Boards›Gameplay

if you ever doubt the extent of power creep in this game

Critmaster Garen··3 votes·1,353 views

this is the complete history of changes to Garen since the beginning of season 6, except for minor stat buffs as a result of the new rune system, or small bug fixes.

take a good look. try to sum up all the buffs compared to the one nerf he received over the course of not even three years.

were not talking about an overpowered or exceptionally strong champion. this is a champion here who is currently performing average in solo que. 50% average winrate and 3% pick rate. still not a great champion at high mmr. i just think its pretty crazy how much a single champion like him had to get buffed over the course of 3 seasons to just keep him somewhat relevant.

V6.24

  • Judgment New Effect: Enemy champions hit by 4 spins lose 25% of their armor for 6 seconds. Hits after the 4th refresh the duration.

V7.14

  • Perseverance Health regeneration increased to 2 / 8 (based on level)% maximum health from 2 / 4 / 10 (based on level)% maximum health. Out-of-combat timer reduced to 9 / 4 (based on level) seconds from 9 / 6 / 4 (based on level). New Effect: Health regeneration doubles to 4 / 16 (based on level)% maximum health while below 25 / 50 (based on level)% of his maximum health.
  • Judgment AD ratio increased to 36 / 37 / 38 / 39 / 40% AD from 34 / 35 / 36 / 37 / 38%.
  • Courage New Effect: Now displays how much damage is mitigated. New Effect: Damage reduction is doubled to 60% for the first 0.75 seconds. Drops to 30% thereafter. New Effect: Grants 60% Tenacity for the first 0.75 seconds.

V8.9

  • Decisive Strike Base damage increased to 30 / 65 / 100 / 135 / 170 from 30 / 55 / 80 / 105 / 130.
  • Courage Maximum bonus resistances increased to 40 from 30. Total unit kill required increased to 160 from 120.

V8.17

  • Decisive Strike Base damage reduced to 30 / 60 / 90 / 120 / 150 from 30 / 65 / 100 / 135 / 170.

V9.7

  • Courage Bonus resistances per kill increased to 0.33 from 0.25. Maximum bonus resistances increased to 50 from 30. Total unit kill required reduced to 150 from 160. Cooldown reduced to 23 / 21 / 19 / 17 / 15 seconds from 24 / 23 / 22 / 21 / 20. Active duration reduced to 2 / 2.75 / 3.5 / 4.25 / 5 seconds from 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6.

18 Comments

Critmaster Garen6 votes

also, nerf vayne.

Moody P4 votes

garen has never been a good champion and a design as weak as his shouldn't be used as a metric here

Critmaster Garen2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Moody P,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2019-04-24T20:58:51.753+0000)

garen has never been a good champion and a design as weak as his shouldn't be used as a metric here

i think exactly because he is such a straight forward champion, garen is a pretty good indicator.

its harder to gage the average strength of a champion in this game on someone like akali or irelia who also represent leaps in the power creep in this game, just because they have so much more versatile kits that have an answer to every situation theyre faced with.

when the requirement of what a champion has to be able to do to keep up increased in league of legends, garen dropped off and received buffs as a result.

MankeyMadness3 votes

All of these changes have been aimed at making his skill ceiling higher. None of them effect his core weakness, and that of the entire class he fits into.

Its not that Garens buffs were to offset powercreep, and none of them really effect his ability to win games. He just went from "annoying in lane immune to poke late" to being a more skillful champion that still does a lot of nothing.

Show me Amumu or Veigar, champions who can effect win or loss by strength alone, and tell me what picture that paints.

Powercreep is more evident in items than champions, and spin it all you like but your examples are cherrypicked and meaningless.

Critmaster Garen2 votes

{quoted}

All of these changes have been aimed at making his skill ceiling higher. None of them effect his core weakness, and that of the entire class he fits into.

Its not that Garens buffs were to offset powercreep, and none of them really effect his ability to win games. He just went from "annoying in lane immune to poke late" to being a more skillful champion that still does a lot of nothing.

Show me Amumu or Veigar, champions who can effect win or loss by strength alone, and tell me what picture that paints.

Powercreep is more evident in items than champions, and spin it all you like but your examples are cherrypicked and meaningless.

but while some of these buffs increased his skill ceiling, they were still overall clear buffs to his kit.

its not like they power shifted from the rest of his kit into these new mechanics, but just straight up added them in as additional power.

and a whole lot of the other buffs are just straight number buffs.

power creep in items is part of the overall power creep though.

Fízz v22 votes

well unfun immobile melee champs are getting powercrept to hell until they automatically win most 1v1s, not really sure why tbh with riot talking about "counterplay" all the time xd

Critmaster Garen2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Fízz v2,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2019-04-24T20:51:42.235+0000)

well unfun immobile melee champs are getting powercrept to hell until they automatically win most fights , not really sure why tbh with riot talking about "counterplay" all the time xd

garen doesnt automatically win shit even after all of those buffs. that is the whole point im trying to make. hes currently performing average and isnt even amazing at what he does.

if you gave him all of those changes at once at the start of season 6, you would have ended up with a rework skarner level champion back then.

right now, even all of those buffs just mean he stays a champion in this game.

riot has directly and indirectly power crept this game for 3 years straight.

