The current hatred for Zed

Jefftiffy··6 votes·775 views

Okay, lately there has been a huge spot light on Zed. He is the current FotM.

I want to address these things that people are complaining about:

  • His ability to assassinate a single target.
  • His ability to escape.

Now before you down vote me hard hear me out.

Zed is probably one of the highest skill cap assassins (yes assassins, not champs) in the game who requires his ult to kill a decently skilled player (he can't just roll his face on the keyboard or press a very fast combo and win). If he kills you without ult you weren't playing right. On top of this his ult can be Zhonya's, Merc Scimmed, spell shielded, GA'd etc. That is a lot of counter play.

On top of this if you wait until after he lands and then dash away you can mitigate a lot of the damage you take.

Now let's compare this to Akali. She jumps you with ult and you do any of the above. She still has the ability to kill you and heal for a ton while doing it. Fizz has the ability to nuke a person jump out then come back in and burst another over and over again while dodging most abilities. Talon can jump in nuke a single person and put some serious damage on anyone happening to be nearby. Zed trades his ability to kill teams for the ability to nuke a single target effectively. Shaco, if he gets to late game, can nuke a single target and run to safety and use his clone to bait for him as he runs and he is more dps based meaning he has a high potential to get more than 1 kill. Although he isn't necessarily the same role as Zed, Yi can kill entire teams and he is a hyper carry classified partly as an assassin with much more in his kit.

Zed on the other hand either kills someone and runs for his life using shadows, or he doesn't kill anyone and is now useless for about a minute late game where he already has issues.

Hence your complaints about Zed are more about the fact he is doing the assassin job the correct way. He is killing single targets which is his job. He has issues killing tanks and bruisers, 100% acceptable. He can be counter built/counter played, also acceptable. He can be counter picked, acceptable. I don't see what the real problem is. Sure he can escape, but what dps does he have? And how much range does he actually have? Not that much.

Assassins reach toxic level when they are no longer just assassinating single targets which Zed can rarely do (anymore) if the team he if fighting is competent.

If you are going to go swinging the nerf bat just let me remind you that Zed's maximum damage output requires him to hit 3 Qs using 2 shadows. And that double hitting people with his E does no extra damage but does slow slightly more.

27 Comments

Drogmyre4 votes

People hate assassins. Period. End of story.

People hate assassins because their core design philosophy is incompatible with League.

League is not Assassin's Creed, where one player murders everything and has a jolly good time. There are 9 other players in the game other than the 1 assassin player.

So, when assassins are too strong, the 5 players on the enemy team feel vulnerable or even outright helpless: How are they going to stop the enemy assassin from just one shotting them and going on his merry way? He's too mobile/has stealth/etc. This creates problems, because that one assassin is constantly ruining games for people by doing his job too well.

But when assassins are too weak (current Eve for example) they're AWFUL. They're not fun to play, they're not fun to play against, and they're just overall blegh. I love Evelynn, but dear fucking god is she terrible. But I can also see the perspective on the enemy team: Fuck this bitch and her bullshit immunity to vision. If Eve does well, she's monstrous (especially when she's viable.) If she does poorly she feels awful, and her team isn't having a good time either.

Assassins, so far, do not have a middle ground: They are either too strong or too weak. This creates CONSTANT complaints: players want Akali/Zed/Kata/whoever nerfed, people want Eve/Shaco/whoever buffed, nobody wins.

Assassins are basically unbalanceable with their current definition.

An assassin is someone who plans out a strike in advance: selecting a target(s) and eliminating them quickly, and escaping just as quickly, ideally avoiding any backup the enemy might have in reserve. Premeditated murder, in other words.

In League, this definition is a source of complaint: The target(s) are also players, and they also have skin in the game. If Akali/Zed/Kata/Whoever (hereafter referred to as Akali for sake of my fingers not wanting to list 3 champs every time i refer to assassins) is easily able to kill them, get out, and do this repeatedly, it ruins their game (and thus killing their fun along with their champion.)

This means that Riot needs to balance assassins so that they are LITERALLY AT ODDS WITH THEIR CORE IDENTITY. Riot needs to make them able to kill their targets, but at the same time NOT kill their targets: Providing some level of artificial difficulty without making it impossible.

Eventually I'm going to flesh this idea out in full, and cover the entire assassin class (and why they're problematic.) Until then, I'll just leave this.

TL;DR: Assassins are problematic not because they're OP/UP, but because the concept of assassins runs perpendicular to League's design and gameplay.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

So, when assassins are too strong, the 5 players on the enemy team feel vulnerable or even outright helpless

I think you can say the same thing about too strong ADCs or bruisers. Probably even more so, as most assassins tend to be one kill champions and not murder your entire team champions.

But when assassins are too weak (current Eve for example) they're AWFUL. They're not fun to play, they're not fun to play against, and they're just overall blegh. I love Evelynn, but dear fucking god is she terrible. But I can also see the perspective on the enemy team: Fuck this bitch and her bullshit immunity to vision. If Eve does well, she's monstrous (especially when she's viable.) If she does poorly she feels awful, and her team isn't having a good time either.

