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I think the tank issue is item gold efficiency, and mixed damage.

GigglesO··27 votes·1,468 views

  1. While adc's and mages can just build straight damage, tanks are forced to mix a combination of 3 resistances. (HP, Armor/MR) This creates a very high imbalance in being able to optimize tanking.

  2. Damage items are just too efficient, lets take a look:

item 3046 is 97.02% gold efficient without its two passives. item 3031 is 95.59% gold efficient without its passive. item 3508 is 103.43% gold efficient, without its passives. item 3087 is 87.4% gold efficient, without its passive. item 3085 is 95.25% gold efficient, without its passive.

Meanwhile: item 3075 is 74.71% gold efficient without its passives. item 3143 is 78.16% gold efficient without its passive, active and critical strike damage reduction. item 3742 is 80.46% gold efficient without its two passives.

wooo have an item that is efficent: item 3065 is 104.88% gold efficient, without its full passive. item 3194 is 88.93% gold efficient without its passive. < so close

So While we come close to hitting the mark on magic resistance items, the two issues combined create a very unhealthy imbalance in gameplay where tanks/divers/bruisers/juggernauts need to be super overloaded to be able to function properly. Just take a look at the new Win Zhao. (xin) His ulti completely ignores damage from ranged targets that are too far away from him......

Oh yea because that isn't going to be a gameplay issue.... Please, instead of reworking all of the non cc-tank like champions, just redo some itemization.

29 Comments

xJLx MCHammer16 votes

When the tank items were reworked, Phreak did a live stream to analyze the items. Keep in mind, when the patch was released, the AD items were also changed, buffed or reworked. Basically, his entire stream was about how tank items were nerfed in gold efficiency. ALL but ONE item were nerfed. That item was item 3193 . Since then I believe the item was nerfed.

Almost ALL AD but one AD item were buffed. BOTRK was the only one that got a slight nerf but still overvalued.

Even Phreak was struggling to justify some of the buff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OKt_uwXT2o

there is the video

jwebb01136 votes

i guess this why i play maokai as an ap juggernaut instead of full tank

MeowGath1 votes

lol i build almost full tank cho with a random nashors tooth and titanic hydra. works for me most of the time.

xJLx MCHammer2 votes

{quoted}

lol i build almost full tank cho with a random nashors tooth and titanic hydra. works for me most of the time.

Don't confuse the champion with the items

The items aren't that great in terms of gold effiency but the champion like Cho-gath can abuse them due to his kid...

GigglesO1 votes

[{quoted}](name=xJLx MCHammer,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=OOp6Qzeq,comment-id=000000000000,timestamp=2017-09-24T18:39:27.700+0000)

Don't confuse the champion with the items

^^ This

Now go try and do that on every single tank/bruiser/juggernaut and let me know how it works on someone that isn't mao...

It doesn't work very well...

jwebb01131 votes

{quoted}

lol i build almost full tank cho with a random nashors tooth and titanic hydra. works for me most of the time.

as a tree main my typical build now is

item 3001 item 3025 item 3075 item 3068 item 3151 item 3047

or if i need to be more ap ill go item 3027

in lane my go to build is item 3751 item 3010 item 3076 item 3057 typically once i get catalys and bramble vs ( if vs hard ad) or bami i can out damage and sustain most match ups and build into complete items

if you look at my above comment i went 11-3-8 and out damage every on in the entire game as maokai

and i have had games where i top 80K in damage to champs , 75k, 60k on a regular basis

GigglesO3 votes

And mao is currently quite overloaded in his kit. Just look at his ratios, cc, and base damages...

jwebb01131 votes

{quoted}

And mao is currently quite overloaded in his kit. Just look at his ratios, cc, and base damages...

he has 4 cc ,

his base damage is high yes... his ratios not so much

his Q 70 / 115 / 160 / 205 / 250 (+ 40% AP) his W 50 / 75 / 100 / 125 / 150 (+ 40% AP) his E 25 / 50 / 75 / 100 / 125 (+ 6 / 6.5 / 7 / 7.5 / 8% (+ 1% per 100 AP) of target's maximum health). 50 / 100 / 150 / 200 / 250 (+ 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16% (+ 2% per 100 AP) of target's maximum health) his ult 150 / 225 / 300 (+ 75% AP)

so his q and w only have 40% ap so for ever 100 ap he gets he does 40 of it on the base damages and his e is 1% per 100 or 2% per 100 that is a very low ratio

