quickly.
But that's just my limited experience struggling against her at top.
I'd call her pretty OP since, as Lumus said, there's very little counterplay available. Irelia jumps on you and starts smacking you around with her huge base damage, sustain, and true damage. What do?
You lose the fight but can't run because she has an instant gapcloser and a strong slow
You start to win the fight, but then she stuns you for two seconds and then kills you.
There's a reason Irelia's patch history is just season after season of nerfs.
