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Dreams of what Ekko could have been

Teh Cuddlez··31 votes·2,524 views

Believe it or not this isn't a post about him being overpowered or underpowered. The reason I don't like ekko is that there's just too much there. Riot has lately been pushing more and more mechanics and utility into each champ they release and I'm honestly starting to get a little tired of it. Think about it, this guy has a slow, a stun/shield/slow, a blink (possible double blink), an untargetable, a passive speed boost and slow, good waveclear, excellent engage and disengage/antichase topped with high burst potential. Whether or not his stats have been tweaked to balance perfection doesn't even matter, the champion is just not fun to play against at all and kind of feels like cheating when I do play him. Why not make his e a dash? I mean, what is the NECESSITY that it HAD to be a blink? All in all I think this is poor champ design and I wish that riot would focus more on what makes a champion unique rather than an entire swiss army kit in one champ. His ult makes him unique and awesome, what if his e did a % of their missing health as additional damage? What if instead of the three hit major damage/slow/ms boost, every three hits on something reduced cooldown on abilities, more so with champs (you know the whole time thing) and w instead slowed enemies significantly and him entering granted a speed boost to allies inside the dome (that one could use a little brainstorming to make better). His role would then be an assasin that excelled in teamfights because the more abilities he got off on more champs the more moves he could keep sending out, how cool would that be?? Instead of the cc heavy assasin bruiser waveclear pest he is now.

38 Comments

ChaosThief17 votes

Personally I'm disappointed they didn't take the coding challenge of giving him the global game rewind for an ult.

In all seriousness, the W passive has no place in there besides to be there, the shield WITH a stun is maybe a bit much, and his ult scales way too well for something that heals him as well, even if it tells you where it'll be.

EDIT: Riot actually did try that huh? I guess it sucks that it doesn't work out so well. Also, the rewind part was supposed to help ekko fix mistakes. Remember in the cinematic? He would go back in time any time he screwed up and got pinned in a bad position, so he could try again. That was how he used it in the cinematic, so why not the same thing in the game?

Robert Smith5 votes

Wasn't a challenge. What I remember was Riot said a Global Game Rewind would work to much in favor of the team with Ekko, regardless of how far back it could go.

Leetri1 votes

It'd be way too disorienting for everyone involved and everyone would essentially have to run up to 2 extra instances of the game in order to rewind. Imagine the server load during All-For-One and they pick Ekko. Another issue is that Ekko could negate any bad situation that happens. Missed the counter-smite? Just rewind and time it better. Your team got caught and half of them died? Just rewind and back off. Your Blitz missed the game-winning pull? Rewind. Then there's the trolling aspect as well. One on your team got a penta? Rewind. You get the point.

Best Darius KR1 votes

At an early state, Ekko's ult would place a "time anchor", which would rewind the next 8 seconds (if Ekko chose to i think). The problem with that was, once the thing was placed down, everyone would just UNLOAD EVERYTHING their kit had, in hopes of getting a kill.

It just didn't generate fun interactions.

AutoreactiveCD41 votes

The shield lasts 2 seconds and the stun is 2.25. That's an odd one to me. But ya hes got ALOT in his kit and its kind of annoying. I'd love to see more kits like bard's. It's fairly simple but overall really interesting.

ChaosThief2 votes

They gave ekko a few things he didn't truly need. The shield I assume is for anyone not standing inside the stun zone.

Honestly the stun should scale up and not be straight up 2.25 seconds.

xl Kirito lx13 votes

A conditional slow, a conditional stun/ shield / slow, a dash, a conditional blink, untargetability frames, a conditional speed buff / slow, average waveclear, average engage, conditional disengage, with average - subpar burst potential. I'll admit, still kind of good. But, let me tell you about this one champion.

  • % damage reduction
  • Point and click nuke
  • Scaling shield that ALSO slows on-hit
  • % armor reduction + dot damage
  • Suppression + stat boost

Urgot sounds pretty good, right? Until you realize, he's slow, immobile, and has a poor range. He has to land his e to abuse his q, the shield can be broken, and the ult can move him into a bad position also. Listing the strengths of a champion is easy. It also makes the champion sound incredibly overpowered. Look at some of the weakness.

In terms of kit, I can see where you're coming from. When Azir was just teased, I expected him to control a ton of minions, a dps, a ranged, and a tank, then his entire play style would revolve around rotating those minions and relying on micro'ing to win fights. I was disappointed when I saw Azir, I thought Riot could've done a lot better creating him, today... I still dislike their design / choices, but I can see that they were valid, and it worked out well.