I think this is an specific assassins thing, not a class thing. A behind Kha'Zix or LeBlanc still has ways to help the team.

Assassins, so far, do not have a middle ground: They are either too strong or too weak. This creates CONSTANT complaints: players want Akali/Zed/Kata/whoever nerfed, people want Eve/Shaco/whoever buffed, nobody wins.

This happens with everything in league. People will complain about anything that kills them and anything they can't kill.

In League, this definition is a source of complaint: The target(s) are also players, and they also have skin in the game. If Akali/Zed/Kata/Whoever (hereafter referred to as Akali for sake of my fingers not wanting to list 3 champs every time i refer to assassins) is easily able to kill them, get out, and do this repeatedly, it ruins their game (and thus killing their fun along with their champion.)

This means that Riot needs to balance assassins so that they are LITERALLY AT ODDS WITH THEIR CORE IDENTITY. Riot needs to make them able to kill their targets, but at the same time NOT kill their targets: Providing some level of artificial difficulty without making it impossible.

Assassination attempts need to have risk to feel balanced. People need to feel like there was a mistake they made that left them vulnerable, and people also need to feel like the assassin could have been caught out if he misplayed.

The main thing that people hate about Zed is that he can't get himself into hot water. If he ults you, and I show up to countergank, he just presses R and hits the laugh button.

TL;DR: Assassins are problematic not because they're OP/UP, but because the concept of assassins runs perpendicular to League's design and gameplay.

I think assassins are the necessary counterbalance to hypercarry ADCs. If we deleted all the assassins, we'd have League of Marksmen, because lord knows the bruisers are no longer satisfactorily able to dive a Tristana. Far from being orthogonal, I think assassins are essential to modern League design.

Drogmyre2 votes

I think you can say the same thing about too strong ADCs or bruisers. Probably even more so, as most assassins tend to be one kill champions and not murder your entire team champions.

To an extent, yes. I'm more referring to the 'we can't even catch this fucking fuck' more than the 'HOW DO YOU STOP THIS UNKILLABLE JUGGERNAUT' of a broken bruiser.

As for your second point, that's demonstrably false. Every singe assassin, literally every single one, has been in the 'fuck this champion' list because they didn't just kill one person, they killed EVERYFUCKINGBODY. Every assassin has had at LEAST one period of time where this has occurred: Talon with League of Cleavers, Kat just recently with Hexakill (and moved on to FotM on SR), Akali and the entirety of Season 2, Shaco and any time he's been viable, Evelynn and any time she's been viable, Fizz and any time he gets ahead, Leblanc and Season 3/4.

I can continue, but I just wanted to point out that every single assassin has had the 'I'll have my cake and eat yours too, fuck you' period.

I think this is an specific assassins thing, not a class thing. A behind Kha'Zix or LeBlanc still has ways to help the team.

Ehh, somewhat. Maybe Eve was a bad example, because she's on the far end of the spectrum (basically unplayable.) Even then, Eve while behind can still provide utility and be a meatshield. Providing ways to help the team doesn't really mean too much, any champion can do that. Hell, minions do that.

This happens with everything in league. People will complain about anything that kills them and anything they can't kill.

Right. However, assassins are by definition in both categories: They're supposed to kill you and get away with it, and some do it too well, while some absolutely fail at it (which ruins the experience.)

Assassination attempts need to have risk to feel balanced. People need to feel like there was a mistake they made that left them vulnerable, and people also need to feel like the assassin could have been caught out if he misplayed.

The main thing that people hate about Zed is that he can't get himself into hot water. If he ults you, and I show up to countergank, he just presses R and hits the laugh button.

Agreed. Zed is a classic example of what I'm talking about when I refer to 'strong assassins'. He has strong assassination abilities, he has multiple, secure ways to escape, and he still has good waveclear and sustained damage. In other words, he butchers his target and leaves and there's basically fuck-all you can do about it. Not fun to play against at all.

I think assassins are the necessary counterbalance to hypercarry ADCs. If we deleted all the assassins, we'd have League of Marksmen, because lord knows the bruisers are no longer satisfactorily able to dive a Tristana. Far from being orthogonal, I think assassins are essential to modern League design.

See, here's the thing: I don't disagree with you. Assassins are a bit of a paradox: We need them to balance out the ADCs, but at the same time they're seriously problematic for balance. (although Zed would say balance is weakness, he can go fuck himself.)

This is partially a statement about how absolutely out of control ADC power is: They need a fundamentally broken/difficult to balance class of champions to deal with them.

As to the 'league of marksmen' comment: We already had 'League of Bruisers', it's why bruisers have been punished so heavily. They basically turned the entirety of Season 2 into 10 guys in fat suits practicing Kendo for 20 minutes, with the (more than) occasional Akali ripping people a new asshole, among others.

To be honest, we kind of already HAVE League of Marksmen: Just look at S4, and how utterly abusive Lucian and Tristana were/are/have been. We've had League of Marksmen for years in some capacity: The Holy Trinity of season 2, League of Draven, Caitlyn FotM, Jinx release (seriously i hate that bitch), Lucian basically since release (I called it, I KNEW he was going to be broken OP), and so on.

