How good are the new biscuits?

So with the new iteration of (Total) biscuits this season we went from a small but effective buff to purchased health pots to four separately-timed auto-inventoried items. What are the differences?

The Secret Stash mastery from season 7 replaced any purchased potions with Biscuits of Rejuvenation which gave you 15 hp and mana immediately upon use and also increased the duration of potions and elixirs by 15%. Using a biscuit would regen 5 health every half second for ( 15 x 1.15 = ) 16.5 seconds. This is 165 health regenerated and combined with the 15 immediate health gain we end up with 180 hp restored over 16.5 seconds.

You were limited to purchasing these at the shop for 50g each and could only keep 5 biscuits in your inventory at a time (same as potions). Another important note is that you could not buy any other types of healing potions if you had this mastery.

Our new biscuits from the Biscuit Delivery rune are officially titled "Total Biscuits of Everlasting Will" and they are given to the player without the need to spend gold or even be at the shop. You are given a biscuit at the 3,6,9, and 12 minute marks. These biscuits restore 15% of your missing health and mana over 15 seconds while also granting your champion 40 maximum mana permanently while manaless champions instead heal for 20% of missing hp over the duration.

The new biscuits have no flat healing value and instead heal a champion's missing hp. Let's compare healing effectiveness between health potions, the old biscuits, and the new.

A normal potion resotres 5 health every half second for 15 second resulting in 150 health regained.

We already established Biscuits of Rejuvenation restored 180 health over 16.5 seconds.

For a Biscuit of Everlasting Will to restore as much health as a normal potion, a champion with mana has to be missing 1000 health and a champion without mana will need to be missing 750 health.

We receive our first biscuit at 3:00 and if we are a solo laner we can expect to be level 3 by this point. has 758 health by this point in the game without any extra health from runes or items. If Trundle used his biscuit here at 25% health he would restore just 85 health, only 56% of the healing he would have received from a health potion and 47% as much as the Biscuit of Rejuvenation.

If Trundle was at just 1 hp when he consumed his Biscuit of Everlasting Will he would restore 113 hp. This amount of healing is 75% the effectiveness of a red pot and 62% the effectiveness of the old Biscuit of Rejuvenation. Even at the lowest possible health-point a non-rune item will serve for better hp sustain at this point in the game.

Now, let's say Trundle was against a ranged top laner. The player is expecting to take a lot of harass from the opponent so they take the Resolve Tree as their main Tree while selecting the Inspiration Tree's Biscuit Delivery and Celestial Body runes. Trundle just started the game with 230 more health off the bat from the Resolve Tree's 130 innate health bonus and Celestial Body's instant 100 health gain. He buys and at the start of the game to try and withstand the poke and gains another 80 maximum health. This game, by the time he is level 3, Trundle will now have a whopping 1,068 health. Now, under these very specific optimizations can our champion receive as much health as a normal potion... if he has been poked down to just 68 health when the biscuit is used.

There are a couple decent upsides to the new biscuits that need addressed and the first is that the new biscuits don't restrict potion buying or usage. Referring to the above scenario: if this Trundle player uses his or her starting potions and their Biscuit of Everlasting Will when Trundle was at just 68 hp then Trundle's healing would be doubled and he would restore 300 health over 15 seconds. It is during this period of time that, one could argue, is the strongest aspect of the new biscuits as it can allow you to bait an opponent while you are low health and surprise them with a turnaround with your increased healing values for an outplay.

Our second upside is that this rune has some nice synergies with a few things in the game. The first of these is which will increase the healing gained from biscuits by 25%. Next, the Resolve Tree's Iron Skiin or Mirror Shield's bonuses of 5% increased armor/mr values for 3 seconds will be granted to a champion upon consumption of a biscuit. Finally, the Inspiration Tree's innate +20% potion and elixir duration extends the healing value that is calculated when a Biscuit of Everlasting Will is consumed by an additional 3 seconds.

The next upside is that this biscuit is automatically placed in the player's inventory. This means no need to recall to base in order to buy a new healing item. There's not much else to say about this other than it's nice overall and will let you be able to stick around a bit longer when you are low but it's also important to mention that players with a full inventory cannot receive a new biscuit until an inventory slot is cleared.

The last upside to the new biscuits is something that was not factored into the Trundle scenario: the mana sustain. The biscuits not only give 15% missing health regen but 15% missing mana regen and an increase in maximum mana by 40. This is where the rest of the value of the biscuits come along and it follows the same rules as before: use the biscuit when your mana is low and more max mana means more sustain. To get optimal value out of the Biscuits of Everlasting Will as a champion with mana you will need to use these when you are at both incredibly low health and mana values.

The biscuits don't seem to be made to be an amazing early-game sustain rune. They aren't useless and can certainly be helpful, but, considering the low health and mana values during the early game and the percent missing sustain over flat values along with the risk of needing to be very low to receive any noticeable effective regen from the biscuits make Biscuit Delivery seem underwhelming for a rune; especially one that also takes up an inventory slot.

TL;DR: the health restore from the new Biscuit Delivery rune is very underwhelming and will not match a normal health pot unless you are missing a minimum of 1000 health on a champion with mana or 750 missing health on a champion who does not use mana. To effectively use this rune you must maximize your max health and mana values as much as possible and use it when you are at very, very low health thresholds. Using this consumable on a champion with mana just for restoring health and not for both health and mana will almost always be a poor choice as the mana portion constitutes over half the value of the new biscuits to begin with. The rune seems be used for when you are barely surviving in lane and trying to just stick around for one more wave before heading back to base.

At first glance this rune seems as though it is intended to try and fill an early-game sustain niche but gives sustain based on max health and mana. This means the longer you wait to use the biscuits the more effective they will be. This isn't intrinsically bad as the duality leaves the player choices of when it's best for them to use their biscuits (either use early game for less sustain or wait until you have more health/mana and capitalize then) but if Riot wants this rune dedicated for early game sustain (like potions and biscuits have always been) then this rune's restoration effects typically leave something to be desired. Outplay potential was briefly mentioned above but the choices for Biscuit Delivery's "sister runes" (i.e. Hextech Flashtraption and Perfect Timing) will provide better outplays (likely) 98% of the time. If early game health or mana sustain are your main concerns then one is almost certainly better off going for the Second Wind or Manaflow Band. These runes will not only last you the entire game but will also not take up any of your inventory space.

If you were to ask me how to fix the new biscuits I'd recommend making them based around superior early game sustain compared to other options while making the rune strong enough to justify it taking up a precious inventory slot. I'd also like to keep the lower health=more healing thing going so I'd suggest making the biscuits regen approximately 175 health and 100 mana over 15 seconds while increasing the healing of the biscuit by 1% plus an additional 1% per missing health for a maximum healing value of 350 health and 200 mana over 15 seconds. Manaless champs can have something like 25 health restored instantly.