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For how well she scales into late game, Fiora has a very strong lane.

Melledoneus··145 votes·7,696 views

Most champions cannot keep up with her vitals game, she out-trades most people by Q'ing at them and walking off, and if you try to retaliate she'll turn it on your head or just be gone by the time you do. Now, I'm not going to pretend like Fiora doesn't have bad matchups (I'm sure she has a few), but she is too consistently strong across most matchups in most elos. Even Darius is easier to lane against, to be honest.

Now that I've brought this up, I want to bring up a list of reasonable solutions and why they might work. So, here we go.

  1. Reduce the damage on Fiora Q. Shift it to the vitals if you need to. The Q itself provides way too much damage and is a relatively potent harass tool when Fiora does not hit a vital. Reducing its damage early on would make her more prone to actually working for vitals rather than using Q to poke down her enemy.

  2. Increase the mana costs of her abilities. Right now Fiora can fight on-par with most laners and still have a near-full bar of mana. She should be punished for spamming her abilities, but frankly we don't see this. Give mana refund on Q if Fiora hits a vital if needed, but she seriously might as well be resourceless.

  3. Reduce the dash speed of Fiora's Q early on. This ability is not only efficient, but so FAST! She can pretty much lunge, strike, and back off before most people can retaliate. You notice this especially when you play champions like Poppy or Shen, and you have the tools to negate Fiora's Q damage. Poppy's W can stop Fiora's dash, but it's so quick you need to basically predict it. I'm perfectly fine with her being a speed demon late game, but that speed does not belong on a hypercarry so early on.

EDIT: Some suggestions I'm seeing in the comments for changes (keep it up, guys!):

(A) Reduce Fiora's base stats. This change would serve to accentuate her role as an agile fighter who uses her mobility and positioning to defeat her opponents rather than stat-check them and shrug off burst with her sustain. A lower HP pool and/or lower base/scaling armor would make Fiora easier to take down earlier and would make her a bit more susceptible to burst she does not block with her defensive ability, as most sustained fighters tend to be. Overall would smooth out her power curve if done right (cue the 3 AD memes).

(B) Make the vitals harder to hit. Bôôsted Bonobo defies his namesake and brings us the idea to lessen the forgiveness factor on where Fiora can proc a vital from. This change would make Fiora players have to be a bit more precise with their lunges and auto attacks, and would thus allow them to be a bit less sloppy. After all, who has ever heard of a sloppy duelist with a rapier? (That one's gonna come back to bite me later on).

It's a good idea to have discussions about things, so don't downvote and walk away. I invite anyone to give their ideas or disagreements on the subject.

200 Comments

Chønklord48 votes

I would like to add one:

  • Make the vitals slightly harder to hit Right now she basically just sneezes in your general direction and still procs a vital from something like 200 units away.

And when you think you've finally out-smarted her by walking out of range to switch the vitals around to be less favorable to her, a new vital appears which is even more favorable to her. Fuck that noise.

Sp33d Zer013 votes

Make the vitals just as easy to hit, just make the cooldown on them scale with level, capping out at where they are now at level 16 (maybe tie the cooldown of them to her ultimate ranks). That way, it takes longer in between them coming back up after she procs them so it feels like there are better windows of opportunity to fight her. Taking away the hit box on vitals just aims to make her feel less fluid and more clunky, which tends to be a bad way to nerf a champion.

Chønklord10 votes

I didn't say take away the hitbox on the vitals, I said "make it slightly more difficult to proc the vitals."

It's far too easy right now for her to proc vitals and do so from a longer distance than her AA melee range. They proc at something like 150 to 200 units (aka what I like to call "Rakan distance") away.

It's like if suddenly they changed Darius' Q spin to proc another 100-200 units past the edge of his spin animation.

Sp33d Zer04 votes

Then I misunderstood you. Reading "Make it more difficult to proc" sounds a lot like "make it so she has to much more precise to get the proc"

Chønklord4 votes

No, I think she should just need to be closer to proc it and more aligned with the side it's on, though.