Assassins are essential because the game is already so out of whack: The core imbalance of assassins is heavily masked by the massive power/mobility creep that's been going on for several years now. Only the true standouts, like Zed, really attract attention as to how 'broken' the assassin class is (same way Lucian attracts/attracted the hate for the Marksman class, and Maokai for the Tank class, and so on.)

Thanks for taking the time to read and respond to my post, i appreciate it.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

As for your second point, that's demonstrably false. Every singe assassin, literally every single one, has been in the 'fuck this champion' list because they didn't just kill one person, they killed EVERYFUCKINGBODY. Every assassin has had at LEAST one period of time where this has occurred: Talon with League of Cleavers, Kat just recently with Hexakill (and moved on to FotM on SR), Akali and the entirety of Season 2, Shaco and any time he's been viable, Evelynn and any time she's been viable, Fizz and any time he gets ahead, Leblanc and Season 3/4.

Assassins, by their nature, are kill the MVP champs, rather than kill the team champs. They're all burst and no sustain.

In my mind, Kat is the exception, because she's a reset champ. I have seen Fizz and Talon make pentas, because they have a fair amount of AoE damage, but they are way worse at it than <insert fed bruiser or marksman here>. Taken to the extreme end of the pool, I don't think I've ever seen Shaco or LeBlanc make a pentakill.

The failure mode with strong assassins is every bush containing something that makes you instantly dead, not someone who makes it impossible to teamfight. In fact, early grouping is usually the way good teams play in an assassin meta, and someone like Zed responds by split pushing rather than trying to teamfight.

This happens with everything in league. People will complain about anything that kills them and anything they can't kill.

Right. However, assassins are by definition in both categories: They're supposed to kill you and get away with it, and some do it too well, while some absolutely fail at it (which ruins the experience.)

I think bruisers are inherently more frustrating than assassins. With assassins, you get this "argh I can't catch him" thing, but that feels better than "he's tankier and more damaging than me, I just got right clicked to death" thing the ahead bruiser has.

Better isn't good, but it's really hard to make losing feel good. To the extent that losing feels good, it feels best on mages with high skillcap ability use.

Agreed. Zed is a classic example of what I'm talking about when I refer to 'strong assassins'. He has strong assassination abilities, he has multiple, secure ways to escape, and he still has good waveclear and sustained damage. In other words, he butchers his target and leaves and there's basically fuck-all you can do about it. Not fun to play against at all.

There's actually a lot you can do to avoid Zed making the kill. There's just not much you can do to punish him for it. His ult cooldown isn't even that long. It's the dive equivalent of Nidalee spear spam.

This is partially a statement about how absolutely out of control ADC power is: They need a fundamentally broken/difficult to balance class of champions to deal with them.

Which in turn comes from bruisers causing teams to need super powerful ADCs. This is the old DotA chestnut, where everything is OP so nothing is.

As to the 'league of marksmen' comment: We already had 'League of Bruisers', it's why bruisers have been punished so heavily. They basically turned the entirety of Season 2 into 10 guys in fat suits practicing Kendo for 20 minutes, with the (more than) occasional Akali ripping people a new asshole, among others.

To be honest, we kind of already HAVE League of Marksmen: Just look at S4, and how utterly abusive Lucian and Tristana were/are/have been. We've had League of Marksmen for years in some capacity: The Holy Trinity of season 2, League of Draven, Caitlyn FotM, Jinx release (seriously i hate that bitch), Lucian basically since release (I called it, I KNEW he was going to be broken OP), and so on.

We bounce from bruisers to marksmen to assassins being the defining class, typically it shifts a couple times a year. Right now we're in a marksman meta and have been since about June.

I think the game actually works best in assassin metas. You end up with a heavy roaming and high surprise factor game when assassins are strong. When bruisers are strong, you end up with a camp top lane meta and lots of snoozey split pushing.

Assassins are essential because the game is already so out of whack: The core imbalance of assassins is heavily masked by the massive power/mobility creep that's been going on for several years now. Only the true standouts, like Zed, really attract attention as to how 'broken' the assassin class is (same way Lucian attracts/attracted the hate for the Marksman class, and Maokai for the Tank class, and so on.)

I don't really think the game is out of whack. I just think people like complaining when they lose, and half of all players lose. If we could somehow make it so that 2/3 of players won every game, we'd be in business.

I think mobility creep has been tremendously positive for the game. It's created quite a few problems but the gameplay is more fun, varied, and skill testing.

Drogmyre1 votes

Assassins, by their nature, are kill the MVP champs, rather than kill the team champs. They're all burst and no sustain.

In my mind, Kat is the exception, because she's a reset champ. I have seen Fizz and Talon make pentas, because they have a fair amount of AoE damage, but they are way worse at it than <insert fed bruiser or marksman here>. Taken to the extreme end of the pool, I don't think I've ever seen Shaco or LeBlanc make a pentakill.

The failure mode with strong assassins is every bush containing something that makes you instantly dead, not someone who makes it impossible to teamfight. In fact, early grouping is usually the way good teams play in an assassin meta, and someone like Zed responds by split pushing rather than trying to teamfight.