Fízz v23 votes

Im pretty sure broken bruiser items + all the stat buffs to Garen make him win many 1v1s. barely any other champs got so many buffs so I kinda doubt the whole game is getting power crept, just champs like nasus and garen

ZephyrDrake2 votes

so you are comparing Garen… someone who has had like one instance where he was deemed "strong" and every single other time he was either terrible or average to power creep? I mean sure, if you also conveniently ignore every single buff and nerf to nerf to base stats and everything before season 6 then ofc. Now show me Karma from the beginning of season 6, or Soraka, or Ziggs… heck even Morgana. If minor base stat buffs/nerfs don't matter then an increase of 2% ratio of something also shouldn't matter... also kinda hilarious that most impactful buffs done to Garen according to your list are the defensive ones rather than the offensive ones

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

so you are comparing Garen… someone who has had like one instance where he was deemed "strong" and every single other time he was either terrible or average to power creep?

i mean yea. that is literally my point. he remained terrible or mediocre despite all those buffs.

over the course of the past 3 years, you could watch his performance steadily decline from patch to patch, because the game environment changed and average power that was neccessary for a champion to be viable increased. then he got buffed, jumped back to average tier, and then you could watch him decline all over. this was a gradual process that happened between every major buff ive listed there.

not all this power creep happened as a result of champion buffs, but changes to items, runes, game pacing (massive amounts of extra gold from turret plating) and a whole ton of other shit.

thats a pretty good indication for overall power creep. put todays garen into the game that it was back in season 6, and you dont think he would have been overpowered back then? at the end of season 5, garen had a higher winrate than he does now.

ZephyrDrake2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=00030000,timestamp=2019-04-24T21:13:15.769+0000)

i mean yea. that is literally my point. he remained terrible or mediocre despite all those buffs.

over the course of the past 3 years, you could watch his performance steadily decline from patch to patch, because the game environment changed and average power increased. then he got buffed, jumped back to average tier, and then you could watch him decline all over.

thats a pretty good indication for overall power creep. put todays garen into the game that it was back in season 6, and you dont think he would have been overpowered back then?

or that all those buffs didn't do much. Once again, you didn't say anything other than "this very specific champion even with buffs remained average throughout most of his life" Show me every single other champion in the game. Today's Garen put into season 6 would have what? more defenses and a shred? since those are literally his only meaningful buffs. He would still remain an average pick... at best he would be seen as a "strong" pick against champions that don't do much in the early game

Critmaster Garen2 votes

{quoted}

or that all those buffs didn't do much. Once again, you didn't say anything other than "this very specific champion even with buffs remained average throughout most of his life" Show me every single other champion in the game. Today's Garen put into season 6 would have what? more defenses and a shred? since those are literally his only meaningful buffs. He would still remain an average pick... at best he would be seen as a "strong" pick against champions that don't do much in the early game

youre treating those individual buffs as if they wouldnt have actually made him stronger or had any effect. if that was the case, he would still sit at 47% winrate before the most recent buff.

each of those buffs had an impact, and made him overall a stronger champion.

but then following those buffs, riot kept power creeping the game and you could watch his performance slowly decline of the course of the next few month as a result, until he was in need of buffs again.

this was a repeating process over the past 3 years.

ZephyrDrake2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=0003000000000000,timestamp=2019-04-24T21:25:04.600+0000)

youre treating those individual buffs as if they wouldnt have actually made him stronger or had any effect. if that was the case, he would still sit at 47% winrate before the most recent buff.

each of those buffs had an impact, and made him overall a stronger champion.

but then following those buffs, riot kept power creeping the game and you could watch his performance slowly decline of the course of the next few month as a result, until he was in need of buffs again.

this was a repeating process over the past 3 years.

yes they did something, but very little. Also according to YOU a 2% increase to a ratio is somehow more impactful than a base stat buff. Each buff did very little to him in the grand scheme of everything. You are literally just going "look he got buffs he stronger!" without looking at what did those buffs accomplish, how meaningful they are or anything other than "buff = stronk". He still needs to farm to get the defensive buffs, so... those buffs are gone if he cannot farm properly. Q hitting slightly harder is ok, E's 2% ratio increase does nothing considering Garen isn't building much AD to begin with. The he gets what? an increase in regen at the later lvls when he is out of combat? His "buffs" were barely "buffs" they were touch ups that increased his power in the smallest of ways.

