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@Riot: What was the reason for removing Zyra's old passive again?

Forbidden Siren··5 votes·4,753 views

Zyra's Old Passive: Rise of the Thorns Upon taking fatal damage, Zyra returns to her plant form for up to 8 seconds, becoming untargetable. She cannot use any abilities while in this state, but can cast Vengeful Thorn using any ranked-up one after 2 seconds of transforming.

I love Zyra and it's awesome that she's MUCH better now than she was before her rework. But I do miss her old passive as it brings very cool moments of either contributing some damage in a teamfight, even if it's just a little, or last hitting an enemy from the distant. Granted, the majority of the time, I've noticed people (including myself) would just shoot the projection blindly, or it didn't do much damage or simply waste it away but still, I thought it was unique.

What was the reason for removing it again? If she still have it now, would it make much of an impact?

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-R3yKmnnAU_g/UmGMUwNu0aI/AAAAAAAAIIE/unAkoMBd1xk/s1600/passive.png

13 Comments

Fondling Gems2 votes

It was because it didn't feel rewarding. Unlike Karthus and Sion her death passive just felt clunky and bad.

Kog And Balls2 votes

They gave reasons here

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/developer-corner/xVQr7ihf-mid-year-mage-updates-zyra-direction

  • It was the weakest part of her kit and they thought they could do better
  • It held back Zyra more than it helped her
  • It had to have long windup and slow missile speed for it to be fair
  • It wasn't as fun as a passive should be

Wow its almost like these apply to Kog passive I wonder when Riots gonna get on that.

Vistha Kai1 votes

And now Zyra was once again nerfed into a pure support, because her new passive is more harmful than helpful.

It's like nothing changed.

1374341 votes

They said from the beginning of the mage update that they were going to primarily balance her around support.

LXII1 votes

To give her the new passive, centralizing her "I grow little plants" theme?

Forbidden Siren1 votes

Why not have both? Her old passive was non-existent unless she's dead anyway.

LXII4 votes

Because you would have to deal with her army of plants THEN dodge a true damage missile after finally killing her. lol

Ralanr1 votes

I think it was because many people felt it was a useless passive. I don't play Zyra so idk.

Woodakoodashooda1 votes

Most people hated her passive, comparing it to Kog's passive. Some went so far as to state, they hate the fact that passives like his just open up problems by providing an incentive to go HAM because even if you died while going all out, you could still try taking out an enemy and it just looks like a very, very terrible incentive because it often increases the amount one player ends up feeding. Because a passive like kog's is basically, die to make it work. And the worst thing anyone can end up doing in league is allowing their champion to die.

Death activated passives really should be looked at and changed so as to provide better incentives to players. Zyra's rework was a step in the right direction. Now if only Kog, Karthus, and Sion could receive a similar treatment.

Vhan87651 votes

I play a shit ton of Zyra and I personally absolutely adore her new passive now.

Let's break it down though still; With Zyra's old passive, you needed to die for it to be of any use. Having a skill that requires you to die to use it will never be fun for the player. It's a whole extra skill you intentionally don't want to use because of the requirements. With how long it actually took for Zyra to get to the point where she could fire her, thorn (I guess), the enemies could have walked a few feet out of it's hitbox. Not to mention how slow the thorn went itself. Anyone with even a little reaction time could dodge it. The only other skill comparable to it is Kog'Maw's passive. When the two are put side to side, an instant, controllable walking time bomb compared to a super slim skillshot that went super slow, it's easy to see why Zyra's passive wasn't meeting expectations.

With her new passive now, not only does it play to the character (and her joke) so much better, but is allows for so much more for Zyra players to do now. The harass, the poke, being able to completely destroy the whole enemy team by using your ult right; not to mention how Zyra can solo baron at 20 no problem under the right conditions. And even if she can't solo it, a decent Zyra player even would only need a single other person there to take it. She just fits her role in the game so much better now with her new passive.

Simply put though, Zyra is just a destructive beast now. I've straight solo carried games because of her new passive. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Mig891 votes

This. I've soloo carried games as well as Zyra support without taking cs until clearing minions mid/late game. H

Linna Excel1 votes

It had a bit of a delay making it hard to hit. You'd sometimes hit an opponent (I got a double kill with it once).

IMO the new passive works with her kit much better.

BobaFlautist1 votes

But you can teleport to her corpse (briefly). Which is pretty cool.

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