I would argue that a strong assassin killing your MVPs is exactly that: Killing the team. He's not literally 1v5ing, he's killing your carries and then dancing away. Even if he dies doing so, he's removed any capability your team had to fight, and the assassin's team still has its carry, whereas yours either doesn't or only has a bruiser/fighter, and he can't deal with 2 carries and your support+tank alone, even with his team's support/tank backing him up.

To put it another way, Shaco and Leblanc don't need a pentakill: They need picks, and strong assassins make it infuriatingly easy to get them. You have massive outliers like Season 2 Akali (where she'd just shit on everyone) but usually when an assassin is 'too strong' it's due to them being able to effortlessly pick off your MVPs and more often than not escape, but it's not the end of the world if he doesn't (because he's hamstrung your team.)

I would like to point out that I'm talking primarily about Solo Queue and not teams. Although I don't doubt that Diamond+ players will do exactly what you suggested, the vast majority of the playerbase, well, isn't that good/smart.

I think bruisers are inherently more frustrating than assassins. With assassins, you get this "argh I can't catch him" thing, but that feels better than "he's tankier and more damaging than me, I just got right clicked to death" thing the ahead bruiser has.

Better isn't good, but it's really hard to make losing feel good. To the extent that losing feels good, it feels best on mages with high skillcap ability use.

Bruisers are their own entire post worth of balance issues that I'd love to go into in greater detail at some point. However, the 'argh i can't catch him' thing is VERY often worse than the 'fuck this meatslab of bullshit' thing, because the 'argh i can't catch him' is ALWAYS preceded by 'an ally has been slain', signalling that you're not teamfighting for the next minute or so, and their team just got the go ahead to take dragon/objectives/free cs/baron/force a fight.

Bruisers don't have that. They'll bulldoze your ass, absolutely, but assassins are more insidious and more of a pain in the ass than bruisers are. It's easy to see where bruisers need a nerf bat to the balls, assassins less so.

Not to disagree with you, though, I completely agree that bruisers are equally as problematic, if not more in many situations.

There's actually a lot you can do to avoid Zed making the kill. There's just not much you can do to punish him for it. His ult cooldown isn't even that long. It's the dive equivalent of Nidalee spear spam.

Yes, I know, and perhaps i phrased that portion of my post incorrectly. My intention was to state exactly what you said: You can't punish him, even if you avoid dying. Sure, you can pop Zhonya's or use QSS to cleanse the ult. That doesn't mean you're going to be able to put a few holes in the shady bastard.

Which in turn comes from bruisers causing teams to need super powerful ADCs. This is the old DotA chestnut, where everything is OP so nothing is.

This meme needs to go away, for several reasons. I play DotA, so I know from experience that this is bullshit.

  1. DotA has a lot of its balance tied up in item trees. A ton of counterplay involves the items, and how to play around those items, or how to counter items with items. It's a lot deeper than 'buy void staff against MR stacking tanks' or 'buy armor vs physical damage'.

  2. Heroes have BLATANT strengths and weaknesses (again, many of which are tied to items.) Riki is a massive noobstomper, but buying Dust of Appearance basically shits on his parade. Carries can be super irritating, but if they're careless they can kill themselves because of Blade Mail. So on and so forth.

  3. Power is different in DotA. There is no scaling. Some heroes, like Skywrath Mage, do get some scaling from stats on their abilities, but nowhere near the kind of scaling League has. You're not going to see Lina ult'ing for 3000 damage because she's full build: that damage is static (with the exception of Aghanim's upgrades, but that's a different story)

  4. Continuing on 'power is different', the map is also different: Blink Dagger would be GAMEBREAKING in League, the map is TINY compared to DotA. Blink Dagger is basically mandatory in DotA for a very large selection of heroes because of the size of the map and the short range of many abilities (such as Axe's Call or Magnus's RP.)

I could go on for hours about this, I really think this meme does DotA a disservice and is used as an excuse. It's just not true.

As for your point about needing powerful ADCs to stop bruisers: When it comes to ADCs I feel like the community gets into circular arguments.

Bruisers are OP, therefore we need ADCs. Without ADCs, tanks/bruisers would be OP, so we need ADCs. Teamfights would be too slow without ADCs, so we need ADCs.

That kind of thing. People find all kinds of reasons to justify class power, every class has players that do this. Assassin fans will claim that their champion is squishy or is up shit creek if they mess up, Bruiser fans will claim that their champion is weak early or is vulnerable to split pushing or such and such, Tank fans will say 'don't focus the tank', and so on.

The justification doesn't mean that the class isn't problematic: It's an excuse.

We bounce from bruisers to marksmen to assassins being the defining class, typically it shifts a couple times a year. Right now we're in a marksman meta and have been since about June.

I think the game actually works best in assassin metas. You end up with a heavy roaming and high surprise factor game when assassins are strong. When bruisers are strong, you end up with a camp top lane meta and lots of snoozey split pushing.

I can understand that. That's a valid point.

