Counterplay should be much simpler then the champ you verse.

Aphelios is tearing up the rift, his design shows a problem thats been growing with the rise in complexity. You must know how to play the character to effectively deal with them. Especially with these bad designs where there are seventeen different effects and gismos that clutter the character. You should only need a vague idea of a character to deal with them. Imagine if you played a top lane or jungle tank and you see an aphelios out in the open farming. What should happen is that he is an adc and he should be squashed, but no. He had Crescendum and infernum. Now you get shreaded for all your health. What if you group for a teamfight and he was hiding infernum, he ults and kills or majorly damages all of you. You as the opponent must understand every single combo of main hand and offhand and at what point each weapon is likely going to be present at every stage of the game. You must keep track of two ammo bars, one being hidden and undestand what is likely going to be the next in line. Versing someone like xerath is so much easier because you dont need to main him to get a general idea of when to dive. Did he waste one his spells? go in, he is a mage is likely unable to kill you with his burst because one of his spells are down. Plus these spells are easy to understand when versing. Q does damage, w slows, e stuns. If you are an assassin, you bait the e. Tank or bruiser, do the same or bait the w early in the fight so you can stick. other mage? bait his main damage tool to try to win the trade. These champs with 20000 utility passives and abilities requires not a vague idea of the champ or basic game sense, but how the intricacies of the character interact and play together. It is a toxic experience to verse. While it is true that complex characters need more tools to justify the time investment, I feel that too much utility is easily possible.

Also for those who will likely not fully understand what i am saying. My main point is that, you should as a player, overtime understand each character on a higherlevel, that type of idea should not be forced upon everyone who just wants to play some norms. I should be forced to understand every character i verse on a very basic level to counterplay them. I should not be forced to understand every little intricacy and interaction within his kit just to not be destroyed. I should not be forced to play the character to counterplay them and a design should not rely on a master level dedication and understanding just to have some fun.

some premature rebuttals "so you are saying that if dedicate all of this time to a character, i should be beaten by some brainless idiot who versed my champ twice?" no, what i am saying is that the task that you undertaken to play a complex character is your own. Designs that force an opponent to learn to character on a deeper level just to have fun is not justifiable because the the opponent has their own personal tasks to do. If I am trying my best to be good at a jungler, that will take time. I should not be punished for ganking an alone adc, I should not be punished because i didnt decide my time that I am taking to learn a jungle into understanding what likely combos Aphelios has at 13:35 with 123 cs.

"You are supposed to learn the champ to win" Yes, but thats what i mean by a vague idea. any matchup can cheese a victory through ignorance, but after a certain number of games it gets much easier to go even and get a victory. If you are new versing veigar, you might let them farm too much and lose a trade because you ran into the wall, but after a few games you begin to understand how the champ works. You stay inside the e and dodge the w. Now once and a while a veigar main might flex their muscles. You might find it hard to stop him from farming and he might use his e differently that only a higher level veigar might know. That is a game lost because he was just better. you still get how to counter veigar on a basic level so it never feels like a veigar problem, you are just worse. aphilios and similar champs dont work like that. I dont need to understand the basics of the abilities, I need to understand not only all 5 weapons but also their interacts with offhands and ult. YOu also need to keep track of his ammo and what he might have later if he is low. IF you are not bot lane and follow his every interaction you are much more likely to just have a shit time. You cant just play it once or verse it a few times to get.

"get gud" To have fun I should not be required to be the best ever. I want to climb and when in ranked I am okay with this sort of bullshit, because in ranked when climbing I should learn every matchup. (though I still feel like aphelios is a little too much even for ranked). For norms though, I am not playing at my optimal, I might be playing a new champ or just have less experience with the champ in general. I might be in a lane that I am not in all that often. Or I am just trying to chill out and have fun. Just because this isnt challenger does not mean these problems go away. ruining the experience of players like this makes the game worse for many many people. League is not ranked queue, there is a huge portion of the leagues playerbase that play norms casually. WIth friends or alone, league provides an amazing casual experience. To ruin that casual experience in favor a smaller percentage of players is sad to see. You can make designs like aphelios and make them fun to fight, it just takes dedication.