his ult is kinda high

but once again MAOKAI dont build ap majority of the time ... even in my build the only true ap item i get would be item 3151 which is 80 ap and i get it more for the hp, the magic pen and the passive that applies on all of his abilities

even if you go item 3027 item 3151 with the typical 12-0-18 set up with typical tank /tree runes , attack speed, armor yellows, hp seals and mr blues ( its what i run most of the time) he isnt getting alot of ap... at best it would be 180 ap from items and 18 ap from natural talent

so 198 ap

and so that would give his Q at max rank 250+ 79 = 329 damage and this is before magic pen, masteries , and magic resistance of the target 150 + 79= 229 on W and 449 magic damage on his ult

his E is iffy ... its based on the targets max hp ... it has a very small ap ratio and whether or not it was in a bush and oh you cant target a champ with it. its kinda unreliable

Spoofghoul2 votes

16% per sappling

lemme just throw a bush full

jwebb01131 votes

{quoted}

16% per sappling

lemme just throw a bush full

negated by magic resistance of target cuz its not % hp true damage its magic damage , gated by cdr and mana, oh and the fukin idoit walking into the bush face checking ...

its not like i can point and click the saplings to the enemy

GrReaper961 votes

To me it just feels so bad to build item 3068 on any champion that i almost always just get item 3109 instead

jwebb01131 votes

{quoted}

To me it just feels so bad to build item 3068 on any champion that i almost always just get item 3109 instead

well you get the bami part of it early for wave clear.

item 3751 with item 1056 really allows you to wave clear easily ... cuz any creep killed by bami will proc dorans mana regen

jwebb01131 votes

{quoted}

To me it just feels so bad to build item 3068 on any champion that i almost always just get item 3109 instead

but i never get sunfire on support. sometimes in top lane but with item 3001 passive and item 3151 passive it really helps with the aoe damage cuz its magic damage

Champion Skin1 votes

Well a lot of tanks have some AoE (to be a threat) and if they want wave clear they can just build mana and use their AoE abilities to wave clear (item 3001 item 3800 item 3025 )

Or they can also just get item 3077 (and eventually get item 3748 )

Spoofghoul5 votes

dont forget about item 3020 item 3147 item 3814 item 3151 item 3071 item 3142 item 3036 item 3033

they further decrease ur item gold efficiency

GigglesO4 votes

{quoted}

dont forget about item 3020 item 3147 item 3814 item 3151 item 3071 item 3142 item 3036 item 3033

they further decrease ur item gold efficiency

Yep, last wisperor is gold efficent at like 40 armor, which completely negates any reason to get armor.

Teridax682 votes

Indeed, it's worth mentioning that tank itemization is not only less gold efficient on its own compared to most other items, but is also frequently devalued by damage items. Last Whisper and Void Staff in most cases simply devalue the resists you purchased by 35% against the wielder, and The Black Cleaver goes one step further by devaluing a champion's armor against everyone, which also affects innate scalings. Meanwhile, the only way tanks can devalue stats purchased by their opponents is through Warden's Mail with its comparatively piddly 15% attack speed reduction, and the Grievous Wounds on Bramble Vest, an effect commonly available to mages and marksmen already.

Tanky itemization is effectively balanced around losing a significant portion of its value, which in the past has often led to situations where tanks were nearly impossible to kill until the appropriate anti-resist item was bought. This was, in fact, the meta that preceded the Tank Update, and rather than remove the arms race component, Riot unfortunately chose to nerf tankiness overall instead, shifting durability away from health and onto resists, and thereby making it less powerful early and more counterable late.

kasfas4 votes

I think this may also be the reason why ornn is so weak, because his itemization sucks.

I swear if tank items were actually good, ornn would be good too.

Blåbæret3 votes

Man, Riot must be smoking some seriously potent New-Age crack. The balance team must find themselves surrounded by a constant crackish haze.

How else could they be making these changes?

The Yetii Rider3 votes

item 3742 is a juggernaut item. That is why it is so gold inefficient, it is designed to be built on champions who specifically benefit from its passive to a much greater effect than others. Divers, wardens and vanguards don't care as much about a speed boost at the beginning of combat, whereas juggernauts have a lot more damage and are much less likely to have a built-in way of closing the gap.

Now, on to the items themselves. Yes, the tank item update specifically lowered the benefits of individual items. The reason for this is to make tanks less powerful in the early game and more powerful in the late game. You are excluding item 3193 , I see, which is an item that gives you 80 armor and MR, as well as 3000-4000 health. On a single fucking item. That's insane.