I don't really think the game is out of whack. I just think people like complaining when they lose, and half of all players lose. If we could somehow make it so that 2/3 of players won every game, we'd be in business.

I think mobility creep has been tremendously positive for the game. It's created quite a few problems but the gameplay is more fun, varied, and skill testing.

Losing is certainly a part of it. However, as for mobility creep I feel that Riot could take steps to mitigate the disadvantages and maximize the advantages from a powercreeped League, and they haven't done so. There are legions of champions that lack mobility, or need tweaks and fixes to deal with mobility in their own way, but Riot just keeps on pumping out new mobile champs while playing whack-a-mole with the latest FotM.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

This one's a novel. Ima just pick and choose some highlights.

I would argue that a strong assassin killing your MVPs is exactly that: Killing the team. He's not literally 1v5ing, he's killing your carries and then dancing away. Even if he dies doing so, he's removed any capability your team had to fight, and the assassin's team still has its carry, whereas yours either doesn't or only has a bruiser/fighter, and he can't deal with 2 carries and your support+tank alone, even with his team's support/tank backing him up.

Obviously killing a target of your choice is strong. It's just not as strong as the dominant bruiser or marksman pattern of being unkillable/uncatchable and murdering the whole team. Oppressive Tristana is way more oppressive than oppressive Zed.

I would like to point out that I'm talking primarily about Solo Queue and not teams. Although I don't doubt that Diamond+ players will do exactly what you suggested, the vast majority of the playerbase, well, isn't that good/smart.

Right. Assassins tend to be pubstompers. Even when Akali is bad, she's still good for solo queue.

No clue how to fix people playing stupid though.

Yes, I know, and perhaps i phrased that portion of my post incorrectly. My intention was to state exactly what you said: You can't punish him, even if you avoid dying. Sure, you can pop Zhonya's or use QSS to cleanse the ult. That doesn't mean you're going to be able to put a few holes in the shady bastard.

To be clear, this is a Zed problem, not an assassin problem. Talon goes for the dive in a bad spot, dead Talon is dead.

  1. DotA has a lot of its balance tied up in item trees. A ton of counterplay involves the items, and how to play around those items, or how to counter items with items. It's a lot deeper than 'buy void staff against MR stacking tanks' or 'buy armor vs physical damage'.

  2. Heroes have BLATANT strengths and weaknesses (again, many of which are tied to items.) Riki is a massive noobstomper, but buying Dust of Appearance basically shits on his parade. Carries can be super irritating, but if they're careless they can kill themselves because of Blade Mail. So on and so forth.

These are both things that would improve LoL significantly. They are really pushing #2 with their recent champion releases and most of the reworks. It will still take them years to get a cast as diverse as DotA's.

I could go on for hours about this, I really think this meme does DotA a disservice and is used as an excuse. It's just not true.

Ironically, I find the thing people say about DotA to be much more true about League. Why isn't Tristana OP? Because Lucian. Many, many champions feel OP in League. Too good in too many different ways. DotA heroes are much more focused on being good at this one thing.

As for your point about needing powerful ADCs to stop bruisers: When it comes to ADCs I feel like the community gets into circular arguments.

Bruisers are OP, therefore we need ADCs. Without ADCs, tanks/bruisers would be OP, so we need ADCs. Teamfights would be too slow without ADCs, so we need ADCs.

This isn't actually circular. Circular would be something like "we need ADCs because we have bruisers, bruisers because we have assassins, assassins because we have ADCs", which is also decently accurate when the game is working well.

That said, most people don't get this part of League. Fundamentally, we need ADCs because towers need to die. The only way competently played games end is if ADCs can siege structures late game. That's why ADCs have obnoxious amounts of lifesteal and really safe structure damage.

Drogmyre1 votes

This one's a novel. Ima just pick and choose some highlights.

But I like novels.

Obviously killing a target of your choice is strong. It's just not as strong as the dominant bruiser or marksman pattern of being unkillable/uncatchable and murdering the whole team. Oppressive Tristana is way more oppressive than oppressive Zed.

Agreed about Tristana, but to be completely honest she's basically an ADsassin. Look at some of her games in the LCS from last season, she's fucking brutal.

Right. Assassins tend to be pubstompers. Even when Akali is bad, she's still good for solo queue.

No clue how to fix people playing stupid though.

Here's an idea: Make champions that have obvious pubstomper elements not be braindead easy to understand/learn/play. You can't get much more simple than Akali, unless of course you're Darius.

To be clear, this is a Zed problem, not an assassin problem. Talon goes for the dive in a bad spot, dead Talon is dead.

It's more than just Zed. Assassins with that kind of mobility (leblanc, Shaco) tend to have similar issues in that regard.

These are both things that would improve LoL significantly. They are really pushing #2 with their recent champion releases and most of the reworks. It will still take them years to get a cast as diverse as DotA's.

Because, as i was saying, Items are what makes the game. LoL has a really disappointing selection of items, whereas it literally takes AGES to learn Dota's shop, it's fucking enormous and each item does so many different things. Diffusal Blade can purge things like Omniknight ult, but you wouldn't know that from just reading the item. Manta can be used to juke skillshots, but again you wouldn't know that from the item.

