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What Tanks Actually Need...

Ars Techne·2/15/2017, 8:03:55 PM·2 votes·631 views

So, as we all know tanks are flat, no new information here, but what I worry about is that Riot doesn't understand what actually needs to be done. Here is a list of, what I believe, what would be good abilities for Tanks to have to make them more skill based.

  • Studder - Force 1 sec AA CD on target player, So like how a heal/exhaust works, would delay the next AA damage
  • Reflect - Making a Skill shot shoot backwards or reflecting the skill shot
  • Berserk - Target Player attacks a random target, friends included, for X seconds (boosted damage?)
  • Lead Hands - Slows AA
  • Confuse - May walk in the random direction
  • Paralyze - Random interruptions for X seconds
  • Dulled Blades - Reduce AD/AP for X seconds
  • Dizzy - Skill shots will shoot a random X degrees off target, random in range for point click

There are most likely more that could be done. List any you think down below. But let's make tanks useful again!

Side Note: My Class Definitions

  • Tank - Or meat wall, that draws attention do to threat of effect, not damage, in which a fight could be lost due to the shear tactics they bring to the fight.

  • Juggernaut - More like real life tanks, which are slow, moderate hp, kite-able targets but can annihilate you if they can attack you

  • Duelist - A high damage but low hp that rely on skills to survive. Mainly single target, hence "Duel"ist

  • Diver - High Hp, AOE effect and damage that can survive in the middle of the enemy team long enough for them to lose the fight

  • Assassin - High damage in/out abilities, low hp. Like divers, but with abilities to get out.

  • Carry - Massive ranged damage, very low hp. They have to get close enough to be dived, but far enough to not be annihilated immediately

  • Support - Tank Carry hybrid in thought, as they can do moderate damage but also have abilities that must be considered. Typically moderate to low HP

  • Spell Blade - A melee based AP in which has moderate HP and augmented AA that gets bonuses off the AP. Abilities should be more utility based, otherwise they are just mages (Diana's Vortex, Ekko's double Flash, etc).

7 Comments

Mecha MaIphite2/15/2017, 8:10:24 PM4 votes

The game is already hard enough for new players, adding a bunch of needlessly complicated mechanics wouldn't help. Some of these effects would be too strong on anything but an ultimate, and some others introduce too much RNG (which nobody wants more of).

MaeDoSan2/15/2017, 8:41:29 PM2 votes

i would love to reflect a viegar ult

Julanus2/16/2017, 12:16:01 AM1 votes

Let's just do a quick rundown of these ideas. Some are very similar to each other, so I'll be grouping those together.

I'll start with the easy ones.

[{quoted}](name=Ars Techne,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=PZ3I3R84,comment-id=,timestamp=2017-02-15T20:03:55.417+0000)

  • Lead Hands - Slows AA

Attack Speed slows already exist, from items, champion abilities, and the Summoner Spell Exhaust.

  • Studder - Force 1 sec AA CD on target player, So like how a heal/exhaust works, would delay the next AA damage
  • Paralyze - Random interruptions for X seconds

An auto-attack based "silence", preventing the target from using auto-attacks.

This already exists (called Disarm) in Lulu's Polymorph (both a Disarm and Silence) and Amumu's Ult (Disarm and Root).

Absolutely nothing like how Heal or Exhaust work. (Heal.. heals you and a nearby ally, Exhaust reduces attack speed and damage dealt)

  • Confuse - May walk in the random direction

This is how Fear used to work before it was changed into a more reliable form of CC.

  • Berserk - Target Player attacks a random target, friends included, for X seconds (boosted damage?)

A Taunt-like ability, though I'd adjust it to "attack nearest target/champion within range" to make it more tactically viable.

  • Dizzy - Skill shots will shoot a random X degrees off target, random in range for point click

It's one thing to miss a skill shot.

It's another to be forced to miss a perfectly aimed skill shot, or a skill shot that would normally have missed to randomly hit anyway.

This is a bad idea.

  • Dulled Blades - Reduce AD/AP for X seconds

Reducing stats is an unreliable way of lowering a target's damage output. Either it's very strong against most anyone and everyone, or it's extremely weak for its intended purpose.

Say it reduces AD/AP by a flat amount. Making it effective against high (300+) AD/AP targets will render most anyone else (100 or less AD/AP) useless, and balancing it around the champions with lower AD/AP will barely affect any high AD/AP champions.

So, if flat amounts don't work, what about reducing AD/AP by a percentage amount instead? Similarly, while some champions rely on high levels of AD/AP to be effective, others are more than capable of damaging with minimal levels of AD/AP. It'll hit Marksmen and Mages harder, but Juggernauts and Bruisers are still flattening you with only 1 or 2 damage items.

Next, let's at champions with alternate ways of increasing their damage output regardless of their AD/AP. Some champions scale off other stats to increase their damage output (Ryze uses Mana, Jhin uses Crit and Attack Speed) and others deal damage through additional effects (most any on-hit build, champions with %-based damage).

So, to summarize, if you want to reduce a target's damage output, reduce the damage being dealt.

  • Reflect - Making a Skill shot shoot backwards or reflecting the skill shot

Sounds cool and seems to have quite a number of possible ways to implement it. However, it also sounds like a coding nightmare.

  • What would be used to reflect? (e.g. A wall/area (Braum/Yasuo/Shen/Poppy), a shield/buff (Morgana/Rammus), a parry (Fiora), etc..)

  • Would this reflect only skill shots or all projectiles?

  • Would the reflection persist for a set period of time, or break after X amount of projectiles/damage? (e.g. Yasuo's Windwall vs. Yorick's Soulwall)

  • Would this reflect enemy, ally, or all projectiles? (e.g. Nami wave reflected by ally reflection)

  • Would projectiles change who/what they affect, or just change the direction they travel? (e.g. Reflected Nami wave knocks ally team up vs. Reflected Nami wave passes through allies and knocks enemies up (potentially hitting them with a second knockup))

  • Would it travel back along the same path it took? (e.g. Reflected Nami wave travels back to the position it was originally cast)

  • Would the travel path change based on the angle the projectile hits the reflection? (e.g. Nami wave hits the Reflection at a 90 degree angle, sending the wave directly to the left/right)

  • Would it travel directly back to the source/champion, even if they've moved to an entirely different position? (e.g. Nami sends wave down the middle of lane, Nami moves to the edge of lane, wave is reflected and sent to the edge of lane)

  • Special cases - Would reflecting a Nami wave/Galio wind area give the movement speed boost to allies or enemies? Would Vel'koz ground splitter/Galio wind area be removed or bend/double-up based on how it's reflected? Would Vel'koz splitting shot become an issue?

There are most likely more that could be done. List any you think down below. But let's make tanks useful again!

Well, most of your suggestions are either already in League of Legends or were changed to an improved form, and one is just a bad idea that would end up causing more problems rather than solving any.

However, I do think Berserk and Reflect have merit (along with putting Disarm/Stutter on some more champions). Berserk would probably not fit on a tank, and Reflect would have tons of potential coding issues, but I do think there might be a place for them.