TLDR: Everyone looks OP when you look at strengths alone, champion design is going to change depending on who looks at the champion.

Retillin1 votes

But... Urgot is pretty good. Otherwise he wouldn't get picked so often in pro games.

NemeBro8 votes

{quoted}

A conditional slow, a conditional stun/ shield / slow, a dash, a conditional blink, untargetability frames, a conditional speed buff / slow, average waveclear, average engage, conditional disengage, with average - subpar burst potential. I'll admit, still kind of good. But, let me tell you about this one champion.

  • % damage reduction
  • Point and click nuke
  • Scaling shield that ALSO slows on-hit
  • % armor reduction + dot damage
  • Suppression + stat boost

Urgot sounds pretty good, right? Until you realize, he's slow, immobile, and has a poor range. He has to land his e to abuse his q, the shield can be broken, and the ult can move him into a bad position also. Listing the strengths of a champion is easy. It also makes the champion sound incredibly overpowered. Look at some of the weakness.

In terms of kit, I can see where you're coming from. When Azir was just teased, I expected him to control a ton of minions, a dps, a ranged, and a tank, then his entire play style would revolve around rotating those minions and relying on micro'ing to win fights. I was disappointed when I saw Azir, I thought Riot could've done a lot better creating him, today... I still dislike their design / choices, but I can see that they were valid, and it worked out well.

TLDR: Everyone looks OP when you look at strengths alone, champion design is going to change depending on who looks at the champion.

He's explicitly not saying he's OP. He's saying he thinks him being so overloaded makes him boring.

Rew7113 votes

Yeah, but Urgot's shield isn't as much as Ekko's. Urgot's passive doesn't deal 80% AP damage after 3 hits. Urgot's slow. Has slow AS. His ultimate costs him 100 mana, and it only gives him some armor and magic resist for 2 seconds. Ekko deals tremendous damage, and heals himself (regardless) + heals some for damage to others. Not saying he's OP, I'm saying he's broken right now. I like playing some broken champs, but he's too easy.

Nilok1 votes

I think you're posting in the wrong Ekko thread or you missed the point.

Glamazon1 votes

{quoted}

A conditional slow, a conditional stun/ shield / slow, a dash, a conditional blink, untargetability frames, a conditional speed buff / slow, average waveclear, average engage, conditional disengage, with average - subpar burst potential. I'll admit, still kind of good. But, let me tell you about this one champion.

  • % damage reduction
  • Point and click nuke
  • Scaling shield that ALSO slows on-hit
  • % armor reduction + dot damage
  • Suppression + stat boost

Urgot sounds pretty good, right? Until you realize, he's slow, immobile, and has a poor range. He has to land his e to abuse his q, the shield can be broken, and the ult can move him into a bad position also. Listing the strengths of a champion is easy. It also makes the champion sound incredibly overpowered. Look at some of the weakness.

In terms of kit, I can see where you're coming from. When Azir was just teased, I expected him to control a ton of minions, a dps, a ranged, and a tank, then his entire play style would revolve around rotating those minions and relying on micro'ing to win fights. I was disappointed when I saw Azir, I thought Riot could've done a lot better creating him, today... I still dislike their design / choices, but I can see that they were valid, and it worked out well.

TLDR: Everyone looks OP when you look at strengths alone, champion design is going to change depending on who looks at the champion.

He's saying he's overly complex. He's arguing about the design not the strength/op.

air tiger3 votes

Oh computer Jesus, another one of THESE posts. Let me start by saying you failed to add "Conditional" to each Urgot strength that it applies to - namely, the point and click nuke.

Even then... your list of Urgot's strengths pales in comparison to the list of Ekko strengths (which is reasonable, since Ekko's strengths go on and on), so I think in a way your argument is self-defeating.

Since ppl want to continue to play this game, let's play. Can anyone make any other champ sound as strong as ekko?

xl Kirito lx1 votes

You're right. Every one of those things are conditional, based upon some factor. Range, aim, ect. I was using that example in reference to how he did the same way. I'll admit, poor ordering on my part, I cede that.

Opinion of a champions strengths, in comparison to another is relative. Say we compare... Shaco and Evelynn. I personally think Shaco outclasses Evelynn 100%. In turn, an evelynn main will argue that.

Looking at strengths alone, a lot of champions are on par with, or outclass Ekko outright. Ahri has three dashes, Warwick has AOE champion detection, Nunu has huge AP scalings, and amazing debuffs tied into that. Any champion in particular? If you decide to add in champion weaknesses, then you'll have a slightly more valid point.