Riot has, historically, avoided burden of knowledge like the plague. Unfortunately for them, with a 120something champion pool, burden of knowledge is already a thing, and it's getting bigger every season. Take the damn dive already, the game will be better for it.

Ironically, I find the thing people say about DotA to be much more true about League. Why isn't Tristana OP? Because Lucian. Many, many champions feel OP in League. Too good in too many different ways. DotA heroes are much more focused on being good at this one thing.

League's balance, and the reasons behind it, are all too often REALLY shortsighted. I saw, at Lucian's release, by far the most broken kit i've ever seen for an ADC. I immediately said 'he's going to be god tier.' Nobody believed me, and oh look at him now.

Even DotA was REALLY cautious with a double strike passive. That shit is absolutely OP, regardless of the math.

This isn't actually circular. Circular would be something like "we need ADCs because we have bruisers, bruisers because we have assassins, assassins because we have ADCs", which is also decently accurate when the game is working well.

That said, most people don't get this part of League. Fundamentally, we need ADCs because towers need to die. The only way competently played games end is if ADCs can siege structures late game. That's why ADCs have obnoxious amounts of lifesteal and really safe structure damage.

I would agree with you, but...

See, we don't actually NEED ADCs for tower siege, you're literally proving my point: That's a justification for them being obnoxious.

We have an entire subclass of champions across multiple roles for this: Pushers.

There are quite a few mages, more than a few bruisers, and of course the entire ADC class that is capable of this. Heimerdinger and Azir are more than capable of obliterating towers extremely quickly, for example.

The thing is, ADCs are given a pass on that. An ADC tower sieging is seen as 'business as usual'. However, that's just ONE of the many things ADCs excel at. They're powerful in teamfights, they're powerful in lane, they're powerful at taking objectives, they kite, provide utility, and so on.

That's not to say that those qualities are unique to ADCs, but other champions are often criticized for being good at too many things (hi Lee Sin and friends) meanwhile we have Trist and her bodyguard down bot lane butchering towers and basically winning every fight, but nah let's bitch about Lee Sin because he's SOOOOO op...

ADCs being needed to kill towers is an excuse for ADCs being the way they are. Bruisers being needed to tank damage while still having damage themselves is 'justified' by saying that straight up tanks are boring/LCS. Assassins being Zed is 'justified' by, sigh, 'muh skill cap', among other dead horses being beaten (like the LCS!).

That's not to say your point is invalid: but it helps make my point, that various classes and the things they do, even if they shouldn't be able to do them, is so deeply ingrained into the game that it's used as a fundamental justification for why they're the way they are.

This applies to assassins and mobility, just as much as it does to bruisers and their ridiculously high damage for how tanky they are.

Jefftiffy1 votes

He can't just kill anyone. He kills squishies and improperly built bruisers. And Zed relies on his ult for kills while Talon is perfectly capable of killing someone with just his normal rotation combined with Ghostblade. Talon can kill you with these and use his ult to burst for damage as he runs for his life. He doesn't need his ult to kill at the moment.

Each assassin has their specialty. Zed attempts to nuke a single person and gtfo, he has no purpose past that. Talon kills a single person and AoE nukes the entire team and shreds them all as he runs unless he can kill more. Akali focuses down single targets and sustains but lacks a reliable escape. I'm not sure I want to talk about Fizz, he makes Zed look like a boyscout. He nukes single person and gets out barely touched then jumps back in and nukes another and repeats the process over and over and over again.

If you really look at his peers, Zed is the best example of a proper assassin. Except for Akali and Kata. Akali would be ok if she didn't ramp up with so little gold. And I don't even want to talk about people obsession with nerfing Kata who is literally countered by about 75% of the champ in the game if they are half intelligent.

OJ1911 votes

I think the game actually works best in assassin metas. You end up with a heavy roaming and high surprise factor game when assassins are strong. When bruisers are strong, you end up with a camp top lane meta and lots of snoozey split pushing.

Assassins are essential because the game is already so out of whack: The core imbalance of assassins is heavily masked by the massive power/mobility creep that's been going on for several years now. Only the true standouts, like Zed, really attract attention as to how 'broken' the assassin class is (same way Lucian attracts/attracted the hate for the Marksman class, and Maokai for the Tank class, and so on.)

I don't really think the game is out of whack. I just think people like complaining when they lose, and half of all players lose. If we could somehow make it so that 2/3 of players won every game, we'd be in business.

I think mobility creep has been tremendously positive for the game. It's created quite a few problems but the gameplay is more fun, varied, and skill testing.

Meanwhile immobile mages get a massive hairy dump on their chest every single season.