I've many, many Fiora players proc a vital that was below me (and they were above me), simply by dashing forward slightly to one side and proc it practically through my champion model. While still being out of my auto attack range (as melee). And then dash away again before I can even react/close that small gap to return any meaningful damage with autoattacks.

TheSingularity3 votes

I rofled when I read the addition.

Just, idk something about the grand duelist sneezing in your general direction and killing you if fucking hilarious.

Amusement aside I agree.

I also wouldn't mind reducing their activation range and increasing the delay between a new one appearing if it expires and isn't proced. Tis stupid that she gets free pressure even if she never hits u

4th3t0s4 votes

With this in mind, what if proccing a vital put that specific side on an internal cooldown of 20-30(?) seconds? This would eliminate some of the RNG cheese that occasionally happens when she gets the same vital 2-3 times.

Edit: Should be worth mentioning that her ult would of course reset these suggested cooldowns

Melledoneus4 votes

This is also something that bothers me.

Her Q is a dash that has an automatic Yasuo Q toward someone, and that in itself is fine until you realize she can proc a vital when she hits the side that's not opposite the vital.

Also, stealing this and adding it to my post.

Eedat18 votes

You know you can manipulate her vitals right? Its super easy lol

Even Darius is easier to lane against, to be honest.

No its not. Darius is practically a stat check. You either out stat him, or abuse him from outside of his bubble. Thats pretty much it

Melledoneus37 votes

Darius is slow and he takes time to ramp up. You can out-maneuver a Darius and deny him his Q heal and trades. It just takes understanding of his timings and you can beat them.

Fiora, on the other hand, is too fast for most people to manipulate. Sure, you can manipulate vitals, but what good will it do? A decent Fiora can manipulate vitals and even trades freely.

WinTheWarOnPants7 votes

How?! if you are melee with no mobility there is nothing you can do. All you can do is run, in which case you get no cs, and he scales harder than almost every champ in the game. If you cs he kills you and snowballs, if you don't cs he farms and out scales. I guess i will never understand why people cry about fiora, yet the same people praise Darius for his "don't play a melee champ" counter play.

morris110 votes

He actually loses out on a lot if you run inside his Q. It has a long cast animation that locks him out of auto attacking, does less damage than an auto at point blank and doesn't apply his passive. A lot of people make the mistake of trying to escape right as they're hooked and end up losing more health. With AA-WAA-Q-AA he still only gets 4 stacks of bleed even if he lands his Q perfectly, without it he's gonna have an even harder time.

WinTheWarOnPants8 votes

You're gonna have to walk me through how "out position darius while you are under a 90% slow" is a valid counterplay tip(not to mention his first rush item in ever gameitem 3071 gives him crazy MS, and once he get's it you will never get away from him if you get in AA range)...

Melledoneus2 votes

Darius loses to people who respect his power and play into his confidence. A good Darius can do nothing against a knowledgeable player who can skirt in and out of his ranges and harass him down. Short of calling his jungler, of course.

Jamenawerl3 votes

{quoted}

Darius only loses to meta toplaners with either more mobility or range than him. A good Darius can do nothing against a champion who can skirt in and out of his ranges and harass him down. Short of calling his jungler, of course.

FTFY.

KONO RUBICK DA1 votes

Yorick is not meta and has the most aberrated win rate against darius i can continue to list the non meta toplaners that have an insane win rate against darius such as aatrox

please stop manipulating board's ignorance

Theorchero3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Metal Malicious,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=QdJvynsF,comment-id=000100000000000100000000,timestamp=2017-05-26T12:52:59.492+0000)

Yorick is not meta and has the most aberrated win rate against darius i can continue to list the non meta toplaners that have an insane win rate against darius such as aatrox

please stop manipulating board's ignorance

Hahahaha did you seriously make the mistake of using poorly-sampled winrates? Really?

Darius has the capacity to duel and murder most any melee champion.

Chønklord7 votes

It's very easy to lane against a Darius in this meta, if you know how darius works.

Sure you can stat-check him with a stronger champ, or you can play a counterpick champ, or you can kite him with a weaker champ that has more mobility, etc.