TahmKench Expert1 votes

"An Evelynn main"

air tiger1 votes

{quoted}

Looking at strengths alone, a lot of champions are on par with, or outclass Ekko outright. Ahri has three dashes, Warwick has AOE champion detection, Nunu has huge AP scalings, and amazing debuffs tied into that. Any champion in particular? If you decide to add in champion weaknesses, then you'll have a slightly more valid point.

Let's just play the game. People are using this 'defense' without giving consideration to the thought that Ekko really is overtuned. So, let's do Ahri. Please make Ahri sound stronger than Ekko.

xl Kirito lx1 votes

Please understand, I'll agree he's overtuned currently. The absolute gutting that people want, I can't agree with. There are some nerfs worth looking at.

Ahri thou, making my job a bit easier. I was worried you were going to go with someone hard like Quinn. Alright, first, ranged vs melee, tends to be favorable towards ranged. Passives, sustain against damage / cc. Ahri sustains through usage of spells, assuming she can hit something with her spells. Ekko has to land three spell stacks, from melee range. Even with his e-q-aa, many champions can just dash out, and avoid the third proc.

Next, their Q. Ahri's provides a large MS bonus, with half her q damage being true damage. Ekko, same type of skill except, his is significantly slower. This makes it harder to land the secondary part of his Q, without proccing his passive first, or the target being cc'd. The bonus MS from Ahri's Q makes it easier to land hers.

W's. Targeted single target damage against a conditional stun / shield / slow (the slow is bs, why do people keep bringing that up?), with passive assassination damage. If Ekko lands his W, then he wins this comparison straight up.

E's. Skillshot cc against a dash / conditional blink. Ekko's E allows him to set up his combo, Ahri allows her to combo / killing. Not much to argue here, seperately both abilities are average, but that allow both champions kit to work well.

Ults. Ahri gets three dashes, hitting three targets each dash. Ekko jumps back four seconds, nuking anyone nearby and healing. Both have offensive and defensive uses, Ahri's use allows her to kite better though, and continue trades, Ekko tends to be all or nothing with his ult.

Ekko has 300% in offensive scalings, assuming that he uses his ult for damage, and that his ult can land on his target. Ahri's at 274% in offensive scalings, with significantly more AOE and mobility. Utility goes to Ekko, arguably. Ahri's free MS on Q, the psuedo taunt from E, and the dashing from her Ult. Consistentcy of kits also comes up. Ahri has two skillshots, both having a respectable travel speed, combined with her mobility makes them relatively easy to land. Ekko has two skillshots also, a conditional passive, conditional slow, conditional stun, and a conditional ult.

Next?

air tiger1 votes

{quoted}

Ahri thou, making my job a bit easier. I was worried you were going to go with someone hard like Quinn. Alright, first, ranged vs melee, tends to be favorable towards ranged. Passives, sustain against damage / cc. Ahri sustains through usage of spells, assuming she can hit something with her spells. Ekko has to land three spell stacks, from melee range. Even with his e-q-aa, many champions can just dash out, and avoid the third proc.

Next, their Q. Ahri's provides a large MS bonus, with half her q damage being true damage. Ekko, same type of skill except, his is significantly slower. This makes it harder to land the secondary part of his Q, without proccing his passive first, or the target being cc'd. The bonus MS from Ahri's Q makes it easier to land hers.

W's. Targeted single target damage against a conditional stun / shield / slow (the slow is bs, why do people keep bringing that up?), with passive assassination damage. If Ekko lands his W, then he wins this comparison straight up.

E's. Skillshot cc against a dash / conditional blink. Ekko's E allows him to set up his combo, Ahri allows her to combo / killing. Not much to argue here, seperately both abilities are average, but that allow both champions kit to work well.

Ults. Ahri gets three dashes, hitting three targets each dash. Ekko jumps back four seconds, nuking anyone nearby and healing. Both have offensive and defensive uses, Ahri's use allows her to kite better though, and continue trades, Ekko tends to be all or nothing with his ult.

Ekko has 300% in offensive scalings, assuming that he uses his ult for damage, and that his ult can land on his target. Ahri's at 274% in offensive scalings, with significantly more AOE and mobility. Utility goes to Ekko, arguably. Ahri's free MS on Q, the psuedo taunt from E, and the dashing from her Ult. Consistentcy of kits also comes up. Ahri has two skillshots, both having a respectable travel speed, combined with her mobility makes them relatively easy to land. Ekko has two skillshots also, a conditional passive, conditional slow, conditional stun, and a conditional ult.