Critmaster Garen2 votes

{quoted}

yes they did something, but very little. Also according to YOU a 2% increase to a ratio is somehow more impactful than a base stat buff. Each buff did very little to him in the grand scheme of everything. You are literally just going "look he got buffs he stronger!" without looking at what did those buffs accomplish, how meaningful they are or anything other than "buff = stronk". He still needs to farm to get the defensive buffs, so... those buffs are gone if he cannot farm properly. Q hitting slightly harder is ok, E's 2% ratio increase does nothing considering Garen isn't building much AD to begin with. The he gets what? an increase in regen at the later lvls when he is out of combat? His "buffs" were barely "buffs" they were touch ups that increased his power in the smallest of ways.

garens spin scales with total ad and not with bonus ad. so the 2% increase youre talking about is 5 damage per spin at 250 ad, and 50 damage over 10 spins. 67 damage to isolated opponents. as a damage buff to a single ability, this isnt anything crazy, but not nothing either.

i dont know why youre so hung up on this particular buff though, since it was just a minor buff next to his w in the same patch.

the base stat buffs i left out were a result of the change to the new rune system.

every single champion in the game received such a buff as partial compensation for the typical rune pages they used to run.

i didnt think it would make sense to include them since they werent technically a buff. if you started with 9 armor runes before, then removing those runes and adding 9 armor to every champion who ran that page is not a relative change to the game.

ZephyrDrake1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=000300000000000000000000,timestamp=2019-04-24T22:24:39.273+0000)

garens spin scales with total ad and not with bonus ad. so the 2% increase youre talking about is 5 damage per spin at 250 ad, and 50 damage over 10 spins.

the base stat buffs i left out were a result of the change to the new rune system.

every single champion in the game received such a buff as partial compensation for the typical rune pages they used to run.

i didnt think it would make sense to include them since they werent technically a buff. if you started with 9 armor runes before, then removing those runes and adding 9 armor to your champion is not a relative change to the game.

total!? oh noes! it's still a 2% increase! tell me what is the difference between 38% of 250 and 40% of 250. 5! so you are telling me that I have to wait until he gets 250 AD in the game to get 5 more damage per spin tick? wow that is so much power right there! 2% is MEANINGLESS! If this is what "power creep" looks like then you have done nothing but tell us "power creep doesn't exist"

Critmaster Garen2 votes

{quoted}

total!? oh noes! it's still a 2% increase! tell me what is the difference between 38% of 250 and 40% of 250. 5! so you are telling me that I have to wait until he gets 250 AD in the game to get 5 more damage per spin tick? wow that is so much power right there! 2% is MEANINGLESS! If this is what "power creep" looks like then you have done nothing but tell us "power creep doesn't exist"

yea, its small but its not unlike any other regular 10 damage buff that riot does to abilities.

and it wasnt the only buff in that patch. i dont know why youre so fixated on this.

i would understand if that was the only change there, but the same patch also added the parry mechanic to his w, which was huge for him. it was one of the best additions to his kit that he ever received.

Rock MD1 votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3b3hDvRjJA

tl;dr for people who are too lazy to watch it, it's not powercreep to turn a 3 mana 5/1 in Hearthstone into a 3 mana 5/2 because that 3 mana 5/1 was so dogshit that even a buffed version of itself didn't see play. The game was overall not powercreeped from that card.

Now just replace "dogshit 3 mana 5/1" with "dogshit bruiser with no depth, incredibly low skillfloor, and completely champion-invalidating counterplay."

Critmaster Garen1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Rock MD,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TEQMY5vY,comment-id=0005,timestamp=2019-04-24T22:58:47.075+0000)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3b3hDvRjJA

tl;dr for people who are too lazy to watch it, it's not powercreep to turn a 3 mana 5/1 in Hearthstone into a 3 mana 5/2 because that 3 mana 5/1 was so dogshit that even a buffed version of itself didn't see play. The game was overall not powercreeped from that card.

Now just replace "dogshit 3 mana 5/1" with "dogshit bruiser with no depth, incredibly low skillfloor, and completely champion-invalidating counterplay."

oook, except that garens winrate and play rate made a leap to 50% in every case he got buffed.

but the game overall changed with the following couple of patches in every single instance in a way that he just slowly kept dropping off from patch to patch.

be it as a result of other champions getting buffed directly, items introduced that buffed other champions, or mechanics like conqueror being added to the game.

were not talking about a champion who got buffed and was still garbage after the buffs, but was garbage, went to average to decent in solo que after a buff, and then slowly dropped back to garbage over the next few month until he got buffed back to 50% again.

this is something that happened over and over and over.

More from Gameplay

3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay764 comments
7,167
votes
3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay156 comments
3,510
votes
UPVOTE FOR URF
Gameplay606 comments
2,440
votes
Yes plz.
Gameplay456 comments
1,721
votes
3 Refunds per season, up vote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay114 comments
1,716
votes
When is ANYONE at riot going to address the awful new player experience?
Gameplay634 comments
1,383
votes

More by Critmaster Garen

5 years and we still have to go to third party sites to get all the information about a champion
Gameplay95 comments
371
votes
to ADC mains who complain that bot lane ziggs pokes you down from far out of your range
Gameplay228 comments
352
votes
"Melee Phase Rush users are almost universally outperforming their ranged compatriots"
Gameplay167 comments
242
votes
we need an "enemy missing" - ping
Gameplay78 comments
218
votes
WHY is vayne even buffed?
Gameplay153 comments
168
votes
cut off one head...
Gameplay60 comments
168
votes