His biggest weakness is his reliance on his Q damage for sustain/out-trading; his kit revolving around smaller AoE melee fighting; his "kiteability"; and his lack of any meaningful disengage/mobility tools other than his W slow.

Melledoneus5 votes

Actually, the reason people lose to Darius is because they try to stat-check him rather than out-maneuver him. If you simply be clever and avoid big bad Darius' slow abilities, he has nothing.

Theorchero5 votes

{quoted}

Actually, the reason people lose to Darius is because they try to stat-check him rather than out-maneuver him. If you simply be clever and avoid big bad Darius' slow abilities, he has nothing.

Honestly dealing with a Darius top lane with someone nimble but fragile is as close to dark souls as you get in league. If you fuck up you lose a fuckton of health or straight up die, but if you play around attack patterns properly it's easy.

MunchCrunchLunch4 votes

{quoted}

You know you can manipulate her vitals right? Its super easy lol

No its not. Darius is practically a stat check. You either out stat him, or abuse him from outside of his bubble. Thats pretty much it

no. not at all. I've beaten darius with wukong many times. wukong doesn't outstat darius. you just bait Q dash in and kill him. fiora can completely outtrade darius as she can dodge his Q easily with her Q. he is not a stat check compared to most other stat checking champs

TheSingularity6 votes

I used to think the same thing about darius.

Then I practiced how to eat him and now darius doesn't mean shit to me. Kled yorick illaoi. Pick any of them for me. If it's illaoi the dari will rage quit before 10 minutes. Kled can out play his q and yorick simply shits on him.

Fiora however.... I've only ever beaten her with yorick, once. I was just lucky to crush their nexus before she could scale. While manipulating her vitals does work, if that's all you can do then something is wrong. You shouldn't be forced to play a minigame when you have almost no say in how it plays out. She either gets vitals and eats u or she doesn't. It isn't up to you, it's up to the fiora not messing up

Chønklord3 votes

The worst part is you can be full health at level 6, and her at half health at level 6 (by this point she'll already have at least two longswords), and then she presses R.

Now suddenly you're entirely lit up like a fucking christmas tree, and unless you have some SERIOUS mobility or hard cc and burst (or are already ahead of her in levels/items), all a decent fiora player has to do is just lung lung lung lung, and somehow hit all your vitals. Oh yea, even if you're against a wall/rock to protect one vital from being proc'd -- apparently there's ways to proc it regardless.

Thanks Riot.

TL;DR you can counter-play and out-play a Fiora pre-6 so hard, but once she hits 6 it's adios muchachos.

Asayake 5150glow2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Bôôsted Bonobo,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=QdJvynsF,comment-id=000100040000,timestamp=2017-05-26T06:36:01.971+0000)

The worst part is you can be full health at level 6, and her at half health at level 6 (by this point she'll already have at least two longswords), and then she presses R.

Fiora should never have 2 longswords by level six unless she's kill you already. Because her first item should almost always be Phage, not Tiamat. Shows how much you know about her.

Now suddenly you're entirely lit up like a fucking christmas tree, and unless you have some SERIOUS mobility or hard cc and burst (or are already ahead of her in levels/items), all a decent fiora player has to do is just lung lung lung lung, and somehow hit all your vitals. Oh yea, even if you're against a wall/rock to protect one vital from being proc'd -- apparently there's ways to proc it regardless.

Or, uh, any sort of non-targeted dash which can be used to escape? Or even, just oneshot her because she's half health and every single bruiser in the game can take out 50% of Fiora's health with their ult and full kit, unless you get outplayed and she Ripostes your damage, but if that's so, you deserve to die because you got outplayed.

Thanks Riot.

TL;DR you can counter-play and out-play a Fiora pre-6 so hard, but once she hits 6 it's adios muchachos.

You don't know the first thing about Fiora...

Hexs Fortune17 votes

Fiora needs to be squisher.

She gets to enjoy the W immunity, high mobility, percent health damage. She should be easier to take out if you can get past all that, but then she gets tons of sustain.