Next?

It feels as though you are comparing Ahri's strengths to Ekko's comparative weaknesses. Sorry for any miscommunication on my end - what I'm looking for is a list of strengths for ekko, and a list of strengths for ahri, and for ahri to come out looking stronger (since the name of the game is listing a chars strengths make them sound op).

Ekko

Passive Slow Passive MS Passive DMG at 3 stacks (q procs stacks, so not all hits need to be in melee range.. as you claimed) "medium range" 2 sided skillshot poke Slow on hit from Q AOE slow that only appears to enemy .5s before activation That becomes a potential AOE 2.5s stun at lv1 Insanely scalable shield Passive %HP dmg Dash Blink with damage tied to it Ult AOE nuke Ult Major heal Ult temporary invulnerability Ult reposition Potential to use ult to get back to lane immediately after backing Ult costs nothing to cast

Ahri

Passive heal on a connecting spell after 9 stacks "medium range" two sided skillshot poke Notable MS boost for duration of Q "Heat seeking" mini burst with W Charm/Taunt (2s max rank?) Ult 3x dash Ult up to 3x "heat seeking" damage per use

If there are any strengths that I've missed, please let me know so I can add them. As of now, I don't think Ahri looks near as good as Ekko. I'd also say that Ahri doesn't seem OP just by listing her strengths.

Rew7117 votes

I wish one of these things to happen to Ekko:

  • Ekko's passive now only allows bonus speed if it hits all stacks. Instead of damage, he revives 2/4/6% of his mana if on a minion or monster, 10/20/30% on a champion (levels up at level 1/7/13).
  • Ekko's Q now deals damage when it gets to the end of the area it can go to dealing 80/125/170/215/260 (+80% AP) damage. Slow still active. Stacks still active.
  • Ekko's W passive is removed.
  • Ekko's E is now either just a blink or a longer dash that also gives the bonus damage.
  • Ekko's R deals 100% AP.

I'd be happy with just 1.

I'm sick and tired of accidentally getting hit twice with the Q and losing almost all my health. I'm sick of the W passive that allows easy kill. I'm sick of the E that allows so much close up range or a good getaway. And though the R will cost 100 mana soon, its heal and easy escape make me mad, but the 100 mana will make me happier.

I Main Swain1 votes

the thing is, if they took away his passive damage bonus he would deal absolutely garbage damage with anything but his ult.

Rew7111 votes

(•_•)

Depends on what passive.

If we just take the [P] passive away, he still has Q damage, E damage, and his R damage, and still has a W passive that deals % health damage bellow 30% health.

If we take away the [W] passive, he still has Q, E, and R, with his passive.

I don't see any garbage in this.

I Main Swain1 votes

his w passive is nearly useless, whereas his actual passive is a huge portion of his damage. his q is never going to be hit more than once against a good player that isn't cc'd, and his e only has a 20% scaling. his ult is an extremely unreliable source of damage considering how ridiculously difficult it is to use most of the time against people who know what they're doing. I honestly think they should just remove the w passive, it's kinda arbitrary and doesn't really fit. there's no need for it.

Rew7111 votes

And yet, he's allowed to deal a lot of damage. True, the ultimate is unreliable. His Q is not easy to avoid if hit. Especially if you don't have a way to get out. Like Anivia Brand Ryze Syndra Veigar Viktor Xerath and Ziggs. And just when mages where slowly coming back.

I Main Swain1 votes

actually, his q is ridiculously easy to avoid even if it does hit. you just have to walk to the side and you're fine. as for your examples, every single one of those guys (not veigar, sorry guygar) can destroy ekko pretty easily

Llanite3 votes

He's a high skill-cap generalist. And it's good for the game, why?

+Niche picks create hard-counter which is boring and plain unfair that you lose because you have to pick first. +Low skill-capped champs like Annie/Nasus/Tryn makes game looks dumb and uninteresting. There is no play to make, whoever got more ganks win. +Kalista Ekko RekSai are hated, because they're strong when play right, but not everyone can play them due to high skill cap, and that's exactly what the game needs.

fractalfantasies3 votes

{quoted}

He's a high skill-cap generalist. And it's good for the game, why?

+Niche picks create hard-counter which is boring and plain unfair that you lose because you have to pick first. +Low skill-capped champs like Annie/Nasus/Tryn makes game looks dumb and uninteresting. There is no play to make, whoever got more ganks win. +Kalista Ekko RekSai are hated, because they're strong when play right, but not everyone can play them due to high skill cap, and that's exactly what the game needs.