League of assassins where they do our job, but better, and repeatedly within a single teamfight, while shitting on most of us in lane. Who cares if we have better AoE when they instagib us in melee range (so if we attack them we don't even hit the rest of their team anyway) and then do the same to our teammates when their "cooldowns" come back 3 seconds later. (or worse, when leblanc was strong and instagibbed you from range and you couldn't even return fire before dying)

League of bruisers where they soak our entire teams damage while dealing damage to us faster than we can to them - ok technically we are doing more raw damage to them, and sometimes more actual damage, but it becomes irrelevant when they do so much damage to your entire team before dying that a 5v1 in your favour turns into a 2.5v4 5 seconds later

league of ADC's where either they kill us in 2 hits and out lifesteal our burst, and if they get in danger from one of the few champs who can actually lock down and kill them the support saves their ass... and they kill us in 2 hits.

Yeah there are outliers like orianna and syndra but for the most part it sucks. At least mobile "mages" like Ahri can function as pseudo assassins I guess?

The best part is when bruisers cry about mage itemisation, as though it actually makes a meaningful difference - hint: the too strong are still too strong and the too weak are still too weak, even if you deleted stuff like zhonyas. Oh no, fizz can no longer invuln for 10 seconds straight. Too bad they picked zed instead and went 20/0 off your mid lane despite him cowering in fountain.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

Meanwhile immobile mages get a massive hairy dump on their chest every single season.

I don't really think that's true. I feel quite good about Syndra Orianna Xerath Zyra Anivia Karthus Ryze Swain right now, and this list is a lot longer than it was in season 3.

I will say that it has been a long time since we had a mage meta.

Yeah there are outliers like orianna and syndra but for the most part it sucks. At least mobile "mages" like Ahri can function as pseudo assassins I guess?

Well, some can. I would say most mobile mages can't, though. I don't see mobility as a big axis for mages though. The presence of mobility skills on mages is important, but nowhere near as important as it is on bruiser, marksman, or carry. I feel pretty good about immobile mages, and the ones that aren't good I think are weak because their kits are weak, not because they get countered too hard by mobility creep.

Concretely, I think Brand has more problems with Orianna than he ever has with Zed.

The best part is when bruisers cry about mage itemisation, as though it actually makes a meaningful difference - hint: the too strong are still too strong and the too weak are still too weak, even if you deleted stuff like zhonyas. Oh no, fizz can no longer invuln for 10 seconds straight. Too bad they picked zed instead and went 20/0 off your mid lane despite him cowering in fountain.

Bruisers have a right to complain about AP itemization. Bruisers have more power baked into their kits and one of the side effects of that is that they don't get as many game changing items as mages do.

Kuroi862 votes

Eh, never had anything against Zed personally, he's just annoying to lane against. If anything, he's just too reliable in that even if he does bad, he can still be very effective.

Jefftiffy1 votes

I don't know, Have you ever seen a shut down Zed actually kill someone important by himself? At that point he is down to picking off kills to get built so he can. It is the same with all champs, but he has an early game, and his late game is pretty weak in team fights. He is a true assassin he excels in a 1v1 and fails elsewhere.

Kuroi861 votes

In some cases I have seen him do well from behind, he'd wait and pick off the AD while we're rotating lanes or attempting drag. Obviously it's harder than it may look, but it's still a bit frustrating lol.

Skias1 votes

Yeah, id say hes way to safe for an assassin. He just sits back and morganas all lane. Really boring opponent.

Hayaishi2 votes

I love how people act like Zed needs his ultimate to kill late game.

We see high elo players do it withotu R all the time.

Leblancs Boob1 votes

Zed's skill cap is very high, yes. However, his skill floor is extremely low. It isn't hard to press r and then just mash every button on your keyboard and then press r again to escape.

Zed is problematic because of how safe and reliable he is. Other assassins pay for having such a big powerspike at 6 by having a very weak pre-6, where Zed easily beats just about any mage in the game. Other assassins have to commit to kills and die if they pick the wrong moment. Zed easily gets out of any situation if it turns sour. As a result, anytime he is allowed to be strong he single handedly dominates the meta.

Zhonya's is probably the only real counter to Zed, and even still by the time a mage is able to finish it they're lucky if they aren't 0/2 because of how easily Zed is able to outlane and tower dive them. QSS is not a counter to Zed because the stats are just ineffiecient for an ADC to build to counter an AD assassin. By the time Zed is point blank range of an ADC theyre already dead regardless of the mark.

Jefftiffy1 votes

The thing is, Zed has to burn his escape to out harass most people in lane. This should leave him wide open to counter harass and ganks. On top of this his late game is about one of the worst of the assassins.

Your best friends against Zed is range and constant harass. You do not want to be near him unless you can force a trade in your favor. I have had huge success zoning Zed with Azir, Xerath, Annie (oh boy this one is a steam roll), etc. Other fun champs to use against him, Malzahar, Lissandra, Syndra, Fizz. You wreck him hard early and force an advantage on him then you call every MIA you can and shove his lane down or follow him and try to pick him off at the lane or on the way.

Most assassins power spike hard at 6. Zed just gets the ability to kill a single target which in all honesty is easily countered if you know your champion and its limits. And if your champ is not capable of handling him ask your jungler to bring someone with lock down or strong gank damage and to help you.

And his ult can be juked if you know his kit. If you learn how he likes to use his ult and where he pops up you can generally decide based on where you are the best way to try to run from him after he lands (not a predictable one). If you get good enough you can use his ult as your own gap closer to kill him. Such as Ahri charm him in the face when he lands and unload while he wastes his combo time walking at you and dying.