WinTheWarOnPants6 votes

She IS squishy, she needs lower base dmg and better scaling, so that she is not rewarded for building tanky.

48983507DEL115 votes

Remove her attack speed slow honestly. It isn't fair that I'm forced to hold onto my CC only to be punished with a crippling hindrance to my DPS.

Asayake 5150glow1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Prom Queen Annie,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=QdJvynsF,comment-id=0006,timestamp=2017-05-26T00:51:00.101+0000)

Remove her attack speed slow honestly. It isn't fair that I'm forced to hold onto my CC only to be punished with a crippling hindrance to my DPS.

Fuck you, there's something called 'dodging'. Do you complain that Lux is OP because she oneshots you whenever she snares you with Q? No, you dodge the Q. Do the same with Fiora's W.

Plus, it's not like many champions still fuck Fiora over even when hit by the AS slow as long as CC/burst isn't Riposted, and she also needs the attack speed slow to fight conventional attack speed/ad duelists.

48983507DEL12 votes

The point is she shouldn't be rewarded for misusing the spell. If its purpose was to simply slow someone's attack speed, then why isn't that the entire spell?

Also, keep in mind that to play against this champion, you have to constantly be thinking about your positioning in regards to her always changing vitals. This makes dodging a relatively wide linear skillshot fairly difficult all things considered.

Sahn Uzal9 votes

I'm Typing from my phone, gonna keep this short.

Better areas to hit would be:

  • base stats

  • w's AS slow.

Reducing base stats should make it easier to beat/punish her for when she messes up.

W's AS slow makes her way more reliable/strong than she should be in certain situations IMO

General Esdeath 9 votes

Ah boards. I said the same thing months ago and got a downvote blizzard while being told she was balanced like Orianna. Now I see both of them being called OP.

Rákãñ3 votes

FOTM champs really. if its popular and common, it most be op? If its not popular then its balanced. Amiright?

General Esdeath 2 votes

Tru

84759733DEL28 votes

or maybe increase the cooldown on her Q so she cant spam that shit in lane, and increase the mana cost so she has to use it more wisely

Melledoneus2 votes

I'm going to be fair and say the cooldown on her Q is already fairly high and has that reset on it. I was thinking maybe changing the reset to only give a CD reduction on her Q if she hits a vital or gets both her E auto attacks off?

The E autos are not as important but I didn't want to discourage aggressive play if the Fiora is against something like Poppy, or Shen that can deny her a vital if she goes for it.

Mira Arya Enthe8 votes

Excellent post Melledoneus. You pointed out a champion being too strong without it sounding whiny or accusatory. You offered what I view as very solid nerf directions to reduce their power. You didn't try to gut their entire design and call it justified. Instead of just assuming you could nerf everything and walk away you suggested compensation if it is too much. You didn't pretend to know the champion perfectly. You tone was very well mannered and thoughtful. Your title was straight foward, not clickbait like mine. Your writing was readable. And you didn't come across as a screaming banshee wanting attention.

I think most importantly you did not just list all her strengths without context, exaggerate and make up lies about the champion so you could call Riot incompetent or something.

I would upvote this post even if I disagreed, because it is a healthy promotion of discussion on the topic, which is what deserves upvotes regardless of agreement. But I do agree, so have my upvote.

Melledoneus4 votes

Excellent comment Mira Arya Enthe. You praised the post's strengths, were very well-reasoned with your observations, and promoted healthy discussions.

Also, you're an awesome person, so have an upvote. :)

Formalities aside, what is your take? Any suggestions or thoughts?

Keeby7 votes

I am a D5 Fiora main and I agree that she is probably too powerful. Fiora

Fiora actually gasses herself pretty hard if she trades aggressively, I constantly find myself running out of mana midgame after any kind of fight and being forced to back. Generally the best way to defeat a Fiora is with jungle pressure. If you put her behind straight away it is hard for her to come back.

I agree that the vitals are too easy to proc with regards to terrain blocking. When you are actually trying to block the vitals using terrain and she still somehow hits you from the wrong side it's annoying.

The AS slow on her W is superfluous but it does aid her in dealing with scrappy annoying Olaf players and the like.