This is especially true for Kalista(as well as Zed and LB in fact) which is why this board hates them. None of these champs are really broken, OP or toxic, but deep down a lot of people here know that no matter how many guides they read, they will never be able to play them like Doublelift or faker, i.e. people who have really good mechanical skill. They think the game should be like chess where you look at the 'moves' (the picks, the items) your opponent makes and you memorise how to counter them.

This is not so.

(Good post +1)

A Miss Fortune1 votes

If I gave a champion an ability where he teleported anywhere he wanted on a 1 second cooldown, and all of his other abilities were 1k damage AoE nukes, he would still be fun. But not unique.

I wouldn't call Ekko unique or a good champion design, you can overload anything and it will still be fun and interesting to play.

Ventira1 votes

It's less an issue about him being fun to play. It's a matter of him not being fun to play against AT ALL

A Miss Fortune1 votes

That's not what I mean, take Thresh for example. People consider him to be a great, unique champion and a great support. In reality he's overloaded, you can give a champion everything they will ever need and it will most likely be considered fun but obviously no one else at all will enjoy fighting against them. It's pretty much the same way with Ekko.

Ventira1 votes

Well yes, Thresh is overloaded compared to other supports, but not so much that he is unpleasant to play against. I actually enjoy playing against Thresh because he has noticeable ways to deal with him.

Also I think you misunderstood my post as well. It is entirely possible to have an overloaded champion and has weaknesses that can be exploited (like Thresh). But when you have a champ who can pretty much do it all and has no real glaring weaknesses (ala Ekko) it is the worst thing on the planet to be against. Is what I meant.

Dengeden1 votes

Giving Ekko a lot to work with means that none of his abilities have to be over-bearing for him too be any good.

Personally I think Ekko's design is great because of how easily you can avoid most of his damage. He takes a lot of set up to be even remotely relevant. Heck, when I first saw him, I was really worried that he wouldn't do any damage for that very reason. Also, his wave clear is horrible compared to other mages, it takes forever.

Giving him additional CDR would both buff his wave clear and make him dish out more %health damage with his E (if you moved it there). Regardless, his E is the only reliable spell he has and you want him to dish out more of it? Really?

Aych Pii1 votes

The blink is thematic and emphasizes his reliance on magic and technology over physical prowess.

As for your proposed passive, it sounds nice in theory... but would likely result in his kit feeling more overloaded than it already does, and reset based assassins are already among the most hated champions in the game.

As is he's a jack of all trades, master of none who can apply lots of CC but has trouble applying hard CC, can deal decent burst damage that doesn't really compare to that of dedicated assassins like leblanc, can remain useful in extended fights but not so much that he threatens the role of Karthus, and is pretty hard to kill if he gets free use of his abilities but can easily be screwed by circumstance if he uses those abilities offensively or gets snared. It's a style of play we don't really see from many other champions, and I find it fun to play against.

Hard Penetrator1 votes

I don't like few things about Ekko right now.

He is too fast. He has speedup, can naturally build ludens and he can run ms quints because of his really good base dmg and ratios. -5 ms should be fine. (fizz lvl)

His scalling is too high.

His ult has way too short of cd for what it does. Potentially flash, heal and AOE nuke on 70cd without any cd reduction? With 40% cd red its 42s. NO! Closest ultimate in the game is Hecarim Onslaught of Shadows on 100s with 0cd red and 60s with max.

Too little tradeoffs and weak points for his enemies to capitalise. And I haven't even met good Ekko players yet. Imagine him in 2 months.

DoFr1 votes

you didn't even mention his nemesis hitler item 3070 (i would honestly play him, looks hella fun)

I Main Swain1 votes

im fine with there being complex champs, but I would be all for the next one being nice and simple.

Ravvyn1 votes

We've actually started using "ekko" in place of "OP" around my house, lol. I think Ekko would have been a much more enjoyable champ to play and play against had they kept things a bit more simple and gone with the basic multi-tool model instead of the 50+ tool swiss army knife model. His mechanics just feel backwards when you play him which makes it not a lot of fun to play, even when you're winning.

I would have made him more of a support role champ personally, with perhaps an ally teleport, dash, armor/magic pen ability, and an ult much like he has now except without the healing aspect. When I hear "the boy who fractured time" I think more "Time Lord" style champ and less... whatever amalgamation of things Ekko is now.

KidSpectre1 votes

That wall of text though...

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