Skias2 votes

He doesnt need the escape in lane when the shadow boosted shurikens hit you from the safety ofhis tower. He needs a big hit to range.

Jefftiffy1 votes

If he is ballsy enough to use his shadow as pure harass gank him. He can't run without his shadow. Its on a 15s cd early game and about a 12s one late game (This is counting it actually being on CD not being active). You have 15-10s to kill him based on how for the game is. That is a huge window and is much bigger than a lot of other champs windows.

Skias1 votes

Zed doesn't harass with it. He farms safely like a swaddled baby under his tower.

Jefftiffy1 votes

Learn to harass without pushing lane. Then he can't hide under his tower.

forist1 votes

People are bitching about zed because, he was always considered to be a high skill cap, high rewards and extremely bursty champ. For the past 2 years he has been arguably one of the best mid lane assassins in the game. Now at the end of the season and nearing worlds riot decides to do its annual assassin purge, proceeding to buttfuck talon (basically the weaker, riskier, aoe version of zed), nerf yasuo into oblivion, take leblanc and kassadin's silence completely away, and hand out minor nerfs to kha-zix, akali, and katarina. Zed; however, actually gets a buff before worlds and immediately begins to wreck on the competitive scene.

People aren't complaining because he's dominant, they are complaining because he is the lee sin of mid lane. He has the perfect amount of mobility, engage, disengage, and high burst damage that you want in a midlane assassin, and champs that are already weaker than him keep getting nerfed. It's kind of like riot's idea of nerfing adc's like lucian and tristana...... they just don't. Basically, zed is just too safe to be an assassin is what people are complaining about.

Counter-play is an issue, but only because people on here insist that counterbuilding is not considered counter-play. Its the same situation that talon had, you buy a qss or a ga or take cleanse in mid lane, but surprise surprise no one wants to build those items or take that summoner. I agree with you. Zed has counterplay in the form of good itemization, but other than that he has no real inherent counterplay. I think some of this has to do with how ridiculously strong this item is: item 3153 (I mean the active is ridiculous, stealing movement speed from a target is way too strong in this mobility creep meta), but it doesn't really matter, because as long as people feel helpless to prevent a zed player from outplaying them or not, but still getting the kill, they will scream op.

Jefftiffy1 votes

Actually for me as I play Zed, I have stopped rushing Botrk. The only thing you get from it in a combo was the active which lost 5% (used to be 15% max hp) damage awhile back but does more damage on AA which doesn't synce as well with Zed's ult. So I bring Tiamat now for the extra damage (about the same as Botrk now with active on the average mid laner) and wave clear and build Botrk later. More than likely if they hit Zed they are probably going to leave him at his abysmal HP/5 now as he scales terribly with regen items.

forist1 votes

Botrk is still really strong on zed tho, it prevents the target from running away while guaranteeing zed can do more damage and chase longer while the mark is active. Zed is such a strong 1v1 champ so the active is extremely good on him. Plus it greatly increases his split push threat. Tiamat is great for wave clear and the active, but in reality zed does more than enough single target damage, and his wave clear is great even without it. The percent hp damage on auto's also synergizes with his passive, which is really too good to ignore. When I play zed the two items I immediately rust are botrk and yommu's, because they both have low cooldown actives, and having them basically garantees that zed goes unmatched in any 1v1 duel with just about every champ in the game. Popping both actives after ulting is pretty much a guaranteed kill.

Dextino1 votes

Easiest way to beat Zed is to play Lux. If he ults, then just W. You get 4 seconds of protection from the spells and autos, then another 4 seconds for when his ult actually pops. I've never lost a lane when I've played lux into Zed. (Also it helps if you run barrier to give you some extra shield for him to have to work through. Exhaust works too, but I prefer barrier for the baits under tower).

Jefftiffy1 votes

From a person who plays Zed I can tell you, you are horribly wrong here. Lux is Zed's best friend. An entire champ made of skill shots and whose shield can only block a little bit of damage. I feel confident in a lane against Lux, dodge her Q and harass her and kill her. It isn't that hard once you get used to it. Although Lux is probably going to be nerfed soon for her high damage all game because of the passive changes (when I play Lux she can nuke entire teams every 30s).

Dextino1 votes

From a person who plays Zed I can tell you, you are horribly wrong here. Lux is Zed's best friend. An entire champ made of skill shots and whose shield can only block a little bit of damage. I feel confident in a lane against Lux, dodge her Q and harass her and kill her. It isn't that hard once you get used to it. Although Lux is probably going to be nerfed soon for her high damage all game because of the passive changes (when I play Lux she can nuke entire teams every 30s).

Thats probably because most Lux's don't understand how Zed works. When Zed ults, he's placed behind you. Knowing that, you can easily snare as soon as he comes out of ult. All you have to do is bait out Zed's W with lux's E (you should be able to detonate it before he swaps position) wait for it to go on cool down, then snare and full combo him. Unless you're just blindly throwing out spells (which is awful with any champ), you're going to win with lux.

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