Her Q could probably use toning down but I disagree with the notions from other posters that the cooldown is too short. If you miss your Q at rank 1 0% cdr you have a fat ass 16 second cooldown waiting for you, from which you are an absolute sitting duck with a giant "GANK ME LEE SIN" sign above your head.

Fiora should also have the ability lategame to endlessly chase a person if she keeps hitting her Q on them due to her melee nature, the onus is on the enemy team to either keep her from scaling or peel her and kill her if she deadman chases an ADC forever in a teamfight.

If her dash speed were slower early on then Fiora would have to be more careful about where she lunges so that she doesn't go straight into the enemy's harass or misses the enemy champion and gets hit with the big cooldown. That seems like a reasonable nerf to her earlygame trading patterns. Making her physical Q damage not a 1.0 AD ratio would probably also help, maybe knock it down to .90 and have it scale back up with rank to 1.0.

RenektonTopOnly6 votes

She has way to much in her kit. Lets be honest. True damage when vital proced, if she fucks up her parry dont owrry you still can move and attack speed is slowed to 50%%???

Lands a q and now that cd is half. Later on she can dash every 2 second??? fun game. Dumpster her in lane and she will still outscale you when u have 3 items to her 2

NíbbaBíbba4 votes

she has a 50.3% winrate, I'm not a fiora expert and I personaly think she is broken base purely off of what I see ingame but 50.3% is pretty balanced, There is counterplay to her and there is ways to beat her, idk how I'm silver, but if she was as op as you claim why is she not like 70% winrate

nGio5 votes

{quoted}

she has a 50.3% winrate, I'm not a fiora expert and I personaly think she is broken base purely off of what I see ingame but 50.3% is pretty balanced, There is counterplay to her and there is ways to beat her, idk how I'm silver, but if she was as op as you claim why is she not like 70% winrate

http://www.metasrc.com/all/5v5/current/tierlist?ranks=all 52.04%, which is higher than Darius, GP, Ren, Galio, Jayce, Irelia, Kled, Kennen, Illaoi, Fizz, and the same as Yasuo and Riven.

A single percent is big. 70% win rate for a champion picked or banned in over 30% of games isn't op, it's fantasy. Also, you can't only use win % to determine strength. As you can see, metasrc uses more data than win % to determine lane strength, and she's currently #1.

Melledoneus2 votes

Good lord I just found the website of my dreams. Thank you for this invaluable resource.

Aseeya4 votes

The most infuriating thing recently is that even if you're pressed up against a solid terrain wall, she can still strike a vital if she uses Q in the direction - even if she never actually moves to that side of your hitbox.

OHminus3 votes

How to balance Fiora:

Play blitzcrank. The French can't handle the blitz.

(For anyone who doesn't get it, it's a bad,crass WW2 reference)

Sexy Jack Rabbit2 votes

I think I agree with your second point the most.

One of the reasons why Camille was just so utterly fucked come her release was the 100% uptime on her E late-game. Sure she had a BUNCH of other shit that made her obnoxious af. But the mana cost nerf to Camille's E made it so CONSTANTLY Spamming her E to be a lot less practical thing to do.

Give Fiora's E the same Treatment and I'd be very happy.

GreenBoÍ2 votes

...

Melledoneus7 votes

This... this comment right here. Its simplicity, its elegance... it overwhelms me. It brings tears to my eyes at the sheer beauty it exudes upon my soul!

Bumby pie2 votes

fiora has always been my go-to ban when i top cause shes not healthy for me or my team

LemurMonster2 votes

My biggest qualm with her is the Parry. It offers far to much for a ability. Blocking everything in the game makes it a windwall 2.0

Wish they nerf its duration really. Otherwise her slows are really stupid...

LostFr0st2 votes

Make it so that she only gains the movespeed from her ultimate while going towards a vital of the marked enemy champion (of course allow leeway like Warwick bloodscent).

Right now she gets the movespeed in any direction within the quite large zone so even if it's to escape she marks someone and as they run after her they are actually helping her get away by allowing her to stay in the zone.

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