Why Riot? You've done NOTHING major to nautilus in years, why nerf him now?

Please Note: I am aware that the nerfs on nautilus are merely PBE changes, however this is to address the issue that they chose to nerf, somone who hasn't been buffed in eons over buffing someone/something else.

And obviously, I'm a naut jg main, but I'll try to be as unbiased as possible.

Most people are likely aware of Nautilus' recent spike in popularity as a top lane pick in the pro scene, and the success the champion is bringing with his time in the spotlight. However instead of choosing to buff certain items/champions to better deal with him, riot has decided to long shot Naut with a nerf gun.

BUT WHY? Why nerf a champion, who has only received minor tweaks and NO! buffs whatsoever in 2 years. Nautilus' current strength is a product of other champions being nerfed/banned (looking at you fiora and morgana). As he's remained, pretty much the same champion since I started playing him serially like 2.5-->3 years ago. So what exactly, is so strong about Naut top? NOTHING! Recent item changes haven't made him a more viable top laner, the sunfire cape buff was only to minions/monsters so that didn't increase his strength, whatsoever and it certainly wasn't the addition of expose weakness.

Nautilus isn't strong, everyone else is simply weak as rat piss.

To emphasize, on the absence of any buffs naut has received over the last few years, here are the 3 most recent patches which contained naut changes;

5.13 = A flat out nerf to his E, if I recall correctly it was to address his strength as a support. Which only came to be because of constant morgana nerfs over several patches, as nautilus lacked the damage to pop her black shield. DAMAGE ON FIRST WAVE: 60/100/140/180/220 ⇒ 60/95/130/165/200 MAX DAMAGE: 90/150/210/270/330 ⇒ 90/142.5/195/247.5/300

5.5 = Merely a stat reassignment in order to shift some of the strength in his W to his E. Aimed at making him a less binary champion in terms of damage output. W Titans Wrath
DAMAGE: 40/55/70/85/100 magic damage ⇒ 30/40/50/60/70 damage RATIO: 7/9.5/12/14.5/17% max health ⇒ 9/11/13/15/17% max health E Rip Tide
COOLDOWN: 10 seconds at all ranks ⇒ 7/6.5/6/5.5/5 seconds COST: 60/70/80/90/100 mana ⇒ 40/50/60/70/80 mana RATIO: 0.5 ability power ⇒ 0.3 ability power SLOW DURATION: 2 seconds ⇒ 1.5 seconds

5.1 = Yet another stat reassignment however I personally viewed this as a decent nerf to his early game. W BASE SHIELD STRENGTH: 100/150/200/250/300 ⇒ 65/70/75/80/85 SHIELD SCALING: 15% bonus health ⇒ 7/9.5/12/14.5/17% maximum health

Now then, patch 5.13 was released on the 8th of july last year. Naut hasn't received any changes since then. And the only Drastic change was way back in 2014 patch 4.17 where his hook was changed so that it could interact with champion made terrain while his last buffs were way back in patch 4.4, march 18th 2014.

So why riot, would you even consider nerfing a champion who has received nothing but tweaks or nerfs for nearly 2 years? Why not buff champions with %max HP of enemy champion based spells? or maybe a slight BOTRK buff?

As I said in another thread:

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/qIv9fXBH-so-after-rammus-and-malphite-nautilus-has-become-one-of-the-best-top-laners

"In the Meta's current state, there is absolutely no reason to touch naut unless they are desperately trying to maintain this 'ADC Meta'.

Rammus is in a similar boat, he's a niche champ you pick against heavy AD comps, while naut is picked when your team lacks beef/CC/Peel. And look at this meta we have here? Potentially 4 ADC/1 support compositions are perfectly viable along with most hard-to-peel assassins useful in most compositions. As a champion he INITIALLY only ever saw pro play as support, after morg was nerfed out of the meta (as his spells lacked the dmg to pop her black shield and he is CC reliant) and he has received rather small tweaks over the last few years to help him adjust to the new, more powerful jungle monsters, which has left him in a pretty balanced jungle state. Only reason I can see him dominating top lane is fiora being banned nearly every-game (I know I do it) and champs with tank shred spells like vayne, gnar, mundo, trundle, varus and zac, not really fitting into the current champion pool as well as the %hp dmg spells feeling rather lacklustre.