Incidentally, tanks are just fine right now. The only people who are bitching about tank items are A) people who don't actually play tanks, but play melee champions that require some level of durability and are dissatisfied or B) top lane tanks who are frustrated because they don't have a good one item spike anymore.

Actual tanks are doing very well. Tankiness is fantastic. Tanks on average benefit much more from higher resistances, and you also get the benefit of each item giving you a double dose of less damage from % health effects as before (the item gives less health and it also gives more resistance which reduces the damage further).

Prestige Eve2 votes

{quoted}

  1. While adc&#039;s and mages can just build straight damage, tanks are forced to mix a combination of 3 resistances. (HP, Armor/MR) This creates a very high imbalance in being able to optimize tanking.

  2. Damage items are just too efficient, lets take a look:

item 3046 is 97.02% gold efficient without its two passives. item 3031 is 95.59% gold efficient without its passive. item 3508 is 103.43% gold efficient, without its passives. item 3087 is 87.4% gold efficient, without its passive. item 3085 is 95.25% gold efficient, without its passive.

Meanwhile: item 3075 is 74.71% gold efficient without its passives. item 3143 is 78.16% gold efficient without its passive, active and critical strike damage reduction. item 3742 is 80.46% gold efficient without its two passives.

wooo have an item that is efficent: item 3065 is 104.88% gold efficient, without its full passive. item 3194 is 88.93% gold efficient without its passive. &lt; so close

So While we come close to hitting the mark on magic resistance items, the two issues combined create a very unhealthy imbalance in gameplay where tanks/divers/bruisers/juggernauts need to be super overloaded to be able to function properly. Just take a look at the new Win Zhao. (xin) His ulti completely ignores damage from ranged targets that are too far away from him......

Oh yea because that isn&#039;t going to be a gameplay issue.... Please, instead of reworking all of the non cc-tank like champions, just redo some itemization.

I feel like the wording for these threads are always a tiny bit off. It's not that these AD damage items are more efficient than tank or AP itemization. It's that these items are way too good in terms off efficiency and gold cost in comparison to everything else. There's a couple of other threads suggesting that AP items should cost less due to AD items being so good for less the cost. What I believe is that these AD items should either cost more or give less stats, forcing ADCs to think more about what their building. The same goes for all those threads bringing up Magic Resist vs Armor and how much more effective MR is compared to Armor (Casters actually struggling with it vs ADCs just melting through armored tanks). Maybe...just maybe... It's the fact that these specific AD items that keep being mentioned all over the boards is the problem?

Sun Wu Ryuumoku2 votes

ADC itemzation is too strong... yeah. But u are so shameless to cry about it when tanks are stupidly strong atm. Will be even worse with runes

GigglesO1 votes

I'm not sure what MMR you are in, but I only see two "tanks" played you have Sejuani and Maokai. The rest are extremely rare to see.

jwebb01131 votes

https://imgur.com/7VEyF5I https://imgur.com/a/3u9lq here is an example

AirKingNeo1 votes

That's because armor as a stat is more valueable than it's gold efficiency, similar to CDR.

Hence why no one but an ADC can hurt tanks.

GigglesO3 votes

Then why are cdr items still gold efficient?

AirKingNeo1 votes

I'm not a shitty riot designer, but my guess is they just want everyone to have CDR.

Still, that doesn't disprove my point. Tanks can't really be killed by most bruisers or mages (or assassins, not that they should).

DuskDaUmbreon1 votes

Because we clearly need to re-shift the gold values of items. CDR and defensive stats clearly don't have the same value they used to.

CDR has become far more common, and is typically used to make an item more gold efficient, or it gets carried along with its partial items (Most notably, Caufield's Warhammer. It's brought so much CDR to items, because it builds into a lot of different items). Meanwhile, tank stats have gone down in total values. Yet I honestly don't feel that much less tanky, when on equal footing, than I did a season or two ago. A bit, sure, I can't just sit and take a beating from the entire enemy team at once anymore. But I can dash in as Shen, and still feel pretty much indestructible, as long as the enemy DPS is roughly on the same footing as me.

So I honestly think that we need to first re-evaluate assumed gold values of items, and then compare items.

Champion Skin1 votes

That's because armor as a stat is more valueable than it's gold efficiency, similar to CDR.

The worst offender of this is AD, AS and Crit when they are all combined

No bonus AS and no Crit ---> usually around 50 - 70% AD as DPS Full AS ----> 250% AD as DPS Full Crit ----> 125% - 175% AD as DPS Full AS and Crit ----> 625% AD as DPS

This makes AD, AS and Crit absurdly valuable and powerful when combined

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