If they have to touch anything in relation to naut TOP I'd rather see them maybe give a small buff to botrk or small buffs to %hp dmg spells on some of the top laners like the ones above. As this would make it allot harder for him to thrive in the top lane, as he is a HP based tank(his core spell, W scales with HP) while not affecting his jungle clear/ganks at all.

Hopefully they can find a healthy solution and get him out of the spotlight before Challenger wannabes start insta-locking my bae. "

Nautilus' current top strength is not the product of any buffs or item changes. It is the product of tank shredding champions, bruisers and lane bullies being nerfed to the point at which naut, a relatively weak solo lane champion, can safely lane and duel lane bullies like poppy. There is only one champion, in this entire game, that has managed to shred my HP down to zero in no time at all recently, and that's anivia, a DOT mage and potentially the next Brand. I would count fiora, but she's become less common recently and is banned nearly every ranked game I play. [zombie-brand-mindblown]

The proposed E nerf on the PBE will not only cut naut down to size in every lane, making it much harder for those who wish to 'break the meta' to do so, it will also have a rather hefty cost on the titans' already slow, early jungle clear times. So again I ask, why not buff some of the %hp based champions above? I mean, they clearly need the buffs as they aren't used in pro play, isn't that how we balance this game? sarcasm over :P

But there wouldn't be much point to this without some form of constructive solution suggestions, so it's party time;

Buff Zac: As another utility tank, a buff to Zac's W %hp damage would not only allow him to duel and out-class naut and other top lane tanks (yeah, that's right fiora) , but it wouldn't have nearly as big an impact on squishy champs simply strengthening him as a lane bully/utility tank.

Buff BOTRK: Even in it's prime, very few champs out of the entire champion pool actually used this item effectively. Some include kog, vayne, yi, trundle, volibear, gnar, warwick, udyr, yasuo and zed. Would you look at that? 5 champs with spells that allowed/allow ( in yi's case) them to shred tanks. Both vayne and gnar received nerfs to their %hp based damage as well as indirect nerfs from the BOTRK nerf. With no compensation buffs in response. Trundle, udyr and volibear, the Icy ones in particular made a better use of tri force than BOTRK and haven't received much attention while udyr, also a more efficient tri force than BOTRK user, saw pro play when combined with devourer, and then came the nerfs.

Buff vayne; That's right, I went there, buff the true damage, tank shredding turd of a marksman. I will admit I was happy to see her destroyed amidst the tank meta, however riot did to her, what they did to sejuani, an unforgivable offence. Nerfed her core item, and the champion herself without any compensation post nerf to keep her viable (Yes I am aware she is viable atm with a crit based/atk speed build) . If there's one champ, anyone can count on, to ruin a nautilus top, jg, support, what ever positions' day. It's vayne.

Buff rumble: We've seen the intended rumble nerfs to his ult, which make absolutely no logical sense. However I feel this DOT based bruiser mage is 100% capable of putting a naut through hell with constant lane shoving to match nautilus' splash dmg, high early game base damages to shred his shield and then his build naturally containing the AP tank shred item. A minor buff to flame spitter or to his shield would allow him to trade aggressively, but it would have to be small/cautious as the last thing I want is rumble tipped into broken mode.

I would say buff liandries, however with the current state of anivia any stat buff would tip her well over the broken wall. Perhaps a cost reduction would be more appropriate?

And lastly varus, I honestly have no bloody clue as to what could be changed on varus without damaging his stable status as a marksman.

So what are your thoughts? Got some more interesting ideas that I've missed? are my ideas retarded? I don't mind KrakenKnight out [slayer-pantheon-thumbs]